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get the victory, he ought ever to desist.

The idea

of conquest will so dazzle him, that it is hardly possible he should discern the truth. I have some

times thought the mind so calculated, that a small degree of force may impel it to a certain pitch of pleasure or of pain; beyond which it will not pass, by any impetus whatsoever. I doubt whether it be not true, that we hate those faults most in others which we are guilty of ourselves. A man of thorough sense scarcely admires even any one; but he must be an ideot, that is the admirer of a fool. It may be prudent to give up the more trivial parts of character for the amusement of the invidious: as a man willingly relinquishes his silver to save his gold from a highwayman. Better be ridiculed for an untoward peruke, than be attacked on the score of morals, as one would rather be pulled by the hair, than stabbed to the heart. Virtue seems to be nothing more than a motion consonant to the systim of things. Were a planet to fly from it's orbit, it would represent a vicious man. It is difficult not to be angry at beings we know incapable of acting otherwise than they do. One ought no more, if one reflect, to be angry at the stupidity of a man than of a horse, except it be vincible and voluntary; and yet the practice is otherwise. People say, "Do not regard what he says, now he is in liquor." Perhaps it is the only time he ought to be regarded: "Aperit præcordia liber." tience is the Panacea; but where does it grow, or who can swallow it? Wits uniformly exclaim against fools, yet fools are their proper foil; and it is from them alone they can learn what figure them selves make. Their behaviour naturally falls in with

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the generality, and furnishes a better mirror than that of artful people, who are sure enough to deceive you either on the favourable or the ill-natured side. We say, he is a man of sense who acknowledges the same truths that we do; that he is a man of taste who allows the same beauties. We consider him as a person of better sense and finer taste, who discerns more truths and more beauties in conjunction with ourselves: but we allow neither appellation to the man who differs from us. We deal out our

genuine esteem to our equals; our affection for those beneath us; and a reluctant sort of respect to those that are above us. Glory relaxes often and debilitates the mind; censure stimulates and contracts -both to an extreme. Simple fame is, perhaps, the proper medium. Persons of new families do

well to make magnificent funerals, sumptuous weddings, remarkable entertainments; to exhibit a number of servants in rich and ostentatious liveries; and to take every public occasion of imprinting on the mob an habitual notion of their superiority. For so is deference obtained from that quarter:

"Stupet in titulis & imaginibus."

One scarcely sees how it is possible for a country girl or a country fellow to preserve their chastity. They have neither the philosophical pleasure of books, nor the luxurious pleasure of a table, nor the refined amusement of building, planting, drawing, or designing, to divert their imagination from an object to which they seem continually to stimulate it by provocative allusions. Add to this the health and vigour that are almost peculiar to them. I am afraid there are many ladies who only exchange the pleasures of incontinence for the pleasure they de

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rive from censure. At least it is no injustice to conclude so, where a person is extravagantly censorious.

Persons of judgment and understanding may be divided into two sorts. Those whose judgment is so extensive as to comprehend a great deal; existences, systems, universals: but as there are some eyes so constituted as to take in distant objects, yet be excelled by others in regard to objects minute or near, so there are other understandings better calculated for the examination of particular objects.

The mind is at first an open field without partitions or enclosures. To make it turn to most account, it is very proper to divide and enclose. In other words, to sort our observations. Some men are called sagacious, merely on account of their avarice: whereas a child can clench it's fist the moment it is born. It is a point of prudence, when you converse with your inferior, to consider yourself as conversing with his inferior, with whom, no doubt, he may have the same connection that you have with him: and to be on your guard accordingly. How deplor

able then is a person's condition, when his mind can only be supported by flattery, and his constitution but by cordials! when the relief of his present complaint undermines it's own efficacy, yet encreases the occasion for which it is used; Short is then the duration of our tranquillity, or of our lives.

A man is not esteemed ill-natured for any excess of social affection; or an indiscreet profusion of his fortune on his neighbours, companions, or friends; altho' the true measure of his affections is as much impaired by this, as by selfishness. If any one's curse can effect damnation, it is not that of the Pope, but that of the poor. People of the finest

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A person, elevated one degree above the populace, assumes more airs of superiority than one that is raised ten. The reason is somewhat obvious. His superiority is more contestible. The character of a decent, well-behaved gentleman-like man seems more easily attainable by a person of no great parts or passions, than by one of greater genius and more volatility. It is there no mismanagement, for the former to be chiefly ambitious of it. When a man's capacity does not enable him to entertain or animate the company, it is the best he can do to render himself inoffensive, and to keep his teeth clean. But the person who has talents for discourse, and a passionate desire to enliven conversation, ought to have many improprieties excused, which in the other were unpardonable. A lady of good-nature would forgive the blunder of a country esquire, who, through zeal to serve her with a glass of claret, should involve his spurs in her Brussels apron. On the contrary, the fop (who may in some sense use the words of Horace; "Quod verum atque decens curo & rogo & ❝omnis in hoc sum,")

would be entitled to no pardon for such unaccountable misconduct. Man, in general, may be considered as a mechanic, and the formation of happiness as his business or employment: virtue, his repository or collection of instruments; the goods of fortune as his materials: in proportion as the workman, the instruments, and the materials excel, the work will be executed in the greater perfection.

The silly censorious are the very "fel naturæ," "the most bitter of all bitter things;" from the hyssop that grows upon the wall, to the satirist het piss against it. I have known a

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