Letter to Thomas Gray (1766) [ ]
… way, as long as I can: it is not youth I court, but liberty; and I think making one's self tender, is issuing a general warrant against one's own person. I suppose I shall submit to confinement, when I cannot help it; but I a m indifferent … the whole plan, but fully retained the purport of the maxim. In short, she is an epitome of empire, subsisting by rewards and punishments. Her great enemy/ Madam e du Deffand, was for a short time mistress of the Regent, is now very old … or anybody, and laughs both at the clergy and the philosophers. In a dispute, into which she easily falls, she is very warm, and yet scarce ever in the wrong: her judgment on every subject is as just as possible; on every point of conduct …
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