74 F A L S E G R I E F. 
a precarious tenure, that when night comes we may throw it 
off, as a loofe garment when we retire to reft. 
Whilft you inftrudt your young friend, improve your own 
mind, as I enlarge mine by writing to you. Virtue is never 
unrewarded. You may laugh, or look ferious, as you are dif- 
pofed : I began my xxn d letter with a monkey’s elopement 
from his miftrefs, and I end this with a refledtion on mortality. 
The truth is, fools and philofophers are near akin ; and yet, 
you know as well as I, there is an eternal difference between 
folly and wifdom ; mifery is the companion of the one, im- 
mortal happinefs will crown the other. £c He hath fet fire 
“ and water before thee ; ftretch forth thy hand unto whether 
u thou wilt.” Adieu. I am yours, &c. 
LETTER XXVII. 
1*0 the fame . 
Madam, 
O U R ideas are link’d together by a very wonderful chain. 
Would you think that a monkey fhould give occaiion for 
a moral and religious effay ? I know not how it happens, ex- 
cept it arife from flattery joined to a pernicious felf- compla- 
cency in the contemplation of their, own charms, that women, 
particularly if they are young and handfome, often talk and 
act, as if they imagined there was a difference of fex in fouls ; 
or that the fame reafon did not precide in both fexes. 
Do you think there is really any difference in the original con- 
ftitution, as appointed by the author of nature ? We fee indeed a 
3 very 
