He was equally ready with advice and encouragement during the difficulties connected with the brewery.  He was not of opinion with Aristotle and Parson Adams, that trade is below a philosopher[1]; and he eagerly buried himself in computing the cost of the malt and the possible profits on the ale.  In October 1772, he writes from Lichfield: 

[Footnote 1:  “Trade, answered Adams, is below a philosopher, as Aristotle proves in his first chapter of ‘Politics,’ and unnatural, as it is managed now.”—­Joseph Andrews.]

“Do not suffer little things to disturb you.  The brew-house must be the scene of action, and the subject of speculation.  The first consequence of our late trouble ought to be, an endeavour to brew at a cheaper rate; an endeavour not violent and transient, but steady and continual, prosecuted with total contempt of censure or wonder, and animated by resolution not to stop while more can be done.  Unless this can be done, nothing can help us; and if this be done, we shall not want help.  Surely there is something to be saved; there is to be saved whatever is the difference between vigilance and neglect, between parsimony and profusion.  The price of malt has risen again.  It is now two pounds eight shillings the quarter.  Ale is sold in the public-houses at sixpence a quart, a price which I never heard of before.”

In November of the same year, from Ashbourne: 

“DEAR MADAM,—­So many days and never a letter!—­Fugere fides, pietasque pudorque.  This is Turkish usage.  And I have been hoping and hoping.  But you are so glad to have me out of your mind.[1]

“I think you were quite right in your advice about the thousand pounds, for the payment could not have been delayed long; and a short delay would have lessened credit, without advancing interest.  But in great matters you are hardly ever mistaken.”

[Footnote 1:  This tone of playful reproach, when adopted by Johnson at a later period, has been cited as a proof of actual ill-treatment.]

In May 17, 1773: 

“Why should Mr. T——­ suppose, that what I took the liberty of suggesting was concerted with you?  He does not know how much I revolve his affairs, and how honestly I desire his prosperity.  I hope he has let the hint take some hold of his mind.”

In the copy of the printed letters presented by Mrs. Thrale to Sir James Fellowes, the blank is filled up with the name of Thrale, and the passage is thus annotated in her handwriting: 

“Concerning his (Thrale’s) connection with quack chemists, quacks of all sorts; jumping up in the night to go to Marlbro’ Street from Southwark, after some advertising mountebank, at hazard of his life,” In “Thraliana”: