too often happens that I am talking to the air. He has no fufpicion that I may poffibly be in the right, and therefore no curiofity to know what is capable of being alleged in favour of my opinion. A truly ludicrous fpectacle would be to fee two fuch men talking together, each hearing himself only, and each, however he may cover it with an exterior politenefs, deaf to the pretenfions of his antagonist. From this description of a felf-educated man it may fafely be inferred, that I ought to wish any young perfon in whofe future eminence Í intereft myself, rather occafionally to affociate with individuals of this defcription, than to be one of their body himself. It ought however to be remarked that, whatever rank the self-educated man may hold among perfons who have exerted themselves for the improvement of their intellectual faculties, he will always, if judicious and able, be regarded by the difcerning with peculiar refpect, inafmuch as there has been much more of voluntary in his acquifitions, than can well have fallen to the fhare of those who have enjoyed every advantage of inftitution and scientifical incitement. There is a kind of declamation very generally afloat in the world, which, if it could be taken as juft and well founded, would prove that the selfeducated, A a 2 educated, instead of labouring under the important difadvantages here enumerated, were the most fortunate of men, and thofe upon whom the hopes of their fpecies, whether for inftruction or delight, fhould principally be fixed. How much cloquent invective has been spent in holding up to ridicule the generation of bookworms! We have been told, that a perfevering habit of reading, kills the imagination, and nar rows the understanding; that it overloads the intellect with the notions of others and prevents its digesting them, and, by a ftill stronger reason, prevents it from unfolding its native powers; that the man who would be original and impreffive, muft meditate rather than hear, and walk rather than read. He that devotes himfelf to a methodical profecution of his ftudies, is perhaps allowed fome praife for his industry and good intention; but it is at the fame time infinuated, that the only refult to be expected from fuch ill-placed industry, is a plentiful harvest of laborious dulnefs.. It is no wonder that this fort of declamation has been generally popular. It favours one of the most fundamental paffions of the human mind, our indolence. To acquaint ourselves profoundly with what other men have thought in different ages of the world, is an arduous task; the the afcent of the hill of knowledge is fteep, and it demands the moft unalterable refolution to be able to conquer it. But this declamation prefents to us every difcouragement, and fevers all the nerves of the foul. He that is infected by it, no longer "girds up the loins of his mind*;" but furrenders his days to unenterprifing indulgence. Its effect is like that of a certain religious creed, which, difclaiming the connection between motives and action, and between one action and another, inftructs its votaries to wait, with pious refignation, for the influx of a fupernatural strength which is to fuperfede the benefit of our vigilance and exertions. Nothing however can be more ill founded than this imputed hoftility between learning and genius. If it were true, it is among favages only that we ought to feek for the genuine expansion of the human mind. They are, of all their kind, the most undebauched by learning, and the leaft broken in upon by any regular habits of attention. In civilifed fociety, and efpecially among that clafs in civilifed fociety who pay any attention to intellectual purfuits, thofe who have the greateft antipathy to books, are yet modified in a thousand ways by the actual ftate of literature. * 1 Peter, Chap. I, ver. 13. They They converse with men who read, though they difdain to read themselves. A fagacious obferver might infer beforehand, in its principal outlines, what a felf-educated man could do, from a previous knowledge of the degree of improvement existing in the country he inhabited. Man in fociety is variously influenced by the characters of his fellow men; he is an imitative animal, and, like the camelion, owes the colour he affumes, to the colour of the surrounding objects. But, if men the most aufterely and cynically independent in this respect, must be so deeply affected by literature and books at second hand, it were furely better to go at once to the fountainhead, and drink of the spring in all its purity. The opinion here combated, feems to have originated in the moft profound ignorance of the intellectual nature of man. Man taken by himfelf is nothing. In the first portion of his life, he is more ignorant and worthless than the beafts. For all that he has, he is indebted to collifion. His mother and his nurfe awaken his mind from its primeval fleep. They imbue it in various respects with subtlety and difcrimination. They unfold the understanding, and roufe in turn the whole catalogue of the paffions. The remaining fections of the hiftory of man, are are like the firft. He proceeds forward, as he commenced. All his improvements have communication for their fource. Why are men not always favages? Because they build upon one another's ftructures. Bccaufe "one man labours, and other men enter into the fruits of his labour * ” It is thus that the fpecies collectively feems formed to advance, and one generation, casualties and extraordinary revolutions being excepted, to improve upon the attainments of another. The felf-educated man seems to propose, as far as poffible, to divest himfelf of this fundamental advantage, If I would do well in any art or science, I fhould think nothing could be more neceffary for me, than carefully to enquire in the first instance what had been done already. I fhould otherwise most likely only write over again in a worfe manner, what had been repeatedly written before I was born. It would be the most atrocious abfurdity to affirm, that books may be of ufe to other men, but not to an author. He of all men wants them moft. If on the other hand they be without utility, for what reason is he an author? The principle of all judgment and taste, is comp |