to Friendship, whose Grief happens not to be moist enough to wet such a Parcel of Handkerchiefs.  But Experience has told us, nothing is so fallacious as this outward Sign of Sorrow; and the natural History of our Bodies will teach us that this Flux of the Eyes, this Faculty of Weeping, is peculiar only to some Constitutions.  We observe in the tender Bodies of Children, when crossed in their little Wills and Expectations, how dissolvable they are into Tears.  If this were what Grief is in Men, Nature would not be able to support them in the Excess of it for one Moment.  Add to this Observation, how quick is their Transition from this Passion to that of their Joy.  I won’t say we see often, in the next tender Things to Children, Tears shed without much Grieving.  Thus it is common to shed Tears without much Sorrow, and as common to suffer much Sorrow without shedding Tears.  Grief and Weeping are indeed frequent Companions, but, I believe, never in their highest Excesses.  As Laughter does not proceed from profound Joy, so neither does Weeping from profound Sorrow.  The Sorrow which appears so easily at the Eyes, cannot have pierced deeply into the Heart.  The Heart distended with Grief, stops all the Passages for Tears or Lamentations.

’Now, Sir, what I would incline you to in all this, is, that you would inform the shallow Criticks and Observers upon Sorrow, that true Affliction labours to be invisible, that it is a Stranger to Ceremony, and that it bears in its own Nature a Dignity much above the little Circumstances which are affected under the Notion of Decency.  You must know, Sir, I have lately lost a dear Friend, for whom I have not yet shed a Tear, and for that Reason your Animadversions on that Subject would be the more acceptable to’, SIR, Your most humble Servant, B.D.

  June the 15_th_.

  Mr.  SPECTATOR,

’As I hope there are but few who have so little Gratitude as not to acknowledge the Usefulness of your Pen, and to esteem it a Publick Benefit; so I am sensible, be that as it will, you must nevertheless find the Secret and Incomparable Pleasure of doing Good, and be a great Sharer in the Entertainment you give.  I acknowledge our Sex to be much obliged, and I hope improved, by your Labours, and even your Intentions more particularly for our Service.  If it be true, as ’tis sometimes said, that our Sex have an Influence on the other, your Paper may be a yet more general Good.  Your directing us to Reading is certainly the best Means to our Instruction; but I think, with you, Caution in that Particular very useful, since the Improvement of our Understandings may, or may not, be of Service to us, according as it is managed.  It has been thought we are not generally so Ignorant as Ill-taught, or that our Sex does so often want Wit, Judgment, or Knowledge, as the right Application of them:  You are so well-bred, as to say your fair Readers are already deeper Scholars than the Beaus,