ORIGINAL DEDICATIONS. VOLUME THE FIRST. My Lord, TO JOHN LORD SOMERS, BARON OF EVESHAM. I SHOULD not act the part of an impartial Spectator, if I dedicated the following papers to one who is not of the most consummate and most acknowledged merit. None but a person of a finished character can be a proper patron of a work which endeavours to cultivate and polish human life by promoting virtue and knowledge, and by recommending whatsoever may be either useful or ornamental to society. I know that the homage I now pay you, is offering a kind of violence to one who is as solicitous to shun applause, as he is assiduous to deserve it. But, my lord, this is perhaps the only particular in which your prudence will be always disappointed. While justice, candour, equanimity, a zeal for the good of your country, and the most persuasive eloquence in bringing over others to it, are valuable distinctions, you are not to expect that the public will so far comply with your inclinations, as to forbear celebrating such extraordinary qualities. It is in vain that you have endeavoured to conceal your share of merit in the many national services which you have effected. Do what you will, the present age will be talking of your virtues, though posterity alone will do them justice. the interests of Europe in general; to which I must also add, a certain dignity in yourself, that (to say the least of it) has been always equal to those great honours which have been conferred upon you. It is very well known how much the church owed to you in the most dangerous day it ever saw, that of the arraignment of its prelates;* and how far the civil power, in the late and present reign, has been indebted to your counsels and wisdom. But to enumerate the great advantages which the public has received from your administration, would be a more proper work for a history, than for an address of this nature. Your lordship appears as great in your private life, as in the most important offices which you have borne. I would, therefore, rather choose to speak of the pleasure you afford all who are admitted to your conversation, of your elegant taste in all the polite arts, of learning, of your great humanity and complacency of manners, and of the surprising influence which is peculiar to you, in making every one who converses with your lordship prefer you to himself, without thinking the less meanly of his own talents. But if I should take notice of all that might be observed in your lordship, I should have nothing new to say upon any other character of distinction. I ain, Other men pass through oppositions and contending interests in the ways of ambition; but your great abilities have been invited to power, and importuned to accept of advancement. Nor is it strange that this should happen to your lordship, who could bring into the service of your sovereign the arts and policies of ancient Greece and Rome; as well as the most exact knowledge peached in 1688. of our own constitution in particular, and of *He was one of the counsel for the seven bishops im business, it is as a torch in the hand of one who is willing and able to show those who were bewildered, the way which leads to their prosperity and welfare. A generous concern for your country, and a passion for every thing which is truly great and noble, are what actuate all your life and actions; and I hope you will forgive me when I have an ambition this book may be placed in the library of so good a judge of what is valuable; in that library where the choice is such, that it will not be a disparagement to be the meanest author in it. Forgive me, my lord, for taking this occasion of telling all the world how ardently I love and honour you; and that I am, with the utmost gratitude for all your favours, ledged myself incapable. While I busy | his own; but in the possession of a man of myself as a stranger upon earth, and can pretend to no other than being a looker-on, you are conspicuous in the busy and polite world; both in the world of men, and that of letters. While I am silent and unobserved in public meetings, you are admired by all that approach you, as the life and genius of the conversation. What a happy conjunction of different talents meets in him whose whole discourse is at once animated by the strength and force of reason, and adorned with all the graces and embellishments of wit! When learning irradiates common life, it is then in its highest use and perfection; and it is to such as your lordship, that the sciences owe the esteem which they have with the active part of mankind. Knowledge of books in recluse men, is like that sort of lantern which hides him who carries it, and serves only to pass through secret and gloomy paths of MY LORD, Your Lordship's most obliged, most obedient, and most humble servant, THE SPECTATOR, VOLUME THE THIRD. TO THE RIGHT HON. HENRY BOYLE.* 1712. Sir, Youngest son of Charles Lord Clifford. He was created Baron Charleton, in 1714; but dying, unmarried, in 1725, the title died with him. He was several years secretary of state during the reign of Queen Anne. life. Your aversion to any ostentatious arts of setting to show those great services which you have done the public, has not likewise a little contributed to that universal acknowledgment which is paid you by your country. The consideration of this part of your character, is that which hinders me from enlarging on those extraordinary talents which have given you so great a figure in the British senate, as well as in that elegance and politeness which appear in your more retired conversation. I should be unpardonable if, after what I have said, I should longer detain you with an address of this nature: I cannot, however, conclude it, without acknowledging these great obligations which you have laid upon, SIR, Your most obedient humble servant, Marlborough, I question not but it would the most able and fortunate captain before fil the reader with more agreeable images, your time,declared he had lived long enough and give him a more delightful entertain-both to nature and to glory; and your grace ment than what can be found in the follow- may make that reflection with much more ing or any other book. justice. He spoke it after he had arrived at empire by an usurpation upon those whom he had enslaved: but the Prince of Nindelheim* may rejoice in a sovereignty which was the gift of him whose dominions he had preserved. One cannot indeed without offence to yourself observe, that you excel the rest of mankind in the least, as well as the greatest endowments. Nor were it a circumstance to be mentioned, if the graces and attractions of your person were not the only preeminence you have above others, which is left almost unobserved by greater writers. Yet how pleasing would it be to those who shall read the surprising revolutions in your story, to be made acquainted with your ordinary life and deportment! How pleasing would it be to hear that the same man, who carried fire and sword into the countries of all that had opposed the cause of liberty, and struck a terror into the armies of France, had, in the midst of his high station, a behaviour as gentle as is usual in the first steps towards greatness! And if it were possible to express that easy grandeur, which did at once persuade and command, it would appear as clearly to those to come, as it does to his contemporaries, that all the great events which were brought to pass under the conduct of so well-governed a spirit, were the blessings of heaven upon wisdom and valour; and all which seem adverse, fell out by divine permission, which we are not to search into. You have passed that year of life wherein Glory established upon the uninterrupted success of honourable designs and actions, is not subject to diminution; nor can any attempts prevail against it, but in the proportion which the narrow circuit of rumour bears to the unlimited extent of fame. We may congratulate your grace not only upon your high achievements, but likewise upon the happy expiration of your command, by which your glory is put out of the power of fortune: and when your person shall be so too, that the Author and Disposer of all things may place you in that higher mansion of bliss and immortality which is prepared for good princes, lawgivers, and heroes, when he in his due time removes them from the envy of mankind, is the hearty prayer of, MY LORD, Your Grace's most obedient, most devoted, humble servant, THE SPECTATOR. *This title was conferred upon the Duke by the Em peror, after the battle of Hochstadt. VOLUME THE FIFTH. TO THE EARL OF WHARTON. 1712-13. My Lord, THE author of the Spectator, having prefixed before each of his volumes the name of some great persons to whom he has par-ledge this great extent in your lordship's ticular obligations, lays his claim to your character, at the same time that they use lordship's patronage upon the same ac- their utmost industry and invention to decount. I must confess, my lord, had not I rogate from it. But it is for your honour already received great instances of your that those who are now your enemies were favour, I should have been afraid of sub- always so. You have acted in so much conmitting a work of this nature to your peru-sistency with yourself, and promoted the sal. You are so thoroughly acquainted with the characters of men, and all the parts of human life, that it is impossible for the least misrepresentation of them to escape your notice. It is your lordship's particular distinction that you are master of the whole compass of business, and have signalized yourself in all the different scenes of it. We admire some for the dignity, others for the popularity of their behaviour; some for their clearness of judgment, others for their happiness of expression; some for the laying of schemes, and others for the putting them in execution. It is your lordship only who enjoys these several talents united, and that too in as great perfection as others possess them singly. Your enemies acknow interests of your country in so uniform a manner, that even those who would misrepresent your generous designs for the public good, cannot but approve the steadiness and intrepidity with which you pursue them. It is a most sensible pleasure to me that I have this opportunity of professing myself one of your great admirers, and in a very particular manner, MY LORD, Your Lordship's most obliged, and most obedient humble servant, THE SPECTATOR. VOLUME THE SIXTH. TO THE EARL OF SUNDERLAND. My Lord, 1712-13. tates powerful or inconsiderable in Europe, VERY many favours and civilities (re-as they are friends or enemies to Great ceived from you in a private capacity) Britain. The importance of those great which I have no other way to acknowledge, events which happened during that adwill, I hope, excuse this presumption; but ministration in which your lordship bore so the justice I, as a Spectator, owe your cha-important a charge, will be acknowledged racter, places me above the want of an as long as time shall endure. I shall not excuse. Candour and openness of heart, therefore attempt to rehearse those illuswhich shine in all your words and actions, trious passages, but give this application a exact the highest esteem from all who have more private and particular turn, in desirthe honour to know you; and a winning ing your lordship would continue your facondescension to all subordinate to you, vour and patronage to me, as you are a made business a pleasure to those who ex- gentleman of the most polite literature, and ecuted it under you, at the same time that perfectly accomplished in the knowledge it heightened her majesty's favour to all of books* and men, which makes it necesthose who had the happiness of having it sary to beseech your indulgence to the folconveyed through your hands. A secretary lowing leaves, and the author of them, who of state, in the interest of mankind, joined is, with the greatest truth and respect, with that of his fellow-subjects, accomplished with a great facility and elegance in all the modern as well as ancient languages, was a happy and proper member of a ministry, by whose services your sovereign is in so high and flourishing a condition, as makes all other princes and poten MY LORD, Your Lordship's obliged, obedient, THE SPECTATOR. * His lordship was the founder of the splendid and truly valuable library at Althorp. VOLUME THE SEVENTH. Sir, TO MR. METHUEN.* stand the interest of either nation. The great part you had, as British amIt is with great pleasure I take an oppor-bassador, in procuring and cultivating the tunity of publishing the gratitude I owe you advantageous commerce between the courts for the place you allow me in your friend- of England and Portugal, has purchased ship and familiarity. I will not acknow-you the lasting esteem of all who underledge to you that I have often had you in my thoughts, when I have endeavoured to draw, in some parts of these discourses, the character of a good-natured, honest, and accomplished gentleman. But such representations give my reader an idea of a person blameless only, or only laudable for such perfections as extend no farther than to his own private advantage and reputa tion. But when I speak of you, I celebrate one who has had the happiness of possessing also those qualities which make a man useful to society, and of having had opportunities | of exerting them in the most conspicuous manner. *Of Bishops-Canings, in the county of Wilts; after wards Sir Paul Methuen, K. B. He was several years ambassador at the court of Lisbon, where he conducted himself with great ability. Those personal excellencies which are overrated by the ordinary world, and too much neglected by wise men, you have applied with the justest skill and judgment. The most graceful address in horsemanship, in the use of the sword, and in dancing, has been cmployed by you as lower arts; and as they have occasionally served to cover or introduce the talents of a skilful minister. But your abilities have not appeared only in one nation. When it was your province to act as her majesty's minister at the court of Savoy, at that time encamped, you accompanied that gallant prince through all the vicissitudes of his fortune, and shared by his side the dangers of that glorious day in which he recovered his capital. As far as it regards personal qualities, you attained, in that one hour, the highest military re- | have at your table, your easy condescension putation. The behaviour of our minister in the action, and the good offices done the vanquished in the name of the Queen of England, gave both the conqueror and the captive the most lively examples of the courage and generosity of the nation he represented. Your friends and companions in your absence frequently talk these things of you; and you cannot hide from us (by the most discreet silence in any thing which regards yourself) that the frank entertainment we in little incidents of mirth and diversion, and general complacency of manners, are far from being the greatest obligations we have to you. I do assure you, there is not one of your friends has a greater sense of your merit in general, and of the favours you every day do us, than, SIR, Your most obedient, and most humble servant, RICHARD STEELE, VOLUME THE EIGHTH. TO WILLIAM HONEYCOMB, ESQ.* THE seven former volumes of the Spec- | their lives. But I need not tell you that the tator having been dedicated to some of the free and disengaged behaviour of a fine most celebrated persons of the age, I take gentleman makes as many awkward beaux, leave to inscribe this eighth and last to you, as the easiness of your favourite hath made as to a gentleman who hath ever been am- insipid poets. bitious of appearing in the best company. You are now wholly retired from the busy part of mankind, and at leisure to reflect upon your past achievements; for which reason I look upon you as a person very well qualified for a dedication. I may possibly disappoint my readers, and yourself too, if I do not endeavour on this occasion to make the world acquainted with your virtues. And here, sir, I shall not compliment you upon your birth, person, or fortune; nor on any other the like perfections which you possess, whether you will or no; but shall only touch upon those which are of your own acquiring, and in which every one must allow you have a real merit. Your janty air and easy motion, the volubility of your discourse, the suddenness of your laugh, the management of your snuff-box, with the whiteness of your hands and teeth (which have justly gained you the envy of the most polite part of the male world, and the love of the greatest beauties in the female) are entirely to be ascribed to your own personal genius and application. You are formed for these accomplishments by a happy turn of nature, and have finished yourself in them by the utmost improvements of art. A man that is defective in either of these qualifications (whatever may be the secret ambition of his heart) must never hope to make the figure you have done, among the fashionable part of his species. It is therefore no wonder we see such multitudes of aspiring young men fall short of you in all these beauties of your character, notwithstanding the study and practice of them is the whole business of * Generally supposed to be Col. Cleland. At present you are content to aim all your charms, at your own spouse, without farther thought of mischief to any others of the sex. I know you had formerly a very great contempt for that pedantic race of mortals who call themselves philosophers; and yet, to your honour be it spoken, there is not a sage of them all could have better acted up to their precepts in one of the most important points of life: I mean, in that generous disregard of popular opinion which you showed some years ago, when you chose for your wife an ob scure young woman, who doth not indeed pretend to an ancient family, but has certainly as many forefathers as any lady in the land, if she could but reckon up their names. I must own I conceived very extraordinary hopes of you from the moment that you confessed your age, and from eightand-forty (where you had stuck so many years) very ingeniously stepped into your grand climacteric. Your deportment has since been very venerable and becoming. If I am rightly informed, you make a regular appearance every quarter-sessions among your brothers of the quorum; and if things go on as they do, stand fair for being a colonel of the militia. I am told that your time passes away as agreeably in the amusements of a country life, as it ever did in the gallantries of the town; and that you now take as much pleasure in the planting of young trees, as you did formerly in the cutting down of your old ones. In short, we hear from all hands that you are thoroughly reconciled to your dirty acres, and have not too much wit to look into your own estate. After having spoken thus much of my patron, I must take the privilege of an au |