he seeds of knowledge may be planted in solitude, but must be
cultivated in publick. Argumentation may be taught in colleges, and
theories formed in retirement; but the artifice of embellishment, and
the powers of attraction, can be gained only by general converse.

An acquaintance with prevailing customs and fashionable elegance is
necessary likewise for other purposes. The injury that grand imagery
suffers from unsuitable language, personal merit may fear from rudeness
and indelicacy. When the success of AEneas depended on the favour of the
queen upon whose coasts he was driven, his celestial protectress thought
him not sufficiently secured against rejection by his piety or bravery,
but decorated him for the interview with preternatural beauty. Whoever
desires, for his writings or himself, what none can reasonably contemn,
the favour of mankind, must add grace to strength, and make his thoughts
agreeable as well as useful. Many complain of neglect who never tried to
attract regard. It cannot be expected that the patrons of science or
virtue should be solicitous to discover excellencies, which they who
possess them shade and disguise. Few have abilities so much needed by
the rest of the world as to be caressed on their own terms; and he that
will not condescend to recommend himself by external embellishments,
must submit to the fate of just sentiment meanly expressed, and be
ridiculed and forgotten before he is understood.

No. 169. TUESDAY, OCTOBER 29, 1751.

_Nec pluteum caedit, nec demorsos sapit ungues_. PER. Sat. i. 106.

No blood from bitten nails those poems drew;
But churn'd, like spittle, from the lips they flew. DRYDEN.

Natural historians assert, that whatever is formed for long duration
arrives slowly to its maturity. Thus the firmest timber is of tardy
growth, and animals generally exceed each other in longevity, in
proportion to the time between their conception and their birth.

The same observation may be extended to the offspring of the mind. Hasty
compositions, however they please at first by flowery luxuriance, and
spread in the sunshine of temporary favour, can seldom endure the change
of seasons, but perish at the first blast of criticism, or frost of
neglect. When Apelles was reproached with the paucity of his
productions, and the incessant attention with which he retouched his
pieces, he condescended to make no other answer than that _he painted
for perpetuity_.

No vanity can mo