trusion of a drunken company be confidered as a fort of interlude, which ladies could bear without uneafiness; and, at any rate, as it was an equal chance that their future husbands would give fuch dinners, and receive fuch guests, as their father did, it might not be improper to accustom them, in their earlier days, to a species of conversation and behaviour which they must afterwards be obliged to endure.

"Ay," says he, "Charles, this is your way; "the follies of mankind are familiar to you, " and you are always ready to find an apolo"gy for them; but I, who, for many years, " have only heard of them, cannot be suppo" sed to bear their defects with as much pa"-tience. I am fick of this town of yours;

and, though I could have as much pleasure " as any man in witneffing such elegant man"ners, and partaking in such agreeable con"versation, as we faw and enjoyed during a " part of this evening, if I must purchase it, " by sharing in the intemperance, the noife, " and the folly which preceded it, should you " wonder if I long to return to my books and " my folitude?”

K

N° 77.

TUESDAY, February 1. 1780.

All impediments in fancy's course,

Are motives of more fancy..

A

SHAKESPEARE.

MIDST the variety of objects around us, philosophers have frequently been employed in pointing out and diftinguishing those which are the fources of pleasure, and those which are productive of pain; they have endeavoured also to investigate the causes and the qualities in the different objects by which these effects are produced. I suspect that, in many cafes, we must be obliged to have recourse to the original constitution of our frame, and that the most penetrating philosophical inquirers can often go no farther than to say, thus Nature has made us.

But whatever may be the original fources of our pleasure and pain, it is certain that there are various circumstances which may be pointed out, as adding to or diminishing both the one and the other; circumstances by which

the

the warmth of expectation may be heightened or allayed, and the pangs of disappointment increased or mitigated.

It is a common obfervation, the justice of which, I believe, will not be disputed, that every passion increases according to the difficulty there is in its gratification. When once a defire for a certain object is raised, every opposition which occurs to the attainment of it, provided it be not such as cits off ail hopes of fucceeding, and every perplexity and embarrassment thrown in the way, when the mind is engaged in the pursuit, inflames the defire; the object becomes heightened and exaggerated in our ideas, the mind grows more attached to it, and the expectation of enjoyment from the poffeffion is increased.

To account for this appearance in our nature, it may be obferved, that nothing is fo apt to make an object figure in the imagination, as to have our attention long and earnestly fixed upon it. This makes it appear in stronger and more lively colours. If it be an object of defire, it appears more and more calculated to give pleasure; if an object of averfion, it appears more and more calculated to produce pain. Every time we view it, there is

an

an addition made to the impression we have received. The sensations it has already given us still continue, and the passion it has created receives additional force. If the object be pleasant, the mind dwells upon its good, if disagreeable, upon its bad qualities; it broods over them, it amplifies, it exaggerates them. Now, no circumstance is so much calculated to fix the attention upon any particular object as those difficulties which arife in our pursuit of it. The mind, unwilling to be overcome, cannot think of fubmitting to a defeat, or of giving up those expectations of enjoyment which it has formed. Every little oppofition, therefore, that is met with, every obstruction thrown in the way, calls forth a fresh confideration of the object. We take a view of it in its every form, to try if we can get the better of those difficulties, and remove those obstructions. The object itself, meanwhile, gains complete poffeffion of the foul. It swells and heightens in our imagination, and is no longer seen as it is by other men, nor as it would be by the same person, were other objects allowed to have a place in his mind, or to divide his attention.

From this circumstance in our nature, that fixing our attention upon any one object, or fet of objects, is apt to increase or heighten them in our imagination, a variety of remarks might be made, tending to illustrate the history of the human heart. It is owing to this

circumstance, that a general lover feldom forms an attachment to any particular object. It is from the fame cause, that the gentleman who follows no particular profeffion feldom exaggerates the advantages of any one. It is the merchant who limits his views solely to commerce that fees in too strong a light the advantages of trade; it is the man of learning, who is shut up within the walls of a college, that exaggerates the advantages of literature; it is the scholar who confines himself to one branch of science that is the complete pedant. The moral philofopher wonders how any man can be occupied by the dry unpleasant study of the mathematics, while the curious fabric of the human mind remains unexplored. The mathematician is equally furprised that any man should compare the certainty of mathematical evidence to the vague inquiries of the moral philofopher. The geometrician, who, by the intreaty of his friends, was prevailed with to read the Gid of Corneille,