never adorn any character, but will always debase the best.  To prove this, suppose any man, without parts and some other good qualities, to be merely a whoremaster, a drunkard, or a gamester; how will he be looked upon by all sorts of people?  Why, as a most contemptible and vicious animal.  Therefore it is plain, that in these mixed characters, the good part only makes people forgive, but not approve, the bad.

I will hope and believe that you will have no vices; but if, unfortunately, you should have any, at least I beg of you to be content with your own, and to adopt no other body’s.

The adoption of vice has, I am convinced, ruined ten times more young men than natural inclinations.

As I make no difficulty of confessing my past errors, where I think the confession may be of use to you, I will own that when I first went to the university, I drank and smoked, notwithstanding the aversion I had to wine and tobacco, only because I thought it genteel, and that it made me look like a man.  When I went abroad, I first went to The Hague, where gaming was much in fashion, and where I observed that many people of shining rank and character gamed too.  I was then young enough, and silly enough, to believe that gaming was one of their accomplishments; and, as I aimed at perfection, I adopted gaming as a necessary step to it.  Thus I acquired by error the habit of a vice which, far from adorning my character, has, I am conscious, been a great blemish in it.

Imitate then, with discernment and judgment, the real perfections of the good company into which you may get; copy their politeness, their carriage, their address, and the easy and well-bred turn of their conversation; but remember that, let them shine ever so bright, their vices, if they have any, are so many spots which you would no more imitate, than you would make an artificial wart upon your face, because some very handsome man had the misfortune to have a natural one upon his:  but, on the contrary, think how much handsomer he would have been without it.

Having thus confessed some of my ‘egaremens’, I will now show you a little of my right side.  I always endeavored to get into the best company wherever I was, and commonly succeeded.  There I pleased to some degree by showing a desire to please.  I took care never to be absent or ‘distrait’; but on the contrary, attended to everything that was said, done, or even looked, in company; I never failed in the minutest attentions and was never ‘journalier’.  These things, and not my ‘egaremens’, made me fashionable.  Adieu!  This letter is full long enough.

LETTER LIV

Bath, October 19, O. S. 1748.

Dear boy:  Having in my last pointed out what sort of company you should keep, I will now give you some rules for your conduct in it; rules which my own experience and observation enable me to lay down, and communicate to you, with some degree of confidence.  I have often given you hints of this kind before, but then it has been by snatches; I will now be more regular and methodical.  I shall say nothing with regard to your bodily carriage and address, but leave them to the care of your dancing-master, and to your own attention to the best models; remember, however, that they are of consequence.