The Young Gentleman and Lady's Monitor, and English Teacher's Assistant Part 21

9. The number of adorers, and the perpetual distraction of my thoughts by new schemes of pleasures, prevented me from listening to any of those who crowd in mult.i.tudes to give girls advice, and kept me unmarried and unengaged to my twenty-seventh year, when, as I was towering in all the pride of uncontested excellency, with a face yet little impaired, and a mind hourly improving, the failure of a fund, in which my money was placed, reduced me to a frugal competency, which allowed a little beyond neatness and independence.

10. I bore the diminution of my riches without any outrages of sorrow, or pusillanimity of dejection. Indeed I did not know how much I had lost, for having always heard and thought more of my wit and beauty, than of my fortune, it did not suddenly enter my imagination, that Melissa could sink beneath her established rank, while her form and her mind continued the same; that she should cease to raise admiration, but by ceasing to deserve it, or feel any stroke but from the hand of time.

11. It was in my power to have concealed the loss, and to have married, by continuing the same appearance, with all the credit of my original fortune; but I was not so far sunk in my esteem, as to submit to the baseness of fraud, or to desire any other recommendation than sense and virtue.

12. I therefore dismissed my equipage, sold those ornaments which were become unsuitable to my new condition, and appeared among those with whom I used to converse with less glitter, but with equal spirit.

13. I found myself received at every visit with sorrow beyond what is naturally felt for calamities in which we have no part, and was entertained with condolence and consolation so frequently repeated, that my friends plainly consulted rather their own gratification, than my relief.

14. Some from that time refused my acquaintance, and forebore without any provocation, to repay my visits; some visited me, but after a longer interval than usual, and every return was still with more delay; nor did any of my female acquaintances fail to introduce the mention of my misfortunes, to compare my present and former condition, to tell me how much it must trouble me to want that splendor which I became so well; to look at pleasures, which I had formerly enjoyed, and to sink to a level with those by whom I had been considered as moving in a higher sphere, and who had hitherto approached me with reverence and submission, which I was now no longer to expect.

15. Observations like these are commonly nothing better than covert insults, which serve to give vent to the flatulence of pride, but they are now and then imprudently uttered by honesty and benevolence, and inflict pain where kindness is intended; I will, therefore, so far maintain my antiquated claim to politeness, as to venture the establishment of this rule, that no one ought to remind another of misfortunes of which the sufferer does not complain, and which there are no means proposed of alleviating.

16. You have no right to excite thoughts which necessarily give pain whenever they return, and which, perhaps, might not have revived but by absurd and unseasonable compa.s.sion.

17. My endless train of lovers immediately withdrew without raising any emotions. The greater part had indeed always professed to court, as it is termed upon the square, had enquired my fortune, and offered settlements; these undoubtedly had a right to retire without censure, since they had openly treated for money, as necessary to their happiness, and who can tell how little they wanted any other portion?

18. I have always thought the clamours of women unreasonable, who imagine themselves injured, because the men who followed them upon the supposition of a greater fortune, reject them when they are discovered to have less. I have never known any lady, who did not think wealth a t.i.tle to some stipulations in her favour; and surely what is claimed by the possession of money, is justly forfeited by its loss.

19. She that has once demanded a settlement, has allowed the importance of fortune; and when she cannot shew pecuniary merit, why should she think her cheapner obliged to purchase?

20. My lovers were not all contented with silent desertion. Some of them revenged the neglect which they had formerly endured by wanton and superfluous insults, and endeavoured to mortify me, by paying in my presence those civilities to other ladies, which were once devoted only to me.

21. But as it had been my rule to treat men according to the rank of their intellect, I had never suffered any one to waste his life in suspense who could have employed it to better purpose, and had therefore no enemies but c.o.xcombs, whose resentment and respect were equally below my consideration.

22. The only pain which I have felt from degradation, is the loss of that influence which I have always exerted on the side of virtue, in the defence of innocence and the a.s.sertion of truth. I now find my opinions slighted, my sentiments criticised, and my arguments opposed by those that used to listen to me without reply, and struggle to be first in expressing their conviction.

23. The female disputants have wholly thrown off my authority, and if I endeavour to enforce my reasons by an appeal to the scholars that happen to be present, the wretches are certain to pay their court by sacrificing me and my system to a finer gown; and I am every hour insulted with contradiction by cowards, who could never find till lately, that Melissa was liable to error.

24. There are two persons only whom I cannot charge with having changed their conduct with my change of fortune. One is an old curate, that has pa.s.sed his life in the duties of his profession, with great reputation for his knowledge and piety; the other is a lieutenant of dragoons. The parson made no difficulty in the height of my elevation, to check me when I was pert, and instruct me when I blundered; and if there is any alteration, he is now more timorous lest his freedom should be thought rudeness.

25. The soldier never paid me any particular addresses, but very rigidly observed all the rules of politeness, which he is now so far from relaxing, that whenever he serves the tea, he obstinately carries me the first dish, in defiance of the frowns and whispers of the table.

26. This, Mr. Rambler, is _to see the world_. It is impossible for those that have only known affluence and prosperity, to judge rightly of themselves or others. The rich and the powerful live in a perpetual masquerade, in which all about them wear borrowed characters; and we only discover in what estimation we are held, when we can no longer give hopes or fears.

_I am_, &c. MELISSA.

_On the Omniscience and Omnipresence of the Deity, together with the Immensity of his Works._

1. I was yesterday about sun-set walking in the open fields, till the night insensibly fell upon me. I at first amused myself with all the richness and variety of colours, which appeared in the western parts of heaven; in proportion as they faded away and went out, several stars and planets appeared one after another, till the whole firmament was in a glow. The blueness of the aether was exceedingly heightened and enlivened by the season of the year, and by the rays of all those luminaries that pa.s.sed through it.

2. The _Galaxy_ appeared in its most beautiful white. To complete the scene, the full moon rose at length in that clouded majesty, which _Milton_ takes notice of, and opened to the eye a new picture of nature, which was more finely shaded, and disposed among softer lights, than that which the sun had before discovered to us.

3. As I was surveying the moon, walking in her brightness, and taking her progress among the constellations, a thought rose in me which I believe very often perplexes and disturbs men of serious and contemplative natures. _David_ himself fell into it in that reflection, _When I consider the heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and stars which thou hast ordained; what is man, that thou art mindful of him, and the son of man, that thou regardest him!_

4. In the same manner, when I consider that infinite host of stars, or, to speak more philosophically, of suns, who were then s.h.i.+ning upon me, with those innumerable sets of planets or worlds, which were moving round their respective suns; when I still enlarged the idea, and supposed another heaven of suns and worlds rising still above this which he had discovered, and these still enlightened by a superior firmament of luminaries, which are planted at so great a distance, that they may appear to the inhabitants of the former as the stars do to us; in short, while I pursued this thought, I could not but reflect on that little insignificant figure which I myself bore amidst the immensity of G.o.d's works.

5. Were the sun, which enlightens this part of the creation, with all the host of planetary worlds that move about him, utterly extinguished and annihilated, they would not be missed, more than a grain of sand upon the sea-sh.o.r.e. The s.p.a.ce they possess is so exceedingly little in comparison of the whole, that it would scarce make a blank in the creation. The chasm would be imperceptible to an eye that could take in the whole compa.s.s of nature, and pa.s.s from one end of the creation to the other; as it is possible there may be such a sense in ourselves hereafter, or in creatures which are at present more exalted than ourselves.

6. We see many stars by the help of gla.s.ses, which we do not discover with our naked eyes; and the finer our telescopes are, the more still are our discoveries. _Huygenius_ carries his thought so far, that he does not think it impossible there may be stars whose light is not yet travelled down to us, since their first creation. There is no question but the universe has certain bounds set to it; but when we consider that it is the work of infinite power, prompted by infinite goodness, with an infinite s.p.a.ce to exert itself in, how can our imagination set any bounds to it!

7. To return, therefore, to my first thought, I could not but look upon myself with secret horror, as a being that was not worth the smallest regard of one who had so great a work under his care and superintendency. I was afraid of being overlooked amidst the immensity of nature, and lost among that infinite variety of creatures, which in all probability swarm through all these immeasurable regions of matter.

In order to recover myself from this mortifying thought, I consider that it took its rise from those narrow conceptions which we are apt to maintain of the divine nature. We ourselves cannot attend to many different objects at the same time. If we are careful to inspect some things, we must of course neglect others.

8. This imperfection which we observe in ourselves, is an imperfection that cleaves in some degree to creatures of the highest capacities, as they are creatures, that is, beings of finite and limited natures. The presence of every created being is confined to a certain measure of s.p.a.ce, and consequently his observation is stinted to a certain number of objects. The sphere in which we move, and act, and understand, is of a wider circ.u.mference to one creature than another, according as we rise one above another in the scale of existence.

9. But the widest of these our spheres has its circ.u.mference. When, therefore, we reflect on the divine nature, we are so used and accustomed to this imperfection in ourselves, that we cannot forbear in some measure ascribing it to him in whom there is no shadow of imperfection. Our reason indeed ascribes that his attributes are infinite, but the poorness of our conceptions is such, that it cannot forbear setting bounds to every thing it contemplates, till our reason comes again to our succour, and throws down all those little prejudices which rise in us unawares, and are natural to the mind of man.

10. We shall therefore utterly extinguish this melancholy thought, of our being overlooked by our Maker in the multiplicity of his works, and the infinity of those objects among which he seems to be incessantly employed, if we consider, in the first place, that he is omnipresent, and in the second, that he is omniscient.

If we consider him in his omnipresence; his being pa.s.ses through, actuates and supports the whole frame of nature. His creation, and every part of it, is full of him.

11. There is nothing he has made, that is either so distant, so little, or so inconsiderable, which he does not essentially inhabit. His substance is within the substance of every being, whether material or immaterial, and is intimately present to it, as that being is to itself.

It would be an imperfection in him, were he able to remove out of one place into another, or to withdraw himself from any thing he has created, or from any part of that s.p.a.ce which is diffused and spread abroad to infinity. In short, to speak of him in the language of the old philosophers, He is a being whose centre is every where, and his circ.u.mference no where.

12. In the second place, he is omniscient as well as omnipresent. His omniscience, indeed, necessarily and naturally flows from his omnipresence. He cannot but be conscious of every motion that arises in the whole material world, which he thus essentially pervades; and of every thought that is stirring in the intellectual world, to every part of which he is thus intimately united. Several moralists have considered the creation as the temple of G.o.d, which he has built with his own hands, and which is filled with his presence.

13. Others have considered infinite s.p.a.ce as the receptacle, or rather the habitation of the Almighty; but the n.o.blest, and most exalted way of considering this infinite s.p.a.ce, is that of Sir _Isaac Newton_, who calls it the _sensorium_ of the G.o.dhead. Brutes and men have their _sensoria_, or little _sensoriums_, by which they apprehend the presence and perceive the actions of a few objects that lie contiguous to them.

Their knowledge and apprehension turn within a very narrow circle. But as G.o.d Almighty cannot but perceive and know every thing in which he resides, infinite s.p.a.ce gives room to infinite knowledge, and is, as it were, an organ to omniscience.

14. Were the soul separate from the body, and with one glance of thought should start beyond the bounds of the creation; should it for millions of years continue its progress through infinite s.p.a.ce with the same activity, it would still find itself within the embraces of its Creator, and encompa.s.sed round with the immensity of the G.o.dhead. While we are in the body, he is hot less present with us because he is concealed from us. _Oh that I knew where I might find him_! says Job. _Behold I go forward, but he is not there; and backward, but I cannot perceive him; on the left hand, where he does work, but I cannot behold him: he hideth himself on the right hand, that I cannot see him._ In short, reason as well as revelation a.s.sures us, that he cannot be absent from us, notwithstanding he is undiscovered by us.

15. In this consideration of G.o.d Almighty's omnipresence and omniscience, every uncomfortable thought vanishes. He cannot but regard every thing that has beings especially such of his creatures who fear they are not regarded by him. He is privy to all their thoughts, and to that anxiety of heart in particular, which is apt to trouble them on this occasion; for, as it is impossible he should overlook any of his creatures, so we may be confident that he regards, with an eye of mercy, those who endeavour to recommend themselves to his notice, and in unfeigned humility of heart think themselves unworthy that he should be mindful of them.

_Motives to Piety and Virtue, drawn from the Omniscience and Omnipresence of the Deity._

SPECTATOR, No. 571.

1. In your paper of Friday the 9th instant, you had occasion to consider the ubiquity of the G.o.dhead; and at the same time to shew, that as he is presented every thing, he cannot but be attentive to every thing, and privy to all the modes and parts of its existence; or, in other words, that his omniscience and omnipresence are co-existent, and run together through the whole infinitude of s.p.a.ce.

2. This consideration might furnish us with many incentives to devotion, and motives to morality; but as this subject has been handled by several excellent writers, I shall consider it in a light wherein I have not seen it placed by others.

_First_, How disconsolate is the condition of an intellectual being who is thus present with his Maker, but at the same time receives no extraordinary benefit or advantage from this his presence!

3. _Secondly_, How deplorable is the condition of an intellectual being, who feels no other effects from this his presence, but such as proceed from divine wrath and indignation!

_Thirdly_, How happy is the condition of that intellectual being, who is sensible of his Maker's presence from the secret effects of his mercy and loving kindness!

4. _first_, How disconsolate is the condition of an intellectual being who is thus present with his Maker, but at the same time receives no extraordinary benefit or advantage from this his presence! Every particle of matter is actuated by this Almighty Being which pa.s.ses through it. The heavens and the earth, the stars and planets, move, and gravitate by virtue of this great principle within them. All the dead parts of nature are invigorated by the presence of their Creator, and made capable of exerting their respective qualities.