the experience of disappointment has ever been able to drive out of his head..

By the favour of a person of considerable interest, whom his officious civility had in some instance happened to oblige, he has obtained a small pension, on which he makes shift to live, and to get into very to lerable company, being admitted as a good-natured oddity, who never offends, and is never offended. He has now given up his plans for bettering his private fortune, except in so far as they are connected with the prosperity of his country, having turned his thoughts entirely to politics and to finance. I know not if it was an ill-natured amusement which I received the other morning from seeing him attack his old acquaintance Sanguine in the coffee-house, and drive him from the fire-place to the window, from the window to the door, and from the door out into the street, with a paper of observations on Mr. Pitt's plan for reducing the national debt. Sanguine was dumb with vexation and contempt, which Prospect (who was full of bustle and of enjoyment from this new-sprung scheme) very innocently construed into the silence of attention, and concluded his pursuit, by thrusting the paper into the other's hand, telling him, that when next they met he should be glad to have his sentiments on the probability of the plan, and the justness of the calculations.

It would, I believe, Sir, considerably increase the stock of human happiness, if you could persuade men like Mr. Sanguine, that misanthropy, comfortless as it is, is yet more an indulgence than a virtue: that a war with the world is generally founded on injustice; and that neither the yieldings of complacency, nor the sportfulness of good humour, are inconsistent with the dignity of wisdom, I am, &c.

V

MODERATUS,

N° 67. SATURDAY, MAY 13, 1786.

OVID.

Studiumque immane loquendi. NOBODY will deny the superiority of the modern over the ancient world in almost all the arts and sciences. But perhaps that superiority is not more observable when we think of the articles of modern acquirement in detail, than when we consider the facility which the present times have introduced in the art of obtaining knowledge in general; or, when that idea is applied to the young, the highly improved system of Education which we have invented, so much simpler and more concise than that which the ignorance of our forefathers led them to adopt. Were it not beneath the dignity of the subject, one might apply to our present system of education, what some venders of little books of Arithmetic, Mathematics, and Astronomy, have advertised of their performances-it is Education made easy to the meanest capacities.'

The ancient system for the acquisition of knowledge, was by listening to the instructions of the wise and experienced; and in some of the old schools a probationary silence for a very long period was insisted on for that purpose. In those times, that might perhaps be suitable enough; but now when life, according to some philosophers, is so much shortened, and there are so many more things to talk about, the ancient mode would surely be very preposterous. Indeed there is much reason to doubt if, even in ancient times, this method of listening was so much practised as has sometimes been represented. Pythagoras, it is presumed, like some philosophers of

our own days, chose to talk for all the rest of the company, and enjoined silence to his scholars, that he might have hearers; but Socrates, who had been taught better breeding by his wife, let them have more than word about with him. Plutarch indeed another of their wise men, says, in a Treatise upon Education, that man has two powers, which give him the pre-eminence over all other animals, understanding and speech; that the first is made to command, and the latter to obey; that understanding or mind is superior to accident or fortune, that sickness or disease has no power over it, and that the wrinkles of age do not diminish its beauty; that time, which conquers all things, has no effect on it, but, by a privilege peculiar to itself, it maintains its youth in old age.' This Plutarch, however, was himself one of the most talkative fellows in the world, and delighted in story-telling beyond any man of his time; and the description he has given us above, of understanding or intelligence, applies equally to the other faculty he meant to set it over, to wit, that of speech. We have every day examples to convince us, that neither loss of fortune, bad health, or old age, has any power over the tongue; to it indeed the circumstance of its superior vigour, when old, applies so strikingly, that one would almost suppose an error in the text, and that there was here a mistake, which those Greeks had a hard word to express, but which signified, that one had put first what should have been last: on this supposition, what the author really meant to say is, that it is the business of the tongue to command, and the part of the understanding to obey.

Now this, when so corrected, is pretty nearly the modern idea, which is, that knowledge is to be acquired fully as much, or rather more, by speaking than by hearing; and this rule, like other rules of education, is to be attended to from the earliest

years.

Mothers, who, according to the ablest opinions on the head, are the best instructors of early youth, have particularly an excellent method of inculcating this doctrine on their pupils. As they grow up, those pupils are to be confirmed in the practice of it. When brought into company, they are to be particularly cautioned against that antique bashfulness which used to disqualify young people from this attainment; as far indeed as youth might be used by way of argument for silence, they are to forget altogether their being young, and to talk, with the authority of experience and the loquacity of age, in all places, public and private. Neither the Church nor the Play-house is to be excepted; and in public exhibitions of greater moment, if a young man, for example, happens to get into the House of Commons, and gives himself any trouble about what is going on there, it is wonderful how much he may learn merely by speaking, as the daily examples of Orators, who get up without knowing any thing of what they are to talk about, evince.

There is one part of the course of modern education, which might at first view be supposed unfavourable to this mode of acquiring knowledge—and that is, the article of travelling; because it often happens, that, from a want of the languages of those countries through which he is to pass, a young traveller cannot speak so much as is proper for the purpose. But this may be almost entirely remedied in Paris, and other capitals of every foreign country, by conversing with English only, or with such of the natives as already understand a little of the English tongue, and are very willing to learn more of it, as Friseurs, Tailors, Valets de place, &c. From such companions, one not only may obtain a very competent knowledge of the manners and customs of such foreign countries; but one has also a favourable op

portunity of communicating to them the manners and customs of one's own, which can be done with much more freedom and truth to such hearers than to others. In this manner travel, instead of a hindrance will be of very great use in promoting this new and improved mode of education; it will promote speaking, and insure an audience, both while a young man remains abroad, and after he comes home: while abroad he will speak of nothing but his own country, which will enable him to speak of nothing but foreign countries when he returns.

This general maxim, which I am here endeavouring to enforce, must however be understood to apply to people of a certain fortune only. With those in less favoured circumstances, hearing and receiving instruction are necessary, at least in particular situations and societies. In the company of the great or the rich, which they are at all times to seek after and frequent, they must listen with as unlimited assent, though not quite so rigid a silence, as the disciples of the Philosopher we first mentioned; but, when they leave this society, and get among their equals, they will then have the privilege of communicating what knowledge they have received, and are entitled to impose silence on their auditory, by the decisive authority of those great and rich men, of whose school they are. This leads me to mention a method of acquiring knowledge, the most easy and compendious of any, which is by growing rich or great one's self; a truth which I have seen many very wise and learned men confess, by the deference they paid to the opinions and information of one lately come to the possession of a fortune or a title, whom, before he attained that wealth or rank, they had been obliged to pronounce very ignorant and uninformed.

But as those who are poor may acquire knowledge