ponderous, they were not able to stir the opposite balance, nor could they have prevailed, though assisted with the weight of the sun, the stars, and the earth. Upon emptying the scales, I laid several titles and honours, with pomps, triumphs, and many weights of the like nature, in one of them, and seeing a little glittering weight lie by me, I threw it accidentally into the other scale, when, to my great surprise, it proved so exact a counterpoise, that it kept the balance in an equilibrium. This little glittering weight was inscribed upon the 10 edges of it with the word Vanity. I found there were several other weights which were equally heavy, and exact counterpoises to one another; a few of them I tried, as avarice and poverty, riches and content, with some others. There were likewise several weights that were of the same figure, and seemed to correspond with each other, but were entirely different when thrown into the scales; as religion and hypocrisy, pedantry and learning, wit and vivacity, superstition and devotion, gravity and wisdom, with many others. I observed one particular weight lettered on both sides, and, 20 upon applying myself to the reading of it I found on one side written, 'In the dialect of men,' and underneath it, CALAMITIES; on the other side was written, 'In the language of the gods,' and underneath BLESSINGS. I found the intrinsic value of this weight to be much greater than I imagined, for it overpowered health, wealth, good fortune, and many other weights, which were much more ponderous in my hand than the other. There is a saying among the Scots, that ‘An ounce of mother wit is worth a pound of clergy:' I was sensible of the truth of this saying, when I saw the difference between the weight of 30 natural parts and that of learning. The observation which I made upon these two weights opened to me a new field of discoveries; for notwithstanding the weight of natural parts was much heavier than that of learning, I observed that it weighed an hundred times heavier than it did before, when I put learning into the same scale with it. I made the same observation upon faith and morality; for notwithstanding the latter out-weighed the former separately, it received a thousand times more additional weight from its conjunction with the former than what it had by itself. This odd phænomenon shewed itself in other 40 particulars, as in wit and judgment, philosophy and religion, justice and humanity, zeal and charity, depth of sense and perspicuity of style, with innumerable other particulars too long to be mentioned in this paper. As a dream seldom fails of dashing seriousness with impertinence, mirth with gravity, methought I made several other experiments of a more ludicrous nature: by one of which I found that an English octavo was very often heavier than a French folio; and by another, that an old Greek or Latin author weighed down a whole library of moderns. Seeing one of my 10 Spectators lying by me, I laid it into one of the scales, and flung a two-penny piece into the other: the reader will not inquire into the event, if he remembers the first trial which I have recorded in this paper ". I afterwards threw both the sexes into the balance; but, as it is not for my interest to disoblige either of them, I shall desire to be excused from telling the result of this experiment. Having an opportunity of this nature in my hands, I could not forbear throwing into one scale the principles of a Tory, and into the other those of a Whig; but, as I have all along declared this to be a neutral paper, I shall likewise desire 20 to be silent under this head also, though, upon examining one of the weights, I saw the word TEKEL engraven on it in capital letters ". I made many other experiments, and, though I have not room for them all in this day's speculation, I may perhaps reserve them for another. I shall only add, that upon my awaking I was sorry to find my golden scales vanished, but resolved for the future to learn this lesson from them, Not to despise or value any things for their appearances, but to regulate my esteem and passions towards them according to their real and intrinsic value.-C. No. 464. The Story of Chremylus. Auream quisquis mediocritatem Sordibus tecti, caret invidenda HOR. Od. ii. 10, 5. * * * 30 Chremylus, who was an old and a good man, and withal exceeding poor, being desirous to leave some riches to his son, consults the oracle of Apollo upon the subject. The oracle bid him follow the first man he should see upon his going out of the temple. The person he chanced to see was to appearance an old sordid blind man, but, upon his following him from place to place, he at last found, by his own confession, that he was Plutus the god of riches, and that he was just come out of the house of a miser. Plutus further told him, that when he was a boy he used to declare, that as soon as he came to age he would distribute wealth to none but virtuous and just men; upon 10 which Jupiter, considering the pernicious consequences of such a resolution, took his sight away from him, and left him to stroll about the world in the blind condition wherein Chremylus beheld him. With much ado Chremylus prevailed upon him to go to his house; where he met an old woman in a tattered raiment, who had been his guest for many years, and whose name was Poverty. The old woman refusing to turn out so easily as he would have her, he threatened to banish her, not only from his own house, but out of all Greece, if she made any more words upon the matter. Poverty on this occasion pleads her cause very 20 notably, and represents to her old landlord, that should she be driven out of the country, all their trades, arts, and sciences, would be driven out with her; and that, if every one was rich, they would never be supplied with those pomps, ornaments, and conveniences of life which make riches desirable. She likewise represented to him the several advantages which she bestowed upon her votaries, in regard to their shape, their health and their activity, by preserving them from gouts, dropsies, unwieldliness and intemperance; but whatever she had to say for herself, she was at last forced to troop off. Chremylus immediately con30 sidered how he might restore Plutus to his sight; and in order to it, conveyed him to the temple of Esculapius, who was famous for cures and miracles of this nature. By this means the deity recovered his eyes, and began to make a right use of them, by enriching every one that was distinguished by piety towards the gods, and justice towards men; and at the same time by taking away his gifts from the impious and undeserving. This produces several merry incidents, till, in the very last act, Mercury descends with great complaints from the gods, that, since the good men were grown rich, they had received no sacrifices; which is 40 confirmed by a priest of Jupiter, who enters with a remonstrance, AN ANTEDILUVIAN COURTSHIP. 421 that since this late innovation he was reduced to a starving condition, and could not live upon his office. Chremylus, who, in the beginning of the play, was religious in his poverty, concludes it with a proposal which was relished by all the good men who were now grown rich, as well as himself, that they should carry Plutus in a solemn procession to the temple, and instal him in the place of Jupiter. This allegory instructed the Athenians in two points; first, as it vindicated the conduct of Providence in its ordinary distributions of wealth; and, in the next place, as it 10 shewed the great tendency of riches to corrupt the morals of those who possessed them ".-C. No. 584. The Loves of Hilpa. Hic gelidi fontes, hic mollia prata, Lycori, VIRG. Ecl. X. 42. Hilpa was one of the 150 daughters of Zilpah, of the race of Cohu, by whom some of the learned think is meant Cain. She was exceedingly beautiful, and when she was but a girl of threescore and ten years of age, received the addresses of several who made love to her. Among these were two brothers, Harpath and Shalum. Harpath, being the first-born, was master of that fruitful region which lies at the foot of mount Tirzah, in the southern parts of China. Shalum (which is to say, the planter, 20 in the Chinese language) possessed all the neighbouring hills, and that great range of mountains which goes under the name of Tirzah. Harpath was of a haughty contemptuous spirit; Shalum was of a gentle disposition, beloved both by God and man. 30 It is said that, among the antediluvian women, the daughters of Cohu had their minds wholly set upon riches; for which reason the beautiful Hilpa preferred Harpath to Shalum, because of his numerous flocks and herds that covered all the low country which runs along the foot of mount Tirzah, and is watered by several fountains and streams breaking out of the sides of that mountain. Harpath made so quick a dispatch of his courtship, that he married Hilpa in the hundredth year of her age; and being of an insolent temper, laughed to scorn his brother Shalum for having pretended to the beautiful Hilpa, when he was master of nothing but a long chain of rocks and mountains. This so much provoked Shalum, that he is said to have cursed his brother in the bitterness of his heart, and to have prayed that one of his mountains might fall upon his head if ever he came within the shadow of it. From this time forward Harpath would never venture out of the vallies, but came to an untimely end in the 250th year of his age, being drowned in a river as he attempted to cross it. This river is called to this day, from his name who perished in it, the river Harpath, and what is very remarkable, issues out of one of Io those mountains which Shalum wished might fall upon his brother, when he cursed him in the bitterness of his heart. Hilpa was in the 160th year of her age at the death of her husband, having brought him but 50 children before he was snatched away, as has been already related. Many of the antediluvians made love to the young widow, though no one was thought so likely to succeed in her affections as her first lover Shalum, who renewed his court to her about ten years after the death of Harpath; for it was not thought decent in those days that a widow should be seen by a man within ten years after the 20 decease of her husband. Shalum falling into a deep melancholy, and resolving to take away that objection which had been raised against him when he made his first addresses to Hilpa, began, immediately after her marriage with Harpath, to plant all that mountainous region which fell to his lot in the division of this country. He knew how to adapt every plant to its proper soil, and is thought to have inherited many traditional secrets of that art from the first man. This employment turned at length to his profit as well as his amusement; his mountains were in a few years shaded with young 30 trees, that gradually shot up into groves, woods, and forests, intermixed with walks and lawns and gardens; insomuch that the whole region, from a naked and desolate prospect, began now to look like a second paradise. The pleasantness of the place, and the agreeable disposition of Shalum, who was reckoned one of the mildest and wisest of all who lived before the flood, drew into it multitudes of people, who were perpetually employed in the sinking of wells, the digging of trenches, and the hollowing of trees, for the better distribution of water through every part of this spacious plantation. 40 The habitations of Shalum looked every year more beautiful |