Ihave read your manuscript twice over, my dear Porphyry; and I know no work which so faithfully describes the manners of the world: you boldly satyrize its follies, absurdities, and vices; a more daring attempt than that of which fools are so vain; their attack upon Religion, upon Kings and government – in the midst of a general corruption, insolence and impiety never fail to meet with admirers; but you dare to expose vice; you dare, without reserve, to assert useful truths; and nothing that deserves it escapes your censure. – At the same time you pay a sincere deference to religion, you praise virtue without parade and from the bottom of your heart; and you prove, ‘That there is no happiness without it.’ Believe me, the modern writings, which appear to be the boldest, are not half so much so as your's. Your motives are laudable, and you make the best and noblest use of your abilities. Nevertheless, not to deceive you, my dear Porphyry, if you expect much admiration and success, you will be disappointed; we must not look for praise from those we expose. – What courtier, in Fenelon's time, would praise Telemachus? – so, when you have finished a master-piece, the greatest part of the public will be against you: you will always meet with enemies in the atheists, the ambitious, coquets, and pedants; bad fathers, people without morals, and without principles; and the generality of the world. – Proceed, my son; work for glory, and not for applause. Do still better, seek only in your own breast for the reward of your labours; for will you be worthy to paint virtue, and to delineate its charms, if virtue alone will not content you? – If injustice should disgust you, if calumny should blacken your character, if malice should persecute you, reflect, that this work of yours may guard unexperienced youth and innocence from the detestable snares of vice, that it may bring back into the right way wandering and depraved characters, that, if your enemies should decry it, it may nevertheless be read with approbation and gratitude by good fathers and tender mothers of families.