ders; for the passengers, not being acquainted with the business, and yet very desirous to labour for the common safety, did but embarrass one another, and hinder the work they endeavoured to advance. Some, who thought they could never do too much, pulled the ropes with such violence, that they frequently broke them. Others, by tugging contrary ways, destroyed the effect of each other's strength. The decks were so crowded by people, who knew only how to make confusion, that the sailors had not room to stir; and there was such a loud and distracted clamour, of some roaring one thing, and some another, that neither the captain nor the pilot could be heard. Whenever the ship heeled, they cried out, We are all lost! And tumbled over one another in heaps, some being sorely bruised, and others falling overboard, into the sea.

By these means, and the darkness of the nights, the ships lost sight of one another, and fell off to different courses. The largest of them, which was also the best manned, made towards a certain island, which was at a sufficient distance from the power of Dictatoria, and yet so near, that it might be reached, without exposing the vessel to the many dangers incident to too long a voyage.

There was a passenger on board this vessel, who, by the time it had been a week at sea, had gained a smattering of the sailor's art, and being very whimsical and overbearing, thought himself capable of giving law to the master, and all the crew. He pretended great dislike to the ship, and the government of it, and practising secretly with the simpler sort, in which he was assisted by certain Dictatorians, who, making a show of abhorrence to the tyrant, came on board, purely to raise disturbances; he gained over some to his party, and made them serious converts to his feigned discontents. These he assembled one day, privately in the hold, and harangued them in the following manner :

I cannot but lament, my fellow-sailors, that after all our endeavours to fly from the wickedness of Dictatoria, and the divine judgments due to it, we are still deeply infected with the former, and consequently have but too much reason to dread the latter. In the first place, we left a tyranny, in order to put ourselves under the kinder

influence of a free government. But what have we gained by our attempt? Are we not still under the government of one? What security can we have, that he will not tyrannize like him of Dictatoria? Nay, I can assure you, his principles are perfectly Dictatorian, and you yourselves may perceive it, for he goes habited like the Dictatorians, he cocks his hat, and laughs like one of the profane. He cannot sink a dungeon in the ship; but, as soon as we come ashore, you may expect it, for he talks much of discipline and government; and it is but two days since, as you all can witness, he confined me to this hold, for saying we ought not to suffer ourselves to be guided by a pilot, but commit ourselves to the steerage of Providence. Now the hold is but another kind of dungeon; and, since he hath so soon begun to play the governor, we may be sure he will in a little time act the tyrant. Trust him not, O my fellow-sailors; for he is a haughty lord, and a proud tyrant. He is a Dictatorian in his heart. Again, we left Dictatoria, in order to purge ourselves of the luxury, and strip ourselves of the pomps and vanities of that wicked place; and yet, behold, we are still polluted with the same corruptions. How odious to my eyes is that dazzling paint that adorns the side of the ship! How detestable those graven figures that glitter on the stern in various colours, and shine in all the splendour of gold, the author of all corruption! How imperiously does the flag of pride wave from the bolt-sprit in the wind! But above all, O my dear fellows! how can you endure that wooden idol, that painted whore, that stands naked from the waist upwards at the prow? To what fortunes, think you, can you follow such a whore? But farther, do we not shew the most unworthy distrust of Providence, in committing ourselves to the guidance of a human pilot, and the government of a mortal's wisdom? To what end the rudder, the mast, and the tackle, those relics of our former abominations? To what purpose the sails, those rags of Dictatorian profanation? Is there the smallest mention made of them? Is there any command for them in our ancient laws? If there be not, with what assurance can we suffer such unwarranted innovations? O how my soul abhors such human, such carnal, such profane inventions! Let us fly, my dear companions,

let us quickly fly from this damnable machine, whose keel I know to be rotten, and let us throw ourselves into the cock-boat, a vessel that has nothing of Dictatorian art or pride about it, and with firm faith, commit ourselves to the protection of Providence.'

This speech made a strong impression on his unwary hearers, and the more, because of that vehement aversion they had to the Dictatorian abuses. So they, one and all, protested against every thing that looked like Dictatorian, and with one consent resolved to seize the cock-boat, and attempt a voyage in it through the wide sea.

This resolution they put in practice the very next day, and committed themselves to the ocean, without oars, without rudder, and without victualling. They were no sooner got to sea in their little bark, than they perceived it did not stir, and that they were in danger of being left motionless in the midst of the ocean, to starve for want of food, or perish by the next violent blast of wind. It was then first they had recourse to human help, and seized a rope that dragged after the ship in the water; so that they made a shift to keep up with the vessel. The rest of the crew, knowing nothing of their intention, threw out some other ropes to relieve them from the distress they were in, and haul them to again. But instead of thanking them for their brotherly concern, they railed aloud at them, calling them vile and profane wretches, proud Dictatorians; and whenever they saw any of them mounting the shrouds to order the tackle, or sails, they called them tyrants and high-flyers; and bid them beware of the hold and the dungeon, to humble their pride. In this mood they followed the ship, till at length they began to feel the want of victualling grow fast upon them, which made them call aloud for food to the ship; but their extravagant madness made them do it in such disobliging terms, that they on deck thought proper to refuse them for some time, till pity, and a tenderness for their lives, moved them to hand down some mouldy biscuit, and some coarse beef to them. This, although their hunger forced them to devour it, did not satisfy them. They insisted that they were entitled to an equal share of the ship's provision, and cursed the crew for refusing it. Their malecontent spirit was still more in

flamed, when the under sailors taunted them from the stern, and derided, with great sharpness, their mad project, and the absurd defence they made for themselves. At last, the captain, having found what was the matter, appeared at the cabin window, and spoke to this effect:

'I am much troubled, my dear friends, for the extravagant spirit, with which I find you are possessed. Be assured, I have not the smallest intentions to tyrannize. I only took the office I hold at the request of you all; I am ready to lay it down again, if my administration has been faulty. But then you must elect another, order and government necessarily requiring it, and our laws giving sufficient warrant thereunto. We all abhor the flagitious lives, and miserable degeneracy of the Dictatorians, as much as you; but the rigging and ornaments of our ship were none of their crimes, being harmless and indifferent things. Without our rudder, our sails, &c. we cannot make the voyage; we must therefore retain them, as necessary to our preservation. Nor do we shew, by so doing, any distrust of Divine Providence, which we can only hope to assist us, where human means fail. You yourselves perceive, that your hopes in Providence, to do that for you which you can do for yourselves, were idle, because it has deserted you, and left you to depend on that rope for your way, and on us for your victuals. I do not, like the rest of our crew, deride your folly, but I pity the unhappy resolution you have taken, which must inevitably end in your ruin, if not speedily laid aside. Return, let me earnestly beseech you, to your friends and fellow-sailors, and, instead of destroying yourselves, help forward the common good of the community you embarked in at our departure from Dictatoria. In purging ourselves of abuses, we have not so much regarded what was Dictatorian, as what was contrary to our ancient laws. Joined with us you may live and prosper, but if you separate you must perish.'

Upon hearing this, one or two returned to a better mind, and were hauled up into the ship. The boat being driven against the ship by one wave, and overset by another, the rest were all lost.

ALLUSION VIII.

ABOUT one thousand seven hundred years ago, there was a temple built, no matter where; but its foundations were sunk deep in a rock of adamant, and its dome pierced the clouds: the materials were too hard for time to impair, and the workmanship too firm for the most furious storms to injure: the plan was drawn by the greatest architect in the world, and the design was proportionable to the immense and exalted genius of its author: it was built in a plain style, so that, if it were viewed by one of a corrupt taste, it had little that he could admire, for there was nothing extravagant or enormous in it; nay, its height and platform were so judiciously adjusted, that, although both were very great, yet neither seemed prodigious. To one of any judgment, the whole figure appeared wonderfully majestic and stately. It had two excellences peculiar to it; one, that if you should survey it for some time attentively, it would seem to grow in size and grandeur, till, without either straining the eye, or shocking the imagination, it had insensibly enlarged both, and taught the beholder a certain capacity of seeing and conceiving, which he was unacquainted with before; the other, that the instant you entered it, you were struck with a sacred kind of awe, which came so irresistibly upon you, that were you of ever so gay or loose a disposition, you could not help being grave. But then this was attended with no uneasiness or fear; for the beauty and cheerfulness of all you saw was such, and the light, which entered by a thousand spacious windows, was so great, that you were as much delighted as awed. Every thing was disposed in so simple and natural an order, and yet with such magnificence, as could not but fill a judicious beholder with a serious and solemn kind of joy, accompanied with that profound reverence, which ought to be felt, when a divine nature is supposed to be present. Some were more taken with one thing, and some with another; but all agreed, that the architect had shewn uncommon skill, in giving such abundance