TO THE RIGHT HONOURARLE DAVID STEUART ERSKINE, EARL OF BUCHAN. MY LORD, I have nothing to offer worthy of a Mecænas, descended of antient kings. Yet, I hope, your lordship may peruse, not without a degree of interest, a tour through your native country, by a route in some measure new, and that may unfold facts, circumstances, and situations of men in society, not perhaps always known even to those who make these their study. Men placed on the elevation of illustrious descent and high rank, of minds naturally erect and noble, and expanded and refined by the arts and sciences, take long and comprehensive views. They look back to the past, around them on every side, and forward to what is to come after them.-Selfish and grovelling calculators, whether in business or politics, consider refined and generous pursuits as romance and folly; and, without either a sense of honour, or regard to natu re, truth, and justice, study, in all things, not what is graceful, excellent, and right, but what, at the moment, seems advantageous or prudent. But the true and accomplished nobleman considers nothing as foreign to himself that is interesting to human nature, admires virtue for her own sake, loves his country, the centre of every association of moral ideas, prefers glory to riches, and, instead of bowing to present power and upstart authority, devotes his attentions to great and permanent objects. He promotes the happiness with the improvement of mankind, intellectual and moral. I therefore hope, my lord, that you will extend your noble and generous patronage and protection to my book: which has much need of such patronage and protection, as a counterbalance to that odium which will arise from a free exposure of grievances and abuses; and these too, in one instance, ex isting to a flagrant degree, in a quarter where they were but little to be suspected. The case, my lord, to which I allude has a particular claim to the consideration and care of a family, renowned for their love of the muses, and the love with which that is returned. I have the honour to subscribe myself, My Lord, With the profoundest esteem, Your Lordship's Obedient and humble servant, JAMES HALL. LONDON, June 4, 1806. |