man Empire")

VI The Causes of the Destruction of the City of Rome.
(From "The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire")

GREAT BRITAIN AND IRELAND--II

1672-1800

SIR RICHARD STEELE

Born in Ireland in 1672; died in Wales in 1729; companion of
Addison at Oxford; served in the army in 1694, becoming a
captain; elected to Parliament, but expelled for using
seditious language; knighted under George I; quarreled with
Addison in 1719; founded the Tatler, and next to Addison,
was the chief writer for the Spectator.

I

OF COMPANIONS AND FLATTERERS

An old acquaintance who met me this morning seemed overjoyed to see
me, and told me I looked as well as he had known me do these forty
years; but, continued he, not quite the man you were when we visited
together at Lady Brightly's. Oh! Isaac, those days are over. Do you
think there are any such fine creatures now living as we then
conversed with? He went on with a thousand incoherent circumstances,
which, in his imagination, must needs please me; but they had the
quite contrary effect. The flattery with which he began, in telling me
how well I wore, was not disagreeable; but his indiscreet mention of a
set of acquaintance we had outlived, recalled ten thousand things to
my memory, which made me reflect upon my present condition with
regret. Had he indeed been so kind as, after a long absence, to
felicitate me upon an indolent and easy old age, and mentioned how
much he and I had to thank for, who at our time of day could walk
firmly, eat heartily and converse cheerfully, he had kept up my
pleasure in myself. But of all mankind, there are none so shocking as
these injudicious civil people. They ordinarily begin upon something
that they know must be a satisfaction; but then, for fear of the
imputation of flattery, they follow it with the last thing in the
world of which you would be reminded. It is this that perplexes civil
persons. The reason that there is such a general outcry among us
against flatterers is that there are so very few good ones. It is the
nicest art in this life, and is a part of eloquence which does not
want the preparation that is necessary to all other parts of it, that
your audience should be your well-wishers; for praise from an enemy is
the most pleasing of all commendations.

It is generally to be observed, that the person most agreeable to a
man for a constancy, is he that has