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should reflect, that what are considered as elementary principles in one century are farther analyzed in the next, and what pass for undeniable truths with one generation are subjeet to be questioned and overturned by another. Thus Davenant in one century was read as gospel; Duquesnoi, and Turgot, and the French economists had their day; Adam Smith's opinions were next cited, long and loud, as irrefragable authority, till bold inquirers have of late started doubts concerning some of his fundamental principles. Without the base wish to derogate from the reputation of these great men, it is fit to point out these variations of opinion, and to warn young students from swearing to the tenets of any master. Without being caught by the novelty and fashion, or deterred by the unpopularity 'or crabbedness of any author, he should read every work from which he can obtain information, or which will oblige him to revise his principles. The word crabbed was suggested by the recollection of the Marquis de Casaux's book " Sur le Méchanisme de la Société ; work written in such a repulsive style, that the author is in danger of losing his claim to originality, because few readers know enough of him to do him justice. Some writers have, indeed, robbed him of his ideas, and have produced them as their own in a more popular form. De Casaux first started the bold, and seemingly paradoxical ideas, that taxes do not permanently affect the wealth of any individuals in a statethat the national debt is a phantom, that the dread of national bankruptcy is but a species of financial hypochondriacism.

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It is sufficient to have pointed out these examples of opposite tenets, on which young political economists should

form their judgment. They should also attend to recent publications, in which any old doctrines are attacked, or new opinions proposed. For example, Dr. Gray's Examination of the essential Principles of the Wealth of Nations-Dumont's View of Bentham's work on Legislation-Selkirk on Emigration—and Malthus on Population. These works have already been recommended to the attention of the higher classes of country gentlemen; to study them with unprejudiced attention, is the absolute duty of all intended for public life. They must never be deterred by any temporary popular odium from giving new opinions a fair hearing; nor should they ever deny just premises in argument, from the apprehension of remote consequences. Admission should never be refused to truth, from the base fear, that, if it were generally known and acknowledged, it would lead to errour and vice. The knowledge of truth can never produce either misery or guilt; but partial information, or deception practised on a people by their rulers, will infallibly create the evils, which they weakly attempt to prevent or remedy. These are not the days when the scheme of esoteric and exoteric doctrines can prosper. Knowledge has unrolled her ample printed page to all eyes, and there is no longer any language peculiar to the adept, or sacred from the vulgar. These are not the days when a man can be reduced to the alternative of burning his book, or of being burned for asserting that the earth turns round the sun. These are not times, when people can be paid with mere words and assertions; that nature abhors a void, would not now be thought sufficient with any class of readers to account for physical phenomena. In political economy, as in all other sciences, the habit of reasoning is

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now general, and the human mind, from experience of success, has become at once more daring and more inquisitive. Of this it behoves our young politicians, and rulers expectant to beware. Whoever should, in this age, attempt to answer reason by abuse, or to put down truth by persecution, would only expose himself to ridicule or danger; he would be in the situation of a chief, ignorant of the use of fire-arms, who should, in battle, persist in opposing slings and arrows to musketry and cannon.

In reading on all these important subjects a young man must decide in favour of what at the time appears to him to be the right side of the question. But these decisions he should hold as provisional rather than absolute; he should sedulously keep his mind open to conviction, and ready to submit all he has learned from books to the test of observation and experience. "Sir," said Doctor Johnson to one who at tacked some of his principles-" I have made up my faggot " of opinions, I will not let one single twig be drawn out, lest "it should loosen the whole bundle." Would it not be better to put a sound twig in the place of the rotten one, lest the whole faggot loosen and fall to pieces?

After having completed his studies, a young statesman should visit each capital of the British empire; he should make himself acquainted with every distinguished public character and with all the youth, who are rising or likely to rise to eminence. After having studied books, he should now study mankind; after having read he must converse. Mere scholars are much mistaken when they imagine, that all know

ledge is to be learned from books alone; much is acquired from conversation: and for various reasons, the power of conversing well must be advantageous to a man, who intends to devote himself to public life. In the first place, it is his interest to establish an early reputation for abilities; his companions and rivals, and the world of acquaintance, will estimate him by his colloquial powers before he has an opportunity of making any public display of his talents. In the next place, conversation will improve his talents, whatever they may be. The habits of speaking in good language, of arguing closely, and of replying with promptitude, may be every day improved in well informed and well bred society. It has, however, been observed, that many have great talents for conversation, who show no powers as orators; that many can talk fluently in private company, who are absolutely incapable of uttering two connected sentences, or even of articulating in a public assembly. An acute and eloquent philosopher" has endeavoured to account for the inferiority in powers of conversation, which is sometimes observed in men of superior talents and deep thought; he remarks, "that men of a philosophical “turn of mind, and of enlarged understandings, sometimes

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appear dull in mixed companies, because they cannot or "will not express their opinions, unless they have time to develop the whole of their systems, and to show the con"nexion of their ideas and principles. They foresee, that "they cannot obtain the time and attention necessary for "this purpose, and therefore they remain silent; if they do speak, they dissert rather than converse, and they appear dull

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"and slow, because their ideas are not wakened by the casual "associations which govern common minds, nor are their powers called forth by trivial motives." On the contrary, men who excel in conversation are accustomed to have their ideas called forth by the words and thoughts of others, or by accidental external circumstances: when they attempt to speak in public, these excitements are wanting; they must arrange their thoughts by habits and principles, to which they are not accustomed, and by an effort of voluntary exertion, of which, from want of practice, they are probably incapable. A man of abilities, who speaks good language fluently in private company, may fail as a public orator, merely from want of self-possession or civil courage; the more he practises speaking, the more he will acquire command over his faculties. If he converse on subjects with which he is well acquainted, he may practise himself either in dilating or compressing, according to the temper or comprehension of his company. He may habituate himself to watch over and preserve the connexion of his ideas, while in expressing them he makes those elisions, which are necessary to prevent conversation from becoming tiresome. By constantly observing how these abbreviations are made, he will not only acquire the power of conversing, but will prepare himself for speaking well in public: he will know when to use logic, and when eloquence; he will acquire the necessary power of adapting his style of expression and argument to his audience, and he will have the habit of attending to the reasonings of others, and of replying to them when suddenly called upon.

That the powers of conversing well, and of speaking elo

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