affairs that he who is guilty of it towards him on whom he depends, fares like the beggar who exposes his sores, which, instead of moving compassion, makes the man he begs of turn away from the object. I cannot tell what is become of him, but I remember about sixteen years ago an honest fellow who so justly understood how disagreeable the mention or appearance of his wants would make him that I have often reflected upon Lim as a counterpart of Irus, whom I have formerly mentioned. This man, whom I have missed for some years in my walks, and have heard was some way employed about the army, made it a maxim that good wigs, delicate linen, and a cheerful air, were to a poor dependent the same that working tools are to a poor artificer. It was no small entertainment to me, who knew his circumstances, to see him, who had fasted two days, attribute the thinness they told him of to the violence of some gallantries he had lately been guilty of. The skillful dissembler carried this on with the utmost address; and if any suspected his affairs were narrow, it was attributed to indulging himself in some fashionable vice rather than an irreproachable poverty, which saved his credit with those on whom he depended. The main art is to be as little troublesome as you can, and make all you hope for come rather as a favor from your patron than claim from you. But I am here prating of what is the method of pleasing so as to succeed in the world, when there are crowds who have-in city, town, court, and country-arrived to considerable acquisitions, and yet seem incapable of acting in any constant tenor of life, but have gone on from one successful error to another: therefore I think I may shorten this inquiry after the method of pleasing, and as the old beau said to his son, once for all, "Pray, Jack, be a fine gentleman," so may I to my reader abridge my instructions and finish the art of pleasing in a word, "Be rich.” LAURENCE STERNE. (1713-1768.) ODDLY humorous is the characteristic note of the personality of this author, as well as of his writings. There is nothing quite like them, or to be classed with them, in our own or in any other literature; although he may be said to have followed Rabelais, he is so distinctly himself that no one can be said to have followed him. Indeed, those who have accused him of plagiarism, not without justice perhaps, have been obliged to admit that he has so invested his pickings with the Shandean flavor that their own authors would not recognize them. Without writing a single book which may be called great, either in plot or in style, he has given to the world a group of characters which have become as personal acquaintances to thousands who have never read his writings. My Uncle Toby,' 'Mr. and Mrs. Shandy,' 'The Widow Wadman,' Yorick,' 'Corporal Trim,' and 'Dr. Slop,' are familiar in our mouths as household words, and many of their sayings and expressions have become a part of the language. Laurence Sterne was born at Clonmel, Ireland, on Nov. 24, 1713. His father was an officer in the 34th Regiment, and the child was dragged from barrack to transport, from Ireland to England, knocking about in this way until in 1722 he was sent to a school in Halifax, Yorkshire. Here be continued till 1731, when his father died. While there, he tells us, the schoolmaster "had the ceiling of the schoolroom new whitewashed; the ladder remained there; I one unlucky day mounted it, and wrote with a brush in large capital letters, LAU. STERNE,' for which the usher severely whipped me. My master was very much hurt at this, and said before me that never should that name be effaced, for I was a boy of genius, and he was sure that I should come to preferment. This expression made me forget the stripes I had received." In 1732 he went to the University of Cambridge, and in 1736 he received the degree of B.A. After this he went to his uncle, Dr. Jaques Sterne, at York, where he made the acquaintance of the lady whom he married in 1741. After his marriage his uncle procured him the prebendary of York. By his wife's means he later acquired the living of Stillington. "I had then very good health," he says. "Books, painting, fiddling, and shooting were my amusements." Leaving his family at York, he went up to London in 1761 to publish the first two volumes of 'The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gent. The success of these was enough to turn his head, and, fortune still favoring him, he was the same year presented with the curacy of Coxwold, "a sweet retirement." Here he resided for some years at Shandy Hall in the village, and here also he finished his Tristram Shandy' and other works. In 1762 he went to France, the outcome of his journey thither being the 'Sentimental Journey,' |