he
least disappointment. You are now so near the port, which I have so long
wished and labored to bring you safe into, that my concern would be
doubled, should you be shipwrecked within sight of it. The object,
therefore, of this letter is (laying aside all the authority of a parent)
to conjure you as a friend, by the affection you have for me (and surely
you have reason to have some), and by the regard you have for yourself,
to go on, with assiduity and attention, to complete that work which, of
late, you have carried on so well, and which is now so near being
finished. My wishes and my plan were to make you shine and distinguish
yourself equally in the learned and the polite world. Few have been able
to do it. Deep learning is generally tainted with pedantry, or at least
unadorned by manners: as, on the other hand, polite manners and the turn
of the world are too often unsupported by knowledge, and consequently end
contemptibly, in the frivolous dissipation of drawing-rooms and ruelles.
You are now got over the dry and difficult parts of learning; what
remains requires much more time than trouble. You have lost time by your
illness; you must regain it now or never. I therefore most earnestly
desire, for your own sake, that for these next six months, at least six
hours every morning, uninterruptedly, may be inviolably sacred to your
studies with Mr. Harte. I do not know whether he will require so much;
but I know that I do, and hope you will, and consequently prevail with
him to give you that time; I own it is a good deal: but when both you and
he consider that the work will be so much better, and so much sooner
done, by such an assiduous and continued application, you will, neither
of you, think it too much, and each will find his account in it. So much
for the mornings, which from your own good sense, and Mr. Harte's
tenderness and care of you, will, I am sure, be thus well employed. It is
not only reasonable, but useful too, that your evenings should be devoted
to amusements and pleasures: and therefore I not only allow, but
recommend, that they should be employed at assemblies, balls, SPECTACLES,
and in the best companies; with this restriction only, that the
consequences of the evening's diversions may not break in upon the
morning's studies, by breakfastings, visits, and idle parties into the
country. At your age, you need not be ashamed, when any of these morning
parties are proposed, to say that you must beg to b