There was a great similitude between his character and that of Sir Richard Steele.  He had the advantage both in learning, and, in my opinion, genius:  they both agreed in wanting money in spite of all their friends, and would have wanted it, if their hereditary lands had been as extensive as their imagination; yet each one of them so formed for happiness, it is a pity he was not immortal....  This Richardson is a strange fellow.  I heartily despise him, and eagerly read him, nay, sob over his works in a most scandalous manner.  The first two tomes of Clarissa touched me, as being very resembling to my maiden days; and I find in the pictures of Sir Thomas Grandison and his lady, what I have heard of my mother, and seen of my father....

PHILIP DORMER STANHOPE, EARL OF CHESTERFIELD

1694-1773

TO HIS SON

Dancing

Dublin Castle, 29 Nov. 1745.

DEAR BOY,

I have received your last Saturday’s performance, with which I am very well satisfied.  I know or have heard of no Mr. St. Maurice here; and young Pain, whom I have made an ensign, was here upon the spot, as were every one of those I have named in these new levies.

Now that the Christmas breaking-up draws near, I have ordered Mr. Desnoyers to go to you, during that time, to teach you to dance.  I desire that you will particularly attend to the graceful motion of your arms; which with the manner of putting on your hat, and giving your hand, is all that a gentleman need attend to.  Dancing is in itself a very trifling, silly thing; but it is one of those established follies to which people of sense are sometimes obliged to conform; and then they should be able to do it well.  And though I would not have you a dancer, yet when you do dance, I would have you dance well; as I would have you do everything you do, well.  There is no one thing so trifling, but which (if it is to be done at all) ought to be done well; and I have often told you that I wish you even played at pitch, and cricket, better than any boy at Westminster.  For instance, dress is a very foolish thing; and yet it is a very foolish thing for a man not to be well dressed, according to his rank and way of life; and it is so far from being a disparagement to any man’s understanding, that it is rather a proof of it, to be as well dressed as those whom he lives with:  the difference in this case between a man of sense and a fop is, that the fop values himself upon his dress; and the man of sense laughs at it, at the same time that he knows he must not neglect it.  There are a thousand foolish customs of this kind, which not being criminal, must be complied with, and even cheerfully, by men of sense.  Diogenes the cynic was a wise man for despising them; but a fool for showing it.  Be wiser than other people if you can; but do not tell them so.