8.  But at the same time the hen, that has all this seeming ingenuity (which is indeed absolutely necessary for the propagation of the species) considered in other respects, is without the least glimmerings of thought or common sense.  She mistakes a piece of chalk for an egg, and sits upon it in the same manner:  she is insensible of any increase or diminution in the number of those she lays:  she does not distinguish between her own and those off another species; and when the birth appears of ever so different a bird, will cherish it for her own.  In all these circumstances, which do not carry an immediate regard to the subsistence of herself or her species, she is a very idiot.

9.  There is not, in my opinion, any thing more mysterious in nature than this instinct in animals, which thus, rises above reason, and falls infinitely short of it.  It cannot be accounted for by any properties of matter, and at the same time works after so odd a manner, that one cannot think it the faculty of an intellectual being.  For my own part, I look upon it as upon the principle of gravitation in bodies, which is not to be explained by any known qualities inherent in the bodies themselves, nor from any laws in mechanism; but, according to the best notions of the greatest philosophers, is an immediate impression from the first mover, and the divine energy acting in the creature.

Good-Breeding.

1.  Complaisance renders a superior amiable, an equal agreeable, and an inferior acceptable.  It smoothes distinction, sweetens conversation, and makes every one in the company pleased with himself.  It produces good nature and mutual benevolence, encourages the timorous, soothes the turbulent; humanizes the fierce, and distinguishes a society of civilized persons from a confusion of savages.  In a word, complaisance is a virtue that blends all orders of men together in a friendly intercourse of words and actions, and is suited to that equality in human nature which every one ought to consider, so far as is consistent with the order and economy of the world.

2.  If we could look into the secret anguish and affliction of every man’s heart, we should often find, that more of it arises from little imaginary distresses, such as checks, frowns, contradictions, expressions of contempt, and (what Shakspeare reckons among other evils under the sun)

    “—­The poor man’s contumely, The insolence of office, and the spurns
    That patient merit of the unworthy takes,”

than from the more real pains and calamities of life.  The only method to remove these imaginary distresses as much as possible out of human life, would be the universal practice of such an ingenious complaisance as I have been here describing, which, as it is a virtue, may be defined to be a “constant endeavour to please those whom we converse with, so far as we may do it innocently.”

3.  Good-breeding necessarily implies civility; but civility does not reciprocally imply good-breeding.  The former has its intrinsic weight and value, which the latter always adorns, and often doubles by its workmanship.