and those which approach nearest to it not being respectful enough to be applied to a stranger. Both nations, indeed, are idle with so much activity, and contrive to do nothing, and to say nothing, with so much interest in their looks, and so much movement in their gestures, that it is no wonder the word should not find a place in their vocabulary; but they, too, marked some traces of my character; though, as is their custom, they tacked a compliment to their draft of it. "Monsieur," said the Abbé at a petit souper of Madame de V- -'s, at Paris, "Monsieur est quelquefois rêveur, mais toujours intéressant, toujours aimable!"

On all those occasions, however, I was not quite so idle as those around me imagined. Like Alfred in the Danish camp, I harped for them, but observed for myself; and, like him, too, enjoyed my observation the more, that it was secret and unsuspected. If this resemblance should convey some idea of treachery, of advantage over those with whom I associated, let it be known at least that, in the use of it, I was perfectly inoffensive. The Lounger is one of the best-natured characters in the world, even in the sense which I allow the term to apply to myself. 'Tis the player who frets, and scolds, and is angry; the looker-on sees more errors in the play; but he applies them only to the theory of the game, and thinks but little of the party who commits them.

As a Lounger, I had, from my earliest age, been fond of books, and sometimes ventured to write when I was tired of reading. A Lounger of the sort I could wish to be thought, is one who, even amidst a certain intercourse with mankind, preserves a constant intimacy with himself; it is not therefore to be wondered at if he should sometimes, if I may be

allowed the expression, correspond with himself, and write down, if he can write at all, what he wishes this favourite companion more particularly to remark. Exactly of this sort are the notes and memorandums I have sometimes been tempted to make; transcripts of what I have felt or thought, or little records of what I have heard or read, set down without any other arrangement than what the disposition of the time might prompt. These little papers formed a kind of new society, which I could command at any time without stirring from my fireside. It was, of all sorts of company, the most fitted for a Lounger; company in which he could be unaccommodating without offence, and inattentive without incivility.

The idea of giving those trifles to the world in the form of periodical essays, is an effort beyond the usual force of my character. Unknown, however, as a man, and new as an author, The Lounger risks but little either in censure or in praise. There is a censure, indeed, and a suffrage, which no man can escape, to which one of his disposition is peculiarly liable, I mean that of his own mind. He trusts his publication will be such as to risk nothing on this ground; it is the only promise which he will venture on its behalf. It may be gay without wit, and grave without depth, when its author is disposed to gayety or to thought; but while it endeavours to afford some little amusement by the one, or some little instruction by the other, it will at least be harmless in both.

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No. 2. SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 12, 1785.

THE precepts of the moralist and philosopher are generally directed to guide their disciples in the great and important concerns of life, to incite to the practice of cardinal virtues, and to deter from the commission of enormous crimes; the advices of wisdom and experience point out the road to success and to honour in stations of public consequence, or in nice and important circumstances of private duty.

In the earlier periods of society, a very simple code of morality and of rectitude was all that was necessary. To controul the violence of the stronger passions, to prescribe the rules of distributive justice, and to inculcate the duties of active humanity, was the proper and essential province of the instructor, as well as of the legislator. At first, indeed, these two characters would be nearly the same; legislation embracing all that was required of morality, and morality having no range beyond that of the laws. And even when man advanced to a certain point, where the doctrine of morals went beyond the legal rules of conduct; yet that would contain incentives to the exertion only of principal and leading virtues, in certain modes and situations, which the law could not foresee, and for which it could not provide.

In a state of society so advanced as ours, for it is needless to trouble my reader with the intermediate gradations, every one will see the necessity of a nicer and more refined system of morality. The

family of the social virtues, like the genealogical tree of an extensive ancestry, spreads with the advancing cultivation of mankind, till it is branched out into a numerous list of collateral duties, many of which it needs an acute discernment to trace up to their source; and some acknowledge their connection, without being able to unravel their pedigree.

The study of those lesser branches of duty and of excellence is called the science of manners; but our language has no word to distinguish the teacher of it. As moralist is applied to the teacher of the more important obligations, so mannerist should have been the denomination of him who inculcates the lesser, had not that word been already appropriated to a very different meaning.

But, however the professors of the art may be distinguished, its importance will not be denied. It is seldom that in more essential points of duty men of a certain class are deficient. In most particulars, the obligations of morality are aided by the ties of honour, and the fear of punishment enforced by the dread of shame. But in the smaller offices of social life, men may be wanting in their duty, without incurring either punishment or obloquy. The decalogue, if the phrase may be allowed, of manners, the laws of civility, of gentleness, of taste, and of feeling, are not precisely set down, and cannot easily be punished in the breach or rewarded in the observance; and yet their observance forms, amidst the refinements of modern society, an important part of our own happiness, and of that regard we owe to the happiness of others. To practise them is somewhat difficult; to teach them is still more so; yet 't is an art which, though difficult, does not always obtain the honours of difficulty. The pictures which it exhibits must be drawn in those middle

tints which it requires a nice pencil to hit; and yet when attained they acquire but a small portion of that applause which stronger colouring and deeper shades are calculated to procure. It is not easy to define that right which our neighbour possesses to general complacency, or to little attentions; nor to mark with precision that injury we do, those wounds we inflict, by a contrary behaviour; and yet the favour in the first, and the wrong in the latter case, is often as strongly felt as in the serious exertions of kindness or malevolence. I have known a friend acquired for life by a trifling civility in a crowded theatre; and a lasting enmity created by a boisterous laugh, or a mutilated bow.

Amidst weighty business indeed, and momentous concerns, such things do not easily find place. But the number of those who are within their reach more than compensates for the consequence of the few who are beyond it. 'Tis but a very small proportion of men who can move in the sphere of government or of greatness; but scarce anybody is exempted from performing a part in the relations of ordinary life. Even of the first class, the reward they hope for their labours consists often in the opportunity of coming down with advantage to the region of the latter; like the hero of a pageant, who looks forward to the hour when he shall undo his trappings, and enjoy, in his plain apparel, the tale of the day at his family fireside.

A periodical paper, though it may sometimes lift its voice against a neglect of the greater moralities, yet has for its peculiar province the correction and reform of any breach of the lesser. For that pur

pose it is perhaps better calculated than more laboured and more extended compositions, from its diurnal or weekly appearance. The greater virtues