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love him, than by those that admire his excellencies, or folicit his favours; for admiration ceases with novelty, and intereft gains its end and retires. A man whofe great qualities want the ornament of fuperficial attractions, is like a naked mountain with mines of gold, which will be fre quented only till the treafure is exhausted,

I am, &c.

PHILOMIDES.

THE

RAMBLER.

NUMBER LXXIII.

LONDON, Tuesday, November 27. 1750.

Stulte, quid, beu! votis fruftra puerilibus optas
Qua non ulla tulit, fertve, feretve dies.

OVID.

SIR,

I

To the RAMBLER.

F you feel any of that compaffion which you recommend to others, you will not disregard a representation of a cafe which I have reafon to believe, from obfervation, very common, and which I know by experience to be very miferable.

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And

though

though the querulous are feldom received with great ardour of kindness, I hope to escape the mortification of finding, that my lamentations Spread the contagion of impatience, and produce anger rather than tenderness. I write not merely to vent the fwelling of my heart, but to inquire by what means I may recover my tranquillity; and fhall at least endeavour at brevity in my narrative, having long known that complaint quickly tires, however elegant, or however just.

I was born in a remote county, of an ancient family that boafts of alliances with the greatest names of the English history, and extends its claims of affinity to the Tudors and Plantagenets. My ancestors had, by little and little, wafted their patrimony, till my father had not enough left for the fupport of a family, without defcending to the cultivation of his own grounds; being condemned to pay his three fifters' fortunes allotted them by my grandfather; who is fufpected to have made his will when he was incapable of adjusting the claims of his children in due proportions, and who, perhaps without defign, enriched his daughters by beggaring his fon. My aunts being, at the death of their father, neither young nor beautiful, nor very eminent for softness of behaviour, benevolence of temper, or extent of knowledge, were fuffered by the neighbours to live unfolicited, and, by the accumulation of the intereft of their fortunes, grew every day richer and prouder. My father pleafed himself with forefeeing that the poffeffions of thofe ladies mult revert at last to the hereditary eftate; and, that his family might lofe none of its dignity, refolved to keep me untainted with any profeffion or lucrative employment: and when

ever

ever I discovered any inclination to the improvement of my condition, my mother never failed to put me in mind of my family, and charged me to do nothing with which I might be reproached when I fhould come to my aunts' estate.

In all the perplexities or vexations which want of money brought upon us, it was our conftant practice to have recourfe to futurity. If any of our neighbours furpaffed us in appearance, we went home, and contrived an equipage, with which the death of my aunts was to fupply us. If any purfeproud upftart was deficient in respect, vengeance was referred to the time in which our estate was to be repaired. We regiltered every act of civility and rudenefs, inquired the number of dishes at every feaft, and minuted the furniture of every house, that we might, when the hour of affluence fhould come, be able to eclipfe all their fplendour, and furpass all their magnificence.

Upon plans of elegance and fchemes of pleasure the day role and fet, and the year went round unregarded; while we were bufied in laying out plantations on ground not yet our own, and deliberating whether the manor-houfe fhould be rebuilt or repaired. This was all the amufement of our leifure, and all the folace of our exigencies. We met together only to contrive how our approaching fortune fhould be enjoyed in this our converfation always ended, on whatever fubject it began. We had none of the collateral interefts which diverfify the life of others with joys and hopes, but had turned our whole attention on one event, which we could neither haften nor retard; and had no other object of curiofity, than the health or fickness

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