rosity than ordinary, though they may have some kindness for him they have seldom much respect; and the warmth of their kindness is very seldom sufficient to compensate the coldness of their respect. Men of no more than ordinary discernment never rate any person higher than he appears to rate himself. He seems doubtful himself, they say, whether he is perfectly fit for such a situation or such an office, and immediately give the preference to some impudent blockhead who entertains no doubt about his own qualifications. Though they should have discernment, yet, if they want generosity, they never fail to take advantage of his simplicity, and to assume over him an impertinent superiority which they are by no means entitled to. His good nature may enable him to bear this for some time; but he grows weary at last, and frequently when it is too late, and when that rank which he ought to have assumed is lost irrecoverably, and usurped, in consequence of his own backwardness, by some of his more forward, though much less meritorious, companions. A man of this character must have been very fortunate in the early choice of his companions if, in going through the world, he meets always with fair justice even from those whom, from his own past kindness, he might have some reason to consider as his best friends; and a youth, too unassuming and to unambitious, is frequently followed by an insignificant, complaining, and discontented old age.

Those unfortunate persons whom nature has formed a good deal below the common level, seem sometimes to rate themselves still more below it than they really are. This humility appears sometimes to sink them into idiotism. Whoever has taken the trouble to examine idiots with attention, will find that in many of them the faculties of the understanding are by no means weaker than in several other people, who, though acknowledged to be dull and stupid, are not by any body accounted idiots. Many

idiots, with no more than ordinary education, taught to read, write, and account tolerably w persons, never accounted idiots, notwithstandin careful education, and notwithstanding that in vanced age they have had spirit enough to learn what their early education had not taught never been able to acquire, in any tolerable d one of those three accomplishments. By an pride, however, they set themselves upon a leve equals in age and situation, and, with courage an maintain their proper station among their compa an opposite instinct the idiot feels himself be company into which you can introduce him. I which he is extremely liable, is capable of thr into the most violent fits of rage and fury. B usage, no kindness or indulgence, can ever ra converse with you as your equal. If you can to converse with you at all, however, you will find his answers sufficiently pertinent and eve But they are always stamped with a distinct co of his own great inferiority.

He seems to shrink, and, as it were, to retire look and conversation, and to feel when he pla in your situation, that, notwithstanding your app descension, you cannot help considering him as below you. Some idiots, perhaps the greater to be so chiefly or altogether, from a certain nu torpidity in the faculties of the understanding. are others in whom those faculties do not ap torpid or benumbed than in many other people w accounted idiots. But that instinct of pride, ne support them upon an equality with their breth totally wanting in the former, and not in the latt

That degree of self-estimation, therefore, whi

butes most to the happiness and contentment of the person himself, seems likewise most agreeable to the impartial spectator. The man who esteems himself as he ought, and no more than he ought, seldom fails to obtain from other people all the esteem that he himself thinks due. He desires no more than is due to him, and he rests upon it with complete satisfaction.

The proud and the vain man, on the contrary, are constantly dissatisfied. The one is tormented with indignation at the unjust superiority, as he thinks it, of other people; the other is in continual dread of the shame which he foresees would attend upon the detection of his groundless pretensions. Even the extravagant pretensions of the man of real magnanimity, though, when supported by splendid abilities and virtues, and, above all, by good fortune, they impose upon the multitude, whose applauses he little regards, do not impose upon those wise men whose approbation he can only value, and whose esteem he is most anxious to acquire. He feels that they see through, and suspects that they despise, his excessive presumption; and he often suffers the cruel misfortune of becoming, first the jealous and secret, and at last the open, furious, and vindictive enemy of those very persons whose friendship it would have given him the greatest happiness to enjoy with unsuspicious security.

Though our dislike to the proud and the vain often disposes us to rank them rather below than above their proper station, yet, unless we are provoked by some particular and personal impertinence, we very seldom venture to use them ill. In common cases we endeavour for our own ease rather to acquiesce, and, as well as we can, to accommodate ourselves to their folly. But, to the man who underrates himself, unless we have both more discernment and more generosity than belong to the greater part of men, we

seldom fail to do at least all the injustice which h himself, and frequently a great deal more. He is more unhappy in his own feelings than either the the vain, but he is much more liable to every so usage from other people. In almost all cases it to be a little too proud than in any respect too and, in the sentiment of self-estimation, some excess seems, both to the person himself and to th tial spectator, to be less disagreeable than any d defect.

In this, therefore, as well as in every other emo sion and habit, the degree that is most agreeable t partial spectator is likewise most agreeable to th himself; and according as either the excess or the least offensive to the former, so either the one or is in proportion least disagreeable to the latter.

CONCLUSION OF THE SIXTH PART.

CONCERN for our own happiness recommends to us the virtue of prudence; concern for that of other people, the virtues of justice and beneficence—of which the one restrains us from hurting, the other prompts us to promote that happiness. Independent of any regard either to what are or to what ought to be, or to what upon a certain condition would be the sentiments of other people, the first of those three virtues is originally recommended to us by our selfish, the other two by our benevolent affections. Regard to the sentiments of other people, however, comes afterwards both to enforce and to direct the practice of all those virtues; and no man, during either the whole course of his life or that of any considerable part of it, ever trod steadily and uniformly in the paths of prudence, of justice, or of proper beneficence, whose conduct was not principally directed by a regard to the sentiments of the supposed impartial spectator, of the great inmate of the breast, the great judge and arbiter of conduct. If in the course of the day we have swerved in any respect from the rules which he prescribes to us; if we have either exceeded or relaxed in our frugality: if we have either exceeded or relaxed in our industry; if through passion or inadvertency we have hurt in any respect the interest or happiness of our neighbour; if we have neglected a plain and proper opportunity of promoting that interest and happiness—it is this inmate who in the evening calls us to an account for all those omissions and violations, and his reproaches often make us blush inwardly, both for our folly and inattention to our own happiness, and for our still greater indifference and inattention, perhaps, to that of other people.