s his corn to town on market-days, is not
more usefully employed than I am, then let me work ten years longer at
the galleys to which I am now chained.

Oh, the brilliant wretchedness, the weariness, that one is doomed
to witness among the silly people whom we meet in society here! The
ambition of rank! How they watch, how they toil, to gain precedence!
What poor and contemptible passions are displayed in their utter
nakedness! We have a woman here, for example, who never ceases to
entertain the company with accounts of her family and her estates. Any
stranger would consider her a silly being, whose head was turned by
her pretensions to rank and property; but she is in reality even
more ridiculous, the daughter of a mere magistrate's clerk from this
neighbourhood. I cannot understand how human beings can so debase
themselves.

Every day I observe more and more the folly of judging of others by
ourselves; and I have so much trouble with myself, and my own heart is
in such constant agitation, that I am well content to let others pursue
their own course, if they only allow me the same privilege.

What provokes me most is the unhappy extent to which distinctions of
rank are carried. I know perfectly well how necessary are inequalities
of condition, and I am sensible of the advantages I myself derive
therefrom; but I would not have these institutions prove a barrier to
the small chance of happiness which I may enjoy on this earth.

I have lately become acquainted with a Miss B--, a very agreeable girl,
who has retained her natural manners in the midst of artificial life.
Our first conversation pleased us both equally; and, at taking leave,
I requested permission to visit her. She consented in so obliging a
manner, that I waited with impatience for the arrival of the happy
moment. She is not a native of this place, but resides here with her
aunt. The countenance of the old lady is not prepossessing. I paid her
much attention, addressing the greater part of my conversation to her;
and, in less than half an hour, I discovered what her niece subsequently
acknowledged to me, that her aged aunt, having but a small fortune, and
a still smaller share of understanding, enjoys no satisfaction except
in the pedigree of her ancestors, no protection save in her noble birth,
and no enjoyment but in looking from her castle over the heads of the
humble citizens. She was, no doubt, handsome in her youth, and in her
early years probably t