recommended to some provision, whom he, after a very deliberate experience, had seen reason so decently to provide for. I look upon most places of attendance at Court to be an idle, loytering, empty course of life; in which a man is obliged to dress expensively, keep frothy, vain, or vicious company, and to have the salary more backwardly paid than in other places. Therefore I should prefer some office in the Revenue, rather than to be upon the Civil List. "Any clerkship, that must double a man down to a desk for a set of hours, morning and afternoon, he should be inured to from his youth, to be {531} anything dextrous or easy in; but one, who has been the greatest part of his life master of his own time and thoughts, has his head pre-occupied; at least is commonly fitter for the direction than the execution of business; unless it be such in which his head will concur with his hand. Besides, not to mention other incongruities, how would it fit a man, growing in years, to be company for a pack of young clerks? or, how could he hope to be continued, of such honourable persons, as should recommend him even to that situation, but might with the same trouble to something more convenient for him? "I have been assured by persons of experience, that an handsome post is not only sooner procured as having less candidates, but a man's pretension is more regarded. Whereas, in business of ordinary or mean account, his merits and abilities are thought proportionable, and therefore his pretension or request is less regarded. Besides, places that are something considerable, are generally less slavish and engrossing of a man's time; which, God knows, I desire not to be better employed than mine is, and may be by myself; only, a part of it more profitably: and yet, the convenience of such leisure, with the credit attending such a place, I should more value than the profit. "There is a common advice, that a man should not put in for everything, because it implys too high thoughts of his own sufficiency, as if he thought himself fit for everything: which is the character of an arrogant and conceited coxcomb. This offering of one's self, without latitude or limitation, is indeed one extreme; but the other is, to nail one's self down to some one individual place, like a dainty guest, that can taste but of one dish, and so wait for the vacancy; wherein he is led, by his own election, first to go barefoot (perhaps to his grave) in waiting for a dead man's shoes; and when he is dead, then he shall probably see another wear them. So that any vacancy which will accommodate the candidate with a competency suitable to his condition and qualifications; or, at least, equal to what he has appeared in, and decently enjoyed, cannot, 'tis presumed, be thought unreasonable.