appearance. Philander had good nature, a genteel person, a good address, and something very open and pleasing in his countenance; could sing, dance, and, in short, was quite what is called the ladies' man; but he had no taste either for business or letters, and was so far gone in what are styled the more innocent pleasures of the town, that his life was one continued circle of amusements, and these were pursued to the utmost extent of his fortune.

The passion of both lovers seemed equally sincere, but was expressed very differently to the lady. Clerimont saw in her more virtues and fewer faults than in most of her sex; Philander was so enamoured with the charms of her person, that he mistook for beauties even the imperfections of her mind. The one thought her an amiable woman, the other an angel; this admired her, that adored her: Clerimont was her lover, Philander her slave. Amanda was now debating with herself which to make the happy man ; but whilst reason pointed out Clerimont, a kind of compassionate inclination strongly pleaded for Philander; and at length the slavish adoration of the one, found a readier way to her heart, than all the valuable accomplishments of the other.

Beauty soon fades in reality, but much sooner in the lover's eye; flames and raptures are soon extinguished by possession; it is well if they survive the honey-moon. When these are no more, when love is ripened into esteem, Clerimont, by his reading and observations, will have a thousand ways to make life agreeable both to himself and her, whose happiness may become essential to his own, which Philander has not; the want of them will make life hang heavy at home, and will force him to seek among expensive pleasures abroad, that happiness which Clerimont can always find within doors. Amanda will be too apt to interpret, what is the mere effect of Philander's taste for gaiety, into a particular slight and indifference towards her; and this notion once harboured in the bosom of a fine woman, is enough to change the warmest affection into coldness and

aversion.

Besides, Philander's passion is not only too violent to be lasting, but it hardly inerits the name of love. Philander may scorn and Amanda be amazed at the imputation; but it is not in nature to be really in love with a virtuous woman, and commence an amour with one that is not so, at the same time; if it is, Philander must have much stronger motives than Amanda's charms for his future constancy. :

SOBRINA;

A FEMALE CHARACTER.

SOBRINA, the daughter of an eminent merchant deceased, being possessed of a genteel fortune (not less than six thousand pounds) on the death of her father and grandfather, took no small pains to lay herself out to be useful, exemplary, and benevolent in the neighbourhood in which she lived, and among those with whom she was more immediately connected. Being taught by her religious parents the principles and practice of true Christians, and animated to imitate their virtuous precepts by their pious example, she thought it her indispensable duty to follow their steps, and attend to their affectionate admonitions.

In her twenty-fourth year she married an amiable young gentleman, whose highest ambition consists in going handin-hand with her in the paths of virtue, piety, and benevolence: by him she had several children; and it is her daily and pleasing employ to superintend the nursery, while it is ber constant endeavour to instruct the young and tender minds of their infant offspring in the truths of religion; and by the most engaging and successful methods mature experience and parental affection can dictate, to instil into their young minds the love of the Supreme Being.

Naturally averse to the vain amusements of the age, the uninteresting conversation of gay company, and the fashionable follies of the times, she, contrary to the greatest part of her sex, avoids the acquaintance of the polite world, and secludes herself from the fatiguing formalities of visiting and dress, in a prudent attendance on the management of her little family, and the devotional retirements of her closet; free from the superstitious sentiments of fanaticism on the one hand, and a careless indifference respecting religious duties on the other.

Her husband, the happy partner of her best affections, thanks Heaven daily for the gift of so much excellence and worth, while God himself looks down with complacency and delight on their mutual felicity and connubial bliss.

But is Sobrina without her troubles? No, the loss of her eldest daughter, an engaging child, together with her own declining health, are the source of no little uneasiness to her and her much-loved Theoron; while anxiety, fear,

and concern alternately take place in each other's breast, to prove the impossibility of perfect happiness on earth, and teach them to aspire after a state of uninterrupted, complete and eternal bliss in heaven, where fears and sorrows shall be known no more.

ON FEMALE DRESS.

AT the age when young women are introduced into ge neral society, the character, even of those who have been the best instructed, is in a considerable degree unfixed. The full force of temptations, as yet only known by report, is now to be learned from hazardous experience. Right principles, approved in theory, are to be reduced from speculation into practice. Modes of conduct, wisely chosen and well begun, are to be confirmed by the influence of habit. New scenes are to be witnessed; new opinions to be heard; new examples to be observed; new dangers to be encountered. The result of very few years at this season of life in almost every case powerfully affects, and in many cases unequivocally decides, the tenor of its future course. tunate are those individuals who, at this critical period, being destitute of the counsel of judicious friends, or too giddy to give it a patient hearing, or too opinionated to receive it with kindness, advance unaided to the trial; and are left blindly to imbibe the maxims, and imitate the proceedings, of the thoughtless multitude around them.

Unfor

As erroneous opinions and reprehensible proceedings with respect to dress and amusements are frequently occasioned, or in a very high degree aggravated, by the habit of imitation, in things which in themselves, and also in their attendant circumstances, are indifferent, custom is generally the proper guide; and obstinately to resist its authority, with respect to objects in reality of that description, is commonly the mark either of weakness or of arrogance. The variations of dress, as in countries highly polished frequent variations will exist, fall within its jurisdiction. And as long as the prevailing modes remain actually indifferent, that is to say, as long as in their form they are not tinctured with indelicacy, nor in their costliness are inconsistent with the station or the fortune of the wearer, or with the spirit

of Christian moderation; such a degree of conformity to them, as is sufficient to preclude the appearance of particu larity, is reasonable and becoming.

But let not this reasoning be misapplied. In the first place, it neither suggests nor justifies the practice of adopting fashions which intrench either on the principles of decency, or on the rules of reasonable frugality and Christian simplicity. Fashions of the former kind are not unfrequently introduced by the shameless, of the latter by the profuse; and both are copied by the vain and inconsiderate. But deliberately to copy either, is to shew that delicacy, the chief grace of the female character; or that economy, the support not merely of honesty alone, but of generosity; or that a conformity to the temper which characterizes the followers of Christ, is deemed an object only of secondary importance. To copy either inadvertantly, denotes a want of habitual liveliness of attention to the native dictates of sensibility, or to the suggestions of equity and kindness, or to the revealed will of God. Among the modes of attire more or less inconsistent with feminine modesty, those which studiously ape the garb of the other sex are to be classed.* Their unpleasing effect is heightened by additional circumstances, which very commonly attend them, and are designed perhaps to strengthen the resemblance: a masculine air and deportment, and masculine habits of address and familiarity. To those whom higher motives would not deter from exhibiting or following so preposterous an example, it may not be ineffectual to whisper, that she who conceives that to imitate the habiliments of persons of the other sex, is a probable method of captivating the beholders, is not a little unfortunate in her conjecture. Let her ask herself, in what manner she would be impressed by the appearance of a young man studiously approaching in his dress to the

From the account which Dr. Henry gives of English manners and customs at different periods, both sexes among our ancestors appear to have been as much attached to costliness, variety, and I may add, absurdity in dress, as their contempora ries abroad, and each sex commonly as much as the other. From the two following passages, however, in his history, it may be inferred that at one period, namely, in the reign of Henry the Eighth, the men exceeded the women in extravagance and fickleness." The dress of that period was costly, and in its fashions subject to frequent fluctuation; so costly, that the wardrobes of the nobility in fifty years had increased to twenty times their former' value; so changeable, that the capricious inconstancy of the national dress was quaintly represented by the figure of an Englishman in a musing posture, with sheers in his hand and cloth on his arm, perplexed amidst a multiplicity of fashions, and uncertain how to devise Itis garments."-"The attire of females was becoming and decent, similar in its fashion to their present dress, but less subject to change and caprice,"

model of her own; and she will not be at a loss to estimate the repulsive influence of her accoutrements on those whom she copies.

In the next place it is to be observed, that the principles which recommend such a degree of compliance with established fashions of an unobjectionable nature as is sufficient to prevent the appearance of particularity, cannot be alledged in defence of those persons, who are solicitous to pursue existing modes through their minute ramifications, or who seek to distinguish themselves as the introducers or early followers of new modes. Fickleness, or vanity, or ambition, is the motive which encourages such desires; desires which afford presumptive evidence of feebleness of intellect, though found occasionally to actuate and degrade superior minds. It happens, in the embellishment of the person, as in most other instances, that wayward caprice, and a passion for admiration, deviate into those paths of folly which lead from the objects of pursuit.

We have run

Through every change that fancy, at the loom
Exhausted, has had genius to supply;

And studious of mutation still, discard
A real elegance, a little used,

For monstrous novelty, and strange disguise.

So preposterous and fantastic are the disguises of the human form which modern fashion has exhibited, that her votaries, when brought together in her public haunts, have sometimes been found scarcely able to refrain from gazing with an eye of ridicule and contempt on each other. And while individually priding themselves on their elegance and taste, they have very commonly appeared in the eyes of an indifferent spectator, to be running a race for the acquisition of deformity.

I have not scrupled to inculcate the duty of refraining from compliance with fashions in dress, which would be accompanied with a degree of expense inconsistent with the circumstances of the individual. Young women who accustom themselves to be lavish in matters of personal decoration, easily proceed to think, that so long as they restrain their expensiveness within the limits of the resources supplied by their parents and friends, they are not chargeable with blame on the subject. If they pay their bills punctually, who is entitled to find fault? Those persons will discern just cause of reprehension, who do not consider the bonest payment of bills at the customary times as compris