of the industrious part of mankind. It very naturally, upon this occasion, touched my conscience in particular, that I had not acquitted myself to my friend Mr. Peter Motteux. That industrious man of trade, and formerly brother of the quill, has dedicated to me a poem upon tea. It would injure him, as a man of business, if I did not let the world know that the author of so good verses writ them before he was concerned in traffic. In order to expiate my negligence towards him, I immediately resolved to make him a visit. I found his spacious ware-houses filled and adorned with tea, China, and Indian ware. I could observe a beautiful ordonnance of the whole; and such different and considerable branches of trade carried on in the same house, I exulted in seeing disposed by a poetical head. In one place were exposed to view silks of various shades and colors, rich brocades, and the wealthiest products of foreign looms. Here you might see the finest laces held up by the fairest hands; and there, examined by the beauteous eyes of the buyers, the most delicate cambrics, muslins, and linens. I could not but congratulate my friend on the humble, but, I hope, beneficial use he had made of his talents; and wished I could be a patron to his trade, as he had been pleased to make me of his poetry. The honest man has, I know, that modest desire of gain which is peculiar to those who understand better things than riches; and I dare Say he would be contented with much less than what is called wealth at that quarter of the town which he inhabits, and will oblige all his customers with demands agreeable to the moderation of his desires. Among other omissions of which I have been also guilty, with relation to men of industry of a superior order, I must acknowledge my silence towards a proposal frequently inciosed to me by Mr. Renatus Har ris, organ-builder. The ambition of this artificer is to erect an organ in St. Paul's cathedral, over the west door, at the entrance into the body of the church, which, in art and magnificence, shall transcend any work of that kind ever before invented. The proposal in perspicuous language sets forth the honor and advantage such a performance would be to the British name, as well as that it would apply the power of sounds in a manner more amazingly forcible than perhaps has yet been known, and I am sure to an end much more worthy. Had the vast sums which have been laid out upon operas, without skill or conduct, and to no other purpose but to suspend or vitiate our understandings, been disposed this way, we should now perhaps have had an engine so formed as to strike the minds of half the people at once, in a place of worship, with a forgetfulness of present care and calamity, and a hope of endless rapture, joy and hallelujah hereafter. When I am doing this justice, I am not to forget the best mechanic of my acquaintance, that useful servant to science and knowledge, Mr. John Rowley; but I think I lay a great obligation on the public, by acquainting them with his proposals for a pair of new globes. After his preamble, he proposes in the said proposals, that, In the Celestial Globe, "Care shall be taken that the fixed stars be placed according to the true longitude and latitude, from the many and correct observations of Hevelius, Cassini, Mr. Flamstead, reg. astronomer; Dr. Halley, Savilian professor of geometry in Oxon; and from whatever else can be procured to render the globe more exact, instructive, and useful. "That all the constellations be drawn in a curious, new, and particular manner; each star in so just, distinct, and conspicuous a proportion, that its true magnitude may be readily known by bare inspection, according to the different light and sizes of the stars. That the track or way of such comets as have been well observed, but not hitherto expressed in any globe, be carefully delineated in this. In the Terrestrial Globe, "That by reason the descriptions formerly made, both in the English and Dutch great globe, are erroneous, Asia, Africa and America, be drawn in a manner wholly new; by which means it is to be noted, that the undertakers will be obliged to alter the latitude of some places in ten degrees, the longitude of others in twenty degrees; besides which great and necessary alterations, there are many remarkable countries, cities, towns, rivers, and lakes, omitted in other globes, inserted here according to the best discoveries made by our late navigators. Lastly, that the course of the trade winds, the monsoons, and other winds periodically shifting between the tropics, be visibly expressed. "Now, in regard that this undertaking is of so universal use, as the advancement of the most necessary | parts of the mathematics, as well as tending to the honor of the British nation, and that the charge of carrying it on is very expensive; it is desired that all gentlemen who are willing to promote so great a work will be pleased to subscribe on the following conditions. "I. The undertakers engage to furnish each subscriber with a celestial and terrestrial globe, each of thirty inches diameter, in all respects curiously adorned; the stars gilded, the capital cities plainly distinguished, the frames, meridians, horizons, hour circles, and indexes, so exactly finished up and aceurately divided, that a pair of these globes will really appear in the judgment of any disinterested and intelligent person, worth fifteen pounds more than will be demanded for them by the undertakers. ❝II. Whosoever will be pleased to subscribe, and pay twenty-five pounds in the manner following, for a pair of these globes, either for their own use, or to present them to any college in the universities, or any public library or schools, shall have his coat of arms, name, title, seat, or place of residence, &c. inserted in some convenient place of the globe. "III. That every subscriber do at first pay down the sum of ten pounds, and fifteen pounds more upon the delivery of each pair of globes perfectly fitted up. And that the said globes be delivered within twelve months after the number of thirty sub scribers be completed; and that the subscribers be served with globes in the order in which they subscribed. "IV. That a pair of these globes shall not here. after be sold to any person but the subscribers under thirty pounds. "V. That if there be not thirty subscribers within four months after the first of December 1712, the money paid shall be returned on demand, by Mr. John Warner, goldsmith, near Temple-bar, who shali receive and pay the same according to the abovementioned articles. T No. 553. THURSDAY, December 4, 1712. BY ADDISON and others. Nec lusisse pudet, sed non incidere ludum. HOR. Ep. 14. I, 1. v. 36. Once to be wild is no such foul disgrace; still to run the frantic race. CREECH. THE project which I published on Monday last has brought me in several packets of letters. Among the rest, I have received one from a certain projector, wherein, after having represented, that in all probability the solemnity of opening my mouth will draw together a great confluence of beholders, he proposes to me the hiring of Stationers-hall for the more convenient exhibiting of that public ceremony. He undertakes to be at the charge of it himself, provided he may have the erecting of galleries on every side, and the letting of them out upon that occasion. I have a letter also from a bookseller, petitioning me in a very humble manner, that he may have the printing of the speech which I shall make to the assembly upon the first opening of my mouth. I am informed from all parts that there are great canvassings in the several clubs about town upon the choosing of a proper person to sit with me on those arduous affairs to which I have summoned them. Three clubs have already proceeded to election, whereof one has made a double return. If I find that my enemies shall take advantage of my silence to begin hostilities upon me, or if any other exigency of affairs may require, since I see elections in so great a forwardness, we may possibly meet before the day appointed; or if matters go on to my satisfaction, I may per SO |