113.

"I found the original of my hell, in the world which we inhabit," said Dante, and he said a greater truth than some literary antiquaries can always comprehend.-Ib.

114.

One word more on this long chapter of quotation. (Cur. of Lit. vol. 4. 241.) To make a happy one is a thing not easily to be done. Cardinal du Perron used to say, that the happy application of a verse from Virgil was worth a talent; and Boyle, perhaps too much prepossessed in their favour, has insinuated, that there is not less invention in a just and happy application of a thought found in a book, than in being the first author of that thought. The art of quotation requires more delicacy in the practice than those conceive who can see nothing more in a quotation than an extract. Whenever the mind of a writer is saturated with the full inspiration of a great author, a quotation gives completeness to the whole; it seals his feelings, with undisputed authority. Whenever we would prepare the mind by a forcible appeal, an opening quotation is a symphony preluding on the chords whose tones we are about to harmonize.-Ib.

115.

It is generally supposed that where there is no quotation there will be found most originality, Our writers usually furnish their pages rapidly with the productions of their own soil: they run up a quickset hedge, or plant a poplar, and get trees and hedges of this fashion much faster than the former landlords procured their timber. The greater part of our writers, in consequence, have become so original that no one cares to imitate them; and

those who never quote, in return are seldom quoted. -Ib.

116.

The ancients, who in their writing were not, perhaps, such blockheads as some may conceive, considered poetical quotation as one of the requisite ornaments of oratory. Cicero, even in his philosophical works, is as little sparing of qnotations as Plutarch. Old Montaigne is so stuffed with them, that he owns if they were taken out of him little of himself would remain; and yet they never enjoyed that original turn which the old Gascon has given to his thoughts. I suspect that Addison hardly ever composed a Spectator which was not founded on some quotation, noted in those three folio manuscript volumes which he had previously collected; and Addison lasts, while Steele, who always wrote from first impressions, and to the times, with perhaps no very inferior genius, has passed away, insomuch that Dr. Beattie once considered, that he was obliging the world by collecting Addison's papers, and carefully omitting Steele's.-Ib.

117.

The congenial histories of literature and of art are accompanied by the same periodical revolutions; and none is more interesting than that one which occurs in the decline and corruption of arts, when a single mind returning to right principles, amidst the degenerated race who had forsaken them, seems to create a new epoch, and teaches a servile race once more how to invent!

These epochs are few, but are easily distinguished. The human mind is never stationary; it advances or it retrogrades; having reached its meridian point, when the hour of perfection has gone by, it must merge to its decline. In all art, perfection lapses

into that weakened state too often dignified as classical imitation; but it sinks into mannerism, and wantons into affectation, till it shoots out into fantastic novelties. When all languishes in a state of mediocrity, or is deformed by false tastes, then is reserved for a fortunate genius the glory of restoring another golden age of invention.—Ib.

118.

Taste, when once obtained, may be said to be no acquiring faculty, and must remain stationary; but knowledge is of perpetual growth, and has infinite demands. Taste, like an artificial canal, winds through a beautiful country; but its borders are confined, and its term is limited. Knowledge navigates the ocean, and is perpetually on voyages of discovery.-Ib.

119.

A complete collection of classical works, all the bees of antiquity, may be hived in a glass case; but there we should find only the milk and honey of our youth; to obtain the substantial nourishment of European knowledge, a library of ten thousand volumes will not avail, nor satisfy our inquiries, nor supply our researches even in a single topic. -Ib.

120.

"Il faut manger pour vivre et non vivre pour manger," says the comedian: il faut vivre pour mourir, et mourir pour vivre, says revelation.-Anon.

121.

Such is the power of music. It is the only talent which enjoys itself; all others require witnesses. This gift of Heaven was given to man in his state of innocence; it is the purest of pleasures.

Marmontel.

122.

Solitude is indispensable for literary pursuits. No considerable work has yet been composed, but its author, like an ancient magician, retired first to the grove or the closet, to invocate his spirits. Every production of genius must be the production of enthusiasm. When the youth sighs and languishes, and feels himself among crowds in an irksome solitude, that is the moment to fly into seclusion and meditation. When can he indulge but in solitude the fine romances of his soul? Where but in solitude can he occupy himself in useful dreams by night, and, when the morning rises, fly without interruption, to his unfinished labours? Retirement to the frivolous is a vast desert; to the man of genius it is the enchanted garden of Armida.— D'Israeli.

123.

Exile and death are terrible but to the wickedCicero.

124.

Virtue is nothing else than a constant and perpetual exactitude in following right reason. Now this exactitude is susceptible neither of augmentation nor diminution; and as nothing can be added to it so as to enhance its essence of virtue, so nothing can be taken from it so that it may cease to be virtue.-Ib.

125.

As virtue is the great highway of the mind, so is vice the narrow alley that serpentines.-Ib.

126.

Unjust condemnations cannot confer dishonour.— It is not, therefore, the wood of the gibbet, but the guilt of the crime that is disgraceful.-Ib.

127.

The pleasure of possessing, and the fear of losing, always go together.-16.

128.

Facts are more convincing than arguments.—Ib.

129,

It is a mark of virtue to avoid vice; and true wisdom to lack nonsense.-Horace.

130.

The man of desire is a man of fear; and he that lives in fear lives in slavery.—Ib.

131.

If you can sell your captive, do not kill him; for he will then be of use to you. Nay, he may lead your sheep to pasture; he may plough your lands ; he may navigate your ship, and brave for your welfare the tempest on the deep.-Ib.

132.

Death is the last line of the chapter.—1b.

133.

A liberty taken with caution will be granted.
Et dabitur licentia sumpta prudenter.

134.

Complacent indulgence captivates the mind-
Dextera præcipuè capit indulgentia mentum.

Ib.

Ovid.