hand against the fatherless, when I saw my help in the gate; then let mine arm fall from my shoulder-blade, and mine arm be broken from the bone.  If I have rejoiced at the Destruction of him that hated me, or lift up myself when evil found him:  (Neither have I suffered my mouth to sin, by wishing a curse to his soul).  The stranger did not lodge in the street; but I opened my doors to the traveller.  If my land cry against me, or that the furrows likewise thereof complain:  If I have eaten the Fruits thereof without mony, or have caused the owners thereof to lose their Life; Let thistles grow instead of wheat, and cockle instead of barley. [8]

[Footnote 1:  Cleomenes to Pantheus,

  ’Would I could share thy Balmy, even Temper,
  And Milkiness of Blood.’

‘Cleomenes’, Act i. sc.  I.]

[Footnote 2:  that]

[Footnote 3:  the Patrons of the Indigent]

[Footnote 4:  ‘Proverbs’ xix. 17.]

[Footnote 5:  ‘Rel.  Med.’  Part II. sect. 13.]

[Footnote 6:  ‘Matt.’ xxi. 31, &c.]

[Footnote 7:  The Epitaph was in St. George’s Church at Doncaster, and ran thus: 

  ’How now, who is heare? 
  I Robin of Doncastere
  And Margaret my feare. 
  That I spent, that I had;
  That I gave, that I have;
  That I left, that I lost.’]

[Footnote 8:  ‘Job’ xxix. 2, &c.; xxx. 25, &c.; xxxi. 6, &c.]

* * * * *

No. 178.  Monday, September 24, 1711.  Steele.

      ‘Comis in uxorem ...’

      Hor.

I cannot defer taking Notice of this Letter.

  Mr. SPECTATOR,

I am but too good a Judge of your Paper of the 15th Instant, which is a Master-piece; I mean that of Jealousy:  But I think it unworthy of you to speak of that Torture in the Breast of a Man, and not to mention also the Pangs of it in the Heart of a Woman.  You have very Judiciously, and with the greatest Penetration imaginable, considered it as Woman is the Creature of whom the Diffidence is raised; but not a Word of a Man who is so unmerciful as to move Jealousy in his Wife, and not care whether she is so or not.  It is possible you may not believe there are such Tyrants in the World; but alas, I can tell you of a Man who is ever out of Humour in his Wife’s Company, and the pleasantest Man in the World every where else; the greatest Sloven at home when he appears to none but his Family, and most exactly well-dressed in all other Places.  Alas, Sir, is it of Course, that to deliver one’s self wholly into a Man’s Power without Possibility of Appeal to any other Jurisdiction but to his own Reflections, is so little an Obligation to a Gentleman, that he can be offended and fall into a Rage, because my Heart swells Tears into my Eyes when I see him in a cloudy Mood?  I pretend to no Succour, and hope for no Relief but from himself; and yet he