Cottage Economy, others for the Woodlands and the Gardener; and, in
short, for every one of my works have I received letters of thanks from
numerous persons, of whom I had never heard before. In many cases I have
been told, that, if the parties had had my books to read some years
before, the gain to them, whether in time or in other things, would have
been very great. Many, and a great many, have told me, that, though long
at school, and though their parents had paid for their being taught
English Grammar, or French, they had, in a short time, learned more from
my books, on those subjects, than they had learned, in years, from their
teachers. How many gentlemen have thanked me, in the strongest terms,
for my Woodlands and Gardener, observing (just as Lord Bacon had
observed in his time) that they had before seen no books, on these
subjects, that they could _understand_! But, I know not of anything that
ever gave me more satisfaction than I derived from the visit of a
gentleman of fortune, whom I had never heard of before, and who, about
four years ago, came to thank me in person for a complete reformation,
which had been worked in his son by the reading of my two SERMONS on
_drinking_ and on _gaming_.

8. I have, therefore, done, already, a great deal in this way: but,
there is still wanting, in a compact form, a body of ADVICE such as that
which I now propose to give: and in the giving of which I shall divide
my matter as follows. 1. Advice addressed to a YOUTH; 2. Advice
addressed to a BACHELOR; 3. Advice addressed to a LOVER; 4. To a
HUSBAND; 5. To a FATHER; 6. To a CITIZEN or SUBJECT.

9. Some persons will smile, and others laugh outright, at the idea of
'Cobbett's giving advice for conducting the affairs of _love_.' Yes, but
I was once young, and surely I may say with the poet, I forget which of
them,