He holds that all the beauty and virtue of women will soon be destroyed by the use of tea[1].  He triumphs when he talks on the present system of education, and tells us, with great vehemence, that we are learning words when we should learn things.  He is of opinion that we suck in errours at the nurse’s breast, and thinks it extremely ridiculous that children should be taught to use the right hand rather than the left.

Bob Sturdy considers it as a point of honour to say again what he has once said, and wonders how any man, that has been known to alter his opinion, can look his neighbours in the face.  Bob is the most formidable disputant of the whole company; for, without troubling himself to search for reasons, he tires his antagonist with repeated affirmations.  When Bob has been attacked for an hour with all the powers of eloquence and reason, and his position appears to all but himself utterly untenable, he always closes the debate with his first declaration, introduced by a stout preface of contemptuous civility.  “All this is very judicious; you may talk, Sir, as you please; but I will still say what I said at first.”  Bob deals much in universals, which he has now obliged us to let pass without exceptions.  He lives on an annuity, and holds that there are as many thieves as traders; he is of loyalty unshaken, and always maintains, that he who sees a Jacobite sees a rascal.

Phil Gentle is an enemy to the rudeness of contradiction and the turbulence of debate.  Phil has no notions of his own, and, therefore, willingly catches from the last speaker such as he shall drop.  This flexibility of ignorance is easily accommodated to any tenet; his only difficulty is, when the disputants grow zealous, how to be of two contrary opinions at once.  If no appeal is made to his judgment, he has the art of distributing his attention and his smiles in such a manner, that each thinks him of his own party; but if he is obliged to speak, he then observes that the question is difficult; that he never received so much pleasure from a debate before; that neither of the controvertists could have found his match in any other company; that Mr. Wormwood’s assertion is very well supported, and yet there is great force in what Mr. Scruple advanced against it.  By this indefinite declaration both are commonly satisfied; for he that has prevailed is in good humour; and he that has felt his own weakness is very glad to have escaped so well.

I am, Sir, yours, &c.  ROBIN SPRITELY.

[1] Dr. Johnson was, as he has humorously described himself, “a hardened
    and shameless tea-drinker.”  See his amusing Review of a Journal of
    Eight Days’ Journey and his Reply to a paper in the Gazetteer, May
    26, 1757.

No. 84.  SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 24, 1759.

Biography is, of the various kinds of narrative writing, that which is most eagerly read, and most easily applied to the purposes of life.