I shall add to these illustrious Examples out of ancient Story, a remarkable instance of the Delicacy of our Ancestors in Relation to the State of Widowhood, as I find it recorded in Cowell’s Interpreter. At East and West-Enborne, in the County of Berks, if a Customary Tenant die, the Widow shall have what the Law calls her Free-Bench in all his Copy-hold Lands, dum sola & casta fuerit; that is, while she lives single and chaste; but if she commit Incontinency, she forfeits her Estate:  Yet if she will come into the Court riding backward upon a Black Ram, with his Tail in her Hand, and say the Words following, the Steward is bound by the Custom to re-admit her to her Free-Bench. [1]

’Here I am, Riding upon a Black Ram, Like a Whore as I am; And, for my_ Crincum Crancum, Have lost my Bincum Bancum; And, for my Tail’s Game, Have done this worldly Shame; Therefore, I pray you Mr. Steward, let me have my Land again.’

The like Custom there is in the Manor of Torre in Devonshire, and other Parts of the West.

It is not impossible but I may in a little Time present you with a Register of Berkshire Ladies and other Western Dames, who rode publickly upon this Occasion; and I hope the Town will be entertained with a Cavalcade of Widows.

[Footnote 1:  Frank Bank or Free bench are copyhold lands which the wife, being married a spinster, had after her husband’s death for dower.]

* * * * *

No. 615.  Wednesday, November 3, 1714.

’—­Qui Deorum Muneribus sapienter uti, Duramque callet pauperiem pati, Pejusque letho flagitium timet:  Non ille pro caris amicis Aut patria timidus perire.’

  Hor.

It must be owned that Fear is a very powerful Passion, since it is esteemed one of the greatest of Virtues to subdue it.  It being implanted in us for our Preservation, it is no Wonder it sticks close to us, as long as we have any thing we are willing to preserve.  But as Life, and all its Enjoyments, would be scarce worth the keeping, if we were under a perpetual Dread of losing them; it is the Business of Religion and Philosophy to free us from all unnecessary Anxieties, and direct our Fear to its proper Object.

If we consider the Painfulness of this Passion, and the violent Effects it produces, we shall see how dangerous it is to give way to it upon slight Occasions.  Some have frightened themselves into Madness, others have given up their Lives to these Apprehensions.  The Story of a Man who grew grey in the Space of one Night’s Anxiety is very famous;

  ‘O!  Nox, quam longa es, quae facis una Senem.’

These Apprehensions, if they proceed from a Consciousness of Guilt, are the sad Warnings of Reason; and may excite our Pity, but admit of no Remedy.  When the Hand of the Almighty is visibly lifted against the Impious, the Heart of mortal Man cannot withstand him.  We have this Passion sublimely represented in the Punishment of the Egyptians, tormented with the Plague of Darkness, in the Apocryphal Book. of Wisdom ascribed to Solomon.