Introduction to SERIOUS CONVERSATION. 131 
The objects with which we had been fo well entertained, being 
now fhut from our eyes, it was but natural to beguile the hours, 
with fome profitable difeourfe. 
When the delights of imagination fail, the gayefl mortals 
often fly for fuccour to the pleafures of the understanding : 
unhappy thofe to whom fuch pleafures are not grateful ! Tired 
with gay amufements nature demands of us to be ferious : at- 
tention to grave subjects is, however, a very laborious talk to 
thofe who have no relish for them. My difeourfe would 
hardly have been fo much confined to religion, if your queftions 
had not prepared the way, and in fome meafure conftrained me 
to expatiate : and it would be an ill compliment, to fuppofe 
that nothing more than your politenefs to me, was concerned 
in your enquiries. Adieu. I am yours, &c. 
LETTER XLV. 
To the fame . 
Madam, 
O U R firfl: fubjedt, on the road, was the vanity and 
folly of mankind : we confidered the great difference 
between the fame perfon living, and dead ; and thence con- 
cluded, that as life is fo very precarious, it is extremely foolifli 
to suffer the concerns of it, whatever they may be, to tor- 
ment us with anxious thoughts. It feems to follow as cer- 
tain, as pleafure is preferable to pain, that we ought to make 
it our ftudy to fupport a conftant habit of tranquillity ; or, in 
other words, to meet a gratification in every thing we fee or 
hear, fuppofing it is not criminal. If this can be moft eafily 
S 2 accom- 
