THE SPECTATOR WITH INTRODUCTION AND NOTES BY GEORGE A. AITKEN AUTHOR OF THE LIFE OF RICHARD STEELE," ETC. WITH EIGHT ORIGINAL PORTRAITS AND EIGHT VIGNETTES IN EIGHT VOLUMES VOLUME THE FOURTH LONDON JOHN C. NIMMO NEW YORK: LONGMANS, GREEN, & CO. MDCCCXCVIII TO THE DUKE OF MARLBOROUGH.' MY LORD, S it is natural to have a fondness for what has cost us much time and attention to produce, I hope your Grace will forgive an endeavour to preserve this work from oblivion, by affixing it to your memorable name. I shall not here presume to mention the illustrious passages of your life, which are celebrated by the whole age, and have been the subject of the most sublime pens; but if I could convey you to posterity in your private character, and describe 1 John Churchill, Duke of Marlborough, was born in 1650, and was therefore sixty-two when this Dedication was written. He was made Prince of Mindelheim by the Emperor in 1705, after the battle of Blenheim, and the palace of Blenheim was built for him at Woodstock; but after the battle of Malplaquet in 1709, the opposition to the prolongation of the war grew in force, and in December 1711, after an inquiry into various charges against the duke, he was dismissed from all his employments. In November 1712 Marlborough VOL. IV. b the stature, the behaviour and aspect of the Duke of Marlborough, I question not but it would fill the reader with more agreeable images, and give him a more delightful entertainment than what can be found in the following, or any other book. One cannot indeed, without offence to yourself, observe that you excel the rest of mankind in the least as well as the greatest endowments. Nor were it a circumstance to be mentioned, if the graces and attractions of your person were not the only pre-eminence you have above others, which is left, almost, unobserved by greater writers. Yet how pleasing would it be to those who shall read the surprising revolutions in your story, to be made acquainted with your ordinary life and deportment? How pleasing would it be to hear that the same man who had carried fire and sword into the countries of all that had opposed the cause of liberty, and struck a terror into the armies of France, had in the midst of left England, and did not return until after Queen Anne's death; but Steele and Addison did not waver in their loyalty to the great general. Immediately after his fall, Steele published a pamphlet (January 4, 1712), "The Englishman's Thanks to the Duke of Marlborough"; and in 1714 it was announced that Steele was preparing a folio history of the war, covering the period that Marlborough was general; but this work was never written. his high station a behaviour as gentle as is usual in the first steps towards greatness? And if it were possible to express that easy grandeur, which did at once persuade and command, it would appear as clearly to those to come, as it does to his contemporaries, that all the great events which were brought to pass under the conduct of so wellgoverned a spirit, were the blessings of Heaven upon wisdom and valour; and all which seem adverse fell out by Divine permission, which we are not to search into. You have passed that year of life wherein the most able and fortunate captain, before your time, declared he had lived enough both to nature and to glory; and your Grace may make that reflection with much more justice. He spoke it after he had arrived at empire, by an usurpation upon those whom he had enslaved; but the Prince of Mindelheim may rejoice in a sovereignty which was the gift of him whose dominions he had pre served. Glory established upon the uninterrupted success of honourable designs and actions is not subject to diminution; nor can any attempts prevail against it, but in the proportion which the narrow circuit of rumour bears to the unlimited extent of fame. 1 Julius Cæsar. |