pulfe of paffion be filent, till you can be foft. Labour even to get the command of your countenance fo well, that those emotions may not be read in it: a most unspeakable advantage in bufinefs! On the other hand, let no complaisance, no gentleness of temper, no weak defire of pleasing on your part, no wheedling, coaxing, nor flattery, on other people's, make you recede one jot from any point that reafon and prudence have bid you purfue; but return to the charge, perfift, perfevere, and you will find moft things attainable that are poffible. A yielding, timid meekness is always abufed and infulted by the unjust and the unfeeling; but meeknefs when fuftained by the fortitèr in re, is always refpected, commonly fuccefsful. In your friendships and connections, as well as in your enmities, this rule is particularly useful; let your firmness and vigour, preferve and invite attachments to you; but, at the fame time, let your manner hinder the enemies of your friends and dependents from becoming yours let your enemies be difarmed by the gentleness of your manner, but let them feel at the fame time, the fteadiness of your juft refentment; for there is a great difference between bearing malice, which is always ungenerous, and a refolute felf-defence, which is always prudent and justifiable.

I CONCLUDE with this obfervation, That gentleness of manners, with firmness of mind, is a short, but full defcription of human perfection, on this fide of religious and moral duties.

LORD CHESTERFIELD.

1

CHAP.

CHA P.

VIII.

ON GOOD SENSE.

ERE I to explain what I understand by good fense,

WE

I should call it right reason; but right reafon that arifes not from formal and logical deductions, but from a fort of intuitive faculty in the foul, which distinguishes by immediate perception: a kind of innate fagacity, that in many of its properties feems very much to refemble instinct. It would be improper, therefore, to fay, that Sir Ifaac Newton fhewed his good fenfe, by thofe amazing difcoveries which he made in natural philofophy: the operations of this gift of heaven are rather instantaneous, than the refult of any tedious process. Like Diomed, after Minerva had endued him with the power of difcerning gods from mortals, the man of good fenfe difcovers at once the truth of those objects he is most concerned to diftinguish; and conducts himself with suitable caution and fecurity.

Ir is for this reason, poffibly, that this quality of the mind is not so often found united with learning as one could wish: for good fenfe being accustomed to receive her discoveries without labour or ftudy, fhe cannot fo eafily wait for those truths, which being placed at a diftance, and lying concealed under numberlefs covers, require much pains and application to unfold.

BUT though good fenfe is not in the number, nor always, it must be owned, in the company of the fciences; yet is it (as the moft fenfible of poets has justly observed)

fairly worth the feven.

Rectitude of underflanding is indeed the most useful, as well as the most noble of human endowments, as it is the fove

reign guide and director in every branch of civil and social intercourfe.

UPON whatever occafion this enlightening faculty is exerted, it is always fure to act with diftinguished eminence; but its chief and peculiar province feems to lie in the commerce of the world. Accordingly we may obferve, that those who have converfed more with men than with books; whofe wif dom is derived rather from experience than contemplation; generally poffefs this happy talent with superior perfection. For good fenfe, though it cannot be acquired, may be improved; and the world, I believe, will ever be found to afford the most kindly foil for its cultivation.

CHA P. IX.

ON STUDY.

MELMOTH.

TUDIES ferve for delight, for ornament, and for abili

STUDI

ty. The chief use for delight is in privatenefs and retiring; for ornament, is in difcourfe; and for ability, is in the judgment and difpofition of business. For expert men can execute, and perhaps judge of particulars one by one; but the general counfels, and the plots, and marshalling of affairs come beft from those that are learned. To spend too much time in ftudies is floth; to use them too much for ornament is affectation; to make judgment wholly by their rules is the humour of a fcholar. They perfect nature, and are perfected by experience; for natural abilities are like natural plants, that need pruning by duty, and ftudies themselves to give forth directions too much at large, except they be bounded in by experience. Crafty men contemn ftudies, fimple men admire them, and wife men use them :

for

for they teach not their own ufe, but that is a wisdom.with

out them, and above them, won by observation. Read not to contradict and confute, nor to believe and take for granted, nor to find talk and discourse, but to weigh and confider. Some books are to be tafted, others to be swallowed, and fome few to be chewed and digefted; that is, fome books are to be read only in parts; others to be read but not curiously; and fome few to be read wholly, and with diligence and attention. Some books alfo may be read by deputy, and extracts made of them by others; but that should be only in the lefs important arguments, and the meaner fort of books; elfe diftilled books are like common diftilled waters, flashy things. Reading maketh a full man; conference a ready man; and writing an exact man. And therefore, if a man write little, he had need have a great memory; if he confer little, he had need have a present wit; and if he read little, he had need have much cunning to feem to know that he doth not.

BACON.

-T

CHA P. X.

ON SATIRICAL WIT.

RUST me, this unwary pleafantry of thine will fooner or later bring thee into fcrapes and difficulties, which no after wit can extricate thee out of. In thefe fallies, too oft I fee, it happens, that the perfon laughed at, confiders himself in the light of a perfon injured, with all the rights of fuch a fituation belonging to him; and when thou viewest him in that light too, and reckon'ft upon his friends, his family, his kindred and allies, and musterest up with them the many recruits which will lift under him

5

from

from a fense of common danger; 'tis no extravagant arithmetic to fay, that for every ten jokes, thou haft got an hundred enemies; and, till thou haft gone on, and raised a swarm of wafps about thine ears, and art half stung to death by them, thou wilt never be convinced it is fo.

I CANNOT fufpect it in the man whom I efteem, that there is the leaft fpur from spleen or malevolence of intent in these fallies. I believe and know them to be truly honest and sportive; but confider, that fools cannot distinguish this, and that knaves will not; and thou knoweft not what it is, either to provoke the one, or to make merry with the other: whenever they affociate for mutual defence, depend upon it they will carry on the war in such a manner against thee, my dear friend, as to make thee heartily fick of it, and of thy life too.

REVENGE from fome baneful corner fhall level a tale of dishonour at thee, which no innocence of heart or integrity of conduct shall fet right. The fortunes of thy house shall totterthy character, which led the way to them, shall bleed on every fide of it-thy faith queftioned-thy works belied-thy wit forgotten-thy learning trampled on. To wind up the laft fcene of thy tragedy, CRUELTY and CowARDICE, twin ruffians, hired and fet on by MALICE in the dark, fhall strike together at all thy infirmities and mistakes: the best of us, my friend, lie open there, and trust mewhen to gratify a private appetite, it is once refolved upon, that an innocent and an helplefs creature fhall be facrificed, it is an eafy matter to pick up sticks enough from any thicket where it has strayed, to make a fire to offer it up with.

STERNE.

CHA P.