their heads. Seek for their particular merit,
their predominant passion, or their prevailing weakness; and you will
then know what to bait your hook with to catch them. Man is a composition
of so many, and such various ingredients, that it requires both time and
care to analyze him: for though we have all the same ingredients in our
general composition, as reason, will, passions, and appetites; yet the
different proportions and combinations of them in each individual,
produce that infinite variety of characters, which, in some particular or
other, distinguishes every individual from another. Reason ought to
direct the whole, but seldom does. And he who addresses himself singly to
another man's reason, without endeavoring to engage his heart in his
interest also, is no more likely to succeed, than a man who should apply
only to a king's nominal minister, and neglect his favorite. I will
recommend to your attentive perusal, now that you are going into the
world, two books, which will let you as much into the characters of men,
as books can do. I mean, 'Les Reflections Morales de Monsieur de la
Rochefoucault, and Les Caracteres de la Bruyere': but remember, at the
same time, that I only recommend them to you as the best general maps to
assist you in your journey, and not as marking out every particular
turning and winding that you will meet with. There your own sagacity and
observation must come to their aid. La Rochefoucault, is, I know, blamed,
but I think without reason, for deriving all our actions from the source
of self-love. For my own part, I see a great deal of truth, and no harm
at all, in that opinion. It is certain that we seek our own happiness in
everything we do; and it is as certain, that we can only find it in doing
well, and in conforming all our actions to the rule of right reason,
which is the great law of nature. It is only a mistaken self-love that is
a blamable motive, when we take the immediate and indiscriminate
gratification of a passion, or appetite, for real happiness. But am I
blamable if I do a good action, upon account of the happiness which that
honest consciousness will give me? Surely not. On the contrary, that
pleasing consciousness is a proof of my virtue. The reflection which is
the most censured in Monsieur de la Rochefoucault's book as a very
ill-natured one, is this, 'On trouve dans le malheur de son meilleur ami,
quelque chose qui ne des plait pas'. And why not? Why may I not feel a