able and interesting scenes present themselves to our view the brilliant fun finking behind the lofty mountains, tinging their fnow-crowned turrets with golden rays; the feathered choir haftening to feek, within their moffy cells, a soft, a filent, and secure repofe; the fhrill crowing of the amorous cock; the folemn and ftately march of oxen. returning from their daily toil; and the graceful paces of the generous fteed. But, amidst the vicious pleasures of a great METROPOLIS, where fense and truth are conftantly despised, and integrity and confcience thrown afide as inconvenient and oppreffive,* the fairest forms of fancy are obfcured, and the pureft virtues of the heart corrupted.

BUT

* In fpeaking thus of the dangers of a Metropolis, the Author can only mean to point out the effects produced by the bad company that infeft it; for in another part of his work he has given an inftance in which THE TOWN is preferable to THE COUNTRY. "The poet Martial," fays he, " on his return to Bibilis, the village of his nativity, in Spain, after having lived thirty-four years among the most learned and enlightened men of Rome, found it a dreary desert, a frightful solitude! Forced to afsociate with perfons who felt no pleasure in the elegant occupations of literature and the sciences, a painful languor feized his mind, and he fighed inceffantly to revifit the beloved METROPOLIS where he had acquired fuch univerfal fame; where his good fenfe, his penetration, his fagacity, were duly applauded; and immortality promised to his writings, by the encomiums they received from the younger Pliny, as poffeffing equal acumen, wit, and ease: but, on the contrary, in the stupid village of Bibilis, his fame and learning only acquired him envy and contempt."

BUT the first and most inconteftible advantage of SOLITUDE is, that it accuftoms the mind to think the imagination becomes more vivid, and the memory more faithful, while the fenfes remain undisturbed, and no external object agitates the foul. Removed far from the tiresome tumults of public fociety, where a multitude of heterogeneous objects dance before our eyes, and fill the mind with incoherent notions, we learn to fix our attention to a fingle fubject, and to contemplate that alone. An author, whofe works I could read with pleasure every hour of my life, fays, "It is "the power of attention which in a great measure "distinguishes the wife and the great from the "vulgar and trifling herd of men. The latter "are accustomed to think, or rather to dream, "without knowing the subject of their thoughts. "In their unconnected rovings they pursue no

end; they follow no track. Every thing floats "loose and disjointed on the surface of their minds; "like leaves fcattered and blown about on the "face of the waters."

THE

* Dr. Blair, the author of the highly celebrated Sermons, and of an excellent work, intitled, "Lectures on Rhetoric and "Belles Lettres," printed at London, for the first time, in the year 1783, and indifpenfably necessary to be studied by every person who wishes to fpeak and write with elegance and propriety.

THE habit of thinking with steadiness and attention, can only be acquired by avoiding the diftraction which a multiplicity of objects always create; by turning our obfervation from external things; and feeking a fituation in which our daily occupations are not perpetually fhifting their course, and changing their direction.

IDLENESS and inattention foon destroy all the advantages of retirement; for the moft dangerous paffions, when the mind is not properly employed, rife into fermentation, and produce a variety of eccentric ideas and irregular defires. It is neceffary, alfo, to elevate our thoughts above the mean confideration of fenfual objects: the unincumbered mind then recalls all that it has read; all that has pleased the eye, or delighted the ear; and reflecting on every idea which either observation, experience, or discourse, has produced, gains new information by every reflection, and conveys the pureft pleasures to the foul. The intellect contemplates all the former fcenes of life; views by anticipation those that are yet to come; and blends all ideas of past and future in the actual enjoyment of the present moment. To keep, however, the mental powers in proper tone, it is neceffary to direct our attention invariably towards fome noble and interefting ftudy.

IT

It may, perhaps, excite a fmile when I affert, that Solitude is the only school in which the characters of men can be properly developed; but it must be recollected, that, although the materials of this study must be amaffed in Society, it is in Slitude alone that we can apply them to their proper ufe. The world is the great scene of our observations; but to apply them with propriety to their refpective objects is exclufively the work of Solitude. It is admitted, that a knowledge of the nature of man is neceffary to our happiness; and therefore I cannot conceive how it is poffible to call those characters malignant and misanthropic, who, while they continue in the world, endeavour to discover even the faults, foibles, and imperfections, of humankind. The pursuit of this species of knowledge, which can only be gained by observation, is furely laudable, and not deserving the obloquy that has been caft on it. Do I, in my medical character, feel any malignancy or hatred to the fpecies, when I ftudy the nature, and explore the secret causes, of those weaknesses and disorders which are incidental to the human frame? when I examine the fubject with the clofeft infpection, and point out, for the general benefit, I hope, of mankind, as well as for my own fatisfaction, all the frail and imperfect parts in the anatomy of the human body?

BUT a difference is fuppofed to exift between the anatomy of the body and the philosophy of

the

the mind. The physician, it is faid, ftudies the maladies which are incidental to the human frame, to apply fuch remedies as the particular occafion may require: but it is contended, that the moralift has a different end in view. This diftinction, however, is certainly without foundation. A fenfible and feeling philofopher views both the moral and phyfical defects of his fellow-creatures with an equal degree of regret. Why do moralists shun mankind, by retiring into Solitude, if it be not to avoid the contagion of those vices which they perceive fo prevalent in the world, and which are not observed by those who are in the habit of seeing them daily indulged without censure or restraint? The mind, without doubt, feels a confiderable degree of pleafure in detecting the imperfections of human nature; and where that detection may prove beneficial to mankind, without doing an injury to any individual, to publish them to the world, to point out their qualities, to place them by a luminous description before the eyes of men, is, in my idea, a pleasure so far from being mischievous, that I rather think, and I truft I fhall continue to think fo even in the hour of death, it is the only real mode of discovering the machinations of THE DEVIL, and destroying the effects of his works. Solitude, therefore, as it tends to excite a difpofition to think with effect, to direct the attention