Letters to His Son, 1751 On the Fine Art of Becoming a Man of the World and a Gentleman
by Philip Dormer Stanhope, Earl of Chesterfield
- Pages
- about 135
- Category
- Self-improvement
- Language
- English
- Reading time
- 2.5 h at 250 wpm
From the opening
MY DEAR FRIEND: By your letter of the 5th, N. S., I find that your
'debut' at Paris has been a good one; you are entered into good company,
and I dare say you will, not sink into bad. Frequent the houses where you
have been once invited, and have none of that shyness which makes most of
your countrymen strangers, where they might be intimate and domestic if
they pleased. Wherever you have a general invitation to sup when you
please, profit of it, with decency, and go every now and then. Lord
Albemarle will, I am sure, be extremely kind to you, but his house is
only a dinner house; and, as I am informed, frequented by no French
people. Should he happen to employ you in his bureau, which I much doubt,
you must write a better hand than your common one, or you will get no
credit by your manuscripts; for your hand is at present an illiberal one;
it is neither a hand of business nor of a gentleman, but the hand of a
school-boy writing his exercise, which he hopes will never be read.
Madame de Monconseil gives me a favorable account of you; and so do
Marquis de Matignon and Madame du Boccage; they all say that you desire
to please, and consequently promise me that you will; and they judge
right; for whoever really desires to please, and has (as you now have)
the means of learning how, certainly will please and that is the great
point of life; it makes all other things easy. Whenever you are with
Madame de Monconseil, Madame du Boccage, or other women of fashion, with
whom you are tolerably free, say frankly and naturally: "I know little of
the world; I am quite a novice in it; and although very desirous of
pleasing, I am at a loss for the means. Be so good, Madame, as to let me
into your secret of pleasing everybody.
A short sample. Read the whole book
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