and have a Title to our Assistance.  All cannot be bred in the same Place; but in all Places there arise, at different Times, such Persons as do Honour to their Society, which may raise Envy in little Souls, but are admired and cherished by generous Spirits.

It is certainly a great Happiness to be educated in Societies of great and eminent Men.  Their Instructions and Examples are of extraordinary Advantage.  It is highly proper to instill such a Reverence of the governing Persons, and Concern for the Honour of the Place, as may spur the growing Members to worthy Pursuits and honest Emulation:  But to swell young Minds with vain Thoughts of the Dignity of their own Brotherhood, by debasing and villifying all others, doth them a real Injury.  By this means I have found that their Efforts have become languid, and their Prattle irksome, as thinking it sufficient Praise that they are Children of so illustrious and ample a Family.  I should think it a surer as well as more generous Method, to set before the Eyes of Youth such Persons as have made a noble Progress in Fraternities less talk’d of; which seems tacitly to reproach their Sloth, who loll so heavily in the Seats of mighty Improvement:  Active Spirits hereby would enlarge their Notions, whereas by a servile Imitation of one, or perhaps two, admired Men in their own Body, they can only gain a secondary and derivative kind of Fame.  These Copiers of Men, like those of Authors or Painters, run into Affectations of some Oddness, which perhaps was not disagreeable in the Original, but sits ungracefully on the narrow-soul’d Transcriber.

By such early Corrections of Vanity, while Boys are growing into Men, they will gradually learn not to censure superficially; but imbibe those Principles of general Kindness and Humanity, which alone can make them easie to themselves, and beloved by others.

Reflections of this nature have expunged all Prejudices out of my Heart, insomuch that, tho’ I am a firm Protestant, I hope to see the Pope and Cardinals without violent Emotions; and tho’ I am naturally grave, I expect to meet good Company at Paris.

  I am, SIR,
  Your obedient Servant.

  Mr.  SPECTATOR,

I find you are a general Undertaker, and have by your Correspondents or self an Insight into most things:  which makes me apply my self to you at present in the sorest Calamity that ever befel Man.  My Wife has taken something ill of me, and has not spoke one Word, good or bad, to me, or any Body in the Family, since Friday was Seven-night.  What must a Man do in that Case?  Your Advice would be a great Obligation to,

  SIR, Your most humble Servant,

  Ralph Thimbleton.

  Mr.  SPECTATOR,

  When you want a Trifle to fill up a Paper, in inserting this you will
  lay an Obligation on