Essays and Tales

Essays and Tales is by Joseph Addison, and its contents list Public Credit, Household Superstitions, Opera Lions, Women and Wives, The Vision of Mirza, Theodosius and Constantia, Good Nature and Trust in God. In one scene there is a great change in the hill of money-bags and the heaps of money, the former shrinking and falling into so many empty bags, while the great heaps of gold on either side the throne appear to be only heaps of paper, or little piles of notched sticks.

Another scene brings in pairs of apparitions: the first pair was Liberty with Monarchy at her right hand, the second Moderation leading in Religion, and the third a person with the Genius of Great Britain. A piece asks whether you can despise visions and magic spells and laugh at witches, ghosts and prodigies. The writer says of one man that, when he has been going to a play or an opera, he diverts the money designed for that purpose upon an object of charity whom he has met with in the street.