Page images
PDF
EPUB

like the sailor's horse, has at least the comfortable refreshment of having the spur often changed.

As I see no reason why they should carry off all the rewards of genius, I have some thoughts, for the future, of making my essays a magazine in miniature: I shall hop from subject to subject, and, if properly encouraged, I intend in time to adora my feuille-volant with pictures. But to begin, in the usual form, with

A modest Address to the Public in behalf of the Infernal Magazine.

The public has been so often imposed on by the unperforming promises of others, that it is with the utmost modesty we assure them of our inviolable design of giving the very best collection that ever astonished society. The public we honour and regard, and therefore to instruct and entertain them is our highest ambition, with labours calculated as well to the head as the heart. If four extraordinary pages of letter-press be any recommendation of our wit, we may at least boast the honour of vindicating our own abilities. To say more in favour of the Infernal Magazine, would be unworthy the public; to say less, would be injurious to ourselves. As we have no interested motives for this undertaking, being a society of gentlemen of dis tinction, we disdain to eat or write like hirelings; we are all gentlemen, and therefore are resolved to sell our magazine for sixpence, merely for our own

amusement.

Be careful to ask for the Infernal Magazine.

DEDICATION.

To that most ingenious of all Patrons, the
Tripoline Ambassador.

May it please your Excellency,

As your taste in the fine arts is universally al lowed and admired, permit the authors of the Infernal Magazine to lay the following sheets humbly at your excellency's toe; and should our labours ever have the happiness of one day adorning the courts of Fez, we doubt not that the influence wherewith we are honoured, shall be ever retained with the most warm ardour by,

May it please your Excellency,

Your most devoted humble servants,

The Authors of the Infernal Magazine.

A SPEECH

Spoken by the Indigent Philosopher, To persuade his Club at Cateaton not to declare War against Spain.

My honest friends and brother politicians, I perceive that the intended war with Spain makes many of you uneasy. Yesterday, as we were told, the stocks rose, and you were glad; to-day they fall, and you are again miserable. But, my dear friends, what is the rising or the falling of the stocks to us, who have no money. Let Nathan Ben Funk, the Dutch Jew, be glad or sorry for this; but, my good Mr. Bellows-mender, what is all this to you or me? You must mend broken bellows, and I write bad prose, as long as we live, whether we like a Spanish war or not. Believe me, my honest friends, what

ever you may talk of liberty and your own reason, both that liberty and reason are conditionally resigned by every poor man in every society; and, as we are born to work, so others are born to watch over us while we are working. In the name of common sense then, my good friends, let the great keep watch over us, and let us mind our business, and perhaps we may at last get money ourselves, and set beggars at work in our turn. I have a Latin sentence that is worth its weight in gold, and which I shall beg leave to translate for your instruction. An author, called Lily's Grammar, finely observes, that Es in presenti perfectum format; that is, Ready money makes a perfect man.' Let us then become perfect men, by getting ready money, and let them that will spend theirs by going to war with Spain.

RULES FOR BEHAVIOUR,

Drawn up by the indigent Philosopher.

If you be a rich man, you may enter the room with three loud hems, march deliberately up to the chimney, and tarn your back to the fire. If you be a poor man, I would advise you to shrink into the room as fast as you can, and place yourself, as usual, upon the corner of a chair, in a remote

corner.

When you are desired to sing in company, I would advise you to refuse; for it is a thousand to one but that you torment us with affectation or a bad voice.

If you be young, and live with an old man, I would advise you not to like gravy. I was disinherited myself for liking gravy.

Don't laugh much in public: the spectators that are not as merry as you, will hate you, either be. cause they envy your happiness, or fancy themselves the subject of your mirth.

RULES FOR RAISING THE DEVIL.

Translated from the Latin of Danæus de Sortiariis, a writer cotemporary with Calvin, and one of the Reformers of our Church.

The person who desires to raise the devil, is to sacrifice a dog, a cat, and a hen, all of his own pro. perty, to Beelzebub. He is to swear an eternal obedience, and then to receive a mark in some unseen place, either under the eye-lid, or in the roof of the mouth, inflicted by the devil himself. Upon this he has power given him over three spirits; one for earth, another for air, and a third for the Upon certain times the devil holds an assembly of magicians, in which each is to give an account of what evil he has done, and what he wishes. to do. At this assembly he appears in the shape of an old man, or often like a goat with large horns. They, upon this occasion, renew their vows of obedience; and then form a grand dance in honour of their false deity. The deity instructs them in every method of injuring mankind, in gathering poisons, and of riding upon occasion through the air. He shows them the whole method, upon examination, of giving evasive answers; his spirits have power to assume the form of angels of light, and there is but one method of detecting them, viz. to ask them, in proper form, what method is the most certain to propagate the faith over all the world? To this they are not permitted by the superior power to

make a false reply, nor are they willing to give the true one; wherefore they continue silent, and are thus detected.

BEAU TIBBS: A CHARACTER.

THOUGH naturally pensive, yet I am fond of gay company, and take every opportunity of thus dismissing the mind from duty. From this motive I am often found in the centre of a crowd; and wherever pleasure is to be sold, am always a purchaser. In those places, without being remarked by any, I join in whatever goes forward, work my passions into a similitude of frivolous earnestness, shout as they shout, and condemn as they happen to disapprove. A mind thus sunk for a while below its natural standard, is qualified for stronger flights, as those first retire who would spring forward with greater vigour.

Attracted by the serenity of the evening, a friend and I lately went to gaze upon the company in one of the public walks near the city. Here we sauntered together for some time, either praising the beauty of such as were handsome, or the dresses of such as had nothing else to recommend them. We had gone thus deliberately forward for some time, when my friend, stopping on a sudden, caught me by the elbow, and led me out of the public walk. I could perceive by the quickness of his pace, and by his frequently looking behind, that he was attempting to avoid somebody who followed: we now turned to the right, then to the left; as we

« PreviousContinue »