The Spectator
Chapter 274 : Why Terror and Grief are pleasing to the Mind when excited by Descriptions. A particul

Why Terror and Grief are pleasing to the Mind when excited by Descriptions. A particular Advantage the Writers in Poetry and Fiction have to please the Imagination. What Liberties are allowed them.

PAPER IX. [No. 419, Volume 3.]

Of that kind of Poetry which Mr. Dryden calls the Fairy Way of Writing. How a Poet should be Qualified for it. The Pleasures of the Imagination that arise from it. In this respect why the Moderns excell the Ancients. Why the English excell the Moderns. Who the Best among the English. Of Emblematical Persons.

PAPER X. [No. 420, Volume 3.]

What Authors please the Imagination who have nothing to do with Fiction. How History pleases the Imagination. How the Authors of the new Philosophy please the Imagination. The Bounds and Defects of the Imagination. Whether these Defects are Essential to the Imagination.

PAPER XI. [No. 421, Volume 3.]

How those please the Imagination who treat of Subjects abstracted from Matter, by Allusions taken from it. What Allusions most pleasing to the Imagination. Great Writers how Faulty in this Respect. Of the Art of Imagining in General. The Imagination capable of Pain as well as Pleasure. In what Degree the Imagination is capable either of Pain or Pleasure.

O.

No. 422. Friday, July 4, 1712. Steele.

'Haec scripsi non otii abundantia sed amoris erga te.'

Tull. Epis.

I do not know any thing which gives greater Disturbance to Conversation, than the false Notion some People have of Raillery. It ought certainly to be the first Point to be aimed at in Society, to gain the good Will of those with whom you converse. The Way to that, is to shew you are well inclined towards them: What then can be more absurd, than to set up for being extremely sharp and biting, as the Term is, in your Expressions to your Familiars? A Man who has no good Quality but Courage, is in a very ill way towards making an agreeable Figure in the World, because that which he has superior to other People cannot be exerted, without raising himself an _Enemy_. Your Gentleman of a Satyrical Vein is in the like Condition. To say a Thing which perplexes the Heart of him you speak to, or brings Blushes into his Face, is a degree of Murder; and it is, I think, an unpardonable Offence to shew a Man you do not care, whether he is pleased or displeased. But won't you then take a Jest? Yes: but pray let it be a Jest. It is no Jest to put me, who am so unhappy as to have an utter Aversion to speaking to more than one Man at a time, under a Necessity to explain my self in much Company, and reducing me to Shame and Derision, except I perform what my Infirmity of Silence disables me to do.

_Callisthenes_ has great Wit accompanied with that Quality (without which a Man can have no Wit at all) a Sound Judgment. This Gentleman rallies the best of any Man I know, for he forms his Ridicule upon a Circ.u.mstance which you are in your Heart not unwilling to grant him, to wit, that you are Guilty of an Excess in something which is in it self laudable. He very well understands what you would be, and needs not fear your Anger for declaring you are a little too much that Thing. The Generous will bear being reproached as Lavish, and the Valiant, Rash, without being provoked to Resentment against their Monitor. What has been said to be a Mark of a good Writer, will fall in with the Character of a good Companion. The good Writer makes his Reader better pleased with himself, and the agreeable Man makes his Friends enjoy themselves, rather than him, while he is in their Company. _Callisthenes_ does this with inimitable Pleasantry. He whispered a Friend the other Day, so as to be overheard by a young Officer, who gave Symptoms of c.o.c.king upon the Company, That Gentleman has very much of the Air of a General Officer. The Youth immediately put on a Composed Behaviour, and behaved himself suitably to the Conceptions he believed the Company had of him.

It is to be allowed that _Callisthenes_ will make a Man run into impertinent Relations, to his own Advantage, and express the Satisfaction he has in his own dear self till he is very ridiculous, but in this case the Man is made a Fool by his own Consent, and not exposed as such whether he will or no. I take it therefore that to make Raillery agreeable, a Man must either not know he is rallied, or think never the worse of himself if he sees he is.

_Acetus_ is of a quite contrary Genius, and is more generally admired than _Callisthenes_, but not with Justice. _Acetus_ has no regard to the Modesty or Weakness of the Person he rallies; but if his Quality or Humility gives him any Superiority to the Man he would fall upon, he has no Mercy in making the Onset. He can be pleased to see his best Friend out of Countenance, while the Laugh is loud in his own Applause. His Raillery always puts the Company into little Divisions and separate Interests, while that of _Callisthenes_ cements it, and makes every Man not only better pleased with himself, but also with all the rest in the Conversation.

To rally well, it is absolutely necessary that Kindness must run thro'

all you say, and you must ever preserve the Character of a Friend to support your Pretensions to be free with a Man. _Acetus_ ought to be banished human Society, because he raises his Mirth upon giving Pain to the Person upon whom he is pleasant. Nothing but the Malevolence, which is too general towards those who excell, could make his Company tolerated; but they with whom he converses, are sure to see some Man sacrificed where-ever he is admitted, and all the Credit he has for Wit is owing to the Gratification it gives to other Men's Ill-nature.

_Minutius_ has a Wit that conciliates a Man's Love at the same time that it is exerted against his Faults. He has an Art of keeping the Person he rallies in Countenance, by insinuating that he himself is guilty of the same Imperfection. This he does with so much Address, that he seems rather to bewail himself, than fall upon his Friend.

It is really monstrous to see how unaccountably it prevails among Men, to take the Liberty of displeasing each other. One would think sometimes that the Contention is, who shall be most disagreeable, Allusions to past Follies, Hints which revive what a Man has a Mind to forget for ever, and deserves that all the rest of the World should, are commonly brought forth even in Company of Men of Distinction. They do not thrust with the Skill of Fencers, but cut up with the Barbarity of Butchers. It is, methinks, below the Character of Men of Humanity and Good-manners, to be capable of Mirth while there is any one of the Company in Pain and Disorder. They who have the true Taste of Conversation, enjoy themselves in a Communication of each other's Excellencies, and not in a Triumph over their Imperfections. _Fortius_ would have been reckoned a Wit, if there had never been a Fool in the World: He wants not Foils to be a Beauty, but has that natural Pleasure in observing Perfection in others, that his own Faults are overlooked out of Grat.i.tude by all his Acquaintance.

After these several Characters of Men who succeed or fail in Raillery, it may not be amiss to reflect a little further what one takes to be the most agreeable Kind of it; and that to me appears when the Satyr is directed against Vice, with an Air of Contempt of the Fault, but no Ill-will to the Criminal. Mr. _Congreve's Doris_ is a Master-piece in this Kind. It is the Character of a Woman utterly abandoned, but her Impudence by the finest Piece of Raillery is made only Generosity.

'Peculiar therefore is her Way, Whether by Nature taught, I shall not undertake to say, Or by experience bought;

For who o'er Night obtain'd her Grace, She can next Day disown, And stare upon the strange Man's Face, As one she ne'er had known,

So well she can the Truth disguise, Such artful Wonder frame, The Lover or distrusts his Eyes, Or thinks 'twas all a Dream.

Some censure this as lewd or low, Who are to Bounty blind; For to forget what we bestow, Bespeaks a n.o.ble Mind.'

T.

No. 423. Sat.u.r.day, July 5, 1712. Steele.

'--Nuper Idoneus.'

Hor.

I look upon my self as a Kind of Guardian to the Fair, and am always watchful to observe any thing which concerns their Interest. The present Paper shall be employed in the Service of a very fine young Woman; and the Admonitions I give her, may not be unuseful to the rest of the s.e.x.

_Gloriana_ shall be the Name of the Heroine in To-day's Entertainment; and when I have told you that she is rich, witty, young and beautiful, you will believe she does not want Admirers. She has had since she came to Town about twenty five of those Lovers, who make their Addresses by way of Jointure and Settlement. These come and go, with great Indifference on both Sides; and as beauteous as she is, a Line in a Deed has had Exception enough against it, to outweigh the l.u.s.tre of her Eyes, the Readiness of her Understanding, and the Merit of her general Character. But among the Crowd of such cool Adorers, she has two who are very a.s.siduous in their Attendance. There is something so extraordinary and artful in their Manner of Application, that I think it but common Justice to alarm her in it. I have done it in the following Letter.

Madam,

'I have for some time taken Notice of two Gentlemen who attend you in all publick Places, both of whom have also easie Access to you at your own House: But the Matter is adjusted between them, and _Damon_, who so pa.s.sionately addresses you, has no Design upon you; but _Strephon_, who seems to be indifferent to you, is the Man, who is, as they have settled it, to have you. The Plot was laid over a Bottle of Wine; and _Strephon_, when he first thought of you, proposed to _Damon_ to be his Rival. The manner of his breaking of it to him, I was so placed at a Tavern, that I could not avoid hearing. _Damon_, said he with a deep Sigh, I have long languished for that Miracle of Beauty _Gloriana_, and if you will be very stedfastly my Rival, I shall certainly obtain her. Do not, continued he, be offended at this Overture; for I go upon the Knowledge of the Temper of the Woman, rather than any Vanity that I should profit by an Opposition of your Pretensions to those of your humble Servant. _Gloriana_ has very good Sense, a quick Relish of the Satisfactions of Life, and will not give her self, as the Crowd of Women do, to the Arms of a Man to whom she is indifferent. As she is a sensible Woman, Expressions of Rapture and Adoration will not move her neither; but he that has her must be the Object of her Desire, not her Pity. The Way to this End I take to be, that a Man's general Conduct should be agreeable, without addressing in particular to the Woman he loves. Now, Sir, if you will be so kind as to sigh and die for _Gloriana_, I will carry it with great Respect towards her, but seem void of any Thoughts as a Lover. By this Means I shall be in the most amiable Light of which I am capable; I shall be received with Freedom, you with Reserve. _Damon_, who has himself no Designs of Marriage at all, easily fell into the Scheme; and you may observe, that where-ever you are _Damon_ appears also. You see he carries on an unaffecting Exactness in his Dress and Manner, and strives always to be the very Contrary of _Strephon_. They have already succeeded so far, that your Eyes are ever in Search of _Strephon_, and turn themselves of Course from _Damon_. They meet and compare Notes upon your Carriage; and the Letter which, was brought to you the other Day, was a Contrivance to remark your Resentment. When you saw the Billet subscribed _Damon_, and turned away with a scornful Air, and cried Impertinence! you gave Hopes to him that shuns you, without mortifying him that languishes for you. What I am concerned for, Madam, is, that in the disposal of your Heart, you should know what you are doing, and examine it before it is lost. _Strephon_ contradicts you in Discourse with the Civility of one who has a Value for you, but gives up nothing like one that loves you. This seeming Unconcern gives this Behaviour the advantage of Sincerity, and insensibly obtains your good Opinion, by appearing disinterested in the purchase of it. If you watch these Correspondents hereafter, you will find that _Strephon_ makes his Visit of Civility immediately after _Damon_ has tired you with one of Love. Tho' you are very discreet, you will find it no easie matter to escape the Toils so well laid, as when one studies to be disagreeable in Pa.s.sion, the other to be pleasing without it. All the Turns of your Temper are carefully watched, and their quick and faithful Intelligence gives your Lovers irresistible Advantage. You will please, Madam, to be upon your guard, and take all the necessary Precautions against one who is amiable to you before you know he is enamoured.

_I am, Madam, Your most Obedient Servant._

_Strephon_ makes great Progress in this Lady's good Graces, for most Women being actuated by some little Spirit of Pride and Contradiction, he has the good effects of both those Motives by this Covert-Way of Courts.h.i.+p. He received a Message Yesterday from _Damon_ in the following Words, superscribed _With Speed_.