The Ladies I hope pass a truer estimate on themselves, and need not be told that they were made for nobler purposes. For tho I wou’d by no means encourage Pride, yet I wou’d not have them take a mean and groveling Spirit for true Humility. A being content with Ignorance is really but a Pretence, for the frame of our nature is such that it is impossible we shou’d be so; even those very Pretenders value themselves for some Knowlege or other, tho it be a trifling or mistaken one. She who makes the most Grimace at a Woman of Sense, who employs all her little skill in endeavouring to render Learning and Ingenuity ridiculous, is yet very desirous to be thought Knowing in a Dress, in the Management of an Intreague, in Coquetry or good Houswifry. If then either the Nobleness or Necessity of our Nature unavoidably excites us to a desire of Advancing, shall it be thought a fault to do it by pursuing the best things? and since we _will_ value our selves on somewhat or other, why shou’d it not be on the most substantial ground? The Humblest Person that lives has some Self-Esteem, nor is it either Fit or Possible that any one should be without it. Because we always Neglect what we Despise, we take no care of its Preservation and Improvement, and were we throughly possess’d with a Contempt of our selves, we shou’d abandon all Care both of our Temporal and Eternal Concerns, and burst with Envy at our Neighbours. The only difference therefore between the Humble and the Proud is this, that whereas the former does not prize her self on some Imaginary Excellency, or for any thing that is not truly Valuable; does not ascribe to her self what is her Makers due, nor Esteem her self on any other account but because she is GOD’s Workmanship, endow’d by him with many excellent Qualities, and made capable of Knowing and Enjoying the Sovereign and Only Good; so that her Self-Esteem does not terminate in her _Self_ but in _GOD_, and she values her self only for GOD’s sake. The Proud on the contrary is mistaken both in her Estimate of Good, and in thinking it is her Own; She values her self on things that have no real Excellency, or which at least add none to her, and forgets from whose Liberality she receives them: She does not employ them in the Donors Service, all her care is to Raise her self, and she little considers that the most excellent things are distributed to others in an equal, perhaps in a greater measure than to herself, they have opportunities of advancing as well as she, and so long as she’s puft up by this Tumor of Mind, they do really excel her.