I never could fee what right any one has to call another to account for not playing well. We are content to excel in mufic, dancing, every polite accomplishment, and look with complacent pity on those poor mortals whofe inferior abilities prevent their arriving at fuch excellence: why muft indifferent play be the only fault without excufe?

As it is every one's intereft to play the best he can, fo there is no doubt but every one does fo. How is it then that people allow themselves on thefe occafions to make use of fuch expreffions, as they would think the highest breach of common good manners in any other cafe? .

If the fuppofed bad play fhould proceed from ignorance, or inattention, in the player, warmth and pettishness will but make it worse: to inform him better, with good nature and politeness, is the only poffible method of improving him.

For my own part, who really play for amufement, I am all aftonishment, when I fee fo many pleafing countenances fet down to cards, and, in an hour's time, behold them wear fo different an appearance; and wonder how reasonable creatures can conjure up all the troublesome paffions they poffefs, at a time when they profess a design of amufing themselves.

The

The likelieft way to avoid any fhare in these foolish altercations, is to fit down with a married pair: the gentleman's good manners generally keeps his ill-humour confined to his wife, who having taken him for better and for worse, muft be content to bear the whole force of it.

I am particularly acquainted in a family where that is the cafe: the lady is not fond of cards, but plays fometimes to oblige her husband; and he good man, out of all patience, that his rib fhould not be a second Hoyle, by crofs looks, and sharp fpeeches, totally banishes, every idea she ever had: the rest of the company feel themfelves unhappy, and yet this is called amufement! Indeed I would advise every fingle lady, if poffible, to attend her inamorato, pretty frequently at the card table; and however genteel and agreeable his behaviour should be to herself, if he is hafty or pettish with any one elfe in company, fhe may depend on the fame fate when once the knot is tied.

I advise the gentlemen to purfue the fame method, for I do not pretend to fay the ladies play with more good humour than themselves. They may both, on these occafions, make fad difcoveries; and the who can rage, fret, or pout at the trifling

H

trifling disappointments which happen at cards, gives fmall proof of that patience, fortitude, and refignation which, joined to fweetness of temper, make the chief ornaments of a female character, and are indispensably neceffary in our paffage through life. My defign, is not to cenfure, indiscriminately, all who play: I am fo happy as to be intimately acquainted with feveral families, whose chearfulnefs, good humour, and evenness of temper, make cards really a relaxation: but as I think, in our most trivial actions, we fhould aim at the pleasure or profit of each other, and even in trifles do as we would be done by, fo I cannot help wishing every one to fit down with a determined refolution of being pleafed himself, or at leaft to appear fo, and contributing all in his power towards the pleasure of others.

I must confefs I never could fee the poffibility of any perfon's being happy when he found he had given pain to another. I believe if we endeavour to govern our tempers in these leffer inftances, we fhould find our account in it, and more easily behave with propriety in things of greater confequence, and then our very amusements would improve us. I have ever thought the inattention of most people to the foibles of their tempers, a very dangerous neglect, and often productive of

the

the most fatal confequences. The regulation can never be begun too early. The difpofition of children should be carefully watched, and whatever we find unamiable there, we fhould endeavour to correct, if we cannot totally eradicate it by our authority, till they are capable of reason, and when that period is arrived, by argument, convincing them, if poffible, of the neceffity of it, in a religious light, as well as in every other: but nothing will ever be fo convincing as our own example.

The Folly and Mifery of a Spendthrift.

HERE is scarcely among the evils of human

THE

life, any fo generally dreaded as poverty. Every other species of mifery, those who are not much accustomed to disturb the prefent moment with reflection, can eafily forget, because it is not always forced upon their regard: but it is impoffible to pass a day or an hour in the confluxes of men, without feeing how much indigence is expofed to contumely, neglect, and infult; and, in its lowest state, to hunger and nakedness; to injuries against which every paffion is in arms, and to wants which nature cannot fuftain.

Againft

Against other evils the heart is often hardened by true or false notions of dignity and reputation; thus we fee dangers of every kind faced with willingness, because bravery, in a good or bad caufe, is never without its encomiafts and admirers. But in the profpect of poverty, there is nothing but gloom and melancholy; the mind and body fuffer together; its miseries bring no alleviations; it is a ftate in which every virtue is obfcured, and in which no conduct can avoid reproach: a ftate in which chearfulness is infenfibility, and dejection fullennefs of which the hardships are without honour, and the labours without reward.

Of these calamities there feems not to be wanting a general conviction; we hear on every fide the noife of trade, and fee the streets thronged with numberlefs multitudes, whofe faces are clouded with anxiety, and whofe fteps are hurried by precipitation, from no other motive than the hope of gain and the whole world is put in motion, by the defire of that wealth, which is chiefly to be valued, as it fecures us from poverty; for it is more useful for defence than acquifition, and is not fo much able to procure good as to exclude

evil.

Yet there are always fome whofe paffions or follies lead them to a conduct oppofite to the general