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Adventures in the Moon, and Other Worlds

by Earl John Russell Russell · English · Gutenberg #43543 · 549,216 chars · public domain (US)

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Title: Adventures in the Moon, and Other Worlds

Author: Earl John Russell Russell


        
Release date: August 23, 2013 [eBook #43543]
                Most recently updated: October 23, 2024

Language: English

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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ADVENTURES IN THE MOON, AND OTHER WORLDS ***

  ADVENTURES

  IN

  THE MOON,

  &c.


  LONDON:
  Printed by A. SPOTTISWOODE,
  New-Street-Square.


  ADVENTURES

  IN

  THE MOON,

  AND

  OTHER WORLDS.


  LONDON:
  PRINTED FOR
  LONGMAN, REES, ORME, BROWN, GREEN, & LONGMAN,
  PATERNOSTER-ROW.
  1836.




CONTENTS.


                                                            Page

  A JOURNEY TO THE MOON                                        3

  MAHOMET AND THE SPIDER. (A Dialogue.)                      149

  A LETTER FROM POSTERITY TO THE PRESENT AGE                 179

  ANSWER FROM THE PRESENT AGE TO POSTERITY                   193

  THE SLEEPER AND THE SPIRIT. (A Dialogue.)                  211

  A DISPUTE BETWEEN THE MIND AND THE BODY                    243

  ALCIBIADES                                                 293

  TRUTH RELEASED                                             325
        A Letter from Thrasicles of Miletus to Rhodius of
          Athens.

  THE TWO EVIL SPIRITS.
        Dialogue I.                                          373
        Dialogue II.                                         386

  THE JUDGMENT OF MAHOMET                                    419




A JOURNEY TO THE MOON.


  Ove mirabilmente era ridutto
  Ciò che si perde o per nostro difetto,
  O per colpa di tempo o di fortna.
  Ciò che si perde qui là si raguna.--Ariosto.

Je vous parle d'une des plus agréables foliès de l'Arioste, et je suis
sûr que vous serez bien aise de la savoir.--Fontenelle.

Amongst inquisitive persons there has always been a wish to know
something about the moon, its surface, its inhabitants, and their
manners; and several philosophers, to satisfy this curiosity, have, with
much sagacity, construed its spots into mountains, volcanoes, and other
commodities which a world is supposed to want. But these travels must be
considered very imperfect; for by visiting a country through a
telescope, but little is to be known of its people, their manner of
living, their literature, their arts, or opinions. Accordingly, while
that was the only way of travelling, we knew little more of the moon
than that there was one.

Amongst the other speculations on this subject, many ingenious men
exercised themselves in guessing what service the moon has to discharge
for the earth, since it was generally agreed impossible that our
satellite should revolve round us merely for its own advantage, though
it might perhaps in some measure be consulting its private ends; and it
was most commonly supposed to be transacting our business and its own at
the same time.

First, then, it was supposed that the moon had been ordained with its
mountains, valleys, and volcanoes, that it might give us light in the
absence of the sun; and this was declared a powerful argument for the
bounty of Providence, which did not forget us even in the night, when
all other beings are asleep. But it was objected, that according to
this, reasoning Providence is bountiful only during a part of the month;
and that any argument in favour of Providence ought to last through the
whole year.

To pass over all these uncertainties, I must remind my readers that our
moon was at length proved to be the receptacle of every thing lost upon
earth. This truth was the discovery of a great philosopher, and has
nothing in it of theory or conjecture, but was attained by experiment
and the strictest rules of induction. The knowledge of this must very
much increase the interest with which we look at the moon; since every
person has some loss to lament, and may gaze upon that heavenly body
with a certainty that it contains what has been dear to him.

I had often wished that we could procure admission into the moon, in
order to regain what had once belonged to us, and had amused myself with
imagining the eager search that would take place; but without having the
least suspicion that this could ever be really effected, since the want
of air, and other conveniencies, is sufficient to discourage most
travellers; besides which, the having no ground to tread upon must
increase the difficulty of the journey. It cannot, therefore, be
wondered, that in former times only one journey to the moon was known to
have been accomplished, which is that related by Ariosto. But nothing
seems too difficult for modern science; and it is well known that, by a
most ingenious invention, we have lately been enabled to walk up into
our satellite with safety. As I, amongst others, have accomplished this
journey, I shall give a short narrative of my adventures, for the
amusement of those who have been deterred by the distance from
travelling in person.

The nature of this invention is so well known, that I need give no
description of the journey. I saw great numbers travelling on the same
expedition; some being led by curiosity, but most by a hope of
retrieving the several losses that they had met with during life. I
inquired of many, what prizes they hoped to recover. Some decayed
people were going up in search of the health which they had once
enjoyed; a woman with a melancholy look told me she had undertaken this
journey with the hope of recovering her husband's good humour, which he
had totally lost, to her great discomfort. There was a lady who refused
to tell the motive of her journey, but it was whispered that she went to
look for her character. Many old people were going to regain their
youth. There seemed a great uncertainty as to the success of all these
projects; for, first, it might be very difficult to find the lost
advantages, and if they were found, none knew whether they could be used
a second time: all, however, had great hopes; and I saw two or three
men, who appeared incurably old, and were nevertheless convinced that,
as soon as they arrived in the moon, they should revoke their wrinkles,
and find some contrivance for not having lived the last fifty years.

As I approached the moon, I enjoyed the splendour of the sight. Its
mountains far surpass ours in size; and in the shape of the surface
there is a greatness not to be found in the noblest parts of our earth.
I landed in the moon upon a plain, where I found grass and trees, the
particular nature of which I shall not describe, as this short narrative
is not intended to include botany and natural history--subjects which I
leave to those who travelled into our satellite for the express purpose
of studying them. I wish that my forbearance in this instance may be
imitated by some of the more confined travellers on this earth, who, in
the description of a country, thinking that no circumstance or
production must be omitted, are very apt to give information on subjects
of which they are profoundly ignorant. A traveller, who, in his own
country, has not skill to distinguish one herb from another, is a sudden
botanist on the other side of the globe, lest the book he is writing
should be incomplete. Many of them involve themselves in shells,
minerals, and other intricacies, on which they would not hazard a
conjecture at home. He who is silent on any subject, leaves his
knowledge in doubt; whereas, if he speaks, there can no longer be a
question. Upon many productions of the moon, therefore, I shall avoid
the indiscretion of being learned.

When I landed there, my attention was first engaged by a singular change
in my sensations, through an increase of strength and activity. I had
known that this change must take place, and had expected some amusement
by observing it in my fellow travellers. As the weight of a body depends
not on its own mass alone, but also on the force of attraction in the
globe where it is placed, and as this attraction is in proportion to the
mass of the globe, a man who goes out of our earth into the moon, which
is much smaller, finds a great diminution of his weight. Still his
muscular strength remains the same, so that he gains a great advantage
in vigour and activity, and at the same time has a sensation of
lightness not to be described. Though prepared for this, I could not
immediately accommodate myself to the change. There was a small ditch in
my way, and thinking to step over it, I sprung as far as a deer could
leap. Nor could I at first regulate the effort of my muscles in walking,
but every step was a great bound; and until I had had some experience, I
was not able to walk with any moderation.

While I was endeavouring to discipline my movements, I was amused by the
astonishment of my fellow travellers, who knew not the cause of their
own gambols, and were exhibiting great feats of activity when they
intended to be perfectly sedate. A number of persons were seen bounding
about like balls of Indian rubber. Some of them laughed, and others were
terrified at their sudden want of substance. A large man, who in his own
world had also been heavy, came bounding towards me with great
consternation in his face: I seized him in one hand, raised him from the
earth, and twirled him round my head with as much ease as a woman finds
in tossing a young child; at which his terror and astonishment were
redoubled. I endeavoured to make him understand why we were suddenly so
active and so strong; but gravitation was a new study to him, for he had
never had so frivolous a curiosity as to inquire the reason why he had
always remained on the earth in preference to flying away from it, and
accordingly I could not succeed in making his frolics intelligible. I
perceived he did not believe me, when I told him, that before we reached
the moon I had foreseen what gambols we should execute at our first
arrival.

As I was determined to travel alone, I soon left my companions,
endeavouring not to jump about. After a short practice in walking I
attained a tolerable steadiness; and as my journey was to be on foot, I
found great advantage in the reduction of my weight, for I soon was able
to move along with wonderful speed, and scarcely ever was weary. The
sense of lightness was so singular, that it was impossible to make
others imagine what I felt. Not only had my whole body acquired a new
ease in moving, but every limb had a strange alacrity, and I could not
raise my hand without being surprised by its readiness. It seemed as if
I had been newly released from fetters.

I found in myself another strange alteration, which I attributed to the
same cause. I arrived in the moon early in the morning, and left it in
the evening of the same day: this is a fortnight of our time; for as the
moon turns only once on its axis during a revolution round the earth, it
has only one day and night during our month. In this long day or
fortnight I never slept, and felt not the slightest desire for sleep. I
conclude that the relief from weight prevented the perpetual want of
restoration which we here labour under.

Each country on our earth has a separate district in the moon, to which
its lost things repair; and these territories are divided from each
other by high and difficult mountains. Every thing which takes flight
from the earth has a strange intelligence, which guides it to its own
country in the moon. I had landed on the English domain, and now walked
along in expectation of meeting with some of the lost advantages of my
own world. My chief motive for this journey had been curiosity,
accompanied perhaps by that desire which makes so many travellers,--the
desire of having been where others have not. But besides these
inducements, I had entertained a design of bringing back some of my past
pleasures, if I should be able to find them, and if they were in a
condition to bear removal. Amongst the things that I had to regret, was
a considerable portion of time, which I had not used with all the
frugality that I now could wish. I was, therefore, in hope that this
commodity, though perhaps of no very great value, would appear to me in
the moon, and that I might find means of carrying it back. But I was
apprehensive that I might find it without knowing what it was; for I
could not imagine how time would appear to the eye, nor by what art it
could be laid by and preserved.

As I walked along, being now quite alone, I heard a voice near me, and
turned towards it in the hope of being informed which way to betake
myself in order to find some of the curiosities that I was in search of.
When I reached the spot whence this voice proceeded, to my astonishment
I saw not a human being near, though the talking continued close to me.
I listened, and soon discovered that what I heard was the advice of a
father to his son against gambling; and then I concluded that it had
repaired to the moon as having been lost. In this admonition I
recognised the voice of an old friend of mine, whose son had devoted
himself with great energy to the gaming table. The aged voice spoke with
much earnestness and wisdom, showing clearly the consequences of play to
the fortune, the disposition, and the character. The lecture had arrived
in the moon with the proper tone, the pauses, and the emphasis; so that
I could distinguish every shake of the head, and every blow of the
withered hand upon the table. The old gentleman omitted no efficacious
topic; it seemed impossible to stop a bad practice more eloquently; and
I wondered how this insurmountable advice could have failed. I listened
to all its arguments, its infamy, distress, and ruin; but finding at the
conclusion that it began again without respite, and proceeded in the
same words as before, I walked out of hearing, sufficiently advised
against play.

I may here mention, that before I left the moon I met with the very
young man who had undergone this eloquence; the purpose of his journey
being to search for the money that he had distributed in his vocation. I
told him that I knew the place where he might find what had been lost by
his indiscretion. He eagerly inquired where his treasure was kept, and I
directed him to the spot whence this noble admonition proceeded.

"What!" said he; "is all that I have lost collected there?"

"Yes," I answered; "every argument, every word is preserved."

"Arguments, and words!" he exclaimed; "I am looking for money."

I then explained to him that the lost treasure, which I had found, was
the advice of his father; and I urged him to repair to the spot, and be
fortified against future losses. He was angry with me for disappointing
him; said he did not think the advice likely to be more efficacious in
the moon than it had been upon earth; besides which, his father was
still alive, so that he could have advice fresh from his lips whenever
he was in need of it, for the old man was so munificent as never to
refuse him a supply in any difficulty.

"He is old now," said the son; "but the faculty of advising commonly
remains in full vigour when all others have decayed."

This meeting with the advised son occurred, as I have said, at a later
period of my travels. I was now in retreat from the father's lecture,
and had just walked beyond its reach, when a confused noise came towards
me, which at first I could by no means interpret, for a solemn
declamatory tone, and a shrill railing voice, seemed to be united in it.
As the sound approached me, I heard what I should have thought a sermon,
had not some angry and profane expressions been inserted in it. As it
went slowly along, I accompanied it, and by a little attention was able
to understand this singular combination; for in the solemn part of the
clamour I remembered the voice of a celebrated preacher, whom I had
often listened to. It appeared that one of his sermons, not being the
cause of much virtue on the earth, and accordingly discharged, had taken
refuge in the moon, where, while it was floating about in the air, and
preaching with great solemnity, it had unfortunately been entangled in
the invective of a fish-woman, which no doubt had been lost by the
fortitude of her antagonist. Thus these two pieces of eloquence, having
by some means been involved in each other, continued with equal
vehemence, and without the least chance of one being silenced by the
other. I was scandalised to hear the solemn words interrupted by such
abominable phrases, and waved my hat about the place in hope of
separating the two harangues; but they were so confused together, that
though I drove them about by disturbing the air, my efforts to
disengage them were vain, and I was obliged to leave a fine moral
discourse loaded with these vile execrations.

The divine and his associate the fish-woman were no sooner out of
hearing than I walked into a long story, which was telling itself with
great pomp and emphasis. I listened, and heard some passages, where I
was sure that an explanatory finger had been stretched out. I could not,
however, discover the purport of the narrative, which seemed to be
wholly destitute of all the three particulars required by Aristotle,--a
beginning, a middle, and an end; but it had this excellence, that it
might have been undertaken at any period of it without disadvantage. I
afterwards found that the tellers of long stories provide the moon with
a great abundance of sound. I now heard other attempts at conversation,
and amongst them many of the small enterprises which are called puns.

But now, from a different quarter, a sudden wind sprung up, which was
encumbered with a great variety of sounds, and I was quite overwhelmed
with the clamour. First it blew sermons for a short time, and doctrines
of every sect flew past me. This hurricane of divinity was succeeded by
speeches in parliament: I was entertained by a declamatory breeze on the
grievances of Ireland; then came a zealous wind in defence of the Church
of England, and afterwards a prolix gale on free trade. I was at first
amused by the novelty of all this piety, anger, learning, and eloquence
in the air; but when it was no longer new, I found the clamour
intolerable; and it is certainly a discouragement to those who would
visit the moon, that any breeze which rises may preach and declaim so
immoderately.

I may here mention that all sounds from the earth are at first allotted
to separate districts in the moon. There is the region of puns, that of
speeches, of sermons, and of every other fruitless noise. To each kind
of noise a valley is assigned; the surface of the moon being very much
varied, and the valleys very deep. Each sound, upon its first arrival,
repairs of its own accord to the valley which is its proper habitation;
but when the wind is violent, and happens to blow through one of these
valleys, it sweeps away many of the sounds, and scatters them over the
moon. Thus the most unsuitable alliances are formed of the different
sounds, and the precepts of religion are often enforced by oaths; for a
violent gale having passed through the residence of sermons, and carried
many discourses away with it, may blow them through the valley where the
Billingsgate rhetoric is preserved, by which means an unusual energy is
added to those pious compositions: and many other sounds equally averse
to each other are in this manner united. But when the air becomes calm,
each by degrees returns to its own habitation; and no doubt the sermon,
which I had vainly endeavoured to set free from the scurrilous abuse
annexed to it, would in time escape from its intemperate colleague by
its own efforts, and go home to the other divines. The eloquent wind, in
which I have said that I was involved, by degrees became less copious,
and at last quite silent.

I now saw a young woman running towards me in pursuit of something which
rolled along in the wind. As she approached, I perceived that it bore
the figure of a heart; and the lady I knew to be one who had lately been
very much dejected on account of a hopeless passion. She had come to the
moon to recover her lost heart, and was just about to possess herself of
it when the wind had snatched it away, and she pursued it with all the
speed she could exert. I should explain, that things do not ascend into
the moon in the same substantial form that they bear upon earth: this
heart was a mere shadow or ghost, and so light as to be blown about by
every breath of air. I placed myself in the way, and endeavoured to
catch it; but it bounded past me, and the poor girl continued the chase.

Another young lady, who had once sung extremely well was come in search
of her voice, which she had lost by an illness. She had heard it at a
distance singing an Italian song with great taste, and hastened to the
spot in hope that she might inhale it; but a wind springing up had
swept it along singing as it flew, and in despair she heard her own
sweet notes dying away in the distance.

I now saw a well-known English statesman, who had come here in search of
his integrity, which he had lost in the service of his country. Without
it he had found himself quite disabled in the pursuit of his designs,
being no longer eloquent in parliament or dexterous in council.

Soon after this I met a very beautiful woman, but extremely pale, with
whom I was acquainted. She told me that she was endeavouring to find her
complexion, which she had lost very early in life, and never ceased to
regret. Her countenance was so attractive that I could not forbear
offering to assist her in the search, though I told her that I knew not
where the lost complexions were kept; for being very lately arrived in
the moon, I was not yet conversant with its geography. She said that no
farther search was necessary, for she was convinced that she had
discovered her complexion, though she had not been able to regain
possession of it; but perhaps I by a little vigour might succeed. It had
been seized, she said, and was now worn, by a young man, in whose face
she had detected it; for she instantly recognised her own bloom though
after a separation of some years; besides which, it evidently did not
fit the face of the usurper. I inquired where the young man was to be
found; and as the lady knew what road he had taken, we followed at our
utmost speed and soon overtook him. He was a young man of effeminate
appearance, and studied dress. It was plain at first sight that the
beautiful bloom, which he wore, had no natural affinity with his
features; for he had not been able to make it adhere to them with any
exactness, but in several places it was separate from the skin. I
observed him endeavouring by delicate touches to contrive a better
alliance; but with all these inducements he could not detain it with any
confidence, nor reconcile it to his cheeks, and he seemed every moment
apprehensive lest it should drop.

I asked him very courteously, whether he was quite sure that he had his
own complexion on. He answered "Yes," with some indignation; upon which
I endeavoured to convince him of his mistake, representing that in some
places there was a separation between his complexion and his skin, and
that he would never bring them to unite in any security. But as he did
not seem disposed to relinquish his prize, I approached him on pretence
of examining his face more closely, and grasped him by the chin; when
the disputed complexion slipped off with the greatest ease, and I
presented it to the lady, who applied it to her face, where it instantly
fitted itself on, and seemed to be quite at home. I could not forbear
smiling at the sallow cheeks of the young man, who had been thus
despoiled. He remonstrated very angrily against the violence done to his
face, and persisted in claiming what he called his property. I desired
him to observe that the complexion was so settled and established in the
lady's face, as to make a removal impossible, which was a proof that he
must have been mistaken when he believed it to be his. I told him I was
convinced that his own complexion, when he had it, was of equal beauty
with this; and no doubt, by a diligent search, might be found, being
certainly in the moon, since by his cheeks he had evidently lost it. He
was not to be satisfied; but still insisted, that even if this
complexion had originally been produced in the lady's face, yet by
coming to the moon it had been forfeited, and became the lawful prize of
any person who could seize it. I remarked, that it was now useless to
dispute against the lady's right to wear her complexion, since it was
immoveably fixed; and therefore, if he were determined to wear no other
bloom, his only expedient was to wait till it should again arrive in the
moon, and endeavour to gain possession of it a second time. He turned
away with great resentment; and the lady, being now perfectly beautiful,
took leave of me with many acknowledgments of the service I had done
her. I afterwards met this young man again with a fine florid bloom, to
which I believe he had no right, for he turned away his head as he
passed me.

After restoring this lady to her beauty, I walked on to seek new
adventures, and had not proceeded far before I saw a large building,
which I approached, and the doors being open I walked in. The building
consisted of one vast room, the walls of which were covered with
shelves, containing a vast multitude of small bottles with their corks
tied down as if to confine some liquor that was ready to escape. In the
room I found some persons, who gave me an explanation of what I saw.

These bottles contained the lost spirits of those, who for some
melancholy reason, or without reason, had, from being cheerful, become
unhappy. The bottles appeared to be filled, not with any liquor, but
with a sort of vapour, which was constantly in very active motion. Each
bottle had a label, inscribe with the name of the person from whom its
contents had escaped, to which was added the misfortune that had caused
this loss of cheerfulness.

I found a great amusement in walking round the shelves and reading these
little narratives, by which I discovered the concealed sorrows of
several of my acquaintance, who had become pensive without any apparent
pretext, and exercised in vain the penetration of their friends. By far
the greater number of these bottles were female. Many ladies had been
deprived of their mirth by disappointed affection, some by unhappy
marriages, others by the want of children, and several by wanting
nothing. Some labels had blank spaces where the calamity ought to have
been recorded; these blanks, I learned, were the histories of those
whose vivacity had dropped off them without any real cause, and only
because it was not of a durable kind.

The reading of these bottles alone might be a sufficient inducement to
visit the moon, with those persons who excel in providing their friends
with motives, and in explaining every thing in the look or manner, which
is abstruse; for here, in a few minutes, such discoveries are made, as
must be unattainable by mere inquiry and sagacity; and I think that
amongst all the incentives to curiosity and study, there is nothing that
so much provokes research as a mysterious melancholy in one who
seemingly has every title to mirth.

It appeared to me that many of the owners of these bottled spirits had
become unhappy on very slight provocation. Some of the reasons assigned,
I thought hardly sufficient to justify a frown of a day's duration; part
of these afflictions ought rather, in my opinion, to have been received
as advantages; others seemed altogether fanciful, and it was manifest
that the sufferer had become unfortunate merely by the force of a lively
imagination. Amongst these bottles I observed some that were empty, and
inquiring the reason, I was told that they had contained the mirth of
persons who, after a certain period of melancholy, had regained their
happiness by fortitude, philosophy, religion, a change of wind, or some
other consolation; for whenever a person, whose mirth has been under
this confinement, is ready to be cheerful again, and wants his spirits
back, they make so great an effort to escape from the bottle as to force
out the cork, and immediately they return into the possession of their
owner, performing the journey in a few minutes. When this liberation is
effected, the attendants who manage the bottles inscribe on the label
the length of time that the spirits had remained in prison; and the
empty bottle is still left to receive them again, should they be
banished from their owner a second time. This often occurs by the
vicissitudes incident to many tempers, in which the being happy to-day
affords no security for happiness to-morrow. By these inscriptions, I
found that the spirits of some people are engaged in perpetual journeys
between the earth and the moon.

Upon one of the empty bottles I saw the name of a friend of mine, who
had been in great affliction from the loss of his wife. I was surprised
to read on the inscription that his spirits had driven out the cork, and
returned to him at an early period of his sorrow, since which time I had
seen him in profound melancholy; and it then appeared evident that he
was to be unhappy much longer. I thought there must be an error in the
date, but was informed that these bottles are infallible; that they
estimate sorrow by the heart, and not by the countenance; and that as
soon as a secret disposition to mirth returns, they certainly release
the cork, though the face should remain inconsolable. It appeared,
therefore, that though my friend had been so plausibly grieved, the
bottle knew he was fit to receive its contents, and I had merely wanted
penetration to detect his clandestine cheerfulness. I rejoiced in the
discovery, having never thought that the being melancholy is so great a
duty or public good as is sometimes believed. I entertained myself here
in detecting the real duration of sorrow in some others for the death of
friends, and I saw with pleasure how soon a resignation to the will of
Heaven had sometimes taken place after the most grievous loss. Some had
begun to submit on the day after the funeral; others had wept with so
much despatch that, the death having occurred in the morning, and their
spirits being immediately sent to the bottle, they had wanted them again
in the evening of the same day.

The bottles being arranged in order according to the time when each was
filled, I could easily find any cases of affliction which had come
within my own knowledge; and I discovered that, in several instances, I
had wasted much friendly compassion upon people so speedy in submission
as to attain a Christian serenity of mind long before others had ceased
to be distressed for them,--a lasting melancholy having been
apprehended from the skilful gloom which was preserved.

There were many people engaged, like myself, in examining these bottles;
and amongst them I found a pretty woman of my acquaintance, who had once
been remarkable for vivacity, but had suddenly fallen into a pensive
dejection, for which she could give no reason, except that assigned in
Shakspeare,--that she was sad because she was not merry. Feeling
severely the want of her former mirth, she had travelled to the moon in
quest of it, where, being directed to this building, she had discovered
the bottle containing her own spirits, and I found her considering by
what expedient she could transfer them to herself. She had intended to
carry away the bottle, and meditate some contrivance at her leisure; but
they were all fixed immoveably in the shelves, so that whatever plan
should be tried it could only be practised on the spot. She consulted me
in her difficulty; and remembering the invention described by Ariosto, I
advised her, when the cork should be removed, to hold her head over the
bottle, and endeavour to inhale the vapour which should issue forth. She
stood ready, and I cut the string which confined the cork; when it
instantly flew out with a loud report, and a roar of laughter rushed
after it: this was the imprisoned merriment escaping, and it lasted as
long as the vapour continued to come forth. The lady applied herself to
it as if to a smelling-bottle as long as this violent evaporation
lasted. When the bottle had ceased to laugh she raised her head, and I
immediately saw that my invention had succeeded; her eyes had regained
their mirth, and her mouth its beautiful smile. She walked away in great
delight at finding herself happy again.

There were many other people in the room who, having found the bottles
belonging to themselves, were in perplexity about the means of
recovering the contents; and now, having observed the success of my
contrivance, they began to practise it upon themselves, so that very
soon I heard corks flying and bottles laughing on every side. The first
restoration of lost mirth had a violent effect upon most of the
patients, and raising their heads at the end of the operation they burst
into a vehement fit of laughter; some danced about very zealously, and
performed other exploits. But this frantic delight sunk gradually, and
in a few minutes was turned into a steady and reasonable cheerfulness.
The first senseless joy from these bottles very much resembled the wild
behaviour from nitrous oxide, popularly called laughing gas, which he
who inhales commonly has recourse to a violent career of laughter,
without being able to assign any just grounds of merriment.

Those who have seen this common experiment, may conceive exactly the
extravagances acted in consequence of these bottles.

The most ridiculous frolics were exhibited by an old woman, who, having
found the bottle containing the spirits of her youth, applied herself to
it in order to be young again. Immediately the features of seventy were
animated by the mirth of sixteen, the old woman was intoxicated by her
new feelings, laughed immoderately, danced, and sung, with many other
achievements, which greatly disturbed her daughter, who accompanied her,
and endeavoured in vain to control this aged vivacity.

I took notice of a lady with a very grave countenance, who was making a
most diligent search amongst the bottles of that time, from which she
dated the absence of her own cheerfulness, but still she was unable to
find one bearing her name. I heard another lady, her companion,
endeavouring to persuade her that she had always been as phlegmatic as
she was then, and not at any part of her life able to furnish the
contents of a bottle, so that it was vain to search for vivacity which
was neither there nor in any other place. The solemn lady, however, was
resolved to be lively, and not finding any mirth that she could justly
claim, she prepared to invade the bottle of some other person, which,
she said, would do no injury; for the person whom she should despoil
might take her bottle in exchange, since it was undoubtedly there,
though at that moment she could not find it. Accordingly she released
the cork of a bottle which, by the explosion, seemed to have been very
well provided with merriment, and she inhaled it all to the concluding
laugh; but raising her head after this instigation, she remained as
sedate as before, and found to her great disappointment that she could
not be lively with the spirits of another person. I afterwards saw the
same theft committed by others, and in every case it proved that the
bottled spirits were ineffectual in any person except the owner. This
might perhaps have been foretold, as we frequently see persons who have
no vivacity of their own, endeavour, without success, to borrow it from
others, though not out of a bottle. I speak of the emulation of those
who, being solemn by birth, attempt vivacity by a strict execution of
those gestures, looks, and sayings which they have observed to be the
practice of lively persons, and with all their study can never contrive
that those gestures, looks, and sayings shall be received as life and
spirit, though in certain people they pass without dispute.

I saw an unfortunate lady in great distress: she had been endeavouring
to practise my contrivance upon the bottle which preserved her spirits;
but by being too slow to intercept them as they hastened out, and then
by holding her head in a wrong place she had suffered the whole mirth
to escape, and it flew laughing through a window as if in derision of
her. The poor girl stood at the window in despair to hear herself
laughing at a distance, being now condemned to hopeless dejection for
the rest of her life. I had, however, the satisfaction of restoring many
to a cheerful mind; and it was a great amusement to see the melancholy
faces of many as they entered this room, and the happy countenances with
which they left it after exhilarating themselves in this manner.

Having entertained myself here some time, I departed, and continued my
wandering journey. It was not long before I came to another building
which I entered, and found it full of bottles like the last. These
contain the hopes, which have never been fulfilled, and to the eye they
appear to hold a clear transparent liquor. Upon each bottle is the name
of the person to whom it belongs, together with a short account of the
hopes within, and the circumstances in which they were entertained. At
the first glance on the outside of the bottles, I saw coronets, mitres,
riches, and other amusements, in great abundance, which made me think,
that if, as we often hear asserted, hope is the most agreeable
employment of the mind, it is with great injustice that we complain of
the misery of life. According to the same doctrine, we ought to rejoice
that so few of the advantages within sight are attainable, because what
is once gained can no longer be hoped for, and the chief delight from
it, therefore, must be lost. The happiness of every man ought to be
estimated, not by the number of his successes, but by the multitude of
his hopes; and whatever seeming adversity he may have laboured under,
yet if nature has provided him with an alacrity in hoping, he must be
declared a prosperous man. For some, the most unfortunate in their
undertakings, yet have through life been succeeding in prospect, and
thus been fully recompensed for actual disappointment. The office of
this passion is to make men equal in happiness, since every advantage
obtained must take away a hope.

Seeing on one of these bottles the primacy of England, as the hope
contained in it, I looked for the name in some curiosity, to know who
had aspired so high, expecting it to be some celebrated divine. The name
was that of a clergyman, who had passed his whole life on a curacy of a
hundred pounds a year. He had died at the age of seventy-six, and no
doubt his age, poverty, and infirmities had been greatly relieved by the
expectation of being primate. The office of prime minister had for many
years been the hope of a man, who had been known to speak in parliament
twice, on one of which occasions he was manifestly applauded. To be the
greatest of English poets, was hoped for by a young man, on no other
provocation than the having written some verses in a newspaper. A
family of two fine boys and four beautiful girls, was the secure hope of
a lady who had been married at the age of forty-six.

I found here many hopes so fantastical, and having so little regard for
possibility, that they made me think less incredible a certain wish,
recorded by Rabelais, which I had before thought a high strain of
imagination. The projector of this wish desired that, a certain church
being filled with needles from the floor to the roof, he might be in
possession of as many ducats as would be required to fill all the bags,
which could be sewn with these needles, till every one of them had lost
either its point or its eye. This computation of a livelihood, hardly
exceeds in boldness some of the designs which I observed here.

I saw an old man reading the bottle which contained his own past hopes;
he laughed heartily at their extravagance, declaring that to have
fulfilled them all he must have lived a thousand years, and that many of
them could not have been accomplished unless all mankind had been in a
confederacy to complete his schemes. Some bottles contained a vast
number of hopes, the owner having had so much fertility in hoping; other
persons seemed to have had no room for more than one hope at a time. I
amused myself with pursuing the hopes of a man from youth to age, and
observing the variation in the different stages of life. Some of the
young hopes diverted me; a girl of sixteen had been entirely occupied
with the hope that the outline of her nose might improve before she grew
up. Another young lady of the same age had been equally busy with the
hope of her hair becoming darker.

Seeing my own name on a bottle I read my early hopes, which however I do
not intend to divulge. I was surprised by the extravagance and absurdity
of them; for till that moment I had imagined myself a rational man, and
I could not conceive how such projects had ever been let into my brain.

I observed another old man studying his bottle and recapitulating the
brilliant hopes of his youth. He lamented that he was no longer capable
of transacting such visions, and declared he would try to recover the
faculty of hope by drinking the contents of the bottle. Accordingly,
having obtained a glass, he drew the cork and poured out the liquor,
which sparkled like champagne, and he drank it hastily, seeming to think
that the escape of every bubble was the loss of a hope. He finished the
draught, which was about a pint, and was immediately thrown into the
most violent transports. All the hopes of his life took possession of
him at once, and he fancied himself about to perform some mighty
exploit, though unable to conjecture what it was to be. His words,
looks, and gestures were wild and incoherent; and if two friends by whom
he was accompanied had not taken him into custody, he would probably
have attempted some dangerous enterprise. They forced him out of the
room, and I afterwards heard that it was several hours before his
delirium abated; and even when he had recovered his composure of mind he
remained subject to occasional visions, and from time to time is still
elevated by chimerical fancies.

It occurred to me that, although the whole bottle of hope swallowed at
once produced madness, yet perhaps a small quantity at a time might be
drunk with benefit and encouragement in the decline of life; and I
resolved to take my bottle with me for cheerfulness in old age, the
bottles of hope not being fastened to the shelves like those containing
lost spirits, which I have mentioned before. On one occasion since,
having been a little dispirited, I drank a very small quantity of my
hopes diluted with water, and found a very agreeable elevation of mind
from it.

One caution, however, is to be observed, which I learned from the
example of an old gentleman, who had brought his bottle of hopes from
the moon, and had recourse to it after it had stood undisturbed for some
time. By standing still the several hopes had been separated from each
other, so that he had poured out a single hope from the top, and drunk
that alone. It appeared that the hopes were arranged according to their
weight, and not according to the order in which they had entered the
bottle; that which he drank first, therefore, happened to be one of his
early youth. It was a hope that he might obtain favour with a certain
married woman of great beauty, and, according to the most received
opinion, by no means inaccessible; but, after he had prosecuted his plot
for three years without an approach to success, he discreetly resolved
to abandon it, and accordingly the hope flew up into its bottle. This
hope, being now swallowed from the top, possessed him again with all its
former vehemence. It had been perfectly suitable to the time of life
when he had first entertained it, but agreed very ill with his present
venerable appearance.

The same lady was no longer in sight, but he was acquainted with another
of as much beauty and ambiguity, every age being furnished with such
enterprises, and to her he immediately had recourse through the
inspiration of his bottle, soliciting her by every known artifice, to
the great amusement of many observers, and the surprise of his friends;
for before this he had always conformed himself to the lapse of time,
and never pretended to an indiscretion above his years. This hope
continued to molest him for three weeks, during which he was
indefatigable; but the effects of the draught having then passed away,
he discovered the fallacy, and was in great confusion at what he had
been doing. He told me that if he was to commit such absurdities through
his bottle, he should prefer despair and dejection. I advised him to
shake his bottle thoroughly, so as to confound all the hopes together
before he poured out a draught, whence I conceived that he would not be
instigated to any single project, but obtain only a general
encouragement. This he practises with great success, repeating his
draught from time to time; after each dose, he is possessed with a
conviction of some speedy good fortune, though he can gain no insight
into the particular nature of it, and he is thus quite fortified against
the melancholy of old age. It is true that to drink for hope and
prosperity is not a new invention; but the complacency obtained in the
manner I describe has the advantage of not being followed by any of
those injuries which attend the peace of mind from a common bottle.

Leaving the House of Hopes, and pursuing my travels, I met with an old
gentleman, who told me he had come to the moon in search of the time
that he had lost during his life; "for," said he, "if I could recover
all the hours that I have mis-applied, I should be a young man again."

"But," said I, "is it not probable, that if these hours had to be
employed again, they would be engaged in the very same occupations which
have brought them to the moon before?"

"No," he answered, "I believe there are some old men who lament their
loss of time only because it is a loss of pleasure; but I rejoice in
having freed myself from my errors. I lately undertook a complete
reformation of my habits, and succeeded. I wish to regain my time, only
that I might pass it all in the virtue which I now enjoy; for, alas! I
have discovered the pleasure of virtue so late, that I cannot expect
much time for the practice of it."

I walked on with this old man till we came to a building, which,
according to the information of one whom we met, contained "lost vices."
Inquiring what was meant by that expression, I was told that in this
building are preserved all the profligate habits, which have been
unwillingly relinquished by those, whom old age alone can reform, and
who never part with an infirmity till they lose the faculty of being
frail.

We entered the building; and found, as before described, a large room
with innumerable shelves, on which the bad habits are kept by a singular
contrivance. The vices of every man are contained in a little
instrument, exactly resembling in appearance and use that ingenious toy
called a kaleidoscope. On each of these instruments is inscribed the
name of the libertine who has filled it. On one of them I observed the
name of a man with whose past life and character I am acquainted. He
once accepted very frankly of all the blessings offered him by
Providence, but now lives in the strict practice of every virtue which
decrepitude enforces. I took his kaleidoscope from the shelf; and
looking into it, saw him carousing at a table with some companions,
according to the morals of a former time, when the worship of Bacchus
was more diligently prosecuted than it is now. I knew his person, though
in this scene he was a young man. His colleagues I had never seen, for I
believe he had buried them all by his example. Their figures in this
vision were very small, but quite perfect, and all their looks and
gestures faithfully exhibited; no sounds were heard, though much clamour
was intimated. I could perceive that songs were sung, and stories told,
with all the usual literature of such meetings. While I was entertained
by seeing this company drink in miniature, I accidentally gave the
kaleidoscope a turn, upon which the scene vanished in an instant, and
another adventure appeared, the same man being still the hero. He was
now soliciting a beautiful girl with great energy; and, from her
reluctance and alarm, I supposed it to be the first interview. He seemed
to make no progress while I held the kaleidoscope still; but I gave it a
slight turn, which advanced his suit considerably, and a great part of
her austerity was now omitted; whence I found that I must continue to
turn the instrument, in order to bring his addresses to a conclusion. I
therefore turned it round very gradually, not to lose any stage of the
transaction, according to the injunction of Ovid:--

  Non est properanda voluptas,
  At sensim longâ prolicienda morâ.

When this exploit was ended, another took its place; and I found that by
still turning the kaleidoscope, I might bring all the debaucheries of
this old man in succession before me. But my curiosity did not last
through many years of his life, which was crowded with incidents.

I lamented that Le Sage and Smollett had not had access to these
kaleidoscopes for inspiration. If there is now any writer who believes
himself their descendant, he could not employ his time more profitably
than in a journey to the moon, in order to consult these little
instruments, from which he may derive a fertility of adventures that he
cannot possibly gain by observation of real life. The readers too of
such novels, as well as the authors, may find here the best of
libraries: for, by a few turns of a kaleidoscope, they will pass through
a greater variety of adventures than by turning over a hundred pages;
and no mortal pen can relate an enterprise with as much spirit and
fidelity as one of these kaleidoscopes. I had recourse to several of
them, and gained much useful information.

While I was engaged in this study of biography, I perceived the old man
with whom I had entered the room very intent on the same employment. I
walked up to him, and saw his own name on the kaleidoscope into which
he was looking. This surprised me; for he had spoken of his past vices
with so much contrition, that I imagined he would have chosen to avoid
these apparitions of them, instead of wilfully distressing himself with
the sight. I supposed, therefore, that he must be reviewing his life for
the benefit of reproach and mortification; but when I looked into his
face, expecting to see it full of horror, I observed his eye glistening
with delight at the remembrance of his pleasures. He examined them one
after another, pausing at each, and turning the kaleidoscope with the
slowest caution, so as not to hurry the enjoyment, nor pass over any
material circumstance; and while he made these confessions, there was a
voluptuous joy in his face, very ill suited to his venerable appearance.
I found that these visions of the past have a singular power over the
owner of the kaleidoscope, reviving his former thoughts and sensations,
and imparting at the moment a fancied vigour.

"I see," said I, "that you have returned to the amusements of your
youth. You have here the means of retrieving your lost time."

"How so?" he inquired.

"Why," I answered, "you have only to take back with you this little
instrument, and then you can be a young man in your arm-chair whenever
you please. The actual performance of these things would require an
effort inconvenient to you; but, having this kaleidoscope, you may
enjoy any vice you wish, with no other labour than shutting one eye."

"That is true," said he; "it will be a great comfort to me in my old
age."

"But," I asked, "will it not interfere with the strict temperance and
virtue which you are to practise for the rest of your life?"

"Not at all," answered he, "because none of the consequences of vice
will follow these repetitions; I can do no harm by looking into this
little thing. I may carouse with the friends of my youth in this
kaleidoscope, and awake the next morning without a pain in my head. The
wine that was drunk forty years ago will now furnish a very innocent
debauch; or, if I choose to prosecute a design against a village beauty,
I can accomplish the plot here, and no woman on earth will lose her
peace of mind by my success. I have full confidence in my reformation, I
have thoroughly reclaimed myself from actual vice; but I know not why I
should be so austere as to refuse my old age the comfort of these
recollections, in which I find a remarkable charm." So speaking, he put
his kaleidoscope into his pocket, and walked away to practise
temperance.

I saw several other old men here, each of whom had found his own
kaleidoscope, and was repeating the vices of his youth with great
satisfaction. Under this inspiration, their venerable countenances were
disfigured with a most unbecoming look of enjoyment. Every one of them
carried away his instrument for the support of his declining age. It is
probable that all these old men, like the one mentioned before, had for
some time past been admiring their own temperance, and extolling
themselves for a complete victory over the bad passions of their youth,
having become abstemious by means of seventy years, and attained a habit
of refraining from all those vices which require bodily strength. Men
act alike towards their vices and their friends, no one will confess
himself forsaken by either. A man who finds himself avoided and
discountenanced by one whose acquaintance is advantageous to him,
assures himself first that the friendship is irrecoverable, and then
begins to devise retaliation, endeavours to exceed the neglect with
which the other treats him, and disputes his claim to the first
coolness. Thus an old man, when his pleasures abandon him, pretends to
priority; and being convinced by fair trial that a bad habit is
irrevocably lost, he firmly demands that he and his vice shall part.
This forbearance from what we cannot do resembles what is sometimes
called resignation in a dying man, who, having tried in vain every
expedient for remaining alive, begins to prefer death, descants on the
disadvantage of being a man, and earnestly endeavours to justify his
choice.

I cannot here avoid a reflection on the hard lot of virtue in being so
commonly the successor of vice. When the house being torn to pieces by
the riots of vice is abandoned as no longer habitable, with the
foundations undermined, the roof fallen in, the furniture destroyed, and
the walls tottering, it is made over to virtue, and she is desired to
take possession of the ruin, and make herself comfortable for life.

Not far from the house of lost vices is a building, which contains lost
virtues, and I entered it as soon as I had left the other. These virtues
are not preserved in the same manner as the vices, but turned into a
liquid, and kept in bottles. On each bottle is declared what virtues are
within, together with the period of life or particular occasion that had
caused the loss. The good qualities lost by age appeared to be chiefly
benevolence and generosity, from which inconveniences men had been
released at very different times, some being qualified for avarice and
ill-nature much sooner than others. As I have lately made some remarks
on the indecorous regret of certain old men at the decay of their vices,
I must now do justice to their patience under the loss of virtue. Old
men have been known to shed tears on finding themselves unable to be
riotous; but I believe none have ever wept at failing to do a generous
action: and however culpable may be their discontent at missing their
pleasures, they amply atone for it by a perfect resignation under the
decay of liberality, and by giving up without a sigh the whole pleasure
of doing good. Covetousness has been appropriated to old men from the
earliest times; and when a man has nothing left except vigour in saving
money, and joy in keeping it from others, it would be a great cruelty to
forbid him the exercise of those qualities.

I here observed a young man seeking some particular bottle very
earnestly, which having found, he took possession of it with great joy.
It contained certain virtues, which had once been in the mind of his
father, and had dropped out as he proceeded through life. The father,
though very old, persisted in remaining alive, without considering how
much pain his son suffered by this usurpation. Amongst other virtues
which had failed him in his latter years, his generosity had quite
decayed; and his son had very dutifully undertaken a journey to the moon
in hope of recovering it. Having gained the bottle, he intended to
contrive that the old man should insensibly drink this generosity with
his tea, taking care to be present himself, that he might intercept any
bounty which might be the consequence of the draught.

I have since heard the success of this stratagem. The young man's
sister, who commanded the tea table, was easily engaged in the plot; and
having supplied her tea with a portion of this medicine from the moon,
she was very urgent in recommending it as composed with uncommon art,
and exactly agreeing with her father's judgment. It had an instant
effect; and the old man, with a sudden look of beneficence, having
descanted for a short time on his own declining years, and his inability
to enjoy wealth, declared he would make over to his son a considerable
portion of his estate, and desired him to send for an attorney on the
following morning that the gift, might be legal and secure. But when
morning arrived, and the young man was punctually proceeding to execute
the order, his father suddenly revoked it, having been cleared from
these fumes of generosity in his sleep. Some expedient, therefore, was
to be devised for making the father's gift irrevocable before his
benevolence should have time to escape.

The teapot was again corrupted, and an excuse contrived for a visit of
an attorney while the medicine was in full vigour. Thus the desired deed
was accomplished; and the father, at the return of his avarice, found
himself strangely dispossessed of his property by his own consent.

Amongst the virtues lost by advance in life, I saw a great quantity of
pity and sensibility. Grief for the misfortunes of others is one of
those follies that seldom fail to be cured by age, being the benefit of
experience, which, amongst other lessons, demonstrates the absurdity of
claiming a share in the afflictions of another man.

I here became melancholy by seeing how ready our best qualities are to
slip out of our minds; and I soon, therefore, left the building and
entered another, where I found a vast room containing what at first
appeared to me a collection of statues: but I was informed that what I
saw was the female beauty that has been lost by time, sickness, or other
calamities to which it is liable. These statues, therefore, are merely
bloom and outline without any substance. In the walls of the room there
are as many niches as can be inserted from the bottom to the top, in
each of which stands one of these beautiful outlines, and a multitude of
others placed on pedestals are distributed over the whole room. They are
beautiful from posture as well as shape, being adjusted in every
graceful variety of attitude and purpose; and it may easily be supposed
that this room far surpasses any gallery of statues in our world.

As soon as I was in the midst of these beauties, I began to think myself
guilty of an unfair examination, and of inquiring into secrets which
were not designed for me; but seeing no displeasure or retirement in the
lovely forms as I looked at them, I was emboldened to continue my
studies.

These beautiful figures are in appearance real women, being perfect both
in shape and colour; and, indeed, they seemed to have every female
excellence, except the being alive. I had a great curiosity to know how
these beings would affect the touch; and, being now on terms of
familiarity with them, I approached one, which looked the most
indulgent of those round me, and ventured to lay my hand upon her: but
never was man more disappointed in such an enterprise; for I could
scarcely feel any thing; and though I proceeded to the most resolute
pressure, my solicitations were quite ineffectual:--

  "Frustra comprensa manus effugit imago."

The surface yielded, and when I removed my hand immediately regained its
shape. I raised the whole figure from the ground, and could perceive no
weight. I placed a hand on each side of the body, and squeezed it quite
flat without the least resistance; and when it was loosed, it recovered
itself in a moment. Putting my finger on the nose, I pushed it into the
face quite out of sight, and it was restored as soon as my finger was
taken away. I proceeded so far in disfiguring the lady as to hold her
concealed between my two hands, and compressed into a little ball,
which, when released, shot out into a beautiful woman, who had sustained
no injury by the confinement.

I observed that some of these statues were mutilated, wanting arms,
legs, or other appendages to the human figure. This I understood to
happen when the lady retains a part of her beauty. Thus, if her arms
have not lost their perfection, while all the rest has undergone some
decay, a figure of her appears in the moon without arms, which however
are added as soon as she has relinquished them. I saw a nose resting on
a pedestal by itself, the beauty of its outline having been destroyed by
an accident, while the owner was otherwise uninjured. In another place
was some beautiful dark hair, being the spoils of a fever. But the most
common of these particular beauties separate from the rest was the
complexion, which seemed to have frequently preceded all other
endowments in its journey to the moon. Each of these fragments had a
pedestal, upon which was engraved the name of the lady, as amongst
ancient statues we see a beard or a foot, and are told it is Phocion.

I was pleased to see the restoration of beauty to a young woman who had
lost it by the small-pox. She had found her former face, which was a
mere surface like a mask; and applying it to her features, perceived
that it adjusted itself, and adhered to them without needing any care or
contrivance. I saw some depredations committed by women, who never
having been able to acquiesce in their own features would not lose this
opportunity of obtaining others: and I was amused by the incoherent
faces which they constructed; for whenever a feature was appropriated to
a strange face, it evidently dissented from all the other parts of it.
There was a girl, who never having regarded her nose with approbation,
was earnestly engaged in fixing to it a new outline that she had found;
but at first sight this nose was not at all to the purpose. She was
adjusting it by a small mirror, and I heard her expressing her fears
that it never would be made to co-operate with her chin. Another woman,
endowed with long sallow features, had obtained possession of a
beautiful complexion off a small face, and without any regard to the
disproportion had pressed it down upon her boundless features, whence it
projected and had a very ridiculous appearance. However, she walked
away, seeming very well pleased with her new bloom.

When I had left this building and was wandering on for new adventures, I
heard a confused sound, which I supposed to proceed from a valley the
receptacle of some particular kind of eloquence or noise. I soon arrived
at the place, and found it to be the valley containing lost advice,
whence had escaped the father's counsel against gambling, which I had
heard on my first arrival in the moon.

In this valley innumerable voices were striving to hinder various kinds
of imprudence; and I wondered how it happens that with so much good
advice in the world there is also so much folly. When I compared the
excellent precepts which I heard all round me with the actions of men, I
could not avoid considering why it is that we are so much wiser for our
friends than for ourselves; why, in our own case, we are liable to be
misled by every temptation, and usually pursue the most agreeable
course instead of the wisest, while in any other person's case we find
ourselves inspired with invincible resolution, can resist the strongest
temptations and make the greatest sacrifices. From this reflection I
determined that were I to receive a commission to alter and reform the
human race, I would contrive that, instead of being obliged to act for
ourselves, we should all act for each other, by which invention there
would be no such thing as vice or imprudence in the world.

While these admonitions reiterated themselves all round me, I admired
the generosity with which all men are ready to give away advice; and it
appeared to me that if, as some have said, this is the chief office of
friendship, the fidelity of mankind is not to be disputed, since I never
knew an instance of one who would withhold a largess of this kind from a
friend who needed it.

I found here exhortations pronounced in all the several capacities in
which men are qualified to impede others with advice. The counsel of
parents was transacted in one place, that of friends in another; here
the advice of husbands proceeded, and there of wives. I also heard
guardians and tutors imparting discretion to those under their charge.
There was besides much exhortation in a feeble voice from those who have
no right from consanguinity, but are advisers by old age; it being a
well known law of nature that when the faculties of a man are decayed
through time so as to be of no use to himself, they become available to
others. Besides these, I heard many of those universal advisers, whose
vocation it is that nothing indiscreet be done by any of their
acquaintance. In short, there are assembled in this place the words of
all who have any kind of title to provide other people with prudence.

I listened for some time to these rejected counsels in the hope of
discovering by what fault they had failed to persuade, and thinking they
might possibly show what relation the adviser ought to bear to the
sufferer in order to prevail. But I could draw no conclusions from what
I heard. The generality of advisers succeed so far as to make their
friend angry, but not to make him wise; and it is observable that the
advised person, who can find any pretext for being incensed against his
counsellor, always thinks it a valid reason for refusing to do what is
recommended. The skill, therefore, must be to avoid all grounds of
offence. But then occurs another difficulty; for he who can find no
reasonable cause of displeasure either in the advice given, or in its
coming from the particular person who offers it, is still more
exasperated at finding himself without the means of anger. I think it
may be remarked, that the most judicious advice is the most apt to be
resented; for we are displeased with counsel only when we are conscious
that it ought to be followed; when we are convinced that it is mistaken,
we commonly receive it with proper gratitude, because we can neglect it
without self-reproach. The interpretation we put upon good advice is,
that our friend, in order to show his own wisdom, has made us
dissatisfied with ourselves.

From what I heard, therefore, I could not judge what relation an adviser
ought to stand in towards the person advised in order to obviate this
anger, which is always ready. If it be a man who by situation has some
right and authority to advise, the dictation is intolerable; and if he
has no such right, his impertinent interference is not to be borne.

Nor could I learn any thing as to the manner in which advice ought to be
bestowed; for I heard voices in this place advising in every possible
variety of style, and by their being here I knew they had failed to
persuade.

Some advisers tried to make men wise by reproach, others applied
entreaty, and a third class taught by alternately railing and
beseeching. One voice conveyed prudence by a hint, another by resolute
frankness; some pretended great alarm, which made silence impossible;
and I thought that not the least plausible were the confident advisers,
who had not a doubt that what they enjoined would be done: for I knew by
experience that to refuse advice, offered confidently, and confront the
surprise of the giver, requires great firmness. There was here, also,
much of that counsel which enforces an action by showing that nothing
else can possibly be done; and yet it appeared that the ingenuity of the
advised person had found another way. I heard intermitting advice,--that
which revives at stated times, and much, too, of the incessant counsel
which never wants renewal.

This fruitless wisdom, therefore, having been offered in all the
different figures of advice, I found it impossible to conclude any thing
concerning the manner, or tone of voice, the looks or nods most
conducing to prudence. But perhaps an habitual adviser may not think the
inquiry important, since his purpose is usually gained though his
counsel should not be followed, and he succeeds in proving himself a
wise man though he fails to make his friend one.

The general failure of advice is usually imputed to the obstinacy of
those who receive it, but from what I heard in this place I was inclined
to think that the person who gives it is as often in fault. Most of
those whose counsel was here collected did not seem to have considered
what advice would most benefit their friend, but what would best evince
their own prudence, sagacity, or other virtue which they had to
demonstrate; and they appeared very eager to have it concluded, that
what they desired another to do they would practise themselves if the
case were their own. Thus, there are men of courage, who, if their
friend has had a quarrel, will with great intrepidity advise him to
fight a duel; and he must be shot that they may show their spirit. In
this multitude of voices, I heard one in a resolute tone giving counsel
to a friend, who was labouring under that domestic affliction called the
tooth-ache, which the adviser very courageously exhorted him to relieve
by extraction, giving many hints of what he would do himself if a tooth
of his gave him similar provocation. It is a great advantage that in all
exigencies requiring a painful remedy there is always some man who thus
freely undertakes to furnish resolution while his friend undergoes the
pain.

This valley contains, also, much of that advice which I think the most
discreet in all emergencies, and the least likely to be proved
erroneous, which is, to recommend some expedient for which the
opportunity is past. A prudent adviser, consulted in hurry and danger,
will always endeavour, first, to discover something which ought to have
been done before, and which cannot be done now. Accordingly, in this
valley I heard many faithful counsellors dissuading their friends from
something past, and teaching them how to have prevented yesterday some
misfortune which has happened to-day.

Having left this valley of advice, I entered a very large building not
far from it, which I was told was a library. It consists of one room,
containing all the books which are lost upon earth. The hapless volumes
resort to this room as soon as they cease to be read; some had come up
on the day of their publication, others had lived below a whole year,
and the immortality of many had been cut off in a month.

My eye was caught by some shelves, on which were ranged a vast multitude
of books, all bound alike, and on approaching them, I saw that on the
back of each was the title "Similes." When I found that these volumes
comprised all the fruitless similes of English literature, I did not
wonder at the number of them.

I here found an Englishman of my acquaintance conversing with an
Italian, who had applied to him for an explanation of this great
assembly of similes. "I am conversant," said he, "with the old writers
of your country, but have not much studied the moderns: now it seems to
me that all the similes of your best writers collected together would
scarcely fill one of these volumes. Your recent authors must greatly
excel them in imagination, if they have produced such a library of
similes."

"Undoubtedly," said the Englishman, "there is a great poverty of these
beauties in our old writers. Similes have now invaded all our
literature, both prose and verse, and make a part of every thing we
speak or write."

"I have looked into one of these volumes," said the Italian, "and some
of the similes appear to me difficult of application. A poet is here
describing a greyhound in chase of a hare, and, in order to increase the
speed of the dog, he compares it to Westminster Abbey."

"And how," said the other, "does he effect a likeness?"

"That," he answered, "is what I cannot arrive at. I have read it over
many times, but cannot discover what he would wish the resemblance to
be."

"That is a true modern simile," said the Englishman. "In the similes of
the old writers, a natural resemblance is instantly apparent between the
two things compared. Now the moderns are of opinion that when two things
are in themselves similar, there is no invention shown in comparing
them, but that the imagination and ingenuity of a writer are proved by
his bringing together two objects obstinately unlike, and forcing them
into a comparison in spite of all resistance. Therefore, as no two
things could easily be more different than a greyhound in pursuit of a
hare and Westminster Abbey, the poet, with a great deal of invention,
has coupled them together, by which he thinks that he has very much
accelerated his greyhound."

The Italian, turning round, saw another row of shelves, equally
extensive, covered with books, upon the backs of which he read
"Description."

"Your modern writers," said he "must excel those of former times in
description, as much as in similes."

"Yes," answered his informer: "description is another beauty in which
the old writers were very barren and defective. By universal consent,
this is now the noblest way of writing; and those authors who are
conversant only with the reason, and the passions are proved, by
incontestable arguments, to be far inferior to those who treat of
mountains, woods, and water. Modern literature, therefore, is overrun
with trees, and diversified with hill and valley, far beyond the bleak
writings of former ages. Nor are these landscapes confined to poetry. It
is impossible that even a novel should succeed without several
well-wooded chapters, and indeed there is scarcely any subject too
austere to admit this kind of beauty: the most abstruse reasoning may be
rendered more clear by a well-written grove or mountain. Any young man,
therefore, who resolves to be a poet, instead of applying himself to
books, and filling his mind with the thoughts of others, has recourse
for his education to rocks and woods, which, in modern language, are
called nature, and from these he derives all his knowledge and poetical
spirit. Indeed, he has only to roam amongst mountains, and write down
the verses which they dictate. Some of our best modern poems were
entirely composed at the instigation of wood and water, and without any
assistance from books."

One division of this library is filled with novels, and the Italian
expressed his astonishment at the number of them. "You do not consider,"
said the Englishman, "how many people read novels: they are the books
from which our young men and women derive the chief part of their
instruction. These works come out every spring with the butterflies, are
quite as numerous, and live about the same length of time. There are
several kinds of romance: the most abundant species, I think, is that in
which the events of modern life are related with so much fidelity that
in every page men and women do exactly what we see them doing elsewhere.
The author is at great pains to make a true representation of society;
and therefore, that he may not exceed nature, he takes care that in all
his dialogues there shall be no more than that limited portion of wit
and amusement which is usually found in conversation.

There is an admirable expedient frequently practised in romances of this
kind. The author introduces into his narrative some of the newest
incidents of society, relates them with the utmost exactness as they
really happened, and describes the characters, circumstances, and
persons of those engaged in them. You may easily imagine the noble
exercise of mind with which readers are thus provided in recognising
the adventures of the last year; you may conceive the pleasure with
which they adjust the book to the real event,--how they explain the
agreement to those who are not in the secret; how they praise the author
for so artfully describing persons they know, even to the colour of
their hair. This copying of real life is carried to its utmost
perfection by some writers, who introduce not only the events and
characters, but the names also with a slight disturbance of the letters,
contriving, with wonderful skill, that the last syllable of the name
shall take precedence, or by some other invention displacing the several
parts of it, so that discerning persons may have an opportunity of
rectifying the letters and restoring the name to its true sound. It
would surprise you to see the sagacity with which all these mysteries
are explained in a few days after the book has appeared.

Another kind of romance is the history of some imaginary person, who is
to charm the reader by the most abominable crimes. The author frees him
from every restraint of morality, honour, integrity, and kindness. This
monster is always in some plot, and is of so peculiar a disposition that
he has no pleasure in success except with the ruin and misery of others.
Murder is merely the trifling of his leisure; he merits death in every
page, but with great dexterity always evades the law. By these
perfections he is very acceptable to all women he approaches, and they
are sacrificed to him one after another in a deplorable manner. He is
commonly a wanderer, and infests many parts of the globe; but at last,
having arrived at the end of the third volume, he either dies in a
distraction of mind from his crimes, or is rewarded with the hand of a
beautiful woman, and leads an exemplary life ever afterwards. Few novels
succeed better than those with a monster. The historical novel is
another kind. In this composition the endeavour of the author is to show
us the true genius and character of the remarkable persons who lived at
the time of which he writes: thus, if it be recorded of a great man,
that he wore a hat with three feathers, you may be sure that he will
wear a hat with three feathers in the novel. The author dresses him with
a strict adherence to truth, and does not venture to omit a single
button of history, or to introduce so much as a bit of lace that is
fabulous; every ornament he wears is attested by writers of acknowledged
veracity; even his shoe-buckles are facts. Sir Walter Scott having
acquired great fame by historical romances, which represent the thoughts
and designs of uncommon men, has instigated others to embroil themselves
in the same undertaking; but since the thoughts and designs of great men
are not amongst their studies, their discernment being limited to that
part of the human character which is called the dress, they have
contented themselves with narratives of hats, cloaks, and other parts
of apparel, in which their success cannot be disputed."

"I observe," said the Italian, "that each of these novels consists of
three volumes. Is that one of the modern laws of writing?"

"Yes," answered the Englishman: "it is a new discovery; and now a writer
of novels produces three volumes as punctually as a pigeon lays two
eggs. This is a great hardship to the lovers, who are delighted with
each other in the first chapter, and might accomplish their union in a
few pages, if they were not maliciously undermined by the author, who
involves them in difficulties which cost him infinite thought and study,
and thus are they obliged to pass through the three volumes with
perpetual disappointment and vexation. I am not able to give any reason
for this modern law, that every novel should be divided into three, any
more than I can account for the ancient decree that comedies should
consist of five acts; but it is well known that any romance in more or
fewer volumes than three would be instantly rejected by the booksellers,
who have a peculiar sagacity in judging what circumstances will gain a
good reception for a new book. Thus the author of the 'Tale of a Tub'
informs us, that a bookseller, to whom he first offered that work,
assured him it could not possibly succeed unless in the following year
there should be a scarcity of turnips."

At this moment I was startled by a quarto volume which flew close to my
head; it had just arrived from the earth, and coming in at the window
flew two or three times round the room like a bird, as if looking for a
place to light upon; it then perched on a shelf of quartos, and pressed
itself into a vacant space. On examining these quartos I found them to
be books of travels; the one which had just flown in had arrived quite
new, and full of fresh intelligence.

From this multitude of travels the Italian took occasion to admire the
adventurous spirit of Englishmen, who wander about the world to increase
our knowledge of it, and make a book. "These large and numerous works,"
said he, "must contain abundant information on the laws, customs, and
natures of men."

"There are travellers," answered the other, "from whom such knowledge is
to be derived; but these works being found in the moon, we may
conjecture that the authors of them have not been conversant with any
such abstruse studies. Many of our recent travellers go out to explore
countries in which there are no laws, customs, or men to be found; they
undergo great hardships, and at their return the knowledge they impart
to us is, that in one place they were hot, in another cold, and in a
third hungry."

When I had listened for some time to this conversation, I took a cursory
survey of the several divisions in which the library is arranged, and
found it to contain a great variety of works in every kind of
literature. There is a collection of divinity sufficient to perplex the
reason of all the inhabitants of Europe. The poets occupy a very large
space; the names of some I had never heard before. The political
writers, too, stretch over a great territory; there is a whole library
of those small undertakings called pamphlets, which redress all abuses,
and extricate the country out of every distress.

A large extent of shelves is covered with the lives of men written by
themselves: this is a kind of literature much increased in modern times.
It was formerly the custom of celebrated men to let posterity decide
whether their actions were worthy of remembrance; but it is now the
undoubted right of every one to determine this matter for himself. Our
ancestors erroneously believed that praise was a good which every man
must owe to the kindness of others, and could not confer upon himself:
we have detected this mistake amongst many others committed by our
forefathers, and it is now well known that men labour under no such
natural disability as was supposed, but that any one can extol himself
with much greater ease, confidence, and zeal, than any other person.
Through this discovery we abound with lives written without the least
envy or detraction. Johnson says, "Who does not wish that the author of
the 'Iliad' had gratified succeeding ages with a little knowledge of
himself?" Accordingly, the moderns resolve to avoid this culpable
silence of Homer, by freely imparting to the world all their
undertakings, hopes, and fears,--all that they have done, and all that
they have failed to do. Every man now imitates Julius Cæsar, and relates
his own exploits. Very little renown is enough to justify a life, and
indeed many have been written without any such instigation at all; for
if a man has only tried to be famous, the story of his disappointment
cannot fail to be instructive.

It is also a great discovery of modern times, that a man may publish his
own adventures during his life. Formerly, it was thought decorous to die
before the divulging of any private particulars; but, by the new
invention, a man is able to combine the glory from memoirs with the
advantage of being alive. It is now justly thought that a person famous
by writing, or any other stratagem, would betray a culpable indifference
to the impatience of mankind, if he delayed till his death all
satisfaction of the general curiosity concerning his private habits; and
there is hardly a writer of plays or romances so regardless of the world
as to keep it in suspense with respect to the hours when he is used to
write, the books that he reads, and the places where he dines.

I looked over the shelves of biography, and amongst all the authors of
their own praises, I could hardly find one name that I had heard before.
This gave me occasion to consider that memoirs are not so effectual a
provision against the being forgotten as they are usually thought; and I
could not help comparing the precaution of these writers with the device
of Panurge in Rabelais, who, being at sea in a storm, and the ship
expected to sink, could think of no rescue except making his will; for
anxiety had not left him sagacity to discern that all the benefactions
he might record must be drowned with him. So those writers, who are just
about to be overwhelmed in oblivion, betake themselves with all the
foresight of Panurge, to inform posterity of their virtues, forgetting
that this intelligence must be included in the destruction.

Happening to look through the window of the library, I saw a great
flight of new books approaching. They came in, and flew up and down in
search of places. There were works of every size: the quartos soared
backwards and forwards like swans, and the duodecimos fluttered about in
the manner of sparrows. Being endued with a sagacity to find their own
places, they all settled themselves in the class of books to which they
belonged; the several volumes of a work remained together, and one
followed another in a line, like wild geese; volume the first taking the
lead, and so in succession. I saw a history consisting of fourteen
octavos, which made a splendid flight; and it was amusing to see them
wind round the room, still preserving their order, and then light one by
one upon a shelf.

My curiosity was excited by a thin book, which, having just flown in,
hovered about unable to find a resting place, and seemed to be in great
distress. It had first approached the district of religious writings,
and, finding room, was just preparing to light when the surly volumes
closed themselves together with one accord, and refused to admit the new
comer amongst them. It attempted several different openings on these
shelves, but still found the same want of hospitality, and wherever it
appeared the divines shut up their ranks. It then flew round the room in
great trouble, and I observed that as it passed the political pamphlets
they opened of their own accord and offered it an asylum, but it turned
away in disdain, and again made trial of the clergy; these inexorable
octavos still refused, and it fluttered about appearing to be almost
exhausted. I endeavoured to catch it, but it was too active to be
entrapped. I then took aim at it with another book, and was so dexterous
as to bring it down stunned and crippled by the blow. I found it to be a
bishop's "Charge," which, instead of enforcing the topics that belong
to that sort of exhortation, was almost entirely a political treatise.
The religious writings, therefore, had not acknowledged it as divinity,
but the pamphlets had supposed it to be one of themselves. I thought
that this "Charge" was justly excluded from the religious shelves, and
that it had no right to look with contempt upon the political writings,
the language of which it had thought proper to assume. I therefore
pushed it in amongst the pamphlets, though it flapped violently and made
great efforts to escape.

As I left the library I observed two men, who were likewise quitting it,
each of them having a roll of parchment in his hand, about which they
were engaged in a violent controversy. I found that they had come up to
the moon in search of the British Constitution, which they agreed had
long ago been lost. Each fancied that he had found it, and vehemently
asserted that what he carried was the real constitution, and the
parchment of the other a fiction. One of them triumphantly pointed to
the date, asking whether that was not the time when the constitution
flourished. The other denied that there had been any constitution in
being at that time, and asserted that his own date was the true one.
Neither of them would give up the pretensions of his parchment, and they
parted in some anger, each of them being convinced that he had the
British constitution under his arm.

I next entered a valley containing the consolation which has been
lavished in vain upon those stubborn people who will not cease to be
unhappy at the desire of a friend. A great multitude of exhortations
were proceeding here in every tone and cadence of sympathy. I heard the
several topics of comfort under all earthly evils, so that any
unfortunate man, who comes to this valley, may find the particular
harangue suited to his case, and thus be reasoned out of his calamity.

Every saying to be cheerful by is here repeated without intermission,
and the folly of being grieved under any affliction is so forcibly
represented, that he who listens might wonder for what reason men are
ever so perverse as to be miserable.

One person was desired to be easy, because he could not possibly have
prevented his misfortune; another was told that he had no right to
mourn, because his calamity might have been easily avoided. One
comforter represented that, notwithstanding what had been taken away,
the world was still full of happiness; while another declared that every
thing in the world being utterly worthless, it was ridiculous that any
man should imagine he had sustained a loss. Many were desired to console
themselves with the advantage of others being in the same adversity. I
also heard it urged, that Providence was certainly the best qualified
to conduct the affairs of the world, and that we had no right to
remonstrate, even by our tears, against what he might choose to do. One
comforter would have cured all grief by affirming that we are altogether
governed by imagination, and that the being either happy or miserable is
a mere act of fancy. Some were very peremptory in their consolation, and
inveighed against the grief of their friend as the most reprehensible of
errors. Another consolation, of which I heard many specimens, was, that
adversity is beneficial, and that there is nothing so much to a man's
advantage as the being in affliction. To be grieved, therefore, was said
to be altogether erroneous; and the reasonable deportment under all
troubles was to rejoice. It was also declared that an admirable remedy
against affliction is to consider that there has been sorrow from the
beginning of the world; for how can men be troubled by something which
has been from the beginning of the world?

By listening to these several ways of dissuading a man from having been
unfortunate, I was confirmed in an opinion which I had formed before,
that nature, fearing lest fortune should not be careful enough to
provide us with calamities for our good, has annexed consolation to
every disaster as an additional evil. It is said in a comedy of Molière,
that no sick man ought to consult a physician unless he be sure that his
constitution is strong enough to bear not only the disease but the
remedies also; and perhaps it would be a caution equally proper that no
man in distress should have recourse to a comforter unless confident
that he has patience to undergo consolation as well as his calamity.

Leaving these remedies against adversity, I wandered on, and hearing a
confused noise at a distance, walked towards it in expectation of
another instructive valley. I was soon met by a man who was walking in a
great hurry away from this sound, and I inquired of him what it was.

"Are you a married man?" said he; "if so, I advise you to fly from those
murmurs; for in that valley are collected the noises of all the wives
that have scolded since our first parents. The first I heard was the
eloquence of my own excellent partner, which put me to flight, as it has
often done before."

Notwithstanding the warning given me by this fugitive husband, I boldly
approached the scene of domestic oratory; and as I drew near I heard
female reprimands uttered in every variety of English phrase, ancient
and modern, whence I learned that this species of rhetoric has been
cultivated in our island from the earliest times, and continued to
flourish without interruption through every change of the language.
These invectives having arrived in the moon, it was plain that they had
all been lost upon the inaccessible husbands, and I could not help
admiring the firmness of men.

I was amused by observing the different styles of eloquence; there were
several florid scolds, who declaimed with great copiousness, while
others railed in a brief and forcible manner. Some spoke in a style of
earnest remonstrance, many abandoned themselves to invective, and not
the least powerful were those who conveyed censure in a sneer. In short,
here might be studied all those varieties of reproof by which certain
wives are accustomed to enforce domestic peace.

It was easy to distinguish the different ranks of life to which these
connubial noises belonged; for some of them expressed a well-bred
displeasure in good English, while others were so disguised by a
provincial dialect that I was unable to interpret them. From the great
variety of accent I concluded that every county in England was scolding
here.

Soon after I had left this valley, I saw at a little distance from me a
gentleman of my acquaintance, who with a stick was distributing some
very vigorous blows in the air, as if defending himself from a swarm of
bees, yet I could see no enemy against which all these efforts were
directed. As I approached him, I heard an angry voice, very loud and
voluble; and I then discovered his difficulty. He had been in the valley
which I have last mentioned, where was a considerable quantity of his
own wife's rhetoric, which, as soon as he approached it, had recognised
him by a strange instinct, and swarming round his head, had assailed him
with great fury. He instantly quitted the valley, hoping to leave this
attendant behind, but it adhered to him with wonderful fidelity wherever
he went, and he was now vainly endeavouring to drive it away with a
stick, which instrument, whatever power it may sometimes have had to
silence a similar clamour, was applied to this reproof without the least
mitigation. I endeavoured to assist him in repelling it by disturbance
of the air, but all we could do was to cut some of the words through the
middle, and thus cause a little hesitation in the harangue. I could not
forbear smiling to hear the lady's voice, which I knew very well,
uttering a groundless invective upon domestic matters of very little
importance. The husband perceiving my inclination to mirth, was much
troubled that I should be a witness of the discipline he was undergoing.
He said something about every family being liable to misunderstandings,
and as the voice then entered upon a very private topic he walked
hastily away, and carried his reproaches out of my hearing. I afterwards
heard that he could not free himself from his incumbrance as long as he
remained in the moon; but when he left it, the oratory could follow him
no farther, and returned to its valley. I have been told that several
other husbands who entered this valley were assailed in the same
manner, and afterwards walked about the moon surrounded by these
reprimands.

As I walked along, my attention was caught by a humming sound at a
distance, which, as I was told, proceeded from the valley of lost
sermons, whence an accidental wind had dispersed those discourses which
had already assailed me in another part of the moon. I advanced into the
valley, and stood surrounded by the uproar of divinity which filled it.

Notwithstanding the vast multitude of voices preaching in defiance of
each other, I had no difficulty in distinguishing the words of each, but
could single out any one that I chose to listen to. In all these valleys
the same peculiarity is observable, that any voice can be heard without
confusion, and separately from the rest.

The sermons in this place are divided according to their persuasion; the
Church of England having its own district, and each body of Dissenters
being limited to one place. The sects are sometimes confounded together
by the wind, but when it is calm again they are all speedily reclaimed.
Here are collected all the fruitless English sermons, that is, all which
have failed to effect either of the two great ends of preaching,--the
virtue of the hearers, and the preferment of the clergyman.

I heard much Christian anger uttered with great sincerity. Some of these
compositions had more the sound of political speeches delivered to a
body of electors than of discourses written for morality; and I imagined
they must have been enrolled in the sermons by mistake.

Most of the sermons aiming at a reformation of manners which I here
listened to were, as it seemed to me, guilty of wanton calumny in
describing the vices of mankind; for they agreed that not one virtuous
man could be discovered on the earth by the most diligent search. Had
these preachers been any thing more than sound, I should certainly have
remonstrated with some of them against traducing us to the moon with so
much zeal.

This comprehensive invective has long been the established practice of
the pulpit, and many specimens of it are found in our oldest divines.
Indeed, it seems to be a common opinion, that no writing could be an
authentic sermon unless it contained at least one bold assertion--that
the whole world is abandoned to vice. But notwithstanding the authority
of an established practice, if it were my function to make men good from
the pulpit, I should certainly dispense with this rule, whatever
uneasiness I might feel at the sacrifice of an old custom. To affirm the
universal prevalence of vice, appears to me a most preposterous method
of recommending virtue. The clergyman, in order to discourage those who
are inclined to frailty, informs them that, although they gratify every
bad inclination, they will always be countenanced by the similar conduct
of all other men. Instead of engaging the influence of example on his
own side, he exerts himself to make vice more pleasing by the attraction
which there is in the practice of others. Our preachers in this might
take a hint from our political orators, who, wishing to discredit any
particular opinions, always represent them as embraced by a very small
party. The most ignorant declaimer on politics has never endeavoured to
make converts to his principles by affirming that there is not another
man in the country who entertains them: yet by this argument virtue is
enjoined from the pulpit, though against all common methods of
persuasion; and I can hardly conceive, that when men are reasoned with
from a small enclosed place, called a pulpit, they are to be moved by
arguments exactly opposite to those which affect them from any other
spot. I think, therefore, a preacher would furnish his hearers with a
more natural inducement to virtue if, instead of labouring to convince
them that by a dissolute life they will merely conform to established
custom, he endeavoured to show that vicious practices will connect them
with a small condemned party.

And, besides the attraction of example, these invectives against all
mankind afford another discouragement to those who would practise
morality; for he who learns from a sermon that there is not a good man
in the world, must conclude goodness to be impracticable. Not having,
therefore, the vanity to suppose that he can accomplish what no man
living has succeeded in, and having heard that no man has been able to
be virtuous, he infers, that he may spare himself the trouble and
vexation of trying.

The sermons to which I was now listening, after having affirmed an
universal depravity, proceeded to lament the uselessness of preaching,
and to wonder how men could contrive their vicious enjoyments in
defiance of so many sermons. Amongst all the reproaches with which a
clergyman assails his congregation, there is none more frequent than
imputing to them that he does not preach with any success; and he always
concludes, without scruple, that the blame of not listening effectually
must accrue to them.

It is observable, that the mind and the body, being committed for safety
to two different artists, and many satirical observations being made
against the success and utility of both, there is this difference in the
two cases,--that all reflections on the art of medicine are directed
against the physician by other people; while the satire concerning the
efficacy of preaching is applied by the clergyman himself to his
congregation. The preacher reproaches men with not becoming virtuous by
his sermons; but a patient would think a physician very unreasonable,
who should upbraid him with remaining ill in contempt of medicine. A
sick man, who finds no health in the remedies prescribed, thinks himself
entitled to call in question the skill of his physician: yet I believe
there is no example of a profligate man complaining to his clergyman of
not having been reclaimed. Now, I would propose it as a question to be
considered, whether the preacher can justly claim this peculiar
advantage of having his patients supposed incurable, because he has
failed to cure them; whether he has in all cases a right to complain of
having been heard without amendment of life, and should not rather
share, at least, with his hearers the blame of their not being reformed?

Not that I would enforce against the clergy that rigorous computation of
service which Lucian recommends against the philosophers who had to
furnish men with virtue in his time. He relates, that a philosopher
demanding payment from a young man who had attended his lectures, the
guardian of this pupil interposed, and accused the philosopher of not
having fulfilled the contract; "for," said he, "you engaged to supply
this young man with morality; and it is but a few days since he basely
corrupted a young woman in our neighbourhood. How, then, can you have
the confidence to require payment for goodness which he has never
received from you?" Lucian advises that this exaction of the morals,
before they be paid for, should be generally practised against the
providers of virtue. I wonder the expedient has not occurred to those
modern statesmen who have discovered that our prosperity depends upon
our obtaining doctrine from the clergy at the lowest possible price; for
I think nothing could so effectually impoverish them as that all under
their charge should insist upon having virtue before they paid for it:
so that any one accosted by the collector of tithe should, in surprise,
plead such an immunity as this:--"By what right can the clergyman demand
payment for morals which he has not given me? Was I not intoxicated last
night? Did I not beat my wife yesterday? Have not I taught my children
to steal?"

When I had satisfied myself with the Valley of Sermons, and was
proceeding in my travels, I met with a gentleman who formerly acquired
considerable renown by some poems which were much read and admired. He
told me, in confidence, that he was in search of his poetical fame,
which he had unaccountably lost without any demerit of his own. When his
works were first published, he said, they had been universally admitted
as authentic poetry; yet they were now generally exploded, though every
word had remained in the situation where he had first placed it. He had
for some time connived at the decay of his reputation, but at length
felt himself so obsolete, that he had no longer the confidence to walk
into a room as a poet, but had relapsed into an ordinary man.

I endeavoured to comfort him by observing, that the same fate had
happened even to the illustrious dead: Pope was once in high esteem, but
is now by no means a poet according to the most received doctrine. The
greatest man has genius only on permission; and how long even Homer and
Virgil may remain poets, depends upon the indulgence of those writers
who furnish us with taste and admiration.

The neglected poet, however, thought that the loss of fame by others was
but little advantage to himself. He said, that Pope, being dead, was not
embarrassed about the behaviour to be assumed in a decay of reputation;
and he seemed to think that he ought at least to have been read as long
as he lived, that he might have escaped this perplexity. He said he
could have borne the want of success if from the beginning men had
committed the injustice of not reading him; but obscurity after fame was
so irksome, that he knew not what to do. To evince the outrage he had
suffered, he began to enlarge upon his forgotten works, and to argue in
favour of their being poetry, in which I knew not how to help him. I
was, indeed, innocent of having ceased to read his poems, for I had
never attained to any farther knowledge of them than the names.
However, I acquiesced in his praises as plausibly as I could.

He said his downfal gave him additional regret, because he had written
his own life, which he had expected to be as much read and esteemed as
that of either Alfieri or Goldoni; but he now should not have the
confidence to publish it. When it was written, the world had evinced a
great curiosity concerning him; and now nobody asked a question about
the way in which he passed his time. I expressed my sense of the
injustice committed by the world in having no curiosity about him.

He told me he had learned that a building within sight contained the
lost renown of Englishmen, who from greatness had fallen into the
adversity that he now suffered; and he had some hope of recovering his
fame there. We advanced, and entered this building, which is very
similar to that described before, as containing the cheerfulness of
dejected persons. In a large room we saw great numbers of phials, which,
we were told, preserve the fame that has left men before their death. As
they are all arranged according to chronology, my companion, by a search
into that period when his reception had become less certainly that of a
poet, discovered the phial that bore his name. He took it into his hand,
and held it up to the light; but, although it was of transparent glass,
nothing could be seen within. But now it occurred to him, that he had
not recovered his fame by acquiring this phial. He knew not what
measures to take, and was at a loss to conceive how the phial could
contribute to the general reading of his works.

I advised him to remove the stopper, and apply his nose, to receive any
virtue that might ensue. This he did; when immediately his eyes began to
sparkle, and he told me that the perfume he enjoyed was the greatest
pleasure he had ever felt. He then held the phial to me: but I could
perceive nothing, this renown being no pleasure to any but the owner. He
exulted as much as a young author during the sale of his first book, and
seemed to think himself suddenly restored to his honours; repeating
several times, "I am a poet again!" I hinted to him, that the
consequences of this phial must be fallacious, and expressed a doubt
whether it were possible to become a poet through the nose, as he now
believed himself to have done; since it was hardly to be supposed that,
because he had found an agreeable perfume, men would read his poems with
new eagerness. He took no notice of what I said, but exclaimed, "The
tenth edition is wanted! the press cannot work fast enough! the public
must have patience!" I perceived that the phial had made him delirious;
but, concluding that its suggestions would soon cease, I let him enjoy
his greatness without any farther interruption. He walked away; and I
know not how long it was before he was undeceived.

I now took a farther survey of the room. Each phial had a label
recording the name of the person whose renown it contained, the means by
which he had become famous, and the cause of his losing reputation, with
some other particulars. They are divided into the different classes of
writing, oratory, and other contrivances for being great. I first
examined the authors, who led me into speculations on the instability of
a writer's fame, and on the causes by which a work full of genius last
year has now no merit, and that without any apparent change, except that
twelve months have elapsed.

On the labels of these phials I read the several artifices practised by
authors for renown. The device of some had been obscurity, which had
charmed those judges who think a passage of no value if it can be read
without delay, and ascribe the greatest genius to him who can obstruct
his reader the most frequently, and oppose to him the greatest number of
impassable phrases.

Another way to greatness recorded here is, the combining together of
words the most repugnant to each other. I saw the name of a man who had
eminently practised this deception, and obtained by it a great renown
for a few weeks. In every page of his writings, those words which might
have been supposed irreconcileable were found side by side, to the
great admiration of the public. These unusual alliances, as being
imagination, were very successful; and it was thought that none but an
extraordinary man could have brought together words which offered so
much resistance. But these words having remained in conjunction for a
few weeks, the wonder ceased, and it began to be thought that, with an
ample collection from diligent study of a dictionary, this style would
not be so difficult as at first had been imagined. From observing the
several stratagems for greatness, I concluded, that the most efficacious
expedient is surprise. The author who can so perplex his readers, that
they know not what to think, is sure of renown. And, not only in
writing, but all other kinds of imposition, he who can devise some
project for giving men a surprise, will be a celebrated person, until
they are recovered from it. This, indeed, soon happens, for men will not
remain astonished; and, as soon as their wonder has ceased, they always
impute fraud to the author of their amazement, and despise him
accordingly. But still they cannot take from him the advantage of having
once been famous, which sometimes is sufficient for peace of mind; since
ambitious men differ much in their wants; and although some, like my
friend the poet, cannot live in comfort without constant supplies of
applause, yet others, by having once been gazed at for a month, are
cheerful and serene till death.

I saw here the names of many authors who were once famous by a
contrivance which has often been practised with great success: it is not
in the power of a single man, but requires a confederacy. This stratagem
is no more than a secret agreement amongst certain writers to extol each
other; every one in this league, therefore, continues to affirm that the
others are great men, till the world can no longer avoid believing it.
Sometimes a man performs this office for himself, and endeavours to be a
great author on his own assertion: but it is far safer to depend on the
word of an accomplice. While one, in such a combination, is eagerly
prosecuting the plot by encomiums on the rest, he seems merely to be
acting with great candour towards his competitors for fame; and the
world admires the generous spirit in which these men of genius live
together. This invention is exactly described by Horace:--

  "Discedo Alcæus puncto illius, ille meo quis?
  Quis nisi Callimachus? Si plus adposcere visus
  Fit Mimnermus, et optivo cognomine crescit."

In this room, also, I found some who had been illustrious by another
kind of conspiracy--the founding of mysterious sects in poetry. For this
purpose, a few writers enter into a league, and agree upon a style (if
so it can be called) in which, to prevent criticism, they take care that
there shall be no meaning. The art is to give their words such a sound,
that the reader shall be persuaded they signify something remarkable,
though he cannot reach it; and that he shall always seem just about to
understand what he reads, without ever quite arriving at the sense. So
great is the charm of reading in this confusion of mind, that he who has
once contracted a love of it lays aside with contempt any composition
that he can understand, and derides those who had before been received
as poets, and who, in truth, are so far from being so, that a plain man
of competent sagacity may in any passage discern their meaning without
much difficulty. It is true, that the followers of these mysterious
poets, being those who read for the sake of not understanding, are a
small body: but this is a cause of pride to the poets, as being suited
only to a few exalted minds; and any person, who complains of not
understanding what he reads, is readily answered that he is not one of
the chosen few. The readers, too, are as proud of the singularity as
their author, and assume a superiority over all men who insist on
comprehending what they read.

                                ----"Illud
  Quod mecum ignorat solus vult scire videri."
                                                       HORACE.

Next to the phials which contain the lost reputation of authors are some
which hold the decayed fame of orators; those who, in their first
session of parliament, cause wonder by their eloquence; and in the
second, by their silence. I also saw the names of some orators of a
lower kind; those statesmen in the open air, who distribute strange
noises to any who will listen, and undertake to redress the hunger and
raggedness of their hearers.

I observed on each of these phials containing the past renown of
exploded men the name of the merit with which he was once supposed to be
endowed, and under it the true quality, which had been erroneously
construed into that merit. Thus, on the phial of one of these orators to
the crowd, I read "Eloquence," as his claim to greatness; and this word,
underneath, was translated into "Impudence," which was also the
interpretation of many other excellencies; and I was surprised to find
in how many different ways a man may be great by this single endowment.
He who has not this inspiration imagines that confidence must denote the
possession of something to rely upon, and ignorantly supposes, that a
man cannot be assured of his own eloquence without a subject to speak
upon, and words to utter; while those who are endued with this great
quality lie under no such necessities, but are intrepid without any
means of confidence, except their own inward vigour and alacrity.

I learned here, that this gift of impudence had been wit and humour,
argument, eloquence, industry, courage, zeal for the public good, and,
indeed, any other virtue convenient to the owner. However, the renown by
impudence never lasts long, which seems to be the only defect of that
attribute.

Having examined these phials with many reflections on the perishable
nature of fame, I walked forth, and soon reached a building, which
contains the good intentions that have never been executed. There is a
vast accumulation of these virtuous endeavours; and I found amongst them
many actions so noble, that I greatly regretted they should have been
put in practice only so far as to be thought of. Some persons appeared
to have entertained only two or three of these excellent projects during
their lives; others had been incessantly occupied in schemes of future
goodness. I found a great number of resolutions to reform voluptuous
habits: many had determined to repeat a beloved vice no more after a
certain time; some deferred their abstinence till the following year;
and others declared that it should begin the next day. This contrivance,
of beginning virtue at an appointed time, seemed to have been much
practised: one man, in the month of April, had resolved that he would be
good after the first of June, retaining a license for the intervening
weeks.

It is a precept of Lord Bacon's, that those who are endeavouring to
assume an authority over their bad habits should contrive that what they
undertake at one time be neither too easy nor too difficult; since, by
attempting too little, they make no progress, and by aiming at too
much, they fail altogether, and are discouraged. This plan seems
plausible; but I here found innumerable instances in which it had been
useless: nor from these examples was I able to form any opinion as to
what quantity of reformation is the most likely to be endured at one
time. Some confident men had been very peremptory with their faults, and
resolved to dismiss them altogether; the consequence of which was, that
these faults adhered to each other, and all remained where they were.
Others had been content to begin with prohibiting one little enjoyment
at a time, and had found the same disobedience; while others, who had
tried the moderate amendment prescribed by Lord Bacon, had succeeded no
better.

There were several who, after the frequent failing of a resolution, had
desisted in despair, and for the rest of their lives permitted the error
to remain unmolested; but many had continued to repeat the same
unsuccessful effort, and as soon as one resolution gave way, had
supplied its place with another, exactly similar, so as to equal the
perseverance with which the spider renews his web whenever it is swept
away.

A man, who lived principally in bed, had every day entered into a
determination to rise at six; one, whose health suffered by the
achievements of his appetite at meals, had employed the morning of every
day in a resolution to dine sparingly; a third, while he was zealously
dispersing a good fortune, had not passed a day without resolving to
commence a rigid scrutiny into his accounts, and to have a personal
acquaintance with every shilling he possessed. A man who, by an angry
temper, put both his family and himself to great inconvenience, had
undertaken from that moment to be the most peaceable man alive: this
resolution had wanted repairing several times every day.

Men are apt to commit the error of believing, that a resolution, once
fixed in the mind, will remain there till they authorise it to leave its
post. Another mistake is, the supposing that, because a certain bad
inclination is not troublesome at the present moment, it can never
return. Some animals have a property which naturalists call hybernation
(they remain a part of every year without apparent life); and many
persons do not know that their faults are amongst the creatures which
undergo this intermission. From ignorance of this part of natural
history, they believe a vice to be dead, and exult at having destroyed
it, when it is only taking this natural rest, from which it is to have
new vigour. The bad success of these persons, who all their lives were
about to be excellent men, made me reflect on the deficiency of the
ancient and celebrated injunction, "Know thyself," which "e coelo
descendit," and was delivered and received as comprehending all wisdom
and virtue; whereas, to know our faults, and to abstain from them, are
two achievements so obviously distinct, that I wonder how they could
have been confounded.

It has been said, that hell is paved with good intentions; by which all
efficacy seems to be denied to these unsuccessful attempts. This
judgment appears to me a little too severe; and I would allow some merit
to the good that we do in prospect. The chief praise, no doubt, must be
given to the inexorable man who is actually virtuous; but he who makes
an effort, though in vain, must, I think, be acknowledged superior to
the numbers who continue to sin with perfect resignation. Moralists
usually agree, that he who intends to do ill is culpable, though he
should not accomplish his schemes; and I think, therefore, it is but
just, that he who designs to do good, though without success, should be
allowed some portion of praise.

Pursuing my journey, I arrived at a valley, in which I saw a crowd of
seeming men and women, dressed in fantastic habits, and walking up and
down: but one whom I there met informed me, that this was the Valley of
Lost Fashions, and that the persons I saw were only dresses which had
formerly reigned. I walked down into the valley; and then perceived that
these dresses had no person to guide and conduct them: yet they stood
upright, as if the wearers had been within, and moved about as
gracefully as they could have done under their command. The several
parts of the same suit adhered together, each occupying its proper
place; and the hat hovered over, as if supported by a head. These
dresses were of both sexes; and I saw every variety of apparel that has
inhabited England. The dresses of the different ages were mingled
together: there was the scanty and simple concealment of savage times,
and the several sorts of gorgeous and cumbersome robes formerly worn in
our country; in looking at which, I wondered how people could ever have
been induced to involve themselves in such impediments.

I here found, not only the dresses once in fashion, but also the
gestures which have been practised in former ages; for every suit of
clothes retained the manner and behaviour to which it had been
accustomed. There were some ceremonious clothes, which were incessantly
paying homage to others, and, in particular, made very low bows to every
female dress which they met. Some moved with a solemn sedate pace, and
others were very lively. I observed several ladies' gowns that had a
great deal of vivacity.

All these dresses conducted themselves so naturally, that I could hardly
be satisfied there was not a prompter within each. Seeing, therefore, an
embroidered petticoat, which walked in a very stately manner, I ventured
to raise it, in order to disclose whatever might be there. To this
inquiry it made no resistance; and I found that it had none of those
secrets to keep, which are usually entrusted to a petticoat.

I observed a gold-headed cane walking up and down with a great deal of
medical dignity and learning, and above this, at about six feet from the
ground, there floated in the air a redundant wig, as being part of the
same physician.

I was here convinced how many of the estimable qualities of human nature
are comprehended in dress and gesture; for when I saw these suits of
clothes walking about, each with its own grace and manner, I could not
avoid feeling some respect for them as human beings. When the splendid
apparel of a nobleman in Queen Elizabeth's time stalked past me with a
slow solemn step, I admired its profound reflection, and political
abilities; and I was several times inclined to laugh at the wit of a
lively coat and waistcoat.

I think, in our estimation of those suits of clothes which discharge all
the duties of this life with propriety and applause, we do not
sufficiently acknowledge where the true merit lies. Lord Burleigh was so
sensible of the rights of dress, that in throwing off his gown, he
frequently said to it, "Lie there, Lord Treasurer," as being the real
officer of state.

As I was walking about amongst these actors, I was suddenly startled by
a formidable oath, which was pronounced near me; and I turned round to
see which of the garments was the profane one. I found, however, that
they were not capable of such an accomplishment as swearing. Another
oath, still more copious than the first, was uttered close to me, where
there was no suit of clothes to be seen; and I then found that these
imprecations were preserved here amongst the exploded fashions. I soon
heard every variety of them uttered without anger, and, as it seemed,
merely for the purpose of adding grace or vigour to the sentiments which
they had accompanied. There were some poetical oaths, which seemed to
come from a swearer of imagination, and others very concise and simple.
Many were so obscure, that I found it impossible to discover their
meaning; while some were intelligible enough. As swearing is now a dead
language, we could not, without considerable study, become thoroughly
versed in that literature. But I think it might admit of dispute,
whether the suppression of oaths has been a wise or useful measure,
since they certainly added great facility to conversation. It is known
that, in the days of oaths, there were many who swore with much
invention, but had little ability to converse in any other style; so
that we may suppose there are persons who, by the prohibition of the
only language they can speak, are excluded from all conversation, and
must distinguish themselves by silence. Our ancestors applied oaths to a
great variety of purposes: to enforce an argument, or supply the want
of one; to evince sincerity; to ratify a sentiment; to gain time for
preparation: they used them, also, as invective, wit, fancy, repartee,
and, indeed, as the representatives of every beauty of speech; so that,
manifestly, a great loss and barrenness must have accrued to our
conversation from this supposed refinement.

But in favour of this art, we may allege an antiquity far beyond our
ancestors, since we find specimens of it in the oldest writings. The
orators have always used it in great abundance: it was successfully
cultivated both by Demosthenes and Cicero; and it is to be observed,
that it remained in the modern oratory of England after it had been
exploded in conversation. In both Houses of Parliament, a well-timed
"Good God!" has been frequently known to have great force, and sometimes
was the chief argument that a speech contained.

Whilst I was wandering amongst the departed garments, having escaped
from the oaths, I heard a voice near me exclaim, "Whatever is, is;" and
very soon was added, "It is impossible for the same thing to be, and not
to be." I could not conjecture whence this important intelligence came,
till I met with a person, who informed me, that the maxims which have
passed for truths amongst men, as soon as they are exploded, arrive in
the moon, and are associated with the other dismissed fashions. In what
I had just heard, I recognised the innate ideas with which philosophers
formerly stored the mind of an infant, supposing that, for our safety
through life, we are born fully instructed, that "Whatever is, is," and
provided, also, with some other truths equally useful.

I afterwards heard many other maxims, which once were undisputed: for in
this Valley of Lost Fashions the air was filled with truths, religious,
moral, political, and physical; and, finding here so much of the
learning of our ancestors, I trembled for the fate of many things which
are now undoubtedly true amongst us: for the reason of man is certainly
as variable as his dress; and that secret power, which we call fashion,
regulates opinions, as it does skirts and collars. Different doctrines
come and go in succession, just as one form of apparel supplants
another: a particular kind of dress is dismissed, not for any demerit,
but because it has been worn for a certain time. By the same law of
variety, that which has been true for several years is therefore not
entitled to be true any longer; and as those who abandon a particular
dress can assign no reason for it, except the example of others, so,
when an opinion is universally renounced in any country, the chief part
of the nation know not why they now consider it false, nor why they
before believed it to be true. There are, indeed, some stubborn enemies
of fashion, both in dress and reason: one man prides himself on
fidelity to notions which all others have deserted, and disdains to
think any thing which was not thought a century ago; another, of the
same character, but differently manifested, continues to dress himself
with equal firmness, resists all innovation in the brim of his hat, and
never deviates in his coat or his gaiters from the example set him by
his father.

It has been an eager study, with some writers, to trace the progress and
succession of opinions in past ages, and to explain how one prevalent
notion has been naturally derived from another; but in such speculations
there is usually this imperfection, that they stop at the present time,
instead of proceeding to deduce future opinions from the present. For it
is singular, that men who have sagacity to demonstrate that the maxims
prevalent in one age must unavoidably have followed those in the
preceding, yet from our present doctrines can derive no opinions at all
for the future; and can no more invent maxims to be entertained five
years hence, than a milliner can invent dresses to be worn at that time.

In this assembly of the deceased fashions I found many ancient and
venerable maxims, which served our ancestors for truth; and some of
them, I thought, might have been retained amongst us with advantage,
though many had certainly been dismissed with justice. I began to think
of catching a few of these past truths which I most approved of, and
turning them out in England; but was informed that they would
immediately return to the moon. Besides the ancient truths, I found here
some which had been born and had died within my own memory, and some
which had been truths one year, and delusions the next.

The noise of these contending opinions, each as positive as its
antagonist, each enjoying its short popularity, and thus succeeding and
undermining each other like statesmen, could not fail to make me
consider with regret how very little of real durable truth there is in
the world. However, we have this consolation, that if truth is not to be
found on the earth, its place is amply supplied by belief, which is an
excellent substitute for it.

Belief has, indeed, many advantages over truth; it serves equally well
to stop inquiry, and satisfy the curiosity which harasses mankind; and
it may be attained without the labour and search by which truth must be
pursued; for it happens fortunately that it is as easy to believe as it
is difficult to know. He, too, who follows truth with a life of
meditation, can seldom arrive at any firm conviction, but is continually
perplexed by doubt; while the resolute believer is not disturbed in his
tenets by the slightest distrust. Besides this, the truths that we can
reach are but few, and the greatest part of nature is inaccessible to
inquiry; while the knowledge of him who believes is unlimited: he finds
nothing obscure, but is admitted into all the secrets of the universe.
This, too, must be considered, that he who, after great labour, fancies
himself possessed of a truth, may, upon further discoveries, see his
hypothesis taken from him; but the believer, who has a resolute mind,
can by no art or reasoning be deprived of his belief. It is also a great
evil of truth, that we must receive it as it is by nature, and not as we
would wish it to be. On the other hand, we have it in our power to
believe whatever we desire; and in our plans of the universe may take
care to admit nothing to our disadvantage. This flexible nature of
belief is well understood by those reasoners who, when they would refute
a doctrine, consider it sufficient if they prove it to be pernicious;
whence, without hesitation, it is to be false. For the reasons I have
assigned, my advice to all persons is, that they leave the perplexities
of truth, and resort to belief, as of much greater ease, certainty, and
serenity.

The place I visited after the territory of fashions, was a house
preserving the female characters that have been lost. They are kept in
bottles; and upon the label of each is recorded the accident or
temptation under which the character was let go; and I found much
amusement in this enumeration of the disasters incident to the female
reputation. One character had entered the bottle by surprise, another by
perseverance; society had been fatal to some, and solitude to others;
some perished by flattery, others by argument; here I saw a character
lost by thoughtlessness, and there by contemplation.

While I was reading the narratives of these accidents I observed a lady
whom I knew to have incurred this important loss, in search of the
bottle that contained her own reputation, which having found, she seized
it very eagerly, when immediately it dropped from her hands and was
broken. The character flowed out, resembling quicksilver in appearance,
and the lady in great anxiety endeavoured to collect it, but in vain,
for it escaped with the utmost agility whenever she touched it.

From this house I proceeded to another, filled also with bottles,
containing the lost popularity of statesmen. I here found a well known
politician who has occupied a place in the English cabinet. He told me
in confidence that he had been sent to the moon to regain the lost
popularity of his party. It had escaped from them, he said, in a very
singular manner, and without any misconduct of theirs. He soon found the
bottle he was in search of; but these bottles being fixed to their
shelves he had contrived a plan for catching and detaining the
popularity, which he had been told would issue forth as soon as the cork
should be removed. He produced a paper bag, composed of an act of
parliament, which had been designed for endless popularity, supposing
that if he could once enclose the lost popularity of himself and his
colleagues in that bag he could carry it back without any danger of
losing it on the road.

Just as he was about to release the prize, and with much preparation was
holding his bag ready to catch it, another statesman of a different
party entered the room, and advancing to the spot produced a bag, with
which he also stood ready to dispute the possession of this valuable
popularity. His bag also was made out of a parliamentary bill, but it
had not yet been passed, and he seemed to be confident that it would be
strong enough to secure the captive.

But the first invader of the bottle seeing this new competitor desisted
from his undertaking, and began to remonstrate against the interference.
He said the popularity, that he was going to regain, belonged to himself
and his colleagues, and no other party could have a just claim to it;
their rivals, he added, ought to invent a popularity for themselves, and
not attempt to steal that which others had made by their own industry.
He affirmed, too, that the bag which his adversary had brought was made
of paper stolen out of his desk.

To this the second politician answered, that the popularity in this
bottle was not the property of one party rather than another, but the
prize of any who could gain possession of it. "You and your
colleagues," said he, "have devised a convenient maxim, that whoever
obtains the good will of the public is usurping something that belongs
to you. You have bespoken for yourselves every benefit to the country
that can be thought of, and any other man who attempts to do good is
encroaching on your rights. You declare yourselves the authors of every
useful law that any man may hereafter propose; you are the sole
proprietors of the people's applause, and nobody can acquire approbation
except by defrauding you."

In the midst of this dispute, a third statesman, armed with a bag, came
to claim the contents of the bottle. He derided the pretensions of the
other two, saying that no party could have popularity by just means
except himself and his friends, and whatever portion other men might
enjoy they must have gained by deceit. However, he was convinced that
the bags of the other two would be incapable of holding the popularity,
and that his own would succeed, for he said it was made out of some
admirable laws. I looked at his bag, and saw it was composed of blank
paper, for the laws he spoke of were yet to come, being only in his
intentions, and the paper kept vacant for them.

After some farther dispute it seemed impossible that these claims to the
bottle should be settled by negotiation; and the only agreement that the
three statesmen could arrive at was, that the popularity being let
loose should remain in the possession of any one of the three to whom it
should be allotted by that kind of justice called a scramble, which is a
mode of arbitration very useful and decisive in adjusting many political
contests.

The three politicians, therefore, standing watchfully with their bags,
the cork was drawn, when a loud shout of English huzzas rushed from the
bottle. This was the popularity; and the first of the three statesmen
lost no time in placing his bag over the mouth of the bottle, when it
was instantly torn into a thousand pieces by the wild shout. The second
politician had placed his bag immediately over that of his rival, to
provide for this accident; but the precious huzzas escaped through it
with the same ease as through the first, and left it a similar ruin. The
third statesman laughed triumphantly, and held out his bag with great
confidence; but not a single cry would enter it, and the whole clamour
flew through an open window, and was heard gradually becoming more
distant. The three baffled statesmen ran to the window, and listened
eagerly to the retiring uproar, imagining sometimes that it approached
them again. When at length it had quite died away, they began to dispute
in which bag it ought to have been enclosed, and continued the debate
for some time with much argument and anger.

As I walked along, looking for new adventures, I was surprised by the
sight of a church, with a parsonage house near to it, the scene having
an appearance entirely English. I approached the house, wondering at so
exact a copy of things in my own world; but when I had come close to it,
I was still more astonished to see the house shrink suddenly, and
convert itself into the dress of a bishop, the roof dwindling to a wig,
and the walls becoming robes; at the same instant the church was
increased into a cathedral, which I recognised as the cathedral of
Worcester. While I gazed in wonder, the cathedral underwent another
change, and in a moment was that of Canterbury. Immediately afterwards
the bishop's robes raised themselves, and stood upright as vigorously as
if they had enclosed a real bishop, while the wig hung over them as if
supported by a head. The robe then stretched out its right sleeve as
being in the act of oratory. I had a great curiosity to understand this
mysterious transaction, and fortunately I met with a person who was able
to explain it. He told me that all this was merely a vision, which had
passed through the mind of one of those contemplative persons who are
usually called castle builders; that fortunate race of beings, who, if
they are left alone but a few minutes, can bring to pass whatever they
wish for. He said the moon was amply supplied with such meditations, the
name of the dreamer being always to be found upon the figure which he
had sent there.

On learning this, I approached Canterbury Cathedral to look for the name
of the person who had built it, and I found inscribed over the door the
name of a young clergyman whom I knew. He had taken orders without
either money or interest, and did not seem likely to benefit
Christianity, otherwise than by wearing a black coat. Having, therefore,
time for meditation, he had been busy in making the only kind of
provision for himself that lay in his power. When I saw his name I could
easily interpret his vision: in the beginning of it he had been settled
in a country living, which was the church and parsonage house that had
first drawn my attention; from this, by some celebrated works on
divinity, he had been raised to the bishopric of Worcester, and thence
transferred to Canterbury with a remarkably rapid promotion. The robes
and the wig were now evidently addressing the House of Lords. In this
office the lawn sleeves performed many explanatory and convincing
gestures; and the wig supporting itself in the air, at a suitable
distance from the robes, duly executed all that significant nodding and
trembling by which such a wig usually defends the church. The dress,
indeed, had every perfection of oratory except meaning. While this
eloquence proceeded, he who had attained all this preferment was
probably wandering solitary and neglected.

I now found that I was in the territory allotted to these castles; and
proceeding a little farther, I was surrounded by visionary sights, the
several objects changing every instant as the dream went on. In the
midst of these chimeras I observed a beautiful woman seated, and was
surprised by her not taking the least notice of any thing round her; but
on going behind her I saw a name inscribed on the back of her neck, and
so discovered that she was herself a castle. The name was that of a
young lady endued with a very homely person, who being unable to
acquiesce in the face and shape imposed upon her, had secretly provided
herself with another form more to her taste. What I now saw, therefore,
was the figure which she had appointed to personate her in her imaginary
actions. This elegant apparition was a dark beauty when I first observed
her, but soon after became suddenly fair, the lady in the course of her
dream having chosen a new complexion. She was at first in an evening
dress; but in an instant a riding habit grew over her, and she was on
horseback with a very graceful seat. Soon after she resumed the evening
dress and was dancing.

At the same time I saw a lawyer's wig and gown, and by the eloquent
gestures of the sleeves and the forcible nods of the wig, I perceived
that it was pleading a cause. This was the apparel of a young lawyer,
which, finding no employment in court, was frequently exercised in the
imagination of the wearer.

While I was examining these visions a sudden wind sprung up and swept
them away. Canterbury Cathedral glided along in a very majestic manner,
and the wig and gown continued to argue as far as I could see them.
Amongst the fictitious actions here, which I had time to observe, were
many pairs of young men and women engaged in very agreeable
conversation. These were the dreams of those hapless persons, who,
unable to obtain a real accomplishment of their tenderness, have
recourse to imagination, where no accident or prohibition can interrupt
their interviews. But I must here warn those who practise such
clandestine meetings, that since the road to the moon has been opened
their private meditations are no longer safe. An action only thought of
has formerly been judged secure from the most inquisitive; but now, when
all have access to the moon, where the tenderest visions are thus
exposed, it will be advisable to dream with great caution. I here saw
two or three young ladies of my acquaintance engaged in confederacies of
which the world has had no suspicion, and the apparitions bore an exact
resemblance to the ladies themselves. It is true that in one of these
chimerical scenes of tenderness two figures must concur, and,
therefore, it cannot be known which of the two has transacted the
vision; but a probable conjecture may often be formed by those who know
them. I have thought it right to give this warning to the builders of
castles, who have hitherto been secure against curiosity, and in all
their forbidden meetings have enjoyed an exemption from the common
danger of discovery. Their privilege of secrecy is now lost; and
henceforth, when they wish to retire for the customary enjoyment, they
will do well to remember that all they are to think of must be acted
also before the eyes of profane and satirical observers.

The castles being blown away from me, I walked forward reflecting on the
happy lot of those who build castles, and are thus enabled to determine
what events shall happen to them. There are many persons so dull, that
through life they have no incidents except those which really occur; and
if an advantage, which they desire, does not actually take place, they
are quite unable to obtain the enjoyment of it. These persons cannot
conceive the life of a castle builder. He is the only man who can set
fortune at defiance, being entirely the master of his own destiny. He
does not, therefore, distribute prosperity to himself in that sparing
and imperfect manner which fortune always observes: he is subject
neither to delay nor disappointment in his undertakings; and instead of
needing the labour and perseverance which are necessary to others for
success, he can accomplish all that he wishes in walking about, in
sitting still, or at full length. The best gifts of fortune are not
comparable to his fictions; for in real life there is always something
defective to impair the happiest lot, but he who lives in vision takes
care to exclude every circumstance that could disturb his serenity. It
is to be considered, too, that an actual event can happen only once, but
in imagination the same fortunate casualty may be repeated as often as
it is wished for. It has always been a complaint that the successes of
life are followed by satiety; but an able builder of castles is never
satisfied. Those who are subservient to real occurrences are perpetually
stopped in their designs by an obstacle called impossibility, but this
is no impediment to a true visionary: he can recover a fortune which has
been squandered, recall a lost friend to life, and restore ruined health
to vigour. It is true that those who devote themselves to the pursuit of
these fancies are soon disqualified for the real affairs and successes
of life, but so great is the happiness by a proficiency in dreaming that
they can willingly relinquish all other advantages.

I was now attracted by the loudest valley that I had yet heard, and was
told by one whom I met, that it contained the disputes of conversation,
so that I no longer wondered at the great eagerness and confusion of
voices. I soon arrived at the place, and walked into these
controversies, which are divided into separate districts according to
the subjects of them.

I first found myself in the political disputes to which every place of
resort and conversation throughout England had contributed. Clamours on
public affairs were assembled in this spot from the clubs of London, the
coffee-rooms of all the towns in the kingdom, the dinner tables of
country gentlemen, and innumerable other places where men talk for the
welfare of their country; and since every Englishman is both a statesman
and an orator, it may be imagined there is here a noble exhibition of
eloquence. I heard with some amusement these voices talking with all the
zeal of men engaged in a public duty; for most of those who are
politicians in private believe that their country cannot prosper if they
are silent. I listened to several of those who are statesmen out of
history, and in their reasonings about present events always argue two
hundred years back. I heard the dispute of two voices, which contrived
to embroil Hampden in all the transactions of the present time. There
were many other reasoners who combated on the events of former ages with
as much zeal and anger as they could have done on the laws which
concerned their own property. Indeed, few Englishmen are neutral readers
of history: almost all enrol themselves as party men in all contests
since Elizabeth, and with great fidelity adhere to their friends in
every page. A true Englishman is persuaded that his own credit depends
on the reputation of certain statesmen of past times, in whose designs
he is so deeply engaged that he must share their praise or ignominy, and
he is defending his own character when he decries their adversaries, who
must be villains before he can be an honest man.

After listening to these historical disputes, I advanced a few steps,
and found myself in modern times, where all the late vicissitudes were
debated with much indignation. I heard animadversions on certain
politicians, in voices which by an earnest sincerity of tone betrayed
suffering for the want of office.

I amused myself here with observing the several arts of controversy
which are practised by private disputants, and perhaps are in greatest
perfection on political subjects, such as a louder voice than the
adversary may be willing or able to arrive at; a sudden anger, which may
make him silent from fear or decency; the not hearing any thing that he
says, a resolution which must baffle the best reasoner; the beginning to
talk while he is in the crisis of his argument. I found here an
admirable expedient for making an argument unanswerable, which is to
repeat it till the adversary is tired of answering it. Another artifice,
much practised in this place, was, that when one disputant had urged
something inconvenient, the other, with great confidence, would say
something wholly foreign to the question, as if in answer, and then the
surprise and silence of the first, while he considers how this can be
applied to the subject, must be construed into a defeat.

There are other arts, perhaps, not less victorious than these, as a
contemptuous silence, and disdaining to argue any longer; a smile of
superiority, a look of having much more to say were it worth the
trouble, a pretended yielding to the adversary, as if encouraging him to
talk, and expose his ignorance.

Being tired of politics, I wandered through the valley, and heard
innumerable subjects debated. I here found a proof that nature leaves no
creature altogether without defence; for when she does not empower a man
to argue, she enables him to be angry.

I had occasion to consider the extravagance of those philosophers, who
from time to time have embraced a singular project of bringing all the
world to one opinion, for I observed here how naturally our friend, by
maintaining one side of a question, provokes us to undertake the other.
And yet this wild design of making men unanimous is still entertained by
certain persons, who believe that they are appointed to think for all
the world, and that mankind have nothing to do but think after them. It
is true, they allow, that men are now stubborn; but the age of thinking
alike will arrive.

I remarked, in this valley, that there is nothing so efficacious in
prolonging and enforcing a controversy as for men not to know what they
are disputing about. There were also many instances of another endless
way of reasoning, when two disputants agree without suspecting it, and
in different words contend vehemently for the same thing.

I found in this valley a great number of what may be called domestic
disputes, being those contests in which some families pass all their
leisure and retirement. I listened to some of these, and greatly admired
the invention of the reasoners, and their vigilance in seizing
opportunities for a difference of opinion. I heard a lady and six
daughters debating whether a certain person had grey eyes or hazel: the
mother and two daughters contended for the hazel, while the four others
supported grey. Both sides maintained their own hypothesis with great
vehemence, dexterity, and strength of argument. Each reasoner insisted
on her own superior opportunities of information, for one had seen the
eyes most frequently, but another had viewed them in the most
advantageous light. Neither party could gain a proselyte from the other.
I heard another family disputing with equal earnestness, whether a
certain person, lately dead, had been good-natured or not. I listened
to several other controversies of the same kind, as acute, angry, and
useful, as many famous disputes amongst scholars and divines.

Being at last quite weary of all this wrangling, I continued my journey,
and soon reached a building that contains lost experience, being the
opportunities which men have neglected of becoming wise at their own
expense. Over the door is a statue representing Experience. It is the
figure of an old man, expressing very significantly the pretence to
wisdom, from a long life, appearing to be in the act of imparting
caution, and asserting a title to know more than others, from having
lived longer. This figure reminded me of several old men whom I have
known to gain great confidence in their own opinion from a long
seclusion, supposing themselves practised in the conduct of life by a
continuance of infirmity and decay, and concluding that by an absence of
twenty years from the world they must understand it better than those
who are still conversant with it. Most old men need to be told that the
being alive is not experience, and that the longer their old age has
been, the more time they have had to forget.

I entered the building, and found one large room of the same appearance
as I have before described, being full of bottles, which preserve the
wasted experience. Each bottle had a label giving a history of its
contents. This room made me consider how erroneous is the common
opinion concerning the efficacy of experience. It is usually said, that
we are not to be taught by what happens to others, but only by what
befalls ourselves, yet I think most who reflect on their lives must
confess that the warnings they give themselves are to little purpose. To
prove the vanity of experience, I would have any man consider how often
he has failed to effect that improvement in his own character or
conduct, which he now promises himself shall be very soon concluded.
When we have every day endeavoured not to do a thing, and have yet done
it every day for some years past, we are still convinced that to-morrow
it really will be omitted; such is the authority of experience over our
judgment. A stone, says Aristotle, being thrown up a thousand times does
not learn to ascend. In many laudable endeavours, men benefit no more by
experience than the stone, but still come back to the same place. I
think, therefore, it may be said that experience has just force enough
to make men lament that they are doing wrong, but not enough to make
them do right.

In this room I saw many persons examining their own bottles, where they
found the follies which they had diligently repeated after learning the
bad consequences of them. They all were struck with melancholy at
finding how many occasions of becoming prudent they had neglected.
Gamblers found here the frequent losses and turns of fortune which had
warned them of ruin, and in defiance of which they had proceeded with
admirable resolution. The spendthrift was reproached with having still
forgotten the want and difficulty which many times in his life had
admonished him of the habits by which he was now a beggar.

I read with some amusement the histories on many of these bottles. One
of them containing the wasted experience of a friend of mine, a member
of parliament, records his endeavours to be an orator. Though every
experiment has been conclusive in favour of silence, he still persists
in his design of being the first orator in the House of Commons. Next to
this bottle is one, which proves that experience has no greater force
against poetry. It belongs to the author of a yearly volume, the
reception of which every year has bid him desist from being a poet, but
has not retarded the composition for the year following.

I observed a gentleman of my acquaintance studying attentively the label
of his own bottle, which was covered with a long narration of neglected
warnings, for he is thoroughly conversant with almost every enterprise
of imprudence. He told me that he should take possession of his bottle,
and carrying it to the earth make use of it to resist temptations; for
he had seen another man drink a small quantity out of his bottle, by
which he was immediately inspired with experience, and resolute against
all follies. My friend, therefore, intended to have recourse to his
bottle upon every urgent occasion, and so keep himself prudent as long
as its contents lasted. I have since inquired the success of his scheme,
and learned that at first, on the approach of any dangerous allurement,
he applied himself to his bottle, and by a few drops mixed with water
was quite fortified against it, having a painful remembrance and awe of
former evils. While the influence of his draught continued, he
remembered only the satiety and weariness of pleasure, with every
inconvenience and shame of his several transgressions. These visions of
prudence soon passed away, and each separate temptation required a new
draught. But when the first charm of temperance was over, another
difficulty occurred; for when an opportunity of being frail was
expected, it required as much firmness to drink from the bottle as to
resist without drinking. He still, however, continued this excellent
medicine; but took care to be austere only when there was no occasion of
enjoyment, and when any pleasure was near, he carefully abstained from
the bottle. Timing his draughts thus judiciously, he still benefits by
past experience.

Not long after I had quitted this house, I arrived at a valley which
yielded a sound quite different from all the rest, not resembling either
the human voice or any instrument that I had ever heard. Being told
that it was the valley of Cant I did not wonder that it should give an
unintelligible noise. I entered the valley, and found myself in the
midst of these sounds, which I had been unable to interpret, and I then
discovered that they were the religious tones which have prevailed in
England since the first introduction of cant. There were no articulate
words, but only tones in every variety of zeal and devotion.

I found here a gentleman very learned in antiquities, who was delighted
with this multitude of noises; for he said that the most eloquent and
faithful historian being unable to describe a sound, we have had no real
knowledge of the tones of different sects, though we read much about
them, but here he had found the authentic whining of every persuasion in
past times. He listened attentively, endeavouring to assign the tones to
their respective ages, which he imagined himself able to do with great
exactness, though I knew not by what rules he was guided. He declared he
should catch specimens of all these sounds, and shut them up in a box,
so as to have by him all the tones in which our ancestors have served
God, and thus supply a great defect in history.

I did not stay long amongst these strange noises, which at different
times have served as piety, but passing further into the valley, I found
cant under another representation. I was surrounded by a vast multitude
of faces, or appearances of faces, which hovered in the air without
being allied to bodies, or any other visible support. These faces were
employed in the different contortions and grimaces which have been
thought acceptable to God by adherents of the several sects. I was not a
little amused by the violent endeavours of these faces; I saw features
let out to an immoderate length; eye-brows with wonderful skill conveyed
to a place far remote from that where nature had settled them: and eyes
most ingeniously put out of sight without the lids being shut. Some of
these artists had great advantages from nature in uncommon gifts of
ugliness, and others had by industry supplied their natural defects in
that endowment.

Being soon satisfied with this morality I left the faces frowning for
their faith, and walking on saw a crowd of hands in the air performing
their office also in the rites of cant. Some pairs of hands appeared to
be preaching, and others praying; some were held upwards for a time,
then stretched out, probably to the conviction of all who listened; some
were clasped together with a violent effort of the muscles.

As soon as I had walked out of the district of hands, I found the air
darkened by a flight of religious tracts, a crowd of which hovered round
me in the air. When I appeared amongst them they rushed to me and opened
themselves before my eyes that I might read them, struggling and
contending with each other for the preference. Many of these tracts had
been great travellers, and bore on the outside the names of the places
they had visited. Some of them had preached in the East Indies, others
in the West; and I felt a pride in considering how great a part of the
world we supply with cant; nor is there the least fear of our stock
being exhausted.

In another part of the valley I found a book recording the designs of
cant, which are not yet completed. The first I cast my eye upon was a
project to suppress eating, drinking, and breathing on a Sunday,
particularly amongst tradesmen. Rabelais mentions some people whose
practice was to breakfast on yawning; but this proposed law would make
it serve for breakfast and dinner too on one day in every week. It
appeared that the authors of this design have great hopes of persuading
parliament very soon to enforce yawning on Sunday, and also of inducing
people voluntarily to devote fifty-two days of the year to that laudable
exercise, most advantageous to the public and most pleasing to heaven.

After this valley I came to another, whence issued a great uproar, which
I found was the debates of parliament. I was soon in the midst of them,
and heard a formidable din on various subjects, together with the many
sounds of acquiescence and dissent. English orators will be pleased to
find their speeches preserved in this manner; for it may spare them the
expense and solicitation by which they must obtain a place in certain
volumes for what they have said. I observed here several renowned
senators who listened with exemplary attention to their own harangues.
The speeches are preserved by this valley more faithfully than they can
be by printing; for they are uttered without the loss of a single
hesitation, repetition, or any other beauty with which they were first
delivered. A speech, by losing these delays loses much of its length,
which is now acknowledged the chief merit of oratory, as appears by the
practice in both our houses of parliament. Cicero being asked which
oration of Demosthenes he thought the best, answered, "The longest." All
speeches are now estimated by the same rule, but our English orators far
excel the ancients in duration; and we have many who, on any important
subject, are at least two hours more eloquent than Demosthenes. In
judging of speeches by their length there is this great convenience,
that there can be no dispute about the superiority of one to another;
for when speeches were praised according to the force of reasoning,
choice of words, and other particulars once in esteem, it was impossible
from the difference of taste in men that they should agree which of two
speeches had those merits in the greatest perfection; but now the
preference between two orations can make no question, provided the clock
be carefully consulted.

I may mention in this place a project which I have devised for greatly
improving the debates in parliament, and freeing the despatch of
business. In explaining my plan, I must confess that it is borrowed,
having been practised in the following case with great success. A
married woman once complained to a female friend of the bitter and
incessant disputes between herself and her husband, and asked advice
about the means of avoiding them. Her friend answered that she had in
her possession a certain water, of singular virtue in preventing
quarrels between married people, and she would give her a bottle of it,
with instructions for using it to that excellent purpose. Having filled
a bottle with the peaceful liquid, she presented it to her friend,
desiring that whenever her husband was beginning to be angry and
contentious, she would fill her mouth with this water, and keep it there
till he had become perfectly quiet. Soon after, the wife came back to
have the bottle replenished, and to thank her friend for the miraculous
cure and peace effected in her household, for the water had put an end
to all disputes. Now I have been informed by a great chemist that the
water of the Thames has the same wonderful property; and my contrivance
is, that every member of parliament, at the beginning of each debate,
should hold a sufficient quantity of it in his mouth, until the question
be passed. I am convinced that this practice would infinitely improve
the deliberations of our senate, by preventing the delays of business,
and the perplexing of many subjects.

In the building which I next entered, the lost friendships of English
people are preserved. I found a large room filled with urns of a
beautiful shape, each of which contains a past friendship. On the
outside of the urn is inscribed the cause which alienated the two
friends, the duration of their kindness, with some other circumstances.
I became melancholy at surveying this great assemblage of urns, and
reflecting on the instability of friendship. When we lose our kindness
towards a friend, we commonly pass into the contrary emotion, and
entertain something like aversion towards him. Two men thus altered
cannot meet without uneasiness; and I believe most people very early in
life can name several whose presence reproaches them in this manner.

There is often no reason to be assigned for these separations: we
formerly loved our friend without knowing why, and now his voice, his
countenance, his gestures give us offence, which is equally
inexplicable. We may be mortified that our judgment in reasoning is so
liable to vary at different times of our life; but perhaps this want of
firmness in our affections is still more lamentable.

It is said by Swift that every man is born with a certain portion of
friendship, which he is to distribute amongst those he lives with, so
that he cannot give to one without taking from another. I think there is
some truth in this observation; and it may explain the cessation of many
friendships, which otherwise would be very mysterious. There are some
who pretend to have an unlimited stock of this commodity, and are
liberal in bestowing it upon all who approach them; but this alacrity in
loving only confirms the maxim of Swift: for the little value of the
kindness, which in this case falls to the share of each, proves that
friendship is not to be so divided.

On many of these urns I read the causes of estrangement. Some friends
had lost their kindness for each other by being too long separate,
others by being too long together; some by having different interests,
and others by pursuing the same thing.

Lord Bacon says that admonition is the chief office and benefit of
friendship; but I found here numberless instances of friends having been
divided for ever by too faithful an execution of this office.

In wandering about when I had left the house of friendship I approached
a valley, which I learned was the receptacle of lost vanity, and I was
surprised to hear of such a place, because I had always thought that
this endowment is never lost, but remains with a man till his death.
Having often seen it in full vigour after the decay of strength, memory,
benevolence, and almost every faculty, I had supposed that where it once
is it must be inseparable from a human being, and consequently that it
wanted no asylum in the moon.

I had always thought it the chief mitigation of old age, that whoever is
in that difficulty, though he should lose every other ease, can still
keep his vanity, which is certainly the principal comfort of life.

But I found there was here a valley full of this excellent attribute
without any loss to the owners; for the vanity kept in this place is the
fruitless ostentation of those who erroneously believe themselves
admired, and are at the pains to assume a superiority which is
altogether groundless.

When I arrived at the edge of the valley, I saw first a crowd of what I
conceived to be young men employed in very singular movements; but on
walking amongst them, I found they were only the outsides of men, or
rather apparitions. They were all dressed with exact propriety; and I
soon discovered that these shadows represented the elaborate behaviour
of that race of men who claim greatness from a superiority in moving
about. Each of these figures was engaged in executing the gestures
peculiar to it in walking along a street, in entering a room, in bowing,
and in every other momentous transaction. They went through their arts
very rapidly, so as to make a great confusion in the different duties
and situations of life. Their gestures passed from the park to the
opera, and thence to a ball-room without the least delay, the exploits
of each place being performed with wonderful despatch. Many of these
figures smiled perpetually, and some with great skill. It was a
ridiculous thing to see them bowing without any provocation, and
performing other gestures, which there was nothing to justify.

They had no voice, but they moved their lips, and greatly excelled in
conversation so far as it is a beauty to the eye. But all the gifts
exhibited here had been lost by the dulness of mankind, the superiority
of these men being of such a nature that no one could discover the
grounds upon which they reasoned.

I had a wish to take one of these actors a prisoner, thinking he might
be an useful warning to certain young men of my acquaintance. I
therefore seized the one of greatest pretensions, and compressed him
till he was concealed within the palms of my hands, but, notwithstanding
this restraint, I felt him endeavouring to continue his exercises. I
then suddenly let him go, when, being instantly restored to his size and
shape, he began without delay to renew the practice of his
accomplishments. Supposing, therefore, that he would not lose his energy
by a temporary confinement, I again pressed him into a small compass and
secured him in a pocket-book. When, at my return to the earth, he was
released to his right dimensions, he retained all his vigour, and still
he goes through his manoeuvres without cessation.

When I advanced farther into this valley I found it filled with a great
variety of characters, innumerable shapes of people being engaged in a
rapid exhibition of their several kinds of vanity, all being transacted
in silence, for none of the apparitions could speak. I was amused by the
loftiness and pretence of these shadows: here and there I saw a learned
lady dictating to all round with authoritative gestures, nodding with
great erudition, and sometimes stretching out an instructive finger.
Several shapes of young men wandered about quite unable to suppress
their greatness through having spoken once in parliament. The authors,
too, are very abundant here: I remarked the appearance of a man which
seemed to labour extremely with its dignity, and I discovered that the
person whom it represented had fought a duel the day before. One figure
sat with a look of greatness, but quite immovable: this was the
ostentatious reserve of one of those men who would impose their silence
upon the world as learning and superiority, and so much mistake the
reception given them as to construe dislike into respect. This error,
indeed, is not at all uncommon: every one must know people who fancy
themselves universally esteemed only because they put a visible
constraint on every company they enter.

When I looked at the great crowd assembled here, all believing
themselves admired, and all really despised, I could not help
considering how very little admiration there is in the world, and how
many are in pursuit of it. If we except the few solitary men of
remarkable genius, who in the vast crowd that is left obtains any real
admiration? Still the belief of being admired is what gives life all its
spirit. Mankind is in a perpetual plot to obtain applause, and yet every
one prides himself on detecting vanity, and denies to all others what he
expects from them. He who in conversation hears any thing ostentatiously
spoken remarks the vanity of it to his neighbour, who secretly imputes
to him an equal vanity for pretending to this quick discernment of a
fault.

Being now told that I was near the valley of lost labour, I walked
towards it, expecting a very large collection of curiosities, if here
were the efforts of all those Englishmen, who have been laborious to no
purpose. The end of the valley, where I entered, was occupied by a vast
crowd of students. Innumerable shapes or apparitions of men were here
reading for future eminence, being destined to no other reward than the
remembrance of their industry. Each of them fixed his eyes on his book
with great zeal, removing them from time to time as if to enjoy a vision
of his future greatness. I could not avoid some melancholy thoughts at
seeing the pale resolute faces of these persons, who had given up their
health and pleasure for the sake of disappointment, and I considered how
much endeavour there is in the world, and how little reward.

These shadows appeared to be of various ages, some not arrived at
manhood, and others far advanced in life, representing the different
periods at which men desist from trying to be great. Some had given up
renown as soon as they became men, others did not despair to the end of
their lives, but in their old age were still preparing to be famous in
spite of experience. He who means to be eminent usually fixes an early
time for the first appearance of his genius: the time arrives, and his
genius has not yet appeared, but this is no just cause of despair; for
he has only fallen into the common error of expecting a too hasty
success, and he gives a new allowance of time with the same confidence
as before. In the mean time he has a comfort, that early fame is often
pernicious, and his greatness will be more secure by beginning later. He
is also encouraged by the celebrated men who were unknown till long
after his age,--a reflection which has supported many a pensive
candidate for fame. These hopes and alleviations occur at certain
cheerful moments, but there are many hours when the hardship of not
being famous is bitterly felt. And despair, though often deferred, must
come at last, in which emergency consolation is to be sought in the
notorious injustice of the world, and its ignorance of merit. The
sufferer in this disaster has not mistaken his own abilities, but the
judgment of other men: he has failed, not from a deficiency of true
genius, but from the want of some dexterity, or fraudulent art, without
which genius cannot be manifested. Thus a man encourages himself in his
youthful hopes by the sagacity of the world, which insures success to
real ability, and afterwards in his despair he comforts himself by the
dulness of the world, which denies all opportunity to genius. After the
final disappointment, therefore, he is still a great man in secret, and
corrects the injustice of the world, by privately maintaining himself in
his true rank. I believe it is little suspected how many of these
concealed men of genius there are.

Having passed through these laborious readers, I came to a company of
writers equally industrious. A crowd was here afflicted in the
composition of books never to be read. Amongst these authors, I saw two
or three of my acquaintance, whom I had never suspected of such
practices, so carefully had they concealed their infirmity, intending,
probably, to surprise the world with the sudden appearance of a great
work; but through the inexorable temper of booksellers, or some other
impediment, the surprise had never occurred.

The sight of these unsuspected writers confirmed an opinion I have long
had, that the clandestine authors are a very numerous race. And whatever
mortification there may be in finding that what we have written is not
to be a book, yet a writer of this kind has great advantages by his
concealment; for his work, not spreading beyond himself, he is sure of
unanimous approbation, and is the only author who can securely write
without censure. Besides which, while his works are confined to his
desk, he may assign that to himself as an excuse for their not having
been read; but he who by publication has given men an opportunity of
reading him, which they have declined, has no justification. To my
friends, therefore, who must write, I recommend secrecy as the best art
to defend their works from censure, ridicule, neglect, feeble praise,
and other calamities incident to a book.

In examining these appearances of authors, I observed that there were
some of every rank in life; many of them betrayed that they could not be
clothed without difficulty, while several seemed to belong to the
highest order of society. All gave proofs of being affected by the force
and merit of what they were writing; some appeared ready to weep for
the distress which they were causing in a romance; and others were much
diverted by their own wit. I saw two or three authors who could not
contain their laughter at every new sentence that came from their pens.
The works were of various kinds, with which all these persons were
trying to enrich the world. I looked over the shoulders of some, and saw
poems and novels, politics, history, divinity, and every other
undertaking.

Leaving the authors, and advancing farther into the valley of lost
labour, I saw a crowd of young men, who with much energy were throwing
their bodies into many different postures. At first I could not imagine
the purpose of this peculiar diligence, but soon discovered that these
young men were in the practice of oratory, and that all the strange
attitudes I saw were for parliament. As I approached the orators, I
found they were reciting speeches to these gestures, each having a
mirror before him, to direct that part of eloquence which lies in the
arms and legs. All of them argued vehemently with their limbs, and I
lamented that so many convincing gestures should have been lost.

After seeing many other lost labours, which it would be tiresome to
enumerate, I left the valley, and before I had gone far, observed a
pretty woman, with a disconsolate countenance, sitting to rest herself,
as it appeared, from some fruitless search. I asked whether I could
assist her in finding what she wanted, and she gladly accepted of my
aid, informing me that she was in quest of her husband's affection,
which she had unaccountably lost, two years after their marriage, and
had vainly attempted to regain. She had been told that somewhere near
the place where she now sat there was a receptacle for the lost
affection both of husbands and wives, but she had not yet succeeded in
finding it. I comforted her with observing, that a place which should
contain all the lost love of married people must be of considerable
extent, and therefore easily found.

We walked on together, and making inquiries, were directed to a large
building where the affection which has dropped out of the bosoms of
married people is preserved in the shape of small hearts, white and
shining, like alabaster. On each is an inscription, recording the fault
of the wife or husband, by which it had been lost. On one male heart I
read "Decay of beauty," that being the wife's misconduct, by which this
heart had been estranged from her. Almost every heart alleged some
excellent reason for the ceasing of affection, such as a hasty temper,
jealousy, dulness, vivacity, scolding, growing old, the having been
married _two_ years, with many other equally good causes for the
discontinuance of domestic kindness. On some of the hearts was a blank,
and no reason assigned for the alienation, which intimated that the
affection of the husband or wife had not been extinguished by any
violence, but had gone out of itself.

I saw a considerable number both of men and women searching for the
hearts that they desired to regain. There is no name on any of these
hearts, but all people were enabled to discover that which had once
loved them, by a very singular property in the heart; for when they took
hold of that which had formerly entertained a kindness for them, it
instantly began to beat and palpitate violently, though to the eye it
appeared common alabaster; but if it had never felt any passion for them
it remained perfectly still.

There was an old man who seized every female heart that he met with; and
as I came up to him, I heard him mutter, "This certainly beats a
little." He then requested me to feel the heart, which he held in his
hand, and give my judgment whether there was any thing amounting to a
real palpitation while he held it. I could not perceive the least
motion, except from the trembling of his hands, which greatly mortified
him. He told me he had been married late in life to a young woman, who
had very soon become extremely cool towards him, though he had done
nothing to displease her, and always spoke to her with the greatest
kindness. I represented to him that unless he was quite sure he had once
been really possessed of her heart it was vain to search for it here;
but he declared he was confident that when he married the lady her heart
was his own, though it escaped from him in so singular a manner soon
after. He then continued to try all the hearts in his way, imagining a
palpitation in each.

One male heart was vehemently disputed by half-a-dozen women, each of
whom pleaded a lawful claim to it, and, indeed, it actually beat
whichever of them held it, thus owning a passion for them all. One of
them was wife to this heart; but her right was contested by the others,
on the pretence that the palpitation of the heart when she touched it
was much weaker than when it was held by any of them. There were many
other hearts, both male and female, which, having been pluralists, were
disputed by many competitors, each of whom was able to produce a real
palpitation.

I was informed that somebody had invented a method by which these hearts
might restore the lost affection; and as the wife whom I accompanied had
found the heart of her husband, I explained to her the invention, which
she has since practised with complete success. According to the
direction given her, she dissolved the heart in a certain liquid, and,
keeping it in a bottle, secretly mixed a small quantity with whatever
her husband drank. The effect was, that after the first draught he
intimated some return of kindness, which still increased as he
proceeded through the bottle; and when he had drank the whole heart he
had resumed all his former affection.

When I had left this building, I soon arrived at another which contains
groundless fears. I entered it, and found, as in many others, a spacious
room filled with bottles, containing the apprehensions that have
troubled mankind without necessity. On studying the labels of these
bottles, I thought the fears of men little less wild and visionary than
their hopes; and it appeared to me that the worst calamities of life are
those which are never to happen. Moralists have often praised the
concealment of the future from man as a most ingenious invention against
approaching evils; but since we are so much tormented by evils that are
not coming, I think this ignorance is but an imperfect security.

I diverted myself in reading the terrors with which these bottles are
stored. Every gale of wind supplies them with apprehensions from those
who are at sea; and I was surprised to observe how many people there are
who, in a thunder-storm on shore, are fully convinced that the lightning
will choose their persons in preference to every other spot where it
could light. Great numbers in a trifling sickness had suffered all the
horrors of approaching death. I knew not before how many there are who
use the precaution of being always uneasy, and have so much foresight
as to lose all the comfort of life.

One part of this room is assigned to public fears, which are contained
in large urns. These are the apprehensions which have seized a great
part of our nation from time to time. There is great variety in the
nature of them. At one time a small party of men are suddenly convinced
that all the rest of the nation are soon to be mad by agreement at the
same instant, leaving only themselves in possession of reason: every
thing they see tends to a general insanity; and by the expectation of
this event they are much harassed, as is reasonable. Sometimes those who
are earnest in religion apprehend that the people, at a stated time, are
going to disbelieve Christianity and abolish it. And sometimes the
farmers of England are seized with a belief that parliament, instigated
by a bad ministry, intends to pass a law forbidding the practices of
ploughing and sowing, to the manifest injury of agriculture.

These epidemic fears are so frequent in England that every body must
remember a great number of them. Sometimes they seem to invade the
country of their own accord, and at other times are contrived by the
invention and industry of certain statesmen,--for one of these terrors
has often power to ruin or secure a ministry; so that the great wisdom
of state in England is a skill in prompting and regulating fears. I know
not whether there is more art or fortune in the beginning and progress
of a fear: very able men often undertake to be the authors of one
without any success; and in spite of the reasoning with which they tell
the world to be afraid, not a man will consent to feel any alarm.
Sometimes a most plausible apprehension is invented, and sent into the
world with the countenance of eminent men, and every other advantage for
its promotion, and yet it can obtain no credit, but is almost
immediately lost, while, at another time, a terror is obscurely raised,
and, although without probability, favour, or any arts of advancement,
it is instantly spread and established.

It is vain to oppose a successful fear: a wise minister attacked by one
will enrol himself under it, and be as much terrified as any body. These
apprehensions differ much in duration, the life of some being only a few
weeks, and others lasting for many months, or even for some years.

I have said that the public fears are kept in large urns, with this
difference from the private fears, that a bottle contains the
apprehensions of only one person, while an urn holds the terror of a
whole party, each public fear having an urn to itself. Every urn is
inscribed with the name of the fear that it preserves, and is larger or
smaller according to the numbers who have been possessed by its
contents. On one urn I read "Popery," on another, "Revolution."

But while I was reading the names of these past disturbances, a fearful
clamour rushed into the room, sounding like the sudden shout of a vast
crowd, but incessantly repeated. I found it was a public terror newly
arrived from the earth, and the guardian of the room made haste to
secure it. He brought an urn, the size of which he had determined by his
ear, and enticed the uproar into it by a proceeding very similar to the
art which inveigles a swarm of bees into a hive. This clamour was the
repetition of a single word by thousands of voices. What the word was I
shall not disclose; for since it has very lately been a prevalent fear,
some excellent persons not yet dispossessed, on learning its departure
to the moon, would be distressed by the fatal security that has befallen
us.

It is possible that a skilful statesman might employ these urns in his
service by letting out some terror judiciously chosen at a time
favourable to its progress. I am not able to say whether it would
prosper a second time, or return instantly to the moon, as having been
discharged, but I think the experiment worthy of being tried by any
administration that wants aid. Great care and judgment would be required
in the selection of a fear for release, lest it should turn against its
deliverers.

I next entered a building filled with the unavailing projects of
Englishmen, and spent a short time in examining these enterprises,
which are political, moral, religious, mechanical, and chemical. The
collection has been much enriched by recent contributions. Many
excellent designs of the present age for the benefit of England and the
rest of the world are here honourably preserved. I saw numerous projects
for making morality: every virtue had some contrivance to be practised
by; and these schemes appeared very easy of execution, requiring nothing
for their success except the universal concurrence of mankind in
receiving them.

I found here plans for dispensing with all laws, and extinguishing crime
by a general resolution of men in favour of virtue, for preventing the
birth of children by argument, for discontinuing war throughout the
world, for converting all nations to the true religion, that is, the
religion of the projector.

Amongst all the noble schemes that I saw here, I most admired those
which were not content with the improvement of England, but designed the
good of the whole world, such as the plan last mentioned, for including
all the inhabitants of the globe in one religion. The means of effecting
so great a work were not described, but the inventor of this unanimity
was said to have devised so infallible a project, that for spreading
truth over the earth he required nothing but a steam vessel, and
undertook by a few tons of coal to convince all mankind.

I saw many other English schemes for the welfare of distant nations, so
that not a people was to remain vicious, ignorant, or oppressed. In
examining these ample designs, I felt a secret pride in the noble spirit
of some amongst my countrymen; and it appeared to me that nothing has
been so much improved in modern times as the virtue of humanity. Men
were formerly satisfied with relieving the distresses which they saw and
heard; but there is now a large body of men in England who busy
themselves with the troubles of distant nations, and consider all
sufferings on the farther side of the globe as their own calamities. It
is well known how many persons of all ranks in England pined away under
the lashes inflicted upon the negroes in the West Indies. Others could
not be cheerful as long as Greece was under the dominion of Turkey; and
another party, who were not concerned either about Greece or the
negroes, regarded themselves as the most unfortunate of men because in
India widows sometimes burned themselves at the funerals of their
husbands. How would one of the ancient moralists admire the dismay which
has been caused in England by the conflagration of an old woman in the
East!

It is observable that one who is thoroughly inspired with this remote
pity disdains to do a kindness in his own hemisphere, and despises that
superficial humanity which makes us supply the wants of those who are
immediately round us. He can only pity at a distance, and feels
compassion in proportion to the number of leagues that intervene between
him and the sufferer. He can see with firmness the starvation of those
who live near him, but shudders to think that a man may be hungry two
thousand miles off. Thus he claims a share in the misery of every man at
a sufficient distance: a lash inflicted on the other side of the
Atlantic makes a mark upon his back--he is flogged with the negro,
enslaved with the Greek, and burned to ashes with the Indian widow.

I had now been wandering in our satellite almost a fortnight, according
to the earth, and almost a day according to the moon, for I arrived
there in the morning, and the day was now almost ended. I have not
related all that I saw, but selected a few of the most remarkable places
that I visited; nor have I instructed the world in what manner I
provided for my own personal comforts, according to the practice of many
travellers, who rescue every one of their meals from oblivion, and never
eat or drink without recording it. I have also omitted all mention of
the moon's inhabitants, because they are to be fully described by other
travellers.

When I left the House of Projects, I was informed that I was very near
to the Valley of Lost Time, and I hastened towards it, that I might
observe whatever was there, before it should be dark. I descended into
the valley, and found myself surrounded by the sounds of innumerable
clocks. These sounds did not proceed from any visible mechanism, but
lived in the air like the other preserved clamours. They are the ghosts
of minutes and hours that have perished. It was remarkable that in this
confused clamour, every man knew his own time, and could distinguish the
hours he had lost when he heard them struck; yet he knew not what it was
that discovered them to him: all were alike in sound; only at the
striking of particular hours, he was seized with a conviction that he
heard his own time.

There were many persons in the valley, and I observed that some of them
heard their own lost hours with great emotion. They turned pale,
trembled, and were overpowered by the reproach. And not only could a man
discern his own losses amongst these sounds, but knew what particular
hour or minute of his past life he was listening to, which very much
aggravated the rebuke. Men heard the striking of the very crisis which
might have saved, enriched, or advanced them. In some men the emotion
from these sounds continued a long time, others soon recovered
themselves.

I saw two or three running about in chase of their time with a hat, as a
boy follows a butterfly. The hours were very nimble, escaping by an
irregular flight, and the pursuit was long continued in vain. At last
one of these men succeeded in the capture of a portion of time, which he
had followed with much perseverance. The chase being finished close to
me, I heard the stifled hours striking under his hat. As he had been
present in the room of lost spirits when I had shown the means of
recovering mirth from the phial containing it, he had contracted a high
opinion of my skill and invention in rendering available these regained
prizes, and he now earnestly consulted me about the means of making the
time under his hat serve the purpose which it ought to have been applied
to before. He told me he was a London tradesman, and not very
prosperous, through the misapplication of three particular days which he
now had in captivity. A few years ago he had been in pursuit of a rich
widow, from whom though he had extorted no promise, yet he had been
convinced that she was waiting only till a decorous time had elapsed
since her first husband. But this confidence ruined him: he was absent
three days with some friends; and on returning to his vocation found the
lady had so much resented his neglect of office as to supply his place
with another candidate, whom soon after she married. "Now," he
continued, "I have caught these three days, and here they are, but still
I know not how to make them answer my purpose. However, since you, sir,
could restore a lady her spirits out of a phial, perhaps you can restore
me my widow from under a hat."

"I fear," said I, "your case is beyond my skill; for I know not how the
noise under your hat can by any artifice prevent the widow from having
been married as you remember. Whatever use you make of these sounds, I
fear you must still have misemployed the three days and lost the widow.
It appears to me, that the only way of retrieving lost time is to make
better use of what remains; I therefore advise you to make diligent
search for another rich widow, and when you have found one, remember you
are not to have a respite of three days."

"So, then, I have come to the moon in vain," he said; "and I may as well
let these three days go again, after I have taken so much trouble to
catch them."

"No," I answered: "a contrivance occurs to me by which, perhaps, they
may be useful."

"What is that?" he inquired eagerly.

"You may shut them up in a box," said I, "and always keep them by you,
to remind you of former neglect, and enforce vigilance in case of
another widow." He seemed to think this an ineffectual invention for
correcting his former mistake; however he carried away his three days
with a discontented face.

Another man, who had stood in dismay, and quite overcome by the
striking of his lost hours, hearing what I said, declared he would try
the same expedient, and keep his misemployed time in a box for the sake
of prudence and industry in time to come; and immediately he betook
himself to the chase.

I saw a pretty young woman in pursuit of some portion of time, which she
seemed to consider a valuable opportunity. It led her up and down at her
utmost speed: but at last, as I stood in its course, it was entangled in
the skirts of my coat; I seized it before it could escape, and presented
it to her. It was a single hour: she accepted it with joy; but I could
not prevail upon her to tell me what advantage she had lost with this
hour. This young woman, and some other persons, followed their time very
earnestly with a confused notion of benefit from it, when it should be
caught, though without any plan for applying it to a real purpose. The
truth was, that most of those who heard the striking of their own hours,
by awe and regret from the sound, were incapable of thinking accurately,
and were driven by a desire of retrieving the past they knew not how.

Without any such reproach, it was impossible to stand in this valley,
and hear the destruction of time all round, without sorrow for the waste
of this commodity. There was a reasoning in the place not to be opposed.
I considered that time and money being the two things most earnestly
desired in our world, the ingenuity of men is chiefly exercised in
devising arts for the waste of both. It appeared to me also that amongst
all the errors in the plan of a human being, the most fatal is that the
present moment should be so much the most plausible instant of our
lives, and capable of persuading us to whatever it chooses. By universal
agreement and practice, the present time is for ease and enjoyment, the
future for abstinence, resolution, and insatiable industry; and since
the present moment is only one, while our future moments, by the
blessing of Providence, may be many, we judge that this distribution of
time is greatly to the advantage of industry and virtue, and we seem to
be treating ourselves with admirable severity, when we allot no portion
of our lives to pleasure, except the present moment; but in this
computation it is forgotten that life is made of present moments. The
bargain, however, is concluded; and pleasure exacts the observance of it
by still claiming the present moment, while industry, abstinence, and
other virtues included in the agreement, stand waiting for their turn
with

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