when it was much the interest of either party to raise and fix the prejudices of the people. At that time appeared Mercurius Aulicus, Mercurius Rusticus, and Mercurius Civicus. It is said that when any title grew popular, it was stolen by the antagonist, who by this stratagem conveyed his notions to those who would not have received him, had he not worn the appearance of a friend. The tumult of those unhappy days left scarcely any man leisure to treasure up occasional compositions; and so much were they neglected, that a complete collection is no where to be found.

These Mercuries were succeeded by L'ESTRANGE'S OBSERVATOR, and that by LESLEY'S REHEARSAL, and perhaps by others: but hitherto nothing had been conveyed to the people, in this commodious manner, but controversy relating to the church or state; of which they taught many to talk, whom they could not teach to judge.

It has been suggested that the Royal Society was instituted soon after the Restoration, to divert the attention of the people from public discontent. The TATLER and SFECTATOR had the same tendency: they were published at a time when two parties,

loud, restless, and violent, each with plausible declarations, and each perhaps without any distinct termination of its views, were agitating the nation: to minds heated with political contest, they supplied cooler and more inoffensive reflections; and it is said by ADDISON, in a subsequent work, that they had a perceptible influence upon the conversation of that time, and taught the frolic and the gay to unite merriment with decency; an effect which they can never wholly lose, while they continue to be amongst the first books by which both sexes are initiated in the elegancies of knowledge.'

If it was the aim of the first ESSAYISTs to direct the public attention to subjects that, like those of LORD VERULAM, came home to men's business and bosoms,' a wide field lay before them, for the cultivation of which little provision had been made by preceding authors. There were innumerable topics, which, though of great importance in promoting regularity and propriety in social life, and securing the happiness of the domestic relations, had been but superficially touched upon by any of the teachers of wisdom. The weightier morals and the Christian virtues, the grosser vices and de

pravities, were indeed duly attended to in the discourses of our English Divines, which form a body of religious and moral instruction, such as no other nation can hope to rival; but the freaks and vagaries of fashion, operating upon various tempers, and creating many varieties of character, and many modifications of absurdity, whatever influence they might have upon society, were excluded from a place where nothing can intrude but what is capable of grave discussion.

We cannot make a just estimate of the literature of a country if we do not take into our consideration its political government, and the advantages or obstructions which they may present to genius and imagination. If our ESSAYISTS have excelled in humour, they owe their materials and their opportunities to circumstances that are not known in other countries to the freedom of our constitutionto the vast extension of commerce-to the forms of social intercourse, the general relish for conversation, and unconstrained interchange of sentiments; to a taste for dress, to the intermixture of the sexes in all companies ;—and to the operation of wealth on minds of strong or weak texture. A these circumstances pre

sent a numerous class of characters; which, as they display themselves openly, without fear and without shame, become the prey of the wit, and present him with such opportunities of exposing improprieties and wrong notions to ridicule, as no systematic study or philosophical contemplation could suggest.

When the ESSAYISTS, whose works compose these volumes, began to write, they found this wide field almost entirely unoccupied. Their predecessors and their contemporaries, as Dr. JOHNSON has observed, meddled only with politics, which, as they discussed them, required neither wit nor learning. Elegance of style was but little known at that time in any prose compositions: and wit, confined chiefly to the stage, was associated with the grossest immorality. In such an undertaking, then, the regulation of TASTE became a principal object. The PASSIONS also would prove a rich source of remark, both serious and humorous. To treat of LOVE is the peculiar province of this class of writers; and JEALOUSY enters so deeply into every species of gallantry as to afford another very fertile source of humourous character and observation, as well as of more grave and important discussion. MARRIAGE

has also been considered by our ESSAYISTS in every possible light; and the influence of FRIENDSHIP upon the state of society presents another series of characters and remarks, of great importance. Its nature and properties are therefore frequently discussed in these volumes; and it will be found that the crimes or whims of PRIDE, ENVY, and REVENGE, occupy no inconsiderable part of the lucubrations of the ESSAYISTS, and afford some of the most striking pictures of real life, and displays of genuine humour.

Such are a few of the leading subjects which have been touched upon by this distinguished class of writers; but on examining these papers it will be found that no topic connected with the general good of mankind is left unnoticed. Of the works written upon this plan, the first in point of time is the TATLER. The design of this work belonging exclusively to SIR RICHARD STEELE, we shall present to our readers the best-authenticated account we can obtain of one who has bequeathed to posterity so eminently useful a legacy.

SIR RICHARD STEELE was born at Dublin, according to one account, in 1671; but another, by conjecture, places his birth about 1676. His