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fectly consistent with softness and delicacy; yet they are seldom found united. Wit is so flattering to vanity, that they who posses it become intoxicated, and loose all selfcommand.

Humour is a different quality; it will make your company much solicited: but be cautious how you indulge it. It is often a great enemy to delicacy, and a stil! greater one to dignity of character. It may sometimes gain You applause, but will never procure you respect.

GREGORY.

FEMALE ECONOMY.

LADIES, whose natural vanity has been aggravated by a false education, may look down on economy as a vulgar attainment, unworthy of the attention of a highly cultivated intellect; but this is the false estimate of a shallow mind. Economy, such as a woman of fortune is called on to practise, is not merely the petty detail of small daily expenses, the shabby curtailments and stinted parsimony of a little mind, operating on little concerns; but it is the exercise of a sound judgment exerted in the comprehensive outline of order, of arrangement, of distribution; of regulations, by which alone well governed societies, great and small, subsist. She, who has the best regulated mind, will, other things being equal, have the best regulated family. As in the superintendance of the universe, wisdom is seen in it's effects; and as in the visible works of Providence, that which goes on with such beautiful regularity is the result not of chance but of design; so that management, which seems the most easy, is commonly the consequence of the best concerted plan; and a well concerted plan is seldom the offspring of an ordinary mind. A sound economy is a sound understanding brought into

action; it is calculation realized; it is the doctrine of proportion reduced to practice; it is foreseeing consequences, and guarding against them; it is expecting contingencies, and being prepared for them. The difference is, that to a narrow minded, vulgar economist the details are continually present; she is overwhelmed by their weight, and is perpetually bespeaking your pity for her labours, and your praise for her exertions; she is afraid you will not see how much she is harassed. She is not satisfied, that the machine moves harmoniously, unless she is perpetually exposing every secret spring to observation. Little events and trivial operations engross her whole soul; while a woman of sense, having provided for their probable recurrence, guards against the inconveniences, without being disconcerted by the casual obstructions which they offer to her general scheme. Subordinate expenses, and inconsiderable retrenchments, should not swallow up that atten tion, which is better bestowed on regulating the general scale of expense, correcting and reducing an overgrown establishment, and reforming radical and growing ex MRS. HANNAH MORE.

cesses.

FEMALE ACCOMPLISHMENTS.

A YOUNG lady may excel in speaking French and Italian; may repeat a few passages from a volume of extracts; play like a professor, and sing like a siren; have her dressing room decorated with her own drawing, tables, stands, flower pots, screens, and cabinets; nay, she may dance like Sempronia herself, and yet we shall insist, that she may have been very badly educated. I am far from meaning to set no value whatever on any or all of these qualifications; they are all of them elegant, and many of them properly tend to the perfecting of a polite education.

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These things, in their measure and degree, may be done; but there are others, which should not be left undone, Many things are becoming, but one thing is needful." Besides, as the world seems to be fully apprised of the value of whatever tends to embellish life, there is less occasion here to insist on it's importance.

But, though a well bred young lady may lawfully learn most of the fashionable arts; yet, let me ask, does it seem to be the true end of education, to make women of fashion dancers, singers, players, painters, actresses, sculptors, gilders, varnishers, engravers, and embroiderers? Most men are commonly destined to some profession, and their minds are consequently turned each to it's respective object. Would it not be strange if they were called out to exercise their profession, or to set up their trade, with only a little general knowledge of the trades and professions of all other men, and without any previous definite application to their own peculiar calling? The profession of ladies, to which the bent of their instruction should be turned, is that of daughters, wives, mothers, and mistresses of families. They should be therefore trained with a view to these several conditions, and be furnished with a stock of ideas, and principles, and qualifications, and habits, ready to be applied and appropriated, as occasion may demand, to each of these respective situations. For though the arts, which merely embellish life, must claim admiration; yet, when a man of sense comes to marry, it is a companion whom he wants, and not an artist. It is not merely a creature who can paint, and play, and sing, and draw, and dress, and dance; it is a being who can comfort and counsel him; one who can reason, and reflect, and feel, and judge, and discourse, and discriminate; one who who can assist him in his affairs, lighten his cares, sooth his sorrows, purify his joys, strengthen his principles, and educate his children. MBS. MOORE.

FAMILY DUTIES.

FAMILY friendships are the friendships made for us (if I may so speak) by God himself. With the kindest intentions, he has knit the bands of family love by indispensable duties and wretched are they, who have burst them asunder by violence and ill will, or worn them out by constant little disobligations, and by the want of that attention to please, which the presence of a stranger always inspires, but which is so often shamefully neglected towards those, whom it is most our duty and interest to please. May you, my dear, be wise enough to see, that every faculty of entertainment, every engaging qualification, which you possess, is exerted to the best advantage for those, whose love is of most importance to you; for those who live under the same roof, and with whom you are connected for life, either by the ties of blood, or by the still more sacred obligations of a voluntary engagement.

To make you the delight and darling of your family, something more is required, than barely to be exempt from ill temper and troublesome humours: the sincere and genuine smiles of complacency and love must adorn your countenance that ready compliance, that alertness to assist and oblige, which demonstrates true affection, must animate your behaviour, and endear your most common actions: politeness must accompany your greatest familiarities, and restrain you from every thing that is really offensive, or which can give a moment's unnecessary pain: conversation, which is so apt to grow dull and insipid in families, nay, in some to be almost wholly laid aside, must be cultivated with the frankness and openness of friendship, and by the mutual communication of whatever may conduce to the improvement or innocent entertainment of each

other.

Reading, whether apart or in common, will furnish useful and pleasing subjects; and the sprightliness of youth will naturally inspire harmless mirth and native humour, if encouraged by a mutual desire of diverting each other, and making the hours pass agreeably in your own house : every amusement that offers, will be heightened by the participation of these dear [companions, and by talking over every incident together, and every object of pleasure. If you have any acquired talent of entertainment, such as music, painting, or the like, your own family are those before whom you should most wish to excel, and for whom you should always be ready to exert yourself: not suffering the accomplishments which you have gained, perhaps by their means, and at their expense, to lie dormant, till the arrival of a stranger gives you spirit in the performance. Where this last is the case, you may be sure vanity is the only motive of the exertion :—a stranger will praise you more. But how little sensibility has that heart, which is not more gratified by the silent pleasure painted on the countenance of a partial parent, or of an affectionate brother, than by the empty compliment of a visitor, who is perhaps inwardly more disposed to criticise and ridicule, than to admire you! MRS. CHAPONE.

ON SENSIBILITY.

THERE is nothing in which self deception is more notorious, than in what regards sentiment and feeling. Let a vain young woman be told, that tenderness and softness are the peculiar charm of the sex; that even their weakness is lovely, and their fears becoming; and you will presently observe her grow so tender, as to be ready to weep for a fly; so fearful, that she starts at a feather; and so weak hearted, that the smallest accident quite overpowers her.

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