Essays on Various Subjects | Page 8

declaims against it as the source of irregularity, and the frugal citizen dreads it more than bankruptcy itself, for he considers it as the parent of extravagance and beggary. The Cynic will ask of what use it is? Of very little perhaps: no more is a flower garden, and yet it is allowed as an object of innocent amusement and delightful recreation. A woman, who possesses this quality, has received a most dangerous present, perhaps not less so than beauty itself: especially if it be not sheathed in a temper peculiarly inoffensive, chastised by a most correct judgment, and restrained by more prudence than falls to the common lot.
THIS talent is more likely to make a woman vain than knowledge; for as Wit is the immediate property of its possessor, and learning is only an acquaintance with the knowledge of other people, there is much more danger, that we should be vain of what is our own, than of what we borrow.
BUT Wit, like learning, is not near so common a thing as is imagined. Let not therefore a young lady be alarmed at the acuteness of her own wit, any more than at the abundance of her own knowledge. The great danger is, lest she should mistake pertness, flippancy, or imprudence, for this brilliant quality, or imagine she is witty, only because she is indiscreet. This is very frequently the case, and this makes the name of wit so cheap, while its real existence is so rare.
LEST the flattery of her acquaintance, or an over-weening opinion of her own qualifications, should lead some vain and petulant girl into a false notion that she has a great deal of wit, when she has only a redundancy of animal spirits, she may not find it useless to attend to the definition of this quality, by one who had as large a portion of it, as most individuals could ever boast:
'Tis not a tale, 'tis not a jest, Admir'd with laughter at a feast, Nor florid talk, which can that title gain, The proofs of wit for ever must remain. Neither can that have any place, At which a virgin hides her face; Such dross the fire must purge away; 'tis just, The author blush there, where the reader must.
COWLEY.
BUT those who actually possess this rare talent, cannot be too abstinent in the use of it. It often makes admirers, but it never makes friends; I mean, where it is the predominant feature; and the unprotected and defenceless state of womanhood calls for friendship more than for admiration. She who does not desire friends has a sordid and insensible soul; but she who is ambitious of making every man her admirer, has an invincible vanity and a cold heart.
BUT to dwell only on the side of policy, a prudent woman, who has established the reputation of some genius will sufficiently maintain it, without keeping her faculties always on the stretch to say good things. Nay, if reputation alone be her object, she will gain a more solid one by her forbearance, as the wiser part of her acquaintance will ascribe it to the right motive, which is, not that she has less wit, but that she has more judgment.
THE fatal fondness for indulging a spirit of ridicule, and the injurious and irreparable consequences which sometimes attend the too prompt reply, can never be too seriously or too severely condemned. Not to offend, is the first step towards pleasing. To give pain is as much an offence against humanity, as against good breeding; and surely it is as well to abstain from an action because it is sinful, as because it is impolite. In company, young ladies would do well before they speak, to reflect, if what they are going to say may not distress some worthy person present, by wounding them in their persons, families, connexions, or religious opinions. If they find it will touch them in either of these, I should advise them to suspect, that what they were going to say is not so very good a thing as they at first imagined. Nay, if even it was one of those bright ideas, which Venus has imbued with a fifth part of her nectar, so much greater will be their merit in suppressing it, if there was a probability it might offend. Indeed, if they have the temper and prudence to make such a previous reflection, they will be more richly rewarded by their own inward triumph, at having suppressed a lively but severe remark, than they could have been with the dissembled applauses of the whole company, who, with that complaisant deceit, which good breeding too much authorises, affect openly to admire what they secretly resolve never to forgive.
I HAVE always been delighted with the story of the little