l
recompense and repose. Its pages inculcate the same lesson, as
those of the Rambler, but "the precept, which is tedious in a
formal essay, may acquire attractions in a tale, and the sober
charms of truth be divested of their austerity by the graces of
innocent fiction[c]." We may observe, in conclusion, that the
abrupt termination of Rasselas, so left, according to sir John
Hawkins, by its author, to admit of continuation, and its unbroken
gloom, induced Miss E. Cornelia Knight to present to
the public a tale, entitled Dinarbas, to exhibit the fairer view of
life.

FOOTNOTES
[a] See Idler, No. 41, and his letter to Mr. Elphinstone, on the death
of his mother.
[b] Aristot. Ethic. Nich. lib. i. c. 10, 11. In Barrow's sermon on the
"the least credulous or fanciful of men."
[c] See Drake's Speculator, 1790, No. 1.

THE HISTORY

OF

RASSELAS, PRINCE OF ABISSINIA.

CHAP. I.

DESCRIPTION OF A PALACE IN A VALLEY.

Ye, who listen, with credulity, to the whispers of fancy, and pursue,
with eagerness, the phantoms of hope; who expect, that age will perform
the promises of youth, and that the deficiencies of the present day will
be supplied by the morrow; attend to the history of Rasselas, prince of
Abissinia.

Rasselas was the fourth son of the mighty emperour, in whose dominions
the father of waters begins his course; whose bounty pours down the
streams of plenty, and scatters over half the world the harvests of
Egypt.

According to the custom, which has descended, from age to age, among the
monarchs of the torrid zone, Rasselas was confined in a private palace,
with the other sons and daughters of Abissinian royalty, till the order
of succession should call him to the throne.

The place, which the wisdom, or policy, of antiquity had destined for
the residence of the Abissinan princes, was a spacious valley in the
kingdom of Amhara, surrounded, on every side, by mountains, of which the
summits overhang the middle part. The only passage, by which it could be
entered, was a cavern that passed under a rock, of which it has been
long disputed, whether it was the work of nature, or of human industry.
The outlet of the cavern was concealed by a thick wood, and the mouth,
which opened into the valley, was closed with gates of iron, forged by
the artificers of ancient days, so massy, that no man could, without the
help of engines, open or shut them.

From the mountains, on every side, rivulets descended,