SPECTATOR'S LIBRARY.

SOCIAL PHIL060PUT, The Letters of Philip Dormer Stanhope, Earl of Chesterfield ; Including numerous Letters now first published from the Original Manuscripts. Edited, with Notes,

by Lord Mahon. In four volumes Bentley. FICTION,

The White Slave ; or the Russian Peasant Girl. By the Author of " Revelations in

Russia." In three volumes Colbiwn.

LORD MAHON'S EDITION or LORD CHESTERFIELD'S LETTERS.

IT has happened to Chesterfield as to other men, to be better known by some accidental circumstances and characteristics than by his essential qualities. The weight which he attached to manners, in his cele- brated Letters to his Son, and still more the importance which he ascribed to particular forms, and the minute details he entered into re- specting them, probably combined with the sarcasms of Dr. Johnson, have rendered him in popular estimation little more than a " wit amongst lords " and the first of fine gentlemen. This is a mistaken notion, even if it be grounded on those remarkable epistles ; for the case was special. His only son, and the sole object of his future hopes, was illegitimate ; incapable of succeeding to title or estate, and not merely dependent on himself for advancement in life, but having a difficulty to struggle with, through the stigma of his birth, which Chesterfield felt might operate in- juriously,—as in fact it really did with George the Second,* besides pro- ducing a sort of open fracas at Brussels between Dayrolles, the British Resident, and the Imperial Ambassador. This youth appears to have possessed a solid ability, with great perseverance, and an addiction to learning, accompanied by a penetrating judgment, and a sense as sound perhaps as that of his father, though his taste directed it to different re- sults. His education had been cultivated with a degree of care and attention of which we remember no other example. The first masters in every department of letters and science were employed ; distance was disregarded when mere superiority was in question—as Leipzic was chosen for German, or rather for a particular professor of pub- lic law • above all, these studies were directed and stimulated by Chesterfield himself: He addressed young Philip upon rhetoric at eight years old ; explaining the art in a style adapted to a child's comprehen- sion, but with a clearness to which little could be added, and exhorting him to study it. At a previous period, he had drawn up for him still simpler abridgments of ancient and modern history and so forth, (not then procurable as now) ; and throughout the whole course of his edu- cation, the father continually directed his son what to read and how to read it ; furnishing him with some pithy outlines of history deduced from original reading, (for none of our historians had then written,) and com- pelling research by proposing questions to be answered, very often upon contemporary subjects, under the guise of wanting information. By these advantages, it would appear, Philip Stanhope profited well. Before twenty, he had mastered Greek, Latin, French, Italian, and German, logic, the various branches of public law, and history, especially the modern diplomatic part of it. At the same age he had visited the prin- cipal cities of Europe from Naples to Berlin ; had been presented at many of the principal courts ; had made acquaintance on terms of greater or less familiarity with some of the most eminent men and most accom- plished women of the age; and even in his teens had been employed in the British Embassy at Paris. In the exercises—dancing, riding, fencing —he had acquired competent skill, and for dancing he appears to have had some taste : but, partly from natural disposition, partly from Westminster, Leipzic, and the professors he lived among, he had acquired habits not pleasing in any one, but destructive to advancement, at least to early advancement, in the line of life for which he was designed—that of the courtier, the diplomatist, and Parliament man. It might, with his native character, be an injudicious choice. We think it was ; and that the law or finance would have been a more congenial profession. But with respect to them his father might answer, that his interest would avail nothing in law, and that both professions were occupied, whereas diplomacy was in demand ; as he writes to his son, atat. sixteen, on resigning the office of Secretary of State. " Do not apprehend that my retirement from business may be a hinderance to your advancement in it, at a proper time: on the contrary, it will promote it; for, having nothing to ask for myself, I shall have the better title to ask for you. But you have still a surer way than this of rising, and which is wholly in your power. Make yourself necessary; which with your natural parts, you may by application

i

do. We are in general, in England, ignorant of foreign affairs; and of the inte- rests, views, ipretensions, and policy of other courts. That part of knowledge never enters our thoughts, nor makes part of our education: for which rea- son,. we have fewer proper subjects for foreign commissions than any other coun- try in Europe; and when foreign affairs happen to be debated in Parliament, it is incredible with how much ignorance. The harvest of foreign affairs being then so great and the labourers so few, ifyou make yourself master of them you will make yourself necessary, first as a foreign, and then as a domestic minister for that department."

The choice having been made, there is no doubt but that a habit of in- distinct speaking, a brusque manner, a slovenly disregard of personal appearance especially in dress, an appearance of absence, and an awkward timidity in company, which subsequently passed into indifference towards persons he did not value, especially ladies, were all or each great drawbacks to success in the business of courts. The difficulty of removing these appears to have been increased by young Stanhope's standing upon the principle, that solid matter and real merit were in- dependent of externals. This position Chesterfield combats, not as false in itself, but as injurious in practice. His reiteration of "sacrifice to the graces," his continual recommendation of attention to manners and forms, (as opposed to substance,) sometimes in general remarks, some- times by historical examples, sometimes by sketches of contemporary

• Newcastle, who was taken with young Stanhope, and perbaps had an eye to

his father's Parliamentary interest and abilities' no • him to the Residency at Venice when scarcely of age; but the King refused to confirm the appoint- ment, on account of his birth. life, and often by directions so minute that in any other hands they would become ludicrous and contemptible, were partly of the nature of con- troversy, and of controversy to meet a particular case ; partly on the principle of Reynolds that when a bow has been bent long in one di- rection it must be as much reversed to get it straight. We must also consider that the age was very formal and polite, yet tolerant to some extent of gross habits and strange peculiarities, more socially and perhaps more morally offensive than anything public opinion would now permit. Hence, manners were more necessary, and the want of them more apt to degenerate into coarseness and brutality, than is now likely to be the case, when practice has rendered the want of decent behaviour less offensive than it then might become. At that time, on the Continent royal favour, in England royalty and the heads of sundry great families, could do more than now ; so that individuals were really of greater weight. Still, with all the circumstances of a peculiar person to deal with, and an age that attached great importance to manners, Chesterfield does not in the main do more than a system of criticism urges in respect to the words and syllables of style—the manner of composition. Their importance he expressly bases on his son's chosen pursuit. Your profession has this agreeable peculiarity in it which is, that it is con- nected with and promoted by pleasures; and it is the only one in which a thorough knowledge of the world, polite manners, and an engaging address, are absolutely necessary. If a lawyer knows his law, a parson his divinity, and a financier his calculations, each may make a figure and a fortune in his profession, without great knowledge of the world, and without the manners of gentlemen. But your profession throws you into all the intrigues and cabals as well as pleasures of courts: in those windings and labyrinths, a knowledge of the world, a discern- ment of characters, a suppleness and versatility of mind, and an elegancy of manners, must be your clue: you must know how to soothe and lull the monsters that guard, and how to address and gain the fair that keep, the golden fleece. These are the arts and the accomplishments absolutely necessary for a foreign minister; in which it must be owned, to our shame, that most other nations out- do the English; and, cteteris paribus, a French minister will get the better of an English one at any third court in Europe. The French have something more liant, more insinuating and engaging in their manner, than we have. An Eng- lish minister shall have resided seven years at a court without having made any one personal connexion there, or without being intimate and domestic in any one house. He is always the inglish minister, and never naturalized. He receives his orders, demands an audience, writes an account of it to his court, and his business is done. A French minister, on the contrary, has not been six weeks at a court without having, by a thousand little attentions, insinuated himself into some degree of favour with the prince, his wife, his mistress, his favourite, and his minister. He has established himself upon a familiar and domestic footing in a dozen of the best houses of the place; where he has accustomed the people to be not only easy but unguarded before him: he makes himself at home there, and they think him so. By these means, he knows the interior of those courts; and can almost write prophecies to his own, from the knowledge he has of the characters, the humours, the abilities, or the weaknesses of the actors."

And again, in a more particular prospect-

" Suppose (which is by no means improbable) that, at your return to England, I should place you near the person of some one of the Royal Family: in that si- tuation good-breeding, engaging address, adorned with all the graces that dwell at courts, would very probably make you a favourite, and from a favourite a minister: but all the knowledge and learning in the world, without them, never would. The penetration of princes seldom goes deeper than the surface. It is the exterior that always engages their hearts; and I would never advise you to give yourself much trouble about their understandings. Princes in general (I mean those Porphyrogenets who are born and bred in purple) are about the pitch of women; bred up like them, and are to be addressed and gained in the same manner. They always see, they seldom weigh. Your lustre, not your solidity, must take them: your inside will afterwards support and secure what your out- side has acquired."

Nor was Chesterfield perhaps more truly understood by his own age than be has been by posterity. Acknowledged politeness, wit, and oratory, were the qualities assigned to him ; and Pope's characteristic is " attic wit. In both subjects, without question, he attained great eminence. He was, however, by no means sui generic—no rara avis except in excellence— but the head of a numerous class, that of a man or rather a philosopher of the world. This is not in any way lowering or degrading Chesterfield : for thoroughly to know society in theory, and in practice to master it, is as difficult perhaps as to discover some laws of matter or ofmind; requiringthe same acumen, the same reflection, as much if not more industry, with a readiness of resource and personal accomplishments that the speculative philosopher does not need. A man of the world regards the "shows of things as little as the philosophical inquirer : rank, birth, forms, ceremo- nies, he rates at their true value—perhaps underrates them; but he assigns them an outward importance, according to their operation upon human af- fairs. As much a philosopher as Aristippus or Epicurus, he forms a system by which pleasure and utility are made the main ends of life. The pleasures of the senses are to be refined from their grossness, lest taste and decorum should be offended. They are to be indulged in with moderation, lest health should suffer. They are to be intermingled with studies or busi- ness, to avoid frivolity of character, give zest to the interchange, and escape satiety. If the proposition were put to such a man, he might hold that as matter and its properties, and even mind itself, are presented to us clothed in forms, form is a law and a most important law of nature, and manners as necessary a part of an advanced society as shape and colours in the animal and vegetable world. But, without going so deeply, he finds men are so constituted that manners please them, and that he who pleases exercises influence. He would therefore cultivate them as a means of pleasure and a source of advantage : but as all excellence im- plies a native bent habitually exercised, many men of the world have formed a taste, that is as much offended by a bad manner as a musical ear by a false note, or a literary critic by a turgid phrase or an improba- ble incident. Manners indicate the mind. Low or awkward habits show a bad education, or a want of attention. Nothing needs be said on personal cleanliness ; it is essential to health and comfort, and to avoid offence : but the slightest speck or oddity in appearance must be avoided, as marring the completeness of the omnis homo, showing the want of a sense of fitness, and exposing a person to ridicule or perhaps to a nick- name.

Except in polite pleasures not of a nature to injure fortune or health,

many of these men are strict moralists, at least in matters that might be proved against them. Their character must be without spot. Whe- ther this be the result of taste, temperament, or habit, or of obedience to a moral law, may be debated : when such a man, says Sterne, tells me that a thing goes against his conscience, I look upon it in precisely the same light as if he said it went against his stomach. But whatever the theory or principle may be, the utility of a strict, and with some a lofty morality, is the avowed ground of action. Hear Chesterfield on the text of " Honesty's the best policy." His son was then eighteen.

"London, May 17, 0. S., 1750.

"My dear Friend—Your apprentice is near out, and you are soon to set up for yourself: that approaching moment is a critical one for you, and an anxious one for me. A tradesman who would succeed in his way must begin by establish- ing a character of integrity and good manners: without the former, nobody will go to his shop at all; without the latter, nobody will go there twice. This rule does not exclude the fair arts of trade. He may sell his goods at the best price he can within certain bounds. He may avail himself of the humour, the whims, and the fantastical tastes of his customers: but what he warrants to be good must be really so, what he seriously asserts must be true, or his first fraudulent profits will soon end in a bankruptcy. It is the same in higher life, and in the great business of the world. A man who does not solidly establish and really deserve a character of truth, probity, good manners, and good morals, at his first setting out in the world, may impose and shine like a meteor for a very short time, but will very soon vanish, and be extinguished with contempt. People easily pardon, in young men, the common irregularities of the senses; but they do not forgive the least vice of the heart. The heart never grows better by age; I fear rather worse, always harder. A young liar will be an old one, and a young knave will only be a greater knave as he grows older. But should a bad young heart, accompanied with a good head, (which, by the way, very seldom is the case,) really reform in a more advanced age from a consciousness of its folly as well as of its guilt, such a conversion would only be thought prudential and political, but never sincere."

And again, on a Latin thesis which young Stanhope had sent him two years earlier, maintaining a doctrine that may be gathered from Chester- field's reply.

" I must now say something as to the matter of the lecture; in which, I con- fess, there is one doctrine laid down that surprises me. * * * * "I cannot conceive that the use of poison can, upon any account, come within the lawful means of self-defence. Force may, without doubt, be justly repelled by force, but not by treachery and fraud: for I do not call the stratagems of war, such as ambuscades, masked batteries, false attacks, &c., frauds or treachery; they are mutually to be expected and guarded against: but poisoned arrows, poi- soned waters, or poison administered to your enemy, (which can only be done by treachery,) I have always heard, read, and thought, to be unlawful and infamous means of defence, be your danger ever so great. But, si fermium exuere mine- tetur; must I rather die than poison this enemy? Yes, certainly, much rather die than do a base or criminal action: nor can I be sure, beforehand, that this enemy may not in the last moment ferociam exuere. But the public lawyers now seem to me rather to warp the law, in order to authorize, than to check those unlawful proceedings of princes and states, which by being become common ap- pear less criminal, though custom can never alter the nature of good and ill. " Pray let no quibbles of lawyers, no refinements of casuists, break into the plain notions of right and wrong which every man's right reason and plain com- mon sense suggest to him. To do as you would be done by, is the plain, sure, and undisputed rule of morality and justice. Stick to that; and be convinced, that whatever breaks into it in any degree, however speciously it may be turned, and however puzzling it may be to answer it, is notwithstanding false in itself; unjust, and criminal." It is remarked by Johnson, that " Iago bellows at Brabantio's window in terms that a modern audience would not easily endure, but without injury to the scheme of the play." There is something more than this. Iago's " terms " are in exact conformity to his character. Whatever may be the temperament or conduct or even morality of a " man of the world," his discourse is always "facetious." Graduating his terms to the charac- ter and position of the person he addresses, Iago is always as smutty as he dare to be. Chesterfield likewise omits no opportunity of this kind. His terms, indeed, are polished, and his allusions delicate; so much so, that unless his drift has been seized his phrases would often be puzzling, and at times the Italics alone convey the meaning. This fault Chesterfield has in common with a very large class ; and with him " vice loses half its evil by losing all its grossness." The manner in which he urges " gallantry" upon his son, and in the case of " Paimable petite Blot," to the seduction of a married woman of unblemished character, if not without example is without excuse; as are his frequent allusions to the topic, evidently out of curiosity, when, in his own words, " non sum qualis cram." Born in 1694, he was educated by the men of the court of Charles the Second, if not formed in that court : his youth and manhood were passed amid the polished profligacy of Paris and the Hague, or the profligacy without polish of the earlier Monarchs of the house of Brunswick. These considerations may form an excuse for his own conduct and opinions, but are none for his paternal inculcations ; whose turpitude is far greater than Johnson's coarse sarcasm expresses. Half-a-dozen excisions or less would remove the worst of them, but the existence of one establishes the turpitude. With the class of men of whom Chesterfield was the facile prineeps, "time is my estate" forms the motto. Lose not a moment is the maxim, whatever the practice may be. For the " dolce far niente" they have neither sympathy nor toleration ; as little, perhaps, for reverie or re- flection that cannot in some way be turned to account. Study, busi- ness, exercise, or pleasure, should occupy every minute. Chesterfield's recipe for reading the lighter classics is too indelicate for modern habits to be quoted ; but it is a curious example of making the most of every minute. In the opinion of this school, however, it is very possible to waste time even on study. The classics and capital modern authors form the taste and teach the language; criticism and virtu have analogous effects. . These, like polite pleasures, may be constantly pursued within cer- tain : the particular kind of reading connected with your profession most be studied au fond. All else is useless, and to be avoided. No- thing should be studied as a pursuit or an amusement;, for it wastes time and gets you nothing. Beware of bibliography, bibliomania, a taste for collecting anything, low sports, and even music.

"As you are now in a musical country, where singing, fiddling, and piping are not only the common topics of conversation, but almost the principal objects of attention, I cannot help cautioning you against giving into those (I will call them illiberal) pleasures, (though music is commonly reckoned one of the liberal arts,) to the degree that most of your countrymen do when they travel in Italy. Ifyou love music, hear it ; go to operas, concerts, and pay fiddlers to play to you: but I in- sist upon your neither piping nor fiddling yourself. It puts a gentleman in a very frivolous, contemptible light; brings him into a great deal of bad company; and takes up a great deal of time, which might be much better employed. Few things would mortify me more than to see you bearing part in a concert, with a fiddle under your chin or a pipe in your mouth." "Sculpture and painting are very justly called liberal arts; a lively and strong imagination, together with.a.just observation, being absolutely necessary to excel

in either: which, in my opinion, is by no means the case of music, though called a liberal art, and now in Italy placed even above the other two: a proof of the decline of that country. The Venetian school produced many great painters, such as Paul Veronese, Titian, Palma, &c., by whom you will see, as well in private houses as in churches, very fine pieces. The Last Supper, by Paul Veronese, in the church of St. George, is reckoned his capital performance, and deserves your

attention; as also does the famous picture of the COMM family by Titian. A taste of sculpture and painting is in my mind as becoming as a taste of fiddling and piping is unbecoming a man of fashion. The former is connected with his- tory and poetry, the latter with nothing that I know of but bad company."

Order and method are cardinal virtues of this school ; ostensibly, for their obvious advantages ; really, perhaps, for the regularity of mind,

and the attentive habit which they show. Economy is another key-

stone ; not a mere indiscriminate saving, but an attention to live within your income ; a judicious outlay, if you can get a character by it, espe- cially when the sums at issue are trifling. Buy the best if necessary, but buy nothing that you do not want. " I have known many a man," says Chesterfield, " save a penny and wrangle for twopence, who was un-

doing himself at the same time by living above his income and not attending to essential articles." On another occasion he observes, that a line should be strictly drawn in the plus or minus where trifles often affect character. For example, a man who gives four shillings will be thought mean, but generous if he give five.

Men of this stamp, whatever be their sphere, cannot endure the word "impossible," or the fact of negligence or inattention. Chesterfield maintained, that, except in poetry, any man could become what he pleased if he would but give the requisite attention and take the requi- site pains. Want of finish is another defect to which no mercy is shown.

" If it be worth while to do a thing, it is worth while to do it right."

This reaches from the highest to the lowest things—from the choice of a style, and the personal appearance and manners, down to the hand-

writing, or the smallest effect of the toilet. This idea of the sufficiency of will in Chesterfield in part belonged to his age, which had just been startled by Locke's confutation of the doctrine of innate ideas, in his argument that we owe them to sensation—that a being without senses would be without ideas : and Reynolds inculcated a similar view of the all- sufficiency of industry and determination, in his Lectures. Much of the view, however, originated in his health and constitution, which enabled him to rise at his usual hour however late he had been up the night before, and incessantly to apply himself with vigour to some object of study, business, or pleasure. When his body, perhaps from these drafts upon it, broke down rather early, (before sixty,) he began to find that some- thing more than will was necessary; that it was useless attempting " invits Minerva" ; and that, even with the entire day before him, and no external calls upon it, writing required an animating spirit. It may be questioned, however, whether he extended his sympathy to anything save old age or actual illness : he and all his tribe have little sympathy with the lassitude of ill health or delicacy of constitution.

From Chesterfield's writings could be abstracted a scheme of practical philosophy such as we have here outlined, and such, by the by, as is ever practised in various degrees in the world at large. Its professors always succeed in advancing their fortunes, or " making a figure" in their re- spective spheres ; and a system could be formed from Chesterfield quite as worthy of the name of " moral philosophy" as that of Paley or Whewell. There is, however, something hard, selfish, and (one would think) unenjoyable, about its excessive caution, its unceasing vigilance,

and its want of abandon even in the nearest and dearest relations. They

love nobody, they value nothing, for intrinsic qualities, but for what they will yield. Chesterfield does not seem to have loved his son, notwith- standing all his care for him : he was but his hobby or his object. Even

the manners would seem to have been stiff or hard, to a searching eye. The dry precept, wanting the living example in the volumes before us,

impresses the reader with an idea that art must sometimes have been seen through the boasted politeness of Chesterfield, as art in con- junction with selfishness continually disgusts in his living followers. This feeling, and the distrust men of the world inspire, perhaps ex- plain the want of worldly success which so often attends them, compared with the ability and industry which they exert. With his birth, rank, fortune, interest, and eloquence, Chesterfield himself can scarcely be said to have greatly succeeded in a worldly sense. Ambas- sador, Viceroy, and Secretary of State, were his greatest posts,—high offices, no doubt, but continually filled by men with scarcely one of his claims. It must be remembered, too, that his reputation does not depend upon his official position or exertions. Putting selfishness aside, sense and observation are the fundamentals of the man of the world. These give him a stock of matter, fresh from reality, and independent if not original ; whilst his vigour of constitution

and vivacity of mind impart liveliness of manner. Hence, their conver• sation is generally attractive, often instructive ; as are their letters, if they

have literature enough to write. In this point of view, Chesterfield was

the facile princeps of the race. His wide range of the belles lettres, extending over the classics of ancient and modern literature—his deep

acquaintance with, history and politics—his experience of Parliament, office, and courts-44 acquaintance with the fashionable society of every civilized country—and his intimacy with celebrated men—gave him ad- vantages which have fallen to the lot of few. From early youth he bad cultivated style, especially an English style, till, as he says himself, pro- priety of expression had become habitual. A natural common sense and a solid judgment had been sharpened by constant exercise. Attention to the fashionable style of his age gave his composition a graceful tournure ; a pointed, neat, clear, and sparkling diction, was attained by incessant attention ; and an attic salt pervaded and preserved the whole. But his genius was bounded by the earth, and perhaps by the fashionable and business part of it. He had the buoyant vivacity of a lesser poet, nor was he devoid of invention ; but he was deficient in the large comprehen- sion of a greater genius, not merely in conception but in understanding. Marlborough he could not comprehend, in the higher part of his cha- racter : Shakspere's genius he admitted, but exaggerated his faults, after the fashion of his age : Milton he could not relish, if he did not dislike; and he seems to have disliked the loftiest parts—the first two books : Homer be could not altogether rise to, from the difference of manners, which his cast of mind did not allow him to supply ; though his sense

enabled him to detect the weak points and put them in the most striking light,—as, for example, in his estimate of Achilles.

" I dare assert, too, in defiance of the favourers of the ancients, that Homer's hero, Achilles, was both a brute and a scoundrel, and, consequently, an improper character for the hero of an epic poem. He had so little regard for his country, i that he would not act in defence of it, because he had quarrelled with Agamem- non about a w—; and then, afterwards, animated by private resentment only, he went about killing people basely, I will call it, because he knew himself in- vulnerable; and yet, invulnerable as he was, he wore the strongest armour in the world; which I humbly apprehend to be a blunder, for a horse-shoe clapped to his vulnerable heel would have been sufficient."

His favourite authors were Pope, Voltaire, and Bolingbroke ; partly from his cast of mind, partly from his age, whose influence no man can

altogether overcome.

Chesterfield's Letters are unrivalled both for matter and manner. Except iu some juvenile and business epistles, and his correspondence with Lady Suffolk, (which last overturn his own theory about the all- sufficiency of manner,) his matter is always appropriate to the occasion and the person ; the most trifling topics attracting attention from their aptness, the most important and profound being stripped of their heavi- ness yet not of their weight. His manner is a model. To the frank straightforwardness of a gentleman, and the pleasantry of a man of the world, he adds the refined graces of a courtier, the wit of a belle esprit, and the clearness, finish, and precision of a scholar. Yet, notwithstand- ing his acknowledged artifice, the whole is natural. " Ars celare artem." When Chesterfield is probably disingenuous we do not see it; it is only when he is recommending art to others that he appears artful.

It is not merely as letters, or even as representing a system of conduct that will always prevail in the world, that these celebrated compositions are to be considered. They contain many sketches of life and manners, perhaps more striking than those of Addison and Steele, because they are less laboured and less formal, have less of writing for the public, and not being composed on a set model are quitted as soon as the object is attained. Various portraits of contemporaries of eminence are met with in the Letters ; and they contain many reminiscences of the writer's early life, as open as such confessions are ever likely to be, because they were designed as warnings, and the gallantry which most people would have considered a vice Chesterfield merely deemed a pleasure.

The striking passages of these Letters are so numerous that " Beauties of Chesterfield" and similar collections have frequently been made, either as mere specimens, or as systems of polite behaviour. These, however, flarnish but a poor idea of the man or the author ; minute graces, the pervading salt, and much of the happy wit dependent upon delicate turns, altOgether escaping. Our extracts will not attempt to do what we have declared impossible for extracts to accomplish, but merely present some salient points. The following character of Arbuthnot has, however, another claim—that of novelty ; appearing for the first time.

"Dr. Arbuthnot was both my physician and my friend; and in both those capa- cities I justly placed the utmost confidence in him.

• " Without any of the craft, he had all the skill of his profession; which he ex- erted with the most care and pleasure upon those unfortunate patients who could not give him a fee. "To great and various erudition he joined an infinite fund of wit and humour; to which his friends Pope and Swift were more obliged than they have acknow- ledged themselves to be.

His imagination was almost inexhaustible; and whatever subject he treated, or was consulted upon, he immediately overflowed with all that it could possibly produce. It was at anybody's service; for as soon as he was exonerated, he did not care what became of it; insomuch, that his sons, when young, have frequently made kites of his scattered papers of hints, which would have furnished good matter for folios.

"Not being in the least jealous of his fame as an author, he would neither take the time nor the trouble of separating the best from the worst: he worked out the whole mine, which afterwards, in the hands of skilful refiners, produced a rich vein of ore.

"As his imagination was always at work, he was frequently absent and inat- tentive in company; which made him both say and do a thousand inoffensive ab- surdities; but which, far from being provoking, as they commonly are, supplied new matter for conversation, and occasioned wit both in himself and others. "His social character was not more amiable than his moral character was pure and exemplary: charity, benevolence, and a love of mankind, appeared unaffectedly in all he said or did. His letter to Pope against personal satire, published in the works of the latter, breathes in a most distinguished manner that amiable spirit of humanity. "His good understanding could not get the better of some prejudices of his education and country. For he was convinced that he had twice had the second sight; which in Scotch signifies a degree of nocturnal inspiration, but in English only a dream. He was also a Jacobite by prejudice, and a Republican by re- flection and reasoning. "He indulged his palate to excess, I might have said to gluttony; which gave him a gross plethoric habit of body, that was the cause of his death.

"He lived and died a devout and sincere Christian. Pope and I were with him the evening before he died; when he suffered racking pains from an inflammation in his bowels; but his head was clear to the last. He took leave of us with ten- derness, without weakness, and told us that he died not only with the comfort but even the devout assurance of a Christian.

" By all those who were not much acquainted with him he was considered infi- nitely below his level: he put no price upon himself, and consequently went at an under-value; for the world is complaisant or dupe enough to give every man the price he sets upon himself, provided it be not insolently and overbearingly de- manded. It turns upon the manner of asking."

The exhumation of the Marlborough Despatches has revived an in.. terest in John Churchill, which the following notices, drawn from several parts of the Letters, may gratify.

" Of all the men that over I knew in my life, (and I knew him extremely well,) the late Duke of Marlborough possessed the graces in the highest degree, not to say engrossed them. And, mdeed, he got the most by them; for I will venture (contrary to the custom of profound historians, who always assign deep cause* for great events) to ascribe the better half of the Duke of Marlborough's great. ness and riches to those graces. He was eminently illiterate; wrote bad English, and spelled it still worse. He had no share of what is commonly called parts,: that is, he had no brightness, nothing shining in his genius. He had most un- doubtedly an excellent good plain understanding, with sound judgment. But these alone would probably have raised him but something higher than they found him, which was Page to King James the Second's Queen. There the graces pro- tected and promoted him: for while he was an Ensign of the Guards, the Dutchess of Cleveland, then favourite mistress to King Charles the Second, struck by these very graces, gave him five thousand pounds; with which he immediately be ht an annuity for his life of five hundred pounds a year of my grandfather

which was the foundation of his subsequent fortune. His figure was beautiful; but his manner was irresistible by either man or woman. It was by this en- gaging graceful manner that he was enabled, during all his wars, to connect the various and jarring powers of the Grand Alliance, and to carry them on to the main object of the war, notwithstanding their private and separate views, jee- bowies, and wrongheadednesses. Whatever court he went to, (and he was otter' obliged to go himself to some resty and refractory ones,) he as constantly pre- vailed and brought them into his measures. The Pensionary Heinsius, a venera- ble old Minister, grown grey in business, and who had governed the Republic of the United Provinces for more than forty years, was absolutely governed by the Duke of Marlborough, as that Republic feels to this day. He was always cool, and no- body ever observed the least variation in his countenance: he could refuse more gracefully than other people could grant; and those who went away from him the most dissatisfied as to the substance of their business were yet personally charmed with him, and in some degree comforted by his manner. With all his gentleness and gracefulness, no man living was more conscious of his situation, nor main- tained his dignity better." • * • • * •

" The late Duke of Marlborough's manners and address prevailed with the first King of Prussia to let his troops remain in the army of the Allies, when neither their representations nor his own share in the common cause could do it. Ths Duke of Marlborough had no new matter to urge to him, but had a manner which he could not and did not resist."

" Good-breeding carries along with it a dignity that is respected by the most petulant. Ill-breeding invites and authorizes the familiarity of the most timid, No man ever said a pert thing to the Duke of Marlborough. No man ever adds civil one (though many a flattering one) to Sir Robert Walpole."

The following estimate of Parliament and Parliamentary speaking may serve to furnish comparisons, if for nothing else. Has the House of Commons improved since Chesterfield's day ? How many have the adtli- tional Irish Members added to his thirty? " You are sure of being, as early as your age will permit, a Member of that House which is the only road to figure and fortune in this country. These indeed who are bred up to and distinguish themselves in particular professions, as the army, the navy, and the law, may by their own merit raise themselves to a certain degree; but you may observe too, that they nevergetto the top without the assistance of Parliamentary talents and influence. s . * Whoever does nel shine there is obscure, insignificant, and contemptible; and you cannot conceive bow easy it is for a man of half your sense and knowledge to shine there if he pleases. The receipt to make a speaker, and an applauded one too, is short and easy. Take of common sense quantum sufficit; add a little application to the rules and orders of the House; throw obvious thoughts in a new light; and make up the whole with a large quantity of purity, correctness, and elegancy of style. Take it for granted, that by far the greatest part of mankind do neither analyze nor search to the bottom: they are incapable of penetrating deeper than the sur- face. All have senses to be gratified; very few have reason to be applied to. Graceful utterance and action please their eyes; elegant diction tickles their ears;

but strong reason would be thrown away upon them."

• •

" All these considerations should not only invite you to attempt to make a figure in Parliament, but encourage you to hope that you shall succeed. To govern mankind, one must not overrate them; and to please an audience as a speaker, one must not overvalue it. When I first came into the House of Corns mons, I respected that assembly as a venerable one, and felt a certain awe upon me: but upon better acquaintance that awe soon vanished, and I discovered that of the five hundred and sixty not above thirty could understand reason, and that all the rest were peuple; that those thirty only required plain common sense, dressed up in good language; and that all the others only required flowing and harmonious periods, whether they conveyed any meaning or not; having ears to hear, but not sense enough to judge. These considerations made me speak with little concern the first time, with less the second, and with none at all the third. I gave myself no farther trouble about anything except my elocution and my style; presuming, without much vanity, that I had common sense sufficient not to talk nonsense. Fix these three truths strongly in your mind,—first, that it is, absolutely necessary for you to speak in Parliament; secondly, that it only re- quires a little human attention, and no supernatural gifts; and thirdly, that you have all the reason in the world to think that you shall speak well."

CHARACTER OF COURTS.

You will soon be at courts, where, though you will not be concerned, yet re- flection and observation upon what you see and hear there may be of use to you when hereafter you may come to be concerned in courts yourself. Nothing in courts is exactly as it appears to be; often very different, sometimes directly contrary. Interest, which is the real spring of everything there, equally creates and dissolves friendships, produces and reconciles enmities; or rather, allows of neither real friendships nor enmities; for, as Dryden very justly ob- serves, Politicians neither love nor hate. This is so true, that you may think you connect yourself with two friends today, and be obliged tomorrow to make your option between them as enemies: observe, therefore, such a degree d reserve with your friends as not to put yourself in their power if they shonld be- come your enemies, and such a degree of moderation with your enemies as not to make it impossible for them to become your friends. Courts are unquestionably the seats of politeness andgood-breeding; were they not so, they would be the seats of slaughter and desolation. Those who now smile upon and embrace, would affront and stab each other if manners did not in- terpose: but ambition and avarice, the two prevailing passions at courts, found dissimulation more effectual than violence; and dissimulation introduced that habit of politeness which distinguishes the courtier from the country gentleman. In the former case, the strongest body would prevail; in the latter, the strongest mind.

A man of parts and efficiency need not flatter everybody at court, but he mast take great care to offend nobody personally; it being in the power of very many to hurt him, who cannot serve him. Homer supposes a chain let down from Ju- piter to the earth to connect him with mortals. There is at all courts a chain which connects the prince or the minister with the page of the back-stairs or the chambermaid. The king's wife or mistress has an influence over him; a lows has an influence over her; the chambermaid or the valet-de-chambre has an in-. thence over both; and so ad infinitum. You must, therefore, not break a link of that chain by which you hope to climb up to the prince. You must renounce courts if you will not connive at knaves and tolerate fools; their number makes them considerable. You should as little quarrel as connect yourself with either. Whatever you say or do at court, you may depend upon it, will be known; the business of most of those who crowd levees and antechambers being to repeat all that they see or hear, and a great deal that they neither see nor hear, according arthey are inclined to the persons concerned, or according to the wishes of those to whom they hope to make their court. Great caution is therefore necessary; and if to great caution you can join seeming frankness and openness, you will unite what Machiavel reckons very difficult, but very necessary to be united, volt° sciolto e pemsieri stretti. Women are very apt to be mingled in court intrigues; but they deserve atten- tion better than confidence: to hold by them is a very precarious tenure.

As regards the Letters, Characters, and a few lesser Tracts, this is unquestionably the edition of Chesterfield, essential to all libraries. Though not to be classed among rare books, any of the genuine editions of Chesterfield cannot always be commanded, and still less the whole of them; without which, all the Letters published soon after his death can- not be procured, and then, except the Letters to his Son, they are scat- tered here and there without arrangement. But, supposing these attain- able, and the purchaser to take the labour of "finding the places" of them all, there are still the epistles contained in lately published col- lections, such as "the Suffolk Papers." The only point of doubt in our minds upon this edition regards the omission of the earlier letters to Lord Chesterfield's son, and of a few to his godson. True enough, we do not require to be told that Romulus built Rome, and similar boy's first book knowledge ; but the manner in which Chesterfield conveyed such information to the childish mind is more curious than several of the later miscellaneous letters ; and their absence militates against the perfect com- pleteness of the collection.