But there are others who refine upon the former by a pretended fellow-suffering in the more private concernments of life, whereby they wriggle themselves deeper into the affections of those they flatter; as, if they find a man unhappily married, or distrustful of his children or domestics, they spare not their own family, but immediately entertain you with some lamentable story of the hard fortune they have met with in their children, their wife, their servants, or relations. For, by the parallel circumstances they pretend to, they seem more passionately concerned for the misfortunes of their friends, who, as if they had already received some pawn and assurance of their fidelity, blab forth those secrets which they cannot afterwards handsomely retract, and dare not betray the least distrust of their new confidant for the future. I myself knew a man who turned his wife out of doors because a gentleman of his acquaintance divorced his, though the latter lady smelt the intrigue afterwards by the messages the flatterer sent to his wife after the pretended divorce and the private visits he was observed to make her. So little did he understand the flatterer who took these following verses for the description of a crab rather than his:— The shapeless thing’s all over paunch and gut: Who can the monster’s mighty hunger glut? It crawls on teeth, and with a watchful eye Does into every secret corner pry. For this is the true portraiture of those sharpers, who, as Eupolis speaks, sponge upon their acquaintance for a dinner. 10. But we will reserve these remarks for a more proper place. In the mean time I must not omit the other artifice observable in his imitation, which is this: that if at any time he counterfeit the good qualities of his friend, he immediately yields him the pre-eminence; whereas there is no competition, no emulation or envy amongst true friends, but whether they are equally accomplished or not, they bear the same even unconcerned temper of mind towards each other. But the flatterer, remembering that he is but to act another’s part, pretends only to such strokes as fall short of the original, and is willing to confess himself outdone in any thing but his vices, wherein alone he claims the precedency to himself; as, if the man he is to wheedle be difficult and morose, he is quite overrun with choler; if something superstitious, he is a perfect enthusiast; if a little in love, for his part he is most desperately smitten. I laughed heartily at such a passage, says one; But I had like to have died with laughter, says the other. But now in speaking of any laudable qualities, he inverts his style; as, I can run fast enough, says he, but you perfectly fly. I can sit an horse tolerably well, but alas! what’s that to this Hippocentaur for good horsemanship? I have a tolerable good genius for poetry, and am none of the worst versifiers of the age; But thunder is the language of you Gods, not mine.