accident, arrived at Rome, where he was most graciously welcomed.

From Rome Taffo retired to Naples to profecute a law-fuit for the recovery of his family-eftate. But he had not long been in that place before his friend, the cardinal of St. George, again drew him to Rome, having prevailed on the pope to give him the honour of being folemnly crowned with laurel in the Capitol. Though Taffo himself was not in the least defirous of fuch pomp, he yielded to the perfuafion of others, particularly of his dear friend Manfo, to whom he protefted that he went merely at his earneft defire, not with any expectation of the promifed triumph, which he had a fecret prefage would never be. He was greatly affected at parting with Manfo, and took his leave of him as of one whom he fhould never fee again.

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At his entering Rome he was met by many perfons of diftinction, and was afterwards introduced to the prefence of the pope, who was pleafed to tell him that his merit would add as much honour to the laurel he was going to receive, as that crown had formerly given to thofe on whom it had been bestowed."

Nothing was now thought on but the approaching folemnity: orders were given not only to decorate the Jope's palace and the Capitol, but all the principal ftreets through which the proceflion was to pafs. Yet Taffo appeared little moved with these preparations, which he faid would be in vain and being fhewn a fonnet composed on the occafion by his relation Hercole Taffo, he anfwered by the following verfe of Seneca :

Magnifica verba mors propè admosa excutêt. His prefages were but too true; for while they waited for fair weather to

celebrate the folemnity, Taffo was feized with his last sickness.

Though he had only completed the fifty-first year of his age, his studies and misfortunes had brought on a premature old age. On the tenth of April he was feized by a violent fever, and the most famous phyficians in vain exerted their art to relieve him. Rinaldini, the pope's phyfician, and Taffo's intimate friend, having informed him that his last hour was near at hand, Taffo embraced him tenderly, and with a compofed countenance returned him thanks for his tidings; then looking up to heaven, he " acknowledged the goodness of God, who was at last pleased to bring him fafe into port, after fo long a ftorm."

Being defired to dictate his will and his epitaph, he fmiled, and faid, that" in regard to the firft, he had little worldly goods to leave; and as to the fecond, a plain stone would fuffice to cover him."

He defired his friend the cardinal, with great earnestnefs, to collect the copies of all his works, particularly his Jerufalem delivered, which he efteemed moft imperfect, and commit them to the flames.

Whence could this ftrange request proceed? Surely not from affectation, for the drops her plume at the grave. Poffibly it might arife from fome religious fcruple.

This celebrated poet died on the twenty-fifth of April, 1595, uttering this unfinished fentence, In manus, tuas, Domine

With respect to his perfon, he was tall and well-shaped; his complexion fair, but rather pale through fickness and ftudy; his hair was of a chefnut colour; his beard thick and bushy; his forehead fquare and high; his head large; his eye brows were dark;

his eyes full and piercing, and of a clear blue; his nofe was large; his lips thin; his teeth well fet and white; his breast full; his shoulders broad; and all his limbs more finewy than flefly: his voice was ftrong, clear, and folemn: he spoke with deliberation; feldom laughed; and never to excess.

In his oratory he ufed little action, and rather pleafed by the beauty and force of his expreffions, than by the graces of gefture and utterance that compofe fo great a part of elocution.

As to his mental qualities, he appears to have had a foul elevated

above the common rank of mankind. It is faid of him that there never was a scholar more humble, a wit more devout, or a man more amiable in fociety; never fatisfied with his works, even when they rendered his name famous throughout the world; always fatisfied with his condition, even when he wanted every thing; entirely relying on Providence and his friends; without malevolence towards his greatest enemies; only wishing for riches that he might be ferviceabie to others, and making a fcruple to receive or keep any thing himself that was not abfolutely neceffary.

paffed in a state contrary to our natural defires, that one of the principal topics of moral inftruction is the art of bearing calamities. And fuch is the certainty of evil, that it is the duty of every man to furnish his mind with thofe principles that may enable him to a&t under it with decency and propriety.

The fect of ancient philofophers, who boafted to have carried this neceffary fcience to the higheft perfection, were the Stoics, or fcholars of Zeno; whofe wild enthusiastic virtue pretended to an exemption from the fenfibilities of unenlighten ed mortals, and who boasted of being exalted, by the doctrines of their fea, above the reach of thofe miferies which embitter life to the reft of the world. They therefore removed pain, and poverty, the lofs of friends, exile, and violent death, from the catalogue of evils; and paffed, in their haughty stile, a kind of reversible decree, by which they

among the objects of terror and anxiety, or to give any disturbance to the tranquility of a wife man.

This decree was not indeed univerfally obferved; for though one of the more refolute, when he was tortured by a violent difeafe, cried out, "that let pain harrafs him to its utmoft power, it fhould never force him to retract the doctrines of his fect, or to confider it as any other than indifferent and neutral;" yet all had not the refolution to hold out against their fenfes for one of Zeno's pupils is recorded to have confeffed in the anguifh of the gout, that," he now found pain to be an evil.”

It may however be queftioned, whether thefe philofophers can be very properly numbered among the teachers of patience; for, if pain be not an evil, there feems no inftruction requifite how it may be borne; and therefore, when they endeavoured to arm their followers with arguments against it, they may be thought

to have given up their firft pofition. But fuch inconfiftencies are to be expected from the greatest understandings, when they endeavour to grow eminent by fingularity, and employ their ftrength in establishing opinions oppofite to nature.

The controversy about external evils is now at an end. That life has many miferies, and that thofe miferies are, fometimes at leaft, equal to all the powers of fortitude which can be raised against them, is now univerfally confeffed; and therefore it is useful to confider not only how we may escape them, but by what means those which either the accidents of affairs, or the neceffities of nature, must bring upon us, may be mitigated and lightened; and how we may make thofe hours lefs wretched, which the condition of our prefent existence will not allow to be very happy.

The cure for the greater part of human miferies is not radical, but palliative. Infelicity is involved in our corporeal nature, and interwoven with our being; to attempt therefore to decline it wholly, is ufeleis and vain. The armies of pain fend their arrows against us on every fide, and the choice is only between those which are more or lefs fharp, or tinged with poifon of greater or lefs malignity; and the strongeft armour, which reafon can fupply, will only blunt their points, but cannot repel them.

The great remedy which heaven has put into our hands is patience, by which, though we cannot leffen the torments of the body, we can in a great measure preferve the peace of the mind, and fuffer only the natural and genuine force of evil, with out heightening its acrimony, or prolonging its effects.

March, 1764.

There is indeed nothing more unfuitable to the nature of man in any calamity than rage and turbulence, which, without examining whether they are not fometimes impious, are at least always offenfive, and incline others rather to hate and despise than to pity and affift us. If what we fuffer has been brought upon us by ourselves, patience, as an ancient poet juftly obferves, is eminently our duty, fince no one should be angry at feeling that which he has deferved. And furely if we are not confcious that we have contributed to our own fufferings, if punishment fall upon innocence, or difappointment happens to industry and prudence; patience, whether more neceffary or not, is much eafier, fince our pain is then without aggravation, and we have not the bitterness of remorfe to add to the afperity of misfortune.

In thofe evils which are allotted to us by Providence, fuch as deformity, privation of any of the fenfes, or old age, it is always to be remembered, that impatience can have no prefent effect but to deprive us of the confolation which our condition admits, by driving away from us thofe by whofe converfation or advice we might be amused or assisted; and that with regard to futurity it is yet lefs eligible, fince, without leffening the pain, it cuts off the hope of that reward, which he, by whom it is inflicted, will confer upon those who bear it well.

In all evils which admit a remedy, impatience is to be avoided, because it wastes that time and attention in complaints, which, if properly applied, might remove the caufe. Turenne, among the acknowledgements which he used to pay in converfation to the memory

of those by whom he had been inftructed in the art of war, mentioned one with honour, who taught him not to spend his time in regretting any mistake which he had made, but to fet himself immediately to repair and obviate it.

Patience and fubmiffion are very carefully to be diftinguished from cowardice and indolence. We are not to repine, but we may lawfully Aruggle; for the calamities of life, like the neceffities of nature, are calls to labour, and exercises of diligence. When we feel any preffure of distress, we are not to conclude that we can only obey the will of heaven by languishing under it, any more than when we perceive the pain of thirst we are to imagine that water is prohibited. Of misfortune it never can be known,whether, as proceeding from the hand of God, it is an act of favour or of punishment: but all ordinary difpenfations of Providence are to be interpreted according to the general analogy of things, and we may conclude, that we have a right to remove one inconvenience as well as another; that we are only to take care left we purchafe eafe with guilt; and that his purpose, whether of reward or feverity, will be anfwered by the labours which he lays us under the. neceffity of performing.

This duty is not more difficult in any state, than in difeafes intenfely painful, which may indeed admit of fuch exacerbations as feem to ftrain the powers of life to their utmost ftretch, and leave very little of the attention vacant to precept or reproof. In this ftate the nature of man requires fome indulgence, and every extravagance but impiety may be easily forgiven him. Yet, left we should think ourselves too foon en-.

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titled to the mournful privileges of irrefiftible mifery, it is proper to reflect, that the utmost pains which human wit can contrive, or human malice can inflict, have been borne with conftancy; and that if the pains of disease be, as I believe they are, fometimes greater than thofe of artificial torture, they are therefore in their own nature fhoiter, the vital frame is quickly broken, the union between foul and body for a time fufpended, and we foon ceafe to feel our maladies when they come to be too violent to be borne. I think there is fome reafon for questioning whether the body and mind are not fo proportioned that the one can bear all that can be inflicted on the other; whether virtue cannot ftand its ground as long as life; and whether a foul well principled will not be feparated before it is fubdued.

In calamities which operate chiefly on our paffions, fuch as diminution of fortune, lofs of friends, or declenfion of character, the chief danger of impatience is upon the first attack; and many expedients have been contrived, by which the blow may be broken. Of these the most general precept is, not to take pleasure in any thing, of which it is not in our power to fecure the poffeffion to ourselves.

This counfel, when we confider the enjoyment of any terreftrial advantage as oppofite to a conftant and habitual folicitude for future felicity, is undoubtedly juft, and delivered by that authority which cannot be difputed; but, in any other fenfe, is it not like advice, not to walk left we fhould stumble, or not to see left our eyes fhould light upon deformity? It feems to me reasonable to enjoy bleffings with confidence, as well as to lose them with submission, and to hope for the continuance of good

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which we poffefs without infolence or voluptuoufnefs, as for the reftitution of that which we lofe without murmurs or defpondency.

The chief fecurity against the fruitless anguish of impatience muft arife from the frequent reflection on the wisdom and goodness of the God of nature, in whofe hands are riches

and poverty, honour and difgrace, pleafure and pain, and life and death. A fettled conviction of the tendency of every thing to our good, and of the poffibility of turning miferies into happiness, by receiving them rightly, will incline us to bless the name of the Most High, whether he gives or takes away.

GENTLEMEN,

T cannot, I think, be confidered as an idle task, or an attempt deftitute of entertainment, to draw a parallel between two of the most celebrated men the world ever faw, and whofe genius and learning will be revered as long as civil fociety and a love for the fciences continue in the world. Mr. Locke's preferments were rewards paid to his merit, the rewards of an unblemished integrity, rewards for exerting himfelf in the cause of liberty and his country, and for fecuring the advantage of trade and commerce, by his unravelling the difficulties relating to our fpecie. Had merit taken place, Bacon would fooner have enjoyed the honours he was at laft invested with; and had he fully known that merit, he would never have ftooped fo low to attain them. And here the political cunning and addrefs, the afpiring ambition of Sir Francis Bacon, form a perfect contrast to the artless fimplicity, the unafpiring temper of Mr. Locke: the former fupplicating with unwearied diligence, and paying his homage to every courtier who could help him to advance his fortune and his honour: the latter averfe to grandeur, and declining the acquifition of

wealth. Happy in himself and unambitious of external honours, Mr. Locke anfwered the congratulations of his friend, who rejoiced at his receiving a post of honour, and a thoufand pounds a year, with a greatnefs of mind that proved him a real philofopher: "If you will give me leave to whisper truth, without vanity, in the ear of a friend, faid he, 'tis a preferment which I fhall get nothing by, and I know not whether my country will, though that I shall aim at with all my endeavours. Riches may be inftrumental to fo many good purposes, that it is, [ think, vanity, rather than religion or philofophy, to pretend to contemn them. But yet, they may be purchafed too dear. My age and health demand a retreat from bustle and bufinefs, and the purfuit of fome enquiries I have in my thoughts, makes it more defireable than any of those rewards which public employments tempt people with. I think the little I have enough, and do not defire to live higher, or die richer than I am, And therefore you have reafon rather to pity the folly, than to congratulate the fortune that engages me in the whirlpool."

They both spent great part of their T 2 lives