not lessen your personal regard for his merit; but that, on the contrary, his zeal and ability in the service of his master, increase it; and that, of all things, you desire to make a good friend of so good a servant.  By these means you may, and will very often be a gainer:  you never can be a loser.  Some people cannot gain upon themselves to be easy and civil to those who are either their rivals, competitors, or opposers, though, independently of those accidental circumstances, they would like and esteem them.  They betray a shyness and an awkwardness in company with them, and catch at any little thing to expose them; and so, from temporary and only occasional opponents, make them their personal enemies.  This is exceedingly weak and detrimental, as indeed is all humor in business; which can only be carried on successfully by, unadulterated good policy and right reasoning.  In such situations I would be more particularly and ‘noblement’, civil, easy, and frank with the man whose designs I traversed:  this is commonly called generosity and magnanimity, but is, in truth, good sense and policy.  The manner is often as important as the matter, sometimes more so; a favor may make an enemy, and an injury may make a friend, according to the different manner in which they are severally done.  The countenance, the address, the words, the enunciation, the Graces, add great efficacy to the ‘suaviter in modo’, and great dignity to the ‘fortiter in re’, and consequently they deserve the utmost attention.

From what has been said, I conclude with this observation, that gentleness of manners, with firmness of mind, is a short, but full description of human perfection on this side of religious and moral duties.  That you may be seriously convinced of this truth, and show it in your life and conversation, is the most sincere and ardent wish of, Yours.

LETTER CXXXIV

London, March 11, O. S. 1751.

My dear friend:  I received by the last post a letter from Abbe Guasco, in which he joins his representations to those of Lord Albemarle, against your remaining any longer in your very bad lodgings at the Academy; and, as I do not find that any advantage can arise to you from being ‘interne’ in an academy which is full as far from the riding-house and from all your other masters, as your lodgings will probably be, I agree to your removing to an ‘hotel garni’; the Abbe will help you to find one, as I desire him by the inclosed, which you will give him.  I must, however, annex one condition to your going into private lodgings, which is an absolute exclusion of English breakfasts and suppers at them; the former consume the whole morning, and the latter employ the evenings very ill, in senseless toasting a l’Angloise in their infernal claret.  You will be sure to go to the riding-house as often as possible, that is, whenever your new business at Lord Albemarle’s does not hinder you.  But, at