that Vision, I went to Whitehall to hear the Sermon; after which ended, I returned to my lodging, which was then in King Street at Westminster, and sitting down to dinner with my Wife, two Messengers were sent from the whole Council-Board, with a warrant to carry me to the Keeper of the Gate House, Westminster, there to be safely kept, until further order from the Lords of the Council; which was done without showing me any cause at all wherefore I was committed. Upon which said warrant I was kept there ten whole years close prisoner; where I spent five years thereof about the translating of the said Book: insomuch as I found the words very true which the old man in the foresaid Vision did say unto me, I will shortly provide for you both place and time to translate it.'" CHAPTER CCXXXII. THE DOCTOR'S FAMILY FEeling. It behoves the high For their own sakes to do things worthily. No son ever regarded the memory of his father with more reverential affection than this last of the Doves. There never lived a man, he said, to whom the lines of Marcus Antonius Flaminius, (the sweetest of all Latin poets in modern times, or perhaps of any age,) could more truly be applied. Viristi, genitor, bene, ac beate, Nec pauper, neque dives; cruditus "What if he could not with the Hevenninghams of Suffolk count five and twenty knights of his family, or tell sixteen knights successively with the Tilneys of Norfolk, or with the Nauntons shew where his ancestors had seven hundred pounds a year before the conquest," ," he was, and with as much, or perhaps more reason, contented with his * FULLER. parentage. Indeed his family feeling was so strong, that, if he had been of an illustrious race, pride, he acknowledged, was the sin which would most easily have beset him; though on the other hand, to correct this tendency, he thought there could be no such persuasive preachers as old family portraits, and old monuments in the family church. He was far, however, from thinking that those who are born to all the advantages, as they are commonly esteemed, of rank and fortune, are better placed for the improvement of their moral and intellectual nature, than those in a lower grade. Fortunatos nimium sua si bona nôrint! he used to say of this class, but this is a knowledge that they seldom possess; and it is rare indeed to find an instance in which the high privileges which hereditary wealth conveys are understood by the possessors, and rightly appreciated and put to their proper use. The one, and the two talents are, (Oh! bright occasions of dispensing good in general, more profitably occupied than the five; the five indeed are not often tied up in a napkin, but still less often are they faithfully employed in the service of that Lord from whom they are received in trust, and to whom an account of them must be rendered. "A man of family and estate," said Johnson," ought to consider himself as having the charge of a district over which he is to diffuse civility and happiness."-Are there fifty men of family and estate in the Three Kingdoms who feel and act as if this were their duty? Are there five and forty?— Forty-Thirty?—Twenty ? — Or can it be said with any probability of belief that "peradventure Ten shall be found there?" — in sangue illustre e signorile, In nom d' alti parenti al mondo nato, La viltà si raddoppia, e più si scorge Che in coloro il cui grado alto non sorge. Here in England stood a village, within the memory of man, no matter where, + CowPER. TASSO RINALDO. close by the Castle of a noble proprietor, no matter who: - il figlio Del tale, ed il nipote del cotale, feeling) nothing cruel. I am not aware that any hardship was inflicted upon the families who were ejected, farther than the inconvenience of a removal. He acted as most persons in the same circumstances probably that his magnificent habitation was greatly improved by the demolition of the poor dwellings which had neighboured it so closely. Farther it may be said in his justification, (for which I would leave nothing unsaid,) that very possibly the houses had not sufficient appearance of neatness and comfort to render them agreeable objects, that the people may have been in no better state of manners and morals than villagers commonly are, which is saying that they were bad enough; that the filth of their houses was thrown into the road, and that their pigs, and their children, who were almost as unclean, ran loose there. Add to this, if you please, that though they stood in fear of their great neighbour, there may have been no attachment to him, and little feeling of good-will. But I will tell you how Dr. Dove would have proceeded if he had been the hereditary Lord of that Castle It contained about threescore houses, and every cottager had ground enough for keep-would have acted, and no doubt he thought ing one or two cows. The noble proprietor looked upon these humble tenements as an eye-sore; and one by one as opportunity offered, he purchased them, till at length he became owner of the whole, one field excepted, which belonged to an old Quaker. The old man resisted many offers, but at last he was induced to exchange it for a larger and better piece of land in another place. No sooner had this transaction been compleated, than the other occupants, who were now only tenants at will, received notice to quit; the houses were demolished, the inclosures levelled, hearthsteads and homesteads, the cottage garden and the cottage field disappeared, and the site was in part planted, in part thrown into the park. The Quaker, who unlike Naboth had parted with the inheritance of his fathers, was a native of the village; but he knew not how dearly he was attached to it, till he saw its demolition: it was his fault, he said; and if he had not exchanged his piece of ground, he should never have lived to see his native place destroyed. He took it deeply to heart; it preyed upon his mind, and that domain. He would have considered that this vil lage was originally placed there for the sake of the security which the Castle afforded. Times had changed, and with them the relative duties of the Peer and of the Peasantry: he no longer required their feudal services, and they no longer stood in need of his protection. The more, therefore, according to his "way of thinking," was it to be desired, that other relations should be strengthened, and the bonds of mutual good-will be more closely intertwined. He would have looked upon these villagers as neighbours, in whose welfare and good conduct he was especially interested, and over whom it was in his power to exercise a most salutary and beneficial influence; and, having this power, he would have known that it was his duty so to use it. He would have established a school house there. He would have taken his doin the village, and have allowed no alemestics preferably from thence. If there were a boy who, by his gentle disposition, his diligence, and his aptitude for learning, gave promise of those qualities which best become the clerical profession, he would have sent that boy to a grammar-school, and afterwards to college, supporting him there in part, or wholly, according to the parents' means, and placing him on his list for preferment, according to his deserts. If there were any others who discovered a remarkable fitness for any other useful calling, in that calling he would have had them instructed, and given them his countenance and support, as long as they continued to deserve it. The Archbishop of Braga, Fray Bartolomen dos Martyres, added to his establishment a Physician for the poor. Our friend would, in like manner, have fixed a medical practitioner in the village, -one as like as he could find to a certain Doctor at Doncaster; and have allowed him such a fixed stipend as might have made him reasonably contented and independent of the little emolument which the practice of the place could afford, for he would not have wished his services to be gratuitous where there was no need. If the parish, to which the village belonged, was too extensive, or the parochial Minister unwilling, or unable, to look carefully after this part of his flock, his Domestic Chaplain, (for he would not have lived without one,) should have taken care of their religious instruction. In his own family and his own person he would have set his neighbours an example of "whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report.' And as this example produced its sure effects, he would have left the Amateurs of Agriculture to vie with each other in their breeds of sheep and oxen, and in the costly culti vation of their farms. It would have been, not his boast, for he boasted of nothing; not his pride, for he had none of that poor vice which only empty men Esteem a virtue-* BEAUMONT AND FLETCHER. it was out of the root of Christian humility that all his virtues grew,—but his consolation and his delight, to know that nowhere in Great Britain was there a neater, a more comfortable village than close to his own mansion; nowhere a more orderly, a more moral, a more cheerful, or a happier people. And if his castle had stood upon an elevation commanding as rich a survey as Belvoir or Shobden, that village, when he looked from his windows, would still have been the most delightful object in the prospect. I have not mentioned the name of the old Quaker in my story; but I will preserve it in these pages, because the story is to his honour. It was Joshua Dickson. If Quakers have (and certainly they have) the quality which is called modest assurance, in a superlative degree, that distinguishes them from any other class of men (it is of the men only that I speak), they are the only sect, who, as a sect, cultivate the sense of conscience. This was not a case of conscience, but of strong feeling, assuming that character under a tendency to madness. When Lord Harcourt, about the same time, removed the village of Nuneham, an old widow, Barbara Wyat by name, earnestly intreated that she might be allowed to remain in her old habitation. The request, which it would have been most unfeeling to refuse, was granted; she ended her days there, and then the cottage was pulled down: but a tree, which grew beside it, and which she had planted in her youth, is still shown on the terrace at Nuneham, and called by her name. Near it is placed the following Inscription by that amiable man, the Laureate Whitehead. Like all his serious poems it may be read with pleasure and profit, though the affecting circumstance, which gives the anecdote its highest interest, is related only in a note. This Tree was planted by a female hand, To her, long used to nature's simple ways, Here with her Colin oft the faithful maid Had led the dance, the envious youths among; Here when his aged bones in earth were laid, The patient matron turned her wheel and sung. She felt her loss, yet felt it as she ought, Nor dared 'gainst Nature's general law exclaim, Did dreadful tales the clowns from market bear And good Queen Anne, for aught she cared, might reign. The sun her day, the seasons marked her year, She toiled, she slept, from care, from envy free; For what had she to hope, or what to fear, Blest with her cottage, and her favourite Tree. With reverence visit her august domain; To her unlettered memory bow the knee; She found that happiness you seek in vain, Blest with a cottage, and a single Tree.* Mason would have produced a better inscription upon this subject, in the same strain; Southey in a different one; Crabbe would have treated it with more strength; Bowles with a finer feeling; so would his kinswoman and namesake Caroline, than whom no author or authoress has ever written more touchingly, either in prose or verse. Wordsworth would have made a picture from it worthy of a place in the great Gallery of his Recluse. But Whitehead's is a remarkable poem, considering that it was produced during what has been not unjustly called the neap tide of English poetry: and the reader who should be less pleased with it than offended by its faults, may have cause to suspect that his refinement has injured his feelings in a greater degree than it has improved his taste. *The Classical reader will be aware that the Author of these lines bad Claudian's "Old Man of Verona" in his mind's eye, as Claudian had Virgil's "Corycian Old Man."- Georg. iv. 127. Ita nati estis, ut bona malaque vestra ad Rempublicam pertineant. TACITUS. "WE have long been accustomed to laugh at the pride and poverty of petty German Princes," says one of the most sensible and right-minded travellers that ever published the result of his observations in Germany † ; "but nothing," he proceeds, "can give a higher idea of the respectability which so small a people may assume, and the quantity of happiness which one of these insignificant monarchs may diffuse around him, than the example of the little state of Weimar, with a prince like the present Grand Duke at its head. The mere pride of sovereignty, frequently most prominent where there is only the title to justify it, is unknown to him; he is the most affable man in his dominions, not simply with the condescension which any prince can learn to practise as a useful quality, but from goodness of heart.” The whole population of his state little if at all exceeds that of Leicestershire; his capital is smaller than a third or fourth rate country town; so in fact it scarcely deserves the name of a town; and the inhabitants, vain as they are of its well-earned reputation as the German Athens, take a pride in having it considered merely a large village: his revenue is less than that of many a British Peer, great Commoner, or commercial Millionist. Yet "while the treasures of more weighty potentates were insufficient to meet the necessities of their political relations, his confined revenues could give independence and careless leisure to the men who were gaining for Germany its intellectual reputation." It is not too much to say that for that intellectual reputation, high as it is, and lasting as it will be, Germany is little less beholden to the Duke of Weimar's well-bestowed patronage, than to the genius of Wieland, and Schiller, and Goëthe. "In these little principalities, the same goodness of disposition can work with more proportional effect than if it swayed the sceptre of an empire; it comes more easily and directly into contact with those towards whom it should be directed: the artificial world of courtly rank and wealth has neither sufficient glare nor body to shut out from the prince the more chequered world that lies below." Alas no Prince either petty or great has followed the Duke of Saxe Weimar's example! "He dwells," says Mr. Downes, "like an estated gentleman, surrounded by his tenantry." Alas no British Peer, great Commoner, or commercial Millionist, has given to any portion of his ampler revenues a like beneficent direction. A good old Bishop* quoting the text "not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble are called," cautions us against distorting the Scripture as if it pronounced nothing but confusion to the rulers of the earth: "let not the honourable person," said he, " hang down his head, as if power and wisdom, and noble blood, and dignity, were causes of rejection before God: no, beloved! Isaiah foretold that Kings should be nursing fathers, and Queens should be nursing mothers of the Church, but it is often seen that the benignity of nature and the liberality of fortune are made impediments to a better life; and, therefore, Nobles and Princes are more frequently threatened with judgment. I adjoin moreover that the Scriptures speak more flatly against illustrious Magistrates, than the common sort; for if God had left it to men, whose tongues are prostituted to flattery, they had scarce been told that their abominable sins would bring damnation." When our philosopher considered the BISHOP HACKET. manner in which large incomes are expended, (one way he had opportunities enough of observing at Doncaster,) he thought that in these times high birth brought with it dangers and evils which in | many or most instances more than counterbalanced its advantages. That excellent person Mr. Boyle had formed a different opinion. To be the son of a Peer whose prosperity had found many admirers, but few parallels, and not to be his eldest son, was a happiness that he used to "mention with great expressions of gratitude; his birth, he said, so suiting his inclinations and designs, that, had he been permitted an election, his choice would scarce have altered God's assignment. For as on the one side, a lower birth would have too much exposed him to the inconveniences of a mean descent, which are too notorious to need specifying; so on the other side, to a person whose humour indisposes him to the distracting hurry of the world, the being born heir to a great family is but a glittering kind of slavery, whilst obliging him to a public entangled course of life, to support the credit of his family, and tying him from satisfying his dearest inclinations, it often forces him to build the advantages of his house upon the ruins of his own contentment." "A man of mean extraction," he continues, "is seldom admitted to the privacy and secrets of great ones promiscuously, and scarce dares pretend to it, for fear of being censured saucy, or an intruder. And titular greatness is ever an impediment to the knowledge of many retired truths, that cannot be attained without familiarity with meaner persons, and such other condescensions, as fond opinion, in great men, disapproves and makes disgraceful.” "But he himself," Mr. Boyle said, "was born in a condition that neither was high enough to prove a temptation to laziness, nor low enough to discourage him from aspiring." And certainly to a person that affected so much an universal knowledge, and arbitrary vicissitudes of quiet and employments, it could not be unwelcome to be of a quality that was a handsome |