members take possession of their seats, and the house soon resounds with resolutions for the impeachment of the minister Strafford, and the primate Laud. The humble monarch confirms the fatal bill of attainder, and sends Strafford to the scaffold; he ratifies the act for securing parliament against future dissolution, and subscribes to his own deathwarrant with the same pen.

The proceedings of this famous parliament are of a mixt nature; in many we discern the true spirit of patriotism, and not a few seem dictated by revenge and violence: the Courts of High Commission and Star-Chamber are abolished, and posterity applauds their deliverers; the city-crosses are pulled down, the bishops sent to the Tower, and their whole order menaced with expulsion from parliament, and here we discover the first dawnings of fanatic phrensy. An incurable breach is made in the constitution: its branches are dissevered, and the axe of rebellion is laid to the root of the tree. The royal standard is set up; the father of his people becomes the general of a party, and the land is floated with the blood of its late peaceable inhabitants. Great characters start forth in the concussion, great virtues and great vices. Equal courage and superior conduct at length prevail for the leaders of the people; a fanatic champion carries all before him; the sovereign surrenders himself weakly; capitulates feebly, negociates deceitfully, and dies heroically.

And this is the reign, this is the exit of a king! Let kings ponder it, for it is a lesson, humbling, perhaps, to the pride of station, but pointedly addressed to their instruction.

If there is a trust in life, which calls upon the conscience of a man who undertakes it more strongly than any other, it is that of the education of an heir

apparent to a crown: the training such a pupil is a task, indeed; how to open his mind to a proper knowledge of mankind, without letting in that knowledge which inclines to evil; how to hold off flattery, and yet admit familiarity; how to give the lights of information, and shut out the false colours of seduction, demands a judgement for distinguishing and an authority for controuling, which few governors in that delicate situation ever possess, or can long retain. To educate a prince, born to reign over an enlightened people, upon the narrow scale of secret and sequestered tuition, would be an abuse of common sense; to let him loose upon the world is no less hazardous in the other extreme, and each would probably devote him to an inglorious destiny. That he should know the leading characters in the country he is to govern, be familiar with its history, its constitution, manners, laws, and liberties, and correctly comprehend the duties and distinctions of his own hereditary office, are points that no one will dispute. That he should travel through his kingdom I can hardly doubt, but whether those excursions should reach into other states, politically connected with, or opposed to, his own, is more than I will presume to lay down as a general rule, being aware that it must depend upon personal circumstances: splendour he may be indulged in, but excess in that, as in every thing else, must be avoided, for the mischiefs cannot be numbered which it will entail upon him: excess in expense will subject him to obligations of a degrading sort; excess in courtesy will lay him open to the forward and assuming, raise mountains of expectation about him, and all of them undermined by disappointment, ready charged for explosion, when the hand of presumption shall set fire to the train: excess in pleasure will lower him in character, destroy

health, respect, and that becoming dignity of mind, that conscious rectitude, which is to direct and support him, when he becomes the dispenser of justice to his subjects, the protector and defender of their religion, the model for their imitation, and the sovereign arbiter of life and death in the execution of every legal condemnation. To court popularity is both derogatory and dangerous, nor should he who is destined to rule over the whole, condescend to put himself in the league of a party. To be a protector of learning, and a patron of the arts, is worthy of a prince, but let him beware how he sinks himself into a pedant or a virtuoso. It is a mean talent, which excels in trifles; the fine arts are more likely to flourish under a prince, whose ignorance of them is qualified by general and impartial good-will towards their professors, than by one, who is himself a dabbler; for such will always have their favourites, and favouritism never fails to irritate the minds of men of genius concerned in the same studies, and turns the spirit of emulation into the gall of acrimony.

Above all things let it be his inviolable maxim to distinguish strongly and pointedly in his attentions. between men of virtuous morals and men of vicious. There is nothing so glorious and at the same time nothing so easy; if his countenance is turned to men of principle and character, if he bestows his smile upon the worthy only, he need be at little pains to frown upon the profligate, all such vermin will crawl out of his path, and shrink away from his presence. Glittering talents will be no passport for dissolute morals, and ambition will then be retained in no other cause, but that of virtue; men will not choose crooked passages and bye-alleys to preferment, when the broad highway of honesty is laid open and straight before them. A prince,

though he gives a good example in his own person, what does he profit the world, if he draws it back again by the bad example of those whom he employs and favours? Better might it be for a nation, to see a libertine on its throne, surrounded by virtuous counsellors, than to contemplate a virtuous sovereign, delegating his authority to unprincipled and licentious servants.

The king who declares his resolution of countenancing the virtuous only amongst his subjects, speaks the language of an honest man: if he makes good his declaration, he performs the functions of one, and earns the blessings of a righteous king; a life of glory in this world, and an immortality of happiness in the world to come.

NUMBER LV.

Non erat his locus.

HOR. ARS POET. 19.

THERE is a certain delicacy in some men's nature, which, though not absolutely to be termed a moral attribute, is nevertheless so grateful to society at large, and so recommendatory of those who possess it, that even the best and worthiest characters cannot be truly pleasing without it. I know not how to describe it better than by saying it consists in a happy discernment of times and seasons.'

Though this engaging talent cannot positively be called a virtue, yet it seems to be the result of many virtuous and refined endowments of the mind, which produces it; for when we see any man so tenderly considerate of our feelings, as to put aside his own

for our accommodation and repose, and to consult opportunities with a respectful attention to our ease and leisure, it is natural to us to think favourably of such a disposition, and although much of his discernment may be the effect of a good judgment and proper knowledge of the world, yet there must be a great proportion of sensibility, candour, diffidence, and natural modesty, in the composition of a faculty so conciliating and so graceful. A man may have many good qualities, and yet, if he is unacquainted with the world, he will rarely be found to understand those apt and happy moments of which I am now speaking; for it is a knowledge not to be gained without a nice and accurate observation of mankind, and even when that observation has given it, men, who are wanting in the natural good qualities above described, may indeed avail themselves of such occasions to serve a purpose of their own; but, without a good heart, no man will apply his experience to general practice.

But as it is not upon theories that I wish to employ these papers, I shall now devote the remainder of my attention to such rules and observations as occur to me upon the subject of the times and seasons.

Men, who in the fashionable phrase live out of the world, have a certain awkwardness about them, which is for ever putting them out of their place in society, whenever they are occasionally drawn into it. If it is their studies which have sequestered them from the world, they contract an air of pedantry, which can hardly be endured in any mixed company, without exposing the object of it to ridicule; for the very essence of this contracted habit consists in an utter ignorance of times and seasons. Most of that class of men who are occupied in the education of youth, and not a few of the young men themselves, who are educated by them, are of this de