Letters to His Son on the Art of Becoming a Man of the World and a Gentleman

<p><SPAN name="link2H_4_0260" id="link2H_4_0260"></SPAN></p> <h2> LETTER CCLIX </h2> <h3> BLACKHEATH, September 1, 1763 </h3> <p>MY DEAR FRIEND: Great news! The King sent for Mr. Pitt last Saturday, and the conference lasted a full hour; on the Monday following another conference, which lasted much longer; and yesterday a third, longer than either. You take for granted, that the treaty was concluded and ratified; no such matter, for this last conference broke it entirely off; and Mr. Pitt and Lord Temple went yesterday evening to their respective country houses. Would you know what it broke off upon, you must ask the newsmongers, and the coffee-houses; who, I dare say, know it all very minutely; but I, who am not apt to know anything that I do not know, honestly and humbly confess, that I cannot tell you; probably one party asked too much, and the other would grant too little. However, the King's dignity was not, in my mind, much consulted by their making him sole plenipotentiary of a treaty, which they were not in all events determined to conclude. It ought surely to have been begun by some inferior agent, and his Majesty should only have appeared in rejecting or ratifying it. Louis XIV. never sat down before a town in person, that was not sure to be taken.</p> <p>However, 'ce qui est differe n'est pas perdu'; for this matter must be taken up again, and concluded before the meeting of the parliament, and probably upon more disadvantageous terms to the present Ministers, who have tacitly admitted, by this negotiation, what their enemies have loudly proclaimed, that they are not able to carry on affairs. So much 'de re politica'.</p> <p>I have at last done the best office that can be done to most married people; that is, I have fixed the separation between my brother and his wife; and the definitive treaty of peace will be proclaimed in about a fortnight; for the only solid and lasting peace, between a man and his wife, is, doubtless, a separation. God bless you!</p> <p><SPAN name="link2H_4_0261" id="link2H_4_0261"></SPAN></p> <h2> LETTER CCLX </h2> <h3> BLACKHEATH, September 30, 1763 </h3> <p>MY DEAR FRIEND: You will have known, long before this, from the office, that the departments are not cast as you wished; for Lord Halifax, as senior, had of course his choice, and chose the southern, upon account of the colonies. The Ministry, such as it is, is now settled 'en attendant mieux'; but, in, my opinion cannot, as they are, meet the parliament.</p> <p>The only, and all the efficient people they have, are in the House of Lords: for since Mr. Pitt has firmly engaged Charles Townshend to him, there is not a man of the court side, in the House of Commons, who has either abilities or words enough to call a coach. Lord B&mdash;&mdash;is certainly playing 'un dessous de cartes', and I suspect that it is with Mr. Pitt; but what that 'dessous' is, I do not know, though all the coffeehouses do most exactly.</p> <p>The present inaction, I believe, gives you leisure enough for 'ennui', but it gives you time enough too for better things; I mean reading useful books; and, what is still more useful, conversing with yourself some part of every day. Lord Shaftesbury recommends self-conversation to all authors; and I would recommend it to all men; they would be the better for it. Some people have not time, and fewer have inclination, to enter into that conversation; nay, very many dread it, and fly to the most trifling dissipations, in order to avoid it; but, if a man would allot half an hour every night for this self-conversation, and recapitulate with himself whatever he has done, right or wrong, in the course of the day, he would be both the better and the wiser for it. My deafness gives me more than a sufficient time for self-conversation; and I have found great advantages from it. My brother and Lady Stanhope are at last finally parted. I was the negotiator between them; and had so much trouble in it, that I would much rather negotiate the most difficult point of the 'jus publicum Sacri Romani Imperii' with the whole Diet of Ratisbon, than negotiate any point with any woman. If my brother had had some of those self-conversations, which I recommend, he would not, I believe, at past sixty, with a crazy, battered constitution, and deaf into the bargain, have married a young girl, just turned of twenty, full of health, and consequently of desires. But who takes warning by the fate of others? This, perhaps, proceeds from a negligence of selfconversation. God bless you.</p> <div style="break-after:column;"></div><br />