The letter which follows has already been in. print; but as it is probable that few of my readers have met with it, and as it fuits admirably the complexion of this Paper, I cannot refuse myself the fatisfaction of inferting it. It is from Sir Hugh Dalrymple to Sir Laurence Dundas.

"DEAR SIR LAURENCE,

North Berwick.

Having spent a whole life in the pursuit of "pleasure and health, I am now retired from the "world, with poverty and the gout; so joining <<< with Solomon, "that all is vanity and vexation "of fpirit," I go to church every day, and fay my

prayers. Going laft Sunday as usual, I faw an "unknown man in the pulpit; and rifing up to

pray, I found my ears engaged by the foreign "accent of the Parfon. I paid him all attention, and had my devotion awakened by the most

cr

pathetic prayer which I ever heard. This made

me attend equally to the fermon-a better never CC came from the lips of man. I returned in the " afternoon, and heard the fame Preacher finifh his morning's work by the finest chain of reasoning, conveyed in the most eloquent expreffion. I fent "to afk the Man of GOD to honour my roof, and

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"dine with me. I asked him about his country; « I even asked him if his fermons were his own? "He affirmed they were. I affured him I believed ❝ him, for never man wrote or spoke so well. “My "name," fays he, "is Difhington. I am Curate "to a mad Minister in the Orkneys, who enjoys "a rich benefice of £50 a year, out of which I "receive £.20 for preaching to and inftructing ❝ 1200 people, who inhabit several islands. Out "of this £.20 I pay 25 fhillings every year to the "boatman who transports me from one to the "other by turns. I fhould be very glad if I could " continue in that terreftrial paradife; but we have

a great Lord, who has many little people foli"citing him for many little things which he can "do, and many that he cannot do; and if my "Minifter were to die, his fucceffion is too great

a prize not to raise up many powerful rivals "to baulk my hopes of preferment." I asked of "him if he poffeffed any other wealth than his £.20 a year? "Yes," faid he, "I married the

prettiest girl in the ifland; fhe has already "bleffed me with three children, and, as we are "both young, we may expect more. Befides, I

am fo beloved, that I have all my turf brought VOL. II.

F

"home

"home carriage-free."-This is my story: now " to the prayer of my petition. I never before ❝ envied you the poffeffion of the Orkneys, which "I now do, only to provide for this eloquent in"nocent Apoftle. The fun has refused your barren Inland its kind influence; do not then ❝ deprive them of fo eloquent a Preacher.*** "Yours, in all meeknefs and benevolence, « H. D."

No 33.

SATURDAY, DECEMBER 22.

Magnum certè quiddam præftare videntur, fi delibantes aliorum ingenia ex compendio fapiant, aut in cortice doctrinæ aliquatenus bæreant. BACON, de Aug. Scient.

They think they have done wonders, if, by fimply colouring their thoughts with other men's wit, they can fhorten the fatigues of ftudy, or just penetrate the rind of knowledge, unable to pierce

into the core.

I HAVE given my readers a chapter on the false

refinements of the prefent age-I fhall now prefent them with my thoughts on the falfe learning by which it is disgraced.

Falle

Falfe learning, in which I include falfe tafte, is properly a branch of that false spirit of refinement which has been confidered before, and confifts, in Lord Bacon's words, " of vain altercations, vain "affectations, and vain imaginations." This part of the question was left untouched in the former Paper, as being a topic broad and interesting enough to demand a separate confideration. It is a fubject of regret to confider, that this falfe learning does not arise from the want of a disposition in the character of the times, towards objects of this nature, but from a wrong bias in its direction, refulting from the contagious effects of this diftempered refinement.

It would be unjust to our own age to deny, that what we have loft in depth, we have recovered in breadth; and that, for one profoundly learned of the old times, we have ten fuperficially fo in the prefent. Unfortunately indeed, literature has of late years become a part of the mode, and has accordingly partaken of its infipidity, its caprice, and its adulterations. There is in fashion a tyrannical infolence, that loves to trample upon nature and the right conftitution of things:

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things: fhe infifts upon fubmiffion, and yet her requifitions are as perverse as they are peremptory. She impofes the fame tax upon us all, without confidering our inequality of refource, and different measures of ability. If it be the fashion to be learned, learned we must be at all events; and our ingenuity is ftrained to the top of its bent, to difcover fuccedaneums that may supply, and impofitions that may dazzle, till literature becomes a commodity as artificial as dress, and admits of the fame mockery of imitation, the same speciousness of ornament, the fame coxcombry of character, and the fame artifices of deception. When an article becomes the mode, fuch as have the means, will procure it genuine and perfect; while those who are without them, must refort to fome adulteration that retains its resemblance, or some compofition that ufurps its appearance.

It seems perhaps a folecifm, yet in fome circumftances I cannot but lament the abundance of our resources, and the fertility of our inventions, which, in respect to learning, have conjured up fuch impofitions and deceptions, and fuggefted fuch feducing resemblances, that we are betrayed

by