unusually, that very testimony that ought most to be doubted.

XVI.

IT is curious that intellectual darkness creates some authors, whom physical darkness would destroy; such would be totally silent if they were absolutely blind, and their ability to write would instantly cease with their ability to read. They could neither draw, like Shakspeare, on imagination; like Bacon, on reflection; like Ben Jonson, on memory; nor, like Milton, on all. These traffickers in literature are like bankers in one respect, and like bakers in another. Like bankers, because they carry on business with a small capital of their own, and a very large one of other men's, and a run would be equally fatal to both. They are like bakers, because while the one manufactures his bread and the other his book, neither of them has had any hand in the production of that which forms the staple of his respective commodity.

XVII.

WITH the offspring of genius, the law of parturition is reversed; the throes are in the conception, the pleasure in the birth.

XVIII.

AS no roads are so rough as those that have just been mended, so no sinners are so intolerant as those that have just turned saints.

XIX.

WHEN dunces call us fools without proving us to be so, our best retort is to prove them to be fools without condescending to call them so.

XX.

PEDANTRY crams our heads with learned lumber,

and takes out our brains to make room for it.

XXI.

HE that pleases himself without injuring his neighbour, is quite as likely to please half the world, as he who vainly strives to please the whole of it; he also stands a far better chance of a majority in his favour, since upon all equal divisions he will be fairly entitled to his own casting vote.

XXII.

I HAVE often heard it canvassed how far it would be beneficial that written speeches should be permitted to be read in our Houses of Parliament. Madame De Stael, who in the infancy of the French revolution, saw the consequences of written speeches developed before her eyes, has, with her usual discernment, set the question at rest, by deciding in favour of the system that excludes them. In the British Senate, she observes, it is a rule not to read a written speech, it must be spoken, so that the number of persons capable of addressing the House with effect is of necessity very small. But, she adds, as soon as permission is given to read either what we have written for ourselves, or what others have written for us, men of eminence are no longer the permanent leaders of an assembly, and thus we lose the great advantages of a free government, that of giving talent its place, and consequently of prompting all men to the improvement of their faculties.

XXIII.

WOMEN will pardon any offence rather than a neglect of their charms, and rejected love re-enters the female bosom with a hatred more implacable than that of Coriolanus, when he returned to Rome. In good truth we should have many Potiphars, were it not that Josephs are scarce. All Addison's address and integrity were found necessary to extricate him from a dilemma of this kind. The Marquiss Des Vardes fared not so well. Madame the Duchess of Orleans fell in love with him, although she knew

he was the gallant of Madame Soissons, her most intimate friend. She even went so far as to make a confidante of Madame Soissons, who not only agreed to give him up, but carried her extravagance so far as to send for the Marquis, and to release him, in the presence of Madame, from all his obligations, and to make him formally over to her. The Marquis Des Vardes deeming this to be only an artifice of gallantry to try how faithful he was in his amours, thought it most prudent to declare himself incapable of change, but in terms full of respect for Madame, but of passion for the Duchess. His ruin was determined upon from that moment, nor could his fidelity to the one, save him from the effects of that hatred his indifference had excited in the breast of the other. As a policiser, the marquis reasoned badly; for had he bcen right in his conclusion, it would have been no difficult matter for him, on the ladies discovering their plot, to have persuaded his first favourite that his heart was not in the thing, and that he had fallen into the snare, only from a deference to her commands; and if he were wrong in his conclusion, which was the case, women do not like a man the worse for having many favourites if he deserts them all for her; she fancies that she herself has the power of fixing the wanderer; that other women conquer like the Parthians, but that she herself, like the Romans, cannot only make conquests, but retain them.*

XXIV.

IN civil jurisprudence† it too often happens that there is so much law that there is no room for justice, and that the

* It follows upon the same principle that the converse of what has been offered above will also be true, and that women will pardon almost any extravagancies in the men, if they appear to have been the uncontrolable effects of an inordinate love and admiration. It is well known from the confession of Catharine herself, that Alexis Orloff, though at that time a common soldier in the guards, had the hardiesse to make the first advances to the Autocatrix of all the Russias,

+ Grievances of this kind are not likely to be speedily redressed, on many accounts, some of which I have elsewhere enumerated. There is

claimant expires of wrong, in the midst of right, as mariners die of thirst, in the midst of water.

XXV.

TOO high an appreciation of our own talents is the chief cause why experience preaches to us all in vain. Hence it happens, that both in public and in private life, we so constantly see men playing that very game at which they know that others have been ruined; but they flatter themselves that they shall play it with more skill. The powerful are more deaf to the voice of experience, than their inferiors, from the very circumstances in which they are placed. Power multiplies flatterers, and flatterers multiply our delusions, by hiding us from ourselves. It is on this principle only, that we can account for such a reign as that of the Second Charles, treading so quickly upon that of the First. The former was restored to a throne that might be said to have been built out of the very materials that composed the scaffold of his father! He converted it into an Altar of Bacchanalians, where he himself officiated as high priest of the orgies, while every principle of purity and of honour, were the costly victims that bedewed with libations, and bedizened with flowers, were led in disgusting splendour to the sacrifice.

an esprit du corps amongst lawyers which is carried to a greater height than in any other profession; its force here is more prominent, because it is more effectual. Lawyers are the only civil delinquents whose judges must of necessity be chosen from themselves. Therefore the "Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?" is a more perplexing question with regard to them, than any other body of men. The fact is, that the whole Civil Code is now become a most unwieldy machine, without the least chance of being improved, for to those who manage its movements, its value rises in precise proportion to its complication, and to them it is most profitable, when its performs the least. This machine devours an immensity of paper in the shape of bank notes, and returns to its customers other paper in the shape of legal instruments and documents, from which on examination nothing can be learnt, except that the par ties have been regularly ruined according to law.

XXVI.

HE that would thoroughly accomplish himself for the government of human affairs, should have a wisdom that can look forward into things that are present, and a learning that can look back into things that are past.* But the poring pedant, who will slake his thirst only from antiquity, will find that it abounds with wells so deep, that some of them were not worth the digging, and now so dark that they are not worth the descending; yet so dry withal, that he will come up more thirsty than he went down, with eyes blinded by the dust of time, and with lips unquenched by the living waters of truth. Wisdom, however, and learning, should go hand in hand, they are so beautifully qualified for mutual assistance. But it is better to have wisdom without learning, than learning without wisdom; just as it is better to be rich without being the possessor of a mine, than to be the possessor of a mine without being rich.

XXVII.

WHEN we have lost a favourite horse or a dog, we usually endeavour to console ourselves, by the recollection of some bad qualities they happened to possess ; and we are very apt to tranquillize our minds by similar reminiscences, on the death of those friends who have left us nothing.

XXVIII.

WHEN certain persons

abuse us, let us ask ourselves

what description of characters it is that they admire; we shall often find this a very consolatory question.

XXIX.

WHY is it that we so constantly hear men complain

* Some contend that the moderns have less strength than the ancients, but it would be nearer the truth, to insist that the moderns have less weakness; the muscularity of their mind on some points is not enfeebled by any ricketty conformation on others, and this enables us to ascend the ladder of science, high enough to be on a level with the wisdom of our forefathers at some times, and above their errors at all times.