Never was a notion more false. Many sensible people, that happen to see you, will think nothing at all about you: those who are filled with the same vain notion as you are, will perceive your attempt to impose on them, and despise it. Rich people will wholly disregard you, and you will be envied and hated by those who have the same vanity that you have, without the means of gratifying it. Dress should be suited, in some measure, to our condition. A surgeon or physician need not dress exactly like a carpenter; but, there is no reason why any body should dress in a very _expensive_ manner. It is a great mistake to suppose, that they derive any _advantage_ from exterior decoration. For after all, men are estimated by other _men_ according to their capacity and willingness to be in some way or other _useful_; and, though, with the foolish and vain part of _women_, fine clothes frequently do something, yet the greater part of the sex are much too penetrating to draw their conclusions solely from the outside appearance. They look deeper, and find other criterions whereby to judge. Even if fine clothes should obtain you a wife, will they bring you, in that wife, _frugality_, _good sense_, and that kind of attachment which is likely to be lasting? Natural beauty of person is quite another thing: this always has, it always will and must have, some weight even with men, and great weight with women. But, this does not need to be set off by expensive clothes. Female eyes are, in such cases, discerning; they can discover beauty though surrounded by rags: and, take this as a secret worth half a fortune to you, that women, however vain they may be themselves, _despise vanity in men_. SECTION XII. _Bashfulness and Modesty._ Dr. Young says, 'The man that blushes is not quite a brute.' This is undoubtedly true; yet nothing is more clear, as Addison has shown us, than that a person may be both bashful and impudent. I know the world commend the former quality, and condemn the latter; but I deem them both evils. Perhaps the latter is the greater of the two. The proper medium is true modesty. This is always commendable. We are compelled to take the world, in a great measure, as it is. We can hardly expect men to come and buy our wares, unless we advertise or expose them for sale. So if we would commend ourselves to the notice of our fellow men, we must set ourselves up,--not for something which we are not;--but for what, upon a careful examination, we find reason to think we are. Many a good and valuable man has gone through _this_ life, without being properly estimated; from the vain belief that true merit could not always escape unnoticed. This belief, after all, is little else but a species of fatalism.