Thus having slated the accounts between morality and trade, I shall
leave the reader to draw the ballance. I shall not pronounce after so
great a master, and upon so delicate a subject, but shall only ask,
"Whether the people in trade are more corrupt than those out?"

If the curious reader will lend an attentive ear to a pair of farmers in
the market, bartering for a cow, he will find as much dissimulation as
at St. James's, or at any other saint's, but couched in homelier phrase.
The man of well-bred deceit is '_infinitely_ your friend--It would give
him _immense_ pleasure to serve you!' while the man in the frock 'Will
be ---- if he tells you a word of a lye!' Deception is an innate
principle of the human heart, not peculiar to one man, or one
profession.

Having occasion for a horse, in 1759, I mentioned it to an acquaintance,
and informed him of the uses: he assured me, he had one that would
exactly suit; which he showed in the stable, and held the candle pretty
high, _for fear of affecting the straw_. I told him it was needless to
examine him, for I should rely upon his word, being conscious he was too
much my friend to deceive me; therefore bargained, and caused him to be
sent home. But by the light of the sun, which next morning illumined the
heavens, I perceived the horse was _greased_ on all fours. I therefore,
in gentle terms, upbraided my friend with duplicity, when he replied
with some warmth, "I would cheat my own brother in a horse." Had this
honourable friend stood a chance of selling me a horse once a week, his
own interest would have prevented him from deceiving me.

A man enters into business with a view of acquiring a fortune--A
laudable motive! That property which rises from honest industry, is an
honour to its owner; the repose of his age; the reward of a life of