LONDON, August 7, O. S. 1749.
DEAR BOY: By Mr. Harte’s letter to me of the 18th July N. S., which I
received by the last post, I am at length informed of the particulars
both of your past distemper, and of your future motions. As to the
former, I am now convinced, and so is Dr. Shaw, that your lungs were only
symptomatically affected; and that the rheumatic tendency is what you are
chiefly now to guard against, but (for greater security) with due
attention still to your lungs, as if they had been, and still were, a
little affected. In either case, a cooling, pectoral regimen is equally
good. By cooling, I mean cooling in its consequences, not cold to the
palate; for nothing is more dangerous than very cold liquors, at the very
time that one longs for them the most; which is, when one is very hot.
Fruit, when full ripe, is very wholesome; but then it must be within
certain bounds as to quantity; for I have known many of my countrymen die
of bloody-fluxes, by indulging in too great a quantity of fruit, in those
countries where, from the goodness and ripeness of it, they thought it
could do them no harm. ‘Ne quid nimis’, is a most excellent rule in
everything; but commonly the least observed, by people of your age, in
anything.
As to your future motions, I am very well pleased with them, and greatly
prefer your intended stay at Verona to Venice, whose almost stagnating
waters must, at this time of the year, corrupt the air. Verona has a pure
and clear air, and, as I am informed, a great deal of good company.
Marquis Maffei, alone, would be worth going there for. You may, I think,
very well leave Verona about the middle of September, when the great
heats will be quite over, and then make the best of your way to Naples;
where, I own, I want to have you by way of precaution (I hope it is
rather over caution) in case of the last remains of a pulmonic disorder.
The amphitheatre at Verona is worth your attention; as are also many
buildings there and at Vicenza, of the famous Andrea Palladio, whose
taste and style of buildings were truly antique. It would not be amiss,
if you employed three or four days in learning the five orders of
architecture, with their general proportions; and you may know all that
you need know of them in that time. Palladio’s own book of architecture
is the best you can make use of for that purpose, skipping over the
mechanical part of it, such as the materials, the cement, etc.
Mr. Harte tells me, that your acquaintance with the classics is renewed;
the suspension of which has been so short, that I dare say it has
produced no coldness. I hope and believe, you are now so much master of
them, that two hours every day, uninterruptedly, for a year or two more,
will make you perfectly so; and I think you cannot now allot them a
greater share than that of your time, considering the many other things
you have to learn and to do. You must know how to speak and write Italian
perfectly; you must learn some logic, some geometry, and some astronomy;
not to mention your exercises, where they are to be learned; and, above
all, you must learn the world, which is not soon learned; and only to be
learned by frequenting good and various companies.
Consider, therefore, how precious every moment of time is to you now. The
more you apply to your business, the more you will taste your pleasures.
The exercise of the mind in the morning whets the appetite for the
pleasures of the evening, as much as the exercise of the body whets the
appetite for dinner. Business and pleasure, rightly understood, mutually
assist each other, instead of being enemies, as silly or dull people
often think them. No man tastes pleasures truly, who does not earn them
by previous business, and few people do business well, who do nothing
else. Remember that when I speak of pleasures, I always mean the elegant
pleasures of a rational being, and, not the brutal ones of a swine. I
mean ‘la bonne Chere’, short of gluttony; wine, infinitely short of
drunkenness; play, without the least gaming; and gallantry without
debauchery. There is a line in all these things which men of sense, for
greater security, take care to keep a good deal on the right side of; for
sickness, pain, contempt and infamy, lie immediately on the other side of
it. Men of sense and merit, in all other respects, may have had some of
these failings; but then those few examples, instead of inviting us to
imitation, should only put us the more upon our guard against such
weaknesses: and whoever thinks them fashionable, will not be so himself;
I have often known a fashionable man have some one vice; but I never in
my life knew a vicious man a fashionable man. Vice is as degrading as it
is criminal. God bless you, my dear child!