- est manners, were by no means incompatible, though
so seldom found united in the same person; and I have engaged myself to exhibit you, as a proof of the truth of this assertion. Should you, instead of that, happen to disprove me, the concern indeed will be mine, but the loss will be yours. Lord Bolingbroke is a strong instance on my side of the question; he joins, to the deepest erudition, the most elegant politeness and good-breeding that ever any courtier and man of the world was adorned with. And Pope very justly called him All Accomplished St. John, with regard to his knowledge and his manners. He had, it is true, his faults; which proceeded from unbounded ambition and impetuous passions; but they have now subsided by age and experience; and I can wish you nothing better than to be, what he is now, without being what he has been formerly. His address pre-engages, his eloquence persuades, and his knowledge informs all who approach him. Upon the whole, I do desire, and insist, that, from after dinner till you go to bed, you make good-breeding, address, and manners your serious object and your only care. Without them, you will be nobody; with them, you may be anything. [No date.]
Proper Distinction.—Every rational being (I
take it for granted) proposes to himself some object
more important than mere respiration and obscure
