effectually, that, with all my pains, I could never find a farthing."

By this time my shoe was mended, and satisfying the poor artist for his trouble, and rewarding him besides for his information, I took my leave, and returned home to lengthen out the amusement his conversation afforded, by communicating it to my friend. Adieu.'

LETTER LXVI.

From Lien Chi Altangi, to Hingpo, by the way of Moscow. THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN LOVE AND GRATITUDE [MEN

CIUS AND THE HERMIT. THE STORY OF THE FIDDLE

CASE].2

GENEROSITY, properly applied, will supply every other external advantage in life, but the love of those we converse with; it will procure esteem, and a conduct resembling real affection; but actual love is the spontaneous production of the mind; no generosity can purchase, no rewards increase, nor no liberality continue it: the very person who is obliged, has it not in his power to force his lingering affections upon the object he should love, and voluntarily mix passion with gratitude.

Imparted fortune, and well-placed liberality, may procure the benefactor good-will, may load the person obliged with the sense of the duty he lies under to retaliate; this is gratitude; and simple gratitude, untinctured with love, is all the return an ingenuous mind can bestow for former benefits.

But gratitude and love are almost opposite affections; love is often an involuntary passion, placed upon our com

1 Here ends the first volume in the original editions of the 'Citizen of the World.'-ED.

2 Dated Aug. 19, 1760, in the Public Ledger.-ED.

3 The Ledger version opens-" A proper application of benefits, my son, will supply," &c. Otherwise the letter as it now appears has been a good deal re-written, though not altered in substance.-ED.

panions without our consent, and frequently conferred without our previous esteem. We love some men, we know not why; our tenderness is naturally excited in all their concerns; we excuse their faults with the same in. dulgence, and approve their virtues with the same applause with which we consider our own. While we entertain the passion, it pleases us; we cherish it with delight, and give it up with reluctance; and love for love is all the reward we expect or desire.

Gratitude, on the contrary, is never conferred, but where there have been previous endeavours to excite it; we consider it as a debt, and our spirits wear a load till we have discharged the obligation. Every acknowledgment of gratitude is a circumstance of humiliation; and some are found to submit to frequent mortifications of this kind, proclaiming what obligations they owe, merely because they think it in some measure cancels the debt.

Thus love is the most easy and agreeable, and gratitude the most humiliating affection of the mind: we never reflect on the man we love, without exulting in our choice, while he who has bound us to him by benefits alone, rises to our idea as a person to whom we have in some measure forfeited our freedom. Love and gratitude are seldom, therefore, found in the same breast without impairing each other; we may tender the one or the other singly to those we converse with, but cannot command both together. By attempting to increase, we diminish them; the mind becomes bankrupt under too large obligations; all additional benefits lessen every hope of future return, and bar up every avenue that leads to tenderness.

In all our connections with society, therefore, it is not only generous, but prudent, to appear insensible of the value of those favours we bestow, and endeavour to make the obligation seem as slight as possible. Love must be taken by stratagem, and not by open force: we should seem ignorant that we oblige, and leave the mind at full liberty to give or refuse its affections; for constraint may indeed leave the receiver still grateful, but it will certainly produce disgust.

If to procure gratitude be our only aim, there is no great art in making the acquisition; a benefit conferred demands

a just acknowledgment, and we have a right to insist upon our due.

But it were much more prudent to forego our right on such an occasion, and exchange it, if we can, for love. We receive but little advantage from repeated protestations of gratitude, but they cost him very much from whom we exact them in return: exacting a grateful acknowledgment is demanding a debt by which the creditor is not advantaged, and the debtor pays with reluctance.

As Mencius, the philosopher, was travelling in pursuit of wisdom, night overtook him at the foot of a gloomy mountain, remote from the habitations of men. Here, as he was straying, while rain and thunder conspired to make solitude still more hideous, he perceived a hermit's cell, and, approaching, asked for shelter: "Enter," cries the hermit, in a severe tone; "men deserve not to be obliged, but it would be imitating their ingratitude to treat them as they deserve. Come in: examples of vice may sometimes strengthen us in the ways of virtue."

After a frugal meal, which consisted of roots and tea, Mencius could not repress his curiosity to know why the hermit had retired from mankind, the actions of whom taught the truest lessons of wisdom. "Mention not the name of man," cries the hermit, with indignation; "here let me live retired from a base ungrateful world; here among the beasts of the forest I shall find no flatterers: the lion is a generous enemy, and the dog a faithful friend; but man, base man, can poison the bowl, and smile while he presents it!"-"You have been used ill by mankind ?" interrupted the philosopher shrewdly. "Yes," returned the hermit, on mankind I have exhausted my whole fortune, and this staff, and that cup, and those roots, are all that I have in return."-" Did you bestow your fortune, or did you only lend it?" returned Mencius.-"I bestowed it, undoubtedly," replied the other, "for where were the merit of being a money-lender? "Did they ever own that they received it?" still adds the philosopher." A thousand times," cries the hermit; "they every day loaded me with professions of gratitude for obligations received, and solicitations for future favours."-" If, then," says Mencius, smiling, "you did not lend your fortune in order

to have it returned, it is unjust to accuse them of ingratitude; they owned themselves obliged, you expected no more, and they certainly earned each favour by frequently acknowledging the obligation." The hermit was struck with the reply, and surveying his guest with emotion,"I have heard of the great Mencius, and you certainly are the man: I am now fourscore years old, but still a child in wisdom; take me back to the school of man, and educate me as one of the most ignorant and the youngest of your disciples!"

Indeed, my son, it is better to have friends in our passage through life than grateful dependants,' and as love is a more willing, so it is a more lasting tribute than extorted obligation. As we are uneasy when greatly obliged, gratitude once refused can never after be recovered: the mind that is base enough to disallow the just return, instead of feeling any uneasiness upon recollection, triumphs in its new acquired freedom, and, in some measure, is pleased with conscious baseness.

Very different is the situation of disagreeing friends: their separation produces mutual uneasiness; like that divided being in fabulous creation, their sympathetic souls once more desire their former union; the joys of both are imperfect; their gayest moments tinctured with uneasiness; each seeks for the smallest concessions to clear the way to a wished-for explanation; the most trifling acknowledgment, the slightest accident, serves to effect a mutual reconciliation.

But instead of pursuing the thought, permit me to soften the severity of advice, by a European story which will fully illustrate my meaning.

A fiddler and his wife, who had rubbed through life, as most couples usually do, sometimes good friends, at others not quite so well, one day happened to have a dispute, which was conducted with becoming spirit on both sides. The wife was sure she was right, and the husband was resolved to have his own way. What was to be done in such a case? the quarrel grew worse by explanations, and at last the fury of both rose to such a pitch, that they 1 For "grateful dependants" the Public Ledger has "admirers."

ED.

made a vow never to sleep together in the same bed for the future. This was the most rash vow that could be imagined, for they were still friends at bottom, and besides, they had but one bed in the house: however, resolved they were to go through with it, and at night the fiddlecase was laid in the bed between them, in order to make a separation. In this manner they continued for three weeks; every night the fiddle-case being placed as a barrier to divide them.

By this time, however, each heartily repented of their vow, their resentment was at an end, and their love began to return; they wished the fiddle-case away, but both had too much spirit to begin. One night, however, as they were both lying awake with the detested fiddle-case between them, the husband happened to sneeze, to which the wife, as is usual in such cases, bid God bless him.1 Ay, but," returns the husband, "woman, do you say that from your heart? ""Indeed I do, my poor Nicholas," cries his wife; 66 I say it with all my heart.". "If so, then," says the husband,

66

we had as good remove the fiddle-case.'

LETTER LXVII.

To the Same.

THE FOLLY OF ATTEMPTING TO LEARN WISDOM BY BEING RECLUSE.2

Books, my son, while they teach us to respect the interests of others, often make us unmindful of our own; while they instruct the youthful reader to grasp at social happiness, he grows miserable in detail, and, attentive to

1 In allusion to an ancient and still prevailing usage. The Greeks thought sneezing as of good omen in the crisis of an attack of the plague. With them "The gods bless you!" addressed to one sneezing was equivalent to" May the gods so bless you as that portends!" (Xenophon, Cyrop., Aristotle, &c.) Later the same idea seems to have been somewhat differently applied to the so-called plague of sneezing of the year 558, when, we are told, persons apparently in good health were suddenly attacked with fits of sneezing which proved fatal.-ED.

2 Dated Aug. 22, 1760, in the Public Ledger.-ED.