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"admirable fir William Petty has given examples of "this in fome of his writings: one of them, as I re"member, is that of a watch, which I fhall endeavour "to explain fo as fhall fuit my prefent purpose.

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certain that a fingle watch could not be made fo cheap in proportion by one only man, as a hundred "watches by a hundred; for as there is a vaft variety in "the work, no one perfon could equally fuit himself to "all the parts of it; the manufacture would be tedious, "and at laft but clumfily performed; but if an hundred "watches were to be made by an hundred men, the cases may be affigned to one, the dials to another, the wheels to another, the fprings to another, and every other 66 part to a proper artift; as there would be no need of perplexing any one perfon with too much variety, every one would be able to perform his fingle part "with greater skill and expedition; and the hundred "watches would be finished in one-fourth part of the "time of the first one, and every one of them at one"fourth part of the coft, though the wages of every

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man were equal. The reduction of the price of the "manufacture would encrease the demand of it, all the "fame hands would be ftill employed and as well paid. "The fame rule will hold in the cloathing, the fhipping, and all other trades whatsoever. And thus an " addition of hands to our manufactures will only re"duce the price of them; the labourer will still have as "much wages, and will confequently be enabled to

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purchase more conveniencies of life; fo that every "intereft in the nation would receive a benefit from the "increase of our working people.

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"Befides, I fee no occafion for this charity to common beggars, fince every beggar is an inhabitant of a farish, and every parish is taxed to the maintenance "of their own poor. For my own part, I cannot be mightily pleafed with the laws which have done this, "which have provided better to feed than employ the 66 poor. We have a tradition from our forefathers, that "after the first of thofe laws was made, they were in"fulted with that famous fong;

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Hang forrow, and caft away care,

The parish is bound to find us, &c.'

"And if we will be fo good-natured as to maintain "them without work, they can do no less in return than fing us The Merry Beggars.

"What then? am I against all acts of charity? God "forbid! I know of no virtue in the gospel that is in

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more pathetic expreffions recommended to our prac"tice. I was hungry and ye gave me no meat, thirsty. "and ye gave me no drink, naked and ye clothed me not, a ftranger and ye took me not in, fick and in prifon and ye vifited me not.' Our bleffed Saviour treats the exercise or neglect of charity towards a poor man, as the performance or breach of this duty to"wards himself. I fhall endeavour to obey the will of 66 my Lord and Mafter: and therefore if an industrious 66 man fhall fubmit to the hardest labour and coarseft fare, rather than endure the fhame of taking relief "from the parish, or asking it in the ftreet, this is the "hungry, the thirfty, the naked; and I ought to be"lieve, if any man is come hither for fhelter against perfecution or oppreffion, this is the ftranger, and I ought to take him in. If any countryman of our own "is fallen into the hands of infidels, and lives in a state "of miferable captivity, this is the man in prifon, and "I should contribute to his ranfom. I ought to give to an hofpital of invalids, to recover as many useful fubjects as I can; but I fhall beftow none of my bounties upon an alms-house of idle people; and for the fame "reason I should not think it a reproach to me if I had "withheld my charity from thofe common beggars. "But we prescribe better rules than we are able to prac"tice; we are ashamed not to give into the mistaken "cuftoms of our country; but at the fame time, I can"not but think it a reproach worfe than that of com

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mon fwearing, that the idle and the abandoned are "fuffered in the name of Heaven and all that is facred, to extort from christian and tender minds a fupply to "a profligate way of life, that is always to be fupported, * but never relieved."

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N° 233.

Tuesday, November 27.

-Tanquam hæc fint noftri medicina furoris, Aut deus ille malis hominum mitefcere difcat.

VIRG. Ecl. 10. ver. 60.

As if by these my fufferings I could eafe,
Or by my pains the god of love appeafe. DRYDEN.

I SHALL, in this paper, discharge myself of the pro

mife I have made to the public, by obliging them with a tranflation of the little Greek manufcript, which is faid to have been a piece of thofe records that were preserved in the temple of Apollo, upon the promontory of Leucate: it is a fhort hiftory of the Lover's Leap, and is infcribed, "An account of perfons, male and female, who offered up their vows in the temple of the Pythian Apollo, "in the forty-fixth Olympiad, and leaped from the promontory of Leucate into the Ionian fea, in order to cure themselves of the paffion of love."

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This account is very dry in many parts, as only mentioning the name of the lover who leaped, the perfon he leaped for, and relating, in short, that he was either cured or killed, or mained by the fall. It indeed gives the names of fo many who died by it, that it would have looked like a bill of mortality, had I tranflated it at full length; I have therefore made an abridgment of it, and only extracted fuch particular paffages as have fomething extraordinary, either in the cafe, or in the cure, or in the fate of the perfon who is mentioned in it. After this short preface take the account as follows.

Battus, the fon of Menalcas the Sicilian, leaped for Bombyca the mufician: got rid of his paffion with the lofs of his right leg and arm, which were broken in the fall. Meliffa, in love with Daphnis, very much bruised, but escaped with life.

Cynifca, the wife of Efchines, being in love with Lycus; and fchines her husband being in love with Eurilla; (which had made this married couple

very uneafy to one another for feveral years ;) both the husband and the wife took the leap by confent; they both of them efcaped, and have lived very happily together ever fince.

Lariffa, a virgin of Theffaly, deferted by Plexippus, after a courtship of three years; fhe ftood upon the brow of the promontory for fome time, and after having thrown down a ring, a bracelet, and a little picture, with other prefents which the had received from Plexippus, fhe threw herself into the fea, and was taken up alive. N. B. Lariffa, before fhe leaped, made an offering of a filver Cupid in the temple of Apollo.

Simatha, in love with Daphnis the Myndian, perished in the fall.

Charixus, the brother of Sappho, in love with Rhodope the courtefan, having fpent his whole eftate upon her, was advised by his fifter to leap in the beginning of his amour, but would not hearken to her until he was reduced to his laft talent; being forfaken by Rhodope, at length refolved to take the leap. Perifhed in it.

Aridæus, a beautiful youth of Epirus, in love with Praxinoe, the wife of Thefpis, efcaped without damage, faving only that two of his fore teeth were struck out, and his nofe a little flatted.

Cleora, a widow of Ephefus, being inconfolable for the death of her husband, was refolved to take this leap in order to get rid of her paffion for his memory; but being arrived at the promontory, the there met with Dimmachus the Miletian, and after a fhort converfation with him, laid afide the thoughts of her leap, and married him in the temple of Apollo.

N. B. Her widow's weeds are ftill feen hanging up in the western corner of the temple.

Olphis, the fisherman, having received a box on the ear from Theftylis the day before, and being determined to have no more to do with her, leaped, and efcaped with life.

Atalanta, an old maid, whofe cruelty had feveral years before driven two or three defpairing lovers to this leap; being now in the fifty-fifth year of her age, and in love with an officer.of Sparta, broke her neck in the fall.

Hipparchus being paffionately fond of his own wife, who was enamoured of Bathyllus, leaped, and died of his fall; upon which his wife married her gallant.

Tettyx, the dancing-mafter, in love with Olympia an Athenian matron, threw himself from the rock with great agility, but was crippled in the fall.

Diagoras, the ufurer, in love with his cook-maid; he peeped feveral times over the precipice, but his heart mifgiving him, he went back and married her that evening.

Cinædus, after having entered his own name in the Pythian records, being asked the name of the person whom he leaped for, and being ashamed to discover it, he was fet afide, and not fuffered to leap.

Eunica, a maid of Paphos, aged nineteen, in love with Eurybates. Hurt in the fall, but recovered.

N. B. This was the second time of her leaping. Hefperus, a young man of Tarentum, in love with his master's daughter. Drowned, the boats not coming in foon enough to his relief.

Sappho, the Lesbian, in love with Phaon, arrived at the temple of Apollo, habited like a bride in garments as white as fnow. She wore a garland of myrtle on her head, and carried in her hand the little musical instrument of her own invention. After having fung an hymn to Apollo, the hung up her garland on one fide of his altar, and her harp on the other. She then tucked up her veftments, like a Spartan virgin, and amidit thousands of fpectators, who were anxious for her fafety, and offered up vows for her deliverance, marched directly forwards, to the utmoft fummit of the promontory, where after having repeated a stanza of her own verfes, which we could not hear, fhe threw herself off the rock with such an intrepidity as was never before observed in any who had attempted that dangerous leap. Many who were prefent related, that they faw her fall into the fea, from whence fhe never rofe again: though there were others who affirmed, that she never came to the bottom of her leap, but that fhe was changed into a fwan as the fell, and that they faw her hovering in the air under that fhape. But whether or po the whiteness and fluttering of her garments might not deceive those who looked upon her, or whether the might

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