ract, that the husband shall take his
wife every year to this festival. There is on the stage at Naples, a
performer eighty years old, who for sixty years has entertained the
Neapolitans in their comic, national character of Polichinello. Can we
imagine what the immortality of the soul may be to a man who thus
employs his long life? The people of Naples have no other idea of
happiness than pleasure; but the love of pleasure is still better than
a barren egotism.

It is true that no people in the world are more fond of money than the
Neapolitans: if you ask a man of the people in the street to show you
your way, he stretches out his hand after having made you a sign, for
they are more indolent in speech than in action; but their avidity for
money is not methodical nor studied; they spend it as soon as they get
it. They use money as savages would if it were introduced among them.
But what this nation is most wanting in, is the sentiment of dignity.
They perform generous and benevolent actions from a good heart rather
than from principle; for their theory in every respect is good for
nothing, and public opinion in this country has no force. But when men
or women escape this moral anarchy their conduct is more remarkable in
itself and more worthy of admiration than any where else, since there is
nothing in external circumstances favourable to virtue. It is born
entirely in the soul. Laws and manners neither reward nor punish it. He
who is virtuous is so much the more heroic for not being on that account
either more considered or more sought after.

With some honourable exceptions the higher classes pretty nearly
resemble the lower: the mind of the one is seldom more cultivated than
that of the other, and the practice of society is the only external
difference between them. But in the midst of this ignorance there is
such a natural intelligence in all ranks that it is impossible to
foresee what a nation like this might become if all the energies of
government were directed to the advancement of knowledge and morality.
As there is little education at Naples, we find there, at present, more
originality of character than of mind. But the remarkable men of this
country, it is said, such as the Abbe Galiani, Caraccioli, &c.,
possessed the highest sense of humour, joined to the most profound
reflection,--rare powers of the mind!--an union without which either
pedantry or frivolity would hinder us from knowing the true value of
t