sition as the Preface to Bellendenus, and his inscriptions; and of his English style and ethics, as the Dedication and the Preface to the Warburtonian Tracts, and some of his pulpit discourses and political addresses, we confess that we are disposed to unite in placing him at least on the level of the Bentleys and Porsons in scholarship, and of the Taylors and Johnsons in dignity, force, plenitude, and correctness of English diction. He is a great moralist, an erudite divine, a deep metaphysician, a well-informed jurist, a most redoubtable censor and disputant, the nicest and surest of philologers. But it is not in these characters, or with this extraordinary combination of positive excellence, that we would at first view him, and treat his biography as a subject of unusual interest for the British world of letters, in which we include our own country. Warburton, Johnson, and Parr, are eminently remarkable as the representatives of a species of scholars and writers peculiar to England, who have enjoyed an existence altogether singular. We refer to their long ascendency and vogue in the highest circles; their close and equal relations with noblemen, statesmen, and other dignitaries of the first order; and to the importance conferred on their opinions and labours. For all this we find no other basis or origin than classical erudition and literary faculties; and it was obtained in spite of uncouth manners, dictatorial spirit and tone, and the want of those adventitious and external advantages which commonly procure deference, sway, and exalted intimacies.

The continent of Europe has furnished no instances of which we have heard or read, like that of Parr in his whole character, pursuits and connexions. Men there have been and are, out of England, who can be at least compared with him as scholars and writers, and whose merits and productions have been widely honoured and acknowledged; yet their lives and influence have been materially different, or relatively unimportant. In France, a few years before and at the beginning of her Revolution, authors, plebeians by birth, and some of them-such as Jean Jacques Rousseau-of unpolished and overweening demeanor, seemed to mix on an equal footing with the privileged and fashionable classes, and to be invested with both social and political consequence but they were writers of eloquent declamation operating upon the nation in general; poets and moralists addressing themselves to the fancy and taste of the patricians; pseudo-philosophers assailing political institutions and religious sentiments, upon which attention was universally fixed, and which even courtiers and ministers were blindly leagued to impair. Moreover, their consideration and influence with the upper ranks were rather apparent than real; a fact so well understood and keenly felt by themselves, that it rendered them more earnest and reckless in their revolutionary efforts. D'Alembert's curious and

able Essay on the Commerce of Men of Letters with the Great, (Essai sur la Société des Gens de Lettres et des Grands,) though written at an earlier period, is applicable for the most part to all the subsequent time. The men of letters and the great were distinct species every where on the continent; the former much inferior in the estimation of the latter; seeking rather than sought, and constantly subject to airs of condescension and humours of insolence. We shall make a few quotations from D'Alembert's text, as illustrations possessing historical and moral interest.

"Les Dieux, écrivoit Philippe au plus grand génie qu'il eût dans ses états, m'ont donné un fils, et je ne les remercie pas tant de me l'avoir donné, que de me l'avoir donné du temps d'Aristote. Cette lettre, qui fait pour le moins autant d'honneur au prince qu'au philosophe, doit immortaliser Philippe aux yeux des sages, bien plus que l'habileté dangereuse avec laquelle il prépara les chaînes de la Grèce; il y a long-temps que les philosophes ne reçoivent plus de pareilles lettres, je ne dis pas des princes, mais de ceux même qui n'ont aucune espérance de le devenir."

"C'est un grand géomètre, dit-on, et c'est pourtant un homme d'esprit; louanges assez humiliantes dans leur principe, et semblables à celles que l'on donne aux grands seigneurs. Ces derniers raisonnent-ils passablement sur un ouvrage de science ou de belles-lettres, on se récrie sur leur sagacité; comme si un homme de qualité étoit obligé par état d'être moins instruit qu'un autre sur les choses dont il parle, en un mot on traite en France les géomètres et les grands seigneurs àpeuprès comme on fait les ambassadeurs Turcs et Persans; on est tout surpris de trouver le bon sens le plus ordinaire à un homme qui n'est ni François ni chrétien, et en conséquence on recueille de sa bouche comme des apophthegmes les sottises les plus triviales. En vérité si on démêloit les motifs des éloges que prodiguent les hommes, on y trouveroit bien de quoi s'y consoler de leurs satires, et peut-être même de leur mepris."

"Parmi les grands seigneurs les plus affables, il en est peu qui se dépouillent avec les gens de lettres de leur grandeur vraie ou prétendue jusqu'au point de l'oublier tout-à-fait. C'est ce qu'on aperçoit surtout dans les conversations où l'on n'est pas de leur avis. Il semble qu'à mesure que l'homme d'esprit s'éclipse, l'homme de qualité se montre, et paroisse exiger la déférence dont l'homme d'esprit avoit commencé par dispenser. Aussi le commerce intime des grands avec les gens de lettres ne finit que trop souvent par quelque rupture éclatante; rupture qui vient presque toujours de l'oubli des égards réciproques auxquels on a manqué de part ou d'autre, peut-être même des deux côtés."

"Un homme de lettres plein de probité et de talens, est sans comparaison plus estimé qu'un ministre incapable de sa place, ou qu'un grand seigneur deshonoré: cependant qu'ils se trouvent ensemble dans le même lieu, toutes les attentions seront pour le rang, et l'homme de lettres oublié pourroit dire alors comme Philopamen, je paye l'intérêt de ma mauvaise mine."

The same author remarks, that in England, all were satisfied with the circumstance of Newton's being the greatest genius of his age; but that in France, the philosopher would have been required to be aimable besides. It happened that an eminent French geometrician was discovered to be a man of refined mind and captivating manners; very soon, says D'Alembert, every geometrician, without distinction, was run after in Paris, but the mania did not last long. He laboured to persuade his countrymen of rank and wealth, that the writers of the nation were the dispensers of fame or blame both present and future, domestic and external, and of course to be caressed and honour

ed; that the professed, regular men of letters were the only true judges of literary productions; that intellectual culture and endowments were the most valuable and noble in themselves; that England was indebted for the admiration which she enjoyed in France, to her authors; that birth, fortune, rank, office, power, might fail, while knowledge and talents were sure resources, and alone procured reputation and honour for a country. We may infer from the success of the Johnsons and Parrs, that these truths have made the proper impression on the great in England; but other circumstances contribute to explain the case. The English nobility and opulent gentry are educated in the classical schools and universities, where they imbibe a particular reverence for scholarship, receive a strong tincture of it, and become more or less acquainted with its intrinsic value. The constitution of church and state, and of the liberal professions, is such that individuals of humble birth and fortune, may and often do reach the highest posts in each, by means chiefly of learning and talents. In the administration of a government comparatively free, under a system of education mainly classical, with an immense body of readers, and an overruling public opinion formed by public writers and speakers, literary knowledge and capacity cannot fail to be recognised and treated as powers: all who would possess general influence and reputation, must strive to speak or write with pith, information, elegance or correct taste; and they naturally honour what is thus necessary and efficient. The hierarchy in Great Britain-we might say the clergy in general, have great weight throughout the social and political system; and they owe it to religion, income and learning united. Their learning being essentially classical, that accomplishment partakes of whatever authority and lustre they derive from other sources. nisters of the gospel enjoy considerable importance in the United States, and a portion of them are scholars, though not of the same calibre as the British. New-England can boast a number of divines eminently erudite, whose lives and works deserve to be much more widely known and appreciated than they are. that division of our Republic, too, the ecclesiastic is a person of manifold consequence. But neither erudition nor oratory nor superior authorship, enters materially into what we may call the clerical momentum: this is derived from the religious spirit and habits of the people, the rivalry or polemic warfare of numberless sects, the impressive functions and exemplary morals of the pastors.

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In our country, the number of individuals of the several higher professions and classes, whom such scholars and writers as Johnson and Parr would directly and forcibly interest, is much less in proportion, than it is in Great Britain, or even in Germany, France, or Italy. Here liberal leisure is rare; classical education

slender; business, in the common sense, nearly universal; elementary, practical, or statistical knowledge chiefly prized. No employment, not even that of the teacher of the ancient languages, seems to exact profound or very comprehensive studies. A smattering suffices, almost for celebrity. Authorship and oratory are pursued to a wonderful extent, and in a signal variety of modes, but with fewer exigencies as to philological knowledge, philosophical insight, refined taste, and durable texture, than they ever have been in any other nation. Nevertheless, the British classical models are read and valued among us. The peculiar circumstances of the country account for the rarity of close imitation, and the relative insignificance of scholarship. We may hope that the multiplication of classical seminaries, the improvement of colleges, the enlargement of professional education, and other conducive changes which are in progress, will finally advance and determine the standard of merit and utility; since, whatever may be the prevailing doctrines and general practice on this side of the Atlantic, classical instruction is demonstrably the most eligible as a basis for the national mind and reputation. "It so happens," says Parr, "that my own reading either in ancient or modern books, is not very confined; and the result of my observations is, that classical learning enables men to lay the strongest and broadest foundation for zeal and knowledge; that it qualifies them in the best manner for the duties of public as well as private life; that it prepares them to advance with a firm and steady step, from the refinements of taste, to the researches of philosophy; and above all, that in well-stored and well-disciplined minds it forms a most effectual barrier against the encroachments of those delusive and pernicious principles which have disturbed the repose, and obstructed both the intellectual and moral improvement of the civilized world.' But we have, on this head, not merely the evidence and authority of scholars of this gigantic frame, and indeed of all who have been deeply versed in the ancient languages, or long engaged in teaching them. There is, besides, emphatic testimony from men who had taken a most efficacious lead and passed the greater part of their lives in the political and social world, and who, having been classically educated, could fully judge by their double experience. Thus, Mackintosh, Grenville, Burke, Fox, reciprocate the strain of Parr. "I am earnest in my wish," says Burke, "that critical erudition may live and flourish; for, let persons of limited conception think what they will of it, it has ever been and ever must be the first principle of a taste, not only in the arts, but in life and in morals. If we have any priority over our neighbours, it is in no small measure owing to the early care we take with respect to classical education, which cannot be supplied by the cultivation of any other branch of learning, and

which makes some amends for many shocking defects in our system of training our youth. It diffuses its influence over the society at large; it is enjoyed where it is not directly bestowed; and those feel its operations who do not know to what they owe the advantages they possess." Charles James Fox observes in one of his letters to Parr-"If I had a boy whom I wished to make a figure in public speaking, I would recommend Euripides to him, morning, noon, and night, perhaps preferably to Homer and Virgil themselves." A popular speaker with us might find it difficult to imagine how excellence in his art could be connected with the perusal of a Greek tragedian; yet the greatest of British parliamentary debaters practised no affectation, and expected to be at once understood, when he expressed the idea which we have just quoted, and when he referred familiarly to Homer and Virgil also, as manuals for the youth ambitious of distinction in oratory.

We shall now proceed to digest a part of the details which are furnished in the rival Memoirs of Mr. Field and Dr. Johnstone, in order to make more particularly known to the American reader, who and what was the illustrious subject of their pages, and to exemplify some of the sentiments which we have premised.

Samuel Parr was born at Harrow, in England, on the 15th January (0. S.) 1747. His father was a respectable surgeon and apothecary in that village, who, himself, taught the son the rudiments of the Latin. His education was continued by regular and able tutors in the celebrated public school of the place. From this institution he was withdrawn at the age of fourteen, for the purpose of being trained to his father's profession. His proficiency in the ancient languages had been extraordinary; and the passion which he had conceived for them and literature in general, constantly impeded and at length totally frustrated the scheme of converting him into a surgeon or physician. During the three or four years of his probation, he read some medical books, and assisted in some surgical operations, but he was much more occupied and delighted with philological and metaphysical researches, and exercises in Latin and Greek prosody. On one occasion, vexed at being called from his Aristotle to compound medicines, he petulantly indicated to his father a grammatical error in a Latin prescription, and the father replied"Sam, d-n the prescription, make up the medicine." But the pestle and mortar were not implements for such an intelligence. When he reached his seventeenth year, he obtained permission to exchange the profession of medicine for that of divinity, and was supplied with the means of entering Emanuel College in the University of Cambridge.

In the college he found excellent tutors, and every facility for