The Online Library of Liberty

A project of Liberty Fund, Inc.

• Preface
• Key to Abbreviations and References
• Introduction
• 1.: The Manuscript
• 2.: The Lectures
• 3.: Considerations Concerning the First Formation of Languages
• 4.: Rhetoric and Literary Criticism
• 5.: System and Aesthetics
• Bibliographical Note
• Lectures On Rhetoric and Belles Lettres: Lecture 2D.
• Lecture 3D.: Of the Origin and Progress of Language 1
• Lecture 4tha
• Lecture 5. A
• Lecture 6.THA: Of What Is Called the Tropes and Figures of Speech. B
• Lecture. 7. A
• Lecture. 8. A
• Lecture. 9tha
• Lecture. 10tha
• Lecture. 11 a
• Lecture. 12.THA: Of Composition
• Lecture. 13 a
• | Lecture. 14 a
• Lecture 15tha
• Lecture. 16th. a
• Lecture XVII. A
• Lecture Xviii a
• Lecture. Xixth. a
• Lecture. XX.THA
• Lecture Xxist. a
• Lecture Xxiida
• Lecture Xxiiida
• Lecture Xxivtha
• Lecture XXV. A
• Lecture Xxvitha
• Lecture Xxvii a
• Lecture Xxviiitha
• Lecture Xxix a
• Lecture. Xxx a
• Considerations Concerning the First Formation of Languages,&c. &c.1
• Appendix 1 (see P. 32) the Bee, Or Literary Weekly Intelligencer, For Wednesday, May 11, 1791.
• Appendix 2 Table of Corresponding Passages

Lecture. XXX ^a

Friday

Febry. 18^th 1763

In the last Lecture I mentioned to you that all the orations of the Greeks may be considered as of two sorts, viz. either the publick or the private ones; The first ^b tho composed by orators who made that their profession were nevertheless spoke by the persons themselves and of consequence were adapted to the character of those persons. They ^c are therefore generally adapted to the Character of a Plain or Simple country man who was not in the least acquainted with the ^d niceties of the law. Of this sort I gave you an example from Isaeus. The character he endeavours to maintain is that of a plain sensible man. Lysias again endeavours to appear in the character of a man of the greatest simplicity such as we might expect in a countryman not acquainted with the more refined manners. The Private orations of Demosthenes very much resemble those of Isaeus, as to the character kept up in them. He has not however the orderly arrangement of Isaeus, in the severall parts of his oration, but has in that point more of the manner of Lysias. And if you can conceive the Plainness and Sense ^e | 222 joined with the Simplicity and Elegance of Isaeus you will have a compleat notion of the private Judic[c]iall ^f orations of Demosthenes.

Of Public Orations we have no such great number. There is one of Lycurgus, and 3 of Æschines ^g and of all those of Demosthenes 1 that remain there are but three or four which appear to have been spoken by himself; if we except the Philippicks which are more properly Deliberative orations. Of these orations there are two in which Demosthenes and Æschines ^h accuse each other, as well as those wherein they make their defense. 2 Those are περι στεϕανου and περι παραπρεσβειας, which are two of the most perfect and noblest of any of the Greek orations. That particularly of Demosthenes is the most instructive and most elegant of any wrote by him. In it he accuses Æschines by name of great misconduct in the Embassy he had been sent upon. In that περι στεϕανου Æschines directs his accusation against one Ctespihon ⁱ who had proposed that a Crown should be decreed to Demosthenes; but as the design of it is to prove that | 223 Demosthenes was unworthy of it, the greatest part of the Oration is taken up with him. Neither of these orations produced what they were intended for. But that of Æschines was still less successfull than that of Demosthenes. It was a maxim at Athens that if one had not the 5th part of his judges on his side, who were very ignorant and generally easily influenced, he was to be accounted guilty of Calumny and suffer the Punishment the person accused would if he had been found guilty. Demosthenes tho he seems to have accused Æschines unjustly had nevertheless ⅕ of the Judges, which Æschines had not and was accordingly banished.

The manner of these two orators is considerably different. Æschines has a certain gaiety and livelyness thro all his works which we do not find in the other; who tho’ he has a great deal more of Splendor than the former orators has not near so much as Æschines and still less than Cicero. That disposition for mirth often takes away from the force of his orations in other points, and indeed is not at all fitted for raising any of those passions which are chiefly to be excited by oratory, viz. Compassion | 224 and indignation. This we see ^j is the case in many passages which were proper to have been described in the serious manner, in which he frequently introduces touches of humour which entirely prevent all that effect and prevent either indignation or compassion from being excited as nothing can be more conterary to those passions: But though ^k they do not at all suit with grave parts, are admirably adapted to a genteel and easy railing which appears to have been his peculiar excellence. His humour is always agreable and polite and such as we can attend to with great pleasure; Whereas Demosthenes whenever ^l he attemp<t>s to Rally runs into downright Scurrility and abuse, and abuse such as we could never attend to with patience, as nothing can be more dissagreable than this Coarse sort of Railery, were it not that the earnestness and sincerety of the orator is hereby displayed. As Gaiety and Levity appear in Æschines works so does a certain austere Severity and Rigidity in those of Demosthenes; as it is very well adapted to feel and excite the more violent passions, | 225 so it indisposes him to humour and Ridicule, and we see accordingly that where the best opportunities offered of Rallying his adversary he ^m hardly ever makes advantage of them; tho Æschines never fails to turn them to the best account. ⁿ This last mentioned orator is so agreable in this gay and entertaining temper that even those parts which are in most cases the driest and dullest of any, as the division of the Subject of his Oration, are made as entertaining as we can well conceive anything of that sort will admit of. Thus in the division of that part of his Oration where he intends to shew the misconduct of Demosthenes in his generall conduct, ^o he tells the Judges that Demosthenes said his life might be divided into four periods from one time to another and so on; 3 And that when he came to this part of his Oration Demosthenes was to ask him in which of these he was to accuse him of bad conduct, and that if he did not answer him he was to drag him to the forum and compell to determine which it was or else to give up his accusation. When he does this, says he, I will tell him that it is | 226 not against any of these particularly that my accusation is directed, but that I accuse him in them all together and in them all equally. This manner tho rather somewhat pert, is at the same time very entertaining and would probably fix the division he was to follow in the minds of the Judges.

But tho Demosthenes may be inferior perhaps to his Rivall in some of these more triviall points he has greatly the advantage over him in the more important and weighty parts of his orations. The severe and passionate temper which appears in his works is admirably adapted to the graver and serious parts which alone are capable of raising the passions of Compassion and Indignation, of which the latter particularly all his Orations tend ^p greatly to excite. His Judiciall Orations in most points indeed resemble his Deliberative ones, excepting that we find in the [the] latter more eloquence and passion than ^q is the case which all other authors. For as the Subject of Deliberative orations is politicks or something nearly allied to it, the object of this must be the concerns of a whole people; at a debate concerning | 227 peace or war etc. which tho very important will never affect the passions so highly as the distress of a single person or Indignation against the Crimes of an individuall. When Æschines ^r enters upon these subjects he often misses the effect by the interruption of some stroke of Raillery, as that where he represents Demosthenes hopping into the market place thro grief that he had receivd none of the money which was distributed amongst the Thebans. And when he sets himself purposely to affect the passions in a high degree he generally runs into bombast. As we see in the Exclamation ^s etc. {and severall other passages.} Those actors who enter least into their parts are observed to use more grimace and Gesticulation than those who are greatly affected by what they act; for whatever is affected is found always to be overdone. This is the case with Æschines, his temper was not adapted to gravity, or to be any ways greatly affected by those things which would stir up the [the] passions of more earnest men, so that whenever he attempts any thing of this sort he always outdoes. In all such more interesting events, Æschines has generally little more than Commonplace remarks, and such incidents as happen on every | 228 such like occasion. Thus in the Description he gives of the taking of Thebes, on<e> of the most important events that happened about that time, he dwells greatly on the carrying the old men into Captivity, the Rape of the Virgins and matrons, and other such like which happen on the taking of every City; whereas Demosthenes in describing the taking of Elatea and the confusion this occasiond all Athens, tho the event was of much less moment and the danger which threatend Athens was still at a distance; yet I say he points out the severall circumstances of the confusion, the ^t croud which gathered at the Forum, how everyone looked on the others in expectation that they had discovered some expedient which had escaped him etc. etc. in such an interesting manner and with circumstances so peculiar to the event that it is highly interesting and striking etc.

However as no one is altogether perfect, it is greatly to be suspected that Demosthenes has not divided ^u his Orations in the most happy order; a talent which Æschines ^v and Cicero have possessed in a very high degree. There is in all his orations a confusion in the order of the Arguments and the different parts it consists of, which will appear | 229 to anyone on the slightest attention. Dionysius of Halicarnassus, a Critick of great penetration but whose observations appear sometimes to be rather nice and refind than solid, would persuade us that this confusion is merely apparent and that the order he has chosen is the most happy he could possibly have hit upon. But as far as I can see there is not only an apparent but a real ^w confusion. Thus in the oration ^x περι παραπρεσβειας he begins his oration 4 with telling the people that there were 5 things which a people may ^y [to] expect from an ambassador and these he repeats in order. One should expect from this that he was to begin with the 1^st and having discussed it proceed to the 2^d, from that to the 3^d and so on; but of this we find nothing thro the whole; he begins at the first to give us a narration of the whole story as it happened, and tho we might perhaps reduce all that he has thrown together in that Oration ^z to one or other of these, yet they are not at all classed in that order but told in the very order they happened; and from the whole it appears most probable that this division was added after the oration was wrote, and that when <he> | 230 begun it he had no thought of dividing it, but finding before he got to the conclusion that it would be difficult to observe at what the several parts pointed, he has afterwards prefixed ^a the division, to point out what the hearers were chiefly to consider in the Oration. Æschines on the other hand is very happy in his divisions and, as I said before, attains in them a perfection very seldom met with, as he renders them even entertaining, and to these divisions he adheres very strictly. The best apology we can make for Demosthenes in this defect is that his eagerness, vehemence and passion have hurried him on both in speaking and writing to deliver the severall parts of his oration in the manner they affected him most, without considering in what manner they would give the hearer ^b or reader the clearest notion of what he delivers. {And we see this accordingly is most remarkably the case in those orations which he himself delivered and in which he was most interested}

The characters of these two Orators were we are informed very agreable to that which we would be apt to form from the consideration of their writings. Æschines who was bred a player, 5 an employment as creditable at that time as it is discreditable now, had all the mirth, gaiety and levity which we | 231 find in most of his profession. This temper made his company be greatly sought after by all the young people of his time, as he himself tells us and Demosthenes throws up to him as being noway to his honour. He seems also to have had a goo[o]d deal of the mimick about him; and there are some passages in the oration abovementioned which are evidently intend<ed> to mimick Demosthenes and must have been delivered with his tone and Gesture. This talent of mimickry recommended him to the favour and patronage of Philip, who we are told was extremely delighted with all sorts of mimicks and Buffoons.

Demosthenes on the other hand was of an austere and rigid disposition, which made him not be affected with anything which was not of importance, but at the same time his vehemence made him enter into every thing which was of any moment with the greatest warmth; and prosecute those who seemed to deserve his indignation. This temper made <him> not much entertained with common conversation as there are but few things of importance generally canvassed in it, and at the same time made him not be much desired as a companion, as men of this character | 232 can neither be much intertained by other<s> or be very entertaining. He therefore lived for the most part shut up in his own house seeing and seen by very few. He spent much of his time in the study of the Stoick and Platonick Philosophy, to the latter of which he seems to have been most addicted. He has in most of his passionate and animated passages many of the sentiments of those philosophers, particularly in that where he introduces the famous Oath mentioned by Longinus. 6 And there <are> many pass[s]ages which resemble Plato so much even in the expression that I have been often tempted to believe that he had Copied them from him. I should have given you a translation of these two orations 7 were it not that they are both of them very long and could not be abriged without loosing greatly in their merit. I would however reckommend them greatly to your perusall as they are not only excellent in their way, but also as they give us a very good Abrigement of the History of Greece for a period of considerable length.

There are severall other Greek orators whose works are still remaining but as they are but little read and are generally in private causes | 233 which are commonly not ^c [not] the most entertaining I shall pass them over altogether and proceed to make some observations on Cicero and the Differences betwixt his manner and that of Demos<thenes>.

I have already ^d pointed out some of the Differences betwixt those two great Orators, 8 which appear to me to proceed chiefly from the different conditions and Genius of their two nations. I shall now observe more particularly those which proceed from the differences of character and circumstances of the men themselves.

There is no character in antiquity with which we are better acquainted than with that of Cicero, which is evidently displayed in all his works and in particular must receive great light from his Epistles.—But we may perhaps discover more of the real ^e spirit and turn of his writings by considering his naturall temper, his Education, and the Genius of the times he lived in, than from the Observations of his Criticks. But altho these men have a very extraordinary knack at mistaking his meaning, yet they have not been able to err so grosely with respect to his character, so clearly does it shine out, as the sun now does ^f | 234 thro all his writings. He seems to have ^g by nature [nature] had along with a great degree of Sensibility and Natural parts a considerable share of Vanity and Ostentation. Sensibility is without doubt a most amiable character, and one which is of all others most engaging; We may therefore with justice make some allowance if it be joind with some failings. Now there are no two tempers of mind which are so often combind as Levity in a certain proportion and a great degree of Sensibility. The same temper which disposes one to partake in the joys or misfortunes of others, or to be much affected with ones own, is naturally connected with a disposition that makes one both easily buoyed up by the smallest circumstances of the pleasant kind and depressed with those which are in the least distressing, and at the same time prompts them to communicate their feelings with others no less at the one time than at the other. One who is of a Joyous temper turns every thing that ^h happens to him into an object of pleasure, and dwells on the most minute circumstances; and is no less inclined to communicate it to others. If it happens that he has nothing which immediately calls for any exertion of this happy temper | 235 his happy condition becomes an object of his joy, he looks on himself and his condition with a certain complacense and his joy becomes the object of his Joy; the same disposition which makes him communicate his joy at other times and expatiate on the agreableness of certain things around, makes him now dwell upon himself and be continually talking of the happiness of his circumstances and the joy of his own mind. A morose or melancholy man on the other hand takes everything in the worst light and finds something in it which distresses ⁱ him, and when nothing occurrs which can give him any real distress his own unhappiness becomes his vexation. He continually dwells on the misery of his own disposition which thus turns every thing to his misery.—He talks of himself no less than the Joyous man, and as the one dwells on the happiness of his condition so he insists on the misery of his. A man of great Sensibility, in the same manner, who enters ^j much into the happiness or distress either of himself or others is no less inclind to display these sensations to others, and | 236 in this way will frequently talk ^k of himself and frequently with a good deal of vanity and ostentation. We see that the women, who are generally thought to have a good deal more of Levity and vanity in their temper, are at the same time acknowledged to have more sensibility and compassion in their tempers than the men. The French nation who are thought ^l <to have> more levity and Vanity than most others are reckoned to be the most humane and charitable of any.

Cicero seems in the same way to have been possessed of a very high degree of Sensibility and to have been very easily depressed or elated by the missfortunes or prosperity of his friends {as his letters to them evidently shew, where he enters intirely into their misfortunes ^m } or of himself; which levity of temper tho it might indispose him for Publick business and render him somewhat unsettled in his behaviour would nevertheless be of no small advantage to him as a speaker. {Men of the greatest Calmeness and Prudence are not generally ⁿ the most sensible and Compassionate} It would also make him a very agreable and pleasant companion and dispose him frequently to mirth and | 237 Jovialty. We are told accordingly that his apothegms 9 or sayings were no less esteemed than his orations; Volumes of them were handed about in his life time and his servant Tyro published 7 volumes of them after his death. We may reasonably suppose that one of this temper would be very susceptible of all the different passions but of none more than of pity and compassion, which accordingly appears to have been that which chiefly affected him.

Cicero lived at a time when learning had been introduced into Rome and was indeed but just then introduced. It was in very high reputation and as Novelty generally inhances the value of a thing it was perhaps more highly esteemed than it deserved, and than it was afterwards when they became better acquainted with it. Rhetorick and Dialectick were the Sciences which had then arrived to the greatest perfection and were the most fashionable study amongst all the polite men of Rome. Their | 238 Dialectick was pretty much the same with that of Aristotle though somewhat altered and improved by the Stoicks, who cultivated it more than the Peripatiticks. Their Rhetorick was that of Henagoras ^o which I have already touched upon. To these studies Cicero applied himself with great assiduity till the age of 25. He tells that he disputed under the inspection of some of the most Renowned masters severall hours every day. After this having appeared in two or three causes, one of which was that of Roscius 10 of Almeira, ^p and gain’d no little reputation as a speaker, he went over into Gree<c>e where he staid [a] about two years. This time he employed in attending the Harangues and Discourses of the most Celebrated Orators and Philosophers of the time, under whose direction he wrote and delivered harangues and orations of all sorts. The Eloquence then in fashion in Greece had deviated a good deal from the Simplicity and easiness of Demosthenes but still retained a great deall of familiarity | 239 and Homelyness, which was unknown in ^q the Pleadings at Rome for the reasons I have already pointed out. When he returned from his travells he found a more florid and Splendid Stile to be fashionable at Rome than what he had met with at Athens or the other parts of Greece; and Hortensius, 11 the most Celebrated orator of his time, was more florid and aimd more at the Splendor and Grandeur then esteemd than any other. We would naturally expect of a man of this temper, this Education and in these circumstances the very conduct that Cicero had followd in his works. We should expect that he would aim at that Splendor and dignity of expression which was then fashionable tho conterary to the familiar method which was esteemed in Greece. We may expect that he will be at considerable pains to display his knowledge in those Sciences which were then in highest repute; That we will find in <his> Orations the whole of those parts which were reckoned proper to the form of a regular oration; a Regular exordium, narration where ever the Subject will admit of it, a Proof, a confu| 240tation, and perroration, all regularly marked out [all regularly marked out]. We might expect also that he would even sometimes adhere to the Rhetoricall divisions and topicks where they appeared to be very unsuitable to the cause in hand, as we saw in his Oration for Milo. We may expect also that one of his cast as his temper naturally leads him to compassion will be more inclind to undertake a defense than to accuse; whic<h> we see was the case, and when he has been necessitated to accuse he will insist rather on the missfortunes of the injurd than on the guilt of the Offender; As we see he does in his orations in Verrem, 12 where he dwells chiefly on the misfortunes of some of the oppressed Syracusans etc., touching but little on the crimes ^r of the Praetor. We may expect too that he would have some part of his oration where he would purposely endeavour to move the Compassion of the Judges towards the Injurd persons. This he generally places ^s immediately before the perroration; Which is much preferable | 241 to one placed nearer the beginning; for compassion even when strongest is but a short lived passion. So that the whole influence of it would be lost if it was placd near the beginning before the time came where it was to produce its effect. ^u observes that Cicero generally draws the attention of the Reader from the cause to himself and tho we admire the Orator we do not reap great instruction with regard to the Cause. 13 This observation so far as it is just proceeds from the Digressions which Cicero introduces in many parts of his Orations to raise the passions of his audience, tho sometimes they do not tend to explain the cause. ^t

Demosthenes was very different from this both in naturall temper and the Genius of the Country. He was of an austere temper which was not easily moved but by things of a very important nature, and in all cases his indignation rose much higher than his compassion. His earnestness makes him hurry on from one thing to another without attending to any particular order. Logice or Dialectick was not then | 242 nor was it or Rhetorick ever in such high reputation as they were afterwards at Rome, and accordingly we find no traces of their divisions in his Orations. He frequently has no exordium, at least none distinc<t>ly marked from the narration, and the other parts are in like manner blended together. The Florid and Splendid does not appear in his works, a more easy and familiar one was more esteemd in his time. The passion which animates him in all his orations is Indignation, and this as it is a more lasting passion than Compassion he often begins with and continues in thro a whole oration. The free and easy manner of the Greeks would not admit of any such perroration designed to move the passions as those we meet with in Cicero; and it is not accordingly to be met with in any of the Greek orators. Upon the whole Cicero is more apt to draw our Pity and love and Demosthenes to raise our Indignation. The one is strong and commanding, the other persuasive | 243 and moving. The character Quinctilian gives of Cicero intirely corresponds with this.— — —

Of all the immense number of Orators who are enumerated ^v by Quinctilian, 14 none have come down to us excepting Cicero. With regard to those who preceded him and were his contemporaries we surely may ^w regreat the loss; but as to those who came after him, they are perhaps as well buried in oblivion as if they remained to perplex us.—We see that even Cicero introduces in his Orations severall digressions which tended merely to amuse the Judge without in the least explaining the cause. This became the universall and ordinary practise after his time, insomuch that there were fixt pla[e]ces where these digressions were introduced. There was one betwixt the narration and the proof, of which I can see no design unless it was make the judge forget what they were to prove. There was another betwixt the proof and the confutation and another betwixt that and the perroration, for which I can see no purpose but the same as the former. The whole | 244 of their orations was also filled with figures as they called them, no less usefull than these digressions. We may see how far this was come so soon after Cicero’s time as that of Tiberius, by the Story of one ^x <Albucius>. He when pleading against one <Arruntius> ^y offered to referr it to his oath, which he accepted; 15 But says he, you must swear by the ashes of your father which are unburied etc.; and so on, laying all sort of crimes to his charge. The man accepted the condition but <Albucius> ^z refused to allow him to swear saying that it was only a figure. And when the man insisted on his standing to his word he told them if that was the case there would be an end of all figures. <Arruntius> ^a told him he believed men could live without them, and still insisted on the oaths being put to him, which the judges agreed to. But <Albucius> ^b was so enraged at his figures being thus laid hold on that he swore he should never appear at the bar for the future. He kept his word and we are told he used to brag that he had more hearers at his house listening to his declamations on feigned Causes than others had at their pleading on real ones. | 245 In a short time their Orations came to be nothing but a String of Digressions and figures of this sort one after another, so that we need not wonder at what Quinctilian informs us of, that there were many orations delivered for which the pleader was highly commended when at the same time no one could tell on which side of the cause he was. 16 We need not therefore regret much the loss of these later orations.

I shall now give ye some account of the state of the Judicial eloquence of England, which is very different from that either of Gree<c>e or of Rome. This difference is generally ascribed to the small progress which has been made in the cultivation of language and Stile in this country compared with that which it had arrived to in the Old World. But <tho> this may be true in some degree, yet I imagine there are other causes which must make them essentially different. The eloquence which is now in greatest esteem is a plain, distinct, and perspicuous Stile without any of the Floridity or other ornamentall parts of the Old Eloquence. This and other differences must necessarily arise from the nature of the | 246 courts and the particular turn of the people. The Courts were then ^c much in the same manner as the Jury is now; they were men unskilld in the Law, whose office continued but for a very short time and were often in a great part chosen for the trial of that particular cause, and not from any particular set of men, but often by ballot or rotation from the whole body of the people; and of them there was always no inconsiderable number. The Judges in England on the other hand are single men, who have been bred to the law and have generally or at least are supposed to have a thorough knowledge of the law and are much versed in all the different circumstances of cases, of ^d which they have attended many before ^e either as Judges or pleaders, and are supposed to be acquainted with all the different arguments that may be advanced on it. This therefore cutts them out from a great part of the substance of the old orations. There can here be no room for a narration, | 247 the only design of which is ^f by interweaving those facts for which ^g proof can be brought with others for which no proof can be brought, that these latter may gain credit by their connection with the others. But as nothing is now of any weight for which direct proof is not brought this sort of narration should serve no end. The pleader therefore can do no more than tell over what facts ^h he is to prove, which may often be very unconnected. The only case indeed where he can give a compleat narration of the whole transaction is when he has <a> witness who has been present thro the whole, which can happen but very rarely. {And if he should assert any thing as a fact, as the old orators frequently did, for which he can bring no proof he would be severely reprimanded.} The pleader has here no opportunity of smoothing over any argument which would make against him, as the Judge will perceive it and pay no regard to what he advances in this manner. Nor can he conceal any weak side by placing it betwixt two on which he depends for the proof of it, as this would be | 248 soon perceived. All these ⁱ were particularly directed by the antient Rhetoricians; the innatention and ignorance of the Judges was the sole foundation of it; as [as] this is not now to be expected they can be of no service. The Pleader must be much more Close than those of ancient R<ome> or G<reece>, and we find that those Pleaders are most esteemed who point out the Subject in the clearest and distinctest manner and endeavour to give the Judge a fair idea of the Cause. ^j

A great popular assembly is a great object which strikes the Speaker at first with awe and dread, but as they begin to be moved by the cause and the Speaker himself to be interested in it they then animate him and embolden him. The confusion which he will perceive amongst them will give him courage and rouse his passions. A Single Judge is but a single man and he, attended with a pityfull Jury, can neither strike such awe nor animate the passions. Florid speakers are not at all in esteem. One who was to Storm and Thunder before 5 or 6 persons would be taken for a fool or a madman; Tho the same | 249 behaviour before a Great assembly of the People would appear very proper and suitable to the occasion. It might perhaps seem that the House of Lords which consist of a considerable number might give an opportunity of being more animated and passionate. But in most private causes there are not above 30% ^k of them together. In State trials indeed they are all met, but then the great order and decorum which is kept up there gives no opportunity for expatiating. In all the State trialls which have been published those speeches were most commended which proceeded in the most naturall and plain order; and if ever one brings in any thing that may appear designed to move the passions it must be only by the by, a hint and no more. The order and Decorum of Behaviour which is now in fashion will not admit of any the least extravagancies. The behaviour which is reckoned polite in England is a calm, composed, unpassionate serenity ^l | 250 noways ruffled by passion. Foreigners observe that there is no nation in the world which use so little gesticulation in their conversation as the English. A Frenchman in telling a story that was not of the least consequence to him or any one else will use 1000 gestures and contortions of his face, whereas a well bread Englishman will tell you one wherein his life and fortune are concerned without altering a muscle in his face.—Montain in some of his essays 17 tells us that he had seen the same Opera acted before both an English and an Italian audience; the difference of their behaviour he says was very remarkable; At the time where the one would be dying away in extasies of pleasure the others would not appear to be the least moved. This is attributed by that Judicious Frenchman to their want of Sensibility and ignorance of Music: But in this he seems to be mistaken; For if there is any art thoroughly understood in England it is Musick. The lower[s] sort often ^m evidence a great accuracy of Judgement in it, and the better sort often | 251 display a thorough and most masterly knowledge of it. The real cause is the different idea of Politeness.

The Spaniards notion of Politeness is a Majestick Proud and overbearing philosophic Gravity. A Frenchman again places it in an easy gaiety, affableness and Sensibility. Politeness again in England consists in Composure, calm and u<n>ruffled behaviour. The most Polite persons are those only who go to the Operas and any emotion would there be reckoned altogether indecent. And we see that when the same persons go out of frolick to a Beargarden or such like ungentlemanny entertainment they preserve the same composure as before at the Opera, while the Rabble about express all the various passions by their gesture and behaviour.

We are not then to expect that any thing passionate or exagerated will be admitted in the house of Lords. ⁿ Nothing will be receivd there which is not or at least appears not to be a plain, just and exact account. The pleadings ^o for this reason of the most Celebrated Speakers | 252 appear to us to be little more than the heads of a discourse as we are here accustomed with a more loose way of pleading. If however under this appearance of plainess and candidness the pleader can artfully interweave something which favours his side the effect may often be very great. ^p

The Lords in their speeches to one another always observe the same rules of Decorum and if any thing of passion be hinted at it must be a hint only. We see that those who have made great figures as speakers in the house of Commons, where a very loose manner and often a great deal of Ribaldry and abuse is admitted of, lost their character when transferred into the upper house. For tho they were sensible that the manner they had been acc[o]ustomed to ^q was not at all proper there yet it was not in their power to lay it aside all at once. Many of the speeches of the | 253 State trials must have had a great deal of their effect from the delivery and Emphasis with which the different heads, for little more can here be admitted of, were delivered: That of Atterbury 18 which is spoken of with Rapture by all who heard it, appears to us confused and unnanimated, tho it certainly produce(d) a wonderfull effect on the hearers. ^r —Floridity and Splendor has allway<s> been disliked. Sir Robert Walpoles speech on ^s was for its being somewhat of this sort called by way of derision an Oration.

I shall only observe farther on this head that the idea of English Eloquence hinted at here is very probably a just one, as the two most admired orators, Lord Mansefield and Sir Wm. Pym, spoke exactly in the same manner tho very distant in their time. 19 The former however ^t is to us more agreable on account of the langu[e]age and is without doubt greatly more perspicuous and orderly.

CONSIDERATIONS CONCERNING THE FIRST FORMATION of LANGUAGES, AND THE Different Genius of original and compounded LANGUAGES.

Considerations Concerning the First Formation of Languages,&c. &c.1

The assignation of particular names, to denote particular objects, that is, the institution of nouns substantive, would probably, be one of the first steps towards the formation of language. Two savages, 2 who had never been taught to speak, but had been bred up remote from the societies of men, would naturally begin to form that language by which they would endeavour to make their mutual wants intelligible to each other, by uttering certain sounds, whenever they meant to denote certain objects. Those objects only which were most familiar to them, and which they had most frequent occasion to mention, would have particular names assigned to them. The particular cave whose covering sheltered them from the weather, the particular tree whose fruit relieved their hunger, the particular fountain whose water allayed their thirst, would first be denominated by the words cave, tree, fountain, or by whatever other appellations they might think proper, in that primitive jargon, to mark them. Afterwards, when the more enlarged experience of these savages had led them to observe, and their necessary occasions obliged them to make mention of other caves, and other trees, and other fountains, they would naturally bestow, upon each of those new objects, the same name, by which they had been accustomed to express the similar object they were first acquainted with. The new objects had none of them any name of its own, but each of them exactly resembled another object, which had such an appellation. It was impossible that those savages could behold the new objects, without recollecting the old ones; and the name of the old ones, to which the new bore so close a resemblance. When they had occasion, therefore, to mention, or to point out to each other, any of the new objects, they would naturally utter the name of the correspondent old one, of which the idea could not fail, at that instant, to present itself to their memory in the strongest and liveliest manner. And thus, those words, which were originally the proper names of individuals, would each of them insensibly become the common name of a multitude. A child that is just learning to speak, calls every person who comes to the house its papa or its mama; and thus bestows upon the whole species those names which it had been taught to apply to two individuals. I have known a clown, who did not know the proper name of the river which ran by his own door. It was ^athe river, he said, and he never heard any other name for it. His experience, it seems, had not led him to observe any other river. The general word river^a , therefore, was, it is evident, in his acceptance of it, a proper name, signifying an individual object. If this person had been carried to another river, would he not readily have called it a river? Could we suppose any person living on the banks of the Thames so ignorant, as not to know the general word river, but to be acquainted only with the particular word Thames, if he was brought to any other river, would he not readily call it a^bThames? This, in reality, is no more than what they, who are well acquainted with the general word, are very apt to do. An Englishman, describing any great river which he may have seen in some foreign country, naturally says, that it is another Thames. The Spaniards, when they first arrived upon the coast of Mexico, and observed the wealth, populousness, and habitations of that fine country, so much superior to the savage nations which they had been visiting for some time before, cried out, that it was another Spain. Hence it was called New Spain; and this name has stuck to that unfortunate country ever since. We say, in the same manner, of a hero, that he is an Alexander; of an orator, that he is a Cicero; of a philosopher, that he is a Newton. This way of speaking, which the grammarians call an Antonomasia, and which is still extremely common, though now not at all necessary, demonstrates how much mankind are naturally disposed to give to one object the name of any other, which nearly resembles it, and thus to denominate a multitude, by what originally was intended to express an individual.

It is this application of the name ^c of an individual to a great multitude of objects, whose resemblance naturally recalls the idea of that individual, and of the name which expresses it, that seems originally to have given occasion to the formation of those classes and assortments, which, in the schools, are called genera and species, and of which the ingenious and eloquent M. Rousseau of Geneva * finds himself so much at a loss to account for the origin. What constitutes a species is merely a number of objects, bearing a certain degree of resemblance to one another, and on that account denominated by a single appellation, which may be applied to express any one of them.

When the greater part of objects had thus been arranged under their proper classes and assortments, distinguished by such general names, it was impossible that the greater part of that almost infinite number of individuals, comprehended under each particular assortment or species, could have any peculiar or proper names of their own, distinct from the general name of the species. When there was occasion, therefore, to mention any particular object, it often became necessary to distinguish it from the other objects comprehended under the same general name, either, first, by its peculiar qualities; or, secondly, by the peculiar relation which it stood in to some other things. Hence the necessary origin of two other sets of words, of which the one should express quality; the other, relation.

Nouns adjective 4 are the words which express quality considered as qualifying, or, as the schoolmen say, in concrete with, some particular subject. Thus the word green expresses a certain quality considered as qualifying, or as in concrete with, the particular subject to which it may be applied. Words of this kind, it is evident, may serve to distinguish particular objects from others comprehended under the same general appellation. The words green tree, for example, might serve to distinguish a particular tree from others that were withered or blasted.

Prepositions are the words which express relation considered, in the same manner, in concrete with the co–relative object. Thus the prepositions of, to, for, with, by, above, below, &c. ^d denote some relation subsisting between the objects expressed by the words between which the prepositions are placed; and they denote that this relation is considered in concrete with the co–relative object. Words of this kind serve to distinguish particular objects from others of the same species, when those particular objects cannot be so properly marked out by any peculiar qualities of their own. When we say, the green tree of the meadow, for example, we distinguish a particular tree, not only by the quality which belongs to it, but by the relation which it stands in to another object.

As neither quality nor relation can exist in abstract, it is natural to suppose that the words which denote them considered in concrete, the way in which we always see them subsist, would be of much earlier invention than those which express them considered in abstract, the way in which we never see them subsist. The words green and blue would, in all probability, be sooner invented than the words greenness and blueness; the words above and below, than the words superiority and inferiority. To invent words of the latter kind requires a much greater effort of abstraction than to invent those of the former. It is probable, therefore, that such abstract terms would be of much later institution. Accordingly, their etymologies generally shew ^e that they are so, they being generally derived from others that are concrete.

But though the invention of nouns adjective be much more natural than that of the abstract nouns substantive derived from them, it would still, however, require a considerable degree of abstraction and generalization. Those, for example, who first invented the words green, blue, red, and the other names of colours, must have observed and compared together a great number of objects, must have remarked their resemblances and dissimilitudes in respect of the quality of colour, and must have arranged them, in their own minds, into different classes and assortments, according to those resemblances and dissimilitudes. An adjective is by nature a general, and in some measure an abstract word, and necessarily presupposes the idea of a certain species or assortment of things, to all of which it is equally applicable. The word green could not, as we were supposing might be the case of the word cave, have been originally the name of an individual, and afterwards have become, by what ^f grammarians call an Antonomasia, the name of a species. The word green denoting, not the name of a substance, but the peculiar quality of a substance, must from the very first have been a general word, and considered as equally applicable to any other substance possessed of the same quality. The man who first distinguished a particular object by the epithet of green, must have observed other objects that were not green, from which he meant to separate it by this appellation. The institution of this name, therefore, supposes comparison. It likewise supposes some degree of abstraction. The person who first invented this appellation must have distinguished the quality from the object to which it belonged, and must have conceived the object as capable of subsisting without the quality. The invention, therefore, even of the simplest nouns adjective, must have required more metaphysics than we are apt to be aware of. The different mental operations, of arrangement or classing, of comparison, and of abstraction, must all have been employed, before even the names of the different colours, the least metaphysical of all nouns adjective, could be instituted. From all which I infer, that when languages were beginning to be formed, nouns adjective would by no means be the words of the earliest invention.

There is another expedient for denoting the different qualities of different substances, which as it requires no abstraction, nor any conceived separation of the quality from the subject, seems more natural than the invention of nouns adjective, and which, upon this account, could hardly fail, in the first formation of language, to be thought of before them. This expedient is to make some variation upon the noun substantive itself, according to the different qualities which it is endowed with. Thus, in many languages, the qualities both of sex and of the want of sex, are expressed by different terminations in the nouns substantive, which denote objects so qualified. In Latin, for example, lupus, lupa; equus, equa; juvencus, juvenca; Julius, Julia; Lucretius, Lucretia, &c. denote the qualities of male and female in the animals and persons to whom such appellations belong, without needing the addition of any adjective for this purpose. On the other hand, the words forum, pratum, plaustrum, denote by their peculiar termination the total absence of sex in the different substances which they stand for. Both sex, and the want of all sex, being naturally considered as qualities modifying and inseparable from the particular substances to which they belong, it was natural to express them rather by a modification in the noun substantive, than by any general and abstract word expressive of this particular species of quality. The expression bears, it is evident, in this way, a much more exact analogy to the idea or object which it denotes, than in the other. The quality appears, in nature, as a modification of the substance, and as ^g it is thus expressed, in language, by a modification of the noun substantive, which denotes that substance, the ^h quality and the subject are, in this case, blended together, if I may say so, in the expression, in the same manner as they appear to be in the object and in the idea. Hence the origin of the masculine, feminine, and neutral genders, in all the ancient languages. By means of these, the most important of all distinctions, that of substances into animated and inanimated, and that of animals into male and female, seem ⁱ to have been sufficiently marked without the assistance of adjectives, or of any general names denoting this most extensive species of qualifications.

There are no more than these three genders in any of the languages with which I am acquainted; that is to say, the formation of nouns substantive can, by itself, and without the accompaniment of adjectives, express no other qualities but those three above mentioned ^j , the qualities of male, of female, of neither male nor female. I should not, however, be surprised, if, in other languages with which I am unacquainted, the different formations ^k of nouns substantive ^l should be capable of expressing many other different qualities. The different diminutives of the Italian, and of some other languages, do, in reality, sometimes, express a great variety of different modifications in the substances denoted by those nouns which undergo such variations.

It was impossible, however, that nouns substantive could, without losing altogether their original form, undergo so great a number of variations, as would be sufficient to express that almost infinite variety of qualities, by which it might, upon different occasions, be necessary to specify and distinguish them. Though the different formation of nouns substantive, therefore, might, for some time, forestall the necessity of inventing nouns adjective, it was impossible that this necessity could be forestalled altogether. When nouns adjective came to be invented, it was natural that they should be formed with some similarity to the substantives, to which they were to serve as epithets or qualifications. Men would naturally give them the same terminations with the substantives to which they were first applied, and from that love of similarity of sound, from that delight in the returns of the same syllables, which is the foundation of analogy in all languages, they would be apt to vary the termination of the same adjective, according as they had occasion to apply it to a masculine, to a feminine, or to a neutral substantive. They would say, magnus lupus, magna lupa, magnum pratum, when they meant to express a great he wolf, a great she wolf, a great meadow.

This variation, in the termination of the noun adjective, according to the gender of the substantive, which takes place in all the ancient languages, seems to have been introduced chiefly for the sake of a certain similarity of sound, of a certain species of rhyme, which is naturally so very agreeable to the human ear. Gender, it is to be observed, cannot properly belong to a noun adjective, the signification of which is always precisely the same, to whatever species of substantives it is applied. When we say, a great^mman, a great woman^m , the word great has precisely the same meaning in both cases, and the difference of the ⁿ sex in the subjects to which it may be applied, makes no sort of difference in its signification. Magnus, magna, magnum, in the same manner, are words which express precisely the same quality, and the change of the termination is accompanied with no sort of variation in the meaning. Sex and gender are qualities which belong to substances, but cannot belong to the qualities of substances. In general, no quality, when considered in concrete, or as qualifying some particular subject, can itself be conceived as the subject of any other quality; though when considered in abstract it may. No adjective therefore can qualify any other adjective. A great good man, means a man who is both great and good. Both the adjectives qualify the substantive; they do not qualify one another. On the other hand, when we say, the great goodness of the man, the word goodness denoting a quality considered in abstract, which may itself be the subject of other qualities, is upon that account capable of being qualified by the word great.

If the original invention of nouns adjective would be attended with so much difficulty, that of prepositions would be accompanied with yet more. Every preposition, as I have already observed, denotes some relation considered in concrete with the co–relative object. The preposition above, for example, denotes the relation of superiority, not in abstract, as it is expressed by the word superiority, but in concrete with some co–relative object. In this phrase, for example, the tree above the cave, the word above expresses a certain relation between the tree and the cave, and it expresses this relation in concrete with the co–relative object, the cave. A preposition always requires, in order to complete the sense, some other word to come after it; as may be observed in this particular instance. Now, I say, the original invention of such words would require a yet greater effort of abstraction and generalization, than that of nouns adjective. First of all, a relation is, in itself, a more metaphysical object than a quality. Nobody can be at a loss to explain what is meant by a quality; but few people will find themselves able to express, very distinctly, what is understood by a relation. Qualities are almost always the objects of our external senses; relations never are. No wonder, therefore, that the one set of objects should be so much more comprehensible than the other. Secondly, though prepositions always express the relation which they stand for, in concrete with the co–relative object, they could not have originally been formed without a considerable effort of abstraction. A preposition denotes a relation, and nothing but a relation. But before men could institute a word, which signified a relation, and nothing but a relation, they must have been able, in some measure, to consider this relation abstractedly from the related objects; since the idea of those objects does not, in any respect, enter into the signification of the preposition. The invention of such a word, therefore, must have required a considerable degree of abstraction. Thirdly, a preposition is from its nature a general word, which, from its very first institution, must have been considered as equally applicable to denote any other similar relation. The man who first invented the word above, must not only have distinguished, in some measure, the relation of superiority from the objects which were so related, but he must also have distinguished this relation from other relations, such as, from the relation of inferiority denoted by the word below, from the relation of juxtaposition, expressed by the word beside, and the like. He must have conceived this word, therefore, as expressive of a particular sort or species of relation distinct from every other, which could not be done without a considerable effort of comparison and generalization.

Whatever were the difficulties, therefore, which embarrassed the first invention of nouns adjective, the same, and many more, must have embarrassed that of prepositions. If mankind, therefore, in the first formation of languages, seem to have, for some time, evaded the necessity of nouns adjective, by varying the termination of the names of substances, according as these varied in some of their most important qualities, they would much more find themselves under the necessity of evading, by some similar contrivance, the yet more difficult invention of prepositions. The different cases in the ancient languages is a contrivance of precisely the same kind. The genitive and dative cases, in Greek and Latin, evidently supply the place of the ^o prepositions; and by a variation in the noun substantive, which stands for the co–relative term, express the relation which subsists between what is denoted by that noun substantive, and what is expressed by some other word in the sentence. In these expressions, for example, fructus arboris, the fruit of the tree; sacer Herculi, sacred to Hercules; the variations made in the co–relative words, arbor and Hercules, express the same relations which are expressed in English by the prepositions of and to.

To express a relation in this manner, did not require any effort of abstraction. It was not here expressed by a peculiar word denoting relation and nothing but relation, but by a variation upon the co–relative term. It was expressed here, as it appears in nature, not as something separated and detached, but as thoroughly mixed and blended with the co–relative object.

To express relation in this manner, did not require any effort of generalization. The words arboris and Herculi, while they involve in their signification the same relation expressed by the English prepositions of and to, are not, like those prepositions, general words, which can be applied to express the same relation between whatever other objects it might be observed to subsist.

To express relation in this manner did not require any effort of comparison. The words arboris and Herculi are not general words intended to denote a particular species of relations which the inventors of those expressions meant, in consequence of some sort of comparison, to separate and distinguish from every other sort of relation. ^p The example, indeed, of this contrivance would soon probably ^q be followed, and whoever had occasion to express a similar relation between any other objects would be very apt to do it by making a similar variation on the name of the co–relative object. This, I say, would probably, or rather certainly happen; but it would happen without any intention or foresight in those who first set the example, and who never meant to establish any general rule. The general rule would establish itself insensibly, and by slow degrees, in consequence of that love of analogy and similarity of sound, which is the foundation of by far the greater part of the rules of grammar.

To express relation, therefore, by a variation in the name of the co–relative object, requiring neither abstraction, nor generalization, nor comparison of any kind, would, at first, be much more natural and easy, than to express it by those general words called prepositions, of which the first invention must have demanded some degree of all those operations.

The number of cases is different in different languages. There are five in the Greek, six in the Latin, and there are said to be ten in the Armenian 5 language. It must have naturally happened that there should be a greater or a smaller number of cases, according as in the terminations of nouns substantive the first formers of any language happened to have established a greater or a smaller number of variations, in order to express the different relations they had occasion to take notice of, before the invention of those more general and abstract prepositions which could supply their place.

It is, perhaps, worth while to observe that those prepositions, which in modern languages hold the place of the ancient cases, are, of all others, the most general, and abstract, and metaphysical; and of consequence, would probably be the last invented. Ask any man of common acuteness, What relation is expressed by the preposition above? He will readily answer, that of superiority. By the preposition below? He will as quickly reply, that of inferiority. But ask him, what relation is expressed by the preposition of, and, if he has not beforehand employed his thoughts a good deal upon these subjects, you may safely allow him a week to consider of his answer. The prepositions above and below do not denote any of the relations expressed by the cases in the ancient languages. But the preposition of, denotes the same relation, which is in them expressed by the genitive case; and which, it is easy to observe, is of a very metaphysical nature. The preposition of, denotes relation in general, considered in concrete with the co–relative object. It marks that the noun substantive which goes before it, is somehow or other related to that which comes after it, but without in any respect ascertaining, as is done by the preposition above, what is the peculiar nature of that relation. We often apply it, therefore, to express the most opposite relations; because, the most opposite relations agree so far that each of them comprehends in it the general idea or nature of a relation. We say, the father of the son, and the son of the father; the fir–trees of the forest,^r and the forest of the fir–trees. The relation in which the father stands to the son, is, it is evident, a quite opposite relation to that in which the son stands to the father; that in which the parts stand to the whole, is quite opposite to that in which the whole stands to the parts. The word of, however, serves very well to denote all those relations, because in itself it denotes no particular relation, but only relation in general; and so far as any particular relation is collected from such expressions, it is inferred by the mind, not from the preposition itself, but from the nature and arrangement of the substantives, between which the preposition is placed.

What I have said concerning the preposition of, may in some measure be applied to the prepositions to, for, with, by, and to whatever other prepositions are made use of in modern languages, to supply the place of the ancient cases. They all of them express very abstract and metaphysical relations, which any man, who takes the trouble to try it, will find it extremely difficult to express by nouns substantive, in the same manner as we may express the relation denoted by the preposition above, by the noun substantive superiority. They all of them, however, express some specific relation, and are, consequently, none of them so abstract as the preposition of, which may be regarded as by far the most metaphysical of all prepositions. The prepositions, therefore, which are capable of supplying the place of the ancient cases, being more abstract than the other prepositions, would naturally be of more difficult invention. The relations at the same time which those prepositions express, are, of all others, those which we have most frequent occasion to mention. The prepositions above, below, near, within, without, against, &c. are much more rarely made use of, in modern languages, than the prepositions of, to, for, with, from, by. A preposition of the former kind will not occur twice in a page; we can scarce compose a single sentence without the assistance of one or two of the latter. If these latter prepositions, therefore, which supply the place of the cases, would be of such difficult invention on account of their abstractedness, some expedient, to supply their place, must have been of indispensable necessity, on account of the frequent occasion which men have to take notice of the relations which they denote. But there is no expedient so obvious, as that of varying the termination of one of the principal words.

It is, perhaps, unnecessary to observe, that there are some of the cases in the ancient languages, which, for particular reasons, cannot be represented by any prepositions. These are the nominative, accusative, and vocative cases. In those modern languages, which do not admit of any such variety in the terminations of their nouns substantive, the correspondent relations are expressed by the place of the words, and by the order and construction of the sentence.

As men have frequently occasion to make mention of multitudes as well as of single objects, it became necessary that they should have some method of expressing number 6 . Number may be expressed either by a particular word, expressing number in general, such as the words many, more, &c. or by some variation upon the words which express the things numbered. It is this last expedient which mankind would probably have recourse to, in the infancy of language. Number, considered in general, without relation to any particular set of objects numbered, is one of the most abstract and metaphysical ideas, which the mind of man is capable of forming; and, consequently, is not an idea, which would readily occur to rude mortals, who were just beginning to form a language. They would naturally, therefore, distinguish when they talked of a single, and when they talked of a multitude of objects, not by any metaphysical adjectives, such as the English a, an, many, but by a variation upon the termination of the word which signified the objects numbered. Hence the origin of the singular and plural numbers, in all the ancient languages; and the same distinction has likewise been retained in all the modern languages, at least, in the greater part of words.

All primitive and uncompounded languages seem to have a dual, as well as a plural number. This is the case of the Greek, and I am told of the Hebrew, of the Gothic, and of many other languages 7 . In the rude beginnings of society, one, two, and more, might possibly be all the numeral distinctions which mankind would have any occasion to take notice of. These they would find it more natural to express, by a variation upon every particular noun substantive, than by such general and abstract words as one, two, three, four, &c. These words, though custom has rendered them familiar to us, express, perhaps, the most subtile and refined abstractions, which the mind of man is capable of forming. Let any one consider within himself, for example, what he means by the word three, which signifies neither three shillings, nor three pence, nor three men, nor three horses, but three in general; and he will easily satisfy himself that a word, which denotes so very metaphysical an abstraction, could not be either a very obvious or a very early invention. I have read of some savage nations, whose language was capable of expressing no more than the three first numeral distinctions. But whether it expressed those distinctions by three general words, or by variations upon the nouns substantive, denoting the things numbered, I do not remember to have met with any thing which could determine.

As all the same relations which subsist between single, may likewise subsist between numerous objects, it is evident there would be occasion for the same number of cases in the dual and in the plural, as in the singular number. Hence the intricacy and complexness of the declensions in all the ancient languages. In the Greek there are five cases in each of the three numbers, consequently fifteen in all.

As nouns adjective, in the ancient languages, varied their terminations according to the gender of the substantive to which they were applied, so did they likewise, according to the case and the number. Every noun adjective in the Greek language, therefore, having three genders, and three numbers, and five cases in each number, may be considered as having five and forty different variations. The first formers of language seem to have varied the termination of the adjective, according to the case and the number of the substantive, for the same reason which made them vary it according to the gender; ^s the love of analogy, and of a certain regularity of sound. In the signification of adjectives there is neither case nor number, and the meaning of such words is always precisely the same, notwithstanding all the variety of termination under which they appear. Magnus vir, magni viri, magnorum virorum; a great man, of a great man, of great men; in all these expressions the words magnus, magni, magnorum, as well as the word great, have precisely one and the same signification, though ^t the substantives to which they are applied have not. The difference of termination in the noun adjective is accompanied with no sort of difference in the meaning. An adjective denotes the qualification of a noun substantive. But the different relations in which that noun substantive may occasionally stand, can make no sort of difference upon its qualification.

If the declensions of the ancient languages are so very complex, their conjugations are infinitely more so. And the complexness of the one is founded upon the same principle with that of the other, the difficulty of forming, in the beginnings of language, abstract and general terms.

Verbs must necessarily have been coëval ^u with the very first attempts towards the formation of language. No affirmation can be expressed without the assistance of some verb. We never speak but in order to express our opinion that something either is or is not. But the word denoting this event, or this matter of fact, which is the subject of our affirmation, must always be a verb.

Impersonal verbs, which express in one word a complete event, which preserve in the expression that perfect simplicity and unity, which there always is in the object and in the idea, and which suppose no abstraction, or metaphysical division of the event into its several constituent members of subject and attribute, would, in all probability, be the species of verbs first invented. The verbs pluit, it rains; ningit^v, it snows; tonat, it thunders; lucet, it is day; turbatur, there is a confusion, &c. each of them express a complete affirmation, the whole of an event, with that perfect simplicity and unity with which the mind conceives it in nature. On the contrary, the phrases, Alexander ambulat, Alexander walks; Petrus sedet, Peter sits, divide the event, as it were, into two parts, the person or subject, and the attribute, or matter of fact, affirmed of that subject. But in nature, the idea or conception of Alexander walking, is as perfectly and completely one simple conception, as that of Alexander not walking. The division of this event, therefore, into two parts, is altogether artificial, and is the effect of the imperfection of language, which, upon this, as upon many other occasions, supplies, by a number of words, the want of one, which could express at once the whole matter of fact that was meant to be affirmed. Every body must observe how much more simplicity there is in the natural expression, pluit, than in the more artifical expressions, imber decidit, the rain falls; or tempestas est pluvia, the weather is rainy. In these two last expressions, the simple event, or matter of fact, is artificially split and divided in the one, into two; in the other, into three parts. In each of them it is expressed by a sort of grammatical circumlocution, of which the significancy is founded upon a certain metaphysical analysis of the component parts of the idea expressed by the word pluit. The first verbs, therefore, perhaps even the first words, made use of in the beginnings of language, would in all probability be such impersonal verbs. It is observed accordingly, I am told, by the Hebrew grammarians, that the radical words of their language, from which all the others are derived, are all of them verbs, and impersonal verbs.

It is easy to conceive how, in the progress of language, those impersonal verbs should become personal. Let us suppose, for example, that the word venit, it comes, was originally an impersonal verb, and that it denoted, not the coming of something in general, as at present, but the coming of a particular object, such as the Lion.^w The first savage inventors of language, we shall suppose, when they observed the approach of this terrible animal, were accustomed to cry out to one another, venit, that is, the lion comes; and that this word thus expressed a complete event, without the assistance of any other. Afterwards, when, on the further progress of language, they had begun to give names to particular substances, whenever they observed the approach of any other terrible object, they would naturally join the name of that object to the word venit, and cry out, venit ursus, venit lupus. By degrees the word venit would thus come to signify the coming of any terrible object, and not merely the coming of the lion. It would now, therefore, express, not the coming of a particular object, but the coming of an object of a particular kind. Having become more general in its signification, it could no longer represent any particular distinct event by itself, and without the assistance of a noun substantive, which might serve to ascertain and determine its signification. It would now, therefore, have become a personal, instead of an impersonal verb. We may easily conceive how, in the further progress of society, it might still grow more general in its signification, and come to signify, as at present, the approach of any thing whatever, whether good, bad, or indifferent.

It is probably in some such manner as this, that almost all verbs have become personal, and that mankind have learned by degrees to split and divide almost every event into a great number of metaphysical parts, expressed by the different parts of speech, variously combined in the different members of every phrase and sentence * . The same sort of progress seems to have been made in the art of speaking as in the art of writing. When mankind first began to attempt to express their ideas by writing, every character represented a whole word. But the number of words being almost infinite, the memory found itself quite loaded and oppressed by the multitude of characters which it was obliged to retain. Necessity taught them, therefore, to divide words into their elements, and to invent characters which should represent, not the words themselves, but the elements of which they were composed. In consequence of this invention, every particular word came to be represented, not by one character, but by a multitude of characters; and the expression of it in writing became much more intricate and complex than before. But though particular words were thus represented by a greater number of characters, the whole language was expressed by a much smaller, and about four and twenty letters were found capable of supplying the place of that immense multitude of characters, which were requisite before. In the same manner, in the beginnings of language, men seem to have attempted to express every particular event, which they had occasion to take notice of, by a particular word, which expressed at once the whole of that event. But as the number of words must, in this case, have become really infinite, in consequence of the really infinite variety of events, men found themselves partly compelled by necessity, and partly conducted by nature, to divide every event into what may be called its metaphysical elements, and to institute words, which should denote not so much the events, as the elements of which they were composed. The expression of every particular event, became in this manner more intricate and complex, but the whole system of the language became more coherent, more connected, more easily retained and comprehended.

When verbs, from being originally impersonal, had thus, by the division of the event into its metaphysical elements, become personal, it is natural to suppose that they would first be made use of in the third person singular. No verb is ever used impersonally in our language, nor, so far as I know, in any other modern tongue. But in the ancient languages, whenever any verb is used impersonally, it is always in the third person singular. The termination of those verbs, which are still always impersonal, is constantly the same with that of the third person singular of personal verbs. The consideration of these circumstances, joined to the naturalness of the thing itself, may serve to convince us that verbs first became personal in what is now called the third person singular.

But as the event, or matter of fact, which is expressed by a verb, may be affirmed either of the person who speaks, or of the person who is spoken to, as well as of some third person or object, it became necessary to fall upon some method of expressing these two peculiar relations of the event. In the English language this is commonly done, by prefixing, what are called the personal pronouns, to the general word which expresses the event affirmed. I came, you came, he or it came^y ; in these phrases the event of having come is, in the first, affirmed of the speaker; in the second, of the person spoken to; in the third, of some other person, or object. The first formers of language, it may be imagined, might have done the same thing, and prefixing in the same manner the two first personal pronouns, to the same termination of the verb, which expressed the third person singular, might have said ego venit, tu venit, as well as ille or illud venit. And I make no doubt but they would have done so, if at the time when they had first occasion to express these relations of the verb, there had been any such words as either ego or tu in their language. But in this early period of the ^z language, which we are now endeavouring to describe, it is extremely improbable that any such words would be known. Though custom has now rendered them familiar to us, they, both of them, express ideas extremely metaphysical and abstract. The word I, for example, is a word of a very particular species. Whatever speaks may denote itself by this personal pronoun. The word I, therefore, is a general word, capable of being predicated, as the logicians say, of an infinite variety of objects. It differs, however, from all other general words in this respect; that the objects of which it may be predicated, do not form any particular species of objects distinguished from all others. The word I, does not, like the word man, denote a particular class of objects, separated from all others by peculiar qualities of their own. It is far from being the name of a species, but, on the contrary, whenever it is made use of, it always denotes a precise individual, the particular person who then speaks. It may be said to be, at once, both what the logicians call, a singular, and what they call, a common term; and to join in its signification the seemingly opposite qualities of the most precise individuality, and the most extensive generalization. This word, therefore, expressing so very abstract and metaphysical an idea, would not easily or readily occur to the first formers of language. What are called the personal pronouns, it may be observed, are among the last words of ^a which children learn to make use. A child, speaking of itself, says, Billy walks, Billy sits, insteads of I walk, I sit. As in the beginnings of language, therefore, mankind seem to have evaded the invention of at least the more abstract prepositions, and to have expressed the same relations which these now stand for, by varying the termination of the co–relative term, so they likewise would naturally attempt to evade the necessity of inventing those more abstract pronouns by varying the termination of the verb, according as the event which it expressed was intended to be affirmed of the first, second, or third person. This seems, accordingly, to be the universal practice of all the ancient languages. In Latin, veni, venisti, venit, sufficiently denote, without any other addition, the different events expressed by the English phrases, I came, you came, he or it came. The verb would, for the same reason, vary its termination, according as the event was intended to be affirmed of the first, second, or third persons plural; and what is expressed by the English phrases, we came, ye came, they came, would be denoted by the Latin words, venimus, venistis, venerunt. Those primitive languages, too, which, upon account of the difficulty of inventing numeral names, had introduced a dual, as well as a plural number, into the declension of their nouns substantive, would probably, from analogy, do the same thing in the conjugations of their verbs. And thus in all those original languages, we might expect to find, at least six, if not eight or nine variations, in the termination of every verb, according as the event which it denoted was meant to be affirmed of the first, second, or third persons singular, dual, or plural. These variations again being repeated, along with others, ^bthrough all its different tenses, through all its different modes, and through^b all its different voices, must necessarily have rendered their conjugations still more intricate and complex than their declensions.

Language would probably have continued upon this footing in all countries, nor would ever have grown more simple in its declensions and conjugations, had it not become more complex in its composition, in consequence of the mixture of several languages with one another, occasioned by the mixture of different nations. As long as any language was spoke by those only who learned it in their infancy, the intricacy of its declensions and conjugations could occasion no great embarrassment. The far greater part of those who had occasion to speak it, had acquired it at so very early a period of their lives, so insensibly and by such slow degrees, that they were scarce ever sensible of the difficulty. But when two nations came to be mixed with one another, either by conquest or migration, the case would be very different. Each nation, in order to make itself intelligible to those with whom it was under the necessity of conversing, would be obliged to learn the language of the other. The greater part of individuals too, learning the new language, not by art, or by remounting to its rudiments and first principles, but by rote, and by what they commonly heard in conversation, would be extremely perplexed by the intricacy of its declensions and conjugations. They would endeavour, therefore, to supply their ignorance of these, by whatever shift the language could afford them. Their ignorance of the declensions they would naturally supply by the use of prepositions; and a Lombard, who was attempting to speak Latin, and wanted to express that such a person was a citizen of Rome, or a benefactor to Rome, if he happened not to be acquainted with the genitive and dative cases of the word Roma, would naturally express himself by prefixing the prepositions ad and de to the nominative; and, instead of Roma, would say, ad Roma, and de Roma. Al Roma and di Roma, accordingly, is the manner in which the present Italians, the descendants of the ancient Lombards and Romans, express this and all other similar relations. And in this manner prepositions seem to have been introduced, in the room of the ancient declensions. The same alteration has, I am informed, been produced upon the Greek language, since the taking of Constantinople by the Turks. The words are, in a great measure, the same as before; but the grammar is entirely lost, prepositions having come in the place of the old declensions. This change is undoubtedly a simplification of the language, in point of rudiments and principle. It introduces, instead of a great variety of declensions, one universal declension, which is the same in every word, of whatever gender, number, or termination.

A similar expedient enables men, in the situation above mentioned, to get rid of almost the whole intricacy of their conjugations. There is in every language a verb, known by the name of the substantive verb; in Latin, sum; in English, I am. This verb denotes not the existence of any particular event, but existence in general. It is, upon this account, the most abstract and metaphysical of all verbs; and, consequently, could by no means be a word of early invention. When it came to be invented, however, as it had all the tenses and modes of any other verb, by being joined with the passive participle, it was capable of supplying the place of the whole passive voice, and of rendering this part of their conjugations as simple and uniform, as the use of prepositions had rendered their declensions. A Lombard, who wanted to say, I am loved, but could not recollect the word amor, naturally endeavoured to supply his ignorance, by saying, ego sum amatus. Io sono amato, is at this day the Italian expression, which corresponds to the English phrase above mentioned.

There is another verb, which, in the same manner, runs through all languages, and which is distinguished by the name of the possessive verb; in Latin, habeo; in English, I have. This verb, likewise, denotes an event of an extremely abstract and metaphysical nature, and, consequently, cannot be supposed to have been a word of the earliest invention. When it came to be invented, however, by being applied to the passive participle, it was capable of supplying a great part of the active voice, as the substantive verb had supplied the whole of the passive. A Lombard, who wanted to say, I had loved, but could not recollect the word amaveram, would endeavour to supply the place of it, by saying either ego habebam amatum, or ego habui amatum. Io avevá amato, or Io ebbi amato, are the correspondent Italian expressions at this day. And thus upon the intermixture of different nations with one another, the conjugations, by means of different auxiliary verbs, were made to approach towards the simplicity and uniformity of the declensions.

In general it may be laid down for a maxim, that the more simple any language is in its composition, the more complex it must be in its declensions and conjugations; and, on the contrary, the more simple it is in its declensions and conjugations, the more complex it must be in its composition.

The Greek seems to be, in a great measure, a simple, uncompounded language, formed from the primitive jargon of those wandering savages, the ancient Hellenians and Pelasgians, from whom the Greek nation is said to have been descended. All the words in the Greek language are derived from about three hundred primitives, a plain evidence that the Greeks formed their language almost entirely among themselves, and that when they had occasion for a new word, they were not accustomed, as we are, to borrow it from some foreign language, but to form it, either by composition, or derivation from some other word or words, in their own. The declensions and conjugations, therefore, of the Greek are much more complex than those of any other European language with which I am acquainted.

The Latin is a composition of the Greek and of the ancient Tuscan languages. Its declensions and conjugations accordingly are much less complex than those of the Greek; it has dropt the dual number in both. Its verbs have no optative mood distinguished by any peculiar termination. They have but one future. They have no aorist distinct from the preterit–perfect; they have no middle voice; and even many of their tenses in the passive voice are eked out, in the same manner as in the modern languages, by the help of the substantive verb joined to the passive participle. In both the voices, the number of infinitives and participles is much smaller in the Latin than in the Greek.

The French and Italian languages are each of them compounded, the one of the Latin, and the language of the ancient Franks, the other of the same Latin, and the language of the ancient Lombards. As they are both of them, therefore, more complex in their composition than the Latin, so are they likewise more simple in their declensions and conjugations. With regard to their declensions, they have both of them lost their cases altogether; and with regard to their conjugations, they have both of them lost the whole of the passive, and some part of the active voices of their verbs. The want of the passive voice they supply entirely by the substantive verb joined to the passive participle; and they make out part of the active, in the same manner, by the help of the possessive verb and the same passive participle.

The English is compounded of the French and the ancient Saxon languages. The French was introduced into Britain by the Norman conquest, and continued, till the time of Edward III. to be the sole language of the law as well as the principal language of the court. 9 The English, which came to be ^cspoken afterwards, and which continues to be spoken^c now, is a mixture of the ancient Saxon and this Norman French. As the English language, therefore, is more complex in its composition than either the French or the Italian, so is it likewise more simple in its declensions and conjugations. Those two languages retain, at least, a part of the distinction of genders, and their adjectives vary their termination according as they are applied to a masculine or to a feminine substantive. But there is no such distinction in the English language, whose adjectives admit of no variety of termination. The French and Italian languages have, both of them, the remains of a conjugation; ^d and all those tenses of the active voice, which cannot be expressed by the possessive verb joined to the passive participle, as well as many of those which can, are, in those languages, marked by varying the termination of the principal verb. But almost all those other tenses are in the English eked out by other auxiliary verbs, so that there is in this language scarce even the remains of a conjugation. I love, I loved, loving, are all the varieties of termination which the greater part of English verbs admit of. All the different modifications of meaning, which cannot be expressed by any of those three terminations, must be made out by different auxiliary verbs joined to some one or other of them. Two auxiliary verbs supply all the deficiencies of the French and Italian conjugations; it requires more than half a dozen to supply those of the English, which, besides the substantive and possessive verbs, makes use of do, did; will, would; shall, should; can, could; may, might.

It is in this manner that language becomes more simple in its rudiments and principles, just in proportion as it grows more complex in its composition, and the same thing has happened in it, which commonly happens with regard to mechanical engines. All machines are generally, when first invented, extremely complex in their principles, and there is often a particular principle of motion for every particular movement which it is intended they should perform. Succeeding improvers observe, that one principle may be so applied as to produce several of those movements; ^e and thus the machine becomes gradually more and more simple, and produces its effects with fewer wheels, and fewer principles of motion. In language, in the same manner, every case of every noun, and every tense of every verb, was originally expressed by a particular distinct word, which served for this purpose and for no other. But succeeding observation discovered, that one set of words was capable of supplying the place of all that infinite number, and that four or five prepositions, and half a dozen auxiliary verbs, were capable of answering the end of all the declensions, and of all the conjugations in the ancient languages.

But this simplification of languages, though it arises, perhaps, from similar causes, has by no means similar effects with the correspondent simplification of machines. The simplification of machines renders them more and more perfect, but this simplification of the rudiments of languages renders them more and more imperfect, and less proper for many of the purposes of language: ^f and this for the following reasons.

First of all, languages are by this simplification rendered more prolix, several words having become necessary to express what could have been expressed by a single word before. Thus the words, Dei and Deo, in the Latin, sufficiently show, without any addition, what relation the object signified is understood to stand in to the objects expressed by the other words in the sentence. But to express the same relation in English, and in all other modern languages, we must make use of, at least, two words, and say, of God, to God. So far as the declensions are concerned, therefore, the modern languages are much more prolix than the ancient. The difference is still greater with regard to the conjugations. What a Roman expressed by the single word, amavissem, an Englishman is obliged to express by four different words, I should have loved. It is unnecessary to take any pains to show how much this prolixness must enervate the eloquence of all modern languages. How much the beauty of any expression depends upon its conciseness, is well known to those who have any experience in composition.

Secondly, this simplification of the principles of languages renders them less agreeable to the ear. The variety of termination in the Greek and Latin, occasioned by their declensions and conjugations, gives ^g a sweetness to their language altogether unknown to ours, and a variety unknown to any other modern language. In point of sweetness, the Italian, perhaps, may surpass the Latin, and almost equal the Greek; but in point of variety, it is greatly inferior to both.

Thirdly, this simplification, not only renders the sounds of our language less agreeable to the ear, but it also restrains us from disposing such sounds as we have, in the manner that might be most agreeable. It ties down many words to a particular situation, though they might often be placed in another with much more beauty. In the Greek and Latin, though the adjective and substantive were separated from one another, the correspondence of their terminations still showed their mutual reference, and the separation did not necessarily occasion any sort of confusion. Thus in the first line of Virgil, ^h

Tityre tu patulæ recubans sub tegmine fagi;

we easily see that tu refers to recubans, and patulæ to fagi; though the related words are separated from one another by the intervention of several others; because the terminations, showing the correspondence of their cases, determine their mutual reference. But if we were to translate this line literally into English, and say, Tityrus,ⁱthou of spreading reclining under the shade beech. OEdipus himself could not make sense of it; because there is here no difference of termination, to determine which substantive each adjective belongs to. It is the same case with regard to verbs. In Latin the verb may often be placed, without any inconveniency or ambiguity, in any part of the sentence. But in English its place is almost always precisely determined. It must follow the subjective and precede the objective member of the phrase in almost all cases. Thus in Latin whether you say, Joannem verberavit Robertus, or Robertus verberavit Joannem, the meaning is precisely the same, and the termination fixes John to be the sufferer in both cases. But in English John beat Robert, and Robert beat John, have by no means the same signification. The place therefore of the three principal members of the phrase is in the English, and for the same reason in the French and Italian languages, almost always precisely determined; whereas in the ancient languages a greater latitude is allowed, and the place of those members is often, in a great measure, indifferent. We must have recourse to Horace, in order to interpret some parts of Milton’s literal translation; ^j

• Who now enjoys thee credulous all gold,
• Who always vacant, always amiable
• Hopes thee; of flattering gales
• Unmindful— 10

are verses which it is impossible to interpret by any rules of our language. There are no rules in our language, ^k by which any man could discover, that, in the first line, credulous referred to who, and not to thee; or that all gold referred to any thing; or, that in the fourth line, unmindful, referred to who, in the second, and not to thee in the third; or, on the contrary, that, in the second line, always vacant, always amiable, referred to thee^l in the third, and not to who in the same line with it. In the Latin, indeed, all this is abundantly plain.

• ^m Qui nunc te fruitur credulus aurea,
• Qui semper vacuam, semper amabilem
• Sperat te; nescius auræ fallacis. 11

Because the terminations in the Latin determine the reference of each adjective to its proper substantive, which it is impossible for any thing in the English to do: ⁿ How much this power of transposing the order of their words must have facilitated the composition of the ancients, both in verse and prose, can hardly be imagined. 12 That it must greatly have facilitated their versification it is needless to observe; and in prose, whatever beauty depends upon the arrangement and construction of the several members of the period, must to them have been acquirable with much more ease, and to much greater perfection, than it can be to those whose expression is constantly confined by the prolixness, constraint, and monotony of modern languages.

Appendix 1 (see p. 32)
THE BEE, OR LITERARY WEEKLY INTELLIGENCER, FOR WEDNESDAY, MAY 11, 1791.

Anecdotes tending to throw light on the character and opinions of the late Adam Smith, L L D,—author of the wealth of nations, and several other well–known performances.

It has been often observed, that the history of a literary person consists chiefly of his works. The works of Dr. Adam Smith are so generally known, as to stand in need neither of enumeration nor encomium in this place;—nor could a dry detail of the dates when he entered to such a school or college, or when he obtained such or such a step of advancement in rank or fortune, prove interesting. It is enough, if our readers be informed, that Mr. Smith having discharged for some years, with great applause, the important duties of professor of moral philosophy in Glasgow, was made choice of as a proper person to superintend the education of the Duke of Buccleugh, and to accompany him in his tour to Europe. In the discharge of this duty, he gave so much satisfaction to all the parties concerned, as to be able, by their interest, to obtain the place of commissioner of customs and salt duties in Scotland; with the emoluments arising from which office, and his other acquirements, he was enabled to spend the latter part of his life in a state of independent tranquillity. Before his death, he burnt all his manuscripts, except one, which, we hear, contains a history of Astronomy, which will probably be laid before the public by his executors in due time.

Instead of a formal drawn character of this great man, which often tends to prejudice rather than to inform, the Editor believes his readers will be much better pleased to see some features of his mind fairly delineated by himself, as in the following pages, which were transmitted to him under the strongest assurances of authenticity;—concerning which, indeed, he entertained no doubt after their perusal, from the coincidence of certain opinions here mentioned, with what he himself had heard maintained by that gentleman.

SIR,

In the year 1780, I had frequent occasion to be in company with the late well–known Dr. Adam Smith. When business ended, our conversation took a literary turn; I was then young, inquisitive, and full of respect for his abilities as an author. On his part, he was extremely communicative, and delivered himself, on every subject, with a freedom, and even boldness, quite opposite to the apparent reserve of his appearance. I took down notes of his conversation, and have here sent you an abstract of them. I have neither added, altered, nor diminished, but merely put them into such a shape as may fit them for the eye of your readers.

Of the late Dr. Samuel Johnson, Dr. Smith had a very contemptuous opinion. ‘I have seen that creature,’ said he, ‘bolt up in the midst of a mixed company; and, without any previous notice, fall upon his knees behind a chair, repeat the Lord’s Prayer, and then resume his seat at table.—He has played this freak over and over, perhaps five or six times in the course of an evening. It is not hypocrisy, but madness. Though an honest sort of man himself, he is always patronising scoundrels. Savage, for instance, whom he so loudly praises, was but a worthless fellow; his pension of fifty pounds never lasted him longer than a few days. As a sample of his economy, you may take a circumstance, that Johnson himself once told me. It was, at that period, fashionable to wear scarlet cloaks trimmed with gold lace; and the Doctor met him one day, just after he had got his pension, with one of these cloaks upon his back, while, at the same time, his naked toes were sticking through his shoes.’

He was no admirer of the Rambler or the Idler, and hinted, that he had never been able to read them.—He was averse to the contest with America, yet he spoke highly of Johnson’s political pamphlets: But, above all, he was charmed with that respecting Falkland’s Islands, as it displayed, in such forcible language, the madness of modern wars.

I inquired his opinion of the late Dr. Campbell, author of the Political Survey of Great Britain. He told me, that he never had been above once in his company; that the Doctor was a voluminous writer, and one of those authors who write from one end of the week to the other, without interruption. A gentleman, who happened to dine with Dr. Campbell in the house of a common acquaintance, remarked, that he would be glad to possess a complete set of the Doctor’s works. The hint was not lost; for next morning he was surprised at the appearance of a cart before his door. The cart was loaded with the books he had asked for;—the driver’s bill amounted to seventy pounds! As Dr. Campbell composed a part of the universal history, and of the Biographia Britannica, we may suppose, that these two ponderous articles formed a great part of the cargo. The Doctor was in use to get a number of copies of his publications from the printer, and keep them in his house for such an opportunity. A gentleman who came in one day, exclaimed; with surprise, ‘Have you ever read all these books’.—‘Nay’, replied Doctor Campbell, laughing, ‘I have written them’.

Of Swift, Dr. Smith made frequent and honourable mention. He denied, that the Dean could ever have written the Pindarics printed under his name. He affirmed, that he wanted nothing but inclination to have become one of the greatest of all poets. ‘But in place of this, he is only a gossiper, writing merely for the entertainment of a private circle’. He regarded Swift, both in stile and sentiment, as a pattern of correctness. He read to me some of the short poetical addresses to Stella, and was particularly pleased with one Couplet.—‘Say, Stella, feel you no content, reflecting on a life well–spent’.—Though the Dean’s verses are remarkable for ease and simplicity, yet the composition required an effort. To express this difficulty, Swift used to say, that a verse came from him like a guinea. Dr. Smith considered the lines on his own death, as the Dean’s poetical master–piece. He thought that upon the whole, his poetry was correct, after he settled in Ireland, when he was, as he himself said, surrounded ‘only by humble friends’.

The Doctor had some singular opinions. I was surprised at hearing him prefer Livy to all other historians, ancient and modern. He knew of no other who had even a pretence to rival him, if David Hume could not claim that honour. He regretted, in particular, the loss of his account of the civil wars in the age of Julius Caesar; and when I attempted to comfort him by the library at Fez, he cut me short. I would have expected Polybius to stand much higher in his esteem than Livy, as having a much nearer resemblance to Dr. Smith’s own manner of writing. Besides his miracles, Livy contains an immense number of the most obvious and gross falsehoods.

He was no sanguine admirer of Shakespeare. ‘Voltaire, you know,’ says he, ‘calls Hamlet the dream of a drunken savage’.—‘He has good scenes, but not one good play’. The Doctor, however, would not have permitted any body else to pass this verdict with impunity: For when I once afterwards, in order to sound him, hinted a disrespect for Hamlet, he gave a smile, as if he thought I would detect him in a contradiction and replied, ‘Yes! but still Hamlet is full of fine passages’.

He had an invincible contempt and aversion for blank verse, Milton’s always excepted. ‘They do well, said he, to call it blank, for blank it is; I myself, even I, who never could find a single rhime in my life, could make blank verse as fast as I could speak; nothing but laziness hinders our tragic poets from writing, like the French, in rhime. Dryden, had he possessed but a tenth part of Shakespeare’s dramatic genius, would have brought rhyming tragedies into fashion here as well as they are in France, and then the mob would have admired them just as much as they now pretend to despise them’.

Beatie’s minstrel he would not allow to be called a poem; for it had, he said, no plan, no beginning, middle, or end. He thought it only a series of verses, but a few of them very happy. As for the translation of the Iliad, ‘They do well,’ he said, ‘to call it Pope’s Homer; for it is not Homer’s Homer. It has no resemblance to the majesty and simplicity of the Greek’. He read over to me l’Allegro, and II’ Penseroso, and explained the respective beauties of each, but added, that all the rest of Milton’s short poems were trash. He could not imagine what had made Johnson praise the poem on the death of Mrs. Killigrew, and compare it with Alexander’s Feast. The criticism had induced him to read it over, and with attention, twice, and he could not discover even a spark of merit. At the same time, he mentioned Gray’s odes, which Johnson has damned so completely; and in my humble opinion with so much justice, as the standard of lyric excellence. He did not much admire the Gentle Shepherd. He preferred the Pastor Fido, of which he spoke with rapture, and the Eclogues of Virgil. I pled as well as I could for Allan Ramsay, because I regard him as the single unaffected poet whom we have had since Buchanan.

Proximus huic longo, sed proximus intervallo.

He answered: ‘It is the duty of a poet to write like a gentleman. I dislike that homely stile which some think fit to call the language of nature and simplicity, and so forth. In Percy’s reliques too, a few tolerable pieces are buried under a heap of rubbish. You have read perhaps Adam Bell Clym, of the Cleugh, and William of Cloudeslie’. I answered yes. ‘Well then’, said he, ‘do you think that was worth printing’. He reflected with some harshness on Dr. Goldsmith; and repeated a variety of anecdotes to support his censure.

They amounted to prove that Goldsmith loved a wench and a bottle; and that a lie, when to serve a special end, was not excluded from his system of morality. To commit these stories to print, would be very much in the modern taste; but such proceedings appear to me as an absolute disgrace to typography.

He never spoke but with ridicule and detestation of the reviews. He said that it was not easy to conceive in what contempt they were held in London. I mentioned a story I had read of Mr. Burke having seduced and dishonoured a young lady, under promise of marriage. ‘I imagine’, said he, ‘that you have got that fine story out of some of the magazines. If any thing can be lower than the Reviews, they are so. They once had the impudence to publish a story of a gentleman’s having debauched his own sister; and upon inquiry, it came out that the gentleman never had a sister. As to Mr. Burke, he is a worthy honest man. He married an accomplished girl, without a shilling of fortune’. I wanted to get the Gentleman’s Magazine excepted from his general censure; but he would not hear me. He never, he said, looked at a Review, nor even knew the names of the publishers.

He was fond of Pope, and had by heart many favourite passages; but he disliked the private character of the man. He was, he said, all affectation, and mentioned his letter to Arbuthnot, when the latter was dying, as a consummate specimen of canting; which to be sure it is. He had also a very high opinion of Dryden, and loudly extolled his fables. I mentioned Mr. Hume’s objections; he replied, ‘You will learn more as to poetry by reading one good poem, than by a thousand volumes of criticism’. He quoted some passages in Defoe, which breathed, as he thought, the true spirit of English verse.

He disliked Meikle’s translation of the Lusiad, and esteemed the French version of that work as far superior. Meikle, in his preface, has contradicted with great frankness, some of the positions advanced in the Doctor’s inquiry, which may perhaps have disgusted him; but in truth, Meikle is only an indifferent rhymer.

You have lately quoted largely from Lord Gardenstoun’s Remarks on English Plays; and I observe, that this lively and venerable critic, damns by far the greater part of them. In this sentiment, Dr. Smith, agreed most heartily with his Lordship; he regarded the French theatre as the standard of dramatic excellence. *

He said, that at the beginning of the present reign, the dissenting ministers had been in use to receive two thousand pounds a year from government, that the Earl of Bute had, as he thought, most improperly deprived them of this allowance, and that he supposed this to be the real motive of their virulent opposition to government.

Appendix 2
Table of Corresponding Passages

The first column gives volume and page number from the manuscript. The second column gives the corresponding pages in the Lothian edition of 1963. *

[a]MS XXIX

[b]for second?

[c]changed from and

[d]Proceedings usuall deleted

[e]supply of Lysias?

[f]numbers written above reverse the original Judicciall private

[g]MS Æschyles, with note in margin in Hand B(?) Lege Eschines semper, corrected to Æschines

[1 ]Lycurgus, Against Leocrates; Aeschines, see n.2 below; Demosthenes, speeches 18–24, but Against Meidias (see LJ ii.138, and Longinus xx.1) was never delivered. Demosthenes therefore delivered six.

[h]MS Æschylus for Æschines; so repeatedly up to 230

[2 ]To summarize the altercations: Demosthenes and Aeschines went on embassage to Macedon in 346bc; the prosecution of Aeschines for misconducting it by Demosthenes and Timarchus was delayed by Aeschines charging Timarchus with vices incompatible with public office—Against Timarchus, 345bc; Demosthenes alone in 343bc prosecuted Aeschines, who successfully defended himself—the two speeches περὶ τω̂ς παραπρεσβείας (usually called De falsa legatione, since Cicero in Orator, xxxi.111, spoke of the first as ‘contra Aeschinem falsae legationis’) in 366 bc Ctesiphon carried a motion to award Demosthenes a golden crown for services to the state, but Aeschines prosecuted him in 330 bc for unconsitutional action—Against Ctesiphon—with Demosthenes defending successfully in the speech usually called περὶ τοω̂ στεϕάνου or De Corona (but of course both speeches are ‘on the Crown’). Aeschines left Athens in mortification (not banished).

[i]i.e. Ctesiphon

[j]often deleted

[k]ugh inserted later below line

[l]MS when every, y deleted

[m]often deleted

[n]But tho Demosthenes may be inferior to his Rivall in the deleted (anticipation of next paragraph)

[o]general conduct replaces oratory (?)

[3 ]References as follows: Against Ctesiphon, 54–6—the four periods of Demosthenes’ political activity equated with four periods in the city’s history (Aeschines misuses this); ibid. 149–50—Demosthenes’ frantic behaviour in jumping up in the assembly and swearing an oath by Athena, as if Pheidias had made her statue expressly for Demosthenes to perjure himself by— all out of pique at not sharing the bribe–money; ibid. 157 ff.—Aeschines on capture of Thebes, contrasted with Demosthenes on news of the capture of Elateia by Philip (De Corona, 169); cf. i.74 n.2 above.

[p]replaces are des

[q]MS which

[r]This time changed from Æschylus

[s]blank of about ten letters in MS

[t]con deleted

[u]replaces arranged

[v]changed from Æschylus in a different hand

[w]numbers written above change original order a real but an apparent

[x]of deleted

[4 ]De falsa legatione, 4: an ambassador’s responsibilities embrace his reports, the advice he offers, observance of his instructions, use of times and opportunities, and integrity.—For Dionysius of Halicarnassus and his praise of the methods of Demosthenes see his Critical Essays i (LCL).

[y]changed from had

[z]for narration

[a]replaces, in inner margin, added

[b]MS hearre

[5 ]Aeschines as a small–part actor with two ‘Growlers’ (Ἐτριταγωνίστεις), see De Corona, 262–6; and Demosthenes’ mocking question at 180, ‘What part do you wish me to assign you . . . in the drama of that great day?’; also De falsa leg. 246. For the equivocal response of Aeschines to taunts about his licentious and unsavoury private life: Against Timarchus, 135; Against Ctesiphon, 216. Demosthenes addresses Aeschines as a ‘disreputable quill–driver’, a ‘third–rate tragedian’, at De Corona 209.

[6 ]On the Sublime cites the two most famous passages in De Corona: at x.7 the news of Elateia (see i.74 n.2, ii.228 above); at xvi.2, Demosthenes’ impassioned oath (De Cor. 208) by those who fought at Marathon, Plataea, Salamis, by all brave men who rest in public sepulchres—much admired by Quintilian (IX.ii.62, XI.iii.168, XII.x.24) and other rhetoricians.

[7 ]De Corona and De falsa legatione: apparently the speeches of Demosthenes, though as at ii.222 above the context is ambiguous.

[c]numbers written above reverse the original order not commonly; then a superfluous not

[d]shewn deleted

[8 ]Cf. ii.151 ff. above.

[e]geni deleted

[f]last five words added (scribe’s remark?) at foot of page

[g]been deleted

[h]can deleted

[i]changed from depresses

[j]changed from partakes

[k]ing deleted

[l]thought deleted, wrongly?

[m]and deleted

[n]best deleted

[9 ]Quintilian (VI.iii.5) wishes Tiro had shown more judgment in selecting the three volumes of Cicero’s jests or obiter dicta than zeal in collecting them. Cicero (Ad Familiares, IX.xvi.4) reports that Caesar, who was making a collection of apophthegms, had instructed his friends to bring him any mots they picked up in Cicero’s company.

[o]i.e. Hermagoras; line above and below in MS

[10 ]Cf. ii.213 ff. above, 242 below. Hermagoras (c. 150 bc), a very influential teacher of rhetoric, whom Cicero (Brutus, lxxvi.263 ff., lxxviii.271) found unhelpful for embellishment of style but a purveyor of useful precepts and guidelines of general applicability in argument: ‘ad inveniendum expedita Hermagorae disciplina’. Hence frequent references to him in Cicero’s early De Inventione. On Pro Roscio Amerino cf. ii.194 n.2 above.

[p]i.e. Ameria

[q]Greece deleted

[11 ]Q. Hortensius Hortalus (114–50 bc). See ii.169 n.5 above.

[12 ]For Gaius Verres, pro–praetor of Sicily 73–71 bc, cf. ii.154 above; prosecuted by Cicero for the people of Sicily in 70 bc.—Verrine orations, (LCL).

[r]inserted later in short blank left

[s]scribe wrote im of immediately, then repeated places

[u]blank of five letters in MS

[13 ]Cicero’s critic here is almost certainly Quintilian; cf. his report of Cicero’s famous boast over the Cluentius case, II.xvii.21 (ii.211 n.6 above).

[t]replaces effect

[v]MS neumerated

[14 ]XII.x.12–26, following a list of ancient painters (3–6) and sculptors (7–9).

[w]replaces are with

[x]He wh deleted: then blank, for which JML supplies Albucius

[y]blank in MS: JML supplies Arruntius

[15 ]The advocate Albucius is infuriated when his challenge to his opponent Arruntius, ‘Will you swear by the ashes of your father?’, is taken literally and accepted, since he insists it was a figure (the Omotic). ‘Nota enim fabula est’ (Quintilian, IX.ii.95). See Seneca the Elder, Controversiae, VII. praefatio 6–7 (Albucius incidentally is breathless with admiration for Hermagoras, 5). LCL edn. cites also Suctonius De grammaticis et rheloribus, XXX.3.

[z]blank in MS: supply Albucius

[a]blank in MS: supply Arruntius

[b]required, but no blank in MS

[16 ]The remark is not in Quintilian; but its spirit informs the little portrait in Persius, Satire i.85–8, of the advocate Pedius (the name is from Horace, Satires I.x.28) to whom the fate of his client is indifferent as long as the beauty of his speech (‘rasis/librat in antithetis, doctas posuisse figuras’) is admired; and Quintilian’s own question (XI.i.49–50) on what we should think of a man pleading his imperilled case and hunting only for fine words (‘verba aucupantem et anxium de fama ingenii’), with leisure to show off his eloquence (‘diserto’).

[c]composed deleted

[d]changed from and

[e]the deleted

[f]that deleted

[g]there deleted; numbers written above change original order can proof

[h]MS parts

[i]replaces which

[j]The deleted

[k]reading doubtful

[l]MS serenay

[17 ]The word ‘essays’ betrays that the scribe is thinking of Montaigne, in error for Montesquieu: De l’esprit des lois (1748), XIV.ii (entitled ‘Combien les hommes sont différens dans les divers climats’), §8: ‘Comme on distingue les climats par les degrés de latitude, on pourroit les distinguer, pour ainsi dire, par les degrés de sensibilité. J’ai vû les Opéra d’Angleterre et d’Italie; ce sont les mêmes pieces et les mêmes Acteurs; mais la même Musique produit des effets si différens sur les deux Nations, l’une est si calme, et l’autre si transportée, que cela paroit inconcevable’. The 18th century saw much controversy over the relative musical capacities of different peoples and their languages; Rousseau was involved in one over French and Italian.

[m]scribe started to write display, by anticipation

[n]replaces commons

[o]that deleted

[p]barely decipherable sentence deleted: This the the delivery mentioned is that which all the speakers of Repute have practised: Many of the Ora

[q]the deleted

[18 ]The speech which Henry Sacheverell delivered on 7 March 1710 at his impeachment before the House of Lords differed so much in tone and style—quiet and modest, with balanced phrasing and an edge of paradox—from the two offending sermons he had preached at Derby Assizes and at St Paul’s in August and November 1709, that everyone believed it to be by Francis Atterbury (1662–1732), later Bishop of Rochester. It was printed in A compleat history of the whole proceedings of the Parliament of Great Britain against Dr. Henry Sacheverell: with his Tryal before the House of Peers, for High Crimes and Misdemeanors, 1710: 2.66–84; reprinted as ‘universally ascribed to Dr. Atterbury when originally published’, in The Epistolary Correspondence, Visitation Charges, Speeches and Miscellanies of Atterbury, iii (1784), 456–502.

Any identification of the ‘oration’ of Sir Robert Walpole referred to would be guesswork. He eschewed flights of oratory, but his speeches were often praised. Burke, in An Appeal from the New to the Old Whigs, thought Walpole’s speech on the Sacheverell trial a clear exposition of constitutional principle. In his refutation of Pulteney’s vote of censure in January 1742 ‘he exceeded himself . . . He actually dissected Mr Pulteney’, according to Sir Robert Wilmot. But the reference above may be to his only speech, as Earl of Orford, in the House of Lords, speaking on 24 February 1744 on an apprehended French invasion in support of Prince Charles Edward: ‘a long and fine speech’, said his son Horace, a connoisseur in such matters. See W. Coxe. Memoirs of . . . Sir R.W., 1798; and J. H. Plumb, Sir Robert Walpole, 1956–61.

[r]MS Hearres

[s]blank of five letters in MS

[19 ]William Murray (1705–93), judge and parliamentarian, was created Baron Mansfield of Mansfield in 1756; first Earl, 1776. ‘In all debates of consequence [he] had greatly the advantage over Pitt in point of argument’ (Waldegrave, 1755); Horace Walpole, an opponent, ‘never heard so much argument, so much sense, so much oratory united’ (Memoirs of the reign of George II, iii.120), as in a 1758 speech of Mansfield’s. The lucidity and sharpness of his forensic oratory are even more highly praised by contemporaries.

Pym is the parliamentarian John Pym (1583–1643), a leading speaker in the Commons from 1621 onwards: bibliographical details in S. R. Brett, John Pym 1583–1643: the statesman of the Puritan Revolution, 1940. The scribe confuses him no doubt with William Prynne (see i.10 n.9 above), much better known as a pamphleteer than as a parliamentary orator.

[t]MS howvear

[1 ]For full title (set out in capitals in 3–5) see Note on the Text; only 6 abbreviates it thus. Smith seems to show some indifference to what his essay is called.

[2 ]This fanciful account could have been suggested by the passage in the Abbé Étienne Bonnet de Condillac’s Essai sur l’origine des connoissances humaines (1746) referred to in Rousseau’s Discours (see below). Adam and Eve had the gift of speech as part of their God–given perfection; ‘mais je suppose que, quelque temps après le déluge, deux enfans, de l’un et de l’autre sexe, aient été égarés dans des déserts, avant qu’ils connussent l’usage d’aucun signe.’ Eventually their child develops the use of lingual signs: II.sec.1 préambule, to sec.7. Condillac cites the Essai sur les Hiéroglyphes des Égyptiens (1744, 48) by ‘M. Warburthon’, i.e. the translation by M. A. Leonard des Malpeines of Warburton’s The Divine Legation of Moses Demonstrated (1741, Bk IV sec.iv). Warburton himself refers to Diodorus Siculus ii and Vitruvius ii.1, on the beginnings of articulate human sounds in mutual association; also to Gregory of Nyssa, Adversus Eunomium xii; the seventeenth century Hebraist Richard Simon, Histoire critique du Vieux Testament i.14–15, iii.21; and J. F. Lafitau, Moeurs des sauvages amériquains, comparées aux moeurs des premiers temps (1724), i.482; cf. LJ(A), ii.96. Smith had copies of both Condillac’s Essai (1746) and of his Traité des sensations (1754), part of the background of the essay ‘Of the External Senses’ in EPS.

[a–a]roman type PM 3

[b]a in roman type PM 3

[c]names PM

[* ]Origine de l’Inegalité. 3 Partie Premiere, p. 376, 377. Edition d’Amsterdam des Oeuvres diverses de J. J. Rousseau.

[4 ]The grammatical terms noun adjective and noun substantive, taken from late Latin nomen adiectivum and nomen substantivum, were normal usage from the late fourteenth century, but were rivalled from c. 1500 by the simple adjective and substantive (the latter eventually almost wholly replaced by noun). The first probably sounded a little archaic, and ambiguous, in 1761. ‘What is an Adjective? I dare not call it Noun Adjective’ (Horne Tooke, Diversions of Purley, 1786, II.vi).

[d]&c PM 3–5

[e]show PM 3–5

[f]PM has the before Grammarians

[g]PM omits as

[h]substance. The PM

[i]seems PM 3

[j]above–mentioned PM 3

[k]formation PM

[l]Substantives PM 3

[m–m]Man, . . . Woman, PM 3

[n]PM 3 omits the

[o]PM 3 omits the

[p]relation; the PM 3

[q]would probably soon PM

[5 ]The ancient Greeks were acquainted through their colonies in Asia Minor with the Armenian language, which they associated with Phrygian; but I have found no source for this statement on its cases. Primitive Indo–European had, besides the six cases of Latin, a locative and an instrumental, and Old Armenian had an additional objective case formed by the prefix z–. The plural in –k may be confusing the issue; but, if authentic, the statement may partly involve the large non–Indo–European element absorbed by the Armenians into their vocabulary when c.1200 bc they overran the speakers of Urartian and Hurrian. In Smith’s time the Armenian of the classical period, ad 400–460, had been artificially revived as a literary language; but in that period the cases had fallen together into only four forms. In 1710 Leibniz described Armenian in a paper to the Berlin Academy as a mixed language and as in need of more study. Modern treatments include A. Meillet, Esquisse d’une grammaire comparée de l’arménien classique (ed. 2, 1936) and H. Jensen, Altarmenische Grammatik (1959); on the history of the study, H. Zeller in Geschichte der indogermanischen Sprachwissenschaft, iv (1927).

[r]forest; 3

[6 ]On number cf. Rousseau’s Discours as above; note 11 (pp. 250–2, 1755 ed.).

[7 ]Examples nearer home would be the Old Irish noun and the 1st and 2nd personal pronouns in Old English.

[s]Gender, PM 3

[t]tho PM 3–5

[u]coeval PM 3–5

[v]nigit, PM

[w]the Lion PM 3

[* ]As the far greater part of verbs x express, at present, not an event, but the attribute of an event, and, consequently, require a subject, or nominative case, to complete their signification, some grammarians, not having attended to this progress of nature, and being desirous to make their common rules quite universal, and without any exception, have insisted that all verbs required a nominative, either expressed or understood; and have, accordingly, put themselves to the torture to find some awkward nominatives to those few verbs, which still expressing a complete event, plainly admit of none. Pluit, for example, according to Sanctius, means pluvia pluit, in English, the rain rains. See Sanctii Minerva, l. 3. c. 1. 8

[y]came, PM

[z]their PM

[a]PM 3 omit of

[b–b]thro’ in all three cases 3 5

[9 ]Parliament was first opened in English, by Edward III, in 1362, and in the same decade English began to be used in the law courts.

[c–c]spoke in both cases PM

[d]conjugation, PM 3–5

[e]movements, PM 3–5

[f]Language: PM

[g]give PM 3–5

[h]Virgil: then line Ecl. I.1 in italic, full stop, then We . . . PM 3–5

[i]Tyterus, PM 3

[j]Milton’s lines in italic PM 3–5; then full stop and Are PM 3 (are 4), or semicolon and are 5

[10 ]Milton’s unrhymed translation of the Pyrrha ode of Horace (I.v) was metrically influential in the 1740s. The brothers Thomas and Joseph Warton imitated its stanza, and probably led to their friend William Collins choosing it for his ‘Ode to Evening’ (in Odes on Several Descriptive and Allegoric Subjects, Dec. 1746, dated 1747; often reprinted).

[k]PM 3–5: 6 has lahguage

[l]thee PM

[m]Horace’s lines in italic PM 3–5; aurea PM 3–5, aurea 4–6

[11 ]PM and 3 print Fallacis as a fourth line; the practice of running the third and fourth lines of Latin lyric stanzas together (as 4–6 here do) was not uncommon. More curious is the presence in all editions of the ‘Considerations’ of the redundant te in line 3: curious that the metrically sensitive Adam Smith should have misremembered the Pherecratean third line of the Fourth Asclepiad, to which this ode belongs.

[n]do. PM 3–5

[12 ]On this familiar truth cf. Du Bos, Réflexions critiques sur la poésie et sur la peinture (1719), ch. xxxv: ‘Avantage des Poëtes qui ont composé en latin sur ceux qui composent en François’. It accounts for the prominence given to word–order (the resources of rhythm, significant juxtaposition, emphasis etc.) by the ancient rhetoricians, e.g. Dionysius of Halicarnassus, De compositione verborum; Longinus, On the Sublime, xxix–xxxii; Quintilian, IX.iv; Demetrius, De elocutione, II.38–74, IV.199 ff.

[* ]It is entertaining to observe men of abilities contradict each other on topics apparently simple. Dr. Smith admired as the very climax of dramatic excellence, Voltaire’s Mahomet; on the other hand, Lord Gardenstoun pronounces, that every line in the play betrays a total want of genius, and even of taste for tragic composition. It is not my business to balance accounts between his Lordship and the Doctor.

[* ]Since there are some blank pages in the manuscript, the sequence of numbers is on occasion irregular. References to passages written on the verso side of a page (marked ‘v’) also occur out of sequence to take account of variation in their position.

[* ]Origine de l’Inegalité. 3 Partie Premiere, p. 376, 377. Edition d’Amsterdam des Oeuvres diverses de J. J. Rousseau.

[* ]As the far greater part of verbs x express, at present, not an event, but the attribute of an event, and, consequently, require a subject, or nominative case, to complete their signification, some grammarians, not having attended to this progress of nature, and being desirous to make their common rules quite universal, and without any exception, have insisted that all verbs required a nominative, either expressed or understood; and have, accordingly, put themselves to the torture to find some awkward nominatives to those few verbs, which still expressing a complete event, plainly admit of none. Pluit, for example, according to Sanctius, means pluvia pluit, in English, the rain rains. See Sanctii Minerva, l. 3. c. 1. 8

[3](inegalité PM 3; premiere PM 3–5). The reference is to Discours sur l’origine et les fondemens de l’inégalité parmi les hommes Par Jean Jaques Rousseau citoyen de Genève (1755), I.§§23–31. The dilemma there posed is that generalization is possible only if we possess words but that words are made possible only by the power to generalize; and so ‘on jugera combien il eût falu de milliers de Siécles, pour développer successivement dans l’Esprit humain les Opérations, dont il étoit capable.’ A few months after the appearance of the Discours on 24 April 1755 Smith had quoted extensively from it in his Letter to the Edinburgh Review No 2 (see EPS 250–4).

[x]Verbs PM 3 4

[8]Minerva, seu de causis Linguae Latinae Commentarius by Franciscus Sanctius (i.e. Francisco Sanchez of Salamanca), first published 1587. (Smith owned the 5th ed. 1733). Lib. III.cap.i (194–6 in ed. 3, 1704), ‘De Constructione verborum. Exploduntur Impersonalia Grammaticorum’, refutes the absurd impersonalia falsely called naturae by the grammarians. There is nothing to prevent pluit etc. occurring in the 1st person ‘si modo loquatur Deus. Integra ergo est oratio, pluit pluvia, fulget fulgur, lucescit lux: licebit tamen pro proprio recto suppresso, aliud exprimere; Ut. Deus pluit, et pluunt lapides’. Examples follow from Plautus, Martial, Tibullus, etc.