in philosophy he would have had reserved for himself alone?-We may therefore fairly conclude that the world would go on infinitely better if men would learn to do without it; and we may rank it among those evils permitted by Providence to bring forth some unknown good, but which we should neither encourage in ourselves or others."

§ 3.

Of Forcing the Mind.

I was a scholar: seven useful springs
Did I deflower in quotations

Of cross'd opinions 'bout the soul of man:
The more I learnt, the more I learnt to doubt;
Delight, my spaniel, slept, whilst I baused leaves,
Toss'd o'er the dunces, pored on the old print
Of titled words; and still my spaniel slept,
Whilst I wasted lamp-oil, baited my flesh,
Shrunk up my veins and still my spaniel slept.
And still I held converse with Zabarell,

:

Aquinas, Scotus, and the musty saw

Of antique Donate: still my spaniel slept.
Still on went 1: first, an sit anima;

Then, an it were mortal. O hold, hold, at that
They're at brain-buffets, fell by the ears amain.
Pell-mell together: still my spaniel slept.
Then whether 'twere corporeal, local, fixt,
Ex traduce, but whether I had free will
Or no, hot philosophers

Stood banding factions, all so strongly propt,
I stagger'd, knew not which was firmer part,
But thought, quoted, read, observ'd and pryed,
Stufft noting books: and still my spaniel slept.
At length he waked and yawned; and by yon sky,
For aught I know he knew as much as I.-

1. If the love of knowledge is the passion upon which the hope of endless progression mainly depends, it must be remembered that by improper stimulants this love may be weakened or destroyed, and that debility is the consequence of excess. When Prospero sees the incipient love of Ferdinand and Miranda, he says

this swift business

I must uneasy make, lest too light winning
Make the prize light.

2. Cicero, at five years old, when other children are not capable of applying themselves to any thing, discovered a great inclination to study: but his father thought good rather to keep him back awhile than to urge him on: at which Cicero seemed not a little dissatisfied and impatient; especially when he saw some of his companions go to school to one Plotius, who was then in high repute.

3. There are various modes of producing late roses: by cutting off the tops immediately after bearing; by pulling off the buds of the roses when

they are newly knotted: by cutting off some few of the top boughs in the spring-time, but suffering the lower boughs to grow on: by removing the tree some months before it buddeth; and by planting them in the shade: and, indeed, the November rose is the sweetest, having been less exhaled by the

sun.

4. Upon the supposition that the mind ought to be forced, how much is expected from direct education, where information is intentionally communicated; how little from indirect, or the effect of accident and virtuous example! It is not, however, by the exertions, but by the temperament and example of the instructor, that the mind is awakened to be ever alive and ever active. It is seldom effected by direct education; it results rather from the slow, indirect, silent, but certain and persuasive admonition of an intellectual and virtuous life. It does not originate in precept, but in the manner of the preceptor-not in the lecture-room, but by the fireside, and amidst the sweet charities of private life

I

not in the praise of temperance, of simplicity, of diligence; but in being temperate, and meek and industrious-not in extolling wisdom, but in loving her beauty in taking her to dwell with us, reposing with her, and manifesting that her conversation hath no bitterness, and to live with her hath no sorrow, but mirth and joya.

CONCLUSION.

Whether the young men of Greece and of Rome were more ardent in the pursuit of knowledge than the young men of England, which was the professed object of this inquiry, may seem, amidst these different queries, to have been forgotten; as the tract endeavours to establish only certain general propositions; viz.

a See note Z at the end of this Tract.