FullReads

And yet who so prone to a contemptuous carriage as these? I have myself seen a little female thing which they have called “my lady,” of no greater dignity in the order of beings than a cat, and of no more use in society than a butterfly; whose mien would not give even the idea of a gentlewoman, and whose face would cool the loosest libertine; with a mind as empty of ideas as an opera, and a body fuller of diseases than an hospital–I have seen this thing express contempt to a woman who was an honour to her sex and an ornament to the creation.

To confess the truth, there is little danger of the possessor’s ever undervaluing this titular excellence. Not that I would withdraw from it that deference which the policy of government hath assigned it. On the contrary, I have laid down the most exact compliance with this respect, as a fundamental in good-breeding; nay, I insist only that we may be admitted to pay it, and not treated with a disdain even beyond what the eastern monarchs shew to their slaves. Surely it is too high an elevation when, instead of treating the lowest human creature, in a Christian sense, as our brethren, we look down on such as are but one rank in the civil order removed from us as unworthy to breathe even the same air, and regard the most distant communication with them as an indignity and disgrace offered to ourselves. This is considering the difference not in the individual, but in the very species; a height of insolence impious in a Christian society, and most absurd and ridiculous in a trading nation.

I have now done with my first head, in which I have treated of good-breeding, as it regards our actions. I shall, in the next place, consider it with respect to our words, and shall endeavour to lay down some rules, by observing which our well-bred man may, in his discourse as well as actions, contribute to the happiness and well-being of society.

Certain it is, that the highest pleasure which we are capable of enjoying in conversation is to be met with only in the society of persons whose understanding is pretty near on an equality with our own; nor is this equality only necessary to enable men of exalted genius and extensive knowledge to taste the sublimer pleasures of communicating their refined ideas to each other; but it is likewise necessary to the inferior happiness of every subordinate degree of society, down to the very lowest. For instance; we will suppose a conversation between Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, and three dancing-masters. It will be acknowledged, I believe, that the heel sophists would be as little pleased with the company of the philosophers as the philosophers with theirs.

It would be greatly, therefore, for the improvement and happiness of conversation, if society could be formed on this equality; but, as men are not ranked in this world by the different degrees of their understanding, but by other methods, and consequently all degrees of understanding often meet in the same class, and must ex necessitate frequently converse together, the impossibility of accomplishing any such Utopian scheme very plainly appears. Here therefore is a visible but unavoidable imperfection in society itself.

But, as we have laid it down as a fundamental that the essence of good-breeding is to contribute as much as possible to the ease and happiness of mankind, so will it be the business of our well-bred man to endeavour to lessen this imperfection to his utmost, and to bring society as near to a level at least as he is able.

Now there are but two ways to compass this, viz., by raising the lower, and by lowering what is higher.

Let us suppose, then, that very unequal company I have before mentioned met; the former of these is apparently impracticable. Let Socrates, for instance, institute a discourse on the nature of the soul, or Plato reason on the native beauty of virtue, and Aristotle on his occult qualities–What must become of our dancing-masters? Would they not stare at one another with surprise, and, most probably, at our philosophers with contempt? Would they have any pleasure in such society? or would they not rather wish themselves in a dancing-school, or a green-room at the playhouse? What, therefore, have our philosophers to do but to lower themselves to those who cannot rise to them?