a perfon's activity for his own good and that of his fellow-creatures, he is to be reckoned a more or lefs valuable member of fociety: And if all the idle people in a nation were to die in one year, the lofs would be inconfiderable, in comparifon of what the community muft fuffer by being deprived of a very few of the active and induftrious. Every moment of time ought to be 1 put to its proper uie, either in business, in improving the mind, in the innocent and neceflary relaxations and entertainments of life, or in the care of our fouls.

And as we ought to be much more frugal of our time than our money, the one being infinitely more valuable than the other, fo ought we to be particularly watchful of opportunities. There are times and feafons proper for every purpose of life; and a very material part of prudence it is to judge rightly of them, and make the beft of them. If you have, for example a favour to afk of a phlegmatic gloomy man, take him, if you can, over his bottle. If you want to deal with a covetous man, by no means propofe your bufinefs to him immediately after he has been paying away money, but rather after he has been receiving. If you know a perfon, for whose interest you have occafion, is unhappy in his family, put yourfelf in his way abroad, rather than wait on him at his own houfe. A ftateiman will not be likely to give you a favourable audience immediately after meeting with a difappointment in any of his fchemes. There are even many people who are always four and ill-humoured from their riding till they have dined. And as in perfons, fo in things, opportunity is of the utmoft confequence. The thorough knowledge of the probable rife and fall of merchandize, the favourable feafons for importing and exporting, a quick eye to fee, and a nimble hand to feize advantages as they turn up; thefe are the talents which raife men from low to affluent circumstances.

It would be greatly for the advantage of men of bufinefs, if they made it a rule never to trust any thing of confequence to another, which they can by any means do themfelves. Let another have my intereft ever fo much at heart, I am fure I have it more myfelf: And

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no fubftitute one can employ can understand one's bufinefs fo well as the principal, which gives him a great advantage for doing things in the best way, as he can change his measures according to circumftances, which another has not authority to do. As for dependents of all kinds, it is to be remembered always, that their mafter's intereft poffeffes at most only the fecond place in their minds. Self-love will ever be the ruling principle, and no fidelity whatever will prevent a person from beftowing a good deal of thought upon his own concerns, which must break in, lefs or more, upon his diligence in confulting the intereft of his conftituent. How men of business can venture, as they do, to truft the great concerns fome of them have, for one half of every week in the year, which is half the year, to fervants, and they expect others to take care of their bufinefs, when they will not be at the trouble of minding it themselves, is to me inconceivable. Nor does the detection, from time to time, of the frauds of fuch people, feem at all to deter our men of business from trufting to them.

There is indeed nothing more difficult than to know the characters of thofe we confide in. How fhould we imagine we can know thofe of others, when we are fo uncertain about our own? What man can fay of himfelf, I never shall be capable of fuch a vice or weaknefs? And if not of himself, much less of another. Who would then needlessly truft to another, when he can hardly be fure of himself?

Of Frugality and Economy. Of Projects. Of Diverfions,

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EXT to diligence and affiduity in bufinefs, frugality and economy are the most neceffary for him who would raise himself in the world by his own industry. Simple nature is contented with a little, and there is hardly any employment which, if purfued with prudence and attention, will not yield an income fufficient for the neceffary uses of life: as, on the other hand, no revenue is fo great as to be proof against extravagance.

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travagance. Witnefs the emperor Caligula, who in a few years spent the riches of the world, at leaft of the Roman world; I mean, the immenfe treasures his avaritious predeceffor Tiberius had been amaffing for twenty-two years, befides the current revenues of the empire; and found himself reduced to ftraits from the most exorbitant riches. Every perfon's experience confirms this truth, That thofe pleasures of life which cost the moft are the leaft fatisfactory and contrariwife. The noife of balls, plays, and masquerades, is tire fome; the parade of gilt coaches, of powdered footmen, and of ftate-vifits, is fulfome; while the converfation of a wife and virtuous friend, the endearments of a faithful wife and innocent children, charity to the indigent, which none but a good economift can beftow, the pursuit of ufeful and ornamental knowledge, the ftudy of virtue and religion, these are entertainments ever new and ever delightful: And if a wife man may thus be fatisfied from himself; if the nobleft pleafures and trueft enjoyments are only to be had in our own hearts and in our own houfes, how great is the folly of mankind, who fly from the genuine, the rational, the cheap, and easily-attainable enjoyments of life, in a mad purfuit after the imaginary, expenfive, and tirefome vanities of fhew and oftentation! Were the enjoyments which pomp and grandeur yield (fuppofing them unimbittered with reflections on their fatal confequences, which will ever be crowding into the mind,) infinitely more exquifite than thofe of virtue and fobriety, which is the very contrary of the truth, a prudent man would take care, in confideration of the fhortnefs of life, how he indulged them to the neglect of the ferious bufinefs of life, or to the ruin of his fortune. None but a madman would lavish away his whole patrimony in one feason, with the profpect of poverty and mifery for the remainder of his days: For he would confider, that a life languished out in wretchednefs, or in dependence, would immenfely overbalance the pleafure of reflecting, that he had spent one year in hearing the finest mufic, in feeing the politeft company, in eating the rareft food, and in drinking the richeft wines the world could afford: Nay,

he would forefee that the reflection upon paft pleafures and gaieties would only render his mifery fo much the more intolerable. There is not, indeed, a more deplorable cafe than that of a perfon, who, by his own folly, has reduced himself to beggary: For, befides the other dtreffes he muft ftruggle with, he has the cruel ftings

his own reflections to torture him, and is deprived of poor confolation of the fympathy and compaffion of hiquaintance.

er perfon who happens by any means whatever, thous wholly out of his own power either to foresee or prevent, o fink in the world, may lay his account with mecting nottle contempt and ill-ufage from the bulk of his acquaintance, and even from thofe for whom he has in his profperity done the greatest kindneffes. But when it is known that a man's misfortunes are owing to his own extravagance, people have too good a pretence for withholding their compaffion or affiftance, and for treating him with neglect and contempt. It will therefore be a young perfon's wifdom, before he goes too far, to make fuch reflections as thefe: "Shall "I lavish away in youthful pleafure and folly the pa"trimony that muft fupport me for my whole life? "Shail I indulge myfelf in rioting and drunkenness, till "I have not a morfel of bread? Shall I revel in plays, balls, and mufic-gardens, till I bring myself to a gaol? "Shall I waste my fubftance in regaling a fet of wretches, "who will turn their backs upon me whenever they "have undone me? Shall I pafs my youth like a lord, "and be a beggar in my old age?"

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There is nothing more unaccountable than the common practice in our times among that part of the people who ought to be the examples of frugality as well as of industry, the citizens of London; I mean the usual way of fetting out in life. It feems, generally fpeaking, as if our traders thought themfelves in duty bound to go to the utmost ftretch of expence which their circumftances will afford, and even beyond, the very first year of their fetting up. That a young fhop-keeper and his new-married wife, whofe joint fortunes would not make up five thousand pounds, fhould begin with fitting in

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flate to receive company, keeping footmen, carriages, and country-houses, and awkwardly mimicking the extravagances of the other end of the town, before they know how trade may turn out, or how numerous a family of children they may have to provide for; what can be more prepofterous? As if the public had' fo little difcernment, as to conclude that people's circumstances were always according to the fhew they made. How eafy is it for any man to increase his expence, if he finds his income increase? And how hard is it to be obliged, after setting out in a grand manner, to retrench and lower the fails? It is not indeed to be done in trade, without affecting a perfon's credit, which accordingly obliges many traders to go on in the exorbitant way they first fet out in, to their own ruin and that of others who have been engaged with them. In fome countries, infolvency, where a good account of the causes which brought it on cannot be given, is punished with death. If the law of England were as fevere, what the fate of many of the bankrupt citizens of London must have been, every one may judge.

The great confumption of private fortunes is owing chiefly to thofe expences which are conftant, and run on, day after day, the whole year round. People do not feem to attend fufficiently to the confequences of the expence of one difh, or one bottle of wine more than enough in their daily economy. Yet the faving of three or four fhillings a-day will amount to fixty or eighty pounds in a year; which fum faved up yearly for thirty years, the ordinary time a man carries on bufinefs, would amount to near five thousand pounds, reckoning intereft; and still more, if you fuppofe it laid out in an advantageous trade.

If any young gentleman of fortune imagines the largenefs of his income fufficient to render frugality and economy useless, a little experience will fhew him to his coft, that no error can be greater. The charge of maintaining a number of fervants, who are to be fupported not only in neceffaries, but in all the wafte and deftruction they please to make; the expence of coachmen, footmen, horfes and hounds, a town-house and coun

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