diligence, they might fashion their minds as fuccefsfully as Madam Catharina difforts her body.

There is not in the world a more useJefs idle animal, than he who contents himfelf with being merely a Gentleman. He has an estate, therefore, he will not endeavour to acquire knowledge: he is not to labour in any vocation, therefore he will do nothing. But the misfortune is, that there is no fuch thing in nature as negative virtue, and that abfolute idlene's is impracticable. He who does no good, will certainly do mifchief; and the mind, if it is not stored with ufeful knowledge, will neceffarily become a magazine of nonfenfe end trifles. Wherefore a gentleman, though he is not obliged to rife to open his fhop, or work at his trade, fhould always find fome ways of employing his time to ad vantage. If he makes no advances in wifdom, he will become more and more a flave to folly; and he that does nothing, becaufe he has nothing to do, will 'become vicious and abandoned, or at beft ridiculous and contemptible.

I do not know a more melancholy object than a man of an honeft heart "and fine natural abilities, whofe good qualities are thus deltroved by Indolence. 'Such a pérfon is a conftant plague to all his friends and acquaintance, with all the means in his power of adding to their happiness and fuffers himself to rank among the lowest characters, when he might render himself conspicuous among the hig eft. Nobody is more univerfally beloved, and more univerfally avoided, than my friend Carelefs. He is an humane man, who never did a beneficent action; and a man of unfhaken integrity, on whom it is impoffible to depend. With the helt head, and the best heart, he regulates his condu in the moit abfurd manner, and frequently injures his friends; for whoever neglects to do juftice to himself, must inevitably wrong thofe with whom he is connected; and it is by no means a true maxim, that an idle man hurts nobody but himself.

Virtue then is not to be confidered in the light of mere innocence, or abstaining from harm; but as the exertion of our faculties in doing good: as Titus, when he had let a day flip, undistingui hed by fome act of virtue, cried out

I have loft a tay.' If we regard our time in this light, how many days

fhall we look back upon as irretrievably loft? and to how narrow a compais would fuch a method of calculation frequently reduce the longest life? If we were to number our days according as we have applied them to virtue, it would occafion ftrange revolutions in the manner of reckoning the ages of men. We should fee fome few arrived to a good old age in the prime of their youth, and meet with feveral young fellows of fourfcore.

Agreeable to this way of thinking, I remember to have met with the epitaph of an aged man, four years old; dating his existence from the time of his reformation from evil courfes. The infcriptions on mott tomb-ftones commemorate no acts of virtue performed by the perfons who lie under them, but only record, that they were born one day, and died another. But I would fain have thofe people, whofe lives have been ufelefs, rendered of fome fervice after their deaths, by affording leffons of inftruction and morality to thofe they leave behind them. Wherefore I could with, that in every parifh feveral acres were marked out for a new and fpacious Burying ground in which every perfon, whofe remains are there deposited, fhould have a fmall ftone laid over them, reckoning their age, according to the manner in which they have improved or abufed the time allotted them in their lives.

In fuch circumstances, the plate on a coffin might be the highest panegyvic which the deceafed could receive; and a little fquare ftone, inferibed with

་

Ob. Ann. Etat. 80,' would be a nobler eulogium than all the lapidary adulation of modern epitaphs. In a Burying-ground of this nature, allowing for the partiality of furvivors, which would certainly point out the most brilliant actions of their dead friends, we might perhaps fee fome inferiptions not much unlike the following.

'Here lie the remains of a celebrated Beauty, age 50, who died in her • fifth year. She was born in her eighteenth year, and was untimely killed by the fmall- pox in her twenty-third.'

Herc refts, in eternal sleep, the mertal part of L. B. a Free thinker, aged 88, an Infant. He came into the world by chance in the year→→→ and was annibilated in the first year ' of his age.'

• Here

Here continue to rot the bones of a noted Buck, an embryo, which never fhewed any figns of life; but after twenty-three years was fo totally putrified, that it could not be kept above ground any longer."

Here lies the fwoln carcafe of a Boon Companion, who was born in a droply in his 40th year. He linger⚫ed in this condition, till he was obliged to be tapped; when he relapfed into his former condition, and died in the fecond year of his age, and twentythird of his drinking.'

I

Know not any greater misfortune that can happen to a young fellow, at his first fetting out in life, than his falling into Low Company. He that finks to a familiarity with perfons much below his own level, will be conftantly weighed down by his bafe connections; and, though he may eafily plunge ftill lower, he will find it almoft impoffible ever to rise again. He will allo inevitably contract a mean air, and an illi beral difpolition; and you can no more give him an ingenuous turn of mind, by a fudden introduction to genteel conpany, than you can make an apprentice a fine gentleman, by dreffing him in embroidery: though experience teaches us, that the mind is, unhappily, fooner diftorted than reformed; and a gentleman will as readily catch the manners of the vulgar, by mixing with fuch mean affociates, as he would daub his cloaths with foot, by running against a chimney-fweeper.

A propensity to low company is owing, either to an original meannefs of fpirit, a want of education, or an illplaced pride, commonly arifing from both the fore-mentioned caules. Thofe who are naturally of a grovelling difpotion, fhew it even at Ichool, by chufing their playfellows from the fcum of the clafs, and are never fo happy as when they can steal down to romp with the fervants in the kitchen. They have

no emulatio in them: they entertain none of that decent pride, which is fo effential a requifite in all characters; and the total abfence of which, in a boy, is a certain indication that his riper age will be contemptible. I remember a young fellow of this caft, who, by his early attachment to Low Company, gave up all the advantages of a good family and ample fortune. He not only lost all his natural intereft in the county where his eftate was fituated, but was not honoured with the acquaintance of one gentleman in it. He lived, indeed, chiefly in town, and at an exper ce fufficient to have maintained him among those of the firit rank; but he was fo perpetually furrounded with men of the lowest cha rafter, that people of fashion, or even thofe of much inferior fortune, would have thought it infamous to be feen with him. All the while, he was reckoned, by his affociates, to be a mighty good natured gentleman, and without the least bit of pride in him.

It is one of the greatest advantages of education, that it encourages an inenuous fpirit, and cultivates a liberal difpofition. We do not wonder, that a lad who has never been fent to school, and whofe faculties have been fuffered to ruft at the hall-houfe, fhould form too close an intimacy with his belt friends, the groom and the game-keeper; but it would amaze us to fee a boy

well

well-educated, cherish this ill-placed pride of being, as it is called, the head of the company. A perfon of this humble ambition will be very well content to pay the reckoning, for the honour of being distinguished by the title of The Gentleman: while he is unwilling to affociate with men of fashion, left they fhould be his fuperiors in rank or fortune; or with men of parts, let they fhould excel him in abilities. Some times, indeed, it happens, that a perfon of genius and learning will stoop to receive the incenfe of mean and illiterate flatterers in a porter-houfe or cyder-cellar; and I remember to have heard of a poet, who was once caught in a brothel in the very fact, of reading his verfes to the good old mother and a circle of her daughters.

There are fome few who have been led into Low Company, merely from an affectation of Humour; and, from a defire of feeing the droller fcenes of life, have defcended to affociate with the meaneft of the mob, and picked their cronies from lanes and alleys. The most striking instance I know of this low paffion for drollery is Toby Bumper, a young fellow of family and fortune, and not without talents, who has taken more than ordinary pains to degrade himself, and is now become aloft as low a character as any of thote whom he has chofen for his companions. Toby will drink puil in a morning, fmoke his pipe in a night-cellar, dive for a dinner, or eat black-puddings at Bartholomew Fair, for the humour of the thing. He has alfo ftudied, and practifes, all the plebeian arts and exercifes, under the belt mafters; and has difgraced himfelf with every impolite accomplishment. He has had many a fet to with Buckhorfe; and has now and then had the honour of receiving a fall from the great Broughton himself. Nobody is better known among the hackney-coachmen, as a brother-whip: at the noble game of prifon-bars, he is

a match even for the natives of Effex or Cheshire; and he is frequently engaged in the Artillery Ground with Faulkner and Dingate at cricket, and is hitelf esteemed as good at Bat as either of the Bennets. Another of Toby's favou rite amufements is, to attend the executions at Tyburn; and it once happened, that one of his familiar intimates was unfortunately brought thither; when Toby carried his regard to his deceafed friend fo far, as to get himfelf knocked down in endeavouring to refcue the body from the furgeons.

As Toby affects to mimic, in every particular, the air and manners of the vulgar, he never fails to enrich his converfation with their emphatic oaths, and expreffive dialect; which recommend him as a man of excellent humour and high fun, among the Choice Spirits at Comus's Court, or at the meetings of the Sons of Sound Senfe and Satisfaction. He is alfo particularly famous for finging thofe cant fongs, drawn up in the barbarous dialect of sharpers and pick-pockets; the humour of which he often heightens, by ferewing up his mouth, and rolling about a large quid of tobacco between his jaws. Thefe, and other like accompliments, fre quently promote him to the chair in thete facetious Societies.

Toby has indulged the fame notions of Humour even in his amours; and is well known to every ftreet-walker between Charing Crofs and Cheapfide. This has given feveral fhocks to his conftitution, and often involved him in unlucky fcrapes. He has been frequently bruifed, beaten and kicked, by the bullies of Wapping and Fleet Ditch; and was once foundly drubbed by a foldier, for engaging with his trull in St. James's Park. The last time I faw him, he was laid up with two black eyes and a broken pate, which he got in a midnight fkirmish, about a mistress, in a night cellar.

SIR,

IF

TO MR. TOWN.

MIDDLE TEMPLE.

IF we look into the feveral inns of court, the profeffed ftudents of the law compose a very numerous body: but if we afterwards turn our eyes on thofe few who are employed in exercifing their talents in Weftminster Hall, this prodigious army of lawyers fhrinks to a very thin and inconfiderable corps. Thoufands, it feems, are difguited with the unpleafing drynefs of the study, as it is now managed, and conceive an unconquerable averfion to the white leaves and the old black letter. This early diflike to legal inquiries certainly proceeds from the fatal mistakes in the plan of study hitherto recommended. According to all fyftems now extant, it is abfolutely impoffible to be at once a lawyer and a fine gentleman. Seeing with concern the many evils arifing from these erroneous principles, I have at length devised a method to remedy all thefe inconveniencies; a method now very fuccessfully practifed by feveral young gentlemen. Wherefore I must beg leave to fubmit my thoughts to the public by means of your paper, and to chalk out the outlines of a trearife, now ready for the prefs, intituled, The Compleat Barrister; or, a New Inftitute of the Laws of England.

My Lord Coke prefcribes to our ftudent to follow the advice given in the ancient verses prefixed to this letter, for the good fpending of the day: Six hours to fleep, fix to the fludy of the law, four to prayer, two to meals, and the reft to the Mufes.' But what an abfurd and unfashionable diftribution of the four-and-twenty hours! I will venture a thousand pounds to a fhilling, that not one student in the kingdom divides his time in this manner. Here is not a fingle word of Vauxhall, Ranelagh, the theatres, or other

Co. LITT.

public diverfions; not to mention, that nobody but a methodit would ever think of praying four hours; and that it would be impoffible, though we were. content with fnapping up a chop every day at Betty's, to difpatch even dinner in two. How then fhall we reconcile

thefe precepts, fcarce practicable by an hermit, to the life of a young gentleman, who keeps the best company; or how can these rules for fevere application be made confiftent with the practice of thefe, who divide their whole time between eating, drinking, fleeping, and amufements? Well knowing that the volatile difpofitions of the young gentlemen of the prefent age can never fubmit the ordering of their lives to any prefcribed rules, I have endeavoured to fquare my precepts to their lives; and have fo contrived the matter, that amidst the keeneft purfuit of their pleatures, they thall be engaged in the most improving courfe of the law.

As laws are chiefly nothing elfe but rules of action, what can be more cruel and abfurd, than to coup up a brifk young man, to learn, in his chamhers, what he can fo much better teach himself by going abroad into the world? I propofe to dofe gentlemen with study, as Dr. Rock does with phyfic, to be taken at home or abroad, without loss of time or hindrance of business. This, I am convinced, is not only the best method, but alfo the only fcheme which feveral inhabitants of the inns of court would ever follow. I fhall not at prefent forestall the contents of my treatise, by prefenting you with a dry abstract of it; but rather endeavour to give you an idea of the fpirit and manner in which it is written, by delineating the plan diligently pursued by one of my favourite pupils: and I cannot but congratu late the bar, that fo many young men, inttead of blinding their eyes and hewildering their understandings with Coke,

Plowden,