of the finest allegories which I think I have ever read. invented by the divine Plato, and, to fhew the opinion he himfelf had of it, afcribed by him to his admired Socrates, whom he represents as difcourfing with his friends, and giving the history of love in the following manner :

"Át the birth of beauty, fays he, there was a great feaft made, and many guests invited: among the reft, was the god Plenty, who was the fon of the goddess Prudence, and inherited many of his mother's virtues. After a full entertainment he retired into the garden of Jupiter, which was hung with a great variety of ambrofial fruits, and feems to have been a very proper retreat for fuch a guest. In the mean time an unhappy female called Poverty having heard of this great feast, repaired to it in hopes of finding relief. The first place she lights upon was Jupiter's garden, which generally stands open to people of all conditions. Poverty enters, and by chance finds the god Plenty asleep in it. She was immediately fired with his charms, laid herself down by his fide, and managed matters fo well, that fhe conceived a child by him. The world was very much in fufpenfe upon the occafion, and could not imagine to themselves what would be the nature of an infant that was to have its original from two fuch parents. At the last the child appears; and who should it be but Love. This infant grew up, and proved in all his behaviour what he really was, a compound of oppofite beings. As he is the fon of Plenty (who was the offspring of Prudence), he is fubtle, intriguing, full of ftratagems and devices; as the fon of Poverty, he is fawning, begging, ferenading, delighting to lie at a threshold or beneath a window. By the father, he is audacious, full of hopes, confcious of merit, and therefore quick of refentment: by the mother, he is doubtful, timorous, mean-fpirited, fearful of offending, and abject in fubmiffions in the fame hour you may fee him transported with raptures, talking of immortal pleasures, and appearing satisfied as a god; and immediately after, as the mortal mother prevails in his compofition, you behold him pining, languishing, despairing, dying."

I have been always wonderfully delighted with fables, allegories, and the like inventions, which the politeft and the best inftructors of mankind have always made ufe of: they take off from the severity of inftruction, and enforce it at the fame time that they conceal it. The fuppofing Love to be conceived immediately after the birth of Beauty, the parentage of Plenty, and the inconfiftency of this paffion with itself fo naturally derived to it, are great mafter-strokes in this fable; and, if they fell into good hands, might furnish out a more pleafing canto than any in Spencer.

CHAPTER IV.

MR. BICKERSTAFF IS CONSULTED BY AN UNFORTUATE LOVER -HIS ADVICE, AND CONFESSION OF HIS OWN EXPERIENCE.

BOUT four this afternoon, which is the hour I ufually put myself in a readiness to receive company, there entered a gentleman who I believed at firft came upon fome ordinary question; but as he approached nearer to me, I faw in his countenance a deep forrow, mixed with a certain ingenuous complacency that gave me fudden goodwill towards him. He stared, and betrayed an absence of thought as he was going to communicate his business to me. But at last, recovering himself, he faid, with an air of great refpect, "Sir, it would be an injury to your knowledge in the occult fciences to tell you what is my distress; I dare fay you read it in my countenance: I therefore beg your advice to the most unhappy of all men." Much experience has made me particularly fagacious in the discovery of diftempers, and I foon faw that his was love. I then turned to my common-place book, and found his case under the word coquet; and reading over the catalogue which I have collected out of this great city of all under that character, I faw at the name of Cynthia his fit came upon him. I repeated the name thrice after a mufing manner, and immediately perceived his pulfe quicken two-thirds; when his eyes, inftead of the wildnefs with which they appeared at his entrance, looked with all the gentleness imaginable upon me, not without tears. "Oh, fir," said he, 66 you know not the

unworthy ufage I have met with from the woman my foul doats on. I could gaze at her to the end of my being; yet when I have done fo, for fome time past, I have found her eyes fixed on another. She is now two-and-twenty, in the full tyranny of her charms, which he once acknowledged fhe rejoiced in, only as they made her choice of me, out of a crowd of admirers, the more obliging. But in the midst of this happiness (fo it is, Mr. Bickerstaff), that young Quickfett, who is just come to town, without any other recommendation than that of being tolerably handsome and exceffively rich, has won her heart in fo fhameless a manner that fhe dies for him. In a word, I would confult you how to cure myself of this paffion for an ungrateful woman, who triumphs in her falfehood, and can make no man happy, because her own fatisfaction confifts chiefly in being capable of giving distress. I know Quickfett is at prefent confiderable with her, for no other reafon but that he can be without her, and feel no pain in the lofs. Let me therefore defire you, fir, to fortify my reason against the levity of an inconftant, who ought only to be treated with neglect.”

All this time I was looking over my receipts, and asked him if he had any good winter boots .? " Boots, fir," faid my patient- -I went on: you may easily reach Harwich in a day, fo as to be there when the packet goes off. "Sir," faid the lover, "I find you defign me for travelling; but alas! I have no language; it will be the fame thing to me as folitude to be in a strange country. I have," continued he, fighing, "been many years in love with this creature, and have almost loft even my English, at least to speak fuch as anybody else does. I asked a tenant of ours, who came up to town the other day with rent, whether the flowery mead near my father's house in the country had any shepherd in it? I have called a cave a grotto these three years, and must keep ordinary company and frequent bufy people for fome time, before I can recover my common words." I fmiled at his raillery upon himself, though I well faw it came from a heavy heart. "You are," faid I, "acquainted to be fure with fome of the

general officers: fuppofe you made a campaign?" "If I did,” said he, “ I should venture more than any man there, for I should be in danger of ftarving; my father is such an untoward old gentleman, that he would tell me he found it hard enough to pay his taxes towards the war, without making it more expensive by an allowance to me. With all this, he is as fond as he is rugged, and I am his only fon."

I looked upon the young gentleman with much tenderness, and not like a phyfician, but a friend; for I talked to him fo largely, that if I had parcelled my difcourfe into diftinct prefcriptions, I am confident I gave him two hundred pounds' worth of advice. He heard me with great attention, bowing, fmiling, and fhewing all other instances of that natural good breeding which ingenuous tempers pay to those who are elder and wifer than themselves. I entertained him to the following purpose. "I am forry, fir, that your paffion is of fo long a date, for evils are much more curable in their beginnings; but at the fame time must allow that you are not blamed, fince your youth and merit has been abused by one of the most charming, but the most unworthy fort of women, the coquets. A coquet is a chaste jilt, and differs only from a common one, as a foldier who is perfect in exercife does from one that is actually in fervice. This grief, like all others, is to be cured only by time; and although you are convinced this moment as much as you will be ten years hence, that fhe ought to be fcorned and neglected, you fee you must not expect your remedy from the force of reafon. The cure, then, is only in time; and the haftening of the cure only in the manner of employing that time. You have answered me as to travel and a campaign, fo that we have only Great Britain to avoid her in. Be then yourself, and listen to the following rules, which only can be of use to you in this unaccountable distemper, wherein the patient is often averfe even to his recovery. It has been of benefit to fome to apply themselves to business; but as that may not lie in your way, go down to your estate, mind your fox-hounds, and venture the life you are weary of over every hedge and ditch in the country. These are whole