DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.61480#0105
INDUSTRY AND IDLENESS.
PLATE VII.
THE IDLE 'PRENTICE RETURNED FROM SEA, AND IN A
GARRET WITH A COMMON PROSTITUTE.
" The sound of a shaken leaf shall chase him." Leviticus, chap. xxvi. verse 6.
The idle apprentice, as appears by this print, is advancing with rapid strides towards
his fate. We are to suppose him returned from sea after a long voyage ; and to have
met with such correction abroad for his obstinacy, during his absence from England,
that though it was found insufficient to alter his disposition, yet it determined him to
pursue some other way of life ; and what he entered on is here but too evident (from
the pistols by the bed-side, and the trinkets his companion is examining, in order to
strip him of) to be that of the highway. He is represented in a garret, with a common
prostitute, the partaker of his infamy, awaking, after a night spent in robbery and
plunder, from one of those broken slumbers which are ever the consequences of a life
of dishonesty and debauchery. Though the designs of Providence are visible in every
thing, yet they are never more conspicuous than in this,—that whatever these unhappy
wretches possess by wicked and illegal means, they seldom comfortably enjoy. In
this scene we have one of the finest pictures imaginable of the horrors of a guilty con-
science. Though the door is fastened in the strongest manner with a lock and two
bolts, and with the addition of some planks from the flooring, so as to make his retreat
as secure as possible ; though he has attempted to drive away thought by the powerful
effects of spirituous liquors, plain from the glass and bottle upon the floor, still he is
not able to brave out his guilt, or steel his breast against reflection. Behold him roused
by the accidental circumstance of a cat's coming down the chimney, and the falling of a
few bricks, which he believes to be the noise of his pursuers ! Observe his starting up
in bed, and all the tortures of his mind imprinted in his face! He first stiffens into
25.
PLATE VII.
THE IDLE 'PRENTICE RETURNED FROM SEA, AND IN A
GARRET WITH A COMMON PROSTITUTE.
" The sound of a shaken leaf shall chase him." Leviticus, chap. xxvi. verse 6.
The idle apprentice, as appears by this print, is advancing with rapid strides towards
his fate. We are to suppose him returned from sea after a long voyage ; and to have
met with such correction abroad for his obstinacy, during his absence from England,
that though it was found insufficient to alter his disposition, yet it determined him to
pursue some other way of life ; and what he entered on is here but too evident (from
the pistols by the bed-side, and the trinkets his companion is examining, in order to
strip him of) to be that of the highway. He is represented in a garret, with a common
prostitute, the partaker of his infamy, awaking, after a night spent in robbery and
plunder, from one of those broken slumbers which are ever the consequences of a life
of dishonesty and debauchery. Though the designs of Providence are visible in every
thing, yet they are never more conspicuous than in this,—that whatever these unhappy
wretches possess by wicked and illegal means, they seldom comfortably enjoy. In
this scene we have one of the finest pictures imaginable of the horrors of a guilty con-
science. Though the door is fastened in the strongest manner with a lock and two
bolts, and with the addition of some planks from the flooring, so as to make his retreat
as secure as possible ; though he has attempted to drive away thought by the powerful
effects of spirituous liquors, plain from the glass and bottle upon the floor, still he is
not able to brave out his guilt, or steel his breast against reflection. Behold him roused
by the accidental circumstance of a cat's coming down the chimney, and the falling of a
few bricks, which he believes to be the noise of his pursuers ! Observe his starting up
in bed, and all the tortures of his mind imprinted in his face! He first stiffens into
25.