Besides the Serious Study which is to be the general exercise and employment of your life, and without being Master of which You can never make any great figure in the World You should be pretty well Versed in some more Pleasing and if I may so express it, some Secundary Science.
This You will find convenient it will take idle Hours from your hand when alone, and have a proper use in Company, a double one if You are in any public Station, for it will hinder the Curious pressing upon you as to more solemn matter, and enable You without appearing Ignorant or ill bred to turn the Discourse to what may at once conceal your Secret and entertain your Company.
Amongst these Arts of a Mechanical Consideration I reckon Architecture, Sculpture, Painting, Gardening &ca.
The Choice of these must be determined by the bent of every Mans own Mind, and without such an inclination or what we call a Genius he will make a very little Progress in these or any of those Sciences which the Supported and improved by Judgmt are founded upon imagination. These Arts I say at once Instruct and amuse, help Men that have Estates to employ them agreably, and to oblige those who have not, and may yet participate of another Mans pleasure; and add at the same time to it; For there is no Man that does any thing of this kind but is pleased to show it, and no Man that understands it but is obliged to him for the Communication; besides the Company wch the Exercise of these Arts bring a Man into is as well Honorable as agreable, Their Studies are mixed with other Arts, and the conversation they must have met with before they can have arrived to any Perfection in their own Art must needs have rendered them in a great Measure Scholars and Gentlemen.
To these I add Music, but with these Cautions that it takes up too much of our Time, and does not furnish Us with the best Company. Those who are obliged to get their Livelyhood by it have Addicted so much of their life to the Study of it, that they have very little knowledge in any other Science. I wish the Art were more encouraged, and that Musicians were not forced even to Practice so much that they have not time to study their own Science much less any other, But so it is. Now a Gentleman Musically given cannot blow his Flute or strike his Violin alone, and as to Conversation he is insensibly in a Chorus instead of a Company, and thô when he came into the Opera he thought he took his Place in the Box or the Pitt before the Entertainment is half done he finds himself in the middle of the Orchestre.
An Essay upon Opinion.
Opinion.
SINCE Opinion is said to be the Queen of the World and Our Allions must depend a good deal upon the Sentiments which others Conceive of them it may be worth our while to Enquire a little what this Opinion is, How it is commonly formed, Upon what it Subsists, and in what manner it is Altered.
Opinion is in One word the Estimate which every Man makes of every thing he sees, the Product of what he calls Common Sense, and takes it very ill if he is not allowed to be the Master of it; Many cannot read, more cannot write, but all can and will Discourse and Determine: They have Eyes they say, and consequently can see; They have Ears and must be allowed to hear, so all Visible and Audible Objects are properly within their Connoissance, as to any thing shown or proposed to them, They can tell if it Delights or Displeases them, and the greatest Judges can do no more. Then again the General Opinion will be found to be only a Collection of the Sentiments of particular Persons, or to use a Modern Phrase a Majority of Voices.
Let us consider then first the different Sentiments which Men have of Things, those Sentiments guided by difference of Age, Appetite and Inclination as well as by the Degrees of Natural Sense or Acquired Knowledge of which the Person judging is possessed, and then let us Observe the greater difference in Opinion which must flow from the Sentiment of each Society, Province and Kingdom, in which relation must be had to their Utility, their Pleasure, their Manners and Customes.
I dont pretend to Examine the Nature and Essence of this Mind of Ours, This Divina particula as a Divine or a Philosopher, but as a stander by to take a little notice of some of its Motions, the feats of Activity it plays, and the sudden Escapes and Changes it often makes.
Man is to Himself so great a Stranger that Nosce Te ipsum is quoted as one of the wisest Sayings that ever was Pronounced: Our Frame is such as may be Compared to a River, the solid part are no more than Banks and Dykes, which keep the Current within its Natural Course, the fluid are in perpetual motion, in Eternal Flux and Reflux: As in our Body, so is there a continued motion in our Mind; How far one may have an influence or Operation upon the other, I shal not at present Enquire, But certain it is that the same Man at different times alters his Opinion of the same Things.
He that in the Opening of Manhood Delights in Dogs and Horses, Hunting and Exercises (as Horace finely describes it) in the middle of Life turns his Thoughts to the Acquisition of Wealth and search of Honor, and towards the end of it, he insures his Ease, counts his Riches, and Prattles over the Scenes of his Youth to Younger People, who all the while are weary of hearing him. Terence founds his finest Comedies upon the Observation of this change of our Manners with our Ages, and the Concessions that human Nature ought to make to it.
I have read somewhere a Pritty Spanish Conceit, that, as we are born our Mind comes in at our Toes, so goes upward to our Leggs to our Middle, thence to our heart and breast, Lodges at last in our head and from thence flies away; The meaning of which is that Childish sports and youthful Wrestlings, and Trials of Strength, Amorous desires, Couragious and Manly designs, Council and Policy succeed each other in the Course of our Lives ‘till the whole terminates in Death; The Consequence of it is Obvious, our Passions change with our Ages, and our Opinion with our Passions.
Let Us next Observe the different Passions by which People of the same Age are moved, and observe what Power either Choler or Flegme, a Sanguine or a Melancholy complexion have in the Motions or Operations of our Mind. And here I might bring in all Burtons Melancholy. Anger is a short Frenzy, and fear the worst of Counsellors, we are hardly thought reasonable Men, or responsible for our Actions whilst we continue possessed with the Violence of either of these Passions. The Cautious Man suspects every thing, the bold fears nothing, a harsh and close temper shal spend half his Estate in a Law Suit, while one more free & Open would not give three Pence for the most compleat Revenge imaginable of this kind. The Lover retrenches from the Necessarys of life that the obje£t of his Passion may shine in Velvet and Brocard. The Miser that sees her thus Dressed had rather have her Pettycoat than her Person. Every Man on this Head may as Actually be tryed as Achilles when shut up with Licomedes Daughters, in the Chest amongst the Ribbons Ear-rings and Necklaces, You will presently observe him find the Sword, the Predominant Passion will appear thro all Disguise of Artifice and Hypocricy.
The Two great Passions which Triumph over our Judgment and consequently subjugate our Opinion are Ambition and Love, the first makes us think too well, and the latter too meanly of our Selves. Ambition calls in all our Friends to our Assistance, and sends us into Camps and Cities, Noise and Popularity; Love retires Us into Solitude, subjects Us to One person, and makes Us like Nothing but what She does, nor desire any place but where She is; And indeed She Alone. I speak of these as the frailties of the greatest Minds; Julius lost all the Praises that could be given to a Successful! General, and all the Blessings that could be heaped upon an honest Patriot only because he would be the first Man in the World. And Mark Anthony forgetting the Pursuit of his Vengeance and Honor fled into a Corner of Egypt, contenting himself only to Possess that Beauty which the same Julius had some Years before Enjoyed and Abandoned. Add to this that Julius hazarded his Estate, gave up his Quiet, and lost his Life for what in truth could do him no good; And Anthony did the same for what must do him Mischief. Our Edward the Fourth had like to have lost England for his Passion to his Beautiful Widow, and Harry the fourth of France was as near losing that Crown for leaving his Army to pay a Visit to La belle Gabrielle. Yet in some Years so avowedly indifferent were these Princes to the Objects of their Passion that both of them ha
d other Mistresses, and lived only with common Civility towards those Persons to whom they would sometime before have Sacrifized their Fortunes and their Lives, So hard is it for the best and greatest of Men to form a just Opinion of things contributing to their own Interest, and to be Decided by their own Election.
This Love, and this Ambition it may be Objected were the same Passions, the Objects were only changed, and indeed it is hard to conceive any Opinion but what is founded on or sustained by one Passion or other, But now let us think how often the Passion it self does change in the same Person: Did not Dioclesian quit the Empire of Rome to Cultivate a Garden? And Charles the Fifth Abdicate the Government of half Europe to tell his Beeds in a Monestary? How many Examples may be given of One Passion yielding to another directly contrary but more prevalent. Cornaro is jealous of his Wife so far as to draw a line in the middle of her Chamber, beyond which She is not to Approach towards the Window, yet worked up by Mosca and Avarice, he consents to put her to Bed to another Man, this instance for the Poets honor however fictitious explains a thousand real Ones of the same kind, which every Man who Consults Baudius’s Anthilogia, Morery’s Dictionary may think himself Entituled to Quote.
Let Us now see how our Passions vary as guided by our Judgment and Understanding: in Minds most worthy to be distinguished there is a Natural Fire or Impulse.
Est Deus in nobis agitante calescimus illo
a tendency to know, Practice and Esteem some things, some matters, some Objects preferably to others, and this Desire encreases with the Knowledge which the Person has of the thing desired. Hence arise those particular Applications and Studies which form what we call a Genius, hence Poets, Painters, Orators, Mathematicians, and these subdivided again into twenty other Classes, and hence it comes to pass that the Man who has spent all his time in One Science and consequently neglected the rest may talk finely upon some few Subjects, and like a Child upon ail others. Not only so but the further some of these Genius’s go in pursuit of their beloved Study the more persevere they in some new Sentiment. Ptolomy had for many Ages fixt the Earth ‘till Copernicus was pleased to bowl it off again from its Basis, and Epicurus had enjoyed his Attorns for about Two thousand Year with the greatest Satisfaction imaginable till Descartes thought good to Contest with him the Subtility and Indivisibility of matter. Half a Century has past in the Agitation of this Question, and I am glad now to hear that some ingenious Gentlemen are like to silence them both by proving beyond all Contradiction that there is no such thing as matter, the very subject of their Dispute, nor ever was nor ever can be.
The various Estimate we make as to the Value of Things cannot be better Illustrated then by the wants we find in the pursuit of our Studies, every Man adding to his heap, and desirous to compleat his Collection; Books, Pictures, Medals, nay dryed flowers, insects, Cockle-shells, any thing will do, but then the Cruel Losses which we sometimes sustain, the late Monarch and Court of France were all Disturbed, and Charles Patin was banished the Kingdom because it was suspected by some that the Otho which he Sold the King was not Genuine; perhaps a little Boy Yesterday at Canterbury tore that Butterfly in Pieces, or at Dover threw the very Shell into the Sea, the Species of which were the only Ones now missing in Sir Hans Sloans Cabinet, and an Oyleman on Fish Street Hill did actually wrap up his Anchovies in the first Horace that was ever Printed, whilst Frazer has with useless Pains been looking for the Book this Two and Twenty Years. How many better Editions has been since Published, or why the worst is the most Valuable I refer to another Opportunity.
This difference of Genius produces the most indifferent Effect imaginable upon divers Persons, as to the same Object, while one Man is admiring the Beauties of a Picture another shal observe indeed that the frame is very fine. As I showed a Friend of mine who is really a Man of great parts and learning a flower piece of Bimbi finely Painted, he observed that the Butterfly at the Corner was the prettyest thing he ever saw, and upon the view of a little Closet, where are some good Originals, he contented himself by taking Notice that the Green Hangings Edged with Gold looked exceeding Handsom. One of the greatest Men of this Age hates Tragedy, I have heard him say, he only goes to a Play to Laugh, another the he is far from being a Cruel Man in his Temper likes to see the Butcher of the West really wounded at the Bear-Garden, not content with the sham red that glows upon the Skirt of Banco’s Ghost. A Country Gentleman I have heard of, who had seen Shakespears Harry the Eight, forgetting unhappily the fall of Buckingham, or the Policy of Woolsey, remarked to his Friend, a Man of the Town, who carryed him to the Play, that the Bishop of Winchester, who sat at the Tryal of Queen Catharine, was the same Man that snuffed the Candles between the Adis with a greater Dexterity than could be conceived in Human Angers. To this I would add, that the common herd of Mankind (and I am afraid the Majority is on their side) have no Opinion, or they seem to be in the same Case in relation to that which they think they have as Bartholmew Coaks was as to his Purse, They scarse know if they lost it before they had it, or after; How different so ever their Inclinations may be, they consent in this at least, that they are always changing: It is impossible for any rational being to please them, because it is impossible to oblige them long: Tis hard for them to continue in a Mind, which was determined by no previous consideration, not being in any wise capable of Judging what was right, They generaly think most things wrong: They know just enough to find their own want, and from that Knowledge fancy that every body finds it as well as themselves, having no Opinion of their own j They do as an Old Roman would, who had no Child; They Adopt that of the Arst Man they like, and from a Debate in Parliament or a New Play, go to the next Coffee House to be informed of their own Sentiments. If You trace this Man thro life (for one and a hundred of them are the same) You will And him always uncertain, A Husband or a Lover He’s Jealous or Anxious, an Unequal Parent and a froward Master. As he never thinks he has friendship or respect enough from those about him; his Opinion of their Service and Duty is always Various; he whispers with one, Chides t’other, Embroils himself from the Stories of both, and hearkning to Lies finds his Servants, as Solomon expresses it, always Wicked. Does his Whim run to building, and has he seen any House within twenty Miles of his own the New Appartment he made last Year must as certainly down as the old Parlour did the Year before to give it Place; And for Gardening meerly upon the Observation that his Neighbors Gravel Walk is too narrow or too large, his own shal be Altered twice in a Year, and his Terras shal be raised or depressed by the same Rule, he giving You only the reason that he likes it so; For fear you should think he was Govern’d by any body. If he comes to Town as he sees more Objects, he finds more Distraction, Loads of ill Pictures, and worse Books are sent to the Carryers till the end of the Session, but lye unpacked and unthought of when they come into the Country, and if he gives into what the French call Laquinquaillieree (as it is ten to one but he does) Quare does not set his Watch more actually than Mathar does his understanding: he buys a pocket book, but dislikes before he has set down one word in it: can he rest when he has seen a Cane better clouded then his own, and disliking the hinge of his Snuff box, must not the Dinner stay whilst he immediately drives to Temple-Bar to give five Guineas more to exchange it for a worse.
Let us leave him and return to the Human mind in general upon which so many external Objects have an influence, regularity of Diet, Intemperence or Abstinence as to Wine, the continuance or interruption of health, the too frequent excitation or Disuse of any Passion from the Neighborhood, or Absence of its Object, the favor of Fortune or the hand of Adversity, a word thrown Casually into a Discourse, the reading of a book, the sight of a Picture or Statute, an Emblem, a Motto, a Seal, every thing intelligible in Art, nay every thing Visible in Nature may form new Impressions in our Mind, and alter those already formed there. We judge of things according to the humour we are in and that very Humour is subject to infinite Variety; if Six Bells as John Keil tells me can make more than a thousand Millions of Changes, what must be the result of t
he jangling of ten or twelve Passions sustained by an infinite variety of objects in Minds upon which every thing can Operate; the Dawning of Light excites us into Chearfulness, the approach of Night depresses us into Melancholy; a different weight of Air raises or depresses our Spirits, a Trumpet alarms us to an Ardour and action of War and a Flute softens us again into thoughts of Love and delight. An Herb, a Flower, can render us either pleased or Grave as we consider the Beauty of its Colours, or the shortness of its Duration, and the very Accident that makes Us angry, makes us Laugh at the same time if any little Redicule accompanies the Action; So many Things seem, I say, to contribute to the forming our Opinion the least of which has Power in a great Measure to make Us change it; so that no Man is so different from another as the same Man is from Himself.
Amongst the External Causes which as I say [have] an Influence upon our Minds I have thought One very comical, that is the Opinion which other Men conceive of our Opinion. We desire not only to be justifyed but applauded, and our Pride has a great share in the Confirmation of our Choice; its a pretty thought that Semele was not content to be beloved by Jupiter except the World knew she was kept by the King of the Gods, else Thunder and Lightning are but odd Furniture or Ornaments to a Ladys Bed-chamber, and that Candaules was not Sufficiently happy in the enjoyment of a beautiful Wife till he had showed her Naked to his Friend; perillous Tryals, but natural enough. A Man in the Reign of Nero or Commodus would have past his time ill if he had not given it for granted that the first of these Emperors was the best Musician and the other the most skilful Gladiator then alive. I cite these as the most Extravagant Actions that Men of their great Quality were ever guilty of, and yet You see their Pleasure depended upon the Sentiments which other people had of them. Epictetus the a Stoic confesses truly enough that it is not the Thing but the Opinion conceived of the thing that vexes. Harry the second of France built a Palace, which is yet standing for his favorite Dutchess de Valentinois in the form of a Crescent, the Architraves and Windows are adorned with Horns, Netts and hunting Spears, and all this meerly upon the conceit of her name being Diana, and our Harry the Eight, about the same time brought Mrs. Bullen a private Gentlewoman from the Tower to Westminster in the first open Calesch which had been then seen in England, that all the City by viewing his M”. might approve his Passion. What a Mortification had it been to either of these warm Spirits if they had heard any body whisper the least thing about the house or the Calesch, as declaring too publickly the Weakness of these Princes, But if the same Person had said that La Valentinois had been Mistress many Years to the Kings Father, that She was much older than his Majty, and had a Grand Daughter Mariagable, or that M”. Bullen, was a raw Girle, knew no more than her Lute or her Saraband, and was just returned from being a Waiting Woman to the Kings Sister, unequal to him in all Degrees of Quality, Conversation and Age, good Lord what must have ensued: Bella horida Bella, the Person had been disaffected a Hugonot or a Traitor in his heart.
Complete Works of Matthew Prior Page 52