"pect to fee here." Kemarkable Letter from David Hume to Sir John Pringle. 393 "It was curiofity "that led me," faid the other; "but "I affure you," added he," that the per"fon who is the object of all this pomp "and magnificence, is the man I envy "the leaft." You fee this ftory is fo near traced from the fountain-head, as to wear a great face of probability. Query, what if the Pretender had taken up Dymock's gauntlet? though my Lord refufed to name her. The Pretender came to her house in the evening, without giving her any preparatory information, and entered the room when he had a pretty large company with her, and was herfelf playing at cards. He was announced by the fervant under another name: the thought the cards would have dropped from her hands on feeing him; but he had prefence enough of mind to call him by the name he affumed, to afk him when he came to England, and how long he intended to stay there. After he and all the company went away, the fervants remarked how wonderfully like the ftrange entleman was to the Prince's picture which hung on the chimneypiece in the very room in which he entered.-My Lord added (I think from the authority of the fame Lady), that he uled fo little precaution, that he went abroad openly in day-light in his own drefs, only laying afide his blue ribband and ftar; walked once through St. James's, and took a turn in the Mall. About five years ago, I told this flory to Lord Holderness, who was Secretary of State in the year 1753; and I added, that I fuppofed this piece of int ligence had at that time efcaped his Lordthip. By no means, faid he; and who do you think first told it me? It was the King himfelf; who fubjoined, " And what do you think, my Lord, I fhould do with him?" Lord Holderaefs owned that he was puzzled how to reply, for if he declared his real fentiments, they night favour of indifference to the royal family. The King perceived his embarralfment, and extricated him from it by adding, "My Lord, I shall juft do nothing at all; and when he is tired of England, he will go abroad again.”—I think this ftory, for the honour of the late King, ought to be more generally known. But what will furprife you more, Lord Marechal, a few days after the coronation of the prefent King, told me that he believed the young Pretender was at that time in London, or at least had been fo very lately, and had come over to fee the fhew of the coronation, and had actually seen it. I asked my Lord the reafon for this ftrange fact. Why, fays he, a gentleman told me fo that faw him there, and that he even spoke to him, and whifpered in his ears these words: "Your Royal Highnefs is the "laft of all mortals whom I should exGENT. MAG. May, 1788. I find that the Pretender's vifit in England in the year 1753, was known to all the Jacobites; and ome of them have affured me, that he took the opportunity of formally renouncing the Roman Catholic religion, under his own name of Charles Stuart, in the New Church in the Strand! and that this is the reason of the bad treatment he met with at the court of Rome. I own that I am a fceptic with regard to the aft particulars. Lord Marechal had a very bad opinion of this unfortunate Prince, and thought there was no vice fo man or atrocious of which he was not capable; of which the gave me feveral inftances.-My Lord, though a man of great honour, may be thought a difcontented courtier; but what quite confirmed me in that idea of that Prince, was a converfation I had with Helvetius at Paris, which I believe I have told you. In cafe I have not, I fhall mention a few particulars That gentleman told me that he had no acquaintance with the Pretender; but fome time after that Prince was chaced out of France, a letter, faid he, was brought me from him, in which he told me, that the neceflity of his affans obliged him to be at Paris, and as he know me by character to be a man of the greatest probity and honour in France, he would truft himfelf to me, if I would promife to conceal and protect him. I own, added Helvetius to me, although I knew the danger to be greater of harbouring him at Paris than at London; and although I thought the family of Hanover not only the lawful fovereigns in England, but the only lawful fovereigns in Europe, as having the free content of the people; yet was I fuch a dupe to his flattery, that I invited him to my house, concealed him there going and coming near two years, had all his correfpondence pafs through my hands, met with his partizans upon Pont Neuf, and found at laft that I had incurred all this danger and trouble for the most unworthy of all mortals; infomuch that I have been affured, when he went down to Nantz to embark on his expedi expedition to Scotland, he took fright, and refused to go on board; and his attendants, thinking the matter gone too far, and that they would be affronted for his cowardice, carried him in the night time into the thip, pieds et mains liés. I afked him, if he meant literally. Yes, faid he, literally they tied him, and carried him by main force. What think you now of this hero and conqueror? Both Lord Marechal and Helvetius agree, that with all this ftrange character, he was no bigot, but rather had learned from the philofophers at Paris to affect a contempt of all religion. You must know that both thefe perfons thought they were afcribing to him an excellent quality. Indeed both of them ufed to laugh at me for my narrow way of thinking in thofe particulars. However, my dear Sir John, I hope you will do me the justice to acquit me. I doubt not but hefe circumftances will appear curious to Lord Hardwicke, to whom you will pleafe to prefent my refpects. 1 furpofe his Lordship will think this unaccountable mixture of temerity and timidity in the fame character not a little fingular. I am yours very fincerely, Mr. URBAN, IN DAVID HUME. Norwich, May 1. a conversation among fome perfons who are fond of philosophical difquifitions, it was debated, Whether man, unaflifted and uninformed by the fociety of his own fpecies, would arrive at a higher degree of understanding than the brutes? The Works of Lord Monboddo (whofe inveftigations of this fubject are very ingenious, although not always confiftent,) were quoted, in order to decide the question in the negative. This gave rife to a more clofe examination of his fentiments upon the fubject, and likewife led to a comparifon between what he advances upon it, in his "Origin of Language" and "Ancient Metaphyfics." In his "Origin of Language," vol. I. p. 147, he appeals to the judgement of his readers, whether, fo immerfed as the mind is in matter, without the affiftance of lan guage, or thofe reciprocal aids which, in refined fociety, we borrow from cack other, there be any difference between us and other animals. He maintains, that, from the force of their memory and perceptions, they have, like ourfelves, a notion of famenefs, likeness, and diverfity, in the objects of fenfe; and they recognise the fpecies in the individual as our children do. "All which indicates," he fays, "that there is no natural difference betwixt our minds and theirs; and that the fuperiority we have over them is adventitious, and from acquired habit." His Lordfhip here feems to infinuate an equality between them and us; and that our prefent fuperiority over them is as much the effect of chance as any thing else. If this be his meaning, I muft widely differ from him. I cannot fuppofe that the capacity of any animal is equal to our own. Much greater changes and improvements must have taken place to warrant the truth of fuch an allertion. Every animal under our notice feems to have arrived at the fummit of that perfection which was the original defign of Nature; but man, if in a totally uncul. tivated ftate, is extremely imperfect, and feems to rife in the fcale of excellence proportionably with the degree of inftruction beftowed upon him. Witnefs the difparity between any two men of equal capacities; one of whom enjoys all the advantages of a liberal edu cation, the other has few opportunities of enlarging and improving his ideas. Then let us obferve the ftate of a clown, who, from his infancy, has been totally confined to labour: from fuch an one defcend to the loweft fcale of intellec tual deficiency, to those beings of our own fpecies (feveral of whom History mentions) who have been deprived from their infancy of all intercourfe with human kind. They are always fpoken of as incapable of flying to those refources which Nature, more kind to other animals, has inftinctively pointed out to them for their immediate good and prefervation. The various charac ters and appearances which men affume from the different examples fet before them, afford the ftrongest proof what mere children of education we are;how difficult, fometimes, it is for us, from the imitative quality fo peculiar to our nature, to be divefted of the most abfurd prejudices; and, without the guidance of Example and Precept, even to difcover the exercife of the mental faculties. Not to mention the difficulty of bringing to maturity the latent feeds of Genius in individuals, there is frequently the greateft application and a fortunate train of fingular events neceffary, in order to produce a complete difplay of them. Hence our fuperiority to other animals appears to rife in proportion to the A Doubt propofed to Lord Monboddo.—Anecdotes of Chefs. 395 the degree of care and pains taken to obtain it. How then is this fuperiority, that appears to have arifen from exterior helps and fuccours, confiftent with his Lordship's very high ideas of Scripture? In the one cafe he confiders man as having had immediate communica. tion with the Deity, who converfed with him by word of mouth, and gave to every animal and every plant its particular name. in the other cafe he views man as a favage, living for ages like other animals: acquiring improvements by the flowest steps; first having recourfe to motions and founds, by way of vehicles of thought; then proceed. ing to articulation and language. How then is this adventitious fuperiority of ours, which he treats of in his "Origin of Language," confiftent with his fenti ments in his "Ancient Metaphyfics," in which he maintains, that if man had been intended for no other purpose than the brutes were, that degree of intellect, which is peculiar to them, would have been fufficient for him? But he adds, Man, by Nature, was deftined for a nobler purpose." This apparent con tradiction of terms muft arife from his Lordship viewing the matter in a different light, when he wrote his "Ancient Metaphyfics," to what he did when he wrote his "Origin of Language;" for our fuperiority could not have been adventitious if there muft be, as he fays, in his opinion (Anc. Metaphyf. vol. I. p. 133), a difference specific, and not in degree only, between our minds and thofe of other animals. Our author's contradictory affertions appear to me to have arifen from his not having laid sufficient stress, during the course of his two treatifes, on the meaning of the word Capability; a term of fuch importance, and fo expreffive of the highest part of our nature, that it is far above the reach of Imagination to conceive the distance to which it may carry our future difcoveries. Perhaps even at prefent, knowledge is in its infancy; and why fhould we not infer, from a review of improvements that have already taken place, an accumulation of them tranfcendently higher in future? With respect, therefore, to the nature of man, our own experience, the ftate of whole tribes of men, for many generations, compared with other animals before civilization was introduced, the actual progrefs we are now making in arts and fciences, wherein our anceftors, perhaps, thought themselves qually expert;-all, or any fuch ex amples, are fufficient to demonstrate that man, in a totally rude and favage ftate, is inferior to the brutes; and that all our prefent improvements and ideas have arifen from that most astonishing and comprehenfive faculty, Capability. As thefe obfervations may be no where fo likely to catch the eye of Ld. Monboddo as in your entertaining Mifcellany, I requeft the favour of you to infert them in it. K. H. Mr. URBAN, March 31. MR TWISS hath omitted, in his Farrago Libelli upon Chefs, the following paffage in the Opus Arithmeticum of Dr. Wallis: "One Sella, an Indian, having first found out the game at Chefle, and fhewed it to his prince Shehram; the king, who was highly pleafed with it, bid him ask what he would for the reward of his invention ; whereupon he afked, that, for the first little fquare of the chefs-board he might have one grain of wheat given him; for the fecond, 2; and fo on, doubling continually according to the number of fquares in the chefs-board, which was 64. And when the king, who intended to give a noble reward, was much difpleafed that he had asked fo trifling a one, Seffa declared that he would be contented with this small one. So this reward he had fixed upon was ordered to be given him but the king was quickly aftonished, when he found that this would rife to fo vaft a quantity, that the whole earth itfelf could not furnish out fo much wheat." Mr. T. hath alfo omitted a curious ftory of the confequences of a game at cheis between a Fitzwarin and King John, at Whittington castle, in Shrop hire, related in Leland's Collectanea ; which, for the peculiar quaintnefs and naiveté with which it is told, well deferves to be tranfcribed into your Magazine; but I have not the book at hand. Pafchius relates (which I do not find in Mr. Twifs's compilation) that Louis IX. of France, and our James 1. prohibited the ufe of this game because it fatigues the mind. De Nov-antiquis, p. 760. The fame author gives us the following verfes, which defcribe neatly enough the manner of placing the pieces, at this game, and are not to be met with in the publication alluded to: In medio Rex eft, prope quem Regina lo catur; His Jaculator opem præftat utrinque fuam: Huc 396 Anecdotes of Chefs.-Licentioufnefs reprehended.—Stained Glass. Hinc auratus Eques fequitur, poft Turriger alas Occupat, et Miles cuique ftat ante pedes. The ftory of Al Amin, p. 24, may be paralleled by one told by Seneca, de Tranquil. Animi, cap. 14, of one Canius Julius, who, being fummoned to execution, defired the centurion to bear witnefs that he had one man more upon of those things which are done of them in fecret.' But if fo; if it be an evil thing to let corrupt communication proceed out of the mouth; what shall be faid to palliate the diffufing of it in characters that may last long after the pablishers may be gone to receive the recompense for dee is done in the body? And be it remembered, if we are found tranfgref fors at the bar of Divine Juftice, it will be of laws which have been fully known and ex the board than his adverfary. I doubt, plained to us here. And thali the paltry however whether the ludus latrunculorum was the fame with our chefs: for the author of the Carmen in Pifonem feems rather to speak of fomething like drafts, as he does not take notice of any variation between the moves of the feveral pieces. The following paffage from Thucydides, I. 28 may, with great propriety, be fubjoined to the excellent paper of Dr. Franklin's, re printed in vol. LVII. P. 590: Αει προς εν βολευομένοις τᾶς ἐφαντίες παρασκευαζεσθαι δεί, και ουκ εξ εκείνων ως αμαρτησομένων έχειν τας ελπίδας, which is not unlike that of Cicero de 66 Off. I. 23: Ingenii magni eft præcipere cogitatione futura, et aliquanto ante conftituere quid accidere poflit in utramque partem; et quid agendum fit cum quid evenerit, nec committere, ut aliquando dicendum fit non putaram." Mr. URBAN, Hampshire, Jan. 2. ΤΗ HE following letter having been lately fent to the editor of one of the London news-papers; it is tranfcribed for the Gentleman's Magazine, in hopes it may be the more extensively useful. A CONSTANT CUSTOMER. "IT is not without furprize, and with real forrow, that I lately obferved in the an advertisement, of what I have no doubt is a licentious and obfcene publica tion. I never faw it: but the intimations thrown out by the advertisements were, I fuppofe, thought fufficient to attract the eye of lewdness, and awaken the curiofity of youth. It is indeed furprifing and forrowful, that, in an age profefling the fublime revelation of the Gospel, we should thus openly fpread corruption and indecency, when the virtue of the Greek and Roman ftates would probably have prohibited and abhorred it. What care did they take (in the purer ages of thote states) to prevent their youth from being corrup.cd and enervated by vice! And fhall this be our condemnation, that the greater tight of divine purity is unveiled to us, but that men yet chufe a darkness worfe than heathen, vainly hoping to cover themfelves from the confequences of fuch perversion? "Hear the decency of language which Chriftianity infpired upon obfcene and deteftable fubjects: It is a flame even to speak gains of these things be put in the balance with the folid comforts that will arife to fuch as at the clofe of life have this reflection, that, Not one immoral, one corrupted thought, One word, which dying they might with to blot, have they published, to ftand forth as a bandwriting upon the wall against them. "Accept this memento (as it is offered) in good-will, from a heart interested in the caufe of virtue. AMICUS." Mr. URBAN, April 14. ACCORDING so the perceptions of P. Q your candour has given too much confequence to the emblematical ftained glafs defcribed vol. LVII. 849. This gentleman's diflike does not pro ceed, I hope, from the application; at which no fincere friend to our national interefts would be difpleafed. It was never brought forward as an object of great merit or confequence; the princi pal motive is fufficiently pointed out at the beginning of the introduction. He feems to poffefs a partial knowledge in the fpeculative line of coloured gials; fibly have paffed through his hands by and many fubjects of the kind may pof the intervention of his friend Sam Paterfon. As an admirer of the art, it would be efteemed a favour if P. Q would inform me if Mr. P. be ftill liv ing, and where*. His trade, it may be prefumed, did not advance his fortune; which is no wonder, for many fuch collectors of curiofities are to be met with on the Continent," whofe expectations have been disappointed. Now as P. Q. has brought on the fubject, it is natural to imagine him a connoiffeur, of which he has given a degree of proof, in saying that the piece in queftion is the work of a Flemish artift. It is very true; and I fhall freely own that it was purchased by me in Flanders, where I procured many others of the fort, which are new in my poffeffion. What could be collected at home were, in general, imper *That this ingenious and worthy, though unfortunate, man is living, our correfpondent will be glad to hear. See p. 338. EDIT. tect, The Bradshaws. Remarkable Diffèction.-St. Owen's Bay. 397 fect, or ill defigned; and therefore the I Mr. URBAN, May 4. BELIEVE I may venture to inform your correfpondent B-s-Cl. that Bradshaw's remains were not buried in Wigan church. The Bradfhaugh family, late in that neighbourhood, once fpelt their name Bradshaw; but I have always heard them mentioned as a loyal family; and I do not believe any of them would have efteemed it an honour to have claimed relationship to the Loid Prefident. I fhould imagine the stairs leading to their gallery were originally as at prefent. Under them, in the family chancel, lie the remains of Sir William Bradshaw, knt. and Mabel his wife, of remarkable memory, with a monument erected to them. Any of your readers, by referring to the Baronetage, will fearn fomething of the penance of Mabel, and the romantic (though true) Occurrences that occafioned it. There have been variety of accounts relative to the burial-place of the Lord Prefident, which, however, is certainly not in Wigan church. BENEDICT. Mr. URBAN, Yo Margate, May 5. YOU have remarked, p. 362, that "a diffection at Mr. Cruikshank's, in Windmill-ftreet, is faid to have oc cafioned much fpeculation." Now, Sir, any of your medical readers may find, in Bonetus's Practical Anatomy, book IV. fect. xi. obf. 7, a full and an accurate defcription (from Cattierus, obf. 17) of the diffection of an affaflin, executed for murder in the year 1630, whofe vifcera were all reverfed, the apex of the heart pointing to the right, and its bafis to the left fide of the thorax, and the liver occupying, in the abdomen, the place of the ftomach and fpleen, &c. ROB. ED. HUNTER. Mr. URBAN, May 2. ST. Owen's (not St. Owen's) Bay is at the Weft end of the island of Jerfey; and that ifland, being open to the mouth of the British channel, is expofed to the violence of the Wefterly winds, and rage of the fea, quite uninterrupted by any other land than the great continent of America. That end of the island is now, however, bounded by a high and fteep bluff, or cliff; but, I apprehend, it was not always in that ftate, but that the fea has made large incroachments thereon, and confequently devoured many acres of lower land, and swallow ed up the trees now to be found in the ocean, and for many yards under the fandy defert you mention; for there is not only the finest foil in the island, but many houfes, as well as trees, are buried under that defert fand, the chimnies of fome of which I have feen. No wonder, therefore, that large trees have been found lying where they originally grew, as mentioned in your News of last month. Why thofe winds, which cover this fertile, and once most beautiful, part of the island, with fand in these latter ages, efcaped fo many preceding ones, must be explained by wifer heads than mine; but it is probable the land's end of England extended farther than it does at prefent, or that the islands of Scilly were, in former days, one fingle island of much greater magnitude, and confequently protected the Jerfey ifland from thofe ravages and devastations it is now feen under*. In a ftrong Wefterly wind at this day, high as the cliff now is, though much of the loofe fand is difperfed over the adjacent country, yet more is fupplied even from the mar gin of the fea. Nor is it poflible to stand upon that defcent and face a ftorm, the drift of the fands is fo cutting and fevere, and, confequently, fo changes the furface of the fands, as to expofe fome times the chimnies of houses, which are covered at others. The island of Jersey would afford an Antiquary much matter of attention; there are, I believe, feveral Druidical monuments + to be ex. plored there. Yours, &c. THE Mr. URBAN, May 3 HE Epifcopalians of Scotland had, I hoped, configned the whole charge of their armoury, offenfive and defenPerhaps the islands of Scilly have been cut off from the main land. + See vol. LVII. p. 700. EDIT. |