Place,  for  inilance,  before  your  eyes,  fuch  a  man
as  Montefquieu.  Think  of  a  genius  not  born  in
every  country,  or  every  time;  a  man  gifted  by  nature

with


•with  a  penetrating  aquiline  eye ;  with  a  judgment
prepared  with  the  moft  extenfive  erudition ;  with
an  herculean  robuftnefs  of  mind,  and  nerves  not  to
be  broken  with  labour  j  a  man  who  could  fpend
twenty  year  in  one  purfuit.  Think  of  a  man,  like
the  univerfal  patriarch  in  Milton  (who  had  drawn  up
before  him  in  his  prophetic  viiion  the  whole  fmes
of  the  generations  which  were  to  iffue  from  his  loins)
a  man  capable  of  placing  in  review,  after  having
brought  together,  from  the  eaft,  rhe  weft,  the  north,
and  the  fouth,  from  the  coarfenefs  of  the  rudeft  bar-
barifm  to  the  moft  refined  and  fu'otf -.  civilization,  all
the  fchemes  of  government  which  had  ever  prevailed
amongft  mankind,  weighing,  meafuring,  collaring,
and  comparing  them  all,  joining  fact  with  theory,
and  calling  into  council,  upon  all  this  infinite  aiicm-
blage  of  things,  all  the  fpeculations  which  have  fa-
tigued the  underflandings  of  profound  reafoners  in  all
times ! — Let  us  then  confider,  that  all  thefe  were
but  fo  many  preparatory  freps  to  qualify  a  man,
and  fuch  a  man,  tinctured  with  no  national  preju-
dice, with  no  domeftic  affection,  to  admire,  and
to  hold  out  to  the  admiration  of  mankind  the
conftitution  of  England  !  And  J(hall  we  Engiiihmen
revoke  to  fuch  a  fuit  ?  Shall  we,  when  fo  much
more  than  he  has  produced,  remains  flill  to  be  under-
ftood  and  admired,  inftead  of  keeping  ourfelves  in
the  fchools  of  real  fcience,  choofe  for  our  teachers
men  incapable  of  being  taught,  whofe  only  claim  to
know  is,  that  they  have  never  doubted ;  from  whom
we  can  learn  nothing  but  their  own  indocilityj
who  would  teach  us  to  fcorn  what  in  the  filence  of
cur  hearts  we  ought  to  adore  ?

Different  from  them  are  all  the  great  critics.
