1828.] [ 155 ] 
FRIAR BACON’S KEY: 
«“ THERE are two modes, in the present day, by which any one may. 
get the name of a liberal man, and in the lottery of good things, I know 
few reputations more profitable. Be what you please, or do what you 
please, it matters little, so long as you have a character for generosity. 
This single virtue, or, what will dojust as well, the appearance of it, will 
stand.you in stead of allthe other virtues; it is a cloak to cover the 
inward nakedness, an umbrella to keep off the pitiless pelting of the storm 
when it is pouring somewhat too freely on the head of unworthiness. In 
short, what is it not, in the way of profit or defence, to the fortunate pos- 
sessor? Nor is the obtaining of it, by any means, as I have said, a 
difficult task to him who has a purse, the roads to it being an hundred 
fold—among the best, say, subscribing to some fund, where the money is 
not wanted ; or purchasing, at an enormous price, some works of art that 
you don’t understand or care about, and setting up a museum. As to 
your children or relations, if you happen to have any, you need not waste 
a thought upon them ; for, as all you may do on their account is no more 
than what you ought to do, it cannot redound to the praise of your 
liberality ; and, therefore, you may as well leave it undone.” 
_ Such was the advice of my friend Dives; and, as it happened to chime 
in with my own notions of the truth, I resolved to send my poor relations 
to the devil, or to any one else who might think proper to take them in ; 
while, in the meantime, I opened my “ collecting” campaign in a cele- 
brated auction-room at the west-end of the town. The object I had 
selected for the foundation of my new character as a “ patronizing man,” 
was a Venus or a Hercules, that Mr. C had to sell : the antiquarians 
could not decide which of the two characters above named properly 
belonged to it; and no wonder, seeing that the god or goddess had been 
by time and accidents so reduced and shorn of its original properties, as 
to bear no bad resemblance to a mile-stone—saving only in its material, 
which, I can vouch, without being a connoisseur, to have been genuine 
marble. Such as it was, however, the fame of this mutilated sculpture 
had roused the whole body of antiquarians, equestrian and pedestrian, 
amateurs and professors. Anxious, at least, to be able to say I had bid 
for such a rarity, even though I should fail to win it, for want of that 
species of courage which, I opine, is the highest of all courage, namely, 
the courage to part with one’s money, I hurried to the auction-room at an 
early hour, and found the orator already risen, and holding forth, with 
much eloquence and learning, upon a very equivocal as well as humble 
article. What that article was, I must not venture to say ; wanting the 
speaker’s exquisite powers of periphrasis, which enabled him at once’ to 
veil and ennoble that subject, which, to say the truth, stood in need both 
of one assistance and the other. Indeed, as my friend Dives remarked 
to me in a whisper, the dapper, smooth-chinned gentleman, with his 
_ starched collar, his oily tongue, and still more oily face, looked the very 
A ‘Bint of crockery, the born Apollo of Delft and China-ware. But my 
ind was bent on highér matters, namely,on the Venus or Hercules, and I 
+ n grew heartily sick of the tropes and similes that buzzed about my 
__ ears like so many May-chaffers on a warm summer’s evening. All the 
bidding and battling previous to the struggle for the precious statue, 
X 2 
