My health is now so far re-established, that I am no longer confined to my room. Stuart pays us constant visits, and his lively advice and witty reasoning, more complimentary than reproachful, and more insinuated than expressed, have tended to perfect my reformation.

He had put Don Quixote (a work which I never read before) into my hands; and on my returning it to him, with a confession of the benefit that I derived from it, the conversation naturally ran upon romances in general. He thus delivered his sentiments.

'I do not protest against the perusal of fictitious biography altogether; for many works of this kind may be read without injury, and some with profit. Novels such as the Vicar of Wakefield, The Fashionable Tales, and Coelebs, which draw man as he is, imperfect, instead of man as he cannot be, superhuman, are both instructive and entertaining. Romances such as the Mysteries of Udolpho, the Italian, and the Bravo of Venice, which address themselves to the imagination alone, are often captivating, and seldom detrimental. But unfortunately so seductive are the latter class of composition, that one is apt to neglect more useful books for them; besides, when indulged in extreme, they tend to incapacitate us from encountering the turmoils of active life. They present us with incidents and characters which we can never meet in the world; and act upon the mind like intoxicating stimulants; first elevate, and at last enervate it. They teach us to revel in ideal scenes of transport and distraction; and harden our hearts against living misery, by making us so refined as to feel disgust at its unpoetical accompaniments.

'In a country where morals are on the decline, novels always fall several degrees below the standard of national virtue: and the contrary holds in an opposite state of things. For as these works are an exaggerated picture of the times, they represent the prevalent opinions and manners with a gigantic pencil. Thus, since France became depraved, her novels have become dissolute; and since her social system arrived at its extreme of vicious refinement, they too have adopted that last master-stroke of refined vice, which wins the heart by the chastest aphorisms, and then corrupts it by the most alluring pictures of villainy. Take Rousseau for instance. What St. Preux is to Heloise, the book is to the reader. The lover so fascinates his mistress by his honourable sentiments, that she cannot resist his criminal advances. The book infatuates the reader, till, in his admiration of its morality, he loses all recollection of its licentiousness; for as virtue is more captivating, so vice is less disgusting when adorned with the Graces. It may be said that an author ought to portray vice in its seductive colours, for the purpose of unmasking its arts, and thus warning the young and inexperienced. But let it be recollected, that though familiarity with enchanting descriptions of vice may add to prudence, it must diminish virtue; and that while it teaches the reason to resist, it entices the passions to yield. It was Rousseau's system, however, to paint the scenes of a brothel, in order to speak the cant of a monastery; and thus has he undone many an imitating miss or wife, who began by listening to the language of love, that she might talk sentiment, and act virtue; and ended by falling a victim to it, because her heart had become entangled, her head bewildered, and her principles depraved.

'Now, though we seldom see such publications in this country, yet there is a strain of well-meaning, but false morality prevalent in some. I will add (for why should I conceal it from you?) that your principles, which have hitherto been formed upon such books alone, appear, at times, a little perverted by their influence. It should now, therefore, be your object to counteract these bad effects by some more rational line of reading; and, as your ideas of real life are drawn from novels; and as even your manners and language are vitiated by them, I would recommend to you to mix in the world, to copy living instead of imaginary beings, and to study the customs of actual, not ideal society.'

With this opinion my father perfectly coincided: the system has already been begun, and I now pass my time in an alternation of instruction and amusement. Morality, history, languages, and music, occupy my mornings; and my evenings are sometimes enlivened by balls, operas, and familiar parties. As, therefore, we shall remain some time in town, my father has taken a house.

Stuart, my counsellor and my companion, sits by my side, directs my studies, re-assures my timidity, and corrects my mistakes. Indeed he has to correct them often; for I still retain some taints of my former follies and affectations. My postures are sometimes too picturesque, my phrases too flowery, and my sentiments too sublime.

This having been the day fixed for the trials of Betterton and Grundy, the prisoners were brought to the bar, and the names of the prosecutors called. But these did not appear, and of consequence the culprits were discharged. It is supposed that Betterton, the great declaimer against bribery and corruption, had tampered with the postilion and the police, and thus escaped the fate which awaited him.

Adieu.