larity, order, decency, and love of study, banter in return the opposite qualities in them; and venture to own, frankly, that you came to Cambridge to learn what you can; not to follow what they call pleasure.

I come now to the part of the advice I have to offer you which most nearly concerns your welfare, and upon which every good and honourable purpose of your life will assuredly turn-I mean the keeping up in your heart true sentiments of religion. If you are not right towards God, you can never be so towards man. The noblest feeling of the human heart is here brought to the test. Is gratitude in the number of a man's virtues? If it is, the Highest Benefactor demands the warmest returns of gratitude, love, and praise. If a man wants this virtue, where there are infinite obligations to excite and quicken it, he will be likely to want all offers towards his fellow-creatures, whose utmost gifts are poor, compared to those which he daily receives at the hands of his never-failing Almighty friend. "Remember thy Creator in the days of thy youth," is a maxim big with the deepest wisdom. "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom," and "to depart from evil is understanding." This is eternally true, whether the wits and rakes of Cambridge allow it or not; nay, I must add, of this religious wisdom, "that her ways are ways of pleasantness, and all her paths are peace," whatever your young gentlemen of pleasure think. Hold fast, therefore, by this sheetanchor of happiness, Religion: you will often want it in the times of most danger-the storms and tempests of life. Cherish true religion; shun, with abhorrence and contempt, superstition and enthusiasm. The first is the perfection and glory, the

two last are the depravation and disgrace of human nature. Remember the essence of religion is, “a heart void of offence towards God and man;" not subtle, speculative opinions, but an active, vital principle of faith.

Go on, my dear child, in the admirable dispositions you have towards all that is right and good. I have neither paper nor words to tell you how tenderly I am yours,

CHATHAM.

Dr. Schomberg to a Lady.-On Reading. MADAM,

CONFORMABLY to your desire, and my promise, I present you with a few thoughts on a method of reading, which you would have had sooner, only that you gave me leave to set them down at my leisure hours. If my remarks should answer your expectations-if they should conduce to the spending of your time in a more profitable and agreeable manner than most of your sex generally spend theirs-it will give me a pleasure equal at least to that which you will receive.

It is to be wished that the female part of the human creation, on whom Nature has poured so many charms with so lavish a hand, would pay some regard to the cultivation of their minds, and the improvement of their understandings. This might easily be accomplished. Would they bestow a fourth part of the time in reading proper books which they throw away on the trifles and gewgaws of dress, it would perfectly answer the purpose. Not that I am against the ladies adorning their persons, but let it be done with reason and good sense, not caprice and humour; for there is good

sense in dress as in all things else. Strange doctrine to some! but I am sure, madam, you know there is you practise it.

The most important rule to be laid down to any one who reads for improvement is, never to read but with attention.

As abstruse learning is not necessary for the accomplishment of one of your sex, a small degree of it will suffice. The subjects which I would particularly recommend to you, I will throw under the following heads: history, morality, and poetry. The first employs the memory; the second, the judgment; and the third, the imagination.

Whenever you undertake to read history, make a small abstract of the memorable events, and set down in what year they happened. If you entertain yourself with the life of a famous person, do the same with respect to his most remarkable actions, adding the year, and the place of his birth and death. You will find this method a great help to your memory, as it will lead you to remember what you do not write down, by a sort of chain that links the whole history together.

Books on morality deserve an exact reading. There are none in our language more useful and entertaining than the "Spectators," "Tatlers," and "Guardians." They are the standards of the English tongue; and as such, they should be read over and over again; for as we imperceptibly slide into the habits and manners of those persons with whom we most frequently converse, so reading, being as it were a silent conversation, we insensibly write and talk in the style of the authors whom we have most frequently read, and who have left the deepest impressions on our mind. Now, in order to retain what you read on the various sub

jects that fall under the head of morality, I would advise you to mark with a pencil whatever you find particularly worth remembering. If a passage should strike you, mark it in the margin; if an expression, draw a line under it; if a whole paper in the forementioned books, or any others which are written in the same loose and unconnected manner, make an asterisk over the first line. By these means you will select the most valuable parts, which, by being distinguished from the rest, will, on repeated reading, sink deeper in your memory.

The last article is poetry. To distinguish good poetry from bad, turn it out of verse into prose, and see whether the thought is natural and the words are adapted to it; or whether they are not too big and sounding, or too low and mean for the sense which they would convey. This rule will prevent you from being imposed on by bombast and fustian, which, with many, pass for sublime : smooth verses, that run off the ear with an easy cadence and harmonious turn, very often impose nonsense on the world, and are like your finedressed beaux, who pass for fine gentlemen. Divest both of their outward ornaments, and people are surprised they could have been so easily deluded.

I have now, madam, given you a few rules: I could have added more; but these will be sufficient to enable you to read without burthening your memory, and yet with another view besides that of barely killing time, as too many are accustomed to do.* The task you have imposed on me is a

* 66 Many people," says an ingenious writer, "lose a great deal of time by reading; for they read absurd romances, where characters that never existed are insipidly displayed, and sentiments that were never felt are pompously described; and such sort of idle, frivolous stuff,

strong proof of your knowing the true value of time, and having improved it; and that there are other proofs, those who have the pleasure of being acquainted with you can tell.

Believe me to be, with the utmost sincerity, as I really am, madam,

Your faithful, humble servant,

ISAAC SCHOMBERG.

John Dunning, Esq. to a young gentleman of the Inner

DEAR SIR,

Temple.

Lincoln's Inn, March 3, 1779.

THE habits of intercourse in which I have lived with your family, joined to the regard which I entertain for yourself, make me solicitous, in compliance with your request, to give you some hints concerning the study of the law.

Our profession is generally ridiculed, as being dry and uninteresting; but a mind anxious for the

that nourishes and improves the mind just as much as whipped cream would the body. Adhere to the bestestablished books in every language; the celebrated poets, historians, orators, and philosophers. By these means, (to use a city metaphor,) you will make fifty per cent. of that time of which others do not make above three or four, or probably nothing at all. Lay down a method for your reading, and allot to it a certain share of your time. Let it be in a consistent and consecutive course, and not in that desultory manner in which many people read scraps of different authors upon different subjects. Never read history without having maps, and a chronological book or tables lying by you, and constantly recurred to, without which, history is a confused heap of facts. At your spare moments, take up a good book of rational amusement and detached pieces-as Horace, Boileau, La Bruyere, &c. This will be so much time saved, and by no means ill employed."