other event. But this subsequent inundation was formed by the Count himself, whose imagination found little difficulty in deluging worlds, or making them; while Mr. de Pauw found as little in swallowing either the deluges or the worlds.

The animals of America the Count has found to be few in the number of their species; small in their size; defective in their structure; degenerate in their natures; and a great part of them unfortunately without tails. All this train of misfortunes these gentlemen ascribe to the wretchedness of our climate; the infancy of nature on this continent; the sterility of our soil; the deficiency of matter; and the great number of lakes and marshes left by this mischievous deluge. A prudent philosopher will generally choose to be sure of his effects before he looks out for their causes: while those, who make causes, as generally find little trouble in creating also their effects. The man, who could discover the origin of this globe in the impact of a comet against the surface of the sun, which struck off a quantity of melted glass, sufficient to form the world, can discover any thing, and make any thing, which he pleases.

Unfortunately for these gentlemen, there are fewer species of animals without tails in America than on the eastern continent, the Count himself being the umpire.

I have already considered the size and weight of our animals. It is unnecessary to observe again, that the elk, the moose, the brown bear, and the bison, are larger than the caribou or the tapir, boldly asserted to be the largest native animals of this continent, or than a calf a year old. I have also considered the assertion, that European animals, introduced into this country, degenerate; and shall only add, on this subject, that there is now in this town a horse, twenty hands, or six feet and eight inches in height, every way wellproportioned, and but four years old; a native of this land of deterioration.

An eagle was not long since killed at Brookfield in Connecticut, which had just destroyed a calf. The American condor is the largest known bird of prey in the world.

With regard to the bodies of the native Americans, Mr. de Pauw and Dr. Robertson acknowledge, that there are

no deformed persons among the savages of America, because they put all children of this description to death. But they assert, that, wherever this species of cruelty is prevented, the proportion of deformed persons is greater than in any country in Europe. It would have been well, if these gentlemen had furnished us some evidence of the truth of these assertions, or at least of their probability. As they have left the story, it can only afford diversion to such as read it on this side of the Atlantic, mingled with pity for its authors.

Deformed people are certainly uncommon in this country; and the inhabitants are as tall, as well made, as strong, as agile, and as handsome, upon an average, to say the least, as those who visit us from the eastern side of the Atlantic.

With regard to the insalubrity of the climate, I shall have occasion to consider the subject in another place.

The great object, at which all this ingenuity is aimed, is, I suspect, the minds of the Americans. Most of the followers of these gentlemen have left to them the task of carrying on a war against the subjects, already specified in these remarks; and have directed their own attacks to the genius, learning, and science, which are found on this side of the Atlantic. As these attacks are peculiarly pointed against the people of the American States, you will cheerfully permit me to pay some attention to them.

There are few questions on which more pedantry, and more prejudice, have been displayed; in which vanity has assumed sillier airs, or reason been oftener put to the blush, than on that, which is so customarily started respecting the comparative genius of different nations. Were it not, that pride is so pleasantly regaled by the incense regularly offered to it, whenever the question is brought up to view, by those who present it, good sense must long ago have been wearied and surfeited, and decency have sickened with the service.

Genius may be generally and accurately defined to be the power of making mental efforts. This definition involves alike what may with propriety be termed logical genius, or the power by which intellectual efforts are made, and rhetorical genius, or that which is seen in the efforts of the imagination and the feelings. The attribute, in both its forms, is unquestionably communicated to some minds more than to others. The great

body of mankind may, I think, be said, with some qualifications, to possess the average share, or genius at the middle point. A few are raised above it, and a few depressed below. The differences among those, who are numbered in either of these classes (differences, which are often very great), are derived chiefly from energy in the individual; from the motives set before him to exert it; and from the incidental advantages, which are furnished to him by the mode and circumstances of his life. This truth is evidenced in a great variety of ways. In many instances, for example, individuals, who have removed from the older settlements in the United States (where they had few motives to exertion, because every thing, which prompts to effort, was already in the possession of others), to the new settlements (where all things of this nature lay equally open to them as to others), have suddenly exhibited talents, which before they were not suspected to possess. So common is this fact, that it is here generally admitted to be a part of the regular course of things.

For similar reasons, operating on other modes of life, the Greeks and Romans, during those periods of their political existence which called for great efforts, and annexed to them splendid rewards, never wanted great men to lead their armies. For the same reasons the French revolution has regularly produced a constant succession of very able generals; and if a considerable number have at any time lost their lives, their places have been immediately filled up by successors equally able. For the same reasons, also, the American and British navies have regularly been supplied with commanders, whose talents have been equal to every achievement within the reach of man.

From these very causes, he, who wishes to satisfy himself, will find derived the whole of that distinction, which attended the four ages, as they are emphatically termed, of genius,

As genius is the power of making efforts, it is obvious that it will never be exerted, or, in other words, the efforts will never be made, without energy; that is, without the resolution, activity, and perseverance, which are necessary to their existence. This energy can never be summoned into action but by motives of a suitable nature, and sufficient mag

nitude, to move the mind. Nor can it act to any considerable purpose, unless attended with proper advantages. Wherever these causes do not meet, the fire will be smothered. Gray wrote sound philosophy, as well as beautiful poetry, in the following fine stanzas :

Full many a gem, of purest ray serene,

The dark, unfathom'd caves of ocean bear:
Full many a flower is born to blush unseen,
And waste its sweetness on the desert air.

Some village Hampden, that with dauntless breast,
The little tyrant of his fields withstood;
Some mute, inglorious Milton, here may rest;
Some Cromwell, guiltless of his country's blood.

Th' applause of listening senates to command,
The threats of pain and ruin to despise,
To scatter plenty o'er a smiling land,
And read their history in a nation's eyes,

Their lot forbade.

How obviously must the real Milton have been inglorious, if he had been mute; and how obviously would he have been mute, notwithstanding all his powers, if his energy had not prompted him; or if commanding motives had not summoned that energy into action.

Various writers have attributed the existence of genius to natural causes, particularly to climate; and many others, who have not made this ascription in express terms, have yet plainly implied their adoption of it in the manner in which they have generally spoken of this subject. In the contemptuous observations concerning America, and, particularly, concerning the United States, to which I have referred above, this doctrine seems to have been taken for granted. Of these gentlemen I ask, whether the Greeks and Romans owed their genius to this cause. If they did, why does not the same climate now produce the same genius? Greeks inhabit Greece still. But where are Homer and Sophocles, Plato and Aristotle, Pericles and Demosthenes? Where are Themistocles, Cymon, Lycurgus, and Epaminondas? The climate of Italy is unaltered. But who would think of looking for Cicero and Livy, Virgil and Horace; or for Tasso, Ariosto, and Father Paul, among the inhabitants of

that country? In a word, whence is it universally the fact, that no climate, and no country, has for any great length of time been productive of this coveted endowment.

I ask again, what is the nature, what the quality of the climate? Must it be temperate? If so, whence were derived the talents of the two Gustavuses, Charles the Twelfth, Peter the Great, Suwarrow, and a long train of others, born and educated under a frozen sky? Or, on the other hand, whence were those of Moses, David, Solomon, Job, Isaiah, and Paul? Whence those of Cyrus, Kouli Khan, Mohammed, Sesostris, and a splendid train of Arabian and Persian poets? Must it be moist? Whence were derived those illustrious inhabitants of dry and parched regions, just now mentioned? Must it be dry? Why were Shakspeare and Milton, Alfred and the Black Prince, Bacon and Newton, born under the dripping canopy of Great Britain? Must it be clear? To what cause then does the world owe Pindar, Pelopidas, and Epaminondas, Erasmus, Grotius, and De Witt? Must it be foggy? How shall we explain the character of Pascal and Montesquieu, Corneille and Racine, Henry the Fourth and Conde?

Perhaps it will be said, however, that salubrity of climate is the immediate cause of this mental superiority. If it were true, that strong health regularly accompanied vigour of mind, if the bodies which last the longest regularly sustained the highest powers of the soul, there would be some reason for resorting to this attribute of climate for an explanation of the difficulty under consideration. But how many of those minds, which have attracted the admiration of mankind, have inhabited frail tenements, and quitted them at a comparatively early period; while the grosser spirits, which occupied the strong barracks of Pratt, and Parr, and Jenkins, and a host of Russian peasants, found them unassailed by disease, and defying death many years beyond a century. At the same time Greece, and Judea, and Arabia, and even Italy, are countries not remarkable for health.

Upon the whole, I believe, with all due respect to the Count and his postillion, that this scheme must be given up. But were we to allow this curious theory all which it solicits, the result would be in the highest degree favourable, in