knowledge, alone can merit, alone can procure. Dii tibi dent annos! de te nam cætera fumes, * was a pretty piece of poetical flattery, where it was faid; I hope that, in time, it may be no flattery when faid to you. But I affure you, that, whenever I cannot apply the latter part of the line to you with truth, I fhall neither fay, think, nor with the former.-Adieu ! LETTER LXVIII. Inftructions relative to Expenfes... Neceffity of keeping correc Accounts... Attention to the State of Pruffia. DEAR BOY, London, January the 10th. I HAVE received your letter of the 13th December. Your thanks for my prefent, as you call it, exceed the value of the prefent; but the ufe, which you affure me that you will make of it, is the thanks which I defire to receive. Due attention to the infide of books, and due contempt for the outfide, is the proper relation between a man of sense and his books. Now that you are going a little more into the world, I will take this occafion to explain my intentions as to your future expenfes, that you may know what you have to expect from me, and make your plan accordingly. I fhall neither deny nor grudge you any money, that may be neceffary for either your improvement or your pleasures; I mean, the pleafures of a rational being. Under the head of improvement, I mean the best books, and the best mafters, coft what they will; I alfo mean all the expenfe of lodgings, coach, drefs, fervants. &c. which, according to the feveral places where you may be, fhall be refpectively neceffary, to enable you to keep the beft company. Under the head of rational pleafures, I comprehend, firft proper charities, to real and compaffionate objects of it; fecondly, proper prefents, to thofe to whom you are obliged, or whom you defire to oblige; thirdly, a conformity of expense to May the Gods give you long life! for every thing elfe is your own. that of the company which you keep as in public fpectacles; your fhare of little entertainments; a few piftoles at games of mere commerce; and other incidental calls of good company. The only two articles which I will never fupply, are, the profufion of low riot, and the idle lavifhnefs of negligence and laziness. A fool fquanders away, without credit or advantage to himself, more than a man of fenfe fpends with both. The latter employs his money as he does his time, and never fpends a fhilling of the one, nor a minute of the other, but in fomething that is either useful or rationally pleafing to himfelf or others. The former buys whatever he does not want, and does not pay for what he does want. He cannot withstand the charms of a toy-shop, fnuff-boxes, watches, heads of canes, &c. are his deftruction. His fervants and tradesmen confpire with his own indolence, to cheat him; and, in a very little time, he is aftonished, in the midft of all the ri diculous fuper fluities, to find himself in want of all the real comforts and neceffaries of life. Without care and method, the largest fortune will not, and with them, almost the smalleft will fupply all neceffary expenfes. As far as you can poffibly, pay ready money, for every thing you buy, and avoid bills. Pay that money too yourfelf, and not through the hands of any fervant; who always either ftipulates poundage, or requires a prefent for his good word, as they call it. Where you must have bills (as for meat and drink, clothes, &c.) pay them regularly every month, and with your own hand. Never, from a mistaken economy, buy a thing you do not want, because it is cheap; or, from a filly pride, because it is dear. Keep an account, in a book, of all that you receive, and of all that you pay for no man, who knows what he receives, and what he pays, ever runs out. I do not mean that you fhould keep an account of the fhillings and half-crowns which you may spend in chair-hire, operas, &c. they are unworthy of the time, and of the ink that they would confume; leave fuch minutia to dull, penny-wife fellows: but remember, in oeconomy, as well as in every other part of life, to have the proper attention to proper objects, and the proper contempt for little ones. A ftrong mind fees things in their true proportions; a weak one views them through a magnifying medium; which, like the microfcope, makes an elephant of a flea; magnifies all little objects, but cannot receive great ones. I have known many a man pals for a mifer, by faving a penny, and wrangling for two-pence, who was undoing himself, at the fame time, by living above his income, and not attending to effential articles, which were above his portée. The fure characteristic of a found and strong mind, is, to find, in every thing, thofe certain bounds, quos ultra citraque nequit confiftere rectum.* These boundaries are marked out by a very fine line, which only good-fenfe and attention can difcover; it is much too fine for vulgar eyes. In manners, this line is good-breeding; beyond it, is troublefome ceremony; thort of it, is unbecomiag negligence and inattention. In morals, it divides oftentatious puritanifm from criminal relaxation; in religion, fuperftition from impiety; and, in fhort, every virtue from its kindred vice or weaknefs. I think you have fenfe enough to discover the line: keep it always in your eye, and learn to walk upon it; reft upon Mr. Harte, and he will poife you, till you are able to go alone. By the way, there are fewer people who walk well upon that line, than upon the flack rope; and, therefore, a good performer fhines fo much the more. Your friend, comte Pertingue, who conftantly inquires after you, has written to comte Salmour, the governor of the academy at Turin, to prepare a room for you there, immediately after the Afcenfion; and has recommended you to him, in a manner which, I hope, you will give him no reafon to repent, or be alhamed of. As comte Salmour's fon, now refiding at the Hague, is my particular acquaintance, I fhall have regular and authentic accounts of all that you do at Turin. During your ftay at Berlin, I expect that you fhould *On either fide of which is error. P inform yourself thoroughly of the prefent ftate of the civil, military, and ecclefiaftical government of the king of Pruflia's dominions. You must alfo inform yourself of the reformation which the king of Pruffia has lately made in the law; by which he has both leffened the number, and fhortened the duration of lawfuits: a great work, and worthy of fo great a prince! As he is indifputably the ableft prince in Europe, every part of his government deferves your moft diligent inquiry, and your moft serious attention. It must be owned that you fet out well, as a young politician, by beginning at Berlin, and then going to Turin, where you will fee the next ableft monarch to that of Pruffia; fo that, if you are capable of making political reflexions, thofe two princes will furnish you with fufficient mat ter. LETTER LXIX. Neceffity of an early Habit of Reflection.. Account of the Awthor's early Conduct. Prejudices Enthufiafm for the Ancients... Homer...Milton. Prejudices of Fashion ..The Pope... The Pretender.Prejudices of the French and English... Free and defpotic Governments. DEAR BOY, You London, February the 7th. OU are now come to an age capable of reflexion; and I hope you will do what, however, few people at your age do exert it, for your own fake, in the fearch of truth and found knowledge. I will confefs (for ! am not unwilling to difcover my fecrets to you) that it is not many years fince I have presumed to reflect for myfelf. Till fixteen or feventeen I had no reflexion; and, for many years after that, I made no use of what I had. I adopted the notions of the books I read, or the company I kept, without examining whether they were juft or not, and I rather chofe to run the risk of eafy error, than to take the time and trouble of inveftigating truth. Thus, partly from lazinefs, partly from diffipation, and partly from the mauvaise bante of reject Ι fashionable notions, I was (as I have fince found hurried away by prejudices, inftead of being guided by reafon; and quietly cherished error, instead of feeking for truth. But, fince I have taken the trouble of reafoning for myfelf, and have had the courage to own that I do fo, you cannot imagine how much my notions of things are altered, and in how different a light I now fee them, from that in which I formerly viewed them, through the deceitful medium of prejudice or authority. Nay, I may poffibly ftill retain many errors, which, from long habit, have perhaps grown into real opin ions; for it is very difficult to diftinguish habits, early acquired and long entertained, from the refult of our reafon and reflexion. My first prejudice (for I do not mention the prejudices of boys and women, fuch as hobgoblins, ghosts, dreams, fpilling falt, &c.) was my claffical enthufiafm, which I received from the books I read, and the mafters who explained them to me. I was convinced there had been no common fenfe nor common honesty in the world for thefe laft fifteen hundred years; but that they were totally extinguifhed with the ancient Greek and Roman governments. Homer and Virgif could have no faults, because they were ancient; Milton and Taffo could have no merit, because they were modern. And I could almoft have faid, with regard to the ancients, what Cicero, very abfurdly and unbecomingly for a philofoper, fays with regard to Plato, Cum quo errare malim quam cum aliis rectè fentire. Whereas now, without any extraordinary effort of genius, I have difcovered, that nature was the fame three thoufand years ago, as it is at prefent; that men were but men then as well as now; that modes and customs vary often, but that human-nature is always the fame. And I can no more fuppofe, that men were better, braver, or wifer, fifteen hundred or three thoufand years ago, than I can fuppofe that the animals, or vegetables, were better then than they are now. I dare affert too, in defiance of the favourers of the ancients, that Homer's Hero, Achilles, was both a brute and a * ▲ would rather err with him than be right with others. |