Honour perhaps of Health of Fortune and Estate And it shows the Safe and the Honourable Roads of Vertue And is it not a very Important and necessary thing to be taught these Matters before we launch into the World Without this we shall be in danger of learning the Shelves in this dangerous Sea by running aground there and the Rocks by splitting upon them Without a previous Admonition and Instruction about what we are to avoid and what to chuse we shall learn the World only to imitate it we shall learn and comply and endeavour to be as like it as we can we shall be led away with the Error of the Wicked and follow a Multitude to do Evil. We are naturally prone to imitate what we see done by others and more prone to imitate Evil than Good and we shall commonly meet with more Ill Examples than Good ones By consequence we shall be in greater likelihood of learning and following Vice than Vertue if we are not fenced against it by Good Instruction before we venture into the World Let me add 'T is of very great Importance to you to be as early as is possible acquainted with these things to learn betimes the Knowledge and Practice of Vertue For as much as Habits of Good or Ill are continually growing in us but especially in our young and tender Years Our Actions in those Years are as it were the Seeds or Foundations of future Habits which we contract when we are young and are not able to leave when we are old But if we cannot rightly discern Good from Evil we shall become accustomed to do Evil before we know what it is And if once we are arrived as this it will be a matter of as much difficulty to cure our selves as it were for the Ethiopian to change his Skin or the Leopard his Spots This encreases the difficulty of convincing us of our Faults We shall be loth to own that we have been in an Error This will engage us to justifie our Faults rather than acknowledge them that we may let our selves go on without shame or remorse And besides if we are convinced of a Fault after that difficulty is over there is more remaining and 't is yet a very large task to conquer and forsake it when 't is become as it were a second nature It is easie to correct and form young and tender Inclinations to Evil. But when several Years are gone over them and they are become confirm'd Habits they are then not easily subdued We must then know Vertue and Vice betimes and know them in their least beginnings and lowest degrees that we may practice the one and abstain from the other And 't is necessary that we begin betimes to practice Vertue and to resist and avoid Vice that we may be inured and accustomed to do so Then will it be easie to be Vertuous all our Days and we must put a Violence and Constraint upon our selves if we would comply with the Solicitations of any Vice Whereas without this we shall fall into that unhappy State that it will be easie to us only to be Vicious and we must put a Constraint upon our selves when we are to do that which would become us and would be for our Interest or our Honour Besides 't is our Wisdom and Happiness to have as little occasion for repentance as is possible and therefore to begin a Course of Vertue betimes And 't is our Honour to have attain'd a great and eminent degree of Vertue but the sooner we begin to endeavour this the more likely we are to attain it Vertue in youth settles a good Constitution and confirms Health in the strong Bodies and supports a tender and weak Constitution which Vice would quickly destroy Vertue in youth makes the best Provision of Worldly Enjoyments and Comfortable Thoughts for Old Age. It defers the Infirmities of Old Age and makes that commonly the freer from the things that are usually grievous to it To Young Persons then I would particularly recommend the Vse of this Book for the promoting of Vertue among them To conclude The Women have here an excellent Mirrour wherein they may see themselves and all the World they may discover whatever Spots or Deformities are upon themselves or others This is a Glass that will certainly show you what does best become and most adorn you Drest by this you must needs like your selves and may do so with good reason and without flattering your selves and you would also approve your selves to God and the Holy Angels and to the best and wisest among Mankind I must only desire you to take notice of this further That I do not apply the great Character I have given of this Book to what you now see of it but to the whole that which is here is at most but half worthy of it for it is but half the intended design The other half is actually under Hand and I hope will be speedily presented to you And then I doubt not but it will appear worthy of your Esteem and of my Recommendation and Highly Vseful to promote your Honour and Happiness the end for which it is designed A TABLE OF THE Subjects Treated on in this BOOK Chap. 1. OF Reading with some Remarks upon that of this Book Page 1 Chap. 2. Of Conversation Page 31 Chap. 3. Of the Chearful Humour and the Melancholy Page 51 Chap. 4. Of Reputation Page 70 Chap. 5. Of the Inclination to Vertue and of Devotion Page 82 Chap. 6. Of Chastity and of Complaisance Page 91 Chap. 7. Of Courage Page 102 Chap. 8. Of Constancy Page 112 Chap. 9. Of Prudence and Discretion Page 123 Chap. 10. Of the Learned Women Page 131 Chap. 11. Of Habits or Ornaments Page 141 Chap. 12. Of Beauty Page 148 Chap. 13. Of Curiosity and Slander Page 156 Chap. 14. Of the Cruel and the Compassionate Page 163 Chap. 15. Of a Good Grace Page 170 Chap. 16. The Debauched or Lewd Woman Page 176 Chap. 17. Of Jealousie Page 183 Chap. 18. Of Friendship and the Love of Inclination and that of Election Page 196 Chap. 19. Of the Complaisant or Pleasing Humour Page 216 Chap. 20. Of Birth or Nature and Education Page 252 Chap. 21. Of an Equal Mind under Good and Bad Fortune Page 279 ERRATA PAge 8. Line 5. for least read last p. 18. l. 6. for west r. wast p. 20. l. 8. for Jammuz r. Tammuz P 57. l. 28. for void r. avoid p. 121. l. 18. for Wickednesses r. Wickedness p. 134. l. 15. for really r. rarely p. 180. l. 20. for Impudence r. Imprudence p. 272. l. 2. for are r. are not Of READING With some Remarks upon that of this Book THERE IS NOT any thing more true than that Reading Conversation and Contemplation are three of the most useful and most charming emploiments in the world By Reading we enjoy the Dead by Conversation the Living and by Contemplation our Selves Reading enriches the Memory Conversation polishes the Wit
should appear that these were absolutely necessary to the recommending them to your Favour and Esteem and this also would return to your advantage since by this Influence upon the World it would come to pass that you could not want a proportionable number of fit and worthy Objects of your Affections and Choice To your great advantage it would be to stir up in the Men an Ambition to be well accomplisht too to make them asham'd of Ignorance and Vice by your Example and you your selves would be the more happy in Brothers Husbands and Children And the Women of our Age have perhaps greater advantage than ever their Ancestours had for the Improvement of their Minds at least so far as the Reading of Good Books can contribute towards this When you have a great many of the best Books in the World either wrote in your own Language or Translated into it Translation is a mighty Favour to you It brings the Wisdom of the Ancients to you unveil'd and inables you to study and learn it without the previous discouraging fatigue of Learning Languages We have lately seen some of the choicest Histories and best Pieces of useful Philosophy that Greece or Rome could boast of Translated into English And still this Work of Translating goes on and will especially do so if it has the Encouragement and Favour of your Sex And I would hope to see our own Language as Learned as any other in the World And why may we not see the costly useless Trifles that fill the Closets of our Ladies thrown out and Excellent and Vseful Books set up there in their stead You have almost nothing else to do but to study all the time that you live single and are at liberty from Affairs of the World To be sure there is nothing you can do so much to your advantage as to entertain and employ your selves much with Good Books I need not Recommend to you Plutarch or Hierocles or Livy or Seneca or the Excellent Antoninus lately Translated with the Learned and Vseful Reflections of Madam Dacier a Philosopher of your own Sex at this time Famous for her Wit and Learning Nor shall I mention any more since they may be met with at every Booksellers And it is chiefly my present Business to Recommend the following Book Here then you have the Characters of the Vertues and Vices very faithfully and truly drawn Whereby you may learn to distinguish the one from the other and may avoid that common and mischievous Error of mistakeing Vertue for Vice and Vice for Vertue Vice is an Vgly Name and that which almost all abhor should be imputed to them and Vertue is generally in the Notion commended and esteemed and therefore almost all pretend to Vertue in general But when we come to the reproof of particular Vices and to charge them upon those that are Guilty and so when we come to insist upon particular Vertues and to urge the Practice of them Then the World boggles and hesitates or it may be is angry and opposes Then the beloved Vice will not be believed to be a Vice and it shall be accounted ill nature or moroseness or a particular spite that calls it so And the Vertue that we want and do not care to put in practice will not be allow'd to be a Vertue but shall be disputed against The one will be defended under a soft and specious name and the other rejected under a bad one Thus do many Persons often deceive themselves to their disparagement and shame and misery While they cannot discern aright in this matter they perhaps shun the most Honourable Vertues and embrace the most shameful Vices They will refuse what is good and betake themselves to what is hurtful They will be asham'd of Vertue and boast of their Vices Further as Persons are apt for themselves to find out this way to evade the Arguments for Vertue and the Reproofs of Vice so they will endeavour to influence others after the same manner They that are Vicious naturally desire to have others like themselves that their better practice may not condemn or disparage them that others may fall into the same inconveniencies which they have brought themselves to by their wickedness and so may not be able to deride or despise them or that they may accomplish upon those who are yet afraid of Vice some base and shameful design To these Purposes they endeavour much the confounding of all things and especially of the natural and common signs of Passions and Vices in the Soul These they would fain have not regarded nor believed to be the Marks and Symptoms of any such things Highly necessary it is then to be possest with a clear and distinct knowledge of these things And here you have Vertue represented in her true Beauty and Lustre and the ugly Mask the frightful Vizor which spiteful Sinners put upon her is taken off You may see her in all her Charms as far as they can be represented in a Description or Picture of her which I confess cannot have the advantages of the Life in a sublime Example but yet may be sufficient to beget in us some Love and Admiration of the Beauty And here you have also Vice represented in its true Colours and all her Deformity shown as far as was consistent with Modesty and Discretion and the Paint and Disguise which the Vicious Wit of the World puts upon her is also removed Here are Motives to Vertue and just Disswasives from Vice proposed The Means of practising and improving in the one and of abstaining from and mortifying the other You have the Subjects treated on such as are of common Vse and Concern such as relate to every one The Vertues such as all may reach and the Vices such as all are exposed to You have all the Discourse plain and easie Free from the crabbed terms of the Schools You have a Philosopher not dictating after the rudeness of an Academy but complementing and insinuating his wholsome Counsels in the stile and manner of a Courtier And if thà t will recommend the Book further I must tell you That the most of it was written by a very Eminent Person in a Neighbour Nation who had the Honour to be a Counsellour and Preacher in Ordinary to the King that then Reigned there Here you have an Excellent Anatomy as it were of the Soul a view of the Insides of Mankind so that you may see the secret Motions Workings and Effects of all sorts of Passions and Humours Here you may learn the World then without mingleing with it which is the safest way and the pleasantest of doing this For thus you will not be in danger of being corrupted or vexed with the wickedness and folly of it while you are learning it which things in Converse you will be constantly exposed to This Book like a Mariners Chart shows the Rocks and Shelves of Vice whereon unwary and untaught Souls are wont to make Shipwrack of
and Contemplation improves the Judgment But among these noble Occupations of the Soul if we would determine which is the most important it must be confessed that Reading furnishes both the other And without that our Contemplation would be of no advantage and our Conversation without pleasure It is necessary to the Ladies of greatest Wit as well as to those of the meanest in that it gives to the former much the greater Lustre as it mends the Imperfections and Defects of the latter It renders these tolerable and makes them admirable And to say the truth Reading shews us many things which our own reasoning could never discover it adds solidity to our thoughts and a charming sweetness to our discourse It finishes and compleats that which Nature has but only begun Nor is it strange that we should receive so great advantage from this since the best Inventions in the world have ow'd their Original to Reading join'd with Judicious Thinking and the one is as the Father the other a Mother to the sinest Thoughts And because neither of these separately can produce any thing of perfection it is easie to comprehend why they who have no love for Books can speak nothing but what is trivial and their conversation is no better than a persecution of their company That a good Wit may set off its self well enough without any thing of Study as they say a good Face needs no Ornaments is what I cannot without dissimulation allow But on the contrary it must be said that as the stomachs which have greatest heat have need of most food to keep the body in good plight and maintain life so the brightest Wits have most need of reading to acquire thereby politeness and fulness and especially to moderate that vigour which cannot succeed but by chance when it is altogether alone It is then in this incomparable School they must learn what is excellent to entertain the company that is good and to be a remedy against the bad Here the Ladies must receive antidotes against the persecutions of those whose discourse is all Idle and Impertinent It is Reading that renders Conversation most grateful and Solitude least tedious There are others nevertheless of another opinion and such as think that 't is sufficient for learning the best things in the world to enjoy the conversation of good Wits without putting ones self to the trouble of turning over Books But tho I grant that the Conversation of Worthy Persons is very necessary and may as a living School influence us most powerfully while we see the rule and an excellent example together Yet it seems to me that they who content themselves with the company of those that Know much might become more compleat by reading their works It is my Opinion that if Conversation gives readiness Reading affords abundance that the former distributes only what this latter acquires and is liberal of the riches which reading heaps together Moreover since men take more pains about what they write than what they speak and no man employs so much care in that which is to endure but for a moment as in that which is to endure for ever It must be own'd that we may rather expect to find excellent things in the Writings of great Persons than in their Discourse for while they let nothing pass in their Books that is not finisht it is not possible but many things imperfect will slip from them in discourse and conversation Besides there needs no more but an agreeable voice or with some a great noise a sweet accent or a good grace to charm those that hear But there is nothing to abuse or impose upon them that read It is much more easie to deceive the Ear than the Eye Discourses pass on with but a superficial notice taken of them and hardly have we the leisure to observe their defects But Writings remain steadily exposed to the Censures of those that judge and the faults of them are never pardon'd Herein there lies as I think a very good reason for the reading of good Books that the great Wits have in them left us their best performances and they have employ'd their watchings and studies more to the Writing than Speaking well However if it be necessary for the proof of this to join Experience with Reason what can any desire for the Ornament of the Mind that may not be met with in Books We may find there Instructions of every make we may see Vertue under every sort of Visage We may there discover Truth in every representation of it we can desire we may see her with all her strength among the Philosophers with all her purity among the Historians and with all her beauty postures and sine disguises in the Orators and Poets And from this so agreeable variety it is possible for all sorts of humours and conditions to find content and instruction It is here that Truth is not disorder'd by Passions that she speaks without fear as well as without design and dreads not to enter the Palaces nor even the Presence of the greatest Monarchs For this reason too is Reading extreamly requisite to the Ladies for since they want Mute Instructors as well as Princes and as well Beauty as Royalty does not so easily find Teachers as Flatters It is necessary that for the apprehending their defects they should learn sometimes from the admonitions of the Dead That which the Living dare not say to them It is in Books alone that they can remark the imperfections of their minds as in their Mirrors they discern those of their Faces It is there they will find Judges that cannot be corrupted either by their Love or Hatred It is there that the most fair as well as the least so are equally treated having to do with Arbitrators that use the Eyes they have only to put a difference between Vertue and Vice BUT HOWEVER since all Books are not excellent and there are many which truly deserve to be brought to no light but by the fire the printing of which should rather have been hindred than the reading them It must be acknowledged that there is no less difficulty in choosing good Books to employ us when we are alone than to choose good Wits for our entertainment in company So that if any find they must not rely upon themselves in this matter for the making of a good choice they ought at least to follow the counsel of the most knowing and most vertuous for fear that in reading they may happen to infect the Mind or debauch the Conscience I cannot forbear in this place to reprehend the tyranny of certain Wits who form among themselves a kind of Cabal for the censure of all things and think the approbation of their Cabal must be first obtained before a thing can deserve to be approved by others As the value of Money derives it self from the Ordinance of the Prince so must the value of Books and the purity of Language depend upon
are most truly barren so they that have been conversant in these are oftentimes a little confused and troublesome There is nothing but disorder in their thoughts and conceptions and constraint and affectation in what they say It seems as if their Wit had not heat enough to digest that which their Reading furnishes them with And one may see in the inequality and confusion of their Discourse even at the same time that they speak of excellent things that to have Marble and Porphiry and the most excellent Materials by us is not enough for the building a beautiful Palace if one be not a skilful Architect to dispose them These persons are mightily subject to Repetitions for having tackt their Idea to particular words and phrases and fill'd their thoughts with some particular matters and Subjects their Spirit is not at liberty to invent other when it is necessary They are so inslav'd to their Memory that they can make as it were no use of their Judgment It is for this reason that they cannot speak but by common Place and that they enlarge themselves so much when they are upon a subject wherein they have some advantage that they are ready to speak all even to the Margins Leaves Quotations and other superfluous circumstances I could as willingly find my self among the Conferences of the Ministers of State when they are disputing the Place of Congress the Day the Matter and the Arbiters To deliver these Women from the defect it were best to send them to the Theater of Humane life or some other large and Voluminous Book in which they might read all that they have a mind to speak of Their Repartees and their Complements are Orations when they have begun a discourse before they can make an end they must exhaust their Chapter they cease not to speak till they have no more to say They much resemble those who recite Plays on the Theater who are not able to add to or diminish in the least from their Lesson without putting themselves out and forgetting the rest It is true they make themselves admired in some Rencounters but this is more by chance than that they can be at all assured of it And to speak the Truth that they may seem able persons they have need to speak to those that are not so If by misfortune they are led from what they have some knowledge of and are made fall upon a Subject that is unknown to them and where Reasoning or Judgment is more requisite than Memory you shall then at the same time perceive their Weakness and their Vanity in that they can neither hold their peace nor speak with any good Grace The force upon their Looks shews that they have not Modesty enough to keep silent nor Ability to discourse either they are silent with regret or speak with disorder These are the Principal Vices of Conversation which I thought necessary to be observ'd that the good qualities might appear the better after I had painted out the bad So that now to make an Abridgment of my Thoughts in this matter I judge that there is nothing more Important and conducing to our Conversing with good success than to know well our own humour that we may duly regulate that or to know the Humours of others that we may please them or defend our selves from them Knowledg and a sweet Temper are the two qualifications most necessary for an entertainment Without the former the Conversation will be too trival without the other too rude and tiresome Those Women that speak little as well as they that speak much ought to consider that Modesty is necessary to Silence as well as to Discourse as it frees the one from Contempt and the other from Affectation And whatsoever Humour they are of that they may avoid the danger of being persecuted or debauched it would be good for them never to seek the Conversation but of two sorts of persons That of the best Wits because such will excuse most easily their defects and can best apprehend and acknowledge their merits And that of the most Vertuous for when the Licentious can do no harm to their Conscience yet they will do it to their Reputation and will render them but Infamous if they cannot make them Vicious Of the Chearful Humour and the Melancholy THERE IS NOTHING more necessary to the Ladies for Conversation than to know well their own Humour that they may Reform it if bad or Polish it if it be good This is the foundation of all that which is of any Importance in this matter But as there are two sorts of Humours that may both succeed well each of them in their several way I think fit at present to make a comparison of them in this Discourse that they may the better remark that which is good or which is evil in the one and the other And to describe in the first place that which is of greatest esteem in Society It must be own'd that the Gay and Chearful Humour has here by much the advantage of the Melancholy which truly is not unfit for Knowledge but is a little too heavy for Discourse and too coarse for the Genteel Carriage or Repartee The merry Humours have a much better Grace and more liberty in all they do and so they are much better receiv'd in Company as being the more natural in their Affections less constrain'd in their Deportment and the most innocent in their Designs Whatever some say in Favour of the Melancholy If their Meditations are commendable in some things 't is certain they have their bad as well as good effects and they that call it the Mother of Wisdom ought to acknowledg that 't is very often the Mother of Extravagance They would persuade that such Spirits discover many things and that they go far in Contemplation but their Voyage is often so long too that they never return again Or if they do return again this is as the Pilgrims who abandon their own Country to run needlessly into strange ones without any other advantage than to bring back from thence Poverty and Weariness Musing is a Labyrinth wherein they lose themselves easily and from which they get out with difficulty Nevertheless they name Melancholy the Element of Good wits thinking to excuse their Weakness by giving it a specious Name But as the Lame do not gain any Glory when they spend a great deal of Time and Labour to make but a little way so these poring Spirits do not deserve any praise for being long in finding out that which others of stronger parts could better find and with less pains Those that are more subtle have the same advantage over them as Birds that can fly have over Serpents that can only creep or such as Angels have of Bodies and material things Upon the whole I do not at all comcomprehend why they make a boast of their speaking but little for their Silence proceeds rather from their Barrenness than their Discretion