conform to
the public taste, he wrote Gargantua and Pantagruel, which everybody
liked, extravagant as it was. Adieu.

LETTER XCIV

LONDON, December 9, O. S. 1749.

DEAR BOY: It is now above forty years since I have never spoken nor
written one single word, without giving myself at least one moment's time
to consider whether it was a good or a bad one, and whether I could not
find out a better in its place. An unharmonious and rugged period, at
this time, shocks my ears; and I, like all the rest of the world, will
willingly exchange and give up some degree of rough sense, for a good
degree of pleasing sound. I will freely and truly own to you, without
either vanity or false modesty, that whatever reputation I have acquired
as a speaker, is more owing to my constant attention to my diction than
to my matter, which was necessarily just the same as other people's. When
you come into parliament, your reputation as a speaker will depend much
more upon your words, and your periods, than upon the subject. The same
matter occurs equally to everybody of common sense, upon the same
question; the dressing it well, is what excites the attention and
admiration of the audience.

It is in parliament that I have set my heart upon your making a figure;
it is there that I want to have you justly proud of yourself, and to make
me justly proud of you. This means that you must be a good speaker there;
I use the word MUST, because I know you may if you will. The vulgar, who
are always mistaken, look upon a speaker and a comet with the same
astonishment and admiration, taking them both for preternatural
phenomena. This error discourages many young men from attempting that
character; and good speakers are willing to have their talent considered
as something very extraordinary, if not, a peculiar gift of God to his
elect. But let you and me analyze and simplify this good speaker; let us
strip him of those adventitious plumes with which his own pride, and the
ignorance of others, have decked him, and we shall find the true
definition of him to be no more than this: A man of good common sense who
reasons justly and expresses himself elegantly on that subject upon which
he speaks. There is, surely, no witchcraft in this. A man of sense,
without a superior and astonishing degree of parts, will not talk
nonsense upon any subject; nor will he, if he has the least taste or
application, talk inelegantly. What then does all this mighty art and