A capable statesman, an accomplished diplomatist, and the
courtliest and best-bred man of his century, Philip Dormer
Stanhope, fourth Earl of Chesterfield, born on September 22,
1694, and dead March 24, 1773, would have been almost
forgotten at the present day but for the preservation of his
letters to his natural son, Philip Stanhope. It was the
ambition of Lord Chesterfield's life that this young man
should be a paragon of learning and manners. In a voluminous
series of letters, more than 400 of which are preserved, his
father minutely directed his classical and political studies,
and, above all, instructed him with endless insistence as to
his bearing in society, impressed upon him the importance of
good breeding, the "graces," and the general deportment
required of a person of quality. The letters are a classic of
courtliness and worldly wisdom. They were prepared for the
press by Philip Stanhope's widow, and were published in 1774,
under the title of "Letters Written by the Earl of
Chesterfield, together with Several other Pieces on Various
Subjects." Since then many editions have appeared, bearing
such titles as "The Fine Gentleman," "The Elements of Polite
Education," etc.
_I.--On Manners and Address_
London, _December_ 29, 1747. I have received two letters from you of the
17th and 22nd, by the last of which I find that some of mine to you must
have miscarried; for I have never been above two posts without writing
to you or to Mr. Harte, and even very long letters. I have also received
a letter from Mr. Harte, which gives me great satisfaction; it is full
of your praises.
Your German will go on, of course; and I take it for granted that your
stay at Leipsig will make you a perfect master of that language, both as
to speaking and writing; for remember, that knowing any language
imperfectly is very little better than not knowing it at all, people
being as unwilling to speak in a language which they do not possess
thoroughly as others are to hear them.
Go to the Duchess of Courland's as often as she and your leisure will
permit. The company of women of fashion will improve your manners,
though not your understanding; and that complaisance and politeness,
which are so useful in men's company, can only be acquired in women's.
Remember always what I have told you a thousand times, that all the
talents in the world will want all their lustre, and some part of their
use, too, if they are not advanced with that easy good-breeding, that
engaging manner, and those graces, which seduce and prepossess people in
your favour at first sight. A proper care of your person is by no means
to be neglected; always extremely clean; upon proper occasions, fine.
Your carriage genteel, and your motions graceful. Take particular care
of your manners and address when you present yourself in company. Let
them be respectful without meanness, easy without too much familiarity,
genteel without affectation, and insinuating without any seeming art or
design.... Adieu!
_II.--On the Art of Pleasing_
_Bath, March_ 9, 1748. I must from time to time remind you of what I
have often recommended to you, and of what you cannot attend to too
much: sacrifice to the graces. Intrinsic merit alone will not do; it
will gain you the general esteem of all, but not the particular
affection, that is the heart, of any. To engage the affections of any
particular person you must, over and above your general merit, have some
particular merit to that person; by services done, or offered; by
expressions of regard and esteem; by complaisance, attentions, etc., for
him; and the graceful manner of doing all these things opens the way to
the heart, and facilitates, or rather, insures, their effects.
A thousand little things, not separately to be described, conspire to
form these graces, this _je ne scais quoi,_ that always pleases. A
pretty person, a proper degree of dress, an harmonious voice, something
open and cheerful in the countenance, but without laughing; a distinct
and properly varied manner of speaking; all these things and many others
are necessary ingredients in the composition of the pleasing _je ne
scais quoi_, which everybody feels, though nobody can describe. Observe
carefully, then, what displeases or pleases you in others, and be
persuaded that, in general, the same things will please or displease
them in you.
Having mentioned laughing, I must particularly warn you against it; and
I would heartily wish that you may often be seen to smile, but never
heard to laugh while you live. Frequent and loud laughter is the
characteristic of folly and ill-manners; it is the manner in which the
mob express their silly joy at silly things; and they call it being
merry. In my mind there is nothing so illiberal, and so ill-bred, as
audible laughter. I am neither of a melancholy nor a cynical
disposition, and am as willing and as apt to be pleased as anybody; but
I am sure that since I have had the full use of my reason nobody has
ever heard me laugh. Many people, at first, from awkwardness and
_mauvaise honte_, have got a very disagreeable and silly trick of
laughing whenever they speak.
This, and many other very disagreeable habits, are owing to _mauvaise
honte_ at their first setting out in the world. They are ashamed in
company, and so disconcerted that they do not know what they do, and try
a thousand tricks to keep themselves in countenance; which tricks
afterwards grow habitual to them. Some put their fingers in their nose,
others scratch their heads, others twirl their hats; in short, every
awkward, ill-bred body has its tricks. But the frequency does not
justify the thing, and all these vulgar habits and awkwardness are most
carefully to be guarded against, as they are great bars in the way of
the art of pleasing.
_London, September_ 5, 1748. I have received yours, with the enclosed
German letter to Mr. Grevenkop, which he assures me is extremely well
written, considering the little time that you have applied yourself to
that language.
St. Thomas's Day now draws near, when you are to leave Saxony and go to
Berlin. Berlin will be entirely a new scene to you, and I look upon it,
in a manner, as your first step into the great world; take care that
step be not a false one, and that you do not stumble at the threshold.
You will there be in more company than you have yet been; manners and
attentions will, therefore, be more necessary.
You will best acquire these by frequenting the companies of people of
fashion; but then you must resolve to acquire them, in those companies,
by proper care and observation. When you go into good company--by good
company is meant the people of the first fashion of the place--observe
carefully their turn, their manners, their address; and conform your own
to them. But this is not all either; go deeper still; observe their
characters, and pry into both their hearts and their heads. Seek for
their particular merit, their predominant passion, or their prevailing
weakness; and you will then know what to bait your hook with to catch
them.
As women are a considerable, or, at least, a pretty numerous part of
company; and as their suffrages go a great way towards establishing a
man's character in the fashionable part of the world, which is of great
importance to the fortune and figure he proposes to make in it, it is
necessary to please them. I will, therefore, upon this subject, let you
into certain _arcana_ that will be very useful for you to know, but
which you must, with the utmost care, conceal and never seem to know.
Women, then, are only children of a larger growth; they have an
entertaining tattle, and sometimes wit; but for solid reasoning, good
sense, I never knew in my life one that had it, or who reasoned or acted
consequentially for four-and-twenty hours together. Some little passion
or humour always breaks in upon their best resolutions. Their beauty
neglected or controverted, their age increased or their supposed
understandings depreciated, instantly kindles their little passions, and
overturns any system of consequential conduct that in their most
reasonable moments they have been capable of forming. A man of sense
only trifles with them, plays with them, humours and flatters them, as
he does with a sprightly, forward child; but he neither consults them
about nor trusts them with, serious matters; though he often makes them
believe that he does both, which is the thing in the world that they are
proud of.
But these are secrets, which you must keep inviolably, if you would not,
like Orpheus, be torn to pieces by the whole sex. On the contrary, a man
who thinks of living in the great world must be gallant, polite, and
attentive to please the women. They have, from the weakness of men, more
or less influence in all courts; they absolutely stamp every man's
character in the _beau monde,_ and make it either current, or cry it
down, and stop it in payment.
It is, therefore, absolutely necessary to manage, please, and flatter
them; and never to discover the least mark of contempt, which is what
they never forgive; but in this they are not singular, for it is the
same with men, who will much sooner forgive an injustice than an insult.
These are some of the hints which my long experience in the great world
enables me to give you, and which, if you attend to them, may prove
useful to you in your journey through it. I wish it may be a prosperous
one; at least, I am sure that it must be your own fault if it is not.
_III.--The Secret of Good Breeding_
_London, November_ 3, 1749. From the time that you have had life, it has
been the principal and favourite object of mine to make you as perfect
as the imperfections of human nature will allow. In this view, I have
grudged no pains nor expense in your education, convinced that
education, more than nature, is the cause of that great difference which
you see in the characters of men. While you were a child I endeavoured
to form your heart habitually to virtue and honour, before your
understanding was capable of showing you their beauty and utility. Those
principles, which you then got, like your grammar rules, only by rote,
are now, I am persuaded, fixed and confirmed by reason.
My next object was sound and useful learning. All that remains for me
then to wish, to recommend, to inculcate, to order, and to insist upon,
is good breeding, without which all your other qualifications will be
lame, unadorned, and to a certain degree unavailing. And here I fear,
and have too much reason to believe, that you are greatly deficient. The
remainder of this letter, therefore, shall be--and it will not be the
last by a great many--upon the subject of good breeding.
A friend of yours and mine has very justly defined good breeding to be
the result of much good sense, some good nature, and a little
self-denial for the sake of others, and with a view to obtain the same
indulgence from them. Taking this for granted, as I think it cannot be
disputed, it is astonishing to me that anybody who has good sense and
good nature, and I believe you have both, can essentially fail in good
breeding. As to the modes of it, indeed, they vary according to persons
and places and circumstances, and are only to be acquired by observation
and experience; but the substance of it is everywhere and eternally the
same. Good manners are, to particular societies, what good morals are to
society in general; their cement and their security. And as laws are
enacted to enforce good morals, or, at least, to prevent the ill-effects
of bad ones, so there are certain rules of civility, universally implied
and received, to enforce good manners, and punish bad ones.
Mutual complaisances, attentions, and sacrifices of little conveniences,
are as natural an implied compact between civilised people as protection
and obedience are between kings and subjects; whoever, in either case,
violates that compact justly forfeits all advantages arising from it.
For my own part, I really think that, next to the consciousness of doing
a good action, that of doing a civil one is the most pleasing; and the
epithet which I should covet the most, next to that of Aristides, would
be that of well-bred.