"The highest stations cannot therefore hope to be the abodes of happinefs, which I would willingly believe to have fled from thrones and palaces to feats of humble privacy and placid obfcurity. For what can hinder the fatisfaction, or intercept the expectations, of him whofe abilities are adequate to his employments, who fees with his own eyes the whole circuit of his influence, who chooses by his own knowledge all whom he trufts, and whom none are tempted to deceive by hope or fear? Surely he has nothing to do but to love and to be loved, to be virtuous and to be happy."

"Whether perfect happiness would be procured by perfect goodness, faid Nekayah, this world will never afford an opportunity of deciding. But this, at leaft, may be maintained, that we do not always find visible happiness in proportion to vifible virtue. All natural, and almost all political evils, are incident alike to the bad and good: they are confounded in the mifery of a famine, and not much distinguished in the fury of a faction; they fink together in a tempeft, and are driven together from their country by invaders. All that virtue can afford is quietnefs of confcience, a fteady profpect of a happier ftate; this may enable us to endure calamity with patience; but remember that patience muft fuppofe pain."

CHAP. XXVIII.

RASSELAS AND NEKAYAH CONTINUE THEIR CON

'DEAR

VERSATION.

EAR princefs, faid Raffelas, you fall into the common errours of exaggeratory declamation, by producing, in a familiar difquifition, examples of national calamities, and fcenes of extenfive mifery, which are found in books rather than in the world, and which, as they are horrid, are ordained to be rare. Let us not imagine evils which we do not feel, nor injure life by mifrepresentations. I cannot bear that querulous eloquence which threatens every city with a fiege like that of Jerufalem, that makes famine attend on every flight of locufts, and fufpends peftilence on the wing of every blast that iffues from the fouth.

"On neceffary and inevitable evils, which overwhelm kingdoms at once, all difputation is vain: when they happen they must be endured. But it is evident, that these bursts of universal distress are more dreaded than felt; "thousands and ten thoufands flourish in youth, and wither in age, without the knowledge of any other than domeftick evils, and share the fame pleasures and vexations, whether their kings are mild or cruel, whether the armies of their country persue their enemies, or retreat before them. While courts are disturbed with in testine competitions, and ambaffadors are negociating in foreign countries, the fmith still plies his anvil, and the husbandman drives his plow forward; the neceffaries of life are required and ob

tained;

tained; and the fucceffive business of the feafons continues to make its wonted revolutions.

"Let us cease to confider what, perhaps, may never happen, and what, when it shall happen, will laugh at human fpeculation. We will not endeavour to modify the motions of the elements, or to fix the destiny of kingdoms. It is our bufinefs to confider what beings like us may perform; each labouring for his own happiness, by promoting within his circle, however narrow, the happiness of others.

"Marriage is evidently the dictate of nature; men and women are made to be companions of each other, and therefore I cannot be perfuaded but that marriage is one of the means of happiness."

"I know not, faid the princefs, whether marriage be more than one of the innumerable modes of human mifery. When I fee and reckon the various forms of connubial infelicity, the unexpected caufes of lafting difcord, the diverfities of temper, the oppofitions of opinion, the rude collifions of contrary defire where both are urged by violent impulfes, the obftinate contefts of difagreeable virtues, where both are fupported by conscioufnefs of good intention, I am fometimes difpofed to think with the feverer cafuifts of moft nations, that marriage is rather permitted than approved, and that none, but by the inftigation of a paffion too much indulged, entangle themselves with indiffoluble compacts."

"You seem to forget, replied Raffelas, that you have, even now, reprefented celibacy as lefs happy than marriage. Both conditions may be bad, but they cannot both be worst. Thus it happens when

wrong

wrong opinions are entertained, that they mutually destroy each other, and leave the mind open to truth."

"I did not expect, anfwered the princefs, to hear that imputed to falfehood which is the confequence only of frailty. To the mind, as to the eye, it is difficult to compare with exactness objects vaft in their extent, and various in their Where we parts. fee or conceive the whole at once, we readily note the discriminations, and decide the preference: but of two fyftems, of which neither can be furveyed by any human being in its full compass of magnitude and multiplicity of complication, where is the wonder, that judging of the whole by parts, I am alternately affected by one and the other as either preffes on my memory or fancy? We differ from ourselves juft as we differ from each other, when we fee only part of the question, as in the multifarious relations of politicks and morality; but when we perceive the whole at once, as in numerical computations, all agree in one judgment, and none ever varies his opinion."

"Let us not add, faid the prince, to the other evils of life, the bitterness of controverfy, nor endeavour to vie with each other in fubtilties of argument. We are employed in a fearch, of which both are equally to enjoy the success, or suffer by the mifcarriage. It is therefore fit that we aflift each other. You furely conclude too haftily from the infelicity of marriage against its inftitution: will not the mifery of life prove equally that life cannot be the gift of heaven? The world must be peopled by marriage, or peopled without it."

"How

"How the world is to be peopled, returned Nekayah, is not my care, and needs not be yours. I fee no danger that the prefent generation fhould omit to leave fucceffors behind them: we are not now inquiring for the world, but for ourselves."

CHAP. XXVIII.

THE DEBATE OF MARRIAGE CONTINUED.

THE

HE good of the whole, fays Raffelas, is the fame with the good of all its parts. If marriage be beft for mankind, it must be evidently best for individuals, or a permanent and neceffary duty must be the cause of evil, and some must be inevitably facrificed to the convenience of others. In the estimate which you have made of the two states, it appears that the incommodities of a fingle life are, in a great measure, neceffary and certain, but thofe of the conjugal state accidental and avoidable.

"I cannot forbear to flatter myfelf, that prudence and benevolence will make marriage happy. The general folly of mankind is the caufe of general complaint. What can be expected but difappointment and repentance from a choice made in the immaturity of youth, in the ardour of defire, without judgment, without forefight, without inquiry after conformity of opinions, fimilarity of manners, rectitude of judgment, or purity of fentiment?

"Such is the common procefs of marriage. A youth or maiden meeting by chance, or brought, together by artifice, exchange glances, reciprocate civilities, go home, and dream of one another.