there are manifest signs in it of your endeavouring to excel yourself, and of consequence to please me. You have succeeded in both respects, and will always succeed, if you think it worth your while to consider what you write, and to whom, and let nothing, though of a trifling nature, pass through your pen negligently; get but the way of writing correctly and justly. Time and use will teach you to write readily afterwards; not but that too much care may give a stiffness to your style, which ought in all letters, by all means to be avoided; the turn of them should be always natural and easy, for they are an image of private and familiar conversation. I mention this with respect to the four or five lines of yours, which have an air of poetry, and do therefore naturally resolve themselves into blank verses. I send you your letter again, that yourself may now make the same observation. But you took the hint of that thought from a poem; and it is no wonder, therefore, that you heightened the phrase a little when you were expressing it. The rest is as it should be; and particularly, there is an air of duty and sincerity, which, if it comes from your heart, is the most acceptable present you can make me. With these good qualities, an incorrect letter would please me, and without them, the finest thoughts and language will make no lasting impression on me. The great Being says, you know,-My son, give me thy heart; implying, that without it all other gifts signify nothing. Let me conjure you, never to say any thing, either in a letter, or common conversation, that you do not think; but always to let your mind and your words go together on the most trivial occasions. Shelter not the least degree of insincerity under the notion of a compliment, which, as far as it deserves to be practised by a man of probity, is only the most civil and obliging way of saying what you really mean; and whoever employs it otherwise.

throws away truth for breeding: I need not tell you how little this character gets by such an exchange.

say not this as if I suspected that in any part of your letter you intended to write what was proper, without any regard to what was true; for I am resolved to believe that you were in earnest from the beginning to the end of it, as much as I am, when I tell you that, I am, your loving father, &c.

LETTER XXVI.

Lord Chesterfield to his Son.

London, 30th October, 1747.

Dear Boy, I am very well pleased with your Itinerarium, which you sent me from Ratisbon. It shows me, that you observe and inquire as you go, which is the true end of travelling. Those who travel heedlessly from place to place, observing only their distance from each other, and attending only to their accommodation at the inn at night, set out fools, and will certainly return so. Those who only mind the raree-shows of the places which they go through, such as steeples, clocks, town-houses, &c. get so little by their travels, that they might as well stay at home. But those who observe, and inquire into the situations, the strength, the weakness, the trade, the manufactures, the government, and constitution of every place they go to; who frequent the best companies, and attend to their several manners and characters; those alone travel with advantage: and as they set out wise, return wiser.

I would advise you always to get the shortest description or history of every place where you make any stay; and such a book, however imperfect, will still suggest to you matter for inquiry; upon which you may get better information from the people of the place. For example; while you are at Leipsig, get some short account, (and to be sure there are many such,) of the pre

sent state of that town, with regard to its magistrates, its police, its privileges, &c., and then inform yourself more minutely, upon all those heads, in conversation with the most intelligent people. Do the same thing afterwards with regard to the Electorate of Saxony: you will find a short history of it in Puffendorff's Introduction, which will give you a general idea of it, and point out to you the proper objects of a more minute inquiry. In short, be curious, attentive, inquisitive, as to every thing; listlessness and indolence are always blameable, but, at your age, they are unpardonable. Consider how precious, and how important for all the rest of your life, are your moments for these next three or four years; and do not lose one of them. Do not think I mean that you should study all day long; I am far from advising or desiring it: but I desire that you would be doing something or other all day long; and not neglect half hours and quarters of hours, which, at the year's end, amount to a great sum. For instance; there are many short intervals in the day, between studies and pleasures: instead of sitting idle and yawning, in those intervals, take up any book, though ever so trifling a one, even down to a jest-book; it is still better than doing nothing.

Nor do I call pleasures idleness, or time lost, provided they are the pleasures of a rational being: on the contrary, a certain portion of your time, employed in those pleasures, is very usefully employed. Such are public spectacles, assemblies of good company, cheerful suppers, and even balls; but then these require attention, or else your time is quite lost.

There are a great many people, who think themselves employed all day, and who, if they were to cast up their accounts at night, would find, that they had done just nothing. They have read two or three hours mechanically, without attending to what they read and conse

quently, without either retaining it, or reasoning upon it. From thence they saunter into company, without taking any part in it, and without observing the characters of the persons, or the subjects of the conversation; but are either thinking of some trifle, foreign to the present purpose, or often not thinking at all; which silly and idle suspension of thought, they would dignify with the name of absence and distraction. They go afterwards, it may be, to the play, where they gape at the company and the lights; but without minding the very thing they went to, the play.

Pray do you be as attentive to your pleasures as to your studies. In the latter, observe and reflect upon all you read; and in the former, be watchful and attentive to all that you see and hear; and never have it to say, as a thousand fools do, of things that were said and done before their face,-that, truly, they did not mind them, because they were thinking of something else. Why were they thinking of something else? and if they were, why did they come there? The truth is, that the fools were thinking of nothing. Remember the hoc age: do what you are about, be that what it will; it is either worth doing well, or not at all. Wherever you are, have, (as the low, vulgar expression is,) your ears and your eyes about you. Listen to every thing that is said, and see every thing that is done. Observe the looks and countenances of those who speak, which is often a surer way of discovering the truth, than from what they say. But then keep all these observations to yourself, for your own private use, and rarely communicate them to others. Observe, without being thought an observer; for otherwise people will be upon their guard before you.

Consider seriously, and follow carefully, I beseech you, my dear child, the advice which from time to time I bave given, and shall continue to give you it is at

once the result of my long experience, and the effect of my tenderness for you. I can have no interest in it but yours. You are not yet capable of wishing yourself half so well as I wish you; follow, therefore, for a time at least, implicitly, advice which you cannot suspect, though possibly you may not yet see the particular advantages of it: but you will one day feel them. Adieu.

LETTER XXVII.*

A Student to his Mother.

My dear Mother, Though I am now sitting with my back towards you, yet I love you none the less; and what is quite as strange, I can see you just as plainly as if I stood peeping in upon you. I can see you all, just as you sit round the family table. Tell me, if I do not see you. There is my mother on the right of the table, with her knitting, and a book open before her; and anon she glances her eyes from the work on paper, to that on her needles; now counts the stitches, and then

puts her eye on the book, and starts off for another round. There is Mary looking wise, and sewing with all her might, now and then stopping to give Sarah and Louisa a lift in getting their lessons, and trying to initiate them in the

mysteries of geography. She is on

the left of the ta

*From Todd's Student's Guide.