it. It is good-breeding alone that can prepoffefs people in your favour at firft fight; more time being ne ceffary to difcover greater talents. This good-breeding, you know, does not confift in low bows and formal ceremony; but in an eafy, civil, and refpectful behaviour. You will therefore take care to answer with complaifance, when you are fpoken to; to place yourself at the lower end of the table, unless bid to go high; to drink firft to the lady of the houfe, and next to the mafler; not to eat awkwardly or dirtily; not to fit when others ftand : and to do all this with an air of complaifance, and not with a grave, four look, as if you did it all unwillingly. I do not mean a filly, infipid fmile, that fools have when they would be civil; but an air of fenfible good humour. I hardly know any thing fo difficult to attain, or fo necesary to poflefs, as perfect good-breeding; which is equally inconfiftent with a ftiff formality, an impertinent forwardness, and an awkward bafhfulness. A Nttle ceremony is often neceffary; a certain degree of firmnefs is abfolutely fo; and an outward modefly is extremely becoming: the knowledge of the world, and your own obfervations, muft, and alone can, tell you the proper quantities of each.-Adieu !

LETTER XXXIV.

Good-Breeding....Marks of Repect....Civility to the Female Sex.

DEAR BOY,

Tuesday.

GOOD-BREEDING is fo important an article in

life, and fo abfolutely necefiary for you, if you would pleafe, and be well received in the world, that I muft give you another lecture upon it, and poffibly this will not be the hat neither.

I only mentioned, in my laft, the general rules of common civility, which, whoever does not obferve, will pals for a hear, and be as unwelcome as one in company; and there is hardly any body brutal enough not

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to answer when they are spoken to, or not to fay, Sir, or Madam, according to the rank of the people they speak to. But it is not enough not to be rude; you fhould be civil, and diftinguished for your good-breeding. The firft principle of this good-breeding is, never to fay any thing that you think can be disagreeable to any body in company; but, on the contrary, you fhould endeavour to fay what will be agreeable to them, and that in an easy and natural manner, without feeming to study for compliments. There is likewifefucha thing as a civil look and a rude look; and you should look civil as well as be fo; for if, while you are faying a civil thing, you look gruff and furly, as most English bumpkins do, nobody will be obliged to you for a civility that feemed to come fo unwillingly. If you have occafion to contradict any body, or to fet them right from a mistake, it would be very brutal to fay, That is not fo; I know better; or, You are out; but you fhould fay, with a civil look, I beg your pardon, I believe you miftake, or, If I may take the liberty of contradicting you, I believe it is fo and fo; for, though you may know a thing better than other people, yet it is very hocking to tell them so directly, without fomething to foften it; but, remember particularly, that whatever you fay, or do, with ever fo civil an intention, a great deal confifts in the manner and the look, which must be genteel, eafy, and natural, and is cafier to be felt. than defcribed.

Civility is particularly due to all women; and remember, that no provocation whatfoever can juftify any man in not being civil to every woman; and the greateft man in England would justly be reckoned a brute, if he was not civil to the meaneft woman. It is due to their fex, and is the only protection they have against the fuperior ftrength of ours. Obferve the best and most well-bred of the French people, how agreeably they infinuate little civilities in their converfation. They think it fo effential, that they call an honeft and civil man by the fame name, of honnête homwe; and the Romans called civility bumanitas, as thinking it infeparable from humanity; and depend upon

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it, that your reputation and fuccefs in the world will, in a great meature, depend upon the degree of goodbreeding you are mafter of. You cannot begin too early to take that turn, in order to make it natural and habitual to you; which it is to very few Englishmen, who, neglecting it while they are young, find out, too late, when they are old, how neceflary it is, and then cannot get it right.—Adieu !

I

DEAR BOY,

LETTER XXXV.

Style... Admonitions to Diligence."

Dublin Castle, November the 12th.

HAVE received your two letters, of the 26th October, and 2d November, both which were pretty correct; excepting that you make ufe of the word difaffection to exprefs want of affection, in which fenfe it is feldom or never ufed, but with regard to the gov ernment. People who are against the government are faid to be difaffected; but one never fays, fuch a perfon is difaffected to his father, his mother, &c. though in truth it would be as proper; but ufage alone decides of language; and that ufage as I have obferved before is, the ufage of people of fashion and letters. The common people, in every country, fpeak their own language very ill; the people of fashion (as they ate called) fpeak it better, but not always correctly, be caufe they are not always people of letters. Those who fpeak their own language the moft accurately are thofe who have learning, and are at the fame time in the polite world; at least their language will be reckoned the ftandard of the languages of that country. The grammatical rules of moft languages are pretty nearly the fame, and your Latin Grammar will teach you to speak English grammatically. But every language has its particular idioms and peculiarities, which are not to be accounted for, but, being established by ufage, must be fubmitted to; as, for inftance, How do you do? is abfolute nonfenfe, and has no meaning at

all; but is ufed by every body, for, What is the state of your health? There are a thousand expreffions of this kind in every language, which, though infinitely abfurd, yet, being univerfally received, it would be fill more abfurd not to make ufe of them.-I had a letter by laft poft from Mr. Maittaire, in which he tells me, that your Greek Grammar goes on pretty well, but that you do not retain Greek words, without which your Greek rules will be of very little ufe. This is not want of memory, I am fure, but want of attention; for all people remember whatever they attend to. They fay, that "Great wits have fhort memories;" but I fay, that only fools have fhort ones; because they are incapable of attention, at least to any thing that deferves it, and then they complain of want of memory.

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It is aftonishing to me that you have not an ambition to excel in every thing you do; which, by attention to each thing, and to no other at that time, you might eafily bring about. Can any thing be more flattering than to be acknowledged to excel in whatever one attempts? And can idlenefs and diffipation afford any pleafure equal to that? Qui nil molitur ineptè, was faid of Homer; and is the best thing that can be faid any body. Were I in your place, I proteft I fhould be melancholy and mortified, if I did not both conftrue Homer, and play at pitch, better than any boy of my own age, and in my own form. I like the epigram you fent me laft very well, and would have you in every letter tranfcribe ten or a dozen lines out of fome good I leave the choice of the fubject, and of the language, to you. What I mean by it is, to make you retain fo many fhining palages of different authors, which writing them is the likelieft way of doing, provided you will but attend to them while you write them. Adieu! Work hard, or you will pafs your time very ill at my return.

author;

Who does nothing awkwardly.

I

LETTER XXXVI.

Horace.. Style of the Auguftan Age... Epigram.

DEAR BOY,

Dublin, February the 18th.

RECEIVED your letter, of the 11th, with great pleafure, it being well written in every fenfe. I am glad to find that you begin to tafte Horace ; the more you read him the better you will like him. His Art of Poetry is, in my mind, his mafter-piece; and the rules he there lays down are applicable to almost every part of life. To avoid extremes, to obferve propriety, to confult one's own ftrength, and to be confiftent from beginning to end, are precepts as ufeful for the man as for the poet. When you read it, have this obfervation in your mind, and you will find it holds true througheut. You are extremely welcome to my Tacitus, provided you make a right ufe of it; that is, provided you read it; but I doubt it is a little too difficult for you yet. He wrote in the time of Trajan, when the Latin language had greatly degenerated from the purity of the Auguftan Age. Befides, he has a peculiar concifenefs of Style, that often renders him obfcure. But he knew, and defcribes mankind perfectly well; and that is the great and useful knowledge. You cannot apply yourself too foon, nor too carefully to it. The more you know men, the lefs you will truft them. Young people have commonly an unguarded openness and franknefs; they contract friendships cafily, are credulous to profeffions, and are always the dupes of them. If you would have your fecret kept, keep it to yourself and, as it is very poffible that your friend may one day or other become your enemy, take care not to put yourfelf in his power while he is your friend. The fame arts and tricks that boys will now try upon you, for balls, bats, and half-pence, men will make ufe of with you, when you are a man, for other purposes.

:

Your French epigram is a pretty one. I fend you another in return, which was made upon a very infignificant obfcure fellow, who left a funa