give me if I were to finish the sentence. Now I think of it, what
do you mean to be dressed in when we are married? But it does not much
matter! I wish you would let your hair grow; though perhaps nothing
will be better than 'the same air and look with which at first my
heart was took'. But now to business. I mean soon to call upon your
brother _in form_, namely, as soon as I get quite well, which I hope
to do in about another _fortnight_; and then I hope you will come up
by the coach as fast as the horses can carry you, for I long mightily
to be in your ladyship's presence--to vindicate my character. I think
you had better sell the small house, I mean that at 4.10, and I will
borrow L100. So that we shall set off merrily in spite of all the
prudence of Edinburgh. Goodbye, little dear!

TO HIS SON

_Marriage, and the choice of a profession_

[1822.]

... If you ever marry, I would wish you to marry the woman you like.
Do not be guided by the recommendations of friends. Nothing will
atone for or overcome an original distaste. It will only increase from
intimacy; and if you are to live separate, it is better not to come
together. There is no use in dragging a chain through life, unless
it binds one to the object we love. Choose a mistress from among your
equals. You will be able to understand her character better, and she
will be more likely to understand yours. Those in an inferior station
to yourself will doubt your good intentions, and misapprehend your
plainest expressions. All that you swear is to them a riddle or
downright nonsense. You cannot by any possibility translate your
thoughts into their dialect. They will be ignorant of the meaning of
half you say, and laugh at the rest. As mistresses, they will have no
sympathy with you; and as wives, you can have none with them.

Women care nothing about poets, or philosophers, or politicians. They
go by a man's looks and manner. Richardson calls them 'an eye-judging
sex'; and I am sure he knew more about them than I can pretend to do.
If you run away with a pedantic notion that they care a pin's point
about your head or your heart, you will repent it too late....

If I were to name one pursuit rather than another, I should wish you
to be a good painter, if such a thing could be hoped. I have failed in
this myself, and should wish you to be able to do what I have not--to
paint like Claude, or Rembrandt, or Guido, or Vandyke, if it were
possible. Artists, I t