ing matters of the utmost secrecy,
not fit to be trusted to the common character. If you were to write so to
an antiquarian, he (knowing you to be a man of learning) would certainly
try it by the Runic, Celtic, or Sclavonian alphabet, never suspecting it
to be a modern character. And, if you were to send a 'poulet' to a fine
woman, in such a hand, she would think that it really came from the
'poulailler'; which, by the bye, is the etymology of the word 'poulet';
for Henry the Fourth of France used to send billets-doux to his
mistresses by his 'poulailler', under pretense of sending them chickens;
which gave the name of poulets to those short, but expressive
manuscripts. I have often told you that every man who has the use of his
eyes and of his hand, can write whatever hand he pleases; and it is plain
that you can, since you write both the Greek and German characters, which
you never learned of a writing-master, extremely well, though your common
hand, which you learned of a master, is an exceedingly bad and illiberal
one; equally unfit for business or common use. I do not desire that you
should write the labored, stiff character of a writing-master: a man of
business must write quick and well, and that depends simply upon use. I
would therefore advise you to get some very good writing-master at Paris,
and apply to it for a month only, which will be sufficient; for, upon my
word, the writing of a genteel plain hand of business is of much more
importance than you think. You will say, it may be, that when you write
so very ill, it is because you are in a hurry, to which I answer, Why are
you ever in a hurry? A man of sense may be in haste, but can never be in
a hurry, because he knows that whatever he does in a hurry, he must
necessarily do very ill. He may be in haste to dispatch an affair, but he
will care not to let that haste hinder his doing it well. Little minds
are in a hurry, when the object proves (as it commonly does) too big for
them; they run, they hare, they puzzle, confound, and perplex themselves:
they want to do everything at once, and never do it at all. But a man of
sense takes the time necessary for doing the thing he is about, well; and
his haste to dispatch a business only appears by the continuity of his
application to it: he pursues it with a cool steadiness, and finishes it
before he begins any other. I own your time is much taken up, and you
have a great many different things to do; but remember that