tems of pragmatical and conceited tutors should be admitted. The boy should be taught his grammar like other boys; for though there is indeed a royal game of the goose, I never have yet heard of a royal method of learning Latin and Greek; and if there be such an one, the success of it still remains among the arcana of state.

An heir to a crown should certainly learn the ancient as well as the modern languages; and he will not be able to learn them effectually, without learning them radically. Away then with the indolence and indulgence which grandeur foolishly claims as a happy privilege! Let the boy, if you wish him to maintain the dignity of a man and a king, be early inured to mental labour. Let his memory be exercised in learning the rules of Lilly's grammar. Let him be confined to his books and papers all the morning, and part of the evening, from the age of five to nineteen. The maids of honour will cry out shame; the sycophantic herd of young noblemen, who crowd, with all the servility of their own footmen, around a throne, will repine that they cannot have an opportunity of introducing themselves to the familiarity of the future King; but regard neither the foolish exclamations of vanity, nor the mean murmurs of self-interest. Proceed with him regularly, from the fables of Phædrus to the philosophy of Cicero, from the Cyropædia of Xenophon to the histories and politics of Herodotus, Thucydides, Livy, Sallust, and Polybius. Let his ear be familiarized to the fine language and sentiments of Cicero and Demosthenes, and his heart ennobled by the examples of the brightest characters of Greece and Rome.

Why should his superintendants be so cruel as not to cultivate in him a taste for the beauties of poetry, or leave him unacquainted with Homer and

an enlightened understanding, will adorn him more than the jewels in his crown, or the robes of his coronation. It will give him an internal source of happiness, and will teach him rather to seek his pleasures in a humane and generous conduct, than in the display of pomp, or the indulgence of luxury. A prince, with a mind uncultivated, must necessarily take his chief delight in mischief, in vice, or in unprincely occupations; but he, whose understanding is illuminated, and heart purified by a right discipline, will deserve a title which has been often unjustly claimed-that of Heaven's Vicegerent.

When, by the close application of ten or twelve years, a firm and broad basis is laid of ancient learning, let the stripling be introduced to the avenues of all the parts of human knowledge. Let the years which elapse till he is of the age of three or four and twenty, be employed in acquiring proper ideas of all the objects, whether natural or civil, which surround him, under the tuition of a governor who possesses, not only official and titular, but personal authority, under one who is not frightened, by the laughter of fashion, of dissipation, or of false philosophy, from filling his pupil's mind with moral virtues, and a sincere, not a political, veneration for Christianity.

All this is a general preparation for the particular pursuits which become a King, and these are law and politics. But I mean not the narrow system of a mercenary practitioner and a cunning statesman, but the general principles of justice and equity; the wise maxims of government, as it is instituted for the diffusion of happiness and virtue among the individuals of a nation, and not for the extension of empire, or the accumulation of destructive opulence. What a situation is a Throne for the indulgence of the feelings of a Christian, and of a compassionate

indeed, refer a prince for maxims of equity and government to Puffendorf and Grotius, the dull and unfeeling deliberators of questions on which a good heart and understanding can intuitively decide; but to his own heart and eyes, to his own enlightened reason, to the page of Scripture, and to the volumes of authenticated history.

Princes have been almost uniformly confined in their views to the narrow system of worldly politicians, and of interested courtiers. False grandeur has fascinated themselves, and their subjects. National prosperity has been estimated by fleets and armies, commerce and revenues. The morals, the health, the religion of the individuals, are considerations which do not claim the attention of a cabinet, but are discarded as subjects of declamation in the church or in the schools. "What is it to me," cries aloud the Wisdom of this world, "while his lordship knows how to superintend the navy, whether he believes in God or the Devil, and whether he has kept such laws as I neither understand nor value, the laws of relative and Christian duty?" A nation thus advances in the devious paths of a false wisdom, till an incensed Providence, wearied with repeated provocation, visits it at last with a curse. Look from the Ganges to the Thames, and acknowledge the evident visitation of a chastening Providence.

Imagination triumphs in the prospect of a golden age, when Princes, and all who are concerned in the executive parts of government, shall be early formed to virtue, to learning, to humanity, to religion. How happy, it has been said, would it be if Philosophers, who are justly so called, were Kings; or Kings, Philosophers!

No. CXXXVI.

Introductory Remarks on the Art of Printing.

THAT the desire of knowledge for its own sake is an adventitious passion unknown to nature, and to be classed among the refinements of civilization, is an opinion unsupported by experience, and derogatory from the native dignity of a rational creature. Fancy and sentiment, the powers of the intellect, and the feelings of the heart, are, perhaps, by nature equally strong and susceptible in the rude Indian, and in the polished member of an established community. Perhaps these similar powers would be equally fit for exertion, and these propensities equally importunate for gratification, if the savage were not constantly engaged in providing for that necessary sustenance, which, without his own interposition, is commonly secured to the philosopher.

The pupil of nature, under all his disadvantages, feels the impulse of a species of literary curiosity, and seeks its satisfaction. He possesses the faculty of memory; he must therefore, without the cooperation of his will, remember many of the impressions received by the senses: he has a power of reflection, which will teach him to reason and draw inferences, without designing it, from the objects of his experience and observation. He feels within himself an imagination, capable of recalling past ideas of pleasure and pain, and apt to be delighted by beauty, novelty, and grandeur. Every natural exertion of natural faculties is attended with satisfaction. He feels it from the unpremeditated exertions of the mental powers; he tacitly acknowledges

vours to repeat, to extend, and to prolong it: but the objects which fall under the notice of his own senses, and his personal experience, are insufficient in number and importance to satisfy his capacity. He is led to inquire what passed among his forefathers, and in his turn is requested by his progeny to communicate his own remarks, superadded to the information of his ancestors.

Such, probably is the origin of Tradition; a mode of communicating knowledge, once universal, and still, perhaps, subsisting in the newly discovered islands of the Pacific Ocean, on the banks of the Senegal, and at the foot of the Andes. Beneath the shade of his plantain, the patriarch Indian still recites the divine origin of his tribe or family, the warlike actions of his ancestor, and of his own personal prowess. The attentive audience carry away the tale, and supply the defects of memory by the aid of imagination. The story spreads, time gives it a sanction, and at last it is found to constitute the most authentic history, however obscure and fabulous, of the origin of a nation, after it has emerged from barbarism, and is become the seat of arts and learning.

In the earliest and rudest state of literature, if we may give that appellation to the efforts of the intellectual faculties where letters are unknown, is often produced the most animated, and perhaps most perfect, though least artificial, poetry. Historic truth is, indeed, little regarded, as it is addressed to reason rather than to fancy; but poetic composition appears with marks of genius approaching to inspiration. From his memory, or his invention, or from both, the savage is heard to pour forth the song of war, and to warble the notes of love, warm with the sentiments of a feeling heart, and compensating the want of regularity and grace, by the strength and