of his own; and our embarrassment on the subject is, perhaps, but a part of
that general perplexity which we undergo, in trying to define moral
characters by external circumstances, which may, or may not, be attended
with faults in the mind and the heart. One man finds a vice in the wearing
of linen; another does not, unless the fabric be fine: and if, meantime, it
be true, that a person may be dressed in manufacture either coarse or fine;
that he may sleep in the fields, or lodge in a palace; tread upon carpet,
or plant his foot on the ground; while the mind either retains, or has lost
its penetration, and its vigour, and the heart its affection to mankind, it
is vain, under any such circumstance, to seek for the distinctions of
virtue and vice, or to tax the polished citizen with weakness for any part
of his equipage, or for his wearing a fur, in which, perhaps, some savage
was dressed before him. Vanity is not distinguished by any peculiar species
of dress. It is betrayed by the Indian in the fantastic assortments of his
plumes, his shells, his party coloured furs, and in the time he bestows at
the glass and the toilet. Its projects in the woods and in the town are
the same: in the one, it seeks, with the visage bedaubed, and with teeth
artificially stained, for that admiration, which it courts in the other
with a gilded equipage, and liveries of state.

Polished nations, in their progress, often come to surpass the rude in
moderation, and severity of manners. "The Greeks," says Thucydides, "not
long ago, like barbarians, wore golden spangles in the hair, and went armed
in times of peace." Simplicity of dress in this people, became a mark of
politeness: and the mere materials with which the body is nourished or
clothed, are probably of little consequence to any people. We must look for
the characters of men in the qualities of the mind, not in the species of
their food, or in the mode of their apparel. What are now the ornaments of
the grave and severe; what is owned to be a real conveniency, were once the
fopperies of youth, or were devised to please the effeminate. The new