and improvements by the pencil. But this I conceive to be almoft neceffarily connected with practical skill in the art of painting; and unless it were made fubfervient to the purposes of this art, I should apprehend that more might be loft by opening an inlet to faftidious nicety, than would be gained by viewing things with a more learned eye.

This remark would naturally lead me to confider the pleasures to be derived from the practice of ornamental arts, and from the contemplation of their productions in others. But though I am fully fenfible of the pleasing addition these make to the general stock of human enjoyment, yet with refpect to most individuals, they scarcely come within the catalogue of cheap pleafures. A tafte for them must be formed early in life, must be cultivated with much affiduity, and at confiderable expence both of time and money. They are not of all times and places, but require apparatus and opportunity. They are with difficulty kept within bounds, and are conti

nually

nually disposed to defert the easy and fimple, in pursuit of what is more complex and elaborate. A tafte for music appears to me, as far as I can judge from observation alone, to be eminently of this kind. Where it is marked out by nature, as in some cases it manifeftly is, and can be cultivated early and advantageously, it is ca pable, I doubt not, of affording the most exquifite delights: but then it will probably take place of all other ornamental acquirements. And though fuch a facrifice may be worth making under the circumstances described, yet to make it with a view of creating a taste for any pursuit merely amufive, is, I think, to estimate falfely the value of things. If, however, experience fhews that musical pleasures may be enjoyed in moderation, and fo as to make an agreeable variety, without occupying the place of any thing preferable, my objections are at an end. The fame may be faid of drawing, and various other tastes and acquifitions, concerning which, accident and inclination, if regulated by prudence,

prudence, may be fuffered to determine the choice.

I have now, I think, pointed out to you sources which will supply sufficient materials of eafily procurable pleasure, if you bring to them what is abfolutely effential to the fuccefs of any external means of happiness-a mind in harmony with itself. This, nothing but confcious worth and virtue can bestow. This, " tibi ipse parabis."

Farewell!

LETTER

LETTER XXVII.

ON ATTACHMENT TO COUNTRY.

You, I doubt not, have experienced as well as myself, that one of the earliest paffions which discloses itself in a course of liberal education, is Patriotism. In the moral system of the Greeks and Romans, love to country ftood fo high in the clafs of duties, that he who reads their writers, and is impreffed with admiration of their illuftrious characters, cannot fail of regarding it as one of the qualities which most ennobles a man. I well recollect the period, when ftories of Curtii and Decii, and the lofty sentences of orators and poets, inculcating the most devoted attachment to country, kindled a flame of enthusiastic rapture in my breast, and I verily believe

6

there

there was nothing in which I could not have imitated the great exemplars of this virtue. Every thing in a youth which carries him out of self, and disposes him to make facrifices to principle, deserves encouragement; but when a duty becomes a paffion, it is ever ready to pass its bounds, and encroach upon fome other duty equally facred. In my own case, I confess that I was difpofed to go all the lengths of a true Roman; and that the glory and intereft of my country became

in

I

my eyes paramount to all confiderations of general justice and benevolence. adopted in its full meaning the term natural enemies, and in confequence, (as these fentiments were imbibed during the course of a widely-extended war in which we were engaged) heartily hated a great portion of mankind. I am at present shocked at the extremes to which I was carried by this fpirit, which certainly was not derived from parental instruction and example. But it will ferve to illuftrate the power of early impreffions; and alfo to

I

prove,