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Who, with the utmost weight of all their lead,
Maintain against you what yourself have said :-
Philosophers-and poets-and musicians-

Great statesmen-deep in third and fourth editions→
They know all-read all—and (the greatest curse)
They talk of all-from politics to verse:

On points of taste they'll contradict Voltaire ;
In law, e'en Montesquieu they will not spare ;
They'll tutor Broglio in affairs of arms;

And teach the charming d'Egmont higher charms.
See them, alike in great or small things clever,
Replying constantly though answering never:
Hear them assert, repeat, affirm, aver,

Wax wroth. And wherefore all that mighty stir?
This the great theme that agitates their breast-
Which of two wretched rhymesters rhymes the best!

Pray, gentle reader, did you chance to know
One Monsieur D'Aube, who died not long ago?*
One who the disputatious mania woke

Early each morning? If by chance you spoke
Of your own part in some well-fought affair,
Better than you he knew how, when, and where:
What though your own the deed and the renown?
His" letters from the army" put you down:
E'en Richelieu he'd have told-if he attended-
How Mahon fell, or Genoa was defended.
Although he wanted neither wit nor sense,
His every visit gave his friends offence:
I've seen him, raving in a hot dispute,
Exhaust their logic, force them to be mute,
Or, if their patience were entirely spent,
Rush from the room to give their passion vent.
His kinsmen, whom his property allured,
At last were wearied, though they long endured.
His neighbours, less athletic than himself,
For health's sake laid him wholly on the shelf.
Thus, 'midst his many virtues, this one failing
Brought his old age to solitary wailing ;—
For solitude to him was deepest woe-
A sorrow which the peaceful ne'er can know.
At length, to terminate his cureless grief,
A mortal fever came to his relief,

Caused by the great, the overwhelming pang,
Of hearing in the church a long harangue

* I knew him. He was precisely such as he is depicted by M. de Rulière, the author of this epistle. He was intendant of Caën: but the intendancy was taken from him on account of his rage for disputing about the most trivial things with every one that approached him.-VOLTAIRE.

Without the privilege of contradiction:
So, yielding to this crowning dire affliction,
His spirit fled. But, in the grasp of death,
'Twas some small solace, with his parting breath
To indulge once more his ruling disposition,
By arguing with the priest and the physician.
Oh! may the Eternal goodness grant him now
The rest he ne'er to mortals would allow !
If, even there, he like not disputation
Better than uncontested calm salvation.

But see, my friends, this bold defiance made
To every one of the disputing trade,
With a young bachelor their skill to try;
And God's own essence shall the theme supply.
Come and behold, as on theatric stage,
The pitched encounter, the contending rage;
Dilemmas, enthymemes, in close array-
Two-edged weapons, cutting either way;
The strong-built syllogism's ponderous might,.
The sophism's vain ignis fatuus light;

Hot-headed monks, whom all the doctors dread,
And poor Hibernians arguing for their bread,
Fleeing their country's miseries and morasses*
To live at Paris on disputes and masses:
While the good public lend their strict attention
To what soars far above their sober comprehension.

Is, then, all arguing frivolous or absurd?
Was Socrates himself not sometimes heard
To hold an argument amidst a feast?
E'en naked in the bath he hardly ceased.
Was this a failing in his mental vision?
Genius is sure discovered by collision:

The cold hard flint by one quick blow is fired ;-
Fit emblem of the close and the retired,
Who, in the keen dispute struck o'er and o'er,
Acquire a sudden warmth unfelt before.

All this, I grant, is good. But mark the ill:
Men by disputing have grown blinder still.
The crooked mind is like the squinting eye:
How can you make it see itself awry?
Who's in the wrong? Will any answer, “I”?
Our words, our efforts, are an idle breath;
Each hugs his darling notion until death;
Opinions ne'er are altered; all we do
Is, to arouse conflicting passions too.

What a national disgrace, that this allusion to Ireland is as correct sixty years after it was written as ever!-T.

Not truth itself should always find a tongue:
To be too stanchly right, is to be wrong.

In earlier days, by vice and crime unstained, Justice and Truth, two naked sisters, reigned; But long since fled-as every one can tellJustice to heaven, and Truth into a well..

Now vain Opinion governs every age,
And fills poor mortals with fantastic rage.
Her airy temple floats upon the clouds;
Gods, demons, antic sprites, in countless crowds,
Around her throne-a strange and motley mask-
Ply busily their never-ceasing task,

To hold up to mankind's admiring gaze
A thousand nothings in a thousand ways;
While, wafted on by all the winds that blow,
Away the temple and the goddess go.

A mortal, as her course uncertain turns,
To-day is worshipped, and to-morrow burns.
We scoff, that young Antinous once had priests;
We think our ancestors were worse than beasts;
And he who treats each modern custom ill,
Does but what future ages surely will.
What female face has Venus smiled upon?.
The Frenchman turns with rapture to Brionne,
Nor can believe that men were wont to bow
To golden tresses and a narrow brow.
And thus is vagabond Opinion seen

Tosway o'er Beauty-this world's other queen!

How can we hope, then, that she e'er will quit Her vapoury throne, to seek some sage's feet, And Truth from her deep hiding-place remove, Once more to witness what is done above?

And for the learned-even for the wise-
Another snare of false delusion lies ;-

That rage for systems, which, in dreamy thought,
Frames magic universes out of nought;
Building ten errors on one truth's foundation.
So he who taught the art of calculation,
In one of these illusive mental slumbers,
Foolishly sought the Deity in numbers:
The first mechanic, from as wild a notion,
Would rule man's freedom by the laws of motion:
This globe, says one, is an extinguished sun:
No, says another, 'tis a globe of glass:
And when the fierce contention's once begun,
Book upon book-a vast and useless mass-
On Science' altar are profusely strown,
While Disputation sits on Wisdom's throne.

And then, from contrarieties of speech,

What countless feuds have sprung! For you may teach,
In the same words, two doctrines differing quite

As day from darkness, or as wrong from right.
This has indeed been man's severest curse:
Famine and pestilence have not been worse,
Nor e'er have matched the ills whose aggravations
Have scourged the world through misinterpretations.

How shall I paint the conscientious strife?

The holy transports of each heavenly soul-
Fanaticism wasting human life

With torch, with dagger, and with poisoned bowl:
The ruined hamlet and the blazing town,
Homes desolate, and parents massacred,
And temples in the Almighty's honour reared,

The scene of acts that merit most his frown!
Rape, murder, pillage, in one frightful storm,
Pleasure with carnage horribly combined,
The brutal ravisher amaz'd to find

A sister in his victim's dying form!
Sons by their fathers to the scaffold led;
The vanquished always numbered with the dead.
Oh, God, permit that all the ills we know
May one day pass for merely fabled woe!
But see, an angry disputant steps forth—
His humble mien a proud heart ill conceals
In holy guise, inclining to the earth,
Offering to God the venom he distils,
"Beneath all this a dangerous poison lies:
"So-every man is neither right nor wrong,
And, since he never can be truly wise,
"By instinct only should be driven along."
Sir, I've not said a word to that effect.

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"It's true, you've artfully disguised your meaning; "But, Sir, my judgment ever is correct.' Sir, in this case 'tis rather overweening. Let truth be sought, but let all passion yield; Discussion's right, and disputation's wrong: This have I said;-and that at court, in field,' Or town, one often should restrain one's tongue. "But, my dear Sir, you've still a double sense; "I can distinguish-" Sir, with all my heart; I've told my thoughts with all due deference, And crave the like indulgence on your part. My son, all thinking is a grievous crime; "So, I'll denounce you without loss of time."

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Blest would be they who, from fanatic power,
From carping censors, envious critics, free,
O'er Helicon might roam in liberty,
And unmolested pluck each fragrant flower!

VOL. III.

So does the farmer, in his healthy fields,

Far from the ills in swarming towns that spring,
Taste the pure joys that our existence yields,

Extract the honey and escape the sting.

DISTANCE.

A MAN who knows how to reckon the paces from one end of his house to the other, might imagine that nature had all at once taught him this distance, and that he has only need of a coup d'œil, as in the case of colours. He is deceived; the different distances of objects can only be known by experience, comparison, and habit. It is that which makes a sailor, on seeing a vessel afar off, able to say without hesitation what distance his own vessel is from it, of which distance a passenger would only form a very confused idea. ·

Distance is only the line from a given object to ourselves. This line terminates at a point; and whether the object be a thousand leagues from us or only a foot, this point is always the same to our eyes.

We have then no means of directly perceiving distances, as we have of ascertaining by the touch whether a body is hard or soft; by the taste if it is bitter or sweet; or by the ear whether of two sounds the one is grave and the other lively. For if I duly notice, the parts of a body which give way to my finger are the immediate cause of my sensation of softness; and the vibrations of the air, excited by the sonorous body, are the immediate cause of my sensation of sound. But as I cannot have an immediate idea of distance, I must find it out by means of an intermediate idea; but it is necessary that this intermediate idea be clearly understood, for it is only by the medium of things known that we can acquire a notion of things unknown.

I am told that such a house is distant a mile from such a river; but if I do not know where this river is, I certainly do not know where the house is situated. A body yields easily to the impression of my hand; I conclude immediately that it is soft. Another resists; I feel at once its hardness. I ought therefore to feel the angles formed in my eye, in order to determine the

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