than Scotus and Aquinas*—and in another place, has expressed himself to the same effect so admirably; and, for our present purpose, so appositly, that we cannot refrain from citing the whole passage: "To which (viz. logic) poetry should be made subsequent or, indeed, rather precedent, as being less subtile and fine, and more simple, sensuous and passionate, I mean not here the prosody of a verse, which they could not but have hit on before, among the rudiments of grammar, but that sublime art which in Aristotle's Poetics, in Horace, and the Italian commentaries of Castlevetro, Tasso, Mazzoni, and others, teaches what the laws are of a true Epic Poem, what of a dramatic, what of a lyric, what decorum is, which is the great masterpiece to observe. This would make them soon perceive what despicable creatures our common rhymers and play-writers be, and shew them what religious, what glorious and magnificent use might be made of poetry both in divine and human things."(Tract: on Education.†)

We have enlarged the more upon this head, because we have uniformly observed, that those who question the utility of classical learning, are at bottom, equally unfavourable to all elegant studies. They set out, it is true, in a high-flown strain, and talk largely about the superiority of modern genius. But the secret is sure to be out at last. When they have been dislodged, one by one, from all their literary positions, they never fail to take refuge in this cold and desolate region of utility. They begin by discoursing magnificently of orators, poets and philosophers, and the best discipline for forming them; and end by citing the examples of A, the broker, or B, the attorney, or C, and D, members of congress, and what not, who have all got along in the world without the least assistance from Latin and Greek. Just as if every body did not know that, as that sage moralist Figaro has it, pour avoir du bien le savoir faire vaut mieux que le savoir; and just as if our supposed great men had troubled

*Areopagitica-So Hor. Epist. i. 2. says of Homer,

-quid sit pulchrum, quid turpe, quid utile, quid non Pleniùs ac meliùs Chrysippo et Crantore dicit.

+ See Bishop Lowth's first and eighteenth Lectures on Hebrew poetry. He cites, among other things, a famous passage on the same subject from the Nov. Organon, 1. ii. c .13, with which we regret that our limits do not permit us to favour the reader. In addition to the instances adduced by that learned and elegant scholar to shew that poets were generally ranked, among the Greeks, with the sophists or philosophers as instructors of mankind, see Isocrates Пapaistis passim—or Οἱ παλαιοὶ φιλοσοφιαν τινὰ λέγουσιν πρώτην τὴν ποιητικήν, εἰσάγουσαν εἰς τον βίον ἡμας ἐκ νέων και διδάσκουσαν ηθη και πάθη και πράξεις μετ' ἡδονῆς. Strabo, 1. i, c. 1. Erastosthenes, who, it seems, thought like Mr. Grimké, had pronounced poetry γραώδης μυθολογια [ἡ δὲ ἐτράπημεν, δοκει μοι χρῆναι ἰέναι, σκοποῦντα (τὰ) κατὰ τοὺς ποιητάς. ουτοι γὰρ ἡμῖν ὥσπερ πατέρες τῆς σοφίας εισι και ysuóves. Plat. Lysis. 213.]

their heads any more about the exact sciences and modern literature, than about the classics, or were not quite as little indebted to Newton, to Milton, or to Tasso, as Virgil and Tully, and just as if an argument, which proves so much, were good for any thing at all!

Assuming it, therefore, that our systems of education are to be founded on more liberal principles, and to aim at loftier objects, we proceed to point out a few other defects in the reasonings of Mr. Grimké. We have already had occasion to observe, in citing some passages from the Discourse, that there prevails throughout the whole of it a singular confusion of ideas, which those quotations were intended to exemplify. This confusion appears to be twofold, and consists, first in not distinguishing between the diffusion of knowledge, and its absolute state or condition; and, secondly, in mistaking the progress of those sciences which are capable of being extended (as metaphysics and moral philosophy are not) by a mere accumulation of details, and an accession of new facts and principles, for a positive improvement or enlargement, rather, of the capacity and powers of the understanding itself.

Examples of the former occur perpetually throughout the whole discourse, but we will content ourselves with the following citations:

"It is not customary to consider the history of science as connected with the history of society. In tracing the development of its principles or their progressive application to practical matters, most authors have instituted no inquiry into their effects, beyond the immediate science itself, or the arts and other sciences connected with or dependent upon it. But what is the value of human learning if it do not bless as well as adorn society; if it enlighten its professors only and not the people? Is it only a matter of speculation for the intellectual powers of man, or of entertainment for his taste? Can its sublimity and beauty be objects of just admiration, unless it improve the condition of the ignorant and oppressed; while it enlightens and corrects, refines and elevates those, on whom the progress and future character of society depend? No. The true glory and excellency of science consist in its aptitude to meliorate the condition of man, and to promote substantial, practical, permanent improvement, in the education and government of the people," &c. p. 11.

"Take the whole body of Grecian plilosophy, natural, political, moral, and social, and we must acknowledge that it exerted scarcely any salutary influence on the mass of the community-that their education was no part of its theory or practice; that it lived and moved, and had its being, almost independently of the very society which it adorned; and left behind no monument, save the writings of its devotees." p. 20.

"It is a melancholy and humiliating reflection, that the genius and learning, the eloquence and taste of Greece and Rome, did so little in the cause of truth, moral, political and philosophical.” p. 21.

Then follows the grand inference

"If the opinion expressed above as to their usefulness in their own day, with a view to the people on whom they conferred dazzling honours, but

not practical blessings, be correct, it becomes a momentous question for those who devote so many precious years to the classics," &c. p. 22.

Now, we find no fault with the great leading idea in these passages when stated in the abstract. We, of course, agree with our author, that the light of knowledge ought to be diffused as widely as possible, and that it is the great distinguishing privilege of modern times, and the surest pledge of the future improvement and happiness of mankind, that, by means of the press, it has been diffused within the last three centuries and a half, and especially in our own day, to an extent altogether unparalleled at any previous period. It is also, we admit, very conceivable that a philosophic mind, of a certain turn, should dwell as Mr. Grimké does, with more complacency and interest, upon these beneficial effects of literature, than upon the beauties of its most perfect works considered merely as objects of curiosity or of taste. But how does this concession benefit the argument against the study of the classics? What does the prodigious diffusion of knowledge in modern times prove, except what nobody ever doubted, that the invention of the art of printing was a great blessing, and that books, nowadays, especially of the coarser stereotype editions, cost a great deal less money, and may be multiplied a great deal more easily than MMS. upon parchment? But what sort of connection is there between the premises and the conclusion in the following proposition-Cicero's writings were not read by as many of his contemporaries as, on account of their extraordinary excellencies, it was desirable they should have been, therefore they ought not to be read at all by us! We would venture to back such an enthymeme against any thing that can be found among the logical exploits of the irrefragable Doctors. Or are we to understand, that the style of the classical authors, which is so remarkable for clearness and simplicity now, was originally cabalistic or esoterical on purpose that "the people" should not understand and profit by them, in imitation of what has been said of the hieroglyphics of the Egyptian priests. Or what are we to understand by it?

With respect to the other notion of our author, that the human understanding is, at some future period (he has not precisely said when, but we presume it will be soon after we shall have thrown off the bondage of classical learning,) to attain to a sort of Patagonian stature, and that too, as we infer, by the natural and inevitable progress of scientific discovery-we confess that it appears to us quite original. According to this new rule, the true measure or exponent of the strength and capacity of the human mind, at any given period, is the bulk of the Encyclopædia for the time being; and of two men, he will be, in point of intellect, the greater, who knows one fact more than the other,

however inferior to him in more important points. According to this notion, the last will always be first, and the disciple necessarily equal, at least, with a good chance of being superior to his master. The honors that have been absurdly paid to Lavoisier and to Newton-to the men whose philosophical and creative minds bring order out of chaos, lay the foundation, discover the principles, and project the great outlines of a system-are due, it seems, to those humble followers, who by an isolated, perhaps, an accidental discovery, add another truth to the general stock. This confusion of two things, so perfectly distinct as extent of knowledge and vigour and originality of genius, needs no comment.*

A late writer, addressing himself to this very subject, remarks, that it is this diffusion of knowledge through the press, "and not the height to which individual genius had soared, that forms the grand distinction between ancient and modern literature. The triumph of modern literature consists not in the point of elevation to which it has attained, but in the extent of its conquests the extent to which it has refined and quickened the mass of mankind. It would be difficult to adjust the intellectual precedence of Newton and Archimides, of Bacon and Aristotle, of Shakspeare and Homer, of Thucydides and Hume; but it may be declared with certainty, that the people of modern nations, in consequence of literature becoming more widely diffused, are become more civilized and enlightened." These remarks are perfectly just, and it is amazing that the speculations of Mr. Grimké did not lead him to the same conclusions. The question, whether the ancient models ought to be studied, has immediate reference to the "intellectual precedence" of the great masters, but it has no connection whatever with the general condition of mankind at that time. Nobody, we believe, ever pretended that Homer lived in a very advanced state of society; yet we never heard that urged as a reason why his poems should

Hæc nostra (ut sæpe diximus) felicitatis cujusdam sunt potius quàm facultatis, et potius temporis partus quàm ingenii, as Bacon expresses it with admirable precision.-Nov. Organ. 1. i. c. 23.

It is curious to observe the revolutions in opinion. It was quite fashionable about 200 years ago, to compare the moderns, in their intellectual relation to the ancients, to a dwarf mounted upon the back of a giant-seeing further, indeed, from the advantage of position, but no more to be compared with the mighty being under him, than any other dependant, with him on whose bounty he subsists. In these times the picture is exactly reversed. The giant is mounted upon the dwarf, and is to go on, it seems, increasing in dimensions, until his stature shall reach the skies. The superstition of Europe believed too much of the pastthe enthusiasm of America expects too much from the future. + Dunlop's Hist. Rom. Literature. Pref.

We beg pardon of the ingenious and elegant writer; in a late number of the Quarterly Review, who, in reviewing Milton's Works, endeavors to make out, that the age of Homer was far from barbarous.

not be read, though we think it is a very good one why they should be.

Before we quit this point, we beg leave to make one other remark. The superiority of the moderns, from the causes just adverted to, is not confined to the mass of mankind-the people only. Great men, also, have been more completely enlightened. Their genius has not been (for it could not be) increased, but it has been purged of many errors and superstitions. Nothing could be more exquisite than the judgment of the Greeks, yet their successors listen with a smile of increduility, or of pity, to many of their opinions. In short, the influence of an enlightened communis sensus, in Quinctilian's use of that phrase*-meaning not our common sense, (for in that, nothing could excel antiquity) but the general conclusions or results of inquiry and reasoning about such subjects as are most universally interesting to mankind-upon the speculations of great and ruling minds, has been very visible. The importance of this restraint upon the caprices and the infirmities of genius will be obvious on a moment's reflection. There is no folly that may not be united to the most splendid talents; and the foremost men of all the world are always more or less affected by the spirit of the age in which they live. Thus, Melancthon was a believer in judicial astrology and a caster of nativities,† and Bacon himself was not exempt from many superstitions of those times.

Hitherto, we think we are safe, in affirming, that the reasonings of Mr. Grimké have utterly failed. We would gladly pursue him through all his paradoxes, but we are alarmed at the length to which our remarks are already run out, and we must be as brief as possible in what is to follow. Our author, as we have seen, denies the ancients all merit "in moral, political and social philosophy," to which he has elsewhere added what he calls the "philosophy of history." We will reserve all these for future occasions, except the first, touching which, we will here submit a few remarks.

Mr. Grimke's assertion that the ancients did nothing in ethics, struck us as one of the boldest (and that is saying much) in his whole discourse. We have been always accustomed to think, that if those refined ages have left us anything, in any department of knowledge, of which the excellence is beyond all dispute, it is (after the Greek geometry, perhaps,) their moral philosophy. We presume it will not be considered as derogating from their merit in this particular, that they did not by mere dint of reasoning, a priori, make themselves partakers in the benefits of the Christian Revelation. Neither do we conceive ourselves

* Institut. Orator. I. i. c. 2.—Communis sensus may there be very well rendered "public, or general opinion.”

+ Jortin's Erasmus, I. 146.