There is, in all good company, a fashionable air, countenance, manner, and phraseology, which can only be acquired by being in good company, and very attentive to all that passes there. There is a certain distinguishing diction of a man of fashion; he will not content himself with saying, like John Trott, to a new-married man, "Sir, I wish you joy"--or to a man who lost his son, "Sir I am sorry for your loss," and both with a countenance equally unmoved; but he will say in effect the same thing in a more elegant and less trivial manner, and with a countenance adapted to the occasion. He will advance with warmth, vivacity, and a cheerful countenance to the new-married man, and, embracing him, perhaps say to him, "If you do justice to my attachment to you, you will judge of the joy that I feel upon this occasion better than I can express it." To the other, in affliction, he will advance slowly, with a grave composure of countenance, in a more deliberate manner, and with a lower voice perhaps, say, "I hope you do me the justice to be convinced that I feel whatever you feel, and shall ever be affected where you are concerned."
Mr. Harte tells me that he intends to give you, by means of Signor Vincentini, a general notion of civil and military architecture; with which I am very well pleased. They are frequent subjects of conversation. I would also have you acquire a liberal taste of the two liberal arts of painting and sculpture. All these sorts of things I would have you know, to a certain degree; but remember that they must only be the amusements, and not the business, of a man of parts.
As you are now in a musical country [Italy], where singing, fiddling, and piping are not only the common topics of conversation but almost the principal objects of attention, I cannot help cautioning you against giving in to those--I will call them illiberal--pleasures, though music is commonly reckoned one of the liberal arts, to the degree that most of your countrymen do when they travel in Italy. If you love music, hear it; go to operas, concerts, and pay fiddlers to play to you, but I insist upon your neither piping nor fiddling yourself. It puts a gentleman in a very frivolous, contemptible light, brings him into a great deal of bad company, and takes up a great deal of time which might be much better employed.