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<h2> LETTER CLII </h2>
<h3> GREENWICH, July 15, O. S. 1751 </h3>
<p>MY DEAR FRIEND: As this is the last, or last letter but one, that I think
I shall write before I have the pleasure of seeing you here, it may not be
amiss to prepare you a little for our interview, and for the time we shall
pass together. Before kings and princes meet, ministers on each side
adjust the important points of precedence, arm chairs, right hand and
left, etc., so that they know previously what they are to expect, what
they have to trust to; and it is right they should; for they commonly envy
or hate, but most certainly distrust each other. We shall meet upon very
different terms; we want no such preliminaries: you know my tenderness, I
know your affection. My only object, therefore, is to make your short stay
with me as useful as I can to you; and yours, I hope, is to co-operate
with me. Whether, by making it wholesome, I shall make it pleasant to you,
I am not sure. Emetics and cathartics I shall not administer, because I am
sure you do not want them; but for alteratives you must expect a great
many; and I can tell you that I have a number of NOSTRUMS, which I shall
communicate to nobody but yourself. To speak without a metaphor, I shall
endeavor to assist your youth with all the experience that I have
purchased, at the price of seven and fifty years. In order to this,
frequent reproofs, corrections, and admonitions will be necessary; but
then, I promise you, that they shall be in a gentle, friendly, and secret
manner; they shall not put you out of countenance in company, nor out of
humor when we are alone. I do not expect that, at nineteen, you should
have that knowledge of the world, those manners, that dexterity, which few
people have at nine-and-twenty. But I will endeavor to give them you; and
I am sure you will endeavor to learn them, as far as your youth, my
experience, and the time we shall pass together, will allow. You may have
many inaccuracies (and to be sure you have, for who has not at your age?)
which few people will tell you of, and some nobody can tell you of but
myself. You may possibly have others, too, which eyes less interested, and
less vigilant than mine, do not discover; all those you shall hear of from
one whose tenderness for you will excite his curiosity and sharpen his
penetration. The smallest inattention or error in manners, the minutest
inelegance of diction, the least awkwardness in your dress and carriage,
will not escape my observation, nor pass without amicable correction. Two,
the most intimate friends in the world, can freely tell each other their
faults, and even their crimes, but cannot possibly tell each other of
certain little weaknesses; awkwardnesses, and blindnesses of self-love; to
authorize that unreserved freedom, the relation between us is absolutely
necessary. For example, I had a very worthy friend, with whom I was
intimate enough to tell him his faults; he had but few; I told him of
them; he took it kindly of me, and corrected them. But then, he had some
weaknesses that I could never tell him of directly, and which he was so
little sensible of himself, that hints of them were lost upon him. He had
a scrag neck, of about a yard long; notwithstanding which, bags being in
fashion, truly he would wear one to his wig, and did so; but never behind
him, for, upon every motion of his head, his bag came forward over one
shoulder or the other. He took it into his head too, that he must
occasionally dance minuets, because other people did; and he did so, not
only extremely ill, but so awkward, so disjointed, slim, so meagre, was
his figure, that had he danced as well as ever Marcel did, it would have
been ridiculous in him to have danced at all. I hinted these things to him
as plainly as friendship would allow, and to no purpose; but to have told
him the whole, so as to cure him, I must have been his father, which,
thank God, I am not. As fathers commonly go, it is seldom a misfortune to
be fatherless; and, considering the general run of sons, as seldom a
misfortune to be childless. You and I form, I believe, an exception to
that rule; for, I am persuaded that we would neither of us change our
relation, were it in our power. You will, I both hope and believe, be not
only the comfort, but the pride of my age; and, I am sure, I will be the
support, the friend, the guide of your youth. Trust me without reserve; I
will advise you without private interest, or secret envy. Mr. Harte will
do so too; but still there may be some little things proper for you to
know, and necessary for you to correct, which even his friendship would
not let him tell you of so freely as I should; and some, of which he may
not possibly be so good a judge of as I am, not having lived so much in
the great world.</p>
<p>One principal topic of our conversation will be, not only the purity but
the elegance of the English language; in both which you are very
deficient. Another will be the constitution of this country, of which, I
believe, you know less than of most other countries in Europe. Manners,
attentions, and address, will also be the frequent subjects of our
lectures; and whatever I know of that important and necessary art, the art
of pleasing. I will unreservedly communicate to you. Dress too (which, as
things are, I can logically prove, requires some attention) will not
always escape our notice. Thus, my lectures will be more various, and in
some respects more useful than Professor Mascow's, and therefore, I can
tell you, that I expect to be paid for them; but, as possibly you would
not care to part with your ready money, and as I do not think that it
would be quite handsome in me to accept it, I will compound for the
payment, and take it in attention and practice.</p>
<p>Pray remember to part with all your friends, acquaintances, and
mistresses, if you have any at Paris, in such a manner as may make them
not only willing but impatient to see you there again. Assure them of your
desire of returning to them; and do it in a manner that they may think you
in earnest, that is 'avec onction et une espece d'attendrissement'. All
people say, pretty near the same things upon those occasions; it is the
manner only that makes the difference; and that difference is great.
Avoid, however, as much as you can, charging yourself with commissions, in
your return from hence to Paris; I know, by experience, that they are
exceedingly troublesome, commonly expensive, and very seldom satisfactory
at last, to the persons who gave them; some you cannot refuse, to people
to whom you are obliged, and would oblige in your turn; but as to common
fiddle-faddle commissions, you may excuse yourself from them with truth,
by saying that you are to return to Paris through Flanders, and see all
those great towns; which I intend you shall do, and stay a week or ten
days at Brussels. Adieu! A good journey to you, if this is my last; if
not, I can repeat again what I shall wish constantly.</p>
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