The Spectator Volume Ii Part 120

T.

[Footnote 1: Dr. William Fleetwood, Bishop of St. Asaph, had published Four Sermons.

1. On the death of Queen Mary, 1694.

2. On the death of the Duke of Gloucester, 1700.

3. On the death of King William, 1701.

4. On the Queen's Accession to the Throne, in 1702, with a Preface.

8vo. London, 1712.

The Preface which, says Dr. Johnson, overflowed with Whiggish principles, was ordered to be burnt by the House of Commons. This moved Steele to diffuse it by inserting it in the Spectator, which, as its author said in a letter to Burnet, conveyed about fourteen thousand copies of the condemned preface into people's hands that would otherwise have never seen or heard of it. Moreover, to ensure its delivery into the Queen's hands the publication of this number is said to have been deferred till twelve oclock, her Majesty's breakfast hour, that no time might be allowed for a decision that it should not be laid, as usual, upon her breakfast table.

Fleetwood was born in 1656; had been chaplain to King William, and in 1706 had been appointed to the Bishopric of St. Asaph without any solicitation. He was translated to Ely in 1714, and died in 1723.]

No. 385. Thursday, May 22, 1712. Budgell.

'Thesea pectora juncta fide.'

Ovid.

I intend the Paper for this Day as a loose Essay upon Friendship, in which I shall throw my Observations together without any set Form, that I may avoid repeating what has been often said on this Subject.

Friendship is a strong and habitual Inclination in two Persons to promote the Good and Happiness of one another. Tho' the Pleasures and Advantages of Friendship have been largely celebrated by the best moral Writers, and are considered by all as great Ingredients of human Happiness, we very rarely meet with the Practice of this Virtue in the World.

Every Man is ready to give in a long Catalogue of those Virtues and good Qualities he expects to find in the Person of a Friend, but very few of us are careful to cultivate them in our selves.

Love and Esteem are the first Principles of Friendship, which always is imperfect where either of these two is wanting.

As, on the one hand, we are soon ashamed of loving a Man whom we cannot esteem: so, on the other, tho we are truly sensible of a Man's Abilities, we can never raise ourselves to the Warmths of Friendship, without an affectionate Good-will towards his Person.

Friendship immediately banishes Envy under all its Disguises. A Man who can once doubt whether he should rejoice in his Friends being happier than himself, may depend upon it that he is an utter Stranger to this Virtue.

There is something in Friendship so very great and n.o.ble, that in those fict.i.tious Stories which are invented to the Honour of any particular Person, the Authors have thought it as necessary to make their Hero a Friend as a Lover. Achilles has his Patroclus, and aeneas his Achates. In the first of these Instances we may observe, for the Reputation of the Subject I am treating of, that Greece was almost ruin'd by the Hero's Love, but was preserved by his Friendship.

The Character of Achates suggests to us an Observation we may often make on the Intimacies of great Men, who frequently chuse their Companions rather for the Qualities of the Heart than those of the Head, and prefer Fidelity in an easy inoffensive complying Temper to those Endowments which make a much greater Figure among Mankind. I do not remember that Achates, who is represented as the first Favourite, either gives his Advice, or strikes a Blow, thro' the whole aeneid.

A Friendship which makes the least noise, is very often most useful: for which reason I should prefer a prudent Friend to a zealous one.

Atticus, one of the best Men of ancient Rome, was a very remarkable Instance of what I am here speaking. This extraordinary Person, amidst the Civil Wars of his Country, when he saw the Designs of all Parties equally tended to the Subversion of Liberty, by constantly preserving the Esteem and Affection of both the Compet.i.tors, found means to serve his Friends on either side: and while he sent Money to young Marius, whose Father was declared an Enemy of the Commonwealth, he was himself one of Sylla's chief Favourites, and always near that General.

During the War between Caesar and Pompey, he still maintained the same Conduct. After the Death of Caesar he sent Money to Brutus in his Troubles, and did a thousand good Offices to Antony's Wife and Friends when that Party seemed ruined. Lastly, even in that b.l.o.o.d.y War between Antony and Augustus, Atticus still kept his place in both their Friendships; insomuch that the first, says Cornelius Nepos, whenever he was absent from Rome in any part of the Empire, writ punctually to him what he was doing, what he read, and whither he intended to go; and the latter gave him constantly an exact Account of all his Affairs.

A Likeness of Inclinations in every Particular is so far from being requisite to form a Benevolence in two Minds towards each other, as it is generally imagined, that I believe we shall find some of the firmest Friendships to have been contracted between Persons of different Humours; the Mind being often pleased with those Perfections which are new to it, and which it does not find among its own Accomplishments.

Besides that a Man in some measure supplies his own Defects, and fancies himself at second hand possessed of those good Qualities and Endowments, which are in the possession of him who in the Eye of the World is looked on as his other self.

The most difficult Province in Friendship is the letting a Man see his Faults and Errors, which should, if possible, be so contrived, that he may perceive our Advice is given him not so much to please ourselves as for his own Advantage. The Reproaches therefore of a Friend should always be strictly just, and not too frequent.

The violent Desire of pleasing in the Person reproved, may otherwise change into a Despair of doing it, while he finds himself censur'd for Faults he is not Conscious of. A Mind that is softened and humanized by Friendship, cannot bear frequent Reproaches; either it must quite sink under the Oppression, or abate considerably of the Value and Esteem it had for him who bestows them.

The proper Business of Friendship is to inspire Life and Courage; and a Soul thus supported, outdoes itself: whereas if it be unexpectedly deprived of these Succours, it droops and languishes.

We are in some measure more inexcusable if we violate our Duties to a Friend, than to a Relation: since the former arise from a voluntary Choice, the latter from a Necessity to which we could not give our own Consent.

As it has been said on one side, that a Man ought not to break with a faulty Friend, that he may not expose the Weakness of his Choice; it will doubtless hold much stronger with respect to a worthy one, that he may never be upbraided for having lost so valuable a Treasure which was once in his Possession.

X.

No. 386. Friday, May 23, 1712. Steele.

'c.u.m Tristibus severe, c.u.m Remissis jucunde, c.u.m Senibus graviter, c.u.m Juventute comiter vivere.'

Tull.

The piece of Latin on the Head of this Paper is part of a Character extremely vicious, but I have set down no more than may fall in with the Rules of Justice and Honour. Cicero spoke it of Catiline, who, he said, lived with the Sad severely, with the Chearful agreeably, with the Old gravely, with the Young pleasantly; he added, with the Wicked boldly, with the Wanton lasciviously. The two last Instances of his Complaisance I forbear to consider, having it in my thoughts at present only to speak of obsequious Behaviour as it sits upon a Companion in Pleasure, not a Man of Design and Intrigue. To vary with every Humour in this Manner, cannot be agreeable, except it comes from a Man's own Temper and natural Complection; to do it out of an Ambition to excel that Way, is the most fruitless and unbecoming Prost.i.tution imaginable. To put on an artful Part to obtain no other End but an unjust Praise from the Undiscerning, is of all Endeavours the most despicable. A Man must be sincerely pleased to become Pleasure, or not to interrupt that of others: For this Reason it is a most calamitous Circ.u.mstance, that many People who want to be alone or should be so, will come into Conversation. It is certain, that all Men who are the least given to Reflection, are seized with an Inclination that Way; when, perhaps, they had rather be inclined to Company: but indeed they had better go home, and be tired with themselves, than force themselves upon others to recover their good Humour. In all this the Cases of communicating to a Friend a sad Thought or Difficulty, in order to relieve [a [1]] heavy Heart, stands excepted; but what is here meant, is, that a Man should always go with Inclination to the Turn of the Company he is going into, or not pretend to be of the Party. It is certainly a very happy Temper to be able to live with all kinds of Dispositions, because it argues a Mind that lies open to receive what is pleasing to others, and not obstinately bent on any Particularity of its own.

This is that which makes me pleased with the Character of my good Acquaintance Acasto. You meet him at the Tables and Conversations of the Wise, the Impertinent, the Grave, the Frolick, and the Witty; and yet his own Character has nothing in it that can make him particularly agreeable to any one Sect of Men; but Acasto has natural good Sense, good Nature and Discretion, so that every Man enjoys himself in his company; and tho' Acasto contributes nothing to the Entertainment, he never was at a Place where he was not welcome a second time. Without these subordinate good Qualities of Acasto, a Man of Wit and Learning would be painful to the Generality of Mankind, instead of being pleasing. Witty Men are apt to imagine they are agreeable as such, and by that means grow the worst Companions imaginable; they deride the Absent or rally the Present in a wrong manner, not knowing that if you pinch or tickle a Man till he is uneasy in his Seat, or ungracefully distinguished from the rest of the Company, you equally hurt him.

I was going to say, the true Art of being agreeable in Company, (but there can be no such thing as Art in it) is to appear well pleased with those you are engaged with, and rather to seem well entertained, than to bring Entertainment to others. A Man thus disposed is not indeed what we ordinarily call a good Companion, but essentially is such, and in all the Parts of his Conversation has something friendly in his Behaviour, which conciliates Men's Minds more than the highest Sallies of Wit or Starts of Humour can possibly do. The Feebleness of Age in a Man of this Turn, has something which should be treated with respect even in a Man no otherwise venerable. The Forwardness of Youth, when it proceeds from Alacrity and not Insolence, has also its Allowances. The Companion who is formed for such by Nature, gives to every Character of Life its due Regards, and is ready to account for their Imperfections, and receive their Accomplishments as if they were his own. It must appear that you receive Law from, and not give it to your Company, to make you agreeable.