Tis related by Quintus Curtius, that The Perdians always conceived an invincible contempt of a man who had violated the laws of fecrecy; for they thought that, however he might be deficient in the qualities requifite to actual excellence, the negative virtues at least were in his power; and though he, perhaps, could not speak well if he was to try, it was ftill eafy for him not to ípeak.

In forming this opinion of the eafinefs of fecrecy, they feem to have condered it as oppofed, not to treachery, but loquacity; and to have conceived the man whom they thus cenfured, not frighted by menaces to reveal, or bribed by promises to betray, but incited by the mere pleasure of talking, or fome other motive equally trifling, to lay open his heart without reflection, and to let whatever he knew flip from him, only for want of power to retain it. Whether, by their fettled and avowed fcorn of thoughtless talkers, the Perfians were able to diffufe, to any great extent, the virtue of taciturnity, we are hindered by the distance of those times from being able to discover, there being very few manoirs remaining of the court of Perfepolis, nor any diftinct accounts handed down to us of their office-clerks, their ladies of the bed-chamber, their attornies, their chamber-maids, or their foot

men.

In thefe latter ages, though the old animofity against a prattler is ftill retained, it appears wholly to have loft it's effects upon the conduct of mankind; for fecrets are fo feldom kept, that it

HOR.

FRANCIS.

'ZOSIMA.

may with fome reafon be doubted, whether the ancients were not mistaken in their first poftulate; whether the quality of retention be fo generally bestowed; and whether a fecret has not fome fubtle volatility by which it efcapes imperceptibly at the falleft vent, or fome power of fermentation by which it expands itfelf fo as to burft the heart that will not give it way.

Thofe that study either the body or the mind of man, very often find the moft fpecious and pleafing theory falling under the weight of contrary experience; and, instead of gratifying their vanity by inferring effects from caufes, they are always reduced, at last, to conjecture caufes from effects. That it is eafy to be fecret, the fpeculatift can demonftrate in his retreat; and therefore thinks himfelf justified in placing confidence: the man of the world knows that, whether difficult or not, it is uncommon; and therefore finds himself rather inclined to fearch after the reafon of this univerfal failure in one of the most important duties of fociety.

The vanity of being known to be trusted with a fecret is generally one of the chief motives to difclofe it; for however abfurd it may be thought to boast an honour by an act which fhews that it was conferred without merit, yet most men feem rather inclined to confefs the want of virtue than of importance; and more willingly fhew their influence, though at the expence of their probity, than glide through life with no other pleasure than the private confcioufnefs of fidelity; which, while it is preferved,

muft

muft be without praife, except from the fingle perfon who tries and knows it.

There are many ways of telling a fecret by which a man exempts himself from the reproaches of his confcience, and gratifies his pride, without fuffering himself to believe that he impairs his virtue. He tells the private affairs of his patron, or his friend, only to thofe from whom he would not conceal his own; he tells them to thofe who have no temptation to betray the truft, or with a denunciation of a certain forfeiture of his friendship, if he discovers that they become publick.

Secrets are very frequently told in the first ardour of kindnefs, or of love, for the fake of proving, by fo important a facrifice, fincerity or tendernefs; but with this motive, though it be ftrong in itfelf, vanity concurs, fince every man defires to be most esteemed by thofe whom he loves, or with whom he converfes, with whom he paffes his hours of pleafure, and to whom he retires from bufinefs and from care.

When the discovery of fecrets is under confideration, there is always a distinction carefully to be made between our own and thofe of another: thofe of which we are fully mafters, as they affect only our own intereft; and those which are repofited with us in truft, and involve the happiness or convenience of fuch as we have no right to expofe to hazard. To tell our own fecrets is generally folly, but that folly is without guilt; to communicate those with which we are intrufted is always treachery, and treachery, for the most part, combined with folly.

There have, indeed, been fome enthufiaftick and irrational zealots for friendship, who have maintained, and perhaps believed, that one friend has a right to all that is in poffeffion of another; and that, therefore, it is a violation of kindness to exempt any fecret from this boundless confidence. Accordingly, a late female minifter of state has been shameless enough to inform the world, that she used, when the wanted to extract any thing from her fovereign, to remind her of Montaigne's reafoning; who has determined, that to tell a fecret to a friend is no breach of fidelity, because the number of perfons trufted is not multiplied, a man and his friend being virtually the fame.

That fuch a fallacy could be impofed

upon any human understanding, or that an author could have advanced a pofition fo remote from truth and reafon, any other ways than as a declaimer, to fhew to what extent he could ftretch his imagination, and with what ftrength he could press his principle, would scarcely have been credible, had not this lady kindly fhewn us how far weakness may be deluded, or indolence amufed. But, fince it appears that even this fophiftry has been able, with the help of a strong defire to repofe in quiet upon the underftanding of another, to mislead honest intentions, and an understanding not contemptible, it may not be fuperfluous to remark, that those things which are common among friends are only fuch as either poffeffes in his own right, and can alienate or deftroy without injury to any other perfon. Without this limitation, confidence muft run on without end; the fecond perfon may tell the fecret to the third, upon the fame principle as he received it from the firft; and the third may hand it forward to a fourth, till, at laft, it is told in the round of friendship to them from whom it was the first intention to conceal it.

The confidence which Caius has of the faithfulness of Titius is nothing more than an opinion which himself cannot know to be true, and which Claudius, who first tells his fecret to Caius, may know to be false; and therefore the trust is transferred by Caius, if he reveal what has been told him, to one from whom the perfon originally concerned would have withheld it; and whatever may be the event, Caius has hazarded the happinefs of his friend, without neceffity and without permiffion, and has put that truft in the hand of fortune which was given only to virtue.

All the arguments upon which a man who is telling the private affairs of another may ground his confidence of security, he muft upon reflection know to be uncertain, because he finds them without effect upon himfelf. When he is imagining that Titius will be cautious, from a regard to his intereft, his reputation, or his duty, he ought to reflect that he is himself, at that inftant, acting in oppofition to all these reafons, and revealing what intereft, reputation, and duty, direct him to conceal.

Every one feels that, in his own cafe, he should confider the man incapable of truft, who believed himself at liberty to

tell

I am not ignorant that many questions may be started relating to the duty of fecrecy where the affairs are of publick concern, where fubfequent reafons may arife to alter the appearance and nature of the truft, that the manner in which the fecret was told may change the degree of obligation, and that the principles upon which a man is chofen for a confident may not always equally conftrain him; but thefe fcruples, if not too intricate, are of too extensive confideration for my prefent purpofe, nor are they fuch as generally occur in common life: and though cafuiitical knowledge be ufèful in proper hands, yet it ought by no means to be carelessly expofed, fince molt will ufe it rather to lull than awaken their own confciences; and the threads of reatoning, on which truth is fufpended, are

frequently drawn to fuch fubtilty, that common eyes cannot perceive, and common fenfibility cannot feel them.

The whole doctrine, as well as practice, of fecrecy is fo perplexing and dangerous, that, next to him who is compelled to trust, I think him unhappy who is chofen to be trufted; for he is often involved in fcruples without the liberty of calling in the help of any other underftanding; he is frequently drawn into guilt under the appearance of friendship and honefty; and fometimes fubjected to fufpicion by the treachery of others who are engaged without his knowledge in the fame fchemes: for he that has one confident has generally more, and when he is at lat betrayed, is in doubt on whom he fhall fix the crime.

The rules, therefore, that I fhall propofe concerning fecrecy, and from which I think it not fafe to deviate, without long and exact deliberation, are-Never to folicit the knowledge of a fecret. Not willingly, nor without many limitations, to accept fuch confidence when it is offered. When a fecret is once admitted, to confider the truft as of a very high nature, important as fociety, and facred as truth, and therefore not to be violated for any incidental convenience, or flight appearance of contrary fitnels.

NIL FUIT UNQUAM

SIC DISPAR SIE!

HOR.

MONG the many inconfiftencies

FRANCIS.

fon to repent their curiofity; the bubble

fuffers, in the human mind, there has often been obferved a manifeft and striking contrariety between the life of an author and his writings: and Milton, in a letter to a learned itranger, by whom he had been vifited, with great reafon congratulates himself upon the confcioufnefs of being found equal to his own character, and having preferved, in a private and familiar interview, that reputation which his works had procured him. Thole whom the appearance of virtue, or the evidence of genius, have tempted to a nearer knowledge of the writer in whofe performances they may be found, have indeed had frequent reas

common water at the touch; the phantom of perfection has vanished when they wished to prefs it to their holom. They have loft the pleafure of imagining how far humanity may be cxalted; and, perhaps, felt themfelves leis inclined to toil up the fteeps of virtue, when they obferve thofe who feem beit able to point the way loitering below, as either afraid of the labour, or doubtful of the reward.

It has been long the cuftom of the oriental monarchs to hide themfelves in gardens and palaces, to avoid the converfation of mankind, and to be known to their fubjects only by their edicts.

The

The fame policy is no lefs neceflary to him that writes, than to him that governs; for men would not more patiently fubmit to be taught, than commanded, by one known to have the fame follies and weakneffes with themfelves. A fudden intruder into the clofet of an author would perhaps feel equal indignation with the officer who, having long folicited admiffion into the prefence of Sardanapalus, faw him not confulting upon laws, enquiring into grievances, or modelling armies, but employed in feminine amufements, and directing the ladies in their work.

It is not difficult to conceive, however, that for many reafons a man writes much better than he lives. For without entering into refined fpeculations, it may be fhewn much easier to defign than to perform. A man propofes his fchemes of life in a state of abftraction and difengagement, exempt from the enticements of hope, the folicitations of affection, the importunities of appetite, or the depreffions of fear; and is in the fame fate with him that teaches upon land the art of navigation, to whom the fea is always fmooth, and the wind always profperous. The mathematicians are well acquainted with the difference between pure fcience, which has to do only with ideas, and the application of it's laws to the ufe of life, in which they are constrained to fubmit to the imperfection of matter and the influence of accidents. Thus, in moral difcuffions, it is to be remembered that many impediments obAtruct our practice, which very eafily give way to theory. The fpeculatiit is only in danger of erroneous reafoning, but the man involved in life has his own paffions and thofe of others to encounter, and is embarrased with a thoufend inconveniences, which confound him with variety of impulfe, and either perplex or obftruct his way. He is forced to act without deliberation, and obliged to chufe before he can examine; he is furprifed by fudden alterations of the ftate of things, and changes his meafures according to fuperficial appearancos; he is led by ciners, either becaule he is indolent, or becaufe he is timorous; he is fometimes afraid to know what is right, and fometimes finds friends or enunics diligent to deceive him.

We are, therefore, not to wonder that most fail, amidit tusiult and fhares, and danger, in the oblervance of thofe prpts which they lay down in foli

tude, fafety, and tranquillity, with a mind unbiaffed, and with liberty unobítructed. It is the condition of our present state to see more than we can attain; the exacteft vigilance and caution can never maintain a fingle day of unmingled innocence, much lefs can the utmost efforts of incorporated mind reach the fummits of fpeculative virtue.

It is, however, neceflary for the idea of perfection to be propofed, that we may have fome object to which our endeavours are to be directed; and he that is most deficient in the duties of life, makes fome atonement for his faults, if he warns others against his own failings, and hinders, by the falubrity of his admonitions, the contagion of his example.

Nothing is more unjust, however common, than to charge with hypocrify him that exprefles zeal for thofe virtues which he neglects to practife; fince he may be fincerely convinced of the advantages of conquering his paffions without having vet obtained the victory, as a man may be confident of the advantages of a voyage, or a journey, without having courage or induftry to undertake it, and may honeftly recommend to others thole attempts which he neglects himself.

The intereft which the corrupt part of mankind have in hardening themfelves against every motive to amendment, has difpofed them to give to these contradictions, when they can be produced against the cause of virtue, that weight which they will not allow them in any other cafe. They fee men act in oppofition to their intereft, without fuppoing that they do not know it; thofe who give way to the fudden violence of paffion, and forfake the most important purfuits for petty pleasures, are not suppofed to have changed their opinions, or to approve their own conduct. In moral or religious questions alone they determine the fentiments by the actions, and charge every man with endeavouring to impofe upon the world whofe writings are not confirmed by his life. They never confider that themfelves neglect or practife fomething every day inconfiltently with their own fettled judgment; nor difcover that the conduct of the advocates for virtue can little incrcafe, or leffen, the obligations of their dictates : argument is to be invalidated only by argument, and is in itfelf of the fame force, whether or not it convinces him. by whom it is propofed.

Yet fince this prejudice, however anreasonable,