6. As for _poor_ people themselves, she will admit of no complaints from them: she is very positive they are all _cheats_ and _liars_, and will say any thing to get relief; and therefore, it must be a sin to encourage them in their evil ways.
You would think _Flavia_ had the tenderest conscience in the world, if you was to see how _scrupulous_ she is of the guilt and danger of _giving_ amiss.
7. She buys all books of _wit_ and _humour_, and has made an expensive collection of all our _English poets_. For she says, one cannot have a _true taste_ of any of them, without being conversant with them all.
She will sometimes read a _book_ of _piety_, if it is a short one, if it is much commended for _stile_ and _language_, and she can tell where to _borrow_ it.
_Flavia_ is very _idle_, and yet very fond of _fine work_. This makes her often _sit_ working in _bed_ until _noon_, and be told many a _long story_ before she is up; so that I need not tell you her morning devotions are not _always_ rightly performed.
_Flavia_ would be a _miracle_ of piety, if she was but half so careful of her soul as she is of her body. The rising of a _pimple_ in her face, the sting of a _gnat_, will make her keep her room two or three days; and she thinks they are very _rash_ people, that don’t take care of things in time. This makes her so over-careful of her _health_, that she never thinks she is well enough; and so _over-indulgent_, that she can never be really well. So that it costs her a great deal in _sleeping-draughts_ and _waking-draughts_, in _spirits_ for the head, in _drops_ for the nerves, in _cordials_ for the stomach, and in _saffron_ for her _tea_.
8. If you visit _Flavia_ on the _Sunday_ you will always meet _good company_: you will know what is doing in the world; you will hear the last _lampoon_, be told who wrote it, and who is meant by every name that is in it. You will hear what _plays_ were acted that week, which is the finest song in the _opera_, who was intolerable at the last assembly, and what games are most in fashion. _Flavia_ thinks they are _Atheists_ that play at _cards_ on the _Sunday_; but she will tell you the _nicety_ of all the games, what cards she held, how she _played_ them, and the _history_ of all that happened at _play_, as soon as she comes from _church_. If you would know who is _rude_ and _ill-natured_, who is _vain_ and _foppish_, who lives too _high_, and who is in _debt_; if you would know what is the quarrel at a _certain house_, or who and who are in _love_; if you would know how late _Belinda_ comes home at night, what _cloaths_ she has bought, how she loves _compliments_, and what a long story she told at such a place; if you would know how cross _Lucius_ is to his _wife_, what ill-natured things he says to her when _nobody_ hears him; if you would know how they hate one another in their _hearts_, though they appear so kind in public, you must visit _Flavia_ on the _Sunday_. But still she has so great a regard for the holiness of the day, that she has turned a poor old widow out of her house, as a _prophane wretch_, for having been found once _mending her cloaths_ on the _Sunday_ night.
Thus lives _Flavia_; and if she lives ten years longer, she will have spent about _fifteen hundred and sixty Sundays_ after this manner. She will have wore about _two hundred_ different suits of cloaths. Out of this _thirty years_ of her life, fifteen of them will have been disposed of in _bed_; and of the remaining fifteen, about _fourteen_ of them will have been consumed in eating, drinking, dressing, visiting, conversation, reading and hearing plays and romances; at operas, assemblies, balls, and diversions. For you may reckon all the time she is _up_, thus spent, except about an _hour_ and half that is disposed of at church, most _Sundays_ in the year. With great management, and under mighty rules of œconomy, she will have spent _sixty hundred_ pounds upon herself, bating only some _shillings_, _crowns_, or _half crowns_, that have gone from her in _accidental_ charities.
9. I shall not take upon me to say, that it is impossible for _Flavia_ to be saved; but thus much must be said, that her whole life is in direct opposition to all those _tempers_ and _practices_ which the gospel has made necessary to salvation.
*If you was to hear her say, that she had lived all her life like _Anna_ the prophetess, _who departed not from the temple, but served God with fastings and prayers night and day_, you would look upon her as very extravagant; and yet this would be no greater an extravagance, than for her to say, that she had been _striving to enter in at the straight gate_, or making any one doctrine of the gospel a rule of her life.