1 may be useful or ornamental to the understanding. Therefore it is plain, quite different fchemes are to be pursued in ftudy at thofe two different periods of life. This neceffary diftinction is very little attended to. Accordingly the idea, which many educators of youth feem to have formed of their province, is, plunging a raw boy to a much greater depth in languages, than he will ever, at any period of life, be the better for, and neglecting the neceffary work of laying an early foundation of general improvement. And on the other hand, the notion formed by many grown perfons, of learning, is only, the reading an infinite number of books; fo that they may have it to fay, they have read them, though they are nothing the wiser for it. As fome readers are for grafping at all fcience, fo others confine their refearches to one fingle article. Yet it is certain, that to excel in any fingle art or fcience, being wholly ignorant of all others, is not the complete improvement of the mind. Befides, fome of the different parts of knowledge are fo connected together, and fo neceffary to one another, that they cannot be feparated. In order to a thorough understanding of morality, and religion (a ftudy which might the best pretend to exclude all others, as being of infinitely greater confequence than all others) feveral collateral helps are neceffary, as languages, hiftory, and natural philofophy. There is no part of knowledge, that has been fingly fet up for the whole improvement of the mind fo much as claffical learning. Time was when Latin, Greek, and Logic were the whole of education, and they are by fome few narrow minds, which have had little culture of any other kind, thought fo ftill. But it is to be hoped, that people will at last be wife enough to fee, that, in order to the full improvement of the mind, it is not fufficient that one enter the porch of knowledge, but that he proceed from the study of words to that of things. The purfuit of too many different and inconfiftent ftudies at once is very prejudicial to thorough improvement. The human mind is fo formed, that, without distinction, 1 distinction, method, and order, nothing can be clearly apprehended by it. Many readers take a delight in heaping up in their minds a cumbrous mafs of mere unconnected truths, as if a man fhould get together a quantity of ftone, bricks, mortar, timbers, boards, and other materials, without any defign of ever putting them together into a regular building. Somé read by fits and starts, and, leaving off in the middle of a particular ftudy or inquiry, lofe all the labour they had bestowed, and never purfuing any one fubject to a period, have their heads filled only with incoherent bits and feraps. To prevent a turn to rambling and fauntering, without being able to collect your thoughts, or fix them on any one subject, the studies of arithmetic, mathematics, and logic, in youth, ought to have been purfued. But, if you have miffed of that advantage, you may conAtrain yourself at times to study hard for fome hours, with a fixed refolution, upon no account whatever to give over, till the time is out. By this means you will come at length to be able to bear the fatigue of clofe application. But after forty years of age, never think of going on with ftudy, when it goes against the grain : nature, at that time of life, will not be thwarted. With fome men ftudy is mere inquiry, no matter about what. And a discovery is to them the fame, whether it be of an important truth, or of fomewhat merely curious, or perhaps not even entertaining to any but fuch dull imaginations as their own. Such readers refemble that species of people, which the Spectator diftinguishes by the title of Quidnuncs, who pafs their lives in inquiring after news, with no view to any thing, but merely hearing fomewhat new. Were the works of the learned to be retrenched of all their fuperfluities and fpecious trifling, learning would foon be reduced into a much narrower compafs. The voluminous verbal critics, laborious commentators, and polemical writers, whofe works have, for feveral centuries, made the preffes groan, would then fhrink into fixpenny pamphlets, and pocket volumes. Such a degree of lazinefs as will not allow one to in 04 quire quire carefully into the sense of an author; impatience, inattention, rambling, are difpofitions in a reader, which effectually prevent his improvement, even though he fhould upon the whole fpend as much time over his books, as another, who fhall actually become extenfively learned. Some confider reading as a mere amusement, fo that, to them, the moft diverting book is the best. Such readers having no view to the cultivation of their understanding, there is no need to offer them any directions for the conduct of ftudy. The very great number of novels and tales, which are continually publishing, encourage in people a trifling and idle turn of mind, for which the prefent age is eminently remarkable, which makes any direct addrefs to their underftandings unacceptable; and nothing can please or gain their attention, that is not feafoned with fome amufement, fet off in fome quaint or artificial manner, or does not ferve to excite fome filly paffion. There is nothing more difficult, than to come at a right judgment of our own abilities. It is commonly obferved, that ignorant people are often extremely conceited of their own fancied knowledge. An ignorant perfon, having no manner of notion of the vast extenfiveness of science, concludes he has mastered the whole, because he knows not, that there is any thing to be learned beyond the little he has learned. But it will take many years ftudy only to know how much there is to be ftudied and inquired into, and to go through what is already known; and the moft learned beft know, how mnch, beyond all that is known, is quite out of the reach of human fagacity. There is indeed an infinity of things, in the ftricteft fenfe of the word, of which we cannot even know our own ignorance, not being at all within the reach of our ideas in our prefent ftate. That a young perfon may not run into the egregious, though common, error at the time of life, of fancying himself the most knowing perfon in the world, before he has gone half-way through the first principles, or rudi ments ments of knowledge, let him converfe with a perfon eminent in each branch of fcience, and learn from them what labour he muft beftow, what books he must read, what experiments he muft try, what calculations he muft go through, what controverfies he muft examine, what errors he muft avoid, what collections he muft make, what analogical reafonings he muft purfue, what clofe refemblances in fubjects he muft diftinguish from one another and fo forth. And after he has gone through all that an able mafter in each fcience has prescribed, and has learned all that is to be learned, and feen that all our learning is but ignorance, then let him be proud of his knowledge, if he can. The univerfal finatterer knows nothing to the bottom. The man of one fcience, on the contrary, makes that every thing, folves all difficulties by it, refolves all things. into it; like the musician and dancing-mafter in Moliere who labour to prove, that the welfare of flates, and happinefs of the world, depend wholly on the cultivation of those two elegances. Some men feem to have minds too narrow to apprehend any subject without first cramping and hampering it. Nothing great or generous can find room in their fouls. They view things bit by bit, as one who looks through a microfcope. A man of fuch a character may know fome fubjects more minutely than one who is univerfally allowed to be a great man, and yet fuch a one must be acknowledged to be a perfon of very mean accomplishments. For it is not having a heap of unanimated knowledge in one's head, but having the command of it, and being capable of applying and exerting it in a mafterly manner, that denominates a truly great and highly accomplished mind. Men's natural tempers have a very great influence over their way of thinking. Sanguine people, for example, fee every thing very fuddenly, and often very clearly in one light. But they do not always take time to view acomplex fubject on all fides, and in every light; without which, it is impoffible to determine any thing about it with certainty. Thofe tempers, when joined with weak judgments, make wild work in matters of inquiry inquiry and learning. For through hafte and eagernefs, they lay false foundations, or raise fuperftructures upon nothing. Sanguine tempers, however, are generally found to be the fitteft for action, and without a confiderable degree of zeal and warmth, men feldom carry any great defign into execution. Men of cold faturnine tempers are generally flow and laborious in their researches, doubtful and undetermined in their opinions, and awkward at applying their discoveries and obfervations for the general advantage of knowledge, and of mankind. But if the miner did not dig up the ore, the curious artift could not fashion the metal into utenfils and inftruments neceffary in life. The laborious fearcher after knowledge is neceffary to the man of genius. For it is from him that he has the materials he works upon, which he would not himself bestow the drudgery of fearching after. For a laborious turn is very rarely found to accompany brightness of genius. Some people's reading never goes beyond the bulk of a pamphlet, who do not for all that quit their pretenfions to difputing and arguing. But converfation alone does not go deep enough to lay a folid foundation of knowledge; nor does reading alone fully anfwer the purpose of digefting and rendering our knowledge useful. Reading is neceffary to get at the fundamental principles of a fcience. And the careful perufal of a few capital books is fufficient for this purpose. Afterwards to talk over the fubject with a fet of intelligent men, is the best method for extending one's views of it. For in an evening's conversation, you may learn the substance of what each of your friends has spent many months in studying. If you can find one or more ingenious, learned, and communicative friends, with whom to converse upon curious and useful fubjects, to hear their opinions, and afk the advise, especially of those who are advanced in life, and, having been at the feat of the muses, are qualified to direct you the shorteft way thither; if you can find, in the place where you live, fuch a fet of friends, with whom to converse freely, and without the trammels |