perhaps, with interest. This is not perfidy nor dissimulation; it would be so, if you were, at the same time, to make professions of esteem and friendship to this man; which I by no means recommend, but, on the contrary, abhor. All acts of civility are, by common consent, understood to be no more than a conformity to custom, for the quiet and conveniency of society, the agrémens of which are not to be disturbed by private dislikes and jealousies. Only women and little minds pout and spar for the entertainment of the company, that always laugh at and never pity them. For my own part, though I would by no means give up any point to a competitor, yet I would pique myself upon shewing him rather more civility than to another man. In the first place, this behaviour infallibly makes all the laughers on your side, which is a considerable party; and, in the next place, it certainly pleases the object of the competition, be it either man or woman; who never fail to say, upon such an occasion, that they must own you have behaved yourself very handsomely in the whole affair.' DISSEMBLE RESENTMENT TOWARDS ENEMIES. short, let this be one invariable rule of your conduct: Never to shew the least symptom of resentment which you cannot, to a certain degree, gratify; but always to smile when you cannot strike. There would be no living in the world if one could not conceal and even dissemble the just causes of resentment, which one meets with every day in active and busy life. Whoever cannot master his humour should leave the world, and retire to some hermitage in an unfrequented desert. By shewing an unavailing and sullen resentment, you authorise the resentment of those who can hurt you, and whom you cannot hurt; and give them that very pretence which, perhaps, they wished for, of breaking with and injuring you; whereas the contrary Dehaviour would lay them under the restraints of decency, at least, and either shackle or expose their malice. Besides, captiousness, sullenness, and pouting are most exceedingly illiberal and vulgar.

In

TRUST NOT TOO MUCH TO ANY MAN'S HONESTY.Though men are all of one composition, the several ingredients are so differently proportioned in each individual that no two are exactly alike; and no one, at all times, like himself. The ablest man will, sometimes, do weak things; the proudest man mean things; the honestest man ill things; and the wickedest man good things. Study individuals then; and, if you take (as you ought to do) their outlines from their prevailing passion, suspend your last finishing strokes till you have attended to and discovered the operations of their inferior passions, appetites, and humours. A man's general character may be that of the honestest man in the world: do not dispute it; you might be thought envious or ill-natured; but, at the same time, do not take this probity upon trust to such a degree as to put your life, fortune, or reputation, in his power. This honest man may happen to be your rival in power, in interest, or in love; three passions that often put honesty to most severe trials, in which it is too often cast; but first analyze this honest man yourself, and then only you will be able to judge how far you may or may not with safety trust him.

STUDY THE FOIBLES AND PASSIONS OF BOTH SEXES.

Men

-If you would particularly gain the affection and friendship of particular people, whether man or woman, endeavour to find out their predominant excellency, if they have one, and their prevailing weakness, which every body has; and do justice to the one, and something more than justice to the other. have various objects in which they may excel, or, at least, would be thought to excel; and, though they love to hear justice done to them where they know that they excel, yet they are most and best йattered upon those points where they wish to excel, and yet are doubtful whether they do or not. As, for example: Cardinal Richelieu, who was undoubtedly the ablest statesman of his time, or perhaps of any other, had the idle vanity of being thought the best poet too; he envied the great Corneille his reputation, and

ordered a criticism to be written on the Cid. Those, therefore, who flattered skilfully said little to him of his abilities in state affairs, or, at least, but en passant, and as it might naturally occur. But the incense which they gave him, the smoke of which they knew would turn his head in their favour, was as a bel esprit and a poet. Why? because he was sure of one excellency, and distrustful as to the other.

FLATTER THE VANITY OF ALL.-You will easily discover every man's prevailing vanity, by observing his favourite topic or conversation; for every man talks most of what he has most a mind to be thought to excel in. Touch him but there, and you touch him to the quick.

Women have in general but one object, which is their beauty; upon which scarce any flattery is too gross for them to swallow. Nature has hardly formed a woman ugly enough to be insensible to flattery upon her person. If her face is so shocking that she must, in some degree, be conscious of it, her figure and her air, she trusts, make ample amends for it. If her figure is deformed, her face, she thinks, counterbalances it. If they are both bad, she comforts herself that she has graces, a certain manner, a je ne sais quoi, still more engaging than beauty. This truth is evident, from the studied and elaborate dress of the ugliest women in the world. An undoubted, uncontested, conscious beauty is, of all women, the least sensible of flattery upon that head; she knows it is her due, and is therefore obliged to nobody for giving it her. She must be flattered upon her understanding; which, though she may possibly not doubt of herself, yet she suspects that men may distrust.

Do not mistake me, and think that I mean to recommend to you abject and criminal flattery; no: flatter nobody's vices nor crimes; on the contrary, abhor and discourage them. But there is no living in the world without a complaisant indulgence for people's weaknesses and innocent though ridiculous vanities. If a man has a mind to be thought wiser and a woman handsomer than they really are, their

error is a comfortable one to themselves, and an innocent one with regard to other people; and I would rather make them my friends, by indulging them in it, than my enemies, by endeavouring (and that to no purpose) to undeceive them.

SUSPECT THOSE WHO REMARKABLY AFFECT ANY ONE VIRTUE.- --Suspect, in general, those who remarkably affect any one virtue; who raise it above all others, and who, in a manner, intimate that they possess it exclusively: I say, suspect them; for they are commonly impostors: but do not be sure that they are always so; for I have sometimes known saints really religious, blusterers really brave, reformers of mankind really honest, and prudes really chaste. Pry into the recesses of their hearts yourself, as far as you are able, and never implicitly adopt a character upon common fame, which, though generally right as to great outlines of characters, is always wrong in some particulars.

GUARD AGAINST PROFFERED FRIENDSHIP.-Be upon your guard against those who, upon very slight acquaintance, obtrude their unasked and unmerited friendship and confidence upon you; for they probably cram you with them only for their own eating; but, at the same time, do not roughly reject them upon that general supposition. Examine farther, and see whether those unexpected offers flow from a warm heart and a silly head, or from a designing head and a cold heart; for knavery and folly have often the same symptoms. In the first case, there is no danger in accepting them-valeant quantum valere possunt. In the latter case, it may be useful to seem to accept them, and artfully to turn the battery upon him who raised it.

DISBELIEVE ASSERTIONS BY OATHS.-If a man uses strong oaths or protestations to make you believe a thing which is of itself so likely and probable that the bare saying of it would be sufficient, depend upon it he lies, and is highly interested in making you believe it; or else he would not take so much pains

SHUN RIOTOUS CONNEXIONS.-There is an incontinency of friendship among young fellows, who are associated by their mutual pleasures only, which has, very frequently, bad consequences. A parcel of warm hearts and unexperienced heads, heated with convivial mirth, and possibly a little too much wine, vow, and really mean at the time, eternal friendships to each other, and indiscreetly pour out their whole souls in common, and without the least reserve. These confidences are as indiscreetly repealed as they were made; for new pleasures and new places soon dissolve this illcemented connexion, and then very ill uses are made of these rash confidences. Bear your part, however, in young companies; nay, excel, if you can, in all the social and convivial joy and festivity that become youth. Trust them with your love tales, if you please; but keep your serious views secret. Trust those only to some tried friend, more experienced than yourself, and who, being in a different walk of life from you, is not likely to become your rival; for I would not advise you to depend so much upon the heroic virtue of mankind as to hope or believe that your competitor will ever be your friend, as to the object of that competition.

A SEEMING IGNORANCE OFTEN NECESSARY.A seeming ignorance is often a most necessary part of worldly knowledge. It is, for instance, commonly advisable to seem ignorant of what people offer to tell you; and, when they say, Have you not heard of such a thing? to answer, No: and to let them go on, though you know it already. Some have a pleasure in telling it, because they think they tell it well; others have a pride in it, as being the sagacious discoverers; and many have a vanity in shewing that they have been, though very undeservedly, trusted; all these would be disappointed, and consequently displeased, if you said, Yes. Seem always ignorant (unless to one most intimate friend) of all matters of private scandal and defamation, though you should hear them a thousand times; for the parties affected always look upon the receiver to be almost as bad as