No. CLV. Hoc juvenem egregium præstanti munere dono. VIRGIL I present the " ingenious” youth with this distin- I AM glad to find, that you are so keenly engaged in the study of history and the belles lettres; and I have no doubt but, if you persevere, you will soon make such proficiency as to furnish yourself with a very interesting amusement. But in this, as in every other pursuit, you must lay your account with meeting with disappointments. Here you will soon perceive, that all is not gold that glitters; and when you think you have acquired full information on one head, it will not be long before you will be obliged to unlearn what you have been taught, and to begin anew the laborious task of investigation after you thought it had been completed. To assist you as much as in my power, I shall endeavour to give you some general notions of what you are to expect in the writings of some of our most celebrated authors. To know the general character of these writers, will put you on your guard in reading their works, and will the better enable you to avoid their errors, and to benefit by their knowledge. Hume is, with justice, accounted a writer of the first rank in this nation. He possessed great energy of mind, a strong nervous mode of expression, and a concise and perspicuous style. Few authors have written with greater perspicuity, and none knew better than he did how to place a favourite object in a conspicuous point of view, or to sink what did not serve his purpose in the shade, or to keep it entirely out of sight. Yet with all these talents he had great defects. Nature bestowed upon him strong mental powers; but he relied too much on their assistance. He was indolent in research; and wished to enjoy literary fame at as small an expense of this kind of literary drudgery as possible. Fond of metaphysical investigations, which gave full scope to his speculative ardour without much extraneous research, he attached himself to that mode of reasoning from his earliest infancy; and never could depart from it. Hence it has happened, that his reasoning, though specious and plausible, is often sophistical and erroneous. His notions of political economy, not being founded on facts, but on the imaginations of his own mind, are, in general, crude and imperfect; and his speculations on these subjects fallacious. Being a stranger to mathematical knowledge, and in no wise versant in general physics, he was unable to appreciate the merit of a Bacon, or a Newton. Their works made nearly the same im pression on his mind, as a description of colours may probably produce on the imagination of a blind man. A Shakspeare and a Milton were, in like manner, greatly beyond the sphere of his mental ken. Destitute of these perceptions, which convey to the mind those exquisite sensations denominated by the word taste, he read their writings with indifference, and wondered what any person could see in them to excite those extravagant emotions which he viewed as little short of insanity. To the pleasures and pains of love, he too was a stranger.*. Can we then wonder that the judgment he formed of men and things was often erroneous? Yet his chief aim, in every part of his history, is to present the actions of men as proceeding from mo Never was a more unnatural connection formed between two men, than that which was attempted between Hume and Rousseau. It was like an attempt to unite fire and ice. The result is well known. It was exactly what any man of sense who knew them both could have predicted. Hume and Rousseau no more understood each other, than if the one had known no other language but Hebrew, and the other English.. tives which were familiar to him. It is therefore uniformly tinged with a colouring, that is far from possessing that infinite diversity which nature invariably produces, and which Shakspeare would have imitated. In accompanying him, you are introduced into a fairy land which is extremely beautiful while you skim the surface only, but no sooner do you attempt to enter more deeply on the subject, than you find you have been deceived at every step; and that nothing can be more fallacious than the picture he has given of the transactions that have come under his review. Robertson possesses talents of a different kind, that are not less conspicuous, and defects that as necessarily result from these, as those which belonged to his illustrious contemporary. His mind, less vigorous, though more cultivated, dared not to range so much at large in the regions of Parnassus. He hazards not such daring thoughts, nor clothes them in such ardent expressions. His language is easy, flowing, and correct; his periods are musical, and elegantly rounded; but his thoughts are not so natural nor so easy; nor dares he venture to be so concise and clear. No adept in the principles of political legislation, and conscious of this defect, he tries to conceal it by a combination of beautiful words, which, though conveying no precise ideas, seem to discover great depth of reasoning to those who are no better informed than himself. Unable, too, to trace the actions of men from those principles that affected their va rious minds, he has contrived to write in a manner that did not render this defect perceptible. His history is a string of aphorisms, of which the events he relates are adduced as illustra tions; the mind is therefore prejudiced before it becomes acquainted with facts on which that judgment is founded. And should it happen, that the facts, as they really occurred, do not prove exact illustrations of the aphorism, can we be surprised that they should be sometimes so moulded as to make them seem perfectly fitted for the purpose? From this mode of writing history, you will easily perceive that accurate information is not to be obtained. But notwithstanding these great defects, it is not without reason that Dr. Robertson has obtained a very high degree of applause; for few writers, perhaps, in any tongue, have excelled him in the purity of his language, in the luxuriant flow of his sentences, and the elegant turning of his periods; and in regard to the perspicuity of his arrangement, and the distinctness of his narrative, where he confines himself to narrative |