There is a fashionable kind of small-talk, which however trifling it may be thought, has its use in mixed companies: Of course you should endeavour to acquire it. By small-talk, I mean a good deal to say on unimportant matters; for example, foods, the flavour and growth of wines, and the chit-chat of the day. Such conversation will serve to keep off serious subjects, that might sometimes create disputes. This chit-chat is chiefly to be learned by frequenting the company of the ladies.
OBSERVATION.
As the art of pleasing is to be learnt only by frequenting the best companies, we must endeavor to pick it up in such companies by observation; for, it is not sense and knowledge alone that will acquire esteem; these certainly are the first and necessary foundations for pleasing, but they will by no means do, unless attended with manners and attentions.
There have been people who have frequented the first companies all their life time, and yet have never got rid of their natural stiffness and awkwardness; but have continued as vulgar as if they were never out of a servant’s hall: This has been owing to carelessness, and a want of attention to the manners and behaviour of others.
There are a great many people likewise who busy themselves the whole day, and who in fact do nothing. They have possibly taken up a book for two or three hours, but from a certain inattention that grows upon them the more it is indulged, know no more of the contents than if they had not looked into it; nay, it is impossible for any one to retain what he reads, unless he reflects and reasons upon it as he goes on. When they have thus lounged away an hour or two, they will saunter into company, without attending to any thing that passes there; but, if they think at all, are thinking of some trifling matter that ought not to occupy their attention; thence perhaps they go to the play, where they stare at the company and the lights, without attending to the piece, the very thing they went to see. In this manner they wear away their hours, that might otherwise be employed to their improvement and advantage. This silly suspension of thought they would pass for absence of mind—ridiculous!—Wherever you are, let me recommend it to you to pay an attention to all that passes; observe the characters of the persons you are with, and the subjects of their conversation; listen to every thing that is said, see every thing that is done, and (according to the vulgar saying) have your eyes and your ears about you.
A continual inattention to matters that occur, is the characteristic of a weak mind; the man who gives way to it, is little else than a trifler, a blank in society, which every sensible person overlooks; surely what is worth doing, is worth doing well, and nothing can be well done, if not properly attended to. When I hear a man say, on being asked about any thing that was said or done in his presence, ‘that truly he did not mind it.’ I am ready to knock the fool down. Why did not he mind it?—What else had he to do?—A man of sense and fashion never makes use of this paltry plea, he never complains of a treacherous memory, but attends to and remembers every thing that is either said or done.
Whenever, then, you go into good company, that is the company of people of fashion, observe carefully their behaviour, their address and their manner; imitate them as far as in your power. Your attention, if possible, should be so ready as to observe every person in the room at once, their motions, their looks, and their turns of expression, and that without staring, or seeming to be an observer. This kind of observation may be acquired by care and practice, and will be found of the utmost advantage to you, in the course of life.
ABSENCE of MIND.
Having mentioned absence of mind, let me be more particular concerning it.
What the world calls an absent man, is generally either a very affected one, or a very weak one; but whether weak or affected, he is, in company, a very disagreeable man. Lost in thought, or possibly in no thought at all, he is a stranger to every one present, and to every thing that passes; he knows not his best friends, is deficient in every act of good manners, unobservant of the actions of the company, and insensible to his own. His answers are quite the reverse of what they ought to be; talk to him of one thing, he replies, as of another. He forgets what he said last, leaves his hat in one room, his cane in another, and his sword in a third; nay, if it was not for his buckles, he would even leave his shoes behind him. Neither his arms nor his legs seem to be a part of his body, and his head is never in a right position. He joins not in the general conversation, except it be by fits and starts, as if awaking from a dream: I attribute this either to weakness or affectation. His shallow mind is possibly not able to attend to more than one thing at a time; or he would be supposed wrap’d up in the investigation of some very important matter. Such men as Sir Isaac Newton or Mr. Locke, might occasionally have some excuse for absence of mind! It might proceed from that intenseness of thought which was necessary at all times for the scientific subjects they were studying; but, for a young man, and a man of the world, who has no such plea to make, absence of mind is rudeness to the company, and deserves the severest censure.