>% t .-? ^?F <% I CORNELL UNIVERSITY LIBRARY BOUGHT WITH THE INCOME OF THE SAGE ENDOWMENT FUND GIVEN IN 1 89 1 BY HENRY WILLIAMS SAGE Cornell University Ubrary PN 6014.A39 Great authors 9||fM,?,'L.?|9MU|i|i|{|||{|i|i|i| 3 1924 027 284 524 Cornell University Library The original of this book is in the Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924027284524 GEEAT AUTHORS ALL AGES. GEEAT AUTHOES OF ALL AGES. BEING SELECTIONS FEOM THE PEOSE WOEKS OE EMINENT WEITEES EEOM THE TIME OP PEEICLES TO THE PEESENT DAY. WITH INDEXES. By S. AUSTIN ALLIBONE. AUTHOR OF 'A CRITICAL DICTIONARY OP ENGLISH LITERATURE AND BRITISH AND' AMERICAM AUTHORS," "POETICAL QUOTATIONS FROM CHAUCER TO TENNYSON," PROSE QUOTATIONS PROM SOCRATES TO MACAULAY," ETC. PHILADELPHIA: J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANT. London: S, Henrietta Street, Covent Garden. 1906. oonuitu. I I I n :/, n u Copyright, 1879, b; J. B. Lippihoott A OOk TO ROBERT LENOX KENNEDY, OF NEW YORK, AS A TOKEN OF PBOFOUND EESPECT FOE HIS OHAKACTEK AS A. CHRISTIAN, A PHILANTHROPIST, AND A SCHOLAR, I DEDICATE THIS VOLUME. S. AUSTIN ALLIBOJTE. Nkw York. Ootober 11, 1879. PREFACE. This volume is the fourth of my works constituting a Course of English Literature, viz. : I. A Critical Dictionary of English Literature and British and American Authors, Living and Deceased, from the Earliest Accounts to the Latter Part of the Nineteenth Century, containing over Forty-six Thousand [46,499] Articles (Authors); with Forty Indexes of Subjects. Royal 8vo, 3 vols., pp. 3139. Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott & Co., 1858-70-71. II. Poetical Quotations from Chaucer to Tennyson, with Copious Indexes. Authors, 550; Subjects, 435; Quotations, 13,600. 8vo, pp. xiv. 788. Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott & Co., 1873. III. Prose Quotations from Socrates to Macaulay, with Indexes. Authors, 544; Subjects, 571; Quotations, 8810. 8vo. Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott & Co., 1876. IV. Great Authors of all Ages: Being Selections from the Prose Works of Eminent Writers from the Time of Pericles to the Prese?.it Day, With Indexes. 8vo. Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott & Co., 1880. It is diiBcult for an author to say anything of his works which does not savour of ostentation, or, at least, of egotism; and therefore I prcAsr to say nothing. S. AUSTIN ALLIBONE. New York, October 23, 1879. INDEX OF AUTHORS. PAGE Adams, Johr Quincy 289 Addison, Joseph 133 Arbuthnot, John, M.D 140 Arnold, Thomas, D.U 419 Ascham, Soger 28 Bacon, Francis „ 39 Bancroft, George, LL.D 437 Barclay, JBobert 121 Barrow, Isaac, D.D 93 Baxter, Richard 74 Beattie, James, LL.D 252 Beckford, "William ' 278 Beecher, Heury Ward, D.D 502 Bentham, Jeremy 270 Berkeley, George, D.D 150 Beveridge, "William, D.D 112 Binney, Horace, LL.D 357 Blackstone, Sir "William 220 Blackwall, Anthony 137 Blair, Hugh, D.D 202 Bolinghroke, Lord 145 Boyle, Hon. Kobert 88 Brougham, Henry, Lord Brougham 338 Brown, Thomas, M.D ,... 343 Browne, Sir Thomas, M.D 58 Budgell, Eustace 153 Bunyan, John 90 Buonaparte, Napoleon 290 Burke, Edmund 233 Burritt, Elihu 486 Burton, Robert 44 Burj', Richard de 17 Butler, Joseph, D.D 163 Butler, Samuel 69 Byron, George Gordon Noel, Lord 395 Carey, Henry Charles, LL.D 407 Carleton, William 434 Carlj'le, Thomas 414 Carter, Elizabeth 199 Cavendish, George 25 Caxton, William 20 Cervantes 82 Chalmers, Thomas, D.D., LL.D 354 Chaniiing, William Ellery, D.D 352 Chapone, Esther 226 Charleton, Walter, M.D 80 Charnock, Stephen 86 Chatham, Earl of 176 Chenevix, Richard 361 Chesterfield, Earl of 166 Cicero 12 FAGB Clarendon, Earl of. 65 Clarke, Samuel, D.D 142 Combe, Andrew, M.D 430 Combe, George 392 Cooper, Anthony Ashley 131 Cowley, Abraham, M.D 78 Cowper, William ■ 242 Cudworth, Ralph 77 Cumberland, Richard 246 Dalrymple, David, Lord Hailes 224 Davy, Sir Humphry 342 DeFoe, Daniel 124 De Quincey, Thomas 380 Decker, Thomas 113 Dick, Thomas, LL.D 302 Dickens, Charles 492 Disraeli, Isaac 287 Doddridge, Philip, D.D 170 Dodsley, Robert 171 Dryden, John 97 Eliot, George 530 EUwood, Thomas 114 Elyot, Sir Thomas 51 Emerson, Ralph Waldo 457 Erskine, Ralph 155 Evelyn, John 81 Everett, Edward, D.O.L 409 Eelltham, Owen 60 Eelton, Henry, D.D 149 Fielding, Henry 174 Fisher, John 20 Foster, John 295 Fox, Charles James 272 Franklin, Benjamin 172 Froude, James Anthony 518 Fuller, Thomas 61 Gibbon, Edward 256 Gilpin, William 223 Godwin, William 277 Goldsmith, Oliver 227 Green, Rev. John Richard 527 Guizot, Fran9ois Pierre Guillaume 389 Hailes, Lord 224 Halo, Sir Matthew 67 Hales, John 48 Hall, Captain Basil 399 Hall, Joseph, D.D 42 Hall, Robert 280 ix INDEX OF AUTHORS. PAGE Hallam, Henry, LL.D 335 Hare, Julius Charles 428 Harris, James, M.P 179 Harrison, William S2 Hawkesworth, John, LL.D 195 Hawthorne, Nathaniel 462 Hazlitt, 'William 345 Heber, Reginald, D.D 364 Helps, Sir Arthur 510 Herbert, Lord Edward 46 Herschel, John Frederick William, D.C.L 400 Hoylin, Peter, D.D 56 Hillard, George Stillman 475 Hoadly, Benjamin, D.D 143 Hobbes, Thomas 50 Hooker, Eichard 36 Hopkins, Ezekiel 105 Home, George, D.D 241 Horsley, Samuel, LL.D 248 Howell, James 55 Hughes, John 144 Hume, David 189 Hunt, James Henry Leigh 372 Hurd, Richard, D.D 204 Hyde, Henry 65 Irving, Washington, LL.D 366 James VI. and 1 41 Jefferson, Thomas 259 Jeffrey, Francis 313 Jenyns, Soame 171 Jerrold, Douglas 456 Johnson, Samuel, LL.D 181 Jones, Sir William 2ii3 Junius 293 Kane, Elisha Kent, M.D 521 Kingsley, Rev. Charles 617 Knox, Vicesimus, D.D 273 Lamb, Charles 324 Landor, Walter Savage 330 Lntimer, Hugh 22 Layard, Austen Henry, D.O.L., M.P.... 512 Lecky, William Edward llurtpole 529 Leiffhton, liobert, D.D (i8 Loclte, John 102 Longfellow, Ili'nry A\'iul.>i\vorth 470 Lyi'll, Sir C'huiK.s, 1).(\L 4:!:! Lytli'llcin, lionl (Icorf;!' 17S Lylliin, Kdwiir.l Gi'oi-f,'o Enrlu Bulwcr Lvtton, Lord 465 Maoiiulay, Thomas Raliiugtciii Macnulay, M.l'., Lord '. ."., 440 Allicrhiuvolli 'Jl WarUi'ii/.ic, Sir Oi'i)ri;ii 10!) Miu'k«Ti/.ici, Ui'iirv 262 Muckiiitosli, Sir'.lnim's, J\l.l),, iM P., LL.D os.r, Miiiil, liii'liard, D.D !l;l;! Marliiu'iin, Ilnrriel 4,", I MiiliiHith, \\'illium 1S7 Miller, Hugh l.Vj PACK Milman, Henry Hart, D.D 403 Milton, John 62 Montagu, Elizabeth 203 Jlontagu, Lady Mary Wortley 161 Montaigne, Michel de 30 More, Henry, D.D "3 More, Sir Thomas 23 Motley, John Lothrop, LL.D., D.C.L... 504 Newton, Sir Isaac 117 North, Christopher 375 Overbury, Sir Thomas 47 Owen, John, D.D 76 Paley, William, D.D 260 Pascal, BlaUe 84 Paulding, James Kirke !''0 Pearson, John, D.D 70 Penn, AVilliam 119 Pepys, Samuel 101 Pericles 9 Petrarch, Francesco 18 Phillips, Chark-s 3S7 Pitt, Eight Hon. William, Earl of Chat- ham 17'i Pliny the Younger 15 Pope, Alexander 156 Potter, Alonzo, D.D 450 Prescott, William Hickling, LL.D 422 Priestley, Joseph, LL.D 250 Purchas, Samuel 46 Quincy, Josiah, LL.D 811 Eadcliffe, Anne 2S3 Raleigh, Sir Walter Vt Eapin de Thovrus 122 Reid, Thomas," D.D IS.; Richardson, Siimuel l-">8 Ridley, Xiohola? 26 Robertson, William, D.D 200 Rollin, Charles 123 Rousseau, Jean Jacques 192 Kiiskin, John 519 Russell, Lady Rachel 109 Siiiiit John, Hcnrv 145 Salhist ." 14 Siiiuly.'*, Cotiriro 4.", Scott", Sir Walter 307 Soldcn, John 40 Sownrd, Anna 269 Shnftosbury, Earl of ]:U Sliiirswood, (u'orge, LL.D 4S3 Sliorl.H'k, Tlioma's, 1),D 148 Sherlock, William, D.D Hg Sidnov, Aliiorimn S3 Sidney, Sir Philip 37 Smiles, SaiiHiol, M.l> -,07 Smith, Att,''rol>nis Goori^c, M.O. ...'.!".!".".'.'.!! 218 South, Robert, n.D...'. 108 Soutlicy, Robert, LL.D i 31% INDEX OF AUTHORS. XI PAGE Spence, Joseph 168 Spencer, Herbert 522 Sprat, Thomas 110 Stanhope, Philip Dormer 166 Steele, Sir Kichard 129 Sterne, liaurence 194 Stewart, Dugald 275 Stillingfleet, Edward, D.D 107 Sumner, John Bird, D.D 359 Swift, Jonathan, D.D 125 Talhot, Catherine 206 Taylor, Jeremy, D.D 71 Temple, Sir William 91 Thackeray, William Makepeace 488 Tickell, Thomas 155 Ticknor, George, LL.D 405 Tillotson, John, D.D 95 Trench, Kichard Chenevix, D.D 473 Tuckerman, Henry Theodore 498 Tytler, Alexander Praser 266 PA8« Usher, James 207 Vaughan, Charles John, D.D 509 Von Schlegel, Frederick Wilhelm 305 Walpole, Horace 200 Walton, Izaak 54 Warburton, William, D.D 167 Warton, Joseph, D.D 216 Warton, Thomas 237 Washington, George 244 Watson, Richard, D.D 255 Watts, Isaac, D.D 139 Webster, Daniel, LL.D 362 West, Gilbert, LL.D 169 Whately, Eichard, D.D 385 Whiston, William 128 White, Henry Kirke 379 White, Joseph, D.D 265 Wilson, John {" Christopher North")... 875 Winslow, Forbes, M.D., D.C.L 481 Winthrop, Robert Charles, LL D 4"9 INDEX OF SUBJECTS. PAGE A'btotsford, Irving at 369 ^neid and Virgil's Genius 168 Albania, Byron at 395 Alfred, Hume on 190 America, Burke on 234 American Literature 410 Ancestry, Pride of. 362 Animals, Cruelty to 856 Anjou and Elizabeth 37 Arts, Herschel on the 402 Ascham, Eoger, and Lady Jane Grey... 332 Astronomy, Uses of 411 Augustan Age in England 230 Authorship, Prescott on 427 Bacon, Von Schlegel on 306 Bastille, Attack upon the 418 Battle of the Nile 319 Battle of Princeton 245' Battle of Trafalgar 322 Battle of Trenton 244 Beards, Budgell on 154 Beattieonhis "Minstrel" 252 Beauty, Bacon on 39 Beauty, Emerson on 458 Beauty, Personal 208 Beauty and Love, Scale of 132 Bible as a Study 451 Bois-Guilbert and Rebecca 809 Books, Choice of 419 Books, De Bury on 17 Books, Hillard on 478 Books, Meditation among the 224 Books and Book-Buyers, Kuskin on 521 Books, Buying, Beecher on 503 Books and Heading, Lamb on 327 Books and Reading, Watts on 140 Britain, Languages of 52 British Nation, Industry of the 361 Buonaparte, Phillips on 387 Burning of Vanities 533 Busy-Body, Hall on the 43 Caius Marius to the Romans 14 Calamity, Compensation of 460 Caliph Vathek and his Palaces 278 Candid Man 466 Castle-Building, Steele on 130 Castle of Fdolpho 283 Cato, Smith on 525 Charles I., Clarendon on 66 Charles II., Death of. 444 Charles V., Robertson on 211 PA8I Childe Harold, Byron on 397 Children, Hale's Letter to his 67 Children of Light 428 Chinese, Condition of the 340 Christ, Ascension of 70 Christ, Character and Influence of 529 Christ, Divinity of 290 Christ, Miracles of 247 Christ and Socrates 265 Christian's Dependence upon his Re- deemer 359 Christianity, Proposed Abolition of 126 Christianity the Great Remedy 479 Christianity and Natural Religion 255 Church of England 27 Civilization, Guizot on 389 Clovernook and its Inn 456 Columbus, First Voyage of. 868 Confessions of a Drunkard 329 Conscience, Butler on 164 Contentment, "Walton on 54 Controversy, Baxter on 74 Controversy, Hall on 282 Conversation, Fuller on 61 Conversation, Usher on 209 Copyright, Macaulay on 441 Countries, Ancient 45 Cowper on his Poems 243 Cromwell, Clarendon on 65 Cromwell, Guizot on 392 Daughter, Death of a 91 Day of Judgment 226 Death, Ignorance of the Time of 116 Decision of Character 297 Detraction, Eelltham on 60 Devils in the Head 50 Devotional Feelings 170 Divine Benevolence 261 Divinity, Law, and Physic 133 Don Quixote, Cervantes on 32 Don Quixote, Hallam on 336 Earth, Insignificance of the 355 Earthquakes, London 201 Education, Classical 421 Education, Female, Lady Montagu on.. 162 Education, Female, Sydney Smith on... 300 Education of the Middle Classes 420 Education, Spencer on 523 Education, True and False 63 Elegance, Thoughts on 207 Elizabeth, Amy Eobsart, and Leicester. 310 ziii INDEJ OF SUBJECTS. PAGE Elizabeth, Hume on 191 Elizabeth, Prescott on... 423 Elizabeth, Kapin on 122 Elizabeth, Scott on 310 Elizabeth, Literature of the Age of. 345 Eloquence, Webster on 364 English Literature, Progress of 313 English People, Best 488 Enthusiasm, Defence of 499 Everett, Hillard on 476 Evil Speaking, Selden on 50 Excellency of the Christian Religion 93 Exercise, Combe on 430 Exercise, Elyot on 52 Existence of God 73 Faith in Providence 454 Fame, Love of. 188 Faults, Beecher on 504 Feast in the Manner of the Ancients.... 213 Fire in London, 1666 81 Fortune, Petrarch on 18 Fossils of the Old Red Sandstone 453 France, Critics and Moralists of 216 Francis of Assisi 20 Franklin, Overbury on a 48 Franklin, Jefferson on 260 Franklin and the American Revolution 250 French, Character of the 57 French Revolution .'. 285 Friendship in Heaven 386 Friendship and Benevolence 1.33 Future State, Berkeley on 151 Genius, Emerson on 460 Golden City, Approach to the 90 Good Breeding, Chesterfield on 166 Good Breeding, Warton on 218 Good Works, Franklin on 173 Government, Burke on 235 Grant, Sir William 838 Great Seal, More's Resignation of the... 46 Greatness, Inconvenience of 80 Greek and Roman Authors 137 Hamlet, Hazlitt on 848 Happiness, Butler on 69 Happiness of Others 34.3 Happiness and Misery 197 Harley, Death of 2ii2 Hustings, Impenchmont of 280 lliistiiii^s. Trial of .\.\-i lliatlien, Future State of the 242 Jlonry \'I1I., FrmuU' on 614 lliiii V ^' 111., Hume on 190 lliHliiry, Credit due to 75 lliinier, lUackwall on 137 Homer, l'"(ix cm '2~'l Jlonior and A'irgil, Pope on I,"i7 Honour to God ij,-, Iloniee, Speiicti on ](•,;) Human Life, Slioilness of. \M'> Humility, Selden nn 50 Hypocrite, Hall on tlie 43 Imago-Breakers of the Netherlands 500 * PAOI Immortality, Consciousness of. 342 Immortality, Universal Belief in 803 Incarnation, Mystery of the 76 Incomprehensibility of God 77 Indians, Employment of 177 Inferior Animals, Cruelty to 172 Ingratitude an Incurable Vice 106 Inquiry and Private Judgment in Re- ligion 48 Insanity, Symptoms of. 481 Inventions, Revival of. 507 Irish Village and School-House 435 Irving and Scott's last Interview 371 Isabella of Spain and Elizabeth of Eng- land 423 Johnson, Macaulay on 447 Judgments of God 58 Junius to the King 293 Knowledge, God's 86 Knowledge, Love of 51 Labour, Division of 220 Ladies, Unmarried 158 Language, Changes in 433 Languages, Harrison 180 Languages, Spencer on 524 Last Judgment 105 Latin and Greek _ 299 Laughter, Hobbcs on 51 Law Studies, Sharswood on 483 Law, Study of the, Blackstone on 221 Laws in General, Blackstone on_ 222 Laws, Sleeping, Bentham on 271 Learning, Useless 145 Lexicography, Johnson on 182 Liberty and Government 83 Libraries, Roman 247 Life, Conduct of. „ 59 Life Not too Short. 115 Literary Aspirations 62 Literature, National 853 Loneliness, Vaughan on 609 Lord's Supper....'. 884 Love, Bacon on 89 Lovo, Power of 4.">8 Luther, Itobortsou on 211 Mahomet, Gibbon on 257 Mambrino's Helmet 83 Man's Wriiins; a Memoir of Himself..... 205 Marriage, Prosiioct of. 162 MarriBs;es, Knrly 173 Mary, l^lueen of So.its, Kxeoution cf. r>15 Afary, tjuoen of SooU, Uobortson en 210 Malliomaticnl Learning 141 Matrimonial Happiness 1('.2 Matrimony, Dickens on 497 Mclnnchoiy and Contemplation 44 Memory, Fuller on 61 Memory, Stewart on 276 IMoniory, Watts on 139 Memory, Winslow on ;. 482 Men and Women icO Mercy, God's 155 INDEX OF SUBJECTS. XV PAQE JFexiao, Prescott on 426 Mijton, Country Retreat of. 263 Milton, EUwood on 114 Mind, Knowledge of the 186 More, Sir Thomas, Mackintosh on 286 Names, Sterne on 195 Narrative, Hawkesworth on 195 Nutural Philosophy and Keligion 88 Nature, Love of 253 Neapolitan Church 284 Neglect, Felltham on 60 New Commandment 249 New England, Quincy on 312 Nile, Battle of the 319 Nimroud, Excavations at... 512 Noble Birth, Pride of...... 119 Noodle's Oration 301 Oblivion, Browne on 59 Obscurity, Cowley on 78 One Niche the Highest 486 Opium, Effects of. 381 Pacific Ocean, Discovery of the 511 Partridge at the Playhouse 175 Paul at Athens 404 Paul's Walk 113 Pecksniff. 493 Peloponnesian War 9 Penn's Advice to his Children 120 Plague in London in 1665, De Foe on... 125 Plague in London in 1665, Pepys on 101 Pleasure, Utopian 24 Pleasures, Natural and Eantastical 152 Poet, a Small 69 Poetry, Modern, Defects in 518 Poetry of the Age'of Elizabeth 237 Poetry, Steele on 130 Poetry, What is ? 337 Politeness, True and False 205 Poor Relations 326 Pope, Milton, Thomson 269 Pope to Atterbury 158 Pope's Translation of Homer 185 Power and Activity 393 Power, God's « 87 Poyser, Mrs., and the Squire 530 Practice and Habit 103 Prayer, Bacon's 40 Preaching, Moral 354 Prescott, Death of 406 Press, Censorship of the 64 Princeton, Battle of 245 Private Judgment in Religion 92 Procrastination 79 Prophetic Language 118 Protestant Infallibility 143 Proverbs, Philosophy of. 288 Prudence, Dodsley on 171 Psalms, Beauties of the 241 Purity and Propriety 203 Rainy Sunday in an Inn 367 Raleigh, Three Rules of .'. 35 Baleigh to Prince Henry 35 PAQE Ravenswood and Lucy Ashton 308 Reading, Gibbon on 2-58 Religion and Moral Conduct 198 Religion not Hostile to Pleasure 106 Religion, Sherlock on 148 Remorse, Godwin on 277 Repentance, Death-Bed 72 Revelation, Evidences of. 128 Revolution, Riccabocca on 469 Rewards and Punishments 164 Richard the Third and Macbeth 349 Richmond, Countess of. 20 Right and Wrong 142 Rill from the Town Pump 462 Roast Pig, Lamb on 3^4 Rome in 1621... 56 Rural Life in Sweden 471 Russell, Lady R., to Doctor Fitzwilliam 109 Sacred Writers, Simplicity of the 169 Sallust and Cicero 264 Schoolmaster of Ascham 28 Science and its Methods ; 408 Science, Influence of. 401 Scott, Sir Walter, Hall on 399 Scottish Rebellion 200 Scripture and the Law of Nature 36 Scriptures, Confirmation of the 513 Scriptures, Style of the 89 Scrooge's Christmas 495 Sea, Purchas on the 46 Self-Culture 352 Self-Deoeit 165 Self-Denial 112 Self-Love, Immoderate 108 Shakespeare, Johnson on 183 S^iakspeare, Jeffrey on 317 Shakspeare, Beaumont and Fletcher, and Ben Jonson 98 Shakspere's Later Tears 527 Shepherds of Bethlehem 23 Sidney, Sir Philip, and Lord Brooke 331 Snow-Storm 376 Solitude, Happiness of. 193 Sorcery and Witchcraft 41 Soul, Immortality of the, Gibbon on the 257 Soul, Immortality of the, Hughes on the 144 Spenser and Milton 99 Spring, Pleasures of the '. 156 Squire Bull and his Son 350 Stateliness and Courtesy 459 Stoicism and Christianity 199 Studies, Bacon on 40 Study, Course of. 16 Study, Haste in 104 Style, Blair on 202 Style, Melmoth on 187 Sublime, Pelton on the 149 Success, Macchiavelli on....' 21 Suicide, Leoky on 529 Sunday Amusements 273 Sunday, Aut'obiography of 206 Sunrise in the Woods 224 Taste, Cultivation of. 202 Taste, Formation of the Right 419 XVI INDEX OF SUBJECTS. PAGE Taste, Eeflectionson 123 Tears, Steele on 129 Temple, Knights of the 491 Teufolsdrockh'B View of the City 417 Tezcuco, King of. 424 The Seal I The Seal 1 522 Themistocles, Aristides, and Composition 379 Thoughts and Aphorisms 127 Thurlow, Josephus, and Tacitus 243 Time and Eternity, Hall on 281 Time and Eternity, Heber on 865 Time, Employing our 72 Tinlcer, Overbury's 47 Titles of Honour 121 Trafalgar, Battle of. 322 Translation, Dryden on 100 Travelling, Emerson on 461 Trenton, Battle of. 244 Truth and Sincerity 95 TJnbelievers, Expostulation with 84 Understanding, Weakness of. 102 Union, Preservation of the 363 Vanities, Burning of. 533 Vanity, Mrs. Montagu on 204 Venice, Euskin on 520 Ventriloquism, Dick on 304 Verres, Cicero against 12 I'AGB View of the Divine Government 110 Virtue and Vice 96 Virtue More Pleasant than Vice HO Wakefield, Family of. 227 Wakefield Family in Afliiction 228 Wakefield Family in Prosperity 229 War, Horrors of 280 Warburton to Hurd 1C7 Washington Abroad and at Home 412 Washington Appointed Commandir-in- Chief. 437 Washington, Fame of. 1'^ Washington, Farewell Address of. 3f8 Westminster Abbey 1"4 Wife, Economical 2i.O William the Conqueror 178 Wisdom, God's 87 Wisdom, True - 1"7 Wit, Barrow on 9-1 Wit, Ready and Nimble 80 Wit, Slow but Sure SO Witches, Travel of. 42 Wolsey and Henry VIII 26 Women in Politics 2S9 Women, Learning of. 160 Words, Morality in 474 Words, Study of. 474 Work, Carlyle on 416 GEEAT AUTHOKS OF ALL AQES. PERICLES, an illustrious Athenian statesman and orator, died B.C. 429. " The history of eloquence at Athens is remark- able. From a very early period great speakers bad flourished there. Pisiscratus and Tbemiatoclcs are said to have owed much of their influence to their talents for debate. We learn, with more certainty, that Pericles was distinguished by ex- traordinary oratorical powers. The substance of some of his speeches is transmitted to us by Thu- oydides, and that excellent writer has doubtless faithfully reported the general line of his argu- ments." — Lord Macaulay r On the Athenian Ora- tors ; Knight's Quarterly Magazine^ August, 1824, and in his works, complete, 1S66, 8 vols., 8ro, vii. 668. " His oratipn upon those who fell in the first campaign of the Peloponnesian war has been pronounced the most remarkable of all the com- positions of antiquity." — Ret. James Taylor, D^D^ : Imperial Diet, of Univ. Biog., iii. 644. The Oration which was spoken by Peri- cles AT THE Public Funeral of those Athenians who had been first killed IN the Peloponnesian War. (From Thucydides.) Many of those who have spoken before me on occasions of this kind have com- mended the author of that law which we are now obeying, for having instituted an oration to the honour of those who sacrifice their lives in fighting for their country. For my part, I think it sufficient for men who have approved their virtue in action, by ac- tion to be honoured for it — by such a^ you see the public gratitude now performing about this funeral ; and that the virtues of many ought not to be endangered by the manage- ment of any one person, when their credit must precariously depend on his oration, which may be good, and may be bad. Diffi- cult indeed it is, judiciously to' handle a subject where even probable truth will hardly gain assent. The hearer, enlight- ened by a long acquaintance, and warm in his affections, may quickly pronounce every- thing unfavourably expressed, in respect to what he wishes and what he knows ; whilst the stranger pronounceth all exaggerated, through envy of those deeds which he is conscious are .above his own achievement. For the praises bestowed on others are then only to be endured when men imagine they can do those feats they hear to have been done ; they envy what they cannot equal, and immediately pronounce it false. Yet, as this solemnity has received its sanction from the authority of our ancestors, it is my duty to obey the law, and to endeavour to procure, so far as I am able, the good will and approbation of all my audience. I shall therefore begin first with our fore- fathers, since both justice and decency re- quire that we should, on this occasion, bestow on them an honourable remem- brance. In this our country they kept themselves always firmly settled; and, through their valour, handed it down free to every since succeeding generation. Worthy, indeed, of praise are they, and yet more worthy are our immediate fathers j since, enlarging their own inheritance into the extensive empire which we now possess, they bequeathed that, their work of toil, to us their sons. Yet even these successes, . we ourselves, here present, who are yet in the strength and vigour of our days, have nobly improved, and have made such pro- visions for this our Athens, that now it is all-sufficient in itself to answer every exi- gence of war and of peace. I mean not here to recite those martial exploits by which these ends were accomplished, or the resolute defences we ourselves and our fore fathers have made against the formidable invasions of Barbarians and Greeks. Your own knowledge of these will excuse the long detail, But by what methods we have rose to this height of glory and power ; by what 9 >10 PERICLES. polity, and by what conduct, we are thus aggrandized, I shall first endeavour to show, and then proceed to the praise of the de- ceased. These, in my opinion, can be no impertinent topics on this occasion ; the dis- cussion of them must be beneficial to this numerous company of Athenians and of strangers. We are happy in a form of government which cannot envy the laws of our neigh- bours ; for it has served as a model to others, but is originally at Athens. And this our form, as committed not to the few, but to the whole body of the people, is called a democracy. IIow different soever in a private capacity, we all enjoy the same general equality our laws are fitted to pre- serve ; and superior honours, just as we excel. The public administration is not confined to a particular family, but is at- tainable only by merit. Poverty is not a hindrance, since whoever is able to serve his country meets with no obstacle to pre- ferment from his first obscurity. The offices of the state we go through without obstruc- tions from one another, and live together in the mutual endearments of private life with- out suspicions ; not angry with a neighbour for following the bent of his own humour, nor putting on that countenance of discon- tent which pnins, though it cannot punish ; BO that in private life we converse together without diffidence or damage, whilst we dare not, on any account, offend against the pub- lic, through the reverence we bear to the magistrates and the laws, chiefly to those enacted for redress of the injurec^ and to those unwritten, a breach of which is al- lowed disgrace. Our laws have further provided for the mind most frequent inter- missions of care, by the appointment of pub- lic recreations and sacrifices throughout the year, elegantly performed with a peculiar pomp, the daily delight of which is a charm that puts melancholy to flight. The grand- cur of this our Athens causes the produce of the whole earth to be imported here, by wliioh wo reap a familiar onjoyment, not more of the ddicaoics of our own growth than those of other nations. In the affairs of war wo oxool those of our enemies who ndhoro to motlinda opposite to our own ; for wo lay open Athens to general roHort, ncr I'vcr drive any stranjior from us, whom citlior ini|iriivonioiit or curiosity hath brought amongst iin, lost any enemy should hurt us liy Noi'ing ■nlmt is novor concealed; wo plaoo not BO grout a oniifidonco in the prcpiiriilivcs and artifices of war as in the native wiirmth (if our sctils. iin|ieUing us to action. In point of educatidii, the ymitli of gome people aro inured, by u course of la bcri.cus cxci-cisc, to support toil and hoi-d- ship like men ; but we, notwithstanding our easy and elegant way of life, face all the dangers of war as intrepidly as they. This may be proved by facts, since the Lacede- monians never invade our territories barely with their own, but with the united strength of all their confederates. But when we in- vade the dominions of our neighbours, for the most part we conquer without difficulty, in an enemy's country, those who fight in defence of their own habitations. The strength of our whole force no enemy hath ever yet experienced, because it is divided by our naval expeditions, or engaged in the different quarters of our service by land. But if anywhere they engage and defeat a small party of our forces, they boastingly give it out a total defeat; and if they ar» beat, they were certainly overpowered by our united strength. What though from a .state of inactivity, rather than laborious exercise, or with a natural, rather than an acquired, valour, we learn to encounter dan- ger : this good at least we receive from it, that we never droop under the apprehension of possible misfortunes, and when we hazard the danger, are found no less courageous than those who are continually inured to it. In these respects our whole community de- serves justly to be admired, and in many we have yet to mention. In our manner of living we show an elegance tempered with frugality, and we cultivate philosophy, without enervating the mind. We display our wealth in the season of beneficence, and not in the vanity of discourse. A confes- sion of poverty is disgrace to no man : no effort to avoid it is disgrace indeed. There is visibly, in the same persons, an attention to their own private concerns and those of the public; and in others engaged in the labours of life there is a competent skill in the affairs of government For we are the only people who think him that does not meddle in State affairs — ^not indolent, but good-for-nothing. And vet we p;iss the soundest judgment, and are quick at catch- ing the right apprehensions of things ; not thinking that words are prejudicial to notions, but rather the not being duly pre- pared by previous debate before wo are obliged to proceed to execution. Heroin consists ourdistinguishing excellence, that in the hour of notion we show the greatest courage,- and yet debate beforehand the ex- pediency of our measures. The courace of others is the result of ignorance; delibera- tion makes them cowartls. And those un- doubtedly must beownod to have the greatest souls who, most acutely sensible of the miseries of wnr and tlie sweets of peace, are not hence in the least deterred from facing danger. PERICLES. 11 In acts of beneficence, farther, we dif- fer from the many. We preserve friends, not by receiving but by conferring obliga- tions. For he who does a kindness hath the advantage over him who, by the law of gratitude, becomes a debtor to his benefactor. The person obliged is compelled to act the more insipid part, conscious that a return of kindness is merely a payment, and not an obligation. And we alone are splendidly beneficent to others, not bo much from in- terested motive as for the credit of pure liberality. I shall sum up what yet remains, by only adding, that our Athene, in general, is the school of Greece: and that every single Athenian among us is excellently formed, by his personal qualifications, for all the various scenes of active life, acting with a most graceful demeanour, and a most ready habit of dispatch. That I have notj on this occasion, made use of a pomp of words, but the truth of facts, that height to which, by such a con- duct, this state hath rose, is an undeniable proof. For we are now the only people of the world who are found by experience to be greater than in report ; the only people who, repelling the attacks of an invading enemy, exempts their defeat from the blush of in- dignation, and to their tributaries no discon- tent, as if subject to men unworthy to com- mand. That we deserve our power, we need no evidence to manifest : we have great and signal proofs of this, which entitle us to the admiration of the present and of future ages. We want no Homer to be the herald of our praise ; no poet to deck oflF a history with the charms of verse, where the opinion of ex- ploits must suffer by a strict relation. Every sea hath been opened by our fleets, and every land been penetrated by our armies, which have everywhere left behind them eternal monuments of our enmity and our friend- ship. In the just defence of such a state, these victims of their own valour, scorning the ruin threatened to it, have valiantly fought and bravely died. And every one of those who survive is ready, I am persuaded, to sacrifice life in such a cause. And for this reason have I enlarged so much on national points, to give the clearest proof that in the present war we have more at stake than men whose public advantages are not so valuable; and to illustrate by actual evi- dence how great a commendation is due to them who are now my subjects, and the greatest part of which they have already received. For the encomiums with which I have celebrated the state have been earned for it by the bravery of these, and of men like these. And such compliments might be thought too high and exaggerated if passed on any Grecians but them alone. The fatal period to which these gallant souls are now reduced is the surest evidence of their merit, — an evidence begun in their lives and com- pleted by their deaths : for it is a debt of justice to pay superior honours to me'n who have devoted their lives in fighting for their country, though inferior to others in every virtue but that of valour. Their last service efiaceth all former demerits, — it extends to the public; their private demeanors reached only to a few. let not one of these was at all induced to shrink from danger, through fondness of those delights which the peace- ful, affluent life bestows ; not one was the less lavish of his life through that flattering hope attendant upon want, that poverty at length might be exchanged for affluence. One passion there was in their minds much stronger than these, the desire of vengeance on their enemies. Kegarding this as the most honourable prize of dangers, they boldly rushed towards the mark, to seek revenge, and then to satisfy those secondary passions. The uncertain event they had already se- cured in hope; what their eyes showed plainly must be done, they trusted their own valour to accomplish, thinking it more glorious to defend themselves and die in the attempt, than to yield and live. From the reproach of cowardice, indeed, they fled, but presented their bodies to the shock of battle ; when, insensible of fear, but triumphing in hope, in the doubtful charge they instantly drop ; and thus discharged the duty which brave men owe to their country. As for you who now survive them, it is your business to pray for a better fate, — but to think it your duty also to preserve the) same spirit and warmth of courage against your enemies ; not judging the expediency of this from a mere harangue — where any man, indulging a flow of words, may tell you, what you yourselves know as well as he, how many advantages thei-e are in fighting valiantly against your enemies — but rather making the daily increasing grand-eur of this community the object of your thoughts, and growing quite enamoured of it. And when it really appears great to your appre- hensions, think again, that this grandeur was acquired by brave and valiant men ; by mSn who knew their duty, and in the moments of action were sensible of shame ; who, whenever their attempts were unsuccess- ful, thought it dishonourable their country should stand in need of anything their valour could do for it, and so made it the most glori- ous present. Bestowing thus their lives on the public, they have every one received a praise that will never decay, a sepulchre that will be most illustrious. Not that in which .their bones are mouldering, but that 12 CICERO. in which their fame is preserved, to be on every occasion, when honour is the employ of either word or act, eternally remembered. This whole earth is a sepulchre of illustrious men ; nor is it the inscription on the col- umns in their native soil that alone shows their merit, but the memorial of them, lietter than all inscriptions, in every foreign nation, reposited more durably in universal remem- brance than on their own tomb. From this very moment, emulating these noble patterns, placing your happiness in liberty, and liberty in valour, be prepared to encounter all the dangers of war. For, to be lavish of life is not 80 noble in those whom misfortunes have reduced to misery and despair, as in men who hazard the loss of a comfortable subsist- ence, and the enjoyment of all the blessings this world affords, by an unsuccessful enter- prise. Adversity after a series of ease and affluence sinks deeper into the heart of a man of spirit than the stroke of death in.sen- sibly received in the vigour of life and public hope. For this reason, the parents of those who are now gone, whoever of them may be at- tendinf; here, I do not bewail, — I shall rather comfort. It is well known to what unhappy accidents they were liable from the moment of their birth, and tl)at happiness belongs to men who have reached the most glorious period of life, as these now have who are to you the source of sorrow ; those whose life nath received its ample measure, happy in its continuance, and equally happy in its conclusion. I know it in truth a difficult truth to fix comfort in those breasts which will have frequent reniembrnnces in seeing the happiness of others of what they once themselves enjoyed. And sorrow flows not from the absence of those good things we have never yet experienced, but from the loss of those to whitli we have been accustomed. They who are not yet by age exempted from issue, should be comforted in the hope of having more. The children yet to be born will be a private benefit to some, in causing thoui to forget such as no longer are, and will bo a double bcnolit to their country, in preventing its desolation, iind providing for its security. For those jiorscms cannot in ooniinon justice bo regaraod as members of i'i|ual value to the pulilio, \vl\c) Imvo no chil- dren to cxpdsc to danger for its siil'i'ly. But you whose ago is iilroa. AVo road (hem not merely to instruct us, as they will do, ii the principles of cloquonoe, nnd to acqunint \i8 with the manners, onstoms, nnd laws of the ancient Roirans. of which thi-y are an nbunilnnt repository, but wo may road them from a much higher motive. " We may read them "from n motive nhioh the groat author had doubtless in his view, when by publishing them h« left lo the world and to the latest iiostority a monument by which it may be soon "Imt course a gront public aocusor in a great public ciuiso ought to pursue; and, as oonneoted with it, what course judges ought to pursue in dooiding upon such a cause,"— Kdmvxd Burke: Imprnchmeni of Wnirrn Hnntliigi, Speech in Gen- eral Refill, .ViH(A Dny, June 18, IT'JJ. Tart of Cicero's Oration agvinst A''erres. The time is come, Fathers, when that wliieh has long been wished for, towanU allaying the envy your onler has been sub- ject to, and removing the imputatiout CICERO.^ 13 figainst trials, is (not by human contrivance but superior direction) effectually put in our power. An opinion has long prevailed, not iOnly here at home, but likewise in foreign countries, both dangerous to you and per- nicious to the state, viz., that in prosecutions men of wealth are always safe, however clearly convicted. There is now to be brought upon his trial before you, to the confusion, I hope, of the propagators of this slanderous imputation, one whone life and actions condemn him in the opinion of all impartial persons, but who, according to his own reckoning, and declared dependence upon his riches, is already acquitted: I mean Caius Verres. If that sentence is passed upon him which his crimes deserve, your authority, Fathers, will be venerable and sacred in the eyes of the public : but if his great riches should bias you in his favour, I shall still gain one point, viz., to make it apparent to all the world that what was wanting in this case was not a criminal nor a prosecutor, but justice and adequate punishment. To pass over the shameful irregularities of his youth, what does his quaestorship, the first public employment he held, what does it exhibit but one continued scene of vil- lanies ? Cneius Carbo plundered of the pub- lic money by his own treasurer, a consul stripped and betrayed, an army deserted and reduced to want, a province robbed, the civil and religious right of a people violated. The employment he held in Asia Minor and Pamphilia, what did it produce but the ruin of those countries? in which houses, cities, and temples were robbed by him. What was his conduct in his proetorship here at home? Let the plundered temples, and public works neglected that he might embezzle the money intended for carrying them on, bear witness. But his prsetorship in Sicily crowns all his works of wickedness, and finishes a lasting monument to his infamy. The mis- chiefs done by him in that country during the three years of his iniquitous administra- tion are such that many years under the wisest and best of prsetors will not Tdc suffi- cient to restore things to the condition in which he found them. For it is notorious that during the time of his tyranny the Sicilians neither enjoyed the protection of their own original laws, of the regulations made for. their benefit by the Koman Senate upon their coming under the protection of the commonwealth, nor of the natural and unalienable rights of men. His nod has decided all causes in Sicily for these three years ; and his decisions have broke all law, all precedent, all right. The sums he has, by arbitrary taxes and unheard of imposi- tions, extorted from the industrious poor are not to be, computed. The most faithful allies of the commonwealth have been treated as enemies. Roman citizens have, like slaves, been put to death with tortures. The most atrocious criminals, for money, have been exempted from the deserved pun- ishments ; and men of the most unexception- able characters condemned and banished, unheard. The harbours, though sufficiently fortified, and the gates of strong towns, opened to pirates and ravagers ; the soldiery and sailors belonging to a province under the protection of the commonwealth starved to death ; whole fleets, to the great detri- ment of the province, suffered to perish ; the ancient monuments of either Sicilian or Roman greatness, the statues of heroes and princes, carried off; and the temples stripped of the images. The infamy of his lewdness has been such as decency forbids to describe ; nor will I, by mentioning particulars, put those unfortu- nate persons to fresh pain who have not been able to save their wives and daughters from his impurity. And these his atrocious crimes have been committed in so public a manner that there is no one who has heard of his name but could reckon up his actions. Having, by his iniquitous sentences, filled the prisons with the most industrious and deserving of the people, he then proceeded to order numbers of Roman citizens to be strangled in his gaols ; so that the exclama- tion, " I am a citizen of Rome 1" which has often, in the most distant regions, and among the most barbarous people, been a protection, was of no service to them, but, on the con- trary, brought a speedier and more severe punishment upon them. I ask now, Verres, what you have to ad- vance against this charge ? Will you pre- tend to deny it ? Will you pretend that any thing false, that even any thing aggravated, is alleged against you? Had any prince, or any state, committed the same outrage against the privilege of Roman citizens, should we not think we had sufficient ground for declaring ^inmediate war against them ? What'punishment ought then to be inflicted upon a tyrannical and wicked praetor who dared, at no greater distance than Sicily, within sight of the Italian coast, to put to the infamous death of crucifixion that un- fortunate and innocent citizen, Publius Ga- vius Cosanus, only for his having asserted his privilege of citizenship, and declared his intention of appealing to the justice of his country against a cruel oppressor, who had unjustly confined him in a prison at Syra- cuse, from whence he had just made his escape ? The unhappy man, arrested as he was going to embark for his native country, 14 SALLUST. is brought before the wicked praetor. With eyes darting fury, and a countenance dis- torted with cruelty, he orders the helpless victim of his rage to be stripped and rods to be brought, accusing him, but without the least shadow of evidence, or even of suspi- cion, of having come to Sicily as a spy. It was in vain that the unhappy man cried out, " I am a Roman citizen ! I have served under Lucius Pretius, who is now at Ponormus, and will attest my innocence I" The blood- thirsty praetor, deaf to all he could urge in his own defence, ordered the infamous pun- ishment to be inflicted. Thus, Fathers, was an innocent Roman citizen publicly mangled with scourging ; whilst the only words he uttered amidst his cruel suSerings were, "I am a Roman citi- zen 1" With these he hoped to defend him- self from violence and infamy ; but of so little service was this privilege to him that while he was thus asserting his citizenship the order was given for his execution, — for his execution upon the cross 1 liberty 1 O sound once delightful to every Roman ear! sacred privilege of Roman citizen- ship! once sacred, now trampled upon I But what then? is it come to this? Shall an inferior magistrate, a governor, who holds his whole power of the Roman people, in a Roman province, within sight of Italy, bind, scourge, torture with fire and red-hot plates of iron, and at the last put to the infamous death of the cross, a Roman citizen? Shall neither the cries of innocence expiring in agony, nor the tears of pitying spectators, nor the majesty of the Roman common- wealth, nor the fear of the justice of the country, restrain the licentious and wanton cruelty of a monster, who, in confidence of his riches, strikes at the root of liberty, and sets mankind at defiance? I conclude with expressing my hopes that your wisdom and justice. Fathers, will not, by suffering the atrocious and unexampled insolence of Caius Verres to escape the due punishment, leave room to apprehend the danger of a total subversion of authority, and introduction of general anarchy and confusion. SALLUST, a Roman liistoriaii, was born at Amitornum, B.C. 80, aTid dio.l ii.c. 34. " It would JooMi Ihiit Sallust took Thucviliilos for his modol, but his writings will boar no oompa-ison uk to |iliilo8ophio doplli nnd insiglil with till' Immortal work of tho Qrock hlstoiiiin. Yot his ubsorviitions, If soldom profouml, arc always sonsiblo, ami show Kroa» ahrowdnoaa and •agivoily. Itut it is in tho dolinoation of oharaoter that ho more ospooially exoola. His j :Ttriiit of Catiline, brief as it is, entitles na to place him on a par in this respect with Tacitus and Clarendon. Jle has often been accused of partiality, but so far as our limited knowledge enables us to judge, the charge is unfounded. Like all ancient historians,! with the exception of Polybius, he introduced fictitious speeches into his biFtories. Thus we find him assigning orations of his own composing to Cato and Caesar, alihough the speeches really delivered by them were extant when he wrote." — G., i« Iitiperial Diet, of XJme, Biography^ v. 889. Caius Marihs to the Romans, showing thb absurdity of treir nesitatino to con- FER ON HIH THE RANK OF Ge.VEBAL, UERELT OX ACCOUNT OF HIS EXTRACTION. It is but too commrin, my countrymen, to observe a material difference between the behaviour of those who stand candidates for places of power and trust, before and aftei their obtaining them. They solicit them in one manner, and execute them in another. They set out with a great appearance of activity, humility, and moderation ; and they ?uickly fall into sloth, pride, and avarice. t is, undoubtedly, no easy matter to dis- charge, to the general satisfaction, the duty of a supreme commander in troublesome times. I am, I bone, duly sensible of the im- portance of the office I propose to take upon me for the service of my country. To carry on, with effect, an expensive war, and yet be frugal of the public money ; to oblige those to serve, whom it may be delicate to offend ; to conduct, at the same time, a complicated variety of operations; to concert measures at home, answerable to the state of thingi abroad ; and to gain every valuable end, in spite of opposition from the envious, the factious, and the disaffected, — to do all this, my countrymen, is more difficult than is generally thought. But besides the disadvantages which are common to me with all others in eminent stations, my case is, in this respect, pecu- liarly hai-d, — that whereas a commander of Patrician rank, if he is guilty of a neglect or broach of duty, has his great connections, the antiquity oi" his family, the important services of his ancestors, and the multitudes he has bv power engasod in his interest, to sereen him from condign punishment, my whole safety depends iipon myself; which renders it tho more indispensiihlv necessary for me to take care that my conduct be clear and unexceptionable. HeVides, I am well aware, my countrymen, that the eye of the public is upon me j and that, thouiili the im- partial, who prefer the real advantage of the oommonwealth to all other considerations, favour my pretensions, the Patricians want notliing so much as an oooa-sion against me. It is, therefore, my fixed resolution to use my best endeavours that you be not disap* FLINT THE YOUNGER. 15 pointed in me, and that their indirect designs against me may be defeated. . I have, from my youth, been familiar with toils and with dangers. I was faithful to your interest, my countrymen, when I served you for no reward but that of honour. It is not my design to betray you now that you have conferred upon me a place of profit. You have committed to my ccmduct the war against Jugurtha. The Patricians are of- fended at this. But where would be the wisdom of giving such a command to one of their honourable body? a person of illus- trious birth, of ancient family, of innumer- able statues, but — of no experience 1 What service would his long line of dead ancestors, or his multitude of motionless statues, do his country in the day of battle? What could such a general do, but in his trepida- tion and inexperience have recourse to some inferior commander for direction in difficul- ties to which he was not himself equal? Thus your Patrician general would, in fact, have a general over him ; so that the acting commander would still be a Plebeian. So true is this, my countrymen, that I have myself known those who have been chosen consuls begin then to read the history of their own country, of which till that time they were totally ignorant; that is, they first obtained the employment, and then be- thought themselves of the qualifications necessary for the proper discharge of it. I submit to your judgment, Romans, on which side the advantage lies, when a com- parison is made between Patrician haughti- ness and Plebeian experience. The very actions which they have only read, I have partly seen, and partly myself achieved. What they know by reading, I know by action. They are pleased to slight my mean birth ; I despise their mean characters. Want of birth and fortune is the objection against me ; want of personal worth against them. But are not all men of the same species? What can make a difference between one man and another, but the endowments of the mind ? For my part, I shall always look upon the bravest man as the noblest man. Suppose it were enquired of the fathers of such Patricians as Albinus and Bestia, whether, if they had their choice, they would desire sons of their character, or of mine ; what would they answer but that they should wish the worthiest to be their sons? If the Patricians have reason to despise me, let them likewise despise their ancestors, whose nobility was the fruit of their virtue. Do they envy the honours bestowed lipon me ? let them envy likewise my labours, my abstinence, and the dangers I have undergone for my country, by which I have acquired them. But those worthless men lead such a life of inactivity as if they despised any honours they can bestow, while they aspire to honours as if they had deserved them by the most industrioms virtue. They lay claim to the rewards of activity for their having enjoyed the pleas- ures of luxury : yet none can be more lavish than they are in praise of their ancestors : and they imagine they honour themselves by celebrating their forefatliers ; whereas they do the very contrary : for, as much as their ancestors were distinguished for their virtues, so much are they disgraced by their vices. The glory of ancestors casts a light, indeed, upon their posterity ; but only serves to show what the descendants are. It alike exhibits to public view theii^ degeneracy and their worth. I own I cannot boast of the deeds of my forefathers ; but I hope I may answer the cavils of the Patricians by stand- ing up in defence of what I have myself done. Observe now, my countrymen, the in- justice of the Patricians. They arrogate to themselves honours on account of the ex- ploits done by their forefathers ; whilst they will not allow me the due praise for per- forming the very same sort of actions in my own person. He has no statues, they cry, of his family. He can trace no vener- able line of ancestors. What then ? Is it matter of more praise to disgrace one's illus- trious ancestors than to become illustrious by one's own behaviour? What if I can show no statues of my family ? I can show the standards, the armour, and the trap- pings which I have myself taken from the vanquished ; I can show the scars of those wounds which I have received by facing the enemies of my country. These are my statues. These are the honours I boast of. Not left me by inheritance, as theirs : but earned by toil, by abstinence, by valour ; amidst clouds of dust and seas of blood : scenes of action, where these efifeminate Patricians, who endeavour by indirect means to depreciate me in your esteem, have never dared to show their faces. PLINY THE YOUNGER (Caius Plinius Caeoilius Secundus), born at Comum, A.D. 61 or 62, died about a.d. 116. " Pliny wrote and published a great number of books : but nothing has escaped the wreck of time, except the books of Epistles, and the ' Panegyric upon Trajan,' which has ever been considered ni a masterpiece. His letters seem to have been in- tended for the public ; and in them he may be con- sidered as writing his own memoirs. Every epistle is a kind of historical sketch, in which we have a view of him in some striking attitude, either of J6 PLINY THE YOUNGER. active or contemplatire life." — Chalmert'ii Bid., 64, See the Letters of Pliny the Younger, trans. bj J. D. Lewis, Camb. and Lend., 1879, p. 8vo. To Tuscus : ON A Course of Study. You desire my sentiments concerning the method of study you should pursue in that retirement to which you have long since withdrawn. In the first place, then, I look upon it as a very advantageous practice (and it is what many recommend) to translate either from Greek into Latin, or from Latin into Greek. By this means you will furnish yourself with noble and propec expressions, with variety of beautiful figures, and an ease and strength of style. Besides, by imitating the most approved authors, you will find your imagination heated, and fall insensibly into a similar turn of thought ; at the same time that those things which you may possibly have overlooked in a common way of read- ing, cannot escape you in translating : and this method will open your understanding and improve your judgment. It may not be amiss after you have read an author, in order to make yourself master of his subject and argument, from his reader to turn, as it were, his rival, and attempt something of your own in the same way ; and then make an impar- tial comparison between your performance and his, in order to see in what point either you or he most happily succeeded. It will be a matter of very pleasing congratulation to yourself, if you shall find in some things that you have the advantage of him, as it will be a great mortification if he should rise above you in all. You may sometimes venture in these little essays to try your strength upon the most shining passages of a distinguished author. The attempt, in- deed, will be something bold ; but as it is a contention Avhich passes in secret, it cannot be taxed with presumption. Not but that we have seen instances of persons who have publicly entered this sort "f lists with great success, and while they did not despair of overtaking, have gloriously advaneed before, those whom they thought it sufficient honour to follow. After you have thus finished a composition, you iniist lay it aside till it is no longer fresh in your memory, and then take it up in order to revise and oorroet it. You will find several things to retain, but still more t(i rejeet ; you will add a new thought hero, and alter another there. It is a labori- ous anil tedious (ask, I own, thus to re-iii- flaiiie the Miinil after the first heat is over, to re(^ovor an impulse when its foreo has been chocked and spent ; in a word, to interweave now parts into the texture of a composition without disturbing or eoiifounding the ori- ginal plan ; hut the advantage attending this method will ovorbalanco the difficulty, I know the bent of your present attention ia directed towards the eloquence of the bar ; but 1 would not for that reason advise you never to quit the style of dispute and conten- tion. As land is improved by sowing with various seeds, so is tne mind by exercising it with different studies. I would recom- mend it to you, therefore, sometimes to single out a fine passage of history ; sometimes to exercise yourself in the epistolary style, and sometimes the poetical. For it fre- quently happens that the pleading one has occasion to make use not only of historical, but even poetical descriptions; as by the epistolary manner of writing you will ac- quire a close and easy expression. It will be extremely proper also to unbend your mind with poetry : when I say so, I do not mean that species of it which turns upon subjects of great length (for th.it is fit only for persons of much leisure), but those little pieces of the epigrammatic kind, which serve as proper reliefs to, and are consistent with, employments of every sort. They com- monly go under the title of Poetical Amuse- ments ; buttheseninusementshavesometimes gained as much reputation to their authors as works of a more serious nature. In this manner the greatest men, as well as the great- est orators, used either to exercise or amuse themselves, or rather, indeed, did both. It is surprising how much the mind is enter- tained and enlivened by these little poetical compositions, as they turn upon subjects of gallantry, satire, tenderness, politeness, and every thing, in short, that concerns life and the affairs of the world. Besides, the same advantage attends these as every other sort of poems, that we turn from them to prose witn so much the more pleasure after having experienced the difficulty of being con- strained and fettered by numbers. And now, perhaps, I have troulded you upon this subject longer than you desired ; however, there is one thing which I have omitted : I have not told you what kind of authors you should read; though indeed that was "suf- ficiently implied when I mentioned what subjects I would recommend for your com- positions. You will remombcr, that the most approved writers of each sort are to be care- fully ehoseii ; for, as it has been well ob- served, "Though we should rend much, wo should not read many books." Who these authors are is so clearly settled, and so gen- erally known, that I need not point tnoni out to you: besides, 1 have already extended this letter to sueli an immoderate length, that I have interrnptod, I fear, too long those studios I have been reoommeiuling. I will here resign you. therefore, to your papers, which you will now resume; and either pursue the studies you were before cngagrtl RICEARD BE BURT. n in, or enter upon some of those which I have advised. Farewell. RICHARD DE BURY, bom at Bury St. Edmunds, 1287, became Bishop of Durham 1333, and died 1345. "Richard de Bnry, otherwise called Richard Anngerrylle, is said to have alone possessed more books than all the bishops of England together. Besides the fixed libraries which he had formed in his several palaces, the floor of his common apart- ment was so covered with books that those who entered could not with due reverence approach his presence. . . . Petrarch says that he had once a conversation with Aungervylle concerning the Island Thule, whom he calls Virum ardentis in- genii. Petrarch, Epist., i. 3." — Warton'a Hint, of Eng, Poet., ed. 1840, i. cxv., cxvi. On Books. The desirable treasure of wisdom and knowledge, which all men covet from the impulse of nature, infinitely surpasses all the riches of the world ; in comparison with which precious stones are vile, silver is clay, and purified gold grains of sand ; in the splendour of which the sun and moon grow dim to the sight ; in the admirable sweetness of which, honey and manna are bitter to the taste. The value of wisdom decreaseth not with time ; it hath an ever flourishing virtue that cleanseth its possession from every venom. celestial gift of Divine liberality, descend- ing from the Father of Light to raise up the rational soul even to heaven ! Thou art the celestial alimony of intellect, of which who- soever eateth shall yet hunger, and whoso drinketh shall yet thirnt; a harmony re- joicing the soul of the sorrowful, and never in any way discomposing the hearer. Thou art the moderator and the rule of morals, operating according to which none err. By thee kings reisn and law-givers decree justly. Through thee, rusticity of nature being cast ofi', wits and tongues being pol- ished, and the thorns of vice utterly eradi- cated, the summit of honour is reached, and »iiey become fathers of their country and companions of princes, who, without thee, might have forged their lances into spades and ploughshares, or perhaps have fed swine with the prodigal son. AVhere, then, most potent, most longed-for treasure, art thou concealed ? and where shall the thirsty soul find thee ? Undoubtedly, indeed, thou hast placed thy desirable tabernacle in books, where the Most High, the Light of light, the Book of life, hath established thee. There then all who ask receive, all who seek find thee, to those who knock thou openest quickly. In books Cherubim expand their wings, that the soul of the student may ascend and look around from, pole to pole, from the rising to the setting sun, from the north and from the south. In them the Most High incomprehensible God himself is contained and worshipped. In them the nature of celestial, terrestrial, and infernal beings is laid open. In them the laws by which every polity is governed are decreed, the ofiicers of the celestial hierarchy are distinguished, and tyrannies of such demons are described as the ideas of Plato never surpassed, and the chair of Crato never sustained. In books we find the dead as it were liv- ing ; in books we foresee things to come : in books warlike afiairs are methodized ; the rights of peace proceed from books. All things are corrupted and decay with time. Satan never ceases to devour those whom ho generates, insomuch that the glory of the world would be lost in oblivion.if God had not provided mortals with a remedy in books. Alexander the ruler of the world, Julius the invader of the world and of the city, the first who in unity of person as- sumed the empire, arms, and arts, the faith- ful Fabricius, the rigid Cato, would at this day have been without a memorial if the aid of books had failed them. Towers are razed to the earth, cities overthrown, trium- phal arches mouldered, to dust ; nor can tho king or pope be founded upon whom the privilege of a lasting name can be conferred more easily than by books. A book made renders succession to the author ; for as long as the book exists, the author remaining iMfva TOf, immortal, cannot perish. As Ptolemy witnesseth in the prologue of Almazett, he (he says) is not dead who gave life to science. What learned scribe, therefore, who draws out things new and old from an infinite treasury of books, will limit their price by any other thing whatsoever of another kind 7 Truth, overcoming all things, which ranks above kings, wine, and women, to honour which above friends obtains the benefit of sanctity, which is tho way that deviates not, and the life without end, to which the holy Boetius attributes a threefold existence, in the mind, in the voice, and in writing, ap- pears to abide most usefully and fructify most productively of advantage in books. For the truth of the voice perishes with the sound ; truth latent in the mind is hidden wisdom and invisible treasure ; but the truth which illuminates books, desires to manifest itself to every disciplinable sense, — to the sight when read, to the hearing when heard : it, moreover, in a manner com- mends itself to the touch, when submitting to be transcribed, collated, corrected, and 18 FRANCESCO PETRARCE. preserved. Truth confined to the mind, though it may be the possession of a noble 8oul, while it wants a companion and ig not judged of, either by the sight or the hearing, appears to be inconsistent with pleasure. But the truth of the voice is open to the hearing only, and latent to the sight (which shows as many differences of things fixed upon by a most subtle motion, beginning and ending as it were simultaneously). But the truth written in a book, being not fluc- tuating, but permanent, shows itself openly to the sight passing through the spiritual ways of the eyes, as the porches and halls of common sense and imagination ; it enters the chamber of intellect, reposes itself upon the couch of memory, and there congenei'- ates the eternal truth of the mind. Lastly, let us consider how great a com- modity of doctrine exists in books ; how . easily, how secretly, how safely, they expose the nakedness of human ignorance without putting it to shame. These are the masters that instruct us without rods and ferules, without hard words and anger, without clothes or money. If you approach them, they are not asleep; if investigating you interrogate them, tney conceal nothing; if you mistake them, they never grumble; if you are ignorant, they cannot laugh at you. Translated by J. B. InglU, Lond., 1832, 8vo. FRANCESCO PETRARCH, born at Arezzo, Tuscany, 1304, died at Ar- quil, 1374. " I cannot conclude these remarki vithout making a few observations on the Latin writinj^s of Petrarch. It appears that, both by himself and by his contemporaries, these were far more highly valued than his compositions in the ver- nacular language. Posterity, the supreme court of literary appeal, has not only reversed the judg- ment, but, aooording to its general practice, re- versed it with costs, and condemned the unfortu- nate works to pay, not only for their own inferi- ority, but also for the injustice of those who have given them an unmerited preference. ... He has aspired to emulate the philosophical oloquonoo of Cicero, an well as the poetical moijcsty of Virgil. His essay on the Uemodies of Good and Evil For- tune is a singular work in a colloquial form, and n most scholastic stylo. Tt seems to be ft-amed upon the model of the Tuaculun tjuestions, — with wnat success those who have rcml it may easily determine. It consists of a smios of dialogues : tn each i>f those a person is introduced who has oxperionccd soiuo happy or some adverse event : be gravely states his cuso ; and a rcnsoner, or rather Reason pcrsoniHod, confutes him: a task nut very dilllcult, sinon the disciple defends his position only by pertinaciously ri|Mating it, In alraos* the same words, at the end of every argu- ment of his antagonist." — Lord Maiaulay: CWii- eitmi on (A« J'liucijiul Italian Wriltn, No. II., Petrarch, in Knight's Quartet ly Mag., April, 1824^ and his works, complete, 186C, vii. 629. Petrarch's Dedication to Azzo da Cor- REGGIO OF BIS TREATISE ON THE ReHEDIEI OF Good and Bad Fortune. When I consider the instability of human affairs, and the variations of fortune, I find nothing more uncertain or restless than the life of man. Nature has given to animals an excellent remedy under disasters, which is the ignorance of them. We seem better treated in intelligence, foresight, and mem- ory. No doubt these are admirable presents; but they often annoy more than they assist us. A prey to unuseful or distressing cares, we are tormented by the present, the past, and tlie future ; and, as if we feared we should not be miserable enough, we join to the evil we suffer the remembrance of a former distress, and the apprehension of some future calamity. This is the Cerberus with three heads we combat without ceasing. Our life might be gay and happy if we would ; but we eagerly seek subjects of affliction to render it irksome and melan- choly. We pass the first years of this life in the shades of i^inorance, the succeeding ones in pain and labour, the latter part in grief and remorse, and the whole in error : nor do we suffer ourselves to possess one bright day without a cloud. Let us examine this matter with sincerity, and we shall agree that our distresses chiefly arise from ourselves. It is virtue alone which can render us superior to Fortune ; we quit her standard, and the combat is no longer equal. Fortune mocks us ; she turns us on her wheel : she raises and abases us at her pleasure, but her power is founded on our weakness. This is an old-rooted evil, but it is not incurable : there is nothing a firm and elevated mind cannot accomplish. The discourse of the wise and the study of pood books are the best remedies I know of: but to these we must ioin the consent of the soul, without which tlie best advice will be useless. What gratitude do we not owe to those great men who, though dead many njros before us, live with us by their works, discourse with us, are our masters and (juides, and serve us as pilots in the naviga- tion of life, whoro our vessel is agitated without cen.xiuj; by the storms of our pas- sions ! It is hero that true philosophy brings us to a safe port, by a sure and easy pas- sape: not like that "of the schools, which, raising us on its airy and deceitful win^s, and causing us to hover on the clouds of frivolous dispute, lets us fall without any light or instruction in the same place where she took us up. Dear friend, I do not at- tempt to exhort you to the study I deem «o FRANOESCO PETRARCH. 19 important. Nature has given you a taste for all knowledge, but Fortune has denied you the leisure toacquire it: yet, whenever- you could steal a moment from public affairs, you sought the conversation of wise men ; and I have remarked that your memory often served you instead of books. It is, therefore, unnecessary to invite you to do what you have always done; but, as we cannot retain all we hear or read, it may be useful to furnish your mind with some maxims that may best serve to arm you against the assaults of misfortune. The vulgar, and even philosophers, have decided that adverse fortune was most difficult to sustain. For my own part I am of a differ- ent opinion, and believe it more easy to support adversity than prosperity ; and that fortune is more treacherous and dangerous when she caresses than when she dismays. Experience has taught me this, not books or arguments. I have seen many persons sus- tain great losses, poverty, exile, tortures, death, and even disorders that were worse than death, with courage ; but I have seen none whose heads have not been turned by power, riches, and honours. How often have we beheld those overthrown by good fortune who could never be shaken by bad 1 This made me wish to learn how to support a great fortune. You know the short time this work has taken. I have been less at- tentive to what might shine than to what might be useful on this subject. Truth and virtue are the wealth of all men ; and shall I not discourse on these with my dear Azon 1 I would prepare for you, as in a little port- able box, a friendly antidote against the poison of good and bad fortune. The one requires a rein to repress the sallies of a transported soul, the other a consolation to fortify the overwhelmed and afflicted spirit. Nature gave you, my friend, the heart of a king, but she gave you not a kingdom, of which therefore fortune could not deprive you. But I doubt whether our age can fur- nish an example of worse or better treatment from her than yourself. In the first part of your life you were blest with an admirable cbnstitution and astonishing health and vigour; some years after we beheld you thrice abandoned by the physicians, who despaired of your life. The heavenly Physician, who was your sole resource, restored your health, but not your former strength. You were then called iron-footed, for your singular force and agility ; you are now bent, and lean upon the shoulders of those whom you formerly supported. Your country beheld you one day its governor, the next an exile. Princes disputed for your friendship, and afterwards conspired your ruin. You lost by death the greatest part of your friends ; the rest, according to custom, deserted you, in calamity. To these misfortunes was added a violent disease which attacked you when destitute of all succours, at a distance from your country and family, in a strange land invested by the troops of your enemies ; so that those two or three friends whom fortune had left you could not come near to relieve you. In a word, you have experienced every hardship but imprisonment and death. But what do I say ? I ou have felt all the horrors of the former, when your faithful wife and children were shut up by your enemies ; and even death followed you, and took one of those children, for whose loss you would willingly have sacrificed your own. In you have been united the fortunes of Pompey and Marius ; but you were neither arrogant in prosperity as the one, nor dis- couraged in adversity as the other. You have supported both in a manner that has made you loved by your friends and admired by your enemies. There is a peculiar charm in the serene and tranquil air of virtue which enlightens all around it, in the midst of the darkest scenes and the greatest calamities. My ancient friendship for you has caused me to quit everything for you to perform a work in which, as in a glass, you may adjust and prepare your soul for all events ; and be able to say, as ^neas did* to the Sibyl, " Nothing of this is new to me ; I have fore- seen and am prepared for it all." I am sen- sible that in the disorders of the mind, as well as those of the body, discourses are not thought the most efficacious remedies ; but I am persuaded also that the malady of the soul ought to be cured by spiritual applica- tions. If we see a friend in distress and give him all the consolation we are able, we perform the duties of friendship, which pays more attention to the disposition of the heart than the value of the gift. A small present may. be the testimony of a great love. There is no good I do not wish you, and this is all I can offer toward it. I wish this little treatise may be of use to .you. If it should not answer my hopes, I shall, hcwever, be secure of pardon from your friendship. It presents you with the four great passions: Hope and Joy, the :daughter» of Prosperity; Fear and Grief, the daughters of Adversity, who attack the soul and launch at it all their arrows. Rea- son commands in the citadel to repulse them : your penetration will easily perceive which side will obtain the victory. From the translation in Mrs. Dobson's lAfe of Petrarch, from the French of the Abbi de Sade. 20 WILLIAM CAXTON.—JOEN FISHER. WILLIAM CAXTON, celebrated as the first who introduced print- ing into England, was born in Kent about 1412, and died in 1492. "Exclusively of the laboan attached to the working of his press as a new art, our typographer contrived, though well stricken in years, to trans- late not fewer than five thousand closely-printed folio pages. As a translator, therefore, he ranks among the most laborious, and, I would hope, not the least successful, of his tribe. " The foregoing conclusion is the result of a careful enumeration of all the books translated as well as printed by him; which [the translated books], if published in the modern fashion, would extend to nearly twenty-five octavo volumes." — DiBDiN : Typographical Antiquiliea. " Caxton, Mr. Warton [History of English Poetry] observes, by translating, or procuring to be translated, a great number of books from the French, greatly contributed to promote the stote of literature in England. It was only in this way that he could introduce his countrymen to the knowledge of many valuable publications at a time when an acquaintance with the learned languages was confined to a few ecclesiastics. Ancient learn- ing had as yet made too little progress among us to encourage him to publish the Roman authors in their original tongue. Indeed, had not the French furnished Caxton with materials, it is not probable that Virgil, Ovid, Cicero, and many other good writers, would, by the means of his press, have been circulated in the English language as early as the close of the fifteenth century." — Chalmers: liiog. Did., viii. 512. See, also, The Life and Typography of William Caxton, England's "First Printer," etc., by William Blades, Lend., 1861-6.3, 2 vols. 4to ; and How to Tell a Caxton, by W. Blades. 1870, fp. 8vo. From Caxton's Translation of the Golden Legend, 1483, fol. Francis, servant and friend of Almighty God, was born in the city of Assyse, and was made a merchant until the 25th year of his age, and wasted his time by living vainly, whom our Lord corrected by the scourge of sickness, and suddenly changed him into another man ; so that he liei,'nn to shine by the spirit of prophecy. For on a time he, with other men of Peruse, was taken pris- oner, and were put in a cruel prison, where all the otlior wailed and sorrowed, and he only was glad and enjoyod. And when tlioy had reproved him thoi-cof, ho answered,-^ 'Knciw vo," said ho, "that 1 am jovlul, for I shall Ijc worshipped as a saint throughout ■ 11 the world." ... On a time, as this holy man was in prayer, the devil called him thrice by his own name. And when the holy miin had answered him, he said none ill this world is so groat a sinner, but if he convert him, our Lord would pardon him; but who tliat slooth himself with hard pen- ance, Hhall never find meroy. And anon this holv man know by revelation the fal- lacy and donoit of the fiend, how he would have withdraw him fro to do well. . . . He was ennobled in his life by many miraclea. . . . And the very death, which is to all men horrible and hateful, he admonished them to praise it. And, also, be warned and admonished death to come to him, and said, " Death, my sister, welcome be to you." And when he came at the last hour, he slep^ in our Lord, of whom the friar saw the soul, in manner of a star, like to the moon ic quantity, and the sun in clearness. JOHN FISHER, bom 1459, Margaret Professor of Divinity 1502, Bishop of Rochester 1504, was inhu- manly executed by order of the tyrant Henry VIII. in 1535. " The fame of his learning and virtues reaching the ears of Margaret, Countess of Richmond, mother of Henry VII., she chose him her chap- lain and confessor; in which high station he be- haved himself with so much wisdom and goodness that she committed herself entirely to his govern- ment and direction. It was by his counsel that she undertook those magnificent foundations of St. John's and Christ's Colleges at Cambridge ; established the divinity professorships in both universities ; and did many other actj of gener- osity for the propagation of learning and piety. . . . The issue was a declaration from Fisher that he would ' swear to the succession [of EUiabeth] ; never dispnte more about the marriage [to Anne Boleyn] ; and promise allegiance to the king ; bui his coTiscience could not be convinced that ths marriage was not against the law of God.' These concessions did not satisfy the king; who was re- solved to let all his subjects see that there was no mercy to be expected by any one who opposed hit will. ... He was beheaded about ten o'clock, aged almost 77 : and his head was fixed over Lon- don bridge the next day. "Such was the tragical end of Fisher, 'which left one of the greatest blots upon this kingdom's proceedings,' as Burnet says in his ' History of the Reformation.' . . . Erasmus represents him as a man of integrity, deep learning, sweetncs! of tem- per, ond greatness of soul." — CAa/nr excites our admiration by its mixture of sim- plicity and heroism. He is simple as a child, and yet during for the truth, without shrinking or ostentation. Ho is more odnsistent than Cranmer, more tolerant than Ridley, if loss learned and polished than either. His sermons are rare speci- mens of vigorous eloquence, which read fresh and vivid and powerful now, after throe couturioik SIR THOMAS MORE. 23 Dhe humoroas Saxon scorn and inrectire with ff hich he lashes the vices of the times are, perhaps, their most noted character sties; but they are also remarkable for their clear and homely statements of Christian doctrine, and the faithfulness with which they exhibit the simple ideal of the Chris- tiun life, in contrast to all hypocrisies and preten- sions of religion. In all things, — ^in his sermons, in his reforms, iU' his character, — Latimer was eminently practical." — Rev. John Tdlloch, D.D., Principal of St. Mary's College, St. Andrews. Imperial JHcU of Univ, Biog., v. 116. The Shepherds of Bethlehem. I pray you to whom was the nativity of Christ first opened 7 To the bishops or great lords which were at that time at Bethlehem ? Or to those jolly damsels with their far- dingaleis, with their round-abouts, or with their bracelets ? No, no : they had too many lets to trim and dress themselves, so that they could have no time to hear of the na- tivity of Christ ; their minds were so occu- pied otherwise that they were not allowed to hear of him. But his nativity was re- vealed first to the shepherds, and it was re- vealed unto them in the night-time, when every body was at rest ; then they heard this joyful tidings of the Saviour of the world : for these shepherds were keeping their sheep in tke night- season from the wolf and other beasts, and from the fox ; for the sheep in that country do lamb two times in the year, and therefore it was needful for the sheep to have a shepherd to keep them. And here note the diligence of these shepherds; for whether their sheep were their own, or whether they were servants, I cannot tell, for it is not expressed in the book ; but it is most like they were servants, and their mas- ters had put them in trust to keep their sheep. Now, if these shepherds had been deceit- ful fellows, that when their masters had put them in trust to keep their sheep they had been drinking in the alehouse all night, as some of our servants do nowadays, surely the angel had not appeared unto them to have told them this great joy and good tid- ings. ■ And here .all servants may learn by these shepherds to serve truly and diligently unto their masters ; in what business soever they are set to do, let them be painful and diligeht, like as Jacob was unto his master Laban. Oh what a painful, faithful, and trusty man was he 1 He was day and night at his work, keeping his sheep truly, as he was put in trust to do ; and when any chance ha()pened that any thing was lost he made it good and restored it again of his own. So likewise was Eleazarus a painful man, a faithful and trusty servant. Such a servant was Joseph, in Egypt, to his master Potiphar. So likewise was Daniel unto his master the king. But I pray you where are tho^e servants nowadays ? Indeed I fear me there be but very few of such faithful serv- ants. Now these shepherds, I say, they watch the whole night, they attend upon their vocation, they do according to their calling, they keep their sheep, they run not hither and thither, spending the time in vain, and neglecting their office and calling. No, they did not so. Here, by these shep- herds, men may learn to attend upon their offices and callings. I would wish that cler- gymen, the curates, parsons, and vicars, the bishops, and all other spiritual persons, would learn this lesson by these poor shep herds, which is this, — to abide by their flocks and by their sheep^ to tarry amongst them, to be careful over them; not to run hither and thither after their own pleasure, but to tarry by their benefices and feed thei» sheep with the food of God's word, and to keep hospitality, and so to feed them, both soul and body. For I tell you, these poor, unlearned shepherds shall condemn many a stout and great-learned clerk : for these shep- herds had but the care and charge over brute beasts, and yet were diligent to keep them, and to feed them, and the other have tl;e care over God's lambs, which he bought with the death of his son ; and yet they are so careless, so negligent, so slothful ov^r them ; yea, and the most part intendeth not to feed the sheep, but they long to be fed of the sheep ; they seek only their own pas- times, tney care for no more. But what said Christ to Peter ? What said he 7 Petri, amas me? (Peter, lovest thou me 7) Peter made answer, Yes. Then feed my sheep. And so the third time he commanded Peter to feed his sheep. But our clergymen do declare plainly that they love not Christ, be- cause they feed not his flock. If they had earnest love to Christ, no doubt they would show their love, they would feed his sheep. Latimer's Sermons. SIR THOMAS MORE, born 1480, executed under Henry VIII., 1535. His works were published in Latin, Lovanii, 1565 et 1566, fol. ; in English, Lond., 1557, fol. ; best Latin edit., Francf., 1689, fol. " The indictment was then read by the attorney- general. It set forth that Sir Thomas More, trai- torously imagining and attempting to deprive the king of his title as Supreme Head of the Churchy" etc. *' The usual punishment for treason was com- muted, as it had been with Fisher, to death upon the scaffold; and this last favour was communi. cated as a special instance of the royal clemency. More's wit was always ready. 'God forbid,' be answered, 'that the king should show any mar* 24 SIR THOMAS MORE. >uoh mercy unto aoy of my friends; and God bless all my posterity from such pardons/ . . . The soafibld nad been awkwardly erected, and ^hook as he placed his foot upon the ladder. 'See mo safe up,' he said to Kingston; 'for my coming down I can shift for myself.' He began to speak to the people, but the sberifif begged him not to proceed, and he contented himself with ask- ing for their prayers, and desiring them to bear witness for him that he died in the faith of the holy Catholic Church, and a faithful servant of God and the king. He then repeated the Miserere psalm on his knees ; and when he had ended, and Dad risen, the executioner, with an emotion which promised ill for the manner in which his part in the matter would be accomplished, begged his Ibrgiveness. More kissed him. ' Thou art to do me the greatest benefit that I oan receive,' he said, ' Pluck up thy spirit, man, and be not afraid to do thine office. My neck is very short. Take heed therefore that thou strike not awry for saving of thine honesty.' The executioner offered to tie his eyes. *1 will cover them myself,' he said; and binding them in a cloth, which he had brought with him, he knelt and laid his head upon the block. The fatal stroke was about to fall, when he signed for a moment'c delay, while he moved aside his beard. ' Pity that should be out,' he murmured, ' that has not committed treason.' With which strange words, the strangest perhaps ever uttered at such a time, the lips most famous through Europe for eloquence and wisdom closed forever." — Frodbe : Hittory of Europe, ii., chap, ix. The Utopian Idea of Pleasure ; prom Bishop Burnet's Translation of More's Utopia, Lond., 1684, 8vo. They think it is an evidence of true wis- dom for a man to pursue his own advantages as far as the laws allow it. They account it piety to prefer the public good to one's private concerns. But they think it unjust for a man to seek for his own pleasure by snatching another man's pleasures from him. And, on the contrary, they think it a sign of a gentle nnd good soul for a man to dis- pense with his own advantage for the good of others ; and that by so doing a good man finds as much pleasure one way as he parts with another: for, as he may expect the like from others when he may come to need it, BO, if that should fail him, yet the sense uf a good action, and the reflections that one makes on the love and gratitude of thoM< whom he has obliged, gives the mind more pleasure than the body could have found in that from which it had restrained itself. They are also persuaded thatOod will mnke up the loss of those small pleasures with a vast iind endless joy, of which religion docs nasily convinoo a good nouI. Thus, upon an inquiry into the whole matter, tfiev reckon that all our notions, and oven all our virtues, terminate in ploasiiro, as in our chief end and greatest happitiesa ; and they coll every motion or state, either of body or mind, in which nature teaches us to delight, a pleasure. And thus they cautiously limit pleasure only to those appetites to which nature leads us ; for they reckon that nature leads us only to those delights to which reason as well as sense carries us, and by which we neither injure any other person nor let go greater pleasures for it, and which do not draw troubles on us after them : but they look upon those delights which men, by a foolish though common mistake, call pleasure, as if they could change the nature of things, as well as the use of words, as things that not only do not advance our hap piness, but do rather obstruct it very much, because they do so entirely possess the minds of those that once go into them with a false notion of pleasure, that there is no room left for truer and purer pleasures. There are many things that in themselves have nothing that is truly delighting : on the contrary, they have a good deal of bitterness in them ; and yet by our perverse appetites after forbidden objects, are not only ranked among the pleasures, but are made even the greatest designs of life. Among those who pursue these sophisticated pleasures they reckon those whom I mentioned before, who think themselves really the better for having fine clothes, in which they think they are doubly mistaken, both in the opinion that they have of their clothes, and in the opin- ion that they have of themselves ; for if you consider the use of clothes, why should a fine thread be thought better than a coarse one? And yet that sort of men, as if they had some real advantnges beyond others, and did not owe it wholly to their mistakes, look big, and seem to fancy themselves to be the more valuable on that account, and imagine that a respect is due to them for the sake of a rich garment, to which they would not have pretended if they had been more meanly clothed; and they resent it ns an affront if that respect is not paid them. . . . Anothersortof bodily pleasure is that which consists in a quiet and good eoiiiititution of body, by which there is an entire healthi- ness spread over all the parts of the body not allayed with any disease. This, when it is free from all mixture of pain, gives an inwiini pleasure of itself, even though it should not be excited by any external and delighting object ; and although this pleasure docs not so vigorously affect the sense, nor act so strongly upon it, yet as it is the greatest of all pleiusures, so almost all the Utopians reckon it the foundation and basis of all the other joys of life ; since this alone makes one's stAte of life to be easy and de- sirable ; and when this is wanting,"a man is roiiUy capable of no other pleasure. They look upon indolence and freedom from pain, GEORGE CAVENDISH. 25 if it does not rise from a perfect health, to be a state of stupidity rather than of pleas- ure. There has been a controversy in this mutter very narrowly canvassed among them : Whether a firm and entire health could be called a pleasure or not? Some have thought that there was no pleasure but that which was excited by some sensible motion in the body. But this opinion has been long run down among them, so that now they do almost all agree in this, that health is the greatest of all bodily pleasures ; and that, as there is a pain in sickness, which is as opposite in its nature to pleasure as sickness itself is to health, so they hold that health carries a pleasure along with it. And if any should say that sickness is not really a pain, but that it only carries a pain along with it, they look upon that as a fetch of subtility that does not much alter the matter. So they think it is all one whether it be said that health is in itself a pleasure, or that it begets a pleasure, as fire gives heat, so it be granted that all those whose health is entire have a true pleasure in it ; and they reason thus : What is the pleasure •if eating, but that a man's healtn which had been weakened, does, with the assistance of food, drive away hunger, and so recruit- ing itself, recovers its former vigour ? And being thus refreshed, it finds a pleasure in that conflict. And if the conflict is pleasure, the victory must yet breed a greater pleasure, except we will fancy that it becomes stupid as soon as it has obtained that which it pur- sued, and so does neither know nor rejoice in its own welfare. If it is said that health cannot be felt, they absolutely deny that : for what man is in health that does not perceive it when he is awake ? Is there any man that is so dull and stupid as not to acknowledge that he feels a delight in health ? And what is delight but another name for pleasure ? But of all pleasures, they esteem those to be the most valuable that lie in the mind ; and the chief of these are those that arise out of true virtue, and the witness of a good conscience. They account health the chief pleasure that belongs to the body ; for they think that the pleasure of eating and drink- ing, a,nd all the other delights of the body, are only so far desirable as they give or maintain health. But they are not pleasant in themselves, otherwise than as they resist those impressions that our natural infirmity is still making upon us ; and as a wise man desires rather to avoid diseases than take physic, and to be freed from pain rather than to find ease by remedies, so it were a more desirable state not to need this sort of pleas- ure than to be obliged to indulge it. And if any man imagines that there is a real hap- piness in this pleasure, he must then confess that he would be the happiest of all men if he were to lead his life in a perpetual hunger, thirst, and itching, and by consequence in perpetual eating, drinking, and scratching himself; which any one may easily see would be not only a base, but a miserable state of life. These are, indeed, the lowest of pleas- ures, and the least pure ; for we can never relish them but where they are mixed with the contrary pains. The pain of hunger must give us the pleasure of eating ; and here the pain outbalances the pleasure ; and as the pain is more vehement, so it lasts much longer : for, as it is upon us before the pleasure comes, so it does not cease but with the pleasure that extinguishes it, and that goes off with it : so that they think none of those pleasures are to be valued but as they are necessary. Yet they rejoice in them, and with due gratitude acknowledge the ten- derness of the great author of nature, who has planted in us appetites, by which these things that are necessary for our preserva- tion are likewise made pleasant to us. For how miserable a thing would life be, if these daily diseases of hunger and thirst were to be carried off by such bitter drugs as we must use for those diseases that return sel- domer upon us I GEORGE CAVENDISH, gentleman-usher to Cardinal Wolsey, and subsequently to Henry VIII., died 1557, left in MS. a life of his first-named master, en- titled, " The Negotiations of Woolsey, the Great Cardinal of England," Lond., 1641, 4to. " There is a sincere and impartial adherence to truth, a reality, in Cavendish's narrative, which bespeaks the confidence of his reader, and very much increases his pleasure. It is a work without pretension, but full of natural eloquence, devoid of the formality of a set rhetorical composition, un- spoiled by the affectation of that classical mannei in which all biography and history of old time was prescribed to be written, and which often divests such records of the attraction to be found in the conversational style of Cavendish. . . . Our great poet has literally followed him in,several passages of his King Henry VIII., merely putting his language into verse. Add to this the historical importance of the work, as the only sure and au- thentic source of information upon many of the most interesting events of that reign; and from which all historians have largely drawn (through the secondary medium of Holinshed and Stowe, who adopted Cavendish's narrative), and its in- trinsic value need not be more fully expressed." — S. W. Singer : The Life nf Cardinal WoUey, and Metrical Veraiona from the Original Autograph ManuBcripty with Notea and other Illuatrationa, Chiswick, 1E25, 2 vols. 8va, 1. p. 50 copies. 26 NICHOLAS RIDLEY. Cavendish's Account of Kino Henrt's Visits to Wolsey's House. And when it pleased the king's majesty, for his recreation, to repair unto the cardi- nal's house, as he did divers times in the year, at which time there wanted no prepa- rations or goodly furniture, with viands of the finest sort that might be provided for money or friendship ; such pleasures were then devised for the king's comfort and con- solation as might be invented, or by man's wit imaginel. The banquets were set forth with masks and mummeries, in so gorgeous a sort and costly manner, that it was a heaven to behold. There wanted no dames or damsels, meet or apt to dance with the maskers, or to garnish the place fur the time with other goodly disports. Then was there all kind of music and harmony set forth, with excellent voices both of men and chil- dren. I have seen the king suddenly come in thither in a mask, with a dozen of other maskers, all in garments like shepherds, made of fine cloth of gold, and fine crimson satin paned, and caps of the same, with visors of good proportion ofvisnomy; their hairs and beards either of fine gold wire, or else of silver, and some being of black silk ; having sixteen torch-bearers ; besides their drums, and other persons attending upon them with visors, and clothed all in satin, of the same colours. And at his coming, and before he came into the hall, ye shall understand that he came by water to the water-gate, without any noise, where, against his coming, were laid charged many cham- bers [short guns], and at his landing they were all shot off, which made such a rumble in the air that it was like thunder. It made all the noblemen, ladies, and gentlewomen to muse what it should mean coming so sud- denly, they sitting quietly at a solemn ban- quet. . . . Then, immediately after this great shot of guns, the cardinal desired the lord chamberlain and comptroller to look what this sudilin shot should mean, as though he knew nothing of the matter. They there- upon lookiiigoiitof the window intoThatiies, returned again, and showed him that it seemed to thi'iii there should be some noble- men and Klntiijrors arrived at his bridge, as ambassadors from some foreign prince. ■ , . Then quoth the cnnlinal to my loi-d chamber- lain, "1 jiray voii," quoth he, "show them that it secinetli me tliat there should bo among them some nciblcman whom I suppose to be much more worthy of honour to sit and oo- (uipy this room imd place than I ; to whom I would most {. i.il^, if I know him, surrender my pliKMi ncoonling to my duty." Then spake my lord olmiiiberlain unto them in French, declaring my lord cardinal's mind j and they rounding [whispering] them again in the ear, my lord chamberlain said to my lord cardinal, " Sir, they confess," quoth he, " that among them there is such a noble personage, whom, if your grace can appoint him from the other, he is contented to dis- close himself, and to accept your place most worthily." With that, the cardinal, taking a good advisement among them, at the lasu, quoth he, " Me seemeth the gentleman with the black beard should be even he." And with that he arose out of his chair, and of- fered the same to the gentleman in the black beard, with his cap in his hand. The person to whom he offered then his chair was Sir Edward Neville, a comely knight, of a goodly personage, that much more resembled the king's person in that mask than any other. The king, hearing and perceiving the cai^ dinal so deceived in bis estimation and choice, could not forbear laughing; but plucked down his visor, and Master Ifeville's also, and dashed out with such a pleasant countenance and cheer, that all noble estates there assembled, seeing the king in there amongst them, rejoiced very much. The cardinal eftsoons desired his highness to take the place of estate, to whom the king an- swered that he would go first and shift his apparel ; and so departed, and went straight into my lord's bedchamber, where was a great fire made and prepared for him, and there new-apparelled him with rich and princely garments. And in the time of the king's absence the dishes of the banquet were clean taken up, and the table spread again with new and sweet-perfumed cloths; every man sitting still until the king and bis maskers came in among them again, every man being newly apparelled. Then the king took Tiis scat under the cloth of estate, commanding no man to remove, but sit still, as they did before. Then in came a new banquet before the king's majesty, and to all the rest through the tables, wherein, I sup- pose, were served two hundred dishes, or above, of wondrous costly meats and devices, sulitilly devised. Thus passeil they forth the whole night with banquetting, dancing, and other tri- umphant deviees, to the great comfort of tlie king, and pleasant regard of the nobility there assembled. The Siijotiaiiima of WooUet/. NICHOLAS RIDLEY. born about 1505, became Bishop of Roches- ter 154", Bishop of London 1550, and w«« burnt at the stake, with Bishop Latimer, at Oxford, Oct. Ill, 1555. NICHOLAS RIDLEY. 27 From Ridley's Piteous Lamentatio.v of THE Miserable Estate of the Church IN England, in the Time of the Late Revolt from the Gospel, 1566. Of God's gracious aid in extreme perils coward them that put their trust in him, all Scripture is full both old and new. What dangers were the patriarchs often brought into, as Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, but of all other Joseph ; and how mercifully were they delivered again ! In what perils was Moses when he was fain to fly for the safe- guard of his life! And when was he sent again to deliver the Israelites from the ser- vile bondage 1 Not before they were brought into extreme misery. And when did the .Lord mightily deliver his people from Pha- i:aoh's sword ? Not before they were brought into such straits that they were so compassed on every side (the main sea on the one side, and the main host dn the other), that they could look for norfe other, (yea, what did they else look for then ?) but either to have been drowned in the sea, or else to have fallen on the edge of Pharaoh his sword. 'J^hose judges which w^rought most wonder- ful things in the delivery of the people were ever given when the people were brought to most misery before, as Othoniel, Aioth [Ehud], Sangar, Gedeon, Jepthah, Samson. And so was Saul endued with strength and boldness from above, against the Ammon- ites, Philistines, and Amalechites, for the defence of the people of God. David like- wise felt God's help, most sensibly ever in his extreme persecutions. What shall I speak of the Prophets of God, whom God suffered so oft to be brought into extreme perils, and so mightily delivered them again ; as Helias, Heremy, Daniel, Micheas, and Tonas, and many others, whom it were but voo long to rehearse and set out at large ? And did the Lord use his servants otherwise in the new law after Christ's incarnation ? Read the Acts of the Apostles and you shall see, no. Were not the Apostles cast into prison, and brought out by the mighty hand of God? Did not the angel deliver Peter out of the strong prison, and bring him out by the iron gates of the city, and set him free? And when, I pray you? Even the same night before Herod appointed to have brought him in judgment for to have slain him, as he had a little before killed James, the brother of John. Paul and Silas, when after they had been sore scourged, and were put into the inner prison, and there were held fast in the stocks ; I pray you what appearance was there that the magistrates should be glad to come the next day them- i8elves to them, to desire them to be content, and to depart in peace ? Who provided for Paul that he should be safely conducted out of all danger, and brought to Felix, the Emperor's deputy, whenas both the high priests, the pharisees, and rulers of the Jews had conspired to require judgment of death against him, he being fast in prison, and also more than forty men had sworn each one to other that they would never eat nor drink until they had slain Paul ! A thing wonderful, that no reason could have in- vented, or man could have looked for : God provided Paul his own sister's son, a young man, that disappointed that conspiracy and all their former conjuration. The manner how the thing came to pass, thou mayest read in the twenty-third of the Acts : I will not' be tedious unto thee here with the re- hearsal thereof. Now, to descend from the Apostles to the martyrs that followed next in Christ's church, and in them likew^ise to declare how gracious our good God ever hath been to work wonderfully with them which in his cause have been in extreme perils, it were a matter enough to write a long book. I will here name but one man and one woman, that is, Athauasias, the great clerk and godly man, stoutly standing in Christ's cause against the Arians; and that holy woman, Blandina, so constantly in all ex- treme pains, in the simple confession of Christ. If thou wilt have examples of more, look and thou shalt have both these and a hundred more in Ecclesiastica Historia of Eusebius, and in Tripartita Historia. But for all these examples, both of holy Scrip- ture and of other histories, I fear me the weak man of God, encumbered with the frailty and infirmity of the flesh, will have now and then such thoughts and qualms (as they call them) to run over his heart, and to think thus : All these things which are re- hearsed out of the Scripture, I believe to be true, and of the rest truly I do think well, and can believe them also to be true ; but all these we must needs grant were special miracles of God, which now in our hands ^e. ceased, we see, and to require them of God's hands, were it not to tempt God ? Well-beloved brother, I grant such were great wonderful works of God, and we have not seen many such miracles in our time, either for that our sight is not clear (for truly God worketh with us his part in all times) or else because we have not the like faith of them for whose cause God wrought such things, or because after that he had set forth the truth of his doctrine by snch mira- cles then sufficiently, the time of so many miracles to be done was expired withal. Which of these is the most special cause of all other, or whether there be any other, God knoweth: I leave that to God. Bi>« 28 ROGER ASCHAM. know thou this, my well-beloved in God, that God's hand is as strong as ever it was ; he may do what his gracious pleasure is, and he is as good and gracious as ever he was. Man changeth as the garment doth ; but God, our heavenly Father, is even the same DOW that he was, and shall be for evermore. The world without doubt (this 1 do be- lieve, and therefore I say) draweth towards an end, and in all ages God hath had his own manner, after his secret and unsearch- able wisdom, to use his elect: sometimes to deliver them, and to keep them safe ; and sometimes to suffer them to drink of Christ's cup, that is, to feel the smart, and to feel of the whip. And though the flesh smarteth at the one, and feeleth ease in the other, is glad of the one, and sore vexed in the other ; yet the Lord is all one towards them in both, and loveth them no less when he suf- fereth them to be beaten, yea, and to be put to bodily death, than when he worketh won- ders for their marvellous delivery. Nay, rather he doth more for them, when in an- guish of the torments he standeth by them, and strengtheneth them in their faith, to suffer in the confession of the truth and his faith the bitter pains of death, than when he openeth the prison doors and letteth them go loose: for here he doth but respite them to another time, and leaveth them m danger to fall in like peril again ; and there he maketh them perfect, to be without danger, pain, or peril, after that for evermore : but this his love towards them, howsoever the world doth judge of it, it is all one, both when he delivereth and when he suffereth them to be put to death. He loved as well Peter and Paul, when (after they had, according to his blessed will, pleasure, and providence, fin- ished their courses, and done their services appointed them by him here in preaching of his Gospel,) the one was beheaded, and the other was hanged or crucified of the cruel tyrant Nero (as the ecclesiastical history saith), as when he sent the angel to bring Peter out of pi-ison, and for Paul's delivery he made all the doors of the prison to fly wide open, and the foundation of the same like an earthquake to tremble and shake. Thinkest thou. O man of God, that Christ our Saviour had less affoction to the first martyr, Stephen, bcoivuse ho suffered his enemies, even at the first conflict, to stone him to death? No, surely: nor Janu-s, John's brother, which was one of the three that Paul oalloth primates or principals amongst the Apostles of Christ. lie loved liiiii never a whit the worse tlmn he did the other, although he suffered Horod the ty- rant's swoid to ent off his head. Nay, doth not Daniel say, speaking of the cruelty of Antichrist his time: "And the learned [he meaneth truly learned in God's law] shall teach many, and shall fall upon the sword, and in the flame [that is, shall be burnt in the flaming fire], and in captivity [that is, shall be in prison], and be spoiled and robbed of their goods for a long season." And after a little, in the same place of Dan- iel, it followeth : " And of the learned there be which shall fall or be overthrown, that they moy be known, tried, chosen, and be made white" — he meaneth be burnished and scoured anew, picked and chosen, and made fresh and lusty. If that, then, was foreseen for to be done to the godly learned, and for so gracious causes, let every one to whom any such thing by the will of God doth chance, be merry in God and rejoice, for.it is to God's glory and to bis own everlasting wealth. Wherefore well is he that ever he was born, for whom thus graciously God hath provided, having grace of God, and strength of the Holy Ghost, to stand stead- fastly in the height of the storm. Happy ia he that ever he was born whom God, his heavenly Father, hath vouchsafed to appoint to glorifif him, and to edify his church by the effusion of his blood. To die in Christ's cause is an high honour, to the which no man certainly shall or can aspire but to whom God vouchsafeth that dignity ; for no man is allowed to presume for to take unto himself any office of honour but he which is thereunto called uf God. Therefore John saith well, speaking of them which have obtained the victory by the blood of the Lamb, and by the word of his testi- mony, that they loved not their lives even unto death. ROGER ASCHAM, tutor to the Princess Eliznheth, and Latin secretary to Edward VI., Queen Mary, and Queen Elizabeth, was born in or about 1515, and died 1568. " Ue had a faoilo and fluent I, wherein one customer now wanted to be let blood, and another to be shaved ; to perform which the barber was now on his way, carrying with him his brass basin ; and it so happened that while upon the road it began to rain, and to save his hat, which was a new one, he clapped the basin on his head, which being lately scoured was seen glittering at the distance of half a league ; and he rode on a gray ass, as San- cho had affirmed. Thus Don Quixote took the barber for a knight, his ass for a dapple- gray steed, and his basin for a golden helmet ; for whatever he saw was quickly adapted to his knightly extravagances ; and when the poor knight drew near, without staying to reason the ouno with him, he advaiieod at Kozinanto's best speed, and couched hia lance, intending to run him through and throiifjii ; but, when close "upon him, with- out oluiokiiif; the fury of his ciircor, ho criod out, "Defend thjrself, caitiff I or instantly surrender what is justly my duo." The barber, so unoxpecti^dly siH'ing this phan- tom advancing upon him, had no other wny to avoid the thrust of the lance than to slip down from the ass ; and no sooner had ho touched the ground than, lea)iiiig up nimbler than a roebuck, ho scau pored over the plain with such speed that the wind could not overtake him. The basin he left on the ground : with which Don Quixote was satisfied, observing that the pagan had acted discreetly, and in imitation of the beaver, which, when closely pursued by the hunters, tears off with his teeth that which it knows by instinct to be the object of pursuit. He ordered Sancho to take up the helmet; who, holding it in his hand, said, " Before Heaven, the basin if a special one, and is well worth a piece o< eight, if it is worth a farthing." He then gave it to his master, who immediately placed it upon his head, turning it round in search of the vizor ; but not finding it, he said, " Doubtless the pagan for whom this famous helmet was originally forged must have had a prodigious head, — the worst of it is that one half is wanting." When San- cho heard the basin called a nelmet, he could not forbear laughing ; which, however, he instantly checked on recollecting his mas- ter's late choler. " What dost thou laugh at, Sancho?" said Don Quixote. "I am laugh- ing," answered he, "to think what a huge head the pagan had who owned that helmet, which is for all the world just like b bar- ber's basin." " Rnowest thou, Sancho, what I conceive to be the case ? This famous piece, this enchanted helmet, by some strange acci- dent must have fallen into the possession of one who, ignorant of its true value as a hel- met, and seeing it to be of the purest gold, hath inconsiderately melted down the one half for lucre's sake, and of the other made this, which, as thou sayest, doth indeed look like a barber's basin ; but to me, who know what it really is, its transformation is of no importance, for I will have it so repaired in the first town where there is a smith, that it shall not be surpassed nor even equalled by that which the god of smiths himself made and forged for the god of battles. In the mean time, I will wear it a.s I best can, for something is better than nothing; and it will be sufficient to defend me from stones." '" It will so," said Saneho, " if they do not throw tliein with slings, as tliey did in the battle of the two armies." Adventures of Don Qiiixoie, Jarvis^s Trail*- lotion, Book III. Chapter XXI. SIR WALTER RALEIGH, a distinguished navigator and author, was born at Hayes, Devonshire, 1552, and was executed for alleged treason in 1618. " There is no ohjoot in human pursuits vhioh the genius of Raleigh did not cmbraoo. Wh»« eoionoo was that unwearying mind not buried in 7 Wliat arts of hoar antiquit; did he not love t« SIR WALTER RALEIGH. 35 seek? What sense of the beautiful ever passed transiently over his spirit? His books and his pictures ever accompanied him in his voyages. Even in the short hour before his last morning is he not still before us, while his midnight pen traces his mortuary verse, perpetuating the emo- tions of the sage, and of the hero who oould not fear death?" — Disraeli: Amenitiet of lit. : Psy- chological Hiat. of Hawleigh, " Kaleigh, the soldier, the sailor, the scholar, the courtier, the orator, the poet, the historian, the philosopher; whom we picture to ourselves sometimes reviewing the Queen's guards, some- times giving chase to a Spanish galleon, then answering the chiefs of the country party in the House of Commons, then again murmuring one of his sweet love-songs too near the ears of her Highness's maids of honour, and soon after por- ing over the Talmud, or collating Polybius with Livy." — Lord Macaulay: Burleigh and Hia TimeSf Edin. Sep., April, 1832, and in his works, complete, 1866, 8 vols. 8vo, v. 611. Sib Walter Raleigh to Prince Henbt, Son of Jahes I. May it please your highness, The following lines are addressed to your highness from a man who values his liberty, and a very small fortune in a remote part of this island, under the present constitu- tion, above all the riches and honours that he could anywhere enjoy under any other establishment. You see, sir, the doctrines that are lately come into the world, and how far the phrase' has obtained of calling your royal father God's vicegerent ; which ill men have turned both to the dishonour of God and the im- peachment of his majesty's goodness. They adjoin vicegerency to the idea of being all- powerful, and not to that of being all-good. His majesty's wisdom, it is to be hoped, will save him from the snare that may lie under gross adulations: but your youth, and the thirst of praise which I have observed in you, may possibly mislead you to hearken to these charmers, who would conduct your noble nature into tyranny. Be careful, my prince 1 Hear them not ; fly from their deceit : you are in the succession to a throne, from whence no evil can be imputed to you, but all good must be conveyed from you. Your father is called the vicegerent of Heaven : while he is good, he is the viceger- ent of Heaven. ' Shall man have authority from the fountain of good to do evil? No, my prince ; let mean and degenerate spirits, which want benevolence, suppose yonr power impaired by a disability of doing injuries. If want of power to do ill be an incapacity in a prince, with reverence be it spoken, it is an incapacity he has in common with the Deity. Let me not doubt but all pleas which do not carry in them the mutual hap- piness of prince and people will appear as absurd to your great understanding as dis- agreeable to your noble nature. Exert yourself, generous prince, against such sycophants, in the glorious cause of liberty ; and assume such an ambition worthy of you, to secure your fellow-creatures from slavery ; from a condition as much below that of brutes as to act without reason is less miserable than to act against it. Pre- serve to your future subjects the divine right of free agents ; and to your own royal house the divine right of being their bene- factors. Believe me, my prince, there is no other right can flow from God. While your highness is forming yourself for a throne, consider the laws as so many common-places in your study of the science of government ; when you mean nothing but justice they are an ease and help to you. This way of thinking is what gave men the glorious appellation of deliverers and fathers of their country ; this made the sight of them rouse their beholders into acclamations, and man- kind incapable of bearing their very appear- ance without applauding it as a benefit. Consider the inexpressible advantages which will ever attend your highness while you make the power of rendering men happy the measure of your actions ! While this is your impulse, how easily will that power be extended ! The glance of your eye will give gladness, and your very sentence have a force of beauty. Whatever some men would insinuate, you have lost your subjects when you have lost their inclinations. You are to preside over the minds not the bodies of men ; the soul is the essence of the man, and you cannot have the true man against his inclinations. Choose therefore to be the king or the conqueror of your people: it may be submission, but it cannot be obedi- ence, that is passive. London, Aug. 12, 1611. Raleigh's Three Rules to be observed tor THE Preservation of a Man's Estate. Amongst all other things of the world take care of thy estate, which thou shalt ever preserve if thou observe three things : first, that thou know what thou hast, what every thing is worth that thou hast, and to see that thou art not wasted by thy servants and officers. The second is, that thou never spend anything before thou have it ; for bor- rowing is the canker and death of every man's estate. The third is, that thou suffer not thyself to be wounded for other men's faults, and scourged for other men's offences ; which is the surety for another, for thereby millions of men have been Beggared and destroyed, paying the reckoning of other men's riot and the charge of other men's folly and prodigality ; if thou smart, smart for thine own sins ; and, above all things, be 36 RICHARD HOOKER. not made m ass to carry the burdens of other men : if any friend desire thee to be his surety, give him a part of what thou hast to spare ; if he press thee farther, he is not thy friend at all, for friendship rather chooseth harm to itself than offereth it. If thou be bound for a stranger, thou art a fool ; if fur a merchant, thou puttest thy estate to learn to swim ; if for a churchman, he hath no inheritance ; if for a lawyer, he will find an invasion by a syllable or a word to abuse thee ; if for a poor man, thou must pay it thyself; if for a rich man, he needs not; therefore from suretyship, as from a man slayer or enchanter, bless thyself; for the best profit and return will be this, that if thou force him for whom thou art bound to pay it himself, he will become thy enemy ; if thou use to pay it thyself, thou wilt be a beggar ; and believe thy father in this, and print it in thy thought, that what virtue so- ever thou hast, be it never so manifold, if thou be poor withal, thou and thy qualities shall be despised. Besides, poverty is oft- times sent as a curse of God ; it is a shame amongst men, an imprisonment of the mind, a vexation of every worthy spirit ; thou shalt neither help thyself nor others ; thou shalt drown thee in all thy virtues, having no means to show them ; thou shalt be a burden and an eyesore to thy friends, every man will fear thy company ; thou shalt be driven basely to beg and depend on others, to flat- ter unworthy men, to make dishonest shifts ; and, to conclude, poverty provokes a man to do infamous and aetested deeds ; let no van- ity, therefore, or persuasion, draw thee to that worst of worldly miseries. If thou be rich, it will give thee pleasure in health, comfort in sickness, keep tny mind and body free, save thee from many perils, relieve thee in thy elder years, relieve the poor and thy honest friends, and give means to thy posterity to live and defend themselves and thine own fame. Where it is said in the Proverbs, " That he shall be sore vexed that is surety for a strangor, and he that hatoth Buret;^ship is sure ;" it i» further said, " The poor is hated even of his own neighbour, but the rich have many friends." Lend not to him that is mightier than thyself, for if thou lendest him, count it but lost; bo not surety above thy power, for if thou bo surety, think to pay it. RICHARD HOOKER, horn in or abmit 1553, died 1000. 'Works, arranged by the Uov. John Kelilo, Lond., IH.iO, 4 vols. 8vo; again, 1841, 3 vols. 8vo: Iki edit., Oxf., 184r), 3 vols. 8vo. "Tho fliioi't lis well M tlio niont phlloanphloal writer of tho Kliinboth period ia llookor. Tho first book of the Ecclesiastical Polity is at this day one of the master-pieces of English eloquence. His periods, indeed, are generally much too long and too intricate, but portions of them are often beautifally rhythmical; his language is rich in English idiom without vulgarity, and in words of a Latin source without pedantry ; he is more uni- formly solemn than the usage of later times per- mits, or even than writers of that time, such as Bacon, conversant with mankind as well as books, would have reckoned necessary ; but the example of ancient orators and philosophers, upon themes so grave as those which he discusses, may justify the serious dignity from which he does not depart. Hooker is perhaps the first of such in England who adorned his prose with the images of poetry I but this he has done more judiciously and with more moderation than others of great name; and we must be bigot in Attic severity before we can object to some of his grand figures of speech. We may praise him also for avoiding the super- fluous luxury of quotations ; — a rock on which the writers of the succeeding age were so frequently wrecked." — Hallah : Introduction to Lit. of Europe, ed. 1854, ii. IQS. SCRIPTDEB AND THK LaW OF NaTUKE. What the Scripture purposeth, the same in all points it doth perform. Ilowbeit, that here we swerve not in judgment, one thing especially we must observe : namely, that the absolute perfection of Scripture is seen by relation unto that end whereto it tendeth. And even hereby it cometh to pass that, first, such as imagine the general and main drift of the miun body of sacred Scripture not to be so large as it is, nor that God did thereby intend to deliver, as in truth he doth, a full instruction in all things unto salvation necessary, the knowledge whereof man by nature could not otherwise in this life attain unto ; they are by this very mean induced, either still to look for new" revela- tions from heaven, or else dangerously to add to the word of God uncerbiin tradition, that 80 the doctrine of man's salvation may be complete ; which doctrine we constantly hold in all respects, without any such things added, to be so complete, that wo utterly in- fuse as much as once to acquaint ourselves with anything further. Whatsoever, to make up the doctrine of man's salvation, is added as in supply of thb Scripture's in- sufficiency, we reieot it ; Scripture purposing this, hath perfectly and fully done it. Agiun, tlie scope iind purpose of God in delivering the holy Scripture, such as do take more largely than behovoth, they, on the contrary, side-racking and stretching it further than by him was meant, are drawn into sundry as great inconveniences. They pretending the Scripture's perfection, infer thereupon, that in Scripture all things lawful to be done must needs be contained. We count those things perfect which want nothing requisite for the end whereto they were in- Sm PHILIP SIDNEY. 37 gtituted. Aa, therefore, God created every part and particle of man exactly perfect — that is to say, in all points sufficient unto that use for which he appointed it — so the Scripture, yea, every sentence thereof, is perfect, and wanteth nothing requisite unto that purpose for which God delivered the same. So that if hereupon we conclude, that hecause the Scripture is perfect, there- fore all things lawful to be done are com- prehended in the Scripture; we may even as well conclude so of every sentence, as of the whole sum and body thereof, unless we first of all prove that it was the drift, scope, and purpose of Almighty God in holy Scrip- ture to comprise all things which man may practise. But admit this, and mark, I be- seech you, what would follow. God, in delivering Scripture to his church, should clean have abrogated among them the Law of Nature, which is an infallible knowledge imprinted in the minds of all the children of men, whereby both general principles for directing of human actions are compre- hended, and conclusions derived from them ; upon which conclusions groweth in particu- larity the choice of good and evil in the daily afifairs of this life. Admit this, and what shall the Scripture be but a snare and a torment to weak consciences, filling them with infinite perplexities, scrupulosities, doubts insoluble, and extreme despairs? Not that the Scripture itself doth cause any such thing (for it tendeth to the clean con- trary, and the fruit thereof is resolute as- surance and certainty in that it teacheth) ; but the necessities of this life urging men to do that which the light of nature, com- mon discretion, and judgment of itself di- recteth them unto ; on the other side this doctrine teaching them that so to do were to sin against their own souls, and that they put forth their hands to iniquity, whatsoever they go about, and have not first the sacred Scripture of God for direction ; how can it choose but bring the simple a thousand times to their wit's end ; how can it choose but vex and amaze them? Nor in every action of common life, to find out some sen- tence clearly and infallibly setting before our eyes what we ought to do (seem we in Scripture never so expert), would trouble us more than we are aware. In weak and tender minds, we little know what_ misery this strict opinion would breed, besides the stops it would make in the whole course of all men's lives and actions. Make all things sin which we do by direction of nature's light, and by the rule of common discretion, without thinking at all upon Scripture ; ad- mit this position, and parents shall cause their children to sin, as oft as they cause them to do anything before they come to years of capacity, and be ripe for knowledge in the Scripture. Admit this, and it shall not be with masters as it was with him in the gospel ; but servants being commanded to go, shall stand still till they have theii errand warranted unto them by Scripture, which, as it standeth with Christian duty in some cases, so in common affairs to require it were most unfit. The Laws of EedesiasHcal Polity, Lond., Bookes I.-IV. (1594), fol.; Book V., 1597, fol. ; Book VI., 1618 ; Bookes VII., VIII., 1618, 4to ; again, Bookes I.-VIII. (termed The Works), Lond., 1622, fol. SIR PHILIP SIDNEY, born 1554, was fatally wounded at the battle of Zutphen, September 22, 1586, and died at Arnheim on the 17th of October ensuing. As a writer Sidney is best known by the Countesse of Pembroke's Arcadia, Lond., 1590, 4to, a romance, and An Apologie for Poetrie, Lond., 1595, 4to, afterwards en- titled The Defence of Poetry, and The De- fense of Poesy. " Sir Philip Sidney is a writer for whom I can not acquire a taste. As Mr. Burke said he 'could not love the French Republic,' so I may truly say that I cannot love ' The Countess of Pembroke's Arcadia,' with all my good will to it. . . . It is to me one of the greatest monuments of the abuse of intellectual power on record. It puts one in mind of the court dresses and preposterous fashions of the time, which are grown obsolete and disgusting. It is not romantic, but scholastic ; not poetry, but casuistry ; not nature, but art, and the worst sort of art, which thinks it can do better than nature. Of the number of fine things that are constantly passing through the author's mind, there is hardly one that he has not contrived to spoil, and to spoil purposely and maliciously, in order to ag- grandize our idea of himself. Out of five hundred folio pages, there are hardly, I conceive, half a dozen sentences expressed simply and directly, with the sincere desire to convey the image im- plied, and without a systematic interpolation of the wit, learning, ingenuity, wisdom, and everlasting impertinence of the writer, so as to disguise the object, instead of displaying it in its true colours and real proportions." — Hazlitt : Zecta. on the Dramat. Art of the Age of Elizabeth, Leot. V. Horace Walpole also thought Sidney vastly overrated ; but Dr. Zouch, Peter Heylin, Isaac Disraeli, Hallam, Dr. Drake, and others, have much to say in his favour. As a speci- men of Sidney's style, we shall present an extract from a very long letter, which does great credit to his good j udgment, honesty, and courage. Sir Philip Sidjtet to Queen Elizabeth, ANNO 1580, Persuading her not to MABRT with THE DUKE OF AnJOU. Most feared and beloved, most sweet and gracious sovereign : To seek out excuses of 38 SIR PHILIP SIDNEY. this my boldness, and to arm the acknowl- edging of a fault with reasons for it, might better show I knew I did amiss, than any way diminish the attempt, especially in your judgment ; who being able to discern lively into the nature of the thing done, it were folly to hope, by laying on better colours, to make it more acceptable. Therefore carrying no other olive branch of intercession than the laying myself at your feet, nor no other insinuation, either for attention or pardon, but the true vowed sacrifice of unfeigned love, I will in simple and direct terms (as hoping they shall only come to your merciful eyes) set down the overflowing of my mind in this most impor- tant matter, importing, as I think, the con- tinuance of your safety ; and, as I know, the joys of my life. And because my words (I confess shallow, but coming from the deep well-spring of most loyal affection) have de- livered to your most gracious ear what is the general sum of my travailing thoughts therein ; I will now but only declare what be the reasons that make me think that the marriage with Monsieur will be unprofitable unto you ; then will I answer the objection of those fears which might procure so violent a refuge. The good or evil that will come by it must be considered either according to your estate or person. To your estate what can be added to the being an absolute born and accord- ingly respected princess? But, as they say the Irishmen are wont to call over them that die, they are rich, they are fair, what needed they to die so cruelly 7 not unfitly of you, en- dowed with felicity above all others, a man might well ask. What makes you in such a calm to change course ; to so healthful a body to apply so unsavoury a medicine ? Whatcan recompense so hazardous an adventure ? In- deed, were it but the altering of a well- maintained and well-approved trade ; for, as in bodies natural every sudden change is full of peril, so in this boay politic, whereof you are the only head, it is so much the more dangerous, as there are more humours to re- ceive a hurtful impression. But hazards are then most to he regarded when the nature of the patient is fitly composed to ooeiision them. The piitiont I account your realm : the agent MdiiNieiir and his design ; for neither iHitwiinl accidents do much prevail niiiuiist a true inward strength ; nor doth inward weakness lightly subvert itself, without being thrust at by some outward force. Your inwiinl foreo (for us for your treas- ures indeed, the sinews of your eiown, your majesty doth best and only know) eousistetli in your subjects, generally unexporf in war- like dofone,e ; aiid iis they are divided now into mighty factions (and faetions bound in the never-dying knot of religion). The on« of them, to whom your happy government hath granted the free exercise of the ex- ternal truth ; ' with this, by the continuance of time, by the multitude of them ; by die principal offices and strength they hold ; and lastly, by your dealings both at home and abroad against the adverse party ; your state is so entrapped, as it were impossible for you, without excessive trouble, to pull your- self out of the party so long maintained. For such a course once taken in hand, is not much unlike a ship in a tempest, which how dangerously soever it may be beaten with waves, yet is there no safety or succour with- out it ; these, therefore, as their souls live by your happy government, so are they your chief if not your sole strength ; these, how- soever the necessity of human life makes them lack, yet can they not look for better conditions than presently they enjoy; these, how their hearts will be galled, if not aliened, when they shall see you take a bus band, a Frenchman and » Papist, in whom (howsoever fine wits may find further deal- ings or painted excuses) the very common people well know this, that he is the son of a Jezebel of our age ; that his brother made oblation of his own sister's marriage, the easier to make massacres of our brethren in belief; that he himself, contrary to his prom- ise, and all gratefulness, having his liberty and principal estate hy the Huguenots' means, did sack Zacharists, and utterly spoil them with fire and sword. This 1 say. even at first sight, gives occasion to all, truly re- ligious, to abhor such a master, and con- sequently to diminish much of the hopeful love they have long held to vou. The other faction, most rightly indeed to be called a faction, is the Papists ; men whose spirits are full of anguish, some being infested by others, whom they ac- counted damnable; some having their am- bition stopped, because thoy are not in the way of advancement : some in prison and disgrace ; some whose best friends are ban- ished pruetisers; many thinking you an usurper; many thinking also you had dis- annulled your right, because of the Pope's exeoinmunication; all burtliened with the weight of their conscience; men of great numbers, of great riches (because the affairs of state have not lain on them), of united minds (as all men that deem themselves op- pressed naturally are) ; with these I would willingly join all discontented persons, such as want and disgniee keep lower than they have set tlioir hearts ; sucli as have resolvej what to look for at your hands ; such as Civsar said, Quibm opm est bello civili, and are of his mind, malo in ncie, qiiam in ton cadere. FRANCIS BACON. 39 FRANCIS BACON, born in London, 1561, was created Lord High Chancellor of England and Baron Vernlam, 1619; Viscount of St. Alban's, 1620, and died in 1626. The work by which Bacon is best known to the general reader is entitled Essayes : Religious Meditations : Places of Pers wasion and Disswasion, Lond., 1.597, 16mo ; frequently reprinted, with addi- tions. " The first in time, and, we may justly say, the first in excellence, of English writers on moral prudence, are the Essays of Bacon. . . . The tran- scendent strength of Bacon's mind is risible in the whole tenor of these Essays, unequal as they must be from the 'very nature of such compositions. They are deeper and more discriminating than any earlier, or almost any later work in the Eng- lish language : full of recondite observations, long matured, and carefully sifted. . , . Few books are more quoted, and, what is not always the case with such books, we may add, that few are more generally read. In this respect they lead the van of our prose literature ; for no gentleman is ashamed of owning that he has not read the Elizabethan writers ; but it would be somewhat derogatory to a man of the slightest claim to polite letters were he unacquainted with the Es- says of Bacon." — UallAU: Introduc. to Lit, of Europe. Essay X. Of Lovb. The stage is more beholding to love than the life of men ; for as to the stage, love is even matter of comedies, and now and then of tragedies ; but in life it doth much mis- chief; sometimes like a siren, sometimes like a fury. You may observe that amongst all the great and worthy persons (whereof the memory remaineth, either ancient or re- cent) there is not one that hath been trans- ported to the mad degree of love, which shows that great spirits and great business do keep out this weak passion. You must except, nevertheless, Marcus Antonius, the half partner of the empire of Rome, and Appius Claudius, the decemvir and law- giver ; whereof the former was indeed a vo- luptuous man, and inordinate ; but the latter was an austere and wise man ; and therefore it seems (though rarely) that love can find entrance, not only into an open heart, but also into a heart well fortified, if watch be not well kept. It is a poor saying of Epi- curus, " Satis magnum alter alteri theatrum sumus ;" as if man, made for the contempla- tion of heaven, and all noble objects, should do nothing but kneel before a little idol, and make himself a subject, though not of the month (as beasts are), yet of the eye, which was given him for higher purposes. It is a strange thing to note the excess of this pas- sion, and how it braves the nature and value of things by this, that the speaking in a perpetual liyperbole is comely in nothing but love ; neither is it merely in the phrase ; for whereas it hath been well said, " That the arch flatterer, with whom all the pretty flatterers have intelligence, is a man's self;" certainly the lover is more ; for there was never a proud man thought so absurdly well of himself as the lover doth of the person loved ; and therefore it was well said, " That it is impossible to love and to be wise." Neither doth this weakness appear to others only, and not to the party loved, but to the loved most of all, except the love be recip- rocal ; for it is a true rule, that love is ever rewarded, either with the reciprocal, or with an inward or secret contempt ; by how much more the men ought to beware of this pas- sion, which loseth not only other things, but itself. As for the other losses, the poet's re- lation doth well figure them : " That he that preferr'ed Helena quitted the gifts of Juno and Pallas ;" for whosoever esteemeth too much of amorous affection quitteth both riches and wisdom. This passion hath its floods in the very times of weakness, which are great prosperity and great adversity, though this latter hath been less observed ; both which times kindle love, and make it more fervent, and therefore show it to be the child of folly. They do best who, if they cannot but admit love, yet make it keep quarter, and sever it wholly from their seri- ous affairs and actions of life ; for if it check once with business, it troubleth men's for- tunes, and maketh men that they can no ways be true to their own ends. I know not how, but martial men are given to love: I think it is but as they are given to wine ; for perils commonly ask to be paid in pleas- ures. There is in man's nature a secret inclina- tion . and motion towards love of others, which, if it be not spent upon some one bi a few, doth naturally spread itself towards many, and maketh men become humane and charitable, as it is seen sometimes in friars. Niiptial love maketh mankind ; friendly love perfecteth it; but wanton love corrupteth and embasseth it. Essay XLIV. Of Beauty. Virtue is like a rich stone, best plain set ; and surely virtue is best in a body that is comely, though not of delicate features ; and that hath rather dignity of presence than beauty of aspect : neither is it at most seen that very beautiful persons are otherwise of great virtue ; as if nature were rather busy not to err, than in labour to produce excel- lency ; and therefore they prove accom- plished, but not of great spirit : and study rather behaviour than virtue. But this- 4U FRANCIS BACON. holds not always: for Augustus Caesar, Titus Vespasianus, Philip le Belle of France, Edward the Fourth of England, Alcibiades of Athens, Ismael the sophy of Persia, were all high and great spirits, and yet the most beautiful men of their times. In beauty, that of favour is more than that of colour; and that of decent and gracious motion more than that of favour. That is the best part of beauty which a picture cannot ex- press ; no, nor the first sight of life. There IS no excellent beauty that hath not some strangeness in the proportion. A man can- not tell whether Apelles or Albert Durer were the more triner ; whereof the one would make a personage by geometrical proportions : the other, by taking tho best parts out of divers faces to make one ex- cellent. Such personages, I think, would please nobody but the painter that made them : not but I think a painter may make a better face than ever was; but he must do it by a kind of felicity (as a musician that maketh an excellent air in music), and not by rule. A man shall see faces that, if you examine thorn part by part, you shall find never a good ; and yet altogether do well. If it be true that the principal part of beauty is in decent motion, certainly it is no marvel, though persons in years seem many times more amiable : " pulchrorum au- tumnus pulcher;" for no youth can be comely but by pardon, and considering the youth as to make up the comeliness. Beauty IS as summer fruits, which are easy to cor- rupt, and cannot last ; and for the most part it makes a dissolute youth, and an age a little out of countenance ; but yet certainly again, if it light well, it maketh virtues shine and vices blush. EssAT LI. Or Studies. Studies serve for delight, for ornament, and for ability. Their chief use for delight is in privateness and retiring ; for ornament is in discourse ; and for ability is in the judgment and disposition of business ; for expert men can execute, and perhaps judge of particulars, one by one ; but tho general oounsels, and the plots and marshalling of affairs, como best from those that are learned. To spend too much time in studies is sloth ; to use them too much for ornament is affecta- tion ; to make judgroflnt wholly by their rules is the humour of a scholar: thoy per- fect nature, and are porfootod by experience : for natural abilities are like natural plants, that need pruning by study ; and studies themselves do give forth directions too much at large, except they be bounded in by ex- perience. Crafty men oontemn studies, sim- ple men admire them, and wise men use thom; for they teach not the'r own use; but that is a wisdom withoat them, and above them won by observation. Read not to con- tradict and confute, nor to believe and take for granted, nor to find talk and discourse, but to weigh and consider. Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested : that is, some books are to be read only in parts ; others to be read, but not curiously ; and some few are to be read wholly, and with diligence and attention. Some books also may be read by deputy, and extracts made of them by others ; but that would be only in the less important arguments, and the meaner sort of books ; else distilled books are like common distilled waters, flashy things. Reading maketh a full man ; con- ference a ready man ; and writing an exact man : and therefore, if a man write little, he had need have a great memory ; if he con- fer little, he had need have a present wit : and if he read little, he had need have much cunning to seem to know that he doth not. Histories make men wise; poets, witty; the mathematics, subtile; natural philosophy, deep ; moral, grave ; logic and rhetoric, able to contend: "Abeunt studiain mores;" nay, there is no stand or impediment in the wit but may be wrought out by fit studies : like as diseases of the body may have appropri- ate exercises : bowling is good for the stone and reins, shooting for the lungs and breast, gentle walking for the stomach, riding for the head, and the like : so, if a man's wit be wandering, let him study the mathematics ; for in demonstrations, if his wit be called away, never so little, he must begin again ; if his wit be not apt to distinguish or find differences, let him study the scnoolmen, for they are '' Cymini Seotores;" if he be not apt to beat over matters, and to call upon one thing to prove and illustrate another, let him study the lawyer's cases : so every de- fect of the mind may have a special receipt. In The Tafler, No. 267, December 23, 1710, Addison remarks : "I nns infioitel; pleased to find among the works of this cxtraordinnry man a pinyer of hia own oompoaing, whioh for the elevation of thought, and greatness of expression, seem rather the de- votion of an angel than of a man. His principal fault seems to have been the excess of that virtue which covert a multitude of faults. This betrayed him to so great on indulgence towards big ser- vants, who made a corrupt use of it, that it stripped him of all those riches and honour? which a long series of merits had heaped upon him. But in this prayer, at tho same time that we find him prostrating himself before the great mercy -seat, aud humbled under afflictions which at that time lay heavy upon him, we see him supported by the sense of his integrity, his teal, his devction, and his love to mankind; which give hiiu a much higher figure in the minds of thinking nen than JAMES VI. OF SCOTLAND AND I. OF ENGLAI^D. 41 that greatness had done from which he was fallen. 1 shall beg leave to write down the prayer itself, with the title to it, as it was found amongst his lordship's papers, written in his own hand; not being able to furnish my readers with an enter- tainment more suitable to this solemn time." A. Prater, or Psalm, made bt mt Lord Bacon, Chancellor of England. Most gracious Lord God, my merciful Father ; from my youth up my Creator, my Redeemer, my Comforter ! Thou, Lord, soundest and searchest the depths and secrets of all hearts; thou acknowledgest the up- right of heart ; thou judgest the hypocrite ; thou ponderest men's thoughts and doings as in a balance ; thou measurest their inten- tions as with a line ; vanity and crooked ways cannot be hid from thee. Kemember, O Lord ! how thj servant hath walked before thee ; remember what I have first sought, and what hath been principal in my intentions. I have loved thy assem- blies, I have mourned for the divisions of thy church, I have delighted in the bright- ness of thy sanctuary. This vine which thy right hand hath planted in this nation, I have ever prayed unto thee that it might have the first and the latter rain, and that it might stretch her branches to the seas and to the floods. The state and bread of the poor and oppressed have been precious in mine eyes; I have hated all cruelty and hardness of heart ; I have, though in a despised weed, procured the good of all men. If any have been my enemies, I thought not of them, neither hath the sun almost set upon my displeasure ; but I have been as a dove, free from superfluity of maliciousness. My creatures have been my books, but thy Scriptures much more. I have sought thee in the courts, fields, and gar- dens ; but I have found thee in thy temples. Thousands have been my sins and ten thousands my transgressions, but thy sanc- tifications have remained with me, and my heart, through thy grace, hath been an un- quenched coal upon thine altar. Lord, my strength ! I have since my youth met with thee in all my ways, by thy fatherly compassions, by thy comfortable chastisements, and by thy most visible prov- idence. As thy favours have increased upon me, so have thy corrections : so as thou hast been always near me, Lord 1 and ever as my worldly blessings were exalted, so secret darts from thee have pierced me ; and when I have ascended before men, I have descended in humiliation before thee. And now, when I thought most of peace and honour, thy hand is heavy upon me, and hath humbled me according to thy former loving kindness, keeping me still in thy fatherly school, not OS a bastard, but as a jhild. Just are thy judgments upon me for my sins, which are more in number than the sands of the sea, but have no proportion to thy mercies ; for what are the sands of the seas? Earth, heaven, and all these are nothing to thy mercies. Besides my innu- merable sins, I confess before thee that I am debtor to thee for the gracious talent of thy gifts and graces, which I have neither put in a napkin, nor put it, as I ought, to ex* changers, where it might have made best profit, but misspent it in things for which I was least fit : so I may truly say, my soul hath been a stranger in the course of my pilgrimage.- Be merciful unto me, Lord, for my Saviour's sake, and receive me unto thy bosom, or guide me in thy ways. JAMES Vr. OF SCOTLAND AND I. OF ENGLAND, born 1566, died 1625. His best known pub- lication is Daamonologie, in Forme of a Dia- logue divided into three Bookes, Edin., 1597, 4to. "One remark I cannot avoid making: the king's speech is always supposed by Parliament to be the speech of the minister : how cruel would it have been on King James's ministers if that interpretation had prevailed in his reign ! . . . Bishop Montague translated all his majesty's works into Latin ; a man of so much patience was well worthy of favour." — Horace Walpolb : Rnyal and Noble AuihorSf Park's ed., i. 115-116^ 120. On Sorcert and Witchcraft. The fearful abounding at this time in this country of these detestable slaves of the devil, the witches or enchanters, hath moved me (beloved reader) to despatch in post this following treatise of mine, not in any wise, (as I protest) to serve for a show of my learning and ingine, but only, moved of conscience, to press thereby, so far as 1 can, to resolve the doubting hearts of many ; both that such assaults of Sathan are most cer- tainly practised, and that the instruments thereof mei-ita most severely to be punished : against the damnable opinions of two princi- pally in our age, whereof the one called Scot, an Englishman, is not ashamed ic public print to deny that there can be such a thing as witchcraft ; and so maintains the old error of the Sadducees in denying of spirits. The other called Wierus, a German physician, sets out a public apology for all these crafts-folks, whereby, procuring for their impunity, he plainly bewrays himself to have been one of that profession. And to make this treatise the more pleasant and facile, I have put it in form of a dialogue, 42 JOSEPH HALL. which I have divided into three boolcs : the first speaking of magic in general, and nec- romancy in special ; the second, of sorcery and witchcraft ; and the third contains a discourse of all these kinds of spirits and spectres that appears and troubles persons : together with a conclusion of the whole work. My intention in this labour is only to prove tvro things, as I have already said : the one, that such devilish arts have been and are ; the other, what exact trial and severe punishment they merit : and therefore reason I, what kind of things are possible to be performed in these arts, and by what natural causes they may be. Not that I touch every particular thing of the devil's power, for that were infinite: but only to speak scholasticly (since this cannot be spoken in our language), I reason upon genus, leaving species and differentia to be comprehended therein. As, for example, speaking of the power of magicians in the first book and sixth chapter, I say that they can suddenly cause be brought unto them all kinds of dainty dishes by their familiar spirit ; since as a thief he delights to steal, and as a spirit he can subtilly and suddenly enough transport the same. Now under this genus may be comprehended all particu- lars depending thereupon ; such as the bringing wine out of a wall (as we have heard oft to have been practised) and such others; which particulars are sufficiently proved by the reasons of the general. Domionologie. IIow AViTCBES Travel. Philomathes. — But by what way say they, or think ye it possible, they can come to these unlawful conventions 1 Epistemon. — There is the thing which I esteem their senses to be deluded in, and, though they lie not in confessing of it, be- cause they think it to be true, yet not to be BO in substance or eflect, for they say, that by divers moans they may convene either to the adoring of their master or to the putting in practice any service of his committed unto their charge: one way is natural, which is natural riding, goint;, or sailing, at what hour their master ooincs and advertises them. And this way may lie easily believed. An- other way is somewhat more strange, and yet it is possible to be true : which is bv being carrii'd liy the rmoo of the spirit whieli is their conductor, either above the earth or nbovo the sea, swiftly, to the plaoo where tliey arc to meet ; wliioli I am persiiadoil to be likewise possililo, in rospeel that as Ila- l)akkuk was canieil by the an^el in that form to the den whore Daniel lay, so think I the devil will bo ready to iniitiito (iod, as well in that as in other things ; which is much more possible to him to do, being a spirit, than to a mighty wind, being but a natural meteor, to transport from one place to an- other a solid body, as is commonly and daily seen in practice. But in this violent form they cannot be carried but a short bounds, agreeing with the space that they may re- tain their breath ; for if it were longer, their breath could not remain unextinguished, their body being carried in such a violent and forcible manner, as, by example, if one fall ofif a small height, his life is but in peril according to the hard or soft lighting ; but if one fall from a high and stay [steep] rock, his breath will be forcibly banished from the body before he can win [get] to the earth, as Is oft seen by experience. And in this transporting they say themselves that they are invisible to any other, except amongst themselves. For if the devil may form what kind of impressions he pleaaes in the air, as I have said before, speaking of magic, why may he not far easier thicken and obscure 80 the air that is next about them, by con- tracting it strait together, that the beams of any other man's eyes cannot pierce through the same to see them ? But the third way of their coming to their conventions is that wherein I think them deluded ; for some of them saith that, being transformed in the likeness of a little beast or fowl, they will come and pierce through whatsoever house or church, though all ordinary passages be closed, by whatsoever open the air may enter in at. And some saith tnat their bodies lying still, as in an ecst.ioy, their spirits will be ravished out of their bodies and c-irried to such places ; and for verifying thereof will give evident tokens, as well by witnesses that have scan their hotly lying senseless in the mean time, as by naming persons whom with thoy met, and givin:: tokens what purpose was against them, whom otherwise they could not have known ; for this form of journeying they affirm to use most when thoy are transported from one country to another. DiViHonoloijU-. JOSEPH HALL, D.D.. born at .\shliy-do-la-7,ouch, 1,')74 ; became Bishop of Kxeter, ItV.'T; was translated to Norwioh, 1641 ; and died l(i.')ti. His Works, now first eolleeled, with some Account of his Life and SufTerings, written by himself, etc., new edition (by tlio Kev. Peter Hall), wa" published, Oxford, 1S37-'J, 12 vols. 8vo. " A writor n-i dislinKuishrd in works of praofi- oftl pii'ty ivns Ilall. Ilis Art of Divine Medita- tion, hia CentiMiiplations, nnd indeeil many of hia writiiiRs, remind us frequently of [Jeremy] Tay- lor. Both bad equally pious and devotion^ tcm- JOSEPH HALL. 43 pers ; both were full of learning ; both fertile of illustration; both may be said to .hare strong im- agination and poetical geiiius, though Taylor let his predominate a little more. Taylor is also rather more subtle and argumentative; his copi- ousness has more real variety. Hall keeps more closely to his subject, dilates upon it sometimes more tediously, but more appositely. In his ser- mons there Is some excess of quotation and far- fetched illustration, but less than in those of Tay- lor. In some of their writings these two great divines resemble ea^h other, on the whole, so much, that we might for a short time not discover which we were reading. I do not know that any third writer oomes close to either." — Hallau : Lit. Hiat. of Europe. On the Hypocrite. An hypocrite is the worst kind of player, by so much that he acts the better part ; which hath always two faces, ofttimes two hearts ; that can compose his forehead to sadness and gravity, while he bids his heart be wanton and careless within, and, in the mean time, laughs within himself to think how smoothly he hath cozened the beholder. In whose silent face are written the char- acters of religion, which his tongue and ges- tures pronounce, but his hands recant. That hath a clear face and garment, with a foul soul ; whose mouth beliea his heart, and his fingers bely his mouth. Walking early up into the city, he turns into the great church, and salutes one of the pillars on one knee, worshipping that Grod which at home he cares not for, while his eye is fixed on some window or some passenger, and his heart knows not whither his lips go. He rises, and looking about with admiration, com- plains of our frozen charity, commends the ancient. At church he will ever sit where he may be seen best, and in the midst of the sermon pulls out his tables in haste, as if he feared to lose that note ; when he writes either his forgotten errand or nothing. Then he turns his Bible with a noise, to seek an omitted quotation, and folds the leaf as if he had found it, and asks aloud the name of the preacher, and repeats it, whom he pub- licly salutes, thanks, praises in an honest mouth. He can command tears when he speaks of his youth, indeed, because it is past, not because it was sinful ; himself is now better, but the times are worse. All Other sins he reckons up with detestation, while he loves and hides his darling in his bosom : all his speech returns to himself, and every concurrent draws in a story to his own praise. When he should give, he looks about him, and says. Who sees me? No alms nor prayers fall from him without a witness ; belike lest God should deny that he hath received them ; and when he hath done (lest the world should not know it), his own mouth is his trumpet to proclaim it. With the superfluity of his usury he builds an hospital, and harbours them whom his ex- tortion hath spoiled: so when he makes many beggars, he keeps some. He turneth all gnats into camels, and cares not to undo the world for a circumstance. Flesh on a Friday is more abominable to him than his neighbour's bed ; he abhors more not to un- cover at the name of Jesus than to swear by the name of God. When a rhymer reads his poem to him, he begs a copy, and persuades the press. There is nothing that he dislikes in presence, that in absence he censures not. He comes to the sick bed of his step-mother and weeps, when he secretly fears her recovery, lie greets his friend in the street with a clear countenance, so fast a closure, that the other thinks he reads his heart in his face : and shakes hands with an indefinite invitation of — When will you come? and when his back is turned, joys that he is so well rid of a guest ; yet if that guest visit him unfeared, he counterfeits a smiling welcome, and ex- cuses his cheer, when closely he frowns on his wife for too much. He shows well, and says well, and himself is the worst thing he hath. In brief, he is the stranger's saint, the neighbour's disease, the blot of goodness, a rotten stick in a dark night, the poppy in a cornfield,. an ill-tempered candle with a great snuffs, that in going out smells ill ; an angel abroad, a devil at home ; and worse when an angel than when a devil. On the Bust-Bodt. His estate is too narrow for his mind ; and, therefore, he is fain to make himself room in other's affairs, yet ever in pretence of love. No news can stir but by his door ; neither can he know that which he must not tell. AVhat every man ventures in a Guiana voyage, and what they gained, he knows to a hair. Whether Holland wil' have peace he knows; and on what con- ditions, and with what success, is fiimiliar to him, ere it be concluded. No post can pass him without a question ; and rather than he will lose the news, he rides back with him to appose [question] him of tidings ; and then to the next man he meets he sup- plies the wants of his hasty intelligence, and makes up a perfect tale ; wherewith he so haunteth the patient auditor, that, after many excuses, he is fain to endure rather the censures of his manners in running away, than the tediousness of an imperti- nent discourse. His speech is oft broken off with a succession of long parentheses, which he ever vows to fill up ere the con- clusion ; and perhaps would effect it, if the other's ear were as unweariable as his 44 ROBERT BURTON. tongue. If he nee but two men talk, and read a letter in the street, he runs to them, and aska if he may not be partner of that secret relation ; and if thiy deny it, he offers to tell, since he may not hear, wonders ; and then falls upon the report of the Scot- tish mine, or of the great fish taken up at Lynn, or of the freezing of the Thames : and, after many thanks and dismissions, is hardly intreated silence. lie undertakes as much as he performs little. ' This man will thrust himself forward to be the guide of the way he knows not; and calls at his neigh- bour's window, and asks why his servants are not at work. The market hath no com- modity which he prizeth not, and which the next table shall not hear recited. His tongue, like the tail of Samson's foxes, carries firebrands, and is enough to set the whole field of the world on a flame. Him- self begins table-talk of his neighbour at another's board, to whom he bears the first news, and adjures him to conceal the re- porter: whose choleric answer he returns to his first host, enlarged with a second edi- tion : so, as it uses to be done in the fight of unwilling mastiffs, he claps each on the side apart, and provokes them to an eager con- flict. There can no act pass without his comment ; which is ever fai^fetohed, rash, suspicious, dilatory. His ears are long, and his eyes quick, but most of all to imperfec- tions ; which, as he easily sees, so he in- creases with intermeddling. He harbours another man's servant ; and amidst his entertainment, asks what fare is usual at home, what hours are kept, what talk passeth at their meals, what nis mas- ter's disposition is, what his government, what his guests ; and when he hath, by curious inquiries, extracted all the juice and spirit of hoped intelligence, turns him off whence he came, and works on a new. He hates constancy, as an earthen dulness, unfit for men of spirit ; and loves to change his work and his place : neither yet can he be so soon weary of any place, as every place is weary of him ; for, as he sots himself on work, so others pay liim with hatred ; and look, how many masters he hath, so many dnemies; neither is it possible that any should not hate him, but who know him not. So then, ho labours without thanks, talks without credit, lives without love, dies without tears, without pity— save that some Bay, 'It was pity ho died no sooner,' ROBERT BURTON was born at Lindloy, Leicestershire, 1576, Mid di id Januory 25, 1639-40. Burton was the author of the famous An- atomy of Melancholy, Oxford, 1621, 4to. "Burton's 'Anatomy of Melancholy,' he said, was the only book that ever took him [Dr. John- son] out of bed two hours sooner than he wished to rise." — BotweWt Life of Dr. Johnson, year 1771. " He composed this book with a view of reliev- ing his own melancholy, but increased it to such a degree that nothing could make him laugh but going to the bridge-foot and hearing the ribaldry of the bargemen, which rarely failed to throw him into a violent fit of laughter. Before he was over- come with this horrid disorder, he, in the intervals of bis vapours, was esteemed one of the most fa- cetious companions in the nniversity." — Gban- OER : Biog. HUt. of England. Melancholt and Contemplation. Voluntary solitariness is that which is fa- miliar with melancholy, and gently brings on, like a siren, a shooing-horn, or some sphinx, to this irrevocable gulf: a primary cause Piso calls it ; most pleasant it is at first, to such as are melancholy given, to lie in bed whole days, and keep their chambers ; to walk alone in some solitary grove, betwixt wood and water, by a brook-side ; to medi- tate upon some delightsome and pleasant subject, which shall ajSTect them most ; " ama- bilis insania," and "mentis gratissimas er- ror." A most incomparable delight it is so to melancholise, and build castles in the air ; to go smiling to themselves, acting an infi- nite variety of parts, which they suppose and strongly imagine they represent, or that they see acted or done. "^Blanda guidem ab initio," saith Lemnius, to conceive and meditate of such pleasant things, sometimes, present, past, or to come, as Rhiisis speaks. So delightsome these toys are at first, they could spend whole days and nights without sleep, even whole years alone in such contem- plations and fantastical meditations, which are like unto dreams ; and they will hardly be drawn from them, or willingly interrupt. So pleasant their vain conceits are, that they hinder their ordinary tasks and neces- sary business ; they cannot address them- selves to them, or almost to any study or employment: these fantastical and bewitch- ing thoughts so covertly, so feelingly, so ur- gontly, so continually set upon, creep in, insinuate, possess, overcome, distract, and detain them ; they cannot, I say, go about their more necessary business, stave off or extricate themsolvos, but are over musing, melancliolising, and carried along as he (they say) that is led about an heath, with n puck in the night They run earnestly on in this labyrintn of anxious and solicitous melancholy meditations, and cnnnot well or willingly refrain, or easily leave off winding and unwinding themselves, as so many clocks, and still pleasing their humours, un- til at last the scone is turned upon a sudden. GEORGE SANDYS. 15 by some bad object; and they, being now habituated to such vain meditations and sol- itary places, can endure no company, can ruminate of nothing but harsh and dis- tasteful subjects. Fear, sorrow, suspicion, "subrusticus pudor," discontent, cares, and weariness of life, surprise them in a mo- ment ; and they can think of nothing else : continually suspecting, no sooner are their eyes open but this infernal plague of melan- 3holy seizeth on them, and terrifies their souls, representing some dismal object to their minds, which now, by no means, no labour, no persuasions, they can avoid ; " hseret lateri lethalis arundo ;" they may not be rid of it ; they cannot resist. I may not deny but there is some profitable medi- tation, contemplation, and kind of solitari- ness to be embraced which the fathers so highly commended (Hierom, Chrysostome, Cyprian, Austin, in whole tracts, which Pe- trarch, Erasmus, Stella, and others so much magnify in their books) ; a paradise, a heaven on earth, if it be used aright, good for the body and better for the soul ; as many of these old monks used it to divine contemplation ; as Simulus, a courtier in Adrian's time, Dioclesian, the emperor, retired themselves, &c. In that sense, "' Vatia solus scit vivere," which the Romans were wont to say when they commended a country life ; or to the bettering of their knowledge, as Demooritus, Cleanthes, and those excellent philosophers have ever done, to sequester themselves from the tumultuous world ; or as in Pliny's Villa Laurentana, Tally's Tuseulu, Jovius's study, that they might better "vacare studiis et Deo." Methinks, therefore, our too zealous innovators were not so well advised in that general subversion of abbeys and religious houses, promiscuously to fling down all. They might have taken away those gross abuses crept in amongst them, rectified such inconveniences, and not so far to have raved and ravaged against those fair buildings and everlasting monuments of our forefathers' devotion, consecrated to pious uses. Anatomy of Melancholy. GEORGE SANDYS, seventh son of Archbishop Sandys, was born in 1577 ; became a great traveller ; was for some time in Virginia as Treasurer for the English colony, and completed his excellent translation of the Metamorphoses of Ovid on the banks of the James ; returned to England, and died there 1643. He published A Relation of a Journey begun A.D. 1610 ; Four Bookes, containing a Description of the Turkish Empire, of Egypt, of the Holy Land, of the remote Parts of Italy, and Islands adjoining, Lond., 1615, fol. " The desoriptiona and draughts of our learned, sagaoioua countryman, Mr. Sandys, respecting the remarkable places in and about Jerusalem, must be acknowledged so faithful and perfect that they leave very little to be added by after-comerS, and nothing to be corrected." — Maundrell : Journey from Aleppo to Jerusalem, Oxf., 1703, 8vo, p. 68. We give an extract from Sandys's dedica- tion of his Relation to Prince Charles, after- wards King Charles I. Modern State op Ancient Countries. The parts I speak of are the most re- nowned countries and kingdoms; once the seats of most glorious and triumphant em- pires; the theatres of valour and heroical actions ; the soils enriched with all earthly felicities ; the places where Nature hath pro- duced her wonderful works ; where arts and sciences have been invented and perfected ; where wisdom, virtue, policy, and civility have been planted, have flourished ; and, lastly, where God himself did place his own commonwealth, gave laws and oracles, in- spired his prophets, sent angels to converse with men ; above all, where the Son of God descended to become man ; where he honoured the earth with his beautiful steps, wrought the works of our redemption, triumphed over death, and ascended into glory ; which countries, once so glorious and famous for their happy estate, are now, through vice and ingratitude, become the most deplored spectacles of extreme misery; the wild beasts of mankind having broken in upon them, and rooted out all civility, and the pride of a stern and barbarous tyrant pos- sessing the thrones of ancient and just do- minion. Who, aiming only at the height of greatness and sensuality, hath in tract of time reduced so great and goodly a part of the world to that lamentable distress and servitude, under which (to the astonishment of the understanding beholders) it now faints and groaneth. Those rich lands at this present remain waste and overgrown with bushes, receptacles of wild beasts, of thieves and murderers ; large territories dispeopled or thinly inhabited ; goodly cities made des- olate; sumptuous buildings become ruins; glorious temples either subverted or prosti- tuted to impiety; true religion discounte- nanced and oppressed; all nobility extin guished; no light of learning permitted, nor virtue cherished ; violence and rapine insulting over all, and leaving no security except to an abject mind, and unlooked-on poverty ; which calamities of theirs, so great and deserved, are to the rest of the world as threatening instructions. For assistance 46 SAMUEL PURCHAS.—LORD EDWARD HERBERT. ■wherein, I have not only related what I saw of their present condition, but, so fur as con- venience might permit, presented a brief view of the farmer estates and first an- tiquities of those peoples and countries ; thence to draw a right image of the frailty of man, the mutability of whatever is ■worldly, and assurance that, as there is nothing unchangeable saving God, so no- thing stable but by his grace and protection. SAMUEL PURCHAS, D.D., born 1577, died 1628, gained well-deserved fame by his collections of Voyages, viz. : Ilaklvytvs Posthumus, or Pvrchas his Pil- grimes, contayning a History of the World, in Sea Voyages and Lande Travells, by Englishmen and others, Lond., 1625-6, 5 vols. fol. " He has imitated Hakluyt too much, swelling his work into five volumes in folio : yet the whole collection is very valuable, as having preserved many considerable voyages that might otherwise have perished. But, like Hakluyt, he has thrown all that came to hand to fill up so many volumes, and is excessive full of his own notions and of mean fiuibhling and playing words : yet for such as can make choice of the best, the collection is very valuable." — Explan, Cnt, of Voy. prefixed to ChurckilVa CoUec.j ascribed to John Locke, On the Sea. As God hath combined the sea and land into one globe, so their joint combination and mutual assistance is necessary to secu- lar happiness and glory. The sea covereth one-half of this patrimony of man, whereof God set him in possession when he said, " Replenish the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth." . . . Thus should man at once lose half his inheritance, if the art of navigation did not enable hira to manage this untamed beast, and with the bridle of the winds and saddle of his shipping to make him 8erviceal>lo. Now for the services of the sea, they are in- numerable: it is tlio great purveyor of the world's ooiniuoditioB to our use; convoyer of the oxcoHM of riviM's; unitor, by tralVirk, pf all nations; it prosoiils the eye with divorsiflod colours and motions, and is, ivs it were, with rich luooolios, adorned with various islands. It is an open field for merchandise in peace ; a pitched field for the most dreadful figlits of war; yields diversity of fish and fowl fur diet; niatorials for wealth, medicine lor heiillh, siinplos for molicinos, pearls and other jewels for orna- in(!iit; amber and amlicrgnse for delight; " the wonders of the Lord in the deep" foi instruction, variety of creatures for use, multiplicity of natures for contemplation, diversity of accidents for admiration, com- pendiousness to the way, to full bodies healthful evacuation, to the thirsty earth fertile moisture, to distant friends pleasant meeting, to weary persons delightful re- freshing, to studious and religious minds a map of knowledge, mystery of temperance, exercise of continence ; school of prayer, meditation, devotion, and sobriety ; refuge to the distressed, portage to the merchant, passage to the traveller, customs to the prince, springs, lakes, rivers, to the earth ; It hath on it tempests and calms to chastise the sins, to exercise the faith, of seamen ; manifold affections in itself, to affect and stupefy the subtlest philosopher ; sustaineth movable fortresses for the soldier ; main- taineth (as in our island) a wall of defence and watery garrison to guard the state ; entertains the sun with vapours, the moon with obsequiousness, the stars also with a natural looking-glass, the sky with clouds, the air with temperateness, the soil with suppleness, the rivers ■with tides, the hills with moisture, the valleys with fertility ; containeth most diversified matter for me- teors, most multiform shapes, most various, numerous kinds, most immense, diSbrmed, deformed, unformed monsters; once (for why should I longer detAJn you 1) the sea yields action to the body, meditation to the mind, the world to the world, all parts thereof to each part, by this art of arts, navigation. Pilgrimes. LORD EDWARD HERBERT, of Cherbury, born 1581, and died 1648. among other productions gave to the world a History of the Life and Reign of H»nry VIII. of "England, Lend., 164'.V, fol. " Has ever been esteemed one of the best his- tories in the English language ; but there is not in it that porfcot onndnur which one would wish, or expect to see. in so celebrated an historian. lie has given us a much justor portnvit of himself than he has of lloDry. He appears to have laid open cvory foible or dofei't in ni? own ohnracter, but has oast the monstrous vioos of that monstrous tvnvnt into shade, and hn« displayed to great ad- vantage his gallantry. mnL^nilioonco, and gener- osity." — GiiANURH : Biog. Hitl. of Eng. Sir Thomas Core's Resignation op tbb Great Seal. Sir Thomas More, Lord Chancellor of England, after divers suits to be discharged of his place (which he had held two years and a half) did at length by the king's'good SIR THOMAS OVEBBURT. 47 leave resign it. The example whereof being rare, will give me occasion to speak more particularly of him. Sir Thomas More, a person of sharp wit, and endued besides with excellent parts of learning (as his works may testify), was yet (out of I know not what natural facetiousness) given so much to jesting that it detracted no little from the gravity and importance of his place, which, though generally noted and disliked, I do not think was enough to make him give it over in that merriment we shall find anon, or retire to a private life. Neither can I believe him so much addicted to his. private opinions as to detest all other governments by his own Utopia, so that it is probable some vehement desire to follow his book, or secret offence taken against some person or matter (among which perchance the king's new intended marriage, or the like, might be accounted) occasioned this strange counsel ; though yet I find no reason pretended for it but infirmity and want of health. Our king hereupon taking the seal, and giving it, together with the order of knighthood, to Thomas Audeley, speaker of the Lower House, Sir Thomas More, without acquaint- ing anybody with what he had done, repairs to his family at Chelsea, where, after a mass celebrated the next day in the church, he came to his lady's pew, with his hat in his hand (an office formerly done by one of his gentlemen), and says, " Madam, my lord is gone." But she thinking this at first to be but one of his jests, was little moved, till he told her sadly, he had given up the great seal ; whereupon she speaking some passion- ate words, he called his daughters then pres- ent to see if they could not spy some fault about their mother's dressing; but they after search after search saying they could find none, he replied, " Do you not perceive that your mother's nose standeth somewhat awry ?" — of which jeer the provoked lady was so sensible that she went from him in a rage. Shortly after, he acquainted his ser- vants with what he had done, dismissing them also to the attendance of some other great personages, to whom he had recom- mended them. For his fool, he bestowed him on the lord mayor during his office, and afterwaiids on his successors m that charge. And now coming to himself, he began to consider how much he had left, and finding that it was not above one hundred pounds yearly in lands, besides some money, he ad- vised with his daughters how to live together. But the grieved gentlewomen (who knew not what to reply, or indeed how to take these jests) remaining astonished, he says, " We will begin with the slender diet of the stu- dents of the law, and if that will not hold out, we will take such commons as they have at Oxford ; which yet if our purse will not stretch to maintain, for our last refuge we will go a-begging, and at every man's door sing togjther a Salve Regina to get alms." But these jests were thought to have in them more levity than to be taken every- where for current; he might have quitted his dignity without using such sarcasms, and be taken himself to a more retired and quiet life, without making them or himself contemptible. And certainly whatsoever he intended hereby, his family so little under- stood his meaning that they needed soma more serious instructions. So that I cannot persuade myself for all this talk, that so ex- cellent a person would omit at fit times to give his family that sober account of his relinquishing this place which I find he did to the Archbishop Warham, Erasmus, and others. History of the Life and Reign of Hermj rui. SIR THOMAS OVERBURY, born 1581, became a companion of the Earl of Somerset, and for opposing his marriage with the Countess of Essex, was murdered in the Tower in 1613. See the Great Oyer of Poisoning : the Trial of the Earl of Somer- set for the poisoning of Sir Thomas Over- bury, in the Tower of London, and various matters connected therewith, from contem- porary MSS., by Andrew Amos, Lond., 1846, 8vo. Of Overbury's works, the best known is entitled A Wife, now the Widdow of Sir Thomas Overbvrye ; Being a most ex- quisite and singular Poem of the Choice of a Wife; Wherevnto are added many witty Characters, and conceited Newes, written by himselfe and other learned Gentlemen his Friends, Lond., 1614, 4to, second edition. *' The characters, though rather too antithetical in their style, are drawn with a masterly hand, and are evidently the result of personal observa- tion." — Drake : ShaJcapeare and hU Times, i 510. The Tinker. A tinker is a moveable, for he hath no abiding in one place ; by his motion he gath- ers heat, thence his choleric nature. He seems to be very devout, for his life is a continual pilgrimage ; and sometimes in hu- mility goes barefoot, therein making neces- sity a virtue. His house is as ancient as Tubal Cain's, and so is a renegade by an- tiquity ; yet he proves himself a gallant, for he carries all his wealth upon his back ; or a philosopher, for he bears all his substance about him. From his art was music first in- vented, and therefore is he always furnished with a song, to which his hammer keeping tune, proves that he was the first founder of 48 JOHN HALES. the kettle-druu. Note, that where the best ale is, there stands his music most upon crotchets. The companion of his travels is some foul, sun-burnt quean; that, since the terrible statute, recanted gipsyism, and is turned pedlaress. So marches he all over England with his bag and baggage ; his con- versation is irreproveable, for he is ever mending. lie observes truly the statutes, and therefore had rather steal than beg, in which he is irremoveably constant, in spite of whips or imprisonment; and so strong an enemy to idleness, that in mending one hole he had rather make three than want work ; and when he hath done he throws the wallet of his faults behind him. He em- braceth, naturally, ancient customs, convers- ing in open fields and lowly cottages ; if he visit cities or towns, 'tis but to deal upon the imperfections of our weaker vessels. His tongue is very voluble, which, with canting, proves him a linguist. He is entertained in every place, but enters no farther than the door, to avoid suspicion. Some would take him to be a coward, but, believe it, he is a lad of mettle ; his valour is commonly three or four yards long, fastened to a pike in the end for flying off. He is very provi- dent, for he will fight with but one at once, and then also lie had rather submit than be counted obstinate. To conclude, if he '«capo Tyburn and Banbury, hedies a beggar. Characters. A Franklin. His outside is an ancient yeoman of Eng- land, though his inside may give arms (with the best gentleman) and never fee the herald. There is no truer servant in the house than himself Thouirh he be master, he says not to his servants, go to field, but, let us go ; and with his own eye doth fatten his flock, and set forward all manner of husbandry. He is taught by nature.to be contented with a little ; his own fold yields him both food and rai- ment; ho is jileased with any nourishment God sends, whilst curious gluttony ransacks, as it were, Noah's ark for food, only to feed the ridt of one meal. He is never Known to go to law ; understanding to be law-bound luiums; iiioii, is like to bo hide- bound among his beasts; they thrive not under it, nnd that such men sleep as un- quiotly as if thoir pillows were stuffed with lawyers' pciii-kiiivos. When he builds, no poor ti'iiiiiil's cottuce hinders his prospect; they arc, indoi'd, his alms-housos, though there bo painted on thom no such superscrip- tion. 1I« novi'i- sits up late, but when ho hunts the l)a(lj;i'i-, the vowod foe of his lambs ; nor uses ho any cnioUy, but when ho hunts tlio hare ; nor subtlety, but when be setteth snares for the snipe, or pitfalls for the black bird ; nor oppression, but when in the month of July he goes to the next river and shears his sheep. He allows of honest pastime, and thinks not the bones of the dead any- thing bruised, or the worse for it, though the country lasses dance in the church-yard after even-song. Rock-Monday, and the wake in summer, shrovings, the wakeful catches on Christmas-eve, the hoky, or seed- cake, these he yearly keeps, yet holds them no relics of Popery. He is not so inquis- itive after news aerived from the privy-closet, when the finding an eyry of hawks in his own ground, or the foaling of a colt come of a good strain, are tidings more pleasant and more profitable. He is lord paramount within himself, though he hold by never so mean a tenure, and dies the more contentedly (though he leave his heir young), in regard he leaves him not liable to a covetous guar- dian. Lastly, to end him, he cares not when his end comes : he needs not fear his audit, for his quietus is in heaven. Characters. JOHN HALES, a famous divine of the Church of England, styled from his learning " The Ever-Memor- able," was born 1584, and died 1656. " He had r«ad more and carried more abonl him, in his excollcot memory, than anj man 1 ever knev. He was one of tlie leaft men in the king- dom, and one of the greatest scholars in Europe." — Lord Clarendon. Of Isqoirt and Private Judgment in Religion. It were a thing worth looking into, to know the reason why men are so generally willing, in point of religion, to cast them- selves into other men's arms, and, leaving their own reason, rely so much upon another man's. Is it because it is modesty and humility to think another man's reason better than our own? Indeed, I know not how it conies to iiass, we neoount it a vice, a port of envy, to tliink another man's goods, or another mon's fortunes, to be bettor than our own ; and yet we account it a singula! virtue to osteeiu our reason and wit meaner tliivn other men's. Let us not mistake our- selves: to contemn the advice and help others, in love and admiration to our own conceits, to depress and disgrace other men's, this is the foul vice of pride ; on the con- trary, thankfully to entertain the advice of otliers, to give it its due, and ingenuously to prefer it before our own if it deserve it, this 18 that gracious virtue of modesty ; but alto- gether to mistrust and relinquish our own JOHN SELDEN. 49 faculties, and commend ourselves to others, this is nothing but poverty of spirit and in- discretion. I will not forbear to open unto you what I conceive to be the causes of this so general an error amongst men. . . . To return, therefore, and proceed in the refuta- tion of this gross neglect in men of their own reason, and casting themselves upon other wits. Hath God given you eyes to see, and legs to support you, that so your- selves might lie still or sleep, and require the use of other men's eyes and legs ? That faculty of reason which is in every one of you, even in the meanest that hears me this day, next to the help of God, is your eyes to direct you, and your legs to support you, in your course of integrity and sanctity ; you may no more refuse or neglect the use of it, and rest yourselves upon the use of other men's reason, than neglect your own and call for the use of other men's eyes and legs. The man in the gospel, who had bought a farm, excuses himself from going to the marriage-supper, because himself would go and see it: but we have taken an easier course ; we can buy our farm, and go to supper too, and that only by saving our pains to see it ; we profess ourselves to have made a great purchase of heavenly doctrine, yet we refuse to see it and survey it our- selves, but trust to other men's eyes, and our surveyors : and wot you to what end? I know not, except it be that so we may with the better leisure go to the marriage- supper; that, with Hatnan, we may the more merrily go in to the banquet provided for us ; that so we may the more freely betake ourselves to our pleasures, to our profits, to our trades, to our preferments and ambition. . . . "Would you see how ridiculously we abuse ourselves when we thus neglect our own knowledge, and securely hazard our- selves upon others' skill? Give me leave, then, to show you a perfect pattern of it, and to report to you what I find in Seneca the philosopher recorded of a gentleman in Rome, who, being purely ignorant, yet greatly desirous to seem learned, procured himself many servants, of whom some he caused to study the poets, some the orators, some the historians, some the philosophers, and, in a strange kind of fancy, all their learning he verily thought to be his own, and persuaded himself tliat he knew all that his servants understood ; yea, he grew to that height of madness in this kind, that, being weak in body and diseased in his feet, he provided himself of wrestlers and runners, and proclaimed games and races, and per- formed them by his servants ; still applaud- ing himself, as if himself had done them. Beloved, you are this man : when you neglect to try the spirits, to study the means 4 of salvation yourselves, but content your- selves to take them upon trust, and repose yourselves altogether on the wit and knowl- edge of us that are your teachers, what is this in a manner but to account with your- selves, that our knowledge is yours, that you know all that we know, who are but your servants in Jesus Christ? Sermons in Golden Remaines, JOHN SELDEN, one of the most learned men whom England has produced, was born at Salvington, Sus sex, 1584, occupied many important public posts, and died 1634. His erudite works are now known only to scholars and anti- quaries, but the volume of his Table-Talk, published by his amanuensis, Richard Mil- ward, "who had observed his discourses for twenty years together," Lond., 1689, 4to, and later editions, still commands the atten- tion of the general reader. "Mr. Selden was a person whom no character can flatter, or transmit in any expressions equal to his merit and virtue. He was of such stupen- dous -learning in all kinds and in all languages, av may appear from his excellent and transcendent writings, that a man would have thought he had been entirely conversant among hooks, and had never spent an hour but in reading and writing ; yet his humanity, courtesy, and afiFability were such, that he would have been thought to have been bred in the best courts, but that his good na- ture, charity, and delight in doing good, and in communicating all he knew, exceeded that breed- ing.** — Earl op Clarendon (his intimate friend for many years) : Life. When Selden was dying, he said to Arch- bishop Usher : " I have surveyed most of the learning that is among the sons of men, and my study is filled with books and manuscripts [he had 8000 volumes in his library] on various sub- jects ; but at present I cannot recollect any passage out of all my books and papers whereon I can rest my soul, save this from the sacred Scriptures : ' The grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men, teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly, in this present world ; looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour •Jesus Christ; who gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto himself a peculiar people, zeal- ous of good works.' (Tit. ii. 14.)" Dr. Johnson and Hallam considered Sel- den's Table-Talk to be far superior to the Ana of the Continent ; and another eminent authority thus speaks of Selden's volume: 50 THOMAS HOBBES. " There is more weighty bullion sense in this fiook than I ever found in the same number of Eages of anj uninspired writer. ... to have een with Selden over his glass of wine, making every accident an outlet and a vehicle of wisdom." — OoLEBiDOK: Lit. Remaiiu, ii. 361, 362. Evil Speaking. 1. He that speaks ill of another, com- monly, before ho is aware, makes himself such a one as he speaks against ; for if he had civility or breeding, he would forbear such kind of language. 2. A gallant man is above ill words. An example we have in the old Lord of Salis- bury, who was a great wise man. Stone had called some lord about court fool ; the lord complains, and has Stone whipped ; Stone cries, " I might have called my Lord of Salis- bury fool often enough before he would have had me whipped."' 3. Speak not ill of a great enemy, but rather give him good words, that he may use you the better, if you chance to fall into his hands. The Spaniard did this when he was dying; his confessor told him, to work him to repentance, how the devil tormented the wicked that went to hell ; the Spaniard replying, called the devil my lord : ''I hope my lord the devil is not so cruel." His con- fessor reproved him. " Excuse me," said the don, "for calling him so; I know not into what hands I may fall ; and if I happen into his, I hope he will use me the better for giving him good words." TabUrTalk. Humility. 1. Humility is a virtue all preach, none practice, and yet everybody is content to near. The master thinks it good doctrine for his servant, the laity for the clergy, and the clergy for the laity. 2. T^ciaT&iBhumilitas qumdaminvitio. If a man does not take notice of that excel- lency and perfection that is in himself, how can he be tnankful to God, who is the author of all excellency and perfection? Nay, if a man hath too mean an opinion of himself, it will render him unserviceable both to God and man. 3. Pride may be allowed to this or that de- gree, else a man cannot keep up his dignity. In gluttdiiM tlioro iiuisi be eating, in drunken- noMM tluTo must lie drinking : it is not the eating, nor it is not the drinking, that is to \)0 blamed, but the excess. So in pride. Table-Talk. Devils ik the Head. A person of quality enme to my eliamber in the Temple, and told me ho Imd two devils in his head (l wondered what ho meant], and just at that time one of them bid him kill me. With that I began to be afraid, and thought he was mad. He laid he knew I could cure him, and therefore en- treated me to give him something, for he Was resolved he would go to nobody else. I per- ceiving what an opinion he had of me, and that it was only melancholy that tro'ubled him, took him in band, warranted him, if he would follow my directions, to cure him in a short time. I desired him to let me be alone about an hour, and then to come again ; which he was very willing to. In the mean time I got a card, and wrapped it up handsome in a piece of tnSeta, and put strings to the taffeta ; and when he came, gave it to him to bang about his neck; withal charged him, that he should not dis- order himself, neither with eating nor drink- ing, but eat very little of supper, and say his prayers duly when he went to bed ; and I made no question but he would be well in three or four days. Within that time I went to dinner to his house, and asked him how he did. He said he was much better, but not perfectly well ; for, in truth, he had not dealt clearly with me ; he had four devils in his head, and he perceived two of them were gone, with that which I had given him. but the other two troubled him still. " Well,"' said I, " I am glad two of them are gone: I make no doubt to get away the other two likewise." So I gave him another thing to hang about his neck. Three davs after, he came to me in my chamber, and professed he was now as well as ever he was in his life, and did extremely thank me for the great care I had taken of him. I, fearing lest he might relapse into the like distemper, told him that there was none but myself and one physician more in the whole town that could cure the devils in the head, and that was Dr. Harvey (whom I had prepaied). and wished him, if ever he found himself ill in my absence, to go to him, for he oauld cure his disense as well as myself. The gentleman lived many years, and was Diver troubled after. Tahle-TM: THOMAS HOBBES, born ]r)!>S, ami died 1679, was the author cf Human Nature; or, the Fundamental Prin- ciplos of I'oliev concerning the Faculties and Passions of the Human Soul, Lond., 1650, 12ino, Leviathan; or, the Matter, Formo, and Power of a Oommonwoalth. ecctesiasti- oall and oivill, 1C51, fol, and other works. "A permanent foundation of his fame remains In his admirablo sljlo, which scema to be the very perfection of didactic language. Short, ol6»r, pre- cise, pithy, his language never has more than on» SIS THOMAS ELYOT. 51 meanings irhiob it never requires a seoond thought to take. By the help of his exaot method it takes 60 firm a hold on the mind, that it will not allow attention to slacken." — Sir Jauks Mackintosh : Second Prelim. Disuert, to Encyc. Brit, Laughter. There is a passion that hath no name ; but the sign of it is that distortion of the coun- tenance which we call laughter, which is always joy ; but what joy, what we think, and wherein we triumph when we laugh, is not declared by any. That it consisteth in wit, or, as they call it, in the jest, experi- ence confuteth ; for men laugh at mischances and indecencies, wherein there lieth no wit nor jest at all. And forasmuch as the same thing is no more ridiculous when it groweth stale or usual, whatsoever it be that moveth laughter, it must be new and unexpected. Men laugh often (especially such as are greedy of applause from everything they do well) at their own actions performed never so little beyond their own expectations: as also at their own jests: and in this case it is manifest that the passion of laughter pro- ceedeth from a sudden conception of some ability in himself that laugheth. Also, men laugh at the infirmities of others, by com- parison wherewith their own abilities are set off and illustrated. Also, men laugh at jests, the wit whereof always consisteth in the elegant discovering and conveying to our minds some absurdity of another ; and in this case also the passion of laughter pro- ceeded from the sudden imagination of our own odds and emincncy ; for what is else the recommending of ourselves to our own good opinion, by comparison with another man's infirmity or absurdity ? For when a jest is broken upon ourselves,, or friends, of whose dishonour we participate, we never laugh thereat. I may therefore conclude that the passion of laughter is nothing else but sud- den glory arising from a sudden conception of some eminency in ourselves, by compari- son with the infirmity of others, or with our own formerly ; for men laugh at the follies of themselves past, when they come sud- denly to remembrance, except they bring with them any present dishonour. It is no wonder, therefore, that man take heinously to be laughed at or derided ; that is, tri- umphed over. Laughing without offence, must be at absurdities and infirmities ab- stracted from persons, and when all the com- pany may laugh together : for laughing to one's self putteth all the rest into jealousy, and examination of themselves. Besides, it is vain glory, and an argument of little worth, to think the infirmity of another Bu£Ecient matter for his triumph. Human Nature. Love of Knowledge. Forasmuch as all knowledge beginneth from experience, therefore also new experi- ence is the beginning of new knowledge, and the increase of experience the beginning of the increase of knowledge. Whatsoever, therefore, happeneth new to a man, giveth him matter of hope of knowing somewhat that he knew not before. And this hope and expectation of future knowledge from anything that happeneth new and strange, is that passion which we commonly call ad- miration ; and the same considered as appe- tite, is called curiosity, which is appetite of knowledge. As in the discerning of facul- ties, man leaveth all community with beasts at the faculty of imposing names, so also doth he surmount their nature at this pas- sion of curiosity. For when a beast seeth anything new and strange to him, he con- sidereth it so far only as to discern whether it be likely to serve his turn or hurt him, and accordingly approacheth nearer to it, or fieeth from it : whereas man, who in most events remembereth in what manner they were caused and begun, looketh for the cause and beginning of everything that ariseth new unto him. And from this pas- sion of admiration and curiosity have arisen not only the invention of names, but also supposition of such causes of all things as they thought might produce them. And from this beginning is derived all philoso- phy : as astronomy from the admiration of the course of heaven ; natural philosophy ' from the strange effects of the elements and other bodies. And from the degrees of curiosity proceed also the degrees of knowledge amongst men ; for, to a man in the chase of riches or author- ity (which in respect of knowledge are but sensuality) it is a diversity of little pleasure whether it be the motion of the sun or the earth that maketh the day ; or to enter into other contemplations of any strange acci- dent, otherwise than whether it conduce or not to the end he pursueth. Because curi- osity is delight, therefore also novelty is so ; but especially that novelty from which a man conceiveth an opinion, true or false, of bettering his own estate; for in such case they stand affected with the hope that all gamesters have while the cards are shuffling. Human Nature. SIR THOMAS ELYOT, a learned, physician, employed by Henry VIII. on several embassies, published, among other works, The Castle of Heltho, Lond., 1533, 16mo. 52 WILLIAM HARRISON. Different Kinds of Exercise. The quality of exercise is the diversity thereof, for as much aa therein be many differences \i moving, apd also some exer- cise moveth more one part of the body, some another. In difference of moving, some is slow or soft, some is swift or fast, some is strong or violent, some be mixed with strength and swiftness. Strong or violent exercises be these : delving (specially in tough clay and heavy), bearing or sustain- ing of heavy burdens, climbing or walking against a steep, upright hill, holding a rope and climbing up thereby, hanging by the hands on anything above a man's reach, that his feet touch not the ground, standing and holding up or spreading the arms, with the hands fast closed and abiding so a long time. Also, to hold the arms steadfast, causing another man to essay to pull them out, and notwithstanding he keepeth his arm steadfast, enforcing thereunto the-sinews and muscles. Wrestling also, with the arms and legs, if the persons be equal in strength, it doth ex- ercise the one and the other ; if the one be stronger, then is [it] to the weaker a more violent exercise. All these kinds of exer- cise and other like them do augment strength, and therefore they serve only for young men which be inclined or be apt to the wars. Swift exercise without violence is running, playing with weapons, tennis, or throwing of the ball, trotting a space of ground forward and backward, going on the toes and holding up the hands ; also, stirring up and down his arms without plummets. Vehement exercise is compound of violent exercise and swift, when they are joined together at one time, as dancing or gnliards, throwing of the ball and running after it ; foot-ball play may be in the num- ber thereof, throwing of the long dart and continuing it many times, running in har- ness, and other like. The moderate exor- cise is long walking or going a journov. The parts of the body have sundry oxeroisos itppropriod unto them: as running and go- ing is more proper for the legs ; niovinj; of the arms up and down, or strotoliing tliom out and pluyiiig with weapons sorveth most for tlio arms and Hlioulilors ; stooping and rising oftcntinu's, or lifting groat woiglits, taking up pluiniiiots or otlior like poises on the ends of staves, and in likewise lilting up ill every Inmd a spear or morrispiUo by the I'lids, specially crossing the hiiiuls, and to lay them down iigiiin in their places; these do exorcise the back and loins. Of the bulk [chost] and lungs the jirojior exeroiso is moving of the broatli in singing or erying. The entrails, which bo uiuleriieiitli the mid- riff, be exercised by blowing either by con- straint or playing on shalms or sackbuts, or other like instruments, which do require much wind. The muscles are best exercised with holding of the breath in a long time, so that he which doth exercise hath well di- gested his meat, and is not troubled with much wind in his body. Finally, loud read- ing, counterfeit battle, tennis or throwing the ball, running, walking, adde[d] to shoot- ing, which, in mine opinion, exceeds all the other, do exercise the body commodionsly. Always remember that the end of violent exercise is difficulty in fetching of the breath ; of moderate exercise alteration of breath only, or the beginning of sweat. Moreover, in winter, running and wrestling is convenient; in summer, wrestling a little, but not running ; in very cold weather, much walking ; in hot weather rest is more expe- dient. They which seem to have moist bodies, and live in idleness, they have need of violent exercise. They which are lean and choleric must walk softly, and exercise themselves very temperately. The plum- mets, called of Galen aUerres, which are now much used with great men, being of equal weight and according to the strength of him that exerciseth, are very good to be used. The Casik of Hdthe. WILLIAM HARRISON, rector of Radwinter, died ]592(?), wrote a Historical Description of the Island of Brit- ain, prefixed to 1 he Chronicles of Englande, Scoflande, and Irelande, by Raphaell IIol- inshed, Lond., 1677, 2 vols. fol. (" Shak- speare edition.") The Languages of Brit.\in. The British tongue called Cvmrio doth yet remain in that part of the island which is now called Wales, whither the Britons wore driven after the Saxons had made a full conquest of the other, which we now call England, although the pristine integritv thereof bo not a little diminished by mixture of the Latin and S;\xon speeches withal. Ilowbeit, many poesies and writings (in making whereof tliat nation hath evermore delightoiU are yet extant in my time, where- by some dilVeieneo between tlio aneient and present language may ea-sily be discerned, notw itlistiinilins that among all tliose ther« is nothing to be found which can set down any sound and full testimony of their own original, in romcnibranoo whereof their bards and cunning men have been most slack and negligent. . . . Next unto the British speech, the I,;itin tongue was brought in by the R»> WILLIAM HARRISON. 53 mans, and in manner generally planted through the whole region, as the French ■was after by the Normans. Of this tongue I will not say much, because there are few which be not skilful in the same. Howbeit, as the speech itself is easy and delectable, 80 hath it perverted the names of the ancient rivers, regions, and cities of Britain, in such wise, that in these our days their old British denominations are quite grown out of mem- ory, and yet those of the new Latin left at most uncertain. This remaineth, also, unto my time, borrowed from the Romans, that all our deeds, evidences, charters, and writ- ings of record are set down in the Latin tongue, though now very barbarous, and thereunto the copies and court-rolls, and processes of courts and leets registered in the same. The third language apparently known is the Scythian, or High Dutch, induced at the first by the Saxons (which the Britons call Saysonace, as they do the speakers Sayson), a hard and rough kind of speech, God wot, when our nation was brought first into acquaintance withal, but now changed with us into a far more fine and easy kind of utter- ance, and so polished and helped with new and milder words, that it is to be avouched how there is no one speech under the sun spoken in our time that hath or can have more variety of words, copiousness of phrases, or figures and flowers of eloquence, than hath our English tongue, although some have affirmed us rather to bark as dogs than talk like men, because the most of our words (as they do indeed) incline unto one syllable. This, also, is to be noted as a tes- timony remaining still of our language, de- rived from the Sasons, that the general name, for the most part, of every skilful artificer in his trade endeth in here with us, albeit the h be left out and er only inserted, as scrivenhere, writehere, shiphere, &e., for scrivener, writer, and shipper, &c. ; besides many other relics of that speech, never to be abolished. After the Saxon tongue came the Norman or French language over into our country, and therein were our laws written for a long time. Our children, also, were, by an espe- cial decree, taught first to speak the same, and thereunto enforced to learn their con- structions in the French, whensoever they were set to the grammar-school. In like sort, few bishops, abbots, or other clergy- men were admitted unto any ecclesiastical function here among us, but such as came out of religious houses from beyond the seas, to the end they should not use the English tongue in their sermons to the people. In the court, also, it grew into such contempt, that most men thought it no small dishonour to speak any English there ; which bravery took his hold at the last likewise in the country with every ploughman that even the very carters began to wax weary of their mother-tongue, and laboured to speak French, which as then was counted no small token of gentility. And no marvel ; for every French rascal, when he came once hither, was taken for a gentleman, only because he was proud, and could use his own language. And all this (I say) to exile the English and British speeches quite out of the country. But in vain : for in the time of King Edward I., to wit, toward the latter end of his reign, the French itself ceased to be spoken generally, but most of all and by law in the midst of Edward III., and then began the English to recover and grow in more estimation than before ; notwithstanding that, among our artificers, the most part of their implements, tools, and words of art retain still their French denominations even to these our days, as the language itself is used likewise in sundry courts, books of record, and mat- ters of law ; whereof here is no place to make any particular rehearsal. Afterward, also, by diligent travail of Geoffrey Chaucer and John Gower, in the time of Richard II., and after them of John Scogan and John Lydgate, monk of Bury, our said tongue was brought to an excellent pass, notwithstand- ing that it never came unto the type of per- fection until the time of Queen Elizabeth, wjierein John Jewel, bishop of Sarum, John Fox, and sundry learned and excellent writers, have fully accomplished the ornature of the sa,me, to their great praise and im- mortal commendation ; although not a few other do greatly seek to stain the same by fond affectation of foreign and strange words, presuming that to be the best English which is most corrupted with external terms of eloquence and sound of many syllables. But as this excellency of theEnglish tongue is found in one, and the south part of this island, so in Wales the greatest number (as I said) retain still their own ancient lan- guage, that of the north part of the said country being less corrupted than the other, and therefore reputed for the better in their own estimation and judgment. This, also, is proper to us Englishmen, that since ours is a middle or intermediate language, and neither too rough nor too smooth in utter- ance, we may with much facility learn any other language, beside Hebrew, Greek, and Latin, and speak it naturally, as if we were home-born in those countries; and yet on the other side it falleth out, I wot not by what other means, that few foreign nations can rightly pronounce ours, without some and that great note of imperfection, espe- cially the Frenchmen, who also seldom 64 IZAAK iV ALTON. write anything that savoureth of English truly. But thlj of all the rest doth breed most admiration with me, that if any stran- ger do hit upon some likely pronunciation of our tongue, yet in age he ewerveth so much from the same, that he is worse therein than ever he was, and thereto, peradventure, halteth not a little also in his own, as I have seen by experience in Reginald Wolfe, and others, whereof I have justly marvelled. The Cornish and Devonshire men, whose country the Britons call Cerniw, have a speech in like sort of their own, and such as hath indeed more affinity with the Amori- can tongue than I can well discuss of. Yet in mine opinion they are both but a cor- rupted kind of British, albeit so far degen- erating in these days from the old, that if either of them do meet with a Welshman, they are not able at the first to understand one another, except here and there in some odd words, without the help of interpreters. And no marvel, in mine opinion, that the British of Cornwall is thus corrupted, since the Welsh tongue that is spoken in the north and south part of Wales doth differ so much in itself as the English used in Scot- land doth from that which is spoken among us here in this side of the island, as I have Raid already. The Scottish-English hath been much broader and less pleasant in utterance than ours, because that nation bath not, till of late, endeavoured to bring the same to any perfect order, and yet it was such in manner as Englishmen theuiselve^'did speak for the most part beyond the Trent, whither any great amendment of our language had not, as then, extended itself. Ilowbeit, in our time the Scottish language endeavoureth to come near, if not altogether to match, our tongue in fineness of phrase and copiousness of words, and this may in part appear by a history of the Apocrypha translated into Scottish verse by Hudson, dedicated to the king of that country, and oontaining six books, except my memory do fail me. Historical Description of iht Island of Britain. IZAAK WALTON, " The Father of Angling," born at Stafford, 1593, died at 'A'inohostor, lllSli. His Con\plete Angler j or. The Contem- Ti1ative_ Man's Hcoroation, Lond., 1653, l6mo, is an English classic. " Wliotlicr wo ivinildor tho ologant slmpHolty of the «tylo, tho I'ftao and unuiri'olcd humour of tho dliilonuo, the lovoly Boonos vrhloh It dollnoiitoa, tho ODohRDting piuliiriil poolry ivliicOi It ooiitniio, or tho duo morality It ao swootly inouloutos, it haa hardly its fellow among any of the modern lan- guages." — Sir John Hawkins. " Among all your quaint readings did you «ver light upon ' Walton's Complete Angler' ? I asked you the question once before ; it breathes the very spirit of mnocence, purity, and simplicity of heart ; there are many choice old verses interspersed in it: it would Christianiie every discordant angry passion. Pray make yourself acquainted with it." — Chablis Lake to Coleridge, Oct. 28, 1796. CONTENTMKNT. Well, scholar, having now taught you to paint your rod, and we having still a mile to Tottenham High Cross, I will as we walk towards it in the cool shade of this sweet honeysuckle hedge, mention to you some of the thoughts and joys that hare possessed my soul since we met together. And these thoughts shall be told yon, that you also may join with me in thankfulness to the Giver of every good and perfect gift for our happiness. And that our present happiness may appear to be the greater, and we the more thankful for it, I will beg you to con- sider with me how many do, even at this very time, lie under the torment of the stone, the gout, and toothache ; and this we are free from. And every misery that I miss is a new mercy ; and therefore let us be thankful. There have been, since we met, others that have met disasters of broken limbs ; some have been blasted, others thun- der-strucken ; and we have been freed from these and all those many other miseries that threaten human nature : let us therefore rejoice and be thankful. Nav, which is a far greater mercy, we are free from the in- supportable burthen of an accusing torment- ing conscience — a misery that none can bear ; and therefore let us praise Him for his preventing grace, and say. Every misery that I miss is a new mercy. Xay, let me tell you, there be many that have forty times our estates, that would give the greatest part of it to be hcalthl'ul and cheerful like us, who, with the expense of a little money, have eat, and drank, and laughed, and angled, and sung, and slept securely ; and rose next day, and oast away care, and sung, and laughed, and angled again, which are blessings rich men cannot purchase with all their money. Let me toll you, scholar, I have a rieh neighbour that is always so busy that ho has no leisure to laugh ; the whole business of his life is to get money, and more money, that he may still get more and more money : he is still drudging on, and says that Solomon says, '• "The hand of the diligent makoth rich;" and it is true indeed : but he considers not that it is not in tlie power of riches to make a man happy ; for it was wisely said by a man of great observation, "That there be as many mi» JAMES HOWELL. 55 eries beyonJ riches as on this side them." And yet God deliver us from pinching pov- erty, and grant that, having a competency, we may be content and thankful 1 Let us not repine, or so much as think the gifts of God unequally dealt, if we see another abound with riches, when, as God knows, the cares, that are the keys that keep those riches hang often so heavily at the rich man's girdle, that they clog him with weary days and restless nights, even when others Bleep quietly. We see but the outside of the rich man's happiness ; few consider him to be like the silkworm, that, when she seems to play, is at the very same time spinning her own bowels, and' consuming herself: and this many rich men do, loading themselves with corroding cares to keep what they have, probably, unconscionably got. Let US, therefore, be thankful for health and competence, and, above all, for a quiet conscience. Let me tell you, scholar, that Diogenes walked on a day, with his friend, to see a country fair, where he saw ribbons, and looking-glasses, and nut-crackers, and fiddles, and hobby-horses, and many other gimcracks ; and having observed them, and all the other finnimbruns that make a complete country fair, he said to his friend, " Lord, how many things are there in this world of which Diogenes hath no need!" And truly it is so, or might be so, with very many who vex and toil themselves to get what they have no need of. Can any man charge God that he hath not given him enough to make his life happy? No, doubtless ; for nature is content with a little. And yet you shall hardly meet with a man that complains not of some want, though he indeed wants nothing but his will; it may be, nothing but his will of his poor neighbour, for not worshipping or not flattering him : and thus, when we might be happy and quiet, we create trouble to ourselves. I have heard of a man that was anorry with him- self because he was no taller; and of a woman that broke her looking-glass because it did not show her face to be as young and handsome as her next neighbour's was. And I knew another to whom God had given health and plenty, but a wife that nature had made peevish, and her husband's riches had made purse-proud ; and must, because she was rich, and for no other vir- tue, sit in the highest pew in the church ; which being denied her, she engaged her husband into a contention for it, and at last into a lawsuit with a dogged neighbour, who was as rich as he, and had a wife as peevish and purse-proud as the other ; and this lawsuit begot higher oppositions and actionable words, and more vexations and lawsuits ; for you must remember that both were rich, and must therefore have thoir wills. Well, this wilful, purse-proud law- suit lasted during the life of the first hus- band, after which his wife vexed and chid, and chid and vexed, till she also chid and vexed herself into her grave; and so the wealth of these poor rich people was cursed into a punishment, because they wanted meek and thankful hearts, for those only can make us happy. I knew a man that had health and riches, and several houses, all beautiful and ready-furnished, and would often trouble himself and family to be re- moving from one house to another ; and being asked by a friend why he removed so often from one house to another, replied, " It was to find content in some one of them." But his friend, knowing his temper, told him, " If he would find content in any of his houses, he must leave himself behind him ; for content will never dwell but in a meek and quiet spirit." And this may ap- pear, if we read and consider what our Saviour says in St. Matthew's gospel, for he there says, " Blessed be the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy. Blessed be the pure in heart, for they shall see God. Blessed be the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. And blessed be the meek, for they shall possess the earth." Not that the meek shall not also obtain mercy, and see God, and be comforted, and at last come to the kingdom of heaven ; but, in the mean time, he, and he only, possesses the earth, as he goes toward that kingdom of heaven, by being humble and cheerful, and content with what his good God has allotted him. He has no turbulent, repin- ing, vexatious thoughts that he deserves better; nor is vexed when he sees others possessed of more honour or more riches than his wise God has allotted for his share ; but he possesses what he has with a meek and contented quietness ; such a quietness as makes his very dreams pleasing, both to God and himself The Complete Angler. JAMES HOWELL, bom 1594, from 1619 travelled in Holland, Flanders, Spain, France, and Italy, as stew- ard to a glassware manufactory, and from the Restoration until his death, in 1666, was Historiographer-Royal of England. Of hia nearly fifty works and translations, the best known is his Bpistolae Ho-Elianae ; or, Fa- miliar Letters, Domestic and Foreign, Lond., 1645, 4to. "X believe the second published oorrespondence of this kind, nnd, in oar own language at least, of any importance after [Joseph] Hall, will be found 56 PETER HEYLIN. to be EpistolsB Ho-EIiaoee, or the letters of Jamea Howell, a great trareller, an intimate friend of Johnson, and the first who bore the office of the royal-historiographer, whiob discover a variety of literature, and abound with much entertaining and useful information." — Warton: Hiit. of Eng. Poet., ed. 1840, ill. 440, 441. Roue in 1621. The following is an extract from a letter written by Howell to Sir William St. John, Knight, dated Rome, September 13, 1621 : Sir, — Having seen Antenor's tomb in Padua, and the amphitheatre of Flaminius in Verona, with other brave towns in Lom- bardy, I am now come to Rome, and Rome, they s&y, is every man's country ; she is called Communis Patris, for every one that is within the compass of the Latin church finds himself here, as it were, at home and in his mother's house, in regard of interest in religion, which is the cause that for one native there be five strangers that sojourn in this city ; and without any distinction or mark of strangeness, they come to prefer- ments and offices, both in church and state, according to merit, which is more valued and sought after here than anywhere. But whereas I expected to have found Rome elevated upon seven hills, I met her rather spreading upon a flat, having hum- bled herself since she was made a Christian, and descended from those hills to Campus Martins ; with Trasieren, and the suburbs of Saint Peter, she hath yet in compass about fourteen miles, which is far short of that vast circuit she had in Claudius his time : for Vopiscus writes she was then of fifty miles in circumference, and she had five hundred thousand free citizens in a famous cense that was made, which, allowing but six to every family, in women, children, and servants, came to three millions of souls; but she is now a wilderness in comparison of that number. The pope is grown to be a great temporal prince of late years, for the state of the church extends above three hundred miles in length and two hundred miles in breadth ; it contains Ferrnrn, Bo- logna, Romagnia, the Mnrquisate of Anoona, Umbria, Sabina, rcriigia. with a part of Tuscany, the patrimony, Rome hersolf, and Latium. In these there are above fifty bishopricks ; the popo hath also the duohy of Spok'to, and the oxiirohate of Ravenna; he hath the town of llcnpvonto in the king- dom of Naples, and the country of Vonissa, called Avignon, in Franco, lie hath title also good enough to Naples itsolf ; liiit ratlior than ofi'ond his ehanijiion, the king of Spain, he is contiiMti'd with a white nuilo, and purse of pistolos about the neck, which he receives every year for \ heriot, or homage, or what you will call it ; he pretends also to be lord paramount of Sicily, Urbin, Parma, and Masseran ; of Norway, Ireland, and England, since King John did prostrate our crown at Pandelfo his legate's feet. . . . The air of Rome is not so wholesome as of old ; and amongst other reasons, one is be- cause of the burning of stubble to fatten their fields. For her antiquities, it would take up a whole volume to write them ; those which I hold the chiefest are Ves- pasian's amphitheatre, where fourscore thou- sand people might sit; the stoves of An- thony ; divers rare statues at Belvidere and St. Peter's, specially that of Laocoon ; the obelisk ; for the genius of the Roman hath always been much taken with imagery, limning, and sculptures, insomuch that, as in former times, so now I believe, the statues and pictures in Rome exceed the number of living people. . . . Since the dismembering of the empire, Rome hath run through many vicissitudes and turns of fortune ; and had it not been for the residence of the pope, I believe she had become a heap of stones, a mount of rubbish, by this time : and how- ever that she bears up indifferent well, yet one may say, — Qui miseranda videt veteris restigia Romte, Ille potest merito dicere, Roma fuit. " They who the mins of first Rome behold. May say, Rome is not now, but was of old." Present Rome may be said to be but a monument of Rome past, when she was in that flourish that St. Austin desired to see her in. She who tamed the world tamed herself at last, and falling under her own weight, fell to be a prey to time ; vet there is a providence seems to have a care of her still ; for though her air be not so good, nor her circumjacent soil so kindly ns it was, yet she hath wherewith to keep life and soul together still, by her ecclesiastical courts, which is the sole cause of her peopling now ; so that it may be said, when the pope came to be her head, she was reduced to her first principles ; for as a shepherd was founder, so a shepherd is still governor and pre- server. EpisMoB Ho-EUance. PETER HEYLIN, D.D., born 1600, died ltiti2, was the author of at least tliirty-sevon works, — theological, polit- ical, eduoationni, historical, Ac. From the \'oyage of France : or, a compleat Journey through France (in 1625), Lond., 1673, 8y6, also 1679, wo give some quotations. "This volume, however, we nssuie our reader*, is of a must amusing desoription, uid indic«tiT( PETER HEYLIN. 57 of great reading and acquirements for the age at which it was written. It is full of the eSerres- cenco of young life and animal spirits. The air of France seems to hare actually conrerted the author into a Frenchman, whose vivacity, point, and badinage he seems to have imbibed. The very moment he touched the Crallio soil he cast away his canonicals, and became the most fa- cetious and joyous of good fellows, the most lively of tourists." — (London) Retroapec, Hev., iii. 22-31, 1821. Character op the French. The present French is nothing but an old Gaul moulded into a new name ; as rash he is, as headstrong, and as hair-brained. A nation whom you shall win with a feather, and lose with a straw; upon the first sight of him you shall liave him as familiar as your sleep, or the necessity of breathing. In one hour's conference you may endear him to you, in the second unbutton him, the third pumps him dry of all his secrets, and he gives them you as faithfully as if you were his ghostly father, and bound to conceal them ' sub sigillo coufessiones' ; when you have learned this you may lie him aside, for he is BO longer serviceable. If you have any hu- mour in holding him in a further acquaint- ance (a favour which he confesseth, and I be- lieve him, he is unworthy of), himself will make the first separation : he hath said over his lesson now unto you, and now must find out somebody else to whom to repeat. Fare him well : he is a garment whom I would be loath to wear above two days together, for in that time he will be threadbare. " Familiare est hominis omnia sibi remit- tere," saith Velleius of all ; it holdeth most properly in this people. He is very kind- hearted to himself, and thinketh himself as free from wants as he is full ; so much he hath in him the nature of a Chinese, that he thinketh all men blind but himself In this private gelf-conceitedness he hateth the Spaniard, loveth not the English, and con- temneth the German ; himself is the only courtier and complete gentleman, but it is his own glass which he seeth in. But of this conceit of his own excellency and partly out of a shallowness of brain, he is very liable to exceptions ; the least distaste that can be draweth his sword, and a minute's pause sheatheth it to your hand ; afterwards, if you beat him into better manners, he shall take it kindly, and cry serviieur. In this one thing they are wonderfully like the devil ; meekness or submission makes them insolent, a little resistance putteth them to their heels, or makes them your spaniels. In a word (for I have held him too long), he is a walk- ing vanity in a new fashion. I will give you now a taste of his table, which you shall find in a measure furnished (I speak not of the present), but not with so full a manner as with us. Their beef they cut out into such chops that that which goeth there for a laudable dish, would be thought here a university commons, new served from the hatch. A loin of mutton serves amongst them for three roastings, besides the hazard of making pottage with the rump. Fowl, also, they have in gocd plenty, especially such as the king found in Scotland; to say truth, that which they have is sufBoient for nature and a friend, were it not for the mistress or the kitchen witch. I have heard much fame of the French cooks, but their skill lieth not in the neat handling of beef and mutton. They have (as generally have all this nation) good fancies, and are special fellows for the mak- ing of puflF-pastes, and the ordering of ban- quets. Their trade is not to feed the belly, but the palate. It is now time you were set down, where the first thing you must do is to say your grace ; private graces are as ordinary there as private masses, and from thence I think they learned them. That done, fall to where you like best ; they ob- serve no method in their eating, and if you look for a carver, you may rise fasting. When you are risen, if you can digest the sluttishness of the cookery (which is most abominable at first sight), I dare trust you in a garrison. Follow him to church, and there he will show himself most irreligious and irreverent. I speak not of all, but the general. At a mass, in Cordeliers' church, in Paris, I saw two French papists, even when the most sacred mystery of their faith was celebrating, break out into such a blas- phemous and atheistical laughter that even an Ethnic would have hated it; it was well they were Catholics, otherwise some French hothead or other would have sent them laughing to Pluto. The French language is, indeed, very sweet and delectable ; it is cleared of all harshness by the cutting and leaving out the conso- nants, which maketh it fall off the tongue very volubly ; yet, in my opinion, it is rather elegant than copious ; and, therefore, is much troubled for want of words to find out para- phrases. It expresseth very much of itself in the action ; the head, body, and shoulders concur all in the pronouncing of it ; and he that hopeth to speak it with a good grace must have something in him of the mimic. It is enriched with a full number of signifi- cant proverbs, which is a great help to the French humour in scoffing ; and very full of courtship, which maketh all the people com- plimental. The poorest cobbler in the village hath his court cringes, and his eau benite de cour; his court holy-water as perfectly as the prince of Cond6. ... At my being there, the sport was dancing, an r^xercise much 58 SIR THOMAS BROWNE. used by the French, who do naturally affect it. And it seems this natural inclination is so strong and deep-rooted, that neither age nor the absence of a smiling fortune can prevail against it. For on this dancing green there assembleth not only youth and gentry, but also age and beggary ; old wives which could not set foot to ground without a crutch in the streets had here taught their feet to amble ; you would have thought by the cleanly conveyance and carriage of their bodies that they had been troubled with the sciatica, and yet so eager in the sport as if their dancing days should never be done. Some there was so ragged that a swift gal- liard would almost have shaken them into nakedness, and they, also, most violent to have their carcasses directed in a measure. To have attempted the staying of them at home, or the persuading of them to work when they heard the fiddle, had been a task too unwieldy for Hercules. In this mixture of age and condition did we observe them at their pastimes ; the rags being so interwoven with the silks, and wrinkled brows being so interchangeably mingled with fresh beauties, that you would have thought it to have been a mummery of fortunes ; as for those of both sexes which were altogether past action, they had caused themselves to be carried thither in their chairs, and trod the meas- ures with their eyes. The Voyage of France. SIR THOMAS BROWNE, M.D., born 1605, died 1682, was the author of four works of great merit : Religio Medici, Lond., 1642, 12mo; Pseudodoxia Epidemica: En- quiries into very many received Tenets, and commonly presumed Truths, or Enquiries into vulgar and common Errors, Lond., 1646, sm. fol. ; Hydriotaphia : Urn Burial), etc., Lond., 1658, 8to; and Christian Morals, Camb., 1716, 8vo. " It ig not on the praises of others, but on his own writings, thut he is to depend for the esteem of posterity ; of which he will not easily be deprived while learning shall have any revoronoe among men; for there is no soionoe in which he docs not discover some skill ; and scarce any kind of knowl- edge, profane or sacred, abstruse or elegant, which he does not appear to have cultivated with suo- oess." — Dn. S. Johnson : Lift of Sir T. Bromie. Tb5 Judgments of God. And to be true, and speak my soul, when I survey the ooourrenoes of my life, and call 'into account the finger of Ood, I ciin per- ceive nothing but an abyss and mass of mer- cies, either in general to mankind, or in particular to myself: and whether out of the prejudice of my affection, or an invert- ing and partial conceit of his mercies. I know not ; but those which others term crosses, afflictions, judgments, mrsfortanes, to me who inquire farther into them than their visible effects, they both appear, and in event have ever proved, the secret and dissembled favours of his affection. It is a singular piece of wisdom to apprehend truly, and without passion, the works of God, and so well to distinguish his justice from his mercy as not to miscall those noble attri- butes : yet it is likewise an honest piece of logic, so to dispute and argue the proceed- ings of God, as to distinguisn even his judg- ments into mercies. For God is merciful unto all, because bet- ter to the worst than the best deserve ; and to say he punisheth none in this world, though it be a paradox, is no absurdity. To one that hath committed murder, if the judge should only ordain a fine, it were a madness to call this a punishment, and to repine at the sentence, rather than admire the clemency of the judge : thus our offences being mortal, and deserving not only death, but damnation, if the goodness of God be content to traverse and pass them over with a loss, misfortune, or disease, what phreniy were it to term this a punishment, rather than an extremity of mercy, and to groan under the rod of his judgments, rather than admire the sceptre of his mercies 1 There- fore to adore, honour, and admire him is a debt of gratitude due from the obligation of our nature, states, and conditions ; and with these thoughts, he that knows them best will not deny that I adore him. That I obtain heaven, and the bliss thereof, is ac- cidental, and not the intended work of my devotion ; it being a felicity I can neither think to deserve, nor scarce in modesty to expect. For these two ends of us all, either as rewards or punishments, are mercifully ordained and disproportionably disposed unto our actions ; the one being so far be- vond our deserts, the other so infinitely bo- low our demerits. There is no salvation to those that believe not in Christ, that is, sny some, since his nativity, and, ns divinity affirmeth, before also ; which makes mo much apprehend the end of those honest worthies and philoso- phers which died before his incarnation. It IS hard to place those souls in hell whose worthy lives do tench us virtue on earth ; methinks amongst those many sulidivisions of hell there might have been'one liiubo left for these. What a strange vision will it be to see their poetical fictions converted into verities, and tneir imagined and fnncied furies into real devils 1 How strange to them will SIR THOMAS BROWNE. 59 Round the history of Adam, when they shall Buffer for him they never heard of! when they that derive their genealogy from the gods, shall know they are the unhappy issue of sinful man 1 Religio Medici. The Conduct op Life. Since thou hast an alarum in thy breast which tells thee thou hast a living spirit in thee above two thousand times in an hour, dull not away thy days in -slothful supinity and the tediousness of doing' nothing. To strenuous minds there is an inquietude in over-quietness, and no laboriousness in la- bour; and to tread a mile after the slow Cace of a snail, or the heavy measures of the izy of Brazilia, were a most tiring penance, and worse than a race of some furlongs at the Olympics. The rapid courses of the heavenly bodies are rather imitable by our thoughts than our corporeal motions: yet the solemn motions of our lives amount unto a greater measure than is commonly appre- hended. Some few men have surrounded the globe of the earth ; yet many in the set locomotions and movements of their days have measured the circuit of it, and twenty thousand miles have been exceeded by them. Move circumspectly, not meticulously, and rather carefully solicitous than anxiously solicitudinous. Think not there is a lion In the way, nor walk with leaden sandals in the paths of goodness ; but in all virtuous motions let prudence determine thy meas- ures. Strive not to run, like Hercules, a fur- long in a breath : festination may prove pre- cipitation : deliberating delay may be wise cunctation, and slowness no slothfulness. Since virtuous actions have their own trumpets, and, without any noise from thy- self, will have their resound abroad, busy not thy best member in the encomium of thy self. Praise is a debt we owe unto the virtues of others, and due unto our own from all whom malice hath not made mutes, or envy struck dumb. Fall not, however, into the common prevaricating way of self- commendation and boasting, by denoting the imperfections of others. He who dis- commendeth others obliquely commendeth himself. He who whispers their infirmities proclaims his own exemption from them ; and consequently says, I am not as this publican, or Tiic niger, whom I talk of. Open ostentation and loud vainglory is more tolerable than this obliquity, as but contain- ing some froth, no ink ; as but consisting of a personal piece of folly, nor complicated with uncharitableness,. Superfluously we seek a precarious applause abroad ; every good man hath h\a plaudite within himself; and though his tongue be silent, is not with- out loud cymbals in his breast. Conscience will become his panegyrist, and never for- get to crown and extol him unto himself. Bless not thyself only that thou wert born in Athens, but, among thy multiplied ac- knowledgments, lift up one hand unto heaven that thou wert born of honest par- ents ; that modesty, humility, patience, and veracity lay in the same egg, and came into the world with thee. From such foun- dations thou mayst be happy in a virtuous precocity, and make an early and lon^ walk in goodness; so mayst thou more naturally feel the contrariety of vice unto nature, and resist some by the antidote of thy temper. Christian Morals. Oblivion. Darkness and light divide the course of time, and oblivion shares with memory a great part even of our living beings. Wa slightly remember our felicities, and the smartest strokes of affliction leave but short smart upon us. Sense endureth no extrem- ities, and sorrows destroy us or themselves. To weep into stones are fables. Afflictions induce callosities; miseries are slippery, or fall like snow upon us, which, notwithstand- ing, is no unhappy stupidity. To be igno- rant of evils to come, and forgetful of evils past, is a merciful provision in nature, whereby we digest the mixture of our few and evil days, and our delivered senses not relapsing into cutting remembrances, our sorrows are not kept raw by the edge of repetitions. A great part of antiquity con- tented their hopes of subsistency with a transmigration of their souls ; a good way to continue their memories, while, having the advantage of plural successions, they could not but act something remarkable in such variety of beings, and enjoying the fame of their passed selves, make accumula- tion of glory unto their last durations. Others, rather than be lost in the uncom- fortable night of nothing, were content to recede into the common being, and make one particle of the public soul of all things, which was no more than to return into their unknown and divine original again. Egyp- tian ingenuity was more unsatisfied, contriv- ing their bodies in sweet consistencies to attend the return of their souls. But all was vanity, feeding the wind and folly. The Egyptian mummies, which Cambyses or time hath spared, avarice now consumeth. Mummy is become merchandise, Mizraim cures wounds, and Pharaoh is sold for bal- sams. In vain do individuals hope for immor- tality, or any patent from oblivion, in pres- ervations below the moon. Men have been deceived even in their flatteries above the 60 OWEN FELL TEAM. Bun, and studied conceits to perpetuate their name in heaven. The various cosmography of that part hath already varied the names of contrived constellations. Nimrod is lost in Orion, and Osiris in the Dog-star. While we look for incorruption in the heavens, we 6nd they are but like the earth, durable in their main bodies, alterable in their parts ; whereof, beside comets and new stars, per- spectives begin to tell tales, and the spots that wander about the sun, with Pharethon's favout, would make clear conviction. Urn Burial. OWEN FELLTHAM, OR FEL- THAM, born about 1608, died about 1678, lived for some years in the family of the Earl of Tho- mond, was the author of Resolves, Divine, Moral, and Pulitical, Lond., without date, t2mo ; 2d edit., Lond., 1628, 4to ; 3d, the first complete edit., Lond., 1628, 4to ; 12th edit.. 1709, 13th edit., 1806, &c., 14th edit., 1820, &c. Both of the last two editions were edited, with an Account of the Author, by J. Camming. New edit., Lond., Pickering, 1839, 12mo; Century L, 1840, cr. 4to; The Beauties of Owen Feltham, Selected from bis Resolves, by J. A., Lond., 1818, 12mo. " We lay aside the Resolves as we part from our dearest friends, in the hope of frequently return- ■ ing to them. We recommend the whole of them to our readers' perusal. They will find therein more solid maxims, as muoh piety, and far bettor writing, than in most of the pulpit lectures now current among us." (London) Hetrospective Re- view, X. 365. " For myself, I can only say that Feltham ap- pears not only a laboured and artificial, but a shallow writer. Among bis many faults, none strike me more than a want of depth, which bis pointed and sententious manner renders more ■ ridiculous. . , . lie is one of our worst writers in point of style ; with little vigour, he has less ele- gance." — Hallau : Lit. Him. of Europe, Iiitroduc. Aqainst Detraction. In some dispositions there is siioh an envi- ous kind of pride, that they cannot endure that any but themselves should bo sot forth as excellent; ei, that, when they hear one justly praised, thoy will either openly do- tract from his virtues, or, if those virtues be like a cleiir and shiiiiiif; light, eminent and distinguished, so that he cannot be safely tradtieed by the tmi^ne, tliey will then raise a suspicion against him by a mysterious silence, as if there wore soiiiethini; remain- ing to be told, whirh over-oloiiilod even his brightest glory. Surely, if wo ennsidoreii detraction to proeood, as it does, from envv, and to bi'long only to dolioient minds, we (hould find that to applaud virtue would Erooure us far more honour than under- andedly seeking to disparage her. The former would show that we loved what we commended, while the latter tells the world we grudge that in others which we want in ourselves. It is one of the basest offices of man to make his tongue the lash of the worthy. Even if we do know of faults in others, I think we can scarcely show our- selves more nobly virtuous than in having the charity to conceal them ; so that we do not flatter or encourage them in their fail- ings. But to relate anything w^e may know against our neighbour, in his absence, is most unbeseeming conduct. And who will not condemn him as a traitor to reputation and society who tells the private fault of his friend to the public and ill-natured world ? When two friends part they should lock up one another's secrets, and exchange their keys. The honest man will rather be a grave to his neighbour's errors than in any way expose them. Of Neglect. There is the same dificrence between dili- gence and neglect that there is between a garden properly cultivated and the slug- gard's field which fell under Solomon's view, when overgrown with nettles and thorns. The one is clothed with beauty, the other is unpleasjint and disgusting to the sight. Negligence is the rust of the soul, that cor- rodes through all her best resolutions. What nature made for use, for strength, for or- nament, neglect alone cenvorts to trouble, weakness, and deformity. Wo need onlv sit still, and diseases will arise from the mere want of exercise. How fair soever the soul mav be, yet while connected with our fleshy "nature" it requires continual care and vijiilance to pre- vent its being soiled and liiseoloured. Take the wecdors from the Floralium and a very little time will chango it to a wilderness, and turn that which was before a recreation for men into a habitation for vermin. Our life is a warfare ; and we ought not, while passing through it, to sleep without a sen- tinel, or march without a scout, lie who neglects either of these prcojxutions exposes himself to surprise, and to becoming a prey to the diligeiioe aiul persevoranoe of his nd- versary. The mountls of life and virtue, as well as those of pastures, will deeny ; and if we do not repair them, all the beasts of the field will enter, and tear up ovorvtbing good \yhieh grows within thcin. 'NVitli the re- ligious and well-disposed a slitiht deviation from wisdom's laws will disturb the mind's fair (leneo. Macarius did penance for only killing a gnat in auger. Like the Jowisk THOMAS FULLER. Gl touch of things unclean, the least miscar- riage requires purification. Man is like a watch : if evening and morning he he not wound up with prayer and circumspection he is unprofitable and false, or serves to mis- lead. If the instrument be not truly set it will be harsh and out of tune : the diapason dies when every string does not perform his part. Surely without a union to God we cannot be secure or well. Can he be happy who from happiness is divided? To be united to God we must be influenced by his goodness and strive to imitate his perfec- tions. Diligence alone is a good patrimony ; out neglect will waste the fairest fortune. One preserves and gathers ; the other, like death, is the dissolution of all. The indus- trious bee, by her sedulity in summer, lives on honey all the winter. But the drone is not only oast out from the hive, but beaten and punished. THOMAS FULLER, bom 1608, died 1661, was the author of The Historic of the Holy Warre, Camb., 1639, fol.. The Holy and Profane State, Camb., 1642, fol., The Church History of Britain, from the Birth of Jesus Christ untill the Year MDCXLVIII., Lond., 1655, fol.. The History of the Worthies of England, Lond., 1662, fol., and other works. "Next to Shakspeare, I am not certain whether Thomas Fuller beyond all other writers does not excite in me the sense and emotion of the marvel- lous; the degree in which any given faculty, or combination of faculties, is possessed and mani- fested, so far surpassing what wo would have thought possible in a single mind, as to give one's admiration the flavour and quality of wonder. Fuller was incomparably the most sensible, the least prejudiced, great man of an age that boasted of a galaxy of great men. In all his numerous volumes, on so many different subjects, it is scarcely too much to say, that you will hardly find a page in which some one sentence out of every three does not deserve to be quoted for itself as a motto or as a maxim." — S. T. Coleridge. "The historical works of Fuller are simply a caricature of the species of composition to which they professedly belong; a systematic violation of all its proprieties. The gravity and dignity of the historic muse are continually violated by him. But not only is he continually cracking his jokes and perpetrating his puns ; his matter is as full of treason against the laws of history as his manner." — Henby Rogebs: Edin. Bev., Ixxiv. 352-353, and in his Essays, Rules por Improving the Memory. First, soundly infix in thy mind what thou desirest to remember. What wonder is it if agitation of business jog that out of thy head which was there rather tacked than fiwtened ? Whereas those notions which get in by " violenta possessio" will abide there till " ejectio firma," sickness, or extreme age dispossess them. It is best knocking in the nail overnight, and clinching it the next morning. Overburden not thy memory to make so faithful a servant a slave ! Remember Atlas was weary. Have as much reason as a camel, to rise when thou hast thy full load. Memory, like a purse, if it be overfull that it cannot shut, all will drop out of it: take heed of a gluttonous curiosity to feed on many things, lest the greediness of the appetite of thy memory spoil the digestion thereof. Beza's case was peculiar and'memo- rable ; being above fourscore years of age, he perfectly could say by heart any Greek chapter in St. Paul's epistles, or anything else which he had learnt long before, but forgot whatsoever was newly told him ; his memory, like an inn, retaining old guests, but having no room to entertain new. ■ Spoil not thy memory by thine own jeal- ousy, nor make it bad by suspecting it. How canst thou find that true which thou wilt not trust? St. Augustine tells of his friend Simplicius, who, being asked, could tell all Virgil's verses backward and for- ward, and yet the same party avowed to God that he knew not that he could do it till they did try him. Sure there is concealed strength in men's memories, which they take no notice of. Marshal thy notions into a handsome method. One will carry twice more weight trussed and packed up in bundles, than when it lies untoward flapping and hanging about his shoulders. Things orderly far- died up under heads are most portable. Adventure not all thy learning in one bottom, but divide it betwixt thy memory and thy note-books. He that with Bias carries all his learning about him in hia head, will utterly be beggared and bankrupt if a violent disease, a merciless thief, should rob and strip him. I know some have a commonplace against commonplace books, and yet, perchance, will privately make use of what they publicly declaim against. A commonplace book contains many notions in garrison, whence the owner may draw out an army into the field on competent warn- ing. Conversation. The study of books is a languishing and feeble motion that heats not ; whereas con- ference teaches and exercises at once. , If I confer with an understanding man and a rude jester, he presses hard upon me on both sides.; his imaginations raise up mine in more than ordinary pitch. Jealousy, glory, and contention stimulate and raise 62 JOHN MILTON. me up to Bomething above myself; and a consent of judgment is a quality totally offensive in conference. But, as our minds fortify themselves by the communication of vigorous and able understandings, 'tis not to be expressed how much they lose and degenerate by the continual commerce and frequentatiou we have with those that are mean and low. There is no contagion that spreads like that. I know sufficiently, by experience, what 'tis worth a yard. I love to discourse and dispute, but it is with few men, and for myself; for to do it as a spec- tacle and entertainment to great persons, and to vaunt of a man's wit and eloquence, is in my opinion very unbecoming a man of honour. Impertinency is a scurvy quality; but not to be able to endure it, to fret and vex at it, as I do, is another sort of disease, little inferior to impertinence itself, and is the thing that I will now accuse in myself. I enter into conference and dispute with great liberty and facility, forasmuch as opinion meets in me with a soil very unfit for penetration, and wherein to take any deep root : no propositions astonish me, no belief offends me, though never so contrary to my own. There is no frivolous and ex- travagant fancy that does not seem to me suitable to the product of human wit. . . , The contradictions of judgments, then, do neither offend nor alter, they only rouse and exercise me. We evade correction, whereas we ought to offer and present our- selves to it, especially when it appears in the form of conference, and not of authority. At every opposition, we do not consider whether or no it be just, but right or wrong how to disengage ourselves ; instead of ex- tending the arms, we thrust out our claws. I could suffer myself to be rudely handled by my friend, so much as to tell me that I am a fool, and talk I know not of what. I love stout expressions amongst brave men, and to have them speak as they think. We must fortify and harden our hearing against this tenderness of the ceremonious xound of words. I love a strong and manly famili- arity in conversation ; a friendship that flatters itself in the sharpness and vigour of communication, like love in biting and scratching. It Im not vigorous and gener- ous enough if it bo not quarrelsome ; if civilized iiMil artificial, if it treads nicelv, and fears the shook. When any one con- tradicts mo, ho raises my attention, not my anger ; I advance tnwanls him that contro- verts, that instructs mo. The cause of truth ought ti) bo the oommon oauso both of one and tlie other. ... I eniliruee and oaresH truth in what hand soever 1 And it, and cheerfully surrender niyself and my conquered arms, as far off as 1 can discover it ; and, provided it be not too imperiously, take a pleasure in being reproved ; and ac- commodate myself to my accusers, very often more by way of civility than amendment, loving to gratify and nourish the liberty of admonition by my facility of submitting to it. . . . In earnest, I rather choose the fre- quentation of those that ruffle me than those that fear me. 'Tis a dull and hurtful pleasure to have to do with people who admire us and approve of all we say. JOHN MILTON, bom 1608, died 1674, is but little known to general readers as a prose writer, great as he was in this species of composition. We give some specimens, — taken from the Reason of Church Government urged against Prela- tory, in two Books, Lond., 1641, 4to, Letter to RIaster Hartlibon'Education, Lend., 1H44, 4to, and Areopagitica ; a Speech to the Par- liament of England for the liberty of unli- censed Printing, Lond., 1644, 4to. " It is to be regretted that the prose writings of Milton should, in our time, be so little read. As compositions, they deserve the attention of every man who wishes to become acquainted with the full power of the English language. They abound with passages compared with which the finest dec- lamations of Burke sink into insignificance. They are a perfect field of cloth of gold. The style is stiff with gorgeous embroidery. Not eren in the earlier books of the Paradise Lost has the great poet ever risen higher than in those parts of his controversial works in wtiich his feeling^:, excited by conflict, find a rent in bursts of devotional and lyric rapture. It is. to borrow his own migestio language, ' a sevenfold chorus of hallelujahs and harping symphonies.'" — Lono Macadlat: Edin. Rer., xliii. 345, and in his Essays. " nis prose writings are disagreeable, though not altogether deficient in genius." — HuuE : Hitt. of Eng. " Milton's prose works are exceedingly stiff and pedantic." — Dr. Richard Farmkr: tioodkugh't E. a. Lib. Man., 43. LiTERART AsPIR.tTIONS. After I had, from my first years, by the ceaseless diligence and care of my father, whom t^icid recompense, been exercised to the tongues, ond some sciences, as my age would suffer, by sundry masters and teachers, both at home and at tlie schools, it was found that whether aught was imposed me by thera that had the overlooking, or be taken to of my own ehoieo in English, or other tongue, prosing or versing, but chiefly the latter, the stylo, by certain vital signs it had, was likely to live. But much latelier, in the private academies of Italy, whither I was favoured to resort, perceiving that some trifles which I had in m<^mory, composed at under twenty JOHN MILTON. 63 or thereabout (for the manner is, that eVfery one must give some proof of his wit and reading there), met with acceptance above what was looked for ; and other things which I had shifted, in scarcity of books and conveniences, to patch up among them, were received with written encomiums, \^ich the Italian is not forward to bestow on men of this side the Alps, I began thus far to assent both to them and divers of my friends here at home ; and not less to an inward prompting, which now grew daily upon me, that by labour and intent study (which I take to be my portion in this life), joined to the strong propensity of nature, I might perhaps leave something so written, to after-times, as they should not willingly let it die. These thoughts at once possessed me, and these other, that if I were certain to write as men buy leases, for three lives and downward, there ought no regard be sooner had than to God's glory, by the honour and instruction of my country. For which cause, and not only for that I knew it would be hard to arrive at the second rank among the Latins, I applied myself to that resolution which Ariosto fol- lowed against the persuasions of JBembo, to fis all the industry and art I could unite to the adorning of my native tongue ; not to make verbal curiosities the end, that were a toilsome vanity ; but to be an interpreter, and relater of the best and safest things among my own citizens throughout this island, in the mother dialect. That what the greatest and choicest wits of Athens, Rome, or modern Italy, and those Hebrews of old did for their country, I in my propor- tion, with this over and above, of being a Christian, might do for mine ; not caring to be once named abroad, though perhaps I could attain to that, but content with these British islands as my world, whose fortune hath hitherto been, that if the Athenians, as some say, made their small ,deeds great and renowned by their eloquent writers, England hath had her noble achievements made small by the unskilful handling of monks and mechanics. . . . Neither do I think it shame to covenant with any know- ing reader, that for some few years yet I may go on trust with him toward the pay- ment of what I am now indebted, as being a work not to be raised from the heat of youth or the vapours of wine ; like that which flows at waste from the pen of some vulgar amorist or the trencher fury of a rhyming parasite ; not to be obtained by the invocation of dame memory and her syren daughters; but by devout prayer to that eternal Spirit who can enrich with all utterance and knowledge, and sends out his seraphim with the hallowed fire of his altar, to touch and purify the lips of whom he pleases. To this must be added industrious and select reading, steady observation, insight into all seemly arts and afiairs ; till which in some measure be compassed, at mine own peril and cost, I refuse not to sustain this expectation from as many as are not loath to hazard so much credulity upon the best pledges that I can give them. The Reason of Church Government. True and False Education. And seeing every nation affords not ex- perience and "tradition enough for all kind of learning, therefore we are chiefly taught the languages of those people who have at any time been most industrious after wisdom ; so that language is but the instrument con- veying to us things useful to be known. And tnough a linguist should pride himself to have all the tongues that Babel cleft the world into, yet, if he have not studied the solid things in them as well as the words and lexicons, he were nothing so much to be esteemed a learned man, as any yeoman or tradesman competently wise in his mother dialect only. Hence appear the many mis- takes which have made learning generally so unpleasing and so unsuccessful : first we do amiss to spend seven or eight years merely in scraping together so much Latin and Greek, as might be learned otherwise easily and delightfully in one year. . . . And for the usual method of teaching arts, I deem it to be an old error of the universi- ties, not yet well recovered from the scholastic grossness of barbarous ages, that instead of beginning with arts most easy (and those be such as are most obvious to the sense), they present their young unmatriculated novic«9 a,t first coming with the most intellective abstractions of logic and metaphysics, so that they having but newly left those gym- nastic flats and shallows where they stuck unreasonably to learn a few words with lamentable construction, and now on the sudden transported under another climate, to be tossed and turmoiled with their unbal- lasted wits in fathomless and unquiet deeps of controversy, do for the most part grow into hatred and contempt of learning, mocked and deluded all this while with ragged notions and babblements, while they expected worthy and delightful knowledge ; till poverty or youthful years call them importunately their several ways, and hasten them, with the sway of friends, either to an ambitious and mer- cenary, or ignorantly zealous divinity ; some allured to the trade of law, grounding their purposes not on the prudent and heavenly contemplation of justice and equity, which was never taught them, but on the promis- 64 JOEN MILTON ing and pleasing thoughts of litigious terms, fat contentions, and flowing fees; others be- talce them to statu affairs, with souls so unprincipled in virtue and true generous breeding, that flattery and courtshifts, and tyrannous aphorisms, appear to them the highest points of wisdom ; instilling their barren hearts with a conscientious slavery ; if, as I rather think, it be not feigned. Others, lastly, of a more delicious and airy spirit retire themselves (knowing no better) tc the enjoyments of ease and luxury, living out their days in feasts and jollity ; which, indeed, is the wisest and the safest course of all these, unless they were with more integrity undertaken. And these are the errors, and these are the fruits of misspend- ing our prime youth at schools and universi- ties as we do, either in learning mere words, or such things chiefly as were better un- learned. I shall detain you now no longer in the de- monstration of what we should not do, but straight conduct you to a hill-side, where I will point you outtheright path of a virtuous and noble education ; laborious, indeed, at the first ascent, but else so smooth, so green, so full of goodly prospect and melodious sounds on every side, that the harp of Or- pheus was not more charming. I doubt not but ye shall have more ado to drive our dullest and laziest youth, our stocks and stubs, from the infinite desire of such a happy nature, than we have now to hale and drag our choicest and hopefuUest wits to that asinine feast of sowthistles and brambles which is commonly set before them, as all the food and entertainment of their tenderest and most docile age. I call, therefore, a complete and generous education, that which fits a man to perform justly, skilfully, and magnanimously, all the offices, both private and public, of peace and war. Letter to Master Hartlib on Education. The Censorship of the Press. I deny not but that it is of the greatest con- cernment in the church and commonwealth to have a vigilant eye how books demean themselves as well as men; and thoreaftor to cnnflno, imprison, and do sliarpest justice on them as malefactors ; for books are not absolutely (lc>iul things, but do contain a potency of liln in tlioiii, to be as active as that Houl whoso ]irogoiiy they are; nay, tlu-y do pri'sorvii, us ill a vial, the purest i>lfu'iioy and oxtnictioii of timt living intellect that l)red them. I know thoy are as lively, and as vigorously productive, as those fabulous dragons' teeth; and being sown up and down, may chance to spring up armeu men. And yet, on the other band, unless warineM be used, as good almost kill a man as kill a good book : who kills a man kills a reason- able creature, God's image ; but he who destroys a good book, kills reason itself, kills the image of God, as it were, in the eye. Many a man lives a burden to the earth ; but a good book is the precious li£^ blood of a master spirit, embalmed and treasured up on purpose to ii life beyond life. 'Tis true no age can restore a life, whereof perhaps there is no great loss ; and revolutions of ages do not oft recover the loss of a rejected truth, for the want of which whole nations fare the worse. We should be wary, therefore, what persecution we raise against the living labours of public men, how spill that seasoned life of^ man, preserved and stored up in books; since we see a kind of homicide may be thus com- mitted, sometimes a kind of martyrdom; and if it extend to the whole impression, a kind of massacre, whereof the execution ends not in the slaying of an elemental life, but strikes at that ethereal and soft essence, the breath of reason itself, slays an immor- tality rather than a life. . . . When n man writes to the world, he summons up all his reason and deliberation to assist him ; he searches, meditates, is industrious, and likely consults and confers with his judicious friends : after all which is done, he takes himself to be informed in what be writes, as well as any that writ before him ; if in this the most consummate act of his fidelity and ripeness, no years, no industrv. no former proof of his abilities, can bring him to that state of maturity, as not to be still mistrusted and suspected, unless he carry all his considerate diligence, all his mid- night watchings, and expense of Palladian oil, to the hasty view of an unleisured licensor, perhaps much his younger, perhaps far his inferior in judgment, perhaps one who never knew the labour of book-writing; and if he be not repulsed, or slighted, must appear in print like a puny with his guai^ dian, and his censor's hand on the back of his title, to be liis bail and surety that he is no idiot or seducer; it cannot be but a dis- honour and derogation to the author, to the book, to the privilege and dignity of learn- ing Vnd how can a man "teno'i with authority, which is the life of teaching; how can ho bo a doctor in his book, ai! he ought to be, or else had better bo silent, whereas all he toaclios, all he delivers, is but under the tuition, under the correction, of his pa- triarchal licenser, to blot or alter what prw- eiscly accords not with the hide-bound humour which he calls his judgment? Areopagitica. EDWARD HYDE. 65 EDWARD HYDE, EARL OF CLARENDON, born 1608, died 1673, will always be dis- tinguished as the author of The History of the Rebellion and Civil Wars in England, to which is added, an historical View of the Affairs of Ireland, Oxf., 1702-3-4. 3 vols, fol. " Clarendon will always be esteemed an enter- taining writer, even independent of our cariosity to know the facts which he relates. His style is prolix and redundant, and suffocates us by the length of its periods ; but it discovers imagination and sentiment, and pleases us at the same time tbat^ve disapprove of it. . . . An air of probity and goodness runs through the whole work, as these qualities did in reality embellish the whole life of the author. . . . Clarendon was always a friend to the liberty and constitution of his country." — Hume: HUt, of Eng, " For au Englishman there is no single historical work with which it can be sff necessary for him to be well and thoroughly acquainted as with Claren- don. I feel at this time perfectly assured, that if that book had been put into my hands in youth, it would have preserved me from all the political errors which I have outgrown." — Southey : Life Olid Correap, But the Hon. Agar Ellis (Cha.racter of Edward Hyde, Earl of Clarendon, Lond., 1827, 8vo) stamps Clarendon as an nnprin cipled man of talent, and Brodie (Hist, of the British Empire, Lond., 1822, 4 vols. 8vo) considers him " a miserable sycophant and canting hypocrite." Character of Oliver Cromwell. He was one of those men, quos vittiperare ne inimici quidem possunt, nisi ut simil lau- dent; whom his very enemies could not condemn without commending him at the same time ; for he could never have done half that mischief without great parts of courage, industry, and judgment. lie must have had a wonderful understanding in the natures and humours of men, and as great a dexterity in applying them : who, from a private and obscure birth (though of argood family), without interest or estate, alliance or friendship, could raise himself to such a height, and compound and knead such oppo- site and contradictory tempers, humours, and interests into a consistence that contributed to his designs, and to their own destruction : whilst himself grew insensibly powerful enough to cut off those by whom he had climbed, in the instant that they projected to demolish their own building. What was said of Cinna may very justly be said of him, ausum eum, qucB nemo auderet bonus; perfecisse quce a nvUo nisi fortissimo, perfici posaent. Without doubt, no man with more wickedness ever attempted anything, or brought to pass what he desired more wick- 5 edly, more in the face and contempt of re- ligion and moral honesty. Yet wickedness as great as his could never have accomplished those designs without the assistance of a great spirit, an admirable circumspection and sagacity, and a most magnanimous resolution. When he appeared first in the parliament he seemed to have a person in no degree gracious, no ornament of discourse, none of those talents which use to conciliate the affections of the stander-by. Yet as he grew into place and authority his parts seemed to be Raised, as if he had concealed faculties till he had occasion to use them ; and when he was to act the part of a great man he did it without any indecency, not- withstanding the want of custom. After he was confirmed and invested Pro- tector by the humble petition and advice, ho consulted with very few upon any action of importance, nor communicated any enter- prise he resolved upon with more than thoso who were to have principal parts in the exe- cution of it ; nor with them sooner than was absolutely necessary. What he once resolved, in which he was not rash, he would not be dissuaded from, nor endure any contradic- tion of his power and authority, but extorted obedience from them who were not willing to yield it. Thus he subdued a spirit that had been often troublesome to the most sovereign power, and made Westminster Hall as obe- dient and subservient to his commands as any of the rest of his quarters. In all other matters, which did not concern the life of his jurisdiction, he seemed to have great reverence for the law, rarely interposing between party and party. As he proceeded with this kind of indignation and haughti- ness with those who were refractory, and durst contend with his greatness, so towards all who complied with his good pleasure, and courted his protection, he used great civility, generosity, and bounty. To reduce three nations, which perfectly hated him, to an entire obedience to all his dictates ; to awe and govern those nations by an army that was indevoted to him, and wished his ruin, was an instance of a very prodigious address. But his greatness at home was but a shadow of the glory he had abroad. It was hard to discover which feared him most, France, Spain, or the Low Countries, where his friendship was current at the value he put upim it. As they did all' sacrifice their honour and their interest to his pleasure, so there is nothing he could have demanded that either of them would have denied him. . . . To conclude his character : Cromwell was not so far a man of blood as to follow Machi- ts EDWARD HYDE. avel'a method ; which prescribes, upon a total alteration of government, as a thing abso- lutely necessary, to cut off all the heads of those, and extirpate their families, who are friends to the old one. It was confidently reported that in the council of officers it was more than once proposed "that there might be a general massacre of all the royal party, as the only expedient to secure the govern- ment," but that Cromwell would never con- sent to it; it may be, out of too great a contempt of his enemies. In a word, as he was guilty of many crimes against which damnation is denounced, and for which hell- fire is prepared, so he had some good quali- ties which have caused the memory of some men in all ages to be celebrated ; and he will be looked upon by posterity as a brave wicked man. History of the Rebellion. Character of Charles I. But it will not be unnecessary to add a short character of his person, that posterity may know the inestimable loss wnich the nation then underwent in being deprived of a prince whose example would have had a greater influence upon the manners and piety of the nation than the most strict laws can have. To speak first of his private qualifications as a man, before the mention of his princely and royal virtues : he was, if ever any, the most worthy of the,title of an honest man ; so great a lover of justice, that no temptation could dispose him to a wrongful action, except it was so disguised to him that he believed it to be just. He had a tenderness and compassion of nature which restrained him from ever doing a hard-hearted thing ; and, therefore, he was so apt to grant pardon to malefactors that the judges of the land represented to him the dam- age and insecurity to the public that flowed from such his indulgence. And then he re- frained himself from pardoning either mur- ders or highway robberies, ana quickly dis- cerned the fruits of his severity by a wonder- ful reformation of those enormities. Ho was very punctual and regular in his devotions: he was never known to enter upon his re- creations or sports, though never so early in the morning, before lie had been at public prayers; so that on hunting days his chap- lains were bound to a very early attendance. Ho was likewiKe very striet in observing the hours of his private oabiiiot devotions, and was so severe an exaeter of gravity and reverence in all montidii of religion, that ho could never ondiiro any light or profane word, with what sharpnesH of wit soever it was eoverod ; and thnHj;li he wns well plonsod and delighted with reading versos made upon any occasion, no man durst bring before him anything that was profane or unclean. That kind of wit had never any countenance then. He was so great an example of con- jugal affection, that they who did not imi- tate him in that particular durst not brag of their liberty; and he did not only permit, but direct, his bishops to prosecute those scandalous vices, in the ecclesiastical courts, against persons of eminence and near rela- tion to his service. His kingly virtues had some mixture and alloy that hindered them from shining in full lustre, and from producing those fruit" they should have been attended with. He was not in his nature very bountiful, though he gave very much. This appeared more after the Duke of Buckingham's death, after which those showers fell very rarely; and he paused too long in giving, which made those to whom he gave less sensible of the benefit. He kept state to the full, which made his court very orderly, no man pre- suming to be seen in a place where he had no pretence to be. He saw and observed men long before he received them about his person ; and did not love strangers, nor very confident men. He was a patient hearer of causes, which he frequently accustomed him- self to at the council board, and judged very well, and was dexterous in the mediating part ; so that he often put an end to causes by Eersuasion, which the stubbornness of men's umours made dilatory in courts of justice. He was very fearless in his person ; but, in his riper years, not very enterprising. He had an excellent understanding, but wns not confident enough of it ; which made him oftentimes change his own opinion for a worse, and follow the advice of men that did not judge as well as himself. This made him more irresolute than the conjuncture of his affairs would admit; if he had been of a rougher and more imperious nature ho would have found more respect and duty. And his not applying some severe cures to approaching evils proceeded from the lenity of liig nature, and the tenderness of his d, made him choose the softer way, and not hearken to severe oounsols, how reasonably soever urged. ... As he excelled in all other vii- tues, so in temperance he was so striet thut he abhori-ed all debauchery to that degrer that, at a groat festival solemnity, where he oneo was, where very many of the nobility of the English and Soots wero entertainetl, being told by one who withdrew from thence, what vast draughts of wine thoy drank, and " that there was one earl who had drank most of the rest down, and was not himself moved or altered," the king said, '' that he dcsorved to bo hanged ;" and that earl com SIR MATTHEW HALE. 67 ing sbortly after into the room where his majesty was, in some gaiety, to show how unhurt he was from that battle, the king nent one to bid him withdraw from his ma- jesty's presence; nor did he in some days after appear before him. History of the Rebellion. SIR MATTHEW HALE, born 1609, Chief Baron of the Exchequer, 1660, Lord Chief Justice of England, 1671, died 1676, was alike distinguished for legal learning and private virtues. "He was most precisely just; insomucli that I believe he would have lost all he had in the world rather than do an unjust act : patient in hearing the most tedious speech which any man had to make for himself; the pillar of justice, the refuge of the subject who feared oppression, and one of the greatest honours of his majesty's government ; for, with some other npright judges, he upheld the honour of the English nation, that it fell not into the reproach of arbitrariness, cruelty, and utter confusion. Every man that had a just cause was almost past fear if he could bring it to the court or assize where he was judge; for the other judges seldom contradicted him. ... I, who heard and read his serions expressions of the concernments of eternity, and saw his love to all good men, and the blamelessness of his life, thought better of his piety than my own." — Richard Baxter. Letter to his Children. Dear Chudren, — I thank God I came well to Farrington this day, about fire o'clock. And as I have some leisure time at my inn, I cannot spend it more to my own satisfaction, and your benefit, than, by a letter, to give you some good counsel. The subject shall be concerning your speech ; because much of the good or evil that be- falls persons arises from the well or ill managing of their conversation. When I have leisure and opportunity, I shall give you my directions on other subjects. Never speak anything for a truth which you know or believe to be false. Lying is a great sin against Ood, who gave us a tongue to speak the truth, and not false- hood. It is a great offence against human- ity itself; for, where there is no regard to truth, there can be no safe society between man and man. And it is an injury to the speaker ; for, besides the disgrace which it brings upon him, it occasions so much base- ness of mind that he can scarcely tell truth,' or avoid lying, even when he has no colour of necessity for it ; and, in time, he comes to such a pass that as other people cannot believe he speaks truth, so he himself scarcely knows when he tells a falsehood. As you must be careful not to lie, so you must avoid coming near it. Tou must not equivocatg, nor speak anything positively for which you have no authority but report, or conjecture, or opinion. Let your words be few, especially when your superiors,' or strangers, are present, lest you betray your own weakness, and rob your- selves of the opportunity, which you might have otherwise have had, to gain knowl- edge, wisdom, and experience, by hearing those whom you silence by your impertinent talking. Be not too earnest, loud, or violent in your conversation. Silence your opponent with reason, not with noise. Be careful not to interrupt another when he is speaking ; hear him out, and you will understand him the better,. and be able to give him the better answer. Consider before you speak, especially when the business is of moment ; weigh the sense of what you mean to utter, and the expres- sions you intend to use, that they may be significant, pertinent, and inoffensive. In- considerate people do not think till they speak ; or they speak, and then think. Some men excel in husbandry, some in gardening, some in mathematics. In con- versation, learn, as near as you can, where the skill or excellence of any person lies ; put him upon talking on that subject, ob- serve what he says, keep it in your memory, or commit it to writing. By this means you will glean the worth and knowledge of every- body you converse with, and, at an easy rate, acquire what may be of use to you on many occasions. When you are in company with light, vain, impertinent persons, let the observing of their failings make you the more cautious both in your conversation with them and in your general behaviour, that you may avoid their errors. If any one, whom you do not know to be a person of truth, sobriety, and weight, re- lates strange stories, be not too ready to be- lieve or report them; and yet (unless he is one of your familiar acquaintance) be not too forward to contradict him. If the oc- casion requires you to declare an opinion, do it modestly and gently, not bluntly nor coarsely ; by this means you will avoid giv- ing offence, or being abused for too much credulity. If a man whose integrity you do not very well know, makes you great and extraordi- nary professions,, do not give much credit to him. Probably you will find that he aims at something besides kindness to you, and that when he has served his turn, or been disappointed, his regard for you will grow cool. Beware also of him who flatters you, and C8 ROBERT LEIGHTON. commends you to your face, or to one who he thinks will tell you of it ; most probably he has either deceived or abused you, or means to do so. Remember the fable of the fox commending the singing of the crow, who had something in her mouth which the fox wanted. Be careful that you do not commend your- selves. It is a sign that your reputation is small and sinking, if your own tongue must praise you ; and it is fulsome and unpleasing to others to hear such commendations. Speak well of the absent whenever you have a suitable opportunity. Never speak ill of them, or of anybody, unless you are sure they deserve it, and unless it is neces- sary for their amendment, or for the safety and benefit of others. Avoid, in your ordinary communications, not only oaths, but all imprecations and earnest protestations. Forbear scoffing or jesting at the condi- tion or natural defects of any person. Such offences leave a deep impression and they often cost a man dear. Be very careful that you give no reproach- ful, menacing, or spiteful words to any per- son. Good words make friends ; bad words make enemies. It is great prudence to gain as many friends as we honestly can, especi- ally when it may be done at so easy a rate as a good word ; and it is great folly to make an enemy by ill words, wnich are of no ad- vantage to the party who uses them. When faults are committed, they may, and by a superior they must, be reproved : but let it be done without reproach or bitterness ; otherwise it will lose its due end and use, and, instead of reforming the offence, it will exasperate the offender, and lay the reprover justly open to reproof. If n person be pas- sionate, and give you ill language, rather pity him than be moved to anger. You will find that silence, or very gentle words, are the most exquisite revenge for reproaches : they will either cure the distemper in the angry man, and make him sorry for his pas- sion, or they will be a severe reproof and punishment to him. But, at any rate, they will preserve your innooiMice, give you the deserved reputation of wisdom and niodera- lion, and keep up the serenity and compo- sure of your mind. Passion and anger make a man unfit for everything that oe- onmes him as a man or as a Christian. Never utior any profane speeches, nor make a jest of any Scripture expressions. When you pronounce the name of God or of Clinst, or repeat any words of Holy Scripture, d(i it with reverniiee and serious- ness, and not lightl^v, for that is " taking the name of God in vain." If you hear of luiy unseemly expressions used in religious exercises, do not publish them ; endeavour to forget them ; or, if you mention them at all, let it be with pity and sorrow, not with derision or reproach. Read these directions often ; think of them seriously ; and practice them diligently. You will find them useful in your conversa- tion ; which will be every day the more evident to you, as your judgment, under- standing, and experience increase. I have little further to add at this time, but my wish and command that you will remember the former counsels that I have frequently given you. Begin and end the day with private prayer ; read the Scriptures often and seriously ; be attentive to the public worship of God. Keep yourselves in some useful employment; for idleness is the nursery of vain and sinful thoughts, which corrupt the mind and disorder the life. Se kind and loving to one another. Honour your minister. Be not bitter nor harsh to my servants. Be respectful to all. Bear my absence patiently and cheerfully. Be- have as if I were present among yoa and saw you. Remember, you have a greater Father than I am, who always, and in all places, beholds you, and knows your hearts and thoughts. Study to requite my love and care for you with dutifulness, observ- ance, and obedience ; and account it an honour that you have an opportunity, by your attention, faithfulness, and industry, to pay some part of that debt which, by the laws of nature and of gratitude, you owe to me. Be frugal in my family, but let there be no want; and provide conveniently for the poor. I pray God to fill your hearts with his grace, fear, and love, and to let you see the comfort and advantage of serving him ; and that his blessins, and presence, and direc- tion, may be witJi you, and over you all. I am your ever loving father. ROBERT LEIGHTON, D.D., born 1611, Archbishop of Glasgow, 1670, died 1684, was the author of a number of religious works which are still held in high estimation for their spirituality. " Perhaps there ia no expository work in the English langunge oqunl altogether to the exposi- tion of Pctor. It is rich in evangelical sentiment "and exalted devotion. The nieuning is seldom missed, and oltcn ndmirably illugtnitod. There in loarninj; without iu parade, theology divealed or systeinntio stiSbess, and oloquenoo in a beauti- ftil flovr of unafTeeted language and appropriat* imagery. To say more nould be unbeooming, and less oould not be said with justice." — Oriik: *»'». tioth«ca BibUcat SAMUEL BUTLER. 69 Or Happiness. The Greek epigram ascribed by some to Prosidipus, by others to Crates the Cynic philosopher, begins thus, "What state of life ought one to choose?" and having enumerated them all, concludes in this manner : " There are, then, only two things eligible, either never to have been born, or to die as soon as one makes his appearance in the world." But now, leaving the various periods and conditions of life, let us, with great brevity, run over those things which are looked upon to be the greatest blessings in it, and see whether any of them can make it completely happy. Can this be expected from a beauti- ful outside ? No : this has rendered many miserable, but never made one happy. For suppose it to be sometimes attended with innocence, it is surely of a fading and perish- ing nature, " the sport of time or disease." Can it be expected from riches? Surely no : for how little of them does the owner possess, even supposing his wealth ■ to be ever so great 1 what a small part of them does he use or enjoy himself 1 And what has he of the rest but the pleasure of seeing them with his eyes 7 Let his table be loaded with the greatest variety of delicious dishes, he fills his belly out of one ; and if he has a hundred beds, he lies but in one of them. Can the kingdoms, thrones, and sceptres of this world confer happiness ? No : we learn from the histories of^ all ages, that not a few have been tumbled down ifrom these by sudden and unexpected revolutions, and those not such as were void of conduct or courage, but men of great and extraordinary abilities. And that those who met with no such misfortunes were still far enough from happiness is very plain from the situation of; their affairs, and, in many cases, from their own confession. The saying of Au- gustus is well known : " I wish I had never been married, and had died childless." And the expression of Severus at his death, " I became all things, and yet it does not profit me." But the most noted saying of all, and that which best deserves to be known, is that of the wisest and most flourishing king,' as well as the greatest preacher, who, having exactly computed all the advantages of his exalted dignity and royal opulence, found this to be the sum total of all, and left it on record for the inspection of posterity and future ages. Vanity of vanities, all is vanity. All this may possibly be true with regard to the external advantages of men, but may not happiness be found in the internal goods of the mind, such as wisdom and virtue ? Suppose this granted ; still that they may confer pferfeot felicity they must, of necessity, be perfect themselves. Now, shew me the man who, even in his own judgment, has attained to perfection in wisdom and virtue : even those who were accounted the wisest, and actually were so, acknowledged they knew nothing; nor was there one among the most approved philosophers whose vir- tues were not allayed with many blemishes. The same must be said of piety and true religion, which, though it is the beginning of felicity, and tends directly to perfection, yet, as in this earth it is not full and com- plete itself, it cannot make its possessors perfectly happy. The knowledge of the most exalted minds is very obscure, and almost quite dark, and their practice of virtue lame and imperfect. And indeed, who can have the boldness to boast of per- fection in this respect when he hears the great Apostle complaining of the law of the flesh, and pathetically exclaiming, Who shall ■deliver me from this body of death ? Rom. vii. 24. Besides, though wisdom, and virtue, or piety, were perfect, so long as we have bodies, we must at the same time have all bodily advantages, in order to perfect felicity. Therefdre the satirist smartly ridicules the wise man of the Stoics. " He is," says he, "free, honoured, beautiful, a king of kings, and particularly happy, except when he is troubled with phlegm." Since these things are so, we must raise our minds higher, and not live with our heads bowed down like the common sort of mankind ; who, as St. Au- gustine expresses it, " look for a happy life in the region of death." To set our hearts upon the perishing goods of this wretched life and its muddy pleasures, is not the hap- piness of men, but of hogs. And if pleasure IS dirt, other things are but smoke. Were this the only good proposed to the desires and hopes of men, it would not have been so great a privilege to be born. Theological Lectures. SAMUEL BUTLER, born 1612, died 1680, acquired great repu- tation by his poem of Hudibras, and was also the author of some prose Characters (in the style of Barle, Hall, and Overbury), which appeared in his Remains in Verse and Prose, published from the original MSS., with Notes by Robert Thyer, Lond., 1759, 2 vols. 8vo ; later edition from the original MSS., Lond., 1827, 8vo, and royal 8vo: vol. i. only published. A Small Poet is one that would fain make himself that which nature never meant him ; like a fa- natic that inspires himself with his own 70 JOHN PEARSON. whimsies. He sets up haberdasher of small poetry, with a very small stock, and no credit. He believes it is invention enough to find out other men's wit ; and whatsoever he lights upon, either in books or company, he makes bold with as his own. This he puts together so untowardly, that you may perceive his own wit has the rickets by the swelling disproportion of the joints. You may know his wit not to be natural, 'tis so unquiet and troublesome in him : for as those that have money but seldom are al- ways shaking their pockets when they have it, so does he when he thinks he has got something that will make him appear. He is a perpetual talker ; and you may know by the freedom of his discourse that he came lightly by it, as thieves spend freely what they get. He is like an Italian thief, that never robs but he murders, to prevent dis- covery ; so sure is he to cry down the man from whom be purloins, that his petty lar- ceny of wit may pass unsuspected. Efe ap- pears so over-concerned in all men's wits, as if they were but disparagements of his own ; and cries down all they do, as if they were encroachments upon him. He takes jests from the owners and breaks them, as jus- tices do false weights and pots that want measure. AVhen he meets with anything that is very good, he changes it into small money, like three groats for a shilling, to serve several occasions. He disclaims study, pretends to take things in motion, and to shoot flying, which appears to be very true, by his often missing of his mark. As for epithets, he always avoids those that are near akin to the sense. Such matches are unlawful, and not fit to be made by a Chris- tian poet; and therefore all his care is to choose out such as will serve, like a wooden leg, to piece out a maimed verse that wants a foot or two, and if they will but rhyme now and then into the bargain, or run upon a letter, it is a work of supererogation. For similitudes, he likes the linrdost and most obscure best: for as ladies wear black patches to make their complexions seem fairer than they are, so when an illustration is more obsouro than the sense that went before it, it must of necessity make it appear clearer than it did ; for contniriea nvi> best set off with contraries. Ho has found out a new net of poetieal Georgies — a triek of sowing wit like clover gruss on barren subjoots, which would yield nothing before. This is very useful for the times, wlierein, some men say, tlioru is no room left for new in- vention. Ho will take three grains of wit, like the elixir, and, pmjeeting it upon the iron agn, turn it immediately into gold. AH the business of mankind hiis presently van- ished, tiie whole world has kept holiday ; there has been no men but heroes and poets, no women but nymphs and shepherdesses ; trees have borne fritters, and rivers flowed plum-porridge. When he writes, he com- monly steers the sense of his lines by the rhyme that is at the end of them, as butchers do calves by the tail. For when he has made one line, which is easy enough, and has found out some sturdy hard word that will but rhyme, he will hammer the sense upon it, like a piece of hot iron upon an anvil, into what form he pleases. There is no art in the world so rich in terms as poetry ; a whole dictionary is scarce able to contain them ; for there is hardly a pond, a sheep- walk, or a gravel-pit in all Greece but the ancient name of it is become a term of art in poetry. By this means small poets have such a stock of able hard words lying by them, as dirades, hamadryades, aonides, fauni, nymphse, sylvani, &c., that signify nothing at all ; and* such a world of pedantic terms of the same kind, as may serve to furnish all the new inventions and " thorough reformations" that can happen between this and Plato's great year. Characters. JOHN PEARSON. D.D., born at Snoring, Norfolk, 1612, became Bishop of Chester, Feb. 9, 1672-73. and died in 1686. Ilis best-known work is An Exposition of the Creed, Lond., 1659, 4to. "A standard book in Engluh divinity. It ex- pands beyond the literal parport of the Creed Itself to most articles of orthodox belief, and is a valuable summary of arguments and authorities on that side. The closeness of Penrson, and his judicious selection of proofs, distinguish him from many, especially the earlier, theolegions. Some might surmise that his underiating adherence to what he calls The Church is hardly consistent with independence of thinking; but. considered AS an advocate, ho is one of much judgment and skill." — Hallau : Lit. Hitt. of Emvpr, 4th ed., 1851, iii. 298. The Ascension of Curist. The ascent of Christ into heaven was not metaphorical or figurntive, a.s if there were no more to be understood by it, but only that he nttainod a more heavenly and glori- ous stale or condition after his resurrection For wliatsoevor alteration was made in the body of Christ when he rose, whatsoever glorious qualities it was invested with there- by, that wnji not his ascension, as app>-'aroth by those words which he spake to Mnrv, nuch me iinl, for I am not yet ascended to mfi Father. Although he hnd said before to Nicodemus, jYn winii \h(ith] a.scended up to hiiiren, but he that rame down from heareiiy JEREMY TAYLOR. 71 even the Son of man which is in heaven; which words imply that he had then as- cended; yet even those concern not this ascension. For that was therefore only true, because the Son of Man, not yet con- ceived in the Virgin's womb, was not in heaven, and after his conception by virtue of the hypostatical union was in heaven : from whence, speaking after the manner of men, he might well say, that he had as- cended into heaven ; because whatsoever was first on earth and then in heaven, we say ascended into heaven. Wherefore, beside that grounded upon the hypostatical union, beside that glorious condition upon his resur- rection, there was yet another and that more proper ascension : for after he had both those ways ascended, it was still true that he had not yet ascended to his Father. Now this kind of ascension, by which Christ had not yet ascended when he spake to Mary after his resurrection, was not long after to be performed ; for at the same time he said unto Mary, Go to my brethren, and say unto them, I ascend unto my Father and your Father, And when this ascension was performed, it appeared manifestly to be a true local translation of the Son of Man, as man, from these parts of the world below into the heaven above ; by which that body which was before locally present here on earth, and was not so then present in heaven, became substantially present in heaven, and no longer locally present on earth. For when he had spoken unto the disciples, and blessed them, laying his hands upon them, and so was corporally present with them, even while he blessed them, he parted from them, and while they beheld, he was taken up, and a cloud received him out of their sight ; and so he was carried up into heaven, while they looked steadfastly towards heaven as he went up. This was a visible departure, as it is described ; a real removing of that body of Christ, which was before present with the apostles ; and that body living after the resurrection, by virtue of that soul which was united to it, and therefore the Son of 'rod according to his humanity, was really and truly translated from these parts below unto the heavens above, which is a proper local ascension. Thus was Christ s ascension visibly per- formed in the presence and sight of the apostles, for the confirmation of the reality and the certainty thereof. They did not see him when he rose, but they saw him when he ascended ; because an eye-witness was not necessary unto the act of his resur- rection, but it was necessary unto the act of his ascension, it was sufficient that Christ shewed himself to the apostles alive after his passion; for being they knew him before to be dead, and now saw him alive, they were thereby assured that he rose again: for whatsoever was a proof of his life after death was a demonstration of his resurrec- tion. But being the apostles were not to see our Saviour in heaven ; being the ses- sion was not to be visible to them on earth ; therefore it was necessary they should be eye-witnesses of the act, who were not with the same eyes to behold the efifect. Beside the eye-witness of the apostles, there was added the testimony of the angels ; those blessed spirits which ministered before, and saw the face of, God in heaven, and came down from thence, did know that Christ ascended up from hence unto that place from whence they came ; and because the eyes of the apostles could not follow him so far, the inhabitants of that place did come to testify of his reception ; for behold two men stood by them in white apparel, which also said. Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven f This same Jesus which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven. We must there- fore acknowledge and confess against all the wild heresies of old, that the eternal Son of God, who died and rose again, did, with the same body and soul with which he died and rose, ascend up to heaven ; which was the second particular consider- able in this Article. An Exposition of the Creed, Article VI. JEREMY TAYLOR, D.D., born 1613, at Cambridge, Bishop of Down and Connor, 1661, died 1667, was the author of many theological works, distinguished for their learning, piety, and fervid imagi- nation. " He was none of G-od's ordinary works, but his Endowments were so many and so great, as really made him a Miracle. . . . He was a rare Human- ist, and hugely versed in all the polite parts of Learning, and thoroughly concocted all the an- cient Moralists, Greek and Roman Poets and Ora- tors, and "ivas net unacquainted with the refined wits of the later ages, whether French or Italian, . . . This great Prelate had the good humour of a Gentleman, the eloquence of an Orator, the fancy of a Poet, the acuteness of a Schoolman, the pro- foundness of a Philosopher, the wisdom of a Chan- cellor, the sagacity of a Prophet, the reason of an Angel, and the piety of a Saint. He had devotion enough for a Cloister, learning enough for an Uni- versity, and wit enough for a College of Virtuosi, And had his parts and endowments been parcelled out among his poor Clergy that he left behind him, it would perhaps have made one of the best dioceses in the world." — Doctor Geokge Rust, his chaplain, and subsequently his episcopal suc- cessor in the see of Dromore. 72 JEREMT TAYLOR. "The greatest ornament of the English pulpit up to the middle of the seventeenth oentarj; and we hare no reason to believe, or rather muoh rea- son to disbelieve, that he had any competitor in other languages," — HA.LLAU : Lit. Hist, of EuropCf i. 359-60. The best edition of his Works is that pub- lished under the supervision of the Rev. C. P. Eden [and Rev. Alexander Taylor], Lond., 1847-51 (again 1854, 1856, 1861), 10 vols. 8vo. Rules for Euplotino ovr Time. 1. In the morning, when you awake, oc- eustom yourself to think first upon God, or something in order to his service; and at night, also, let him close thine eyes: and let your sleep be necessary and healthful, not idle and expensive of time, beyond the needs and conveniences of nature ; and sometimes be curious to see the preparation which the sun makes when he is coming forth from his chambers of the east. 2. Let every man that hath a calling be diligent in pursuance of its employment, so as not lightly or without reasonable occa- sion to neglect it in any of those times which are usually, and by the custom of prudent persons and good husbands, employed in it. 3. Let all the intervals or void spaces of time be employed in prayers, reading, medi- tating works of nature, recreations, charity, friendliness, and neighbourhood, and means of spiritual and corporal health : ever re- membering so to work in our calling as not to neglect the work of our high calling ; but to begin and end the day with God, with such forms of devotion as shall be proper to our necessities. 4. The resting days of Christians, and fes- tivals of the church, must, in no sense, be days of idleness j for it is better to plough upon holy days than to do nothing, or to do viciously : but let them be spent in the works of the day, that is, of religion and charity, according to the rule appointed. 5. Avoid the company of drunkards and busybodies, and all such as are apt to talk much to little purpose ; for no man can be provident of his time that is not prudent in the choice of his company ; and if one of the speakers be vain, todious, and trifling, he that hears, and ho that answers, in the discotirsii, are equal losers of their time. 6. Never walk with any man, or under- take any trifling oinplovmont, merely tci pass the timo away ; for ovory day well spent may booomo ii "day of salvation," and time rightly employed ia an " aoccptablo time." And rcnuMnbor, that the time thou triflost away was given tlioo to repent in, to pra^ for pardon or sins, to work out thy sal- vation, to do the work of grace, to lay up against the day of judgment a treasure of good works, that thy time may be crowned with eternity. 7. In the midst of the works of thy calling, often retire to God in short prayers and ejac- ulations ; and those may make up the want of those larger portions of time, which, it may be, thou desirest for devotion, and in which thou thinkest other persons have ad- vantage of thee ; for so thou reconcilest the outward work and thy inward calling, tho church and the commonwealth, the employ ment of the body and the interest of thy soul : for be sure, that God is present at thy breathings and hearty sighings of prayer, as soon as at the longer offices of less busied persons; and -thy time is as truly sanctified by a trade, and devout though shorter pray- ers, as by the longer offices of those whose time is not filled up with labour and useful business. 8. Let your employment be such as may become a reasonable person ; and not be a business fit for children or distracted people, but fit for your age and understanding. For a man may be very idly busy, and take great pains to so little purpose, that in his labours and expense of time he shall serve no end but of folly and vanity. There are some trades that wholly serve the ends of idle persons and fools, and such as are fit to be seized upon by the severity of laws and banished from under the sun : and there are some people who are busy ; but it is as Do- mitian was, in catching flies. Rules and Exercises of Holy Living. Thb Invalidity op a Late or Death-Bed Repkntaxce. But will not trusting in the merits of Jesus Christ save such a man ? For that, we must be tried by the word of God. in which there is no contract at all made with a dying per- son that lived in name a Christian, in prac- tice a heathen : and we shall dishonour the sufferings and redemption of our blessed Saviour, if we think them to be an um- brella to shelter our impious and ungodly living. But that no such person may, after a wicked life, repose himself on his death- bed upon Christ's merits, observe but these two places of Scripture: "Our Saviour Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us" — what to do? that we might live as we list, and hope to be saved by his merits? no: — but " that he might redeem us from all in- icjuity, and purify to himself a peculiar peo- ple, zealous of good works." These things '' speak and exhort," saith St. Paul. But more plainly jret in St. Peter : " Christ bare our sins in his own body on the tree" — to what end? " That we, being dead nnto sin, should live unto righteousness " Since, HENRY MORE. 73 therefore, our living, a holy life is the end of Christ'8 dying that sad and holy death for us, he that trusts on it to evil purposes, and to excuse his vicious life, does as much as ii) him lies, make void the very purpose and design of Christ's passion, and dishon- ours the blood of the everlasting covenant ; which covenant was confirmed by the blood of Christ ; but as it brought peace from God, so it requires a holy life from us. But why may not we be saved, as well as the thief on the cross 7 even because our case is nothing alike. When Christ dies once more for us, we may look for such another instance ; not till then. But this thief did but then come to Christ, he knew him not before ; and his case was, as if a Turk, or heathen, should be converted to Christianity, and be bap- tized, and enter newly into the covenant upon his death-bed: then God pardons all his sins. And so God does to Christians when they ar& baptized; or first give up their names to Christ by a voluntary confirmation of their baptismal vow : but when they have once entered into the covenant they must perform what they promise, and do what they are obliged. The thief had made no contract with God in Jesus Christ, and there- fore failed of none ; only the defailances of the state of ignorance Christ paid for at the thiefs admission: but we, that have made a covenant with God in baptism, and failed of it all our days, and then return at " night, when we cannot work," have noth- ing to plead for ourselves ; because we have made all that to be useless to us, which God, with so much mercy and miraculous wisdom, gave us to secure our interest and hopes of heaven. And therefore, let no Christian man who hath covenanted with God to give him the service of his life, think that God will be answered with the sighs and prayers of a dying man : for all that great obligation which lies upon us cannot be transacted in an instant, when we have loaded our souls with sin, and made them empty of virtue ; we cannot so soon grow up to "a perfect man in Christ Jesus." . . . Suffer not there- fore yourselves to be deceived by false prin- ciples and vain confidences : for no man can in a moment root out the long-contracted habits of vice, nor upon his death-bed make use of all that variety of preventing, accompanying, and persevering grace which God gave to man in mercy, because man would need it all, because without it he could not be saved ; nor upon his death-bed can he exercise the dutv of mortification, nor cure his drunken- ness then, nor his lust, by any act of Chris- tian discipline, nor " run with patience," nor "resist unto blood," nor "endure with long-sufferance ;" but he can prn Times. We give an extract from An Antidote against Atheism, which was included in his Philosophical Works, Lond., 1662, fol., 4th edit., corrected and much enlarged, Lond., 1712, fol. Nature or the Evidence op the Exist- ence or God. When I say that I will demonstrate th.tt there is a God, I do not promise that I will always produce such arguments that the reader shall acknowledge so strong, as he shall be forced to confess that it is utterly impossible that it should be otherwise ; but they shall be such as shall deserve full as- sent, and win full assent from any unpreju- diced mind. For I conceive that we may give full as- sent to that which, notwithstanding, may possibly be otherwise ; which I shall illus- trate by several examples : suppose two men got to the top of Mount Athos, and there viewing a stone in the form of an altar with ashes on it, and the footsteps of men on those ashes, or some words, if you will, as Optimo Maximo, or To agnosto Theo, or the like, written or scrawled out upon the ashes ; and one of them should cry out. As- suredly here have been some men that have done this. But the other, more nice than wise, should reply. Nay, it may possibly be otherwise; for this stone may have natu- rally grown into this very shape, and the seeming ashes may be no ashes, that is, no remainders of any fuel burnt there ; but some unexplicable and unperceptible mo- tions of the air, or other particles of this fluid matter that is active everywhere, have wrought some parts of the matter into the form and nature of ashes, and have fridg^ed 74 RICHARD .BAXTER. and played about so, that they have also figured those intelligible characters in the same. But would not anybody deem it a piece of weakness, no less than dotage, for the other man one whit to recede from his former apprehension, but as fully as ever to agree with what he pronounced first, not- withstanding this bare possibility of being otherwise ? So of anchors that have been digged up, either in plain fields or mountainous places, as also the Roman urns with ashes and in- scriptions, as Seaerianus Ful. Linus, and the like, or Roman coins with the effigies and names of the Caesars on them, or that which is more ordinary, the skulls of men in every churchyard, with the right figure, and all those necessary perforations for the passing of the vessels, besides those conspicuous hollows for the eyes and rows of teeth, the OS siylocides, eChocides, and what not. If a man will say of them that the motions of the particles of the matter, or some hidden spermatic power, has gendered these, both anchors, urns, coins, and skulls, in the ground, he doth but pronounce that which human reason roust admit is possible. Nor can any man ever so demonstrate that those coins, anchors, and urns were once the arti- fice of men, or that this or that skull was once a part of a living man, that he shall force an acknowledgment that it is impossi- ble that it should be otherwise. But yet I do not think that any man, without doing manifest violence to bis faculties, can at all suspend his assent, but freely and fully agree that this or that skull was once a part of a living man, and that these anchors, urns, and coins were certainly once made by human artifice, notwithstanding the possi- bility of being otherwise. And what I have said of assent is also true in dissent ; for the mind of man, not crazed nor prejudiced, will fully and irreconcilably disagree, by its own natural sagacity, where, notwithstanding, the thing that it doth thus resolvedly and undoubtedly reject, no wit of man can prove impossible to be true. As if we should make such a fiction as this, — that Archi- medes, with the same individual body that he had when the soldiers slow him, is now safely intent upon his ;;oomotrioal figures under ground, at the oentro of the earth, far from the noiso and din of this world that niiglit disturb his meditations, or distract him in his I'lnious deliniMitiona he raiikos with his 1(1(1 upon the dust; which no man living cim prove inipossihio. Yot if any man does not as irrcenncilalily dissent from such a fable as thin, as from any falsehood imaginable, assuredly that man is next door to niiidnoss or dotiigo, or does enormous vio- lenoo to the free use of liis faculties. RICHARD BAXTER, born 1615, died 1691, a divine first of the Church of England, and subsequently a nonconformist, was the author of one hun- dred and sixty-eight works, of which The Saint's Everlasting Rest and the Call to the Unconverted are still in high estimation. A collection of his Practical Works was pub- lished, London, 1707, 4 vols, fol., and other editions appeared, 1838, 4 vols. imp. 8vo, and 1847, 4 vols. imp. 8vo, Works, with a Life of the Author by Rev. W. Orme, 1830, 23 vols. 8vo. After his death was publ ished Reliquiae Baxterianae: A Narrative of his Life and Times, published by Matthew Sylvester, 1696, fol. Boswell tells: "I asked [Dr. Johnson] what works of Richard Baxter's I should read. Ha said, ' Read any of them : they are all good.' " Another of Johnson's friends tells os that the doo- tor " thought Baxter's Reasons of the Christian Religion contained the best collection of the evi- dences of the divinity of the Christian system." "Baiter wrot« as in the view of eternity; but generally judicious, nervous, spiritual, and evan- gelical, though often charged with the contrary. He discovers a manly eloquence and the most evi- dent proofs of an amazing genius, with respect to which he may not improperly be called the Engliak Demonthentt." — DoDDBISOB : LtcU. on Preaching. " Pray read with great attention Baxter's lift of himself; it is an inestimable work. There ia no substitute for it in a course of study for a eler- gyman or public man ; I could almost as soon doubt the Gospel verity as Baxter's veraoity."— - Coleridge. Of Baxter's Life, thus praised, we give two specimens. CONTROTERST. And this token of my weakness so accom- panied those my younger studies that I was very apt to start up controversies in the way of my practical writings, and also more de- sirous to acquaint theworld with all that I took to be the truth, and to assault those books by name which I thought did tend to deceive thom, and did oontAin unsound and dangerous doctrine ; and the reason of all this was, that I was then in the vigour of my youthful apprehensions, and the new appearance of any sacred truth, it was more apt to alVoet me, and be more highly valued, than afterwanls, when commonness had dulled my delight; and I did not sufficiently discern then how nuieli in ir'vst of our con- troversies is verbal, and upon mutuiU mis- takes. And withal, I knew not how im- patient divines were of being contradicted, nor how it would stir up all their powers to defend what they have once said, and to rise up against the truth which is thus thrust upon them, as the mortal enemy of their honour; and I knew not how hardly men's minds are changed from their former cppre- RICHARD BAXTER. 75 hensions, be the eyidence never so plain. And I have perceived that nothing so much hinders the reception of the truth as urging it on men vrith too harsh importunity, and falling too heavily on their errors ; for here- by you engage their honour in the business, and they defend their errors as themselves, and stir up all their wit and ability to oppose you. In controversies, it is fierce opposition which is the bellows to kindle a resisting zeal ; when, if they be neglected, and their opinions lie awhile despised, they usually cool, and come again to themselves. Men ere so loath to be drenched with the truth,- ihat I am no more for going that way to work ; and, to confess the truth, I am lately much prone to the contrary extreme, to be too indifferent what men hold, and to keep my judgment to myself, and never to men- tion anything wherein I difler from another on anything which I think I know more than he ; or, at least, if he receive it not presently, to silence it, and leave him to his own opinion ; and I find this efifect is mixed according to its causes, which are some good and some bad. The bad causes are, 1. An impatience of men's weakness, and mistak- ing forwardness, and self-conceitedness. 2. An abatement of my sensible esteem of truths, through the long abode of them on my mind. Though my judgment value them, yet it is hard to be equally affected with old and common things as with new and rare ones. The better causes are, 1. That I am much more sensible than ever of the neces- sity of living upon the principles of religion which we are all agreed in, and uniting in these ; and how much mischief men that overvalue their own opinions have done by their controversies in the church ; how some have destroyed charity, and some caused schisms by them, and most have hindered godliness in themselves and others, and used them to divert men from the serious prose- cuting of a holy life ; and, as Sir Francis Bacon saith in his Essay of Peace, '' that it is one great benefit of church peace and con- cord, that writing controversies is turned into books of practical devotion for increase of piety and virtue." 2. And I find that it is much more for most men's good and edifi- cation to converse with them only in that way of godliness which all are agreed in, and not by touching upon differences to stir up their corruptions, and to tell them of little more of your knowledge than what you find them willing to receive from you as mere learners ; and therefore to stay till they crave information of you. "We mistake men's diseases when we think there needeth nothing to cure their errors, but only to bring them the evidence of truth. Alas I there are many distempers ol mind to be re- moved before men are apt to receive that evidence. And, therefore, that church ia happy where order is kept up, and the abili- ties of the ministers command a reverend submission from the hearers, and where all are in Christ's school, in the distinct ranks of teachers and learners ; for in a learning way men are ready to receive the truth, but in a disputing way, they come armed against it with prejudice and animosity. Reliquiae Baxtmanas. The Credit due to History. I am much more cautelous in my belief of history than heretofore ; not that I run into their extreme that will believe nothing because they cannot believe all things. But I am abundantly satisfied by the experience of this age that there is no believing two sorts of men, — ^ungodly men and partial men; though an honest heathen, of no reli- gion, may be believed, where enmity against religion biasseth him not ; yet a debauched Christian, besides his enmity to the power and practice of his own religion, is seldom without some further bias of interest or fac- tion : especially when these concur, and a man is both ungodly and ambitious, espous- ing an interest contrary to a holy, heavenly life, and also factious, embodying himself with a sect or party suited to his spirit and designs, there is no believing his word or oath. If you read any man partially bitter •against others, as differing from him in opin- ion, or as cross to his greatness, interest, or designs, take heed how you believe any more than the historical evidence, distinct from his word, compelleth you to believe. The piodigious lies which have been pub- lished in this age in matters of fact, with unblushing confidence, even where thou- sands or multitudes of eye and ear witnesses knew all to be false, doth call men to take heed what history they believe, especially where power and violence affordeth that privilege to the reporter that no man dare answer him, or detect his fraud ; or if they do, their writings are all supprest. As long as men have liberty to examine and contra- dict one another one may partly conjec- ture, by comparing their words, on which side the truth is like to lie. But when great men write history, or flatterers by their appointment, which no man dare con- tradict, believe it but as you are constrained. Yet, in these cases I can freely believe his- tory: 1. If the person show that he is ac- quainted with what he saith. 2. And if he show the evidences of honesty and con- science, and the fear of God (which may be much perceived in the sjrtrit of a writing). 3. If he appear to be impartial and chari- 7G JOHN OWEN. table, and a lover of goodness and of man- kind, and not possessed of malignity, or per- sonal ill-will and malice, nor earned awaj by faction or personal interest. Consci jnable men dare not lie : but faction and interest abate men's tenderness of conscience. And a charitable, impartial heathen may speak truth in a love to truth, and hatred of a lie ; but ambitious malice and false religion will not stick to serve themselves on anything. . . . Sure I am, that as the lies of the Pa- pists, of Luther, Zwinglius, Calvin, and Boza, are visibly malicious and impudent, by the common plenary contradicting evi- dence, and yet the multitude of their se- duced ones believe them all, in despite of truth and charity ; so in this age there have been such things written against parties and persons, whom the writers design to make odious, so notoriously false, as you would think that the sense of their honour, at least, should have made it impossible for such men to write. My own eyes have read such words and actions asserted with most vehe- ment, iterated, unblushing confidence ; which abundance of ear^witnesses, even of their own parties, must needs know to have been altogether false: and therefore having myself now written this history of myself, notwithstanding my protestations that I have not in anything wilfully gone against the truth, I expect no more credit from the reader than the self-evidencing light of the matter, with concurrent rational advantages from persons, -and things, and other wit- nesses, shall constrain him to, if he be a person that is unacquainted with the author himself, and the other evidences of his ve- racity and credibility. Eeliguice Baxteriana. JOHN OWEN, D.D., a famous Puritan divine, born 1616, died 1683, was the author of many learned theo- logical works, of which the Exposition of the Epistle of St. Paul to the Hebrews, with Preliminary Exercitations, Lond., 1()08-)S4, 4 vols, fol., is perhaps the best known. " Lot me again reoommond your studious and sustained attention," remarks Dr. Chalmers to his students, " 10 tho Epistle to the Hebrews. ... I promise you a hundred-fold more advantage from the perusal of this greatest work of John Owen than from tho perusal of all that has been written on tho subject of the heathen saoriflces. It is a work of gigantio strength as well as gigantlo sisej and he who hath mastered it is very little short, both in respect to the doctrinal and practical of Christianity, of being an orudito and accomplished theologian." — Prelnttiont on Hill'i Led: : Chal- muri'i Potth. Worki, Ix. 282. The Mtstert of the Incarnation. Let all vain imaginations cease : there is nothing left unto the sons of men but either to reject the divine person of Christ — as many do unto their own destruction — or humbly to adore the mystery of infinite wisdom and grace therein. And it will re- quire a condescending charit;^ to judge that those do really believe the incarnation of the Son of God who live not in the admira- tion of it, as the most adorable effect of di- vine wisdom. The glory of the same mystery is else- where testified unto, Ileb. i. 13: "God hath spoken unto us by his Son, by whom also he made the worlds ; who, being the bright- ness of his glory, and the express image of his person, upholding all things by the word of his power, by himself purged our sins." That he purged our sins by his death, and the oblation of himself therein unto God, is acknowledged. That this should be done by him by whom the worlds were made, who is the essential brightness of the divine glory, and the express image of the person of the Father . therein, who upholds, rules, sustains all things by the word of his power, whereby God purchased his church with his own blood (Acts xx. 28), is that wherein he will be admired unto eternity. See Phil, ii. 6-9. In Isaiah (chap, vi.) there is a represen- tation made of him as on a throne, filling the temple with the train of his glory. The Son of God it was who was so represented, and that as he was to fill the temple of his human nature with divine glory, when the fulness of the Godhead dwelt in him bodily. And herein the seraphim, which adminis- tered unto him, had six wings, with two whereof they covered their faces, as not being able to behold or look into the glo- rious mysterv of his incarnation: verse 2, 3: John xii."39-41, ii. 19; Col. ii. 9. But when the same ministering spirits, under the name of cherubim, attended the throne of God, in tho administration of his provi- dence as unto the disposal and government of tho world, they had four wings only, and covered not their faces, but steadily beheld the glory of it : E«ek. i. 6, x. 2, 3. This is tlie plory of the Christi.in religion, — the basis and foundation that bears the whole superstructure, — tho root whereon it groNvs. This is its life and soul, that wherein it differs from, and inconceivably excels, whatever was in true religion before, or whatever any false religion pretended unto. Religion, in its first constitution, in the state of pure, uncorrupted nature, was oi^ dorly, beautiful, and glorious. Man being made in the image of God, was fit and abia RALPH CUD WORTH. 77 to glorify him as God. But whereas, what- ever perfection God had communicated unto our nature, he had not united it unto him- self in a personal union, the fabric of it quickly fell unto the ground. Want of this foundation made it obnoxious unto ruin. God manifested herein, that no gracious relation between him and our nature could be stable and permanent, unless our nature was assumed into personal union and sub- sistence with himself. This is the only rock and assured foundation of the relation of the church unto God, which now can never utterly fail. Our nature is eternally secured in that union, and we ourselves (aa we shall see) thereby. " In him all things consist" (Col. i. 17, 18) ; wherefore, what- ever beauty and glory there was in the re- lation that was between God and man, and the relation of all things unto God by man, — in the preservation whereof natural religion did consist, — it had no beauty nor glory in comparison of this which doth excel, or the manifestation of God in the flesh, — the ap- pearance and subsistence of the divine and human natures in the same single individual person. The Person and Glory of Christ. RALPH CUD WORTH, born 1617, died 1688, published in 1678, The True Intellectual System of the Universe, fol. ; new editions, Lond., 1743, 2 vols. 4to, 1820, 4 vols. 8vo. " It contains the greatest mass of learning and argument that ever was brought to bear on atho- ism. A thousand folio pages, full of learned quo- tations, and references to all heathen and sacred antiquity, demonstrate the fertility and laborious diligence of the author. And whoever wishes to know all that can be said respecting liberty and necessity, fate and free-will, eternal reason and justice, and arbitrary omnipotence, has only to digest the Intellectual System." — Orue: Biblio- iheea Biblica. God, though iNCOMPEEHEIfSIBLE NOT IN- CONCEIVABLE. It doth not at all follow because God is incomprehensible to our finite and narrow understandings, that he is utterly inconceiv- able by them, so that they cannot frame any idea of him at all, and he may therefore be concluded to be a non-entity. For it is certain that we cannot comprehend ourselves, and that we have not such an adequate and com- prehensive knowledge of the essence of any substantial thing as that we can perfectly master and conquer it. It was a truth, though abused by the sceptics, akatalepton ti, something incomprehensible in the essence of the lowest substances. For even body itself, which the atheists think themselves so well acquainted with, because they can feel it with their fingers, and which is the only substance that they acknowledge either in themselves or in the universe, hath such puzzling difficulties and entanglements in the speculation of it, that they can never be able to extricate themselves from. We might instance, also, in some accidental things, as time and motion. Truth is bigger than our minds, and we are not the same with it, but have a lower participation only of the intellectual nature, and are rather apprehenders than comprehenders thereof. This is indeed one badge of our creaturely state, that we have not a perfectly compre- hensible knowledge, or such as is adequats and comm'ensurate to the essences of 'things ; from whence we ought to be led to this acknowledgment, that there is another Per- fect Mind or Understanding Being above us in the universe, from which our imperfect minds were derived, and upon which they do depend. Wherefore, if we can have no idea or conception of anything whereof we have not a full and perfect comprehension, then can we not have an idea or conception of the nature of any substance. But though we do not comprehend all truth, as if one mind were above it, or master of it, and cannot penetrate Into, and look quite through the nature of everything, yet may rational souls frame certain ideas and conceptions of whatsoever is in the orb of being proportion- ate to their own nature, and sufficient for their purpose. And though we cannot fully oompreh*nl the Deity, nor exhaust the in- flniteness cf its perfection, yet may we have an idea of ? Being absolutely perfect ; such a one as is nostra modulo conformis, agree- able and propurtionaic to our measure and scantling; as we may approach near to a mountain, and touch it with our hands, though we cannot encompass it all round), and enclasp it within our arms. Whatso- ever is in its own nature absolutely uncon- ceivable, is nothing ; but not whatsoever is not fully comprehensible by our imperfect understandings. It is true, indeed, that the Deity is more incomprehensible to us than anything else whatsoever, which proceeds from the fulness of its being and perfection, and from the transcendency of its brightness ; but for the very same reason may it be said also in some sense, that it is more knowable and conceiv- able than anything. As the sun, though by reason of its excessive splendour it dazzle our weak sight, yet is it, notwithstanding, far more visible also than any of the nebw- losoe Stella, — the small misty stars. Where there is more of light there is more visibility ; so, where there is more of entity, reality^ and perfection, there is more of conceptf ABRAHAM COWLEV. bility and oognoscibility ; such a thing fill- ing up the mind more, and acting more strongly upon it. Nevertheless, because our weak and imperfect minds are lost in the vast immensity and redundancy of the Deity, and overcome with its transcendent light and dazzling brightness, therefore hath it to us an appearance of darkness and incompre- hensibility ; as the unbounded expansion of light, in the clear transparent ether, hath to us the apparition of an azure obscurity ; which yet is not an absolute thing in itself, but only relative to our sense, and a mere fancy in us. The incomprehensibility of the Deity is so far from being an argumentagainst the reality of its existence, as that it is most certain, on the contrary, that were there nothing incom- prehensible to us, who are but contemptible pieces, and small atoms of the universe; were there no other being in the world but what our finite understandings could span or fathom, and encompass round about, look through and through, have a commanding view of, and perfectly conquer and subdue under them, then could there be nothing absolutely and infinitely perfect, that is, no God. ... And nature itself plainly intimates to us that there is some such absolutely perfect Being, which, though not inconceivable, yet is incomprehensible to our finite understand- ings, by certain passions, which it hath im- planted in us, that otherwise would want an object to display themselves upon ; namely, those of devout veneration, adoration, and admiration, together with a kind of ecstasy and pleasing horror j which, in the silent language of nature, seem to speak thus much to us, that there is some object in the world 80 much bigger and vaster than our mind and thoughts, that it is the very same to them that the ocean is to narrow vessels ; so that, when they have taken into tliem- selves as much as they can thereof by con- templation, and filled up nil their capacity, there is still an immensity of it left without, which cannot enter in for want of room to receive it, and therefore must be apprehended after some other strange and more mysteri- OUH manner, namely, liy their being plunged into it, and swallowed up or lost in it. To oonoludo, the Deity is indeed incomprolien- Bible to our finite and iiniierfect understand- ings, but not inooMooiviihlo ; and therefore there is no ground at all for this atheistic pretence to nmk(^ it a non-entity. Tnu Intellectual Si/xlem ojftht Universe, ABRAHAM COWLEY, M.D., born 1018, died KViT, onee famous as a poet, was esteemed one of the best prose writers of his time. His essays are dissertations on Liberty, Solitude, Obscurity, Agriculture, The Garden, Greatness, Avarice, The Dan- gers of an Ilonest Man in Much Company, The Shortness of Life and Uncertainty of Riches, The Danger of Procrastination, Of Myself. First edition of his Works, Lond., 1656, fol. Prose Works, including his Es- says in Prose and Verse, Lond., 1826, or. 8vo, large paper 8vo. "The Essays must not be forgotten. Whit ia said by Sprat of bia converaatiun, that no man ooald draw from it any aaspicion of his excellence in poetry, may be applied to the.^e compositions. No aathor ever kept bis verse and bis prose at a greater distance from each other. Histhonghta are natural, and bis style baa a smooth and placid eqnability, which baa never yet obtained ita due commendation. Nothing ie far-eooght, or hard- laboured ; but all ia easy without feebleness, and familiar without grossness." — Ds. JoHSSOS : Liva of the £ngluh PocU. Of OsscPBiTy. What a brave privilege it ia to be free from all contentions, from all envying or being envied, from receiving and from pay- ing all kinds of ceremonies I It is, in my mind, a very delightful pastime for two good and agreeable friends to travel up and down together, in places where they are by nobody known, nor know anybody. It was the case of .lEneasand bis Achates, when they walked invisibly about the fields and streets of Car- thage. Venus herself A veil of thickened air around them oast. That none might know, or see them, aa they paas'd. The common story of Demosthenes' con- fession, that he had taken great pleasure in hearing of a tanker-wuman say, a« he passed, " This 18 that Demosthenes," is wonderfully ridiculous from so solid an orator. I my- self have often met with that temptation to vanity (if it were any) ; but am so far from finding it any pleasure that it only makes me run faster from the place, till 1 get, as it were, out of sight-shot, Democritns relates, and in such a manner as if he gloried in the good fortune ond commodity of it, that, when he came to Athens, nobody there did .so much as take notice of him; and Ep- ourus lived there very well, that is, lay hid many years in his gardens, so famous since that time, with his IViend, Metrodoriis ; oflt r whoso death, making, in one of his letters, a kind commemoration of the happiness which they two had enjoyed togetJier, he adds at last, that he thought it no dispar- agement to those great i^elioities of their life, that in the midst of the most tnlkedK>f and talking country in Uie world, tliey had lived so long, not only without fame, but ul- ABRAHAM COWLEY. 7» most without being heard of; and yet, within a very few years afterward, there were no two names of men more known or more generally celebrated. If we engage into a large acquaintance and various familiarities, we set open our gates to the invaders of most of our time ; we expose our life to a quo- tidian ague of frigid impertinences, which would make a wise man tremble to think of. Now, as for being known much by sight, and pointed at, I cannot comprehend the honour that lies in that ; whatsoever it be, every mountebank has it more than the best doctor, and the hangman more than the lord- chief-justice of a city. Every creature has it, both of nature and art, if it be anyways extraordinary. It was as often said, " This is that Bucephalus," or " This is that Inci- tatus," when they were led prancing through the streets, as " This is that Alexander," or " This is that Domitian ;" and truly, for the latter, I take Incitatus to have been a much more honourable beast than his master, and more deserving the consulship than he the empire. I love and commend a true good fame, be- cause it is the shadow of virtue : not that it doth any good to the body which it accom- fianies, but it is an efficacious shadow, and ike that of St, Peter, cures the diseases of others. The best kind of glory, no doubt, is that which is reflected from honesty, such as was the glory of Cato and Aristides ; but it was harmful to them both, and is seldom beneficial to any mac whilst he lives ; what it is after his death I cannot say, because r love not philosophy merely notional and conjectural, and no man who has made the experiment has been so kind as to come back to inform us. Upon the whole matter, I account a person who has a moderate mind and fortune, and lives in the conversation of two or three agreeable friends, with little commerce in the world besides, who is es- teemed well enough by his few neighbours that know him, and is truly irreproachable by anybody ; and so, after a healthful quiet life, before the great inconveniences of old age, goes more silently out of it than he came in (for I would not have him so much as cry in the exit) : this innocent deceiver of the world, as Horace calls him, this muia persona, I take him to have been more happy in his part than the greatest actors that fill the stage with show and noise ; nay, even than Augustus himself, who asked, with his last breath, whether he bad not played his part very well. £»»at/s. Or Procrastination. I am glad that yon approve and applaud my design of withdrawing myself from all tumult and business of the world, and con- secrating the little rest of my time to those studies to which nature had so motherly in- clined me, and from which fortune, like a stepmother, has so long detained me. But nevertheless (you say, which is but ceriigc mera, a rust which spoils the good metal it grows upon. But you say) you would ad- vise me not to precipitate that resolution, but to stay a while longer with patience and complaisance, till I had gotten such an estate as might afford me (according to the saying of that person whom you and I love very much, and would believe as soon as another man) cum dignitate otium. This were excel- lent advice to Joshua, who could bid the sun stay too. But there is no fooling with life when it is once turned beyond forty : the seeking for a fortune then is but a desperate after-game ; it is a hundred to one if a man fling two sixes, and recover all ; especially ' if his hand be no luckier than mine. There is some help for all the defects of fortune ; for if a man cannot attain to the length of his wishes, he may have his remedy by cutting of them shorter. Epicurus writes a letter to Idomeneus (who was then a very powerful, wealthy, and, it seems, bountiful person), to recommend to him, who had made so many men rich, one Pythooles, a friend of his, whom he desired might be made a rich man too : " but I intreat you that you would not do it just the same way as you have done to many less deserving per- sons ; but in the most gentlemanly manner of obliging him, which is, not to add any- thing to his estate, bat to take something from his desires." The sum of this is, that for the uncertain hopes of soipe conveniences, we ought not to defer the execution of a work that is necessary ; especially when the use of those things which we would stay for may other- wise be supplied, but the loss of time never recovered ; nay, farther yet, though we were sure to obtain all that we had a mind to, though we were sure of getting never so much by continuing the game, yet, when the light of life is so near going out, and ought to be so precious, " le jeu ne vaut pas la chandelle ;" after having been long tossed in a tempest, if our masts be standing, and we have still sail and tackling enough to carry us to our port, it is no matter for tht want of steamers and top-gallants : '• utere velis, Totos pande sinus." A gentleman, in our late civil wars, when his quarters were beaten up by the enemy, was taken prisoner, and lost his life after- wards only by staying to put on a band and adjust his periwig: he would 3scape like a 80 Y^ ALTER CHARLETON. person of quality, or not at all, and died the noble martyr of ceremony and gentility. Etsays. WALTER CHARLETON, M.D., born 1619, and died 1707, was the author of Chorea Gigantum : or, the most famous antiquity of Great Britain, vulgarly called Stune Heng, standing on Salisbury Plain, restored to the Danes, Lend., 1633, 4to ; Two Philosophical Discourses : the first concerning the Different Wits of Men, the second concerning the Mysteries of Vint- ners, 1668, 8vo (again 1675, 1692), and other works. The Ready and Nimble Wit. Such as are endowed therewith have a certain extemporary acuteness of conceit, accompanied with a quick' delivery of their thoughts, so as they can at pleasure enter- tain their auditors with facetious passages and Suent discourses even upon slight occa- sions ; but being generally impatient of sec- ond thoughts and deliberations, they seem fitter for pleasant colloquies and drollery than for counsel and design ; like fly-boats, good only in fair weather and shallow waters, and then, too, more for pleasure than traf- fic. If they be, as for tne most part they are, narrow in the hold and destitute of bal- last sufficient to counterpoise their large sails, they reel with every blast of argument, and are often driven upon the sands of » " non- plus ;" but where favoured with the breath of common applause, they sail smoothly and proudly, and, like the city pageants, dis- charge whole volleys of squibs and crackers, and skirmish most furiously. But take thera from their familiar ana private conversation into grave and severe assemblies, whence all extemporary flashes of wit, all fantastic allusions, all personal reflections, are ex- cluded, and there engage them in an en- counter with solid wisdom, not in light skirmishes, but a pitched field of long and serious debate concerning any important question, and then you shall soon discover ttieir weakness, and conti'inn that barrenness of undorstaiidini; which is incapable of struggling with the difficulties of apodiotioal knowloilf;i>, ami the deduction of truth from a Ion;; Horics of reasons. Again, if those very ooneiso sayings and lucky repartees, wherein they are so happy, and wiiich at first hearing were mitortained with so much of pleasure and nd miration, ho written down, and brought to a strict examination of their nortinonoy, cohcianoe, and verity, how shal- low, how frothy, how fi)rcod will they be found I how much will they lose of that ap- plause which their tickling of the ear and present flight through the imagination had gained 1 In the greatest part, therefore, of such men, you ought to expect no deep or continued river of wit, but only a few flashes, and those, too, not altogether free from mud and putrefaction. The Su)w but Sdee Wit. Some heads there are of a certain close and reserved constitution, which makes them at first sight to promise as little of the vir- tue wherewith they are endowed, as the for- mer appear to be above the imperfections to which they are subject. Somewhat slow they are, indeed, of both conception and ex- pression ; yet no whit the less provided with solid prudence. When they are en- gaged to speak their tongue doth not readily interpret the dictates of their mind, so that their language comes, as it were, dropping from their lips, even where they are encour- aged by familiar entreaties, or provoked by the smartness of jests, which sudden and nimble wits have newly darted at them. Costive they are also in invention ; so that when they would deliver somewhat solid and remarkable, they are long in seeking what is fit, and as long in determining in what manner and words to utter it. But after a little consideration, they penetrate deeply into the substfince of things and marrow of business, »nd conceive proper and emphatic words, by which to express their sentiments. Barren thev are not, but a little heavy and rsK-.irive. 'Their gifts lie deep and concea!eeing fillet with the maga- zines I'f bookes belonging to y" stationers, and carried thither for safety, they were all consum'd, burning for a week "following. It is also observable, that the lead over y* altar at y' east end was untouch'd. and among ilie divers monuments, the body of one bishop remain'd intire. Thus lay in ashes that most venerable church, one of the most aiUient pieces of early piety in y' Christian world, besides neere UX) more. The lead, yron worke, bells, plate, i<:c., mealted ; the exquisitely wrousxlu Mercers Obapell. the sumptuous F.xchange, y' august fabriq of Olirist (^biirch, all y" rest of Uie Companies Halls, sumptuous buildings, arches, all in dust; tljo fountaines dried up and ruin'd, whilst the very waters re- main'd boiling; the vorago's of subterranean ALGERNON SIDNEY. 83 cellars, wells, and dungeons, formerly ware- hiiuses, still burning in stench and dark clouds of smoke, so that in 5 or 6 miles, in traversing about, I did not see one load of timber unconsum'd, nor many stones but what were calcin'd white as snow. The people who now walk'd about y" ruines ap- pear'd like men in a dismal desart, or rather in some greate citty laid waste by a cruel enemy. Evelyn's Diary. ALGERNON SIDNEY, eon of Robert, Earl of Leicester, born about 1621, illegally convicted and executed for alleged complicity in the Rye House Plot, 1683, was the author of Discourses concern- ing Government: Published from the au- thor's original MS., Lond., 1698, fol. " Sidney's Discourses on Government, not pub- lished till 169S, a.re a diffuse reply to Filmer. They contain indeed many chapters full of his- torical learning and judicious reflection ; yet the constant anxiety to refute that which needs no refutation renders them a little tedious. Sidney does not condemn a limited monarchy like the English, but his partiality is for a form of republic which would be deemed too aristocratical for our popular theories." — Halla.ii : Lit. Hist, nf Europe, 4th ed., 18S4, iii. 440. " Not a syllable can we find that shows the illus- trious author to have regarded the manner in which the people were represented as of any importance." — Lord Brodgham : Polit. Philoa., Part 3, 2d ed., 1849, 88. Liberty and GovEKifMENT. Such as enter into society must, in some degree, diminish their liberty. Reason leads them to this. No one man or family is able to provide that which is requisite for their convenience or security, whilst every one has an equal right to everything, and none acknowledges a superior to determine the controversies that ivpon such occasions must continually arise, and will probably be so many and so great, that mankind cannot bear them. Therefore, though I do not believe that Bellarmine said a common- wealth could not exercise its power ; for he could not be ignorant that Rome and Athens did exercise theirs, ar.d that all the regular kingdoms of the world are commonwealths ; yet there is nothing of absurdity in saying, that man cannot continue in the perpetual and entire fruition of the liberty that God hath given him. The liberty of one is thwarted by that of another; and whilst they tire all equal, none will yield to any, otherwise than by a general consent. This is the ground of all just governments; for violence or fraud can create no right ; and the same consent gives the form to them all, how much soever they differ from each other. Some small numbers of men, living within the -precincts of one city, have, as it were, cast into a common stock the right which they had of governing themselves and chil- dren, and, by common consent joining in one body, exercised such power over every single person as seemed beneficial to the whole ; and this men call perfect democracy. Others choose rather to be governed by a select number of such as most excelled in wisdom and virtue; and this, according to the signification of the word, was called aristocracy ; or when one man excelled all others, the government was put into his hands, under the name of monarchy. But the wisest, best, and far the greatest part of mankind, rejecting these simple species, did form governments mixed or composed of the three, as shall be proved hereafter, which commonly received their respective denomi- nation from the part that prevailed, and did deserve praise or blame as they were well or ill proportioned. It were a folly hereupon to say, that the liberty for which we contend is of no use to us, since we cannot endure the solitude, bar- barity, weakness, want, misery, and dangers that accompany it whilst we live alone, nor can enter into a society without resigning it; for the choice of that society, and the liberty of framing it according to our own wills, for our own good, is all we seek. This remains to us whilst we form governments that we ourselves are judges how far it is good for us to recede from our natural liberty; which is of so great importance, that from thence only we can know whether we are freemen or slaves ; and the difference be- tween the best government and the worst doth wholly depend on a right or wrong ex- ercise of that power. If men are naturally free, such as have wisdom and understand- ing will always frame good governments : but if they are born under the necessity of a perpetual slavery, no wisdom can be of use to them; but all must forever depend upon the will of their lords, how cruel, mad, proud, or wicked soever they be. . . . The Grecians, amongst others who fol- lowed the light of reason, knew no other original title to the government of a nation than that wisdom, valour, and justice which was beneficial to the people. These qualities gave beginning to those governments which we call Heroum Regna ; and the veneration paid to such as enjoyed them proceeded from a grateful source of the good received from them: they were thought to be descended from the gods, who in fortune and benefi- cence surpassed other men: the same at- tended their descendants, till they came to w BLAISE PASCAL. abuse their power, and by their vices showed themselves like to, or worse than other*, who could best perform their duty. Upon the same grounds we may conclude that no privilege is peculiarly annexed to any form of government ; but that all magis- trates are equally the ministers of God, who perform the work for which they are insti- tuted ; and that the people which institutes them may proportion, regulate, and termi- nate their power as to time, measure, and number of persons, as seems most conveni- ent to themselves, which can be no other than their own good. For it cannot be imagined that a multitude of people should send for Numa, or any other person to whom they owed nothing, to reign over them, that he might live in glory and pleasure ; or for any other reason than that it might be good for them and their posterity. This shows the work of all magistrates to be always and everywhere the same, even the doing of justice, and procuring the welfare of those that create them. This we learn from com- mon sense: Plato, Aristotle, Cicero, and the best human authors, lay it as an immovable foundation, upon which they build their arguments relating to matters of that nature. Discourses on Government. BLAISE PASCAL, famous as a mathematician and natural philosopher, and also eminent for his piety, was born at Clermont-Ferrand, Auvergne, France, 1623, and died 1662. He is best known by his Provincial Letters, and his Thoughts upon Religion, and upon some other subjects. " Hie powers of mind were such as have rarely been bestowed on any of the children of men ; and the vehemence of the zeal which animated bim was but too well proved by the cruel penances and vigils under which his maeeralcd frnmo ennk into an early grave. His spirit was the spirit of Saint Bernard: but the delicacy of his wit, the purity, I'rii! energy, the simplicity of hit rhetoric [in the Pr(»vinoial Letters], had never been oquallod, ex- cept by the groat masters of Attic eloquence. All Kuropo road and admired, laughed and wept. The Jesuits attempted to reply, but their feeble answers were received by the ]>ublio with shouts iif mockery."— Lord Mao.vui.av: Hint, of Eng.,\., oh. vi. " The Thoughts of Pasonl are to be ranked, ns a monument of his genius, iibovo the ' Provincial Leltors,' though some have asserted the contrary. They burn with an intense light; condensed in oxprescinii, Bulillme. eneri;itio. rapid, they hurry iiwiiy tlio render, till ho is ncareely able or willing to distinijuisli the sopliisius from the truth they oontain."— Hallam : Inlrail. to Lit. of Europt. The following thoughts are very imjircs- »ive : A Serious Expostulation with Cnbb LIEVERS. The immortality of the soul is a thing which so deeply concerns, so infinitely im- ports us, that we must have utterly lost our feeling to be altogether cold and remiss in our inquiries about it. And all our actions or designs ought to bend so very different a way, according as we are encouraged or forbidden to embrace the hope of eternal rewards, that it is imposi^lble for us to pro- ceed with judgment and discretion, other- wise than as we keep this po:nt always in view, which ought to be our ruling object and final aim. Thus it is our highest interest, no les* than our principal duty, to get light into a subject on which our whole conductdepends. And therefore, in the number of wavering and unsatisfied men, I make the greatest difference imaginable between those who labour with all their force to obtain instruc- tion, and those who live without giving themselves any trouble, or as much as any thought in this affair. I cannot but be touched with a hearty compassion for those who sincerely groan under this dissatisfaction : who look upon it as the greatest of misfortunes, and who spare no pains to deliver themselves from it, by making these researches their chief employment and most serious study. But as for those who pass their life without re- flecting on its issue, and who, for this reason alone, because they find not in themselves a convincing testimony, refuse to seek it elsewhere, and to examine to the bottom, whether the opinion proposed lie such as we are wont to entertain by popular simplicity and credulity, or as such, though obscure in itself, yet is built on solid and immovable foundations, I consider them after quite an- other manner. The carelessness which they betray in an affair where their person, their interest, their whole eternity is embarked, rather provokes my resentment than engages mv pity. Nay, it strikes me with amaze- ment and astonishment: it is a monster to my apprehension. I speak not this as trnns- portod with the pious zeal of a spiritual and rapturous devotion : on the contrary, I alhrm that the love of ourselves, the interest of mankind, and the most simple and art- less reason, do naturally inspire us with these sentiments; and that to see thus far is not to exceed the sphere of unrefined, un- eduoHted men. It requires no great elevation of soul to observe that nothing in this world is pro- ductive of true contentment ; that our pleas- ures are vain and fugitive, our troubles innumeralile and perpetual: and that, after all, death, which threatens us every moment, BLAISE PASCAL. 85 must, in the compass of a few years (per- haps of a few days), put us into the eternal condition of happiness, or misery, or nothing. Between us and these three great periods, or states, no barrier is interposed but life, the most brittle thing in all nature ; and the happiness of heaven being certainly not de- signed for those who doubt whether they have an immortal part to enjoy it, such per- sons have nothing left but the miserable chance of annihilation, or of hell. There is not any reflection which can have more reality than this, as there is none which has greater terror. Let us set the bravest face on our condition, and play the heroes as artfully as we can ; yet see here the issue which attends the goodliest life upon earth. It is in vain for men to turn aside their thoughts from this eternity which awaits them, as if they were able to destroy it by denying it a place in their imagination : it subsists in spite of them ; it advanceth un- observed ; and death, which is to draw the curtain from it, will in a short time infalli- bly reduce them to the dreadful necessity of being forever nothing, or forever miser- able. We have here a doubt of the most afifright- ing consequence, and which, therefore, to entertain, may be well esteemed the most grievous of misfortunes: but, at the same time, it is our indispensable duty not to lie under it without struggling for deliverance. He then who doubts, and yet seeks not to be resolved, is equally unhappy and unjust: but if withal hfr appears easy and composed, if he freely declares his indifference, nay, if he takes a vanity of professing it, and seems to make this most deplorable condi- tion the subject of his pleasure and joy, I have not words to fix a name on so extrava- gant a creature. Where is the very possi- bility of entering into these thoughts and resolutions? What delight is there in ex- pecting misery without end ? What vanity in finding one's self encompassed with im- penetrable darkness ? Or what consolation in despairing forever of a comforter ? To sit down with some sort of acquies- cence under so fatal an ignorance is a thing unaccountable beyond all expression ; and they who live with such a disposition ought to be made sensible of its absurdity and stupidity, by having their inward reflections laid open to them, that they may grow wise by the prospect of their own folly. For behold now men are wont to reason while they obstinately remain thus ignorant of what they are, and refuse all methods of in- struction and illumination : " Who has sent me into the world I know not ; what the world is I know not, nor what I am myself. I am under an astonishing and terrifying ignoranqe of all things. I know not what my body is, what my senses, or ray soul : this vei-y part of me which thinks what I speak, which reflects upon everything else, and even upon itself, yet is as mere a stranger to its own nature as the dullest thing I carry about me. I behold these frightful spaces of the universe with which I am encompassed, and I find myself chained to one little corner of the vast extent, without understanding why I am placed in this seat rather than in any other; or why this moment of time given me to live was assigned rather at such u point than at any other of the whole eter- nity which was before me, or of all that which is to come after me. I see nothing but infinities on all sides, which devour and swallow me up like an atom, or 'like a shadow, which endures but a single instant, and is never to return. The sum of my knowledge is that I must shortly die ; but that which I am most ignorant of is this very death, which I feel unable to decline. "As I know not whence I came,, so I know not whither I go ; only this I know, that at my departure out of the world I must either fall forever into nothing, or into the hands of an incensed God, without being capable of deciding which of these two conditions shall eternally be my portion. Such is my state, full of weakness, obscurity, and wretch- edness. And from all this I conclude that I ought, therefore, to pass all the days of my life without considering what is here- after to befall me ; and that I have nothing to do but to follow my inclinations without reflection or disquiet, in doing all that which, if what men say of a miserable eter- nity prove true, will infallibly plunge me into It. It is possible I might find some light to clear up my doubts ; but I shall not take a minute's pains, nor stir one foot in the search of it. On the contrary, I am re- solved to treat those with scorn and derision who labour in this inquiry and care ; and so to run without fear or foresight upon the trial of the grand ev^t ; permitting myself to be led softly on to death, utterly uncer- tain as to the eternal issue of my future condition." In earnest, it is a glory to religion to have so unreasonable men for its professed enemies ; and their opposition is of so little danger, that it serves to illustrate the prin- cipal truths which our religion teaches. For the main scope of Christian faith is to estab- lish those two principles, the corruption of nature and the redemption by Jesus Christ. And these opposers, if they are of no use towards demonstrating the truth of the re- demption by the sanctity «if t'leir lives, yet 86 STEPHEN CHARNOCK. ftro at least admirably useful in shewing the corruption of nature, by 80 unnatural sen- tintents and suggestions. STEPHEN CHARNOCK, a Nonconformist divine, born 1628, died 1680, was the author of some of the greatest of uninspired productions, — Discourses upon the Existence and Attributes of God, Lond., 1684, fol., and later editions. " Perspicuity and depth ; metaphysical sublimity and evangelical simplicity ; immense learning, but irrefragable reasoning, conspire to render this per- formance one of the most inestimable productions that erer did honour to the sanctified judgment and genius of a human being." — Toplady. " Mr. Chamock with his masculine style and inexhaustible vein of thought." — Hgrvet. Of God's Knowledge. God hath an infinite knowledge and un- derstanding. All knowledge. Omnipres- ence, which before we spake of, respects his essence ; omniscience respects his under- standing, according to our manner of con- ception. This is clear in Scripture ; hence God is called a God of knowledge' (1 Sam. ii. 3), "the Lord is a God of knowledge," Heh. knowledges, in the plural number, of all kind of knowledge ; it is spoken there to quell man's pride in his own reason and parts ; what is the knowledge of man but a spark to the whole element of fire, a grain of dust, and worse than nothing, in compari- son of the knowledge of God, as his essence is in comparison of the essence of God? All kind of knowledge. He knows what angels know, what man knows, and infinitely more : he knows him- self, his own operations, all his creatures, the notions and thoughts of them; he is understanding above understanding, mind above mind, the mind of minds, the light of lights ; this the Greek word, 6e^, signifies in the etymology of it, of etunjcu, to see. to contemplate ; and QufiiM of foiu, soio. The names of Gcul signify a nature, viewing and jiic^reing all thinirsj and the attribution of our senses to God in Seripture, as hearing and seeing, whieh are the senses whereby knowledge enters into us, signifies God's knowledge. 1. The notion of Giul's knowledge of all things lies aliDvo the ruins of nature ; it was not nliliteialed by the fall of man. It was necessary olVendtng n\aii wiis to know that lie had a Creator whem he had injured, that he hml a .Indite to try ami punish him ; since God thought lit to keep up the world, it had been kept up to no purposi- had not this notion been continued alive in the minds of men ; there would not have been any prac- tice of his laws, no bar to the worst of crimes. If men had thought they had to deal with an ignorant Deity, there could be no practice of religion. Who would lift np his eyes, or spread his hands towards heaven, if be im- agined his devotion were directed to a God as blind as the heathens imagined fortune 7 To what boot would it be for them to make heaven and earth resound with their cries, if they had not thought God had an eye to see them, and an ear to hear them ? And indeed the very notion of a God at the first blush, speaks him n Being endued with un- derstanding ; no man can imagine a Creator void of one of the noblest perfections belong- ing to those creatures that are the flower and cream of his works. 2. Therefore all nations acknowledge this, as well as the existence and being of God. No nation but had their temples, particular ceremonies of worship, and presented their sacrifices, which they could not have been so vain as to do without an acknowledgment of this attribute. This notion of God's knowledge owed not its rise to tradition, but to natural implantation ; it was born and grew up with every rational creature. Though the several nations and men of the world agreed not in one kind of deity, or in their sentiments of his nature or other per- fections, some judging him clothed with a fine and pure body, others judging him an uncompounded spirit, some fixing oim to a seat in the heavens, others owning his uni- versal presence in all parts of the world; yet they all agreed in the universality of his knowledge, and their own consciences re- flecting their crimes, unknown to any but themselves, would keep this notion in some vigour, whether they would or no. Now this being implanted in the minds of all men by nature, cannot bo false, for nature imprints not in the minds of all men an assent to a falsity. Nature would not per- vert the reason and minds of men. Uni- versal notions of God are from original not lapsed nature, and preserved in mankind in order to a restoration from a lapsed state. The heathens did aeknowledge this : in all the solemn covenants, solemniied with oaths and the invocation of the name of God, this attribute was supposed. Thoy confessed knowledge to be peeuliar to the Deity; scienlid deoriim rila, saith Cicero. Some called No«r, »it-»u», mind, pure understanding, without any note Kjron-n^c, the inspector of all. .\s tliey called him life, beeause ho was the author of life, so they called him tiitrf- lectus, because ho was t"lio author of all knowledge and understanding in his crea- tures; and one being ivsked, whetlior any man could bo hid from God? Xo, saith ho, STEPHEN CHARNOCK. 87 Dot 80 much as thinking. Some call him the eye of the world ; and the Egyptians represented God by an eye on the top of a sceptre, because God is all eye, and can be ignorant of nothing. And the same nation made eyes and ears of the most excellent metals, consecrating them to God, and hanging them up in the midst of their temples, in signification of God's seeing and hearing all things ; hence they called God Light, as well as the Scrip- *ure, because all things are visible to him. Discourse upon the Existence and Attri- butes of God. On the Wisdom op God. The wisdom of God is seen in this way of redemption, in vindicating the honour and righteousness of the law, both in precept and penalty. The first and irreversible de- sign of the law was obedience. The penalty of the law had only entrance upon trans- gression. Obedience was the design, and the penalty was added to enforce the observ- ance of the precept (Gen. ii. 17) : " Thou shalt not eat ;" there is the precept : " In the day thou eatest thereof thou shalt die ;" there is the penalty. Obedience was our debt to the law, as creatures ; punishment was due from the law to us, as sinners : we were bound to endure the penalty for our first transgression, but the penalty did not cancel the bond of future obedience: the penalty had not been incurred without trans- gressing the precept; yet the precept was not abrogated by enduring the penalty. Since man so soon revolted, and by his re- volt fell under the threatening, the justice of the law had been honoured by man's suf- ferings, but the holiness and equity of the law had been honoured by man's obedience. The wisdom of God finds out a medium to satisfy both : the justice of the law is pre- served in the execution of the penalty ; and the holiness of the law is honoured in the observance of the precept. The life of our Saviour is a conformity to the precept, and his death is a conformity to the penalty; the precepts are exactly performed, and the curse punctually executed, by a voluntary observing the one, and a voluntary under- going the other. It is obeyed as if it had not been transgressed, and executed as if it had not been obeyed. It became the wis- dom, justice, and holiness of God, as the Rector of the world, to exact it (Heb. ii. 10), and it became the holiness of the Me- diator to " fulfil all the righteousness of the law" (Rom. viii. 3 ; Matt. lii. 15). And thus the honour of the law was vindicated in all the parts of it. The transgression of the law was condemned in the flesh of the Re- deemer, and the righteousness of the law was fulfilled in his person : and both these acts of obedience, being counted as one right- eousness, and imputed to the believing sin- ner, render him a subject to the law, both in its preceptive and minatory part. By Adam's sinful acting we were made sinners, and by Christ's righteous acting we are made righteous (Rom. v. 19) : "As by one man's disobedience many were made sin- ners, so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous." The law was obeyed by him that the righteousness of it might be fulfilled in us (Rom. viii. 4). It is not fulfilled in us, or in our actions, by inher- ency, but fulfilled in us by imputation of that righteousness which was exactly fulfilled by another. As he died for us, and rose again for us, so he lived for us. The commands of the law were as well observed for us as the threatenings of the law were endured for us. This justification of a sinner, with the preservation of the holiness of the law in truth, in the inward parts, in sincerity of intention, as well as conformity in action, is the wisdom of God, the gospel wisdom which David desires to know (Ps. Ii. 6) : "Thou desirest truth in the inward parts, and in the hidden part thou shalt make me to know wisdom ;" or, as some render it, " the hidden things of wisdom." Not an inherent wisdom in the acknowledgments of his sin, which be had confessed before, but the wis- dom of God in providing a medicine, so as to keep up the holiness of the law in the observance of it in truth, and the averting the judgment due to the sinner. In and by this way methodized by the wisdom of God, all doubts and troubles are discharged. Naturally, if we take a view of the law to behold its holiness and justice, and then of our hearts, to see the contrariety in them to the command, and the pollution repugnant to its holiness ; and after this, cast our eyes upward, and behold a flaming sword, edged with curses and wrath ; is there any matter but that of terror afforded by any of these ? But when we behold in the life of Christ a sustaining the minatory part of the law, this wisdom of God gives a well-grounded and rational dismiss to all the horrors that can seize upon us. Ibid. On the Power op God. Though God hath a power to furnish every creature with greater and nobler perfections than he hath bestowed upon it, yet he hath framed all things in the perfectest manner, and most convenient to that end for which he intended them. Every thing is endowed 88 ROBERT BOYLE. with tfae best nature an>l quality suitable to God's end in creation, though not in the best manner for itself. In regard of the universal end, there cannot be a better ; for God himself is the end of all things, who is the Supreme Goodness. Nothing can be better toan God, who could not be God if he were not superlatively best, or optimiu; and he hath ordered all things for the decla- ration of his goodness or justice, according to the behaviour of his creatures. Man doth not consider what strength or power he can put forth in the means he useth to attain such an end, but the suitableness of them to his main design, and so fits and marshals them to bis grand purpose. Had God only created things that are most excellent, cre- ated only angels and men ; how, then, would his wisdom have been conspicuous in other works in the subordination and subserviency of them to one another? Qod therefore de- termined his power by his wisdom : and though his absolute power could have made every creature better, yet bis ordinate power, which in every step was regulated by his wisdom, made every thing best for his de- signed intention. A musician hath a power to wind up a string on a lute to a higher and more perfect note in itself, but in wis- dom he will not do it, because the intended melody would be disturbed thereby if it were not suited to the other strings on the instrument ; a discord would mar and taint the harmony which the lutinist designed. God, in creation, observed the proportions of nature : he can make a spider as strong as a lion ; but according to the order of nature which he hath settled, it is not con- venient that a creature of so small a com- Eass should be as strong as one of a greater ulk. The absolute power of God could have prepared a body for Christ as glorious as that be had after his resurrection ; but that had not been agreeable to the end de- signed in his humiliation: and therefore Ood acted most perfectly by his ordinate power, in giving him a body that wore the livery of our infirmities. God's power is always regulated by his wisdom and will ; and though it nromiceth not what is mo-t perfect in itself, yet what is most perfect and decent in relation t<> the end ho fixed. And so in his providence, though he could rack the whole frame of nature to brinj; about his end in a more miraculous way and astonishment to mortals, yet his power is anually nnd ordinarily confined by his will Ui act in ooncurrenoo with the nature of the creatures, and direct them according to the laws of their being, to such ends which he aims at in their conduct, without violencing their natiire. Ibid. HON. ROBERT BOYLE, seventh son of the " Great Earl of Cork," was bom in Munster, Ireland, 1627, and died in London, 1691. He was the author of many treatises narrating the results of his investigations and experiments in pneu- matics, chemistry, medicine, and kindred subjects ; published some theological works, and founded the Boyle Lecture, "designed to prove the truth of the Christian Religion among Infidels." " To Boyle the world is indebted, besides soma very aeate renuirks and m&ny fine illnstrations of his own upon metaphysical qaeetioDB of the highest moment, for the philosophical arguments in defence of religion, which hare addel to mach lostre to the names of Derham and Bentley ; and, far above both, to that of Clarke. ... I do not recollect to hare seen it anywhere noticed, that some of the most striking and beantifnl instances of design in the order of the material world, which oocnr in the sermons preached at Boyle's Lecture, are borrowed from the works of the founder." — Ddgald Stewabt: JhnerU, Firtt Enegc. Brit. The SrnDT or Natttkal Philosopht Fa- vourable TO Religiox. The first advantage that our experimental philosopher, as sucb, hath towards being a Christian, is, that his course of studies con- duceth much to settle in his mind a firm belief of the existence, and diverv of the chief attributes of God ; which belief is, in the order of things, the first principle of that natural religion which itself is pr«- required to revealed religion in general, and consequently to that in particular which is embraced by Christians. That the consideration of the vastness, beauty, and regular motions of the heavenly bodies, the excellent structure of animals and plants, besides a multitDde of other phenomena of nature, and the subBerriency of most of the«c to man, may jastly induce him, as a rational creature, to conclude that thisva'-t. beautiful, orderly, and (in a word) mnny ways admirable system of tbiDj:<>, that we C4kll the world, was framed by an author supremely powerful, wise, and good, can scarce be denied by an intelligent and unprejudiced conniderer. And this is strongly confirmed by experience, which witnesseth that in almost nil ages and countries the generality of philosophers and contemplative men were persuaded of the existence of a Peity by the consideration of the phenomena of the universe, whose fal>ric and conduct, they rationallv concluded, could not be deservedly a.«cri^]ed either to blind chance, or to any other cause than a divine Being. But though it be true that God hath not ROBERT BOYLE. 89 left himself without witness, even to per- functory considerers, by stamping upon divers of the more obvious parts of his workmanship such oonspiouous impressions' of his attributes, that a moderate degree of understanding and attention may suffice to make men acknowledge his being, yet I scruple not to think that assent very much inferior to the belief that the same objects are fitted to produce in a heedful and intel- ligent contemplator of them. For the works of God are so worthy of their author, that besides the impresses of his wisdom and goodness that were left, as it were, upon their surfaces, there are a great many more curious and excellent tokens and effects of divine artifice in the hidden and innermost recesses of them ; and these are not to be discovered by the perfunctory looks of osci- tant and unskilful beholders ; but require, as well as deserve, the most attentive and prying inspection of inquisitive and well- instructed considerers. And sometimes in one creature there may be I know not how many admirable things thac escape a vulgar eye, and yet may be clearly-discerned by tliati of a true naturalist, who brings with faim, besides a more than common curiosity and attention, a competent knowledge of anatomy, optics, cosmography, meohanics, and chimistry. But treating elsewhere pur- posely of this subject, it may here suffice to say, that God has couched so many things in his visible works, that the clearer light a man has the more he may discover of their unubvious exquisiteness, and the more clearly and distinctly he may discern those qualities that lie more obvious. And the more wonderful things he discovers in the works of nature, the more auxiliary proofs he meets with to establish and enforce the argument, drawn from the universe and its parts, to evince that there is a God ; which IS a proposition of that vast weight and im- portance, that it ought to endear everything to us that is able to confirm it, and afford us new motives to acknowledge and adore the divine Author of things. 8ouE Considerations Touchino the Style OP THE Holy Sckiptures. These things, dear Theophilus, being thus despatched, I suppose we may now season- ably proceed to consider the style of the Scripture ; a subject that will as well re- quire as deserve some time and much atten- tion, in regard that divers witty men, who freely acknowledge the authority of the Sitripture, take exceptions at its style, and by tnose, and their own reputation divert many from studying, or so much as perus- ing, those sacred writings, thereby at once giving men injurious and irreverent thoughts of it, and diverting them from allowing the Scripture the best way of justifying itself, and disabusing them. Than which scarce anything can be more prejudicial to a book that needs but to be sufficiently understood to be highly venerated ; the writings these men criminate, and would keep others from reading, being like that honey which Sauls rash adjuration withheld the Israelites from eating, which, being tasted, not only grati- fied the taste, but enlightened the eyes. . . . Of the considerations, then, that I am to lay before you, there ai-e three or four which are of a more general nature ; and therefore being such as may each of them be perti- nently employed against several of the ex- ceptions taken at the Scripture's style, it will not be inconvenient to mention them before the rest. And, in the first place, it should be con- sidered that those cavillers at the style of the Scripture, that you and I have hitherto met with, do (for want of skill in the original, espe- cially in the Hebrew) judge of it by the trans- lations, wherein alone they read it. Now, scarce any but a linguist will imagine how much a book may lose of its elegancy by being read in another tongue than that it was written in, especially if the languages from which and into which the version is made be so very differing as are those gf the eastern and these western parts of the world. But of this I foresee an occasion of saying something hereafter ; yet at present I must observe to you that the style of the Scripture is much more disadvantaged than that of other books, by being judged of by translations; for the religious and just veneration that the interpreters of the Bible have had for that sacred book has made them, in most places, render the Hebrew and Greek passages so scrupulously word for word, that, for fear of not keeping close enough to the sense, they usually care not how much they lose of the eloquence of the passages they translate. So that, whereas in those versions of other books that are made by good linguists the interpreters aie wont to take the liberty to recede from the author's words, and also substitute other phrases instead of his that they may express his meaning without injuring his reputation, in translating the Old Testament interpre- ters have not put Hebrew phrases into Latin or English phrases, but only into Latin or English words, and have too often, besides, by not sufficiently understanding, or at least considering, the various significations of words, particles, and senses in the holy tongue, made many things appear less co- herent, or less rational, or less considerable, which, by a more free and skilful rendering 90 JOHN BUNYAN. of the original, would not be blemished by any appeai'ance of such imperfection. And though this fault of interpreters be pardon- able enough in them, as carrying much of its excuse in its cause, yet it cannot but much derogate from the Scripture to appear with peculiar disadvantages, besides tbose many that are common to almost all books, by being translated. JOHN BUNYAN, born 1628, died 1688, will always be remem- bered as the author of The Pilgrim's Prog- ress (first edition, First Part, Lond., 1678, fp. 8vo), of which Lord Macaulay remarks: " There is no book in our literature on which we could so readily stuko the fame of the old, un- polluted English lan^age; no book which shows so well how rich that language is in its own proper wealth, and how little it has been improved by alt that it has borrowed. . . . We are not afraid to say that, though there were many clever men in England during the latter part of the seventeenth century, there were only two great creative minds. One of thoso minds produced the Paradise Lost, the other, The Pilgrim's Progress." — Lono Ma- CADLAy : Review of Southey't Edition of the Pil- r/rim'i Proi/rett ; Edin. Rev., Dec. 1830, and in Macaulay'a Easat/a. TuE Approach to the Golden City. Now I saw in my dream that by this time the Pilgrims were got over the Enchanted ground ; and entering into the country of Beulah, whose air was very sweet and pleas- ant, the way lying directly through it, they solaced themselves there for a season. Yea, here they heard continually the singing of birds, and saw every day the flowers appear in the earth, and heard the voice of the tur- tle in the land. In this country the sun shineth night and day: wherefore this was beyond the Valley of the Shadow of Death, and also out of the reach of Giant Despair ; neither could they from this place so much as see Doubting Castle., Here they wore within sight of the City they were going to : also here met them some of the inhabitants thereof; for in this land the shining ones ciimtnonly walked, because it was upon the borders of hoiivcn. In this land also the contract between the Jliido and tlie Bride- groom wan renewed : yea, bore, " as the bridogroom rojoiooth over the liriilo, so doth their (iod rejoice over them." Here they had no want of corn and wino; for in this ace thoy nu't with abundance of what thoy 111 sought for in all thoir pilgriiiiago. Here thoy heard vdicos from out of the oitv, loud voiopH, snving, "Say ye to the dauglitor of Zion, HclKihl, thy salvation oonioth ! Be- hold, his reward' is with him!" Hero all I. the inhabitants of the country called them " the holy people, the redeemed of the Lord, sought out," &c. Now, as they walked in this land, they had more rejoicing than in parts more re- mote from the kingdom to which they were bound ; and, drawing near to the City, they had yet a more perfect view thereof. It was builded of pearls and precious stones ; also the streets thereof were paved with gold ; so that, by reason of the natural glory of the City, and the reflection of the sunbeams upon it. Christian with desire fell sick. Hopeful also had a fit or two of the same disease. Wherefore here they lay by it for a while, crying out because of their pangs, " If you see my beloved, tell him that I am sick of love." But being a little strengthened, and better able to bear their sickness, they walked on their way, and came yet nearer and nearer, where were orchards, vineyards, and gardens, and their gates opened into the highway. Now, as they came up to these places, be- hold the gardener stood in the way ; to whom the piigrims said, ''Whose goodly vineyards and gardens are these?" He an- swered, " They are the Kinji's, and are planted here for his own delight, and also for the solace of pilgrims." So the gar- dener had them into the vineyards, and bid them refresh themselves with the dainties ; he also showed them there the King's walks and arbours, where he delighted to be : and here they tarried and slept. Now 1 beheld in my dream, that they talked more in their sleep at this time than ever they did in all their journey; anjj being in a muse thereabout, the gardener said even to me. Wherefore musest thou at the matter? it is the nature of the friiit of the grapes of these vineyards, " to go down so sweetly as to cause the lips of them that are asleep to speak," So I saw tiiat when they awoke, they ad- dressed themselves to go up to the City. But, n» I said, the reflection of the sun upon the City (for the City was pure gold) was so cxtreuioly glorious, that they could not as yet with open face behold it, but through an instrument made for that purpose. So I saw that, as thoy went on, there met them two men in raiment that shone like gold, also their faces shone as tlie light. Now, you must note, that the City stood upon a mighty hill: but the pilgrims went up that hill with ease, because they had these two men to lead them up by the' arms: thev had likewise left their mortal garments behind them in the river j for though thev went in with them, thoy camoout without th'em. They therefore went up here with mueh agility and speed, though the foundation upon which SIR WILLIAM TEMPLE. 91 the City was framed was higher than the clouds : they therefore went up through the region of the air, sweetly talking as they \vent, being comforted, because they safely grst over the river, and had such glorious uonipunions to attend them. 'I'he talk that they had with the shining or.e< was about the glory of the place ; wiio told them that the beauty and glory of it was inexpressible. There, said they, is " Mount Zion, the heavenly Jerusalem, the innumerable company of angels, and the spirits of just men made' perfect." You are going now, said they, to the paradise of God, wherein you shall see the tree of life, and eat of the never-fading fruits thereof : and when you come there, you shall have white robes given you, and your walk and talk shall be every day with the King, even all the days of eternity. There you shall not see again such things as you saw when Tou were in the lower region upon the earth ; to wit, sorrow, sickness, affliction, and death ; " for the former things are passed away." You are going now to Abraham, to Isaac, and Jacob, and to the prophets, men that God hath taken away from the evil to come, and that are now " resting upon their beds, each one walking in his righteousness." The men then asked, What must we do in the holy place ? To whom it was answered, You must there receive the comfort of all your toil, and have joy for all your sorrow ; you must reap what you have sown, even the fruit of all your prayers and tears, and sufferings for the King by the way. In that place you must wear crowns of gold, and enjoy the perpetual sight and vision of the Holy One ; for " there you shall see him as he is." There also you shall serve him continually with prjiise, with shouting, and thanksgiving, whom you desired to serve in the world, though with much difficulty, because if the infirmity of your flesh. There youi 'syes shall be de- lighted with seeing, and your ears with hear- ing the pleasant voice of the Mighty One. Filgrim's Progress. SIR "WILLIAM TEMPLE, an eminent English statesman and diplomat- ist, born 1628, died 1699, was the author of a number of political, historical, biographi- cal, poetical, and other works, of which a collective edition was published, Lond., 1720, 2 vols. fol. ; last edition, 1814, 4 vols. 8vo. " Of all the considerable writers of this age, Sir William Temple is almost the only one that kept himself altogether unpolluted by that inundation of vice and ILsentiousneas which overwhelmed the nation. The style of this author, although ex- tremely negligent, and even infected with foreign idioms, is agreeable and interesting.' That mix- ture of vanity which appears in his works is rather a recommendation to them. By means of it we enter into acquaintance with the character of the author, full of honour and humanity, and fancy that we are engaged, not in the perusal of a book, but in conversation with a companion." — HuUE : Hi»t. of Eng., ch. Ixxi. "Sir William Temple was the first writer who gave cadence to English prose. Before his time they were careless of arrangement, and did not mind whether a sentence ended with an important word or an insignificant word, or with what part of speech it was concluded." — Dn. JoHNSOSr, in B09- well, ch. Ixiii. Dr. Johnson should have said " one of the first." Extract op a Letter AnnuEssED to the Countess op Essex, in 1674, after the Death of her only Daughter. I know no duty in religion more generally agreed on, nor more justly required by God Almighty, than a perfect submission to his will in all things ; nor do I think any dis- position of mind can either please him more, or becomes us better, than that of being satisfied with all he gives, and contented with all he takes away. None, I am sure, can be of more honour to 6od,"nor of more ease to ourselves. For if we consider him as our Maker, we cannot con- tend with him ; if as our Father, we ought not to distrust him ; so that we may be con- fident whatever he does is intended for good ; and whatever happens that we interpret otherwise, yet we can get nothing by repin- ing, nor save anything by resisting. But if it were fit for us to reason with God Almighty, and your ladyship's loss were acknowledged as great as it could have been to any one, yet, I doubt, you would have but ill grace to complain at the rate you have done, or rather as you do ; for the first emotions or passions may be pardoned ; it is only the continuance of them which makes them inexcusable. In this world, madam, there is nothing perfectly good ; and whatever is called so, is but either comparatively with other things of its kind, or else with the evil that is mingled in its composition ; so he is a good man who is better than men commonly are, or in whom the good qualities are more than the bad ; so, in the course of life, his con- dition is esteemed good, which is better than that of most other men, or in which the good circumstances are more than the evil. By this measure, I doubt, madam, your com- plaints ought to be turned into acknowl- edgments, and your friends would have cause to rejoice rather than to condole with you. When your ladyship has fairly con- sidered how God Almighty has dealt with SIR WILLIAM TJuMfLE. you in what he has given, you may be left to judge yourself how you have dealt with him in your complaints for what he has taken away. If you look about you, and consider other lives as well as your own, and what your lot is, in comparison with those that have been drawn in the circle of your knowledge, — if you think hjw few are born with honour, how many die without name or children, how little beauty we see, how few friends we hear of, how mucli poverty, and how many diseases there are in the world, you will fall down upon your knees, and in- stead of repining at one affliction, will ad- mire so many blessings as you have received at the hands of God. . . . But, madam, though religion were no party in your case, and for so violent and injurious a grief you had "nothing to answer to God, but only to the world and yourself, yet I very much doubt how you would be acquitted. We bring into the world with us a poor, needy, uncertain life ; short at the longest, and un- quiet at the best. All -the imaginations of the witty and the wise have been perpetually busied to find out the ways to revive it with pleasures, or to relieve it with diversions ; to compose it with ease, and settle it vith safety. To these ends have been employed the institutions of lawyers, the reasonings of philosophers, the inventions of poets, the pains of labouring, and the extravagances of voluptuous men. All the world is per- petually at work that our poor mortal lives may pass the easier and happier for that little time we possess them, or else end the better when we lose them. On this account riches and honour are coveted, friendship and love pursued, and the virtues themselves admired in the world. Now, madam, is it not to bid defiance to all mankind, to con- demn their universal opinions and designs, if, instead of passing your life as well and easily, you resolve to pass it as ill and as miserably as you can ? You grow insensible to the conveniences of riches, the delights of honour and praise, the charms of kindness or friendship ; nay, to the observance or applause of virtues themselves ; for who can you expect, in these excessps of passions, will allow that you show either temperance or fortitiiile, either prudence or justice? And as for your frionils, I suppose you reckon upon losing their kindness, when you have Humciontly oiinviiu'od them they can never hope for any of yours, sinoe you have left none for yourself, or anytliing else. On TflK Rionr of Private Judqmknt in Remuion. Whosoever designs the ohange of religion in a country or governuioiit, by any othi'i- means than that of a general conversion of the people, or the greatest part of them, designs all the mischiefs to a nation that use to usher in, or attend the two greatest distempers of a state, civil war or tyranny ; which are violence, oppression, cruelty, ra- pine, intemperance, injustice; and, in short, the miserable efi'usion of human blood, and the confusion of all laws, orders, and virtues among men. Such consequences as these, I doubt, are something more than the disputed opinions of any man, or any particular assembly of men, can be worth ; since the great and general end of all religion, next to men's happiness hereafter, is their happiness here ; as appears by the commandments of God being the best and greatest moral and civil, as well as divine precepts, that have been given to a nation ; and by the rewards pro- posed to the piety of the Jews, throughout the Old Testament, which were the blessiiigs of this life, as health, length of age, number of children, plenty, peace, or victory. Now, the way to our future happiness has been perpetually disputed throughout the world, and must be left at last to the impres- sions made upon every man's belief and con- science, either by natural or supernatural arguments and means ; which impressions men may disguise or dissemble, but no man can resist. For belief is no more in a man's power than his stature or his feature ; and he that tells me I must change my opinion for his, because 'tis the truer and the bet- ter, without other arguments that have to me the force of conviction, may as well tell me I must change my gray eyes for others like his that are black, because these are lovelier or more in esteem. He that tells me I must inform myself, has reason if I do it not ; but if I endeavour it all that I con. and perhaps more than ever he did, and yet still difiler from him; and he that, it niay be, is idle, will have me studv on, and in- form myself better, and so to trie end of my life, then I easilv understand what he means by informing, wliich is, in short, that I must do it till I come to be of his opinion. If he that, perhaps, pursues his pleasures or in forests as much or more than I do, and allows me to have as good sense as he has in all other matters, tells me I should b« of his opinion Imt that passion or interest blinds mo ; unless he can convince me how or where this lies, he is but where he was ; only pretends to know me better than I do myself, who cannot imagine why I should not have as much care of my soul as ho has of his. A man that tolls me my opinions are ab- surd or ridiculous, impertinent or unreason- able, because they differ from his, seems t» IHAAC BARROW. 93 intend a quarrel instead of a dispute, and calls me fool or madman, with a little more circumstance ; though, perhaps, I pass for one as well in my senses as he, as pertinent in talk, and as prudent in life : yet these are the common civilities in religious argu- ment, of sufficient and conceited men, who talk much of right reason, and mean always their own, and make their private imagina- tion the measure of general truth. But such language determines all between us, and the dispute comes to end in three words at last, which it might have as well have ended in at first, that he is in the right, and J. am in the wrong. The other great end of religion, which is our happiness here, has been generally agreed on by all mankind, as appears in the- records of all their laws, as well as their religions, which come to be established by the concurrence of men's customs and opin- ions ; though in the latter that concurrence may have been produced by divine im- pressions or inspirations. For all agree in teaching and commanding, in planting and improving, not only those moral virtues which conduce to the felicity and tranquil- lity of every private man's life, but also those manners and dispositions that tend to the peace, order, and safety of all civil societies and governments among men. Nor could I ever understand how those who call themselves, and the world usually calls, religious men, come to put so great weight apon those points of belief which men never have agreed in, and so little upon those of virtue and morality, in which they have hardly ever disagreed. Nor why a state should venture the subversion of their peace, and their order, which are certain goods, and so universally esteemed, for the prop- agation of uncertain or contested opinions. ISAAC BARROW, D.D., an eminent mathematician and divine, the tutor of Sir Isaac Newton, born in Lo' idon 1630, died 1677, was the author of soiie of the best sermons in the English language. The great Earl of Chatham read Barrow's sermons till he could recite many of them memoriter ; and he recommended his son, William Pitt, to study them deeply. Daniel Webster, also, strove to profit by their perusal. New editions of his Theological Works were published, Oxford, 1818, 6 vols. 8vo, also 1830, 8 vols. 8vo ; edited by Rev. T. S. Hughes, 7 vols. 8vo, and by Rev. James Hamilton, Edin., 1842, 3 vols. 8vo; New York, 1845, 3 vols. 8vo. " The sermons of Barrow display a strength of mind, a comprehenaiveness and fertility, which have rarely been eqaalled. No better proof can be given than his eight sermons on the govern- ment of the tongue; copious and exhaustive, without tautology or superfluous declamation, they are in moral preaching what the best parts of Aristotle are in ethical philosophy, with more of development and more extensive observation. . . . His quotations from ancient philosophers, though not so numerous as in Taylor, are equally uncon- genial to our ears. In his style, notwithstanding its richness and occasional Vivacity, we may cen- sure a redundnncy and excess of apposition : his language is more formal and antiquated than of his age; and he abounds too much in uncommon words of Latin derivation, frequently such as ap- pear to have no authority but his own." — Hal- LA3f : Liu Hist, of Europe, The Excellency op the Christian Rb- HGION. Another peculiar excellency of our re ligion is, that it prescribes an accurate rule of life, most agreeable to reason and to our nature, most conducive to our welfare and content, tending to procure each man's pri- vate good, and to promote the public benefit of all, by the strict observance whereof wa bring our human. nature to a resem bianco of the divine ; and we shall also thereby obtain God's favour, oblige and benefit men, and procure to ourselves the conveniences of a sober life, and the pleasure of a good conscience. For if we examine the pre- cepts which respect our duty to God, what can be more just, pleasant, or beneficial to us than are those duties of piety which our religion enjoins 1 What is more fit and reasonable than that we should most highly esteem and honour him who is most excel- lent? that we should bear the sincerest affection for him who is perfect goodness himself, and most beneficial to us? that we should have the most awful dread of him that is infinitely powerful, holy, and just? that we should be very grateful to him from whom we received our being, with all the comforts and conveniences of it? that we should entirely trust and hope in him who can and will do whatever we may in reason expect from his goodness, nor can he ever fail to perform his promises ? that we should render all due obedience to him whose children, servants, and subjects we are ? Can there be a higher privilege than to have liberty of access to him who will favourably hear, and is fully able to supply our wants? Can we desire to receive bene- fits on easier terms than the asking for them ? Can a more gentle satisfaction for our offences be required than confessing of ■them, repentance, and strong resolutions to amend tnem? The practice of such a piety, of a service so reasonable, cannot but be of vast advantage to us, as it procures peace of conscience, a comfortable hope' a freedom 94 ISAAC BARROW. from all terrors and scruples of mind, from all tormenting cares and anxieties. And if we consider the precepts by which our religion regulates our carriage and beha- viour towards our neighbours and brethren, what can be imagined so good and useful as those which the gospel afifbrds? It en- joins us sincerely and tenderly to love one another ; earnestly to desire and delight in each other's good ; heartily to sympathize with all the evils and sorrows of our breth- ren, readily affording them all the help and comfort we are able ; willingly to part with our substance, ease, and pleasure for their benefit and relief; not confining this our charity to particular friends and relations, but, in conformity to the boundless good- ness of Almighty God, extending it to all. It requires us mutually to bear with one another's infirmities, mildly to resent and freely remit all injuries ; retaining no grudge, nor executing no revenge, but re- quiting our enemies with good wishes and good deeds. It commands us to be quiet in our stations, diligent in our callings, true in our words, upright in our dealings, ob- servant of our relations, obedient and re- spectful to our superiors, meek and gentle to our inferiors, modest and lowly, ingenu- ous and condescending in our conversation, candid in our censures, and innocent, inof- fensive, and obliging in our behaviour to- wards all persons. It enjoins us to root out of our hearts all envy and malice, all pride and haughtiness ; to restrain our tongues from all slander, detraction, reviling, bitter and harsh language; not to injure, hurt, or needlessly trouble our neighbour. It en- gages us to prefer the public good before our own opinion, humour, advantage, or convenience. And would men observe and Eractise what this excellent doctrine teaches, ow sociable, secure, and pleasant a life we might lead I what a paradise would this world then become, in comparison to what it now is I Definition op Wit. First it may be demanded what the thing is we speak of, or what this facotinusncss doth import? To wliii-h question I might reply as Itinnooritus did to him that askod hiiii the definition of a man: " Tis that wliich wo all Noo and know." Any one better ii|iprelionila what it is by aeciimint- aiico than I can inform him by lli'scnption. It is inili'ed ii thing so voisatilo and multi- form, appoariiig in so many slinpoa, so many nosturoH, so nmny garbs, no variously nppre- hendeil l.y sovi'ial oyos and judgments, that It seonu'th no less hard to nottlo a oloarand OJrtain notion tlioioul', than to luako a por- trait of Proteus, or to define the figure of the fleeting air. Sometimes it lieth in pat allusion to a known story, or in seasonable application of a trivial saying, or in forging an apposite tale : sometimes it playeth in words and phrases, taking advantage from the ambiguity of their sense, or the afiSnity of their sound. Sometimes it is wrapped in a dress of humorous expression : sometimes it lurketh under an odd similitude: some- times it is lodged in a sly question, in a smart answer, in a quirkish reason, in a shrewd intimation, in cunningly diverting or cleverly retorting an objection : some- times it is couched in a bold scheme of speech, in a tart irony, in a lusty hyper- bole, in a startling metaphor, in a plausible reconciling of contradictions, or in acute nonsense : sometimes an affected simplicity, sometimes a presumptuous bluntness, giveth it being: sometimes it riseth only from a lucky hitting upon what is strange: some- times from a crafty wresting obvious matter to the purpose : often it consists in one knows not what, and springeth up one can hardly tell how. Its ways are unaccountable and inexplicable, being answerable to the num- berless rovings of fancy and windings of language. It is, in short, a manner of speaking out of the simple and plain way (such as reason teacheth and proveth tilings by), which by a pretty surprising uncouthness in conceit or expression doth affect and amuse the fancy, stirring in it some wonder, and breeding some delight thereto. It raiseth admiration, as signifying a nimble sagacity of apprehension, a special felicity of inven- tion, a vivacity uf spirit and reach of wit more than vulgar. It soonieth to argue a rare quickness of parts, that one can fetch in remote conceits applicable; a notable skill, that he can dexterously accommodate them to the purpose before him ; together with a lively briskness of humour, net apt to damp those sportful Bashes of ima^'ina- tion. Avlienoe in Aristotle such persons are termed tpidexioi, dexterous men: and eiitro- poi, men of facile or versatile manners, who ean easily turn themselves to all thincs, or turn all things to themselves. It also pro- cureth delight by gratifying curiosity with its rareness or .■.eniliUuioe of ditheiiltv; as monsters, 'iiot for their boautv, but" their rarity ; as juggling tricks, not for their use, but llieir alistrnseness, are beheld with pleas- ure, by diverting the mind from its road of serious thoughts ; by instilling gaiety and airiness of spirit ; by provoking to sueh dis- positions of spirit in way of eniulauon or oomplaisanee ; and by seasoning niatters, otlierwise distasteful or insipid, with an unusual and tlienee grateful tang. JOHN TILLOTSON. 95 On Honour to God. God is honoured by a willing and careful practice of all piety and virtue for con- science' sake, or an avowed obedience to his holy will. This is the most natural expres- sion of our reverence towards him, and the most effectual way of promoting the same in others. A subject cannot better demon- strate the reverence he bears towards his prince than by (with a cheerful diligence) observing his laws ; for by so doing he de- clares that he acknowledgeth the authority and revereth the majesty which enacted them; that he approves the wisdom which devised them, and the goodness which de- signed them for public benefit ; that he dreads his prince's power, which can main- tain them, and his justice, which will vindi- cate them ; that he relies upon his fidelity in making good what of protection or of recompense he propounds to the observers of them. No less pregnant a signification of our reverence towards God do we yield in our gladly and strictly obeying his laws, thereby evidencing our submission to God's sovereign authority, our esteem of his wis- dom and goodness, our awful regard to his power and justice, our confidence in him, and dependence upon his word. The goodliness to the sight, the pleasantness to the taste, which is ever perceptible in those fruits which genuine piety beareth, the beauty men see in a calm mind and a sober conversation, the sweetness they taste from works of justice and charity, will certainly produce veneration to the doctrine that teacbeth such things, and to the authority which enjoins them. We shall especially honour God by discharg- ing faithfully those offices which God hath entrusted us with ; by improving diligently those talents which God hath committed to us ; by using carefully those means and op- portunities which God hath vouchsafed us of doing him service and promoting his glory. Thus, he to whom God hath given wealth, if he expend it, not to the nourishment of Eride and luxury, not only to the gratifying is own pleasure or humour, but to the furtherance of God's honour, or to the suc- cour of his indigent neighbour, in any pious or charitable way, he doth thereby in a special manner honour God. He also on whom God hath bestowed wit and parts, if he employ them not so much in contriving to advance his own petty interests, or in procuring vain applause to himself, as in advantageously setting forth God's praise, handsomely recommending goodness, dex- terously engaging men in ways of virtue, he doth thereby remarkably honour God. He likewise that hath honour conferred upon him if he subordinate it to God's honour, if he use his own credit as an in- strument of bringing credit to goodness, thereby adorning and illustrating piety, he by so doing doth eminently practise this duty. JOHN TILLOTSON, D.D., born 1630, Archbishop of Canterbury 1691, died 1694, was very famous as a preacher, and his sermons retained their popularity long after his death. " Ho was not only the best preacher of the age- but seemed to have brought preaching to perfec- tion ; his sermons were so well heard and liked, and so much read, that all the nation proposed him as a pattern, and studied to copy after him.'' — Bishop Bubnet: Hist, of Oum Times, ed. 1833, 242. " The sermons of Tillotson were for half a cen- tury more read than any in our language. They are now bought almost as waste paper, and hardly read at all. Such is the fickleness of religious taste, as abundantly numerous instances would prove. Tillotson is reckoned verbose and languid. He has not the former defect in nearly so great a degree as some of his eminent predecessors; but there is certainly little vigour or vivacity in his style. . . . Tillotson is always of a tolerant and catholic spirit, enforcing right actions rather than orthodox opinions, and obnoxious, for that and other reasons, to all the bigots of his own age." — Hallam : Lit, Hist, of Europe, 4th cd., 1854, iii, 297. Advantages or Truth and Sincerity. Truth and reality have all the advantages of appearance and many more. If the show of anything be good for anything, I am sure sincerity is better: for why does any man dissemble, or seem to be that which he is not, but because he thinks it good to have such a quality as he pretends to? for to counterfeit and dissemble is to put on the appearance of some real excellency. Now, the best way in the world for a man to seem to be anything, is really to be what he would seem to be. Besides that, it is many times as troublesome to make good the pretence of a good quality as to have it ; and if a man have it not, it is ten to one but he is discov- ered to want, and then all his pains and la- bour to seem to have it are lost. There is something unnatural in painting, which a skilful eye will easily discern from native beauty and complexion. It is hard to personate and act a part long ; for where truth is not at the bottom, nature will always be endeavouring to return, and will peep out and betray herself one time or other. Therefore, if any man think it con- venient to seem good, let him be so indeed, and then his goodness will appear to every- body's satisfaction : so that, upon all accounts, 96 JOHN TILLOTSON, sincerity is true wisdom. Particularly as to the affairs of this world, integrity hath many advantages over all the fine and artificial ways of dissimulation and deceit ; it is much the plainer and easier, much the safer and more secure way of dealing in the world ; it has less of trouble and difficulty, of entan- glement and perplexity, of danger and haz- ard in it ; it is the shortest and nearest way to our end, carrying us thither in a straight line, and will hold out and last longest. The arts of deceit and cunning do contin- ually grow weaker, and less effectual and serviceable to them that use them ; whereas integrity gains strength by use ; and the more and longer any man practiseth it the greater service it does him, by confirming his reputation, and encouraging those with whom he hath to do to repose the greatest trust and confidence in him, which is an un- speakable advantage in the business and affairs of life. Truth is always consistent with itself, and needs nothing to help it out; it is al- ways near at hand, and sits upon our lips, and is ready to drop out before we are aware; whereas a lie is troublesome, and sets a man's invention upon the rack, and one trick needs a great many more to make it good. It is like building upon a false foundation, which continually stands in need of props to shore it up, and proves at last more chargeable than to have raised a sub- stantial building at first upon a true and solid foundation : for sincerity is firm and substantial, and there is nothing hollow or unsound in it, and because it is plain and open, fears no discovery ; of which the crafty man is always in danger ; and when he thinks he walks in the dark, all his pre- tences are so transparent that he that runs may read them. lie is the last man that finds himself to be found out; and whilst he takes it for granted that he makes fools of others, he renders himself ridiculous. Add to all this, that sincerity is the most compendious wisdom, and an excellent in- strument for the speedy despatch of busi- ness: it creates confidence in those wo have to deal with, saves the labour of many in- quiries, and brings this to an issue in few words; it is like tnivelling in a plain beaten road, which commonly brings a man sooner to his journey's eiul than by-ways, in which men often lose themselves. In a word, wimtever convenience may be thought to lie in fiilsoliooil and dissimulation, it is soon over, but the incnnvonionoeof it is perpetual, lieomiBO it brings a man under an everlasting jealousy and suspicion, so that ho is not be- lieved when he speaks truth, nor trusted perhaps when he means honestly. When a man has once forfeited the reputation of his integrity, he is set fast, and nothing wil] then serve his tarn, neither truth nor fals^ hood. Sermons. Virtue and Vice Declared bt the Genk- RAL Vote of Mankind. God hath shown us what is good by the • general vote and consent of mankind. Not that all mankind do agree concerning virtue and vice ; but that as to the greater duties of piety, justice, mercy, and the like, the exceptions are but few in comparison, and not enough to infringe a general consent. And of this I shall oner to you this three- fold evidence : — 1. That these virtues are generally praised and held in esteem by mankind, and the contrary vices generally reproved and evil spoken of. Now, to praise anything, is to give testimony to the goodness of it ; and to censure anything, is to declare that we be- lieve it to be evil. And if we consult the history of all ages, we shall find that the things which are generally praised in the lives of men, and recommended to the imi- tation of posterity, are piety and devotion, gratitude and justice, humanity and charity ; and that the contrary to these are marked with ignominy and reproach : the former are commended even in enemies, and the latter are branded even by those who had a kind- ness for the persons that were guilty of them : so constant hath mankind always been in the commendation of virtue and the censure of vice. Nay, we find not only those who are virtuous themselves giving their testimony and applause to virtue, but even those who are vicious ; not out of love to goodness, but from the conviction of their own minds, and from a secret reverence they bear to the common consent and opin- ion of mankind. And this is a great testi- mony, because it is the testimony of fin enemy, extorted by the mere light and foico of truth. And, on the contrary, nothing is more ordinary than for vice to reprove sin, and to hear men condemn the like or the same things in others which they allow in themselves. And this is a clear evidence that vice is generally condemned by mankind ; that many men condemn it in themselves; and those who ore so kind as to spare themselves are very quick-sighted to spy a fault in any- body else, and will censure a bad action done by another with as much freedom and impartiality as the most virtuous man in the world. And to this consent of mankind about virtue and vice the Scripture frequently ap- peals. As when it commands us to proviaa JOHN DRYDEN. 97 things honest in the sight of all men ; and hy well-doing to put to silence the ignorance of foolish luen ; intimating that there are some things so confessedly good, and owned to be such by so general a vote of mankind, that the worst of men have not the face to open their mouths against them. And it is made the character of a virtuous action if it be lovely and commendable, and of good report : Philip, iv. 8, " AVhatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good '■eport, if there be any virtue, if there be any praise, make account of these things ;" intimating to us that mankind do generally cimcur in the praise and commendation of what is virtuous. 2. Men do generally glory and stand upon their innooency when they do virtuously, but are ashamed and out of countenance when they do the contrary. Now, glory and shame are nothing else but an appeal to the judgment of others concerning the good or evil of our actions. There are, indeed, some such monsters as are impudent in their impieties, but these are but few in compari- son. Generally, mankind is modest: the greatest part of those who do evil are apt to blush at their own faults, and to confess them in their countenance, which is an ac- knowledgment that they are not only guilty to themselves that they have done amiss, but that they are apprehensive that others think so ; for guilt is a passion respecting ourselves, but shame regards others. Now, it is a sign of shame that men love to con- ceal their faults from others, and commit them secretly in the dark and without wit- nesses, and are afraid even of a child or a fool ; or if they be discovered in them, they are solicitous to excuse and extenuate them, and ready to lay the fault upon anybody else, or to transfer their guilt, or as much of it as they can, upon others. All which are certain tokens that men are not only natu- rally guilty to themselves when they commit a feult, but that they are sensible also what opinions others have of these things. And, on the contrary, men are apt to stand upon their justification, and to glory when they have done well. The conscience of a man's own virtue and integrity lifts up his head, and gives him confidence before others, because he is satisfied they have a good opinion of his actions. What a good face does a man naturally set upon a good deed 1 And how does he sneak when he hath done wickedly, being sensible that he is con- demned by others, as well as by himself I No man is afraid of being upbraided for having dealt honestly or kindly with others, nor does he account it any calumny or reproach to have it rep6rted of him that he is a sober »nd chaste man. No man blusheth when he 7 meets a man with whom he hath kept his word and discharged his trust; but every man is apt to do so when he meets one with whom he has dealt dishonestly, or who knows some notorious crime by him. 3. Vice is generally forbidden and pun- ished by human laws ; but against the contrary virtues there never was any law. Some vices are so manifestly evil in them- selves, or so mischievous to numan society, that the laws of most nations have taken care to discountenance them by severe pen- alties. Scarce any nation was ever so bar- barous as not to maintain and vindicate the honour of their gods and religion by public laws. Murder and adultery, rebellion and sedition, perjury and breach of trust, fraud and oppression, are vices severely prohibited by the laws of most nations, — a clear indica- tion what opinion the generality of mankind and the wisdom of nations have always had of these things. But now, agaiinst the contrary virtues there never was any law. No man was ever impeached for living soberly, righteously, and godly in this present world, — a plain acknowledgment that mankind always thought them good, and never were sensible of the inconvenience of them : for had they been so, they would have provided against them by laws. This St. Paul takes notice of as a great commendation of the Christian virtues, — " The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, long-snflering, gentleness, kindness, fidelity, meekness, temperance : against such there is no law." As if he had said, Turn over the law of Moses, search those of Athens and Sparta, and the twelve tables of the Romans, and those innumerable laws that have been added since, and you shall not in any of them find any of those virtues that I have mentioned condemned and for- bidden, — a clear evidence that mankind never took any exception against them, but are generally agreed about the goodness of them. Sermons. JOHN DRYDEN, one of the most eminent of English poets and prose writers, was born 1631, and died 1700. His principal prose compositions are his Essay on Dramatick Poesy, and his ex- cellent Prefaces and Dedications, and criti cisms connected with them. "Drjden maj be properly considered as th< father of English oriticism, as the writer who first taaght us to determine upon principles the merit of composition. Of our former poets, the greatest dramatist wrote without rules, conducted through life and nature bj a genius that rarely misled, and »s JOUJS DKrVKIS. rarely deserted him. Of the rest, those who kneir the laws of propriety had neglected to teach them." — Dr. Johnson : Life of Dryden. " As to his writings, 1 may venture to say in general terms, that no man hath written in our Innguage so much, and so various matter, and in BO various manners, so well, . . . His prose had all the clearness imaginable, together with all the nobleness of expression, all the graces and orna- ments proper and peculiar to it, without deviating into the language or diction of poetry. I have heard him frequently own with pleasure that if he had any talent of Knglish prose, it was owing to his having *often read the writings of the great Archbishop Xillotson. His versification and bis numbers he could learn of nobody : for he first possessed those talents in perfection in our tongue: and they who have succeeded in them since bis time have been indebted to his example; and the more they have been able to imit ite him, the better they have succeeded." — CoNORE^ e : Dedication of Vryden^a Dramatic Works to the Duke of New- castle. On Shakspeare, Beaumont and Fletcheb, AND Ben Jonson. To begin, then, with Shalcspeare. He was the man who, of all modern, and perhaps ancient, poets had the largest and most com- prehensive soul. All the images of nature were still present to him, and he drew them not laboriously, but luckily. When he de- scribes anything, you more than see it, — you feel it too. Those who accuse him to have wanted learning, give him the greater com- mendation. He was naturally Teamed ; he Deeded not the spectacles of books to read nature ; he looked inwards, and found her there. I cannot say he is everywhere alike : were he so, I should do him injury to com- pare him with the greatest of mankind. He 18 many times flat, insipid ; his comic wit degenerating into clenches, his serious swell- ing into bombast. But he is always great when some great occasion is presented to bim : no man can ever say he had a fit sub- ject for his wit, and did not then raise him- Relf as high above the rest of poets, Quantum lenta solont inter viburna ouprossi. The consideration of this made Mr. Halrii, of Eton, say, that tliere was no subject of which any poet ever writ but he would pro- duce it much better done in Shakspeare : and however others are now generally pre- ferred liofore him, yet the age wherein he lived, which had contemporaries with him Fletelier and Jonson, never oqimlled them to him in their esteem. And in the last king's court, when Hen's reputation was at higiiost, Sir John Suokling. and with him the greater part of the courtiers, set our Shakspeare far above him. Beaumont and I'Motehor, of whom I am neit to speak, had, with the advantage of Shakspeare's wit, which was their precedent, great natural gifts, improved by study ; Beau- mont, especially, being so accurate a judge of plays, that Ben Jonson, while he lived, submitted all his writings to his censure and, 'tis thought, used his judgment in correcting, if not contriving, all his plots. What value he had for him appears by the verses he writ to him, and therefore I need speak no farther of it. The first play that brought Fletcher and him in esteem was their " Philaster ;" for before that they had written two or three very unsuccessfully : as the like is reported of Ben Jonson before he writ " Every man in his Humour." Their plots were generally more regular than Shakspeare's, especially those which were made before Beaumont's death ; and they understood and imitated the conversation of gentlemen much better; whose wild debaucheries, and quickness of wit in repartees, no poet before them could paint as they have done. Humour, which Ben Jonson derived from particular per- sons, they made it not their business to de- scribe: they represented all the jtassions very lively, but above all, love. I am apt to believe the English language in them arrived to its highest perfection : whjit words have since been taken in are rather super- fluous than ornamental. Their plays are now the most pleasant and frequent enter- tainments of the stage ; two of theirs being acted through the year for one of Shak- speare's or Jonson's : the reason is, T>ecause there is a certain gaiety in their comedies, and pathos in their more serious plays, which suits generally with all men's hu- mours. Shakspeare's language is likewise a little obsolete, and Ben Jonson's wit comes short of theirs. As for Jonson, to whose character I au. now arrived, if we look upon him while he was himself (for his last plays were but his dotages) I think him the most learned and judicious writer which any theatre ever had. lie was a most severe judge of himself, as well as others. One cannot say he wnnted wit, but rather that he was frugal of it. In his works you find little to retrench or alter. Wit, and language, and humour also in some measure, we had before him ; but something of art was wanting to the drama till he came. He managed his strength to more advantage than any who preceded him. You seldom find him making love in any of his scenes, or endeavouring to move tlie passions ; his genius was too sullen and saturnine to do it gracefully, especially when he know he came after tliose who hail performe;lit iit that time, yot the goodness of the bare lut, with roapoot to the rule, will not prevent the sting that follows the want of inward integrity in doing it. " The back- slider in heart," saith Solomon, "shall be filled with his own ways, but a good man shall be satisfied from himself" The doing just and worthy and generous things with- out any sinister ends and designs, leaves a most agreeable pleasure to the mind, like that of a constant health, which is better felt than expressed. Sermons. Ihxodesate Self-Lote. There is a love of ourselves which is founded on nature and reason, and is made the measure of our love to our neighbour ; for we are to love our neighbour as our- selves ; and if there were no due love of ourselves, there could be none of our neigh- bour. But this love of ourselves, which is so consistent with the love of our neigh- bour, can be no enemy to our peace : Tor none can live more quietly and peaceably than those who love their neighbours as themselves. But there is a self-love which the Scripture condemns, because it makes men peevish and froward, uneasy to them- selves and to their neighbours, filling them with jealousies and suspicions of others with respect to themselves, making them apt to mistrust the intention and designs of others towards them, and so producing ill-will to- wards them ; and where that hath once got into men's hearts, there can be no long peace with those they bear a secret grudge and ill-will to. The bottom of all is, they have a wonderful value for themselves and those opinions, and notions, and parties, and fac- tions, they happen to be engaged in, and these they make the measure of their esteem and love of others. As far as they comply and suit with them, so far thoy love them, and no farther. If we ask, " Cannot good men differ about sonic things, and vet bo good still?" "Yes." "O:\nnot suclii love one another notwithstanding such differ- ence?'' " Xo doubt they ought." Whence comes it, then, that a small difference in opinion is so apt to make a breach in affec- tion ? In plain truth it is, every one would bo thought to be infallible, if' for shame they durst to pretend to it ; and they have 90 good an opinion of themselves that they cannot bear sueli as do not submit to them. From hence arise quarrcllinns and disput- ings, and ill Inngimi'e, not becoming men or Christians, But all this conies from their setting up themselves and their own notions and praetiees, which they would make a rule to the rest of the world ; and if others have the same opinions of themselves, it is impossible but tliere must be everlasting LABI RACHUL EUSSEJyL.—SIR GEORGE MACKENZIE. 109 clashings and dispatings, and from thence falling into different parties and factions ; whicli can never be prevented till they come to more reasonable opinions of themselves, and more kind and charitable towards others. /Sermons. LADY RACHEL RUSSELL, the wife of Lord William Rassell, who was unjustly executed for alleged treason, 1683, was born 1636, and died 1723. As we have remarked in another place, " her constancy to her husband in his mis- fortunes, her services in court as his aman- uensis, and her efforts to save him from the fatal block, together with her Letters, first published fifty years after her death, have embalmed her memory in the hearts of thousands." Letters of Lady Rachel Russell, Lond., 1773, 4to, and later editions. Of modern editions, we notice, Lond., 1821, 2 vols. 18mo; 1825, 2 vols. 12mo ; with additional Letters, 18.i3, 2 vols. p. 8vo. See also, Life of Lady Rassell and her Correspondence with her Husband, 1672 to 1682, by Lord John [now Earl] Russell, Lond., 1820, 8vo, and The Married Life of Rachel, Lady Rus- sell, by M. Guizot, translated from the French [by John Morton], Lond., 1855, cr. 8vo. " It is very remarkable how much better women write tban men. 1 hare now before me a volume of letters written by the widow of the beheaded Lord BuEsell, which are full of the most moving and expressive eloc[uence. I want the Duke of Bedford to let them be printed." — Horace Walpole to Sir Horace Mann, Oct. 11, 1751: W^lpole's Lbttbrs, ed. 1861, ii. 371. See also V. 448, n., 462. "Her letters are written with an elegant sim- plioity, with truth and nature, which can flow only from the heart. The tenderness and con- stancy of her affection for her murdered lord pre- sents an image to melt the soul." — Bishop BaRNEX. From Ladt Russell to Doctor Fitz- WILLIAM. SocTHAMPTON HousE, 17th July, 1685. Never shall I, good doctor, I hope, forget vour work (as I may term it) of labour and love: so instruntive and comfortable do I find it, that at any time when I have read any of your papers I feel a heat within me to be repeating my thanks to you anew, which is all I can do towards the discharge of a debt you have engaged me in ; and though nobody loves more than I to stand free from all engagements I cannot answer, yet I do not wish for it here, I would have it as it is ; and although I have the present advantage, you will have the future reward : and if I can truly reap what I know you design me by it, a religious and quiet sub- iciwion to all providences, I am assured you will esteem to have attained it here in some measure. Never could you more seasonably have fed me with such discourses, and left me with expectations of new repasts, in a more seasonable time than these my raiser- able months, and in those this very week in which I have lived over again that fatal day that determined what fell out a week after, and that has given me so long and so bitter a time of sorrow. But God has a compass in his providences that is out of our reach, and as he is all good and wise, that consid- eration should in reason slacken the fierce rages of grief. But, sure, doctor, it is the nature of sorrow to lay hold on all things which give a new ferment to it : then how could I choose but feel it in a time of so much confusion as these last weeks have been, closing so tragically as they havp done ; and sure never any poor creature, for two whole years together, has had more awakers to quicken and revive the anguish of its soul than I have had : yet I hope I do most truly desire that nothing may be so bitter to mo as to think that I have in the least offended thee, my God, and that nothing may be so marvellous in my eyes as the exceeding love of my Lord Jesus : that heaven being my aim, and the longing expectation of my soul, I may go through honour and dis- honour, good report and bad report, pros- perity and adversity, with some evenness of mind. The inspiring me with these desires is, I hope, a token of his never-failing love to- wards me, though an unthankful creature, for all the good things I have enjoyed, and do still in the lives of hopeful children by so beloved a husband. God has restored me my little girl ; the surgeon says she will do well. . . . Sure nobody has enjoyed more Eleasure in the conversations and tender indnesses of a husband and a sister than myself, yet how apt am I to be fretful that I must not still do sol but I must follow that which seems to be the will of God, how unacceptable soever it may be to me. Letters of Lady Rachel Russell. SIR GEORGE MACKENZIE, born 1636, died 1691, was the author of a number of legal, moral, political, poetical and other works, but is best known as an essayist: see his Essays upon Several Moral Subjects; To which is Prefixed an Account of his Life and Writings, Lond., 1713, 8vo. " His Miscellaneous Essays, both in prose and verse, may now be dispensed with, or laid aside, without difficulty. TJiey have not vigour enough for long life. But, if they be considered as the elegant amusement of a statesman and lawyer. 110 THOMAS SFEAT. who had little leisure for the culture of letters, they afford a striking proof of the variety of his aceoinj)lishmenf8 and the refinement of his taste. In several of his Axoral Essays both the subject and the manner betray an imitation of Cowley, who was at that moment beginn ng the reforma- tion of English style." — Sin Jauks Mackintosh: Edi». Jiev., xxxvi. 5, and in his Works, ii. 120. " The Essays of Sir George Mackenzie are empty and diffuse : the style is full of pedantic words to a degree of barbarism ; and though they were chiefly written after the Revolution, he seems to \ave wholly formed himself on the older writers, such as Sir Thomas Browne, or even Feltham." — IIallau : Lit. Hist of Europe, 4th ed., Lond., 1854, iii. 559. Virtue more Pleasant than Vice. The first objection, whose difficulty de- Berves an answer, is that virtue obliges us to oppose pleasures, and to accustom our- selves with such rigours, seriousness, and patience, as cannot but render its practice uneasy. And if the reader's own ingenuity supply not what may be rejoined to this, it will require a discourse that shall have no other design besides its satisfaction. And really to show by what means every man may make himself easily happy, and how to soften the appearing rigours of philosophy, is a design which, if I thought it not worthy of a sweeter pen, should be assisted by mine ; and for which I have, in my current experience, gathered some loose reflectii>ns and observations, of whose cogency I have this assurance, that they have often mod- erated the wildest of my own straying incli- nations, and so might pretend to a more prevailing ascendant over such whose reason and temperament make them much more reclaimable. But at present my answer is, that philosophy enji)ins not the crossing of our own inclinations, but in order to their accomplishment; and it proposes pleasure as its end, as well as vice, though, for its more fixed establishment, it sometimes com- mands what seems rude to such as are strangers to its intentions in them. Thus temperance resolves to lioigliton the pleas- ures of enjoyment, by defending us against all the assaultN of oxooss and oppressive loathing ; and when it lessons our ploasuros, it intends not to abridge them, but to make them fit and convenient for us, oven as sol- diers, who, tlioiigh tliey purpose not wounds and starvingH, y et if without these they oan not reach those laurels tn which they eliinb, they will not NO fur disparage their own hopes as to think they should lix (lieni upon anything whose purcOiase doservos not llio sull'oring of these. I'liysic (^annot he oalleil a eriiel einploynieni, lieeaiise to preserve what is Bound it will cut oflT what is taintoil : and these vicious persons wlioso laziness forms this doubt do answer it when they endnrt the sickness of drunkenness, the toiling of avarice, the attendance of rising vanity, and the watchings of anxiety ; and all this to satisfy inclinations whose shortness allows little pleasures, and whose prospect ex- cludes all future hopes. Such as disquiet themselves by anxiety (which is a fre- quently repeated self-murder), are more tortured than they could be by the want of what they pant after : that longed-for pos- session of a neighbour's estate, or of a pub- lic employment, makes deeper impressions of grief by their absence than their enjoy- ment can repair. And a philosopher will sooner convince himself of their not being the necessary integrants of our happiness, than the miser will, by all his assiduous- ness, gain them. THOMAS SPRAT, born 1636, Bishop of Rochester, 1684. died 1713, was the author of a History of the Royal Society of London for the Improving of Natural Knowledge, Lond., 1667, etc., 4to, and of some other works, including poems. "The correctest writer of the age, and comes nearest to the great original of Greece and Jiumef by a studious imitation of the ancients. . . . His sermons are truly fine." — Dr. H. Felton : IHsaert. on Rending ihe Claance. 1711. " His language 15 always beautiful. . . . All his sermons deserve a reading." — Dr. Doddridge. View OF the Divixe Government afforded BY Experimestai, Philosopiit. We are guilty of false interpretations of providence and wonders when we either make those to be miracles that are none, or when we jnit a false sense upon those that are real; when we make general events to have a private aspoet, or particular accidents to have some universal signification. Though both these may seem at first to have the strictest appcaranee of religion, yet they are the greatest usurpations on the secrets of the .Mniiglily, and unpardonable presumii- ticms on his high prerogatives of punisn- niont and reward. And now, if a moderating of those ex- travaganees must bo ostcouied profaneness, I eonfess I cannot absolve the experimental lihilosophcr. It must be granted that he will be very scrupulous in believing all manner of eommontaries on prophetical vis- ions, in giving liherty to new predictions, and in assigning the onuses and marking out the patlis of God's judgments amongst his creatures. lie cannot suddenly conclude all extraor- THOMAS SPRAT. Ill dinary ovents (;o be the immediate finger of God ; because he familiarly beholds the in- ward workingu of things, and thence per- ceives that many effects which used to af- fright the ignorant are brought forth by the common instruments of nature. He cannot be suddenly inclined to pass censure on men's eternal condition from any temporal judgments that may befall them ; because his long converse with all matters, times and E laces has taught him the truth of what the criptiire says, that " all things happen alike to all." He cannot blindly consent to all imaginations of devout men about future contingencies, seeing he is so rigid in exam- ining all particular matters of fact. He cannot be forward to assent to spiritual raptures and revelations ; because he is truly acquainted with the tempers of men's bodies, the composition of their blood, and the power of fancy, and so better understands the dif- ference between diseases and inspirations. But in all this he commits nothing that is irreligious. 'Tis true, to deny that God has heretofore warned the world of what was to come, is to contradict the very Godhead itself; but to reject the sense which any private m.-ao. sha.ll fasten to it, is not to dis- dain the Word of God, but the opinions of men like ourselves. To declare again|t the possibility that new prophets may be sent from heaven, is to insinuate that the same infinite Wisdom which once showed itself that way is now at an end. But to slight all pretenders that come without the help of miracles is not a contempt of the Spirit, but a just circumspection that the reason of men be not over-reached. To deny that God directs the course of human things, is stupidity ; but to hearken to every prodigy that men frame against their enemies, or for themselves, is not to reverence the power of God, but to make that serve the passions, the interests, and revenges of men. It is a dangerous mistake, into which many good men fall, that we neglect the dominion of God over the world, if we do not discover in every turn of human actions many supernatural providences and miracu- lous events. Whereas it is enough for the honour of his government, that he guides the whole creation in its wonted course of causes and effects : as it makes as much for the reputation of a prince's wisdom, that he can rule his subjects pWceably by his known anc standing laws, as that he is often forced to make use of extraordinary justice to punish or reward. Let us, then, imagine our philosopher to have all slowness of belief, and rigour of trial, which by some is miscalled a blind- ness of mind and hardness of heart. Let us suppose that he is most unwilling to grant that anything exceeds the for)e of nature, but where a full evidence convinces him. Let it be allowed that he is always alarmed, and ready on his guard, at the noise of any miraculous event, lest his judgment should be surprised by the dis- guises of faith. But does he by this dimin- ish the authority of ancient miracles? or does he not rather confirm them the more, by confining their number, and taking care that every falsehood should not mingle with them? Can he by this undermine Chris- tianity, which does not now stand in need of such extraordinary testimonies from heaven ? or do not they rather endanger it who still venture its truths on so hazardous a chance, who require a continuance of signs and wonders, as if the works of our Saviour and his apostles had not been sufficient? Who ought to be esteemed the most carnally- minded — the enthusiast that pollutes reli- gion with his own passions, or the experi- menter that will not use it to flatter and obey his own desires, but to subdue them ? Who is to be thought the greatest enemy of the Gospel — he that loads men's faith by so many improbable things as will go near to make the reality itself suspected, or he that only admits a few arguments to confirm the evangelical doctrines, but then chooses those that are unquestionable 7 It cannot be an ungodly purpose to strive to abolish all holy cheats, which are of fatal consequence both to the deceivers and those that are deceived : — to the deceivers, because they must needs be hypocrites, having the argument in their keeping; to the deceived, because if their eyes shall ever be opened, and they chance to find that they have been deluded in any one thing, they will be apt not only to re- ject that, but even to despise the very truths themselves which they had before been taught by those deluders. It were, indeed, to bo confessed that this severity of censure on religious things were to be condemned in experimenters, if, while they deny any wonders that are falsely at- tributed to the true God, they should ap- prove those of idols or false deities. But that is not objected against them. They make no comparison between his power and the works of any others, but only between the several ways of his own manifesting himself. Thus, if they lessen one heap, yet they still increase the other ; in the main, they diminish nothing of his right. If they take from the prodigies, they add to the ordinary works of the same Author. And those ordinary works themselves they do almost raise to the height of wonders, by the exact discovery which they make of their exoellen lies; while the enthusiast goes near to bring iown the price of the true and 112 WILLIAM B EVE RIDGE. primitive miracles, by such a vast and such a negligent augmenting of their number.^ By this, I hope, it appears that this in- quiring, this scrupulous, this inoredulouB temper, is not the disgrace, but the honour, of experiments. And, therefore, I will de- clare them to be the most seasonable study for the present temper of our nation. This wild amusing men s minds with prodigies and conceits of providence, has been one of the most considerable causes of those spir- itual distractions of which our country has long been the theatre. This is a vanity to which the English seem to have been always subject above others. There is scarce any modern historian that relates our foreign wars but he has this objection against the disposition of our countrymen, that they used to order their affairs of the greatest importance according to some obscure omens or predictions that passed amongst them on little or no foundations. And at this time, especially this hist year [1666], this gloomy and ill-boding humour has prevailed. So that it is now the fittest season for experi- ments to arise, to teach us a wisdom which springs from the depths of knowledge, to snake off the shadows, and to scatter the mists, which fill the minds of men with a vain consternation. This is a work well becoming the most Christian profession. For the most apparent effect which attended the passion of Christ was the putting of an eternal silence on all the false oracles and dissembled inspirations of ancient times. History of the Royal Society. ■WILLIAM BEVERIDGE, D.D., born 1638, Bishop of St. Asaph, famous for his learning, piety, and ^ood works, was the author of many theological works, of which a collective edition of those in English was first published, with a Memoir of the Au- thor, and a Oitioal Examination of his Writings, by Thomas Ilartwoll Home, M.A., Lond., lS'i4, 9 vols. 8vo. New edition of Binhop 15i'voriilj;o'8 Works, in Library of AngUi-Oatliolio Tlieology, 1848, 10 vols. 8vo. "Our liMirnod and vonornblo biahop dolirorod hifiiMolf with ihoflo ornamonts alono nhioh hla sub- ject 8U)(n<'»t"'' to l''"'i und wrote in that plainness and »nU^mnity of ulylo, that gravity and aimpliotty, whioli K"'^'° aiilliurity to the aiiorod trutha ho taught, aiui unimNworablo uvidonoo to the doolrinoa he dofoniliMl. There Ib aoinotluiif; so groat, primi- tive, and opostolloal in hia writiiigK, that it creates an awe and venoration in our mind: tlio irouor- tanoo of hla aubjoota ia abuvo the doooration of wordi) and nhat la groat and miijoatio in itaeif looketh moat like itaeif the less it ia adorned,"-* Dr. Hehbt Felto». "Beveridge'a Practical Worka are much lik« Henry's, but not equal to hia." — Db. Doddhidgk. Self-Denial. Christ hath said in plain terms, " If any man will come after me, let him deny him- self;" implying that he that doth not deny himself cannot go after him. But besides that, there is an impossibility in the thing itself, that any one should be a true Christian or go after Christ, and not deny himself, as may be easily perceived if we will but consider what true Christianity requires of us, and what it is to be a real Christian. A true Christian, we know, is one that lives by faith, and not by sight; that "looks not at the things which are seen, but at those things which are not seen ;" that believes whatsoever Christ hath said, trusteth on whatsoever he hath prom- ised, and obeyeth whatsoever he bath com- manded ; that receiveth Christ as his only Priest to make atonement for him. as his only Prophet to instruct, and as his only Lord and Master to rule and govern him. In a word, a Christian is one that gives up himself and all he hath to Christ, who gave himself and all he hath to him ; and there- fore the very notion of true Christianity im- plies and supposes the denial of ourselves, without which it is as impossible for a man to be a Christian as it is for a subject to be rebellious and loyal to his prince at the same time ; and therefore it is absolutely neces- sary that we go out of ourselves before we can go to him. We must strip ourselves of our very selves before we can put on Christ ; for Christ himself hath told us that " no man can serve two masters ; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or else he will hold to the one and despise the other." We cannot serve both "God and Mammon," Christ and ourselves too : so that we must either deny ourselves to go after Christ, or else deny Christ to go after our- solves, so as to mind our own selfish ends and designs in the world. And verily it is a hard cose if we cannot deny ourselves for him, who so far denied himself for us as to lay down his life to re- deem ours. He who was equal to God him- self, yea, who himself was the true God, so far denied himsolf as to become man, yea, " a man of sorrows and acquainted with griefs," for us ; and cannot we deny our solves so much as a fancy, a oonoeit, a sin, or lust, for him ? How, tnon, can we expoot that he should own us for his friends, his servants, or his disciples? No, he will never do it. Neither can wo in reason ex- pect that he should give himself and lUI tha THOMAS DECKER. 113 merits of his death and passion unto us, so long as we think 'much to ^ive ourselves to him, or to deny ourselves for him. And therefore if we desire to be made partakers of all those glorious things that he hath purchased with his own most precious blood for the sous of men, let us begin here, — in- dulge our flesh no longer, but deny ourselves whatsoever God hath been pleased to forbid. And f(ir this end, let us endeavour each day more and more to live above ourselves, above the temper of our bodies, and above the al- lurements of the world: live as those who believe and profess that they are none of their own, but Christ's, — his by creation : it waa he that made us, — his by preservation : it is he that maintains us, — and his by re- demption : it is he that hath purchased and redeemed us with his own blood. And therefore let us deny ourselves for the future to our very selves, whose we are not, and devote ourselves to him, whose alone we are. By this we shall manifest ourselves to be Christ's disciples indeed, especially if we do not only deny ourselves, but also take up our cross and follow him. Private Thoughts on a Christian Life, Part II. THOMAS DECKER, OR DEK- KER, was well known in the reign of James I. as a writer of plays and tracts (more than fifty in number) and as a co-author with Web- ster, Rowley, Ford, and Johnson of various dramas. The best known of his productions is entitled The GvU's Horne-booke, Lend., 1609, 4to ; new ed., by Dr. Nott, Bristol, 1812, 4to. " His ' (Jul's Horne-Booke, or fashions to please all sorts of Guls,' first printed in 1609, exhibits a very carious, minute, and interesting picture of the manners and hahits of the middle class of so- ciety, and on this account will be hereafter fre- quently referred to in these pages." — Drake* a Shak~ Bpeare and Hia Timea. "The pamphlets and plays of Decker alone would furnish a more complete view of the habits and customs of his contemporaries in vulgar and middle life than could easily' be collected from all the grave annals of the times." — (Lond.) Qiiar. Rev, In his description of London life, in The Fortunes of Nigel, Sir Walter Scott draws largely from The Gull's Horne-Booke, of which we give some specimens. How A Gallant should behave Himself IN Paul's Walks. He that would strive to fashion his legs to liis silk stockings, and his proud gait to his broad garters, let him whiff down these 8 observations : for if he once get to walk by the book, and I see no reason but he may, as well as fight by the book, Paul's may be proud of him : W'ill Clarke shall ring forth encomiums in his honour ; John, in Paul's churchyard, shall fit his head for an excel- lent block ; whilst all the inns of court re- joice to behold his most handsome calf. Your Mediterranean isle is then the only gallery wherein the pictures of all your true fashionate and complimental gulls are, and ought to be, hung up. Into that gal- lery carry your neat hody ; but take heed you pick out such an hour when the main shoal of islanders are swimming up and down. And first observe your doors of en- trance, and your exit ; not much unlike the players at the theatres ; keeping your de- corums even in fantasticality. As, for ex- ample, if you prove to be a northern gentle- man, I would wish you to pass through the north door, more often especially than any of the other ; and so, according to your countries, take note of your entrances. Now for your venturing into the walk. Be circumspect, and wary what pillar you come in at ; and take heed in any case, aa you love the reputation of your honour, that you avoid the serving man's leg, and approach not within five fathom Of that pillar ; but bend your course directly iii the middle line, that the whole body of the church may appear to be yours ; where, in view of all, you may publish your suit in what manner you affect most, either with the slide of your cloak from the one shoulder ; and then you must, as 'twere in anger, suddenly snatch at the middle of the inside, if it be taffeta at the least ; and so by that means your costly lining is betrayed, or else by the pretty language of compliment. But one note by the way do I especially woo you to, the neglect of which makes many of our gallants cheap and ordinary, that by no means you be seen above four turns ; but in the fifth make yourself away, either in some of the semsters' shops, the new tobacco office, or amongst the booksellers, where, if you cannot read, exercise your smoke, 'and in- quire who has writ against this divine weed. '&c. For this withdrawing yourself a little will much benefit your suit, which else, by too long walking, would be stale to the whole spectators : but howsoever, if Paul's jacks be once up with their elbows, and quarrelling to strike eleven ; as soon as ever the clock has parted them, and ended the fray with his hammer, let not the duke' a gallery contain you any longer, but pass away apace in open view ; in which depart- ure, if by chance you either encounter, or aloof off throw your inquisitive eye upon any knight or squire, being your familiar, 114 THOMAS ELL WOOD. salute him not by his name of Sir such-ar one. or so ; but call him Ned or Jack, &c. This will set off your estimation with great men ; and if, though there be a dozen com- panies between you, 'tis the better he call aloud to you, for that is most genteel, to know where he shall find you at two o'clock ; tell him at such an ordinary, or such ; and be sure to name those that are dearest, and whither none but your gallants resort. After dinner you may appear again, having trans- lated yourself out of your Englisn cloth cloak into a slight Turkey grogram, if you have that happiness of shifting ; and then be seen, for a turn or two, to correct your teeth with some quill or silver instrument, and to cleanse your gums with a wrought handkerchief; it skills not whether you dined or no ; that is best known to your stomach, or in what place you dined ; though it were with cheese, of your own mother's making, in your chamber, or study. The Gull's Home-Booke. THOMAS ELLWOOD, born 1639, died 1713, was the author of Sacred History, or The Historical Part of the Holy Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments, Digested into due Method, with Observations, 1705-9, Lond., 1794, 2 vols. 8vo, and other works, of which a History of His Life, 1714, 8vo, is especially valuable oh account of its description of Milton, to whom EUwood was reader. Ellwood's Description of Milton. He received me courteously, as well for the sake of Dr. Paget, who introduced me, as of Isaac Penington, who recommended me. to both of whom he bore a good respect ; and having inquired divers things of me, with respect to my former progressions in learning, he dismissed me, to provide my- self of such accommodations as might be most suitable to my future studies. I wenty, therefore, and took myself a lodg- ing as near to his house (which was then in Jewin-Streot] as conveniently [ could; and, from thenceforward, went every day, in the afternoon (excopt on tlio first days of the week), and sitting liy him in his dining- room, read to him suoli bonks in the Latin tongue as he pleased to hear mo read. ,_ At my first sitting tn rend to him, observ- ing that I used the English pronunciation, h(i told mo if I would have the bonolit of the Latin tongue (not only to read and under- stand Latin authors, but to converse with foroignors, oitlior iilircmd or at home], I must learn the foi-oign pronunciation. To this I consenting, he instructed me bow to sound the vowels, so different frOin the common pronunciation used by the English (who speak Anglice their Latin], that (with some few other variations in sounding some consonants, in particular cases, as C, before E or I, like Ch ; Sc, before 1, like Sh, 4c.] the Latin thus spoken seemed as different from that which was delivered as the Eng- lish generally speak it, as if it wa« another language. I faa!d, before, during my retired life at my father's, by unwearied diligence and industry, so far recovered the rules of gram- mar (in which I had once been very ready), that I could both read a Latin author and, after a sort, hammer out his meaning. But this change of pronunciation proved a new difficulty to me. It was now harder to me to read than it was before to understand when read. But Labor omnia rineit Improbos. iDceasant pains The end obtains. And 80 did I, which made my reading the more acceptable to my master. He, on the other hand, perceiving with what earnest desire I pursued learning, gave me not only all the encouragement, bat all the help, he could ; for, having a curious ear, he under- stood, by my tone, when I understood what I read, and when I did not ; and accordingly would stop me, examine me, and open the most difficult passages to me. Thus I went on for about six weeks' time, reading to him in the afternoons, and exer- cising myself, with my own books, in my chamber, in the forenoon. I was sensible of an improvement. But, alas ! I had fixed my studies in a wrong place. London and I could never agree for health. My lungs (as I suppose) were too tender to bear the sulphureous air of that city ; so that I soon began to droop, and in less than two months' time I waa fain to leave lioth my studies and the city, and return into the country to preserve life ; and much ado I had to get thither. . . . i Having recovered, and gone back to Lon- on,] I was very kindly received by my master, who liiul conceived so good an opin- ion of me that my conversation (I found) was acceptable to him ; and he seemed heart- ily glad of my recovery and return ; and into our old method of stuiiy we fell again, I read- ing to him, and he explaining to me as ooca- sion required. . . . Some little time before I went to Ayles- bury prison I was required by my quondam master, Milton, to take a house for him in the neighbourhood where I dwelt, that ho WILLIAM SHEELOCK. 115 might get out of the city, for the safety of himself and his family, the pestilence then growing hot in London. I took a pretty box tor him in Giles Chalfont, a mile from me, of which I gave him notice, and intended to have waited on him, and see him well settled in it, but was prevented by that imprison- ment. But now, being released, and returned home, I soon made a visit to him, to wel- come him into the country. After some common discourse had passed between us, he called for a manuscript of his, which, being brought, he delivered to me, bidding me to take it home with me, and read it at my leisure, and, when I had so done, return it to him with my judgment thereupon. When I came home, and had set myself to read it, I found it was that excellent poem which he entitled " Paradise Lost." After I had, with the utmost attention, read it through, I made him another visit, and returned him his book, with due acknowl- edgment for the favour he had done me in communicating it to me. He asked me how I liked it, and what I thought of it, which I modestly but freely told him ; and after some further discourse about it, I pleasantly said to him, "Thou hast said much here of Paradise Lost ; but what hast thou to say of Paradise Found?" He made me no answer, but sat some time in a muse ; then broke off that discourse, and fell upon another subject. After the sickness was over, and the city well cleansed, and become safely habitable again, he returned thither ; and when, after- wards, I went to wait on him there (which I seldom failed of doing, whenever my occa- sions drew me to London), he showed me his second poem, called " Paradise Regained," and, in a pleasant tone, said to me, " This is owing to you, for you put it into my head at Chalfont : which before I had not thought of." EllwoodCs History of Ms Life, WILLIAM SHERLOCK, D.D., born 1641, Prebendary of St. Paul's, 1681, Master of the Temple, 1684, Dean of St. Paul's, 1691, died 1707, was the author of more than sixty publications, chiefly books and pamphlets against Komanism, theological and political tracts, and single sermons. We notice: Discourse concern- ing the Knowledge of Jesus Christ and our Union with Him, Lond., 1674, 8vo ; The Case of Resistance to the Supreme Powers, 1684, 8vo ; Practical Discourses concerning Death, Lond., 1689, 8vo, 19th edit., 1723, 8vo ; A Vindication of the Doctrine of the Trinity, and of the Incarnation of the Son of God, Lond., 1690, 1691, 1694, 4to; Prac- tical Discourse concerning a Future Judg- ment, Lond., 1692, 8vo, 5th edit., 1639, 8vn, etc. ; Scripture Proofs of oir Saviour's Di- vinity, 1706, 8vo. A collection of his Ser- mons edited by Mr. White was published 1700, 8vo, 3d edit, 1719, 8vo, vol. ii., 1719, 8vo, new edit, of both vols., 1755, 2 vols. 8vo. " He was a clear, a polite, and a strong writer, . . . but he was apt to assume too much to him- self, and to treat his adversaries with contempt: this created him many enemies, and made him pass for an insolent, haughty man." — Bishop Bub- net : Own Times, edit. 1833, iv. 388. "On moral subjects his arguments are generally strong, exceeding proper for conviction. He is plain and manly, great and animated. His repre- sentations are exceeding awful ; therefore his ' Death' and ' Judgment' are his best books. His book on ' Providence' is by many thought to be the best on that subject." — Dr. Doddridge. Life not too Short. Such a long life [as that of the antedila vians] is not reconcilable with the present state of the world. What the state of the world was before the flood, in what manner they lived, and how they employed their time, we cannot tell, for Moses has given no account of it ; but taking the world as it is, and as we find it, I dare undertake to con- vince those men who are most apt to com- plain of the shortness of life, that it would not be for the general happiness of mankind to have it much longer: for, 1st, The world is at present very unequally divided ; some have a large share and portion of it, others have nothing but what they can earn by very hard labour, or extort from other men's charity by their restless importunities, or gain by more ungodly arts. Now, though the rich and prosperous, who have the world at command, and live in ease and pleasure, would be very well contented to spend some hundred years in this world, yet I should think fifty or threescore years abundantly enough for slaves and beggars ; enough to spend in hunger and want, in a jail and a prison. And those who are so foolish as not to think this enough, owe a great deal to the wisdom and goodness of God that he dees. So that the greatest part of mankind hava great reason to be contented with the short- ness of life, because they have no temptation to wish it longer. 2dly, The present state of this world re- quires a more quick succession. The world is pretty well peopled, and is divided amongst its present inhabitants ; and but very few, in comparison, as I observed before, have any considerable share in the division. Now, let us h'lt suppose that all our ancestors, who lie WILLIAM SHERLOCK. lived an hundred or two hundred years ago, were alive still, and possessed their old es- tates and honours, what had become of this present^generation of men, who have now taken tli'eir places, and make as great a show and bustle in the world as they did ? And if you look back three, or four, or five hun- dred years, the case is still so much the worse ; the world would be over-peopled ; and where there is one miserable man now, there must have been five hundred ; or the world must have been common, and all men reduced to the same level ; which, I believe, the rich and happy people, who are so fond of long life, would not like very well. This would utterly undo our young prodigal heirs, were their hopes of succession three or four hundred years off, who, as short as life is now, think their fathers make very little haste to their graves. This would spoil their trade of spending their estates before they have them, and make them live a dull sober life, whether they would or no ; and such a life, I know, they don't think worth having. And therefore, I hope at least they will not make the shortness of their fathers' lives an argument against providence ; and yet such kind of sparks as these are com- monly the wits that set up for atheism, and, when it is put into their heads, quarrel with everything which they fondly conceive will weaken the belief of a God and a providence, and, among other things, with the shortness of life ; which they have little reason to do, when they so often outlive their estates. 3dly, The world is very bad as it is; so bad, that good men scarce know how to spend fifty or threescore years, in it; but consider how bad it would probably be were the life of men extended to six, seven, or eight hundred years. If so near a prospect of the other world as forty or fifty years cannot restrain men from the greatest vil- lanies, what would they do if they could as reasonably suppose death to be throe or four hundred years off? If men make snoh im- provements in wickedness in twenty or thiitv years, what would they do in hundreds"? And what a blessed place then would this world be to live in I We see in the old world, when the life of men was drawn out to so groat a length, the wickedness of man- kind grew 80 iiisufferalilo that it repeiited God ho had made man ; and he resolved to destroy that whole generation, exeepting Noah and his family. And the most prob- able aec^ount that can be given how tliey came to grow so univorsnlly wicked, is the long iiiid proMiierons lives of siieli wieked men, who by deijiees corrupteil others, and thojr (ithors, till there was but one righteous family left, and no oilier romody left Init to destroy them all ; livivingonly lliat righteous family as the seed and future hopes of tha new world. And when God had determined in himself and promised to Noah never to destroy the world again by such an universal destruc- tion, till the last and final judgment, it was necessary by degrees to shorten the lives of men, which was the most effectual means to make them more governable, and to remove bad examples out of the world, which would hinder the spreading of the infection, and people and reform the world again by new examples of piety and virtue. For when there are such quick successions of men, there are few ages but have some great and brave examples, which give a new and better spirit to the world. On our Ignorance of the Time op Deatu. For a conclusion of this argument, I shall briefly vindicate the wisdom and goodness of God in concealing from us the time of our death. This we are very apt to com- plain of, that our lives are so very uncertain, that we know not to-day but what we may die to-morrow ; and we would be mighty glad to meet with any one who would cer- tainly inform us in this matter, how long we are to live. But if we think a little better of it, we shall be of another mind. For, 1st. Though I presume many of you would be glad to know that you shall cer- tainly live twenty, or thirty, or forty years longer, yet would it be any comfort to know that you must die to-morrow, or some few months, or a year or two hence ? which may be your case for ought you know : and this, I believe, you are not very desirous to know ; for how would this chill your blood and spirits 1 How would it overcast all the pleas- ures and comforts of life ! You would spend your days like men under the sentenoo of death, while the execution is suspended. Did all men who must die young certainly know it, it would destroy the industry and improvements of half mankind, which "would half destroy the world, or be an insupport- able inisehief to human societies : for what man who knows that he must die at twenty, or fivo-and-twenty, a little sooner or later, would trouble himself with inijenious or gainful aits, or concern himself any more with this world than just to live so long in it? And yet, how necossarv is the service of such men in the world I VVliat groat things do they many times do! and what great im- provements do they make 1 How plca,«ant and diverting is their conversation while it is innocent I llow do tliey eiijov themselves, and give life and spirit to tie" graver age I How thin would our schools, our shops, out SIR ISAAC NEWTON. 117 nniversities, and all places of education, be did they know how little time many of them •vere to live in the world ! For would such men concern themselves to learn the arts of living, who must die as soon as they have learnt them ? Would any father be at a great expense in educating his child, only that he might die with a little Latin and Greek, logic and philosophy? No : half the world must be divided into cloisters and nunneries, and nurseries, for the grave. Well, you'll say, suppose that ; and is not this an advantage above all the inconveni- ences you can think of, to secure the salva- tion ot so many thousands who are now eternally ruined by youthful lusts and vani- ties, but would spend their days in piety and devotion, and make the nest world their only care, if they knew how little while they were to live here ? Bight : I grant this might be a good way to correct the heat and extravagances of youth, and so it would be to snow them heaven and hell ; but Crod does not think fit to do either, because it offers too much force and violence to men's minds ; it is no trial of their virtue, of their reverence for God, of their conquests and victory over this world by the power of faith, but makes re- ligion a matter of necessity, not of choice : now, God will force and, drive no man to heaven ; the gospel dispensation is the trial and discipline of ingenuous spirits ; and if the certain Jiopes and fears of another world, and the uncertainty of our living here, will not conquer these flattering temptations, and make men seriously religious, as those who must certainly die, and go into another world, and they know not how soon, God will not try whether the certain knowledge of the time of their death will make them religious. That they may die young, and that thou- sands do so, is reason enough to engage young men to expect death, and prepare for it ; if they will venture, they must take their chance, and not say they had no warn- ing of dying young, if they eternally mis- carry by their wilful delays. And besides this, God expects our youth- ful service and obedience, though we were to live on till old age : that we may die young is not the proper, much less the only, reason why we should remember our Creator in the days of our youth, but be- cause God has a right to our youthful strength and vigour; and if this will not oblige us to an early piety, we must not expect that God will set death in our view, to fright and terrify us : as if the only de- sign God had in requiring our obedience was, not that we live like reasonable crea- tures, to the glory of their Maker and Re- deemer, but that we might repent of our sins time enough to escape hell. God is so merciful as to accept of returning prodigals, but does not think fit to encourage us in sin, by giving us notice when we shall die, and when it is time to think of repentance. 2dly, Though I doubt not but that it would be a great pleasure to you to know that you should live till old age, yet con- sider a little with yourselves, and then tell me whether you yourselves can judge it wise and fitting for God to let you know this? I observed to you before what danger there is in flattering ourselves with the hopes of long life ; that it is apt to make us too fond of this world when we expect to live so long in it ; that it weakens the hopes and fears of the next world, by removing it at too great a distance from us ; that it encourages men to live in sin, because they have time enough before them to indulge their lusts, and to repent of their sins, and make their peace with God before they die : and if the uncertain hope of this undoes so many men, what would the certain knowledge of it do ? Those who are too wise and considerate to be imposed on by such uncertain hopes, might be conquered by the certain knowl- edge of a long life. SIR ISAAC NEWTON, the most illustrious of natural philosopheii>, born 1642, died 1727, in addition to his works upon mathematics, philosophy, chro- nology, etc., was the author of Observations upon the Prophecies of Daniel, and the Apoc- alypse of St. John, Lond., 1733, 4to, and other Biblical treatises. In a review of the characteristics and achievements of the great minds which ruled the republic of letters and the domain of science in the latter days of Charles II., an eloquent historian remarks : " But the glory of these men, eminent as they were, is cast into the shade bvthe transcendent lustre of one immortal name, ^n Isaac Newton two kinds of intellectual power — which have littlu in common and which are not often found together in a very high degree of vigour,, but which, never- theless, are equally necessary in the most sublime departments of natural philosophy — were united as they have never been united before or since. There may have beenminds as happily constituted as Ms for the cultivation of pure mathematical science ; there may have been minds as happily constituted for the cultivation of science purely experimental; but in no other mind have the de- monstrative faculty and the inductive faculty co- existed in such supreme excellence and perfect harmony. Perhaps in an age of Scotists and Thomists even his intellect might have run to waste, as many iiitellects ran to waste which were inferior only to his. Happily, the spirit of the ag ) in which his lot was cast gave the right direc- 118 SJR ISAAC NEWTON. tion to his mind, and his mind reacted with ten- fold force on the spirit of the age. In the year , 1685, his fame, though splendid, was only dawn- ing : hut his genius was in the meridian. His great work — that work which effeoted a revolution in the most important provinces of natural pbi- lusophy — had been completed [it was completed in May, 1686], but was not yet published [in mid- summer, 1687], and was just about to be submitted to the consideration of the Royal Society [sub- mitted May, 1686]." — LoBD Macadlat : //u(. of England, vol. i. ch. ill. The results of Newton's diligent exami- nation of the Scriptures should be given in his own words : " I find," he remarks, " more sure marks of the authenticity of the Bible than in any profane history what- ever. . . . Worshipping God and the Lamb in the temple : God, for bis benefaction in creating all things, and the Lamb, for his benefaction in redeeming us with his blood." The Prophetic Lanodage. For understanding the prophecies, we are, in the first place, to acquaint ourselves with the figurative language of the prophets. This language is taken from the analogy between the world natural and an empire or kingdom considered as a world politic. Accordingly, the whole world natural, consisting of heaven and earth, signifies the whole world politic, consisting of thrones and people ; or so much of it as is considered in the prophecy. And the things in that world signify the analogous things in this. For the heavens, and the things therein, signify thrones and dignities, and those who enjoy them ; and the earth, with the things thereon, the inferior people ; and the lowest part of the earth, called Hades, or Hell, the lowest or most miserable part of them. Whence, ascending towards heaven, and descending to the earth, are put for rising and falling in power and honour ; rising out of the earth or waters, and falling into them, for the rising up to any dignity or dominion, out of the inferior state of the people, or falling down from the same into tliat inferior state; descending into the lower parte of the earth, for descending to a very low and un- happy state ; speaking with a faint voice out of the dust, for being in a weak and low condition ; moving from one place to another, for translation from one omoo, dignity, or dominion to another; great earthquakes, and tho shaking of heaven and earth, for the shaking of dominions, so as to distniot and ovei'tlirow them ; tlu> creating a now heaven luui eartli, and tho passing away of an old one, or tlio beginning and iMid of the world, for tho rise and roign of tho body politic signifidcl thereby. In the liouvuiis, the sun and moon arc, by the interpreters of dreams, put for the per- sons of kings and queens. But in sacred prophecy, which regards not single persons, the sun is put for the whole species and race of kings, in the kingdom or kingdoms of the world politic, shining with regal pomp and glory ; the moon for the body of the common people, considered as the king's wife; the stars for subordinate princes and great men, or for bishops and rulers of the people of God, when the sun is Christ ; light for the glory, truth, and knowledge wherewith great and good men shine and illuminate others ; darkness for obscurity of condition, and for error, blindness, and ignorance ; darkening, smiting, or settling of the sun, moon, and stars, for the ceasing of a king- dom, or for the desolation thereof, propor- tional to the darkness ; darkening the sun, turning the moon into blood, and falling of the stars, for the same ; new moons, for the return of a dispersed people into a body politic or ecclesiastic. Fire and meteors refer to both heaven and earth, and signify as follows : — Burning any- thing with fire, is put for the consuming thereof by war ; a conflagration of the earth or turning a country into a lake of fire, for the consumption of a kingdom by war ; the being in a lurnace, for the l)eing in slavery under another nation j the ascending up of the smoke of any burning thing for ever and ever, for the continuation of a conquered people under the misery of perpetual sub- jection and slavery ; the scorching heat of the sun, for vexatious wars, persecutions, and troubles inflicted by the king; riding on the clouds, for reigning over much people; covering the sun with a cloud, or with smoke, for oppression of the king by the armies of an enemy ; tempestuous winds, or the motion of clouds, for wars ; thunder, or the voice of a cloud, for the voice of a multitude; a storm of thunder, lightning, hail, and overflowing rain, for a tempest of war descending from the heavens and clouds politic on the heads of their enemies ; rain, if not immoderate, and dew, and living water, for the graces and doctrines of the Spirit; and the defect of rain, for spiritual barrenness. In the earth, the dry land and congregated waters, ivs a soa, a river, a flood, are put for the people of several regions, nations, and dominions; embittering of waters, for great affliction of the people by w.ir and persecu- tion ; turning things into blood, for the mys- tical death of bodies politic, that is, for tlieir dissolution ; the overflowing of a sea or river, for the invasion of the earth politic by the people of the waters ; drying up of waters, for the> conquest of their "regions, by the earth ; fountains of waters for cities, tlit WILLIAM PENN. 119 permanent heads of rivers politic ; moun- tains and islands, for the cities of the earth and sea politic, with the territories and dominions belonging to those cities ; dens and rocks of mountains, for the temples of cities; the hiding of men in those dens and rocks, for the shutting of idols in their tem- ples ; houses and ships, for families, assem- blies, and towns in the earth and sea politic ; and a navy of ships of war, for an army of that kingdom that is signified by the sea. Animals also, and vegetables, are put for the people of several regions and conditions ; and particularly trees, herbs, and laud ani- mals, for the people of the earth politic ; flags, reeds, and fishes, for those of the waters politic ; birds and insects, for those of the politic heaven and earth ; a forest, for a kingdom; and a wilderness, for a desolate and thin people. If the wor'ld politic, considered in proph- ecy, consists of many kingdoms, they are represented by as many parts of the world natural, as the noblest by the celestial frame, and then the moon and clouds are put for the common people ; the less noble, by the earth, sea, and rivers, and by the animals or vegetables, or buildings therein ; and then the greater and more powerful animals and taller trees, are put for kings, princes, and nobles. And because the whole kingdom is the body politic of the king, therefore the sun, or a tree, or a beast, or a bird, or a man, whereby the king is represented, is put in a large signification for the whole kingdom; and several animals, as a lion, a bear, a leopard, a goat, according to their qualities, are put for several kingdoms and bodies politic ; and sacrificing of beasts, for slaugh- tering and conquering of kingdoms; and friendship between beasts, for peace between kingdoms. Tet sometimes vegetables and animals are, by certain epithets or circum- stances, extended to other significations ; as a tree, when called the " tree of life" or " of knowledge" ; and a beast, when called "the old serpent," or worshipped. ■WILLIAM PENN, the founder of Pennsylvania, a man illus- trious for wisdom and virtue, born 1644, died 1718, was the author of No Cross, No Crown, a Discourse shewing the Nature and Discipline of the Holy Cross of Christ, Loud., 1669, 12mo ; Brief Account of the Rise and Progress of the People called Quakers, Lond., 1694, 12mo, etc. ; Fruits of a Father's Love : being the Advice of William Penn to his Children, Lond., 1726, 12mo, and of other works. See the Select Works of William Penn, with a Journal of his Life, Lond., 1771, fol., large paper; 2d ed., Lond., 1782, 5 vols. 8vo ; Lond., 1825, 3 vols. 8vo. " It should be sufficient for the glory of William Penn that he stands upon record as the most hu- mane, the most moderate, and the most pacific of all rulers." — Lord Jeffrey: Oontrib. to Edin. See., 1853, 849. " To William Penn belongs the distinction, des- tined to brighten as men advance in virtue, of first in human history establishing the Law of Love as a rule of conduct in the intercourse of nations."^ Charles Sdmijee: The True Grandeur of Jfatioiut Orations and SpeeoheSf 1850, i. 114. The Pride 07 Noble Birth. That people are generally proud of their persons is too visible and troublesome, espe- cially if they have any pretence either to blood or beauty ; the one has raised many quarrels among men, and the other among women, and men too often, for their sakes, and at their excitements. But to the first: what a pother has this noble blood made in the world, antiquity of name or family, whose father or mother, great-grandfather or great-grandmother, was best descended or allied? what stock or what clan they came of? what coat of arms they have? which had, of right, the precedence? But, methinks, nothing of man's folly has less show of reason to palliate it. For, first, what matter is it of whom any one descended, that is not of ill fame ; since 'tis his own virtue that must raise, or vice depress him? An ancestor's character is no excuse to a man's ill actions, but an ag- gravation of his degeneracy ; and since vir- tue comes not by generation, I neither am the better nor the worse for my forefather : to be sure not in God's account ; nor should it be in man's. Nobody would endure in- juries the easier, or reject favours the more, for coming by the hand of a man well or ill descended. I confess it were greater honour to have had no blots, and with an hereditary estate to have had a lineal descent of worth : but that was never found; no, not in the most blessed of families upon earth ; I mean Abraham's. To be descended of wealth and titles fills no man's head with brains, or heart with troth : those qualities come from a higher cause. 'Tis vanity, then, and most condemnable pride, for a man of bulk and character to despise another of less size in the world, and of meaner alliance, for want of them ; because the latter may have the merit, where the former has only the effects of it in an ancestor : and though the one be great by means of a forefather, the other ia so too, but 'tis by his own ; then, pray, which is the bravest man of the two ? 120 WILLIAM PENN. " 0," says the person proud of blood, " it was never a good world since wo have had so many upstart gentlemen I" But what should others have said of that man's ances- tor, when he started first up into the knowl- edge of the world? For he, and all men and families, ay, and all states and king- doms too, have had their upstarts, that is, their beginnings. This is like being the True Church, because old, not because good ; for families to be noble l)y being old, and not by being virtuous. No such matter : it must be age in virtue, or else virtue before age; for otherwise, a man should be noble by means of his predecessor, and yet the predecessor less noble than he, because he was the acquirer: which is a paradox that will puzzle all their heraldry to explain. Strange ! that they should be more noble than their ancestor, that got their nobility for theni ! But if this be absurd, as it is, then the upstart is the noble man ; the man that got it by his virtue : and those only are entitled to his honour that are imitators of his virtue ; the rest may bear his name from his blood, but that is all. If virtue, then, give nobility, which heathens themselves agree, then families are no longer truly noble than they are virtuous. And if virtue go not by blood, but by the qualifications of the descendants, it follows, blood is ex- cluded ; else blond would bar virtue, and no man that wanted the one should be allowed the benefit of the other ; which were to stint and bound nobility for want of antiquity, and make virtue useless. No : let blood and name go together ; but pray, let nobility and virtue keep com- pany, for they are nearest of kin. 'lis thus posited by God himself, that best knows how to apportion things with an equal and just hand. He neither likes nor dislikes by de- scent ; nor does he regard what people were, but are. He remembers not the righteous- ness of any man that leaves his righteous- ness, much less any unrighteous man fur the righteousness of his ancestor. No Cross, No Crown. Penn's Advice to nis Children. Next, betako yourselves to some honest, industrious course of life, and that not of sordid covetousness, but for example, and to avoid idliMi«NN. And if you change your condition and marry, choose with the knowl- edge and consent of your mother, if living, or of guardians, or those that have the oharf^n of you. Mind neither beauty nor riches, but the four of the Lord, and a swoct and amiable disposition, such as you can love aliovo all this world, and that may make your habitations pleasant and desirable to you. And being married, be tender, affectionate, patient, and meek. Live in the fear of the Lord, and he will bless you and your off- spring. Be sure to live within compass, borrow not, neither be beholden to any. Ruin not yourselves by kindness to others ; for that exceeds the due bounds of friend- ship, neither will a true friend expect it. Small matters I heed not. Let your industry and parsimony go no further than for a sufficiency for life, and to make a provision for your children, and that in moderation, if the Lord gives you any. I charge you help the poor and needy ; let the Lord have a voluntary share of your in- come for the good of the poor, both in our society and others ; for we are all his crea- tures ; remembering that he that giveth to the poor lendeth to the Lord. Know well your incomings, and your out- goings may be better regulated. Love not money nor the world : use them only, and they will serve you ; but if you love them you serve them, which will debase your spirits as well as offend the Lord. Pity the distressed, and hold out a hand of help to them ; it may be your case, and as you mete to others God will mete to you again. Be humble and gentle in your con- versation ; of few words, I charge you, but always pertinent when you speak, hearing out before you attempt to answer, and then speaking as if you would persuade, not im- pose. Affront none, neither revenge the affronts that are done to you ; but forgive, and you shall be forgiven of your Heavenly Father. In making friends, consider well first ; and when you are fixed, be true, not wavering by reports, nor deserting in affliction, for that becomes not the good and virtuous. AVatch against anger; neither speak nor act in it: for, like drunkenness, it makes a man a beast, and throws people into desper- ate inconveniences. Avoid flatterers, for they are thieves in disguise; their praise is costly, designing to got by thosoitney bespeak ; they are the worst ot oroatures ; they lie to flatter, and flatter to choiit ; and, which is worse, if you believe them, you cheat yourselves mostdan- gerously. But the virtuous, though poor, love, cherish, and prefer. Remember David, who, asking the Lord, " Who shall abide in thy tftbernaolc? who shall dwell upon thy holy hill?" answers, " Ho that w«lketh uprightly, workcth righteousness, and speaketh the truth in his heart ; in whose eves the vile person is oontoninod, but honoureth them who fear the Lord 1" Next, my children, bo temperate in all things : in your diet, for that is physio by prevention ; it keeps, nay, it makes, peoplil ROBERT BARCLAY. 121 healthy, and theii generation sound. This is exclusive 3f tiie spiritual advantage it brings. Be also plain in your apparel: keep out that lust which reigns too much over some : let your virtues be your orna- ments, remembering life is more than food, and the body than raiment. Let your fur- niture be simple and cheap. Avoid pride, avarice, and luxury. Read my " No Cross, No Crown." There is instruction. Make your conversation with the most eminent for wisdom and piety, and shun all wicked men as you hope for the blessing of God and the comfort of your father's living and dying prayers. Be sure you speak no evil of any, no, not of the meanest, much l^ss of your superiors, as magistrates, guardians, tutors, teachers, and elders in Christ. Be no busybodies ; meddle not with other folk's matters, but when in conscience and duty pressed ; for it procures trouble, and is ill manners, and very unseemly to wise men. In your families remember Abraham, Moses, and Joshua, their integrity to the Lord, and do as you have them for your ex- amples. Let the fear and service of the living God be encouraged in your houses, and that plainness, sobriety, and moderation in all things, as becometh God's chosen people ; and as' I advise you, my beloved children, do you counsel yours, if God shojild give you any. Yea, I counsel and command them as my posterity, that they love and serve the Lord God with an upright heart, that he may bless you and yours from gen- eration to generation. And as for you, who are likely to be con- cerned in the government of Pennsylvania and my parts of East Jersey, especially the first, I do charge you before the Lord God and his holy, angels, that you be lowly, dili- gent, and tender, fearing God, loving the people, and hating covetousness. Let jus- tice have its impartial course, and the law free passage. Though to your loss, protect no man against it ; for you are not above the law, but the law above you. Live, there- fore, the lives yourselves you would have the people live, and then you have right and ijoldness to punish the transgressor. Keep upon the square, for God sees you : there- fore, do your duty, and be sure you see with your own eyes, and hear with your own ears. Entertain no lurchers, cherish no in- formers for gain or revenge, use no tricks, fly to no devices to support or cover injus- tice : but let your hearts be upright before the Lord, trusting in him above the contri- vances of men, and none shall be able to hurt or supplant. Fruits of a Father's Lcve. ROBERT BARCLAY, born at Gordonstown, Morayshire, Scotland, 1648, died 1690, will always be known by An Apology for the True Christian Divinity, as the same is held forth, and preached by the people. Called, in Scorn, Quakers, etc., [Aberdeen ?] 1678, 4to; 2d edit. [London?], 1678, 4to. Original, in Latin, Lond., 1676, 4to. In English, 8th edit., Birmingham, Baskerville, 1765, royal 4to. For other edi- tions and translations, see Joseph Smith's Descriptive Catalogue of Friends' Books, 1867, i. 179-184. " A ma4 of emiDent gifts and great endowments, expert not only in tlie language of the learned, but also well versed, in the writings of the ancient Fathers, and other ecclesiastical writers, and fur- nished with a great understanding, being not only of a sound judgment, but also strong in argu- ments." — Sewel : Niat. of the Quakers, ■ " I take him to be so great a man, that I profess freely, I bad rather engage against a hundred Bellarmines, Hardings, and Stapletons, than with one Barclay." — Noreis of Beuerton: Second Treatise of the Light Within, In his Apology Barclay gives his reasonii against Titles op Honour. We affirm positively. That it is not lawful for Christians either to give or receive these .titles of honour, as Your Holiness, Your Majesty, Your Excellency, Your Eminency, &c. First, because these titles are no part of that obedience which is due to magistrates or superiors ; neither doth the giving of them add to or diminish from that subjection we owe to them, which consists in obeying their just and lawful commands, not in titles and designations. Secondly, we find not that in the Scrip- ture any such titles are used, either under the law or the gospel : but that in the speaking to kings, princes, or nobles, they used only a simple compellation, as, " King I" and that without any further designation, save, per- haps, the name of the person, as, " King Agrippa," &c. ']?hirdly, it lays a necessity upon Chris- tians most frequently to lie ; because the persons obtaining these titles, either by election or hereditarily, may frequently 1)8 found to have nothing really in them de- serving them, or answering to them : as some to whom It is said, " Your Excellency," having nothing of excellency in them ; and who is called "Your Grace," appear to be an enemy to grace ; and he who is called " Your Honour," is known to be base and ignoble. I wonder what law of man, or what patent, ought to oblige me to make a lie, in calling good evil, and evil good. I 122 M. DE RAPIN SIEUR DE THOYRAS. wonder what law of man can eecnre me, in so doinj:, from the just judgment of God, that will make me account for every evil word. And to lie is something more. Surely, Christians should be ashamed that ■iuch laws, manifestly crossing the law of God, should be among them. . . . Fourthly, as to those titles of " Holi- ness," "Eminency," and "Excellency," used among the Papists to the Popo and Cardinals, &c. ; and "Grace," "Lordship," and " Worship," used to the clergy among the Protestants, it is a most blasphemous usurpation. For if they use " Holiness" and " Grace," because these things ought to be in a Pope or in a Bishop, how come they to usurp that peculiarly to themselves? Ought not holiness and grace to be in every Cliristian ? And so every Christian should siiy, " Your Holiness," and " Your Grace," one to another. Next, how can they in rear son claim any more titles than were practised and received by the apostles and primitive Christians, whose successors they pretend they are ; and as whose successors (and no otherwise) themselves, I judge, will confess any honour they seek is due to them 7 Now, if they neither sought, received, nor ad- mitted such honour, nor titles, how came these by them 7 If they say they did, let them prove it if they can : we find no such thin^ in the Scripture. The Christians speak to the apostles without any such denomination, neither saying, "If it please your Grace," " your Holiness," nor "your Worship;" they are neither called " Mv Lord Peter," nor " My Lord Paul ;" nor yet Master Peter, nor Mas- ter Paul ; nor Doctor Peter, nor Doctor Paul ; but singly Paul and Peter ; and that not only in the Scripture, but for some hundreds of years after : so this appears to be a manifest fruit of the apostasy. For if these titles arise either from the office or worth of the persons, it will not be denied but the apostles deserved them better than any now that call for them. But the case Is plain : the apostles had the holiness, the excellenoy, the grace ; and because they were holy, excellent, and gracious, they neither used nor per- mitted such titles ; but these having neither holiness, cxi'ollenoy, nor grace, will needs be so called to satisfy thoir ambitious and ostentatious mind, which is a manifest token of tlioir hypocrisy. Fifthly, as to that title of " Miyesty," usually ascribed lo prinoos, we do not find it given to any such in the Holy Scripture; but that it is specially and piHiuliarly ascribed unto God. . . . Wo "find in the Scripture the proud king Nolnu'lmiinoziar assuming this title to hlinsolf, who at that time received a sunioiont roprodf by a sudden judgment which oamo upon him. Therefore in all the compellations nsed to princes in the Old Testament, it is not to be found, nor yet in the New. Paul was yerj civil to Agrippa, yet he gives him no such title. Neither was this title used among Christians in the primitive times. M. DE RAPIN SIEUR DE THOYRAS, born at Castres, France, 1661, died 1725, was the author of the following work, The History of England (from the Earliest Period to the Revolution in 1688), written in French by Mr. Rapin de Thoyras, translated into English, with additional Notes (and a Con- tinuation to the Accession of K. George II.), by N. Tindal, M.A.. Lond., 1743-47, 5 vols, folio. Other editions. "The hiBtorian Rapin is remarkable for his Im- partiality and candour. Althoagh the edition of 1 743 is usually called the best, that of 1732 is pref- erable a£ regards impressions of the plates. The pagination of the two editions is the same ; and there is perceptible difference in the text."— LowndtK*» BibL Man., Bohn's edit., iv. 2047, q. v. " Hame wrote his History for fame, Rapin for instruction; and both gained their ends." — Vol- taire : Martin Sherlock** Lettert frovt an Eitgli«k Traveller, Lond., 1780, 4to. Character of Elizabeth. Elizabeth had a great deal of wit, and was naturally of a sound and solid judg> ment This wi\s visible by her whole man- agement, from one end of her reign to the other. Nothing shews her capacity more than her address in surmounting all the difficulties and troubles created by her ene- mies, especially when it is considered who these enemies were ; persons the most power- ful, the most artful, tne most subtile, and the least scrupulous in Europe. The following are the maxims which she laid down for the rule and measures of her whole conduct, and from which she never swerved : " To make herself beloved by her people : To be frugal of her treasure : To keep up dissen- sion amongst her neighbours." Her enemies pretend that her abilities consisted wholly m overstrained dissimula- tion, and a proflnind hypocrisy. In a word, they say she was a perfect comedian. For my part, 1 don't deny that she made great use of dissimulation, as well with regard to the courts of France and Spain as to the queen of Scotland and the Scots. 1 am also persuaded that, being as much concerned to gain the love and esteem of her subjeots. she affeoted to speak frequently, and with exaggeration of her tender aJGrection foi CHARLES ROLLIN. 123 them. And that she had a mind to make it believed that she did some things from an excessive love to her people, which she was led to more by her own interest. Avaritje is another failing which her own friends reproach her vyith. I will not deny that she was too parsimonious, and upon some occasions stuck too close to the maxims she had laid down, not to be at any expence but what was absolutely necessary. How- ever, in general I maintain, that if her cir- cumstances did not require her to be covet- ous, at least they required that she should not part with her money but with great caution, both in order to preserve the affec- tion of her people, and to keep herself always in a condition to withstand her ene- mies. , . . It is not so easy to justify her concerning the death of the Queen of Scots. Here it must be owned she sacrificed equity, justice, and it may be her own conscience, to her safety. If Mary was guilty of the murder of her husband, as there is ground to believe, it was not Elizabeth's business to punish her for it. And truly it was not for that she took away her life ; but she made use of that pretence to detain her in prison, under the deceitful colour of making her innocence appear. On this occasion her dissimulation was blameworthy. This first piece of in- justice drew her in afterwards to use a world of artful devices to get a pretence to ren- der Mary's imprisonment perpetual. From hence arose in the end the necessity of put- ting her to death on the scaffold. This doubtless is Elizabeth's great blemish, which manifestly proves to what degree she carried the fear of losing a crown. The continued fear and uneasiness she was under on that account is what characterises her reign, because it was the mainspring of almost all her actipg. The best thing that can be said in Elizabeth's behalf is, that the Queen of Scots and her friends had brought matters to such a pass, that one of the two queens must perish, and it was natural that the weakest should fall. I don't believe any- body ever questioned her being a true Prot- estant. But, as it was her interest to be, some have taiken occasion to doubt whether the zeal she expressed for her religion was the effect of her persuasion or policy. All that can be said is, that she happened some- times to prefer her temporal concerns before those of religion. To sum up in two words what may serve to form Elizabeth's char- acter, I snail add, she was a good and illus- trious queen, with many virtues and noble qualities and few faults. But what ought above all things to make her memory pre- cious is, that she caused the English to enjoy a state of felicity unknown to their ancestors, under most part of the kings, her predeces- sors. The History of England. CHARLES ROLLIN, born in Paris, 1661, Professor of Rhetoric in the College du Plessis, 1687, and of Elo- quence in the Royal College de France, 1688 ; Principal of the University of Paris, 1694-1696, died 1741, was the author of a work on the Study of Belles-Lettres (Trait6 de la Manifere d'enseigner et fitudier les Belles-Lettres, 1726) ; of an Ancient His- tory (Histoire Ancienne, 1730-38, 12 vols.) ; and of a History of Rome (Histoire Bo- maine, 1738). Gekeral Reflections upon what is called Good Taste, as it now falls under our consideration, that is, with reference to the reading of authors, and composition, is a clear, lively, and distinct discerning of all the beauty, truth, and just- ness of the thoughts and expressions which compose a discourse. It distinguishes what is conformable to eloquence and propriety in every character, and suitable in different cir- cumstances. And whilst, with a delicate and exquisite sagacity, it notes the graces, turns, manners, and expressions most likely to please, it perceives also all the defects which produce the contrary effect, and dis- tinguishes precisely wherein those defects consist, and how far they are removed from the strict rules of art and the real beauties of natiu'e. Thisliappy faculty, which it is more easy to conceive than define, is less the effect of genius than judgment, and a kind of nat- ural reason wrought up to perfection by study. It serves in composition to guide and direct the understanding. It makes use of the imagination, but without submitting to it, and keeps it always in subjection. It consults nature universally, follows it step by step, and is a faithful image of it. Re- served and sparing in the midst of abun- dance and riches, it dispenses the beauties and graces of discourse with temper and wisdom. It never suffers itself to be daz- zled with the false, how glittering a figure soever it may make. 'Tis equally offended with too much and too little. It knows pre- cisely where it must stop, and cuts off, with- out regret or mercy, whatever exceeds the beautiful and perfect. 'Tis the want of this quality which occasions the various species of bad style ; as bombast, conceit, and witti- cism ; in which, as Quinctilian says, tha genius is void of judgment, and suffers itself 124 DANIEL DE FOE. to be carried away with an appearance of beauty, quoties ingenium judicio caret, and specie boni fallitur. Taste, simple and uniform in its principle, is varied and multiplied an infinite num- ber of ways, yet so as under a thousand different forms, in prose or verse, in a de- clamatory or concise, sublime or simple, jo- cose or serious style, 'tis always the same, and carries with it a certain character of the true and natural, immediately perceived by all persons of judgment. We cannot say the style of Terence, Phaedrus, Sallust, Cae- Bur, Tully, Livy, Virgil, and Horace is the same. And yet they have all, if I may be allowed the expression, a certain tincture of a common spirit, which in that diversity of fienius and style makes an a£5nity between them, and the sensible difference also be- twixt them and the other vrriters, who have not the stamp of the best age of antiquity upon them. I have already said that this distinguish- ing faculty was a kind of natural reason wrought up to perfection by study. In re- ality all men bring the first principles of taste with them into the world, as well as those of rhetoric and logic. As a proof of this, we may urge that every good orator is almost always infallibly approved of by the people, and that there is no difference of taste and sentiment upon this point, as Tully observes, between the ignorant and the learned. The case is the same with music and painting. A concert that has all its parts well composed and well executed, both as to instruments and voices, pleases universally. But if any discord arises, any ill tone of voice be intermixed, it shall displeiise even those who are absolutely ignorant of music. They know not what it is that offends them, but they find somewhat grating in it to their ears. And this proceeds from the taste and sense of harmony implanted in them by nature. In like manner, a fine picture charms and transports a spectator who has no idea of painting. Ask him what pleases him, and why it pleases him, and he cannot easily give an account, or specify the real reasons ; but natural sentiment works almost the same effect in him as art and use in con- noisseurs. The like obsiM-vations will hold good as to the taste we aru hero spoaking of. Most incu have the llrst principUw of it in thomsolvrs, though in tho gnmlor part of thoni they lie dormant in a mnnnor, for want of instruc- tion or roflocliiin ; as tlioy are often stilled or corruptdd by vii'ious education, bad cus- toms, or reigning jircjudioos of the ago and eountry. But how depraved soever the taste may be, it is never absolutely lost. There are certain fixed remains of it, deeply rooted in the understanding, wherein all men agree. Where these secret seeds are cultivated with care, they may be carried to a far greater height of perfection. And if it so happens that any fresh light awakens these first notions and renders the mind attentive to the immutable rules of truth and beauty, so as to discover the natural and necessary con- sequences of them, and serves at the same time for a model to facilitate the application of them, we generally see that men of the best sense gladly cast off their ancient errors, correct the mistakes of their former judgments, and return to the justness and delicacy which are the effects of a refined taste, and by degrees draw others after them into the same way of thinking. To be convinced of this, we need only look upon the success of certain great orators and celebrated authors, who, by their natural talents, have recalled these primitive ideas, and given fresh life to these seeds, which lie concealed in the mind of every man. In a little time they united the voices of those who made the best use of their reason in their fervour ; and soon after gained the ap- plause of every age and condition, both Ignorant and learned. It would be easy to point out amongst us the date of the good taste which now reigns in all arts and sciences ; by tracing each up to its original we should see that a small number of men of genius have acquired the nation this glory and advantage. Study of Belles-Lettres. DANIEL DE FOE, born 1661, died 1731, was the author of more than two hundred works (see Bohn's Lown- des's Bibliographer's Manual, ii. 612-622), of which Robinson Crusoe, and A Journal of the Plague Year (1665): written by a Citizen who continued all the while in Lon- don, Never made publick before, Lond., 1 722, 8vo, lire the best known. Both are fictitious, "Perhaps IhiTO exists no work, either of in- struotiun ur entntiunment, in tho Knglish lan- guage, wbioh has boon nior« generally read, and more univorsnlly admired, than the Life and Ad- ventures of Kobinson Crusoe. It is difficult to say in nbat the oharm consists, by whieh persons or nil classes and denominations are thus fasoi- natoil ; yet the majority of roiidera will recollect it as among llio lirst works that awakened and inter- ested their youthful attention; and feci, even in advanced life, and in the maturity of their under- standing, that ilu'i-o are still a-'soeiatod with Rob- inson t^rusoe the senlimrnta peculiar to that period when nil is new, all glittering in proapeet, iirw when those visions are most bright which th« ex- JONATHAN SWIFT. 12j perience of after-life tends only to darken and de- stroy." — Sir Walter Scott. " Most of our readers.are probably familiar with De Foe's history of that great calamity (the Plague), — a work in which fabuloiis'incidents and circumstances are combined with authentic narra- tives with an art and verisimilitude which no other writer has ever been able to communicate to fic- tion." — Edin. Hcoiew, xxiv. 321. The Plaque in London in 1665. The Plague, like a great fire, if a few houses only are contiguous where it hap- pens, can only burn a few houses ; or if it ))egins in a single or, as we call it, a lone .lOuse, can only burn that lone Jiouse where it begins : but if it begins in a close-built town, or city, and gets a-head, there its fury increases, it rages over the whole place, and consumes all it can reach. . . . It is true, hundreds, yea thousands, of families fled away at this last Plague, but then of them many fled too late, and not only died in their flight, but carried the distemper with them into the countries where they went, and infected those whom they went among for safety; which confounded the thing, and made that be a propagation of the distemper which was the best means to prevent it; and this too is an evidence of it, and brings me back to what I only hinted at before, but must speak more fully to here, namely, that men went about apparently well many days after they had the taint of the disease in their vitals, and after their spirits were so seized as that they could never escape it ; and that all the while they did so they were dangerous to others, — I say this proves that so it was ; for such people infected the very towns they went through ; and it was by that means that al- most all the great towns in England had the distemper among them, more or less ; and always they would tell you such a Londoner or such a Londoner brought it down. It must not be omitted that, when I speak of those people who were really thus dan- gerous, I suppose them to be utterly ignorant of their own condition ; for if they really knew their circumstances to be such as in- deed they were, they must have been a kind of wilful murderers, if they would have gone abroad among healthy people, and it would have verified indeed the suggestion which I mentioned above, and which I thought seemed untrue, viz., that the in- fected people were utterly careless as to giv- ing the infection to others, and rather forward to do it than not ; and I believe it was partly from this very thing that they raised that suggestion, which I hope was not really true in fact. I confess no particular case is sufficient to prove a general, but I could name several people within the knowledge of some of their neighbours and families yet living who shewed the contrary to an extreme. One man, a master of a family in my neighbour- hood, having had the distemper, he thought he had it given him by a poor workman whom he employed, and whom he went to his house to see, or went for some work that he wanted to have finished, and he had some apprehensions even while he was at the poor workman's door, but did not discover it fully, but the next day it discovered itself, and he was taken very ill ; upon which he imme- diately caused himself to be carried into an outbuilding which he had in his yard, and where there was a chamber over a work- house, the man being a brazier ; here he lay, and here he died, and would be tended by none of his neighbours, but by a nurse from abroad, and would not suffer his wife, nor children, nor servants to come up into the room, lest they should be infected, but sent them his blessing and prayers for them by the nurse, who spoke it to them at a dis tance, and all this for fear of giving them the distemper, and without which, he knev» as they were kept up, they could not have it. And here I must observe also, that tho Plague, as I suppose all distempers do, oper- ated in a different manner on different con- stitutions : some were immediately over- whelmed with it, and it came to violent fevers, vomitings, insufferable headaches, pains in the back, and so up to ravings and ragings with those pains ; others with swell- ings and tumours in the neck or groin, or armpits, which, till they could be broke, put them into insufferable agonies and tor- ment ; while others, as I have observed, were silently infected, the fever preying upon their spirits insensibly, and they seeing little of it, till they fell into swooning, and faint- ings and death,, without pain. A Journal of the Plague Year. JONATHAN S^A7^IFT, D.O., famous alike for his wit, his genius, his love affairs with Varina, Stella, and Vanessa, and his political warfare, was born in Dublin, 1667, and died in a state of mental imbe- cility, 1745. Among his best-known works are Tale of a Tub, with an Account of a Battle between the Ancient and Modern Books in St. James's Library, Lond., 1704, 8vo ; The Conduct of the Allies, etc., Lond., 1712, Svo; Law is a Bottomless Pit, Lond., 1712, Svo; Drapier's Letters, 1724, with Prometheus, etc., Dubl., 1725, Svo, Lind., 1730, Svo; Gulliver's Travels, Lond., 1726- 27, 2 vols. Svo, 2d. ed., Lond., 1727, 2 vols. 126 JONATHAN SWIFT. 8vo. There were collective editions of his Works, Lond., 1755-1779, etc., 25 vols. 8vo, and 18rao ; Lond., by John Nichols, 1801, 19 vols. 8vo, and royal 8vo ; again, 1803 (some 1804), 24 vols. J8mo; again, 1808, 19 vols. 8vo; New York, 1812-13, 24 vols. 12rao ; Edin., by Sir Walter Scott, with Life, 1814 (some 1815), 1250 copies, 19 vols. 8vo, and royal 8vo ; 2d ed., 1250 copies, 19 vols. 8vo ; Lond., with Memoir by Thomas Koscoe, 1841, also 1848, 1851, 1853, 1858, 1868, each in 2 vols, demy 8vo; New York ("first com- nlete American edition"), 1859, 6 vols. l2mo; again, Dec. 1862, 6 vols. 12mo. A new edition of Swift's Works, prefaced by a Life, Journal, and Letters, has been an- nounced by Mr. John Murray, of London. Of his Select Works there have been a number of editions. *' In bis works be bas giren very different speci- mens both of sentiments and expressions. His * Tale of a Tub' bas little resemblance to bis otber pieces. It exhibits a rehemenoe and rapidity of mind, a copiousness of images, and vivacity of diction sucb aa be afterwards never possessed or never exerted. It is of a mode so distinct and pecu- liar that it must be considered by itself; what is true of that is not true of aoytbing else wbiob be has written. . . . [" What a genius 1 bad when I wrote that book !" — Swift, in old age.] In his otber works is found an equable tenour of easy language, which rather trickles than flows. His delight was in simplicity. That he bas in his works no metaphor, as has been said, is not true ; but his few metaphors seem to be received rather by necessity than choice. . . . His style was well suited to his thoughts, which are never subtleised by nice disquisitions, decorated by sparkling con- ceits, elevated by ambitious sentences, or varie- gated by far-sought learning. ... In the poetical works of Dr. Swift there is not much upon which the critic can exercise his powers. They are often humorous, almost always light, and have the qualities which recommend sucb compositions, — easiness and gayety. They are, for the most part, what their author intended. The diction is cor- rect, the numbers are smooth, and the rhymes exact. There seldom occurs a bard-lnboured ex- pression, or a redundant epithet; all bis verses exemplify his own deflnition of good style. — Ihoy consist of proper words in proper places." — Dk. Johnson: Life u/ Smi/l, \a Cunningham's ed. of Johnson's Lives of the English Poots, 1854, lii. 190, 191, 199; q. v. (Index) for tho editor's illus- triitivo Notes, Sec also Crokor's BoswcU's John- son, Index. " His stylo is, in its Uiml. ono of the models of English ciim|>Msiliun : it is proper, pure, precise, porsptouous, Bigninoant, nervous, deriving «. cer- tain dignity IViun a masterly contempt of puerile ornaments, in which every word seems to convey tho intended moaning with tho decision of the writer's ohnraoter ; not adantwl, indeed, tn ex- firess nice distinctions of thought or shades of •cling, or to convoy those now and large ideas which must bo illustrated by imagery but oualifled beyond any other In discuss tho common business of life in suoh a manner as to convince and per- suade tho goueralily of men, and, whero occasion allows it, meriting in its vehement plainness the praise of the most genuine eloquence. His verse IS only, apparently, distinguished by the accident of measure ; it bas no quality of poetry, and, lik€ his prose, is retnarkable for sense and wit." — Sib Jahes Mackintosh : Life, ii., oh. iii. See obaps. i., ii., vii. Remarks 0!f a Proposed Abolition or Christianitt. I am very sensible how much the gentle- men of wit and pleasure are apt to murmur and be shocked at the sight of so many daggle-tail parsons, who happen to fall in their way, and ofiend their eyes ; but, at the same time, tljpse wise reformers do not con- sider what an advantage and felicity it is for great wits to be always provided with objects of scorn and contempt, in order to exercise and improve their talents, and divert their spleen from falling on each other, or on themselves ; especially when all this may be done without the least im- aginable danger to their persons. And to urge another argument of a parallel nature : if Christianity were once abolished, how could the free-thinkers, the strong reason- ers, and the men of profound learning, be able to find another subject so calculated in all points whereon to display their abilities ? What wonderful productions of wit should we be deprived of from those whose genius, by continual practice, hath been wholly turned upon raillery and invectives against religion, and would, therefore, be never able to shine or distinguish themselves on any other subject? We are daily complain- ing of the great decline of wit among us, and would we take away the greatest, perhaps the only, topic we have left? Who would ever have suspected Asgill for a wit, or Toland for a philosopher, if the inexhaust- ible stock of Christianity had not been at hand to provide them with materials? What other subject through all art or nature could have produced Tindal for a profound author, or furnished him with readers? It is the wise choice of the subject that alone adorneth and disting"isheth the writer. For had a hundred such pens ns these been em- ployed on the side of religion, they would iinmodiatoly have sunk into silence and ob- livion. Nor do I think it wholly groundless, or my fears altogether imaginary, that the abolishing of Christianity may, perhaps, bring the oliurch in danger, or "at least put tho senute to the trouble of another securing vote. I desire I may not be misunderstood: I am far from presuming to affirm or think that the ohiiroh is in danger at present, or as things now stand, but we know not how soon it may be so, when the Christian reli- gion is repealed. As plausible aa thie pro JONATHAN SWIFT. 127 J3Ct seema, there may a dangerous design lurk under it. Nothing can be more notori- ous than that the atheists, deists, socinians, anti-trinitarians, and other subdivisions of free-thinkers, are persons of little zeal for the present ecclesiastical establishment. Their declared opinion is for repealing the sacra- mental test ; they are very indifferent with regard to ceremonies ; nor do they hold the jus divinum, of episcopacy. Therefore this may be intended as one politic step tovrards altering the constitution of the church estab- lished, and setting up presbytery in its stead ; which I leave to be fartner considered by those at the helm. And therefore if, notwithstanding all I have said, it shall still be thought necessary to have a bill brought in for repealing Chris- tianity, I would humbly offer an amendment, that, instead of the word Christianity, may be put religion in general ; which I conceive will much better answer all the good ends proposed by the projectors of it. For as long as we leave in being a God and his Providence, with all the necessary conse- quences which curious and inquisitive men will be apt to draw from such premises, we do not strike at the root of the evil, although we should ever so effectually annihilate the present scheme of the Gospel. For of what use is freedom of thought if it will not pro- duce freedom of action, which is the sole end, how remote soever in appearance, of all objections against Christianity 7 And therefore the free-thinkers consider it a sort of edifice, wherein all the parts have such a mutual dependence on each other, that if you happen to pull out one single nail the whole fabric must fall to the ground. Thoughts and Aphorisms. If the men of wit and genius would re- solve never to complain in their works of critics and detractors, the next age would not know that they ever had any. Imaginary evils soon become real ones by indulging our reflections on them, as he who in a melancholy fancy sees something like a face on the wall or the wainsooat can, by two or three touches with a lead pencil, make it look visible and agreeing with what he fancied. Men of great parts are often unfortunate in the management of public business, be- cause they are apt to go out of the common road by the quickness of their imagination. This I once said to my Lord Bolingbroke, and desired he would observe that the clerks in his office used a sort of ivory knife with a blunt edge to divide a sheet of paper, which never failed to cut it even, only re- quiring ■ a steady hand ; whereas if they should make use of a sharp penknife, the sharpness would make it often go out of the crease and disfigure the paper. " He who does not provide for his own house," St. Paul says, "is worse than an infidel ;" and I think he who provides only for his own house is just equal with an infidel. I never yet knew a wag (as the term is) who was not a dunce. When we desire or solicit anything, our minds run wholly on the good side or cir- cumstances of it ; when it is obtained, our minds rup wholly on the bad ones. The latter part of a wise man's life is taken up in curing the follies, prejudices, and false opinions he had contracted in the former. Would a writer know how to behave him- self with relation to posterity, let him con- sider in old books what he finds that he is glad to know, and what omissions he most laments. One argument to prove that the common relations of ghosts and spectres are generally false, may be' drawn from the opinion held that spirits are never seen by more than one person at a time ; that is to say, it seldom happens to above one person in a company to be possessed with any high degree of spleen or melancholy. It is pleasant to observe how free the present age is in laying taxes on the next : "Future ages shall talk of this;" "This shall be famous to all posterity :" whereas their time and thoughts will be taken up about present things, as ours are now. I never heard a finer piece of satire against lawyers than that of astrologers, when they pretend by rules of art to tell when a suit will end, and whether to the advantage of the plaintiff or defendant ; thus making the matter depend entirely npon the influence of the stars, without the least regard to the merits of the cause. I have known some men possessed of good qualities, which were very serviceable to others but useless to themselves : like a sun- dial on the front of a house, to inform the neighbours and passengers, but not the owner within. If a man would register all his opinions upon love, politics, religion, learning, &o., beginning from his youth, and so go on to old age, what a bundle of inconsistencies and contradictions would appear at last ! The stoical scheme of supplying our wants by lopping off our desires, is like cutting off our feet when we want shoes. The reason why so few marriages are happy is, because young ladies spend their time in making nets, not in making cages. The power of fi)rtune is confessed only by 128 WILLIAM WHISTON. the miserable, for the happy impute all their success to prudence or merit. Complaint is the largest tribute heaven receives, and the sincerest part of our devotion. The common fluency of speech in many men, and most women, is owing to a scarcity of matter, and a scarcity of words : for who- ever is a master of language, and bath a mind full of ideas, will be apt in speaking to hesitate upon the choice of both ; whereas common speakers have only one set of ideas, and one set of words to clothe them in ; and these are always ready at the mouth : so people come faster out of church when it is almost empty than when a crowd is at the door. WILLIAM WHISTON, born 1667, died 1752, was author of many mathematical and theological works (some of them opposed to trinitarian views), and published a Translation of Josephus, Lond., 1737, etc., which has been, or ought to be, superseded by the translation of Rev. Dr. Robert Traill, Lond., 1846-51, 3 vols, super- royal 8vo. Among his works were : New Theory of the Earth, Lond., 1696, 8vo ; Vin- dication of the New Theory, Lond., 1698, 8vo; Short View of the Chronology of the Old Testament, and of the Harmony of the Four Evangelists, Camb., 1702, 4to, 1707, 4to ; Essay on the Revelation of St. John, Camb., 1706, 4to, some large paper, 2d ed., Lond., 1744, 4to ; The Accomplishment of Scripture Prophecies: Boyle Lecture, Camb., 1708, 8vo; Primitive Christianity Revived, Lond., 1711-12, 5 vols. 8vo ; "Sir Isaac Newtjn's Mathematical Philosophy Demon- stratttd, Lond., 1716, 8vo; Memoirs of the Life and Writings of Mr. William Whiston, Lond., 1749-50, 3 vols. Svo. " The Memoirs of this singulnr nmn, published by himself, contain eomo curious information re- specting his times, and ofTord a view of great honesty and disinterestedness, combined with an extraordinary degree of superstition and love of the marvellous." — Ormr'n Hi!,!. Ilili., 407. "The hono.«t, nlous, visionary Whiston." — Gib- bon : Vedinr aim Fnl!, oh. xliii., n. " I'oiir Wliiaton, who believed in everything but the Trinity."— Loud IMaiAULay : //iX. o/ En;/.. viii., oh. xiv., u. On THE EvrDENTKsop Divine Revelation. I cnnniit but henrtily wisli. for the com- mon good of all the soojitioH and unlioliovei-s of this iipc, that I ooiild imprint in their iriinds all that ronl inidi-noo for luitural niid for revealed religion that now is, or during mjr past inqiiiiii'H has li(>en, upon my own mind thereto roliiling ; and that their temper (.f mind wore suih as that this evidence might afford them as great satisfaction as it has myself. But though this entire com- munication of the evidence that is or has been in my own mind, for the certainty of natural religion, and of the Jewish and Christian institutions, be, in its own nature, impossible, yet I hope I may have leave to address myself to all, especially to the scep- tics and unbelievers of our age; to do what I am able for them in this momentous con- cern ; and to lay before them, as briefly and seriously as I can, a considerable number of those arguments which have the greatest weight with me, as to the hardest part of what is here desired and expected from them. I mean the belief of revealed religion, or of the Jewish and Christian institutions, as contained in the books of the Old and New Testament. But to waive farther prelimi- naries, some of the principal re.isons which make me believe the Bible to be true are the following : 1. The Bible lays the law of natnre for its foundation ; and all along supports and assists natural religion; as every true rev- elation ought to do. 2. Astronomy and the rest of our certain mathematic sciences do confirm the accounts of Scripture, so far as they are concerned. 3. The most ancient and best historical accounts now known do, generally speaking, confirm the accounts of Scripture, so far as they are concerned. 4. The more learning has increased the more certain in general do the Scripture accounts appear, and its more difficult places are more cleared thereby. 5. There are, or have been generally, standing memorials preserved of the certain truths of the principal historical facts, which were constant evidences for the certainty of them. 6. Neither the Mosaical law, nor the Chris- tian religion, could possibly have been re- ceived and established without such miracles as the sncrcd history contains. 7. Althoiicb the .lows all along hated and porsocuted the prophetsofGod, yet were they forced to believe tbev were true prophets, and their writings of divine inspiration. S, The ancient and present state of the Jewish nation are strong arguments for the truth of their law, and of the Scripture prophecy roliitingto them. 9. The ancient and present state of the Christian church are also strong arguments for the truth of their law, and of the Scrip- ture pronheoies relating thereto. 10. The niiraelos whereon the Jewish and Christian religion are founded were of old owned to ho tnio by their very enemies. 11. Tlio sacrod writers, who lived in times and places so remote from one another, dfl SIR RICHARD STEELE. 129 yet all carry on one and ttie same grand de- sign, viz., that of the Balvation of mankind by the worship of and obedience to the one true God, in and through the King Messiah, which without a diyine conduct could nerer have been done. 12. The principal doctrines of the Jewish and Christian religion are agreeable to the most ancient traditions of all other nations. 13. The difficulties relating to this religion are not such as affect the truth of the facts, but the conduct of Providence, the reasons of which the sacred writers never pretended fully to know, or to reveal to mankind. 14. Natural religion, which is yet so cer- tain in itself, is not without such difficulties as to the conduct of Providence as are ob- jected to revelation. 15. The sacred history has the greatest marks of truth, honesty, and impartiality of all other histories whatsoever ; and withal has none of the known marks of knavery and imposture. 16. The predictions of Scripture have been still fulfilled in the several ages of the world whereto they belong. 17. No opposite systems of the universe, or schemes of divine revelation, have any tolerable pretences to be true but those of the Jews and Christians. These are the plain and obvious argu- ments which persuade me of the truth of iJie Jewish and Christian revelations. SIR RICHARD STEELE, the friend of Addison, born in Dublin, 1671, died 1729, was the author of The Christian Hero, Lend., 1701, 8vo, of plays, political and other treatises, and of many papers in The Tatler, The Spectator, and The Guardian. " Steele seems to have gone into his closet chiefly to set down what he observed OHt of doors. Addi- son seems to have spent most of his time in his study, and to have spun out and wire-drawn the hints which he borrowed from Steele or took from na- ture, to the utmost. I am far from wishing to depreciate Addison's talents, but I am anxious to do justice to Steele, who was, I think, upon the whole, a less artificial and more original writer. The humorous descriptions of Steele resemble loose sketches, or fragments of a comedy; those of Addison are rather comments, or ingenious par- aphrases, on the original text." — H azlitt : Lecit. on the Engliah Comic, Lect. V. See also Lect. VIII. " The great, the appropriate praise of Steele is, to have been the first who, after the licentious age of Charles the Second, endeavoured to introduce the Virtues on the stage." — Dr. Drake : Etaaya niuttrative of The Tatler, etc., 2d ed., 1814, i. 58. On Tears. " What I would have you treat of, is the cause of shedding tears. I desire you would discuss it a little, with observations upon the various occasions which provoke us to that expression of our concern, &c." To obey this complaisant gentleman, I know no way so short as examining the va- rious touches of my own bosom, on several occurrences in a long life, to the evening of which I am arrived, after as many variouH incidents as anybody has met with. I have often reflected that there is a great simili- tude in the motions of the heart in mirth and in sorrow ; and I think the usual occasion of the latter, as well as the former, is some- thing which is sudden and unexpected. The mind has not a sufficient time to recollect its force, and immediately gushes into tears before we can utter ourselves by speech or complaint. The most notorious causes of these drops from our eyes are pity, sorrow, joy, and reconciliation. The fair sex, who are made of man and not of earth, have a more delicate humanity than we have ; and pity is the most common cause of their tears ; for as we are inwardly composed of an aptitude to every circum- stance of life, and everything that befall^ any one person might have happened to any other of the human race, self-love, and a sense of the pain we ourselves should suffer in the circumstances of any whom we pity, is the cause of that compassion. Such a reflection in the breast of a woman immediately in- clines her to tears ; but in a man, it makes him think how such a one ought to act on that occasion suitably to the dignity of his nature. Thus a woman is ever moved for those whom she hears lament, and a man for those whom he observes to suffer in silence. It is a man's own behaviour in the circumstances he is under which procures him the esteem of others, and not merely the affliction itself, which demands our pity : for we never give a man that passion which he falls into for himself. He that commends himself never purchases our applause ; nor he that bewails himself our pity. ... In the tragedy of " Macbeth" where Wilks acts the part of a man whose family has been murdered in his absence, the wildness of his passion, which is run over in a torrent of calamitous circumstances, does but raise my spirits, and give me the alarm ; but when he skilfully seems to be out of breath, and is brought too low to say more ; and upon a second reflection cries only, wiping his eyes, " What, both children 1 Both, both my children gonel" there is no resisting a sorrow which seemfl to have cast about for all the reasons possible for its consolar tion, but has no resource. " There is not one left ; but both, both are murdered !" such sudden starts from the thread of the discourse, and a plain sentiment expressed 130 SIR RICHARD STEELE. in an artlesB way, are the irresistible strokes of eloquence and poetry. The same great master, Sbakspeare, can afford us instances of all the places where our souls are ac- cessible ; and ever commands our tears. But it is to be observed that he draws them from some unexpected source, which seems not wholly of a piece with the discourse. Thus, when Brutus and Cassius had a de- bate in the tragedy of " Caesar," and rose to warm language against each other, inso- much that it had almost come to something that might be fatal, until they recollected themselves, Brutus does more than make an apology for the beat he bad been in, by say- ing, " Portia is dead." Here Cassius is all tenderness, and ready to dissolve, when he considers that the mind of bis friend had been employed on the greatest affliction imaginable, when he had been adding to it by a debate on trifles ; which makes him, in the anguish of his heart, cry out, " How 'scaped I killing, when I thus provoked you?" This is an incident which moves the soul in all its sentiments ; and Cassius's iieart was at once touched with all the soft pangs of pity, and remorse, and reconcilia- tion. It is said, indeed, by Horace, " If you would have me weep, you must first weep yourself." This is not literally true ; for it would have been as rightly said, if we ob- serve nature, " That I shall certainly weep, if you do not ;" but what is intended by that expression is, that it is not possible to give passion except you shew that you suf- fer yourself. Therefore the true art seems to be, that when you would have the person you represent pitied, yoii must shew him at once in the highest grief; and struggling to bear it with decency and patience. In this case, we sigh for him, and give him every groan he suppresses. The Tatler, No. 68, September 15, 1709. On Poitrt. An ingenious and worthy gentleman, my ancient friend, fell into discourse with lue this evening upon the force and effieocy which the writings of good poets have on the minds of their intelligent, readers : and recommended to mo his sense of the matter, thrown together in the following manner, which he dosirod mo to communicate to the youth of Great Britain in my Essays. 1 choose to do it in hi8 own words : " I have always boon of opinion," says he, " that virtue sinks deepest into tbo heart of man whon it comes recommended by the powerful olianus of poetry. The most active principle in our mind istiie imagination; to It a good noot makes his court perpetually, and by this faculty takes care to gain it 'first. Our passions and inolinations come over next ; and obr reason surrenders itself with pleasure in the end. Thus the whole soul is insensibly betrayed into morality by bribing the fancy with beautiful and agree- able images of those very things that in the books of the philosophers appear austere, and have at the best but a forbidding aspect. In a word, the poets do, as it were, strew the rough paths of virtue so full of flowers, that we are not sensible of the uneasiness of them ; and imagine ourselves in the midst of pleasures, and the most bewitching allurements, at the time we are making progress in the severest duties of life. All men agree that licentious poems do, of all writings, soonest corrupt the heart. And why should we not be as universally per- suiided that the grave and serious perform- ances of such as write in the most engaging manner, by a kind of divine impulse, must be the most effectual persuasives to good- ness ? If, therefore, I were blessed with a son, in order to the forming of his man- ners, which is making him truly my son, I should be continually putting into ius hand some fine poet The graceful sentences, and the manly sentiments, so frequently to be met with in every great and sublime writer, are, in my judgment, the most ornamental and valuable nirniture that can be for a young gentleman's bead ; methinks they shew like so much rich embroidery upon the brain. Let me add to this, that human- ity and tenderness, without which there can be no true greatness in the mind, are inspired by the Muses in such pathetic language, that all we find in prose authors towards the raising and improving of these passions is, in comparison, but cold or luke- warm at the best There is besides a certain elevation of soul, a sedate magnanimity, and a noble turn of virtue, that distinguishes the hero from the plain, honest man, to which verse only can raise us. The bold metaphors, and sounding numbers, peculiar to the poets, rouse up all our sleeping faculties, and alarm the whole powers of the soul, much like that excellent trumpeter mentioned bv Virgil : — — — Quo non pnuttintior alter JEn oiere Tiros, Martemque aooendere oantn. ytrg. ^H., vi. 154 None 80 renown'd With breathing brass to kindle fleroe alarms. Dbtdek." The Tatltr, No. 9S, November S4, 1709. Oh Castle-bdildino. Sepiemhtr t, 171) Mb. Sprctator, I am a fellow of a very odd frame of mind, as you will find by the sequel ; and Uiink myself fool enough to deserve a place in ANTHONY ASHLEY COOPER. 131 yoar paper. I am unhappily far gone in building, and am one of that species of men who are properly denominated castle-build- ers, who scorn to be beholden to the earth for a foundation, or dig in the bowels of it for materials ; but erect their structures in the most unstable of elements, the air ; fancy alone laying the line, marking the extent, and sliaping the model. It would be diffi- cult to enumerate what august palaces and stately porticos have grown under my form- ing imagination, or what verdant meadows and shady groves have started into being by the powerful heat of a warm fancy. A cas- tle-builder is even just what he pleases, and as such I have grasped imaginary sceptres, and delivered uncontrollable edicts, from a throne to which conquered nations yielded obeisance. I have made I know not how many inroads into France, and ravaged the «ery heart of that kingdom; I have dined in the Louvre and drank champagne at Ver- sailles ; and I would have you take notice, I am not only able to vanquish a people al- ready cowed and accustomed to flight, but I could, Almanzor-like [see Dryden's Conquest of Granada], drive' the British general from the field, were I less a Protestant, or had ever been affronted by the confederates. There is no art or profession whose most celebrated masters I have not eclipsed. Wherever I have afforded my salutary pres- ence fevers have ceased to burn and agues to shake the human fabric. When an elo- quent fit has been upon me, an apt gesture and proper cadence nave animated each sen- tence, and gazing crowds have found their passions worked up into rage, or soothed into a calm. I am short, and not very well made ; yet upon sight of a fine woman I have stretched into proper stature, and killed with a good air and mien. These are the gay phantoms that dance before my waking eyes, and compose my day-dreams. I should be the most contented man alive were the chimerical happiness which springs from the paintings of fancy less fleeting and transitory. But aljss 1 it is with grief of mind I tell you, the least breath of wind has often demolished my magnificent edi- fices, swept away my groves, and left no more trace of them than if they had never been. My exchequer has sunk and vanished by a rap on my door ; the salutation of a friend has cost me a whole continent; and in the same moment I have been pulled by the sleeve, my crown has fallen from my head. The ill consequences of these reve- ries is inconceivably great, seeing the loss of imaginary possessions makes impressions of real woe. Besides, bad economy is visi- ble and apparent in builders of invisible mansions. My tenants' advertisements of ruins and dilapidations oflen cast a damp on my spirits, even in the instant when the sun, in all his splendour, gilds my eastern palaces. Add to this, the pensive drudgery in building, and constant grasping aerial trowels, distracts and shatters the mind, and the fond builder of Babels is often cursed with an incoherent diversity and confusion of thoughts. I do not know to whom I can more properly apply myself for relief from this fantastical evil than to yourself; whom I earnestly implore to accommodate me with a method how to settle my head and cool my brain-pan. A dissertation on castle- building may not only be serviceable to my- self, but all architects who display their skill in the thin element. Such a favour would oblige me to make my next soliloquy not contain the praises of my dear self, but of the Spectator, who shall, by complying with this, make me His obliged humble servant, ViTRUviirs. The Spectator, No. 167, September 11, 1711. ANTHONY ASHLEY COOPER, third Earl of Shaftesbury, born 1671, died 1713, was the author of a famous work en- titled Characteristics of Men, Manners, Opin- ions, and Times, Lond., 1711, etc., '3 vols. 8vo, 5th and first complete edition, 1732, 3 vols. 8vo. " I much question whether several of the rhap- sodies called The Gharactenetio would ever have survived the first edition if they had not discov- ered so strong a tincture of infidelity, and now and then cast out a profane sneer at our holy religion. 1 have sometimes indeed been ready to wonder how a book in the main so loosely written should ever obtain so many readers amongst men of sense. Surely they must be conscious in the perusal that sometimes a patrician may write as idly as a man of plebeian rank, and trifle as much as an old school-man, though it is ia another form. I am forced to say, there are few books that ever I read which made any pretence to a great genius from which I derived so little valuable knowledge as from these treatises. There is indeed amongst them a lively pertness, a parade of literature, and much of what some folks now-a-days call polite- ness ; but it is hard that we should be bound to admire all the reveries of this author uader the penalty of being unfashionable." — Dr. Isaac Watts: Improvement of the Mind, Part I. ch. 5. "Mr. Pope told me that to his knowledge the Characteristics had done more harm to Revealed Beligion in England than all the works on Infi- delity put together." — Bishop Wahbukton. " Grace belongs only to natural movements ; and Lord Shaftesbury, notwithstanding the frequeot beauty of his thoughts and language, has rarely attained it. . . . He had great power of thought and command over words. But be had no talent for inventing character and bestowing life on it. 132 ANTHONY ASHLEY COOPER. The Inquiry concerning Virtue is nearly exempt from the faulty peculiarities of the author; the method is perfect, the reasoning just, the style pre- cise and clear." — Sir Jami^s Mackintosh : Prelim. Dissert, to Eiicyc. Brit. Sir James remarks of the quotation which fol- lows, " that there is scarcely anyoomposition in our language more lofty in its moral and religious sen- timents, or more exquisitely elegant and musical in its diction." Platonic Representation of the Scale of Beauty and Love. I have now a better idea of that melan- choly you discovered ; and notwitlistanding the humorous turn you were pleased to give it, I am persuaded it has a different founda- tion from any of those fantastical causes I then assigned to it. Love, doubtless, is at the bottom, but a nobler love than such as common beauties inspire. Here, in my turn, I began to raise my voice, and imitate the solemn way you have been teaching me. Knowing as you are (continued I), well knowing and experi- enced in all the degrees and orders of beauty, in all the mysterious charms of the particu- lar forms, you rise to what is more general ; and with a larger heart, and mind more com- prehensive, you generously seek that which IS highest in the kind. Not captivated by the lineaments of a fair face, or the well- drawn proportions of a human body, yoii view the life itself, and embrace rather the mind which adds the lustre, and renders chiefly amiable. Nor is the enjoyment of such a single beauty sufficient to satisfy such an aspiring soul. It seeks how to combine more beau- ties, and by what coalition of these to form a beautiful society. It views communities, friendships, relations, duties ; and considers by what harmony of particular minds the general harmony is composed, and common weal established. Not satisfied even with public good in one community of men, it frames itself a nobler object, and with en- larged affection socks the good of mankind. It dwells with pleasure amidst that reason and those orders on which this fair corfe- spondonco and goodly interest is establialicd. Laws, constitiitidiis, civil and ri'liu;ioiis rites ; whatovor oivili/.cs or polishes rude mankind ; the sciimccs and arts, philosophy, morals, virtue; thu lloiu-isliing state of iiuman af- fairs, and the pi'ifi'i'lioii of human nature: thcRd are its delightful prospofts, and this tlio olmnii (if biMiuty which attracts it. Still ardent in this )iursult (such is its love of oi'diT and pcrlcdinn), it rests not here, nor satisfies itscll' with the lioauty of a part, but oxtendin;; further its communicative bounty, seeks the good of all, and affects the interest and proNperity of the whole. True to its native world and higher country, 'tis here it seeks order and perfection, wishing the best, and hoping still to find a wise and just administration. And since all hope of this were vain and idle, if no Universal Mind presided ; since, without such a su- preme intelligence and providential care, the distracted universe must be condemned to suffer infinite calamities, 'tis here the gen- erous mind labours to discover that healing cause by which the interest of the whole is securely established, the beauty of things, and the universal order, happily sustained. This, Palemon, is the labour of your soul ; and this its melancholy : when unsuccessfully pursuing the supreme beauty, it meets with darkening clouds which int«rcept the si<;bt. Monsters arise, not those from Libyan deserts, but from the heart of man moro fertile, and with their horrid aspect cast an unseemly reflection upon nature. She, help- less as she is thought, and working thus ab- surdly, is contemned, the government of the world arraigned, and Deity made void. Much is alleged in answer td show why nature errs ; and when she seems most ignorant or perverse in her productions, I assert her even then as wise and provident as in her goodliest works. For 'tis not then that men complain of the world's order, or abhor the face of things, when they see various interests mixed and interfering ; natures subordinate, of differ- ent kinds, opposed one to another, and in their different operations submitted, the higher to the lower. 'Tis, on the contrary, from this order of inferior and superior things that we admire the world's beauty, founded thus on contrarieties: whilst from such various and disagreeing principles a universal concord is established. Thus in the several orders of terrestrial forms a resignation is required, — a sacri- fice and mutual yielding oi natures one to another. The vegetables by their death sustain the animals, and animal bodies dis- solved enrich the earth, and raise again the vegetable world. The numerous insects are reduced by the superior kinds of birds and beasts ; and these Uirain are checked by man, who in his turn submits to other natures, and resigns his form, a sacrifice in common to the rest of things. And if in natures so little exalted or pre-eminent above each other the sacrifice of interests can appear so just, how much more reasonably may all inferior natures bo subjected to the superior nature of the world ! — that world, Palemon, wliich even now transported you, when the sun's fainting light gave way to those bright constellations, and left you this wide system to contemplate. Hero are those laws which ought not nor can submit to anything below. The central JOSEPH ADDISON. 133 powers which hold the lasting orbs in their just poise and movement, must not be con- trolled to save a fleeting form, and rescue from the precipice a puny animal, whose brittle frame, however protected, must of itself so soon dissolve. The ambient air, the inward vapours, the impending meteors, or whatever else is nutrimental or preserva- tive of this earth, must operate in a natural course; and other good constitutions must submit to the good habit and constitution of the all-sustaining globe. Let us not wonder, therefore, if liy earthquakes, storms, pestilential blasts, nether or upper fires, or floods, the animal kinds are oft afflicted, and whole species perhaps involved at once in common ruin. Nor need we wonder if the interior form, the soul and temper, partakes of this occasional deformity, and sympathises often with its close partner. Who is there that can wonder either at the sicknesses of sense or the depravity of minds enclosed in such frail bodies, and dependent on such pervertible organs 7 Here, then, is that solution you require, and hence those seeming blemishes cast upon nature. Nor is there i ought in this beside what is natural and good. 'Tis good which is predominant ; and every corruptible and mortal nature, by its mortality and cor- ruption, yields only to some better, and all in common to that best and highest nature which is incorruptible and immortal. The Moralists. JOSEPH ADDISON, horn 1672, acquired a high reputation for Latin poetry at King's College, Oxford, and for English poetry by his poem on the battle of Blenheim ; but will always be best known by his admirable papers in The Spectator (he also contributed to The Tatler, The Whig Examiner, The Guardian, and The Freeholder, 1709-15, which range from No. 1, March 1, 1710-11, to No. 600, Sep- tember 29, 1714) ; married the dowager Countess of Warwick, 1716; died June 17, 1719. From his essays in The Spectator, which may known by the letters C, L, I, or O (CLIO), we give some specimens. " Mr. Addison wrote very flaently ; but he was Bometimesvery slow and scrupulous in correcting. He would show his verses to several friends ; and would alter almost everything that any of them hinted as wrong. He seemed to be too difUdent of himself; and too much concerned about his character as a poet ,■ or (as he worded it) too solici- tous for that kind of praise which is but a very little matter after all ! Many of his Spectators he wrote very fast, and sent them to the press as soon as they were written. It seems to have been best for him not to have had too much time to correct. Addison was perfectly good company with inti- mates; and had something more charming in his conversation than I ever knew in any other man ; but with any mixture of strangers, and sometimes only with one, he seemed to preserve his dignity much, with a stiff sort of silence." — Pope : Speiice'a Anecdotea. " His sentences have neithor studied amplitude nor affected brevity ; his periods, though not dili- gently rounded, are voluble and easy. Whoever wishes to obtain an English style, familiar, but not coarse, and elegant, but not ostentatious, must give his days and nights to the study of Addison." — Db. Johnson. " Never, not even by Dryden, not even by Temple, had the English language been written with such sweetness, grace, and facility. But this was the smallest part of Addison's praise. . . . As a moral satirist he stands unrivalled. If ever the best Tatlers and Spectators were equalled in their own kind, we should be inclined to guess that it must have been by the lost comedies of Menander. In wit, properly so called, Addison was not inferior to Cowley or Butler. . . . But what shall we say of Addison's humour ? . . . We own that the humour of Addison is, in our opinion, of a more delicious flavour than the humour of either Swift or Voltaire." — Lord Ma- cahlat: Edin. Review, July, 1843, and in his Essays, and Works. Divinity, Law, and Physic. I am sometimes very much troubled when I reflect upon the three great professions of divinity, law, and physio; how they are each of them overburdened with practi- tioners, and filled with multitudes of inge- nious gentlemen that starve one another. We may divide the clergy into generals, field-officers, and subalterns. Among the first we may reckon bishops, deans, and archdeacons. Among the second are doc- tors of divinity, prebendaries, and all that wear scarfs, 'ihe rest are comprehended under the subalterns. As for the first class, our constitution preserves it from any re- dundancy of incumbents, notwithstanding copipetitors are numberless. . . . The body of the law is no less encumbered with su- perfluous members, that are like Virgil's army, which he tells us was so crowded that many of them had not room to use their weapons. This prodigious society of men may be divided into the litigious and peaceable. Under the first are comprehended all those who are carried down in coach-fulls to Westminster-hall every morning in term time. Martial's description of this species of lawyers is full of humour : Iras et verba locant. " Men that hire out their words and anger ;" that are more or less passionate according as they are paid for it, and allow their client a quantity of wrath proportion- able to the fee which they receive froTi him. 134 JOSEPH ADDISON. I must, however, observe to the reader, that above three parts of those whom I reckon among the litigious are such as are only quarrelsome in their hearts, and have no opportunity of shewing their passion at the bar. Nevertheless, as they do not know what strifes may arise, they appear at the hall every day, that they may shew them- selves in readiness to enter the lists when- ever there shall be occasion for them. The peaceable lawyers are, in the first place, many of the benchers of the several mns of court, who seem to be the dignitar ries of the law, and are endowed with those qualifications of mind that accomplish a roan rather for a ruler than a pleader. These men live peaceably in their habitations, eating once a day, and dancing once a year, for the honour of their respective societies. Another numberless branch of peaceable lawyers are those young men who, being placed at the inns of court in order to study the laws of their country, frequent the play- house more than Westminster-hall, and are seen in all public assemblies except in a court of j ustice. I shall say nothing of those silent and busy multitudes that are employed within-doors m the drawing up of writings and conveyances; nor of those greater num- bers that palliate their want of business with a pretence to such chamber practice. If, in the third place, we look into the pro- fession of physic, we shall find a ifaost for- midable body of men. The sight of them is enough to make a man serious, for we may lay it down as a maxim, that when a nation abounds in physicians it grows thin of people. Sir William Temple is very much puzzled to find out a reason why the North- ern Hive, as he calls it, does not send out such prodigious swarms, and overrun the world with Goths and Vandals ns it did for- merly ; but had that excellent author ob- served that there were no students in physic among the subjects of Thor and Wmion, and that this science very much llourishos in the north at present, he might have found a better solution for this difficulty than any of those he has made use of. This body of men in our own country may be described like the British army in Coosars time. Some of them slay in chariots, niul some ou foot. If the infantry (111 loss I'xcoution than the cbiiriiituors, it is liooauso thi'v cannot be canicHl so soon into all qtmrti-rs of the town, and dosjialch so nuioli business in so short a time. IJcsiilos this body of rej;ular troops, lli(M-c are stragglors who, without being duly listi'd and eniiillod, do infinite niisohiof to thjso who are so unlucky as to fall into their hands. The Spirlator, Xo. 21, Saturday, ^{,l,■.■h i'-J, 1710-U. Westminster Abbey. When I am in a serious humour I very often walk by myself in Westminster-abbey ; where the gloominess of the place, and the use to which it is applied, with the solemn- ity of the building, and the condition of me people who lie in it, are apt to fill the mind with a kind of melancholy, or rather thought- fulness, that is not disagreeable. I yester- day passed a whole afternoon in the church- yard, the cloisters, and the church, amusing myself with the tombstones and inscriptions that I met with in those several regions of the dead. Most of them recorded nothing else of the buried person but that he was born upon one day, and died upon another; the whole history of his life being com- prehended in those two circumstances that are common to all mankind. I could not but look upon these registers of existence, whether of brass or marble, as a kind of satire upon the departed persons ; who had left no other memorial of them but that they were born and that they died. They put me in mind of several persons mentioned in the battles of heroic poems, who have sounding names given them, for no other reason but that they may be killed, and are celebrated for nothing but being knocked on the head. . . . The life of these men is finely described in holy writ by " the path of an arrow," which is immediately closed up and lost. Upon my going into the church I enter- tained myself with the digging of a grave; and saw in every shovel-full of it that was thrown up,. the fragment of n bone or skull intermixed with a kind of fresh mouldering earth that some time or other had a place in the composition of a human body. Upon this I began to consider with myself w-hat innumerable multitudes of people lay con- fused together under the pavement of that ancient cathedral : how men and women, friends and enemies, priests and soldiers, monks and prebendaries, were crumbled amongst one another, and blend together in the same common mass ; how beauty, strength, and youth, with old age, weak- ness, and deformity, lay undistinguished in the snme promiscuous heap of matter. .Vftor having thus surveyed the ereat maga- zine of mortality, as it were in the lump, I examined it more particularly by the ac- counts which I found on several of the mon- uineiits which are raised in everv quarter of that ancient fabric. Some of tliem were eovored with such extravagant epitiiphs, that if it wore possible for the dead person to be acquainted with them, he would blush at the praises which his friends have be- stowed upon him. There arc others so ex- cessively modest, that they deliver the char JOSEPH ADDISON: 135 acter of the person departed in Greek or Hebrew, and by that means are not under- stood once in a twelvemonth. In the poeti- cal quarter I found there were poets who had no monuments, and monuments which had no poets. I observed, indeed, that the present war had filled the church with many of these uninhabited monuments, which had been erected to the memory of persons whose bodies were perhaps buried in the plains of Blenheim, or in the bosom of the ocean. . . . But to return to our subject, I have left the repository of our English kings for the contemplation of another day, when I sliall find my mind disposed for so serious an amusement. I know that entertainments of this nature are apt to raise dark and dismal thoughts in timorous minds and gloomy imaginations ; but for my own part, though I am always serious, I do not know what it is to be melancholy ; and can, therefore, take a view of nature in her deep and solemn scenes with the same pleasure as in her most gay and delightful ones. By this means I can improve myself with those objects which others consider with terror. When I look upon the tombs of the great, every emotion of envy dies in me ; when I read the epitaphs of the beautiful, every in- ordinate desire goes out ; when I meet with the grief of parents upon a tombstone, my heart melts with compassion ; when I see the tomb of the parents themselves, I con- sider the "vanity of grieving for those whom we must quickly follow. When I see kings lying by those who deposed them, when I consider rival wits placed side by side, or tlie holy men that divided the world with their contests and disputes, I reflect with sorrow and astonishment on the little com- petitions, factions, and debates of mankind. When I read the several dates of the tombs, of some that died yesterday, and some six hundred years ago, I consider that great day when we shall all of us be contemporaries, and make our appearance together. The Spectator, No. S8, Friday, March 30, 1711. The Creator and his Works. I was yesterday about sunset walking in the open fields, until the night insensibly fell upon me. I at first amused myself with all the richness and variety of colours which appeared in the western parts of heaven ; iu proportion as they faded away and went out, several stars and planets appeared one after another, until the whole firmament was in a glow. The blueness of the ether was exceedingly heightened and enlivened by the season of the year, and by the rays of all those luminaries that passed through it. The galaxy appeared in its most beautiful white. To complete the scene, the full moon rose at length in that clouded majesty which Milton takes notice of, and opened to the eye a new picture of nature, which was more finely shaded and disposed amon^ softer lights than that which the sun had before discovered to us. As I was surveying the moon walking m her brightness, and taking her progress among the constellations, a thought rose in me which I believe very often perplexes and disturbs men of serious and contemplative natures. David himself fell into it in that reflection, "When I consider the heavens the work of thy fingers, the moon and thi) stars which thou hast ordained; what is man that thou art mindful of him, and the son of man that thou regardest him !" In the same manner when I considered that infinite host of stars, or, to speak more phil- osophically, of suns which were then shining upon me, with those innumerable sets of planets or worlds which were moving round their respective suns ; when I still enlarged the idea, and supposed another heaven of suns and worlds rising still above this which we discovered, and these still enlightened by a superior firmament of luminaries, which are planted at so great a distance, that they may appear to the inhabitants of the former aa the stars do to us; in short, whilst I pursued this thought, I could not but reflect on that little insignificant figure which I myself bore amidst the immensity of God's works. Were the sun, which enlightens this part of the creation, with all the host of planet- ary worlds that move about him, utterly ex- tinguished and annihilated, they would not be missed more than a grain of sand upon the sea-shore. The space they possess is so exceedingly little in comparison of the whole, that it would scarce make a blank in the cre- ation. The chasm would be imperceptibly to an eye that could take in the whole com- pass of nature, and pass from one end of the creation to the other ; as it is possible there may be such a sense in ourselves hereafter, or in creatures which are at present more exalted than ourselves. We see many stars by the help of glasses, which we do not dis- cover with our naked eyes ; and the finer our telescopes are, the more still are our discov- eries. Huygenius carries this thought so far, that he does not think it impossible there may be stars whose light is not yet travelled down to us since their first creation. There is no question but the universe has certain bounds set to it : but when we consider that it is the work of an infinite power, prompted by infinite goodness, with an infinite space to exert itself in, how can our imaginatiou set any bounds to it? i36 JOSEPH ADDISON. To return, therefore, to my first thought. I could not but look upon myself with secret horror, as a being that was not worth the smallest regard of One who had so great a work under his care and superintendency. I was afraid of being overlooked amidst the immensity of nature, and lost among that infinite variety of creatures which in all probability swarm through all these im- measurable regions of matter. In order to recover myself from this mor- tifying thought, I considered that it took its rise from those narrow conceptions which we are apt to entertain of the divine nature. We ourselves cannot attend to many differ- ent objects at the same time. If we are careful to inspect some things, we must of course neglect others. This imperfection which we observe in ourselves, is an imper- fection that cleaves in some degree to crea- tures of the highest capacities, as they are creatures, that is, beings of finite and lim- ited natures. The presence of every created being is confined to a certain measure of space, and consequently his observation is Btinted to a certain number of objects. The sphere in which we move, and act, and un- derstand, is a wider circumference to one creature than another, according as we rise one above another in the scale of existence. But the widest of these our spheres has its circumference. When, therefore, we reflect on the divine nature, we are so used and accustomed to this imperfection in ourselves, that we cannot forbear in some measure as- cribing it to him in whom there is no shadow of imperfection. Our reason indeed assures us that his attributes are infinite ; but the poorness of our conceptions is such that it cannot forbear setting bounds to everything it contemplates, until our reason comes again to our succour, and throws down all those little prejudices which rise in us unawares, and are natural to the mind of man. We shall, therefore, utterly extinguish this melancholy thought of our being over- looked by our Maker in the multiplioity of his works, and the infinity of those objects among which ho seems to be incessantly ciriployod, if wo considiT in the first plaoo, that hii is omnipri'si'nt ; and, in the second, that he is omniscient. If wo consider hinv in liis omnipresenoo, his lieing piissos thronsli, nctuatos, and sup- ports the whole franu< of nutiiio. His crea- tion, and every part of it, is full of him. TJKM-e is nothing ho has made that is either BO distant, no littlo, or so inconsiderable, whieli lie does not essentially inhabit. His substance is within the substance nl' every being, whether matoriiil or immaterial, and as intinuitoly presoiit to it as that being is to itself. It would be an imperfection in him were he able to remove out of on« place into another, or to withdraw himself from any thing he has created, or from any part of that space which is diffused and spread abroad to infinity. In short, to speak of him in the language of the old philosopher, he is a being whose centre is every where, and his circumference no where. In the second place, be is omniscient as well as omnipresent. This omniscience in- deed necessarily and naturally flows from his omnipresence : he cannot but be conscious of every motion that arises in the whole material world, which he thus essentially pervades, and of every thought that is stir- ring in the intellectual world, to every part of which he is thus intimately united. Several moralists have considered the crea- tion as the temple of God, which he has built with his own hands, and which is filled with his presence. Others have con- sidered infinite space as the receptacle, or rather the habitation, of the Almighty ; but the most noble and exalted way of consider- ing this infinite space is that of Sir Isaac Newton, who calls it the sensorium of the Godhead. Brutes and men hare their sen- soriola, or little sensoriums, by which they apprehend the presence and perceive the actions of a few objects that lie contiguous to them. Their knowledge and observation turn within a very narrow circle. But as God Almighty cannot but perceive and know every thing in which he resides, infinite space gives room to infinite knowledge, and is, as it were, an organ to omniscience. Were the soul separate from the body, and with one glance of thought should start beyond the bounds of the creation, should it for millions of years continue its progress through infinite space with the s:inie activity, it would still find itself within the embrace of its Creator, and encompassed round with the inuncnsity of the Godhead. Whilst we are in the body he is not the less present with us lioeause he is concealed from us. "Oh that 1 know whore I might find him !'' says Job. " Behold I go forwurd, but he is not there ; and backward, but I cannot per- oeivo him : on the left hand where he does work, but I cannot behold him : ho hideth himself on the right hand that I cannot soe him." 1 n short, reniion as well as revelation assures us thiit ho cannot be absent from us, notwithstanding ho is undiscovorod bv us. In this consiilonition of God Almigntv's oninipre.sonco and omniscience every un- comfortable thought vanishes. lie can- not but regard every thing that has being, especially such of his creatures who tear they are not regarded by him. He is privy to all their thoughts, and to that anxiety of heart in particular which is apt to troabla ANTHONY BLACKWALL. 137 them on this occasion ; for, as it is impossible he should overlook any of his creatures, so we may be confident that he regards \Yith an eye of mercy those who endeavour to recom- mend themselves to his notice, and in an unfeigned humility of heart think them- selves unworthy that he should be mindful of them. The Spectator, No. 565, Friday, July 9, 17U. A.NTHONY BLACKWALL, of Emmanuel College, Cambridge, and Lec- turer of All Hallows, Derby, born 1674, died 1730, was the author of The Sacred Classics Defended and Illustrated, or, An Essay Humbly Offered towards Proving the Purity, Propriety, and true Eloquence of the Writers of the New Testament, Lond., 1725-27-31, 3 vols. 8vo-; 2d edit., 1737, 2 vols. 8to ; in Latin, by Wollius, Lips., 1736, 4to ; and of an Introduction to the Classics, Lond., 1740, 12mo. " Blackwall was a Btrenuous advocate for the purity of the G-reek style of the New Testament, which he vindicates in his first volume.'' — T. H. HOBNE. Homer. 'Tis no romantic commendation of Homer to say, that no man understood persons and things better than he ; or had a deeper in- sight into the humours and passions of hu- man nature. He represents great things with such sublimity, and little ones with such propriety, that he always makes the une admirable and the other pleasant. He is a perfect master of all the lofty graces of the figurative style and all the purity and easiness of the plain. Strabo, the excellent geographer and historian, as- sures us that Homer has described the places and countries of which he gives account with that accuracy that no man can imagine who has not seen them ; and no man but must admire and be astonished who has. His poems may justly be compared with that shield of divine workmanship so inimitably represented in the eighteenth book of the Iliad. You have there exact images of all the actions of war, and employments of peace ; and are entertained with the delight- ful view of the universe. Homer has all the beauties of every dia- lect and style scattered through his writings: he is scarce inferior to any other poet in the poet's own way and excellency, but excels all others in force and comprehension of genius, elevation of fancy, and immense copiousness of invention. Such a sover- eignty of genius reigns ovei pll his works that the ancients esteemed and admired him as the great High Priest of nature, whp was admitted into her inmost choir, and ac- quainted with her most solemn mysteries. The great men of former ages, with one voice, celebrate the praises of Homer; and old Zoilus has only a few followers in these later times who detract from him either for want of Greek, or from a spirit of conceit and contradiction. These gentlemen tell us that the divine Plato himself banished him out of his com- monwealth ; which, say they, must be granted to be a blemish upon the poet's reputation. The reason why Plato would not let Homer's poems be in the hands of the subjects of that government, was because he did not esteem ordinary men capable readers of them. They would be apt to pervert his meaning, and have wrong notions of God and religion, by taking his bold and beautiful allegories in too literal a sense. Plato frequently de- clares that he loves and admires him as the best, the most pleasant, and the divinest of all the poets ; and studiously imitates his figurative and mystical way of writing. Though he forbad his works to be read fn public, yet he would never be without them in his own closet. Though the philosopher pretends that for reasons of state he must remove him out of his city, yet he declares he would treat him with all possible respect while he staid ; and dismiss him laden with presents, and adorned with garlands (as the priests and supplicants of their gods used to be) ; by which marks of honour all people wherever he came might be warned and in- duced to esteem his person sacred, and re- ceive him with due veneration. Introduction to the Classics. The Greek and Roman Authors. It was among the advantages which the chief classics enjoyed that most of them were placed in prosperous and plentiful circum- stances of life, raised above anxious cares, want, and abject dependence. They were persons of quality and fortune, courtiers and statesmen, great travellers, and gen- erals of armies, possessed of the highest dignities and posts of peace and war. Their riches and plenty furnished them with lei- sure and means of study ; and their employ- ments improved them in knowledge and experience. How lively must they describe those countries and remarkable places which they had attentively viewed with their own eyes! What faithful and emphatical rela- tions were they enabled to make of those councils in which they presided ; of those actions in which they were present and com- manded 1 138 ANTHONY BLACK WALL. Herodotus, the father of history, besides the advantage of his travels and general knowledge, was so considerable in power and interest that he bore a chief part in expelling the tyrant Lygdamis, wno had usurped upon the liberties of his native country. Thucydides and Xenophon were of distin- guished eminence and abilities both in civil and military affairs ; were rich and noble ; hnd strong parts, and a careful education in their youth, completed by severe study in their advanced years: in short, they had all the advantages and accomplishments both of the retired and active life. Sophocles bore great offices in Athens ; led tneir armies, and in strength of parts, and nobleness of thought and expression, was not unequal to his colleague Pericles, who, by his commanding wisdom and elo- quence, influenced all Greece, and was said to thunder and lighten in his harangues. Euripides, famous for the purity of the At£ic style, and his power in moving the passions, especially the softer ones of grief and pity, was invited to, and generously en- tertained in, the court of Archelaus, king of Macedon. The smoothness of his com- position, his excellency in dramatic poetry, the soundness of his morals, conveyed in the sweetest numbers, were so universally admired, and his glory so far spread, that the Athenians, who were taken prisoners in the fatal overthrow under Nicias, were pre- served from perpetual exile and ruin by the astonishing respect that the Sicilians, ene- mies and strangers, paid to the wit and fame of their illustrious countryman. As many as could repeat any of feuripides's verses were rewarded with their liberty, and generously sent home with marks of honour. Plato, by his father's side, sprung from Codrus, the celebrated king of Athens ; and by his mother's from Solon, the no less celebrated law-giver. To gain experience and enlarge his knowledge, he travelled into Italy, Sicily, and Egypt. lie was courted nnd honoured by the greatest men of the age wherein ho lived ; and will be studied and admired by inon of taste and juilgmcnt in nil succeeding nj^os. In his works are in- estimable treuKiiii's of the best learning. In short, as a K'lvrncd gentleman says, he writ with nil llu) Htroniitli of human reason and all the cliavm of liunian oloquonoo. Aniicroon lived familiarly with Polvoratos, king of Samoa: and his uprightly muse, na- turally flowing with inniimorablo pleasures and graces, must improve in delioaey and sweetness by the f^iiiety and refined conver- sation of that nnurisbing court The bold and exalted genius of Pindar was encouraged and heightened by the honours he received from the champions and princes of his age ; and his conversation with the heroes qualified him to sing their praises with more advantage. The conquerors at the Olympic games scarce valued their gar- lands of honour, and wreaths of victory, if they were not crowned with his never-fading laurels, and immortalized by his celestial song. The noble Hiero of Syracuse was his generous friend and patron ; and the most powerful and polite state of all Greece esteemed a line of his in praise of their glorious city worth public acknowledgments and a statue. Most of the genuine and val- uable Latin Classics had the same advantages of fortune, and improving conversation, the same encouragements with these and the other celebrated Grecians. Terence gained such a wonderful insight into the characters and manners of man- kind, such an elegant choice of words, and fluency of style, such judgment in the con- duct of his plot, and such delicate and charming terms, chiefly by the conversation of Scipio and Lselius, the greatest men, and most refined wits, of their age. So much does this judicious writer and clean scholar improve by his diligent application to study, and their genteel and learned conversation, that it was charged upon him by those who envied his superior excellency, that he published their compositions under his own name. His enemies had a mind that the world should believe those noblemen wrote his plays, but scarce believed it themselves; and the poet verv prudently and genteelly slighted tneir malice, and made his great patrons the finest compliment in the world, by esteeming the accusation as an honour, rather than making any formal defence against it. Sallust, so famous for his neat expressive brevitv, nnd quick turns, for truth of fnot and oiearncss of style, for the accuracy of his characters, nnd his piercing view into the mysteries of policy and motives of ac- tion, cultivnted his rich abilities, and made his acquired learning so useful to the world, and so honourable to himself, by bearing the chief offices in the Roman government, and shnring in the important councils and debates of the senate. Caesar had a prodigious wit nnd universal leavMini;: wns noble by birth, a consummate statesman, » brave and wise general, and a most heroic prince. His prudence nnd mod- esty in speaking of himself, the truth and elenrness of his descriptions, the inimitable purity and perspieuity of his style, distin- guish him with advantage from all other writers. None bears a nearer resemblnncs to him in more instances than the ndmirabU ISAAC WATTS. 139 Xenophon. What useful and entertaining accounts might reasonably be expected from such a writer, who gives you the geography and history of those countries and nations which he himself conquered, and the de- scription of those military engines, bridges, and encampments which he himself con- trived and marked out! The best authors in the reign of Augustus, as Horace, Virgil, Tibullus, Propertius, &c., enjoyed happy times and plentiful circum- stances. This was the golden age of learn- ing. They flourished under the favours and bounty of the richest and most generous ourt of the world ; and the beams of majesty shone bright and propitious on them. What could be too great to expect from such poets as Horace and Virgil, beloved and munificently rewarded by such patrons as Maecenas and Augustus 7 A chief reason why Tacitus writes with such skill and authority, that he makes such deep searches into the nature of things and designs of men, that he so exquisitely under- stands the secrets and intrigues of courts, was that he himself was admitted into the highest places of trust, and employed in the most public and important affairs. The statesman brightens the scholar, and the consul improves and elevates the historian. Introduction to the Classics. ISAAC WATTS, D.D., born 1674, became assistant to Dr. Isaac Chauncy, pastor of the Independent Con- gregation then meeting in Mark Lane, London, 1698, and was minister of the same from 1702 until his death, 1748. For the last thirty-six years, of his life he was paying a visit to the family of Sir Thomas Abney. He was the author of some theo- logical and metaphysical works, but is best known by Divine and Moral Songs for Chil- dren, Hymns, and other poetical productions. Works, Lond., 1753, 6 vols. 4to, 1810, 6 vols. 4to, 1824, 6 vols. 4to, and other editions. " Dr. Watts's style is harmonious, florid, poetical, and pathetic ; yet too diffuse, too many words, espe- cially in his latter works; and his former ones are too much loaded with epithets ; yet on the whole excellent. . . . All that he has written is well worth reading." — Db. Doddridge. "Few books have been perused by me with greater pleasure than his 'Improvement of the Mind.' . . . Whoever has the care of instructing others, maybe charged with deficience in his duty if this book is not commended." — Db. Johnson : Life of Watts. Op Impeovinq the Memory. When you would remember new things or words, endeavour to associate and connect them with some words or things which you have well known before, and which are fixed and established in your memory. This associ- ation of ideas is of great importance and force, and may be of excellent use in many instances of human life. One idea which is familiar to the mind, and connected with others which are new and strange, will bring those new ideas into easy remembrance. Maronides had got the first hundred lines of Virgil's uSineid printed upon his memory so perfectly, that he knew not only the order and number of every verse from one to a hundred in perfection, but the order and number of every word in each verse also ; and by this means he would undertake to remember two or three hundred names of persons or things by some rational or fantastic connec- tion between some word in the verse and some letter, syllable, property, or accident of the name or thing to be remembered, even though they had been repeated but once Or twice at most in his hearing. Ani- manto practised much the same art of memory by getting the Latin names of twenty-two animals into his head according to the alphabet, viz., asiniis, basilisctis, canis, draco, elephas, felis, gryphus, hircus, juven- cus, leo, mulus, noctua, ovis, panther a, quad- rapes, rhinoceros, simia, taurus, ursus, xiphias, hyocna, or ycena, zibeiia. Most of these he divided also into four parts, viz., head and body, feet, fins, or wings, and tail, and by some arbitrary or chimerical attach- ment of each of these to a word or thing which he desired to remember, he committed them to the care of his memory, and that with good success. It is also by this association of ideas that we may better imprint any new idea upon the memory by joining with it some circum- stance of the time, place, company, &c., wherein we first observed, heard, or learned it. If we would recover an absent idea, it is useful to recollect those circumstances of time, place, &c. The substance will many times be recovered and brought to the thoughts by recollecting the shadow: a man recurs to our fancy by remembering hia garment, his size or stature, his office, or employment, &c. A beast, bird, or fish by its colour, figure, or motion, by the cage, or court-yard, or cistern, wherein it was kept, &c. To this head also we may refer that re- membrance of names and things which may be derived from our recollection of their likeness to other things which we know ; either their resemblance in name, character, form, accident, or any thing that belongs to them. An idea or word which has been lost or forgotten has been often reocvered by hitting upon some other kindref" word or 140 JOHN ARBUTHNOT. idea which has the nearest resemblance to it, and that in the letters, syllables, or sound of the name, as well as properties of the thing. If we would remember Hippocrates, or Galen, or Paracelsus, think of a physician's name beginning with II, 6, or P. If we will remember Ovidius Naso, we may repre- sent a man with a great nose ; if Plato, we may think upon a person with large shoul- ders; if Crispus, wo shall fancy another with curled hair; and so of other things. And sometimes a new or strange idea may be fixed in the memory by considering its contrary or opposite. So if we cannot hit on the word Goliath, the remembrance of David may recover it : Or the name of a Trojan may be recovered by thinking of a Greek, &c. On Improving the Mind, Pari. I. ch. 17. Books and Reading. Enter into the sense and argument of the authors you read, examine all their proofs, and then judge of the truth or falsehood of their opinions ; and thereby you shall not only gain a rich increase of your under- standings by those truths which the author teaches, when you see them well supported, but you shall acquire also by degrees a habit of judging justly and reasoning well, in imi- tation of the good author whose works you peruse. This is laborious indeed, and the mind is backward to undergo the fatigue of weigh- ing every argument and tracing every thing to its original. It is much less labour to take all things upon trust ; believing is much easier than arguing. But when Studeniio had once persuaded his mind to tie itself down to this method which I have prescribed, he sensibly gained an admirable facility to read, and judge of what he read, by his daily practice of it, and made large aiivances in the pursuit of truth ; while Plumbinus and Plumeo made less progress in knowledge, though they had read over more folios. Plumeo skiinmcd over the pages like a swal- low over tlio flowery meads in May. I'liim- /)/«»» read every line and syllable, but did not give hiniself the trouble of tliinkini; and judging about them. They both could boast in company of their great reading, for they knew more titles and pages than StudeiHio, but were far loss acquainted with science. I confess, those wluisc reading is designed only to fit them for mueh talk and little knowledge may conlont theiiiselvea to run over their authors in such a sudden and trifling way ; thoy may devour libraries in this manner yet bo poor reasoners at last, and have no solid wisdom or true learning. The traveller who walks on fair and softly in a course that points right, and examines every turning before he ventures upon it, will come sooner and safer to his journey's end than be who runs through every lane ho meets, though he gallop full speed through the day. The man of much read ing and a large retentive niemory, but with- out meditation, may become, in the sense of the world, a knowing man ; and if he con- verses much with the ancients he may attain the fame of learning too : But he spends his days afar off from wisdom and true judg- ment, and possesses very little of the sub- stantial riches of the mind. Never apply yourselves to read any human author with a determination beforehand either for him or against him, or with a settled resolution to believe or disbelieve, to confirm or oppose, whatsoever he saith ; but always read it with a design to lay your mind open to truth, and to embrace it wheresoever you find it, as well as to reject every falsehood, though it appear under never so fair a disguise. How unhappy are those men who seldom take an author into their hands but they have determined before they begin whether they will like or dislike him ! They have got some notion of his name, his character, his party, or his prin- ciples, by general conversation, or perhaps by some slight view of a few pages: And having all their own opinions adjusted be- forehand, they read all that he writes with a prepossession either for or against him. Unhappy those who hunt and purvey for a party, and scrape together, out of every author all those things, and those only, which favour their own tenets, while they despise and neglect all the rest ! Yet take this caution, I would not l>e understood here as though I persuaded a person to live with- out any settled principles at all by which to Judge of men and books and things ; or that I would keep a man always doubting about his foundaiions. On Jmproi-iuij Vie -Vind, Part I. cJiap. 4, JOHN ARBUTHNOT, M.D., born l("Tr>, died 17.>'). was associated with Pope, Gray. Swift, Hurley, Atterbury, and Oongreve, in tlie Scriblerus Club, and was solo or joint author of Memoirs of the Ex- traordinary Life, AVorks, and Discoveries of Martiiuis Soriblerus, which were pub- lished in Pope's Works. Among his other productions were a treatise on the Useful- ness of Mnthematienl Learning, 17(X), The History of John Bull, 1712, and Tables of Aiu'ient Coins, 'Weights, and Measurva, Lond., 4to. JOHN ARBUTHNOT. i4l " He has more wit than we all hare, and his humanity is equal to his wit." — Swift. " His good morals were equal to any man's, but his wit and humour superior to all mankind." — Pope. " I think Dr. Arbuthnot the first man among them [the eminent writers in Queen Anne's reign]. He was the most universal genius, being an excel- lent physician, a man of deep learning, and a man of muoh humour." — Dr. Johxsox. Usefulness of Mathematical Learning. The advantages which accrue to the mind by mathematical studies consist chiefly in these things : 1st, In accustoming it to at- tention. 2d, In giving it a habit ot close and demonstrative reasoning. 3d, In freeing it from prejudice, credulity, and superstition. First, the mathematics make the mind attentive to the objects v? hich it considers. This they do by entertsvining it with a great variety of truths, which are delightful and evident, but not obvious. Truth is the same thing to the understanding as music to the ear and beauty to the eye. The pursuit of it does really as much gratify a natural fac- ulty implanted in us by our wise Creator as the pleasing of our senses : only in the former case, as the object and faculty are more spiritual, the delight is more pure, free from the regret, turpitude, lassitude, and in- temperance that commonly attend sensual pleasures. The most part of other sciences consisting only of probable reasonings, the mind has not where to fix, and wanting suf- ficient principles to pursue its searches upon, gives them over as impossible. Again, as in mathematical investigations truth may be found, so it is not always obvious. This spurs the mind, and makes it diligent and attentive. . . . The second advantage which the mind reaps from mathematical knowledge is a habit of clear, demonstrative, and method- ical reasoning. We are contrived by nature to learn by imitation more than by precept ; and I believe in that respect reasoning is much like other inferior arts (as dancinj;. singing, &c.), acquired by practice. By ac customing ourselves to reason closely about quantity, we acquire a habit of doing so in other things. It is surprising to see what superficial incopsequential reasonings sat- isfy the most part of mankind. A piece of wit, a jest, a simile, or a quotation of an autlior, passes for a mighty argument : with such things as these are the most part of authors stufled; and from these weighty premises they infer their conclusions. This weakness and effeminacy of mankind, in being persuaded where they are delighted, have made them the sport of orators, poets, and men of wit. Those lumina rationis are indeed very good diversion for the fancy, but are not the proper business of the un- derstanding ; and where a man pretends to write on abstract subjects in a scientific method, he ought not to debauch in them. Logical precepts are more useful, nay, they are absolutely nbcessary, for a rule of for- mal arguing in public disputations, and confounding an obstinate and perverse ad- versary, and exposing him to the audience or readers. But, in the search of truth, an imitation of the method of the geometers will carry a man farther than all the dialectical rules. Their analysis is the proper model we ought to form ourselves upon, and imitate in the regular disposition and progress of our inquiries ; and even he who is ignorant of the nature of mathematical analysis uses a method somewhat analogous to it. The composition of the geometers, or their method of demonstrating truths already found out, namely, by definition of words agreed upon, by self-evident truths, and propositions that have been already demonstrated, is practica- ble in other subjects, though not to the same perfection, the natural want of evidence in the things themselves not allowing it ; but it is imitable to a considerable degree. I dare appeal to some writings of our own age and nation, the authors of which have been mathematically inclined. I shall add no more on this head, but that one who is ac- customed to the methodical systems of truth which the geometers have reared up in the several branches of those sciences which they have cultivated, will hardly bear with the confusion and disorder of other sciences, but endeavour, as far as he can, to reform them. Thirdly, mathematical knowledge adds vigour to the mind, frees it from prejudice, credulity, and superstition. This it does in two ways : 1st, By accustoming us to exam- ine, and not to take things upon trust. 2d, By giving us a clear and extensive knowl- edge of the system of the world, which, as it creates in us the most profound reverence of the Almighty and wise Creator, so it frees us from the, mean and narrow thoughts which ignorance and superstition are apt to beget. . . . The mathematics are friends to religion, inasmuch as they charm the pas- sions, restrain the impetuosity of imagina- tion, and purge the mind from error and prejudice. Vice is error, confusion, and false reasoning ; and all truth is more or less opposite to it. Besides, mathematical studies may serve for a pleasant entertain- ment for those hours which young men are apt to throw away upon their vices ; the de- lightfulness of them being such as to make solitude not only easy but desirable. Essay on the Usefiilness of Mathematical Learning. 142 SAMUEL CLARKE. SAMUEL CLARKE, D.D., one of the most famous of English philoso- phers and divines, born 1675, entered Caius College, Cambridge, 1691 ; at twenty, by his notes to his new translation of Rohault's Physics substituted at Cambridge the New- tonian for the Cartesian philosophy ; became Iteotor of St. Bennet's, Paul's Wharf, Lon- don, 1706, and of St. James's, Westminster, 1709; published his Demonstration of the Being and Attributes of God, etc., Lond., 1705-0, 2 vols. 8vo, The Scripture Doctrine of the Trinity, Lond., \T\i, 8vo (an Arian treatise), and other works; died 1729. Works, with Account, by Benjamin [Iloadly] Bishop of Winchester, Lond., 1738, 4 vols. 8vo. In vol. iii. will be found his Paraphrase on the Four Evangelists, which has lieen frequently reprinted, and generally accompanies Pyle on the Epistles. " Dr. Clarke's paraphrase on the KvaDgelists deserves an attentive reading ; he narrates a story in handsome language, and connects the parts well together; but fails much in emphasis, and seems to mistake the order of the histories." — Dr. Dod- DBIDOE. " He rarely reaches the sublime or aims at the pathetic ; but in a clear manly flowing style he delivers the most important doctrines, conflrmed on every oocosiun by well-applied passages from Scripture. Ue was not perfectly orthodox in his opinions ; a circumstance which has lowered his character among many." — Dr. Knox. " 1 should recommend Dr. Clarke's Sermons were he orthodox ; however, it is very well known where he was not orthodox, which was upon the doctrine of the Trinity, as to which he is a condemned her- etic : so one is aware of it." — Dr. Johnson : Bom- wetl's Life of Johntun, " Eminent at once as a divine, a mathematician, a metaphysical philosopher, and a philologer ; and BS the interpreter of Homer and CsD^ar, the scholar of Newton, and the antagonist of Leibnitif ap- proved himself not unworthy of oorrespondenoe with the highest order of human spirits."— Sib J. Mackintosh. Natural and Essential Difference or RiGUT AND Wrong. The principal thing that can, with any colour of rea.son seem to oountenanoo the opinion (if those who deny tlie natural and eternal difforonco uf gooil and evil, is the difficulty there may soiiictimes be to define exactly the bounds of rifilit and wrong; the variety of opinions that have obtainoa even among understanding and learned men, eon- corning certiiiii riueHtions of just and unjust, especially in political matters ; and the many contrary laws that liavo lieoi\ made in divers ages iinil in different enuntrios concerning these mutters. But as, in )miiiting, two very dllToront colours, by diluting tnu-\\ ntlier vi'ry slowly and gradually, may, from the higl"'st iii- tenseness in either extreme, terminate in the midst insensibly, and so run one into the other that it shall not be possible even for a skilful eye to determine exactly where the one ends and the other begins ; and yet the colours may really differ as much as can be, not in degree only, but entirely in kind, as red and blue, or white and black: so, though it may perhapsbe very difficult in some nice and perplexed cases (which yet are very far from occurring frequently) to define exactly the bounds of right and wrong, just and unjust (and there may be some latitude in the judg- ment of different men, and the laws of divers nations), yet right and wrong are neverthe- less in themselves totally and essentially different; even altogether as much as white and bl ick, light and darkness. The Spartan law, perhaps, which permitted their youth to steal, may, as absurd as it was, bear much dispute whether it was absolutely unjust or no : because every man having an absolute right in his own goods, it may seem that the members of any society may agree to trans- fer or alter their own properties upon what conditions they shall think fit. But if it could be supposed that a law had been made at Sparta, or at Rome, or in India, or in any other part of the world, whereby it had been commanded or allowed that every man might rob by violence, and murder, whomsoever he met with, or that no faith should be kept with any man, nor any equitable compacts Performed, no man with any tolerable use of is reason, whatever diversity of judgment might be among them in other matters, would have thought that such a law could have au- thorized or excused, much less have justified, such actions, and have made them become good: bceause 'tis plainly not in men's power to make faUehood be truth, though they may alter the property of their goods as they please. Now if in flagrant cases the natural and essential difference between good and evil, right and wrong, cannot but be con- fessed to be plainly and undeniably evident, the dinTeronce between them must be also essential and unalterable in all, even the smallest, and nicest and most intricate cases, though it bo not so easy to be discerned and accurately distinguished. For if, from the difficulty of determining exactly the bounds of right and wrung in many perplexed cases, it could truly be concluded that just and un- just were not essentially different by nature, but only by positive constitution and custom, it would lollow equally that they were not really, essentially, and unalterably different, even in the most flagrant cases that can be supposed ; which is an assertion so very ab- suril that Mr. llnbbes himself could hardly vent it without blushing, and discovering plainly, by his shifting expressions, his seerat BENJAMIN HOADLY. 143 self-condemnation. There are therefore cer- tain necessary and eternal differences of things, and certain fitnesses or unfitnesses of the application of different things, or dif- ferent relations one to another, not depend- ing on any positive constitutions, but founded unchangeably in the nature and reason of things, and unavoidably arising from the differences of the things themselves. BENJAMIN HOADLY, D.D., born 1676, Siishop of Bangor, 1713, Bishop of Salisbury, 1723, Bishop of Winchester, 1734, died 1761, was the author of a num- ber of theological treatises, of which A Plain Account of the Nature and End of the Lord's Supper, 1735, 8vo (A Defence of the same, 1735, 1748, 8vo), and a sermon, entitled My Kingdom is nut of this World, 1717 (which gave rise to the famous Bango- rian Controversy, comprised in forty to fifty tracts), are the best known. A collection of his Sermons was published, 1754-55, 2 vols. 8vo (Discourses, 4th edit., 1734, 8vo), and his Works, with an Index and an Introduc- tory Account of the Author, appeared, Lond., 1773, 3 vols. fol. "A long and celebrated war of pens instantly commenced, known by tbe nnrae of the Bangorian Controversy; managed, perbaps on both sides, with all the chicanery of polemical writers, and disgusting both from its tediousneas, and from the manifest unwillingness of the disputants to speak ingenuously what they meant." — Hallah : Ounttit. Bitt. of England, edit. 186^1, iii. 243-214. Mr. Ilallam appends this note : "These qualities are so apparent, that, after turning over some forty or fifty tracts, and con- suming a good many hours on the Bangorian Con- troversy, I should find some difficulty in stating with decision the propositions in dispute." Protestant Infallibilitt. Your holiness is not perhaps aware how near the churches of us Protestants have at length come to those privileges and per- fections .which you boast of as peculiar to your own ; so near that many of the most quick-sighted and sagacious persons have not been able to discover any other differ- ence between us, as to the main principle of all doctrine, government, worsnip, and discipline, but this one, namely, that you cannot err in anything you determine, and we never do: that is, in other words, that you are infallible, and we always in the right. We cannot but esteem the advantage to be exceedingly on our side in this case ; because we have all the benefits of infalli- bility without the absurdity of pretending to it, and without the uneasy task of main- taining a point so shockincr to tbe under- standing of mankind. And you must pai-- don us if we cannot help thinking it to be as great and as glorious a privilege in us tc be always in the right, without the pretence of infallibility, as it can be in you to be always in the wrong, with it. Thus, the synod of Dort (for whose un- erring decisions public thanks to Almighty God are every three years offered up with the greatest solemnity by the magistrates in that country), the councils of the reformed in France, the assembly of the kirk of Scot- land, and (if I may presume to name it) the convocation of England, have been all found to have the very same unquestionable authority which your church claims, solely upon the infallibility which resides in it, and the people to be under the very same strict obligation of obedience to their de- terminations, which with you is the con- sequence only of an absolute infallibility. The reason, therefore, why we do not openly set up an infallibility is, because we can do without it. Authority results as well from power as from right, and a majority of votes IS as strong a foundation for it as infallibility itself. Councils that may err, never do : and besides, being composed of men whose pecu- liar business it is to be in the right, it is very immodest for any private person to think them not so ; because this is to set up a private corrupted understanding above a public uncorrupted judgment. Thus it is in the north, as well as the south, abroad as well as at home. All maintain the exercise of the same authority in themselves which yet they know not how so much as to speak of without ridicule in others. In England it stands thuR: The synod of Dort is of no weight; it determined many doctrines wrong. The assembly of Scotland hath nothing of a true authority ; and is very much out in its scheme of doctrines, worship, and government. But the church of England is vested with all authority, and justly challengeth all obedience. If one crosses a river in the north, there it stands thus: The church of England is not enough reformed ; its doctrines, wor- ship, and government have too much of ontichristian Rome in them. But the kirk of Scotland hath a divine right from its only head, Jesus Christ, to meet and to enact what to it shall seem fit for the good of his church. Thus, we lefl you for your enormous un- justifiable claim to an unerring spirit, and have found out a way, unknown to your holiness and your predecessors, of claiming all the righte that belong to infallibility, xU JOHN HUGHES. even whilst we disclaim and abjure the thing itself. As for us of the church of England, if we will believe many of its greatest advocates, we have bishops in a succession as certainly uninterrupted from the apostles as your shurch could communicate it to us. And upon this bottom, which makes us a true church, we have a right to separate from !/ou; but no persons living have a right to differ or separate from us. And they again, who differ from us, value themselves upon something or other in which we are sup- posed defective, or upon being free from some superfluities which we enjoy ; and think it hard that any will be still going further, and refine upon their scheme of worship and discipline. Thus we have indeed left you; but we have fixed ourselves in your seat, and make no scruple to resemble you in our defences of ourselves and censurers of others when- ever we think it proper. From the Dedication to Pope Clement XI. prefixed to Sir li. Steele's Account of the State of the Roman Catholic Religion throughout the World. JOHN HUGHES, born 1677, died 1720, was a contributor to The Tatler, the Spectator, and the Guardian ; co-author with Sir Richard Blackraore of the Essays, Discourses. &c., of the Lay Monk, (in 40 Numbers, Nov. 16, 1713-t'eb. 15, 1714, 2d edit.. The Lay Monastery, Lond., 1714, 12mo) ; author of the Siege of Damas- cus, 1720, 8vo, and of other productions, together with translations. His Poems and Essays in Prose were published, Lond., 1735, 2 vols. 12mo, and his Correspondence, with Notes, Lond., 1772, 3 vols. 12uio, 2d edit., 1773, 3 vols. 8vo. His poems were included in Dr. Johnson's collection, with a meagre sketch without any estimate of his merits. " Ho [Hughoa] is ton grave a poet for mo, and, I think, iiniDiip; tlie .yfriliucriiiU in prose as well as verso.'* — Swift to Tni-K. " Wliat ho wanted in genius ho made up as an honest niiin ; hut lie was of the class you thinic him."— -PorK to Swift. " IIuKhoB has mora merit as a translator of poetry than afl nn original poet. . . . Onthoprose of Ilui,'li''f' I iini inellned to bestow more praise than on his poetry. ... All the periodical essays of IIuKhos iiro written in a stylo which ia, in gen- eral, easy, oorrcil, and eli'gant : they ooen«ioniilly exhiliit wit iiiul hunionr; and they uniformly tend to in^'ulonto tlie l>ost proeopts, moral, pruden- tial, and riliKiouH." — Dii. IIkake: t'nny llliitlra- tiveoflhi) Tiiilfi; .s';i,,r.i(..r, niiii Oimrrfioii, iii. 20- Sn 0. v. for lui aoouunt of llughes'a shuro in those periodicals; and see the Prefaces to the varioui editions of those works. Ihhortalitt of the Soul. To THE Spectator. Sir, — I am fully persuaded that one of the best springs of generous and worthy actions is the having generous and worthy thoughts of ourselves. Whoever has a mean opinion of the dignity of his nature will act in no higher a rank than be has allotted himself in his own estimation. If he con- siders his being as circumscribed by the un- certain term of a few years, his designs will be contracted into the same narrow span he imagines is to bound his existence. How can he exalt his thoughts to any thing great and noble who only believes that, after a short turn on the stage of this world, he is to sink into oblivion, and to lose his con- sciousness forever? For this reason I am of opinion that so useful and elevated a contemplation as that of the soul's immortality cannot be resumed too often. There is not a more improving exercise to the human mind than to be fre- quently reviewing its own great privileges and endowments ; nor a more effectual means to awaken in us an ambition raised above low objects and little pursuits, than to value ourselves as heirs of eternity. It is a very great satisfaction to consider the best and wisest of mankind in all nations and ages asserting as with one voice this their birthright, and to find it ratified by an express revelation. At the same time if we turn our thoughts inwards upon our- selves, we may meet with a kind of secret sense concurring with the proofs of our own immortality. You have, in my opinion, raised a good presumptive argument from the increasing appetite the mind has to knowledge, and to the extending its own faculties, which cannot be accomplished, as the more restrained per- fection of lower creatures may, in the limits of a short life. I think another probable conjecture may be raised from our appetite to duration itself, and from a reflection on our progress through the several stages of it. " We are complaining," as you observed in a former speculation, " of the shortness of life, and yet are perpetually hurrying over the parts of it, to arrive at certain little set- tlements or imai;iiiary points of rest, which are dispersed up nixt down in it." Now let us consider what happens to us when we arrive at these imaginary points of rest. Do we stop our motion and sit down satisfied in the soiiloinent we have gained? or are we not removing the boundary, and marking out new points of rest, to which we press forward with the like eagerness, and HENRY ST. JOHN. 145 which cease to be such as fast as we attain them ? Our case is like that of a traveller upon the Alps, who should fancy that the top of the next hill must end his journey, because it terminates his prospect ; but he no sooner arrives at it than he sees new ground and other hills beyond it, and con- tinues to travel on as before. This is so plainly every man's condition in life; that there is no one who has observed «ny thing but may observe that as fast as /lis time wears away his appetite to some- thing future remains. The use, therefore, I would make of it is, that since Nature (as some love to express it) does nothing in vain, or to speak properly, since the Author of our being has planted no wandering pas- sion in it, no desire which has not its object, futurity is the proper object of the passion BO constantly exercised about it: and this restlessness in the present, this assigning ourselves over to farther stages of duration, this successive grasping at somewhat still to come, appears to me (whatever it may be to others) as a kind of instinct, or natural symptom, which the mind of men has of its own immortality. I take it at the same time for granted that the immortality of the soul is sufficiently es- tablished ~by other arguments : and if so, this appetite, which otherwise would be very unaccountable and absurd, seems very reasonable, and adds strength to the conclu- sion. But I am amazed when I consider tnere are creatures capable of thought, who, in spite of every argument, can form to themselves a sullen satisfaction in thinking otherwise. There is something so pitifully mean in the inverted ambition of that man who can hope for annihilation, and please himself to think that his whole fabric shall one day crumble into dust, and mix with the mass of inanimate beings, that it equally deserves our admiration and pity. The mys- tery of such men's unbelief is not hard to be penetrated ; and indeed amounts to nothing more than a sordid hope that they shall not be immortal, because they dare not be so. This brings me back to my first observa- tion, and gives me occasion to say farther, that as worthy actions spring from worthy thoughts, so worthy thoughts are likewise the consequence of worthy actions. But the wretch who has degraded himself below the character of immortality is very willing to resign his pretensions to it, and to substi- tute in its room a dark negative happiness in the extinction of his being. The Spectator, No. 310, Wednesday, Octo- ber 31, 1711. 10 HENRY ST. JOHN, VISCOUNT BOLINGBROKE, born 1678, became Secretary of AVar, 1704, Secretary of State, 1710, fled to France to avoid impeachment, 1715, and was absent until 1723 ; for ten years was in political opposition to Sir Robert Walpole, and died 1751. He was a man of profligate prin- ciples and great intellectual and literary abilities. The Craftsman, by Caleb D' Anvers (Dec. 5, 1725, et seq., Lond., 14 vols. 12mo), was the vehicle of Wyndham's, Pulteney's, and Bolingbroke's fierce attacks upon Wal- pole ; and in the same paper first appeared Bolingbroke's Dissertations upon Parties (in a volume, Lond., 1735, 4to). His Re- marks on the History of England were published, Lond., 1743, 4to ; his Letters on the Spirit of Patriotism, on the Idea of a Patriot King, and on the State of Parties at the Accession of George I., appeared together in a volume, Lond., 1749, 8vo. Pope had previously printed and circulated more copies of The Idea of a Patriot King than the author intended. A collective edition of Boling- broke's AVorks was published by David Mal- let, Lond., 1754, 5 vols. 4to (again, Lond., 1786, 11 vols. 8vo, Lond., 1809, 8 vols. 8vo, Boston, Mass., 1844, 4 vols. 8vo), and his Letters, Correspondence, with State Papers, etc., were published by the Rev. Gilbert Parke, Lond., 1798, 2 vols. 4to. " I really think there is sometliing in that great man which looks as if he was placed here bj mis- take. When the comet appeared to us a month or two ago, I had sometimes an imaginaA^ion that it might possibly be come to our world, to carry him home ; as a coach comes to one's door for other visitors." — Pope : Spence's Anecdotes. " When TuUy attempted poetry he became as ridiculous as Bolingbroke when he attempted phi- losophy and divinity: we look in vain for that genius which produced the Dissertation on Parties in the tedious philosophical works, of which it is no exaggerated satire to say that the reason of them is sophistical and inconclusive, the style dif- fuse and verbose, and the learning seemingly con- tained in them not drawn from the originals, but picked up and purloined from French critics and translations." — Joseph Warton: Life of Pope. On Useless Learning. Some [histories] are to be read, some are to be studied, and some may be neglected entirely, not only without detriment, but with advantage. Some are the proper ob- jects of one man's curiosity, some of another's, and some of all men's ; but all history is not an object of curiosity for any man. He who improperly, wantonly, and absurdly makes it so, indulges a sort of canine appetite ; the curiosity of one, like the hunger of the other, devours ravenously, and without distinction, whatever falls in its 146 HENRY ST. JOHN. ■way, but neither of them digests. They heap crudity upon crudity, and nourish and »mprove nothing but their distemper. Some such characters I have known, though it is not the most common extreme into which men are apt to fall. One of them I knew .n this country [Bishop Warburton]. He joined to a most athletic strength of body a prodigious memory, and to both a pro- digious industry. He had read almost con- stantly fourteen or fifteen hours a day for twenty-five or thirty years, and had heaped together as much learning as could be crowded into a head. In the course of my acquaintance with him I consulted him once or twice — not oftener, for I found this mass of learning of as little use to me as to the owner. The man was communicative enough, but .nothing was distinct in his mind. How could it be otherwise? he had never spared time to think, — all was employed in read- ing. His reason had not the merit of com- mon mechanism. When you press a watch, or pull a clock, they answer your question with precision ; for they repeat exactly the hour of the day, and tell you neither more nor less than you desire to know. But when you asked this man a question, he overwhelmed you by pouring forth all that the several terms or words of your question recalled to his memory ; and if he omitted anything, it was the very thing to which the sense of the whole question should have led him and confined him. To ask him a question was to wind up a spring in his memory, that rattled on with vast rapidity and confused noise, till the force of it was spent; and you went away with all the noise in your ears, stunned and uninformed. I never left him that I was not ready to say to him, Dieu vous fosse la grace de devenir mains savant! — a wish that La Mothe le Vayer mentions upon some occasion or other, and that he would have done well to have applied to himself upon many. Ho who reads with disi-ornment and choice will acquire loss learning, but more knowl- e(li;p; and as this knowloilgo is collected with design, and cultivated with art and mt'tlioj, it will 1)0 at all times of immediate iind I'oaily use to himself and others. Thus u^ofitl arms in inaKazinos wo plaoo, All ranged in onlor, and diapoaed with graoc ; Niir thus iilono the ouriuua o.vo to plonse, lliil to bo found, wbon nood roquiroa, with cnso. You remember the vorses, my lord, in our friend's [I'ono's] Essay on Cviticisin, whioh was the work of his oliiMhood almo.st ; but is Hucli a monuiiuMit of good sense and poetry Bs no other, that I know, has raised in his riper years. He who roads without this discernment and choice, and, like Bodin's pupil, resolres to read all, will not have time, no, nor capa- city neither, to do anything else. He will not be able to think, without which it is impertinent to read ; nor to act, without which it is impertinent to think. He will assemble materials with much pains, and purchase them at much expense, and hava neither leisure nor skill to frame them intc proper scantlings, or to prepare them fo. use. To what purpose should he husband his time, or learn architecture? he has ne design to build. But then, to what purposl all these quarries of stone, all these moun- tains of sand and lime, all these forests of oak and deal ? Essay on the Study of History: Boliny- broke's Works, 175^, ii. 330. Complaints of the Shortness of Human Life. I think very differently from most men of the time we have to pass, and the business we have to do in this world. I think we have more of one, and less of the other, than is commonly supposed. Our want of time, and the shortness of human life, are some of the principal commonplace complaints which we prefer against the established order of things : they are the grumblings of the vulgar, and the pathetic lamenta- tions of the philosopher ; but they are im- pertinent and impious in both. The man of business despises the man of pleasure for squandering the time away ; the man of pleasure pities or laughs at the man of busi- ness for the same thing ; and yet both con- cur superciliously and absurdly to find fault with the Supreme Being for having given them so little time. The philosopher, who misspends it very often as much as the others, joins in the same cry, and authorizes this impiety. Theophrastus thought it ex- tremely hard to die at ninety, and to go out of the world when he had just learned how fo live in it. His master, Aristotle, found fault with nature for treating man in this respect worse than several other animals : both very unphilosopliioally ! and I love Seneea the better for his quarrel with tlie Stngirife on this head. We see, in so many instnnees, a just proportion of things, ao- eonling to their several relations to one another, that philosophy should lead us to conclude this proportion preserved, even wlien we cannot discern it ; instead of lead- ing us to conclude that it is not preserved where we do not discern it, or where we think that wo see the eontrary. To eoneludo otherwise is shocking presumption. It is to presume that the system of the universe would have been more wisely contrived, if HENRY ST. JOHN. 147 . creatures of our low rant among intellectual natures had been called to the councils of the Most High ; or that the Creator ought to mend his work by the advice of the creature. That life which seems to our self-love so short, when we compare it with the ideas we frame of eternity, or even with the dura- tion of some other beings, will appear suf- ficient, upon a leas partial view, to all the ends of our creation, and of a just propor- tion in the successive course of K^nerations. The term itself is long ; we render it short; and the want we complain of flows from our profusipn, not from our poverty. We are all arrant spendthrifts: some of us dis- sipate our estates on the trifles, some on the superfluities, and then we all complain that we want the necessaries, of life. The much greatest part never reclaim, but die bankrupts to God and man. Others reclaim late, and they are apt to imagine, when , they make up their accounts, and see how their fund is diminished, that they have , not enough remaining to live upon, because they have not the whole. But they deceive themselves : they were richer than they thought, and they are not yet poor. If they husband well the remainder, it will be found sufficient for all the necessaries, and for some of the superfluities, and trifles too, perhaps, of life ; but then the former order of expense must be inverted, and the necessaries of life must be provided before they put themselves to any cost for the trifles or superfluities. Let us leave the men of pleasure and of business, who are often candid enough to .own that they throw away their time, and thereby to confess that they complain of the Supreme Being for no other reason than this, that he has not proportioned his bounty to their extravagance. Let us con- sider the scholar and philosopher, who, far from owning that he throws any time away, reproves others for doing it; that solemn . mortal who abstains from the pleasures, and declines the business, of the world, that he may dedicate his whole time to the search of truth and.the improvement of knowledge. , When such a one complaing of the short- ness of human life in general, or of his re- maining share in particular, might not a man, more reasonable, though less solemn, expostulate thus with him : " Your com- plaint is, indeed, consistent with your prac- tice; but you would not possibly renew your complaint if you reviewed your prac- tice. Though reading makes a scholar, yet every scholar is not a philosopher nor every philosopher a wise man. It cost you twenty years to devour all the volumes on one side of your library ; you came out a great critic in Latin and Greek, in the oriental tongues, in history and chronology ; but you were not satisfied. You confessed that these were the literce nihil sananies, and you wanted more time to acquire other knowledge. You have had this time : you have passed twenty years more on the other side of your library, among philosophers, rabbis, commentators, schoolmen, and whole legions of modern doc- tors. You are extremely well versed in all that has been written concerning the nature of God, and of the soul of man, about matter and form, body and spirit, and space and eter- nal essences, and incorporeal substances, and the rest of those profound speculations. You are a master of the controversies that have arisen about nature and grace, about pre- destination and free will, and all the other abstruse questions that have made so much noise in the schools and so much hurt in the world. You are going on, as fast as the infirmities you have contracted will permit, in the same course of study ; but you begin to foresee that you shall want time, and you make grievous complaints of the shortness of human life. Give me leave now to ask you how many thousand years God must prolong your life in order to reconcile you to his wisdom and goodness ? It is plain, at least highly probable, that a life as long as that of the most aged of the patriarchs would be too short to answer your purposes ; since the researches and disputes in which you are engaged have been already for a much longer time the objects of learned inquiries, and remain still as imperfect and undetermined as they were at first. But let me ask you again, and deceive neither your- self nor me, have you, in the course of these forty years, once examined the first prin- ciples and the fundamental facts on which all those questions depend, with an absolute indifference of judgment, and with a scrup- ulous exactness? with the same that you have employed in examining the various consequences drawn from them, and the heterodox opinions about them 7 Have you not taken , them for granted in the whole course of your studies? Or,, if you have looked now and then on the state of the pi'oofs brought to maintain them, have you not done it as a mathematician looks over a demonstration formerly made to refresh his memory, not to satisfy any doubt? If you have thus examined, it may appear marvel- lous to some that you have spent so much time in many parts of those studies, which have reduced you to this hectic condition of so much heat and weakness. But if you have not thus examined, it must be evident to all, nay, to yourself, on the least reflec- tion, that you are still, notwithstanding all your learning, in a state of ignorance. For knowledge can alone produce knowledge ; and without such an examination of axioms 148 THOMAS SHERLOCK. and facts, you can have none about infer- ences I" In this manner one might expostulate very reasonably with many u great scholar, many a profound philosopher, many a dog- matical casuist. And it serves to set the complaints about want of time, and the shortness of human life, in a very ridiculous but a true light. THOMAS SHERLOCK, D.D., son of William Sherlock, D.D., bom 1678, Master of the Temple, 1704, Prebendary of London, 1713, and of Norwich, 1719, Bishop of Bangor, Feb. 4, 1727-28, Bishop of Salis- bury, 1734, Bishop of London, 1748, de- clined the archbishopric of Canterbury, 1747, died 1761, published a collective edition of his Discourses at the Temple Church, Lond., 1754-58, 4 vols. 8vo, 8th edit. 1775, 3 vols. 12mo; vol. v., Oxf, 1797, 8vo; first com- plete edition of Sherlock's Works, by Rev. T. S. Hughes, Lond., 1830, 5 vols. 8vo. His best-known works are The Use and Intent of Prophecy, etc., Lond., 1725, 8vo, 4th edit., Lond., 1744, 8vo; 1755, 8vo (usually added as a 5th volume to the early editions of the Discourses) ; and The Trial of the Witnesses of the Resurrection of Jesus, Lond., 1729, 8vo, 16th edit., Lond., 1807, 8vo ; with the Sequel of the Trial, Lond., 11. G. Bohn, J848, 8vo (In the series entitled "Christian Literature"). " They [Sherlock's Sermons] contain admirable defences of the truths of religion, and powerful incitements to the practice of it. They rouse the virtues of Christians by proper motives, and put to silence the doubts and cavils of Infidels by most convincing arguments." — Dk. Huoh Blair. "Still break the benches, Henley ! with thy strain, WhileSherlock, Hare, and Gibson preach in vain." Pope: Dunciad, Book iii., 203. "Sherlock's style is very clognnt, though ho has not made it his principal study." — Dr. Jon.ssoN : liotweU'a Life, year 1778. Remqion. Religion is founded in the principles of Bonso and nature; ami, without 8n|ipo8ing this foundation, it would In' as rational an act to jircrtoli to horses as to men. A man who has tho use of reason cannot consider his (Condition and eirenmstiinees in thisworld, or relleet on his notions of jjood and evil, and tho sense he I'ei'ls in himself that ho is an aooountablo creature for tho i;oo(l or evil ho does, without asking' himself how ho eamo into this world, mid for what purpose, anil to whom It is that ho is, or possibly may bo, iieeountahlo. When, by tracing his own being to the original, ho finds that there is one supreme all-wise cause of all things ; when by experience he sees that this worlc neither is nor can be the place for taking a just and adequate account of the actions of men ; the presumption that there is another state after this, in which men shall live, grows strong and almost irresistible ; when he considers further the fears and hopes of nature with respect to futurity, the fear of death common to all, the desire of continu- ing in being, which never forsakes us; and reflects for what use and purpose these strong impressions were given us by the Author of nature ; he cannot help concluding that man was made not merely to act a short part upon the stage of this world, but that there is another and more lasting state to which he bears relation. And from hence it must necessarily follow that his religion must be formed on a view of securing a future hap- piness. Since, then, the end that men propose to themselves by religion is such, it will teach us wherein the true excellency of religion consists. If eternal life and nitare happi- ness are what we aim at. that will be the best religion which will most certainly lead us to eternal life and future happiness : and it will be to no purpose to compare religions together in any other respects which have no relation to this end. Let us, then, by this rule examine the pre- tensions of revelation, and, as we go along, compare it with the present state of natural religion, that we may be able to judge " to whom we ought to go." Eternal life and happiness are out of our power to give ourselves, or to obtain by any strength and force, or any policy or wisdom. Could our own arm rescue us from the jaws of death, and the powers of the kingdom of darkness ; could we set open the gates of heaven for ourselves, and enter in'to take possession of life and glory, we should want no instructions or assistances from religion ; since what St. Peter said of Christ everv man niii;ht apply to himself, and sav, "1 have the words, or means, of eternal life." But since we have not this power of life and death, and since there is One who has, who govcrneth all things in heaven and earth, who IS over all God blessed for evermore, it necessarily follows that either we must have no share or lot in the glories of futurity, or else that wo must obtain them from God, and receive them as his gift and favour; and consequently If eternal life he the end of religion, and" likewise the gift of God, religion can bo nothing else biit the means S roper to be made use of by us to obtain of od this most excellent arid perfect gift of etcnml life : for if eternal life be the end of religion, religion must be the means of oS HENRY FELT ON. 149 taining eternal life ; and if eternal life can only be had from the gift of God, religion must be the mean^ of obtaining this gift of And thus far all religions that ever have appeared in the world have agreed: the question has never yet been made by any whether God is to be applied to for eternal happiness or no ; but every sect has placed its excellency in this, that it teaches the properest and most effectual way of making this application. Even natural religion pre- tends to no more than this : it claims not eternal life as the right of nature, but the right of obedience, and of obedience to God, the Lord of nature: and thedisputebetween natural and revealed religion is not, whether God is to be applied to for eternal happiness ; but only whether nature or revelation can best teach us how to make this application. Prayers, and praises, and repentance for sins past are acts of devotion, which nature pretends to instruct and direct us in : but why does she teach us to pray, to praise, or to repent, but that she esteems one to be the proper method of expressing our wants, the other of expressing our gratitude, and the third of making atonement for iniquity and offences against God? In all these acts reference is had to the overruling power of the Almighty; and they amount to this con- fession, that the upshot of all religion ^.is, to please God in order to make ourselves happy. Several Discourses Preached at the Temple Church : Discourse I., Part II. : John vi. 67-69. HENRY FELTON, D.D., born 1679, Principal of Edmund Hall, 1722, died 1740, was author of A Dissertation on Reading the Classics, and Forming a Just Style, 1711; 4th edit., Lond., 1757, 12mo. A good book. On the Sublime. We have no instances to produce of any writers that rise at all to the majesty and dignity of the Divine Attributes except the sacred penmen. No less than Divine Inspi- ration could enabl« men to write worthily of God, and none but the spirit of God knew how to express his greatness, and dis- play his glory : in comparison of these divine writers, the greatest geniuses, the noblest wits, of the Heathen world, are low and dull. The sublime majesty and royal mag- nificence of the Scripture poems are above the reach and beyond the power of all mortal wit. Take the best and liveliest poems of antiquity, and read them as we qo the Scriptures, in t prose translation, and they are flat and poor. Horace, and Virgil, and Homer lose their spirits and their strength in the transfusion, to that degree that we have hardly patience to read them. But the sacred writings, even in our translation, preserve their majesty and their glory, and very far surpass the brightest and noblest compositions of Greece and Rome. And this is not owing to the rich- ness and solemnity of the eastern eloquence (for it holds in no other instance), but to the divine direction and assistance of the holy writers. For, let me only make this remark, that the most literal translation of the Scriptures, in the most natural significa- tion of the words, is generally the best; and the same punctualness which debases other writings preserves the spirit and majesty of the sacred text: it can suffer no improve- ment from human wit ; and we may observe that those who have presumed to heighten the expression by a poetical translation or paraphrase have sunk in the attempt : and all the decorations of their, verse, whether Greek or Latin, have not been able to reach the dignity, the majesty, and solemnity of our prose: so that the prose of Scripture cannot be improved by verse, and even the divine poetry is most like itself in prose. One observation more I would leave with you : Milton himself, as great a genius as he was, owes his superiority over Homer and Virgil, in majesty of thought and splen- dour of expression, to the ■■ Scriptures : they are the* fountain from which he derived his light ; the sacred treasure that enriched his fancy, and furnished him with all the truth and wonders of God and his creation, of angels and men, which no mortal brain was able either to discover or conceive : and in him, of all human writers, you will meet all his sentiments and words raised and suited to the greatness and dignity of the subject. I have detained you the longer on this majesty of style, being perhaps myself car- ried away with the greatness and pleasure of the contemplation. What I have dwelt so much on with respect to divine subjects is more easily to be observed with respect to human : for in all things below divinity we are rather able to exceed than fall short; and in adorning all other subjects our words and sentiments may rise in a just propor- tion to them : nothing is above the reach of man but heaven ; and the same wit can raise a human subject that only debases a divine. A Dissertation on Beading the Classics. The Formation or a Right Taste. A perfect mastery and elegance of stvle is to be learned from the common rules, but 150 GEORGE BERKELEY. must be improved by reading the orators and |)oets, and the celebrated masters in every kind : this will give you a right tnste and a true relish ; and when you can dis- tinguish the beauties of every finished piece, you will write yourself with equal commen- dation, I do not assert that every good writer must have a genius for poetry ; I know Tully is an undeniable exception : but I will venture to affirm that a soul that is not moved with poetry, and has no taste that way, is too dull and lumpish ever to write with any prospect of being read. It is a fatal mistake, and simple superstition to discourage youth from poetry, and en- deavour to prejudice them against it; if they are of a poetical genius, there is no restraining them : Ovid, you know, was deaf tu his father's frequent admonitions. But if they are not quite smitten and be- witched with love of verse, they should be trained to it, to make them masters of every kind of poetry, that by learning to imitate the originals they may arrive at a right conception and a true taste of their authors : and being able to write in verse upon occa- sion, I can assure you, is no disadvantage to prose : for without relishing the one, a man must never pretend to any taste for the other. Taste is a metaphor, borrowed from the palate by which we approve or dislike what we eat and drink from the agreeableness or disagreeableness of the relish in our mouth. Nature directs us in the common use, and every body can tell sweet from bitter, what is sharp, or sour, or vapid, or nauseous ; but it requires senses more refined and ex- orcised to discover every taste that is more perfect in its kind ; every palate is not to judge of that, and yet drinking is more used than reading. All that I pretend to know of the matter is, that wine i-hould be, like a style, clear, deep, bright, and strong, sincere and pure, sound and dry (as our advertisements do well express it), which last is a commendable term, that contains the juice of the richest spirits, and only keopM out all cold and dampness. It is coiiiinon tn oommond a man for an ear to music, iiiui a taste for painting ; which are nothing but a just discernment of what is excel lent and iiuist perfect in thom. The first dopiMuls entirely on the ear ; a man can never expeet to bo a iiiaster that has nut an oar tnned and set to music; and you can no more Hing an ode without an ear than witliout a >;eniua vou can write one. Painting, wo shouM tfiink, requires some understanding In the art, and exact knowledge of the liost masters' manner, to be judge of it; but this faculty, like the rest, is founded in nature : knowledge in t'i«« art, and frequent conversation with the best originals, will certainly perfect a man's judg- ment; but if there is not a natural sagacity' and aptness, experience will be of no great service. A good taste is an argument of a great soul, as well as a lively wit. It is the infirmity of poor spirits to be taken with every appearance, and dazzled by every- thing that sparkles: but to pass by what the generality of the world admires, and to be detained with nothing but what is most perfect and excellent in its kind, speaks a superior genius, and a true discernment. A Dissertation on Reading the Classics, GEORGE BERKELEY, D.D., born in the county of Kilkenny, Ireland, 1684, in 1709 published An Essay towards a New Theory of Vision, Dublin, 8vo (and a Vindication of this Theory, in 1 733), in 17 10 The Principles of Human Knowledge, Dub- lin, 8vo, in 1713 Three Dialogues between Hylas and Philolonous ; made Dean of Derry, 1724 ; in 172S emigrated to America to carry out his " scheme for converting the savage Americans to Christianity by a col- lege to be erected in the Summer Islands, otherwise called the Isles of Bermudas" (Berkeley), and at Newport, Rhode Island, awaited for a long time in vain the receipt of a parliamentary grant to enable him to complete his project ; in 1732 published Alciphron, or the Minute Philosopher, in seven Dialogues, containing an Apology for the Christian Religion against Free-Think- ers, Lond., 2 vols. Svo ; in 1734 was made Bishop of Cloyne, and refused to exchange his see for that of Clogher. of double ita value; in 1747 published Siris, a Chiun of Philosophical Refieetions and Inquiries re- specting the Virtues of Tar Water in the Plague, Lond., Svo, and in 1752 Farther Thoughtji on Tar Water, Lond., Svo, and died in the next year. In 1776 was pub- lished An Aeoount of his Life, with Notes, containing Strioturps upon his Works, Svo; in 1784 bis Whole Works, with an Account of his Life, and several of his Letters to Thomas Prior, Esq., Dean (lervais, and Mr. Pope, etc., by T. Prior, Esq., 2 vols. 4to, appeared. There have been two recent edi- tions of his Works, one in 3 vols. Svo, and another by Kev. G. N'. Wright, in 2 vols Svo, 1S4.'H. Mr. W. gives a translation of the Latin Essays (.\rithmetioa, Miseollanea, Mathematiea,and DeMotu) anil Notes on the Introduction to Human Knowledge. Among his works is The Querist : eontaining several Queries proposed to the Consideration of the GEORGE BERKELEY. 151 Public, 1735. He was also the author of fourteen of The Guardians. " Possessing a mind which, however inferior to that of Locke in depth of refleotion and in sound- ness of judgment, was fully its equal in logical acuteness and invention, and in learning, fancy, and taste far its superior, Berkeley was singularly fitted to promote that reunion of Philosophy and of the Fine Arts which is so essential to the pros- jierity of both. . . . With these intellectual and moral endowments, admired and blazoned as they were by the most distinguished wits of his age, it is not surprising that Berkeley should have given a popularity and fashion to metaphysical pursuits wbicn they had never before acquired in England.'' — DueALD Stewart : 1«< Prelim. Dieeert. to Enci/c. Brit. *' Ancient learning, exact science, polished so- ciety, modern literature, and the fine arts contrib- uted to adorn and enrich the mind of this accom- plished man. All his contemporaries agreed with the satirist [Pope] in ascribing ' To Berkeley every virtue under heaven.' Adverse factions and hostile wits concurred only in loving, admiring, and contributing to advance him. The severe sense of Swift endured his vis- ions ; the modest Addison endeavoured to reconcile Clarke to his ambitious speculations. His charac- ter converted the satire of Pope into fervid praise. Even the discerning, fastidious, and turbulent Atterbury said, after an interview with him, ^So much understanding, so much knowledge, so much innocence, and such humility, I did not think had been the portion of any but angels, till I saw this gentleman.' ... Of the exquisite grace and beauty of his diction, no man accustomed to English com- position can need to be informed. His works are, beyond dispute, the finest models of philosophical style since Cicero. Perhaps they surpass those of the orator, in the wonderful art by which the fullest light is thrown on the most remote and evanescent parts of the most subtile of human conceptions. Perhaps he also surpa^ed Cicero in the charm of simplicity." — Sir Jaues Mackintosh : 2d Prelim. iJisaert. to Encyc. Brit. Grounds to Expect a Future State Proved. Let the most steadfast unbeliever open his eyes, and take a survey of the sensible world, and then say if there be not a connexion, and adjustment, and exact and constant order discoverable in all the parts of it. Whatever be the cause, the thing itself is evident to all our faculties. Look into the animal system, the passions, senses, and locomotive powers ; is not the like contrivance and propriety ob- servable in these too? Are they not fitted to certain ends, and are they not by nature directed to proper objects ? Is it possible, then, that the smallest bodies should, by a management superior to the wit of man, be disposed in the most excellent manner agreeable to their respective natures, and yet the spirits or souls of men be neg- lected, or managed by such rules as fall short of man's understanding? Shall every other passion bo rightly placed by nature, and shall that appetite of immortality nat- ural to all mankind be alone misplaced, or designed to be frustrated? Shall the in dustrious application of the inferior animal powers in the meanest vocations be answered by the ends we proposed, and shall not the generous efforts of a virtuous mind be re- warded? In a word, Shall the corporeal world be order and harmony : the intellec- tual, discord and confusion ? He who is bigot enough to believe these things must bid adieu to that natural rule, " of reasoning from analogy ;" must run coujiter to that maxim of common sense, "that men ought to form their judgments of things unexperi- enced from what they have experienced." If anything looks like a recompense of calamitous virtue on this side the grave, it is either an assurance that thereby we ob- tain the favour and protection of heaven, and shall, whatever befalls us in this, in another life meet with a just return, or else that applause and reputation which is thought to attend virtuous actions. The former of these our free-thinkers, out of their singular wisdom and benevolence to man- kind, endeavour to erase from the minds of men. The latter can never be justly dis- tributed in this life, where so many ill actions are reputable, and so many good actions disesteemed or misinterpreted ; whero subtle hypocrisy is placed in the most en- gaging light, and modest virtue lies con- cealed ; where the heart and the soul are hid from the eyes of men, and the eyes of men are dimmed and vitiated. . . . Let us suppose a person blind and deaf from his birth, who, being grown to men's estate, is by the deaid palsy, or some other cause, de- prived of his feeling, tasting, and smelling, and at the same time has the impediment of his hearing removed, and the film taken from his eyes. What the five senses are to us, that the touch, taste, and smell were to him. And any other ways of perception of a more refined and extensive nature were to him as inconceivable, as to us those are which will one day be adapted to perceive those things which " eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither hath it entered into the heart of man to conceive." And it would be just as reasonable in him to conclude that the loss of those three senses could not possibly be succeeded by any new inlets of percep- tion, as in a modern free-thinker to imagine there can be no state of life and perception without the senses he enjoys at present. Let us farther suppose the same person's eyes, at their first opening, to be struck with a great variety of the most gay and pleasing objects, and his ears with a melodi 152 GEORGE BERKELEY. ous concert of vocal and instrumental music. Behold him amazed, ravished, transported ; and you have some distant representation, some faint and glimmering idea of the ec- static stateof the soul in that article in which she emerges from this sepulchre of flesh into life and immortality. The Quardian, No. Tl, Saturday, April 11, 171S. On Pleascres, Natural and Fantastical. It is of great use to consider the pleasures which constitute human happiness, as they are distinguished into natural and fantasti- cal. Natural pleasures I call those which, not depending on the fashion and caprice of any particular age or nation, are suited to human nature in general, and were intended by Providence as rewards for the using our faculties agreeably to the ends for which they were given us. Fantastical pleasures are those which having no natural fitness to delight our minds, presuppose some partic- ular whim or taste accidentally prevailing in a set of people, to which it is owing that they please. Now I take it that the tranquillity and cheerfulness with which I have passed my life, are the efiect of having, ever since I came to years of discretion, continued my inclinations to the former sort of pleas- ures. . , . The various objects that compose the world were by nature formed to delight our senses, and as it is this alone that makes them de- sirable to an uncorrupted taste, a man may be said naturally to possess them when he possesseth those enjoyments which they are fitted by nature to yield. Hence it is usual with me to consider my- self as having a natural property in every object that administers pleasure to me. When I am in the country, all the fine seats near the place of my residence, and to which I have access, I regard as mine. The same I think of the groves and fields where I walk, and muse on the folly of the i-ivil landlord in London, who has the fantastical pleasure of draining dry rent into his cof- fers, but is a stninp'r to fresh oir and rural enjoyments. By these principles I am po,s- sessed of half a dozen of the finest sonts in England, which in the oyo of the law bolonj; to certain of my luquaintance, who being men of business choose to live near the court. . . . When I walk the streets I use tlio forego- ing natural nmxim (vi/,.. That he is the true fiossi'ssor of a thing who enjoys it, ami not le tluit owns it witlimit the onjiiyiiu>nt of H), to convince myself that I Imve a prop- erty in the gay part of all the gilt olmriot Jkpfrkv: Edin. Rn., v. 43, and in his Contrib. to Edin. Iter., cilit. 1853, 151, Advice to Unmarried Ladies. The reader is indebted for this day's enter- tainment to an author from whom the age has received greater favours, who has en- larged the knowledge of human nature, and taught the passions to move at the command of virtue (Dr. Johnson). SAMUEL RICHARDSON. 153 To THE Rambler. Sir, When the Spectator was first pub- lished in single papers, it gave me so much pleasure that it is one of the favourite ftmusements of my age to recollect it ; and when I reflect on the foibles of those times, as described in that useful work, and com- pare them with the vices now reigning among us, I cannot but wish that you would oftener take cognizance of the manners of the bet- ter half of the human species, that if your precepts and observations be carried down to posterity, the Spectators may shew to the rising generation what were the fashionable follies of their grandmothers, the Rambler of their mothers, and that from both they may draw instruction and warning. . . . In the time of the Spectator, excepting sometimes an appearance in the ring, some- times at a good and chosen play, sometimes on a visit at the house of a grave relation, the young ladies contented themselves to be found employed in domestic duties ; for then routs, drums, balls, assemblies, and such like markets for women, were not known. Modesty and diffidence, gentleness and meekness, were looked upon as the appro- priate virtues and characteristic graces of the sex. And if a forward spirit pushed itself into notice, it was exposed in print as it de- served. The churches were almost the only places where single women were to be seen by strangers. Men went thither expecting to see them, and perhaps too much for that only purpose. . . . Every inquiry he made into the lady's domestic excellence, which, when a wife is to be chosen, will surely not be neglected, confirmed him in his choice. He opens his heart to a common friend, and honestly dis- covers the state of his fortune. His friend applies to those of the young lady, whose parents, if they approve his proposals, dis- close them to their daughter. She, perhaps, is not an absolute stranger to the passion of the young gentleman. His eyes, his assiduities, his constant attendance at a church whither, till of late, he used seldom to come, and a thousand little observ- ances that he paid her, had very probably first forced her to regard, and then inclined her to favour him. That a young lady should be in love, and the love of the young gentleman undeclared, is a heterodoxy which prudence, and even policy, must not allow. But thus applied to she is all resignation to her parents. Charm- ing resignation, which inclination opposes not. Her relationn applaud her for her duty ; friends meet; points are adjusted; delight- ful perturbations, and hopes, and a few lovers' fears, fill up the tedious space, till an interview is granted : for the young lady had not made herself cheap at public places. The time of interview arrives. She is modestly reserved ; he is not confident. He declares his passion : the consciousness of her own worth, and his application to her parents, take from her any doubt of his sincerity ; and she owns herself obliged to him for his good opinion. The inquiries of her friends into his character have taught her that his good opinion deserves to be valued. She tacitly allows of his future visits ; he renews them ; the regard of each for the other is confirmed ; and when he presses for the favour of her hand, he receives a declara- tion of an entire acquiescence with her duty, and a modest acknowledgment of esteem for him. He applies to her parents, therefore, for a near day ; and thinks himself under obliga- tion to them for the cheerful and affectionate manner in which they receive his agreeable application. With this prospect of future happiness the marriage is celebrated. Gratulations pour in from every quarter. Parents and relations on both sides, brought acquainted in the course of the courtship, can receive the happy couple with countenances illu- mined, and joyful hearts. The brothers, the sisters, the friends of one family are the brothers, the sisters, the friends of the other. Their two families, thus made one, are the world to the young couple. Their home is the place of their principal delight, nor do they ever occasionally quit it but they find the pleasure of returning to it augmented in proportion to the time of their absence from it. Ah, Mr. Rambler ! forgive the talkative- ness of an old man ! ^Vhen I courted and married my Lsetitia, then a blooming beauty, every thing passed just so 1 But how is the case now ? The ladies, maidens, wives, and widows are engrossed by places of open resort and general entertainment, which fill every quarter of the metropolis, and being constantly frequented, make home irksome. Breakfasting-plaoes, dining-places ; routs, drums, concerts, balls, plays, operas, mas- querades for the evening, and even for all night ; and, lately, public sales of the goods of broken housekeepers, which the general dissoluteness of manners has contributed to make very frequent, come in as another seasonable relief to those modern time- killers. . . . Two thousand pounds in the last age, with a domestic wife, would go farther than ten 160 SAMUEL RICHARDSON. thousand in this. Yet settlements are ex- pected that often, to a mercantile man espe- cially, sink a fortune into uselessness ; and pin-money is stipulated for, which makes a wife independent, and destroys love, by put- ting it out of a man's power to lay any obli- gation upon her, that might engage gratitude and kindle affection. When to all this the card-tables are added, how can a prudent man think of marrying? . . . But should your expostulations and reproof have no effect upon those who are far gone in fashion- able folly, they may be retailed from their mouths to their nieces (marriage will not often have entitled them to daughters), when they, the meteors of a day, find them- selves elbowed off the stage of vanity by other flatterers ; for the most admired women cannot have many Tunbridge, many Bath seasons to blaze in ; since even fine faces often seen are less regarded than new faces, the proper punishment of showy girls for rendering themselves so impoliticly cheap. I am. Sir, your sincere admirer, &c. The Rambler, Ko. 97, TSiesday, February 19, 1751. Richardson to Lady Bradsqaigh on Learning in Women. Dear M ADAH, — You do not approve of great learning in women. Learning in women may be either rightly or wrongly placed, according to the uses made of it by them. And if the sex is to be brought up with a view to make the individuals of it inferior in knowledge to the husbands they may happen to have, not knowing who those husbands are, or what, or whether sensible or foolish, learned or illiterate, it would be best to keep them from writing and read- ing, and even from the knowledge of the common idioms of speech. Would it not be very pretty for parents on both sides to make it the hrst subject of their inquiries, whether the girl, as a recommonuation, were a greater fool, or more ignorant, than the young fellow ; and if not, that they should reject her, for the booby's siiko? — and would not your objection stand as strongly against a preroroiu'c in mother wit in the girl, as against what is called li'arning; siiion linguists (I will not call all lin;;nists learned men) do very seldom miiko the fignio in convi'i-sation tlint oven girls from Nixti'iMi to twenty nmko. If 11 wtimaii has genius, let it take its (•(jin-HO, as well as in men: pniviilod she ncglcets not any thing that is more peculi- arly her provini'i). If she has good aonso, she will not make the man she chooses, who wants her knowlodgp, uiioaMy, nor despise him for that want, llor good sense will teach her what is her duty ; nor will sha want reminding of the tenor of her marriage vow to him. If she has not, she will find a thousand ways to plague him, though she know not one word beyond her mother- tongue, nor how to write, read, or speak properly in that. The English, madam, and particularly what we call the plain English, is a very copious and very expressive lan- guage. But, dear madam, does what you say in the first part of the paragraph under my eye, limiting the genius of women, quite cohere with the advantages which, in the last part, you tell me they have over us? — "Men do well," you say, "to keep women in ignorance:" but this is not generally in- tended to be the case, I believe. Girls, I think you formerly said, were compounded of brittle materials. They are not, they cannot be, trusted to be sent abroad to semi- naries of learning, as men are. It is neces- sary that they should be brought up to a knowledge of the domestic duties. A young man's learning time is from ten to twenty- five, more or less. At fifteen or sixteen a girl starts into woman ; and then she throws her purveying eyes about her : and what is the learning she is desirous to obtain? — Dear lady, discourage not the sweet souls from acquiring any learning that may keep them employed, ,ind out of nii*ohief, and that may divert them from attending to the whisperings within them, and to the flat- teries witliout them, till they have taken in a due quality of ballast, that may hinder them, all their sails unfurled and streamers flying, from being overset at their first en- trance upon the voyage of life. To Lady Bradshaioo on Men- and Women XoRTB-ExD, Dm. 26, 1751. Tell you sinocroly, which do I think, upon the whole, men or women, have the greatest trials of patience, and which bears tliem the liest? You moan, you sav, from one SOX to the other only? — What a ques- tion is horol Which? Why women, to be sure. Man is an animal that must bustle in the world, go abroad, converse, fight bat- tles, onconntei- other dangers of seas, winds, and I know not w^lmt, in order to protect, provide for, maintain, in ease and plenty, woinon. llravery, anger, fierceness, occa- sionally are made familiar to them. They biiffot and are buffeted by the world ; are impatient and uneontrolloiilo. Thoy talk ol honour, and run thoir heads agaiiist stone walls to make good thoir pretensions to if ; and often quarrel with one another, and fight duels, upon any other silly thing that hapnons to raise their oholer ; with' theif shadows, if you please. LADY MART WORTLEY MONTAGU. 161 Whilo ■women are meek, passive, good I'reatures, who, used to stay at borne, set their maids at work, and formerly them- selves, — get their houses in order, to receive, comfort, oblige, give joy to their fierce, fight- ing, bustling, active protectors, providers, niaintainers,^iivert him with pretty pug's tricks, tell him soft tales of love, and of who and who's together, and what has been done in his absence, — bring to him little master, BO like his own dear papa ; and little pretty miss, a soft, sweet, smiling soul, with her sampler in her hand, so like what her meek mamma was at her years I And with these differences in education, nature, employ- ments, your ladyship asks, whether the man or the woman bears more from each other ? has the more patience ? Dearest lady ! how can you be so severe upon your own sex, yet seem to persuade yourself that you are defending them ? What you say of a lover's pressing his mistress to a declaration of her love for him, is sweetly pretty, and very just ; but let a man press as he will, if the lady answers him rather by her obliging manners than in words, she will leave herself something to declare, and she will find herself rather more than less respected for it : such is the nature of man I — A man hardly ever pre- sumes to press a lady to make this declara^ tion, but when he thinks himself sure of her. He urges her, therefore, to add to his own consequence ; and hopes to quit scores with her, when he returns love for love, and favour for favour : and thus " draws the tender-hearted soul to professions which she is often upbraided for all her life after," says your ladyship. But these must be the most ungenerous of men. All I would suppose is that pride and triumph is the meaning of the urgency for a declara- tion which pride and triumph make a man think unnecessary ; and perhaps to know how far he may go, and be within allowed compass. A woman who is brought to own her love to the man, must act accordingly towards him ; must be more indulgent to him ; must, in a word, abate of her own significance, and add to his. And have you never seen a man strut upon the occasion, and how tame and bashful a woman looks after she has submitted to make the acknowl- edgment? The behaviour of each to the other, upon it and after it, justifies the caution to the sex, which I would never have a woman forget, — always to leave to herself the power of granting something: yet her denials may be so managed as to be more attractive than her compliance. Women, Lovelace says (and he pretends to know them), are fond of ardours ; but there is an end of them when a lover is secure. He can then look about 11 him, and be occasionally, if not indiilerent, unpunctual, and delight in being missed, expected, and called to tender account for his careless absences: and he will be less and less solicitous about giving good reasons for them, as she is more and more desirous of his company. Poor fool 1 he has brought her to own that she loves him : and will she not bear with the man she loves? She, her- self, as I have observed, will think she must act consistently with her declaration ; and he will plead that declaration in his favour, let his neglects or slights be what they will. LADY MARY WORTLEY MONTAGU, eldest daughter of Evelyn, Earl of Kingston (afterwards Marquis of Dorchester, finally Duke of Kingston), by his wife the Lady Mary Fielding, daughter of William, Earl of Denbigh, born about 1690, and married in 1712 to Edward Wortley Montagu, ac- companied her husband during his resi- dence as ambassador to the Porte, 1716-18 ; resided without her husband on the Conti- nent, 1739-1761 ; returned to England, Octo- ber, 1761, and died August 21, 1762. Whilst abroad she wrote many epistles, of which the best collection will be found in The Letters and Works of Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, edited by her great-grandson. Lord Wharn- cliffe, Lond., 1837, 5 vols. 8vo; 2d and best edit, also 1837. See also her Letters from the Levant, edited by J. A. St. John, Lond., 1838, fp. 8vo, and her Works, with Memoirs, Lond., 1803, 5 vols. 8vo. By her exertions inoculation for the small- pox was introduced into England. Pope quarrelled with, and, of course, abused her. " The letters of Lady Mary Wortley Montagu are not unworthy of being named after those of Madame de S6vign€. They have much of the French ease and vivacity, and retain more the character of agreeable epistolary style than per- haps any other letters which have appeared in the English language." — Dr. Hugh Blair : Lecta, on Rhetoric and Setlea-Lettera, LecL xxxvii. " A reader need only glance at Lady Mary's letters to see that she was not less distinguished for wit than prone to indulge in sarcasm, in scan- dal, and in a very free range of opinions of all sorts. . . . We have no doubt whatsoever that oce of the things which drove Lady Mary from Eng- land was the enmity she caused all around her b;^ the license of her tongue and pen. She was alwayft writing scandal : a journal full of it was burnt by her family j her very panegyrics were sometimes malicious, or were thought so, in consequence of her character, as in the instance of the extraordi- nary verses addressed to Mrs. Murray in conuexion with a trial for a man's life. Pope himself, with all the temptations of his wit and resentment, would 162 LADY MARY WORTLEY MONTAGU. hardly hare written of her as he did had her rep- utation for ofTenco heen less a matter of notoriety." — Leiqh Hunt : Men^ Womenf and Booka, vol. ii. Lad^ Montagu to E. W. Montagu, Es(i., In Prospect of Marriage. One part of my character is not so good, nor t'other so bad, as you fancy it. Should we ever live together you would be disap- pointed both ways : you would find an easy equality of temper you do not expect, and a thousand faults you do not imagine. You think if you married me I should be passion- ately fond of you one month, and of some- body else the next. Neither would happen. I can esteem, I can be a friend ; but I don't know whether I can love. Expect all that is complaisant and easy, but never what is I'ond, in me. As to travelling, 'tis what I should do with great pleasure, and could easily quit London upon your account; but a retire- ment in the country is not so disagreeable to me as I know a few months would make it tiresome to you. Where people are tied for life 'tis their mutual interest not to grow weary of one another. If I had all the per- sonal charms that I want, a face is too slight a foundation for happiness. You would be soon tired of seeing every day the same thing. Where you saw nothing else, you would have leisure to remark all the defects : which would increase in proportion as the novelty lessened, which is always a great charm. I should have the displeasure of seeing a coldness, which, though I could not reasonably blame you for, being involuntary, yet it would render me uneasy ; and the more, because I know a love may be revived, which absence, inconstancy, or even infi- delity has extinguished ; but there is no re- turning from a digodt given by satiety. . . . To THE SAME — On MATRIMONIAL HaPPINESS. If we marry, our happiness must consist in loving one another: 'tis principally my concern to think of the most probable method of making that love eternal. You object against living in London : I tan not fond of it myself, and readily give it up to you, though I am assuri'd there needs more art to keep a fondness alive in solitudo, wlioro it gcnorully proys upon it.scll'. There is oiu< article alisnliitcly iiocussary — to be ovor bo- lovcd, one must \w I'viT agreeable. There is no Niii'li thing as Ixiing agreeable without a thorougli good humour, a natural sweet- ness of teni|i(>r iMilivi'iit'd by olu'orfulncss. Whatever luitural funds of gaioty oiio is horn with, 'tis lU'iM'Nsary to bo onfortiiinod with agrcHMilile objoi^ls. Any body capable of tast- ing |il(!iiHnro, when they eonlino themselves to one place, should take euro 'tis the place in the world the most agreeable. Whatovei you may now think (now, perhaps, you have some fondness for me), though your love should continue in its full force, there are hours when the most beloved mistress would be troublesome. People are not forever (nor is it in human nature that they should be) disposed to be fond ; you would be glad to find in me the friend and the companion. To be agreeably the last, it is necessary to be gay and entertaining. A perpetual solitude in a place where you see nothing to raise your spirits at length wears them out, and conversation insensibly falls into dull and in.oipid. Wheq I have no more to say to you, you will like me no longer. How dreadful is that view ! You will reflect, for my sake you have abandoned the conversation of a friend that you liked, and your situation in a country where all things would have contributed to make your life pass in (the true volupte) a smooth tran- quillity. / shall lose the vivacity which should entertain you, and you will have nothing to recompense you for what yoa have lost. Very few people that have set- tled entirely in the country but have grown at length weary of one another. The lady's conversation generally falls into a thousand impertinent effects of idleness ; and the gen- tleman falls in love with his dogs and his horses, and out of love with everything else. I am not now arguing in favour of the town ; you have answered me as to that point. In respect of your health, 'tis the first thing to be considered, and I shall never ask you to do anything injurious to that. But 'tis my opinion, 'tis necessary to be happy that we neither of us think any place more agreeable than that where we are. To THE CODNTESS OF BuTE ON FeXALE Education. LoDVKRE, Jan. 28, N. S., 175S. Dear Child, — You have given me a great deal of satisfaction by your account of your eldest daughter. I am particularly pleased to liear she is a good arithmetician ; it is the best proof of understanding: the knowledge of numbers is one of tlie chief distinctions between ua and brutes. . . . Learning, if she hivs a real tiwste for it^ will not only make her contented, but happv in it [retirement]. No entertainment is so o^ieap as reading, nor any pleasure so lasting. 8ho will not want new fashions, nor regret the loss of expen- sive diversions, or variety of company, it she eiin be amused with an author in her closet. To render this amusement complete, she should be permittt'd to learn the languages. I have hoard it lamented that bjys lose so many yoiu's in mere learning of words: this JOSEPH BUTLER. 163 Is no objection to a girl, whose time is not BO .precious : she cannot advance herself in any profession, and has therefore more hours to spare ; and as you say her memory is good, she will be very agreeably employed this way. There are two cautions to be given on this subject : first, not to think her- self learned when she can read Latin, or even Greek. Languages are more properly to be called vehicles of learning than learn- ing itself, as may be observed in many schoolmasters, who, though perhaps critics in grammar, are the most ignorant fellows upon earth. True knowledge consists in knowing things, not :words. I would no further wish her a linguist than to enable her to read books in their originals, that are often corrupted, and always injured by trans- lations. Two hours' application every morn- ing will bring this about much sooner than you can imagine, and she will have leisure enough besides to run over the English poetry, which is a more important part of a woman's education than it is generally sup- posed. Many a young damsel has been ruined by a fine copy of verses which she would have laughed at if she hnd known it had been stolen from Mr. Waller. . . . The second caution to be given her (and which is most absolutely necessary), is to conceal; whatever learning she attains, with as much solicitude as she would hide crookedness or lameness : the parade of it can only serve to draw on her the envy, and consequently the most inveterate hatred, of all he and she fools, which will certainly be at least three parts in four of her acquaintance. The use of knowledge in our sex, beside the amuse- ment of solitude, is to moderate the pas- sions, and learn to be contented with a small expense, which are the certain effects of a studious life ; and it may be preferable even to that fame which men have engrossed to themselves, and will not suffer us to share. You will tell me I have not observed this rule myself; but you ai'e mistaken : it is only inevitable accident that has given me any reputation that way. I have always care- fully avoided it, and ever thought it a mis- fortune. The explanation of this paragraph would occasion a long digression, which I will not trouble you with, it being my pres- ent design only to say what I think useful to my granddaughter, which I have much at heart. If she has the same inclination (I should say passion) for learning that I was born with, history, geography, and philoso- phy will furnish her with materials to pass away cheerfully a longer life than is allotted to mortals. I believe there are few heads capable of making Sir Isaac Newton's cal- culations, but the result of them is not diffi- cult to be understood by a moderate capacity. Do not fear this should make her affect the character of Lady , or Lady , or Mrs. : those women are ridiculous, not because they have learning, but because they have it not. One thinks herself a complete liistorian, after reading Echard's Roman History, another a profound philosopher, having got by heart some of Pope's \inin- telligihle essays ; and a third an able divine, on the strength of Wliitefield's sermons : thus you hear them screaming politics and controversy. It is a saying of Thucydldes, that igno- rance is bold and knowledge reserved. In- deed it is impossible to be far advanced in it without being more humbled by a convic- tion of human ignorance than elated by learning. At the same time I recommend books, I neither exclude work nor drawing. I think it is as scandalous for a woman not to know how to use a needle, as for a man not to know how to use a sword. JOSEPH BUTLER, D.C.L., born 1692, Preacher at the Rolls, 1718-1726, Clerk of the Closet to Queen Caroline, 1736, Bishop of Bristol, 1738, Bishop of Durham, 1750, died 1752, will always be remem- bered for his great work The Analogy of Religion, Natural and Revealed, to the Con- stitution and Course of Nature, to which are added Two Brief Dissertations : 1. On Pei*- sonal Identity ; 2. On the Nature of Virtue. The first edition of the Analogy was pub- lished in 1736. The Works, with an Ac- count by Bishop Halifax, appeared, Oxford, 1807, 2 vols. 8vo ; same, Oxford, 1849, 2 vols. 8vo; Works, New York, 1845, 8vo. The Works contain The Analogy and Two Dis- sertations, twenty-one Sermons, A Charge, and Correspondence between Dr. Butler and Dr. [Samuel] Clarke. " The author to whom I am under the greatest obligatioas is Bishop Butler. . . . The whole of this admirable treatise— one of the most remark- able that any language can produce — is intended to show that the principles of moral government taught in the Soriptures are strictly analogous to those everywhere exhibited in the goverament of the world as seen in natural religion." — Dr. Fran- cis "Watland : Moral Phil., p. 5 ; Intellec. Phil., p. 338. ''The most original and profound work extant in any language on (he philosophy of religion." — Sir James Mackintosh : 2d Prelim. Siatert. to Encyc. Brit. " I have derived greater aid from the views and reasonings of Bishop Butler than I have been able to find besides in the whole range of our extant authorship." — Dr. T. Chalmers : Bridgewatet Treatise, Pre/. Butler's Sermons also are very valuable. 104 JOSEPH BUTLER. Bewabds and Pcnishuents. That which makes the question concerning n future life to be of so great importance to us, is our capacity of happiness and misery. And that which makes the consideration of it to be of so great importance to us, is the supposition of our happiness or misery here- after depending upon our actions here. Without this indeed, curiosity could not but sometimes bring a subject, in which we may be so highly interested, to our thoughts ; es- pecially upon the mortality of others, or the near prospect of our own. But reasonable men would not take any further thought about hereafter, than what should happen thus occasionally to rise in their minds, if it were certain that our future interest no way depended upon our present behaviour ; whereas, on the contrary, if there be ground, either from analogy or anything else, to think it does, then there is reason also for the most active thought and solicitude to secure that interest; to behave so as that we may escape that misery, and obtain that happiness in another life which we not only suppose ourselves capable of, but which we apprehend also is put in our own power. And whether there be ground for this last apprehension certainly would deserve to be most seriously considered, were there no other proof of a future life and interest than that presumptive one which the fore- going observations amount to. Now in the present state, all which we enjoy, and a great part of what we suffer, is put in our own power. For pleasure and pain are the consequences of our actions; and we are endued by the Author of our nature with capacities for foreseeing these consequences. We find by experience he does not so much as preserve our lives, ex- clusively of our own care and attention to provide ourselves with, and to make use of, that sustenance by which he has appointed our lives shall be preserved ; and without which he has appointed they shall not be preserved at all. And in general we foresee that the external things which are the olijoeta of our various passions can neither bo ob- tulnod nor onJDycd without exerting our- w^lves in such and such iiianni-is : liut by thus exortinjr ourm'lve.s wo obtain and oiijoy these obji'cas in whii'h our natunil good con- sists ; or by this means Goil gives iis the possession and mijoyniont of them. 1 know not that wo Imvo any one kind or donioo of onjoyniont but by tho moans of our own aiaiiins. And by prudence and euro we may, fur tlio most part, pass our days in tolorablii oaso and ciiiu'l: or, on the ooiitriivy, we may, by rashness, uni;ovi>riu>ci passion, wilfuliioas, or oven by nogligenoo, make our- selves as miserable as ever we please. And many do please to make themselves extremely miserable, i.e., to do what they know before- hand will render them so. They follow those ways the fruit of which they know, by instruction, example, experience, will be disgrace, and poverty, and sickness, and un- timely death. This every one observes to be the general course of things ; though it is to be allowed we cannot find by experience that all our sufferings are owing to our own follies. Why the Author of Nature does not give his creatures promiscuously such and such perceptions without regard to their beha- viour ; why he does not make them happy without the instrumentality of their own actions, and prevent their bringing any suf- ferings upon themselves, is another matter. Perhaps there may be some impossibilities in the nature of things, which we are unac- quainted with. Or less happiness, it may be, would upon the whole be produced by such a method than is by the present. Or perhaps divine goodness, with which, if I mistake not, we make very free in our spec- ulations, may not be a bare single disposi- tion to produce happiness ; but a disposition to make the good, the faithful, the honest man happy. Analogy, Chap. II. Conscience. There is a principle of reflection in men by which they distinguish between, approve and disapprove their own actions. We are plainly constituted such sort of creatures as to reflect upon our own nature. The mind can take a view of what passes within itself, its propensions, aversions, passions, affec- tions, as respecting such objects, and in such degrees ; and of the several actions conse- quent thereupon. In this survey it approves of one, disapproves of another, and towards a third is affected in neither of these ways, but is quite indifferent. This principle in man, by which he approves or disapproves his heart, temper, and actions, is conscience ; for this is tho strict sense of tho word, though soinetinies it is used so as to take in more. .\nd that this faculty tends to restnun men from doing niisohiof to each other, and leads them to do gix)d, is too manifest to need lioiug insisted upon. Thus a parent has the aH'ootion of love to his children : this leads him to tako care of, to educate, to make due firovision for them ; the natural affection oads to this; but the rollcction that it is his proper biisinoss, what belongs to him, that it is right and commendable so to do ; this added to the affection becoiiios a much more settled principle, and carries him on JOSEPH BUTLER. 165 through more labour and difficulties for the sake of his children than he would undergo from that affection alone if he thought it, and the course of action it led to, either in- different or criminal. This indeed is impossible, to do that which is good and not to approve of it ; for which reason they are frequently not considered as distinct, though they really are- for men often approve of the actions of others which they will not imitate, and likewise do that which they approve not. It cannot possibly be denied that there is this principle of re- flection or conscience in human nature. Sup- pose a man to relieve an innocent person in great distress; suppose the same man after- wards, in the fury of anger, to do the greatest mischief to a person who had given no just cause of offence ; to aggravate the injury, tidd the circumstances of former friendship and obligation from the inj nred person : let the man who is supposed to have done these two different actions coolly reflect upon them afterwards, without regard to their conse- quences to himself: to assert that any com- mon man would be affected in the same way towards these differ^nt actions; that he WQuld make no distinction between them, but approve or disapprove them equally, is too glaring an absurdity to need being con- fiited. There is therefore this principle of reflection or conscience in mankind. It is needless to compare the respect it has to private good with the respect it has to public ; since it plainly tends as much to the latter as to the former, and is commonly thought to tend chiefly to the latter. This faculty is now mentioned merely as another part in the inward frame of man, pointing out to us in some degree what we are in- tended for, and as what will naturally and of course have some influence. Sermon upon Human Nature. Selp-Deceit. There is not anything relating to men and characters, more surprising and unaccount- able, than this partiality to themselves which is observable in many ; as there is nothing of more melancholy reflection, respecting morality, virtue, and religion. Hence it is that many men seem perfect strangers to their own characters. They think, and reason, and judge quite differently upon any matter relating to themselves from what they do in cases of others where they are not in- terested. Hence it is one hears people ex- posing follies which they themselves are eminent for; and talking with great severity against particular vices which, if all the world be not mistaken, they themselves are notoriously guilty of. This self-ignorance and self-partiality may be in all different degrees. It is a lower degree of it which David himself refers to in these words. Who can tell how ofl he offendeth f cleanse thou me from my secret faults. This is the ground of that advice of Elihu to Job : BureLy it is meet to be said unto God, — That which I see not, teach thou me; if I have done iniquity, 1 will do no more. And Solomon saw this thing in a very strong light when he said. He that trusteth his own heart is a fool. This likewise was the reason why that precept. Know thyself, was so frequently inculcated by the philosophers of old. For if it were not for that partial and fond regard to our- selves it would certainly be no great difficulty to know our own character, what passes within the bent and bias of our mind ; much less would there be any difficulty in judging rightly of our own actions. But from this partiality it frequently comes to pass that the observation of many men's being them- selves last of all acquainted with what falls out in their own families may be applied to a nearer home, — to what passes within their own bre.asts. There is plainly, in the generality of man kind, an absence of doubt or distrust, in a very great measure, as to their moral char- acter and behaviour ; and likewise a disposi- tion to take for granted that all is right and well with them in these respects. The former is owing to their not reflecting,' not exercising their judgment upon themselves ; the latter, to self love. I am not speaking of that extrava- gance, which is sometimes to be met with ; instances of persons declaring in words at length, that they never were in the wrong, nor ever had any diffidence of the justness of their conduct, in their whole lives. No, these people are too far gone to have any- thing said to them. The thing before us is indeed of this kind, but in a lower degree, and confined to the moral character ; some- what of which we almost all of us have, without r<;flecting upon it. Now consider how long and how grossly a person of the best understanding might be imposed upon by one of whom he had not any suspicion, and in whom he placed an entire confidence ; especially if there were friendship and real kindness in the case : surely this holds even stronger with respect to that self we are all so fond of. Hence arises in men a disregard of reproof and instruction, rules of conduct and moral discipline, which occasionally come in their way : a disregard, I say, of these ; not in every respect, but in this single one, namely, as what may be of service to them in particular towards mend- ing their own hearts and tempers, and mak- ing them better men. It never in earnest comes into their thoughts whether such ad- 16G PHILIP DORMER STANHOPE. monitions may not relate and be of service to themselves, and this quite distinct from a positive persuasion to the contrary, a per- suasion from reflection that they are innocent and blameless in these respects. Sermon upon Sdf-Deceit. PHILIP DORMER STANHOPE, EARL OF CHESTERFIELD, born 1694, died 1773, famous in his day as a wit, a courtier, a politician, and patron of literature, is still remembered for his Letters to his Son Philip Stanhope, Lond., 1774, 2 vols. 4to; New edition, with Additions, edited by Lord Mahon [5th Earl Stanhope], Lond., 1845-.53, 5 vols. 8vo. The first edition was republished in Boston, Mass., in 1779. Miscellaneous Works, with Memoirs by M. Maty, M.D., Lond., 1777-78, 2 vols. 4to; Supplement to his Letters, Lond., 1787, 4to. " It waa not to be wondered at that tbey bad so great a sale, considering tbat they were the let- ters of a Btatestnan, a wit, one who had been mnch in the mouths of mankind, one long accustomed virum volitare per ora. . . . Does not Lord Ches- terfield give precepts for uniting wickedness and the graces ? . . . Lord Chesterfield^s Letters to hia Son, I think, might be made a very pretty book. Take out the immorality, and it should be put into the bands of every gentleman." — Dr. Johnson. It may here be remarked that Johnson's letter to Chesterfield was grossly unjust. Good Breeding. A friend of yours and mine has very justly defined good breeding to be, " the re- sult of muoh good sense, some good nature, and a little self denial for the sake of others, and with a view to obtain the same indul- gence from them." Taking this for granted (as I think it cannot be disputed), it is aston- ishing to me that anyboQy who has good sense and good nature can essentially fail in good breeding. As to the modes of it, indeed, they vary according to persons, ilaces, and circumstiincps, and are onlv to 10 air|uired liy olisoniition and pxporicnce ; but till! substiuu'o of it is pvorywlipre and oti!rniilly the snmo. Oiioil manners are, to pnrticiihir Rni'loticK, what good morals are t<> Boiioty in gononil— ^their pcinent and their Hi'inirity. And as laws uro oniu'toil to enforce good morals, or at least to prevent the ill (•nVfts (if had ones, so thcro are certain rules ol civility, universally iinpliod and received, til enforce good manners nnd punish bad ones. And indeed there seems (c lie lesi Jideicnce between the crimes and punish- ments than at first one would imagine. The i:, immoral man who invades another's prop- erty is justly hanged for it ; and the ill-bred man who by his ill manners invades and disturbs the quiet and comforts of private life is by common consent as justly banished society. Mutual complaisances, attentions, and sacrifices of little conveniences, are as natural an implied contract between civilized people as protection and obedience are be- tween kings and subjects ; whoever, in either case, violates that compact justly forfeits all advantages arising from it. For my own part I really think that, next to the con- sciousness of doing a good action that of doing a civil one is the most pleasing ; and the epithet which I should covet the most, next to that of Aristides, would be that of well-bred. Thus much for good breeding in general: I will now consider some of tho various modes and degrees of it. Very few, scarcely any, are wanting in the respect which they should show to tnoso whom they acknowledge to be infinitely their superiors, such as crowned heads, princes, and public persons of distingnished and eminent posts. It is the manner of showing that respect which is different. The man of fashion and of the world expresses it in its fullest extent, bnt naturally, easily, and without concern ; whereas a man who is not used to keep good company expresses it awkwardly ; one sees that he is not used to it, and that it costs him a great deal ; but I never saw the worst-bred man living guilty of lolling, whistling, scratching his bead, and such like indecencies, in company that he respected. In such companies, there- fore, the only point to be attended to is, to show that respect which everybody means to show, in an easv, unembarrassed, and graceful manner. This is what observation and experience must teach you. In mixed companies, whoever is admitted to make part of tnem is, for the time at least, supposed to be on a footing of equality with the rest: and, consequentty, as there is no one principal obiectof awe nnd respect, peo- ple are apt to take a greater latitude in their behaviour, and to be less un .n their guard : and so they may, provided it bo within cer- tain bounds, whicn arc upon no occasion to be trnnsirressed. But upon those occasions, though no one is entitled to distinguished marks of respect, every one claims, and very justly, every mark of civility nnd good iireeding. Lase is allowed, but careless- ness and negliiience are strictly forbidden. If a man accosts you, and talks to vou ever so dully or frivolously, it is worse than rude- ness, jt is brutality, to show him, by n mani- fest inattention to what he savs, "that you think hiiu a fool or a blockhead, and not worth hearing. It is much more so witb WILLIAM WARBURTOK 167 regard to women, who, of whatever rank they are, are entitled, in consideration of their sex, not only to an attentive, but an officious good breeding from men. Their little wants, likings, dislikes, preferences, antipathies, and fancies must be officiously attended to, and, if possible, guessed at and anticipated, by a well-bred man. You must nsver usurp to yourself those conveniences and gratifications which are of common right, such as the best places, the best dishes, &c. ; but on the contrary always decline them yourself, and offer them to others, wKo, in their turns, will offer them to you ; so that, upon the whole, you will in your turn enjoy your share of the common right. It would be endless for me to enumerate all the par- ticular instances in which a well-bred man shows his good breeding in good company ; and it would be injurious to you to suppose that your own good sense will not point them out to you ; and then your own good nature will recommend and your self-inter- est enforce the practice. There is a third sort of good breeding in which people are the most apt to fail from a very mistaken notion that they cannot fail at all. I mean with regard to one's most familiar friends and acquaintances, or those who really are our inferiors ; and there, un- doubtedly, a greater degree of ease is not only allowed, but proper, and contributes much to the comforts of a private social life. But ease and freedom have their bounds, which must by no means be violated. A certain degree of negligence and careless- ness becomes injurious and insulting, from the real or supposed inferiority of the per- sons ; and that delightful liberty of conver- sation among a few friends is soon destroyed, as liberty often has been, by being carried to licentiousness. But example explains things best, and I will put a pretty strong case : Suppose you and me alone together : I be- lieve you will allow that I have as good a right to unlimited freedom in your company as either you or I can possibly have in any other ; and I am apt to believe, too, that you would indulge me in that freedom as far as anybody would. But, notwithstand- ing this, do you imagine that I should think there was no bounds to that freedom? I assure you I should not think so ; and I take myself to be as much tied down by a certain degree of good manners to you, as by other degrees of them to other people. The most familiar and intimate habitudes, iionnexions, and friendships require a de- gree of good breeding both to preserve and cement them. The best of us have our bad sides, and it is as imprudent as it is ill-bred to exhibit them. I shall not use ceremony with you ; it would be misplaced between us ; but I shall certainly observe that degree of good breeding with you which is, in the first place, decent, and which, I am sure, is absolutely necessary to make us like one another's company long. Lord Chesterjidd! s Letters to his Son. WILLIAM WARBURTON, D.D., born 1698, left school (he was never at col- lege) 1715, and for about four years prac- tised as an attorney at Newark ; received deacon's orders, 1723, Preacher to Lincoln's Inn, 1746, Prebendary of Gloucester, 1753, and of Durham, 17.55, Dean of Bristol, 1757, Bishop of Gloucester, 1759, died 1779. He was author of Miscellaneous Translations, Lond., 1723 {some 1724), 12mo; Critical and Philosophical Enquiry into the Causes of Prodigies and Miracles, as related by Histo- rians, Lond., 1727, l2mo (this and the Trans- lations were suppressed) ; The Alliance be- tween Church and State, Lond., 1741, 8vo ; Julian, 1750, 8vo ; and other works. His greatest production was The Divine Legation of Moses Demonstrated, Lond., 1737, etc., never completed : new edition, Lond., Tegg, 1846, 3 vols. 8vo ; Warburton's Works [edited by Bishop Hurd], Lond., 1788, 7 vols. 4to; new edition, Lond., 1811, 12 vols. 8vo. "Warburton's Divine Legation delighted me more than any book I had yet [at 15] read. , . . The luminous theory of hieroglyphics, as a stage in the progress of society, between picture-writing and alphabetic character, is perhaps the only addition made to the stock of knowledge in this extraordinary work; but the uncertain and prob- ably false suppositions about the pantheism of the' ancient philosophers and the object of the myste- ries (iu reality, perhaps, somewhat like the free- masonry of our own times) are well adapted to rouse and exercise the adventurous genius of youth." — Sir Jahes Mackintosh : Life, oh. i. " The Divine Legation of Moses is a monument, already crumbling into dust, of the vigour and the weakness of the human mind. If Warburton'a new argument proved anything, it would be a demonstration against the legislator who left his people without the knowledge of a future state. But some episodes of the work, on the Greek philosophy, the hieroglyphics of Egypt, &c., are entitled to the praise of learning, imagination, and discernment." — Edward Gibbon : Miecelh Works, edit. 1837, 88, n. The reader will find a graphic portrait of Warburton by a good painter in our article on Lord Bolingbroke in this volume. Bishop Warburton to Hurd. Prior Park, Dec. 27, 1761. Let me wish you (as we all do) all the happiness that goodness can derive from this season. 168 JOSEPH SPENCE. The honour this country derives from the Duke of York's visit can hardly compensate the bad news of a Spanish war, which puts the city of London in a consternation. This event does honour to Mr. Pitt's sagacity, and the wisdom of his advice upon it. AVhether this war, which was foreseen by nobody to be inevitable but by him, can be successfully managed by anybody but by him, time must show ; for I would not pretend to be wiser than our teachers, I mean, the news-writers, who refer all doubtful cases, as the Treasury does all desperate payments, to time. . . . What you say of Hume is true : and (what either I said in my last, or intended to say) you have taught him to write so much bet- ter, that he has thoroughly confirmed your system. I have been both too ill and too lazy to finisn my Discourse on the Holy Spirit. Not above half of it is yet printed. ■I have been extremely entertained with the wars of Fingal [Ossian]. It can be no cheat, for I think the enthusiasm of this su- perficial sublime could hardly be counterfeit. A modern writer would have been less simple and uniform. Thus far had I writ- ten when your letter of Christmas-day came to hand ; as you will easily understand by my submitting to take shame upon me, and assuring you that I am fully convinced of my false opinion delivered just above con- cerning Fingnl. I did not consider the mat- ter as I ought. Your reasons for the for- gery are unanswerable. And of all these reasons but one occurred to me, the want of external evidence; and this, I own, did shock me. But you have waked me from a very pleasing dream ; and made me hate the im- postor, which is the most uneasy sentiment of our waking thoughts. . . . Sterne has published his fifth and sixth volumes of Tristram. They are wrote pretty much like the first and second ; but whether they will restore his reputation as a writer with the public is another question. The fellow himself is an irrecoverable scoun- drel. . . . I think the booksellers have an intention of employing HaskcM-ville to print Pope in 4to ; s(i they sent nie the last ootnvo to look over. I have addoil the enclosed to the long note in tlio lio^iinnini; iif the Rape of the L< M, sormons, >to., but is best known by liis Family Expositor; or, A Paraphriisi! and Vcrsidn of tlio Now Ti's- tamont, with Critical Notoa and I'nietioal Imnrovomiint.M, Lend,, ITtKMili, vols. 4to ; witn liis Life bv Dr. Kippis, l.ond., I SOS, 4 vols. -ltd. Ill- (i vols. 8vi); now oilition, Lond., 1839, iin|ioi-ial fob, also 1840, 4 vols. 8vo ; otiior oditiiins. Whole AVorks, by D. Wil- liains and llio Kcv. K. Parsons, Loods, ISOli, 10 vols. 8vo and myal 8vo. A Ouiirso of Lectures on tlio Prinoipnl Siilijoots in I'nou- niiitoldgy, EthicN, and Hivinily, piiblisliod by Ilov. Siiinuel (!larke, Lond., ITI'i.'^, 4to ; 3d edit., by A. Kippi.s, D.D., Lond., 17'.M, 2 vols. 8vo. Miscellaneous Works, by Rev. T. Morell, Lond., 1839, imp. Svo. Letters, Shrewsb., 1790, Svo. Memoirs, by JobOrton, Salop, 1766, Svo. Life and Correspondence, Lond., 1831, 5 vols. Svo. His Rise and Pro- gress of Religion in the Soul, Lond., 1750, l2mo, has been frequently republished. " The Family Expositor is a very judicious work. It has long been highly esteemed, and is worthy of all the credit it has amoDg religious people." — Dr. Adam Clarke. " Aod let me tell you, a man who comments oa the Bible affords all the opportunity a caviller could wish Jor. But your judgment is always so true, and your decision so right, that I am as un- profitable a reader to you as the least of your flock." — Bishop Warbdrtos to Dr. Doddridge, Cambridge, April 4, 1739. Devotional Feelixcs. I hope, my dear, you will not be offended when 1 tell you that I am, what I hardly thought it possible, without a miracle, that I should have been, very easy and happy without you. My days begin, pass, and end in pleasure, and seem short because tbey are so delightful. It may seem strange to say it, but really so it is, I hardly feel that I want anything. I often think of you, and pray for you, and bless God on your account, and please myself with the hope of many comfortable days, and weeks, and ye.irs with you ; yet I am not at all anxious about your return, or indeed about anything else. And the rea.son, the great aSd sufficient reason, is that I have more of the presence of God with me than I remember ever to have en- joyed in any one month of my life. lie enables me to live for him, and to live with him. When I awake in the morning, which is always before it is light, I address myself to him, and converse with him, speak to him while I am lighting my candle and putting on my clothes, and have often more delight before 1 come out of my chamber, though it bo hardly a quarter of an hour after my awaking, than I have enjoved for whole days, or. perhaps, weeks, ol' my life. He moots me in my study, in secret, in family devotions. It is pleasant to road, pleasant to compose, pleasant to converse with my friends at homo ; pleasant to visit those abroad — the poor, the sick : plciisant to write letters of necessary business bv which any good can bo done ; pleasant to go out and preach the gopleasing the Deity. The worship of God is a duty ; the hearing and reading of sermons are useful ; but if men rest in hearing and praying, as too many do, it is as if a tree should value itself on being watered and putting forth leaves, though it never produced any fruit. Your great Master thought much less of those outward appearances and professions than many of his modern disciples. He pre- ferred the doers of the word to the mere hear- ers; the son thatseeminglyrefusedtoobey his father and yet performed his commands, to him that professed his readiness, but neg- lected the work : the heretical but charita- ble Samaritan to the uncharitable though orthodox priest and sanctified Levite; and those who gave food to the hungry, drink to the thirsty, raiment to the naked, entertain- ment to the stranger, and relief to the sick, though they never heard of his name, he declares shall in the last day be accepted ; when those who cry Lord 1 Lord ! who value themselves upon their faith, though great enough to perform miracles, but have neg- lected good works, shall be rejected. He professed that he came not to call the right- eous, but sinners to repentance, which im- plied his modest opinion that there were some in his time who thought themselves so good that they need not hear even him for improvement: but now-a-days we have scarce a little parSon that does not think it the duty of every man within his reach to sit under his petty 'ministrations, and that whoever omits them offends God. 1 wish to such more humility, and to you health and hap- piness, being your friend and servant. To Rev. George Whitefield: Philadelphia^ June 6, 17S3. Early Marriages. Dear Jack, — You desire, you say, my impartial thoughts on the subject of an early marriage, by way of answer to tho numberless objections that have been made by numerous persons to your own. You may remember, when you consulted me on the occasion, that I thought youth on both sides to be no objection. Indeed, from the marriages that have fallen under my obser- vation, I am rather inclined to think that early ones stand the best chance of happi- ness. The temper and habits of the young are not yet become so stiff and uncomply- ing as when more advanced in life : they form more easily to each other, and hence many occasions of disgust are removed. And if youth has less of that prudence which is necessary to manage a family, yet the par- ents and elder friends of young married per- sons are generally at hand to afford their advice, wiieh amply supplies that defect ; and by early marriage youth is sooner formed to regular and useful life ; and pos sibly some of those accidents or connexions that might have injured the constitution, or reputation, or both, are thereby happily pre- vented. Particular circumstances of par- ticular persons may possibly sometimes make it prudent to delay entering into that state ; but in general, when nature has rendered our bodies fit for it, the presumption is in nature's favour, that she has not judged amiss in making us desire it. Late mar- riiiges are often attended, too, with this far- ' ther inconvenience, that there is not the same chance that the parents shall live to 174 BENRY FIELDING. Bee their offspring educated. "Late chil- dren," says the Spanish proverb, " are early orphans,'' — a melancholy reflection to those whose case it may be. With us, in America, marriages are generally in the morning of life ; our children are therefore educated and settled in the world by noon ; and thus, our business being done, we have an afternoon and evening of cheerful leisure to ourselves ; such as our friend at present enjoys. By these early marriages we are blessed with more children ; and from the mode among us, founded by nature, of every mother suck- ling and nursing her own child, more of them are raised. Thence the swift progress of population among us, unparalleled in Eu- rope. In fine, I am glad you are married, and congratulate yuu most cordially upon it. You are now in the way of becoming a use- ful citizen ; and you have escaped the unnat-' ural state of celibacy for life, — the fate of many here [in England], who never intended it, but who, having too long postponed the change of their condition, find, at length, that it is too late to think of it, and so live, all their lives, in a situation that greatly les- sens a man's value. An odd volume of a set of books bears not the value of its proportion to the set: what think you of the value of the odd half of a pair of scissors 7 It can't well cut any thing ; it may possibly serve to scrape a trencher. Pray make my compliments and best wishes acceptable to your bride. I am old and heavy, or I should, ere this, have pre- sented them in person. I shall make but small use of the old man's privilege, that of giving advice to younger friends. Treat your wife always with respect : it will pro- cure respect to you, not only from her, but from all that observe it. Never use a slighting expression to her, even in jest ; for slights in jest, after fre- quent bandyings, are apt to end in ongry earnest. Be studious in your profession, and you will be learned. Bo industrious and frugal, and you will be rich. Be sober and temperate, and you will be healthy. Bo in general virtuous, and you will be happy. At least you will, by such conduct, stand the best chance for such consequences. I jrniy God to bless you both j Doing ever jour affl^)tionate friend. 2b John Allfi/iu; JC»q., Citwen Street, Au- gust 9, ncs. The Famb op Wasiiinqton. 8m, — I have roooivod hut lately the lottor yonr oxcclloncy did mo the Inmour of writ- ing til mo ill rocoiiimcniliitioM of the Maniiiis do la I'liyiUto. Hismoib^sty iloliiinod it long in his own hands. Wo bccaimi iirnuuinteJ. however, from the time of his arrival at Paris ; and his zeal for the honour of oui country, his activity in our affairs here, and his firm attachment to our cause, and to you, impressed me with the same regard and esteem for him that your excellency's letter would have done had it been immediately delivered to me. Should peace arrive after another cam- Faign or two, and afford us a little leisuie, should be happy to see your excellency in Europe, and to accompany you, if my age and strength would permit, in visiting some of its ancient and most famous kingdoms. You would on this side the sea enjoy the great reputation you have acquired, pure and free from those little shades that the jealousy and envy of a man's countrymen and contem- fioraries are ever endeavouring to cast over iving merit. Here you would know, and enjoy, what posterity will say of Washing- ton : for a thousand leagues have nearly the same effect as a thousand years. The feeble voice of those grovelling passions cannot ex- tend so far either in time or distance. At f resent I enjoy that plea-sure for you : as frequently hear the old generals of this martial country (who studied the maps of America, and mark upon them all your operations) speak with s-incere approbation and great applause of your conduct ; and join in giving you the character of one of the greatest captains of the age. I must soon quit the scene, but you may live to see our country flourish, as it will amazingly and rapidly after the war is over : like a field of young Indian corn, which long fair weather and sunshine had enfeebled and discoloured, and which, in that weak state, by a thunder-gust of violent wind, hail, and rain, seemed to be threatened with absolute destruction ; yet, the storm being post, it re- covers fresh verdure, shoots up with double vigour, ond delights the eye not of its owner only, but of every observing traveller. 1 he l>est wishes that can be formed for your health, honour, and happiness ever attend you, from yours, &C. To deneral WaKhiugton: Passy, Afarch 5, 17S0. HENRY FIELDING. one of the s'"'''^'''''' of English novelists, born 17(17, died 1704, was a son of Lieu- tenunt-Oenenil Fielding and great-grandson of William, third Earl of Denliigh, a descend- ant (if the Counts of llnpsburg, tho German branch of which has counted among iis meiiiliers Emperors of Germany and Kings of Spain. In addition to Uis novels of The Adven HENRY FIELDING. 175 turesof Joseph Andrews, Lond., 1742, 2 vols. I2ino, History of Tom Jones, a Foundling, Lond., 1749, 2 vols. 12ino, and Amelia, Lond., 1752, 4 vols. 12mo, he also published History of Jonathan Wild the Great, Love in Several Masks, The Author's Farce, The Grub Street Opera, The Modern Husband, many other comedies, and poems, and es- says. Among the collective editions of his Works are those of Chalmers, 1821, 10 vols. 8vo, and Roscoe, 1840, etc., imp. 8vo. Novels, with Memoir by Sir W. Scott, Bdin., 1821, 8vo. " Smollett and Fielding were so eminently suo- oesEful as novelists that no other English author of that class has a right to he mentioned in the same breath. We readily grant, to Smollett an equal rank with his great rival, Fielding, — while we place both far above any of their successors in the same line of fictitious composition. Perhaps no books ever written excited such peals of inex- haustible laughter as those of Smollett.*' — Sir Walter Scott. "I go to Sterne for the feelings of nature; Fielding for its vices; Johnson for a knowledge of the workings of its powers ; and Shakspeare fur every thing." — Abern ethy. " Fielding being mentioned, Johnson exclaimed, ' He was a blockhead !' and upon expressing my astonishment at so strange an assertion, he said. What I mean by his being a blockhead is, that he was a barren rascal !' Boswell : ' Will you not allow, sir, that he draws very natural pictures of human life ?' Johnson: 'Why, sir, it is of very low life.' " — Boswell : Life of Johnson. Partridge at the Playhouse. As soon as the play, which was Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, began. Partridge was all attention, nor did he break silence till the entrance of the ghost; upon which he asked Jones, "What man that was in the strange dress: something," said he, "like what I have seen in a picture. Sure it is not armour, is it ?" Jones answered, " That is the ghost." To which Partridge replied, with a smile, " Persuade me to that, sir, if you can. Though I can't say I ever aotuallv saw a ghost in my life, yet I am certain I should know one if I saw him better than that comes to. No, no, sir ; ghosts don't appear in such dresses as that neither." In this mistake, which caused mucli laughter in the neighbourhood of Partridge, he was suffered to continue till the scene between the ghost and Hamlet, when Partridge gave that credit to Mr. Garrick which he had denied to Jones, and fell into so violent a trembling that his knees knocked against each other. Jones asked him what was the matter, and whether he was afraid of the warrior upon the stage? "0 la! sir," said he, " I perceive now it is what you told me. I am not afraid of anything, for I know it is but a play ; and if it was really a ghost, it could do one no harm at such a distance, and in so much company ; and yet if I was frightened I am not the only person." " Why, who," cries Jone.s, " dost thou take to be such a coward here beside thyself?'' " Nay, you may call me coward if you will ; but if that little man there upon the stage is not frightened, I never saw any man fright- ened in jny life. Ay, ay ; go along with voul Ay to be sure! Who's fool then? Will you? Lud have mercy upon such fool- hardiness ' Whatever happens, it is good enough for you. Follow you ! I'd follow the devil as soon. Nay, perhaps it is the devil,— for they say he can put on what likeness he pleases. Oh ! here he is again. No farther ! No, you have gone far enough already ; farther than I'd have gone for all the king's dominions." Jones offered to speak, but Partridge cried, " Hush, hush, dear sir, don't you hear him 7" And during the whole speech of the ghost he sat with his eyes fixed partly on the ghost, and pal-tly on Hamlet, and with his mouth open ; the same passions which succeeded each other in Hamlet succeeding, like wise in him. When the scene was over, Jones said, "Why, Partridge, you exceed my expecta- tions. You enjoy the play more tlian I conceived possible." "Nay, sir," answered Partridge, "if you are not afraid of the devil, I can't help it ; but to be sure, it is natural to be surprised at such things, though I know there is nothing in them : not that it was the ghost that surprised me neither; for I should have known that to have been only a man in a strange dress ; but when I saw the little man so frightened himself, it was that which took hold of me." " And dost thou imagine, then, Partridge," cries Jones, " that he was really frightened ?" "Nay, sir," said Partridge, "did not you yourself observe afterwards, when he found it was his own father's spirit, and how he was murdered in his garden, how his fear forsook him by degrees, and he was struck dumb with sorrow, as it were, just as I should have been had it been my own case. But hush ! la ! what noise is that ? There he is again. Well, to be certain, though I know there is nothing at all in it, I am glad I am not down yonder where those men are." Then turning his eyes again upon Hamlet, "Ay, you may draw your sword: what signifies a sword against the power of the devil?" During the second act Partridge made very few remarks. He greatly admired the fineness of the dresses ; nor could he help observing upon the king's countenance. "Well," said he, "how people may be de- ceived by faces ! Nulla Jides front is, I find, a true saying. Who would think, by look- 176 WILLIAM PITT. ing into the king's face, that he had ever coinraitted a murder?" He then inquired after the ghost; but Jones, who intended he should be surprised, gave him no other satisfaction than " that he might possibly see him again soon, and in a flash of fire." Partridge sat in fearful expectation of this; and now, when the ghost made his next appearance. Partridge cried out, " There, sir, now: what say you now? is he fright- ened now or no? As much frightened as you think me, and, to be sure, nobody can help some fears. I would not be in so bad a condition as — what's his name? — Squire Hamlet is there, for all the world. Bless me ! what's become of the spirit? As I am ii living soul, I thought I saw him sink into tlie earth;" "Indeed you saw right," an- swered Jones. " Well, well," cries Par- tridge, " I know it is only a play ; and be- sides, if there was anything in all this. Madam Miller would not laugh so ; for as to you, sir, you would not be afraid, I be- lieve, if the devil was here in person. There, there, ay, no wonder you are in such a pas- sion ; shake the vile wicked wreteh to pieces. If she was my own mother I should serve her so. To be sure all duty to a mother is forfeited by such wicked doings. Ay, go about your business: I hate tne sight of you !" Our critic was now pretty silent till the play which Hamlet introduces before the king. This he did not at first understand till Jones explained it to him ; but he no sooner entered into the spirit of it, than he began to bless himself that he had never committed murder. Then turning to Mrs. Miller, he asked her " If she did not imag- ine the king looked as if he was touched ; though he is," said he, " a good actor, and doth all he can to hide it. Well, I would not have so much to answer for as that wicked man there hath, to sit upon a much higher chair than he sits upon. No wonder he run away: for your sake I'll never trust an innocent face again." The grave-digging scene nextengaged the attention of Partridge, who oxpressed much surprise at the nuinhor of skulls thrown upon the Ktii^c, to whii'li Jones answered, " That it was one of the most famous burial- places about town." " No wonder, then," ciies Partridi';", " ♦Imt the pliico is haunted. Hut I n(v<'r Ninv m my lifo a worse grave- digger. I had a sexton when I was clerk that should havi' dug throe gnivoH while ho is digjjing one. Tlio fellow handles a spade a.H if it was tlio lirht time ho had ever one in his hand. Ay, iiy, you may sing. You had rather sini; tlian work, I believe !" Upon Hamlet's taking up the skull, ho cried out, "Well ! it is strange to see how feai> less some men are. I never could bring my- self to touch anything belonging to a dead man on any account. He seemed fright- ened enough too at the ghost, I thought. Nemo omnibus horis sapit." Little more worth remembering occurred during the play ; at the end of which Jones asked nim " Which of the players he had liked best?" To this he answered, with some appearance of indignation at the question, " The king, without doubt." " Indeed, Mr. Partridge," says Mrs. Miller, " you are not of the same opinion with the town ; for they are all agreed that Hamlet is acted by the best player who ever was on the stage.'' " He the best player !" cries Partridge, with a contemptuous sneer; "why, I could act as well as he myself. I am sure if I had seen a ghost I should have looked in the very same manner, and done just as be did. And then, to be sure, in that scene, as yoa called it, between him and his mother, where you told me he acted so fine, why, Lord help me, any man, that is, any good man, that had such a mother, would have dune exactly the same. I know you are only joking with me; but, indeed madam, though I was never at a play in London . yet I have seen acting before in the country ; and the king for my money : he speaks all his words distinctly, half as loud again as the other. Anyhndf may see he is an actor!" History of Tom Jones. RIGHT HON. WILLIAM PITT. EARL OF CHATHAM, born 1708, and educated at Eton and Trinity College, Oxford, after serving a short time as a cornet in the Blues, Britixh army, was in 1735 chosen M.P. for Old Sarum, was premier for five months ia 1757, and subse- quently gained great glory in the same hich position ; Karl of Chatham, 1766 ; died 1778 See Letters written by the late Earl of Chat ham to his Nephew Thomas Pitt (after- wards Lord Canielfonl), then at Cambridge, Lond., ISlM, ermvn Svo : large paper; Cor- respoTidence of the Earl of Chatnam, Lond., IS;i8, •! vols. Svo; History of the Earl of Chatham, by the Kev. Francis Thackeray, A.M., Lond., 1S07, 2 vols. 4to : Goodrich's Seleet British Eloquence, \. York, 18,')2. Svo. " Ilia eloquence wos of the very highest order: voliemenl. fiery, close to the subject, oonoise, some- tiiiioa emiucntly, oven boldly, figurative: it was original and surprising, vH quite natural. The fine pnssages or I'eliLMtous Atr* in which all popular a!i,', 8vo ; Tlio History of the Life of King Henry tbo Second, and of tlio ,\i;o in whiili ho Lived, cto., Lond., 1704-67, 4 vols. 4to, Dublin, nos, 4 vols. 8vo, Lond., 170'.', 6 vols. 8vo, 1777, vols, Hvo. Misoollnneous AVorks, Lond., 1774, 4to, Dulil., 1774, 2 vols. 8vo, 2ii edit., Lond., I77'), 4lo, 3il edit., 1770, 3 vols. 8vii. Pootii'iil Works, Loiul., 17^:"), :i2ni<>, Cilnsg., 17S7, fol., ISOI, 1 vol. 8vo: and in ('olloolioiis of Uriiisli I'uots. (Soo his M(-inoirB iind Oonospoiulonoo, 1734 to 1773, by R. I'hillimoro, Lond., 184,'>, 2 vols. Svo. " Ills Mnjcsly then imkod him [Dr. .lolinson] what ho tliuught of Lord Ljttdton'e History, which was then just pabliehed. Johnson said he thought his style pretty good, bat that he had blamed Henry the becond rather too mnoh." — Bos- WEtL : Life of Johnton, edit. 1848, royal Svo, 185. *' The reader may consult Lyttelton's History — an elaborate and valaable work — with advantage. '^ — Sharon Turner. " Pedantry was so deeply fixed in his natnre that the hustings, the Treasury, the Exchequer, the House of Commons, the House of Lords, left him the same dreaming school-boy that they found him." — Lord Macaclat : Edin. Jiev., July, 1835 : Sir Jame» Mackintogh't Hitlory of the Revolution ; and in Macantay't Eeeaye. Character of William the Conqueror. The character of this prince has seldom been set in its true light ; some eminent writers have been dazzled so much by the more shining parts of it that they have hardly seen his faults ; while others, out of a strong detestation of tyranny, have been unwilling to allow him the praise he de- serves. lie may with justice be ranked among the greatest generals any age has produced. There was united in him activity, vigilance, intrepidity, caution, great force of judgment, and never failing presence of mind. He was strict in his discipline, and kept his soldiers in perfect obedience ; yet preserved their affection. Having been from his very child- hood continually in war, and at the bend of armies, he joined to all the capacity that genius could give all the knowledge and skill that experience could teach, and was a perfect master of the military art as it was practised in the times wherein he lived. Ilis con- stitution enabled him to endure any hanl- ships, and very few were equal to him in personal strength, which was an excelleneo of more importance than it is now. from the manner of fighting then in use. It is said of him that none except himself could bend his bow. His courage was heroic, and he possessed it not only in the field, but (which was more uncommon) in the cabinet, at- tempting great thinirs with means that to otlior men appeared totally unequal to such undertakings, and steadily pro'ieouting what ho had boldly resolved ; but never disturbed or disheartened by difficulties in the course of his enterprises; but havkig that noble vigour of mind wliioli. insload of bonding to opposition, rises against it, and seems to have a power of controlling and command- ing Fortune herself. Nor was ho less superior to pleasure than to fear : no luxury softened him, no riot dis- ordered, no sloth relaxed. ... A lust of fiowor, whieh no regard to justice could Imit, the most unrelenting cruelty, and the most insatiable avarice, possessed his soul. 1 1 is true, indeed, that among many acts of JAMES HARRIS. 179 extreme liumanity some s'lininp; instances of great clemency may be produced, that were either the effects of his policy, which taught him this method of acquiring friends, or of his magnanimity, which made him slight a weak and subdued enemy, such as was Edgar Atheling, in whom he found neither spirit nor talents able to contend with him for the crown. But where he had no advantage nor pride in forgiving, his nature discovered itself to be utterly void of all sense of compassion ; and some bar- barities vrhich he committed exceeded the bounds that even tyrants and conquerors prescribe to themselves.- Most of our ancient historians give him the character of a very religious prince : but his religion was after the fashion of those times, belief without examination, and devotion without piety. It was a religion that prompted him to endow monasteries, and at the same time allowed him to pillage kingdoms ; that threw him on his knees be- fore a relic or cross, but suffered him unre- strained to trample upon the liberties and rights of mankind. As to his wisdom in government, of which some modern writers have spoken very highly, he was, indeed, so far wise that through a long unquiet reign he knew how to support oppression by terror, and employ the properest means for the carrying on a very iniquitous and violent administration. But that which alone deserves the name of wisdom in the character of a king, the maintaining of authority by the exercise of those virtues which make the happiness of his people, was what, with all his abilities, ha does not appear to have possessed. Nor did he excel in those soothing and popular arts which sometimes change the com- plexion of a tyranny, and give it a fallacious appearance of freedom. His government was harsh and despotic, violating even the principles of that constitution which he himself had established. Yet so far he per- formed the duty of a sovereign that he took care to maintain a good police in his realm ; curbing licentiousness with a strong hand, which, in the tumultuous state of his gov- ernment, was a great and difficult work. How well he performed it we may learn even from the testimony of a contemporary Saxon historian, who says that during his reign a man might have travelled in per- fect security all over the kingdom with his bosom full of gold, nor durst any kill another in revenge of the greatest offences, nor offer violence to the chastity of a woman. But it was a poor compensation that the high- ways were safe, when the courts of justice were dens of thieves, and when almost every man in authority', or in office, used his power to oppress and pillage the people. The king himself did not only tolerate, but en- courage, support, and even share these ex- tortions. Though the greatness of the an- cient landed estate of the crown, and the feudal profits to which he legally was entitled, rendered him one of the richest monarchs in Europe he was not content with all that opulence, but by authorizing the sheriffs who collected his revenues in the several counties to practise the most grievous vexa- tions and abuses for the raising of them higher by a perpetual auction of the crown lands, so that none of his tenants uould be secure of possession, if any other would come and offer more ; by various iniquities in the court of exchequer, which was entirely Nor- man ; by forfeitures wrongfully taken ; and lastly, by arbitrary and illegal taxations, he drew into his treasury much too great a pro- portion of the wealth of his kingdom. It must, however, be owned, that if his avarice was insatiably and unjustly rapa- cious, it was not meanly parsimonious, nor of that sordid kind which brings on a prince dishonour and contempt. He supported the dignity of his crown with a decent magnifi- cence ; and though he never was lavish, he sometimes was liberal, especially to his soldiers and the church. But looking on money as a necessary means of maintaining and increasing power, he devised to accu- mulate as much as he could, rather, perhaps, from an ambitious than a covetous nature ; at least his avarice was subservient to his ambition, and he laid up wealth in his coffers, as he did arms in his magazines, to be drawn out, when any proper occasion required it, for the enlargement of his dominions. Upon the whole, he had many great qual- ities, but few virtues ; and if those actions that most particularly distinguish the man or the king are impartially considered, we shall find that in his character there is much to admire, but still more to abhor. History of the Life of King Henry the Second. JAMES HARRIS, M.P., born 1709, became a Lord of the Admiralty, 1762, Lord of the Treasury, 1763, Secretary and Comptroller to the Queen, 1774, and died 1780. This very learned Grecian was the author of Three Treatises: I. Art, II. Music, Painting, and Poetry, III. Happi- ness, Lond., 1744, etc., 8vo; Hermes, a Philosophical Inquiry concerning Language and Universal Grammar, Lond., 1750, etc., 8vo; The Spring, a Pastoral, 1762, 4to ; Philosophical Arrangements, Edin. and Lond., 1775, 8vo; Philological Enquiries. 180 JAMES HARRIS. Lond., 1780, 2 vols. 8vo, Part III., in French, Paris, 1789, 12ino. Works, with Account by his Son, the Earl of Malmes- bury, Lend., 1792, 5 vols. 8vo; again, 1801, 2 vols. 4to, and royal 4to, and 1803, 5 vols. 8vo; 1841, 8vo. " Those who would enter more fully into this iuVjeot [grammar] will find it fully and accurately bandied, with the greatest acuteness of investiga- tion, perspicuity of application, and elegance of method, in a treatise entitled Hermes, by J, Harris, Esq., the most beautiful and perfect example of analysis that has been exhibited since the days of Aristotle." — Bishop Lowth : Preface to his Eng- lish Grammar. But Home Tooke ridicules Hermes. English, Orient.il, Latin, and Greek Languages. We Britons in our time have been re- markable borrowers, as our multiform lan- guage may sufficiently shew. Our terms in polite literature prove that this came from Orreece ; our terms in music and painting, that these came from Italy ; our phrases in cookery and war, that we learnt these from the French ; and our phrases in navigation, that we were taught by the Flemings and Low Dutch. These many and very differ- ent sources of our language may be the cause why it is so deficient in regularity and analogy. Yet we have this advantage to compensate the defect, that what we want in elegance we gain in copiousness, in which last respect few languages will be found superior to our own. Let us pass from ourselves to the nations of the East. The Eastern world, from the earliest days, has been at all times the seat of enormous monarchy, on it.x natives fair liberty never shed its genial influence. If at any time civil discords arose among them (and arise there did innumerable), the con- test was never about the form of thoir gov- ernment (for this was an olijoot of which the combatants had no conception) ; it was nil from the poor motive of, who should bo their master ; whether a Cyrus or an Artax- er.xcH, a Mahninit or a iMustapha. Such wiis tlicir condition ; and what was the consiMiuoneoV — Thoir ideas lu-cnnio con- sonant to tlioir sorvilo state, and thoir words became consonant to their servile ideas. 'I'lie greiil distiiietion forever in their sight was that of tyninl and slave ; the most unnatural (iiK^ eiiiieeivable, and the most susceptible of Iiiuiip anil empty exiin';enuii)ii. Iloneo lliey talked of kings as fjods, iiiid of themsolvcs as the iiH'nnest and most alijeet reptiles. Nothing; was eitluT great or little in moder- ation, hut <'vei V sentiment was lieiL'hteneil by iniTi'dilile hyperliulo. Thus, thougli they •omotiiLies asoendod into the great and mag- nificent, they as frequently degenerated into the tumid and bombast. The Gree'ks too of Asia became infected by their neighbours, who were often, at times, not only their neighbours, but their masters ; and hence that luxuriance of the Asiatic style, un- known to the chaste eloquence and purity of Athens. . But of the Greeks we forbear to speak now, as we shall speak of them more fully when we have first considered the nature or genius of the Romans. And what sort of people may we pro- nounce the Romans ? — A nation engaged in wars and commotions, some foreign, some domestic, which for seven hundred years wholly engrossed their thoughts. Hence therefore their language became, like their ideas, copious in all terms expressive of things political, and well adapted to the purposes both of history and popular elo- quence. But what was their philosophy? — As a nation it was none, if we may credit their ablest writers. And hence the unfit- ness of their language to this subject ; a defect which even Cicero is compelled to confess, and more fully makes appear when he writes philosophy himself, from the number of terras which he is obliged to in- vent. Virgil seems to have judged the most truly of his countrymen when, admitting their inferiority in the more elegant arts, he concludes at last with his usual majcbty : Tu regere imperio popnlos, Romane, memento, (Hso tibi erunt artes) pacisque imponere morcm, Parcere subjectis, et debellare superbos. From considering the Romans, let us pass to the Greeks. The Grecian commonwealths, while they maintained their liberty, were the most heroic confederacy that ever existed. They were the politest, the bravest, and the wisest of men. In the short space of little more than a century they became such states- men, warriors, on\tors, historians, physi- cians, poets, critics, painters, sculptors, ar- chitects, and (last of all) philosophers, that one can hanily help consiuering that golden period as a providential event in honour of iuiman nature, to shew to what perfection the species mi^lit ascend. Now the language of these Greeks was truly like themselves; it was conformable to their trimseendent and universal genius. Where matter so abounded, words followed of ciiurse, and those exouisito in every kind, as the ideas for whicli they stt)od. And henic it followed there was not a subject to be found which could not with propriety bo expressed in Greek. llere were words nnd numbers for the humour of an Aristophanes; for the active eloi;nnco of a Philemon or Monander; for the amorous strains of a Mimnormus OJ SAMUEL JOHNSON. 181 Sappho ; for the rural lays of a Theocritus or Bion ; and fur the sublime conceptions of a Sophocles or Homer. The same in prose. Here Isocratea was enabled to display his art, in all the accuracy of periods and the nice counterpoise of diction. Here Demos- thenes found materials for that nervous composition, that manly force of unaffected eloquence, which rushed like a torrent, too impetuous to be withstood. Who were more different in exhibiting their philosophy than Xenophon, Plato, and his disciple Aristotle? Different, I say, in their character of composition ; for as to their philosophy itself, it was in reality the same. Aristotle, strict, methodic, and or- derly ; subtle in thought, sparing in orna- ment ; with little address to the passions or imagination; but exhibiting the whole with such a pregnant brevity that in every sen- tence we seem to read a page. How exqui- sitely is this all performed in Greek! Let those who imagine it may be done as well in another language, satisfy themselves, either by attempting to translate him, or by perusing his translations already made by men of learning. On the contrary, when we read either Xenophon or Plato, nothing of this method and strict order appears. The formal and didactic, is wholly dropt. Whatever they may teach, it is without pi-'ofessing to be teachers ; a train of dialogue and truly po- lite address, in which, as in a mirror, we behold human life adorned in all its colour's of sentiment and manners. And yet though these differ in this man- ner from the Stagyrite, how different are they likewise in character from each other ! — Plato, copious, figurative, and majestic: intermixing at times the facetious and sa- tiric ; enriching his works with tales and fables, and the mystic theology of ancient times. Xenophon, the pattern of perfect simplicity; everywhere smooth, harmonious, and pure; declining the figurative, the mar- vellous, and the mystic ; ascending but rarely into the sublime ; nor then so much trusting to the colours of style as to the intrinsic dig- nity of the sentiment itself. The language, in the mean time, in which he and Plato wrote appears to suit so accu- rately with tne style of both, that when we read either of the two, we cannot help think- ing that it is he alone who has hit its char- acter, and that it could not have appeared so elegant in any other manner. And this is the Greek tongue, from its propriety and universality made for all that IS great and all that is beautiful, in every subject and under every form of writing : Sraiis ingeniam Sraiis dedit ore rotiindo Husa loqui. SAMUEL JOHNSON, LL.D., one of the most eminent of English authors, was born in 1709, at Lichfield, where his father was a bookseller, studied at Pembroke College, Oxford, 1728 to 1731, and after an unsuccessful experiment of teaching school at Edial, near Lichfield, came to London in 1737, and from that year until his death, in 1784, may be considered as an author by profession. In 1762 a pension of £300, con- ferred ty George HI., placed him beyond the reach of want. Among his works are : Life of Kichard Savage, Lbnd., 1744, 8vo ; Vanity of Human Wishes, 1749 ; Irene, a Tragedy, Lond., 1749, 8vo ; The Rambler, Lond., 1750-52, 2 vols. fol. ; The Dictionary of the English Language, Lond., 1755, 2 vols, fol., last edit, by Todd and Latham, Lond., 1870, 4 vols. 4to; The Prince of Abyssinia [Rasselas], Lond., 1759, 2 vols. l8mo ; The Idler, Lond., 1761, 2 vols. 12mo ; Preface to his Edition of Shakspeare [Lond., 1765, 8 vols. 8vo], Lond., 1765, 8vo, new edit., Lond., 1858, 8vo; A Journey to the Western Islands of Scotland, Lond., 1775, 8vo ; The Lives of the Most Eminent Eng- lish Poets, with Critical Observations on their Works, Lond., 1779-81, 10 vols. 12mo (being Prefaces to Bell's Poets, 75 vols. 12rao). See Johnson's Works, Oxf., 1825, 11 vols. 8vo ; Poetical Works, Lond., 1785, cr. 8vo; Boswell's Life of Johnson, by broker, Lond., 1848, 8vo, or 10 vols. fp. 8vo. " Had Johnson left nothing but his Dictionary one might have traced there a great intellect, a genuine man. Looking to its clearness of defini- tion, its general solidify, honesty, insight, and successful method, it may be called the best of all Dictionaries. There is in it a kind of architec- tural nobleness; it stands there like a great solid square-built edifice, finished, symmetrically com- plete: you judge that a true Builder did it." — Garlyle : Hero- Worship. "Of the Prefaces to his own or other men's works, it is not necessary to speak in detail. The most ambitious is that to the Dictionary, which is powerfully written, but promises more than it per- forms, when it professes to give a history of the English language: for it does very little more than give a series of passages from the writings in the. Anglo-Saxon and English tongues of different ages. The Dictionary itself, with all its faults, still keeps its ground, and has bad no successor that could supplant it. . . . The Preface to his Shakspeare, -certainly, is far superior to liis other introductory discourses, both fuller of matter and more elaborate. His remarks on the great dra- matist are, generally speaking, sound and judi- cious; many of thetn may even, on a subject suffi- ciently hackneyed, be deemed original.'* — Lord Brougham : Men of Letters Time of Oeori/e III. " He was certainly unskilled in the knowledge of obsolete customs and expressions. His e.^cplana- tory notes, therefore, are, generally speaking, the most controvertible of any ; but no future editor 182 SAMUEL JOHNSON. vill discharge bis duty to the public who ahall omit a single sentence of this writer's masterly preface, or of his sound and tasteful characters of the text of Sbakspeare." — DoucB: lUiut, of Shakup.f Preface. " One of his most pleasing as well as most popu- lar works, The Lives of Ike BritUh Poeli, which he executed with a degree of critical force and talent which hns seldom been concentrated." — Sm Wal- ter Scott: Life of Samuel Johnson, "Johnson decided literary questions like a law- yer, not like a legislator. He nerer examined foundations where a point was already ruled. His whole code of criticism rested on pure assumption, for which he sometimes quoted a precedent or authority, but rarely troubled himself to give a reason drawn from the nature of things." — Lord Macadlait: Edin. Rev., Sept. 1831, and tn hit Eseaye, Lbxicoqrapht. It 18 the fate of those who toil at the lower employments of life to be rather driven by the fear of evil than attracted by the pros- pect of good ; to be exposed to censure with- out hope of praise ; to be disgraced by mis- carriage, or punished for neglect, where success would have been without applause, and diligence without reward. Among these unhappy mortals is the writer of dictionaries ; whom mankind have considered not as the pupil, but the slave of science, the pioneer of literature, doomed only to remove rubbish and clear obstruc- tions from the paths through which learning and genius press forward to conquest and glory, without bestowing a smile on the humble drudge that facilitates their pro- gress. Every other author may aspire to praise ; the lexicographer can only hope to escape reproach, and even this negative recompense has yet been granted to very few. [We venture to inquire — Who have been more commended for their labours than lexicographers 7— £;.jr. ; Du Cange, Iliokes, Raynouard, Somner, Suldas, Stephens, be- fore Johnson, Adelung, Bopp, the Grimms, Latham, Littre, Passow, Roquefort, Todd, Webster, Worcester, since Johnson? To what, next to Boswell's pages, does Johnson himself owe most of his reputation ? Un- doubtedly to his Dictionary. — S. X. A.] I have, notwithstanding this diaoourtige- meut, iittompted a dictionary of the Eii<;li8h language, which, while it was employed in the cultivati.m of every speoies of literature, has itself been hitherto noglei'tcil ; siiflbred to spread, unjcir the direction of chunoo, into wild oxuh(Miiiu'(i i resigned to the tyr- anny of tiiiio anil faehloii ; and exposed to the_ oorruptions of ignorance, and caprices of innovation. No book was ever turned from one lan- guage into aiiollicr without imparting some- thing of its native idiom j this is the most mischievous and comprehensive innovation ; single words may enter by thousands, and the fabric of the tongue continue the same ; but new phraseology changes much at once ; it alters not the single scones of the build- ing, but the order of the columns. If an academy should be established for the cul- tivation of our style — which 1, who can never wish to see dependence multiplied, hope the spirit of English liberty will hin- der or destroy — let them, instead of com- piling grammars and dictionaries, endeav- our, with all their influence, to stop the license of translators, whose idleness and ignorance, if it be suffered to proceed, will reduce us to babble a dialect of France. If the changes that we fe.ir be thus irre- sistible, what remains but to acquiesce with silence, a» in the other insurmountable dis- tresses of humanity. It remains that wn retard what we cannot repel, that we pal- liate what we cannot cure. Life may be lengthened by care, though death cannot be ultimately defeated ; tongues, like gov- ernments, have a natural tendency to de- generation : we have long preserved our constitution, let us make some struggles for our language. In hope of giving longevity to that which its own nature forbids to be immortal. I have devoted this book, the labour of years, to the honour of my country, that we may no longer yield the palm of philology, with- out a contest, to the nations of the conti- nent. The chief glory of every people arises from its authors : whether I shall add any- thing by my own writings to the reputation of English literature must be left to time: much of my life has been lost by the press- ure of disease ; much has been trifled away; much has afways been spent in provision for the day that was passim; over me ; but I shall not think ray omplovment useless or ig- noble, if by my assistaiieo," foreign nations and distant ages gain noooss tn tlie propagators of knowledge, and understand the teachers of truth ! if my labours afford light to the repos- itories of scieneo, and add celebrity to Bacon, to Hooker, to Milton, and to Boyle. When I am animated by this wish, I look with pleasure on my book, however defec- tive, and deliver it to the world with the spirit of a man that has endeavoured well. That it will immediately become popular, I have not promiscil to "myself: a few wild blunders and risil)le absurdities, from which no work of such niultinlioity was ever free, may for a time furnisl'i folly with laughter, and harden innoriinee into contempt; but useful dilineneo will -i* Ip-jt prevail, and there never can be wanting some who dis- tinjinish desert, who will consider that no dictionary of a living tongue ever ciui be SAMUEL JOHNSON. 183 perfect, since, while it is hastening to pub- lication, some words are budding and some falling away ; that a whole life cannot be spent upon syntax and etymology, and that even a whole life would not be sufficient ; that he whose design includes whatever lan- guage can express, must often speak of what he does not understand ; that a writer will sometimes be hurried by eagerness to the end, and sometimes faint with weariness under a task which Scalieer compares to the labours of the anvil and the mine ; that what is obvious is not always known, and what is known is not always present ; that sudden fits of inadvertency will surprise vigilance, slight avocations will reduce attention, and casual eclipses of the mind will darken learning ; and that the writer shall often in vain trace his memory at the moment of need for that which yesterday he knew with intuitive readiness, and which will ccme uncalled into his thoughts to-morrow. In this work, when it shall be found that much is omitted, let it not be forgotten that much likewise is performed ; and though no book was ever spared out of tenderness to the author, and the world is little solicitous to know whence proceeded the faults of that which it condemns, yet it may gratify curi- osity to inform it, that the English dictionary was written with little assistance of the learned, and without any patronage of the great ; not in the soft obscurities of retire- ment, or under the shelter of academic bowers, but amid inconvenience and dis- traction, in sickness and in sorrow. It may repress the triumph of malignant criticism to observe, that if our language is not here fully displayed, I have only failed in an at- tempt which no human powers have hith- erto completed. If the lexicons of ancient tongues, now immutably fixed, and com- prised in a few volumes, be yet, after the toil of successive ages, inadequate and de- lusive; if the aggregated knowledge and co-operating diligence of the Italian acade- micians did not secure them from the cen- sure of Beni ; if the embodied critics of France, when fifty years had been spent upon their work, were obliged to change its econ- omy, and give their second edition another form, I may surely be contented without the praise of perfection, which, if I could obtain in this gloom of solitude, what would it avail me ? I have protracted my work till most of those whom I wished to please have sunk into the grave, and success and mis- carriage are empty sounds. I therefore dismiss it with frigid tranquillity, having little to fear or hope frorn censure or from praise. From the Preface to The Bietionary of the English Langitage. Shakespeare. Shakespeare is, above all writers, at least above all modern writers, the poet of nature ; the poet that holds up to his readers a faith- ful mirror of manners and of life. His char- acters are not modified by the customs of particular places, unpractised by the rest of the world ; by the peculiarities of studies or professions, which can operate but upon small numbers ; or by the accidents of tran- sient fashions or temporary opinions : they are the genuine progeny of common human- ity, such as the world will always supply, and observation will always find. His per- sons act and think by the influence of those general passions and principles by which all minds are agitated, and the whole system of life is continued in motion. In the writings of other poets a character is too often an individual ; in those of Shakespeare it is commonly 9 species. It is from this wide extension of design that so much instruction is derived. It is this which fills the plays of Shakespeare with practical axioms and domestic wisdom. It was said of Euripides that every verse was a precept j.and it may be said of Shake- speare that-from his works mayie collected a system of civil and oeconomical prudence. Yet his real power is not shown in the splendour of particular passages, but by the progress of his fable and the tenour of his dialogue ; and he that tries to recommend him by select quotations will succeed like the pedant in Hierooles, who, when he offered his house to sale, carried a brick in his pocket as a specimen. It will not easily be imagined how much Shakespeare excels in accommodating his sentiments to real life, but by comparing him with other authors. It was observed of the ancient schools of declamation, that the more diligently they were frequented the more was the student disqualified for the world, because he found nothing there 'which he should ever meet in any other place. The same remark maybe applied to evei-y stage but that of Shakespeare. The theatre, when it is under any other direc- tion, is peopled by such characters as were never seen, conversing in a language which was never heard, upon topics which will never arise in the commerce of mankind. But the dialogue of this author is often so evidently determined by the incident which produces it, and is pursued with so much ease and simplicity, that it seems scarcely to claim the merit of fiction, but to have been gleaned by diligent selection out of common conversation and common occurrences. Upon every other stage the universal agent is love, by whose power all good ani evil is 184 SAMUEL JOHNSON. distributed, and every action quickened or retarded. To bring a lover, a lady, and a rival into the fable ; to entanjjle them in contradictory obligations, perplex thera with oppositions of interest, and harass them with violence of desires inconsistent with each other; to make them meet in rapture, and part in agony ; to fill their mouths with hy- perbolical joy and outrageous sorrow ; to distress them as nothing human ever was dis- tressed; to deliver them as nothing human ever was delivered ; is the business of a modern dramatist. For this, probability is violated, life is misrepresented, and language is depraved. But love is only one of many passions; and as it has no greater influence upon the sum of life, it has little operation in the dramas of a poet who caught his ideas from the living world, and exhibited only what he saw before him. He knew that any other passion, as it was regular or exor- bitant, was a cause of happiness pr calamity. Characters thus ample and general were not easily discriminated and preserved ; yet perhaps no poet ever kept his personages more distinct from each other. I will not say with Pope, that every speech may bo as- signed to the proper speaker, because many speeches there are winch have nothing ohar- acteristical : but, perhaps, though some may be equally adapted to every person, it will be difficult to find any that can be' properly transferred from the present pussessor to another claimant. The choice is right, when there is reason for choice. Other dramatists can only gain attention by hyperbolical or aggravated characters, by fabulous and unexampled excellence or de- pravity, as the writers of barbarous romances invigorated the reader by a giant and a dwarf; and ne that should form his expectations of human affairs from the play, or from the tale, would be equally deceived. Shakespeare has no heroes; his scenes dre occupied only by men who act and spoak as the reader thinks that he should himself have spoken or acted on the same ooonsion : even whore the agency is supornatural, the dialogue is level with life. Other writers disguise the ni(wt natural passions and most frequent incidpiits ; so that ho who oontem- plates lliciu in the liook will nut knowthoin in the world : Sliakespoure approximates the re- mote, anil fainiliarizcB the wonderful : tlio event which he ropresentN will not happen ; but, if it wore ]i(issiblo, its effeets would probably bo sui'h as he has assigned ; and it may bo said that ho has not only shown hunuin nature as it acts in real oxigeiieies, but as it would lie found in trials to which it cannot bo exposed. This therefore is the praise of Shakespeare : that his drama is the mirror of life ; that ho who has luazed his imagination, in following the ph.intoms which other writers raise up before him, may here be cured of his deliri- ous ecstacies, by readin$r human sentiments in human language, by scenes from which a hermit may estimate the transactions of the world, and a confessor predict the progress of the passions. His adherence to general nature has ex- posed him to the censure of critics who form their judgments upon narrower prin- ciples. Dennis and Kymer think his Romans not sufficiently Koman ; and Voltaire cen- sures his kings as not completely royal. Dennis is offended that Menenius, a senator of Rome, should play the buffoon ; and Vol- taire perhaps thinks decency violated when the Danish usurper is represented as a drunkard. But Shakespeare always makes nature predominate over accident ; and if he preserves the essential character is not very careful of distinctions superinduced and ad- ventitious. His story requires Romans or Kings, but he thinks only on men. He knew that Rome, like every other city, had men of all dispositions ; and wanting a buf- foon, he went into the senate-house for that which the senate-house would certainly have afforded him. He was inclined to show an usurper and a murderer not only odious but despicable; he therefore added drunkenness to his other qualities, knowing that kinjjs love wine like other men, and that wine exerts its natural power over kings. These are the petty cavils of petty minds : a poet overlooks the casual distinction of country and condition, as a painter, satisfied with the figure, neglects the drapery. The censure which ne has incurred by mixing comic and tragic scenes, as it extends to all his works, deserves more considera- tion. Let the fact be first stated, and then examined. Shakespeare's plays are not, in the rigor- ous and critical sense, either tragedies or comedies, but compositions of a distinct kind : exhibiting the real state of sublunary nature, which partakes of good and evil, joy and sorrow, mingled with endloss va- riety of proportion, and innumerable modes of combination ; and expressing the course of the world, in which the loss of one is the gain of another : in whioh, at the same time, the rovotlor is hastening to his wine, and the mourner burying his friend: in which the malignity of nno is sometimes defeated by the IVolic of another; and many mischiefs' and many benefits are done and hindered without design. Out of this chaos of mingled purposes and casualties the ancient poets, according to the laws which custom had proscribed, selected some the crimes of men, and some SAMUEL JOHNSON. 185 their absurdities ; some the momentous vicis- situdes of life, and some the lighter occur- rences ; some the terrors of distress, and some the gaieties of prosperity. Thus rose the two modes of imitation, known by the names of tragedy and comedy, compositions intended to promote different ends by contrary means, and considered as so little allied, that I do not recollect among the Greeks or Romans a sinp;le writer who attempted both. Shakespeare has united the powers of ex- citing laughter and sorrow, not only in one mind, but in one composition. Almost all his plays are divided between serious and ludicrous characters ; and in the successive evolutions of the design, sometimes produce seriousness and sorrow, and sometimes levity and laughter. That this is a practice contrary to the rules of criticism will be readily allowed ; but there is always an appeal open from criticism to nature. The end of writing is to instruct ; the end of poetry is to instruct by pleasing. That the mingled drama may convey all the instruction of tragedy or comedy cannot be denied, because it in- cludes both in its alternations of exhibi- tion, and approaches nearer than either to the appearance of life, by showing how great machinations and slender designs may pro- mote or obviate one another, and the high and low co-operate in the general system by unavoidable concatenation. It is objected, that by this change of scenes the passions are interrupted in their progression, and that the principal event, being not advanced by a due graduation of preparatory incidents, wants at least the power to move, which con- stitutes the perfection of dramatic poetry. This reasoning is so specious that it is re- ceived as true even by those who in daily experience feel it to be false. The inter- changes of mingled scenes seldom fail to produce the intended vicissitudes of passion. Fiction cannot move so much but that the attention may be easily transferred ; and though it must be allowed that pleasing melancholy be sometimes interrupted by un- welcome levity, yet let it be considered that melancholy is often not pleasing, and that the disturbance of one man may be the re- lief of another ; that different auditors have different habitudes; and that upon the whole, sU pleasure consists in variety. Preface to Johnson's edition of Shake- speare, 1765. Pope's Translation op Homer. The train of my disquisition has now con- ducted me to that poetical wonder, the trans- lation of the " Iliad" ; a performance which no age nor nation can pretend to equal. To the Greeks translation was almost unit nown ; it was totally unknown to the inhabitants of Greece. They had no resource to the bar- barians for poetical beauties, but sought for everything in Homer, where, indeed, there is but little which they might not find. The Italians have been very diligent translators ; but I can hear of no version, unless perhaps Anguillara's Ovid may be excepted, which is read with eagerness. The Iliad of Sal- vini every reader may discover to be punc- tiliously exact ; but it seems to be the work of a linguist skilfully pedantic ; and his countrymen, the proper judges of its power to please, reject it with disgust. Their pre- decessors, the Romans, have left some speci- mens of translation behind them, and that employment must have had some credit in which Tully and Germanicus engaged ; but unless we suppose, what is perhaps true, that the plays of Terence were versions of Me- nander, nothing translated seems ever to have risen to high reputation. The French, in the meridian hour of their learning, were very laudably industrious to enrich their own language with the wisdom of the ancients ; but found themselves reduced, by whatever necessity, to turn the Greek and Roman poetry into prose. Whoever could read an author could translate him. From such rivals little can be feared. The chjef help of Pdpe in this audacious undertaking was drawn from the versions of Dryden. Virgil had borrowed much of his imagery from Homer ; and part of the debt was now paid back by the translator. Popo searched the pages of Dryden for happy combinations of heroic diction ; but it will not be denied that he added much to what he found. He cultivated our language with so much diligence and art that he has left in his "Homer" a treasure of poetical ele- gancies to posterity. His version may be said to have tuned the English tongue ; for since its appeUrance no writer, however de- ficient in other powers, has wanted melody. Such a series of lines, so elaborately cor- rected, and so sweetly modulated, took pos- session of the public ear : the vulgar was enamoured of the poem, and the learned wondered at the translation. But in the most general applause discordant voices will always be heard. It has been objected by some, who wish to be numbered among the sons of learning, that Pope's version of Homer is not Homerical; that it exhibits no resemblance of the original and char acteristic manner of the Father of Poetry, as it wants his artless grandeur, his unaf- fected majesty. [Bentley was one of these. He and Pope soon after the publication of Homer, met at Dr. Mead's at dinner ; when Pope, desirous of his opinion of the translation, addressed 180 THOMAS REID. him thus : " Dr. Bentley, I ordered my book- seller to send you your books : I hope you received them." Bentley, who had purposely avoided saying anything about Homer, pre- tended not to understand him, and asked, "'Books! books!' what books?" "My Homer," replied Pope, '• vrhich you did me the honour to subscribe for." "Oh," said Bentley, " ay, now I recollect — your trans- lation : It is a pretty poem, Mr. Pope : but you must not call it Homer."] This cannot be totally denied : but it must b^ remembered that necesaitas quod cogit de- fendit : that may be lawfully done which cannot be forborne. Time and place will always enforce regard. In estimating this translation consideration must be had of the nature of our language, the form of our metre, and, above all, of the change which two thousand years have made in the modes of life and the habits of thought. Virgil wrote in a language of the same general fiibric with that of Homer, in verses of the same measure, and in nge nearer to Homer's time by eighteen hundred years ; yet he found, even then, the state of the world so much altered, and the demand for elegance so much increased, that more nature would be etidured no longer; and perhaps, in the multitude of borrowed passages, very few can be shown which he has not embellished. Lives of the Most Eminent English Poets : I'ope. THOMAS REID, D.D., born 1710. was presented to the living of New JIachar, Aberdeenshire, 1737, was Pro- fessor of Moral Philosophy in King's Col- lege, Aberdeen, 1752 to 17«l, and died 1796. His best known works are Essays on the In- tellectual Powers of Man, Edin.,1785,4to, and Essays on the Active Powers of Man, Edin., 178H, 4to ; both, Dubl., 1790, 3 vols. 8vo, and other editions. Sir William Hamilton pul>- lishoil a portion of Reid'.s Writings, Lond. and Edin., 1846, 8vo, pp. 914, 5th edit., 1858, 8vo, not completed in that shape, but super- seded by The Works of Thomas Hold, D.D., now fully coll.'ctO(l,otc.,6th edit., Edin., 18C3, 2 voIh. 8vo, pp. xxiii. 1034, 3(l.«. ; Supplement- iirv I'liit, to complete former Editions, 1863, 8vu, 'm. " Thi' Rroat aim of RoUl's philoaophy, tlion, w«« )<> invoBtigato the true theory of porooplion ; to cuntrovort tlio rcprosontntiontilirtt hypothonis, i\8 luilil in one bodho or anotiior by nlinoBt ail pro- (•iilirijf piiiIoBa]iliorK; and lo «tiiy tlio progrvM «liiiili Boi'|>tii'iMii, ftiilod by lhi» liyiMithrBij, wns lO rnplilly making. . . . That lt.>i.l has done inuoii for tliu lulviLiU'oiiieiit of inonUki Hcionoo is aimottt univorsaliy ailmillcii : to complain that ho did not aocomnliBh more, or follow out the tmok which ho optnod to ill furthot reBuIta, iaporliapa uarouauu- able ; eince we ought rather to look for the com- pletion of bis labours from the ban ia of bis fol- lowers, than demand from himself at once the foundation and the auperstnicture." — Morbll : Hitt. of Mod. Philo:, 2d edit., Lond., 1847, i. 281- 295. See also 65, 128-132; ii. 3-5, 50, 69. . " Thomas Reid, a sincere inquirer ifter truth, who maintained the existence of certain principles of knowledge, independent of experience, and treated moral philosophy as the science of the human mind, allowing it, however, no other foundation than that of Common Sense, or a species of Intellectual Instinct." — TsHHEViLiiii : Manual of The Hitt. of Philo:, trans, by Johnso:;. Oxf., 1832, 382. Knowledge of the Mind axd its Fac ULTIES. Since we ought to pay no regard to hypothesis, and to be very suspicious of analogical reasoning, it may be asked, from what source must the knowledge of the mind and its faculties be drawn ? I answer, the chief and proper source of this branch of knowledge ia accurate reflec- tion upon the operations of our own minds. Of this source we shall speak more fully after making some remarks upon two others that may be subservient to it. The first of them is attention to the structure of lan- guage. The language of mankind is ex- pressive of their thoughts, and of the various operations of their minds. The various operations of the understanding, will, and passions, which are common to mankin>l, nave various forms of speech corresponding to them in all languages, which are the signs of them, and by which they are expressed: and a due attention to the signs may, in many cases, give considerable light to the things signified by them. There are in all languages modes of speech by which men signify their judgment, or give their testimony ; by which they accept or refuse ; by which they ask information or advice ; by which they command, or threaten, or supplicate ; by which they plight their faith in promises or contracts. If such operation.'' were not common to mankind, wo should not find in all languages forma of speech by which they are expressed. All languages, indeed, have their imper- fei'tions, — they can never be adequate to all the varieties of bunmn thought ; and there- fore things may bo really distinct in their nature, and capable of being distinguished by the human mind, which are not distin- guished in common language. We can only oxpeot in the structure of languages those distinctions which nil mankind in the com- mon business of life have occasion to maki\ There may be peculiarities in a particular language of the causo.s of which we a'e ignorant, and from which, therefore, we can WILLIAM MELMOTH. \m draw no conclusion. But whatever we find common to all languages must have a com- mon cause ; must be owinf; to some common notion or sentiment of the human mind. We gave some examples of this before, and shall here add another. All languages have a plural number in many of their nouns; from which we may infer that all men have no- tions, not of individual things only, but of attributes, or things which are common to many individuals ; for no individual can have a plural number. Another source of information in this sub- ject, is a due attention to the course of human actions and conduct. The actions of men are effects ; their sentiments, their passions, and their affections are the causes of those effects ; and we may, in many cases, form a j udgment of the cause from the effect. The behaviour of parents towards their chil- dren gives sufficient evidence even to those who never had children, that the parental affection is common to mankind. It is easy to see from the general conduct of men what are the natural objects of their esteem, their admiration, their love, their approbation, their resentment, and of all their other original dispositions. It is obvious, from the conduct of all men in all ages, that man is by his nature a social animal ; that he delights to associate with his species ; to converse, and to exchange good offices with them. Not only the actions but even the opin- ions of men may sometimes give light into the frame of the human mind. The opin- ions of men may be considered as the effects of their intellectual powers, as their actions are the effects of their active principles. Even the prejudices and errors of mankind, when they are general, must have some cause no less general ; the discovery of which will throw some light upon the frame of the human understanding. Essaya on the Intellectual and Active Powers of Man, Essay I. Ch. v. "WILLIAM MELMOTH, born 1710, a Commissioner of Bankruptcy, 1756, died 1790, published a Translation of the Letters of Pliny the Consul, with Occa- sional Remarks, Lond., 1746. 2 vols. 8vo ; re- printed in 2 vols. 8vo in 1747, '48, '57, '70, '86, '96, 1807 ; Translations of the Letters of Cicero to several of his Friends, with Re- marks, 1753, 3 vols. 8vo; reprinted in 3 vols. 8vo, 1778 and '79, and in 2 vols. 8vo, 1814; Translation of Cato ; or. An Essay upon Old Age, and Laelius, or An Essay on Friend- ship, with Remarks, 1773-77, 2 vols. 8vo (the Cato was reprinted 1777, '85, 8vo, the Lselius, 1785, 8vo) ; some poems, and Letters [74] on Several Subjects, by Sir Thomas Htz- osborne [William Melmoth], 1740, 8vo, 14th edit., 1814, 8vo ; Boston, Mass., 1805, 8vo. See Memoirs of a late Eminent Advocate [Wm. Melmoth, K.C] and Bencher, etc., iond., 1796, 8vo, pp. 72. " His Translations of Cicero and Pliny will speak for him while Roman and English eloquence can be united." — Mathias: /^jr«m'(«o/Z»(., 1797,edit. 1812, roy. 4to, 300, n. " A translation [of Pliny] supposed to equal the original both in beauty and tone." — Dn. Abak Clabke. "One of the few translations that are better than the original." — Dk. Wakton, in a note on Pope' a works. Reflections upon Style. The beauties of style seem to be generally considered as below the attention both of an author and a reader. I know not, therefore, whether I may venture to acknowledge, that among the numberless graces of your late performance, I particularly admired that strength and elegance with which you have enforced and adorned the noblest senti- ments. There was a time, however (and it was a period of the truest refinements), when an excellence of this kind was esteemed in the number of the politest accomplishments ; as it was the ambition of some of the greatest names of antiquity to distinguish themselves in the improvement of their native tongue. Julius Caesar, who was not only the greatest hero, but the finest gentleman, that ever per- haps appeared in the world, was desirous of adding this talent to his other most shining endowments : and we are told he studied the language of his country with much applica- tion : as we are sure he possessed it in its highest elegance. What a loss, Euphronius, is it to the literary world that the treatise which he wrote upon this subject is perished, with many other valuable works of that age ! But though we are deprived of the benefit of his observations, we are happily not with- out an instance 6f their effects ; and his own memoirs will ever remain as the best and brightest examplar, not only of true gen- eralship, but of fine writing. lie published them, indeed, only as materials for the use of those who should be disposed to enlarge upon that remarkable period of the Roman story ; yet the purity and gracefulness of his style were such that no judicious writei durst attempt to touch the subject aftei him. Having produced so illustrious an in- stance in favour of an art for which I have ventured to admire you, it would be imper- tinent to add a second, were I to cite a less 188 WILLIAM MELMOTH. authority than that of the immortal Tully. This noble author, in his dialogue concern- ing the celebrated Roman orators, frequently mentions it as a very high encomium, that they possessed the elegance of their native language ; and introduces Brutus as declar- ing that he should prefer the honour of being esteemed the great master and im- prover of Roman eloquence, even to the glory of many triumphs. But to add reason to precedent, and to view this art in its use as well as its dig- nity : vfill it not be allowed of some impor- tance, when it is considered that eloquence is one of the most cotsiderable auxiliaries of_ truth? Nothing, indeed, contributes more to subdue the mfind to the force of reason than her being supported by the powerful assistance of masculine and vigorous ora- tory. As, on the contrary, the most legit- imate arguments may be disappointed of that science they deserve by being attended with a spiritless and enfeebled expression. Accordingly, that most elegant of writers, the inimitable Mr. Addison, observes, in one of his essays, that "There is as much difference between comprehending a thought clothed in Cicero's language and that of an ordinary writer, as between seeing an ob- ject by the light of a taper and the light of the sun." It is surely then a very strange conceit of the celebrated Malebranche, who seems to think the pleasure which arises from perus- ing a well-written piece is of the criminal kind, and has its source in the weakness and effeminacy of the human heart. A man must have a very uncommon severity of temper indeed who can find anything to condemn in adding charms to truth, and gaining the heart by captivating the ear ; in uniting roses with the thorns of science, and joining pleasure with instruction. The truth is, the mind is delighted with a fine style upon the same principle that it prefers regularity to confusion, and beauty to deformity. A taste of this sort is indeed go far from being a mark of any depravity of our nature, that I shduld rather consider It aa evidence, in some degree, of the moral rectitude of its eiiiiBtitiition, as it is a proof of its retaining some relish at least of har- mony and order. One inij;ht he apt indeed to su.speet that eortiyn writers iirnoiigHt us had considered all beauties of this sort in the same gloomy view with Miileliranelie : or, at least, that they avoided every rormeiiu lit in style as unworthy a lover of truth and philosophy. Their seiilinieiits are sunk by tho lowest expressions, and seem eomleiiined to the first eurso of iree|iing upon tlie ground all tho d lys of their life. Others, on tho eoii- trary, mistake pomp for dignity; and, in order to raise their expressions above vul- gar language, lift them up beyond common apprehensions, esteeming it (one should imagine) a mark of their genius that it re- quires some ingenuity to penetrate their meaning. But how few writers, like Euphronius, know how to hit that true medium which lies between those distant extremes I How seldom do we meet with an author whose ex- pressions, like those of my friend, are glow- ing but not glaring, whose metaphors are natural but not common, whose periods are harmonious but not poetical : in a word, whose sentiments are well set, and shown to the understanding in their truest and most advantageous lustre. Fitzosbome't Letters. Os THE Lots of Fake. I can by no means agree with you in think- ing that the love of fame is a passion which eitner reason or religion condemns. I con- fess, indeed, there are some who have repre- sented it as inconsistent with both ; and I remember, in particular, the excellent author of The Religion of Nature Delineated has treated it as highly irrational and absurd. As the passage falls in so thoroughly with your own turn of thought, you will have no objection, I imagine, to my quoting it at large, and I give it you, at the same time, as a very great authority on your side. " In reality," siiys that writer, '"the man is not known ever the more to posterity because his name is transmitted to them: he doth not live lieeause his name does. AVhen it is said Julius Ca'sar subdued Gaul, conquered Pompey, Jke., it is the same thing i\s to say. The conqueror of Pompey was Julius Csesar, I.e., Caesar and the conqueror of Pompey is the same thing; Caesar is as much known by one designation as by the other. The amount then is only this : that the conqueror of Pompey eonnucred Ponipoy ; or, rather, sinee Pompey is as little known now as C»sar, somebody conquered somebody. Such a poor business is this l«>asted immortality ! and sneh is the thing oalleil glory among us I To discerning men this fame is mere air; and what they despise, if not .shun." But surely ■' 'Twero to consider too curi- oualy," as Horatio says to Hamlet, "to con- sider thus." For though fiiiiie witli postoritv should be. in the strict analysis of it, no other than that what is here desoribed, a mere un- interesting proposition amounting to nothing more than that somobody acted meritori- ously, yet it would not neoessarilv follow that true philosophy would banish the de- sire of it from the human breast. Fur thi« I) AVID HUMjJ. 189 passion may be (as most . certainly it is) wisely implanted in our species, notwith- standing the corresponding object should in reality be very different from what it appears in imagination. Do not many of our most refined and even contemplative pleasures owe their existence to oar mistakes? It is but extending (I will not say improving) some of our senses to a higher degree of acuteness than we now possess them, to make the fairest views of nature, or the noblest productions of art, appear horrid and deformed. To see things as they truly and in themselves are, would not always, perhaps, be of advantage to us in the intel- lectual world, any more than in the natural. But, after all, who shall certainly assure us that the pleasure of virtuous fame dies with its possessor, and reaches not to a farther scene of existence? There is nothing, it should seem, either absurd or unphilosophi- cal in supposing it possible, at least, that the praises of the good and the judicious, that sweetest music to an honest ear in this world, may be echoed back to the mansions of the next: that the poet's description of fame may be literally true, and though she walks upon earth, she may yet lift her head into heaven. But can it be reasonable to extinguish a passion which nature has universally lighted up in the human breast, and which we con- stantly find to burn with most strength and brightness in the noblest and best formed bosoms? Accordingly, revelation is so far from endeavouring (as you suppose) to erad- icate the seed which nature has thus deeply planted, that she rather seems, on the con- trary, to cherish and forward its growth. To be exalted, with honour, and to be had in everlasting remembrance, are in the number of those encouragements which the Jewish dispensation offered to the virtuous ; as the person from whom the sacred author of the Christian system received his birth, is her- self represented as rejoicing that all genera- tions should call her blessed. To be convinced of the great advantage of cherishing this high regard to posterity, this noble desire of an after-life in the breath of others, one need only look back upon the history of the ancient Greeks and Bomans. What other principle was it which produced that exalted strain of virtue in those days, that may well serve as a model to these ; Was it not the consentiens laus bonorum, the incorrupta vox bene judicanium (as Tully calls it), the concurrent approbation of the good, the uncorrupted applause of the wise, that animated their most generous pursuits ? To confess the truth, I have been ever in- clined to think it a very dangerous attempt to endeavour to attempt to lessen the motives of right conduct, or to raise any suspicion con- cerning their solidity. The temper and-dispo- sitions of mankind are so extremely difierent that it seems necessary they should be called into action by a variety of incitements. Thus, while some are willing to wed virtue for her personal charms, others are engaged to take her for the sake of her expected dowry, and since her followers and admirers have so little hopes from her in present, it were pity, methinks, to reason them out of any imagined advantage in reversion. Fitzosborne' s Letters. DAVID HUME, born in Edinburgh, 1711, after unsatisfac- tory experiences of. the study of law and commerce, came to London in 1737, and published his Treatise of Human Nature, Lond., 1739, 3 vols. 8vo ; Essays, Moral and Political, and Dialogues concerning Natural Beligion, 1741-42-51-52-57, 5 vols. 12mo ; Essays and Treatises, 3d edit., 1756, 4 vols. 12mo ; other Essays (see his Philosophical Works, now first collected, Edin., 1826, 4 vols. 8vo, with Additions, Boston, Mass., 1854, 4 vols. 8vo) ; and his History of Eng- land, Lond., 1754-62, 6 vols. 4to; many edi- tions. See his Life and Writings by T. E. Ritchie, Lond., 1807, 8vo ; Life and Corre spondence, edited by J. H. Burton, Edin., 1847, 2 vols. 8vo ; Letters of Eminent Per- sons to David Ilume, Edin., 1849, 8vo. " It was in his twenty-seventh year that Mr. Hume published at London the Treatise of Human Nature, the first systematic attaclc on all the prin- ciples of knowledge and belief, and the most for- midable, if universal scepticism could ever be more than a mere exercise of ingenuity. . . . The great speculator did not in this worlc amuse him- self, like Bayle, with dialectical exercises, which only inspire a disposition towards doubt, by show- ing in detail the uncertainty of most opinions. He aimed at proving, not that nothing was known, but that nothing could be known, — from the struc- ture of the understanding to demonstrate that we are doomed forever to dwell in absolute and uni- versal ignorance." — Sir James Mackintosh : Dia- eert. on the Progress of Ethical PhiloB., prefixed to Encyc. Brit.y also in his Miecell. Works. " [Hume's] Essays on Commerce, Interest, Bal- ance of Trade, Money, Jealousy of Trade, and Public Credit, display the same felicity of style and illustration that distinguish the other works of their celebrated author." — J. R. McCuLLOCiI : Lit. of Polit. Eeon., Lond., 1845, Svo. As an historian Hume's carelessness and inaccuracy are notorious : " Hume was not, indeed, learned and well- grounded enough for those writers and investiga- tors of history who judged his works from the usual point of view, because he was not only neg- ligent in the use of the sources of history, but also 190 DAVID HUME. anperfici&l." — Schlosser's Hitl. of the 18(4 Cent., Davignn'g trana., Lond., 1844, ii. 78. " Hume is convicted [by Mr. Brodie] of so many tnaocuracies and partial statementB, that we really think his credit among historians for correctness of assertion will soon be nearly as low as it has long been with theologians for orthodoxy of belief." — i'iiiii. Rev., xi. 92-146 : remeto of Biodie. " The conversation now turned upon Mr. David Hume's style. Johnson : ' Why, sir, his style is not English; the structure of his sentences Is French. Now, the French structure and the Eng- lish structure may in the nature of things be equally good. But if you allow that the English language is established, he is wrong. My name might originally have been Kichoison as well as Johnson ; but were you to call me Nicholson now, you would call me very absurdly.' " — Boswell's Johnson, edit. 1847, 150. " The perfect composition, the nervous lan- guage, the well-turned periods of Dr. Robertson, inflamed me to the ambitious hope that 1 might one day tread in his footsteps: the calm philoso- phy, the careless inimitable beauties of his friend and rival often forced me to close the volume with a mixed sensation of delight and despair." — Gib- bon : A ntobiography, in hia Mitcelt. Works. Character of Alfred, Kino of England. The merit of this prince, both in public and private life, may with advantage be set in opposition to that of any monarch or citizen which the annals of any age or nation can present to us. He seems, in- deed, to be the complete model of that per- fect character whicn, under the denomina- tion of a sage or wise man, the philosophers have been fond of delineating, rather as a fiction of their imagination, tlian in hopes of ever seeing it reduced to practice : so happily were all his virtues tempered to- gether, so justly were they blended, and so powerfully did each prevent the other from exceeding its proper bounds. He knew how to conciliate the most enterprising spirit with the coolest moderation ; the most ob- stinate perseverance with the ea.siest flexi- bility ; the most severe justice with the greatest lenity ; the greatest rigour in com- mand with the greatest affability of deport- ment j the highest capacity and inclination for science with the most shining talents for action. Ilis civil and his military virtues arc almost pfiually the olijects of our admiration, excepting only, that tlio former being moi'O rare iiini)ng princes, as well as moro use- ful, sooni chinlly to ohallongo our applaiisi-. Nature, also, as if desirous that so bright a rodu(Uion of her skill should bo set in the aircst light, hml bestowed on him all bodily aocomplishniontH,— vigour of limbs, dignity of Bhii|io and air, and a pK-asaiit, engaging, iind open oountenaiioc. Fortiiiio alone, by throwing liini into that barbarous ago, do- -rivod him of histurians worthy to triiiismit is fanio to posterity ; and wo wish to see him delino'itoil in more lively colours, and F„ I with more particular strokes, that we may at least perceive some of those small s])eclu and blemishes from which, as a man, it is impossible he should be entirely exempted. Uistory of England. Chaeacteb of Henrt Vin. It is difficult to give a just summitry of this prince's qualities ; he was- so different from himself in different parts of his reign, that, as is well remarked by Lord Herbert, his history is his best character and descrip- tion. The absolute and uncontrouled author- ity which he maintained at home, and the regard he obtained among foreign nations, are circumstances which entitle him to the appellation of a great prince ; while his tyranny and cruelty seem to exclude him from the character of a good one. He possessed, indeed, great vigour of mind, which qualified him for exercising dominion over men : courage, intrepidity, vigilance, inflexibility : and though these qualities lay not always under the guidance of a regular and solid judgment, they were accompanied with good parts and an exten- sive capacity ; and every one dreaded a con- test with a man who was never known to yield or to forgive; and who in every con- troversy was determined to ruin himself or his antagonist. A catalogue of his vice.s would compre- hend many of the worst qualities incident to human nature : violence, cruelty, profu- sion, rapacity, injustice, obstinaov, arro- gance, bigotry, presumption, caprice: but neither was he subject ro all these vices in the most extreme degree, nor was he at intervals altogether devoid of virtues. He was sincere, open, gallant, liberal, and capable at least of a temporary friendship and attAchnient. In this respect he was unfortunate, that the incidents of his times served to display his faults in their full light: the treatment he met with from the court of Ituine provoked him to violence; the danger of a revolt from his superstitious subjects seemed to require the most extreme severity. But it must at the same time l>c acknowledged that his situation tended to throw an additional lustre on what was great and magnanimous in his eharacter. The emnlntiou between the Kmperor and the French King rendered his allianee, not- withstanding his impolitic conduct, of groat importance to Europe. The extensive powers of his prerogative, and the submission, not to sny slavish disposition of his parliament, made it more easy for him to assume and maintain that entire dominion by which his roign is so nuieli distinguished in English history. It may seem a little extraordinary tliot DAVID HUME. 191 notwithstanding his cruelty, his extortion, his violence, his arbitrary administration, this prince not only acquired the regard of his subjects, but never was the object of their hatred : he seems even, in some degree, to have possessed their love and affection. His exterior qualities were advantageous, and fit to captivate the multitude ; his magnificence and personal bravery rendered him illustri- ous to vulgar eyes ; and it may be said with truth, that the English in that age were so thoroughly subdued that, like eastern slaves, they were inclined to admire even those acts of violence and tyranny which were exer- cised over themselves, and at their own ex- pense. History of England. Character of Queen Elizabeth. Some incidents happened which revived her tenderness for Essex, and filled her with the deepest sorrow for the consent which she had unwarily given to his execution. The Earl of Essex, after his return from the fortunate expedition against Cadiz, ob- serving the increase of the queen's fond attachment towards him, took occasion to regret that the necessity of the service, re- quired him often to be absent from her per- son, and exposed him to all those ill offices which his enemies, more assiduous in their attendance, could employ against him. She was moved with this tender jealousy; and making him the present of a ring, desired him to keep that pledge of her affection, and assured him that into whatever disgrace he should fall, whatever prejudices she might be induced to entertain against him, yet if he sent her that ring, she would immediately upon sight of it recall her former tenderness, would afford him a patient hearing, and would lend a favourable ear to his apology. Essex, notwithstanding all his misfortunes, reserved this precious gift to the last ex- tremity ; but after his trial and condemna- tion he resolved to try the experiment, and he committed the ring to the Countess of Nottingham, whom he desired to deliver it to the queen. The countess was prevailed on by her husband, the mortal enemy of Essex, not to execute the commission ; and Elizabeth, who still expected that her fa- vourite would make this last appeal to her tenderness, and wl^o ascribed the neglect of it to his invincible obstinacy, was, after much delay and many internal combats, pushed by resentment and policy to sign the warrant for his execution. The Countess of Notting- ham falling into sickness, and affected with the near approach of death, was seized with remorse for her conduct ; and having ob- tained a visit from the queen, she craved her pardon, and revealed to her the fatal secret. The queen, astonished with this in- cident, burst into a furious passion : she shook the dying countess in herbed; and crying to her that God might pardon .her, but she never could, she broke from her, and thenceforth resigned herself over to the deepest and most incurable melancholy. She rejected all consolation ; she even refused food and sustenance ; and, throwing herself on the floor, she remained sullen and im- movable, feeding her thoughts on her afilic- tions, and declaring life and existence an insufferable burden to her. Pew words shs uttered ; and they were all expressive of' some inward grief which she cared not to reveal : but sighs and groans were the chief vent which she gave to her despondency, and which, though they discovered her sorrows, were never able to ease or assuage them. Ten days and nights she lay upon the carpet, leaning on cushions which her maids brought her ; and her physicians could not persuade her to allow herself to be put to' bed, much less to make trial of any remedies which they prescribed to her. Her anxious mind at last had so long preyed on her frail body, that her end was visibly approaching ; and the council being assembled, sent the keeper, admiral, and secretary to know her will with regard to her successor. She an- swered with a faint voice that as she had held a regal sceptre, she desired no other than a royal successor. Cecil requesting her to explain herself more particularly, she subjoined that she would have a kin i; to succeed her ; and who should that be but her nearest kinsman, the King of Scots ' Being then advised by the Archbishop of Canterbury to fix her thoughts upon God, she replied that she did so, nor did her mine*, in the least wander from him. Her voicd soon after left her; her senses failed; shd fell into a lethargic slumber, which con- tinued some hours, and she expired gently, without farther struggle or convulsioni (March 24), in the seventieth year of her age and forty-fifth of her reign. So dark a' cloud overcast the evening of that day which' had shone out with a mighty lustre in the' eyes of all Europe ! There are few great- personages in history who have been more exposed to the calumny of enemies and the adulation of friends than Queen Elizabeth ; and yet there is scarcely any whose reputa- tion has been more certainly determined by the unanimous consent of poste:-ity. The unusual length of her administration, and the strong features of her character, were able to overcome all prejudices ; and oblig- ing her detractors to abate much of their invectives, and her admirers somewhat of their panegyrics, have at last, in spite of po- litical factions and, what is more, of religiouo .92 JEAN J A CQ UES R US SEA U. animosities, produced a uniform judgment with regard to her conduct. Her vigour, her constancy, her magnanimity, her pene- tration, vigilance, and address, are allowed to merit the highest praises, and appear not to have been surpassed by any person that ever filled a throne : a conduct less rigorous, less imperious, more sincere, more indulgent to her people, would have been requisite to form a perfect character. By the force of her mind she controlled all her more active and stronger qualities, and prevented them from running into excess: her heroism was exempt from temerity, her frugality from avarice,, her friendship from partiality, her active temper from furbulency and vain ambition. She guarded not herself with equal care or equal success from lesser in- firmities, — the rivalship of beauty, the desire of admiration, the jealousy of love, and the sallies of anger. Her singular talents for government were frunded equally on her temper and on her capacity. Endowed with a great command over herself, she soon obtained an uncon- trolled ascendant over her people ; and while she merited all their esteem by her real virtues, she also engaged their affections by her pretended ones. Few sovereigns of England succeeded to the throne in more difficult circumstances ; and none ever con- ducted the government with such uniform success and felicity. Though unacquainted with the practice of toleration, — the true secret for maintaining religious factions, — she preserved her people, by her superior prudence, from those confusions in which theological controversy had involved all the neighbouring nations : and though her ene- mies were the most powerful princes of Eu- rope, the most active, the most enterprising, the least scrupulous, she was able by her vigour to make deep impressions on their states ; her own greatness meanwhile re- mained untouched and unimpaired. The wise ministers and urave warriors who flourished under her reign share the praise of her success ; but instoiid of lesson- ing the applause due to her, tlioy make great addition to it. Tlicy owed, all of tlioni, their advancement to her choioo ; thov wore sup- ported by her oonstancy, and with all thoir abilities, they wcro never able to acquire any undue asci'iidunt ovrr her. In her faniilv, in her court, in her kingdom, she reiniiini'd cqunllv mistn'ss: tlic force of the tciidor piissioiis was groat ovor her, but the fiiroo of her mind was still supoiinr; nnd the odiubat whicli hor victory visilily oust her, servos only to display tlio finnnoss of lior roaohition, iiml the loftinoss of lior luii- bitious Hontimonls. The fame of this prinoess, though it has surmounted the prejudices both of faction and bigotry, yet lies still exposed to another prejudice, which is more durable because more natural, and which, according to the different views in which we survey her, is capable either of exalting beyond measure or diminishing the lustre of her character. This prejudice is founded on the considera- tion of her sex. When we contemplate her as a woman, we are apt to be struck with the highest admiration of her great qualitiep and extensive capacity ; but we are also apt to require some more softness of disposition, some greater lenity of temper, some of those amiable weaknesses by which her sex is dis- tinguished. But the true method of esti- mating her merit is to lay aside all these considerations, and consider her merely as a rational being placed in authority, and in- trusted with the government of mankind. We may find it difficult to reconcile our fancy to her as a wife or a mistress ; but her qualities as » sovereign, though with some considerable exceptions, are tie object of undisputed applause and approbation. History of hngland. JEAN JACQUES ROUSSEAU, born at Geneva, Switzerland, 1712, died 1778, was the author of many works, of which, and of the career of their author, we shall make no attempt to give a description in a volume of English selections. A speci- men of his style, so far as that can be judged of in a translation (which we find in Knight's Half-Hours with the Best Authors, vol. ii. 276-l28(M, we herewith present. " ITero the self-torturing sophist, wild Ronsseao, The npttstlc of nllliotion, he who threw Enchantment over pnssion, and iroxn woe Wrung overwhelming eloquence, tirst drew The breath \Thich made hiui wretched; yet he knew How to make madness beautiful, and c«st O'er erring dccils and thoughts a heavenly hue Of words, lilce sunbeams, dmsling as they pass'd The eyes which o'er them shed tears feelingly and fast. • •••••• His life was one long war with self-sought foes. Or friends by hiiu sclf-banifhed : for his mind Had grown Sus|iioion's sanctuary, and chose For its own cruel sacrifice the kind, 'OiiinsI whom ho rngeil with fury strange and blind : But ho was phreniied, — wherefore, who may know ? Since onuso might bo which skill could never nnd: But ho was freniied by disease or woe To that worst pitoh of all, which wears » reasoning show." — ChUdt Ifttrold't AVyri'ma^e, Canto iii.,etanBai Ivii.. Ixxx. JEAN JACQUES ROUSSEAU. 193 ** Though I see some tincture of extravagance In all his writings, I also think I see so much elo- quence and force of imagination, such an energy of expression, and such a boldness of conception, as entitle him to a place amongst the first writers of his age." — Davib Huue. (Quoted in Encyc. Brit.) The Happiness of Solitude. I can hardly tell you, sir, how concerned I have been to see that you consider me the most miserable of men. The world, no doubt, thinks as you do, and that also dis- tresses me. Oh ! why is not the existence I have enjoyed known to the whole universe ! every one would wish to procure for himself a similar lot, peace would reign upon the earth, man would no longer think of injur- ing his fellows, and the wicked would no longer be found, for none would have an interest in being wicked. But what then did I enjoy virhen I was alone? Myself; the entire universe ; all that is ; all that can be; all that is beautiful in the world of sense : all that is imaginable in the world of intel- lect. I gathered around me all that could delight my heart ; my desires were the limit of my pleasures. No, never have the voluptuous known such enjoyments ; and I have derived a hundred times more hap- piness from- my chimeras than they from their realities. When my sufferings make me measure sadly the length of the night, and the agita- tion of fever prevents me from enjoying a single instant of sleep, I often divert my mind from my present state in thinking of the various events of my life ; and repent- ance, sweet recollections, regrets, emotions, help to make me for some moments forget my sufferings. What period do you think, sir, I recall most frequently and most will- ingly in my dreams 1 Not the pleasures of my youth : they were too rare, too much mingled with bitterness, and are now too distant. I recall the period of my seclu- sion, of my solitary walks, of the fleeting but delicious days that I have passed entirely by myself, with my good and simple house- keeper, with- my beloved dog, my old cat, with the birds of the field, the hinds of the forest, with all nature, and her inconceiv- able Author. In getting up before the sun to contemplate its rising from my garden, when a beautiful day was commencing, my first wish was that no letters or visits might come to disturb the charm. After having devoted the morning to various duties, that I fulfilled with pleasure, because I could have put them off to another time, I hast- ened to dine, that I might escape from importunate people, and insure a longer afternoon. Before one o'clock, even on the hottest days, I started in the heat of the sun with my faithful Achates, hastening my 13 steps in the fear that some one would take possession of me before I could escape ; but when once I could turn a certain corner, with what a beating heart, with what a flutter of joy, I began to breathe, as I felt that I was safe ; and I said, Here now am I my own master for the rest of the day ! I went on then at a more tranquil pace to seek some wild spot in the forest, some desert place, where nothing indicating the hand of man announced slavery and power, — some refuge to which I could believe I was the first to penetrate, and where no wearying third could step in to interpose between nature and me. It was there that she seemed to display before my eyes an ever new magnificence. The gold of the broom, and the purple of the heath, struck my sight with a splendour that touched my heart. The majesty of the trees that covered me with their shadow, the delicacy of the shrubs that flourished around me, the aston- ishing variety of the herbs and flowers that I crushed beneath my feet, kept my mind in a continued alternation of observing and of admiring. This assemblage of so many interesting objects contending for my atten- tion, attracting me incessantly from one to the other, fostered my dreamy and idle humour, and often made me repeat to my- self, No, " even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these." The spot thus adorned could not long re- main a desert to my imagination. I soon peopled it with beings after my own heart, and dismissing opinion, prejudice, and all factitious passions, I brought to these sanc- tuaries of nature men worthy of inhabiting them. I formed with these a charming society, of which I did not feel myself un- worthy. I made a golden age according to my fancy, and, filling up these bright days with all the scenes of my life that had left the tenderest recollections, and with all that my heart still longed for, I affected myself to tears over the true pleasures of humanity, — pleasures so delicious, so pure, and»yet so far from men 1 Oh, if in these moments any ideas of Paris, of the age, and of my little author vanity, disturbed my reveries, with what contempt I drove them instantly away, to give myself up entirely to the exquisite sentiments with which my soul was filled. Yet, in the midst of all this, I confess the nothingness of my chimeras would some- times appear, and sadden me in a moment. If all my dreams had turned to reality, they would not have sufficed, — I should still have imagined, dreamed, desired. I discovered in myself an inexplicable void that nothing could have filled, — a certain yearning of my heart towards another kind of happiness, of which I had no definite idea, but of which 194 LAURENCE STERNE. I felt the want. Ah, sir, this even was an enjoyment, fur I was filled with a lively sense of what it was, and with a delightful sadness of which I should not have wished to be deprived. From the surface of the earth I soon raised my thoughts to all the beings of Nature, to the universal system of things, to the incomprehensible Being who enters into all. Then, as my mind was lost in this immensity, I did not think, I did not reason, I did not philosophize. I felt, with a kind of voluptuousness, as if bowed down by the weight of this universe ; I gave my- self up with rapture to this confusion of grand ideas. I delighted in imagination to lose myself in space ; my heart,' confined within the limits of the mortal, found not room : I was stifled in the universe ; I would have sprung into the infinite. I think that, could I have unveiled all the mysteries of Nature, my sensations would have been less delicious than was this bewildering ecstasy, to which my mind abandoned itself without control, and which, in the excitement of my transports, made me sometimes exclaim, "Oh, Great Being 1 oh. Great Being!" with- out being able to say or think more. Thus glided on in a continued rapture the most charming days that ever human creature passed ; and when the setting sun made me think of retiring, astonished at the flight of time, I thought I had not taken sufficient ad- vantage of my day : I fancied I might have enjoyed it more ; and, to regain the lost time, I said — I will come back to-morrow. I returned slowly home, my head a little fatigued, but my heart content. I reposed agreeably on my return, abandoning myself to the impression of objects, but without thinking, without imagining, without doing anything beyond feeling the calm and the happiness of my situation. I found the cloth laid upon the terrace : I supped with a good appetite, amidst my little household. No feeling of servitude or dependence dis- turbed tlie good will that united uh all. My dog himself was my friend, not my .sliivo. We had always the same wish ; but he novor obeycit ine. My gaiety during the wholo evening testified to my having been alono the wliiiU' day. I wiis very different when I Imd seen company. Then I was raroly contented with others, and never with my- self. In the evening I was cross and taci- turn. This riiinark wuk mado by my house- keeper; and sinco she lins told mo so I havo always found it true, when I wiiti'hod niy- («'ir. Lastly, uftoi' having again takon in the ovcning a few turns in my gardi'n, or Hurij; an air to my siiinnct, I found in my bed repose of body and soul a hundred times iwooliir than sleep itself. These were the days that have made the true happiness of my life, — a happiness without bitterness, without weariness, with- out regret, and to which I would willingly have limited my existence. Yes, sir, let such days as these fill up my eternity ; I do not ask for others, nor imagine that I am much less happy in these exquisite con- templations than the heavenly spirits. But a suffering body deprives the mind of its liberty: henceforth I am not alone; I have a guest who importunes me ; I must free myself of it to be myself. The trial that I have made of these sweet enjoyments serves only to make me with less alarm await the time when I shall taste them without interruption. Letter to the President de Maleaherbei, 1 762. LAURENCE STERNE, bom 1713, on leaving Cambridge obtained the living of Sutton, Yorkshire, and Jan. 16, 1740-41, a prebend in York Cathedral, and subsequently the living of Stillinston, Yorkshire ; curate of Coxwold, Yorkshire, 1760 ; resided chiefly in France, 1762-1767 ; died in London, 1768. He was the author of The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, 1759-1767, 9 vols. 12mo, and later editions ; A Sentimental Journey through France and Italy, by Mr. Yorick. 1768, 2 vols. 12mo ; Sermons collected, 1760-1769, 7 vols., and again, 1775, 6 vols. 12mo, 1777, 6 vol.'*. 12ino, etc. Several collections of his Letters were fiublished, 1775, 3 vols. 12mo, etc. : and col- eotive editions of his Works appeared 1780, 10 vols, crown 8vo, etc. ; see Bohn's Lowndes, 2509-251 1. The edition before us bearsdate, Lond.. H. G. Bohn, 1853, 8vo. His Tristram Shandy and the Sentimental Journey arc dis- tinguished for wit and indecency. " His style is ... at times the most rapid, the most happy, the most idiomatic, of any that is to bo found. It is tho pure essence of English con- versational style. His works consist only of mxr- i-r.iii.r, — of brilliant passages. I wonder that Gold- smith, who ought to have known better, should cull him a 'dull fellow.' Ills wit is poignant, though nrtiflcial ; and his ohanictcrs (though tho ground work of some of them had been laid be- fore) have yet invaluable original difforencos; and tho siiirit of tbe execution, the iiinster-.''trokes oon- staintly thrown into them, are not ti> be surpassed. It is sufficient to name Ihem : — Yorick, Dr. Slop, Mr. Shandy. My Ihiolo Toby, Trim, Susanna, and tho Widow Wmlman." — Hailitt: Lccit.wi tkt Engli-k ('..line Wriirr; Lrrl. 17.; On th^ Englith .\.«rli'i, " Sterne may ho reoordod ns at once one uf the most afl'eoted.and one of the most simple of writers, — as cine ot the greate.'l plagiarists, and one of the most oriitinal geniuses, that England has produced." — Sill WALTKn Sixirr. " He fatigues mc with his perpetual disquiet, and hia uneasy appeals to my risible or sontimcot*' JOHN EAWKESWORTH. 196 faculties. He is always looking in ray face, watch- ing his effeot, uncertain whether I think him nn impostor or not; posture-making, coaxing, and imploring me. ' See what sensibility I have — own now that I am very clever — do cry now ; you can't resist this.' " — Thackeray : Enyliali Humutiiiatt of the Eighteenth Cent,, Led. VI. ; and see his Lect, on Charity and Huniout, his Raundabont Papers^ Dec. 1862, crown 8vo, and Land. Athen., 1862, ii. 739. On Naues. I would sooner undertake to explain the hardest problem in Geometry than pretend to account for it that a gentleman of my fathers great good sense — knowing as the reader must have observed him, and curious too in philosophy, — wise also in political rea- soning, — and in polemical (as he will find) no way ignorant — could be capable of en- tertaining a notion in his head, so out of the common track, — that I fear the reader, when I come to mention it to him, if he is of the least of a choleric temper, will immediately throw the book by ; if mercurial, he will laugh most heartily at it ; — and if he is of a grave and saturnine cast, he will, at first sight, absolutely condemn it as fanciful and extravagant ; and that was in respect to the choice and imposition of Christian names, on which he thought a grdat deal more de- pended than what superficial minds were capable of conceiving. ilis opinion in this matter was, That there was a strange kind of magic basis, which good or bad names, as he called them, irre- sistibly impressed upon our characters and conduct. The hero of Cervantes argued not the point with more seriousness, — nor had he more faith or more to say — on the powers of Necromancy in dishonouring his deeds, — or un Dulcenia's name in shedding lustre upon them, than my father had on those of Tris- HAGiSTDs OR Archimedes, on the one hand, or of NvKV and Simkin on the other. How many CjEsars and Pompeys, he would say, by mere inspiration of the names have been rendered worthy of them ! And how many, he would add, are there who might have done exceedingly well in the world had not their characters and spirits been totally depressed and Nicodbmus'd into nothing I I see plainly. Sir, by your looks (or as the case happened), my father would say, — that you do not heartily subscribe to this opinion of mine, — which to those, he would add, who have not carefully sifted it to the bot- tom, — I own has an air more of fancy than of solid reasoning in it ; — and yet, my dear Sir, if I may presume to know your char- acter, I am morally assured I should hazard little in stating a case to you — nut as a party ill the dispute, but as a .judge, and trusting my appeal upon it to. your own good sense and candid disquisition in this matter. — You are a person free from as many narrow prejudices of education as most men ; and — if I may presume to penetrate farther into you — of a liberality of genius above bearing down an opinion merely because it wants friends. Your son ! — your dear son — from wliose sweet and open temper you have so much to expect, — your Billy, Sir, — would you for the world have called him Judas? . . . Would you, my dear Sir, lie would say, laying his hand upon your breast with the genteelest address, — and in that soft and ir- resistible piano of voice, which the nature of the argumenium ad hominem absolutely requires, — Would you, Sir, if a Jew of a godfather had proposed the name of your child, and offered you his purse along with it, would you have consented to such a dese- cration of him ? — . . . . Your greatness of mind in this action, which I admire, with that generous contempt; of money which you show me in the whole transaction, is really noble ; — and what renders it more so is the principle of it; — the workings of a parent's love upon the truth and conviction of this very hypothesis, namely, that was your son called Judas, — ■ the sordid and treacherous idea so insepara- ble from the name would have accompanied him through life like bis shadow, and, in the end, made a miser and a rascal of him, in spite, Sir, of your example. Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Ch. xix. JOHN HAWKESWORTH, LL.D., born about 1715 to 1719, died 1773, was the editor of The Adventurer (175i-1754), and author of 70 or 72 of its 140 numbers ; pub- lished some Tales. — Edgar and Emmeline, and Almoran and Hamet, — 1761 ; edited Swift's Works and Letters, with his Life (see Bohn's Lowndes, 2557) ; was author of Zimri, and other plays, of a translation of Teleinachus, and of papers in The Gentle- man's Magazine ; and in 1773 (3 vols. 4to) gave to the world an Account of the Voyages of Byron, Wallis, Cartaret, and Cook, by which he gained JE6000. "His imagination was fertile and brilliant, his diction, pure, elegant, and unaffected. . . . Hia manners were polished and affable, and his conver- sation has been described as uncommonly fascinat- ing." — Dr. Drake : Literary Life of Dr. Hamket- inorth: Dr,. Drake's Eaaays, vol, v., q, v. On Narrative. No species of writing affords so general entertainment as the relation of events ; but 196 JOHN HA Wk ES WOR TH. all relations of events do not entertain in the same degree. It is always necessary that facts should appear to be produced in a regular and con- nected series, that they should follow in a quick succession, and yet that they should be delivered with discriminating circum- stances. If they have not a necessary and apparent connexion, the ideas which they excite obliterate each other, and the mind is tantalized with an imperfect glimpse of innu- merable objects that just appear and vanish ; if they are too minutely related they become tiresome; and if divested of all their cir- cumstances, insipid : for who that reads in a table of chronology, or an index, that a city was swallowed up by an earthquake, or a kingdom depopulated by a pestilence, finds either his attention engaged or his curiosity gratified 7 Those narratives are most pleasing which not only excite and gratify curiosity, but engage the passions. History is a relation of the most natural and important events : history, therefore, gratifies curiosity, but it does not often ex- cite either terror or pity ; the mind feels not that tenderness for a falling state which it feels for an injured beauty ; nor is it so much alarmed at the migration of barba- rians who mark their way with desolation and fill the world with violence and rapine, ns at the fury of a liusband, who, deceived into jealousy by false appearances, stabs a faithful and affectionate wife, kneeling at his feet, and pleading to be heard. Voyages and travels have nearly the same excellences, and the same defects : no passion is strongly excited except wonder; or if we feel any emotion at the danger of the trav- eller, it is transient and languid, because his character is not rendered sufficiently impor- tant ; ho is rarely discovered to have any excellencies but daring curiosity ; he is never the object of admiration and seldom of esteem. Biography would always engage the pas- sions if it could sufficiently gratify curiosity : but there have been few among the whole human Hpccics whoso lives would furnish u single ailviMituro: I inoiin such a ocmiiiruMi- 'ion of ciioiiiiiHtanoos ns hold the mind in an anxious yet iilciisini; susponso, and griuliiully unfold in the iiroiiiu'tion of some unforesoi'u and important event ; nuuli loss such a soiios of facts as will iicrpi'tually vary the soonc, and gratiCy the fanoy, with new views of life. Hut milni-e is now exliaustcil : all her won- "lors have been ai'i'iiiiuilatod, every reeoss has 'ioen oxpliired, ileseits Imve lieen traversed, Alps cliiiilied, iirid the societs of the deep ilis- ciiiHod ; time Ims been coinpollpd to restore the oiiiiiiros and the licrocs of antiquity ; all have passed in review ; yet fancy requires new gratifications, and curiosity is still un- satisfied. The resources of Art yet remain : the simple beauties of nature, if they cannot be multiplied, may be compounded, and an in- finite variety produced, in which by the union of different graces both may be height- ened, and the coalition of different powers may produce a proportionate effect. The Epic Poem at once gratifies curiosity and moves the passions ; the events are various and important ; but it is not the fate of a nation, but of the hero, in which they terminate, and whatever concerns the hero engages the passions : the dignity of his character, his merit, and his importance, compel us to follow him with reverence and solicitude, to tremble when he is in danger, to weep when he suffers, and to hum when he is wronged: with the vicissitudes of pas- sion every heart attends Dlysses in his wan- derings and Achilles to the field. Upon this occasion the Old Romance may be considered as a kind of Epic, since it was intended to produce the s:\ine effect upon the mind nearly by the same means. In both these species of writing truth is apparently violated: but though the events are not always produced by probable means, yet the pleasure arising from the story is not much lessened ; for fancy is still captivated with variety, and passion ha.* scarce leisure to reflect that she is agitated with the fate of imaginary beings, and interested in events that never happened. The Novel, though it bears a near resem- blance to truth, has yet less power of enter- tainment; for it is confined within the nar- rower bounds of probability, the number of incidents is necessarily diminished, and if it deceives us more, it surprises us less. The distress is indeed frequently tender, but the narrative often stands still ; the lovers com- pliment each other in tedious letters and set speeches; trivial oircumstanc»>s are enumer- ated with a minute oxaetiiess. and the reader is wearied with languid descriptions and im- pertinent declamations. But the most extravagant, and yet pei^ haps the most generally pleasing, of all literary performances are those in which supernatural events are every moment pro- duoecl by Oenii and Fairies: such are the Arabian Nights' Entortiiinment, the Tales of the Countess d'.Vnois, and many others of the same class. It may be thought strange that the mind should with pleasure aoquiesce in the open violiUion of the most known and obvious truths; and that rela- tions which oontriidict all experience, and exhibit a series of events that are not only impossible but ridiculous, should be read hv JOHN HAWKESWORTH. 197 almost every taste and capacity with equal eagerness and delight. ... Dramatic Poetry, especially tragedy, seems to unite all that pleases in each of these species of writing, with a stronger resem- blance of truth, and a closer imitation of nature: the characters are such as excite attention and solicitude ; the action is im- portant, its progress is intricate yet natural, and the catastrophe is sudden and stril^ing ; and as we are present to every transaction, the images are more strongly impressed, and thepassions more forcibly moved. The Adventurer, No. 4, Saturday, Novem- ber 18, 175S. Happiness and Misery, Virtue and Vice. Among ether favourite and unsuspected topics is the excellency of virtue. Virtue is said necessarily to produce its own happi- ness, and to be constantly and adequately its own reward ; as vice, on the contrary, never fails to produce misery, and inflict upon itself the punishmentit deserves: prop- ositions of which every one is ready to affirm that they may be admitted without scruple and believed without danger. But from hence it is inferred that future rewards and punishments are not necessary either to furnish adequate motives to the practice of virtue, or to justify the ways of God. In consequence of their being not necessary, they become doubtful : the Deity is less and less the object of fear and hope ; and as vir- tue is said to be that which produces ulti- mate good below, whatever is supposed to produce ultimate good below is said to be virtue: right and wrong are confounded, because remote consequences cannot per- fectly be known ; the principal barrier by which appetite and passion is restrained is broken down ; the remonstrances of con- science are ovei-borne by sophistry ; and the acquired and habitual shame of vice is sub- dued by the perpetual efforts of vigorous resistance. But the inference from which these dread- ful consequences proceed, however plausi- ble, is not just; nor does it appear from ex- perience that the premises are true. That "virtue alone is happiness below," is indeed a maxim in speculative morality, which all the treasures of learning have been lavished to support, and all the flowers of wit col- lected to recommend ; it has been the fiv vourite of some among tlie wisest and best of mankind in' every generation ; and is at once venerable for its age and lovely in the bloom of a new youth. And yet if it be al- lowed that they who languish in disease and indigence, who suffer pain, hunger, and nakedness, in obscurity and solitude, are less happy than those who, with the same degree of virtue, enjoy health, and ease, and plenty, who are distinguished by fame, and courted by society ; it follows that virtue alone is not efficient of happiness, because virtue cannot always bestow those things upon which hap- piness is confessed to depend. It is indeed true that virtue in prosperity enjoys more than vice, and that in adversity she suffers less : if prosperity and adversity, therefore, were merely accidental to virtue and vice, it might be granted that setting aside those things upon which moral con- duct has no influence, as foreign to the question, every man is happy, either nega- tively or positively, in proportion as he is virtuous : though it were denied that virtue alone could put into his possession all that is essential to human felicity. But prosperity and adversity, affluence and want, are not independent upon moral conduct : external advantages are frequently obtained by vice, and forfeited by virtue ; for as an estate may be gained by secreting a will, or loading a die, an estate may also be lost by withholding a vote, or rejecting a job. . . . If it be possible by a single act of vice to increase happiness upon the whole of life, from what rational motives can the tempta- tion to that act be resisted ? From none, surely, but such as arise from the belief of a future state in which virtue will be re- warded and vice punished : for to what can happiness be wisely sacrificed but to greater Tiappiness ? and how can the ways of God be justified, if a man by the irreparable in- jury of his neighbour becomes happier upon the whole, than he would have been if he had observed the eternal rule, and done to another as he would that another should do to him? Perhaps I may be told that to talk of sacrificing happiness to greater happiness, as virtue, is absurd ; and that he who is re- strained from fraud or violence merely by the fear of hell, is no more virtuous than he who is restrained merely by the fear of the gibbet. But supposing this to be true, yet with respect to society mere external rectitude answers all the purposes of virtue ; and if I travel without being robbed, it is of little consequence to me whether the persons whom I meet on the road were restrained from attempting to invade my property by the fear of punishment or the abhorrence of vice : so that the gibbet, if it does not pro- duce virtue, is yet of such incontestable utility, that I believe those gentlemen would be very unwilling that it should be removed, who are, notwithstanding, so zealous to steel every breast against the fear of damna- tion : nor would they be content, however 198 :'OnN HAWKESWORTH. negligent of their souls, that their property should be no otherwise secured than by the power of Moral Beauty, and the prevalence of ideal enjoyments. The Adventurer, No. 10, Saturday, Decemr her 9, 1752. The Positive Duties of Religion and Moral Conduct. Of the duties and the privileges of reli- gion, prayer is generally acknowledged to be the chief: and yet I am afraid that there are few who will not be able to recollect some seasons in which their unwillingness to pray has been more than in proportion to the labour and the time that it required ; seasons in which they would have been less willing to repeat a prayer than any other composition ; and rathe'r than have spent five minutes in an address to God, would have devoted an equal space of time wholly to the convenience of another, without any enjoyment or advantage to themselves. . . . A man who lives apparently without re- ligion declares to the world that he is with- out virtue, however he may otherwise con- ceal his vices : for when the obstacles to virtue are surmounted, the obstacles to re- ligion are few. What should restrain him who has broken the bonds of appetite from rising at the call to devotion 7 Will not he who has accomplished a work of difiBculty secure his reward at all events, when to se- cure it is easy ? Will not he that has panted in the race stretch forth his hand to receive the prize ? It may, perhaps, be expected that from this general censure I should except those who believe that all religion is the contri- vance of tyranny and cunning ; and that every human action which has Deity for its object is enthusiastic and absurd. But of these there are few who do not give other evidence of their want of virtue than their neglect of religion ; and even of this few it must be acknowledged that they have not equal motives to virtue, and therefore to say that thoy have not equal virtue, is only to affirm that effects are proportionate to their causes: a propositicm which, I am contidont, no philoso|ih('r will deny. By thoHo motives I do not moan merely thi! hope and fear of futme reward and jiun- ishmcMit; hut such .is arise from the exer- cise of religious duties, both in public and private, and es|ieeiiilly of jiniyer. I know that ediieerniiiL; the operation and effects of prayer there has been much doubt- ful disputation, in whieh iniunnerablo iiieta- pliysioal subtilties have been iiitniduoeil, jnd the unil(n-sti\iiiliiig has been liewildpred in sophistry, and affronted with jargon. Those who have no other proof of the fit- ness and advantage of a prayer than are to be found among these speculations are but little acquainted with the practice. He who has acquired an experimental knowledge of this duty knows that nothing so forcibly restrains from ill as the remem- brance of a recent address to Heaven for protection and assistance. After having petitioned for power to resist temptation, there is so great an incongruity in not con- tinuing the struggle, that we blush at the thought, and persevere, lest we lose all revei^ ence for ourselves. After fervently devot- ing our souls to God, we start with horror at immediate apostacy. Every act of delib- erate wickedness is then complicated with hypocrisy and ingratitude : it is a mockery of the Father of Mercy ; the forfeiture of that peace in which we closed our address, and a renunciation of the hope which it inspired. For a proof of this, let every man ask himself, as in the presence of " Him who searches the heart," whether he has never been deterred from prayer by his fondness for some criminal gratification which he could not with sincerity profess to give up, and which he knew he could not afterward repeat without greater compunction. If prayer and immorality appear to be thus incompatible, prayer should not surely be lightly rejectea by those who contend that moral virtue is the summit of human per- fection ; nor should it be encumbered with such circumstances as must inevitably render it less easy and less frequent. It should ba considered as the wings of the soul, and should be always ready when a sudden impulse prompts her to spring up to God. We should not think it always necessary to be either in a church, or iu our closet, to express joy, love, desire, trust, reverence, ur complacency, in the fervour of a silent ejacu- lation. Adoration, hope, and even a petition, may be conceived in a moment ; and the desire of the heart may aseend, without words, to " Ilim to whom our thoughts are known afar off." He who considers him- self as perpetually in the presence of the Almighty need not fear that gratitude or homage can over be ill-timed, or that it is profane thus to worship in any eircum- stanoes that are not criminal. There is no preservative from vice equal to this habitual and constant intercourse with Ood; neither does anything equally alleviate distress or heighten prosperity; iu distress, it sustains us with liope; nnd in prostioritv, it adds to every other enjoyment the iieligFit of gratitude. yVie .\dva\itirer, Saturday, February JO, 1753. ELIZABEIH CARTER. 199 ELIZABETH CARTER, born 1717, died 1806, published in 1738 Poems upon Several Occasions, Lond., 4to, Home of which were republished, 1762, new editions, 1776, 1789, 8vo ; and subsequently gave to the world translations from Anac- reon, Cronsaz, and Algorotti ; but her great ■work was All the Works of Epictetus which are now Extant, with an Introduction and Notes by the Translator, Lond., 1758, 4to, 1th edit., Lend., 1807, 2 vols. 8vo. This is an excellent translation. Miss Carter was acquainted with Hebrew, Greek, Latin, Ital- ian, Spanish, French, and German. See Memoirs of her Life, by the Rev. M. Penn- ington, Lond., 1807, 4to, etc. ; her Letters to Miss Talbot and Mrs. Vesey, 1808, 2 vols. 4to, and to Mrs. Montagu, 1817, 3 vols. 8vo. Dr. Johnson (see Boswell's Johnson) was a great admirer of this learned and excellent Stoicism and Christianity. Stoicism is indeed in many points inferior to the doctrine of Socrates, which did not teacb that all externals were indifferent; which did teach a future state of recompense ; and agreeably to that, forbade suicide. It doth not belong to the present subject to show how much even this best system is excelled by Christianity. It is sufficient just to observe, that the author of it died in a profession which he had always made of his belief in the popular deities, whose su- perstitious and impure worship were the great source of corruption in the heathen world ; and the last words he uttered were a direction to a friend for the performance of an idolatrous ceremony. This melancholy instance of ignorance and error in the most illustrious character for wisdom and virtue in all heathen antiquity is not mentioned as a reflection on his memory, but as a proof of human weakness in general. Whether reason could have discovered the great truths which in these days are ascribed to it, be- cause now seen so clearly by the light of the Gospel, may be a question; liit that it never did, is an undeniable fact ; and that is enough to teach us thankfulness for the blessing of a better information. Socrates, who had, of all mankind, the fairest preten- sions to set up for an instructor and reformer of the world, confessed that he knew nothing, referred to tradition, and acknowledged the want of a superior guide: and there is a remarkable passage in Epictetus in which he represents it as the office of his supreme God, or of one deputed by him, to appear among mankind as a teacher and example. Upon the whole, the several sects of heathen philosophy serve as so many striking instances of the imperfection of human wisdom ; and of the extreme need of a divine assistance, to rectify the mistakes of depraved reason, and to replace natural religion on its true foundation. The Stoics every where testify the noblest zeal for virtue and the honour of God ; but they attempted to establish them on principles inconsistent with the nature of man, and contradictory to truth and experience. By a direct con- sequence of these principles they were lia- ble to be seduced, and in fact they were seduced, into pride, hard-heartedness, and the last dreadful extremity of human guilt, self-murder. But however indefensible the philosophy of the Stoics in several instances may be, it appears to have been of very important use in the Heathen world ; and they are, on many accounts, to be considered in a very respectable light. Their doctrine of evidence and fixed prin- ciples was an excellent preservative from the mischiefs that might have arisen from the scepticism of the Academics and Pyr- rhonists, if unopposed ; and their zealous defence of a particular providence, a valu- able antidote to the atheistical scheme of Epicurus. To this may be added, that their strict notions of virtue in most points (for they sadly failed in some), and the lives of several among them, must contribute a great deal to preserve luxurious states from an absolutely universal dissoluteness, and the subjects of arbitrary government from a wretched and contemptible pusillanimity. Even now, their compositions may be read with great advantage, as conttrining excellent rules of self-government and of social behaviour; of a noble reliance on the aid and protection of heaven, and of a perfect resignation and submission to the divine will : points which are treated with great clearness, and with admirable spirit, in the lessons of the Stoics: and though their directions are seldom practicable, their principles, in trying cases, may be rendered highly useful in subordination to Christian reflections. If among those who are so unhappy as to remain unconvinced of the truth of Chris- tianity, any are prejudiced against it by tho influence of unwarrantable inclinations, such persons will find very little advantage in re- jecting the doctrines of the New Testament for those of the Portico ; unless they think it an advantage to be laid under moral re- straints almost equal to those of the Gospel, while they are deprived of its encourage- ments and supports. Deviations from the rules of sobriety, justice, and piety meet with small indulgence in the sfoi< writings; 200 HORACE WALPOLE. and they who profess to admire Epictetus, unless they pursue that severely virtuous conduct which he every where proscribes will find themselves treated by him with the utmost degree of scorn and contempt. An immoral character is, indeed, more or less, the outcast of all sects of philosophy; and Seneca quotes even Epicurus to prove the universal obligation of a virtuous life. Of this great truth God never left himself without witness. Persons of distinguished talents and opportunities seem to have been raised, from time to time, by Providence, to check the torrent of corruption, and to pre- serve the sense of moral obligations on the minds of the multitude, to whom the various occupations of life left but little leisure to form deductions of their own. But then they wanted a proper commission to enforce their precepts; they intermixed with them, through false reasoning, many gross mis- takes; and their unavoidable ignorance, in several important points, entangled them with doubts which easily degenerated into pernicious errors. If there are others, who reject Christianity from motives of dislike to its peculiar doc- trines, they will scarcely fail of entertaining more favourable impressions of it, if they can be prevailed on, with impartiality, to compare the Holy Scriptures, from whence alone the Christian religion is to be learned, with the stoic writings ; and then fairly to consider whether there is anything to be met with in the discoveries of our blessed Saviour, in the writings of his apostles, or even in the obscurest parts of the prophetic books, by which, equitably interpreted, either their senses or their reason are con- tradicted, as they are by the paradoxes of these philosophers; and if not, whether notices from above of things in which, though we comprehend them but imper- fectly, we are possibly much more interested than at present we discern, ought not to be received with implicit veneration : as useful exercises and trials of that duty which finite understandings owe to infinite wisdom. HORACE WALPOLE, linrn 1717, bocniiie fourth Earl of Orfonl 17'Jl, and died 17'.l7. ilo was the author of yF.cles ^ValpoiinntB, Lond., 1747, 4to; J''iif;iliv(< I'ii'i'cs in l'ros(i and Vorso, Straw- l«'n-y Hill, l7riS, 8vo; t'ataloi;ui' of the Itiiyal ami N.il.ln Authors cif England, Strawberry Hill, HfiS, '1 v,ils. sm. Svo, by T. I'urk, Lond., I SCO, fi vols. Svo ; Anwddtes of I'liinting in Eniiliind, frriTii thn MSS. of GeorgoVirtuo,Stra\vliorrv Hill, 17012-7 1,'().J, 5 vols. 4to, by R. N. Wornum, Esq., Lend,, 1839, etc., 3 vols. Svo ; The Castle of Otranto, Lond., 1765. Svo; The Mysterious Mother, a Tragedy, Strawberry Hill, 1768, Svo; His- toric Doubts on the Life and Reign of King Richard the Third, Lond., 1768, 4to; Me- moirs of the Last Ten Years, 1751-1760, of the Reign of King George II., Lond., 1822, 2 vols, royal 4to ; Memoirs of the Reign of King George III., Lond., 1845, 4 vols. Svo; Journal of the Reign of King George the Third, Lond., 1859, 2 vols, demy Svo: and other works (see Bohn's Lowndes, 2818- 2823). A collective edition of his Letters, by Peter Cunningham, was publi.«hed, Lond., Bentley, lS.57-59, 9 vols. Svo, Bohn, 1861, 9 vols, demy Nvo. A collective edition of his Works, edited by Robert Berry (and Agnes and Mary Berrv), was published, Lond., 1795, 5 vols. 4to. ''Walpole's ' Letters' are generally considered as his best performances, and, we think, with reason. His faults are far less oflensire to us in his cor- respondence than in his books. His wild, absurd, and evcr-cbnnging opinions abont men and things are easily pardoned in familiar letters. His bitter, scoffing, depreciating disposition does not show itself in so unmitigated a man.ier as in his ' Me- moirs.' A writer of letters most be civil and friendly to his correspondent, at least, if to no other person." — Lord Macaclay : Edin. Jter., Iviii. 240, and in his Essays. The Scottish Rebellion. The rebels are come into England : for two days we believed them near Lancaster, but the ministry must own that they don"t know if they liave passed Carlisle. Some think that they will besiege that town, which has an old wall, and all the militia in it of Cumberland and Westmoreland ; but as they can pass by it, I don't see why they should take it, for they are not strong enough to leave garrisons. Several desert" them as tlu'v advance south ; :ind altogether, good men and bad, nobody believes them ten thousand. By their marching westward to avoid AVade, it is evident that thev are not strong enough to fight him. They may yet retire baek into their moun- tains, but il'oiiee tliey sret to Lancaster their retreat is cut off; for Wade will not stir from Neweastle till he has embarked them deep into Euirland, and then he will be behind them, lie has sent General llandasyde from Berwick with two regiments to take posses- sion of Kdiiiburgh. 'I'lie reliels are certainly in a very desiu-rate situation : tliev dared not meet Wade ; and if they had waited for him their troups would have deserted. Unless thev meet with great risings in their favour in Laiieashire. I dnnt see what thev can hope, exeeiit from a continuation of our neglect. That, indeed, has noblv eurted HORACE WALPOLE. 201 itself fcr them. They were sufifered to march the whole length of Scotland, and take possession of the capital, without a, man appearing against them. Then two thousand sailed to them, to run from them. Till the flight of Cope's army, Wade was not sent. Two roads still lay into England, and till they had chosen that which Wade had not taken, no army was thought of being sent to secure the other. Now Ligonier, with seven old regiments, and six of the new, is ordered to Lancashire ; before this first di- vision of the army could get to Coventry, they are forced to order it to halt, for fear the enemy should be up with it before it was all assembled. It is uncertain if the rebels will march to the north of Wales, to Bristol, or towards London. If to the latter, Ligonier must fight them ; if to either of the other, which I hope, the two armies may join and drive them into a corner, where they must all perish. They cannot subsist in Wales, but by being supplied by the Papists in Ireland. The best is, that we are in no fear from France ; there is no prep- aration for invasions in any of their ports. Lord Clantary, a Scotchman [Irishman] of great parts, but mad and drunken, and whose family forfeited £90,000 a year for King James, is made vice-admiral at Brest. The Duke of Bedford goes in his little round person with his regiment ; he now takes to the land, and says he is tired of being a pen- and-ink-man. Lord Gower insisted, too, upon going with his regiment, but is laid up with the gout. With the rebels in England you may im- figine we have no private news, nor think of foreign. From this account you may judge that our case is for from desperate, though disagreeable. The prince [Ferdinand of Wales], while the princess lies-in, has taken to give dinners, to which he asks two of the ladies of the bed-chamber, two of the maids of honour. Sea., by turns, and five or six others. To Sir Horace Mann, Nov. 15, 11 1)5. London Earthquakes, Etc. " Portents and prodigies are grown so frequent That they have lost their name," — Deyden, My text is not literally true ; but as far as earthquakes go towards lowering the price of wonderful commodities, to be sure we are overstocked. We have had a second, much more violent than the first ; and you must not be surprised if, by next post, you hear of a burning mountain sprung up in Smithfield. In the night between Wednes- day and Thursday last (exactly a month since the first shock), the earth had a shiv- ering fit between one and twc, but so slight that," if no more had followed, I don't be- lieve it would have been noticed. I had been awake, and had scarce dozed again — on a sudden I felt my bolster lift up my head : I thought somebody was getting from under my bed, but soon found it was a strong earthquake that lasted near half a minute, with a violent vibration and great roaring. I rang my bell ; my servant came in, fright- ened out of his senses : in an instant we heard all the windows in the neighbourhood flung up. I got up and found people run- ning into the streets, but saw no mischief done : there has been some : two old houses flung down, several chimneys, and much china-ware. The bells rung in several houses. Admiral Knowles, who has lived long in Jamaica, and felt seven there, says this was more violent than any of them : Francesco prefers it to the dreadful one at Leghorn. The wise say, that if we have not rain soon, we shall certainly have more. Several people are going out of town, for it has nowhere reached above ten miles from London. ... A parson who came into White's the morning of earthquake the first, and heard bets laid on whether it was an earthquake or the blowing up of powder-mills, went away exceedingly scandalized, and said, " I pro- test they are such an impious set of people, that I believe if the last trumpet was to sound they would bet puppet-show against Judgment." If we get any nearer still to the torrid zone, I shall pique myself on sending you a present of cedrati and orange- flower water. I am already planning a ter- reno for Strawberry Hill. ... I will jump to another topic ; I find all this letter will be detached scraps; I can't at all contrive to hide the seams. But I don't care. I began my letter merely to tell you of the earthquake, and I don't pique myself upon doing any more than telling you what you would be glad to have told you. I told you, too, how pleased I was with the triumphs of another old beauty, our friend the prin- cess [Craon]. Do you know, I have found a history that has great resemblance to hers ; that is, that will be very like hers, if hers is but like it. I will tell it you in as few words as I can. Madame la Marechale de I'HSpital [Mary Mignot] was the daughter of a semp- stress ; a young gentleman fell in love with her, and was going to be married to her, but the match was broken off. An old fer- mier-general, who had retired into the prov- ince where this happened, hearing the story, had a curiosity to see the victim ; he liked her, married her, died, and left her enough not to care for her inconstant. She came to Paris, where the Mareohal de I'HSpital mar- ried her for her riches. After the Mare- chal's death, Casimir, the abdicated king of 202 HUGH BLAIR. Poland, who was retired into France, fell in love with the Marechale, and privately mar- ried her. If the event ever happens, I shall certainly travel to Nancy, to near her talk of ma belle fiUe la Reine de France. To Sir Horace Mann, March 11, 1750. HUGH BLAIR, D.D., born in Edinburgh, 1718, minister of Coles- Bie, Fifeshire, 1712-1743, of the Canongate of Edinburgh, 1743-1754. and of the High Church of Edinburgh, 1758 until his death in 1800, was the author of some famous Sermons, Edin. and Lond., 1788-1801, 5 vols. 8vo, many editions, and of Lectures on Rhetoric and Belles-Lettres, Lond., 1783, 2 vols. 4to ; again, Lond., 1798, 3 vols. 8vo, and later. " Dr. Blair's sermons are now universally com- mended, but let bim think that I had the honour of first finding and first praising liis exoellenciea. I did not stay to add my voice to that of the pub- lic." — Dr. Johnson to Boswell, 1777: Bottcelt't Johnson; where see Johnson and Boswell on Blair's Lectures on Rhetoric nnd Belles-Lettres. On the Coltivation of Taste, Such studies have this peculiar advantage, that they exercise our reason without fa- tiguing it. They lead to inquiries acute, but not painful ; profound, but not dry or abstruse. They strew flowers in the path of science, and while they keep the mind bent in some degree and active, they relieve it at the same time from that more toilsome labour to which it must submit in the acqui- sition of necessary erudition or the investi- gation of abstract truth. The cultivation of taste is further recom- mended by the happy effects which it nat- urally tends to produce on human life. The most busy man in the most active sphere cannot be always occupied by business. Men of serious professions cannot always be on the stretch of anxious thought. Ncitlier can the most f;iiy and flourisliiiij; situations of fortune afford any man the power of fill- ing all his hours witli ploiisun". Life must always languish in the liands of the idle. It will rri'(]iii'M(ly languish oven in the hands of lliii busy, if tlioy liavt not some I'mplnyniont siilisiiliary to that wliicli forms tlu'ir iMiiin puisiiit. How, thon, shall those viic-aiit spiioos, tliosd unomployod intorvals, wliiiili iiioro III- loss ni'oiir in tlio lifoof ovory one, bo lilli'd up? How can wo oontrivo to dispose of thoni in any way that shall bo nioro iifjrci'iiblo in itsi'll, or nu>i-o ooiisonnnt til tlio iliLi:nity of the luiman mind, than in the oiitorlainmonts of tasto, and the study of polite literature? He who is so happ^ as to have acquired a relish for these, hat always at hand an innocent and irreproach- able amusement for his leisure hours, to save him from the danger of many a pernicious passion. lie is not in hazard of being a burden to himself He is not obliged to fly to low company, or to court the riot of loose pleasures, in order to cure the tediousness of existence. Providence seems plainly to have pointed out this useful purpose to which the pleas- ures of taste may be applied, by interposing them in a middle station between the pleas- ures of sense and those of pure intellect. We were not designed to grovel always among objects so low as the former ; nor are we capable of dwelling constantly in so high a region as the latter. The pleasures of taste refresh the mind after the toils of the intellect and the labours of abstract study ; and they gradually raise it above the at- tachinents of sense, and prepare it for the enjoyments of virtue. So consonant is this to experience, that in the education of ynnth no object has in every age appeared more important to wise men than to tincture them early with .*i relish for the entertainments of taste. The transition is commonly made with ease from these to the discharge of the higher and more important duties of life. Good hopes may be entertained of those whose minds have this liberal and elegant turn. It is favour- able to many virtues. Whereas, to be en- tirely devoid of relish for eloquence, poetry, or any of the fine arts, is justly construed to bean unpromising symptom of earth ; and raises suspicions of their being prone to low gratifications, or destined to drudge in th« more vulgar and illiberal pursuits of life. Lectures on Rhetoric and Belles-Lettres. On Style. It is not onsy to pve a precise idea of wlmt is meant liy Stylo. The bost defini- tion 1 can givo ol it is, the poouliar manner in wliioh a man expresses his oonoeptions, by means of hingiinjio. It is different from mere Innguago or words. The words which an author ouiplnys may be proper nnd fault- loss : nnd his Stylo may. novortholess, have great fnult.s ; it nuiy bo dry, or stiff, or foolilo, or affootod. Stylo has always .lome rol'ovonoo to an authors manner of tiiinking. It is a pioturo of the ideas which rise in his mind, and of the manner in whioh thoy rise tlioro ; and honoo, when we arc examining an author's oompnsition, it is, in many oasos, extromoly diffioiilt to soparate the Stylo fron\ tho sontiment. No wonder these two should bo 80 intimatoly conneotod, ns Style is nothing else than that sort of ex- ELIZABETH MONTAGU. 203 pression which our thoughts most readily assume. Hence different countries have been noted for peculiarities of Style suited to their different temper and genius. The eastern nations animated their style with the most strong and hyperbolical figures. The Athenians, a polished and acute people, formed a Style accurate, clear, and neat. The Asiatics, gay, and loose in their man- ners, affected a Style florid and diffuse. The like sort of characteristical differences are commonly remarked in the Style of the French, the English, and the Spaniards. In giving the general characters of Style it is usual to talk of a nervous, a feeble, or a spirited Style ; which are plainly the char- acters of a writer's manner of thinking, as well as of expressing himself: so difficult it is to separate these two things from one another. Of the general characters of Style I am afterwards to discourse, but it will be necessary to begin with examining the more simple qualities of it ; from the assemblage of which its more complex denominations, in a great measure, result. All the quali- ties of a good Style may be ranged under two heads. Perspicuity and Ornament. For all that can possibly be required of Lan- guags is, to convey our ideas clearly to the minds of others, and at the same time in such address as, by pleasing and interesting them, shall most effectually strengthen the impressions which we seek to make. When both these ends are answered, we certainly accomplish every purpose for which we use Writing and Discourse. Lectures on Rhetoric and Belles-Letires. On Pueitt and Pkopriety. Purity and Propriety of Language are often used indiscriminately for each other ; and, indeed, they are very nearly allied. A distinction, however, obtains between them. Purity is the use of such words, and such constructions, as belong to the idiom of the Language which we speak, in opposition to words and phrases that are imported from other Languages, or that are obsolete or new coined or used without proper authority. Propriety is the selection of such words in the Language as the best and most established usage has appi'opriated to those ideas which we intend to express by them. It implies the correct and happy application of them, accordfng to that usage, in opposition to vulgarisms, or low expressions ; and to words and phrases which would be less significant of the ideas that we mean to convey. Style may be pure, that is, it may all be strictly English, without Scotticisms or Gallicisms, or ungrammatical, irregular expressions of any kind, and may, nevertheless, be defi- cient in propriety. The words may be ill- chosen ; not adapted to the subject, noi fully expressive of the author's sense. He has taken all his words and phrases from the general mass of English language ; but he has made his selection among these words unhappily. Whereas Style cannot be proper without being also pure; and where both Purity and Propriety meet, besides making Style perspicuous, they also render it grace- ful. 'There is no standard, either of Purity or of Propriety, but the practice of the best writers and speakers in the country. When I mentioned obsolete or new-coined words as incongruous with Purity of Style, it will be easily understood that some ex- ceptions are to be made. On certain occa- sions they may have grace. Poetry admits of greater latitude than prose, with respect to coining or, at least, new-compounding words ; yet, even here, this liberty should be used with a sparing hand. In prose, such innovations are more hazardous, and have a worse effect. They are apt to give Style an affected and conceited air ; and should never be ventured upon except by such whose established reputation' gives them some degree of dictatorial power over Language. The introduction of foreign and learned words, unless w^here necessity re- quires them, should always be avoided. Bar- ren Languages may need such assistances ; but ours is not one of these. Dean Swift, one of our most correct writers, valued himself much on using no words but such as were of native growth : and his Language may, indeed, be considered as a standard of the strictest Purity and Propriety in the choice of words. At present, we seem to be depart- ing from this standard. A multitude of Latin words have, of late, been poured in upon us. On some occasions, they give an appearance of elevation and dignity to Style. But often, also, they render it stiff and forced: and, in general, a plain native Style, as it is more intelligible to all readers, so, by a proper management of words, it may be made equally strong and expressive with this latinized English. Lectures on Rhetoric and Belles-Lettres. ELIZABETH MONTAGU, born 1720, was married in 1742 to Edward Montagu, cousin of Edward Wortley Mour tagu, the husband of Lady Mary. Left a widow of fortune in 1775, she became famous for her hospitalities to the leaders of fashion and letters. Died 1800. "Mrs. Montagu had built a superb new house [Portman Square, London], which was magnifi- 204 RICHARD HLTRD. oently fitted up, and appeared to be rather appro- priate for princes, nobles, and courtiers than for poets, philosophers, and blue-stocl^ing votaries." — Madame D'Abblay : Diary. " These were the members of that brilliant society which quoted, criticised, and ex- changed repartees under the rich peacock- hangings of Mrs. Montagu." She was the author of Three Dialogues of the Dead, in the 4th edition of Lord Lyttelton's New Dialogues of the Dead, Lond., 176.5, 8vo ; An Essay on the Writings and Genius of Shakespear, etc., 17fi9, 8vo. See The Letters of Mrs. Elizabeth Montagu, Lond., 1809-13, 4 vols. 8vo. On Vanity. Allerteorpe, A^oti. 19, 1742. Madam, — ^What prophets are my fears 1 they whispered to me your grace was not well, and I find their suggestions were true. Hard state of things, that one may believe one's fears, but cannot rely upon one's hopes ! I imagined concern would have an ill effect on your constitution : I know you have many pledges in the hands of fate, and I feared for you, and every thing that was near and dear to you. I am sensible your regard and ten- derness for Lady Oxford will make you suf- fer extremely when you see her ill : she has therefore a double portion of my good wishes, on her own and your gr.ace's account. When sensibility of heart and head makes you feel all the outrages that fortune and folly offer, why do you not envy the thoughtless giggle and unmeaning smile? "In Folly's cup still laughs the bubble Joy." Wisdom's cup is often dashed with sorrow, but the nepenthe of stupidity is the only medicine of life : fools neither are troubled with fear nor doubt. What did the wisdom of the wisest man teach him 7 Verily, that all was vanity and vexation of spirit ! A painful lesson fools will never learn, for they are of all vanities most vain. And there is not so sweet a companion as that same vanitv : when we go into the world it leads us by t)ic hand ; if we retire from it, it follows us ; it meets us at court, and finds us in the coun- try; commends the hero that pains the world, and the pliilosophor that forsakes it; praises the luxury of the prodigal, and the prudence uf the primrious; foasts with the »r'uptuouB, fasts with the abstemious, sits on the pen of the author, and visits the papor of the critic; reads lieilieations, and writes them ; nuvkes einirt to superiors, reeeives homage of inferiors : in short, it is useful, it is jifrreeable, and the very thing needful to happiness. Had Solomon felt some inward vanity, sweet sounds had been ever in his ears without the vniees of mon-singcrs, or women-singers : he had not then said of laughter. What is it? and of mirth, What doeth it? Vanity and a good set of teeth would have taught him the ends and pur- poses of laughing, that fame may be ac- quired by it, where, like the proposal for the grinning wager, "The frightfulest grinner Is the winner." Did not we think Lady C would get nothing by that broad grin but the tooth- ache? But vanity, profitable vanity, was her better counsellor; and a-s she always imagined the heart of a lover was caught between her teeth, I cannot say his delay is an argument of her charms, or his gallantry, but she has him secure by an old proverb, that what is bred in the bone will never out of the flesh, and no doubt but this love was bred in the bone, even in the jaw-bone. No wonder if tame weak man is subdued by that weapon with which Samson killed the mighty lion. To the Duchess of Portland. RICHARD HURD, D.D., born 1720, Preacher of Lincoln's Inn, 1765, Archdeacon of Gloucester. 1767. Bishop of Lichfield and Coventry, lT7-i, and of Worces- ter, 1781, declined the Archbishopric of Can- terbury, 1783, died ISOS. He published: Commentary on Horace's Ars Poetica, 1749, 4th edit., 1763, 3 vols. Svo ; Commentary on Horace's Epistola ad Augnstum, etc., 1751, new edit., Lond., 177ii. 3 vols. cr. Svo; Dia- logues on Sincerity, Retirement, etc., 17:>9, Svo ; with his Letters on Chivalry and Ro- mance (1762, Svo), and Dialo;;iies on Foreign Travel (1764, Svo), under the title of Dia- logues, Moral and Political, 1765, 3 vols. Svo, 3d edit., 1771. 3 vols. sm. Svo; again. 17SS, 3 vols. Svo; Select Works of Cowley, 1769, 2 vols. Svo ; An Introduction to the Study of the Prophecies, 1772, Svo, 177S. 2 vols. Svo ; Sermons Preached at Lincoln's Inn, 1776-1780, 3 vols. Svo, 17S5, 3 vols. Svo; Sermons Preached before the Lords. 1777, 4to; Works of Bishop Wnrburton, 1788, 7 vols. 4lo, new edit., ISl 1, 12 vols. Svo. and Life of Warhurton, 1794, 4to; A Idison's Works, IS 10, C vols. Svo. 'J Hard hn«, perhaps, the merit of being the first who, in this country, aimed at philosophical criti- cism : he had great ingenuity, a good deal of read- ing, nn>l a fclioitv in applyiiii; it; but he did not fool very deeply, was semcwbnt of a coxcomb, and having always before his cyos a model neither good in itself, nor made for him to emulate, he assumes a dogmatic arrogance, which, of it always ofionds the reader, so for the most pnrt stands in the way of the author's own search for truth,"— IIallam : Lii, Hiii. o/ Europt, 4th ed., iii. 47 j, u RICHARD HURD. 205 True and False Politeness. It is evident enough that the moral and Christian duty of preferring one another in lionour respects only social peace and char- ity, and terminates in the good and edifica- tion of our Christian brother. Its use is to soften the minds of men, and to draw them from that savage rusticity which engenders many vices, and discredits the virtuous them- selves. But when men had experienced the benefit of this complying teuiper, and further saw the ends, not of charity only, but of self-interest, that might be answered by it, they considered no longer its just purpose and application, but stretched it to that of- ficious sedulity and extreme servility (^'adu- lation which we too often observe and lament in polished life. Hence that infinite attention and consid- eration, which is so rigidly exacted and so duly paid, in the commerce of the world : hence that prostitution of mind, which leaves a man no will, no sentiment, no principle, no character ; all which disappear under the uniform exhibition of good manners : hence those insidious arts, those studied disguises, those obsequious flatteries, nay, those multi- plied and nicely-varied forms of insinuation and address, the direct aim of which may be to acquire the fame of politeness and good-breeding, but the certain effect, to cor- rupt every virtue, to soothe every vanity, and to inflame every vice, of the human heart. These fatal mischiefs Introduce themselves under the pretence and semblance of that humanity which the Scriptures encourage and enjoin : but the genuine virtue is easily distinguished from the counterfeit, and by the following plain signs. True politeness is modest, unpretending, and generous. It appears as little as may be ; and when it does, a courtesy would will- ingly conceal it. It chooses silently to forego its own claims, not ofliciously to with- draw them. It engages a man to prefer his neighbour to himself, because he really esteems him; because he is tender,' of his reputation ; because he thinks it more manly, more Christian, to descend a little himself than to degrade another. It respects, in a word, the credit and estimation of his neigh- bour. The mimic of this amiable virtue, false politeness, is, on the other hand, ambitious, servile, timorous. It affects popularity : is solicitous to please, and to be taken notice of. The man of this character does not offer, but obtrudes, his civilities ; because he would merit by his assiduity ; because in despair of winning regard by any worthier qualities, he would be sure to make the most of this ; and lastly, because of all things he would dread, by the omission of any punctilious observance, to give offence. In a word, this sort of politeness respects, for its immediate object, the favour and consideration of our neighbour. Again : the man who governs himself by the spirit of the Apostle's precept, expresses his preference of another in such a way as is worthy of himself: in all innocent com- pliances, in all honest civilities, in all decent and manly condescensions. On the contrary, the man of the world, who rests in the letter of this command, is regardless of the means by which he con- ducts himself. He respects neither his own digpiity, northat of human nature. Truth, reason, virtue, are all equally betrayed by this supple impostor. He assents to the errors, though the most pernicious ; he applauds the follies, though the most ridiculous; ho soothes the vices, though the most flagrant, of other men. He never contradicts, though in the softest form of insinuation ; he never disapproves, though by a respectful silence ; he never condemns, though it be only by a good example. In short, he is solicitous for nothing but by some studied devices to hide from others, and, if possible, to palliate to himself, the grossness of his illiberal adu- lation. Lastly : we may be sure that the uUimati ends for which these different objects are pursued, and by so different means, must also li^ wide of each other. Accordingly, the true polite man would, by all proper testimonies of respect, pro- mote the credit and estimation of his neigh- bour ; because he sees that, by this generous consideration of each other, the peace of the world is, in a good degree, preserved ; be- cause he knows that these mutual attentions prevent animosities, soften the fierceness of men's manners, and dispose them to all the offices of benevolence and charity ; because, in a word, the interests of society are best served by this conduct ; and because he understands it to be his duty to love his neighbour. The falsely polite, on the contrary, are anxious, by all means whatever to procure the favour and consideration of those they converse with ; because they regard, ulti- mately, nothing more than their private interest : because they perceive that their own selfish designs are best carried on by such practices ; in a word, because they love themselves. Thus we see that genuine virtue consults the honour of others by worthy means, and for the noblest purposes ; the counterfeit solicits their favour by dishonest compli- ances, and for the basest end. 206 CATHERINE TALBOT. CATHERINE TALBOT, born 1720, died 1770, was the author of Reflections on the Seven Days of the Week, 1770, 6th edit., Lond., 1771, 12ino; Kssays, 1772, 2 vols. ]2mo; Letters to a Friend on u Future State ; Dialogues, and other worlcs in prose and verse. Collective edition of her Works by E. Carter, nevf edit., 1795, 8vo; by Rev. M. Pennington, A.M., 1809, 8vo, 9th edit., 1819, 8vo. "So excellent are the compositions of Miss Talbot which have come down to us, that it is to be greatly regretted that she did not devote more time to writing." — Mrs. Ell wood : Lit. Ladiet of Eng., i. 143. Autobiography of Sunday. Mr. Rambler, — There are fevr tasks more ungrateful than for persons of modesty to speak their own praises. In some cases, however, this must be done for the general good, and a generous spirit will on such occasions assert its merit, and vindicate itself with becoming warmth. My circumstances, Sir, are very hard and peculiar. Could the world be brought to treat me as I deserve, it would be a public benefit. This makes me apply to you, that my case being fairly stated in a paper so generally esteemed, I may suffer no longer from ignorant and childish prejudices. My elder brother was a Jew. A very respectable person, but somewhat austere in his manner ; highly and deservedly valued by his near relations and intimates, but utterly unfit for mixing in a larger society, or gaining a general acquaintance with mankind. In a venerable old age he re- tired from the world, and I, in the bloom of youth, came into it, succeeding him in all his dignities, and formed, as I might reasonably flatter myself, to be the olijeot of universal love and esteem. J