Under this head I rank all those places, which are open to an
indiscriminate resort of company. There seems at present such a rage for
pleasure, that when adversity does not call home the thoughts, the whole
day is mostly spent in preparations and plans, or in actual dissipation.
Solitude appears insupportable, and domestic comfort stupid. And though
the amusements may not always be relished, the mind is so enervated it
cannot exert itself to find out any other substitute. An immoderate
fondness for dress is acquired, and many fashionable females spend half
the night in going from one place to another to display their finery,
repeat commonplace compliments, and raise envy in their acquaintance
whom they endeavour to outshine. Women, who are engaged in those scenes,
must spend more time in dress than they ought to do, and it will occupy
their thoughts when they should be better employed.
In the fine Lady how few traits do we observe of those affections which
dignify human nature! If she has any maternal tenderness, it is of a
childish kind. We cannot be too careful not to verge on this character;
though she lives many years she is still a child in understanding, and
of so little use to society, that her death would scarcely be observed.
Dissipation leads to poverty, which cannot be patiently borne by those
who have lived on the vain applause of others, on account of outward
advantages; these were the things they imagined of most consequence, and
of course they are tormented with false shame, when by a reverse of
fortune they are deprived of them.
A young innocent girl, when she first enters into gay scenes, finds her
spirits so raised by them, that she would often be lost in delight, if
she was not checked by observing the behaviour of a class of females who
attend those places. What a painful train of reflections do then arise
in the mind, and convictions of the vice and folly of the world are
prematurely forced on it. It is no longer a paradise, for innocence is
not there; the taint of vice poisons every enjoyment, and affectation,
though despised, is very contagious. If these reflections do not occur,
languor follows the extraordinary exertions, and weak minds fall a prey
to imaginary distress, to banish which they are obliged to take as a
remedy what produced the disease.
We talk of amusements unbending the mind; so they ought; yet even in the
hours of relaxation we are acquiring habits. A mind accustomed to
observe can never be quite idle, and will catch improvement on all
occasions. Our pursuits and pleasures should have the same tendency, and
every thing concur to prepare us for a state of purity and happiness.
There vice and folly will not poison our pleasures; our faculties will
expand; and not mistake their objects; and we shall no longer “see as
through a glass darkly, but know, even as we are known.”