THE

HISTORY

OF A

FOUNDLING.

BOOK X.

In which the Hiftory goes forward about twelve

Hours.

CHAP. I.

Containing Inftructions very necessary to be perufed by modern Critics.

READER, it is impoffible we should know what fort of perfon thou wilt be: for, perhaps, thou may'st be as learned in human nature as Shakespeare himself was; and, perhaps, thou may'st be no wiser than fome of his Editors. Now left this latter fhould be the cafe, we think proper, before we go any farther together, to give thee a few wholefome admonitions; that thou may'ft not as grofsly misunderstand and misreprefent us, as fome VOL. III.

A

of the faid Editors have misunderstood and mifrepresented their author.

First, then, we warn thee not too haftily to condemn any of the incidents in this our History, as impertinent and foreign to our main defign, because thou doft not immediately conceive in what manner such incident may conduce to that defign. This Work may, indeed, be confidered as a great creation of our own; and for a little reptile of a critic to prefume to find fault with any of its parts, without knowing the manner in which the whole is connected, and before he comes to the final catastrophe, is a moft prefumptuous abfurdity. The allufion and metaphor we have here made ufe of, we must acknowledge to be infinitely too great for our occafion; but there is indeed, no other, which is at all adequate to exprefs the difference between an author of the firft rate, and a critic of the lowest.

Another caution we would give thee, my good reptile, is, that thou doft not find out too near a resemblance between certain characters here introduced; as for instance, between the landlady who appears in the feventh Book, and her in the ninth. Thou art to know, friend, that there are certain characteristics, in which moft individuals of every profeffion and occupation agree. To be able to preserve these characteristics, and at the fame time to diverfify their operations, is one talent of a good writer. Again, to mark the

nice diftinction between two perfons actuated by the fame vice or folly, is another; and as this laft talent is found in very few writers, fo is the true difcernment of it found in as few readers; though, I believe, the obfervation of this forms a very principal pleasure in those who are capable of the discovery: every perfon, for inftance, can diftinguish between Sir Epicure Mammon, and Sir Fopling Flutter; but to note the difference between Sir Fopling Flutter and Sir Courtly Nice, requires a more exquifite judgment: for want of which, vulgar fpectators of plays very often do great injuftice in the theatre; where I have fometimes known a poet in danger of being convict ed as a thief, upon much worfe evidence than the refemblance of hands has been held to be in the law. In reality, I apprehend every amorous widow on the ftage would run the hazard of being condemned as a fervile imitation of Dido, but that happily very few of our play-houfe critics underftand enough of Latin to read Virgil.

In the next place, we must admonifh thee, my worthy friend (for, perhaps, thy heart may be better than thy head) not to condemn a character as a bad one, because it is not perfectly a good one. If thou doft delight in these models of perfection, there are books enow written to gratify thy taste; but as we have not, in the course of our converfation, ever happened to meet with any fuch perfon, we have not chofen to introduce any fuch here. To fay the truth, I a little question whether mere

man ever arrived at this confummate degree of excellence, as well as whether there has ever existed a monster bad enough to verify that

nulla virtute redemptum

A vitiis *

in Juvenal: nor do I, indeed, conceive the good purposes ferved by inserting characters of fuch angelic perfection, or fuch diabolical depravity, in any work of invention: fince from contemplating either, the mind of man is more likely to be overwhelmed with forrow and fhame, than to draw any good ufes from fuch patterns; for in the former inftance he may be both concerned and afhamed to fee a pattern of excellence, in his nature, which he may, reasonably defpair of ever arriving at; and in contemplating the latter, he may be no lefs affected with thofe uneafy fenfations, at feeing the nature, of which he is a partaker, degraded into fo odious and deteftable a creature.

In fact, if there be enough of good nefs in a character to engage the admiration and affection of a well-difpofed mind, though there fhould appear fome of those little blemishes, quas humana parum canit natura, they will raife our compaffion rather than our abhorrence. Indeed, nothing can be of more moral use than the imperfections which are feen in examples of this kind; fince fuch form a ⚫ kind of furprife, more apt to affect and dwell upon our minds, than the faults of very vicious and

*

Whofe vices are not allayed with a fingle virtue.

wicked perfons. The foibles and vices of men in whom there is great mixture of good, become more glaring objects, from the virtues which contrast them, and fhow their deformity; and when we find fuch vices attended with their evil confequence to our favorite characters, we are not only taught to fhun them for our own fake, but to hate them for the mischiefs they have already brought on those we love.

And now, my friend, having given you these few admonitions, we will, if you pleafe, once more fet forward with our Hiftory.

CHA P. I I.

Containing the Arrival of an Irish Gentleman, with very extraordinary Adventures which ensued at the Inn.

Now

OW the little trembling hare, which the dread of all her numerous enemies, and chiefly of that cunning, cruel, carnivorous animal, Man, had confined all the day to her lurking - places, sports wantonly over the lawns: now on fome hollow tree the owl, fhrill chorifter of the night, hoots forth notes which might charm the ears of fome modern connoiffeurs in mufic: now in the ima gination of the half-drunk clown, as he ftaggers through the church-yard, or rather charnel-yard, to his home, fear paints the bloody hobgoblin: now thieves and ruffians are awake, and honest watchmen fast asleep. In plain English, it was