so long habituated to the quart and tierce of forensick digladiation, (as doctor Johnson would probably have called it,) as to be unequal to the discussion of a great question of state. Mr. Curran, in his defence of Rowan, seems to have sanctioned the probability of such an effect from such a cause, when he complains of his own mind as having been narrowed and circumscribed, by a strict and technical adherence to established forms; but in the next breath, an astonishing burst of the grandest thought, and a power of comprehension to which there seems to be no earthly limit, proves that his complaint, as it relates to himself, is intirely without foundation.

....

.....

Indeed, if the objection to .. mean any thing more than that he has not had the same illumination and exercise in matters of state as if he had devoted his life to them, I am unwilling to admit it. The force of a cannon is the same, whether point

ed at a rampart or a man of war, although practice may have made the engineer more expert in the one case than in the other. So it is clear, that practice may give a man a greater command over one class of subjects than another; but the inherent energy of his mind remains the same, whithersoever it may be directed. From this impression I have never seen any cause to wonder at what is called a universal genius: it proves only that the man has applied a powerful mind to the consideration of a great variety of subjects, and pays a compliment rather to his superiour industry, than his superiour intellect. I am very certain that the gentleman, of whom we are speaking, possesses the acumen which might constitute him a universal genius, according to the usual acceptation of the phrase. But if he be the truant, which his warmest friends represent him to be, there is very lit

tle probability that he will ever reach this

distinction.

Think you, my dear S

that the

two gentlemen, whom I have attempted to portray to you, were, according to the notion of Helvetius, born with equal minds; and that accident or education has produced the striking difference which we perceive to exist between them? I wish it were the case; and that the .. would be pleased to reveal to us, by what accident, or what system of education, he has acquired his peculiar sagacity and promptitude. Until this shall be done, `I fear I must consider the hypothesis of Helvetius as a splendid and flattering dream.

But I tire you:-adieu, for the present, friend and guardian of my youth.

LETTER VI.

Jamestown, September 27.

I HAVE taken a pleasant ride of sixty miles down the river, in order, my dear S . . . . . . ., to see the remains of the first English settlement in Virginia.

The site is a very handsome one. The river is three miles broad; and, on the opposite shore, the country presents a fine range of bold and beautiful hills. But I find no vestiges of the ancient town, except the ruins of a church steeple, and a disordered group of old tombstones. On one of these, shaded by the boughs of a tree, whose trunk has embraced and grown over the edge of the stone, and seated on the head-stone of another grave, I now address you.

What a moment for a lugubrious meditation among the tombs! but fear not; I have neither the temper nor the genius, of a Hervey: and, as much as I revere his pious memory, I cannot envy him the possession of such a genius and such a temper. For my own part, I would not have suffered the mournful pleasure of writing his book, and doctor Young's Night Thoughts, for all the just fame which they have both gained by those celebrated productions. Much rather would I have danced, and sung, and played the fiddle with Yorick, through the whimsical pages of Tristram Shandy: that book which every body justly censures and admires alternately; and which will continue to be read, abused and devoured, with ever fresh delight, as long as the world shall relish a joyous laugh, or a tear of the most delicious feel

ing.