A proper confidence in ourselves is one of the trueft marks of having lived among perfons of condition. Neither knowledge, genius, valour, nor virtue can bestow it; 'tis fo purely the gift of fashion and fashionable fociety, that the want of it is an abfolute difqualification for the privi leges which attend them. Under this head of mental endowments, I may fuggeft the propriety of forgetting their Religion. It is poffible that in the country they may have given way to fome vulgar prejudices, which it were highly improper to retain in town. It may not be amifs, however, to inform them, in this place, what they might otherwise have scrupled to believe, that the Church has of late become a place of fashionable refort in Edinburgh; and, what is still more odd, that fine people actually attend to the fermon. The eloquence of fome of our preachers, like the dagger of Macbeth, has "murder'd fleep" there; for which reafon, it will not be fo convenient as formerly, to go thither after a late fupper, or a long party at whift, the night before. In point of external Qualities, the Ladies are to forget their Complexions. In the morning they are to be much paler, and in the evening much more blooming than they were in the country. If other people remember them from the one period to the other, there is no help for it ;-as things go now, it does not much fignify. Very fine Ladies may fometimes forget to drefs at all; it will fhow eafe, and a certain contempt for their company, to which people of high fashion are entitled. On the fubject of Dress, I may add, by way of caution, that the Ladies would do well not to forget themselves. I don't mean this in the common acceptation of the phrafe, which it may be sometimes very proper and convenient to do. What I mean is fimply to put them in mind, that a lady in town, in the modern drefs, takes up so much more room than fhe does in the country, that very ferious confequences might enfue from her not attending to the space which she neceffarily occupies. An acquaintance of mine, who is somewhat of an antiquarian, obferved to me, what an opinion our great-grandchildren might be led to form of the fize of the Ladies' heads towards the close of the 18th century, if any of the fashionable Hats fhould happen to be preferved in the cabinets of the curious. But, in reply, I defired him to take notice, notice, that they would be fet right as to the dimenfions of the race by examining the Walkingflicks of the men, which are just as much below the medium ftandard as the Hats of the other fex are beyond it. By the Hats they might conjecture us to be bred of Patagonians; by the Sticks, they would conclude us to be a generation of Laplanders. But I find I am wandering from my fubject. I muft put myself in mind, that it is time to conclude this hafty fcrawl, by having the honour to fubfcribe myself, with all poffible confideration and respect, SIR, Your moft obedient and Moft devoted humble Servant, V. VOL. II. No. 52. SATURDAY, Jan. 28. 1786. On peut ebaucher un portrait en peu des mots; mais le detailler exactement, c'eft un ouvrage fans fin. MARIVAUX. MOST OST Women have no characters at all." So fays a poet of great good fense, and of much obfervation on human character. I own, however, that I am not very willing to acknowledge the truth of the propofition. I admit that there is a certain fameness in the fituation of our women, which is apt to give a fimilarity to their manner and turn of mind; but I am perfuaded there is a foundation of diverfity in the characters of women as ftrong as in thofe of men. The features of the firft, indeed, are more delicate, lefs ftrongly marked, and on that account more difficult to be diftinguifhed; but still the difference equally exifts. In their faces, the features of men are stronger than those of women; but the difference of one woman's face from another is not therefore the lefs real. So it is, in my opinion, with their minds. I have been lately more than ever difpofed to deny the truth of Mr Pope's obfervation, from an acquaintance with two Ladies, who, in fituations nearly alike, without that difference which viciffitudes of fortune, or uncommon incidents in life, might produce, are in character perfectly diffimilar. I never, indeed, knew two characters more pointedly different, than thofe of Mrs Williams and Mrs Hambden. Mrs Williams is a woman of plain good sense, and of great justness of conduct. She was early married to a man of good understanding, and in a respectable fituation of life. He married her, because he wished for a wife who could be a ufeful as well as an agreeable companion to him, and would make a good mother to his children. She married him, because she thought him a worthy man, with whom she could be happy. Neither the husband nor the wife are remarkable for taste or refinement; but they have both such a stock of sense, as prevents their ever falling into any impropriety. Mrs Williams conducts the affairs of her family with the greatest regularity and exactnefs; and she never feels herself above giving attention to any particular of domeftic oeconomy. The education of her fons fhe leaves almost entirely to her husband; that of the daughters fhe confiders as peculiarly belonging to her. Believing the great 0 2 |