London, and the French as happy in that re fpect as the Britons.

At least men of letters are happier in that city than in this; and tho' the lamp of learning is near expiring in England, yet no one stretches his hand to recruit it with fresh oil: the flame, I believe, quivers already; I shall see its total extinction before I leave England; after which, I fhall only tarry to attend its remains and behold it quietly inurned, make a fmall epitaph, inftitute a mass to be faid for its repose, and fly to your arms in Rome; and thus end my life where it began. Adieu, I am

Yours moft fincerely.

LET

LETTER XXIX.

To the Reverend Father LORENZO FRANCIOSANI at Rome.

Dear Sir,

YESTERDAY

ESTERDAY amufing myself with a

walk in that church where the monuments of illuftrious men of this nation are mostly pla ced, amongst others I remarked that of the great Newton, where, in a bas-relief, the other orbs of this folar fyftem are weighed by boys against the fun, on a stillyard.

THIS naturally led me to think on the fate of those philofophies, which from the earliest account of times have come down to us thro Ariftotle to Descartes, and Newton; each of the former exploded by all living writers, unless you except Monfr. Fontenelle; and the latter attacked by the late Mr. Hutchinfon and his followers, a fect of enthusiastic philofophers, who fanfying they have found in the history of Moses, the beft fyftem of the heavens and natural philofophy, decry all others as delufive.

VOL. H.

THIS reflection led me naturally to confider the unstable state of truth, as well as that of fashion, and thence the feeble condition of the human mind, as it is generally found to exist in most beings of our fpecies. The fyftem of Ptolomy, and the natural hiftory of Aritotle and Pliny, were followed and received as undoubted truth for many ages. Copernicus and Defcartes driving thefe from the opinions of mankind, won the whole world to their manner of conceiving things; the first of these remains generally received, and the philofophy of the latter, which was defigned to explain the revolutions of the planets, is, as I have already faid, almost totally exploded. Fontenelle alone, at ninety-fix, like a fepulchral lamp, remains quivering over the dead body.

IF we should fcrutinize too feverely into the minds of men, how contemptibly must we think of their capacities; they have followed the different profeffors of each philofophy by thoufands; embracing error, not under the idea of an object of belief, but of reafon; dignifying that with the name of abfolute truth, which at

pre

prefent appears to be abfolute falfehood. What is this fupreme reafon of man, that is fo easily deluded? or is there any truth belonging to reafon in man, the result of numbers excepted, beyond that which is to be found in any other faculty?

Ir we fhould judge from the analogy and experience of past times, we must conclude, there is no fuch thing as truth; because all that has been discovered and received anciently as true, is now known and received as falfe. Every philofopher has funk into obfcurity, with his fyftem; and all reverence for him, and that, vanished together with time.

PERHAPS the day will come, when fome fertile imagination may ingeniously dethrone this hypothefis of the great Newton, and prove that immortality belongs no more to fyftems, than

to men.

WHETHER this be true or not, the experience of past ages, and the long unfettled ftate of truth, fhould teach us to examine with caution, and pronounce with modesty either on

other people's opinion, or our own.

LET US imagine, as probably it is, that the fyftem of this amazing man, is the true one of the univerfe; we may admire indeed, that wonderful fagacity which could penetrate fuch abstruse matters; and yet, how short in utility and comprehenfion is this degree of knowledge, to that of a legislator.

NEWTON has discovered that the planets and fun, perhaps all other planets and funs, are counterpoised and attracted by one another. The fyftem of nature was before this difcovery fixed, and the whole revelation is the principle which moves these orbs, and the laws which they obferve. In human nature, the fubtilty of discovering that paffions, reason, senses, faith, and imagination in man, counterpoife one another, is not fufficicient, tho' equally difficult all the objects which influence each, must be proportioned and applied to make society proceed happily and well,

Is not the genius which is capable of such force and efficacy, as much beyond that of Newton, as his was beyond the conception of other mathe

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