tonyahowe/johnson.xml

## johnson.xml
<TEI xmlns="http://www.tei-c.org/ns/1.0" xml:id="johns-ramb4">
    <teiHeader>
        <fileDesc>
            <titleStmt>
                <title type="statusBar">The Rambler No. 4</title>
                <author>Samuel Johnson</author>
                <respStmt>
                    <resp>Transcription, correction, editorial commentary, and markup</resp>
                    <name>Tonya Howe</name>
                </respStmt>
            </titleStmt>
            <publicationStmt>
                <p>This text is prepared as part of <title>The Novels in Context</title> project, which provides an accessible, curated, and marked-up selection of primary sources relevant to the study
               and the teaching of the eighteenth-century development of the novel in English.</p>
                <p>
                    <normalization>
                    Original spelling and capitalization is retained, though the long s has been silently modernized and ligatured forms are not encoded. Hyphenation has not been retained. </normalization>
                </p>
                <p>Materials have been transcribed from and checked against first editions.
                </p>
            </publicationStmt>
            <sourceDesc>
                <imprint>
                    <pubPlace>London</pubPlace>
                    <publisher>Printed for J[ohn]. Payne, at Pope's Head, in Pater-noster-Row</publisher>
                    <date type="firstEd">Saturday, 31 March 1750</date>
                    <date>1752</date>
                    <note>This excerpt is sourced from a reprint of the first collected UK
                        edition.</note>
                    <extent>6v. ; 12⁰.</extent>
                    <biblScope unit="page" from="12" to="34">Pages.</biblScope>
                </imprint>
                <imprint>
                    <pubPlace>Public domain electronic facsimile copy</pubPlace>
                    <publisher>Google eBook</publisher>
                    <date type="accessed">15 August 2014</date>
                    <extent>http://books.google.com/books?id=7ZYDAAAAQAAJ</extent>
                </imprint>
            </sourceDesc>
        </fileDesc>
    </teiHeader>
    <text>
        <body>
            <head>Number 4, Saturday, 31 March 1750</head>
            <epigraph xml:lang="la">
                <cit>
                     <bibl>Horace</bibl>
                      <quote>
                      <l>Simul et jucunda et idonea dicere Vitae.</l>
                      </quote>
                </cit>
            </epigraph>
            <div type="main">
            <p>The works of fiction, with which the present generation seems more particularly
                  delighted, are such as <span ana="editorial.xml#realism" type="positive">exhibit
                     life in its true state, diversified only by accidents that daily happen in the
                     world, and influenced by passions and qualities which are really to be found in
                     conversing with mankind.</span>
                </p>
                <p>This kind of writing may be termed not improperly the <span ana="editorial.xml#genre">
                        <span ana="editorial.xml#term">comedy of
                        romance</span>, and is to be conducted nearly by the rules of comic
                     poetry.</span> Its province is <span ana="editorial.xml#purpose" type="positive">to bring about natural events by easy means, and to keep up
                     curiosity without the help of wonder</span>: it is therefore precluded from the
                     <span ana="editorial.xml#genre" type="negative">machines and expedients of the
                     heroic romance</span>, and can neither employ <span ana="editorial.xml#romance">giants to snatch away a lady from the nuptial rites</span>, nor <span ana="editorial.xml#romance">knights to bring her back from captivity</span>; it
                  can <span ana="editorial.xml#romance">neither bewilder its personages in desarts,
                     nor lodge them in imaginary castles</span>. </p>
                <p>I remember a remark made by <span ana="editorial.xml#reference">
                        <rs type="person" ref="SCA">Scaliger</rs> upon Potanus, that all his writings are filled with
                     the same images; and that if you take from him his lillies and his roses, his
                     satyrs and his dryads, he will have nothing left that can be called poetry. In
                     like manner, almost all the fictions of the last age will vanish, if you
                     deprive them of a hermit and a wood, a battle and a shipwreck.</span>
                </p>
                <p>Why this <span ana="editorial.xml#imagination">wild strain of imagination</span>
                  found reception so long, in polite and learned ages, it is not easy to conceive;
                  but we cannot wonder that, <span ana="editorial.xml#economy">while readers could
                     be procured, the authors were willing to continue it</span>: for <span ana="editorial.xml#ease">when a man had by practice some fluency of language,
                     he had no further care than to <span ana="editorial.xml#imagination">retire to
                        his closet, let loose his invention, and <span ana="editorial.xml#metaphor" type="sexual">heat his mind with incredibilities</span>
                        </span>; a book
                     was thus produced without <span ana="editorial.xml#valueClaim" type="positive">fear of criticism, without the toil of study, without knowledge of nature,
                        or acquaintance with life.</span>
                    </span>
                </p>
                <p>
                    <span ana="editorial.xml#valueClaim">The task of our present writers is very
                     different; it requires, together with that learning which is to be gained from
                     books, that <span ana="editorial.xml#sociability">experience which can never be
                        attained by solitary diligence, but must arise from general converse</span>,
                     and <span ana="editorial.xml#empiricism">accurate observation of the living
                        world</span>
                    </span>
                    <span ana="editorial.xml#ease">Their performances have, as <rs type="person" ref="HOR">Horace</rs> expresses it, <span ana="editorial.xml#quote">
                            <span rend="italics">plus oneris quantum veniae minus,</span> little
                        indulgence, and therefore more difficulty.</span>
                    </span>
                    <span ana="editorial.xml#realism">They are engaged in portraits of which every one
                     knows the original, and can detect any deviation from exactness of
                     resemblance</span>. Other writings are safe, except from the malice of
                  learning, but these are in danger from <span ana="editorial.xml#distinguish">every
                     common reader</span>; <span ana="editorial.xml#metaphor">as the slipper ill
                     executed was censured by a shoemaker who happened to stop in his way at the
                     Venus of Apelles.</span>
                </p>
                <p>But the fear of not being approved as <span ana="editorial.xml#purpose">just
                     copyers of human manners</span>, is not the most important concern that an
                  author of this sort ought to have before him. <span ana="editorial.xml#youth">These books are written chiefly to the young, the ignorant, and the idle, to
                     whom they serve as <span ana="editorial.xml#purpose">lectures of conduct, and
                        introductions into life</span>
                    </span>. <span ana="editorial.xml#youth">They
                     are the entertainment of minds unfurnished with ideas</span>, and therefore
                     <span ana="editorial.xml#affect">easily susceptible of impressions</span>;
                     <span ana="editorial.xml#reason">not fixed by principles</span>, and therefore
                     <span ana="editorial.xml#affect">easily following <span ana="editorial.xml#imagination">the current of fancy</span>
                    </span>; <span ana="editorial.xml#reason">
                        <span ana="editorial.xml#experience">not informed by
                        experience, and consequently open to every false suggestion and partial
                        account.</span>
                    </span>
                </p>
                <p>
                    <span ana="editorial.xml#youth">That the highest degree of reverence should be
                     paid to youth, and that nothing indecent should be suffered to approach their
                     eyes or ears; are precepts extorted by sense and virtue from an ancient writer,
                     by no means eminent for chastity of thought. <span ana="editorial.xml#education">The same kind, tho' not the same degree of
                        caution, is required in every thing which is laid before them, to secure
                        them from unjust prejudices, perverse opinions, and incongruous combinations
                        of images</span>.</span>
                </p>
                <p>
                    <span ana="editorial.xml#romance">In the romances formerly written, every
                     transaction and sentiment was so remote from all that passes among men, that
                     the reader was in very little danger of making any application to
                     himself</span>; the virtues and crimes were <span ana="editorial.xml#experience">equally beyond his sphere of activity</span>;
                  and he amused himself with <span ana="editorial.xml#character">heroes and with
                     traitors, deliverers and persecutors, as with beings of another species</span>,
                  whose actions were regulated upon motives of their own, and who had <span ana="editorial.xml#realism">neither faults nor excellences in common with
                     himself</span>. </p>
                <p>
                    <span ana="editorial.xml#realism">But when an adventurer is levelled with the rest
                     of the world, and acts in such scenes of the universal drama, as may be the lot
                     of any other man</span>; young spectators fix their eyes upon him with closer
                  attention, and hope <span ana="editorial.xml#purpose">by observing his behaviour
                     and success to regulate their own practices, when they shall be engaged in the
                     like part</span>. </p>
                <p>For this reason these <span ana="editorial.xml#term">familiar histories</span> may
                  perhaps <span ana="editorial.xml#purpose">be made of greater use than the
                     solemnities of professed morality, and convey the knowledge of vice and virtue
                     with more efficacy than axioms and definitions</span>. <span ana="editorial.xml#affect">But if the power of example is so great, as to take
                     possession of the memory by a kind of violence, and produce effects almost
                     without the intervention of the will, care ought to be taken that, when the
                     choice is unrestrained, the best examples only should be exhibited; and that
                     which is likely to operate so strongly, should not be mischievous or uncertain
                     in its effects</span>. </p>
                <p>
                    <span ana="editorial.xml#valueClaim">The chief advantage which these fictions have
                     over real life is, <span ana="editorial.xml#distinguish">that their authors are
                        at liberty, tho' not to invent, yet to select objects, and to cull from the
                        mass of mankind, those individuals upon which the attention ought most to be
                        employ'd</span>
                    </span>; <span ana="editorial.xml#metaphor" type="jewel">as a
                     diamond, though it cannot be made, may be polished by art, and placed in such a
                     situation, as to display that lustre which before was buried among common
                     stones </span>. </p>
                <p>
                    <span ana="editorial.xml#imitation">It is justly considered as the greatest
                     excellency of art, to imitate nature</span>; but <span ana="editorial.xml#distinguish">it is necessary to distinguish those parts of
                     nature, which are most proper for imitation</span>: <span ana="editorial.xml#affect">greater care is still required in representing life,
                     which is so often discoloured by passion, or <span ana="editorial.xml#metaphor" type="physical">deformed by wickedness</span>
                    </span>. <span ana="editorial.xml#distinguish" type="negative">If the world be promiscuously
                     described, I cannot see of what use it can be to read the account; or why it
                     may not be as safe to turn the eye immediately upon mankind, as upon a mirror
                     which shows all that presents itself without discrimination.</span>
                </p>
                <p>
                    <span ana="editorial.xml#character">It is therefore not a sufficient vindication
                     of a character, that it is drawn as it appears, for many characters ought never
                     to be drawn</span>; nor of a narrative, that the train of events is agreeable
                  to observation and experience, for that observation which is called knowledge of
                  the world, will be found much more frequently to make men cunning than good. <span ana="editorial.xml#purpose">The purpose of these writings is surely not only to
                     show mankind, but to provide that they may be seen hereafter with less hazard;
                     to teach the means of avoiding the snares which are laid by Treachery for
                     Innocence, without infusing any wish for that superiority with which the
                     betrayer flatters his vanity; to give the power of counteracting fraud, without
                     the temptation to practise it; to initiate the youth by mock encounters in the
                     art of necessary defense, and to increase prudence without impairing
                     virtue.</span>
                </p>
                <p>Many writers, for the sake of following nature, <span ana="editorial.xml#distinguish">so mingle good and bad qualities in <span ana="editorial.xml#character">their principal personages</span>, that they
                     are both equally conspicuous</span>; <span ana="editorial.xml#affect">and as we
                     accompany them through their adventures with delight, and are led by degrees to
                     interest ourselves in their favour, we lose the abhorrence of their faults,
                     because they do not hinder our pleasure, or, perhaps, regard them with some
                     kindness for being united with so much merit</span>. </p>
                <p>There have been men indeed splendidly wicked, whose endowments threw a brightness
                  on their crimes, and whom scarce any villainy made perfectly detestable, because
                  they never could be wholly divested of their excellencies; but such have been in
                  all ages the great corruptors of the world, and <span ana="editorial.xml#metaphor">their resemblance ought no more to be preserved, than the art of murdering
                     without pain</span>.</p>
                <p>
                    <span ana="editorial.xml#probability">Some have advanced, without due attention to
                     the consequences of this notion, that certain virtues have their correspondent
                     faults, and therefore that to exhibit either apart is to deviate from
                     probability.</span>
                    <span ana="editorial.xml#reference">Thus men are observed by <rs type="person" ref="SW">Swift</rs> to be "grateful in the same degree as they are
                     resentful."</span>
                    <span ana="editorial.xml#humanNature">This principle, with others of the same
                     kind, supposes man to act from a brute impulse, and persue a certain degree of
                     inclination, without any choice of the object</span>; for, otherwise, though it
                  should be allowed that gratitude and resentment arise from the same constitution
                  of the passions, it follows not that they will be equally indulged when reason is
                  consulted; yet unless that consequence be admitted, this sagacious maxim becomes
                  an empty sound, without any <span ana="editorial.xml#realism">relation to practice
                     or to life</span>.</p>
                <p>Nor is it evident, that even the first motions to these effects are always in the
                  same proportion. For pride, which produces quickness of resentment, will obstruct
                  gratitude, by unwillingness to admit that inferiority which obligation implies;
                  and it is very unlikely, that he who cannot think he receives a favour will
                  acknowledge or repay it.</p>
                <p>It is of <span ana="editorial.xml#purpose">the utmost importance to
                  mankind</span>, that positions of this tendency should be laid open and confuted;
                  for while men consider good and evil as springing from the same root, they will
                  spare the one for the sake of the other, and in judging, if not of others at least
                  of themselves, will be apt to estimate their virtues by their vices. <span ana="editorial.xml#purpose">To this fatal error all those will contribute, who
                     confound the colours of right and wrong, and instead of helping to settle their
                     boundaries, mix them with so much art, that no common mind is able to disunite
                     them.</span>
                </p>
                <p>
                    <span ana="editorial.xml#probability">In narratives, where historical veracity has
                     no place, I cannot discover why there should not be exhibited the most perfect
                     idea of virtue; of virtue not angelical, nor above probability, for what we
                     cannot credit we shall never imitate, but the highest and purest that humanity
                     can reach, which, exercised in such trials as the various revolutions of things
                     shall bring upon it, may, by conquering some calamities, and enduring others,
                     teach us what we may hope, and what we can perform.</span>
                    <span ana="editorial.xml#affect">Vice, for vice is necessary to be shewn, should
                     always disgust</span>; nor should the graces of gaiety, or the dignity of
                  courage, be so united with it, as to reconcile it to the mind. <span ana="editorial.xml#purpose">Wherever it appears, it should raise hatred by the
                     malignity of its practices, and contempt by the meanness of its stratagems; for
                     while it is supported by either parts or spirit, it will be seldom heartily
                     abhorred.</span> The Roman tyrant was content to be hated, if he was but
                  feared; and there are thousands of the readers of romances willing to be thought
                  wicked, if they may be allowed to be wits. <span ana="editorial.xml#education">It
                     is therefore to be steadily inculcated, that <span ana="editorial.xml#reason">virtue is the highest proof of understanding</span>, and the only solid
                     basis of greatness; and that vice is the natural consequence of narrow
                     thoughts, that it begins in mistake, and ends in ignominy.</span>
                </p>
</div>

        </body>
    </text>
</TEI>
	<TEI xmlns="http://www.tei-c.org/ns/1.0" xml:id="johns-ramb4">
	<teiHeader>
	<fileDesc>
	<titleStmt>
	<title type="statusBar">The Rambler No. 4</title>
	<author>Samuel Johnson</author>
	<respStmt>
	<resp>Transcription, correction, editorial commentary, and markup</resp>
	<name>Tonya Howe</name>
	</respStmt>
	</titleStmt>
	<publicationStmt>
	<p>This text is prepared as part of <title>The Novels in Context</title> project, which provides an accessible, curated, and marked-up selection of primary sources relevant to the study
	and the teaching of the eighteenth-century development of the novel in English.</p>
	<p>
	<normalization>
	Original spelling and capitalization is retained, though the long s has been silently modernized and ligatured forms are not encoded. Hyphenation has not been retained. </normalization>
	</p>
	<p>Materials have been transcribed from and checked against first editions.
	</p>
	</publicationStmt>
	<sourceDesc>
	<imprint>
	<pubPlace>London</pubPlace>
	<publisher>Printed for J[ohn]. Payne, at Pope's Head, in Pater-noster-Row</publisher>
	<date type="firstEd">Saturday, 31 March 1750</date>
	<date>1752</date>
	<note>This excerpt is sourced from a reprint of the first collected UK
	edition.</note>
	<extent>6v. ; 12⁰.</extent>
	<biblScope unit="page" from="12" to="34">Pages.</biblScope>
	</imprint>
	<imprint>
	<pubPlace>Public domain electronic facsimile copy</pubPlace>
	<publisher>Google eBook</publisher>
	<date type="accessed">15 August 2014</date>
	<extent>http://books.google.com/books?id=7ZYDAAAAQAAJ</extent>
	</imprint>
	</sourceDesc>
	</fileDesc>
	</teiHeader>
	<text>
	<body>
	<head>Number 4, Saturday, 31 March 1750</head>
	<epigraph xml:lang="la">
	<cit>
	<bibl>Horace</bibl>
	<quote>
	<l>Simul et jucunda et idonea dicere Vitae.</l>
	</quote>
	</cit>
	</epigraph>
	<div type="main">
	<p>The works of fiction, with which the present generation seems more particularly
	delighted, are such as <span ana="editorial.xml#realism" type="positive">exhibit
	life in its true state, diversified only by accidents that daily happen in the
	world, and influenced by passions and qualities which are really to be found in
	conversing with mankind.</span>
	</p>
	<p>This kind of writing may be termed not improperly the <span ana="editorial.xml#genre">
	<span ana="editorial.xml#term">comedy of
	romance</span>, and is to be conducted nearly by the rules of comic
	poetry.</span> Its province is <span ana="editorial.xml#purpose" type="positive">to bring about natural events by easy means, and to keep up
	curiosity without the help of wonder</span>: it is therefore precluded from the
	<span ana="editorial.xml#genre" type="negative">machines and expedients of the
	heroic romance</span>, and can neither employ <span ana="editorial.xml#romance">giants to snatch away a lady from the nuptial rites</span>, nor <span ana="editorial.xml#romance">knights to bring her back from captivity</span>; it
	can <span ana="editorial.xml#romance">neither bewilder its personages in desarts,
	nor lodge them in imaginary castles</span>. </p>
	<p>I remember a remark made by <span ana="editorial.xml#reference">
	<rs type="person" ref="SCA">Scaliger</rs> upon Potanus, that all his writings are filled with
	the same images; and that if you take from him his lillies and his roses, his
	satyrs and his dryads, he will have nothing left that can be called poetry. In
	like manner, almost all the fictions of the last age will vanish, if you
	deprive them of a hermit and a wood, a battle and a shipwreck.</span>
	</p>
	<p>Why this <span ana="editorial.xml#imagination">wild strain of imagination</span>
	found reception so long, in polite and learned ages, it is not easy to conceive;
	but we cannot wonder that, <span ana="editorial.xml#economy">while readers could
	be procured, the authors were willing to continue it</span>: for <span ana="editorial.xml#ease">when a man had by practice some fluency of language,
	he had no further care than to <span ana="editorial.xml#imagination">retire to
	his closet, let loose his invention, and <span ana="editorial.xml#metaphor" type="sexual">heat his mind with incredibilities</span>
	</span>; a book
	was thus produced without <span ana="editorial.xml#valueClaim" type="positive">fear of criticism, without the toil of study, without knowledge of nature,
	or acquaintance with life.</span>
	</span>
	</p>
	<p>
	<span ana="editorial.xml#valueClaim">The task of our present writers is very
	different; it requires, together with that learning which is to be gained from
	books, that <span ana="editorial.xml#sociability">experience which can never be
	attained by solitary diligence, but must arise from general converse</span>,
	and <span ana="editorial.xml#empiricism">accurate observation of the living
	world</span>
	</span>
	<span ana="editorial.xml#ease">Their performances have, as <rs type="person" ref="HOR">Horace</rs> expresses it, <span ana="editorial.xml#quote">
	<span rend="italics">plus oneris quantum veniae minus,</span> little
	indulgence, and therefore more difficulty.</span>
	</span>
	<span ana="editorial.xml#realism">They are engaged in portraits of which every one
	knows the original, and can detect any deviation from exactness of
	resemblance</span>. Other writings are safe, except from the malice of
	learning, but these are in danger from <span ana="editorial.xml#distinguish">every
	common reader</span>; <span ana="editorial.xml#metaphor">as the slipper ill
	executed was censured by a shoemaker who happened to stop in his way at the
	Venus of Apelles.</span>
	</p>
	<p>But the fear of not being approved as <span ana="editorial.xml#purpose">just
	copyers of human manners</span>, is not the most important concern that an
	author of this sort ought to have before him. <span ana="editorial.xml#youth">These books are written chiefly to the young, the ignorant, and the idle, to
	whom they serve as <span ana="editorial.xml#purpose">lectures of conduct, and
	introductions into life</span>
	</span>. <span ana="editorial.xml#youth">They
	are the entertainment of minds unfurnished with ideas</span>, and therefore
	<span ana="editorial.xml#affect">easily susceptible of impressions</span>;
	<span ana="editorial.xml#reason">not fixed by principles</span>, and therefore
	<span ana="editorial.xml#affect">easily following <span ana="editorial.xml#imagination">the current of fancy</span>
	</span>; <span ana="editorial.xml#reason">
	<span ana="editorial.xml#experience">not informed by
	experience, and consequently open to every false suggestion and partial
	account.</span>
	</span>
	</p>
	<p>
	<span ana="editorial.xml#youth">That the highest degree of reverence should be
	paid to youth, and that nothing indecent should be suffered to approach their
	eyes or ears; are precepts extorted by sense and virtue from an ancient writer,
	by no means eminent for chastity of thought. <span ana="editorial.xml#education">The same kind, tho' not the same degree of
	caution, is required in every thing which is laid before them, to secure
	them from unjust prejudices, perverse opinions, and incongruous combinations
	of images</span>.</span>
	</p>
	<p>
	<span ana="editorial.xml#romance">In the romances formerly written, every
	transaction and sentiment was so remote from all that passes among men, that
	the reader was in very little danger of making any application to
	himself</span>; the virtues and crimes were <span ana="editorial.xml#experience">equally beyond his sphere of activity</span>;
	and he amused himself with <span ana="editorial.xml#character">heroes and with
	traitors, deliverers and persecutors, as with beings of another species</span>,
	whose actions were regulated upon motives of their own, and who had <span ana="editorial.xml#realism">neither faults nor excellences in common with
	himself</span>. </p>
	<p>
	<span ana="editorial.xml#realism">But when an adventurer is levelled with the rest
	of the world, and acts in such scenes of the universal drama, as may be the lot
	of any other man</span>; young spectators fix their eyes upon him with closer
	attention, and hope <span ana="editorial.xml#purpose">by observing his behaviour
	and success to regulate their own practices, when they shall be engaged in the
	like part</span>. </p>
	<p>For this reason these <span ana="editorial.xml#term">familiar histories</span> may
	perhaps <span ana="editorial.xml#purpose">be made of greater use than the
	solemnities of professed morality, and convey the knowledge of vice and virtue
	with more efficacy than axioms and definitions</span>. <span ana="editorial.xml#affect">But if the power of example is so great, as to take
	possession of the memory by a kind of violence, and produce effects almost
	without the intervention of the will, care ought to be taken that, when the
	choice is unrestrained, the best examples only should be exhibited; and that
	which is likely to operate so strongly, should not be mischievous or uncertain
	in its effects</span>. </p>
	<p>
	<span ana="editorial.xml#valueClaim">The chief advantage which these fictions have
	over real life is, <span ana="editorial.xml#distinguish">that their authors are
	at liberty, tho' not to invent, yet to select objects, and to cull from the
	mass of mankind, those individuals upon which the attention ought most to be
	employ'd</span>
	</span>; <span ana="editorial.xml#metaphor" type="jewel">as a
	diamond, though it cannot be made, may be polished by art, and placed in such a
	situation, as to display that lustre which before was buried among common
	stones </span>. </p>
	<p>
	<span ana="editorial.xml#imitation">It is justly considered as the greatest
	excellency of art, to imitate nature</span>; but <span ana="editorial.xml#distinguish">it is necessary to distinguish those parts of
	nature, which are most proper for imitation</span>: <span ana="editorial.xml#affect">greater care is still required in representing life,
	which is so often discoloured by passion, or <span ana="editorial.xml#metaphor" type="physical">deformed by wickedness</span>
	</span>. <span ana="editorial.xml#distinguish" type="negative">If the world be promiscuously
	described, I cannot see of what use it can be to read the account; or why it
	may not be as safe to turn the eye immediately upon mankind, as upon a mirror
	which shows all that presents itself without discrimination.</span>
	</p>
	<p>
	<span ana="editorial.xml#character">It is therefore not a sufficient vindication
	of a character, that it is drawn as it appears, for many characters ought never
	to be drawn</span>; nor of a narrative, that the train of events is agreeable
	to observation and experience, for that observation which is called knowledge of
	the world, will be found much more frequently to make men cunning than good. <span ana="editorial.xml#purpose">The purpose of these writings is surely not only to
	show mankind, but to provide that they may be seen hereafter with less hazard;
	to teach the means of avoiding the snares which are laid by Treachery for
	Innocence, without infusing any wish for that superiority with which the
	betrayer flatters his vanity; to give the power of counteracting fraud, without
	the temptation to practise it; to initiate the youth by mock encounters in the
	art of necessary defense, and to increase prudence without impairing
	virtue.</span>
	</p>
	<p>Many writers, for the sake of following nature, <span ana="editorial.xml#distinguish">so mingle good and bad qualities in <span ana="editorial.xml#character">their principal personages</span>, that they
	are both equally conspicuous</span>; <span ana="editorial.xml#affect">and as we
	accompany them through their adventures with delight, and are led by degrees to
	interest ourselves in their favour, we lose the abhorrence of their faults,
	because they do not hinder our pleasure, or, perhaps, regard them with some
	kindness for being united with so much merit</span>. </p>
	<p>There have been men indeed splendidly wicked, whose endowments threw a brightness
	on their crimes, and whom scarce any villainy made perfectly detestable, because
	they never could be wholly divested of their excellencies; but such have been in
	all ages the great corruptors of the world, and <span ana="editorial.xml#metaphor">their resemblance ought no more to be preserved, than the art of murdering
	without pain</span>.</p>
	<p>
	<span ana="editorial.xml#probability">Some have advanced, without due attention to
	the consequences of this notion, that certain virtues have their correspondent
	faults, and therefore that to exhibit either apart is to deviate from
	probability.</span>
	<span ana="editorial.xml#reference">Thus men are observed by <rs type="person" ref="SW">Swift</rs> to be "grateful in the same degree as they are
	resentful."</span>
	<span ana="editorial.xml#humanNature">This principle, with others of the same
	kind, supposes man to act from a brute impulse, and persue a certain degree of
	inclination, without any choice of the object</span>; for, otherwise, though it
	should be allowed that gratitude and resentment arise from the same constitution
	of the passions, it follows not that they will be equally indulged when reason is
	consulted; yet unless that consequence be admitted, this sagacious maxim becomes
	an empty sound, without any <span ana="editorial.xml#realism">relation to practice
	or to life</span>.</p>
	<p>Nor is it evident, that even the first motions to these effects are always in the
	same proportion. For pride, which produces quickness of resentment, will obstruct
	gratitude, by unwillingness to admit that inferiority which obligation implies;
	and it is very unlikely, that he who cannot think he receives a favour will
	acknowledge or repay it.</p>
	<p>It is of <span ana="editorial.xml#purpose">the utmost importance to
	mankind</span>, that positions of this tendency should be laid open and confuted;
	for while men consider good and evil as springing from the same root, they will
	spare the one for the sake of the other, and in judging, if not of others at least
	of themselves, will be apt to estimate their virtues by their vices. <span ana="editorial.xml#purpose">To this fatal error all those will contribute, who
	confound the colours of right and wrong, and instead of helping to settle their
	boundaries, mix them with so much art, that no common mind is able to disunite
	them.</span>
	</p>
	<p>
	<span ana="editorial.xml#probability">In narratives, where historical veracity has
	no place, I cannot discover why there should not be exhibited the most perfect
	idea of virtue; of virtue not angelical, nor above probability, for what we
	cannot credit we shall never imitate, but the highest and purest that humanity
	can reach, which, exercised in such trials as the various revolutions of things
	shall bring upon it, may, by conquering some calamities, and enduring others,
	teach us what we may hope, and what we can perform.</span>
	<span ana="editorial.xml#affect">Vice, for vice is necessary to be shewn, should
	always disgust</span>; nor should the graces of gaiety, or the dignity of
	courage, be so united with it, as to reconcile it to the mind. <span ana="editorial.xml#purpose">Wherever it appears, it should raise hatred by the
	malignity of its practices, and contempt by the meanness of its stratagems; for
	while it is supported by either parts or spirit, it will be seldom heartily
	abhorred.</span> The Roman tyrant was content to be hated, if he was but
	feared; and there are thousands of the readers of romances willing to be thought
	wicked, if they may be allowed to be wits. <span ana="editorial.xml#education">It
	is therefore to be steadily inculcated, that <span ana="editorial.xml#reason">virtue is the highest proof of understanding</span>, and the only solid
	basis of greatness; and that vice is the natural consequence of narrow
	thoughts, that it begins in mistake, and ends in ignominy.</span>
	</p>
	</div>

	</body>
	</text>
	</TEI>