This whole celebrated Piece is a perfect Contradiction to good Manners, good Sense, and common Honesty; and as there is nothing in it but what is built upon the Ruin of Virtue and Innocence, according to the Notion of Merit in this Comedy, I take the Shoemaker to be, in reality, the Fine Gentleman of the Play: For it seems he is an Atheist, if we may depend upon his Character as given by the Orange-Woman, who is her self far from being the lowest in the Play. She says of a Fine Man who is _Dorimant's_ Companion, There _is not such another Heathen in the Town, except the Shoemaker_. His Pretension to be the Hero of the _Drama_ appears still more in his own Description of his way of Living with his Lady. _There is_, says he, _never a Man in Town lives more like a Gentleman with his Wife than I do; I never mind her Motions; she never enquires into mine. We speak to one another civilly, hate one another heartily; and because it is Vulgar to Lye and Soak together, we have each of us our several Settle-Bed_. That of _Soaking together_ is as good as if _Dorimant_ had spoken it himself; and, I think, since he puts Human Nature in as ugly a Form as the Circumstances will bear, and is a staunch Unbeliever, he is very much Wronged in having no part of the good Fortune bestowed in the last Act. To speak plainly of this whole Work, I think nothing but being lost to a sense of Innocence and Virtue can make any one see this Comedy, without observing more frequent Occasion to move Sorrow and Indignation, than Mirth and Laughter. At the same time I allow it to be Nature, but it is Nature in its utmost Corruption and Degeneracy. [2] R. [Footnote 1: 'The Man of Mode', or 'Sir Fopling Flutter', by Sir George Etherege, produced in 1676. Etherege painted accurately the life and morals of the Restoration, and is said to have represented himself in Bellair; Beau Hewit, the son of a Herefordshire Baronet, in Sir Fopling; and to have formed Dorimant upon the model of the Earl of Rochester.] [Footnote 2: To this number of the Spectator is appended the first advertisement of Pope's 'Essay on Criticism'. This Day is publish'd An ESSAY on CRITICISM. Printed for W. Lewis in Russell street Covent-Garden; and Sold by W. Taylor, at the Ship in Pater Noster Row; T. Osborn, in Gray's Inn near the Walks; T. Graves, in St. James's Street; and T. Morphew, near Stationers-Hall. Price 1s.] * * * * * No. 66. Wednesday, May 16, 1711. Steele. 'Motus doceri gaudet Ionicos Matura Virgo, et fingitur artubus Jam nunc, et incestos amores De Tenero meditatur Ungui.' Hor. The two following Letters are upon a Subject of very great Importance, tho' expressed without an Air of Gravity. To the SPECTATOR.