Letters Concerning the English Nation / Lettres philosophiques
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the 1734 French edition and suppression are recorded as transmission context.","GeoCards":[{"Label":"Region","Key":"Region:1"},{"Label":"Terra Avita","Key":"TerraAvita:1"},{"Label":"Terra Avita Region","Key":"TerraAvitaRegion:1"},{"Label":"Modern Country","Key":"Country:FRA:1"}],"OriginalTitle":"Lettres philosophiques","Language":"French","DisciplineCards":[{"Label":"Primary Discipline","Key":"Discipline:epistemology"},{"Label":"Secondary Discipline","Key":"Discipline:political-philosophy"}],"Tradition":"French Enlightenment critique, deism, toleration, civil liberties, philosophical satire, and Newtonian public philosophy","FullText":{"Title":"Full Text","Copy":"Public-domain full text from Project Gutenberg eBook #2445 .","Url":"","Label":"","Kicker":"","Cards":[]},"CoreThesis":["Voltaire uses English religious pluralism, science, commerce, Locke, Newton, and parliamentary culture to criticize French dogma and absolutist habits."],"Classification":{"AlternateTitles":"Letters on England; 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Lettres anglaises; Philosophical Letters"},{"Label":"Key Concepts","Value":"England; toleration; Locke; Newton; commerce; liberty; letters; Enlightenment"},{"Label":"Methodology","Value":"Source-backed Voltaire work row; reference, catalog, source-surface, image-source, and scholarship rows are evidence only and no full text is imported."},{"Label":"Structure","Value":"Work page with explicit lifetime display year, date note, evidence note, source linkage, and no full-text badge."}]},{"Kind":"TextSection","Title":"Arguments","Paragraphs":["Voltaire uses English religious pluralism, science, commerce, Locke, Newton, and parliamentary culture to criticize French dogma and absolutist habits."]},{"Kind":"FieldSection","Title":"Influence","Fields":[{"Label":"Influenced By","Value":"John Locke, Isaac Newton, Pierre Bayle, Lord Bolingbroke, English deism, Samuel Clarke, Montesquieu, classical satire, French libertine writing, and Emilie du Chatelet."},{"Label":"Influence On","Value":"French Enlightenment, public philosophy, deism, religious toleration, civil-liberties discourse, anti-clerical critique, philosophical satire, Newtonian public science, and later liberal thought."}]},{"Kind":"TextSection","Title":"Significance","Paragraphs":["Accepted as a direct Voltaire work because it marks his public turn into Enlightenment philosophical criticism.","Voltaire remains central to debates over toleration, free expression, religious criticism, satire, civil liberties, public intellectual life, deism, natural religion, and Enlightenment political culture."]},{"Kind":"TextSection","Title":"Evidence Note","Paragraphs":["Accepted as a direct Voltaire work because it marks his public turn into Enlightenment philosophical criticism."]},{"Kind":"RawSection","Title":"Full Text","BodyHtml":"\u003cp class=\"dz-philo__section-copy dz-philo__full-text-source\"\u003ePublic-domain full text from \u003ca href=\"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/2445\"\u003eProject Gutenberg eBook #2445\u003c/a\u003e.\u003c/p\u003e\n \u003carticle class=\"dz-philo__full-text-body\"\u003e\r\n\u003ch1\u003eLETTERS ON ENGLAND\u003cbr /\u003e\nby Voltaire\u003c/h1\u003e\n\u003ch2\u003eINTRODUCTION\u003c/h2\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eFran\u0026ccedil;ois Marie Arouet, who called himself Voltaire, was the\nson of Fran\u0026ccedil;ois Arouet of Poitou, who lived in Paris, had given\nup his office of notary two years before the birth of this his third\nson, and obtained some years afterwards a treasurer\u0026rsquo;s office in\nthe Chambre des Comptes.\u0026nbsp; Voltaire was born in the year 1694.\u0026nbsp;\nHe lived until within ten or eleven years of the outbreak of the Great\nFrench Revolution, and was a chief leader in the movement of thought\nthat preceded the Revolution.\u0026nbsp; Though he lived to his eighty-fourth\nyear, Voltaire was born with a weak body.\u0026nbsp; His brother Armand,\neight years his senior, became a Jansenist.\u0026nbsp; Voltaire when ten\nyears old was placed with the Jesuits in the Coll\u0026egrave;ge Louis-le-Grand.\u0026nbsp;\nThere he was taught during seven years, and his genius was encouraged\nin its bent for literature; skill in speaking and in writing being especially\nfostered in the system of education which the Jesuits had planned to\nproduce capable men who by voice and pen could give a reason for the\nfaith they held.\u0026nbsp; Verses written for an invalid soldier at the\nage of eleven won for young Voltaire the friendship of Ninon l\u0026rsquo;Enclos,\nwho encouraged him to go on writing verses.\u0026nbsp; She died soon afterwards,\nand remembered him with a legacy of two thousand livres for purchase\nof books.\u0026nbsp; He wrote in his lively school-days a tragedy that afterwards\nhe burnt.\u0026nbsp; At the age of seventeen he left the Coll\u0026egrave;ge Louis-le-Grand,\nwhere he said afterwards that he had been taught nothing but Latin and\nthe Stupidities.\u0026nbsp; He was then sent to the law schools, and saw\nlife in Paris as a gay young poet who, with all his brilliant liveliness,\nhad an aptitude for looking on the tragic side of things, and one of\nwhose first poems was an \u0026ldquo;Ode on the Misfortunes of Life.\u0026rdquo;\u0026nbsp;\nHis mother died when he was twenty.\u0026nbsp; Voltaire\u0026rsquo;s father thought\nhim a fool for his versifying, and attached him as secretary to the\nMarquis of Ch\u0026acirc;teauneuf; when he went as ambassador to the Hague.\u0026nbsp;\nIn December, 1713, he was dismissed for his irregularities.\u0026nbsp; In\nParis his unsteadiness and his addiction to literature caused his father\nto rejoice in getting him housed in a country ch\u0026acirc;teau with M.\nde Caumartin.\u0026nbsp; M. de Caumartin\u0026rsquo;s father talked with such\nenthusiasm of Henri IV. and Sully that Voltaire planned the writing\nof what became his \u003ci\u003eHenriade\u003c/i\u003e, and his \u0026ldquo;History of the Age\nof Louis XIV.,\u0026rdquo; who died on the 1st of September, 1715.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eUnder the regency that followed, Voltaire got into trouble again\nand again through the sharpness of his pen, and at last, accused of\nverse that satirised the Regent, he was locked up\u0026mdash;on the 17th\nof May, 1717\u0026mdash;in the Bastille.\u0026nbsp; There he wrote the first two\nbooks of his \u003ci\u003eHenriade\u003c/i\u003e, and finished a play on \u0026OElig;dipus, which\nhe had begun at the age of eighteen.\u0026nbsp; He did not obtain full liberty\nuntil the 12th of April, 1718, and it was at this time\u0026mdash;with a\nclearly formed design to associate the name he took with work of high\nattempt in literature\u0026mdash;that Fran\u0026ccedil;ois Marie Arouet, aged\ntwenty-four, first called himself Voltaire.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eVoltaire\u0026rsquo;s \u003ci\u003e\u0026OElig;dipe\u003c/i\u003e was played with success in November,\n1718.\u0026nbsp; A few months later he was again banished from Paris, and\nfinished the \u003ci\u003eHenriade\u003c/i\u003e in his retirement, as well as another play,\n\u003ci\u003eArt\u0026eacute;mise\u003c/i\u003e, that was acted in February, 1720.\u0026nbsp; Other\nplays followed.\u0026nbsp; In December, 1721, Voltaire visited Lord Bolingbroke,\nwho was then an exile from England, at the Ch\u0026acirc;teau of La Source.\u0026nbsp;\nThere was now constant literary activity.\u0026nbsp; From July to October,\n1722, Voltaire visited Holland with Madame de Rupelmonde.\u0026nbsp; After\na serious attack of small-pox in November, 1723, Voltaire was active\nas a poet about the Court.\u0026nbsp; He was then in receipt of a pension\nof two thousand livres from the king, and had inherited more than twice\nas much by the death of his father in January, 1722.\u0026nbsp; But in December,\n1725, a quarrel, fastened upon him by the Chevalier de Rohan, who had\nhim waylaid and beaten, caused him to send a challenge.\u0026nbsp; For this\nhe was arrested and lodged once more, in April, 1726, in the Bastille.\u0026nbsp;\nThere he was detained a month; and his first act when he was released\nwas to ask for a passport to England.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eVoltaire left France, reached London in August, 1726, went as guest\nto the house of a rich merchant at Wandsworth, and remained three years\nin this country, from the age of thirty-two to the age of thirty-five.\u0026nbsp;\nHe was here when George I. died, and George II. became king.\u0026nbsp; He\npublished here his \u003ci\u003eHenriade\u003c/i\u003e.\u0026nbsp; He wrote here his \u0026ldquo;History\nof Charles XII.\u0026rdquo;\u0026nbsp; He read \u0026ldquo;Gulliver\u0026rsquo;s Travels\u0026rdquo;\nas a new book, and might have been present at the first night of \u003ci\u003eThe\nBeggar\u0026rsquo;s Opera\u003c/i\u003e.\u0026nbsp; He was here whet Sir Isaac Newton died.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIn 1731 he published at Rouen the \u003ci\u003eLettres sur les Anglais\u003c/i\u003e,\nwhich appeared in England in 1733 in the volume from which they are\nhere reprinted.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eH.M.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003ch2\u003eLETTERS ON ENGLAND\u003c/h2\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eLETTER I.\u0026mdash;ON THE QUAKERS\u003c/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eI was of opinion that the doctrine and history of so extraordinary\na people were worthy the attention of the curious.\u0026nbsp; To acquaint\nmyself with them I made a visit to one of the most eminent Quakers in\nEngland, who, after having traded thirty years, had the wisdom to prescribe\nlimits to his fortune and to his desires, and was settled in a little\nsolitude not far from London.\u0026nbsp; Being come into it, I perceived\na small but regularly built house, vastly neat, but without the least\npomp of furniture.\u0026nbsp; The Quaker who owned it was a hale, ruddy-complexioned\nold man, who had never been afflicted with sickness because he had always\nbeen insensible to passions, and a perfect stranger to intemperance.\u0026nbsp;\nI never in my life saw a more noble or a more engaging aspect than his.\u0026nbsp;\nHe was dressed like those of his persuasion, in a plain coat without\npleats in the sides, or buttons on the pockets and sleeves; and had\non a beaver, the brims of which were horizontal like those of our clergy.\u0026nbsp;\nHe did not uncover himself when I appeared, and advanced towards me\nwithout once stooping his body; but there appeared more politeness in\nthe open, humane air of his countenance, than in the custom of drawing\none leg behind the other, and taking that from the head which is made\nto cover it.\u0026nbsp; \u0026ldquo;Friend,\u0026rdquo; says he to me, \u0026ldquo;I perceive\nthou art a stranger, but if I can do anything for thee, only tell me.\u0026rdquo;\u0026nbsp;\n\u0026ldquo;Sir,\u0026rdquo; said I to him, bending forwards and advancing, as\nis usual with us, one leg towards him, \u0026ldquo;I flatter myself that\nmy just curiosity will not give you the least offence, and that you\u0026rsquo;ll\ndo me the honour to inform me of the particulars of your religion.\u0026rdquo;\u0026nbsp;\n\u0026ldquo;The people of thy country,\u0026rdquo; replied the Quaker, \u0026ldquo;are\ntoo full of their bows and compliments, but I never yet met with one\nof them who had so much curiosity as thyself.\u0026nbsp; Come in, and let\nus first dine together.\u0026rdquo;\u0026nbsp; I still continued to make some\nvery unseasonable ceremonies, it not being easy to disengage one\u0026rsquo;s\nself at once from habits we have been long used to; and after taking\npart in a frugal meal, which began and ended with a prayer to God, I\nbegan to question my courteous host.\u0026nbsp; I opened with that which\ngood Catholics have more than once made to Huguenots.\u0026nbsp; \u0026ldquo;My\ndear sir,\u0026rdquo; said I, \u0026ldquo;were you ever baptised?\u0026rdquo;\u0026nbsp;\n\u0026ldquo;I never was,\u0026rdquo; replied the Quaker, \u0026ldquo;nor any of my\nbrethren.\u0026rdquo;\u0026nbsp; \u0026ldquo;Zounds!\u0026rdquo; say I to him, \u0026ldquo;you\nare not Christians, then.\u0026rdquo;\u0026nbsp; \u0026ldquo;Friend,\u0026rdquo; replies\nthe old man in a soft tone of voice, \u0026ldquo;swear not; we are Christians,\nand endeavour to be good Christians, but we are not of opinion that\nthe sprinkling water on a child\u0026rsquo;s head makes him a Christian.\u0026rdquo;\u0026nbsp;\n\u0026ldquo;Heavens!\u0026rdquo; say I, shocked at his impiety, \u0026ldquo;you have\nthen forgot that Christ was baptised by St. John.\u0026rdquo;\u0026nbsp; \u0026ldquo;Friend,\u0026rdquo;\nreplies the mild Quaker once again, \u0026ldquo;swear not; Christ indeed\nwas baptised by John, but He himself never baptised anyone.\u0026nbsp; We\nare the disciples of Christ, not of John.\u0026rdquo;\u0026nbsp; I pitied very\nmuch the sincerity of my worthy Quaker, and was absolutely for forcing\nhim to get himself christened.\u0026nbsp; \u0026ldquo;Were that all,\u0026rdquo; replied\nhe very gravely, \u0026ldquo;we would submit cheerfully to baptism, purely\nin compliance with thy weakness, for we don\u0026rsquo;t condemn any person\nwho uses it; but then we think that those who profess a religion of\nso holy, so spiritual a nature as that of Christ, ought to abstain to\nthe utmost of their power from the Jewish ceremonies.\u0026rdquo;\u0026nbsp; \u0026ldquo;O\nunaccountable!\u0026rdquo; say I: \u0026ldquo;what! baptism a Jewish ceremony?\u0026rdquo;\u0026nbsp;\n\u0026ldquo;Yes, my friend,\u0026rdquo; says he, \u0026ldquo;so truly Jewish, that\na great many Jews use the baptism of John to this day.\u0026nbsp; Look into\nancient authors, and thou wilt find that John only revived this practice;\nand that it had been used by the Hebrews, long before his time, in like\nmanner as the Mahometans imitated the Ishmaelites in their pilgrimages\nto Mecca.\u0026nbsp; Jesus indeed submitted to the baptism of John, as He\nhad suffered Himself to be circumcised; but circumcision and the washing\nwith water ought to be abolished by the baptism of Christ, that baptism\nof the Spirit, that ablution of the soul, which is the salvation of\nmankind.\u0026nbsp; Thus the forerunner said, \u0026lsquo;I indeed baptise you\nwith water unto repentance; but He that cometh after me is mightier\nthan I, whose shoes I am not worthy to bear: he shall baptise you with\nthe Holy Ghost and with fire.\u0026rsquo;\u0026nbsp; Likewise Paul, the great\napostle of the Gentiles, writes as follows to the Corinthians, \u0026lsquo;Christ\nsent me not to baptise, but to preach the Gospel;\u0026rsquo; and indeed\nPaul never baptised but two persons with water, and that very much against\nhis inclinations.\u0026nbsp; He circumcised his disciple Timothy, and the\nother disciples likewise circumcised all who were willing to submit\nto that carnal ordinance.\u0026nbsp; But art thou circumcised?\u0026rdquo; added\nhe.\u0026nbsp; \u0026ldquo;I have not the honour to be so,\u0026rdquo; say I.\u0026nbsp;\n\u0026ldquo;Well, friend,\u0026rdquo; continues the Quaker, \u0026ldquo;thou art a\nChristian without being circumcised, and I am one without being baptised.\u0026rdquo;\u0026nbsp;\nThus did this pious man make a wrong but very specious application of\nfour or five texts of Scripture which seemed to favour the tenets of\nhis sect; but at the same time forgot very sincerely an hundred texts\nwhich made directly against them.\u0026nbsp; I had more sense than to contest\nwith him, since there is no possibility of convincing an enthusiast.\u0026nbsp;\nA man should never pretend to inform a lover of his mistress\u0026rsquo;s\nfaults, no more than one who is at law, of the badness of his cause;\nnor attempt to win over a fanatic by strength of reasoning.\u0026nbsp; Accordingly\nI waived the subject.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u0026ldquo;Well,\u0026rdquo; said I to him, \u0026ldquo;what sort of a communion\nhave you?\u0026rdquo;\u0026nbsp; \u0026ldquo;We have none like that thou hintest at\namong us,\u0026rdquo; replied he.\u0026nbsp; \u0026ldquo;How! no communion?\u0026rdquo;\nsaid I.\u0026nbsp; \u0026ldquo;Only that spiritual one,\u0026rdquo; replied he, \u0026ldquo;of\nhearts.\u0026rdquo;\u0026nbsp; He then began again to throw out his texts of Scripture;\nand preached a most eloquent sermon against that ordinance.\u0026nbsp; He\nharangued in a tone as though he had been inspired, to prove that the\nsacraments were merely of human invention, and that the word \u0026ldquo;sacrament\u0026rdquo;\nwas not once mentioned in the Gospel.\u0026nbsp; \u0026ldquo;Excuse,\u0026rdquo; said\nhe, \u0026ldquo;my ignorance, for I have not employed a hundredth part of\nthe arguments which might be brought to prove the truth of our religion,\nbut these thou thyself mayest peruse in the Exposition of our Faith\nwritten by Robert Barclay.\u0026nbsp; It is one of the best pieces that ever\nwas penned by man; and as our adversaries confess it to be of dangerous\ntendency, the arguments in it must necessarily be very convincing.\u0026rdquo;\u0026nbsp;\nI promised to peruse this piece, and my Quaker imagined he had already\nmade a convert of me.\u0026nbsp; He afterwards gave me an account in few\nwords of some singularities which make this sect the contempt of others.\u0026nbsp;\n\u0026ldquo;Confess,\u0026rdquo; said he, \u0026ldquo;that it was very difficult for\nthee to refrain from laughter, when I answered all thy civilities without\nuncovering my head, and at the same time said \u0026lsquo;thee\u0026rsquo; and\n\u0026lsquo;thou\u0026rsquo; to thee.\u0026nbsp; However, thou appearest to me too\nwell read not to know that in Christ\u0026rsquo;s time no nation was so ridiculous\nas to put the plural number for the singular.\u0026nbsp; Augustus C\u0026aelig;sar\nhimself was spoken to in such phrases as these: \u0026lsquo;I love thee,\u0026rsquo;\n\u0026lsquo;I beseech thee,\u0026rsquo; \u0026lsquo;I thank thee;\u0026rsquo; but he did\nnot allow any person to call him \u0026lsquo;Domine,\u0026rsquo; sir.\u0026nbsp; It\nwas not till many ages after that men would have the word \u0026lsquo;you,\u0026rsquo;\nas though they were double, instead of \u0026lsquo;thou\u0026rsquo; employed in\nspeaking to them; and usurped the flattering titles of lordship, of\neminence, and of holiness, which mere worms bestow on other worms by\nassuring them that they are with a most profound respect, and an infamous\nfalsehood, their most obedient humble servants.\u0026nbsp; It is to secure\nourselves more strongly from such a shameless traffic of lies and flattery,\nthat we \u0026lsquo;thee\u0026rsquo; and \u0026lsquo;thou\u0026rsquo; a king with the same\nfreedom as we do a beggar, and salute no person; we owing nothing to\nmankind but charity, and to the laws respect and obedience.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u0026ldquo;Our apparel is also somewhat different from that of others,\nand this purely, that it may be a perpetual warning to us not to imitate\nthem.\u0026nbsp; Others wear the badges and marks of their several dignities,\nand we those of Christian humility.\u0026nbsp; We fly from all assemblies\nof pleasure, from diversions of every kind, and from places where gaming\nis practised; and indeed our case would be very deplorable, should we\nfill with such levities as those I have mentioned the heart which ought\nto be the habitation of God.\u0026nbsp; We never swear, not even in a court\nof justice, being of opinion that the most holy name of God ought not\nto be prostituted in the miserable contests betwixt man and man.\u0026nbsp;\nWhen we are obliged to appear before a magistrate upon other people\u0026rsquo;s\naccount (for law-suits are unknown among the Friends), we give evidence\nto the truth by sealing it with our yea or nay; and the judges believe\nus on our bare affirmation, whilst so many other Christians forswear\nthemselves on the holy Gospels.\u0026nbsp; We never war or fight in any case;\nbut it is not that we are afraid, for so far from shuddering at the\nthoughts of death, we on the contrary bless the moment which unites\nus with the Being of Beings; but the reason of our not using the outward\nsword is, that we are neither wolves, tigers, nor mastiffs, but men\nand Christians.\u0026nbsp; Our God, who has commanded us to love our enemies,\nand to suffer without repining, would certainly not permit us to cross\nthe seas, merely because murderers clothed in scarlet, and wearing caps\ntwo foot high, enlist citizens by a noise made with two little sticks\non an ass\u0026rsquo;s skin extended.\u0026nbsp; And when, after a victory is\ngained, the whole city of London is illuminated; when the sky is in\na blaze with fireworks, and a noise is heard in the air, of thanksgivings,\nof bells, of organs, and of the cannon, we groan in silence, and are\ndeeply affected with sadness of spirit and brokenness of heart, for\nthe sad havoc which is the occasion of those public rejoicings.\u0026rdquo;\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eLETTER II.\u0026mdash;ON THE QUAKERS\u003c/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eSuch was the substance of the conversation I had with this very singular\nperson; but I was greatly surprised to see him come the Sunday following\nand take me with him to the Quakers\u0026rsquo; meeting.\u0026nbsp; There are\nseveral of these in London, but that which he carried me to stands near\nthe famous pillar called The Monument.\u0026nbsp; The brethren were already\nassembled at my entering it with my guide.\u0026nbsp; There might be about\nfour hundred men and three hundred women in the meeting.\u0026nbsp; The women\nhid their faces behind their fans, and the men were covered with their\nbroad-brimmed hats.\u0026nbsp; All were seated, and the silence was universal.\u0026nbsp;\nI passed through them, but did not perceive so much as one lift up his\neyes to look at me.\u0026nbsp; This silence lasted a quarter of an hour,\nwhen at last one of them rose up, took off his hat, and, after making\na variety of wry faces and groaning in a most lamentable manner, he,\npartly from his nose and partly from his mouth, threw out a strange,\nconfused jumble of words (borrowed, as he imagined, from the Gospel)\nwhich neither himself nor any of his hearers understood.\u0026nbsp; When\nthis distorter had ended his beautiful soliloquy, and that the stupid,\nbut greatly edified, congregation were separated, I asked my friend\nhow it was possible for the judicious part of their assembly to suffer\nsuch a babbling?\u0026nbsp; \u0026ldquo;We are obliged,\u0026rdquo; says he, \u0026ldquo;to\nsuffer it, because no one knows when a man rises up to hold forth whether\nhe will be moved by the Spirit or by folly.\u0026nbsp; In this doubt and\nuncertainty we listen patiently to everyone; we even allow our women\nto hold forth.\u0026nbsp; Two or three of these are often inspired at one\nand the same time, and it is then that a most charming noise is heard\nin the Lord\u0026rsquo;s house.\u0026rdquo;\u0026nbsp; \u0026ldquo;You have, then, no priests?\u0026rdquo;\nsay I to him.\u0026nbsp; \u0026ldquo;No, no, friend,\u0026rdquo; replies the Quaker,\n\u0026ldquo;to our great happiness.\u0026rdquo;\u0026nbsp; Then opening one of the\nFriends\u0026rsquo; books, as he called it, he read the following words in\nan emphatic tone:\u0026mdash;\u0026ldquo;\u0026lsquo;God forbid we should presume to\nordain anyone to receive the Holy Spirit on the Lord\u0026rsquo;s Day to\nthe prejudice of the rest of the brethren.\u0026rsquo;\u0026nbsp; Thanks to the\nAlmighty, we are the only people upon earth that have no priests.\u0026nbsp;\nWouldst thou deprive us of so happy a distinction?\u0026nbsp; Why should\nwe abandon our babe to mercenary nurses, when we ourselves have milk\nenough for it?\u0026nbsp; These mercenary creatures would soon domineer in\nour houses and destroy both the mother and the babe.\u0026nbsp; God has said,\n\u0026lsquo;Freely you have received, freely give.\u0026rsquo;\u0026nbsp; Shall we,\nafter these words, cheapen, as it were, the Gospel, sell the Holy Ghost,\nand make of an assembly of Christians a mere shop of traders?\u0026nbsp;\nWe don\u0026rsquo;t pay a set of men clothed in black to assist our poor,\nto bury our dead, or to preach to the brethren.\u0026nbsp; These offices\nare all of too tender a nature for us ever to entrust them to others.\u0026rdquo;\u0026nbsp;\n\u0026ldquo;But how is it possible for you,\u0026rdquo; said I, with some warmth,\n\u0026ldquo;to know whether your discourse is really inspired by the Almighty?\u0026rdquo;\u0026nbsp;\n\u0026ldquo;Whosoever,\u0026rdquo; says he, \u0026ldquo;shall implore Christ to enlighten\nhim, and shall publish the Gospel truths he may feel inwardly, such\nan one may be assured that he is inspired by the Lord.\u0026rdquo;\u0026nbsp;\nHe then poured forth a numberless multitude of Scripture texts which\nproved, as he imagined, that there is no such thing as Christianity\nwithout an immediate revelation, and added these remarkable words: \u0026ldquo;When\nthou movest one of thy limbs, is it moved by thy own power?\u0026nbsp; Certainly\nnot; for this limb is often sensible to involuntary motions.\u0026nbsp; Consequently\nhe who created thy body gives motion to this earthly tabernacle.\u0026nbsp;\nAnd are the several ideas of which thy soul receives the impression\nformed by thyself?\u0026nbsp; Much less are they, since these pour in upon\nthy mind whether thou wilt or no; consequently thou receivest thy ideas\nfrom Him who created thy soul.\u0026nbsp; But as He leaves thy affections\nat full liberty, He gives thy mind such ideas as thy affections may\ndeserve; if thou livest in God, thou actest, thou thinkest in God.\u0026nbsp;\nAfter this thou needest only but open thine eyes to that light which\nenlightens all mankind, and it is then thou wilt perceive the truth,\nand make others perceive it.\u0026rdquo;\u0026nbsp; \u0026ldquo;Why, this,\u0026rdquo; said\nI, \u0026ldquo;is Malebranche\u0026rsquo;s doctrine to a tittle.\u0026rdquo;\u0026nbsp;\n\u0026ldquo;I am acquainted with thy Malebranche,\u0026rdquo; said he; \u0026ldquo;he\nhad something of the Friend in him, but was not enough so.\u0026rdquo;\u0026nbsp;\nThese are the most considerable particulars I learnt concerning the\ndoctrine of the Quakers.\u0026nbsp; In my next letter I shall acquaint you\nwith their history, which you will find more singular than their opinions.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eLETTER III.\u0026mdash;ON THE QUAKERS\u003c/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eYou have already heard that the Quakers date from Christ, who, according\nto them, was the first Quaker.\u0026nbsp; Religion, say these, was corrupted\na little after His death, and remained in that state of corruption about\nsixteen hundred years.\u0026nbsp; But there were always a few Quakers concealed\nin the world, who carefully preserved the sacred fire, which was extinguished\nin all but themselves, until at last this light spread itself in England\nin 1642.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIt was at the time when Great Britain was torn to pieces by the intestine\nwars which three or four sects had raised in the name of God, that one\nGeorge Fox, born in Leicestershire, and son to a silk-weaver, took it\ninto his head to preach, and, as he pretended, with all the requisites\nof a true apostle\u0026mdash;that is, without being able either to read or\nwrite.\u0026nbsp; He was about twenty-five years of age, irreproachable in\nhis life and conduct, and a holy madman.\u0026nbsp; He was equipped in leather\nfrom head to foot, and travelled from one village to another, exclaiming\nagainst war and the clergy.\u0026nbsp; Had his invectives been levelled against\nthe soldiery only he would have been safe enough, but he inveighed against\necclesiastics.\u0026nbsp; Fox was seized at Derby, and being carried before\na justice of peace, he did not once offer to pull off his leathern hat,\nupon which an officer gave him a great box of the ear, and cried to\nhim, \u0026ldquo;Don\u0026rsquo;t you know you are to appear uncovered before\nhis worship?\u0026rdquo;\u0026nbsp; Fox presented his other cheek to the officer,\nand begged him to give him another box for God\u0026rsquo;s sake.\u0026nbsp; The\njustice would have had him sworn before he asked him any questions.\u0026nbsp;\n\u0026ldquo;Know, friend,\u0026rdquo; says Fox to him, \u0026ldquo;that I never swear.\u0026rdquo;\u0026nbsp;\nThe justice, observing he \u0026ldquo;thee\u0026rsquo;d\u0026rdquo; and \u0026ldquo;thou\u0026rsquo;d\u0026rdquo;\nhim, sent him to the House of Correction, in Derby, with orders that\nhe should be whipped there.\u0026nbsp; Fox praised the Lord all the way he\nwent to the House of Correction, where the justice\u0026rsquo;s order was\nexecuted with the utmost severity.\u0026nbsp; The men who whipped this enthusiast\nwere greatly surprised to hear him beseech them to give him a few more\nlashes for the good of his soul.\u0026nbsp; There was no need of entreating\nthese people; the lashes were repeated, for which Fox thanked them very\ncordially, and began to preach.\u0026nbsp; At first the spectators fell a-laughing,\nbut they afterwards listened to him; and as enthusiasm is an epidemical\ndistemper, many were persuaded, and those who scourged him became his\nfirst disciples.\u0026nbsp; Being set at liberty, he ran up and down the\ncountry with a dozen proselytes at his heels, still declaiming against\nthe clergy, and was whipped from time to time.\u0026nbsp; Being one day set\nin the pillory, he harangued the crowd in so strong and moving a manner,\nthat fifty of the auditors became his converts, and he won the rest\nso much in his favour that, his head being freed tumultuously from the\nhole where it was fastened, the populace went and searched for the Church\nof England clergyman who had been chiefly instrumental in bringing him\nto this punishment, and set him on the same pillory where Fox had stood.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eFox was bold enough to convert some of Oliver Cromwell\u0026rsquo;s soldiers,\nwho thereupon quitted the service and refused to take the oaths.\u0026nbsp;\nOliver, having as great a contempt for a sect which would not allow\nits members to fight, as Sixtus Quintus had for another sect, \u003ci\u003eDove\nnon si chiamava\u003c/i\u003e, began to persecute these new converts.\u0026nbsp; The\nprisons were crowded with them, but persecution seldom has any other\neffect than to increase the number of proselytes.\u0026nbsp; These came,\ntherefore, from their confinement more strongly confirmed in the principles\nthey had imbibed, and followed by their gaolers, whom they had brought\nover to their belief.\u0026nbsp; But the circumstances which contributed\nchiefly to the spreading of this sect were as follows:\u0026mdash;Fox thought\nhimself inspired, and consequently was of opinion that he must speak\nin a manner different from the rest of mankind.\u0026nbsp; He thereupon began\nto writhe his body, to screw up his face, to hold in his breath, and\nto exhale it in a forcible manner, insomuch that the priestess of the\nPythian god at Delphos could not have acted her part to better advantage.\u0026nbsp;\nInspiration soon became so habitual to him that he could scarce deliver\nhimself in any other manner.\u0026nbsp; This was the first gift he communicated\nto his disciples.\u0026nbsp; These aped very sincerely their master\u0026rsquo;s\nseveral grimaces, and shook in every limb the instant the fit of inspiration\ncame upon them, whence they were called Quakers.\u0026nbsp; The vulgar attempted\nto mimic them; they trembled, they spake through the nose, they quaked\nand fancied themselves inspired by the Holy Ghost.\u0026nbsp; The only thing\nnow wanting was a few miracles, and accordingly they wrought some.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eFox, this modern patriarch, spoke thus to a justice of peace before\na large assembly of people: \u0026ldquo;Friend, take care what thou dost;\nGod will soon punish thee for persecuting His saints.\u0026rdquo;\u0026nbsp; This\nmagistrate, being one who besotted himself every day with bad beer and\nbrandy, died of an apoplexy two days after, the moment he had signed\na \u003ci\u003emittimus\u003c/i\u003e for imprisoning some Quakers.\u0026nbsp; The sudden death\nwith which this justice was seized was not ascribed to his intemperance,\nbut was universally looked upon as the effect of the holy man\u0026rsquo;s\npredictions; so that this accident made more converts to Quakerism than\na thousand sermons and as many shaking fits could have done.\u0026nbsp; Oliver,\nfinding them increase daily, was desirous of bringing them over to his\nparty, and for that purpose attempted to bribe them by money.\u0026nbsp;\nHowever, they were incorruptible, which made him one day declare that\nthis religion was the only one he had ever met with that had resisted\nthe charms of gold.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe Quakers were several times persecuted under Charles II.; not\nupon a religious account, but for refusing to pay the tithes, for \u0026ldquo;theeing\u0026rdquo;\nand \u0026ldquo;thouing\u0026rdquo; the magistrates, and for refusing to take\nthe oaths enacted by the laws.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eAt last Robert Barclay, a native of Scotland, presented to the King,\nin 1675, his \u0026ldquo;Apology for the Quakers,\u0026rdquo; a work as well drawn\nup as the subject could possibly admit.\u0026nbsp; The dedication to Charles\nII. is not filled with mean, flattering encomiums, but abounds with\nbold touches in favour of truth and with the wisest counsels.\u0026nbsp;\n\u0026ldquo;Thou hast tasted,\u0026rdquo; says he to the King at the close of\nhis epistle dedicatory, \u0026ldquo;of prosperity and adversity; thou knowest\nwhat it is to be banished thy native country; to be overruled as well\nas to rule and sit upon the throne; and, being oppressed, thou hast\nreason to know how hateful the Oppressor is both to God and man.\u0026nbsp;\nIf, after all these warnings and advertisements, thou dost not turn\nunto the Lord with all thy heart, but forget Him who remembered thee\nin thy distress, and give up thyself to follow lust and vanity, surely\ngreat will be thy condemnation.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u0026ldquo;Against which snare, as well as the temptation of those that\nmay or do feed thee and prompt thee to evil, the most excellent and\nprevalent remedy will be, to apply thyself to that light of Christ which\nshineth in thy conscience, which neither can nor will flatter thee nor\nsuffer thee to be at ease in thy sins, but doth and will deal plainly\nand faithfully with thee, as those that are followers thereof have plainly\ndone.\u0026mdash;Thy faithful friend and subject, Robert Barclay.\u0026rdquo;\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eA more surprising circumstance is, that this epistle, written by\na private man of no figure, was so happy in its effects, as to put a\nstop to the persecution.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eLETTER IV.\u0026mdash;ON THE QUAKERS\u003c/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eAbout this time arose the illustrious William Penn, who established\nthe power of the Quakers in America, and would have made them appear\nvenerable in the eyes of the Europeans, were it possible for mankind\nto respect virtue when revealed in a ridiculous light.\u0026nbsp; He was\nthe only son of Vice-Admiral Penn, favourite of the Duke of York, afterwards\nKing James II.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWilliam Penn, at twenty years of age, happening to meet with a Quaker\nin Cork, whom he had known at Oxford, this man made a proselyte of him;\nand William being a sprightly youth, and naturally eloquent, having\na winning aspect, and a very engaging carriage, he soon gained over\nsome of his intimates.\u0026nbsp; He carried matters so far, that he formed\nby insensible degrees a society of young Quakers, who met at his house;\nso that he was at the head of a sect when a little above twenty.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eBeing returned, after his leaving Cork, to the Vice-Admiral his father,\ninstead of falling upon his knees to ask his blessing, he went up to\nhim with his hat on, and said, \u0026ldquo;Friend, I am very glad to see\nthee in good health.\u0026rdquo;\u0026nbsp; The Vice-Admiral imagined his son\nto be crazy, but soon finding he was turned Quaker, he employed all\nthe methods that prudence could suggest to engage him to behave and\nact like other people.\u0026nbsp; The youth made no other answer to his father,\nthan by exhorting him to turn Quaker also.\u0026nbsp; At last his father\nconfined himself to this single request, viz., \u0026ldquo;that he should\nwait upon the King and the Duke of York with his hat under his arm,\nand should not \u0026lsquo;thee\u0026rsquo; and \u0026lsquo;thou\u0026rsquo; them.\u0026rdquo;\u0026nbsp;\nWilliam answered, \u0026ldquo;that he could not do these things, for conscience\u0026rsquo;\nsake,\u0026rdquo; which exasperated his father to such a degree, that he\nturned him out of doors.\u0026nbsp; Young Pen gave God thanks for permitting\nhim to suffer so early in His cause, after which he went into the city,\nwhere he held forth, and made a great number of converts.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe Church of England clergy found their congregations dwindle away\ndaily; and Penn being young, handsome, and of a graceful stature, the\ncourt as well as the city ladies flocked very devoutly to his meeting.\u0026nbsp;\nThe patriarch, George Fox, hearing of his great reputation, came to\nLondon (though the journey was very long) purely to see and converse\nwith him.\u0026nbsp; Both resolved to go upon missions into foreign countries,\nand accordingly they embarked for Holland, after having left labourers\nsufficient to take care of the London vineyard.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eTheir labours were crowned with success in Amsterdam, but a circumstance\nwhich reflected the greatest honour on them, and at the same time put\ntheir humility to the greatest trial, was the reception they met with\nfrom Elizabeth, the Princess Palatine, aunt to George I. of Great Britain,\na lady conspicuous for her genius and knowledge, and to whom Descartes\nhad dedicated his Philosophical Romance.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eShe was then retired to the Hague, where she received these Friends,\nfor so the Quakers were at that time called in Holland.\u0026nbsp; This princess\nhad several conferences with them in her palace, and she at last entertained\nso favourable an opinion of Quakerism, that they confessed she was not\nfar from the kingdom of heaven.\u0026nbsp; The Friends sowed likewise the\ngood seed in Germany, but reaped very little fruit; for the mode of\n\u0026ldquo;theeing\u0026rdquo; and \u0026ldquo;thouing\u0026rdquo; was not approved of\nin a country where a man is perpetually obliged to employ the titles\nof \u0026ldquo;highness\u0026rdquo; and \u0026ldquo;excellency.\u0026rdquo;\u0026nbsp; William\nPenn returned soon to England upon hearing of his father\u0026rsquo;s sickness,\nin order to see him before he died.\u0026nbsp; The Vice-Admiral was reconciled\nto his son, and though of a different persuasion, embraced him tenderly.\u0026nbsp;\nWilliam made a fruitless exhortation to his father not to receive the\nsacrament, but to die a Quaker, and the good old man entreated his son\nWilliam to wear buttons on his sleeves, and a crape hatband in his beaver,\nbut all to no purpose.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWilliam Penn inherited very large possessions, part of which consisted\nin Crown debts due to the Vice-Admiral for sums he had advanced for\nthe sea service.\u0026nbsp; No moneys were at that time more insecure than\nthose owing from the king.\u0026nbsp; Penn was obliged to go more than once,\nand \u0026ldquo;thee\u0026rdquo; and \u0026ldquo;thou\u0026rdquo; King Charles and his Ministers,\nin order to recover the debt; and at last, instead of specie, the Government\ninvested him with the right and sovereignty of a province of America,\nto the south of Maryland.\u0026nbsp; Thus was a Quaker raised to sovereign\npower.\u0026nbsp; Penn set sail for his new dominions with two ships freighted\nwith Quakers, who followed his fortune.\u0026nbsp; The country was then called\nPennsylvania from William Penn, who there founded Philadelphia, now\nthe most flourishing city in that country.\u0026nbsp; The first step he took\nwas to enter into an alliance with his American neighbours, and this\nis the only treaty between those people and the Christians that was\nnot ratified by an oath, and was never infringed.\u0026nbsp; The new sovereign\nwas at the same time the legislator of Pennsylvania, and enacted very\nwise and prudent laws, none of which have ever been changed since his\ntime.\u0026nbsp; The first is, to injure no person upon a religious account,\nand to consider as brethren all those who believe in one God.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eHe had no sooner settled his government, but several American merchants\ncame and peopled this colony.\u0026nbsp; The natives of the country, instead\nof flying into the woods, cultivated by insensible degrees a friendship\nwith the peaceable Quakers.\u0026nbsp; They loved these foreigners as much\nas they detested the other Christians who had conquered and laid waste\nAmerica.\u0026nbsp; In a little time a great number of these savages (falsely\nso called), charmed with the mild and gentle disposition of their neighbours,\ncame in crowds to William Penn, and besought him to admit them into\nthe number of his vassals.\u0026nbsp; It was very rare and uncommon for a\nsovereign to be \u0026ldquo;thee\u0026rsquo;d\u0026rdquo; and \u0026ldquo;thou\u0026rsquo;d\u0026rdquo;\nby the meanest of his subjects, who never took their hats off when they\ncame into his presence; and as singular for a Government to be without\none priest in it, and for a people to be without arms, either offensive\nor defensive; for a body of citizens to be absolutely undistinguished\nbut by the public employments, and for neighbours not to entertain the\nleast jealousy one against the other.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWilliam Penn might glory in having brought down upon earth the so\nmuch boasted golden age, which in all probability never existed but\nin Pennsylvania.\u0026nbsp; He returned to England to settle some affairs\nrelating to his new dominions.\u0026nbsp; After the death of King Charles\nII., King James, who had loved the father, indulged the same affection\nto the son, and no longer considered him as an obscure sectary, but\nas a very great man.\u0026nbsp; The king\u0026rsquo;s politics on this occasion\nagreed with his inclinations.\u0026nbsp; He was desirous of pleasing the\nQuakers by annulling the laws made against Nonconformists, in order\nto have an opportunity, by this universal toleration, of establishing\nthe Romish religion.\u0026nbsp; All the sectarists in England saw the snare\nthat was laid for them, but did not give into it; they never failing\nto unite when the Romish religion, their common enemy, is to be opposed.\u0026nbsp;\nBut Penn did not think himself bound in any manner to renounce his principles,\nmerely to favour Protestants to whom he was odious, in opposition to\na king who loved him.\u0026nbsp; He had established a universal toleration\nwith regard to conscience in America, and would not have it thought\nthat he intended to destroy it in Europe, for which reason he adhered\nso inviolably to King James, that a report prevailed universally of\nhis being a Jesuit.\u0026nbsp; This calumny affected him very strongly, and\nhe was obliged to justify himself in print.\u0026nbsp; However, the unfortunate\nKing James II., in whom, as in most princes of the Stuart family, grandeur\nand weakness were equally blended, and who, like them, as much overdid\nsome things as he was short in others, lost his kingdom in a manner\nthat is hardly to be accounted for.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eAll the English sectarists accepted from William III, and his Parliament\nthe toleration and indulgence which they had refused when offered by\nKing James.\u0026nbsp; It was then the Quakers began to enjoy, by virtue\nof the laws, the several privileges they possess at this time.\u0026nbsp;\nPenn having at last seen Quakerism firmly established in his native\ncountry, went back to Pennsylvania.\u0026nbsp; His own people and the Americans\nreceived him with tears of joy, as though he had been a father who was\nreturned to visit his children.\u0026nbsp; All the laws had been religiously\nobserved in his absence, a circumstance in which no legislator had ever\nbeen happy but himself.\u0026nbsp; After having resided some years in Pennsylvania\nhe left it, but with great reluctance, in order to return to England,\nthere to solicit some matters in favour of the commerce of Pennsylvania.\u0026nbsp;\nBut he never saw it again, he dying in Ruscombe, in Berkshire, in 1718.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eI am not able to guess what fate Quakerism may have in America, but\nI perceive it dwindles away daily in England.\u0026nbsp; In all countries\nwhere liberty of conscience is allowed, the established religion will\nat last swallow up all the rest.\u0026nbsp; Quakers are disqualified from\nbeing members of Parliament; nor can they enjoy any post or preferment,\nbecause an oath must always be taken on these occasions, and they never\nswear.\u0026nbsp; They are therefore reduced to the necessity of subsisting\nupon traffic.\u0026nbsp; Their children, whom the industry of their parents\nhas enriched, are desirous of enjoying honours, of wearing buttons and\nruffles; and quite ashamed of being called Quakers they become converts\nto the Church of England, merely to be in the fashion.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eLETTER V.\u0026mdash;ON THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND\u003c/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eEngland is properly the country of sectarists.\u0026nbsp; \u003ci\u003eMult\u0026aelig;\nsunt mansiones in domo patris mei\u003c/i\u003e (in my Father\u0026rsquo;s house are\nmany mansions).\u0026nbsp; An Englishman, as one to whom liberty is natural,\nmay go to heaven his own way.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eNevertheless, though every one is permitted to serve God in whatever\nmode or fashion he thinks proper, yet their true religion, that in which\na man makes his fortune, is the sect of Episcopalians or Churchmen,\ncalled the Church of England, or simply the Church, by way of eminence.\u0026nbsp;\nNo person can possess an employment either in England or Ireland unless\nhe be ranked among the faithful, that is, professes himself a member\nof the Church of England.\u0026nbsp; This reason (which carries mathematical\nevidence with it) has converted such numbers of Dissenters of all persuasions,\nthat not a twentieth part of the nation is out of the pale of the Established\nChurch.\u0026nbsp; The English clergy have retained a great number of the\nRomish ceremonies, and especially that of receiving, with a most scrupulous\nattention, their tithes.\u0026nbsp; They also have the pious ambition to\naim at superiority.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eMoreover, they inspire very religiously their flock with a holy zeal\nagainst Dissenters of all denominations.\u0026nbsp; This zeal was pretty\nviolent under the Tories in the four last years of Queen Anne; but was\nproductive of no greater mischief than the breaking the windows of some\nmeeting-houses and the demolishing of a few of them.\u0026nbsp; For religious\nrage ceased in England with the civil wars, and was no more under Queen\nAnne than the hollow noise of a sea whose billows still heaved, though\nso long after the storm when the Whigs and Tories laid waste their native\ncountry, in the same manner as the Guelphs and Ghibelins formerly did\ntheirs.\u0026nbsp; It was absolutely necessary for both parties to call in\nreligion on this occasion; the Tories declared for Episcopacy, and the\nWhigs, as some imagined, were for abolishing it; however, after these\nhad got the upper hand, they contented themselves with only abridging\nit.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eAt the time when the Earl of Oxford and the Lord Bolingbroke used\nto drink healths to the Tories, the Church of England considered those\nnoblemen as the defenders of its holy privileges.\u0026nbsp; The lower House\nof Convocation (a kind of House of Commons) composed wholly of the clergy,\nwas in some credit at that time; at least the members of it had the\nliberty to meet, to dispute on ecclesiastical matters, to sentence impious\nbooks from time to time to the flames, that is, books written against\nthemselves.\u0026nbsp; The Ministry which is now composed of Whigs does not\nso much as allow those gentlemen to assemble, so that they are at this\ntime reduced (in the obscurity of their respective parishes) to the\nmelancholy occupation of praying for the prosperity of the Government\nwhose tranquillity they would willingly disturb.\u0026nbsp; With regard to\nthe bishops, who are twenty-six in all, they still have seats in the\nHouse of Lords in spite of the Whigs, because the ancient abuse of considering\nthem as barons subsists to this day.\u0026nbsp; There is a clause, however,\nin the oath which the Government requires from these gentlemen, that\nputs their Christian patience to a very great trial, viz., that they\nshall be of the Church of England as by law established.\u0026nbsp; There\nare few bishops, deans, or other dignitaries, but imagine they are so\n\u003ci\u003ejure divino\u003c/i\u003e; it is consequently a great mortification to them\nto be obliged to confess that they owe their dignity to a pitiful law\nenacted by a set of profane laymen.\u0026nbsp; A learned monk (Father Courayer)\nwrote a book lately to prove the validity and succession of English\nordinations.\u0026nbsp; This book was forbid in France, but do you believe\nthat the English Ministry were pleased with it?\u0026nbsp; Far from it.\u0026nbsp;\nThose wicked Whigs don\u0026rsquo;t care a straw whether the episcopal succession\namong them hath been interrupted or not, or whether Bishop Parker was\nconsecrated (as it is pretended) in a tavern or a church; for these\nWhigs are much better pleased that the Bishops should derive their authority\nfrom the Parliament than from the Apostles.\u0026nbsp; The Lord Bolingbroke\nobserved that this notion of divine right would only make so many tyrants\nin lawn sleeves, but that the laws made so many citizens.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWith regard to the morals of the English clergy, they are more regular\nthan those of France, and for this reason.\u0026nbsp; All the clergy (a very\nfew excepted) are educated in the Universities of Oxford or Cambridge,\nfar from the depravity and corruption which reign in the capital.\u0026nbsp;\nThey are not called to dignities till very late, at a time of life when\nmen are sensible of no other passion but avarice, that is, when their\nambition craves a supply.\u0026nbsp; Employments are here bestowed both in\nthe Church and the army, as a reward for long services; and we never\nsee youngsters made bishops or colonels immediately upon their laying\naside the academical gown; and besides most of the clergy are married.\u0026nbsp;\nThe stiff and awkward air contracted by them at the University, and\nthe little familiarity the men of this country have with the ladies,\ncommonly oblige a bishop to confine himself to, and rest contented with,\nhis own.\u0026nbsp; Clergymen sometimes take a glass at the tavern, custom\ngiving them a sanction on this occasion; and if they fuddle themselves\nit is in a very serious manner, and without giving the least scandal.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThat fable-mixed kind of mortal (not to be defined), who is neither\nof the clergy nor of the laity; in a word, the thing called \u003ci\u003eAbb\u0026eacute;\u003c/i\u003e\nin France; is a species quite unknown in England.\u0026nbsp; All the clergy\nhere are very much upon the reserve, and most of them pedants.\u0026nbsp;\nWhen these are told that in France young fellows famous for their dissoluteness,\nand raised to the highest dignities of the Church by female intrigues,\naddress the fair publicly in an amorous way, amuse themselves in writing\ntender love songs, entertain their friends very splendidly every night\nat their own houses, and after the banquet is ended withdraw to invoke\nthe assistance of the Holy Ghost, and call themselves boldly the successors\nof the Apostles, they bless God for their being Protestants.\u0026nbsp; But\nthese are shameless heretics, who deserve to be blown hence through\nthe flames to old Nick, as Rabelais says, and for this reason I do not\ntrouble myself about them.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eLETTER VI.\u0026mdash;ON THE PRESBYTERIANS\u003c/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe Church of England is confined almost to the kingdom whence it\nreceived its name, and to Ireland, for Presbyterianism is the established\nreligion in Scotland.\u0026nbsp; This Presbyterianism is directly the same\nwith Calvinism, as it was established in France, and is now professed\nat Geneva.\u0026nbsp; As the priests of this sect receive but very inconsiderable\nstipends from their churches, and consequently cannot emulate the splendid\nluxury of bishops, they exclaim very naturally against honours which\nthey can never attain to.\u0026nbsp; Figure to yourself the haughty Diogenes\ntrampling under foot the pride of Plato.\u0026nbsp; The Scotch Presbyterians\nare not very unlike that proud though tattered reasoner.\u0026nbsp; Diogenes\ndid not use Alexander half so impertinently as these treated King Charles\nII.; for when they took up arms in his cause in opposition to Oliver,\nwho had deceived them, they forced that poor monarch to undergo the\nhearing of three or four sermons every day, would not suffer him to\nplay, reduced him to a state of penitence and mortification, so that\nCharles soon grew sick of these pedants, and accordingly eloped from\nthem with as much joy as a youth does from school.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eA Church of England minister appears as another Cato in presence\nof a juvenile, sprightly French graduate, who bawls for a whole morning\ntogether in the divinity schools, and hums a song in chorus with ladies\nin the evening; but this Cato is a very spark when before a Scotch Presbyterian.\u0026nbsp;\nThe latter affects a serious gait, puts on a sour look, wears a vastly\nbroad-brimmed hat and a long cloak over a very short coat, preaches\nthrough the nose, and gives the name of the whore of Babylon to all\nchurches where the ministers are so fortunate as to enjoy an annual\nrevenue of five or six thousand pounds, and where the people are weak\nenough to suffer this, and to give them the titles of my lord, your\nlordship, or your eminence.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThese gentlemen, who have also some churches in England, introduced\nthere the mode of grave and severe exhortations.\u0026nbsp; To them is owing\nthe sanctification of Sunday in the three kingdoms.\u0026nbsp; People are\nthere forbidden to work or take any recreation on that day, in which\nthe severity is twice as great as that of the Romish Church.\u0026nbsp; No\noperas, plays, or concerts are allowed in London on Sundays, and even\ncards are so expressly forbidden that none but persons of quality, and\nthose we call the genteel, play on that day; the rest of the nation\ngo either to church, to the tavern, or to see their mistresses.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThough the Episcopal and Presbyterian sects are the two prevailing\nones in Great Britain, yet all others are very welcome to come and settle\nin it, and live very sociably together, though most of their preachers\nhate one another almost as cordially as a Jansenist damns a Jesuit.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eTake a view of the Royal Exchange in London, a place more venerable\nthan many courts of justice, where the representatives of all nations\nmeet for the benefit of mankind.\u0026nbsp; There the Jew, the Mahometan,\nand the Christian transact together, as though they all professed the\nsame religion, and give the name of infidel to none but bankrupts.\u0026nbsp;\nThere the Presbyterian confides in the Anabaptist, and the Churchman\ndepends on the Quaker\u0026rsquo;s word.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIf one religion only were allowed in England, the Government would\nvery possibly become arbitrary; if there were but two, the people would\ncut one another\u0026rsquo;s throats; but as there are such a multitude,\nthey all live happy and in peace.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eLETTER VII.\u0026mdash;ON THE SOCINIANS, OR ARIANS, OR ANTITRINITARIANS\u003c/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThere is a little sect here composed of clergymen, and of a few very\nlearned persons among the laity, who, though they do not call themselves\nArians or Socinians, do yet dissent entirely from St. Athanasius with\nregard to their notions of the Trinity, and declare very frankly that\nthe Father is greater than the Son.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eDo you remember what is related of a certain orthodox bishop, who,\nin order to convince an emperor of the reality of consubstantiation,\nput his hand under the chin of the monarch\u0026rsquo;s son, and took him\nby the nose in presence of his sacred majesty?\u0026nbsp; The emperor was\ngoing to order his attendants to throw the bishop out of the window,\nwhen the good old man gave him this handsome and convincing reason:\n\u0026ldquo;Since your majesty,\u0026rdquo; says he, \u0026ldquo;is angry when your\nson has not due respect shown him, what punishment do you think will\nGod the Father inflict on those who refuse His Son Jesus the titles\ndue to Him?\u0026rdquo;\u0026nbsp; The persons I just now mentioned declare that\nthe holy bishop took a very wrong step, that his argument was inconclusive,\nand that the emperor should have answered him thus: \u0026ldquo;Know that\nthere are two ways by which men may be wanting in respect to me\u0026mdash;first,\nin not doing honour sufficient to my son; and, secondly, in paying him\nthe same honour as to me.\u0026rdquo;\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eBe this as it will, the principles of Arius begin to revive, not\nonly in England, but in Holland and Poland.\u0026nbsp; The celebrated Sir\nIsaac Newton honoured this opinion so far as to countenance it.\u0026nbsp;\nThis philosopher thought that the Unitarians argued more mathematically\nthan we do.\u0026nbsp; But the most sanguine stickler for Arianism is the\nillustrious Dr. Clark.\u0026nbsp; This man is rigidly virtuous, and of a\nmild disposition, is more fond of his tenets than desirous of propagating\nthem, and absorbed so entirely in problems and calculations that he\nis a mere reasoning machine.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIt is he who wrote a book which is much esteemed and little understood,\non the existence of God, and another, more intelligible, but pretty\nmuch contemned, on the truth of the Christian religion.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eHe never engaged in scholastic disputes, which our friend calls venerable\ntrifles.\u0026nbsp; He only published a work containing all the testimonies\nof the primitive ages for and against the Unitarians, and leaves to\nthe reader the counting of the voices and the liberty of forming a judgment.\u0026nbsp;\nThis book won the doctor a great number of partisans, and lost him the\nSee of Canterbury; but, in my humble opinion, he was out in his calculation,\nand had better have been Primate of all England than merely an Arian\nparson.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eYou see that opinions are subject to revolutions as well as empires.\u0026nbsp;\nArianism, after having triumphed during three centuries, and been forgot\ntwelve, rises at last out of its own ashes; but it has chosen a very\nimproper season to make its appearance in, the present age being quite\ncloyed with disputes and sects.\u0026nbsp; The members of this sect are,\nbesides, too few to be indulged the liberty of holding public assemblies,\nwhich, however, they will, doubtless, be permitted to do in case they\nspread considerably.\u0026nbsp; But people are now so very cold with respect\nto all things of this kind, that there is little probability any new\nreligion, or old one, that may be revived, will meet with favour.\u0026nbsp;\nIs it not whimsical enough that Luther, Calvin, and Zuinglius, all of\nthem wretched authors, should have founded sects which are now spread\nover a great part of Europe, that Mahomet, though so ignorant, should\nhave given a religion to Asia and Africa, and that Sir Isaac Newton,\nDr. Clark, Mr. Locke, Mr. Le Clerc, etc., the greatest philosophers,\nas well as the ablest writers of their ages, should scarcely have been\nable to raise a little flock, which even decreases daily.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThis it is to be born at a proper period of time.\u0026nbsp; Were Cardinal\nde Retz to return again into the world, neither his eloquence nor his\nintrigues would draw together ten women in Paris.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWere Oliver Cromwell, he who beheaded his sovereign, and seized upon\nthe kingly dignity, to rise from the dead, he would be a wealthy City\ntrader, and no more.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eLETTER VIII.\u0026mdash;ON THE PARLIAMENT\u003c/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe members of the English Parliament are fond of comparing themselves\nto the old Romans.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eNot long since Mr. Shippen opened a speech in the House of Commons\nwith these words, \u0026ldquo;The majesty of the people of England would\nbe wounded.\u0026rdquo;\u0026nbsp; The singularity of the expression occasioned\na loud laugh; but this gentleman, so far from being disconcerted, repeated\nthe same words with a resolute tone of voice, and the laugh ceased.\u0026nbsp;\nIn my opinion, the majesty of the people of England has nothing in common\nwith that of the people of Rome, much less is there any affinity between\ntheir Governments.\u0026nbsp; There is in London a senate, some of the members\nwhereof are accused (doubtless very unjustly) of selling their voices\non certain occasions, as was done in Rome; this is the only resemblance.\u0026nbsp;\nBesides, the two nations appear to me quite opposite in character, with\nregard both to good and evil.\u0026nbsp; The Romans never knew the dreadful\nfolly of religious wars, an abomination reserved for devout preachers\nof patience and humility.\u0026nbsp; Marius and Sylla, C\u0026aelig;sar and Pompey,\nAnthony and Augustus, did not draw their swords and set the world in\na blaze merely to determine whether the flamen should wear his shirt\nover his robe, or his robe over his shirt, or whether the sacred chickens\nshould eat and drink, or eat only, in order to take the augury.\u0026nbsp;\nThe English have hanged one another by law, and cut one another to pieces\nin pitched battles, for quarrels of as trifling a nature.\u0026nbsp; The\nsects of the Episcopalians and Presbyterians quite distracted these\nvery serious heads for a time.\u0026nbsp; But I fancy they will hardly ever\nbe so silly again, they seeming to be grown wiser at their own expense;\nand I do not perceive the least inclination in them to murder one another\nmerely about syllogisms, as some zealots among them once did.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eBut here follows a more essential difference between Rome and England,\nwhich gives the advantage entirely to the latter\u0026mdash;viz., that the\ncivil wars of Rome ended in slavery, and those of the English in liberty.\u0026nbsp;\nThe English are the only people upon earth who have been able to prescribe\nlimits to the power of kings by resisting them; and who, by a series\nof struggles, have at last established that wise Government where the\nPrince is all-powerful to do good, and, at the same time, is restrained\nfrom committing evil; where the nobles are great without insolence,\nthough there are no vassals; and where the people share in the Government\nwithout confusion.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe House of Lords and that of the Commons divide the legislative\npower under the king, but the Romans had no such balance.\u0026nbsp; The\npatricians and plebeians in Rome were perpetually at variance, and there\nwas no intermediate power to reconcile them.\u0026nbsp; The Roman senate,\nwho were so unjustly, so criminally proud as not to suffer the plebeians\nto share with them in anything, could find no other artifice to keep\nthe latter out of the administration than by employing them in foreign\nwars.\u0026nbsp; They considered the plebeians as a wild beast, whom it behoved\nthem to let loose upon their neighbours, for fear they should devour\ntheir masters.\u0026nbsp; Thus the greatest defect in the Government of the\nRomans raised them to be conquerors.\u0026nbsp; By being unhappy at home,\nthey triumphed over and possessed themselves of the world, till at last\ntheir divisions sunk them to slavery.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe Government of England will never rise to so exalted a pitch of\nglory, nor will its end be so fatal.\u0026nbsp; The English are not fired\nwith the splendid folly of making conquests, but would only prevent\ntheir neighbours from conquering.\u0026nbsp; They are not only jealous of\ntheir own liberty, but even of that of other nations.\u0026nbsp; The English\nwere exasperated against Louis XIV. for no other reason but because\nhe was ambitious, and declared war against him merely out of levity,\nnot from any interested motives.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe English have doubtless purchased their liberties at a very high\nprice, and waded through seas of blood to drown the idol of arbitrary\npower.\u0026nbsp; Other nations have been involved in as great calamities,\nand have shed as much blood; but then the blood they spilt in defence\nof their liberties only enslaved them the more.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThat which rises to a revolution in England is no more than a sedition\nin other countries.\u0026nbsp; A city in Spain, in Barbary, or in Turkey,\ntakes up arms in defence of its privileges, when immediately it is stormed\nby mercenary troops, it is punished by executioners, and the rest of\nthe nation kiss the chains they are loaded with.\u0026nbsp; The French are\nof opinion that the government of this island is more tempestuous than\nthe sea which surrounds it, which indeed is true; but then it is never\nso but when the king raises the storm\u0026mdash;when he attempts to seize\nthe ship of which he is only the chief pilot.\u0026nbsp; The civil wars of\nFrance lasted longer, were more cruel, and productive of greater evils\nthan those of England; but none of these civil wars had a wise and prudent\nliberty for their object.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIn the detestable reigns of Charles IX. and Henry III. the whole\naffair was only whether the people should be slaves to the Guises.\u0026nbsp;\nWith regard to the last war of Paris, it deserves only to be hooted\nat.\u0026nbsp; Methinks I see a crowd of schoolboys rising up in arms against\ntheir master, and afterwards whipped for it.\u0026nbsp; Cardinal de Retz,\nwho was witty and brave (but to no purpose), rebellious without a cause,\nfactious without design, and head of a defenceless party, caballed for\ncaballing sake, and seemed to foment the civil war merely out of diversion.\u0026nbsp;\nThe Parliament did not know what he intended, nor what he did not intend.\u0026nbsp;\nHe levied troops by Act of Parliament, and the next moment cashiered\nthem.\u0026nbsp; He threatened, he begged pardon; he set a price upon Cardinal\nMazarin\u0026rsquo;s head, and afterwards congratulated him in a public manner.\u0026nbsp;\nOur civil wars under Charles VI. were bloody and cruel, those of the\nLeague execrable, and that of the Frondeurs ridiculous.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThat for which the French chiefly reproach the English nation is\nthe murder of King Charles I., whom his subjects treated exactly as\nhe would have treated them had his reign been prosperous.\u0026nbsp; After\nall, consider on one side Charles I., defeated in a pitched battle,\nimprisoned, tried, sentenced to die in Westminster Hall, and then beheaded.\u0026nbsp;\nAnd on the other, the Emperor Henry VII., poisoned by his chaplain at\nhis receiving the Sacrament; Henry III. stabbed by a monk; thirty assassinations\nprojected against Henry IV., several of them put in execution, and the\nlast bereaving that great monarch of his life.\u0026nbsp; Weigh, I say, all\nthese wicked attempts, and then judge.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eLETTER IX.\u0026mdash;ON THE GOVERNMENT\u003c/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThat mixture in the English Government, that harmony between King,\nLords, and commons, did not always subsist.\u0026nbsp; England was enslaved\nfor a long series of years by the Romans, the Saxons, the Danes, and\nthe French successively.\u0026nbsp; William the Conqueror particularly, ruled\nthem with a rod of iron.\u0026nbsp; He disposed as absolutely of the lives\nand fortunes of his conquered subjects as an eastern monarch; and forbade,\nupon pain of death, the English either fire or candle in their houses\nafter eight o\u0026rsquo;clock; whether was this to prevent their nocturnal\nmeetings, or only to try, by an odd and whimsical prohibition, how far\nit was possible for one man to extend his power over his fellow-creatures.\u0026nbsp;\nIt is true, indeed, that the English had Parliaments before and after\nWilliam the Conqueror, and they boast of them, as though these assemblies\nthen called Parliaments, composed of ecclesiastical tyrants and of plunderers\nentitled barons, had been the guardians of the public liberty and happiness.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe barbarians who came from the shores of the Baltic, and settled\nin the rest of Europe, brought with them the form of government called\nStates or Parliaments, about which so much noise is made, and which\nare so little understood.\u0026nbsp; Kings, indeed, were not absolute in\nthose days; but then the people were more wretched upon that very account,\nand more completely enslaved.\u0026nbsp; The chiefs of these savages, who\nhad laid waste France, Italy, Spain, and England, made themselves monarchs.\u0026nbsp;\nTheir generals divided among themselves the several countries they had\nconquered, whence sprung those margraves, those peers, those barons,\nthose petty tyrants, who often contested with their sovereigns for the\nspoils of whole nations.\u0026nbsp; These were birds of prey fighting with\nan eagle for doves whose blood the victorious was to suck.\u0026nbsp; Every\nnation, instead of being governed by one master, was trampled upon by\na hundred tyrants.\u0026nbsp; The priests soon played a part among them.\u0026nbsp;\nBefore this it had been the fate of the Gauls, the Germans, and the\nBritons, to be always governed by their Druids and the chiefs of their\nvillages, an ancient kind of barons, not so tyrannical as their successors.\u0026nbsp;\nThese Druids pretended to be mediators between God and man.\u0026nbsp; They\nenacted laws, they fulminated their excommunications, and sentenced\nto death.\u0026nbsp; The bishops succeeded, by insensible degrees, to their\ntemporal authority in the Goth and Vandal government.\u0026nbsp; The popes\nset themselves at their head, and armed with their briefs, their bulls,\nand reinforced by monks, they made even kings tremble, deposed and assassinated\nthem at pleasure, and employed every artifice to draw into their own\npurses moneys from all parts of Europe.\u0026nbsp; The weak Ina, one of the\ntyrants of the Saxon Heptarchy in England, was the first monarch who\nsubmitted, in his pilgrimage to Rome, to pay St. Peter\u0026rsquo;s penny\n(equivalent very near to a French crown) for every house in his dominions.\u0026nbsp;\nThe whole island soon followed his example; England became insensibly\none of the Pope\u0026rsquo;s provinces, and the Holy Father used to send\nfrom time to time his legates thither to levy exorbitant taxes.\u0026nbsp;\nAt last King John delivered up by a public instrument the kingdom of\nEngland to the Pope, who had excommunicated him; but the barons, not\nfinding their account in this resignation, dethroned the wretched King\nJohn and seated Louis, father to St. Louis, King of France, in his place.\u0026nbsp;\nHowever, they were soon weary of their new monarch, and accordingly\nobliged him to return to France.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWhilst that the barons, the bishops, and the popes, all laid waste\nEngland, where all were for ruling the most numerous, the most useful,\neven the most virtuous, and consequently the most venerable part of\nmankind, consisting of those who study the laws and the sciences, of\ntraders, of artificers, in a word, of all who were not tyrants\u0026mdash;that\nis, those who are called the people: these, I say, were by them looked\nupon as so many animals beneath the dignity of the human species.\u0026nbsp;\nThe Commons in those ages were far from sharing in the government, they\nbeing villains or peasants, whose labour, whose blood, were the property\nof their masters who entitled themselves the nobility.\u0026nbsp; The major\npart of men in Europe were at that time what they are to this day in\nseveral parts of the world\u0026mdash;they were villains or bondsmen of lords\u0026mdash;that\nis, a kind of cattle bought and sold with the land.\u0026nbsp; Many ages\npassed away before justice could be done to human nature\u0026mdash;before\nmankind were conscious that it was abominable for many to sow, and but\nfew reap.\u0026nbsp; And was not France very happy, when the power and authority\nof those petty robbers was abolished by the lawful authority of kings\nand of the people?\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eHappily, in the violent shocks which the divisions between kings\nand the nobles gave to empires, the chains of nations were more or less\nheavy.\u0026nbsp; Liberty in England sprang from the quarrels of tyrants.\u0026nbsp;\nThe barons forced King John and King Henry III. to grant the famous\nMagna Charta, the chief design of which was indeed to make kings dependent\non the Lords; but then the rest of the nation were a little favoured\nin it, in order that they might join on proper occasions with their\npretended masters.\u0026nbsp; This great Charter, which is considered as\nthe sacred origin of the English liberties, shows in itself how little\nliberty was known.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe title alone proves that the king thought he had a just right\nto be absolute; and that the barons, and even the clergy, forced him\nto give up the pretended right, for no other reason but because they\nwere the most powerful.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eMagna Charta begins in this style: \u0026ldquo;We grant, of our own free\nwill, the following privileges to the archbishops, bishops, priors,\nand barons of our kingdom,\u0026rdquo; etc.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe House of Commons is not once mentioned in the articles of this\nCharter\u0026mdash;a proof that it did not yet exist, or that it existed\nwithout power.\u0026nbsp; Mention is therein made, by name, of the freemen\nof England\u0026mdash;a melancholy proof that some were not so.\u0026nbsp; It\nappears, by Article XXXII., that these pretended freemen owed service\nto their lords.\u0026nbsp; Such a liberty as this was not many removes from\nslavery.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eBy Article XXI., the king ordains that his officers shall not henceforward\nseize upon, unless they pay for them, the horses and carts of freemen.\u0026nbsp;\nThe people considered this ordinance as a real liberty, though it was\na greater tyranny.\u0026nbsp; Henry VII., that happy usurper and great politician,\nwho pretended to love the barons, though he in reality hated and feared\nthem, got their lands alienated.\u0026nbsp; By this means the villains, afterwards\nacquiring riches by their industry, purchased the estates and country\nseats of the illustrious peers who had ruined themselves by their folly\nand extravagance, and all the lands got by insensible degrees into other\nhands.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe power of the House of Commons increased every day.\u0026nbsp; The\nfamilies of the ancient peers were at last extinct; and as peers only\nare properly noble in England, there would be no such thing in strictness\nof law as nobility in that island, had not the kings created new barons\nfrom time to time, and preserved the body of peers, once a terror to\nthem, to oppose them to the Commons, since become so formidable.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eAll these new peers who compose the Higher House receive nothing\nbut their titles from the king, and very few of them have estates in\nthose places whence they take their titles.\u0026nbsp; One shall be Duke\nof D-, though he has not a foot of land in Dorsetshire; and another\nis Earl of a village, though he scarce knows where it is situated.\u0026nbsp;\nThe peers have power, but it is only in the Parliament House.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThere is no such thing here as \u003ci\u003ehaute\u003c/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003emoyenne\u003c/i\u003e, and\n\u003ci\u003ebasse justice\u003c/i\u003e\u0026mdash;that is, a power to judge in all matters\ncivil and criminal; nor a right or privilege of hunting in the grounds\nof a citizen, who at the same time is not permitted to fire a gun in\nhis own field.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eNo one is exempted in this country from paying certain taxes because\nhe is a nobleman or a priest.\u0026nbsp; All duties and taxes are settled\nby the House of Commons, whose power is greater than that of the Peers,\nthough inferior to it in dignity.\u0026nbsp; The spiritual as well as temporal\nLords have the liberty to reject a Money Bill brought in by the Commons;\nbut they are not allowed to alter anything in it, and must either pass\nor throw it out without restriction.\u0026nbsp; When the Bill has passed\nthe Lords and is signed by the king, then the whole nation pays, every\nman in proportion to his revenue or estate, not according to his title,\nwhich would be absurd.\u0026nbsp; There is no such thing as an arbitrary\nsubsidy or poll-tax, but a real tax on the lands, of all which an estimate\nwas made in the reign of the famous King William III.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe land-tax continues still upon the same foot, though the revenue\nof the lands is increased.\u0026nbsp; Thus no one is tyrannised over, and\nevery one is easy.\u0026nbsp; The feet of the peasants are not bruised by\nwooden shoes; they eat white bread, are well clothed, and are not afraid\nof increasing their stock of cattle, nor of tiling their houses, from\nany apprehension that their taxes will be raised the year following.\u0026nbsp;\nThe annual income of the estates of a great many commoners in England\namounts to two hundred thousand livres, and yet these do not think it\nbeneath them to plough the lands which enrich them, and on which they\nenjoy their liberty.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eLETTER X.\u0026mdash;ON TRADE\u003c/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eAs trade enriched the citizens in England, so it contributed to their\nfreedom, and this freedom on the other side extended their commerce,\nwhence arose the grandeur of the State.\u0026nbsp; Trade raised by insensible\ndegrees the naval power, which gives the English a superiority over\nthe seas, and they now are masters of very near two hundred ships of\nwar.\u0026nbsp; Posterity will very probably be surprised to hear that an\nisland whose only produce is a little lead, tin, fuller\u0026rsquo;s-earth,\nand coarse wool, should become so powerful by its commerce, as to be\nable to send, in 1723, three fleets at the same time to three different\nand far distanced parts of the globe.\u0026nbsp; One before Gibraltar, conquered\nand still possessed by the English; a second to Portobello, to dispossess\nthe King of Spain of the treasures of the West Indies; and a third into\nthe Baltic, to prevent the Northern Powers from coming to an engagement.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eAt the time when Louis XIV. made all Italy tremble, and that his\narmies, which had already possessed themselves of Savoy and Piedmont,\nwere upon the point of taking Turin; Prince Eugene was obliged to march\nfrom the middle of Germany in order to succour Savoy.\u0026nbsp; Having no\nmoney, without which cities cannot be either taken or defended, he addressed\nhimself to some English merchants.\u0026nbsp; These, at an hour and half\u0026rsquo;s\nwarning, lent him five millions, whereby he was enabled to deliver Turin,\nand to beat the French; after which he wrote the following short letter\nto the persons who had disbursed him the above-mentioned sums: \u0026ldquo;Gentlemen,\nI have received your money, and flatter myself that I have laid it out\nto your satisfaction.\u0026rdquo;\u0026nbsp; Such a circumstance as this raises\na just pride in an English merchant, and makes him presume (not without\nsome reason) to compare himself to a Roman citizen; and, indeed, a peer\u0026rsquo;s\nbrother does not think traffic beneath him.\u0026nbsp; When the Lord Townshend\nwas Minister of State, a brother of his was content to be a City merchant;\nand at the time that the Earl of Oxford governed Great Britain, a younger\nbrother was no more than a factor in Aleppo, where he chose to live,\nand where he died.\u0026nbsp; This custom, which begins, however, to be laid\naside, appears monstrous to Germans, vainly puffed up with their extraction.\u0026nbsp;\nThese think it morally impossible that the son of an English peer should\nbe no more than a rich and powerful citizen, for all are princes in\nGermany.\u0026nbsp; There have been thirty highnesses of the same name, all\nwhose patrimony consisted only in their escutcheons and their pride.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIn France the title of marquis is given gratis to any one who will\naccept of it; and whosoever arrives at Paris from the midst of the most\nremote provinces with money in his purse, and a name terminating in\n\u003ci\u003eac\u003c/i\u003e or \u003ci\u003eille\u003c/i\u003e, may strut about, and cry, \u0026ldquo;Such a man\nas I!\u0026nbsp; A man of my rank and figure!\u0026rdquo; and may look down upon\na trader with sovereign contempt; whilst the trader on the other side,\nby thus often hearing his profession treated so disdainfully, is fool\nenough to blush at it.\u0026nbsp; However, I need not say which is most useful\nto a nation; a lord, powdered in the tip of the mode, who knows exactly\nat what o\u0026rsquo;clock the king rises and goes to bed, and who gives\nhimself airs of grandeur and state, at the same time that he is acting\nthe slave in the ante-chamber of a prime minister; or a merchant, who\nenriches his country, despatches orders from his counting-house to Surat\nand Grand Cairo, and contributes to the well-being of the world.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eLETTER XI.\u0026mdash;ON INOCULATION\u003c/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIt is inadvertently affirmed in the Christian countries of Europe\nthat the English are fools and madmen.\u0026nbsp; Fools, because they give\ntheir children the small-pox to prevent their catching it; and madmen,\nbecause they wantonly communicate a certain and dreadful distemper to\ntheir children, merely to prevent an uncertain evil.\u0026nbsp; The English,\non the other side, call the rest of the Europeans cowardly and unnatural.\u0026nbsp;\nCowardly, because they are afraid of putting their children to a little\npain; unnatural, because they expose them to die one time or other of\nthe small-pox.\u0026nbsp; But that the reader may be able to judge whether\nthe English or those who differ from them in opinion are in the right,\nhere follows the history of the famed inoculation, which is mentioned\nwith so much dread in France.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe Circassian women have, from time immemorial, communicated the\nsmall-pox to their children when not above six months old by making\nan incision in the arm, and by putting into this incision a pustule,\ntaken carefully from the body of another child.\u0026nbsp; This pustule produces\nthe same effect in the arm it is laid in as yeast in a piece of dough;\nit ferments, and diffuses through the whole mass of blood the qualities\nwith which it is impregnated.\u0026nbsp; The pustules of the child in whom\nthe artificial small-pox has been thus inoculated are employed to communicate\nthe same distemper to others.\u0026nbsp; There is an almost perpetual circulation\nof it in Circassia; and when unhappily the small-pox has quite left\nthe country, the inhabitants of it are in as great trouble and perplexity\nas other nations when their harvest has fallen short.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe circumstance that introduced a custom in Circassia, which appears\nso singular to others, is nevertheless a cause common to all nations,\nI mean maternal tenderness and interest.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe Circassians are poor, and their daughters are beautiful, and\nindeed, it is in them they chiefly trade.\u0026nbsp; They furnish with beauties\nthe seraglios of the Turkish Sultan, of the Persian Sophy, and of all\nthose who are wealthy enough to purchase and maintain such precious\nmerchandise.\u0026nbsp; These maidens are very honourably and virtuously\ninstructed to fondle and caress men; are taught dances of a very polite\nand effeminate kind; and how to heighten by the most voluptuous artifices\nthe pleasures of their disdainful masters for whom they are designed.\u0026nbsp;\nThese unhappy creatures repeat their lesson to their mothers, in the\nsame manner as little girls among us repeat their catechism without\nunderstanding one word they say.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eNow it often happened that, after a father and mother had taken the\nutmost care of the education of their children, they were frustrated\nof all their hopes in an instant.\u0026nbsp; The small-pox getting into the\nfamily, one daughter died of it, another lost an eye, a third had a\ngreat nose at her recovery, and the unhappy parents were completely\nruined.\u0026nbsp; Even, frequently, when the small-pox became epidemical,\ntrade was suspended for several years, which thinned very considerably\nthe seraglios of Persia and Turkey.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eA trading nation is always watchful over its own interests, and grasps\nat every discovery that may be of advantage to its commerce.\u0026nbsp; The\nCircassians observed that scarce one person in a thousand was ever attacked\nby a small-pox of a violent kind.\u0026nbsp; That some, indeed, had this\ndistemper very favourably three or four times, but never twice so as\nto prove fatal; in a word, that no one ever had it in a violent degree\ntwice in his life.\u0026nbsp; They observed farther, that when the small-pox\nis of the milder sort, and the pustules have only a tender, delicate\nskin to break through, they never leave the least scar in the face.\u0026nbsp;\nFrom these natural observations they concluded, that in case an infant\nof six months or a year old should have a milder sort of small-pox,\nhe would not die of it, would not be marked, nor be ever afflicted with\nit again.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIn order, therefore, to preserve the life and beauty of their children,\nthe only thing remaining was to give them the small-pox in their infant\nyears.\u0026nbsp; This they did by inoculating in the body of a child a pustule\ntaken from the most regular and at the same time the most favourable\nsort of small-pox that could be procured.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe experiment could not possibly fail.\u0026nbsp; The Turks, who are\npeople of good sense, soon adopted this custom, insomuch that at this\ntime there is not a bassa in Constantinople but communicates the small-pox\nto his children of both sexes immediately upon their being weaned.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eSome pretend that the Circassians borrowed this custom anciently\nfrom the Arabians; but we shall leave the clearing up of this point\nof history to some learned Benedictine, who will not fail to compile\na great many folios on this subject, with the several proofs or authorities.\u0026nbsp;\nAll I have to say upon it is that, in the beginning of the reign of\nKing George I., the Lady Wortley Montague, a woman of as fine a genius,\nand endued with as great a strength of mind, as any of her sex in the\nBritish Kingdoms, being with her husband, who was ambassador at the\nPorte, made no scruple to communicate the small-pox to an infant of\nwhich she was delivered in Constantinople.\u0026nbsp; The chaplain represented\nto his lady, but to no purpose, that this was an unchristian operation,\nand therefore that it could succeed with none but infidels.\u0026nbsp; However,\nit had the most happy effect upon the son of the Lady Wortley Montague,\nwho, at her return to England, communicated the experiment to the Princess\nof Wales, now Queen of England.\u0026nbsp; It must be confessed that this\nprincess, abstracted from her crown and titles, was born to encourage\nthe whole circle of arts, and to do good to mankind.\u0026nbsp; She appears\nas an amiable philosopher on the throne, having never let slip one opportunity\nof improving the great talents she received from Nature, nor of exerting\nher beneficence.\u0026nbsp; It is she who, being informed that a daughter\nof Milton was living, but in miserable circumstances, immediately sent\nher a considerable present.\u0026nbsp; It is she who protects the learned\nFather Courayer.\u0026nbsp; It is she who condescended to attempt a reconciliation\nbetween Dr. Clark and Mr. Leibnitz.\u0026nbsp; The moment this princess heard\nof inoculation, she caused an experiment of it to be made on four criminals\nsentenced to die, and by that means preserved their lives doubly; for\nshe not only saved them from the gallows, but by means of this artificial\nsmall-pox prevented their ever having that distemper in a natural way,\nwith which they would very probably have been attacked one time or other,\nand might have died of in a more advanced age.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe princess being assured of the usefulness of this operation, caused\nher own children to be inoculated.\u0026nbsp; A great part of the kingdom\nfollowed her example, and since that time ten thousand children, at\nleast, of persons of condition owe in this manner their lives to her\nMajesty and to the Lady Wortley Montague; and as many of the fair sex\nare obliged to them for their beauty.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eUpon a general calculation, threescore persons in every hundred have\nthe small-pox.\u0026nbsp; Of these threescore, twenty die of it in the most\nfavourable season of life, and as many more wear the disagreeable remains\nof it in their faces so long as they live.\u0026nbsp; Thus, a fifth part\nof mankind either die or are disfigured by this distemper.\u0026nbsp; But\nit does not prove fatal to so much as one among those who are inoculated\nin Turkey or in England, unless the patient be infirm, or would have\ndied had not the experiment been made upon him.\u0026nbsp; Besides, no one\nis disfigured, no one has the small-pox a second time, if the inoculation\nwas perfect.\u0026nbsp; It is therefore certain, that had the lady of some\nFrench ambassador brought this secret from Constantinople to Paris,\nthe nation would have been for ever obliged to her.\u0026nbsp; Then the Duke\nde Villequier, father to the Duke d\u0026rsquo;Aumont, who enjoys the most\nvigorous constitution, and is the healthiest man in France, would not\nhave been cut off in the flower of his age.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe Prince of Soubise, happy in the finest flush of health, would\nnot have been snatched away at five-and-twenty, nor the Dauphin, grandfather\nto Louis XV., have been laid in his grave in his fiftieth year.\u0026nbsp;\nTwenty thousand persons whom the small-pox swept away at Paris in 1723\nwould have been alive at this time.\u0026nbsp; But are not the French fond\nof life, and is beauty so inconsiderable an advantage as to be disregarded\nby the ladies?\u0026nbsp; It must be confessed that we are an odd kind of\npeople.\u0026nbsp; Perhaps our nation will imitate ten years hence this practice\nof the English, if the clergy and the physicians will but give them\nleave to do it; or possibly our countrymen may introduce inoculation\nthree months hence in France out of mere whim, in case the English should\ndiscontinue it through fickleness.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eI am informed that the Chinese have practised inoculation these hundred\nyears, a circumstance that argues very much in its favour, since they\nare thought to be the wisest and best governed people in the world.\u0026nbsp;\nThe Chinese, indeed, do not communicate this distemper by inoculation,\nbut at the nose, in the same manner as we take snuff.\u0026nbsp; This is\na more agreeable way, but then it produces the like effects; and proves\nat the same time that had inoculation been practised in France it would\nhave saved the lives of thousands.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eLETTER XII.\u0026mdash;ON THE LORD BACON\u003c/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eNot long since the trite and frivolous question following was debated\nin a very polite and learned company, viz., Who was the greatest man,\nC\u0026aelig;sar, Alexander, Tamerlane, Cromwell, \u0026amp;c.?\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eSomebody answered that Sir Isaac Newton excelled them all.\u0026nbsp;\nThe gentleman\u0026rsquo;s assertion was very just; for if true greatness\nconsists in having received from heaven a mighty genius, and in having\nemployed it to enlighten our own mind and that of others, a man like\nSir Isaac Newton, whose equal is hardly found in a thousand years, is\nthe truly great man.\u0026nbsp; And those politicians and conquerors (and\nall ages produce some) were generally so many illustrious wicked men.\u0026nbsp;\nThat man claims our respect who commands over the minds of the rest\nof the world by the force of truth, not those who enslave their fellow-creatures:\nhe who is acquainted with the universe, not they who deface it.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eSince, therefore, you desire me to give you an account of the famous\npersonages whom England has given birth to, I shall begin with Lord\nBacon, Mr. Locke, Sir Isaac Newton, \u0026amp;c.\u0026nbsp; Afterwards the warriors\nand Ministers of State shall come in their order.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eI must begin with the celebrated Viscount Verulam, known in Europe\nby the name of Bacon, which was that of his family.\u0026nbsp; His father\nhad been Lord Keeper, and himself was a great many years Lord Chancellor\nunder King James I.\u0026nbsp; Nevertheless, amidst the intrigues of a Court,\nand the affairs of his exalted employment, which alone were enough to\nengross his whole time, he yet found so much leisure for study as to\nmake himself a great philosopher, a good historian, and an elegant writer;\nand a still more surprising circumstance is that he lived in an age\nin which the art of writing justly and elegantly was little known, much\nless true philosophy.\u0026nbsp; Lord Bacon, as is the fate of man, was more\nesteemed after his death than in his lifetime.\u0026nbsp; His enemies were\nin the British Court, and his admirers were foreigners.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWhen the Marquis d\u0026rsquo;Effiat attended in England upon the Princess\nHenrietta Maria, daughter to Henry IV., whom King Charles I. had married,\nthat Minister went and visited the Lord Bacon, who, being at that time\nsick in his bed, received him with the curtains shut close.\u0026nbsp; \u0026ldquo;You\nresemble the angels,\u0026rdquo; says the Marquis to him; \u0026ldquo;we hear\nthose beings spoken of perpetually, and we believe them superior to\nmen, but are never allowed the consolation to see them.\u0026rdquo;\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eYou know that this great man was accused of a crime very unbecoming\na philosopher: I mean bribery and extortion.\u0026nbsp; You know that he\nwas sentenced by the House of Lords to pay a fine of about four hundred\nthousand French livres, to lose his peerage and his dignity of Chancellor;\nbut in the present age the English revere his memory to such a degree,\nthat they will scarce allow him to have been guilty.\u0026nbsp; In case you\nshould ask what are my thoughts on this head, I shall answer you in\nthe words which I heard the Lord Bolingbroke use on another occasion.\u0026nbsp;\nSeveral gentlemen were speaking, in his company, of the avarice with\nwhich the late Duke of Marlborough had been charged, some examples whereof\nbeing given, the Lord Bolingbroke was appealed to (who, having been\nin the opposite party, might perhaps, without the imputation of indecency,\nhave been allowed to clear up that matter): \u0026ldquo;He was so great a\nman,\u0026rdquo; replied his lordship, \u0026ldquo;that I have forgot his vices.\u0026rdquo;\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eI shall therefore confine myself to those things which so justly\ngained Lord Bacon the esteem of all Europe.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe most singular and the best of all his pieces is that which, at\nthis time, is the most useless and the least read, I mean his \u003ci\u003eNovum\nScientiarum Organum\u003c/i\u003e.\u0026nbsp; This is the scaffold with which the new\nphilosophy was raised; and when the edifice was built, part of it at\nleast, the scaffold was no longer of service.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe Lord Bacon was not yet acquainted with Nature, but then he knew,\nand pointed out, the several paths that lead to it.\u0026nbsp; He had despised\nin his younger years the thing called philosophy in the Universities,\nand did all that lay in his power to prevent those societies of men\ninstituted to improve human reason from depraving it by their quiddities,\ntheir horrors of the vacuum, their substantial forms, and all those\nimpertinent terms which not only ignorance had rendered venerable, but\nwhich had been made sacred by their being ridiculously blended with\nreligion.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eHe is the father of experimental philosophy.\u0026nbsp; It must, indeed,\nbe confessed that very surprising secrets had been found out before\nhis time\u0026mdash;the sea-compass, printing, engraving on copper plates,\noil-painting, looking-glasses; the art of restoring, in some measure,\nold men to their sight by spectacles; gunpowder, \u0026amp;c., had been discovered.\u0026nbsp;\nA new world had been fought for, found, and conquered.\u0026nbsp; Would not\none suppose that these sublime discoveries had been made by the greatest\nphilosophers, and in ages much more enlightened than the present?\u0026nbsp;\nBut it was far otherwise; all these great changes happened in the most\nstupid and barbarous times.\u0026nbsp; Chance only gave birth to most of\nthose inventions; and it is very probable that what is called chance\ncontributed very much to the discovery of America; at least, it has\nbeen always thought that Christopher Columbus undertook his voyage merely\non the relation of a captain of a ship which a storm had driven as far\nwestward as the Caribbean Islands.\u0026nbsp; Be this as it will, men had\nsailed round the world, and could destroy cities by an artificial thunder\nmore dreadful than the real one; but, then, they were not acquainted\nwith the circulation of the blood, the weight of the air, the laws of\nmotion, light, the number of our planets, \u0026amp;c.\u0026nbsp; And a man who\nmaintained a thesis on Aristotle\u0026rsquo;s \u0026ldquo;Categories,\u0026rdquo; on\nthe universals \u003ci\u003ea parte rei\u003c/i\u003e, or such-like nonsense, was looked\nupon as a prodigy.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe most astonishing, the most useful inventions, are not those which\nreflect the greatest honour on the human mind.\u0026nbsp; It is to a mechanical\ninstinct, which is found in many men, and not to true philosophy, that\nmost arts owe their origin.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe discovery of fire, the art of making bread, of melting and preparing\nmetals, of building houses, and the invention of the shuttle, are infinitely\nmore beneficial to mankind than printing or the sea-compass: and yet\nthese arts were invented by uncultivated, savage men.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWhat a prodigious use the Greeks and Romans made afterwards of mechanics!\u0026nbsp;\nNevertheless, they believed that there were crystal heavens, that the\nstars were small lamps which sometimes fell into the sea, and one of\ntheir greatest philosophers, after long researches, found that the stars\nwere so many flints which had been detached from the earth.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIn a word, no one before the Lord Bacon was acquainted with experimental\nphilosophy, nor with the several physical experiments which have been\nmade since his time.\u0026nbsp; Scarce one of them but is hinted at in his\nwork, and he himself had made several.\u0026nbsp; He made a kind of pneumatic\nengine, by which he guessed the elasticity of the air.\u0026nbsp; He approached,\non all sides as it were, to the discovery of its weight, and had very\nnear attained it, but some time after Torricelli seized upon this truth.\u0026nbsp;\nIn a little time experimental philosophy began to be cultivated on a\nsudden in most parts of Europe.\u0026nbsp; It was a hidden treasure which\nthe Lord Bacon had some notion of, and which all the philosophers, encouraged\nby his promises, endeavoured to dig up.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eBut that which surprised me most was to read in his work, in express\nterms, the new attraction, the invention of which is ascribed to Sir\nIsaac Newton.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWe must search, says Lord Bacon, whether there may not be a kind\nof magnetic power which operates between the earth and heavy bodies,\nbetween the moon and the ocean, between the planets, \u0026amp;c.\u0026nbsp; In\nanother place he says either heavy bodies must be carried towards the\ncentre of the earth, or must be reciprocally attracted by it; and in\nthe latter case it is evident that the nearer bodies, in their falling,\ndraw towards the earth, the stronger they will attract one another.\u0026nbsp;\nWe must, says he, make an experiment to see whether the same clock will\ngo faster on the top of a mountain or at the bottom of a mine; whether\nthe strength of the weights decreases on the mountain and increases\nin the mine.\u0026nbsp; It is probable that the earth has a true attractive\npower.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThis forerunner in philosophy was also an elegant writer, an historian,\nand a wit.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eHis moral essays are greatly esteemed, but they were drawn up in\nthe view of instructing rather than of pleasing; and, as they are not\na satire upon mankind, like Rochefoucauld\u0026rsquo;s \u0026ldquo;Maxims,\u0026rdquo;\nnor written upon a sceptical plan, like Montaigne\u0026rsquo;s \u0026ldquo;Essays,\u0026rdquo;\nthey are not so much read as those two ingenious authors.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eHis History of Henry VII. was looked upon as a masterpiece, but how\nis it possible that some persons can presume to compare so little a\nwork with the history of our illustrious Thuanus?\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eSpeaking about the famous impostor Perkin, son to a converted Jew,\nwho assumed boldly the name and title of Richard IV., King of England,\nat the instigation of the Duchess of Burgundy, and who disputed the\ncrown with Henry VII., the Lord Bacon writes as follows:\u0026mdash;\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u0026ldquo;At this time the King began again to be haunted with sprites,\nby the magic and curious arts of the Lady Margaret, who raised up the\nghost of Richard, Duke of York, second son to King Edward IV., to walk\nand vex the King.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u0026ldquo;After such time as she (Margaret of Burgundy) thought he (Perkin\nWarbeck) was perfect in his lesson, she began to cast with herself from\nwhat coast this blazing star should first appear, and at what time it\nmust be upon the horizon of Ireland; for there had the like meteor strong\ninfluence before.\u0026rdquo;\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eMethinks our sagacious Thuanus does not give in to such fustian,\nwhich formerly was looked upon as sublime, but in this age is justly\ncalled nonsense.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eLETTER XIII.\u0026mdash;ON MR. LOCKE\u003c/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003ePerhaps no man ever had a more judicious or more methodical genius,\nor was a more acute logician than Mr. Locke, and yet he was not deeply\nskilled in the mathematics.\u0026nbsp; This great man could never subject\nhimself to the tedious fatigue of calculations, nor to the dry pursuit\nof mathematical truths, which do not at first present any sensible objects\nto the mind; and no one has given better proofs than he, that it is\npossible for a man to have a geometrical head without the assistance\nof geometry.\u0026nbsp; Before his time, several great philosophers had declared,\nin the most positive terms, what the soul of man is; but as these absolutely\nknew nothing about it, they might very well be allowed to differ entirely\nin opinion from one another.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIn Greece, the infant seat of arts and of errors, and where the grandeur\nas well as folly of the human mind went such prodigious lengths, the\npeople used to reason about the soul in the very same manner as we do.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe divine Anaxagoras, in whose honour an altar was erected for his\nhaving taught mankind that the sun was greater than Peloponnesus, that\nsnow was black, and that the heavens were of stone, affirmed that the\nsoul was an a\u0026euml;rial spirit, but at the same time immortal.\u0026nbsp;\nDiogenes (not he who was a cynical philosopher after having coined base\nmoney) declared that the soul was a portion of the substance of God:\nan idea which we must confess was very sublime.\u0026nbsp; Epicurus maintained\nthat it was composed of parts in the same manner as the body.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eAristotle, who has been explained a thousand ways, because he is\nunintelligible, was of opinion, according to some of his disciples,\nthat the understanding in all men is one and the same substance.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe divine Plato, master of the divine Aristotle,\u0026mdash;and the divine\nSocrates, master of the divine Plato\u0026mdash;used to say that the soul\nwas corporeal and eternal.\u0026nbsp; No doubt but the demon of Socrates\nhad instructed him in the nature of it.\u0026nbsp; Some people, indeed, pretend\nthat a man who boasted his being attended by a familiar genius must\ninfallibly be either a knave or a madman, but this kind of people are\nseldom satisfied with anything but reason.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWith regard to the Fathers of the Church, several in the primitive\nages believed that the soul was human, and the angels and God corporeal.\u0026nbsp;\nMen naturally improve upon every system.\u0026nbsp; St. Bernard, as Father\nMabillon confesses, taught that the soul after death does not see God\nin the celestial regions, but converses with Christ\u0026rsquo;s human nature\nonly.\u0026nbsp; However, he was not believed this time on his bare word;\nthe adventure of the crusade having a little sunk the credit of his\noracles.\u0026nbsp; Afterwards a thousand schoolmen arose, such as the Irrefragable\nDoctor, the Subtile Doctor, the Angelic Doctor, the Seraphic Doctor,\nand the Cherubic Doctor, who were all sure that they had a very clear\nand distinct idea of the soul, and yet wrote in such a manner, that\none would conclude they were resolved no one should understand a word\nin their writings.\u0026nbsp; Our Descartes, born to discover the errors\nof antiquity, and at the same time to substitute his own, and hurried\naway by that systematic spirit which throws a cloud over the minds of\nthe greatest men, thought he had demonstrated that the soul is the same\nthing as thought, in the same manner as matter, in his opinion, is the\nsame as extension.\u0026nbsp; He asserted, that man thinks eternally, and\nthat the soul, at its coming into the body, is informed with the whole\nseries of metaphysical notions: knowing God, infinite space, possessing\nall abstract ideas\u0026mdash;in a word, completely endued with the most\nsublime lights, which it unhappily forgets at its issuing from the womb.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eFather Malebranche, in his sublime illusions, not only admitted innate\nideas, but did not doubt of our living wholly in God, and that God is,\nas it were, our soul.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eSuch a multitude of reasoners having written the romance of the soul,\na sage at last arose, who gave, with an air of the greatest modesty,\nthe history of it.\u0026nbsp; Mr. Locke has displayed the human soul in the\nsame manner as an excellent anatomist explains the springs of the human\nbody.\u0026nbsp; He everywhere takes the light of physics for his guide.\u0026nbsp;\nHe sometimes presumes to speak affirmatively, but then he presumes also\nto doubt.\u0026nbsp; Instead of concluding at once what we know not, he examines\ngradually what we would know.\u0026nbsp; He takes an infant at the instant\nof his birth; he traces, step by step, the progress of his understanding;\nexamines what things he has in common with beasts, and what he possesses\nabove them.\u0026nbsp; Above all, he consults himself: the being conscious\nthat he himself thinks.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u0026ldquo;I shall leave,\u0026rdquo; says he, \u0026ldquo;to those who know more\nof this matter than myself, the examining whether the soul exists before\nor after the organisation of our bodies.\u0026nbsp; But I confess that it\nis my lot to be animated with one of those heavy souls which do not\nthink always; and I am even so unhappy as not to conceive that it is\nmore necessary the soul should think perpetually than that bodies should\nbe for ever in motion.\u0026rdquo;\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWith regard to myself, I shall boast that I have the honour to be\nas stupid in this particular as Mr. Locke.\u0026nbsp; No one shall ever make\nme believe that I think always: and I am as little inclined as he could\nbe to fancy that some weeks after I was conceived I was a very learned\nsoul; knowing at that time a thousand things which I forgot at my birth;\nand possessing when in the womb (though to no manner of purpose) knowledge\nwhich I lost the instant I had occasion for it; and which I have never\nsince been able to recover perfectly.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eMr. Locke, after having destroyed innate ideas; after having fully\nrenounced the vanity of believing that we think always; after having\nlaid down, from the most solid principles, that ideas enter the mind\nthrough the senses; having examined our simple and complex ideas; having\ntraced the human mind through its several operations; having shown that\nall the languages in the world are imperfect, and the great abuse that\nis made of words every moment, he at last comes to consider the extent\nor rather the narrow limits of human knowledge.\u0026nbsp; It was in this\nchapter he presumed to advance, but very modestly, the following words:\n\u0026ldquo;We shall, perhaps, never be capable of knowing whether a being,\npurely material, thinks or not.\u0026rdquo;\u0026nbsp; This sage assertion was,\nby more divines than one, looked upon as a scandalous declaration that\nthe soul is material and mortal.\u0026nbsp; Some Englishmen, devout after\ntheir way, sounded an alarm.\u0026nbsp; The superstitious are the same in\nsociety as cowards in an army; they themselves are seized with a panic\nfear, and communicate it to others.\u0026nbsp; It was loudly exclaimed that\nMr. Locke intended to destroy religion; nevertheless, religion had nothing\nto do in the affair, it being a question purely philosophical, altogether\nindependent of faith and revelation.\u0026nbsp; Mr. Locke\u0026rsquo;s opponents\nneeded but to examine, calmly and impartially, whether the declaring\nthat matter can think, implies a contradiction; and whether God is able\nto communicate thought to matter.\u0026nbsp; But divines are too apt to begin\ntheir declarations with saying that God is offended when people differ\nfrom them in opinion; in which they too much resemble the bad poets,\nwho used to declare publicly that Boileau spake irreverently of Louis\nXIV., because he ridiculed their stupid productions.\u0026nbsp; Bishop Stillingfleet\ngot the reputation of a calm and unprejudiced divine because he did\nnot expressly make use of injurious terms in his dispute with Mr. Locke.\u0026nbsp;\nThat divine entered the lists against him, but was defeated; for he\nargued as a schoolman, and Locke as a philosopher, who was perfectly\nacquainted with the strong as well as the weak side of the human mind,\nand who fought with weapons whose temper he knew.\u0026nbsp; If I might presume\nto give my opinion on so delicate a subject after Mr. Locke, I would\nsay, that men have long disputed on the nature and the immortality of\nthe soul.\u0026nbsp; With regard to its immortality, it is impossible to\ngive a demonstration of it, since its nature is still the subject of\ncontroversy; which, however, must be thoroughly understood before a\nperson can be able to determine whether it be immortal or not.\u0026nbsp;\nHuman reason is so little able, merely by its own strength, to demonstrate\nthe immortality of the soul, that it was absolutely necessary religion\nshould reveal it to us.\u0026nbsp; It is of advantage to society in general,\nthat mankind should believe the soul to be immortal; faith commands\nus to do this; nothing more is required, and the matter is cleared up\nat once.\u0026nbsp; But it is otherwise with respect to its nature; it is\nof little importance to religion, which only requires the soul to be\nvirtuous, whatever substance it may be made of.\u0026nbsp; It is a clock\nwhich is given us to regulate, but the artist has not told us of what\nmaterials the spring of this chock is composed.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eI am a body, and, I think, that\u0026rsquo;s all I know of the matter.\u0026nbsp;\nShall I ascribe to an unknown cause, what I can so easily impute to\nthe only second cause I am acquainted with?\u0026nbsp; Here all the school\nphilosophers interrupt me with their arguments, and declare that there\nis only extension and solidity in bodies, and that there they can have\nnothing but motion and figure.\u0026nbsp; Now motion, figure, extension and\nsolidity cannot form a thought, and consequently the soul cannot be\nmatter.\u0026nbsp; All this so often repeated mighty series of reasoning,\namounts to no more than this: I am absolutely ignorant what matter is;\nI guess, but imperfectly, some properties of it; now I absolutely cannot\ntell whether these properties may be joined to thought.\u0026nbsp; As I therefore\nknow nothing, I maintain positively that matter cannot think.\u0026nbsp;\nIn this manner do the schools reason.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eMr. Locke addressed these gentlemen in the candid, sincere manner\nfollowing: At least confess yourselves to be as ignorant as I.\u0026nbsp;\nNeither your imaginations nor mine are able to comprehend in what manner\na body is susceptible of ideas; and do you conceive better in what manner\na substance, of what kind soever, is susceptible of them?\u0026nbsp; As you\ncannot comprehend either matter or spirit, why will you presume to assert\nanything?\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe superstitious man comes afterwards and declares, that all those\nmust be burnt for the good of their souls, who so much as suspect that\nit is possible for the body to think without any foreign assistance.\u0026nbsp;\nBut what would these people say should they themselves be proved irreligious?\u0026nbsp;\nAnd indeed, what man can presume to assert, without being guilty at\nthe same time of the greatest impiety, that it is impossible for the\nCreator to form matter with thought and sensation?\u0026nbsp; Consider only,\nI beg you, what a dilemma you bring yourselves into, you who confine\nin this manner the power of the Creator.\u0026nbsp; Beasts have the same\norgans, the same sensations, the same perceptions as we; they have memory,\nand combine certain ideas.\u0026nbsp; In case it was not in the power of\nGod to animate matter, and inform it with sensation, the consequence\nwould be, either that beasts are mere machines, or that they have a\nspiritual soul.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eMethinks it is clearly evident that beasts cannot be mere machines,\nwhich I prove thus.\u0026nbsp; God has given to them the very same organs\nof sensation as to us: if therefore they have no sensation, God has\ncreated a useless thing; now according to your own confession God does\nnothing in vain; He therefore did not create so many organs of sensation,\nmerely for them to be uninformed with this faculty; consequently beasts\nare not mere machines.\u0026nbsp; Beasts, according to your assertion, cannot\nbe animated with a spiritual soul; you will, therefore, in spite of\nyourself, be reduced to this only assertion, viz., that God has endued\nthe organs of beasts, who are mere matter, with the faculties of sensation\nand perception, which you call instinct in them.\u0026nbsp; But why may not\nGod, if He pleases, communicate to our more delicate organs, that faculty\nof feeling, perceiving, and thinking, which we call human reason?\u0026nbsp;\nTo whatever side you turn, you are forced to acknowledge your own ignorance,\nand the boundless power of the Creator.\u0026nbsp; Exclaim therefore no more\nagainst the sage, the modest philosophy of Mr. Locke, which so far from\ninterfering with religion, would be of use to demonstrate the truth\nof it, in case religion wanted any such support.\u0026nbsp; For what philosophy\ncan be of a more religious nature than that, which affirming nothing\nbut what it conceives clearly, and conscious of its own weakness, declares\nthat we must always have recourse to God in our examining of the first\nprinciples?\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eBesides, we must not be apprehensive that any philosophical opinion\nwill ever prejudice the religion of a country.\u0026nbsp; Though our demonstrations\nclash directly with our mysteries, that is nothing to the purpose, for\nthe latter are not less revered upon that account by our Christian philosophers,\nwho know very well that the objects of reason and those of faith are\nof a very different nature.\u0026nbsp; Philosophers will never form a religious\nsect, the reason of which is, their writings are not calculated for\nthe vulgar, and they themselves are free from enthusiasm.\u0026nbsp; If we\ndivide mankind into twenty parts, it will be found that nineteen of\nthese consist of persons employed in manual labour, who will never know\nthat such a man as Mr. Locke existed.\u0026nbsp; In the remaining twentieth\npart how few are readers?\u0026nbsp; And among such as are so, twenty amuse\nthemselves with romances to one who studies philosophy.\u0026nbsp; The thinking\npart of mankind is confined to a very small number, and these will never\ndisturb the peace and tranquillity of the world.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eNeither Montaigne, Locke, Bayle, Spinoza, Hobbes, the Lord Shaftesbury,\nCollins, nor Toland lighted up the firebrand of discord in their countries;\nthis has generally been the work of divines, who being at first puffed\nup with the ambition of becoming chiefs of a sect, soon grew very desirous\nof being at the head of a party.\u0026nbsp; But what do I say?\u0026nbsp; All\nthe works of the modern philosophers put together will never make so\nmuch noise as even the dispute which arose among the Franciscans, merely\nabout the fashion of their sleeves and of their cowls.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eLETTER XIV.\u0026mdash;ON DESCARTES AND SIR ISAAC NEWTON\u003c/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eA Frenchman who arrives in London, will find philosophy, like everything\nelse, very much changed there.\u0026nbsp; He had left the world a plenum,\nand he now finds it a vacuum.\u0026nbsp; At Paris the universe is seen composed\nof vortices of subtile matter; but nothing like it is seen in London.\u0026nbsp;\nIn France, it is the pressure of the moon that causes the tides; but\nin England it is the sea that gravitates towards the moon; so that when\nyou think that the moon should make it flood with us, those gentlemen\nfancy it should be ebb, which very unluckily cannot be proved.\u0026nbsp;\nFor to be able to do this, it is necessary the moon and the tides should\nhave been inquired into at the very instant of the creation.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eYou will observe farther, that the sun, which in France is said to\nhave nothing to do in the affair, comes in here for very near a quarter\nof its assistance.\u0026nbsp; According to your Cartesians, everything is\nperformed by an impulsion, of which we have very little notion; and\naccording to Sir Isaac Newton, it is by an attraction, the cause of\nwhich is as much unknown to us.\u0026nbsp; At Paris you imagine that the\nearth is shaped like a melon, or of an oblique figure; at London it\nhas an oblate one.\u0026nbsp; A Cartesian declares that light exists in the\nair; but a Newtonian asserts that it comes from the sun in six minutes\nand a half.\u0026nbsp; The several operations of your chemistry are performed\nby acids, alkalies and subtile matter; but attraction prevails even\nin chemistry among the English.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe very essence of things is totally changed.\u0026nbsp; You neither\nare agreed upon the definition of the soul, nor on that of matter.\u0026nbsp;\nDescartes, as I observed in my last, maintains that the soul is the\nsame thing with thought, and Mr. Locke has given a pretty good proof\nof the contrary.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eDescartes asserts farther, that extension alone constitutes matter,\nbut Sir Isaac adds solidity to it.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eHow furiously contradictory are these opinions!\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cblockquote\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u0026ldquo;Non nostrum inter vos tantas componere lites.\u0026rdquo;\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eVIRGIL, Eclog. III.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u0026ldquo;\u0026rsquo;Tis not for us to end such great disputes.\u0026rdquo;\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003c/blockquote\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThis famous Newton, this destroyer of the Cartesian system, died\nin March, anno 1727.\u0026nbsp; His countrymen honoured him in his lifetime,\nand interred him as though he had been a king who had made his people\nhappy.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe English read with the highest satisfaction, and translated into\ntheir tongue, the Elogium of Sir Isaac Newton, which M. de Fontenelle\nspoke in the Academy of Sciences.\u0026nbsp; M. de Fontenelle presides as\njudge over philosophers; and the English expected his decision, as a\nsolemn declaration of the superiority of the English philosophy over\nthat of the French.\u0026nbsp; But when it was found that this gentleman\nhad compared Descartes to Sir Isaac, the whole Royal Society in London\nrose up in arms.\u0026nbsp; So far from acquiescing with M. Fontenelle\u0026rsquo;s\njudgment, they criticised his discourse.\u0026nbsp; And even several (who,\nhowever, were not the ablest philosophers in that body) were offended\nat the comparison; and for no other reason but because Descartes was\na Frenchman.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIt must be confessed that these two great men differed very much\nin conduct, in fortune, and in philosophy.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eNature had indulged Descartes with a shining and strong imagination,\nwhence he became a very singular person both in private life and in\nhis manner of reasoning.\u0026nbsp; This imagination could not conceal itself\neven in his philosophical works, which are everywhere adorned with very\nshining, ingenious metaphors and figures.\u0026nbsp; Nature had almost made\nhim a poet; and indeed he wrote a piece of poetry for the entertainment\nof Christina, Queen of Sweden, which however was suppressed in honour\nto his memory.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eHe embraced a military life for some time, and afterwards becoming\na complete philosopher, he did not think the passion of love derogatory\nto his character.\u0026nbsp; He had by his mistress a daughter called Froncine,\nwho died young, and was very much regretted by him.\u0026nbsp; Thus he experienced\nevery passion incident to mankind.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eHe was a long time of opinion that it would be necessary for him\nto fly from the society of his fellow creatures, and especially from\nhis native country, in order to enjoy the happiness of cultivating his\nphilosophical studies in full liberty.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eDescartes was very right, for his contemporaries were not knowing\nenough to improve and enlighten his understanding, and were capable\nof little else than of giving him uneasiness.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eHe left France purely to go in search of truth, which was then persecuted\nby the wretched philosophy of the schools.\u0026nbsp; However, he found that\nreason was as much disguised and depraved in the universities of Holland,\ninto which he withdrew, as in his own country.\u0026nbsp; For at the time\nthat the French condemned the only propositions of his philosophy which\nwere true, he was persecuted by the pretended philosophers of Holland,\nwho understood him no better; and who, having a nearer view of his glory,\nhated his person the more, so that he was obliged to leave Utrecht.\u0026nbsp;\nDescartes was injuriously accused of being an atheist, the last refuge\nof religious scandal: and he who had employed all the sagacity and penetration\nof his genius, in searching for new proofs of the existence of a God,\nwas suspected to believe there was no such Being.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eSuch a persecution from all sides, must necessarily suppose a most\nexalted merit as well as a very distinguished reputation, and indeed\nhe possessed both.\u0026nbsp; Reason at that time darted a ray upon the world\nthrough the gloom of the schools, and the prejudices of popular superstition.\u0026nbsp;\nAt last his name spread so universally, that the French were desirous\nof bringing him back into his native country by rewards, and accordingly\noffered him an annual pension of a thousand crowns.\u0026nbsp; Upon these\nhopes Descartes returned to France; paid the fees of his patent, which\nwas sold at that time, but no pension was settled upon him.\u0026nbsp; Thus\ndisappointed, he returned to his solitude in North Holland, where he\nagain pursued the study of philosophy, whilst the great Galileo, at\nfourscore years of age, was groaning in the prisons of the Inquisition,\nonly for having demonstrated the earth\u0026rsquo;s motion.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eAt last Descartes was snatched from the world in the flower of his\nage at Stockholm.\u0026nbsp; His death was owing to a bad regimen, and he\nexpired in the midst of some literati who were his enemies, and under\nthe hands of a physician to whom he was odious.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe progress of Sir Isaac Newton\u0026rsquo;s life was quite different.\u0026nbsp;\nHe lived happy, and very much honoured in his native country, to the\nage of fourscore and five years.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIt was his peculiar felicity, not only to be born in a country of\nliberty, but in an age when all scholastic impertinences were banished\nfrom the world.\u0026nbsp; Reason alone was cultivated, and mankind could\nonly be his pupil, not his enemy.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eOne very singular difference in the lives of these two great men\nis, that Sir Isaac, during the long course of years he enjoyed, was\nnever sensible to any passion, was not subject to the common frailties\nof mankind, nor ever had any commerce with women\u0026mdash;a circumstance\nwhich was assured me by the physician and surgeon who attended him in\nhis last moments.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWe may admire Sir Isaac Newton on this occasion, but then we must\nnot censure Descartes.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe opinion that generally prevails in England with regard to these\nnew philosophers is, that the latter was a dreamer, and the former a\nsage.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eVery few people in England read Descartes, whose works indeed are\nnow useless.\u0026nbsp; On the other side, but a small number peruse those\nof Sir Isaac, because to do this the student must be deeply skilled\nin the mathematics, otherwise those works will be unintelligible to\nhim.\u0026nbsp; But notwithstanding this, these great men are the subject\nof everyone\u0026rsquo;s discourse.\u0026nbsp; Sir Isaac Newton is allowed every\nadvantage, whilst Descartes is not indulged a single one.\u0026nbsp; According\nto some, it is to the former that we owe the discovery of a vacuum,\nthat the air is a heavy body, and the invention of telescopes.\u0026nbsp;\nIn a word, Sir Isaac Newton is here as the Hercules of fabulous story,\nto whom the ignorant ascribed all the feats of ancient heroes.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIn a critique that was made in London on Mr. de Fontenelle\u0026rsquo;s\ndiscourse, the writer presumed to assert that Descartes was not a great\ngeometrician.\u0026nbsp; Those who make such a declaration may justly be\nreproached with flying in their master\u0026rsquo;s face.\u0026nbsp; Descartes\nextended the limits of geometry as far beyond the place where he found\nthem, as Sir Isaac did after him.\u0026nbsp; The former first taught the\nmethod of expressing curves by equations.\u0026nbsp; This geometry which,\nthanks to him for it, is now grown common, was so abstruse in his time,\nthat not so much as one professor would undertake to explain it; and\nSchotten in Holland, and Format in France, were the only men who understood\nit.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eHe applied this geometrical and inventive genius to dioptrics, which,\nwhen treated of by him, became a new art.\u0026nbsp; And if he was mistaken\nin some things, the reason of that is, a man who discovers a new tract\nof land cannot at once know all the properties of the soil.\u0026nbsp; Those\nwho come after him, and make these lands fruitful, are at least obliged\nto him for the discovery.\u0026nbsp; I will not deny but that there are innumerable\nerrors in the rest of Descartes\u0026rsquo; works.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eGeometry was a guide he himself had in some measure fashioned, which\nwould have conducted him safely through the several paths of natural\nphilosophy.\u0026nbsp; Nevertheless, he at last abandoned this guide, and\ngave entirely into the humour of forming hypotheses; and then philosophy\nwas no more than an ingenious romance, fit only to amuse the ignorant.\u0026nbsp;\nHe was mistaken in the nature of the soul, in the proofs of the existence\nof a God, in matter, in the laws of motion, and in the nature of light.\u0026nbsp;\nHe admitted innate ideas, he invented new elements, he created a world;\nhe made man according to his own fancy; and it is justly said, that\nthe man of Descartes is, in fact, that of Descartes only, very different\nfrom the real one.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eHe pushed his metaphysical errors so far, as to declare that two\nand two make four for no other reason but because God would have it\nso.\u0026nbsp; However, it will not be making him too great a compliment\nif we affirm that he was valuable even in his mistakes.\u0026nbsp; He deceived\nhimself; but then it was at least in a methodical way.\u0026nbsp; He destroyed\nall the absurd chimeras with which youth had been infatuated for two\nthousand years.\u0026nbsp; He taught his contemporaries how to reason, and\nenabled them to employ his own weapons against himself.\u0026nbsp; If Descartes\ndid not pay in good money, he however did great service in crying down\nthat of a base alloy.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eI indeed believe that very few will presume to compare his philosophy\nin any respect with that of Sir Isaac Newton.\u0026nbsp; The former is an\nessay, the latter a masterpiece.\u0026nbsp; But then the man who first brought\nus to the path of truth, was perhaps as great a genius as he who afterwards\nconducted us through it.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eDescartes gave sight to the blind.\u0026nbsp; These saw the errors of\nantiquity and of the sciences.\u0026nbsp; The path he struck out is since\nbecome boundless.\u0026nbsp; Rohault\u0026rsquo;s little work was, during some\nyears, a complete system of physics; but now all the Transactions of\nthe several academies in Europe put together do not form so much as\nthe beginning of a system.\u0026nbsp; In fathoming this abyss no bottom has\nbeen found.\u0026nbsp; We are now to examine what discoveries Sir Isaac Newton\nhas made in it.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eLETTER XV.\u0026mdash;ON ATTRACTION\u003c/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe discoveries which gained Sir Isaac Newton so universal a reputation,\nrelate to the system of the world, to light, to geometrical infinities;\nand, lastly, to chronology, with which he used to amuse himself after\nthe fatigue of his severer studies.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eI will now acquaint you (without prolixity if possible) with the\nfew things I have been able to comprehend of all these sublime ideas.\u0026nbsp;\nWith regard to the system of our world, disputes were a long time maintained,\non the cause that turns the planets, and keeps them in their orbits:\nand on those causes which make all bodies here below descend towards\nthe surface of the earth.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe system of Descartes, explained and improved since his time, seemed\nto give a plausible reason for all those phenomena; and this reason\nseemed more just, as it is simple and intelligible to all capacities.\u0026nbsp;\nBut in philosophy, a student ought to doubt of the things he fancies\nhe understands too easily, as much as of those he does not understand.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eGravity, the falling of accelerated bodies on the earth, the revolution\nof the planets in their orbits, their rotations round their axis, all\nthis is mere motion.\u0026nbsp; Now motion cannot perhaps be conceived any\notherwise than by impulsion; therefore all those bodies must be impelled.\u0026nbsp;\nBut by what are they impelled?\u0026nbsp; All space is full, it therefore\nis filled with a very subtile matter, since this is imperceptible to\nus; this matter goes from west to east, since all the planets are carried\nfrom west to east.\u0026nbsp; Thus from hypothesis to hypothesis, from one\nappearance to another, philosophers have imagined a vast whirlpool of\nsubtile matter, in which the planets are carried round the sun: they\nalso have created another particular vortex which floats in the great\none, and which turns daily round the planets.\u0026nbsp; When all this is\ndone, it is pretended that gravity depends on this diurnal motion; for,\nsay these, the velocity of the subtile matter that turns round our little\nvortex, must be seventeen times more rapid than that of the earth; or,\nin case its velocity is seventeen times greater than that of the earth,\nits centrifugal force must be vastly greater, and consequently impel\nall bodies towards the earth.\u0026nbsp; This is the cause of gravity, according\nto the Cartesian system.\u0026nbsp; But the theorist, before he calculated\nthe centrifugal force and velocity of the subtile matter, should first\nhave been certain that it existed.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eSir Isaac Newton, seems to have destroyed all these great and little\nvortices, both that which carries the planets round the sun, as well\nas the other which supposes every planet to turn on its own axis.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eFirst, with regard to the pretended little vortex of the earth, it\nis demonstrated that it must lose its motion by insensible degrees;\nit is demonstrated, that if the earth swims in a fluid, its density\nmust be equal to that of the earth; and in case its density be the same,\nall the bodies we endeavour to move must meet with an insuperable resistance.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWith regard to the great vortices, they are still more chimerical,\nand it is impossible to make them agree with Kepler\u0026rsquo;s law, the\ntruth of which has been demonstrated.\u0026nbsp; Sir Isaac shows, that the\nrevolution of the fluid in which Jupiter is supposed to be carried,\nis not the same with regard to the revolution of the fluid of the earth,\nas the revolution of Jupiter with respect to that of the earth.\u0026nbsp;\nHe proves, that as the planets make their revolutions in ellipses, and\nconsequently being at a much greater distance one from the other in\ntheir Aphelia, and a little nearer in their Perihelia; the earth\u0026rsquo;s\nvelocity, for instance, ought to be greater when it is nearer Venus\nand Mars, because the fluid that carries it along, being then more pressed,\nought to have a greater motion; and yet it is even then that the earth\u0026rsquo;s\nmotion is slower.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eHe proves that there is no such thing as a celestial matter which\ngoes from west to east since the comets traverse those spaces, sometimes\nfrom east to west, and at other times from north to south.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIn fine, the better to resolve, if possible, every difficulty, he\nproves, and even by experiments, that it is impossible there should\nbe a plenum; and brings back the vacuum, which Aristotle and Descartes\nhad banished from the world.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eHaving by these and several other arguments destroyed the Cartesian\nvortices, he despaired of ever being able to discover whether there\nis a secret principle in nature which, at the same time, is the cause\nof the motion of all celestial bodies, and that of gravity on the earth.\u0026nbsp;\nBut being retired in 1666, upon account of the Plague, to a solitude\nnear Cambridge; as he was walking one day in his garden, and saw some\nfruits fall from a tree, he fell into a profound meditation on that\ngravity, the cause of which had so long been sought, but in vain, by\nall the philosophers, whilst the vulgar think there is nothing mysterious\nin it.\u0026nbsp; He said to himself; that from what height soever in our\nhemisphere, those bodies might descend, their fall would certainly be\nin the progression discovered by Galileo; and the spaces they run through\nwould be as the square of the times.\u0026nbsp; Why may not this power which\ncauses heavy bodies to descend, and is the same without any sensible\ndiminution at the remotest distance from the centre of the earth, or\non the summits of the highest mountains, why, said Sir Isaac, may not\nthis power extend as high as the moon?\u0026nbsp; And in case its influence\nreaches so far, is it not very probable that this power retains it in\nits orbit, and determines its motion?\u0026nbsp; But in case the moon obeys\nthis principle (whatever it be) may we not conclude very naturally that\nthe rest of the planets are equally subject to it?\u0026nbsp; In case this\npower exists (which besides is proved) it must increase in an inverse\nratio of the squares of the distances.\u0026nbsp; All, therefore, that remains\nis, to examine how far a heavy body, which should fall upon the earth\nfrom a moderate height, would go; and how far in the same time, a body\nwhich should fall from the orbit of the moon, would descend.\u0026nbsp; To\nfind this, nothing is wanted but the measure of the earth, and the distance\nof the moon from it.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThus Sir Isaac Newton reasoned.\u0026nbsp; But at that time the English\nhad but a very imperfect measure of our globe, and depended on the uncertain\nsupposition of mariners, who computed a degree to contain but sixty\nEnglish miles, whereas it consists in reality of near seventy.\u0026nbsp;\nAs this false computation did not agree with the conclusions which Sir\nIsaac intended to draw from them, he laid aside this pursuit.\u0026nbsp;\nA half-learned philosopher, remarkable only for his vanity, would have\nmade the measure of the earth agree, anyhow, with his system.\u0026nbsp;\nSir Isaac, however, chose rather to quit the researches he was then\nengaged in.\u0026nbsp; But after Mr. Picard had measured the earth exactly,\nby tracing that meridian which redounds so much to the honour of the\nFrench, Sir Isaac Newton resumed his former reflections, and found his\naccount in Mr. Picard\u0026rsquo;s calculation.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eA circumstance which has always appeared wonderful to me, is that\nsuch sublime discoveries should have been made by the sole assistance\nof a quadrant and a little arithmetic.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe circumference of the earth is 123,249,600 feet.\u0026nbsp; This, among\nother things, is necessary to prove the system of attraction.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe instant we know the earth\u0026rsquo;s circumference, and the distance\nof the moon, we know that of the moon\u0026rsquo;s orbit, and the diameter\nof this orbit.\u0026nbsp; The moon performs its revolution in that orbit\nin twenty-seven days, seven hours, forty-three minutes.\u0026nbsp; It is\ndemonstrated, that the moon in its mean motion makes an hundred and\nfourscore and seven thousand nine hundred and sixty feet (of Paris)\nin a minute.\u0026nbsp; It is likewise demonstrated, by a known theorem,\nthat the central force which should make a body fall from the height\nof the moon, would make its velocity no more than fifteen Paris feet\nin a minute of time.\u0026nbsp; Now, if the law by which bodies gravitate\nand attract one another in an inverse ratio to the squares of the distances\nbe true, if the same power acts according to that law throughout all\nnature, it is evident that as the earth is sixty semi-diameters distant\nfrom the moon, a heavy body must necessarily fall (on the earth) fifteen\nfeet in the first second, and fifty-four thousand feet in the first\nminute.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eNow a heavy body falls, in reality, fifteen feet in the first second,\nand goes in the first minute fifty-four thousand feet, which number\nis the square of sixty multiplied by fifteen.\u0026nbsp; Bodies, therefore,\ngravitate in an inverse ratio of the squares of the distances; consequently,\nwhat causes gravity on earth, and keeps the moon in its orbit, is one\nand the same power; it being demonstrated that the moon gravitates on\nthe earth, which is the centre of its particular motion, it is demonstrated\nthat the earth and the moon gravitate on the sun which is the centre\nof their annual motion.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe rest of the planets must be subject to this general law; and\nif this law exists, these planets must follow the laws which Kepler\ndiscovered.\u0026nbsp; All these laws, all these relations are indeed observed\nby the planets with the utmost exactness; therefore, the power of attraction\ncauses all the planets to gravitate towards the sun, in like manner\nas the moon gravitates towards our globe.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eFinally, as in all bodies re-action is equal to action, it is certain\nthat the earth gravitates also towards the moon; and that the sun gravitates\ntowards both.\u0026nbsp; That every one of the satellites of Saturn gravitates\ntowards the other four, and the other four towards it; all five towards\nSaturn, and Saturn towards all.\u0026nbsp; That it is the same with regard\nto Jupiter; and that all these globes are attracted by the sun, which\nis reciprocally attracted by them.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThis power of gravitation acts proportionably to the quantity of\nmatter in bodies, a truth which Sir Isaac has demonstrated by experiments.\u0026nbsp;\nThis new discovery has been of use to show that the sun (the centre\nof the planetary system) attracts them all in a direct ratio of their\nquantity of matter combined with their nearness.\u0026nbsp; From hence Sir\nIsaac, rising by degrees to discoveries which seemed not to be formed\nfor the human mind, is bold enough to compute the quantity of matter\ncontained in the sun and in every planet; and in this manner shows,\nfrom the simple laws of mechanics, that every celestial globe ought\nnecessarily to be where it is placed.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eHis bare principle of the laws of gravitation accounts for all the\napparent inequalities in the course of the celestial globes.\u0026nbsp; The\nvariations of the moon are a necessary consequence of those laws.\u0026nbsp;\nMoreover, the reason is evidently seen why the nodes of the moon perform\ntheir revolutions in nineteen years, and those of the earth in about\ntwenty-six thousand.\u0026nbsp; The several appearances observed in the tides\nare also a very simple effect of this attraction.\u0026nbsp; The proximity\nof the moon, when at the full, and when it is new, and its distance\nin the quadratures or quarters, combined with the action of the sun,\nexhibit a sensible reason why the ocean swells and sinks.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eAfter having shown by his sublime theory the course and inequalities\nof the planets, he subjects comets to the same law.\u0026nbsp; The orbit\nof these fires (unknown for so great a series of years), which was the\nterror of mankind and the rock against which philosophy split, placed\nby Aristotle below the moon, and sent back by Descartes above the sphere\nof Saturn, is at last placed in its proper seat by Sir Isaac Newton.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eHe proves that comets are solid bodies which move in the sphere of\nthe sun\u0026rsquo;s activity, and that they describe an ellipsis so very\neccentric, and so near to parabolas, that certain comets must take up\nabove five hundred years in their revolution.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe learned Dr. Halley is of opinion that the comet seen in 1680\nis the same which appeared in Julius C\u0026aelig;sar\u0026rsquo;s time.\u0026nbsp;\nThis shows more than any other that comets are hard, opaque bodies;\nfor it descended so near to the sun, as to come within a sixth part\nof the diameter of this planet from it, and consequently might have\ncontracted a degree of heat two thousand times stronger than that of\nred-hot iron; and would have been soon dispersed in vapour, had it not\nbeen a firm, dense body.\u0026nbsp; The guessing the course of comets began\nthen to be very much in vogue.\u0026nbsp; The celebrated Bernoulli concluded\nby his system that the famous comet of 1680 would appear again the 17th\nof May, 1719.\u0026nbsp; Not a single astronomer in Europe went to bed that\nnight.\u0026nbsp; However, they needed not to have broke their rest, for\nthe famous comet never appeared.\u0026nbsp; There is at least more cunning,\nif not more certainty, in fixing its return to so remote a distance\nas five hundred and seventy-five years.\u0026nbsp; As to Mr. Whiston, he\naffirmed very seriously that in the time of the Deluge a comet overflowed\nthe terrestrial globe.\u0026nbsp; And he was so unreasonable as to wonder\nthat people laughed at him for making such an assertion.\u0026nbsp; The ancients\nwere almost in the same way of thinking with Mr. Whiston, and fancied\nthat comets were always the forerunners of some great calamity which\nwas to befall mankind.\u0026nbsp; Sir Isaac Newton, on the contrary, suspected\nthat they are very beneficent, and that vapours exhale from them merely\nto nourish and vivify the planets, which imbibe in their course the\nseveral particles the sun has detached from the comets, an opinion which,\nat least, is more probable than the former.\u0026nbsp; But this is not all.\u0026nbsp;\nIf this power of gravitation or attraction acts on all the celestial\nglobes, it acts undoubtedly on the several parts of these globes.\u0026nbsp;\nFor in case bodies attract one another in proportion to the quantity\nof matter contained in them, it can only be in proportion to the quantity\nof their parts; and if this power is found in the whole, it is undoubtedly\nin the half; in the quarters in the eighth part, and so on in \u003ci\u003einfinitum\u003c/i\u003e.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThis is attraction, the great spring by which all Nature is moved.\u0026nbsp;\nSir Isaac Newton, after having demonstrated the existence of this principle,\nplainly foresaw that its very name would offend; and, therefore, this\nphilosopher, in more places than one of his books, gives the reader\nsome caution about it.\u0026nbsp; He bids him beware of confounding this\nname with what the ancients called occult qualities, but to be satisfied\nwith knowing that there is in all bodies a central force, which acts\nto the utmost limits of the universe, according to the invariable laws\nof mechanics.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIt is surprising, after the solemn protestations Sir Isaac made,\nthat such eminent men as Mr. Sorin and Mr. de Fontenelle should have\nimputed to this great philosopher the verbal and chimerical way of reasoning\nof the Aristotelians; Mr. Sorin in the Memoirs of the Academy of 1709,\nand Mr. de Fontenelle in the very eulogium of Sir Isaac Newton.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eMost of the French (the learned and others) have repeated this reproach.\u0026nbsp;\nThese are for ever crying out, \u0026ldquo;Why did he not employ the word\n\u003ci\u003eimpulsion\u003c/i\u003e, which is so well understood, rather than that of \u003ci\u003eattraction\u003c/i\u003e,\nwhich is unintelligible?\u0026rdquo;\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eSir Isaac might have answered these critics thus:\u0026mdash;\u0026ldquo;First,\nyou have as imperfect an idea of the word impulsion as of that of attraction;\nand in case you cannot conceive how one body tends towards the centre\nof another body, neither can you conceive by what power one body can\nimpel another.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u0026ldquo;Secondly, I could not admit of impulsion; for to do this I\nmust have known that a celestial matter was the agent.\u0026nbsp; But so\nfar from knowing that there is any such matter, I have proved it to\nbe merely imaginary.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u0026ldquo;Thirdly, I use the word attraction for no other reason but\nto express an effect which I discovered in Nature\u0026mdash;a certain and\nindisputable effect of an unknown principle\u0026mdash;a quality inherent\nin matter, the cause of which persons of greater abilities than I can\npretend to may, if they can, find out.\u0026rdquo;\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u0026ldquo;What have you, then, taught us?\u0026rdquo; will these people say\nfurther; \u0026ldquo;and to what purpose are so many calculations to tell\nus what you yourself do not comprehend?\u0026rdquo;\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u0026ldquo;I have taught you,\u0026rdquo; may Sir Isaac rejoin, \u0026ldquo;that\nall bodies gravitate towards one another in proportion to their quantity\nof matter; that these central forces alone keep the planets and comets\nin their orbits, and cause them to move in the proportion before set\ndown.\u0026nbsp; I demonstrate to you that it is impossible there should\nbe any other cause which keeps the planets in their orbits than that\ngeneral phenomenon of gravity.\u0026nbsp; For heavy bodies fall on the earth\naccording to the proportion demonstrated of central forces; and the\nplanets finishing their course according to these same proportions,\nin case there were another power that acted upon all those bodies, it\nwould either increase their velocity or change their direction.\u0026nbsp;\nNow, not one of those bodies ever has a single degree of motion or velocity,\nor has any direction but what is demonstrated to be the effect of the\ncentral forces.\u0026nbsp; Consequently it is impossible there should be\nany other principle.\u0026rdquo;\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eGive me leave once more to introduce Sir Isaac speaking.\u0026nbsp; Shall\nhe not be allowed to say? \u0026ldquo;My case and that of the ancients is\nvery different.\u0026nbsp; These saw, for instance, water ascend in pumps,\nand said, \u0026lsquo;The water rises because it abhors a vacuum.\u0026rsquo;\u0026nbsp;\nBut with regard to myself; I am in the case of a man who should have\nfirst observed that water ascends in pumps, but should leave others\nto explain the cause of this effect.\u0026nbsp; The anatomist, who first\ndeclared that the motion of the arm is owing to the contraction of the\nmuscles, taught mankind an indisputable truth.\u0026nbsp; But are they less\nobliged to him because he did not know the reason why the muscles contract?\u0026nbsp;\nThe cause of the elasticity of the air is unknown, but he who first\ndiscovered this spring performed a very signal service to natural philosophy.\u0026nbsp;\nThe spring that I discovered was more hidden and more universal, and\nfor that very reason mankind ought to thank me the more.\u0026nbsp; I have\ndiscovered a new property of matter\u0026mdash;one of the secrets of the\nCreator\u0026mdash;and have calculated and discovered the effects of it.\u0026nbsp;\nAfter this, shall people quarrel with me about the name I give it?\u0026rdquo;\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eVortices may be called an occult quality, because their existence\nwas never proved.\u0026nbsp; Attraction, on the contrary, is a real thing,\nbecause its effects are demonstrated, and the proportions of it are\ncalculated.\u0026nbsp; The cause of this cause is among the \u003ci\u003eArcana\u003c/i\u003e\nof the Almighty.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cblockquote\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u0026ldquo;Precedes huc, et non amplius.\u0026rdquo;\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003c/blockquote\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e(Thus far shalt thou go, and no farther.)\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eLETTER XVI.\u0026mdash;ON SIR ISAAC NEWTON\u0026rsquo;S OPTICS\u003c/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe philosophers of the last age found out a new universe; and a\ncircumstance which made its discovery more difficult was that no one\nhad so much as suspected its existence.\u0026nbsp; The most sage and judicious\nwere of opinion that it was a frantic rashness to dare so much as to\nimagine that it was possible to guess the laws by which the celestial\nbodies move and the manner how light acts.\u0026nbsp; Galileo, by his astronomical\ndiscoveries, Kepler, by his calculation, Descartes (at least, in his\ndioptrics), and Sir Isaac Newton, in all his works, severally saw the\nmechanism of the springs of the world.\u0026nbsp; The geometricians have\nsubjected infinity to the laws of calculation.\u0026nbsp; The circulation\nof the blood in animals, and of the sap in vegetables, have changed\nthe face of Nature with regard to us.\u0026nbsp; A new kind of existence\nhas been given to bodies in the air-pump.\u0026nbsp; By the assistance of\ntelescopes bodies have been brought nearer to one another.\u0026nbsp; Finally,\nthe several discoveries which Sir Isaac Newton has made on light are\nequal to the boldest things which the curiosity of man could expect\nafter so many philosophical novelties.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eTill Antonio de Dominis the rainbow was considered as an inexplicable\nmiracle.\u0026nbsp; This philosopher guessed that it was a necessary effect\nof the sun and rain.\u0026nbsp; Descartes gained immortal fame by his mathematical\nexplication of this so natural a phenomenon.\u0026nbsp; He calculated the\nreflections and refractions of light in drops of rain.\u0026nbsp; And his\nsagacity on this occasion was at that time looked upon as next to divine.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eBut what would he have said had it been proved to him that he was\nmistaken in the nature of light; that he had not the least reason to\nmaintain that it is a globular body?\u0026nbsp; That it is false to assert\nthat this matter, spreading itself through the whole, waits only to\nbe projected forward by the sun, in order to be put in action, in like\nmanner as a long staff acts at one end when pushed forward by the other.\u0026nbsp;\nThat light is certainly darted by the sun; in fine, that light is transmitted\nfrom the sun to the earth in about seven minutes, though a cannonball,\nwhich were not to lose any of its velocity, could not go that distance\nin less than twenty-five years.\u0026nbsp; How great would have been his\nastonishment had he been told that light does not reflect directly by\nimpinging against the solid parts of bodies, that bodies are not transparent\nwhen they have large pores, and that a man should arise who would demonstrate\nall these paradoxes, and anatomise a single ray of light with more dexterity\nthan the ablest artist dissects a human body.\u0026nbsp; This man is come.\u0026nbsp;\nSir Isaac Newton has demonstrated to the eye, by the bare assistance\nof the prism, that light is a composition of coloured rays, which, being\nunited, form white colour.\u0026nbsp; A single ray is by him divided into\nseven, which all fall upon a piece of linen, or a sheet of white paper,\nin their order, one above the other, and at unequal distances.\u0026nbsp;\nThe first is red, the second orange, the third yellow, the fourth green,\nthe fifth blue, the sixth indigo, the seventh a violet-purple.\u0026nbsp;\nEach of these rays, transmitted afterwards by a hundred other prisms,\nwill never change the colour it bears; in like manner, as gold, when\ncompletely purged from its dross, will never change afterwards in the\ncrucible.\u0026nbsp; As a superabundant proof that each of these elementary\nrays has inherently in itself that which forms its colour to the eye,\ntake a small piece of yellow wood, for instance, and set it in the ray\nof a red colour; this wood will instantly be tinged red.\u0026nbsp; But set\nit in the ray of a green colour, it assumes a green colour, and so of\nall the rest.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eFrom what cause, therefore, do colours arise in Nature?\u0026nbsp; It\nis nothing but the disposition of bodies to reflect the rays of a certain\norder and to absorb all the rest.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWhat, then, is this secret disposition?\u0026nbsp; Sir Isaac Newton demonstrates\nthat it is nothing more than the density of the small constituent particles\nof which a body is composed.\u0026nbsp; And how is this reflection performed?\u0026nbsp;\nIt was supposed to arise from the rebounding of the rays, in the same\nmanner as a ball on the surface of a solid body.\u0026nbsp; But this is a\nmistake, for Sir Isaac taught the astonished philosophers that bodies\nare opaque for no other reason but because their pores are large, that\nlight reflects on our eyes from the very bosom of those pores, that\nthe smaller the pores of a body are the more such a body is transparent.\u0026nbsp;\nThus paper, which reflects the light when dry, transmits it when oiled,\nbecause the oil, by filling its pores, makes them much smaller.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIt is there that examining the vast porosity of bodies, every particle\nhaving its pores, and every particle of those particles having its own,\nhe shows we are not certain that there is a cubic inch of solid matter\nin the universe, so far are we from conceiving what matter is.\u0026nbsp;\nHaving thus divided, as it were, light into its elements, and carried\nthe sagacity of his discoveries so far as to prove the method of distinguishing\ncompound colours from such as are primitive, he shows that these elementary\nrays, separated by the prism, are ranged in their order for no other\nreason but because they are refracted in that very order; and it is\nthis property (unknown till he discovered it) of breaking or splitting\nin this proportion; it is this unequal refraction of rays, this power\nof refracting the red less than the orange colour, \u0026amp;c., which he\ncalls the different refrangibility.\u0026nbsp; The most reflexible rays are\nthe most refrangible, and from hence he evinces that the same power\nis the cause both of the reflection and refraction of light.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eBut all these wonders are merely but the opening of his discoveries.\u0026nbsp;\nHe found out the secret to see the vibrations or fits of light which\ncome and go incessantly, and which either transmit light or reflect\nit, according to the density of the parts they meet with.\u0026nbsp; He has\npresumed to calculate the density of the particles of air necessary\nbetween two glasses, the one flat, the other convex on one side, set\none upon the other, in order to operate such a transmission or reflection,\nor to form such and such a colour.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eFrom all these combinations he discovers the proportion in which\nlight acts on bodies and bodies act on light.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eHe saw light so perfectly, that he has determined to what degree\nof perfection the art of increasing it, and of assisting our eyes by\ntelescopes, can be carried.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eDescartes, from a noble confidence that was very excusable, considering\nhow strongly he was fired at the first discoveries he made in an art\nwhich he almost first found out; Descartes, I say, hoped to discover\nin the stars, by the assistance of telescopes, objects as small as those\nwe discern upon the earth.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eBut Sir Isaac has shown that dioptric telescopes cannot be brought\nto a greater perfection, because of that refraction, and of that very\nrefrangibility, which at the same time that they bring objects nearer\nto us, scatter too much the elementary rays.\u0026nbsp; He has calculated\nin these glasses the proportion of the scattering of the red and of\nthe blue rays; and proceeding so far as to demonstrate things which\nwere not supposed even to exist, he examines the inequalities which\narise from the shape or figure of the glass, and that which arises from\nthe refrangibility.\u0026nbsp; He finds that the object glass of the telescope\nbeing convex on one side and flat on the other, in case the flat side\nbe turned towards the object, the error which arises from the construction\nand position of the glass is above five thousand times less than the\nerror which arises from the refrangibility; and, therefore, that the\nshape or figure of the glasses is not the cause why telescopes cannot\nbe carried to a greater perfection, but arises wholly from the nature\nof light.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eFor this reason he invented a telescope, which discovers objects\nby reflection, and not by refraction.\u0026nbsp; Telescopes of this new kind\nare very hard to make, and their use is not easy; but, according to\nthe English, a reflective telescope of but five feet has the same effect\nas another of a hundred feet in length.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eLETTER XVII.\u0026mdash;ON INFINITES IN GEOMETRY, AND SIR ISAAC NEWTON\u0026rsquo;S\nCHRONOLOGY\u003c/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe labyrinth and abyss of infinity is also a new course Sir Isaac\nNewton has gone through, and we are obliged to him for the clue, by\nwhose assistance we are enabled to trace its various windings.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eDescartes got the start of him also in this astonishing invention.\u0026nbsp;\nHe advanced with mighty steps in his geometry, and was arrived at the\nvery borders of infinity, but went no farther.\u0026nbsp; Dr. Wallis, about\nthe middle of the last century, was the first who reduced a fraction\nby a perpetual division to an infinite series.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe Lord Brouncker employed this series to square the hyperbola.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eMercator published a demonstration of this quadrature; much about\nwhich time Sir Isaac Newton, being then twenty-three years of age, had\ninvented a general method, to perform on all geometrical curves what\nhad just before been tried on the hyperbola.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIt is to this method of subjecting everywhere infinity to algebraical\ncalculations, that the name is given of differential calculations or\nof fluxions and integral calculation.\u0026nbsp; It is the art of numbering\nand measuring exactly a thing whose existence cannot be conceived.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eAnd, indeed, would you not imagine that a man laughed at you who\nshould declare that there are lines infinitely great which form an angle\ninfinitely little?\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThat a right line, which is a right line so long as it is finite,\nby changing infinitely little its direction, becomes an infinite curve;\nand that a curve may become infinitely less than another curve?\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThat there are infinite squares, infinite cubes, and infinites of\ninfinites, all greater than one another, and the last but one of which\nis nothing in comparison of the last?\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eAll these things, which at first appear to be the utmost excess of\nfrenzy, are in reality an effort of the subtlety and extent of the human\nmind, and the art of finding truths which till then had been unknown.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThis so bold edifice is even founded on simple ideas.\u0026nbsp; The business\nis to measure the diagonal of a square, to give the area of a curve,\nto find the square root of a number, which has none in common arithmetic.\u0026nbsp;\nAfter all, the imagination ought not to be startled any more at so many\norders of infinites than at the so well-known proposition, viz., that\ncurve lines may always be made to pass between a circle and a tangent;\nor at that other, namely, that matter is divisible in \u003ci\u003einfinitum\u003c/i\u003e.\u0026nbsp;\nThese two truths have been demonstrated many years, and are no less\nincomprehensible than the things we have been speaking of.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eFor many years the invention of this famous calculation was denied\nto Sir Isaac Newton.\u0026nbsp; In Germany Mr. Leibnitz was considered as\nthe inventor of the differences or moments, called fluxions, and Mr.\nBernouilli claimed the integral calculus.\u0026nbsp; However, Sir Isaac is\nnow thought to have first made the discovery, and the other two have\nthe glory of having once made the world doubt whether it was to be ascribed\nto him or them.\u0026nbsp; Thus some contested with Dr. Harvey the invention\nof the circulation of the blood, as others disputed with Mr. Perrault\nthat of the circulation of the sap.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eHartsocher and Leuwenhoek disputed with each other the honour of\nhaving first seen the \u003ci\u003evermiculi\u003c/i\u003e of which mankind are formed.\u0026nbsp;\nThis Hartsocher also contested with Huygens the invention of a new method\nof calculating the distance of a fixed star.\u0026nbsp; It is not yet known\nto what philosopher we owe the invention of the cycloid.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eBe this as it will, it is by the help of this geometry of infinites\nthat Sir Isaac Newton attained to the most sublime discoveries.\u0026nbsp;\nI am now to speak of another work, which, though more adapted to the\ncapacity of the human mind, does nevertheless display some marks of\nthat creative genius with which Sir Isaac Newton was informed in all\nhis researches.\u0026nbsp; The work I mean is a chronology of a new kind,\nfor what province soever he undertook he was sure to change the ideas\nand opinions received by the rest of men.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eAccustomed to unravel and disentangle chaos, he was resolved to convey\nat least some light into that of the fables of antiquity which are blended\nand confounded with history, and fix an uncertain chronology.\u0026nbsp;\nIt is true that there is no family, city, or nation, but endeavours\nto remove its original as far backward as possible.\u0026nbsp; Besides, the\nfirst historians were the most negligent in setting down the eras: books\nwere infinitely less common than they are at this time, and, consequently,\nauthors being not so obnoxious to censure, they therefore imposed upon\nthe world with greater impunity; and, as it is evident that these have\nrelated a great number of fictitious particulars, it is probable enough\nthat they also gave us several false eras.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIt appeared in general to Sir Isaac that the world was five hundred\nyears younger than chronologers declare it to be.\u0026nbsp; He grounds his\nopinion on the ordinary course of Nature, and on the observations which\nastronomers have made.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eBy the course of Nature we here understand the time that every generation\nof men lives upon the earth.\u0026nbsp; The Egyptians first employed this\nvague and uncertain method of calculating when they began to write the\nbeginning of their history.\u0026nbsp; These computed three hundred and forty-one\ngenerations from Menes to Sethon; and, having no fixed era, they supposed\nthree generations to consist of a hundred years.\u0026nbsp; In this manner\nthey computed eleven thousand three hundred and forty years from Menes\u0026rsquo;s\nreign to that of Sethon.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe Greeks before they counted by Olympiads followed the method of\nthe Egyptians, and even gave a little more extent to generations, making\neach to consist of forty years.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eNow, here, both the Egyptians and the Greeks made an erroneous computation.\u0026nbsp;\nIt is true, indeed, that, according to the usual course of Nature, three\ngenerations last about a hundred and twenty years; but three reigns\nare far from taking up so many.\u0026nbsp; It is very evident that mankind\nin general live longer than kings are found to reign, so that an author\nwho should write a history in which there were no dates fixed, and should\nknow that nine kings had reigned over a nation; such an historian would\ncommit a great error should he allow three hundred years to these nine\nmonarchs.\u0026nbsp; Every generation takes about thirty-six years; every\nreign is, one with the other, about twenty.\u0026nbsp; Thirty kings of England\nhave swayed the sceptre from William the Conqueror to George I., the\nyears of whose reigns added together amount to six hundred and forty-eight\nyears; which, being divided equally among the thirty kings, give to\nevery one a reign of twenty-one years and a half very near.\u0026nbsp; Sixty-three\nkings of France have sat upon the throne; these have, one with another,\nreigned about twenty years each.\u0026nbsp; This is the usual course of Nature.\u0026nbsp;\nThe ancients, therefore, were mistaken when they supposed the durations\nin general of reigns to equal that of generations.\u0026nbsp; They, therefore,\nallowed too great a number of years, and consequently some years must\nbe subtracted from their computation.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eAstronomical observations seem to have lent a still greater assistance\nto our philosopher.\u0026nbsp; He appears to us stronger when he fights upon\nhis own ground.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eYou know that the earth, besides its annual motion which carries\nit round the sun from west to east in the space of a year, has also\na singular revolution which was quite unknown till within these late\nyears.\u0026nbsp; Its poles have a very slow retrograde motion from east\nto west, whence it happens that their position every day does not correspond\nexactly with the same point of the heavens.\u0026nbsp; This difference, which\nis so insensible in a year, becomes pretty considerable in time; and\nin threescore and twelve years the difference is found to be of one\ndegree, that is to say, the three hundred and sixtieth part of the circumference\nof the whole heaven.\u0026nbsp; Thus after seventy-two years the colure of\nthe vernal equinox which passed through a fixed star, corresponds with\nanother fixed star.\u0026nbsp; Hence it is that the sun, instead of being\nin that part of the heavens in which the Ram was situated in the time\nof Hipparchus, is found to correspond with that part of the heavens\nin which the Bull was situated; and the Twins are placed where the Bull\nthen stood.\u0026nbsp; All the signs have changed their situation, and yet\nwe still retain the same manner of speaking as the ancients did.\u0026nbsp;\nIn this age we say that the sun is in the Ram in the spring, from the\nsame principle of condescension that we say that the sun turns round.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eHipparchus was the first among the Greeks who observed some change\nin the constellations with regard to the equinoxes, or rather who learnt\nit from the Egyptians.\u0026nbsp; Philosophers ascribed this motion to the\nstars; for in those ages people were far from imagining such a revolution\nin the earth, which was supposed to be immovable in every respect.\u0026nbsp;\nThey therefore created a heaven in which they fixed the several stars,\nand gave this heaven a particular motion by which it was carried towards\nthe east, whilst that all the stars seemed to perform their diurnal\nrevolution from east to west.\u0026nbsp; To this error they added a second\nof much greater consequence, by imagining that the pretended heaven\nof the fixed stars advanced one degree eastward every hundred years.\u0026nbsp;\nIn this manner they were no less mistaken in their astronomical calculation\nthan in their system of natural philosophy.\u0026nbsp; As for instance, an\nastronomer in that age would have said that the vernal equinox was in\nthe time of such and such an observation, in such a sign, and in such\na star.\u0026nbsp; It has advanced two degrees of each since the time that\nobservation was made to the present.\u0026nbsp; Now two degrees are equivalent\nto two hundred years; consequently the astronomer who made that observation\nlived just so many years before me.\u0026nbsp; It is certain that an astronomer\nwho had argued in this manner would have mistook just fifty-four years;\nhence it is that the ancients, who were doubly deceived, made their\ngreat year of the world, that is, the revolution of the whole heavens,\nto consist of thirty-six thousand years.\u0026nbsp; But the moderns are sensible\nthat this imaginary revolution of the heaven of the stars is nothing\nelse than the revolution of the poles of the earth, which is performed\nin twenty-five thousand nine hundred years.\u0026nbsp; It may be proper to\nobserve transiently in this place, that Sir Isaac, by determining the\nfigure of the earth, has very happily explained the cause of this revolution.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eAll this being laid down, the only thing remaining to settle chronology\nis to see through what star the colure of the equinoxes passes, and\nwhere it intersects at this time the ecliptic in the spring; and to\ndiscover whether some ancient writer does not tell us in what point\nthe ecliptic was intersected in his time, by the same colure of the\nequinoxes.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eClemens Alexandrinus informs us, that Chiron, who went with the Argonauts,\nobserved the constellations at the time of that famous expedition, and\nfixed the vernal equinox to the middle of the Ram; the autumnal equinox\nto the middle of Libra; our summer solstice to the middle of Cancer,\nand our winter solstice to the middle of Capricorn.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eA long time after the expedition of the Argonauts, and a year before\nthe Peloponnesian war, Methon observed that the point of the summer\nsolstice passed through the eighth degree of Cancer.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eNow every sign of the zodiac contains thirty degrees.\u0026nbsp; In Chiron\u0026rsquo;s\ntime, the solstice was arrived at the middle of the sign, that is to\nsay to the fifteenth degree.\u0026nbsp; A year before the Peloponnesian war\nit was at the eighth, and therefore it had retarded seven degrees.\u0026nbsp;\nA degree is equivalent to seventy-two years; consequently, from the\nbeginning of the Peloponnesian war to the expedition of the Argonauts,\nthere is no more than an interval of seven times seventy-two years,\nwhich make five hundred and four years, and not seven hundred years\nas the Greeks computed.\u0026nbsp; Thus in comparing the position of the\nheavens at this time with their position in that age, we find that the\nexpedition of the Argonauts ought to be placed about nine hundred years\nbefore Christ, and not about fourteen hundred; and consequently that\nthe world is not so old by five hundred years as it was generally supposed\nto be.\u0026nbsp; By this calculation all the eras are drawn nearer, and\nthe several events are found to have happened later than is computed.\u0026nbsp;\nI do not know whether this ingenious system will be favourably received;\nand whether these notions will prevail so far with the learned, as to\nprompt them to reform the chronology of the world.\u0026nbsp; Perhaps these\ngentlemen would think it too great a condescension to allow one and\nthe same man the glory of having improved natural philosophy, geometry,\nand history.\u0026nbsp; This would be a kind of universal monarchy, with\nwhich the principle of self-love that is in man will scarce suffer him\nto indulge his fellow-creature; and, indeed, at the same time that some\nvery great philosophers attacked Sir Isaac Newton\u0026rsquo;s attractive\nprinciple, others fell upon his chronological system.\u0026nbsp; Time that\nshould discover to which of these the victory is due, may perhaps only\nleave the dispute still more undetermined.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eLETTER XVIII.\u0026mdash;ON TRAGEDY\u003c/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe English as well as the Spaniards were possessed of theatres at\na time when the French had no more than moving, itinerant stages.\u0026nbsp;\nShakspeare, who was considered as the Corneille of the first-mentioned\nnation, was pretty nearly contemporary with Lopez de Vega, and he created,\nas it were, the English theatre.\u0026nbsp; Shakspeare boasted a strong fruitful\ngenius.\u0026nbsp; He was natural and sublime, but had not so much as a single\nspark of good taste, or knew one rule of the drama.\u0026nbsp; I will now\nhazard a random, but, at the same time, true reflection, which is, that\nthe great merit of this dramatic poet has been the ruin of the English\nstage.\u0026nbsp; There are such beautiful, such noble, such dreadful scenes\nin this writer\u0026rsquo;s monstrous farces, to which the name of tragedy\nis given, that they have always been exhibited with great success.\u0026nbsp;\nTime, which alone gives reputation to writers, at last makes their very\nfaults venerable.\u0026nbsp; Most of the whimsical gigantic images of this\npoet, have, through length of time (it being a hundred and fifty years\nsince they were first drawn) acquired a right of passing for sublime.\u0026nbsp;\nMost of the modern dramatic writers have copied him; but the touches\nand descriptions which are applauded in Shakspeare, are hissed at in\nthese writers; and you will easily believe that the veneration in which\nthis author is held, increases in proportion to the contempt which is\nshown to the moderns.\u0026nbsp; Dramatic writers don\u0026rsquo;t consider that\nthey should not imitate him; and the ill-success of Shakspeare\u0026rsquo;s\nimitators produces no other effect, than to make him be considered as\ninimitable.\u0026nbsp; You remember that in the tragedy of \u003ci\u003eOthello, Moor\nof Venice\u003c/i\u003e, a most tender piece, a man strangles his wife on the\nstage, and that the poor woman, whilst she is strangling, cries aloud\nthat she dies very unjustly.\u0026nbsp; You know that in \u003ci\u003eHamlet, Prince\nof Denmark\u003c/i\u003e, two grave-diggers make a grave, and are all the time\ndrinking, singing ballads, and making humorous reflections (natural\nindeed enough to persons of their profession) on the several skulls\nthey throw up with their spades; but a circumstance which will surprise\nyou is, that this ridiculous incident has been imitated.\u0026nbsp; In the\nreign of King Charles II., which was that of politeness, and the Golden\nAge of the liberal arts; Otway, in his \u003ci\u003eVenice Preserved\u003c/i\u003e, introduces\nAntonio the senator, and Naki, his courtesan, in the midst of the horrors\nof the Marquis of Bedemar\u0026rsquo;s conspiracy.\u0026nbsp; Antonio, the superannuated\nsenator plays, in his mistress\u0026rsquo;s presence, all the apish tricks\nof a lewd, impotent debauchee, who is quite frantic and out of his senses.\u0026nbsp;\nHe mimics a bull and a dog, and bites his mistress\u0026rsquo;s legs, who\nkicks and whips him.\u0026nbsp; However, the players have struck these buffooneries\n(which indeed were calculated merely for the dregs of the people) out\nof Otway\u0026rsquo;s tragedy; but they have still left in Shakspeare\u0026rsquo;s\n\u003ci\u003eJulius C\u0026aelig;sar\u003c/i\u003e the jokes of the Roman shoemakers and cobblers,\nwho are introduced in the same scene with Brutus and Cassius.\u0026nbsp;\nYou will undoubtedly complain, that those who have hitherto discoursed\nwith you on the English stage, and especially on the celebrated Shakspeare,\nhave taken notice only of his errors; and that no one has translated\nany of those strong, those forcible passages which atone for all his\nfaults.\u0026nbsp; But to this I will answer, that nothing is easier than\nto exhibit in prose all the silly impertinences which a poet may have\nthrown out; but that it is a very difficult task to translate his fine\nverses.\u0026nbsp; All your junior academical sophs, who set up for censors\nof the eminent writers, compile whole volumes; but methinks two pages\nwhich display some of the beauties of great geniuses, are of infinitely\nmore value than all the idle rhapsodies of those commentators; and I\nwill join in opinion with all persons of good taste in declaring, that\ngreater advantage may be reaped from a dozen verses of Homer of Virgil,\nthan from all the critiques put together which have been made on those\ntwo great poets.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eI have ventured to translate some passages of the most celebrated\nEnglish poets, and shall now give you one from Shakspeare.\u0026nbsp; Pardon\nthe blemishes of the translation for the sake of the original; and remember\nalways that when you see a version, you see merely a faint print of\na beautiful picture.\u0026nbsp; I have made choice of part of the celebrated\nsoliloquy in \u003ci\u003eHamlet\u003c/i\u003e, which you may remember is as follows:\u0026mdash;\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cblockquote\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u0026ldquo;To be, or not to be? that is the question!\u003cbr /\u003e\nWhether \u0026rsquo;t is nobler in the mind to suffer\u003cbr /\u003e\nThe slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,\u003cbr /\u003e\nOr to take arms against a sea of troubles,\u003cbr /\u003e\nAnd by opposing, end them?\u0026nbsp; To die! to sleep!\u003cbr /\u003e\nNo more! and by a sleep to say we end\u003cbr /\u003e\nThe heart-ache, and the thousand natural shocks\u003cbr /\u003e\nThat flesh is heir to!\u0026nbsp; \u0026rsquo;Tis a consummation\u003cbr /\u003e\nDevoutly to be wished.\u0026nbsp; To die! to sleep!\u003cbr /\u003e\nTo sleep; perchance to dream!\u0026nbsp; O, there\u0026rsquo;s the rub;\u003cbr /\u003e\nFor in that sleep of death, what dreams may come\u003cbr /\u003e\nWhen we have shuffled off this mortal coil,\u003cbr /\u003e\nMust give us pause.\u0026nbsp; There\u0026rsquo;s the respect\u003cbr /\u003e\nThat makes calamity of so long life:\u003cbr /\u003e\nFor who would bear the whips and scorns of time,\u003cbr /\u003e\nThe oppressor\u0026rsquo;s wrong, the poor man\u0026rsquo;s contumely,\u003cbr /\u003e\nThe pangs of despised love, the law\u0026rsquo;s delay,\u003cbr /\u003e\nThe insolence of office, and the spurns\u003cbr /\u003e\nThat patient merit of the unworthy takes,\u003cbr /\u003e\nWhen he himself might his quietus make\u003cbr /\u003e\nWith a bare bodkin.\u0026nbsp; Who would fardels bear\u003cbr /\u003e\nTo groan and sweat under a weary life,\u003cbr /\u003e\nBut that the dread of something after death,\u003cbr /\u003e\nThe undiscovered country, from whose bourn\u003cbr /\u003e\nNo traveller returns, puzzles the will,\u003cbr /\u003e\nAnd makes us rather bear those ills we have,\u003cbr /\u003e\nThan fly to others that we know not of?\u003cbr /\u003e\nThus conscience does make cowards of us all;\u003cbr /\u003e\nAnd thus the native hue of resolution\u003cbr /\u003e\nIs sicklied o\u0026rsquo;er with the pale cast of thought:\u003cbr /\u003e\nAnd enterprises of great weight and moment\u003cbr /\u003e\nWith this regard their currents turn awry,\u003cbr /\u003e\nAnd lose the name of action\u0026mdash;\u0026rdquo;\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003c/blockquote\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eMy version of it runs thus:\u0026mdash;\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cblockquote\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u0026ldquo;Demeure, il faut choisir et passer \u0026agrave; l\u0026rsquo;instant\u003cbr /\u003e\nDe la vie, \u0026agrave; la mort, ou de l\u0026rsquo;\u0026ecirc;tre au neant.\u003cbr /\u003e\nDieux cruels, s\u0026rsquo;il en est, \u0026eacute;clairez mon courage.\u003cbr /\u003e\nFaut-il vieillir courb\u0026eacute; sous la main qui m\u0026rsquo;outrage,\u003cbr /\u003e\nSupporter, ou finir mon malheur et mon sort?\u003cbr /\u003e\nQui suis je?\u0026nbsp; Qui m\u0026rsquo;arr\u0026ecirc;te! et qu\u0026rsquo;est-ce que\nla mort?\u003cbr /\u003e\nC\u0026rsquo;est la fin de nos maux, c\u0026rsquo;est mon unique asile\u003cbr /\u003e\nApr\u0026egrave;s de longs transports, c\u0026rsquo;est un sommeil tranquile.\u003cbr /\u003e\nOn s\u0026rsquo;endort, et tout meurt, mais un affreux reveil\u003cbr /\u003e\nDoit succeder peut \u0026ecirc;tre aux douceurs du sommeil!\u003cbr /\u003e\nOn nous menace, on dit que cette courte vie,\u003cbr /\u003e\nDe tourmens \u0026eacute;ternels est aussi-t\u0026ocirc;t suivie.\u003cbr /\u003e\nO mort! moment fatal! affreuse eternit\u0026eacute;!\u003cbr /\u003e\nTout coeur \u0026agrave; ton seul nom se glace \u0026eacute;pouvant\u0026eacute;.\u003cbr /\u003e\nEh! qui pourroit sans toi supporter cette vie,\u003cbr /\u003e\nDe nos pr\u0026ecirc;tres menteurs benir l\u0026rsquo;hypocrisie:\u003cbr /\u003e\nD\u0026rsquo;une indigne maitresse encenser les erreurs,\u003cbr /\u003e\nRamper sous un ministre, adorer ses hauteurs;\u003cbr /\u003e\nEt montrer les langueurs de son ame abatt\u0026uuml;e,\u003cbr /\u003e\nA des amis ingrats qui detournent la v\u0026uuml;e?\u003cbr /\u003e\nLa mort seroit trop douce en ces extr\u0026eacute;mitez,\u003cbr /\u003e\nMais le scrupule parle, et nous crie, arr\u0026ecirc;tez;\u003cbr /\u003e\nIl defend \u0026agrave; nos mains cet heureux homicide\u003cbr /\u003e\nEt d\u0026rsquo;un heros guerrier, fait un Chr\u0026eacute;tien timide,\u0026rdquo;\n\u0026amp;c.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003c/blockquote\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eDo not imagine that I have translated Shakspeare in a servile manner.\u0026nbsp;\nWoe to the writer who gives a literal version; who by rendering every\nword of his original, by that very means enervates the sense, and extinguishes\nall the fire of it.\u0026nbsp; It is on such an occasion one may justly affirm,\nthat the letter kills, but the Spirit quickens.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eHere follows another passage copied from a celebrated tragic writer\namong the English.\u0026nbsp; It is Dryden, a poet in the reign of Charles\nII.\u0026mdash;a writer whose genius was too exuberant, and not accompanied\nwith judgment enough.\u0026nbsp; Had he written only a tenth part of the\nworks he left behind him, his character would have been conspicuous\nin every part; but his great fault is his having endeavoured to be universal.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe passage in question is as follows:\u0026mdash;\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cblockquote\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u0026ldquo;When I consider life, \u0026rsquo;t is all a cheat,\u003cbr /\u003e\nYet fooled by hope, men favour the deceit;\u003cbr /\u003e\nTrust on and think, to-morrow will repay;\u003cbr /\u003e\nTo-morrow\u0026rsquo;s falser than the former day;\u003cbr /\u003e\nLies more; and whilst it says we shall be blest\u003cbr /\u003e\nWith some new joy, cuts off what we possessed;\u003cbr /\u003e\nStrange cozenage! none would live past years again,\u003cbr /\u003e\nYet all hope pleasure in what yet remain,\u003cbr /\u003e\nAnd from the dregs of life think to receive\u003cbr /\u003e\nWhat the first sprightly running could not give.\u003cbr /\u003e\nI\u0026rsquo;m tired with waiting for this chymic gold,\u003cbr /\u003e\nWhich fools us young, and beggars us when old.\u0026rdquo;\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003c/blockquote\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eI shall now give you my translation:\u0026mdash;\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cblockquote\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u0026ldquo;De desseins en regrets et d\u0026rsquo;erreurs en desirs\u003cbr /\u003e\nLes mortals insens\u0026eacute;s promenent leur folie.\u003cbr /\u003e\nDans des malheurs presents, dans l\u0026rsquo;espoir des plaisirs\u003cbr /\u003e\nNous ne vivons jamais, nous attendons la vie.\u003cbr /\u003e\nDemain, demain, dit-on, va combler tous nos voeux.\u003cbr /\u003e\nDemain vient, et nous laisse encore plus malheureux.\u003cbr /\u003e\nQuelle est l\u0026rsquo;erreur, helas! du soin qui nous d\u0026eacute;vore,\u003cbr /\u003e\nNul de nous ne voudroit recommencer son cours.\u003cbr /\u003e\nDe nos premiers momens nous maudissons l\u0026rsquo;aurore,\u003cbr /\u003e\nEt de la nuit qui vient nous attendons encore,\u003cbr /\u003e\nCe qu\u0026rsquo;ont en vain promis les plus beaux de nos jours,\u0026rdquo; \u0026amp;c.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003c/blockquote\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIt is in these detached passages that the English have hitherto excelled.\u0026nbsp;\nTheir dramatic pieces, most of which are barbarous and without decorum,\norder, or verisimilitude, dart such resplendent flashes through this\ngleam, as amaze and astonish.\u0026nbsp; The style is too much inflated,\ntoo unnatural, too closely copied from the Hebrew writers, who abound\nso much with the Asiatic fustian.\u0026nbsp; But then it must be also confessed\nthat the stilts of the figurative style, on which the English tongue\nis lifted up, raises the genius at the same time very far aloft, though\nwith an irregular pace.\u0026nbsp; The first English writer who composed\na regular tragedy, and infused a spirit of elegance through every part\nof it, was the illustrious Mr. Addison.\u0026nbsp; His \u0026ldquo;Cato\u0026rdquo;\nis a masterpiece, both with regard to the diction and to the beauty\nand harmony of the numbers.\u0026nbsp; The character of Cato is, in my opinion,\nvastly superior to that of Cornelia in the \u0026ldquo;Pompey\u0026rdquo; of Corneille,\nfor Cato is great without anything like fustian, and Cornelia, who besides\nis not a necessary character, tends sometimes to bombast.\u0026nbsp; Mr.\nAddison\u0026rsquo;s Cato appears to me the greatest character that was ever\nbrought upon any stage, but then the rest of them do not correspond\nto the dignity of it, and this dramatic piece, so excellently well writ,\nis disfigured by a dull love plot, which spreads a certain languor over\nthe whole, that quite murders it.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe custom of introducing love at random and at any rate in the drama\npassed from Paris to London about 1660, with our ribbons and our perruques.\u0026nbsp;\nThe ladies who adorn the theatrical circle there, in like manner as\nin this city, will suffer love only to be the theme of every conversation.\u0026nbsp;\nThe judicious Mr. Addison had the effeminate complaisance to soften\nthe severity of his dramatic character, so as to adapt it to the manners\nof the age, and, from an endeavour to please, quite ruined a masterpiece\nin its kind.\u0026nbsp; Since his time the drama is become more regular,\nthe audience more difficult to be pleased, and writers more correct\nand less bold.\u0026nbsp; I have seen some new pieces that were written with\ngreat regularity, but which, at the same time, were very flat and insipid.\u0026nbsp;\nOne would think that the English had been hitherto formed to produce\nirregular beauties only.\u0026nbsp; The shining monsters of Shakspeare give\ninfinite more delight than the judicious images of the moderns.\u0026nbsp;\nHitherto the poetical genius of the English resembles a tufted tree\nplanted by the hand of Nature, that throws out a thousand branches at\nrandom, and spreads unequally, but with great vigour.\u0026nbsp; It dies\nif you attempt to force its nature, and to lop and dress it in the same\nmanner as the trees of the Garden of Marli.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eLETTER XIX.\u0026mdash;ON COMEDY\u003c/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eI am surprised that the judicious and ingenious Mr. de Muralt, who\nhas published some letters on the English and French nations, should\nhave confined himself; in treating of comedy, merely to censure Shadwell\nthe comic writer.\u0026nbsp; This author was had in pretty great contempt\nin Mr. de Muralt\u0026rsquo;s time, and was not the poet of the polite part\nof the nation.\u0026nbsp; His dramatic pieces, which pleased some time in\nacting, were despised by all persons of taste, and might be compared\nto many plays which I have seen in France, that drew crowds to the playhouse,\nat the same time that they were intolerable to read; and of which it\nmight be said, that the whole city of Paris exploded them, and yet all\nflocked to see them represented on the stage.\u0026nbsp; Methinks Mr. de\nMuralt should have mentioned an excellent comic writer (living when\nhe was in England), I mean Mr. Wycherley, who was a long time known\npublicly to be happy in the good graces of the most celebrated mistress\nof King Charles II.\u0026nbsp; This gentleman, who passed his life among\npersons of the highest distinction, was perfectly well acquainted with\ntheir lives and their follies, and painted them with the strongest pencil,\nand in the truest colours.\u0026nbsp; He has drawn a misanthrope or man-hater,\nin imitation of that of Moli\u0026egrave;re.\u0026nbsp; All Wycherley\u0026rsquo;s\nstrokes are stronger and bolder than those of our misanthrope, but then\nthey are less delicate, and the rules of decorum are not so well observed\nin this play.\u0026nbsp; The English writer has corrected the only defect\nthat is in Moli\u0026egrave;re\u0026rsquo;s comedy, the thinness of the plot,\nwhich also is so disposed that the characters in it do not enough raise\nour concern.\u0026nbsp; The English comedy affects us, and the contrivance\nof the plot is very ingenious, but at the same time it is too bold for\nthe French manners.\u0026nbsp; The fable is this:\u0026mdash;A captain of a man-of-war,\nwho is very brave, open-hearted, and inflamed with a spirit of contempt\nfor all mankind, has a prudent, sincere friend, whom he yet is suspicious\nof; and a mistress that loves him with the utmost excess of passion.\u0026nbsp;\nThe captain so far from returning her love, will not even condescend\nto look upon her, but confides entirely in a false friend, who is the\nmost worthless wretch living.\u0026nbsp; At the same time he has given his\nheart to a creature, who is the greatest coquette and the most perfidious\nof her sex, and he is so credulous as to be confident she is a Penelope,\nand his false friend a Cato.\u0026nbsp; He embarks on board his ship in order\nto go and fight the Dutch, having left all his money, his jewels, and\neverything he had in the world to this virtuous creature, whom at the\nsame time he recommends to the care of his supposed faithful friend.\u0026nbsp;\nNevertheless the real man of honour, whom he suspects so unaccountably,\ngoes on board the ship with him, and the mistress, on whom he would\nnot bestow so much as one glance, disguises herself in the habit of\na page, and is with him the whole voyage, without his once knowing that\nshe is of a sex different from that she attempts to pass for, which,\nby the way, is not over natural.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe captain having blown up his own ship in an engagement, returns\nto England abandoned and undone, accompanied by his page and his friend,\nwithout knowing the friendship of the one or the tender passion of the\nother.\u0026nbsp; Immediately he goes to the jewel among women, who he expected\nhad preserved her fidelity to him and the treasure he had left in her\nhands.\u0026nbsp; He meets with her indeed, but married to the honest knave\nin whom he had reposed so much confidence, and finds she had acted as\ntreacherously with regard to the casket he had entrusted her with.\u0026nbsp;\nThe captain can scarce think it possible that a woman of virtue and\nhonour can act so vile a part; but to convince him still more of the\nreality of it, this very worthy lady falls in love with the little page,\nand will force him to her embraces.\u0026nbsp; But as it is requisite justice\nshould be done, and that in a dramatic piece virtue ought to be rewarded\nand vice punished, it is at last found that the captain takes his page\u0026rsquo;s\nplace, and lies with his faithless mistress, cuckolds his treacherous\nfriend, thrusts his sword through his body, recovers his casket, and\nmarries his page.\u0026nbsp; You will observe that this play is also larded\nwith a petulant, litigious old woman (a relation of the captain), who\nis the most comical character that was ever brought upon the stage.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWycherley has also copied from Moli\u0026egrave;re another play, of as\nsingular and bold a cast, which is a kind of \u003ci\u003eEcole des Femmes\u003c/i\u003e,\nor, \u003ci\u003eSchool for Married Women\u003c/i\u003e.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe principal character in this comedy is one Homer, a sly fortune\nhunter, and the terror of all the City husbands.\u0026nbsp; This fellow,\nin order to play a surer game, causes a report to be spread, that in\nhis last illness, the surgeons had found it necessary to have him made\na eunuch.\u0026nbsp; Upon his appearing in this noble character, all the\nhusbands in town flock to him with their wives, and now poor Homer is\nonly puzzled about his choice.\u0026nbsp; However, he gives the preference\nparticularly to a little female peasant, a very harmless, innocent creature,\nwho enjoys a fine flush of health, and cuckolds her husband with a simplicity\nthat has infinitely more merit than the witty malice of the most experienced\nladies.\u0026nbsp; This play cannot indeed be called the school of good morals,\nbut it is certainly the school of wit and true humour.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eSir John Vanbrugh has written several comedies, which are more humorous\nthan those of Mr. Wycherley, but not so ingenious.\u0026nbsp; Sir John was\na man of pleasure, and likewise a poet and an architect.\u0026nbsp; The general\nopinion is, that he is as sprightly in his writings as he is heavy in\nhis buildings.\u0026nbsp; It is he who raised the famous Castle of Blenheim,\na ponderous and lasting monument of our unfortunate Battle of Hochstet.\u0026nbsp;\nWere the apartments but as spacious as the walls are thick, this castle\nwould be commodious enough.\u0026nbsp; Some wag, in an epitaph he made on\nSir John Vanbrugh, has these lines:\u0026mdash;\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cblockquote\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u0026ldquo;Earth lie light on him, for he\u003cbr /\u003e\nLaid many a heavy load on thee.\u0026rdquo;\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003c/blockquote\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eSir John having taken a tour into France before the glorious war\nthat broke out in 1701, was thrown into the Bastille, and detained there\nfor some time, without being ever able to discover the motive which\nhad prompted our ministry to indulge him with this mark of their distinction.\u0026nbsp;\nHe wrote a comedy during his confinement; and a circumstance which appears\nto me very extraordinary is, that we don\u0026rsquo;t meet with so much as\na single satirical stroke against the country in which he had been so\ninjuriously treated.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe late Mr. Congreve raised the glory of comedy to a greater height\nthan any English writer before or since his time.\u0026nbsp; He wrote only\na few plays, but they are all excellent in their kind.\u0026nbsp; The laws\nof the drama are strictly observed in them; they abound with characters\nall which are shadowed with the utmost delicacy, and we don\u0026rsquo;t\nmeet with so much as one low or coarse jest.\u0026nbsp; The language is everywhere\nthat of men of honour, but their actions are those of knaves\u0026mdash;a\nproof that he was perfectly well acquainted with human nature, and frequented\nwhat we call polite company.\u0026nbsp; He was infirm and come to the verge\nof life when I knew him.\u0026nbsp; Mr. Congreve had one defect, which was\nhis entertaining too mean an idea of his first profession (that of a\nwriter), though it was to this he owed his fame and fortune.\u0026nbsp; He\nspoke of his works as of trifles that were beneath him; and hinted to\nme, in our first conversation, that I should visit him upon no other\nfooting than that of a gentleman who led a life of plainness and simplicity.\u0026nbsp;\nI answered, that had he been so unfortunate as to be a mere gentleman,\nI should never have come to see him; and I was very much disgusted at\nso unseasonable a piece of vanity.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eMr. Congreve\u0026rsquo;s comedies are the most witty and regular, those\nof Sir John Vanbrugh most gay and humorous, and those of Mr. Wycherley\nhave the greatest force and spirit.\u0026nbsp; It may be proper to observe\nthat these fine geniuses never spoke disadvantageously of Moli\u0026egrave;re;\nand that none but the contemptible writers among the English have endeavoured\nto lessen the character of that great comic poet.\u0026nbsp; Such Italian\nmusicians as despise Lully are themselves persons of no character or\nability; but a Buononcini esteems that great artist, and does justice\nto his merit.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe English have some other good comic writers living, such as Sir\nRichard Steele and Mr. Cibber, who is an excellent player, and also\nPoet Laureate\u0026mdash;a title which, how ridiculous soever it may be thought,\nis yet worth a thousand crowns a year (besides some considerable privileges)\nto the person who enjoys it.\u0026nbsp; Our illustrious Corneille had not\nso much.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eTo conclude.\u0026nbsp; Don\u0026rsquo;t desire me to descend to particulars\nwith regard to these English comedies, which I am so fond of applauding;\nnor to give you a single smart saying or humorous stroke from Wycherley\nor Congreve.\u0026nbsp; We don\u0026rsquo;t laugh in rending a translation.\u0026nbsp;\nIf you have a mind to understand the English comedy, the only way to\ndo this will be for you to go to England, to spend three years in London,\nto make yourself master of the English tongue, and to frequent the playhouse\nevery night.\u0026nbsp; I receive but little pleasure from the perusal of\nAristophanes and Plautus, and for this reason, because I am neither\na Greek nor a Roman.\u0026nbsp; The delicacy of the humour, the allusion,\nthe \u003ci\u003e\u0026agrave; propos\u003c/i\u003e\u0026mdash;all these are lost to a foreigner.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eBut it is different with respect to tragedy, this treating only of\nexalted passions and heroical follies, which the antiquated errors of\nfable or history have made sacred.\u0026nbsp; \u0026OElig;dipus, Electra, and\nsuch-like characters, may with as much propriety be treated of by the\nSpaniards, the English, or us, as by the Greeks.\u0026nbsp; But true comedy\nis the speaking picture of the follies and ridiculous foibles of a nation;\nso that he only is able to judge of the painting who is perfectly acquainted\nwith the people it represents.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eLETTER XX.\u0026mdash;ON SUCH OF THE NOBILITY AS CULTIVATE THE BELLES\nLETTRES\u003c/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThere once was a time in France when the polite arts were cultivated\nby persons of the highest rank in the state.\u0026nbsp; The courtiers particularly\nwere conversant in them, although indolence, a taste for trifles, and\na passion for intrigue, were the divinities of the country.\u0026nbsp; The\nCourt methinks at this time seems to have given into a taste quite opposite\nto that of polite literature, but perhaps the mode of thinking may be\nrevived in a little time.\u0026nbsp; The French are of so flexible a disposition,\nmay be moulded into such a variety of shapes, that the monarch needs\nbut command and he is immediately obeyed.\u0026nbsp; The English generally\nthink, and learning is had in greater honour among them than in our\ncountry\u0026mdash;an advantage that results naturally from the form of their\ngovernment.\u0026nbsp; There are about eight hundred persons in England who\nhave a right to speak in public, and to support the interest of the\nkingdom; and near five or six thousand may in their turns aspire to\nthe same honour.\u0026nbsp; The whole nation set themselves up as judges\nover these, and every man has the liberty of publishing his thoughts\nwith regard to public affairs, which shows that all the people in general\nare indispensably obliged to cultivate their understandings.\u0026nbsp; In\nEngland the governments of Greece and Rome are the subject of every\nconversation, so that every man is under a necessity of perusing such\nauthors as treat of them, how disagreeable soever it may be to him;\nand this study leads naturally to that of polite literature.\u0026nbsp; Mankind\nin general speak well in their respective professions.\u0026nbsp; What is\nthe reason why our magistrates, our lawyers, our physicians, and a great\nnumber of the clergy, are abler scholars, have a finer taste, and more\nwit, than persons of all other professions?\u0026nbsp; The reason is, because\ntheir condition of life requires a cultivated and enlightened mind,\nin the same manner as a merchant is obliged to be acquainted with his\ntraffic.\u0026nbsp; Not long since an English nobleman, who was very young,\ncame to see me at Paris on his return from Italy.\u0026nbsp; He had written\na poetical description of that country, which, for delicacy and politeness,\nmay vie with anything we meet with in the Earl of Rochester, or in our\nChaulieu, our Sarrasin, or Chapelle.\u0026nbsp; The translation I have given\nof it is so inexpressive of the strength and delicate humour of the\noriginal, that I am obliged seriously to ask pardon of the author and\nof all who understand English.\u0026nbsp; However, as this is the only method\nI have to make his lordship\u0026rsquo;s verses known, I shall here present\nyou with them in our tongue:\u0026mdash;\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cblockquote\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u0026ldquo;Qu\u0026rsquo;ay je donc v\u0026ucirc; dans l\u0026rsquo;Italie?\u003cbr /\u003e\nOrgueil, astuce, et pauvret\u0026eacute;,\u003cbr /\u003e\nGrands complimens, peu de bont\u0026eacute;\u003cbr /\u003e\nEt beaucoup de ceremonie.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u0026ldquo;L\u0026rsquo;extravagante comedie\u003cbr /\u003e\nQue souvent l\u0026rsquo;Inquisition\u003cbr /\u003e\nVent qu\u0026rsquo;on nomme religion\u003cbr /\u003e\nMais qu\u0026rsquo;ici nous nommons folie.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u0026ldquo;La Nature en vain bienfaisante\u003cbr /\u003e\nVent enricher ses lieux charmans,\u003cbr /\u003e\nDes pr\u0026ecirc;tres la main desolante\u003cbr /\u003e\nEtouffe ses plus beaux pr\u0026eacute;sens.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u0026ldquo;Les monsignors, soy disant Grands,\u003cbr /\u003e\nSeuls dans leurs palais magnifiques\u003cbr /\u003e\nY sont d\u0026rsquo;illustres faineants,\u003cbr /\u003e\nSans argent, et sans domestiques.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u0026ldquo;Pour les petits, sans libert\u0026eacute;,\u003cbr /\u003e\nMartyrs du joug qui les domine,\u003cbr /\u003e\nIls ont fait voeu de pauvret\u0026eacute;,\u003cbr /\u003e\nPriant Dieu par oisivet\u0026eacute;\u003cbr /\u003e\nEt toujours jeunant par famine.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u0026ldquo;Ces beaux lieux du Pape benis\u003cbr /\u003e\nSemblent habitez par les diables;\u003cbr /\u003e\nEt les habitans miserables\u003cbr /\u003e\nSont damnes dans le Paradis.\u0026rdquo;\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003c/blockquote\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eLETTER XXI.\u0026mdash;ON THE EARL OF ROCHESTER AND MR. WALLER\u003c/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe Earl of Rochester\u0026rsquo;s name is universally known.\u0026nbsp; Mr.\nde St. Evremont has made very frequent mention of him, but then he has\nrepresented this famous nobleman in no other light than as the man of\npleasure, as one who was the idol of the fair; but, with regard to myself,\nI would willingly describe in him the man of genius, the great poet.\u0026nbsp;\nAmong other pieces which display the shining imagination, his lordship\nonly could boast he wrote some satires on the same subjects as those\nour celebrated Boileau made choice of.\u0026nbsp; I do not know any better\nmethod of improving the taste than to compare the productions of such\ngreat geniuses as have exercised their talent on the same subject.\u0026nbsp;\nBoileau declaims as follows against human reason in his \u0026ldquo;Satire\non Man:\u0026rdquo;\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cblockquote\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u0026ldquo;Cependant \u0026agrave; le voir plein de vapeurs l\u0026eacute;geres,\u003cbr /\u003e\nSoi-m\u0026ecirc;me se bercer de ses propres chimeres,\u003cbr /\u003e\nLui seul de la nature est la baze et l\u0026rsquo;appui,\u003cbr /\u003e\nEt le dixieme ciel ne tourne que pour lui.\u003cbr /\u003e\nDe tous les animaux il est ici le ma\u0026icirc;tre;\u003cbr /\u003e\nQui pourroit le nier, poursuis tu?\u0026nbsp; Moi peut-\u0026ecirc;tre.\u003cbr /\u003e\nCe ma\u0026icirc;tre pr\u0026eacute;tendu qui leur donne des loix,\u003cbr /\u003e\nCe roi des animaux, combien a-t\u0026rsquo;il de rois?\u0026rdquo;\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u0026ldquo;Yet, pleased with idle whimsies of his brain,\u003cbr /\u003e\nAnd puffed with pride, this haughty thing would fain\u003cbr /\u003e\nBe think himself the only stay and prop\u003cbr /\u003e\nThat holds the mighty frame of Nature up.\u003cbr /\u003e\nThe skies and stars his properties must seem,\u003cbr /\u003e\n* * *\u003cbr /\u003e\nOf all the creatures he\u0026rsquo;s the lord, he cries.\u003cbr /\u003e\n* * *\u003cbr /\u003e\nAnd who is there, say you, that dares deny\u003cbr /\u003e\nSo owned a truth?\u0026nbsp; That may be, sir, do I.\u003cbr /\u003e\n* * *\u003cbr /\u003e\nThis boasted monarch of the world who awes\u003cbr /\u003e\nThe creatures here, and with his nod gives laws\u003cbr /\u003e\nThis self-named king, who thus pretends to be\u003cbr /\u003e\nThe lord of all, how many lords has he?\u0026rdquo;\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eOLDHAM, \u003ci\u003ea little altered\u003c/i\u003e.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003c/blockquote\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe Lord Rochester expresses himself, in his \u0026ldquo;Satire against\nMan,\u0026rdquo; in pretty near the following manner.\u0026nbsp; But I must first\ndesire you always to remember that the versions I give you from the\nEnglish poets are written with freedom and latitude, and that the restraint\nof our versification, and the delicacies of the French tongue, will\nnot allow a translator to convey into it the licentious impetuosity\nand fire of the English numbers:\u0026mdash;\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cblockquote\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u0026ldquo;Cet esprit que je ha\u0026iuml;s, cet esprit plein\nd\u0026rsquo;erreur,\u003cbr /\u003e\nCe n\u0026rsquo;est pas ma raison, c\u0026rsquo;est la tienne, docteur.\u003cbr /\u003e\nC\u0026rsquo;est la raison friv\u0026ocirc;le, inquiete, orgueilleuse\u003cbr /\u003e\nDes sages animaux, rivale d\u0026eacute;daigneuse,\u003cbr /\u003e\nQui croit entr\u0026rsquo;eux et l\u0026rsquo;Ange, occuper le milieu,\u003cbr /\u003e\nEt pense \u0026ecirc;tre ici bas l\u0026rsquo;image de son Dieu.\u003cbr /\u003e\nVil at\u0026ocirc;me imparfait, qui croit, doute, dispute\u003cbr /\u003e\nRampe, s\u0026rsquo;\u0026eacute;l\u0026egrave;ve, tombe, et nie encore sa ch\u0026ucirc;te,\u003cbr /\u003e\nQui nous dit je suis libre, en nous montrant ses fers,\u003cbr /\u003e\nEt dont l\u0026rsquo;\u0026oelig;il trouble et faux, croit percer l\u0026rsquo;univers.\u003cbr /\u003e\nAllez, reverends fous, bienheureux fanatiques,\u003cbr /\u003e\nCompilez bien l\u0026rsquo;amas de vos riens scholastiques,\u003cbr /\u003e\nP\u0026egrave;res de visions, et d\u0026rsquo;enigmes sacres,\u003cbr /\u003e\nAuteurs du labirinthe, o\u0026ugrave; vous vous \u0026eacute;garez.\u003cbr /\u003e\nAllez obscurement \u0026eacute;claircir vos mist\u0026egrave;res,\u003cbr /\u003e\nEt courez dans l\u0026rsquo;\u0026eacute;cole adorer vos chim\u0026egrave;res.\u003cbr /\u003e\nIl est d\u0026rsquo;autres erreurs, il est de ces d\u0026eacute;vots\u003cbr /\u003e\nCondamn\u0026eacute; par eux m\u0026ecirc;mes \u0026agrave; l\u0026rsquo;ennui du repos.\u003cbr /\u003e\nCe mystique enclo\u0026icirc;tr\u0026eacute;, fier de son indolence\u003cbr /\u003e\nTranquille, au sein de Dieu.\u0026nbsp; Que peut il faire?\u0026nbsp; Il pense.\u003cbr /\u003e\nNon, tu ne penses point, mis\u0026eacute;rable, tu dors:\u003cbr /\u003e\nInutile \u0026agrave; la terre, et mis au rang des morts.\u003cbr /\u003e\nTon esprit \u0026eacute;nerv\u0026eacute; croupit dans la molesse.\u003cbr /\u003e\nReveille toi, sois homme, et sors de ton ivresse.\u003cbr /\u003e\nL\u0026rsquo;homme est n\u0026eacute; pour agir, et tu pretens penser?\u0026rdquo;\u0026nbsp;\n\u0026amp;c.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003c/blockquote\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe original runs thus:\u0026mdash;\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cblockquote\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u0026ldquo;Hold mighty man, I cry all this we know,\u003cbr /\u003e\nAnd \u0026rsquo;tis this very reason I despise,\u003cbr /\u003e\nThis supernatural gift that makes a mite\u003cbr /\u003e\nThink he\u0026rsquo;s the image of the Infinite;\u003cbr /\u003e\nComparing his short life, void of all rest,\u003cbr /\u003e\nTo the eternal and the ever blest.\u003cbr /\u003e\nThis busy, puzzling stirrer up of doubt,\u003cbr /\u003e\nThat frames deep mysteries, then finds them out,\u003cbr /\u003e\nFilling, with frantic crowds of thinking fools,\u003cbr /\u003e\nThose reverend bedlams, colleges, and schools;\u003cbr /\u003e\nBorne on whose wings each heavy sot can pierce\u003cbr /\u003e\nThe limits of the boundless universe.\u003cbr /\u003e\nSo charming ointments make an old witch fly,\u003cbr /\u003e\nAnd bear a crippled carcase through the sky.\u003cbr /\u003e\n\u0026rsquo;Tis this exalted power, whose business lies\u003cbr /\u003e\nIn nonsense and impossibilities.\u003cbr /\u003e\nThis made a whimsical philosopher\u003cbr /\u003e\nBefore the spacious world his tub prefer;\u003cbr /\u003e\nAnd we have modern cloistered coxcombs, who\u003cbr /\u003e\nRetire to think, \u0026rsquo;cause they have naught to do.\u003cbr /\u003e\nBut thoughts are given for action\u0026rsquo;s government,\u003cbr /\u003e\nWhere action ceases, thought\u0026rsquo;s impertinent.\u0026rdquo;\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003c/blockquote\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWhether these ideas are true or false, it is certain they are expressed\nwith an energy and fire which form the poet.\u0026nbsp; I shall be very far\nfrom attempting to examine philosophically into these verses, to lay\ndown the pencil, and take up the rule and compass on this occasion;\nmy only design in this letter being to display the genius of the English\npoets, and therefore I shall continue in the same view.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe celebrated Mr. Waller has been very much talked of in France,\nand Mr. De la Fontaine, St. Evremont, and Bayle have written his eulogium,\nbut still his name only is known.\u0026nbsp; He had much the same reputation\nin London as Voiture had in Paris, and in my opinion deserved it better.\u0026nbsp;\nVoiture was born in an age that was just emerging from barbarity; an\nage that was still rude and ignorant, the people of which aimed at wit,\nthough they had not the least pretensions to it, and sought for points\nand conceits instead of sentiments.\u0026nbsp; Bristol stones are more easily\nfound than diamonds.\u0026nbsp; Voiture, born with an easy and frivolous,\ngenius, was the first who shone in this aurora of French literature.\u0026nbsp;\nHad he come into the world after those great geniuses who spread such\na glory over the age of Louis XIV., he would either have been unknown,\nwould have been despised, or would have corrected his style.\u0026nbsp; Boileau\napplauded him, but it was in his first satires, at a time when the taste\nof that great poet was not yet formed.\u0026nbsp; He was young, and in an\nage when persons form a judgment of men from their reputation, and not\nfrom their writings.\u0026nbsp; Besides, Boileau was very partial both in\nhis encomiums and his censures.\u0026nbsp; He applauded Segrais, whose works\nnobody reads; he abused Quinault, whose poetical pieces every one has\ngot by heart; and is wholly silent upon La Fontaine.\u0026nbsp; Waller, though\na better poet than Voiture, was not yet a finished poet.\u0026nbsp; The graces\nbreathe in such of Waller\u0026rsquo;s works as are writ in a tender strain;\nbut then they are languid through negligence, and often disfigured with\nfalse thoughts.\u0026nbsp; The English had not in his time attained the art\nof correct writing.\u0026nbsp; But his serious compositions exhibit a strength\nand vigour which could not have been expected from the softness and\neffeminacy of his other pieces.\u0026nbsp; He wrote an elegy on Oliver Cromwell,\nwhich, with all its faults, is nevertheless looked upon as a masterpiece.\u0026nbsp;\nTo understand this copy of verses you are to know that the day Oliver\ndied was remarkable for a great storm.\u0026nbsp; His poem begins in this\nmanner:\u0026mdash;\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cblockquote\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u0026ldquo;Il n\u0026rsquo;est plus, s\u0026rsquo;en est fait, soumettons\nnous au sort,\u003cbr /\u003e\nLe ciel a signal\u0026eacute; ce jour par des temp\u0026ecirc;tes,\u003cbr /\u003e\nEt la voix des tonnerres \u0026eacute;clatant sur nos t\u0026ecirc;tes\u003cbr /\u003e\nVient d\u0026rsquo;annoncer sa mort.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u0026ldquo;Par ses derniers soupirs il \u0026eacute;branle cet \u0026icirc;le;\u003cbr /\u003e\nCet \u0026icirc;le que son bras fit trembler tant de fois,\u003cbr /\u003e\nQuand dans le cours de ses exploits,\u003cbr /\u003e\nIl brisoit la t\u0026eacute;te des Rois,\u003cbr /\u003e\nEt soumettoit un peuple \u0026agrave; son joug seul docile.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u0026ldquo;Mer tu t\u0026rsquo;en es troubl\u0026eacute;; O mer tes flots \u0026eacute;mus\u003cbr /\u003e\nSemblent dire en grondant aux plus lointains rivages\u003cbr /\u003e\nQue l\u0026rsquo;effroi de la terre et ton ma\u0026icirc;tre n\u0026rsquo;est plus.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u0026ldquo;Tel au ciel autrefois s\u0026rsquo;envola Romulus,\u003cbr /\u003e\nTel il quitta la Terre, au milieu des orages,\u003cbr /\u003e\nTel d\u0026rsquo;un peuple guerrier il re\u0026ccedil;ut les homages;\u003cbr /\u003e\nOb\u0026eacute;\u0026iuml; dans sa vie, sa mort ador\u0026eacute;,\u003cbr /\u003e\nSon palais fut un Temple,\u0026rdquo; \u0026amp;c.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003c/blockquote\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e* * * * *\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cblockquote\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u0026ldquo;We must resign! heaven his great soul does claim\u003cbr /\u003e\nIn storms as loud as his immortal fame;\u003cbr /\u003e\nHis dying groans, his last breath shakes our isle,\u003cbr /\u003e\nAnd trees uncut fall for his funeral pile:\u003cbr /\u003e\nAbout his palace their broad roots are tost\u003cbr /\u003e\nInto the air; so Romulus was lost!\u003cbr /\u003e\nNew Rome in such a tempest missed her king,\u003cbr /\u003e\nAnd from obeying fell to worshipping.\u003cbr /\u003e\nOn \u0026OElig;ta\u0026rsquo;s top thus Hercules lay dead,\u003cbr /\u003e\nWith ruined oaks and pines about him spread.\u003cbr /\u003e\nNature herself took notice of his death,\u003cbr /\u003e\nAnd, sighing, swelled the sea with such a breath,\u003cbr /\u003e\nThat to remotest shores the billows rolled,\u003cbr /\u003e\nTh\u0026rsquo; approaching fate of his great ruler told.\u0026rdquo;\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWALLER.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003c/blockquote\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIt was this elogium that gave occasion to the reply (taken notice\nof in Bayle\u0026rsquo;s Dictionary), which Waller made to King Charles II.\u0026nbsp;\nThis king, to whom Waller had a little before (as is usual with bards\nand monarchs) presented a copy of verses embroidered with praises, reproached\nthe poet for not writing with so much energy and fire as when he had\napplauded the Usurper (meaning Oliver).\u0026nbsp; \u0026ldquo;Sir,\u0026rdquo; replied\nWaller to the king, \u0026ldquo;we poets succeed better in fiction than in\ntruth.\u0026rdquo;\u0026nbsp; This answer was not so sincere as that which a Dutch\nambassador made, who, when the same monarch complained that his masters\npaid less regard to him than they had done to Cromwell.\u0026nbsp; \u0026ldquo;Ah,\nsir!\u0026rdquo; says the Ambassador, \u0026ldquo;Oliver was quite another man\u0026mdash;\u0026rdquo;\u0026nbsp;\nIt is not my intent to give a commentary on Waller\u0026rsquo;s character,\nnor on that of any other person; for I consider men after their death\nin no other light than as they were writers, and wholly disregard everything\nelse.\u0026nbsp; I shall only observe that Waller, though born in a court,\nand to an estate of five or six thousand pounds sterling a year, was\nnever so proud or so indolent as to lay aside the happy talent which\nNature had indulged him.\u0026nbsp; The Earls of Dorset and Roscommon, the\ntwo Dukes of Buckingham, the Lord Halifax, and so many other noblemen,\ndid not think the reputation they obtained of very great poets and illustrious\nwriters, any way derogatory to their quality.\u0026nbsp; They are more glorious\nfor their works than for their titles.\u0026nbsp; These cultivated the polite\narts with as much assiduity as though they had been their whole dependence.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThey also have made learning appear venerable in the eyes of the\nvulgar, who have need to be led in all things by the great; and who,\nnevertheless, fashion their manners less after those of the nobility\n(in England I mean) than in any other country in the world.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eLETTER XXII.\u0026mdash;ON MR. POPE AND SOME OTHER FAMOUS POETS\u003c/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eI intended to treat of Mr. Prior, one of the most amiable English\npoets, whom you saw Plenipotentiary and Envoy Extraordinary at Paris\nin 1712.\u0026nbsp; I also designed to have given you some idea of the Lord\nRoscommon\u0026rsquo;s and the Lord Dorset\u0026rsquo;s muse; but I find that\nto do this I should be obliged to write a large volume, and that, after\nmuch pains and trouble, you would have but an imperfect idea of all\nthose works.\u0026nbsp; Poetry is a kind of music in which a man should have\nsome knowledge before he pretends to judge of it.\u0026nbsp; When I give\nyou a translation of some passages from those foreign poets, I only\nprick down, and that imperfectly, their music; but then I cannot express\nthe taste of their harmony.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThere is one English poem especially which I should despair of ever\nmaking you understand, the title whereof is \u0026ldquo;Hudibras.\u0026rdquo;\u0026nbsp;\nThe subject of it is the Civil War in the time of the grand rebellion,\nand the principles and practice of the Puritans are therein ridiculed.\u0026nbsp;\nIt is Don Quixote, it is our \u0026ldquo;Satire Menipp\u0026eacute;e\u0026rdquo; blended\ntogether.\u0026nbsp; I never found so much wit in one single book as in that,\nwhich at the same time is the most difficult to be translated.\u0026nbsp;\nWho would believe that a work which paints in such lively and natural\ncolours the several foibles and follies of mankind, and where we meet\nwith more sentiments than words, should baffle the endeavours of the\nablest translator?\u0026nbsp; But the reason of this is, almost every part\nof it alludes to particular incidents.\u0026nbsp; The clergy are there made\nthe principal object of ridicule, which is understood but by few among\nthe laity.\u0026nbsp; To explain this a commentary would be requisite, and\nhumour when explained is no longer humour.\u0026nbsp; Whoever sets up for\na commentator of smart sayings and repartees is himself a blockhead.\u0026nbsp;\nThis is the reason why the works of the ingenious Dean Swift, who has\nbeen called the English Rabelais, will never be well understood in France.\u0026nbsp;\nThis gentleman has the honour (in common with Rabelais) of being a priest,\nand, like him, laughs at everything; but, in my humble opinion, the\ntitle of the English Rabelais which is given the dean is highly derogatory\nto his genius.\u0026nbsp; The former has interspersed his unaccountably-fantastic\nand unintelligible book with the most gay strokes of humour; but which,\nat the same time, has a greater proportion of impertinence.\u0026nbsp; He\nhas been vastly lavish of erudition, of smut, and insipid raillery.\u0026nbsp;\nAn agreeable tale of two pages is purchased at the expense of whole\nvolumes of nonsense.\u0026nbsp; There are but few persons, and those of a\ngrotesque taste, who pretend to understand and to esteem this work;\nfor, as to the rest of the nation, they laugh at the pleasant and diverting\ntouches which are found in Rabelais and despise his book.\u0026nbsp; He is\nlooked upon as the prince of buffoons.\u0026nbsp; The readers are vexed to\nthink that a man who was master of so much wit should have made so wretched\na use of it; he is an intoxicated philosopher who never wrote but when\nhe was in liquor.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eDean Swift is Rabelais in his senses, and frequenting the politest\ncompany.\u0026nbsp; The former, indeed, is not so gay as the latter, but\nthen he possesses all the delicacy, the justness, the choice, the good\ntaste, in all which particulars our giggling rural Vicar Rabelais is\nwanting.\u0026nbsp; The poetical numbers of Dean Swift are of a singular\nand almost inimitable taste; true humour, whether in prose or verse,\nseems to be his peculiar talent; but whoever is desirous of understanding\nhim perfectly must visit the island in which he was born.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIt will be much easier for you to form an idea of Mr. Pope\u0026rsquo;s\nworks.\u0026nbsp; He is, in my opinion, the most elegant, the most correct\npoet; and, at the same time, the most harmonious (a circumstance which\nredounds very much to the honour of this muse) that England ever gave\nbirth to.\u0026nbsp; He has mellowed the harsh sounds of the English trumpet\nto the soft accents of the flute.\u0026nbsp; His compositions may be easily\ntranslated, because they are vastly clear and perspicuous; besides,\nmost of his subjects are general, and relative to all nations.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eHis \u0026ldquo;Essay on Criticism\u0026rdquo; will soon be known in France\nby the translation which l\u0026rsquo;Abb\u0026eacute; de Resnel has made of it.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eHere is an extract from his poem entitled the \u0026ldquo;Rape of the\nLock,\u0026rdquo; which I just now translated with the latitude I usually\ntake on these occasions; for, once again, nothing can be more ridiculous\nthan to translate a poet literally:\u0026mdash;\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cblockquote\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u0026ldquo;Umbriel, \u0026agrave; l\u0026rsquo;instant, vieil gnome\nrechign\u0026eacute;,\u003cbr /\u003e\nVa d\u0026rsquo;une a\u0026icirc;le pesante et d\u0026rsquo;un air renfrogn\u0026eacute;\u003cbr /\u003e\nChercher en murmurant la caverne profonde,\u003cbr /\u003e\nO\u0026ugrave; loin des doux ra\u0026iuml;ons que r\u0026eacute;pand l\u0026rsquo;\u0026oelig;il\ndu monde\u003cbr /\u003e\nLa D\u0026eacute;esse aux Vapeurs a choisi son s\u0026eacute;jour,\u003cbr /\u003e\nLes Tristes Aquilons y sifflent \u0026agrave; l\u0026rsquo;entour,\u003cbr /\u003e\nEt le souffle mal sain de leur aride haleine\u003cbr /\u003e\nY porte aux environs la fievre et la migraine.\u003cbr /\u003e\nSur un riche sofa derri\u0026egrave;re un paravent\u003cbr /\u003e\nLoin des flambeaux, du bruit, des parleurs et du vent,\u003cbr /\u003e\nLa quinteuse d\u0026eacute;esse incessamment repose,\u003cbr /\u003e\nLe coeur gros de chagrin, sans en savoir la cause.\u003cbr /\u003e\nN\u0026rsquo;aiant pens\u0026eacute; jamais, l\u0026rsquo;esprit toujours troubl\u0026eacute;,\u003cbr /\u003e\nL\u0026rsquo;\u0026oelig;il charg\u0026eacute;, le teint p\u0026acirc;le, et l\u0026rsquo;hypocondre\nenfl\u0026eacute;.\u003cbr /\u003e\nLa m\u0026eacute;disante Envie, est assise aupr\u0026egrave;s d\u0026rsquo;elle,\u003cbr /\u003e\nVieil spectre f\u0026eacute;minin, d\u0026eacute;cr\u0026eacute;pite pucelle,\u003cbr /\u003e\nAvec un air devot d\u0026eacute;chirant son prochain,\u003cbr /\u003e\nEt chansonnant les Gens l\u0026rsquo;Evangile \u0026agrave; la main.\u003cbr /\u003e\nSur un lit plein de fleurs negligemment panch\u0026eacute;e\u003cbr /\u003e\nUne jeune beaut\u0026eacute; non loin d\u0026rsquo;elle est couch\u0026eacute;e,\u003cbr /\u003e\nC\u0026rsquo;est l\u0026rsquo;Affectation qui grassa\u0026iuml;e en parlant,\u003cbr /\u003e\n\u0026Eacute;coute sans entendre, et lorgne en regardant.\u003cbr /\u003e\nQui rougit sans pudeur, et rit de tout sans joie,\u003cbr /\u003e\nDe cent maux diff\u0026eacute;rens pr\u0026eacute;tend qu\u0026rsquo;elle est la pro\u0026iuml;e;\u003cbr /\u003e\nEt pleine de sant\u0026eacute; sous le rouge et le fard,\u003cbr /\u003e\nSe plaint avec molesse, et se pame avec art.\u0026rdquo;\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u0026ldquo;Umbriel, a dusky, melancholy sprite\u003cbr /\u003e\nAs ever sullied the fair face of light,\u003cbr /\u003e\nDown to the central earth, his proper scene,\u003cbr /\u003e\nRepairs to search the gloomy cave of Spleen.\u003cbr /\u003e\nSwift on his sooty pinions flits the gnome,\u003cbr /\u003e\nAnd in a vapour reached the dismal dome.\u003cbr /\u003e\nNo cheerful breeze this sullen region knows,\u003cbr /\u003e\nThe dreaded east is all the wind that blows.\u003cbr /\u003e\nHere, in a grotto, sheltered close from air,\u003cbr /\u003e\nAnd screened in shades from day\u0026rsquo;s detested glare,\u003cbr /\u003e\nShe sighs for ever on her pensive bed,\u003cbr /\u003e\nPain at her side, and Megrim at her head,\u003cbr /\u003e\nTwo handmaids wait the throne.\u0026nbsp; Alike in place,\u003cbr /\u003e\nBut differing far in figure and in face,\u003cbr /\u003e\nHere stood Ill-nature, like an ancient maid,\u003cbr /\u003e\nHer wrinkled form in black and white arrayed;\u003cbr /\u003e\nWith store of prayers for mornings, nights, and noons,\u003cbr /\u003e\nHer hand is filled; her bosom with lampoons.\u003cbr /\u003e\nThere Affectation, with a sickly mien,\u003cbr /\u003e\nShows in her cheek the roses of eighteen,\u003cbr /\u003e\nPractised to lisp, and hang the head aside,\u003cbr /\u003e\nFaints into airs, and languishes with pride;\u003cbr /\u003e\nOn the rich quilt sinks with becoming woe,\u003cbr /\u003e\nWrapt in a gown, for sickness and for show.\u0026rdquo;\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003c/blockquote\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThis extract, in the original (not in the faint translation I have\ngiven you of it), may be compared to the description of \u003ci\u003ela Molesse\u003c/i\u003e\n(softness or effeminacy), in Boileau\u0026rsquo;s \u0026ldquo;Lutrin.\u0026rdquo;\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eMethinks I now have given you specimens enough from the English poets.\u0026nbsp;\nI have made some transient mention of their philosophers, but as for\ngood historians among them, I don\u0026rsquo;t know of any; and, indeed,\na Frenchman was forced to write their history.\u0026nbsp; Possibly the English\ngenius, which is either languid or impetuous, has not yet acquired that\nunaffected eloquence, that plain but majestic air which history requires.\u0026nbsp;\nPossibly too, the spirit of party which exhibits objects in a dim and\nconfused light may have sunk the credit of their historians.\u0026nbsp; One\nhalf of the nation is always at variance with the other half.\u0026nbsp;\nI have met with people who assured me that the Duke of Marlborough was\na coward, and that Mr. Pope was a fool; just as some Jesuits in France\ndeclare Pascal to have been a man of little or no genius, and some Jansenists\naffirm Father Bourdalo\u0026uuml;e to have been a mere babbler.\u0026nbsp; The\nJacobites consider Mary Queen of Scots as a pious heroine, but those\nof an opposite party look upon her as a prostitute, an adulteress, a\nmurderer.\u0026nbsp; Thus the English have memorials of the several reigns,\nbut no such thing as a history.\u0026nbsp; There is, indeed, now living,\none Mr. Gordon (the public are obliged to him for a translation of Tacitus),\nwho is very capable of writing the history of his own country, but Rapin\nde Thoyras got the start of him.\u0026nbsp; To conclude, in my opinion the\nEnglish have not such good historians as the French have no such thing\nas a real tragedy, have several delightful comedies, some wonderful\npassages in certain of their poems, and boast of philosophers that are\nworthy of instructing mankind.\u0026nbsp; The English have reaped very great\nbenefit from the writers of our nation, and therefore we ought (since\nthey have not scrupled to be in our debt) to borrow from them.\u0026nbsp;\nBoth the English and we came after the Italians, who have been our instructors\nin all the arts, and whom we have surpassed in some.\u0026nbsp; I cannot\ndetermine which of the three nations ought to be honoured with the palm;\nbut happy the writer who could display their various merits.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eLETTER XXIII.\u0026mdash;ON THE REGARD THAT OUGHT TO BE SHOWN TO MEN\nOF LETTERS\u003c/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eNeither the English nor any other people have foundations established\nin favour of the polite arts like those in France.\u0026nbsp; There are Universities\nin most countries, but it is in France only that we meet with so beneficial\nan encouragement for astronomy and all parts of the mathematics, for\nphysic, for researches into antiquity, for painting, sculpture, and\narchitecture.\u0026nbsp; Louis XIV. has immortalised his name by these several\nfoundations, and this immortality did not cost him two hundred thousand\nlivres a year.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eI must confess that one of the things I very much wonder at is, that\nas the Parliament of Great Britain have promised a reward of \u0026pound;20,000\nsterling to any person who may discover the longitude, they should never\nhave once thought to imitate Louis XIV. in his munificence with regard\nto the arts and sciences.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eMerit, indeed, meets in England with rewards of another kind, which\nredound more to the honour of the nation.\u0026nbsp; The English have so\ngreat a veneration for exalted talents, that a man of merit in their\ncountry is always sure of making his fortune.\u0026nbsp; Mr. Addison in France\nwould have been elected a member of one of the academies, and, by the\ncredit of some women, might have obtained a yearly pension of twelve\nhundred livres, or else might have been imprisoned in the Bastile, upon\npretence that certain strokes in his tragedy of \u003ci\u003eCato\u003c/i\u003e had been\ndiscovered which glanced at the porter of some man in power.\u0026nbsp; Mr.\nAddison was raised to the post of Secretary of State in England.\u0026nbsp;\nSir Isaac Newton was made Master of the Royal Mint.\u0026nbsp; Mr. Congreve\nhad a considerable employment.\u0026nbsp; Mr. Prior was Plenipotentiary.\u0026nbsp;\nDr. Swift is Dean of St. Patrick in Dublin, and is more revered in Ireland\nthan the Primate himself.\u0026nbsp; The religion which Mr. Pope professes\nexcludes him, indeed, from preferments of every kind, but then it did\nnot prevent his gaining two hundred thousand livres by his excellent\ntranslation of Homer.\u0026nbsp; I myself saw a long time in France the author\nof \u003ci\u003eRhadamistus\u003c/i\u003e ready to perish for hunger.\u0026nbsp; And the son\nof one of the greatest men our country ever gave birth to, and who was\nbeginning to run the noble career which his father had set him, would\nhave been reduced to the extremes of misery had he not been patronised\nby Monsieur Fagon.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eBut the circumstance which mostly encourages the arts in England\nis the great veneration which is paid them.\u0026nbsp; The picture of the\nPrime Minister hangs over the chimney of his own closet, but I have\nseen that of Mr. Pope in twenty noblemen\u0026rsquo;s houses.\u0026nbsp; Sir Isaac\nNewton was revered in his lifetime, and had a due respect paid to him\nafter his death; the greatest men in the nation disputing who should\nhave the honour of holding up his pall.\u0026nbsp; Go into Westminster Abbey,\nand you will find that what raises the admiration of the spectator is\nnot the mausoleums of the English kings, but the monuments which the\ngratitude of the nation has erected to perpetuate the memory of those\nillustrious men who contributed to its glory.\u0026nbsp; We view their statues\nin that abbey in the same manner as those of Sophocles, Plato, and other\nimmortal personages were viewed in Athens; and I am persuaded that the\nbare sight of those glorious monuments has fired more than one breast,\nand been the occasion of their becoming great men.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe English have even been reproached with paying too extravagant\nhonours to mere merit, and censured for interring the celebrated actress\nMrs. Oldfield in Westminster Abbey, with almost the same pomp as Sir\nIsaac Newton.\u0026nbsp; Some pretend that the English had paid her these\ngreat funeral honours, purposely to make us more strongly sensible of\nthe barbarity and injustice which they object to us, for having buried\nMademoiselle Le Couvreur ignominiously in the fields.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eBut be assured from me, that the English were prompted by no other\nprinciple in burying Mrs. Oldfield in Westminster Abbey than their good\nsense.\u0026nbsp; They are far from being so ridiculous as to brand with\ninfamy an art which has immortalised a Euripides and a Sophocles; or\nto exclude from the body of their citizens a set of people whose business\nis to set off with the utmost grace of speech and action those pieces\nwhich the nation is proud of.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eUnder the reign of Charles I. and in the beginning of the civil wars\nraised by a number of rigid fanatics, who at last were the victims to\nit; a great many pieces were published against theatrical and other\nshows, which were attacked with the greater virulence because that monarch\nand his queen, daughter to Henry I. of France, were passionately fond\nof them.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eOne Mr. Prynne, a man of most furiously scrupulous principles, who\nwould have thought himself damned had he worn a cassock instead of a\nshort cloak, and have been glad to see one-half of mankind cut the other\nto pieces for the glory of God, and the \u003ci\u003ePropaganda Fide\u003c/i\u003e; took\nit into his head to write a most wretched satire against some pretty\ngood comedies, which were exhibited very innocently every night before\ntheir majesties.\u0026nbsp; He quoted the authority of the Rabbis, and some\npassages from St. Bonaventure, to prove that the \u0026OElig;dipus of Sophocles\nwas the work of the evil spirit; that Terence was excommunicated \u003ci\u003eipso\nfacto\u003c/i\u003e; and added, that doubtless Brutus, who was a very severe Jansenist,\nassassinated Julius C\u0026aelig;sar for no other reason but because he,\nwho was Pontifex Maximus, presumed to write a tragedy the subject of\nwhich was \u0026OElig;dipus.\u0026nbsp; Lastly, he declared that all who frequented\nthe theatre were excommunicated, as they thereby renounced their baptism.\u0026nbsp;\nThis was casting the highest insult on the king and all the royal family;\nand as the English loved their prince at that time, they could not bear\nto hear a writer talk of excommunicating him, though they themselves\nafterwards cut his head off.\u0026nbsp; Prynne was summoned to appear before\nthe Star Chamber; his wonderful book, from which Father Le Brun stole\nhis, was sentenced to be burnt by the common hangman, and himself to\nlose his ears.\u0026nbsp; His trial is now extant.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe Italians are far from attempting to cast a blemish on the opera,\nor to excommunicate Signor Senesino or Signora Cuzzoni.\u0026nbsp; With regard\nto myself, I could presume to wish that the magistrates would suppress\nI know not what contemptible pieces written against the stage.\u0026nbsp;\nFor when the English and Italians hear that we brand with the greatest\nmark of infamy an art in which we excel; that we excommunicate persons\nwho receive salaries from the king; that we condemn as impious a spectacle\nexhibited in convents and monasteries; that we dishonour sports in which\nLouis XIV. and Louis XV., performed as actors; that we give the title\nof the devil\u0026rsquo;s works to pieces which are received by magistrates\nof the most severe character, and represented before a virtuous queen;\nwhen, I say, foreigners are told of this insolent conduct, this contempt\nfor the royal authority, and this Gothic rusticity which some presume\nto call Christian severity, what an idea must they entertain of our\nnation?\u0026nbsp; And how will it be possible for them to conceive, either\nthat our laws give a sanction to an art which is declared infamous,\nor that some persons dare to stamp with infamy an art which receives\na sanction from the laws, is rewarded by kings, cultivated and encouraged\nby the greatest men, and admired by whole nations?\u0026nbsp; And that Father\nLe Brun\u0026rsquo;s impertinent libel against the stage is seen in a bookseller\u0026rsquo;s\nshop, standing the very next to the immortal labours of Racine, of Corneille,\nof Moli\u0026egrave;re, \u0026amp;c.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eLETTER XXIV.\u0026mdash;ON THE ROYAL SOCIETY AND OTHER ACADEMIES\u003c/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe English had an Academy of Sciences many years before us, but\nthen it is not under such prudent regulations as ours, the only reason\nof which very possibly is, because it was founded before the Academy\nof Paris; for had it been founded after, it would very probably have\nadopted some of the sage laws of the former and improved upon others.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eTwo things, and those the most essential to man, are wanting in the\nRoyal Society of London, I mean rewards and laws.\u0026nbsp; A seat in the\nAcademy at Paris is a small but secure fortune to a geometrician or\na chemist; but this is so far from being the case at London, that the\nseveral members of the Royal Society are at a continual, though indeed\nsmall expense.\u0026nbsp; Any man in England who declares himself a lover\nof the mathematics and natural philosophy, and expresses an inclination\nto be a member of the Royal Society, is immediately elected into it.\u0026nbsp;\nBut in France it is not enough that a man who aspires to the honour\nof being a member of the Academy, and of receiving the royal stipend,\nhas a love for the sciences; he must at the same time be deeply skilled\nin them; and is obliged to dispute the seat with competitors who are\nso much the more formidable as they are fired by a principle of glory,\nby interest, by the difficulty itself; and by that inflexibility of\nmind which is generally found in those who devote themselves to that\npertinacious study, the mathematics.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe Academy of Sciences is prudently confined to the study of Nature,\nand, indeed, this is a field spacious enough for fifty or threescore\npersons to range in.\u0026nbsp; That of London mixes indiscriminately literature\nwith physics; but methinks the founding an academy merely for the polite\narts is more judicious, as it prevents confusion, and the joining, in\nsome measure, of heterogeneals, such as a dissertation on the head-dresses\nof the Roman ladies with a hundred or more new curves.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eAs there is very little order and regularity in the Royal Society,\nand not the least encouragement; and that the Academy of Paris is on\na quite different foot, it is no wonder that our transactions are drawn\nup in a more just and beautiful manner than those of the English.\u0026nbsp;\nSoldiers who are under a regular discipline, and besides well paid,\nmust necessarily at last perform more glorious achievements than others\nwho are mere volunteers.\u0026nbsp; It must indeed be confessed that the\nRoyal Society boast their Newton, but then he did not owe his knowledge\nand discoveries to that body; so far from it, that the latter were intelligible\nto very few of his fellow members.\u0026nbsp; A genius like that of Sir Isaac\nbelonged to all the academies in the world, because all had a thousand\nthings to learn of him.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe celebrated Dean Swift formed a design, in the latter end of the\nlate Queen\u0026rsquo;s reign, to found an academy for the English tongue\nupon the model of that of the French.\u0026nbsp; This project was promoted\nby the late Earl of Oxford, Lord High Treasurer, and much more by the\nLord Bolingbroke, Secretary of State, who had the happy talent of speaking\nwithout premeditation in the Parliament House with as much purity as\nDean Swift wrote in his closet, and who would have been the ornament\nand protector of that academy.\u0026nbsp; Those only would have been chosen\nmembers of it whose works will last as long as the English tongue, such\nas Dean Swift, Mr. Prior, whom we saw here invested with a public character,\nand whose fame in England is equal to that of La Fontaine in France;\nMr. Pope, the English Boileau, Mr. Congreve, who may be called their\nMoli\u0026egrave;re, and several other eminent persons whose names I have\nforgot; all these would have raised the glory of that body to a great\nheight even in its infancy.\u0026nbsp; But Queen Anne being snatched suddenly\nfrom the world, the Whigs were resolved to ruin the protectors of the\nintended academy, a circumstance that was of the most fatal consequence\nto polite literature.\u0026nbsp; The members of this academy would have had\na very great advantage over those who first formed that of the French,\nfor Swift, Prior, Congreve, Dryden, Pope, Addison, \u0026amp;c. had fixed\nthe English tongue by their writings; whereas Chapelain, Colletet, Cassaigne,\nFaret, Perrin, Cotin, our first academicians, were a disgrace to their\ncountry; and so much ridicule is now attached to their very names, that\nif an author of some genius in this age had the misfortune to be called\nChapelain or Cotin, he would be under a necessity of changing his name.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eOne circumstance, to which the English Academy should especially\nhave attended, is to have prescribed to themselves occupations of a\nquite different kind from those with which our academicians amuse themselves.\u0026nbsp;\nA wit of this country asked me for the memoirs of the French Academy.\u0026nbsp;\nI answered, they have no memoirs, but have printed threescore or fourscore\nvolumes in quarto of compliments.\u0026nbsp; The gentleman perused one or\ntwo of them, but without being able to understand the style in which\nthey were written, though he understood all our good authors perfectly.\u0026nbsp;\n\u0026ldquo;All,\u0026rdquo; says he, \u0026ldquo;I see in these elegant discourses\nis, that the member elect having assured the audience that his predecessor\nwas a great man, that Cardinal Richelieu was a very great man, that\nthe Chancellor Seguier was a pretty great man, that Louis XIV. was a\nmore than great man, the director answers in the very same strain, and\nadds, that the member elect may also be a sort of great man, and that\nhimself, in quality of director, must also have some share in this greatness.\u0026rdquo;\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe cause why all these academical discourses have unhappily done\nso little honour to this body is evident enough.\u0026nbsp; \u003ci\u003eVitium est\ntemporis poti\u0026ugrave;s quam hominis\u003c/i\u003e (the fault is owing to the age\nrather than to particular persons).\u0026nbsp; It grew up insensibly into\na custom for every academician to repeat these elogiums at his reception;\nit was laid down as a kind of law that the public should be indulged\nfrom time to time the sullen satisfaction of yawning over these productions.\u0026nbsp;\nIf the reason should afterwards be sought, why the greatest geniuses\nwho have been incorporated into that body have sometimes made the worst\nspeeches, I answer, that it is wholly owing to a strong propension,\nthe gentlemen in question had to shine, and to display a thread-bare,\nworn-out subject in a new and uncommon light.\u0026nbsp; The necessity of\nsaying something, the perplexity of having nothing to say, and a desire\nof being witty, are three circumstances which alone are capable of making\neven the greatest writer ridiculous.\u0026nbsp; These gentlemen, not being\nable to strike out any new thoughts, hunted after a new play of words,\nand delivered themselves without thinking at all: in like manner as\npeople who should seem to chew with great eagerness, and make as though\nthey were eating, at the same time that they were just starved.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIt is a law in the French Academy, to publish all those discourses\nby which only they are known, but they should rather make a law never\nto print any of them.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eBut the Academy of the \u003ci\u003eBelles Lettres\u003c/i\u003e have a more prudent\nand more useful object, which is, to present the public with a collection\nof transactions that abound with curious researches and critiques.\u0026nbsp;\nThese transactions are already esteemed by foreigners; and it were only\nto be wished that some subjects in them had been more thoroughly examined,\nand that others had not been treated at all.\u0026nbsp; As, for instance,\nwe should have been very well satisfied, had they omitted I know not\nwhat dissertation on the prerogative of the right hand over the left;\nand some others, which, though not published under so ridiculous a title,\nare yet written on subjects that are almost as frivolous and silly.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe Academy of Sciences, in such of their researches as are of a\nmore difficult kind and a more sensible use, embrace the knowledge of\nnature and the improvements of the arts.\u0026nbsp; We may presume that such\nprofound, such uninterrupted pursuits as these, such exact calculations,\nsuch refined discoveries, such extensive and exalted views, will, at\nlast, produce something that may prove of advantage to the universe.\u0026nbsp;\nHitherto, as we have observed together, the most useful discoveries\nhave been made in the most barbarous times.\u0026nbsp; One would conclude\nthat the business of the most enlightened ages and the most learned\nbodies, is, to argue and debate on things which were invented by ignorant\npeople.\u0026nbsp; We know exactly the angle which the sail of a ship is\nto make with the keel in order to its sailing better; and yet Columbus\ndiscovered America without having the least idea of the property of\nthis angle: however, I am far from inferring from hence that we are\nto confine ourselves merely to a blind practice, but happy it were,\nwould naturalists and geometricians unite, as much as possible, the\npractice with the theory.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eStrange, but so it is, that those things which reflect the greatest\nhonour on the human mind are frequently of the least benefit to it!\u0026nbsp;\nA man who understands the four fundamental rules of arithmetic, aided\nby a little good sense, shall amass prodigious wealth in trade, shall\nbecome a Sir Peter Delm\u0026eacute;, a Sir Richard Hopkins, a Sir Gilbert\nHeathcote, whilst a poor algebraist spends his whole life in searching\nfor astonishing properties and relations in numbers, which at the same\ntime are of no manner of use, and will not acquaint him with the nature\nof exchanges.\u0026nbsp; This is very nearly the case with most of the arts:\nthere is a certain point beyond which all researches serve to no other\npurpose than merely to delight an inquisitive mind.\u0026nbsp; Those ingenious\nand useless truths may be compared to stars which, by being placed at\ntoo great a distance, cannot afford us the least light.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWith regard to the French Academy, how great a service would they\ndo to literature, to the language, and the nation, if, instead of publishing\na set of compliments annually, they would give us new editions of the\nvaluable works written in the age of Louis XIV., purged from the several\nerrors of diction which are crept into them.\u0026nbsp; There are many of\nthese errors in Corneille and Moli\u0026egrave;re, but those in La Fontaine\nare very numerous.\u0026nbsp; Such as could not be corrected might at least\nbe pointed out.\u0026nbsp; By this means, as all the Europeans read those\nworks, they would teach them our language in its utmost purity\u0026mdash;which,\nby that means, would be fixed to a lasting standard; and valuable French\nbooks being then printed at the King\u0026rsquo;s expense, would prove one\nof the most glorious monuments the nation could boast.\u0026nbsp; I have\nbeen told that Boileau formerly made this proposal, and that it has\nsince been revived by a gentleman eminent for his genius, his fine sense,\nand just taste for criticism; but this thought has met with the fate\nof many other useful projects, of being applauded and neglected.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003c/article\u003e"}],"SectionSequence":["Back Link","Work Title","Deck","Author","Period","Era","Composition","Date Note","Region","Terra Avita","Terra Avita Region","Modern Country","Original Title","Language","Primary Discipline","Secondary Discipline","Tradition","Full Versions","Core Thesis","Classification","Arguments","Influence","Significance","Evidence Note","Full Text"],"Counts":{"ContextCards":3,"GeoCards":4,"DisciplineCards":2,"Links":11,"Sections":25,"Styles":3,"Scripts":1}}