than on my admiration. Mr. De Cronfaz, the adverfary of Bayle and Pope is not diflinguifhed by lively fancy or profound reflection; and even in his own country, at the end of a few years, his name and writings are almoft obliterated. But his philofophy had been formed in the fchool of Locke, his divinity in that of Limborch and LeClerc; in a long and laborious life, feveral generations of pupils were taught to think, and even to write; his leffons refcued the academy of Laufanne from Calviniftic prejudice; and he had the rare merit of diffufing a more liberal spirit among the clergy and people of the Pays de Vaud. His fyftem of logic, which in the last editions has fwelled to fix tedious and prolix volumes, may be praised as a clear and methodical abridgement of the art of reafoning, from our fimple ideas to the most complex operations of the human understanding. This fyftem I ftudied, and meditated, and abftracted, till I have obtained the free command of an univerfal inftrument, which I foon prefumed to exercife on my catholic opinions. Pavilliard was not unmindful that his firft talk, his most important duty, was to reclaim me from the errors of popery. The intermixture of fects has rendered the Swiss clergy acute and learned on the topics of controverfy; and I have fome of his letters in which he celebrates the dex terity of his attack, and my gradual conceffions, after a firm and wellmanaged defence. I was willing, and I am now willing, to allow him a handsome share of the honour of my converfion; yet I muft obferve, that it was principally effected by my private reflections; and I fill

remember my folitary transport at the difcovery of a philofophical argument against the doctrine of tranfubftantiation; that the text of fcripture, which feems to inculcate the real presence is attested only by a fingle fenfe-our fight; while the real prefence itself is difproved by three of our fenfes-the fight, the touch, and the tafte. The various articles of the Romish creed difappeared like a dream; and after a full conviction, on Chriftmas-day 1754, I received the facrament in the church of Laufanne. It was here that I fufpended my religious inquiries, acquiefcing with implicit belief in the tenets and myfte ries, which are adopted by the general confent of catholics and protestants.

Such, from my arrival at Laufanne, during the firft eighteen or twenty months (July 1753-March 1755), were my useful ftudies, the foundation of all my future improvements. But every man who rifes above the common level has received two educations; the first from his teachers; the fecond, more perfonal and important, from himfelf. He will not, like the fanatics of the laft age, define the moment of grace; but he cannot for get the era of his life, in which his mind has expanded to its proper form and dimenfions. My worthy tutor had the good fenfe and modefty to difcern how far he could be useful. As foon as he felt that I advanced beyond his fpeed and measure, he wifely left me to my genius; and the hours of leffon were foon loft in the voluntary labour of the whole morning, and fometimes of the whole day. The defire of prolonging my time, gradually confirmed the falutary habit

of

of early rifing; to which I have always adhered, with fome regard to feafons and fituations; but it is happy for my eyes and my health, that my temperate ardour has never been feduced to trefpafs on the hours of the night. During the laft three years of my refidence at Laufanne, I may affume the merit of ferious and folid application; but I am tempted to diftinguifh the Taft eight months of the year 1755, as the period of the most extraordinary diligence and rapid progrefs. In my French and Latin tranflations I adopted an excellent method, which, from my own fuc. cefs, I would recommend to the imitation of ftudents. I chofe fome claffic writer, fuch as Cicero and Vertot, and moft approved for purity and elegance of ftyle. I tranflated, for instance, an epiftle of Cicero into French; and after throwing it afide, till the words and phrases were obliterated from my memory, I re-tranflated my French into fuch Latin as I could find; and then compared each fentence of my imperfect verfion, with the eafe, the grace, the propriety of the Roman orator. A fimilar experiment was made on feveral pages of the Revolutions of Vertot; I turned them into Latin, returned them after a fufficient interval into my own French, and again fcruti nized the resemblance and diffimilitude of the copy and the original. By degrees I was lefs afhamed, by degrees I was more fatisfied with myfelf; and I perfevered in the practice of thefe double tranflations, which filled feveral books, till I had acquired the knowledge of both idioms, and the command at least of a correct ftyle. This useful exercife of writing was ac

companied and fucceeded by the more pleafing occupation of reading the best authors. The perufal of the Roman claffics was at once my exercife and reward. Dr. Middieton's Hiftory, which I then appreciated above its true value, na turally directed me to the writings of Cicero. The most perfeû editions, that of Olivet, which may adorn the fhelves of the rich, that of Ernefti, which fhould lie on the table of the learned, were not in my power. For the familiar e

piftles I used the text and English commentary of bifhop Rofs: but my general edition was that of Verbergius, published at Amsterdam in two large volumes in folio, with an indifferent choice of various notes. I read with application and pleasure, all the epiftles, all the orations, and the most important treatises of rhetoric and philofophy; and as I read, I applauded the obfervation of Quintillian, that every student may judge of his own proficiency, by the fatisfaction which he receives from the Roman orator. I tafted the beauties of language, I breathed the fpirit of freedom, and I imbibed from his precepts and examples the public and private fense of a man. Cicero in Latin, and Xenophon in Greek, are indeed the two ancients whom I would first propofe to a liberal scholar; not only for the merit of their style and fentiments, but for the admirable leffons which may be applied almoft to every fituation of public and private life. Cicero's Epistles may in particular afford the models of every form of correfpondence, from the carelefs effufions of tendernefs and friendship, to the wellguarded declaration of discreet and dignified refentment. After finish

ing this great author, a library of eloquence and reafon, I formed a more extenfive plan of reviewing the Latin claffics, under the four divifions of, 1. hiftorians, 2. poets, 3. orators, and 4 philofophers, in a chronological feries, from the days of Plautus and Salluft, to the decline of the language and empire of Rome; and this plan, in the latt twenty-seven months of my refidence at Laufanne (January, 1756 -April, 1758), I nearly accomplifhed. Nor was this review, however rapid, either hafty or fuperficial. I indulged myself in a fecond and even a third perufal of Terence, Virgil, Horace, Tacitus, &c. and ftudied to imbibe the sense and spirit moft congenial to my own. I never fuffered a difficult or corrupt paffage to efcape, till I had viewed it in every light of which it was fufceptible: though often difappointed, I always confulted the moft learned or ingenious commentators, Torrentius and Dacier on Horace, Catrou and Servius on Virgil, Lipfius on Tacitus, Mezeriac on Ovid, &c. and in the ardour of my enquiries, I embraced a large circle of hiftorical and critical erudition. My abftracts of each book were made in the French language: my obfervations often branched into particular effays; and I can ftill read, without contempt, a differtation of eight folio pages on eight lines (287-294) of the fourth Georgic of Virgil. Mr. Deyverdun, my friend, whose name will be frequently repeated, had joined with equal zeal, though not with equal perfeverance, in the fame undertaking. To him every thought, every compofition, was inftantly communicated; with him I enjoyed the benefits of a free con

verfation on the topics of our common ftudies.

But it is fcarcely poffible for a mind endowed with any active curiofity to be long converfant with the Latin claffics, without aspiring to know the Greek originals, whom they celebrate as their mafters, and of whom they fo warmly recommend the ftudy and imitation:

---Vos exemplaria Græca Nocturnâ verfate manu, verfate diurnâ. It was now that I regretted the early years which had been wafted in fickness or idleness, or mere idle reading; that I condemned the perverse method of our fchoolmafters, who, by first teaching the mother language, might defcend with fo much eafe and perfpicuity to the origin and etymology of a derivative idiom. In the nineteenth year of my age I determined to fupply this defect; and the leffons of Pavilliard again contributed to fmooth the entrance of the way, the Greek alphabet, the grammar, and the pronunciation according to the French accent. At my earnest request we prefumed to open the Iliad; and I had the pleasure of beholding, though darkly and through a glass, the true image of Homer, whom I had long fince admired in an Eng. lith drefs. After my tutor had left me to myself, I worked my way through about half the Iliad, and afterwards interpreted alone a large portion of Xenophon and Herodotus. But my ardour, deftitute of aid and emulation,, was gradually cooled, and, from the barren tafk of fearching words in a lexicon, I withdrew to the free and familiar converfation of Virgil and Tacitus. Yet in my refidence at Lausanne I had laid a folid foundation, which

enabled

enabled me, in a more propitious feafon, to profecute the ftudy of Grecian literature.

From a blind idea of the ufefulnefs of fuch abstract science, my father had been defirous, and even preffing, that I fhould devote fome time to the mathematics; nor could I refufe to comply with fo reafonable a with. During two winters I attended the private lectures of monfieur de Traytorrens, who explained the elements of algebra and geometry, as far as the conic fections of the marquis de l'Hôpital, and appeared fatisfied with my diligence and improvement. But as my childish propenfity for numbers and calculations was totally extinct, I was content to receive the paffive impreffion of my profeffor's lectures, without any active exercife of my own powers. As foon as I understood the principles, I relinquished for ever the purfuit of the mathematics; nor can I lament that I defifted, before my mind was hardened by the habit of rigid demonftration, fo deftructive of the finer feelings of moral evidence, which muft, however, determine the actions and opinions of our lives. I liftened with more pleafure to the propofal of ftudying the law of nature and nations, which was taught in the academy of Laufanne by Mr. Vicat, a profeffor of fome learning and reputation. But, instead of attending his public or private courfe, I preferred in my clofet the leffons of his mafters, and my own reafon. Without being difgufted by Grotius or Puffendorf, I ftudied in their writings the duties of a man, the rights of a citizen, the theory of juftice (it is, alas! a theory), and the laws of peace or war, which have had fome VOL. XXXVIII.

influence on the practice of modern Europe. My fatigues were alleviated by the, good fenfe of their commentator Barbeyrac. Locke's Treatife of Government inftructed me in the knowledge of whig principles, which are rather founded in reafon than experience; but my delight was in the frequent perufal of Montefquieu, whofe energy of ftyle, and boldness of hypothefis, were powerful to awaken and stimulate the genius of the age. The logic of de Croufaz had prepared me to engage with his mafter Locke, and his antagonist Bayle; of whom the former may be used as a bridle, and the latter applied as a spur, to the curiofity of a young philofopher. According to the nature of their refpective works, the fchools of argument and objection, I carefully went through the Effay on Human Understanding, and occafionally confulted the most interefting articles of the Philofophic Dictionary. In the infancy of my reafon I turned over, as an idle amufement, the most serious and important treatife: in its maturity, the moft trifling performance could not exercife my tatte or judgment; and more than once I have been led by a novel into a deep and inftructive train of thinking. But I cannot forbear to mention three particular books, fince they may have remotely contributed to form the hiftorian of the Roman empire. 1. From the Provincial Letters of Pafcal, which almost every year I have perufed with new pleasure, I learned to manage the weapon of grave and temperate irony, even on fubjects of ecclefiaftical folemnity. 2. The Life of Julian, by the Abbe de la Bleterie, firft introduced me to the man and the times; and I Ꮓ

fhould