already possess, and, I hope, take care not to forget, that language which he reserved for his horse. You are absolutely master too, of that language in which he said he would converse with men; French. But, in every language, pray attend carefully to the choice of your words, and to the turn of your expression. Indeed, it is a point of very great consequence. To be heard with success, you must be heard with pleasure: words are the dress of thoughts; which should no more be presented in rags, tatters, and dirt, than your person should. By the way; Do you mind your person and your dress sufficiently? Do you take great care of your teeth? Pray have them put in order by the best operator at Rome. Are you belaced, be-powdered, and be-feathered, as other young fellows are, and should be? At your age, il faut du brillant, et même un peu de fracas, mais point de médiocre, il faut un air vif, aisé, et noble. Avec les hommes, un maintien respectueux et en même tems respectable; avec les femmes, un caquet léger, enjoué, et badin, mais toujours fort poli.

To give you an opportunity of exerting your talents, I send you, here enclosed, a letter of recommendation from Monsieur Villettes, to Madame de Simonetti at Milan: a woman of the first fashion and consideration there: and I shall, in my next, send you another, from the same person to Madame Clerici, at the same place. As these two Ladies' houses are the resort of all the people of fashion at Milan, those two recommendations will introduce you to them all. Let me know, in due time, if you have received these two letters, that I may have them renewed, in case of accidents.

Adieu, my dear friend! Study hard; divert yourself heartily: distinguish, carefully, between the pleasures of a man of fashion, and the vices of scoundrel: pursue the former, and abhor the latter, like a man of sense.

LETTER CLXXXIV.

MY DEAR FRIEND, London, Feb. the 5th, O. S. 1750. VERY few people are good economists of their Fortune, and still fewer of their Time; and yet, of the two, the latter is the most precious. I heartily wish you to be a good economist of both; and you are now of an age to begin to think seriously of these two important articles. Young people are apt to think they have so much time before them, that they may squander what they please of it, and yet have enough left; as very great fortunes have frequently seduced people to a ruinous profusion. Fatal mistakes, always repented of, but always too late! Old Mr. Lowndes, the famous Secretary of the Treasury, in the reigns of King William, Queen Anne, and King George the First, used to say, take care of the pence, and the pounds will take care of themselves. To this maxim, which he not only preached, but practised, his two grandsons, at this time, owe the very considerable fortunes that he left them.

This holds equally true as to Time; and I most earnestly recommend to you the care of those minutes and quarters of hours, in the course of the day, which people think too short to deserve their attention; and yet, if summed up at the end of the year, would amount to a very considerable portion of time. For example; you are to be at such a place at twelve, by appointment; you go out at eleven, to make two or three visits first; those persons are not at home: instead of sauntering away that intermediate time at a coffee-house, and possibly alone; return home, write a letter, beforehand, for the ensuing post, or take up a good book, I do not mean Descartes, Mallebranche, Locke, or Newton, by

way of dipping; but some book of rational amusement; and detached pieces, as Horace, Boileau, Waller, La Bruyere, &c. This will be so much time saved, and by no means ill employed. Many people lose a great deal of time by reading: for they read frivolous and idle books; such as the absurd Romances of the two last centuries; where characters, that never existed, are insipidly displayed, and sentiments, that were never felt, pompously described: the oriental ravings and extravagancies of the Arabian Nights, and Mogul Tales: or, the new flimsy brochures that now swarm in France, of Fairy Tales, Réflexions sur le Cœur et l'Esprit, Métaphysique de l'Amour, Analyse des beaux Sentiments; and such sort of idle frivolous stuff, that nourishes and improves the mind just as much as whipped cream would the body. Stick to the best established books in every language; the celebrated Poets, Historians, Orators, or Philosophers. By these means (to use a city metaphor) you will make fifty per cent. of that time, of which others do not make above three or four, or probably nothing at all.

Many people lose a great deal of their time by laziness; they loll and yawn in a great chair, tell themselves that they have not time to begin any thing then, and that it will do as well another time. This is a most unfortunate disposition, and the greatest obstruction to both knowledge and business. At your age, you have no right nor claim to laziness; I have, if I please, being emeritus. You are but just listed in the world, and must be active, diligent, indefatigable. If ever you propose commanding with dignity, you must serve up to it with diligence. Never put off till to-morrow what you can do to-day.

Dispatch is the soul of business; and nothing contributes more to Dispatch, than Method. Lay down a method for every thing, and stick to it in

violably, as far as unexpected incidents may allow. Fix one certain hour and day in the week for your accompts, and keep them together in their proper order; by which means they will require very little time, and you can never be much cheated. Whatever letters and papers you keep, docket and tie them up in their respective classes, so that you may instantly have recourse to any one. Lay down a method also for your reading, for which you allot a certain share of your mornings; let it be in a consistent and consecutive course, and not in that desultory and immethodical manner, in which many people read scraps of different authors, upon different subjects. Keep a useful and short common-place book of what you read, to help your memory only, and not for pedantic quotations. Never read History without having maps, and a chronological book, or tables, lying by you, and constantly recurred to; without which, History is only a confused heap of facts. One method more I recommend to you, by which I have found great benefit, even in the most dissipated part of my life; that is, to rise early, and at the same hour every morning, how late soever you may have sat up the night before. This secures you an hour or two, at least, of reading or reflection, before the common interruptions of the morning begin; and it will save your constitution, by forcing you to go to bed early, at least one night in three.

You will say, it may be, as many young people would, that all this order and method is very troublesome, only fit for dull people, and a disagreeable restraint upon the noble spirit and fire of youth. I deny it; and assert, on the contrary, that it will procure you both more time and more taste for your pleasures; and, so far from being troublesome to you, that, after you have pursued it a month, it would be troublesome to you to lay it aside. Busi

ness whets the appetite, and gives a taste of pleasures, as exercise does to food: and business can never be done without method: it raises the spirits for plea sures; and a spectacle, a ball, an assembly, will much more sensibly affect a man who has employed, than a man who has lost, the preceding part of the day; nay, I will venture to say, that a fine lady will seem to have more charms, to a man of study or business, than to a saunterer. The same listlessness runs through his whole conduct, and he is as insipid in his pleasures, as inefficient in every thing else.

I hope you earn your pleasures, and consequently taste them; for, by the way, I know a great many men, who call themselves Men of Pleasure, but who, in truth, have none. They adopt other people's, indiscriminately, but without any taste of their own. I have known them often inflict excesses upon themselves, because they thought them genteel; though they sat as awkwardly upon them as other people's clothes would have done. Have no pleasures but your own, and then you will shine in them. What are yours? Give me a short history of them. Tenezvous votre coin à table, et dans les bonnes compagnies ? y brillez-vous du coté de la politesse, de l'enjouement, du badinage? Etes-vous galant? Filez-vous le parfait amour? Est-il question de fléchir par vos soins et par vos attentions les rigueurs de quelque fière Princesse ? You may safely trust me; for, though I am a severe censor of Vice and Folly, I am a friend and advocate for Pleasures, and will contribute all in my power to yours.

There is a certain dignity to be kept up in pleasures, as well as in business. In love, a man may lose his heart with dignity; but if he loses his nose, he loses his character into the bargain. At table, a man may with decency have a distinguishing palate; but indiscriminate voraciousness degrades him to a glutton, A man may play with decency;