. Thus we admire the pert Talk of Children, because we expected
nothing from 'em.

"There are many unpertinent _Witlings_ at _Will_'s, that's certain; but
then your Retailers of _Politicks_, or of second-hand Wit at _Tom_'s,
are ten times more intolerable."

* _Wits_ are generally the most dangerous Company a Woman can keep, for
their Vanity makes 'em brag of more Favours than they obtain.

"Some Women care not what becomes of their Honour, so they may secure
the _Reputation_ of their _Wit_.

"Those People generally talk _most_, who have the least to say; go to
_Will_'s, and you'll hardly hear the Great _Wycherley_ speak two
Sentences in a quarter of an Hour, whilst _Blatero_, _Hamilus_,
_Turpinus_; and twenty more egregious Coxcombs, deafen the Company with
their Political _Nonsense_.

"There are at _Will_'s some _Wit-carriers_, whose business is, to
export the fine Things they hear, from one Room to another, next to a
Reciting-Poet; these Fellows are the most exquisite Plague to a Man of
Sense.

"In spight of the intrinsick Merit of _Wit_, we find it seldom brings a
Man into the _Favour_, or even _Company_ of the _Great_, and the _Fair_,
unless it be for a Laugh and away; never thought on, but when present;
nor then neither, for the sake of the Man of _Wit_, but their own
Diversion. The infallible way to ingratiate ones self with Quality, is
that dull and empty Entertainment, called _Gaming_, for _Picket_,
_Ombre_, and _Basset_, keep always Places even for a _quondam Foot-man,_
or a _Drawer_ at the _Assemblies_, _Apartments_, and _Visiting-days_. If
you lose, you oblige with your Money; if you Win, you command with your
Fortune; the _Lord_ is your _Bubble_, and the Lady what you please to
make her."

* _Flattery_ of our _Wit_, has the same Power over Us, which _Flattery_
of _Beauty_ has over a Woman; it keeps up that good Opinion of our
selves which is necessary to beget _Assurance_; and _Assurance_ produces
success both in _Fortune_ and _Love_.

* Some Men take as much Pains to persuade the World that they have
_Wit_, as _Bullies_ do that they have _Courage_, and generally with the
same Success, for they seldom deceive any one but themselves.

* Some _pert Coxcombs_, so violently affect the Reputation of _Wits_,
that not a _French Journal_, _Mercury_, _Farce_, or _Opera_, can escape
their Pillaging: yet the utmost they arrive at, is but a sort of
_Jack-a-lanthorn Wit_, that like the Sun-shine which wanton