To Henry Mandeville, Esq;
Mount Melvin, Thursday.
I Never so strongly relish the happiness
of my own manner of living, as when
I compare it with that of others. I hear
perpetual complaints abroad of the tediousness
of life, and see in every face a certain
weariness of themselves, from which I am
so happy as to be perfectly free. I carry
about me an innate disposition to be pleased,
which is the source of continual pleasure.
That I have escaped what is in general
the fate of people of my rank, is chiefly
owing to my fortunate choice in marriage:
our mutual passion, the only foundation on
which sensible souls can build happiness,
has been kept alive by a delicacy of behaviour,
an angel purity, in Lady Belmont,
to which words cannot do justice. The
transports of youthful passion yield its sweetness
to the delight of that refined, yet animated
sensation which my heart feels for
her at this moment. I never leave her
without regret, nor meet her without rapture,
the lively rapture of love,
"By long experience mellowed into friendship."
We have been married thirty years. There
are people who think she was never handsome;
yet to me she is all loveliness. I
think no woman beautiful but as she resembles
her; and even Julia's greatest charm,
in my eye, is the likeness she has to her
amiable mother.
This tender, this exquisite affection, has
diffused a spirit through our whole lives,
and given a charm to the most common
occurrences; a charm, to which the dulness
of apathy, and the fever of guilty passion,
are equally strangers.
The family where we are furnish a striking
example of the impossibility of being
happy without the soft union of hearts.
Though both worthy people, having been
joined by their parents, without that affection
which can alone make so near a connexion
supportable, their lives pass on in a
tedious and insipid round: without taste for
each other's conversation, they engage in
a perpetual series of diversions, not to give
relish to, but to exclude, those retired domestic
hours, which are the most sprightly
and animated of my life; they seek, by
crowds and amusements, to fly from each
other and from themselves.
The great secret of human happiness, my
dear Mr. Mandeville, consists in finding such
constant employment for the mind, as,
without over-fatiguing, may prevent its
languishing in a painful inactivity. To
this end, I would recommend to every man
to have not only some important point in
view, but many subordinate ones, to fill
up those vacant hours, when our great purpose,
whatever it is, must be suspended:
our very pleasures, even the best, will fatigue,
if not relieved by variety: the mind
cannot always be on the stretch, nor attentive
to the same object, however pleasing:
Relaxation is as necessary as activity, to
keep the soul in its due equipoise. No
innocent amusement, however trifling it may
seem to the rigid or the proud, is below
the regard of a rational creature, which
keeps the mind in play, and unbends it from
more serious pursuits.
I often regard, at once with pity and astonishment,
persons of my own rank and
age, dragged about in unwieldy state, forging
for themselves the galling fetters of
eternal ceremony, or the still heavier chains
of ambition; their bodies bending under
the weight of dress, their minds for ever
filled with the idea of their own dignity
and importance; to the fear of lessening
which, they sacrifise all the genuine pleasures
of life.
Heaven grant, my dear friend, I may
never be too wise, or too proud, to be
happy!
To you, my amiable friend, who are
just entering on the stage of life, I would
recommend such active pursuits as may
make you an useful member of society, and
contribute to raise your own fortune and
consequence in the world, as well as secure
the esteem of your fellow citizens, and the
approbation of your Prince.
For my own part, like the Roman veterans,
I may now be excused, if I ask
my discharge from those anxious pursuits,
which are only becoming in the vigor of
our days, and from those ceremonial attentions,
which are scarce bearable even them.
My duty as a Senator, and my respect to
my King, nothing but real inability shall
ever suspend; but for the rest, I think it
time at sixty to be free, to live to one's self,
and in one's own way; and endeavour to
be, rather than to
seem, happy.
The rest of my days, except those I owe
to my country and my Prince, shall be devoted
to the sweets of conjugal and paternal
affection, to the lively joys of friendship.
I have only one wish as to this
world; to see Julia married to a man who
deserves her, who has sensibility to make
her happy, and whose rank and fortune
are such as may justify us to the world,
above which the most philosophic mind
cannot entirely rise: let me but see this,
and have a hope that they will pursue my
plan of life; let me see them blest in each
other, and blessing all round them; and
my measure of earthly felicity will be complete.
You know not, my dear Mr. Mandeville,
how much my happiness in this world
has been owing also to the lively hope of
another: this idea has given me a constant
serenity, which may not improperly be
called the health of the mind, and which
has diffused a brightness over all my hours.
Your account of Lord T — made me
smile; his fear of being dismissed at seventy
from the toilsome drudgery of business is
truly ridiculous: rich, childless, infirm,
ought not ease and retirement to be the
first objects of his wishes? But such is the
wretched slavery of all who are under the
absolute dominion of any passion, unguided
by the hand of reason.
The passions of every kind, under proper
restraints, are the gentle breezes which
keep life from stagnation; but, let loose,
they are the storms and whirlwinds which
tear up all before them, and scatter ruin
and destruction around.
Adieu. I ought to apologize for the
length of this; but age is the season of
garrulity.
Your affectionate
Belmont.
