all Affairs trivial or serious, publick or private, were transacted in the Name of the Lord.
Upon the Restoration, Wit and Intrigue usurp'd the Dominion. Ministers of State became Wits, and Wits Ministers; a Play was more regarded than a Treaty of Peace, and keeping a balance with a set of Mistresses of greater consequence than the Tranquillity of Europe.
Something of each of these humours we still retain, but the reigning taste lies towards Avarice and Luxury. Riches are Merit; an Estate Learning and South Sea Stock, Wit. Want is the only Folly, and Poverty the only Vice. Concludes with advising the Templer to pick and cull out the most select passages from learned Authors to embelish his Work.
The Templer thanks his Correspondent, and gives us a specimen:
Eudamidas of Corinth, had an intimate friendship with Charixenus, and Aretheus. He was poor, they rich; he made his Will and bequeathed to Aretheus the maintenance and support of his Mother in her old Age; to Charixenus, the marriage of his Daughter, with a suitable Portion; that if either of the said Legatees should die, the whole to devolve to the survivor. At his death the Executors readily accepting their respective Legacies, and discharg'd their Trust to admiration.
The Templer, Feb. 13. No. 5.
THE Temple, he says, is convenient for two of the most opposite sorts of people; those who have the most, and those who have the least to do. These Societies were instituted; to serve as Colleges for Students and professors of the Law, tho' now inhabited by such as have no business at all. Here a Poet and a Pleader, a Beau and a Counsellor, a Rake and a Serjeant, dwell together in the same Stair Case, without ever knowing, or perhaps seeing one another.
These Reasons induced the Templer to reside here, as the most retir'd. His Family consists of an old Servant, a Laundress, and an old tabby Cat. Thus he is a kind of Philosopher in practice, and a Man of Business in Theory; and tho' he is neither Lawyer, Physician, Statesman, or Divine, yet, as it falls in his way, may make observations on each of those Professions. Cautions his readers to be careful of mistaking his Name, and that he is a Lawyer only in Theory, and a Templer in nothing but residence.
Tom's Coffee house Covent Garden.
Gives an account of a conversation which he had with Marforio, and of his advising him to enlarge his design, so as to comprehend all that may relate to the improvement of Taste and Politeness in Men or Writings, Characters and Passions, Vice, Folly and Dress; whether in the Closet of the Beau, or the Assemblies of the Ladies.―Here Ned Courtal put in, and bid him beware how he was misled into any attempts against the Ladies, for,
London Journal, Saturday, Feb. 13. No. 602.
IS a Letter from Givicus, congratulating Mr. Osborne on the service he had doen his Country by defending the Administration against the attempts of artful and wicked Men, and desiring him to suspect his Labours of that kind for the present, in behalf of another publick spirited design.
The subject of his Discourse is the multitude of Beggers, and the many Villanies and Robberies committed in this City; the threats of Incendiaries, and those threats actually executed: Boys of 7 or 8 years old, taken in robing a Shop; and some of 13 or 14, robbing in the Streets.
A few years since, London was as remarkable for the safety of its Inhabitants, as it is now notorious for the danger Persons are exposed to whowalk
