LONDON, December 16, O. S. 1749.
DEAR Boy: This letter will, I hope, find you safely arrived and well
settled at Rome, after the usual distresses and accidents of a winter
journey; which are very proper to teach you patience. Your stay there I
look upon as a very important period of your life; and I do believe that
you will fill it up well. I hope you will employ the mornings diligently
with Mr. Harte, in acquiring weight; and the evenings in the best
companies at Rome, in acquiring lustre. A formal, dull father, would
recommend to you to plod out the evenings, too, at home, over a book by a
dim taper; but I recommend to you the evenings for your pleasures, which
are as much a part of your education, and almost as necessary a one, as
your morning studies. Go to whatever assemblies or SPECTACLES people of
fashion go to, and when you are there do as they do. Endeavor to outshine
those who shine there the most, get the ‘Garbo’, the ‘Gentilezza’, the
‘Leggeadria’ of the Italians; make love to the most impertinent beauty
of condition that you meet with, and be gallant with all the rest. Speak
Italian, right or wrong, to everybody; and if you do but laugh at
yourself first for your bad Italian, nobody else will laugh at you for
it. That is the only way to speak it perfectly; which I expect you will
do, because I am sure you may, before you leave Rome. View the most
curious remains of antiquity with a classical spirit; and they will clear
up to you many passages of the classical authors; particularly the Trajan
and Antonine Columns; where you find the warlike instruments, the
dresses, and the triumphal ornaments of the Romans. Buy also the prints
and explanations of all those respectable remains of Roman grandeur, and
compare them with the originals. Most young travelers are contented with
a general view of those things, say they are very fine, and then go about
their business. I hope you will examine them in a very different way.
‘Approfondissez’ everything you see or hear; and learn, if you can, the
WHY and the WHEREFORE. Inquire into the meaning and the objects of the
innumerable processions, which you will see at Rome at this time. Assist
at all the ceremonies, and know the reason, or at least the pretenses of
them, and however absurd they may be, see and speak of them with great
decency. Of all things, I beg of you not to herd with your own
countrymen, but to be always either with the Romans, or with the foreign
ministers residing at Rome. You are sent abroad to see the manners and
characters, and learn the languages of foreign countries; and not to
converse with English, in English; which would defeat all those ends.
Among your graver company, I recommend (as I have done before) the
Jesuits to you; whose learning and address will both please and improve
you; inform yourself, as much as you can, of the history, policy, and
practice of that society, from the time of its founder, Ignatius of
Loyola, who was himself a madman. If you would know their morality, you
will find it fully and admirably stated in ‘Les Lettres d’un Provincial’,
by the famous Monsieur Pascal; and it is a book very well worth your
reading. Few people see what they see, or hear what they hear; that is,
they see and hear so inattentively and superficially, that they are very
little the better for what they do see and hear. This, I dare say,
neither is, nor will be your case. You will understand, reflect upon, and
consequently retain, what you see and hear. You have still two years
good, but no more, to form your character in the world decisively; for,
within two months after your arrival in England, it will be finally and
irrevocably determined, one way or another, in the opinion of the public.
Devote, therefore, these two years to the pursuit of perfection; which
ought to be everybody’s object, though in some particulars unattainable;
those who strive and labor the most, will come the nearest to it. But,
above all things, aim at it in the two important arts of speaking and
pleasing; without them all your other talents are maimed and crippled.
They are the wings upon which you must soar above other people; without
them you will only crawl with the dull mass of mankind. Prepossess by
your air, address, and manners; persuade by your tongue; and you will
easily execute what your head has contrived. I desire that you will send
me very minute accounts from Rome, not of what you see, but, of who you
see; of your pleasures and entertainments. Tell me what companies you
frequent most, and how you are received.