very uncertain about. I own I rather suspect it was owing to the latter feeling; and here I would observe, that as pride is the most conspicuous fault of two persons with whom you most intimately converse, so you must expect but little quarter from us, though in justice it ought to be otherwise; yet it is a fact, that Pride hates that pride in another, which virtue and humility would only disapprove.

This vanity, madam, makes you one of the most remarkable egotists that I have ever known; whatever is defective in the character of others, is generally reproved by telling the company how careful you have been to guard against it! And whatever is commendable, you inform us, and often without any mystery, that you are a bright example of! Though you frequently mention former mistakes, it is only as a decent kind of preface, by which you may introduce a declaration of your being grown wiser than you formerly were! Indeed nothing is easier than to accuse, or even to insult former Self, if present Self may but receive an accession of honour. The inconveniences of this figure of speech are obvious enough, but there is one happy effect attending it, which people are not sufficiently sensible of I mean that, by this means, vanity often talks itself into a consumption; for it effectually stops the mouths of others who would be ready to praise us, if we would leave the work to their care; or it produces such direct compliments as are tantamount to the keenest stabs of satire, and so are poisons to our vanity, rather than its food.

An excess of jealousy is another imperfection which I have often observed in you as well as in myself; by which I mean only a disposition to be very much displeased with trifles which are not worth regarding at all. This, in a lady of so much good sense, is peculiarly remarkable, and an illnatured world will be ready to gather arguments from every brighter part of your character to strengthen and aggravate this defect.

The natural consequence of this morbid sensibility is a readiness to express the displeasure which arises upon mere trifles by fretful and impatient speeches. With due submission, madam, I think you are peculiarly obliged to be upon your guard against this, because I hardly know any body whose temper inclines them more keenly to resent any thing that looks like peevishness in others. Now it is obvious, that if we cannot bear such kind of speeches, the best way to avoid hearing them is to take care never to indulge in them ourselves.

Upon this occasion, madam, I must observe, that you have often displayed your wisdom in an instance wherein mine constantly fails me. When you have said a hasty thing, and another answers with some smartness, you have known how, if not entirely to keep your own temper, which is by no means in your own power, yet at least to smother that resentment which would naturally arise upon such a provocation.

But, even while you are attempting this, your prudence does sometimes remarkably fail you, for

you cannot forbear triumphing over your antagonist by saying that he is hot and fierce, and that you will not talk any more because he cannot bear it! This, madam, may be very true, but yet you know it is more provoking than any thing that you could say; because it is glorying in your own superior wisdom, at the same time that you are exposing the imperfection of his temper in an important instance. However, you will have this consolation, that the rest of the company will perceive you are a sharer in the imperfection, though you do not know it, for they will naturally conclude, that if you were not very angry, you would not have taken so unseasonable a time for reproving him.

Another particular is, that though you seem to take a reproof with more patience and thankfulness than any person of your temper, that I ever met with in the whole course of my acquaintance, yet you sometimes attempt to defend, or at least to excuse yourself, by charging the same failure upon the person who blames you. Methinks, madam, you should not stoop so low, unless it were to serve a particular friend; nay, even to such a one I would not repeat such a condescension, for it is natural to imagine that reproofs which are given at such a time proceed from spleen and pride, rather than from wisdom and love; and then it is odds but your friend entirely despises your remarks, at least it is certain he will not think himself at all obliged to you for them.

Once more, madam, when you have contracted an aversion to any person, you are admirably ingenious

in giving the most unlucky turn in the world to every thing that he says or does, and you are apt to allow yourself the liberty of censuring his character with the utmost severity. If such remarks come to the ear of a person who has the misfortune to fall under your displeasure, it certainly provokes him, and makes him your determined enemy.

In the mean time, is not a negligent egotism the least agreeable way of entertaining a company which a lady of so much religion and good sense could possibly invent? Besides, when people imagine that your temper inclines you to aggravate faults to an excess, they will have the less regard for your judgment in those censures which are really equitable and rational.

These, madam, are, so far as I can recollect, the only faults I have ever observed in your behaviour; and I am ready to conclude there is a rational foundation for each of these reflections, because I perceive that the wisest and best of your friends, and those who most intimately know you, all agree in these sentiments. I thought it a more candid and generous part to mention them to you, than to dwell upon them in the company of others, and am fully assured that you will take it kindly. Their enumeration has been both a difficult and unpleasant task, but I find a sweetness in any trouble which may be serviceable to you; and I hope that what I have been doing will not be entirely useless to myself, since what I have said upon each of these heads will lay me under an

additional obligation to avoid the faults which I undertake to censure.

There is one immediate satisfaction attending the review of what I have written, which I will presume to mention, though perhaps modesty would rather require me to conceal it. It is that I am encouraged to hope that I shall never want matter upon any other subject, since I could write so large a letter upon a theme so barren in itself as the defects of Mrs. Wingate. I am, with the utmost sincerity and respect,

Your very great Admirer, your affectionate Friend, and obliged humble Servant,

PHILIP DODDRIDGE.

TO MR. WRIGHT*.

REV. SIR,

January 17, 1727.

IF I had not so very great a respect for you, I should be a much more punctual correspondent; but I frequently suppress an inclination to write, that I may not put you to any unnecessary trouble or expense.

Dr. Doddridge may be considered fortunate in having, at this early period, conciliated the friendship of Mr. afterwards Dr. Wright, who, among many excellencies of the head and the heart, is said to have had a certain hauteur in his general deportment.

He was educated at Attercliffe, under the learned Mr. Timothy Jollie; and, after having been for some time chaplain to Lady Susanna Lort, was chosen assistant to Dr. Grosvenor, a celebrated