A collection of the moral and instructive sentiments, maxims, cautions, and reflexions, contained in the histories of Pamela, Clarissa, and Sir Charles Grandison.:

L.

Lawyer.

A LAWYER who is a good man, will be more noted for composing differences than promoting suits, iii. 23. [19].

Libertines. Rakes.

VIRTUE and vice change names and qualities with Libertine men, i. 33. [27].

Libertines who scruple not to attempt the virtue of the wives, the sisters, and daughters of others, are the most jealous of the chastity of their own, iii. 56. [45].

Some Libertines make a merit of not attempting a married woman: This shews, that their passions are, so far as they adhere to this principle, in their own power; and it encreases the crime of those, who robbing a single woman of her honour, deprive her of that protection by marriage, which even such Rakes as themselves pretend to hold inviolable, iii. 287. [226].

Clumsy Rakes borrow the wit they retale. Their wickedness only is what they may call their own, iv. 400. [350].

Libertines must not be allowed to judge of women in general. They can judge only of those they have been

most acquainted with: And who are they? iii. 412. [325].

It is well that rakish single men do not interest any|body very intimately in their healths or preservation. Neither the public nor private need to be much concern|ed about them; since their next heirs cannot well be worse commonwealth's-men than they; and there is a chance that they may be better, iii. 462. [365].

What has not the wretch to answer for, who sports in destroying a virtuous character; and in throwing upon the town, a poor creature whose love of him, and con|fidence in him, were all her crime? iv. 455. [398].

And who, otherwise, might have made a worthy figure at the head of some reputable family; and an use|ful member of the commonwealth, propagating to numbers good example, instead of infamy, disease, and ruin, iv. 456. [398].

To say nothing of what is still worse, the occasioning too probably, the loss of a soul; since final impenitence too generally follows the first sacrifice, which the poor wretch is seduced to make of her honour, ibid.

The notion that a reformed Rake makes the best husband, is a most presumptuous, dangerous, and pernicious one, iv. 456. [407].

Mr. B's example not to be pleaded in defence of it; and why, ibid.

See Advantages of Men over Women. Advice to Young Women. Credulity. Female Dignity. Keep|ing. Masters Behaviour to his Female Servants. Love. Love at first fight. Promises. Reform|ation. Virtue. Wit. Writers.

Love.

IT is a blameable sign of Love, when we are ready to think well of a person against all appearances of de|merit, ii. 4. [35].

Where we love, we dwell on every little incident that can make for the advantage of the object, ii. 5. [36, 37].

Love, when permitted to reign in a tender bosom, is an absolute tyrant, requiring unconditional obedience,

and deeming every instance of discretion and prudence, and even too often of virtue, an act of rebellion against its usurped authority, iii. 77. [61].

How often do the blemishes of those we love, appear to us as graces! Crimes themselves will be construed, by inconsiderate minds, into human failings; and those are made a common cause of; and excused, or, at least extenuated, by each person, for his or her own sake, ibid.

People deeply in Love generally think too highly of the beloved object, and too lowly of themselves, iii. 78. [61].

Love, or the passion mis-called Love, puts its votaries upon the meanst actions. It levels with the dust the proudest spirit, iii. 225. [178].

True Love, bears not the thought of any object, but of that it sighs for, iv. 74. [62].

Wrong methods taken with a generous spirit, in a supposed beginning Love, are often the means of bring|ing about the event most dreaded; and which, perhaps, but for those wrong methods, would have come to no|thing, iv. 251. [218].

Persons in a beginning liking, who have not had an opportunity to declare themselves, will nevertheless find out a silent language, that shall be full as expressive as the plainest words, iv. 277. [240].

The passion which is generally dignified by the name of Love, and which puts its votaries upon a thousand extravagancies, usually owes its Being rather to ungo|verned fancy, than to solid judgment, iv. 459. [401].

Were we to judge of it by the consequences that usu|ally attend it, it ought rather to be called rashness, incon|sideration, weakness, any thing, but Love, ibid.

When once we dignify the wild misleader by that name, all the absurdities which we read of in novels and ro|mances take place; and we are induced to follow ex|amples, that seldom any where end happily, but in story, ibid.

Love operates differently in the two sexes. In wo|men it is generally a creeping thing; in man an en|croacher, ibid.

Real Love fills with awe and reverence, the heart of the man who boasts its impression, iv. 470. [411].

It is pure in word and deed. The least indelicacy even of thought, cannot mingle with it, ibid.

If therefore a man, be his quality or fortune what it will (the higher the worse) presume to wound the ears of the woman he professes to love, with indecent words or images:

If he is continually pressing her to place a confidence in his honour:

If he be regardless of his behaviour to her, or before her:

If he request favours which a modest woman ought to refuse:

If he treat either her person or dress with boistrous or rude freedoms:

If he avoids urging marriage to her, when he has a fair opportunity of doing it; or,

Leaves it once to her, to wonder he does not so urge her:—

In any of these cases, he is to be suspected; and his visits ought not to be admitted, ibid.

See Advice to Young Women. Libertines. Platonic Love. Promises.

Love at first sight.

LOVE, at first sight, supposes such a susceptibility of passion, as, however it may pass in a man, very little becomes the delicacy of the female character, iv. 462. [404].

There are many chances to one, that a liking so pre|cipitate, ends unhappily, ibid.

What room can there be in such a Love, for caution, for enquiry, for the display of merit and sincerity; and even for the assurance of a grateful return of Love, iv. 463. [404].

Love, at first sight, is a random shot. It is a demon|••tration of weakness. In a woman, it is a giving up ••he negative voice that belongs to the sex, even while she ••oubts to meet with the affirmative one from him she wishes to be hers, ibid.

Such a passion in a woman, shews that her heart has been too much in the power of her eye; and that she has permitted her fancy to be much more busy than her judgment, iv. 463. [405].

On the least favourable impressions of this kind, to a man to whose character and merit she is a stranger, a woman ought immediately to retire into herself, she ought to reflect upon what she owes to her family, to her cha|racter, and to her sex, in order to check such a random prepossession; which, as there are so many undeserving men to one who has real merit, may more probably make her the prey of a base man, than the wife of a worthy one, ibid.

A Love of this sort may be stopt at a first liking, if a young woman broods not over the egg till she hatches it into Love, iv. 464. [405].

See Female Dignity. Love.

Platonic Love.

PLATONIC Love is an insidious pretension, that often betrays even worthy minds into ruin, iv. 253. [219].

The person pretending Platonic Love, may be com|pared, where the best is meant, to the fly buzzing about the blaze, till it scorches its wings, iv. 253. [220].

Or, to speak still stronger, Platonic Love is a bait of the grand deceiver, to catch the unexperienced and thoughtless, ibid.

Old age only can safely determine the barriers of Pla|tonic Love, iv. 254. [220].

It ought not to be pretended to, till the parties, the man at least, can number some years beyond his grand climacteric, ibid.

Need there be a stronger proof of the danger of this pretension, than this; that it is hardly ever set on foot, but among young people? ibid.

Friendships, begun with spiritual views, between men and women of really worthy minds, have often ended grosly, ibid.

Low Life.

THE man who was born to a low lot, is not always the happier, whatever be his talents, for being lifted in|to a higher sphere, iii. 429. [339].

To make such a one easy and happy in his station, is generally as much as ought to be done for him, or as he ought to wish for;

Native poverty is not a very grievous state, where health is not denied, and industry and diligence are not wanting;

Labour is necessary to health: Moderate labour, which brings with it subsistence to a poor man, is far from being an evil;

Content alone is the blessing; if that be wanting where there is a competence, it will probably be so in affluence;

He who has passed the meridian of life, should be ra|ther sollicitous to improve his circumstances in the way he has been used to, than to aim at a higher and more dangerous situation;

Has he talents for a higher sphere, he will make that figure in his lower, that will exalt him among his com|peers, and make him highly useful to them; but which will give him little or no consequence among his supe|riors; who by the advantages of education, added to talents, must be always his superiors;

The peer and peasant are equally links of the great chain of nature, and equally useful in it;

See these and other Reflexions of the like nature, iii. 429 to 433. [339 to 342].

See Consolation to the Poor. Heroic Poverty. Re|signation.