Diana and her train are always described as inhabitants of the woods and followers of the chafe. To be well diverted, is the safest guard to innocence; and methinks it should be one of the first things to be regarded among people of condition to find out proper amufements for young ladies. I cannot but think this of riding might eafily be revived among them, when they confider how much it must contribute to their beauty. This would lay up the best portion they could bring into a family-a good stock of health-to tranfmit to their pofterity. Such a charming bloom as this gives the countenance is very much preferable to the real or affected feebleness or softness which appear in the faces of our modern beauties.

The comedy called "The Ladies' Cure," represents the affectation of wan looks and languid glances to a very entertaining extravagance. "There is," as the lady in the play complains, "fomething fo robuft in perfect health, that it is with her a point of breeding and delicacy to appear in publick with a fickly air." But the natural gaiety and spirit which fhine in the complexion of fuch as form to themselves a fort of diverting industry by choosing recreations that are exercises, furpafs all the false ornaments and graces that can be put on by applying the whole difpenfary of a toilet. A healthy body and a cheerful mind, give charms as irresistible as inimitable. The beauteous Dyctinna, who came to town last week, has, from the conftant profpect in a delicious country and the moderate exercise and journeys in the vifits she made round it, contracted a certain life in her countenance which will in vain employ both the painters and the poets to represent. The becoming negligence in her drefs, the fevere fweetness of her looks, and a certain innocent boldnefs in all her behaviour, are the effect of the active recreations I am talking of.

But instead of fuch, or any other as innocent and pleasing method of paffing away their time with alacrity, we have many in town who spend their hours in an indolent state of body and mind, without either recreations or reflections. am apt to believe there are fome parents imagine their daughters will be accomplished enough if nothing interrupts their

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growth or their fhape. According to this method of education, I could name you twenty families where all the girls hear of in this life is, that it is time to rife and to come to dinner, as if they were fo infignificant as to be wholly provided for when they are fed and clothed.

It is with great indignation that I fee fuch crowds of the female world loft to human fociety and condemned to a laziness, which makes life pass away with less relish than in the hardest labour. Palestris in her drawing-room is fupported by spirits to keep off the returns of spleen and melancholy, before she can get over half the day, for want of fomething to do, while the wench in the kitchen fings and fcours from morning to night.

The next difagreeable thing to a lazy lady, is a very busy one. A man of bufinefs in good company, who gives an account of his abilities and despatches, is hardly more infupportable than her they call a notable woman and a manager. Lady Good-day, where I vifited the other day, at a very polite circle, entertained a great lady with a recipe for a poultice, and gave us to understand that she had done extraordinary cures fince he was laft in town. It seems a countryman had wounded himself with his fcythe as he was mowing, and we were obliged to hear of her charity, her medicine, and her humility, in the harshest tone and tone and coarfeft language imaginable.

What I would request in all this prattle is, that our females would either let us have their perfons or their minds, in fuch perfection as nature defigned them.

The way to this is, that those who are in the quality of gentlewomen, should propofe to themselves fome fuitable method of paffing away their time. This would furnish them with reflections and fentiments proper for the companions of reasonable men, and prevent the unnatural marriages which happen every day between the most accomplished women and the veriest oafs; the worthieft men and the most infignificant females. Were the general turn of women's education of another kind than it is at present, we should want one another for more reasons than we do, as the world now goes.

The

common design of parents is to get their girls off as well as they can, and make no conscience of putting into our hands a bargain for our whole life, which will make our hearts ache every day of it.

I fhall therefore take this matter into ferious confideration, and will propose, for the better improvement of the fair fex, a female library. This collection of books fhall confist of such authors as do not corrupt while they divert, but shall tend more immediately to improve them, as they are women. They shall be such as shall not hurt a feature by the austerity of their reflections, nor cause one impertinent glance by the wantonnefs of them. They shall all tend to advance the value of their innocence as virgins, improve their understanding as wives, and regulate their tenderness as parents. It has been very often faid in these lucubrations, that the ideas which most frequently pafs through our imaginations, leave traces of themfelves in our countenances. There shall be a strict regard had to this in my female library, which shall be furnished with nothing that shall give fupplies to oftentation or impertinence ; but the whole shall be fo digested for the use of my students, that they shall not go out of character in their inquiries, but their knowledge appear only a cultivated innocence.

MR. BICKERSTAFF THINKS THE FAULTS OF THE FAIR SEX
CHIEFLY OWING TO THE FALSE MANNER IN WHICH THEY
ARE ADDRESSED BY MEN-HIS DISCOVERIES
OF HIS RING.

BY MEANS

Nihil eft quod credere de fe

Non poffit, cum laudatur diis aqua poteftas.

Juv. SAT. iv. 70.

Arbitrary power, when commended, believes all panegyric, though ever fo extravagant.

HEN I reflect upon the many nights I have fat up for fome months laft paft in the greatest anxiety for the good of my neighbours and contemporaries, it is no fmall difcouragement to me to see how flow a progress I make in the reformation of the world. But, indeed, I must do my female readers the juftice to own, that their tender hearts are much more fufceptible of good impreffions, than the minds of the other fex. Bufinefs and ambition take up men's thoughts too much to leave room for philofophy; but if you speak to women, in a style and manner proper to approach them, they never fail to improve by your counfels. I fhall, therefore, for the future, turn my thoughts more particularly to their fervice, and study the best methods to adorn their perfons, and inform their minds in the jufteft methods to make them what

nature defigned them, the most beauteous objects of our eyes, and the most agreeable companions of our lives. But when I fay this, I must not omit at the fame time to look into their errors and mistakes, that being the readiefst way to the intended end of adorning and inftructing them. It must be acknowledged, that the very inadvertencies of this fex are owing to the other; for, if men were not flatterers, women could not fall into that general cause of all their follies and our misfortunes, their love of flattery. Were the commendation of these agreeable creatures built upon its proper foundation, the higher we raised their opinion of themselves, the greater would be the advantage to our fex; but all the topick of praise is drawn from very fenfelefs and extravagant ideas we pretend we have of their beauty and perfection. Thus, when a young man falls in love with a young woman, from that moment she is no more Mrs. Alice fuch-an-one, born of such a father, and educated by fuch a mother; but from the first minute that he cafts his eye upon her with defire, he conceives a doubt in his mind, what heavenly power gave fo unexpected a blow to a heart that was ever before untouched? But who can resist fate and destiny, which are lodged in Mrs. Alice's eyes? After which he defires orders accordingly, whether he is to live or die; the fmile or frown of his goddess is the only thing that can now either fave or destroy him. By this means the well-humoured girl, that would have romped with him before she had received this declaration, affumes a state fuitable to the majesty he has given her, and treats him as the vassal he calls himself. The girl's head is immediately turned, by having the power of life and death, and takes care to fuit every motion and air to her new fovereignty. After he has placed himself at this distance, he must never hope to recover his former familiarity, till fhe has had the addreffes of another, and found them lefs fincere.

If the application to women were justly turned, the address of flattery, though it implied at the fame time an admonition, would be much more likely to fucceed. Should a captivated lover, in a billet, let his mistress know that her piety to her parents, her gentleness of behaviour, her prudent economy