above, takes my part when my cousins joke upon intimacies with great folks; I think he is a much genteeler and better bred man than I took him for at first. [No. 72. SATURday, January 15, 1780.] Sunt lacrymæ rerum, et mentem mortalia tangunt.—Virgil THE consideration of death has been always made use of, by the moralist and the divine, as a powerful incentive to virtue and to piety. From the uncertainty of life, they have endeavored to sink the estimation of its pleasures, and if they could not strip the seductions of vice of their present enjoyment, at least to load them with the fear of their end. Voluptuaries, on the other hand, have, from a similar reflection endeavored to enhance the value, and persuade to the enjoyment of temporal delights. They have advised us to pluck the roses which would otherwise soon wither of themselves, to seize the moments which we could not long command, and, since time was unavoidably fleeting, to crown its flight with joy. Of neither of these persuasives, whether of the moral or the licentious, the severe or the gay, have the effects been great. Life must necessarily consist of active scenes, which exclude from its general tenor the leisure of meditation, and the influence of thought. The schemes of the busy will not be checked by the uncertainty of their event, nor the amusements of the dissipated be either controlled or endeared by the shortness of their duration. Even the cell of the anchorite, and the cloister of the monk, have their business and their pleasures; for study may become business and abstraction pleasure, when they engage the mind and occupy the time. A man may even enjoy the present, and forget the future, at the very moment in which he is writing of the insignificancy of the former, and the importance of the latter. It were easy to show the wisdom and benignity of Providence -Providence, ever wise and benign, in this particular of our constitution; but it would be trite to repeat arguments too obvious not to have been often observed, and too just not to have been always allowed. But, though neither the situation of the world, nor the formation of our minds, allow the thoughts of futurity or death a constant or prevailing effect upon our lives, they may surely sometimes, not unseasonably, press upon our imagination, even exclusive of their moral or religious use, there is a sympathetic enjoyment which often makes it not only better, but more delightful to go to the house of mourning, than to the house of feasting. Perhaps I felt it so, when but a few days since, I attended the funeral of a young lady, who was torn, in the bloom of youth and beauty, from the arms of a father who doated on her, of a family by whom she was adored; I think I would not have exchanged my feelings at that time, for all the mirth which gayety could inspire, or all the pleasures which luxury could bestow. Maria was in her twentieth year. To the beauty of her form, and excellence of her natural disposition, a parent equally indulgent and attentive had done the fullest justice. To accomplish her person, and to cultivate her mind, every endeavor had been used; and they had been attended with that success which they commonly meet with, when, not prevented by mistaken fondness or untimely vanity. Few young ladies have attracted more admiration; none ever felt it less: with all the charms of beauty, and the polish of education, the plainest were not less affected, nor the most ignorant less assuming. She died when every tongue was eloquent of her virtues, when every hope was ripening to reward them. It is by such private and domestic distresses, that the softer emotions of the heart are most strongly excited. The fall of more important personages is commonly distant from our observation; but even where it happens under our immediate notice, there is a mixture of other feelings by which our compassion is weakened. The eminently great, or extensively useful, leave behind them a train of interrupted views, and disappointed expectations, by which the distress is complicated beyond the simplicity of pity. But the death of one, who, like Maria, was to shed the influence of her virtues over the age of a father, and the childhood of her sisters, presents to us a little view of family affliction, which every eye can perceive, and every heart can feel. On scenes of public sorrow and national regret, we gaze as upon those gallery pictures which strike us with wonder and admiration; domestic calamity is like the miniature of a friend, which we wear in our bosoms, and keep for secret looks and solitary enjoyment. The last time I saw Maria was in the midst of a crowded assembly of the fashionable and the gay, where she fixed all eyes by the gracefulness of her motions, and the native dignity of her mien; yet so tempered was that superiority which they conferred with gentleness and modesty, that not a murmur was heard, either from the rivalship of beauty, or the envy of homeliness. From that scene the transition was so violent to the hearse and the pall, the grave and the sod, that once or twice my imagination turned rebel to my senses: I beheld the objects around me as the painting of a dream, and thought of Maria as living still. I was soon, however, recalled to the sad reality. The figure of her father bending over the grave of his darling child; the silent suffering composure in which his countenance was fixed; the tears of his attendants, whose grief was light, and capable of tears; these gave me back the truth, and reminded me that I should see her no more. There was a flow of sorrow with which I suffered myself to be borne along, with a melancholy kind of indulgence; but when her father dropped the cord with which he had helped to lay his Maria in the earth, its sound on the coffin chilled my heart, and horror for a moment took the place of pity! It was but for a moment. He looked eagerly into the grave; made one involuntary motion to stop the assistants who were throwing the earth into it; then suddenly recollecting himself, clasped his hands together, threw up his eyes to heaven; and then first I saw a few tears drop from them. I gave language to all this. It spoke a lesson of faith, and piety, and resignation. I went away sorrowful, but my sorrow was neither ungentle nor unmanly; cast on this world a glance rather of pity than of enmity; on the next, a look of humbleness and hope! Such, I am persuaded, will commonly be the effect of scenes like that I have described, on minds neither frigid nor unthinking; for, feelings like these, the gloom of the ascetic is as little susceptible as the levity of the giddy. There needs a certain pliancy of mind, which society alone can give, though its vices often destroy, to render us capable of that gentle melancholy which makes sorrow pleasant, and affliction useful. These are It is not from a melancholy of this sort, that men are prompted to the cold unfruitful virtues of monkish solicitude. often the effects rather of passion secluded than repressed, rather of temptation avoided than overcome. The crucifix and the rosary, the death's head and the bones, if custom has not made them indifferent, wilt rather chill desire than excite virtue; but, amidst the warmth of social affection, and of social sympathy, the heart will feel the weakness, and enjoy the duties of humanity. Perhaps it will be said, that such situations, and such reflections as the foregoing, will only affect minds already too tender, and be disregarded by those who need the lessons they impart. But this, I apprehend, is to allow too much to the force of habit, and the resistance of prejudice. I will not pretend to assert that rooted principles, and long-established conduct, are suddenly to be changed by the effects of situation, or the eloquence of sentiment; but if it be granted that such change ever took place who shall determine by what imperceptible motive, or accidenta impression, it was first begun? And, even if the influence of such a call to thought can only smother, in its birth, one allure ment to evil, or confirm one wavering purpose to virtue, I shak not have unjustly commended that occasional indulgence of pensiveness and sorrow, which will thus be rendered not only one of the refinements, but one of the improvements of life. [No. 101. TUESDAY, APRIL 25, 1780.] To the Author of the Mirror : SIR-In books, whether moral or amusing, there are no passages more captivating, both to the writer and the reader, than those delicate strokes of sentimental morality, which refer our actions to the determination of feeling. In these the poet, the novel writer, and the essayist, have always delighted; you are not, therefore, singular, for having dedicated so much of the Mirror to sentiment and sensibility. I imagine, however, Sir, there is much danger in pushing these qualities too far: the rules of our conduct should be founded on a basis more solid, if they are to guide us through the various situations of life: but the young enthusiast of sentiment and feeling is apt to despise those lessons of vulgar virtue and prudence, which would confine the movements of a soul formed to regulate itself by finer impulses. I speak from experience, Mr. Mirror; with what justice you shall judge, when you have heard the little family history I am going to relate. My niece, Emilia was left to my care by a brother whom I dearly loved, when she was a girl of about ten years old. The beauty of her countenance, and the elegance of her figure, had already attracted universal notice; as her mind opened, it was found not less worthy of admiration. To the sweetest natural disposition, she united uncommon powers both of genius and of understanding; these I spared no pains to cultivate and improve; and I think I so far succeeded, that, in her eighteenth year, Emilia was inferior to few women of her age, either in personal attractions or in accomplishments of the mind. My fond hopes (for she was a daughter to me, Mr. Mirror,) looked now for the reward of my labor, and I pictured her future life as full of happiness as of virtue. One feature of her mind was strongly predominant; a certain delicacy and fineness of feeling which she had inherited from nature, and which her earliest reading had tended to encourage and increase. To this standard she was apt to bring both her own actions and the actions of others; and allowed more to its effects, both in praise and blame, than was consistent with either justice or expediency. I sometimes endeavored gently to combat these notions. She was not always logical, but she was always eloquent in their defence; and I found her more confirmed on their side, the more I obliged her to be their advocate. I preferred, therefore, being silent on the subject, trusting that a little more experience and knowledge of the world would necessarily weaken their influence. At her age, and with her feelings, it is necessary to have a friend: Emilia had found one at a very early period. Harriet S was the daughter of a neighbor of my brother's, a few years older than my niece. Several branches of their education the two young ladies had received together; in these the superiority lay much on the side of Emilia. Harriet was nowise remarkable for fineness of genius or quickness of parts; but though her acquirements were moderate, she knew how to manage them to advantage, and there was often a certain avowal of her inferiority, which conciliated affection the more, as it did not claim admiration. Her manners were soft and winning, ike those of Emilia, her sentiments as delicate and exalted; here seemed, however, less of nature in both. Emilia's attachment to this young lady I found every day increase, till, at last, it so totally engrossed her as rather to displease me. When together, their attention was confined almost entirely to each other; or what politeness forced them to bestow upon others, they considered as a tax which it was fair to elude as much as possible. The world, a term which they applied indiscriminately to almost every one but themselves, they seemed to feel as much pride as happiness in being secluded from; and its laws of prudence and propriety, they held the invention of cold and selfish minds, insensible of the delights of feeling, of sentiment, and of friendship. These ideas were, I believe, much strengthened by a correspondence that occupied most of the hours (not many, indeed,) in which they were separated. Against this I ventured to remonstrate in a jocular manner, with Emilia; she answered me in a strain so serious, as convinced me of the danger of so romantic an attachment. Our discourse on the subject grew insensibly warm; Emilia at last |