some of his experiments he has entertained opinions, which, by subsequent facts and inquiries, he has been convinced These he never fails to correct, with that sacred regard to truth, which ever characterizes a real philosopher.

were erroneous.

Since the year 1800 he has lived in different parts of the continent, either travelling through Switzerland, Italy, France, or Germany, or occupied at Paris or Munich in his philosophical researches. He has seen much of the world; his inquisitive mind has been constantly engaged, and his enthusiasm for the promotion of human happiness has lead him to contemplate society in all its forms and in all its parts.

The speculative philosopher, who withdraws himself from society to reason on abstract sciences, or the involutions in the orbits of invisible planets and satellites, may furnish much to excite admiration of our intellectual powers; but his philosophy is of little use in common life; it neither promotes our temporal enjoyments, nor increases our devotional exercises. View him, seated in his dark and dusty study, lost in contemplation, and bewildered in his own metaphysical speculations; secluded from the world, and admiring the power and goodness of that Being, which has formed a planet, invisible to the naked eye, and until lately unknown, and, if he but cast his eye through his window, perhaps the first object, he beholds, will furnish him with a very different train of reflections. In all probability he will behold some person, a constituent member of that society, he thinks unworthy the attention of a philosopher, overwhelmed with prejudices, and almost crushed with the weight of evils, flowing from error and ignorance, and who, for the want of a little philosophical knowledge concerning the ordinary occupations of domestic and social life, carries in his countenance the sure and indelible indications of discontent and wretchedness. Surely, if such a recluse has any feeling or reflection, he will descend from his solitary apartment, mix with his fellow creatures, and, by his endeavors to make them virtuous, first teach them to be content and happy.

Rumford has interested himself for the poor, and has endeavored by his writings and philosophical improvements to raise the lowest classes of society to happiness and virtue. Nor have his labors been without success or reward. Thousands of wretched beings can never forget with what parental tenderness and cordial affection he converted them to habits of useful industry. For his philanthropic labors he received the warmest expressions of gratitude and transports from the indigent people, for whose welfare he exerted himself. For his philosophy and public service he has been rewarded by the satisfaction, that all the learned and scientific societies in Europe boast of enrolling him among their numbers.

With his genteel and polished manners Rumford possess→ es a penetrating and communicative mind, which, with his extensive knowledge of mankind, renders him an agreeable and instructive companion. The following character is given in a French publication* in a few just and expressive lines. "Sa conversation est animée, intéressante, substantielle ; c'est "celle d'un homme qui a beaucoup vu et qui a porté sur "chaque chose un ceil observateur. Il s'occupe du bien des "hommes et compte peu sur leur reconnaissance. “son goût et n'est pas indifférent à la gloire.”

Il suit

ON THE STYLE OF GIBBON.

From the miscellaneous sketches of Arthur Browne esq.

AFFECT

FFECTATION conciliates more followers, than nature; for it is easier to be affected, than to be natural. The position seems paradoxical, yet I fear it is true. Almost all children at a certain age become affected, and all the efforts of the parent and master are required to bring back to nature the motion of their limbs and carriage of their bodies. We may extend this observation to mental exertions. The style of Mr. Addison is so easy, as scarcely to excite admiration, unless in persons of taste and refinement; while that of John* La Décade Philosop hique, Littéraire et Politique, No. 20.

son or of Gibbon dazzles the world. The mischiefs, done by their example in the regions of taste and elegance, are infinite; and the prodigious influence, they have had on composition in general, calls for every man's efforts to point out to their imitators, servum pecus, the glaring deformities of their models.

Let a writer try to imitate their respective modes, for by an endeavor at imitation alone can the difficulty and desert of composition be thoroughly weighed, and reply what is his decision on their merits. I think he will say, that Addison is inimitable, while the others may be copied, as it were, by a receipt or formula. A learned and ingenious gentleman* has, in the transactions of the Irish academy, by an analysis of Johnson's mode of writing, given what I may call a prescription for composing in the Johnsonian manner, the possibility of which indeed has been humorously proved in the work, called Lexiphanes. The same may be said of Gibbon's. Addison's periods with easy air embrace infinite variety. Gibbon's, with uniform disposition and monotonous cadence, offend the ear of every lover of true harmony in composition. No man, who writes naturally, could shape his sentences with such uniformity. A peculiar style, not an affected peculiarity, like that of walking on stilts instead of legs, but a custom would be perceived, a natural manner, differing, like his hand writing, from other men's, while shades of variation would still be seen at different times of life in different humors, or, as he had been tinctured, by a more recent perusal of this or that author. Gibbon is alike throughout. The following recipe will do for half his periods. Let the sentence be formed of two great members, and no more, nearly of the same dimensions, and of corresponding sound, sometimes copulated by means of the particle and, and sometimes contrasted by means of the particles but or yet. If you change sometimes this bifid sentence into a triplet, these two formulæ will exhaust the greater part of his periods. Examples will best explain. Open any part of his volumes, and you * Dr. Barrowes, F. T. C.D.

will find illustrations. I declare I have not searched for any particular part, but have taken the first, which offered before me. It is in the fortieth chapter, the description of the churches and palaces, built by Justinian, and of the fortifications of Europe. Eight out of fifteen periods, employed on the former, and more than a moiety of twenty sentences, whose subject is the latter, are constructed in these moulds. The skeleton or ribs of a few of them shall be produced. Ex pede Herculem. "The munificence of the emperor was "diffused over the holy land, and, if reason should condemn "the monasteries, built by Justinian, yet charity must applaud "the wells, which he sunk. The schismatic temper of Egypt was ill entitled to the royal bounty, some remedies "were applied to the disasters of wars and earthquakes; and "almost every saint in the calender acquired the honor of a

temple. Almost every city of the empire obtained the solid ad"vantages of bridges, hospitals, and aqueducts; but the severe "liberality of the monarch, &c. &c. The Byzantine palace "was restored, and some notion may be conceived of the whole "edifice by the vestibule. The fortifications of Europe and "Asia were multiplied by Justinian, but the repetition of these "timid precautions exposed to a philosophic eye the debility " of the empire."

One example may do for the triplet. "The poets of the age have celebrated the rare alliance of nature and art in "the summer palace of Justinian, yet the crowd of attend"ants, who followed the court, complained of their inconve"nient lodgings, and the nymphs were too often alarmed by "the famous whale, Porphyrio."*

Labored uniformity however is not the only fault of Gibbon. His wish to write nervously, and to avoid the use of expletives often enfeebling, but which Addison has introdu ced without fear, covers his works with obscurity, and swells them with turgid pomp. Brevis esse laborat, obscurus fit. His history is a perpetual enigma, with the grandeur and the

* Since writing the above, I have observed in the British Critic, when reviewing Gibbon's Miscellaneous Works, this triplet observed,

darkness of an oracle. Each sentence is a riddle, which by obscure allusions to events, scarcely if at all mentioned before, by circuitous descriptions of well known personages, or on the contrary by mentioning others, never before introduced, as if perfectly known to the reader, opens an occasion for conjecture, and presupposes knowledge, which would make his history unnecessary. Whoever takes up his book with avidity, conceiving that it will convey all the useful parts of information, contained in the Byzantine historians, to those, who have neither leisure nor inelination to consult those voluminous compilations, will find, without a previous acquaintance with them, the work of the modern historian nearly unintelligible. To explain what has been urged, let us take any example, the first, that occurs ; suppose in chap. 41. The amours of Antonina, the wife of Belisarius, are the subject. "Before her marriage with Be"lisarius Antonina had one husband, and many lovers. Pho"thus, the son of her former nuptials, was of an age to dis"tinguish himself at the siege of Naples, and it was not till "the autumn of her age and beauty, that she indulged a "scandalous attachment to a Thracian youth. Theodosius "had been educated in the Eunomian heresy; the African "voyage was consecrated by the baptism and auspicious name " of the first soldier, who embarked, and the proselyte was "adopted into the family of his spiritual parents, Belisarius "and Antonina. Before they touched the shores of Africa, "this holy kindred degenerated into sensual love; and, as "Antonina soon overleaped the bounds of modesty and cau❝tion, the Roman general alone was ignorant of his own dis"honor." The first period informs us, that she was attached to a Thracian youth; the second tells us, that Theodosius was educated in the Eunomian heresy; that the African expedition was consecrated by the baptism and auspicious name of the first soldier, who embarked, and that the proselyte was adopted into the family of his spiritual parents, Belisarius and Antonina. It is pretty plain from this, that Belisarius and Antonina were sponsors for the first soldier, who embark