783. He that is in an error cannot rightly justify himfelf, but by immediately forfaking it; that yielding is glorious, and to be overcome by truth, honourable.

784. Fly the company of those who are given to detraction; to hear them patiently, is criminal, and to shew the least countenance of encouragement, is to partake of their guilt, and to promote them to a continuance of it. 785. Fortune commonly makes haste in the prosperity or adverfity of princes.

786. Wit is only to be valued as it is applied, and is very pernicious when accompanied with vice.

787. The modes and customs of this world are so engaging and bewitching, that they are the firft that fools learn, and the last that wife men forfake.

788. It is the business of a true critic to discover beauties as well as blemishes, and, by a due ballancing of both, to pass a found judgment on the whole.

789. People that have a great deal of wit themselves, are apt to over-rate the leaft appearance of it in others; and those that have noble fouls of their own, commonly form their ideas of others accordingly.

790. We ought to fear no other misfortunes but those that are inseparable from our fins; it is impoffible to be unhappy and innocent. A peaceable confcience fills the foul with tranquillity.

791. Hope is the miferable man's God, the vital heat of the mind, an active and vigorous principle, furnished with light and heat, to advife and execute ; it fets the head and heart at work, and animates a man to do his utmoft; it is fometimes fo fprightly and rewarding a qua

lity, that the pleasure of expectation exceeds that of fruition; it refines upon the rules of nature, and paints beyond the life; and when reality is thus outshined by the imagination, fuccefs is a kind of disappointment, and to hope is better than to have.

792. Pleasures, preceded by the greatest difficulties, are the most fenfible.

793. As the sweetest rofe grows upon the fharpeft prickle, fo the hardest labours bring forth the sweetest profit; no pleasure is denied to the painful perfon, by use and labour a man may be brought to a new nature.

794. There feldom lodges other than a mean and feeble mind in an effeminate and tender body, labour coagulates and strengthens the mind, while laziness loofens and effeminates it.

795. Since our perfons are not of our own forming, and that it is God that made us, and not we ourselves; when they appear defective, it is a laudable fortitude, neither to be uneafy nor abashed with the consciousness of imperfections, which we cannot help, and in which there is no guilt, and, confequently, no fhame. Though in the old teftament express notice be taken of the beauty of feveral perfons, yet, in the new, no mention is made of one; not that they wanted outward accomplishments, but the inward is what the gofpel has chiefly recommended. Socrates advises youth to contemplate themselves in a glass, that, if handsome, they may do nothing unworthy of their glorious form; and if otherwife, they may mend themfelves with virtue and wisdom, the true ornaments of the

foul,

foul, without which the brightest body is not to be efteemed as fuch.

796. The best way of reprehending those that commit mistakes, is to do it in general, without any direct addreffes to the person that has forgot himself, to spare him the confufion; this indirect way more effectually gains its point, because it reproves without the sharpness of a reprimand. If the fault be of no confequence, it is better to feem ignorant of it than to cenfure it; but if it be of that nature, that we are obliged in duty, decency, and friendship, to admonish him that is guilty of it, it ought to be done with all the foftnefs and precaution poffible.

797. He who reprehends others, ought to be of an unblameable converfation himself.

798. The greatest love, and the greatest hatred, are caused by religion; nothing is more to be admired, and nothing more to be lamented, than the private contentions, the paffionate quarrels, the perfonal hatred, and the perpetual wars, maffacres, and murders, for religion, among christians.

799. Why should I have fuch an averfion to men on account of their religion? We cannot be fure not to be deceived; the obfcurity of fome queftions, the vanity of human understanding, the engagement of education, perfonal authorities, the feveral degrees of poffibility, the invalidity of tradition, the oppofition of all exterior arguments to each other, the publick violence done to authors and records, the private art of abufing men's understanding, and all perfuafions into their opinions, and ten thoufand more, even all the difficulties of things, all the weaknesses of man, and all the arts of the devil, make it

impoffible for any man, in fo great variety of matter, not to be deceived. Why should I then, if the perfons be christians in their profeffions and lives, hate fuch as, perhaps, God loves, and who love God, because their understandings are not bred like mine?

800. Adapt yourself to the company you are in, be grave with the aged, gay with the young, fupple to the great, affable to all, respectful to every woman you converse with, but, especially, be at the devotion of the young, and the fair. There is no man fenfible how difficult it is to have this complaifance, but those that know how neceffary it is to fupport the character of a well-bred man.

801. Being fome time asunder, heightens conversation; most meats require fauce, but all an appetite. The frequent quarrels between relations, is their being fo much together.

802. Some men adapt themselves to all forts of characters, with so dexterous a compliance, that one would fwear their humours were that of all others; they appear generous with men of honour, fubtle with intriguing perfons, without parts to the stupid, and commit voluntary fopperies, to agree with real fops.

803. When we fay of a man who is hafty, paffionate, inconftant, quarrelfome, morofe, exceptious, whimsical, &c. that is his humour, we do not fo much excufe him, as confefs unawares, that his faults are fo great that they are past mending.

804. The good or ill of men's lives comes more from their humours, than their fortunes.

805. Perfons and humours may be disguised, but nature is like quick filver, that will never be killed.

806. A chriftian that is wife, ought fo well to employ every moment of his life, as not to dread his end; for if he treads the path of uprightness under the conduct of providence, it is indifferent to him at what time or age he finishes his courfe. The only way to live, is not to fear death, and it is this fear alone that difturbs the repose of a voluptuous life.

807. The pleasure which a man of honour takes in being conscious to himself of having performed his duty, is a reward which he pays himself for all his pains, and makes him the lefs to regret the applaufe, efteem, and acknowledgments, which he is fometimes deprived of.

808. As the spleen has great inconveniences, fo the pretence of it is a handfome cover for many imperfections; it oftentimes makes ill nature pass for ill health, dulnefs for gravity, and ignorance for refervedness.

809. A regular well-governed affection does not fcorch, but, like the lamp of life, warms the breast with a gentle and refreshing heat.

810. As he that can revenge an injury, and will not, discovers a great and magnanimous foul; fo he that can return a kindness, and dares not, fhews a mean and contemptible fpirit.

811. Virtue ftrengthens in adverfity, moderates in profperity, guides in fociety, entertains in folitude, advises in doubts, fupports in weakness; it is of all acquifitions the moft precious, without it the goods of fortune beconie evils, ferving only to make us guilty and miferable; for