a vain oftentation of learning and to quote authors without either reading or understanding them, or even knowing fo much as who and what they are. "The Codex Alexandrinus," faith he, "we owe to George the Monk." We are indebted indeed to George the Monk, more usually called Syncellus, for what is entitled Vetus Chronicon.+ But the Codex Alexandrinus is quite another thing; it is as all the learned know, the famous Greek MS. of the Old and New Teftament brought originally from Alexandria and presented to Charles I. and now in the king's library, of which it doth not appear that George the Monk knew anything, and, it is evident, that his Lordship knew nothing. If he meant to say the Chronicum Alexandrinum, that is still another thing and the work of another author. His Lordship is of opinion, that

Virgil, in thofe famous verses, Excudent alii, &c. might have justly ascribed to his

* LETTER I. p. 262, 4to. ed.

† An ancient Chronicle of the Egyptians.-Ed. LETTER V. p. 340.—Ib.

countrymen the praise of writing History better than the Grecians." But which are the Roman Histories that are to be preferred to the Grecian? Why, "the remains, the precious remains" fays his Lordship, "of Sallust, of Livy, and of Tacitus!" But it happened that Virgil * died before Livy had written his history, and before Tacitus was born. And is not this an excellent chronologer now, to correct all ancient history and chronology facred and profane? His Lordfhip is likewife pleased to say " that Don Quixote + believed, but even Sancho doubted:" and it may be afferted on the other fide, that Sir Ifaac Newton believed the prophecies though his Lordfhip did not; the principal reason of which may be found, perhaps, in the different life and morals of the one and the other. Nay, the wifeft politicians and hiftorians have been believers as

Livy,

according to Tacitus was

* Virgil died A. C. 735. Dodwell, finished his history in 745. Conful in 850. See Fabricius. + LETTER IV. p. 130.

well as the greatest philofophers. Raleigh and Clarendon believed; Bacon and Locke believed; and where then is the difcredit to Revelation, if Lord Bolingbroke was an infidel? "A fcorner," as Solomon faith,* "feeketh Wifdom and findeth it not." BISHOP NEWTON.

Books.

TUDIES ferve for delight, for ornament, and for ability. Their chief ufe for delight is in privatenefs and retiring; for ornament

is in discourse, and for ability is in the judgment and difpofition of bufinefs. For expert men can execute and, perhaps, judge of particulars, one by one; but the general counfels and the plots and marfhalling of affairs come beft from thofe that are learned. Read not to contradict and confute, but to weigh and confider. Some books are to be tafted, others to be swallowed, and fome few to be digested. That is, fome books are to be read

Proverbs xiv. 6.

only in parts, others to be read but not curiously; and fome few to be read wholly and with diligence and attention. Reading maketh a full man, conference a ready man, and writing an exact man. Hiftories make

men wife, poets witty, the mathematics fubtile, natural philofophy deep, moral grave, logic and rhetoric able to contend. - LORD BACON.

2. Books are a guide in youth and an entertainment for age. They support us under folitude and keep us from becoming a burden to ourselves. They help us to forget the croffness of men and things, compofe our cares and our paffions, and lay our disappointments afleep. When we are weary of the living we may repair to the dead, who have nothing of peevishness, pride or defign in their converfation.-JEREMY COLLIER.

Books v. Travellers.

HE obfervations I have made in the countries through which I have travelled, in general contradict the characters of those na

tions, commonly afcribed to them in books and in conversation. Thus, for example, in the Spaniards with whom I have been acquainted, I could never find the gravity and ftiffness by which that nation is generally fuppofed to be diftinguished. In the Frenchman I have feldom discovered that winning amiableness of disposition, and that high degree of politenefs and delicacy, which are infeparable from it, that are univerfally attributed to him. I never observed that in his own country, the Englishman was that melancholy, referved and gloomy being, for which he is proverbial. The German is by no means the drunkard, or the clownish uncivilized brute, that in many countries he is described to be. Am I to fuppose, that all the individuals with whom I was acquainted, were exceptions, and that the obfervations of fo many years were falfe? Or may it not rather be afferted, that the characters of whole nations, as delineated in early works, from which probably they have got into every one's mouth, are incorrect? it is much easier to collect ideas of men and things from books