The Tatler, Volume 3

Ulysses, he tells us, made a voyage to the regions of the dead, in order to consult Tiresias how he should return to his own country, and recommend himself to the favour of the gods. The poet scarce introduces a single person, who does not suggest some useful precept to his reader, and designs his description of the dead for the amendment of the living.

Ulysses, after having made a very plenteous sacrifice, sat him down by the pool of holy blood, which attracted a prodigious assembly of ghosts of all ages and conditions, that hovered about the hero, and feasted upon the steams of his oblation. The first he knew, was the shade of Elpenor, who, to show the activity of a spirit above that of body, is represented as arrived there long before Ulysses, notwithstanding the winds and seas had contributed all their force to hasten his voyage thither. This Elpenor, to inspire the reader with a detestation of drunkenness, and at the same time with a religious care of doing proper honours to the dead, describes himself as having broken his neck in a debauch of wine; and begs Ulysses, that for the repose of his soul, he would build a monument over him, and perform funeral rites to his memory. Ulysses with great sorrow of heart promises to fulfil his request, and is immediately diverted to an object much more moving than the former. The ghost of his own mother Anticlea, whom he still thought living, appears to him among the multitude of shades that surrounded him, and sits down at a small distance from him by the lake of blood, without speaking to him, or knowing who he was. Ulysses was exceedingly troubled at the sight, and could not forbear weeping as he looked upon her; but being all along set forth as a pattern of consummate wisdom, he makes his affection give way to prudence; and therefore, upon his seeing Tiresias, does not reveal himself to his mother, till he had consulted that great prophet, who was the occasion of this his descent into the empire of the dead. Tiresias having cautioned him to keep himself and his companions free from the guilt of sacrilege, and to pay his devotions to all the gods, promises him a safe return to his kingdom and family, and a happy old age in the enjoyment of them.

The poet having thus with great art kept the curiosity of his reader in suspense, represents his wise man, after the despatch of his business with Tiresias, as yielding himself up to the calls of natural affection, and making himself known to his mother. Her eyes are no sooner opened, but she cries out in tears, "Oh my son!" and inquires into the occasions that brought him thither, and the fortune that attended him.

Ulysses on the other hand desires to know, what the sickness was that had sent her into those regions, and the condition in which she had left his father, his son, and more particularly his wife. She tells him, they were all three inconsolable for his absence; "and as for myself," says she, "that was the sickness of which I died. My impatience for your return, my anxiety for your welfare, and my fondness for my dear Ulysses, were the only distempers that preyed upon my life, and separated my soul from my body." Ulysses was melted with these expressions of tenderness, and thrice endeavoured to catch the apparition in his arms, that he might hold his mother to his bosom and weep over her.

This gives the poet occasion to describe the notion the heathens at that time had of an unbodied soul, in the excuse which the mother makes for seeming to withdraw herself from her son's embraces. "The soul," says she, "is composed neither of bones, flesh, nor sinews, but leaves behind her all those encumbrances of mortality to be consumed on the funeral pile. As soon as she has thus cast her burden she makes her escape, and flies away from it like a dream."

When this melancholy conversation is at an end, the poet draws up to view as charming a vision as could enter into man's imagination. He describes the next who appeared to Ulysses, to have been the shades of the finest women that had ever lived upon the earth, and who had either been the daughters of kings, the mistresses of gods, or mothers of heroes, such as Antiope, Alcmena, Leda, Ariadne, Iphimedia, Eriphyle, and several others of whom he gives a catalogue, with a short history of their adventures. The beautiful assembly of apparitions were all gathered together about the blood: "each of them," says Ulysses (as a gentle satire upon female vanity), "giving me an account of her birth and family." This scene of extraordinary women seems to have been designed by the poet as a lecture of mortality to the whole sex, and to put them in mind of what they must expect, notwithstanding the greatest perfections, and highest honours, they can arrive at.

The circle of beauties at length disappeared, and was succeeded by the shades of several Grecian heroes who had been engaged with Ulysses in the siege of Troy. The first that approached was Agamemnon, the generalissimo of that great expedition, who at the appearance of his old friend wept very bitterly, and without saying anything to him, endeavoured to grasp him by the hand. Ulysses, who was much moved at the sight, poured out a flood of tears, and asked him the occasion of his death, which Agamemnon related to him in all its tragical circumstances; how he was murdered at a banquet by the contrivance of his own wife, in confederacy with her adulterer: from whence he takes occasion to reproach the whole sex, after a manner which would be inexcusable in a man who had not been so great a sufferer by them. "My wife," says he, "has disgraced all the women that shall ever be born into the world, even those who hereafter shall be innocent. Take care how you grow too fond of your wife. Never tell her all you know. If you reveal some things to her, be sure you keep others concealed from her. You indeed have nothing to fear from your Penelope, she will not use you as my wife has treated me; however, take care how you trust a woman." The poet, in this and other instances, according to the system of many heathen as well as Christian philosophers, shows how anger, revenge, and other habits which the soul had contracted in the body, subsist and grow in it under its stage of separation.

I am extremely pleased with the companions which the poet in the next description assigns to Achilles. "Achilles," says the hero, "came up to me with Patroclus and Antilochus." By which we may see that it was Homer's opinion, and probably that of the age he lived in, that the friendships which are made among the living will likewise continue among the dead. Achilles inquires after the welfare of his son, and of his father, with a fierceness of the same character that Homer has everywhere expressed in the actions of his life. The passage relating to his son is so extremely beautiful, that I must not omit it. Ulysses, after having described him as wise in council and active in war, and mentioned the foes whom he had slain in battle, adds an observation that he himself had made of his behaviour whilst he lay in the wooden horse. "Most of the generals," says he, "that were with us either wept or trembled: as for your son, I neither saw him wipe a tear from his cheeks, nor change his countenance. On the contrary, he would often lay his hand upon his sword, or grasp his spear, as impatient to employ them against the Trojans." He then informs his father of the great honour and rewards which he had purchased before Troy, and of his return from it without a wound. The shade of Achilles, says the poet, was so pleased with the account he received of his son, that he inquired no further, but stalked away with more than ordinary majesty over the green meadow that lay before them.

This last circumstance of a deceased father's rejoicing in the behaviour of his son is very finely contrived by Homer, as an incentive to virtue, and made use of by none that I know besides himself.

The description of Ajax, which follows, and his refusing to speak to Ulysses, who had won the armour of Achilles from him, and by that means occasioned his death, is admired by every one that reads it. When Ulysses relates the sullenness of his deportment, and considers the greatness of the hero, he expresses himself with generous and noble sentiments. "Oh! that I had never gained a prize which cost the life of so brave a man as Ajax! Who, for the beauty of his person, and greatness of his actions, was inferior to none but the divine Achilles." The same noble condescension, which never dwells but in truly great minds, and such as Homer would represent that of Ulysses to have been, discovers itself likewise in the speech which he made to the ghost of Ajax on that occasion. "O Ajax!" says he, "will you keep your resentments even after death? What destructions hath this fatal armour brought upon the Greeks, by robbing them of you, who were their bulwark and defence? Achilles is not more bitterly lamented among us than you. Impute not then your death to any one but Jupiter, who out of his anger to the Greeks, took you away from among them: let me entreat you to approach me; restrain the fierceness of your wrath, and the greatness of your soul, and hear what I have to say to you." Ajax, without making a reply, turned his back upon him, and retired into a crowd of ghosts.

Ulysses, after all these visions, took a view of those impious wretches who lay in tortures for the crimes they had committed upon the earth, whom he describes under the varieties of pain, as so many marks of divine vengeance, to deter others from following their example. He then tells us that notwithstanding he had a great curiosity to see the heroes that lived in the ages before him, the ghosts began to gather about him in such prodigious multitudes, and with such a confusion of voices, that his heart trembled as he saw himself amidst so great a scene of horrors. He adds, that he was afraid lest some hideous spectre should appear to him, that might terrify him to distraction; and therefore withdrew in time.

I question not but my reader will be pleased with this description of a future state, represented by such a noble and fruitful imagination, that had nothing to direct it besides the light of nature, and the opinions of a dark and ignorant age.

No. 153

[Addison. Thursday, March 30, to Saturday, April 1, 1710

Bambalio, clangor, stridor, taratantara, murmur.—Farn., Rhet.

From my own Apartment, March 31

I have heard of a very valuable picture, wherein all the painters of the age in which it was drawn are represented sitting together in a circle, and joining in a concert of music. Each of them plays upon such a particular instrument as is the most suitable to his character, and expresses that style and manner of painting which is peculiar to him. The famous cupola-painter of those times, to show the grandeur and boldness of his figures, has a horn in his mouth, which he seems to wind with great strength and force. On the contrary, an eminent artist, who wrought up his pictures with the greatest accuracy, and gave them all those delicate touches which are apt to please the nicest eye, is represented as tuning a theorbo. The same kind of humour runs through the whole piece.

I have often from this hint imagined to myself, that different talents in discourse might be shadowed out after the same manner by different kinds of music; and that the several conversable parts of mankind in this great city might be cast into proper characters and divisions, as they resemble several instruments that are in use among the masters of harmony. Of these therefore in their order, and first of the drum.

Your drums are the blusterers in conversation, that with a loud laugh, unnatural mirth, and a torrent of noise, domineer in public assemblies, overbear men of sense, stun their companions, and fill the place they are in with a rattling sound, that has seldom any wit, humour, or good breeding in it. The drum notwithstanding, by this boisterous vivacity, is very proper to impose upon the ignorant; and in conversation with ladies who are not of the finest taste, often passes for a man of mirth and wit, and for wonderful pleasant company. I need not observe, that the emptiness of the drum very much contributes to its noise.

The lute is a character directly opposite to the drum, that sounds very finely by itself, or in a very small concert. Its notes are exquisitely sweet, and very low, easily drowned in a multitude of instruments, and even lost among a few, unless you give a particular attention to it. A lute is seldom heard in a company of more than five, whereas a drum will show itself to advantage in an assembly of five hundred. The lutenists therefore are men of a fine genius, uncommon reflection, great affability, and esteemed chiefly by persons of a good taste, who are the only proper judges of so delightful and soft a melody.

The trumpet is an instrument that has in it no compass of music or variety of sound, but is notwithstanding very agreeable, so long as it keeps within its pitch. It has not above four or five notes, which are however very pleasing, and capable of exquisite turns and modulations. The gentlemen who fall under this denomination, are your men of the most fashionable education and refined breeding, who have learned a certain smoothness of discourse, and sprightliness of air, from the polite company they have kept; but at the same time they have shallow parts, weak judgments, and a short reach of understanding: a playhouse, a drawing-room, a ball, a visiting-day, or a Ring at Hyde Park, are the few notes they are masters of, which they touch upon in all conversations. The trumpet however is a necessary instrument about a Court, and a proper enlivener of a concert, though of no great harmony by itself.

Violins are the lively, forward, importunate wits that distinguish themselves by the flourishes of imagination, sharpness of repartee, glances of satire, and bear away the upper part in every concert. I cannot however but observe that, when a man is not disposed to hear music, there is not a more disagreeable sound in harmony than that of a violin.

There is another musical instrument, which is more frequent in this nation than any other; I mean your bass-viol, which grumbles in the bottom of the concert, and with a surly masculine sound strengthens the harmony, and tempers the sweetness of the several instruments that play along with it. The bass-viol is an instrument of a quite different nature to the trumpet, and may signify men of rough sense, and unpolished parts, who do not love to hear themselves talk, but sometimes break out with an agreeable bluntness, unexpected wit, and surly pleasantries, to the no small diversion of their friends and companions. In short, I look upon every sensible true-born Briton to be naturally a bass-viol.

As for your rural wits, who talk with great eloquence and alacrity of foxes, hounds, horses, quickset hedges, and six-bar gates, double ditches, and broken necks, I am in doubt, whether I should give them a place in the conversable world. However, if they will content themselves with being raised to the dignity of hunting-horns, I shall desire for the future that they may be known by that name.

I must not here omit the bagpipe species, that will entertain you from morning to night with the repetition of the few notes, which are played over and over, with the perpetual humming of a drone running underneath them. These are your dull, heavy, tedious storytellers, the load and burden of conversations, that set up for men of importance, by knowing secret history, and giving an account of transactions, that whether they ever passed in the world or not, does not signify a halfpenny to its instruction, or its welfare. Some have observed, that the northern parts of this island are more particularly fruitful in bagpipes.

There are so very few persons who are masters in every kind of conversation, and can talk on all subjects, that I don't know whether we should make a distinct species of them: nevertheless, that my scheme may not be defective, for the sake of those few who are endowed with such extraordinary talents, I shall allow them to be harpsichords, a kind of music which every one knows is a concert by itself.

As for your passing-bells, who look upon mirth as criminal, and talk of nothing but what is melancholy in itself, and mortifying to human nature, I shall not mention them.

I shall likewise pass over in silence all the rabble of mankind that crowd our streets, coffee-houses, feasts, and public tables. I cannot call their discourse conversation, but rather something that is practised in imitation of it. For which reason, if I would describe them by any musical instrument, it should be by those modern inventions of the bladder and string, tongs and key, marrow-bone and cleaver.

My reader will doubtless observe, that I have only touched here upon male instruments, having reserved my female concert to another occasion. If he has a mind to know where these several characters are to be met with, I could direct him to a whole club of drums; not to mention another of bagpipes, which I have before given some account of in my description of our nightly meetings in Sheer Lane. The lutes may often be met with in couples upon the banks of a crystal stream, or in the retreats of shady woods and flowery meadows; which for different reasons are likewise the great resort of your hunting-horns. Bass-viols are frequently to be found over a glass of stale beer and a pipe of tobacco; whereas those who set up for violins, seldom fail to make their appearance at Will's once every evening. You may meet with a trumpet anywhere on the other side of Charing Cross.

That we may draw something for our advantage in life out of the foregoing discourse, I must entreat my reader to make a narrow search into his life and conversation, and upon his leaving any company, to examine himself seriously, whether he has behaved himself in it like a drum or a trumpet, a violin or a bass-viol; and accordingly endeavour to mend his music for the future. For my own part, I must confess, I was a drum for many years; nay, and a very noisy one, till having polished myself a little in good company, I threw as much of the trumpet into my conversation as was possible for a man of an impetuous temper, by which mixture of different musics, I look upon myself, during the course of many years, to have resembled a tabor and pipe. I have since very much endeavoured at the sweetness of the lute; but in spite of all my resolutions, I must confess with great confusion, that I find myself daily degenerating into a bagpipe; whether it be the effect of my old age, or of the company I keep, I know not. All that I can do, is to keep a watch over my conversation, and to silence the drone as soon as I find it begin to hum in my discourse, being determined rather to hear the notes of others, than to play out of time, and encroach upon their parts in the concert by the noise of so tiresome an instrument.

I shall conclude this paper with a letter which I received last night from a friend of mine, who knows very well my notions upon this subject, and invites me to pass the evening at his house with a select company of friends, in the following words:

"Dear Isaac,

"I intend to have a concert at my house this evening, having by great chance got a harpsichord, which I am sure will entertain you very agreeably. There will be likewise two lutes and a trumpet: let me beg you to put yourself in tune, and believe me

"Your very faithful Servant,"Nicholas Humdrum."185

No. 154

[Addison. Saturday, April 1, to Tuesday, April 4, 1710

Obscuris vera involvens.—Virg., Æn. vi. 100.

From my own Apartment, April 3

We have already examined Homer's description of a future state, and the condition in which he has placed the souls of the deceased. I shall in this paper make some observations on the account which Virgil has given us of the same subject, who, besides a greatness of genius, had all the lights of philosophy and human learning to assist and guide him in his discoveries.

Æneas is represented as descending into the empire of death, with a prophetess by his side, who instructs him in the secrets of those lower regions.

Upon the confines of the dead, and before the very gates of this infernal world, Virgil describes186 several inhabitants, whose natures are wonderfully suited to the situation of the place, as being either the occasions or resemblances of death. Of the first kind are the shadows187 of Sickness, Old Age, Fear, Famine, and Poverty (apparitions very terrible to behold); with several others, as Toil, War, Contention, and Discord, which contribute all of them to people this common receptacle of human souls. As this was likewise a very proper residence for everything that resembles death, the poet tells us, that Sleep, whom he represents as a near relation to Death, has likewise his habitation in these quarters, and describes in them a huge gloomy elm-tree, which seems a very proper ornament for the place, and is possessed by an innumerable swarm of Dreams, that hang in clusters under every leaf of it. He then gives us a list of imaginary persons, who very naturally lie within the shadow of the dream-tree, as being of the same kind of make in themselves, and the materials or (to use Shakespeare's phrase) the stuff of which dreams are made. Such are the shades of the giant with a hundred hands, and of his brother with three bodies; of the double-shaped Centaur and Scylla; the Gorgon with snaky hair; the Harpy with a woman's face and lion's talons; the seven-headed Hydra; and the Chimæra, which breathes forth a flame, and is a compound of three animals. These several mixed natures, the creatures of imagination, are not only introduced with great art after the dreams; but as they are planted at the very entrance, and within the very gates of those regions, do probably denote the wild deliriums and extravagances of fancy, which the Soul usually falls into when she is just upon the verge of death.

Thus far Æneas travels in an allegory. The rest of the description is drawn with great exactness, according to the religion of the heathens, and the opinions of the platonic philosophy. I shall not trouble my reader with a common dull story, that gives an account why the heathens first of all supposed a ferryman in hell, and his name to be Charon; but must not pass over in silence the point of doctrine which Virgil has very much insisted upon in this book, that the souls of those who are unburied, are not permitted to go over into their respective places of rest till they have wandered a hundred years upon the banks of Styx. This was probably an invention of the heathen priesthood, to make the people extremely careful of performing proper rites and ceremonies to the memory of the dead. I shall not, however, with the infamous scribblers of the age, take an occasion from such a circumstance, to run into declamations against priestcraft, but rather look upon it even in this light as a religious artifice, to raise in the minds of men an esteem for the memory of their forefathers, and a desire to recommend themselves to that of posterity; as also to excite in them an ambition of imitating the virtues of the deceased, and to keep alive in their thoughts the sense of the soul's immortality. In a word, we may say in defence of the severe opinions relating to the shades of unburied persons, what has been said by some of our divines in regard to the rigid doctrines concerning the souls of such who die without being initiated into our religion, that supposing they should be erroneous, they can do no hurt to the dead, and will have a good effect upon the living, in making them cautious of neglecting such necessary solemnities.

Charon is no sooner appeased, and the triple-headed dog laid asleep, but Æneas makes his entrance into the dominions of Pluto. There are three kinds of persons described as being situated on the borders; and I can give no reason for their being stationed there in so particular a manner, but because none of them seem to have had a proper right to a place among the dead, as not having run out the whole thread of their days, and finished the term of life that had been allotted them upon earth. The first of these are the souls of infants, who are snatched away by untimely ends: the second, are of those who are put to death wrongfully, and by an unjust sentence; and the third, of those who grew weary of their lives, and laid violent hands upon themselves. As for the second of these, Virgil adds with great beauty, that Minos, the judge of the dead, is employed in giving them a rehearing, and assigning them their several quarters suitable to the parts they acted in life. The poet, after having mentioned the souls of those unhappy men who destroyed themselves, breaks out into a fine exclamation: "Oh, how gladly," says he, "would they now endure life with all its miseries! But the Destinies forbid their return to earth, and the waters of Styx surround them with nine streams that are unpassable." It is very remarkable, that Virgil, notwithstanding self-murder was so frequent among the heathens, and had been practised by some of the greatest men in the very age before him, has here represented it as so heinous a crime. But in this particular he was guided by the doctrines of his great master Plato, who says on this subject, that a man is placed in his station of life like a soldier in his proper post, which he is not to quit whatever may happen, until he is called off by his commander who planted him in it.