Page:A Biographical Dictionary of the Celebrated Women of Every Age and Country (1804).djvu/736

722 have some friends, but very few; if it had been possible for me to have cultivated many, I could only have cherished a small number. Wit amuses, but does not impose upon me; but the qualities of the heart deeply interest my own. I am not rich; moderation has always seemed to me capable of supplying the place of opulence. I have accustomed myself to the habitude of not looking on myself as poor, by comparing my situation with that of those who possess great fortunes; and not having their desires, I can pass by a thousand things, without feeling myself deprived of them."

Mrs. Thicknesse, with whom she was acquainted, and who was engaged at the time in writing her sketches of the Lives of celebrated French Ladies, had wished to know some particulars of her history; in answer to which she speaks thus: "The particulars of my life would form a short and very insipid article. My passage upon this globe can neither excite nor satisfy the curiosity of any body. The narrow space which I occupy, makes it difficult to perceive whether I inhabit it at all; neither the world nor its amusements had ever any attractions for me, I have lived in a small circle, avoiding equally wits and fools. The desire to distinguish myself, did not render me an author. My first works were anonymous, and those which appeared afterwards would have shared the same fate, if chance had not discovered my secret. The desire I had of quitingquitting [sic] an unsuitable situation, which even habit could never render supportable to me; and the hope of being able to procure, by my pen, a part of those comforts and convenienciesconveniences [sic] I was about to deprive myself of; induced me to wish the publishing my feeble productions. The indulgence they met with,