thich preceded it. As a proof of this, they point out the cate of each nation, and trace its progress from barbarism to ction, from civilization to refinement. Instead of bowing dbefore the mighty names of antiquity, and acknowledging an inty of intellect, they pretend to avail themselves of the kidge of former times, and suppose that by uniting with it the Sore important discoveries of the moderns, the circle of knowdge is enlarged, and the conveniencies, and even the elegancies of life rendered much more attainable than at any former period. Under these impressions, they scruple not to express their contempt for every former state of society, and their high opinion of that in which they have the happiness to live. Not however content with the eminence at which they have arrived, hope spreads her wings and launches into the realms of conjecture; and the confidence of having done much, gives the assurance that we shall accomplish more. Without wishing to damp this ardor, it may be proper to observe, that if we are to judge from the experience of past ages, we shall scarcely be allowed to conclude that such regular, or progressive improvement, is the characteristic of the human race. If such were the fact, it must of course follow, that nations once civilized never again become retrograde, but must continue to rise till they attain their highest degree of perfection. But where are the countries in which letters and arts have made an uninterrupted progress ? or where have they for any great length of time been even stationary? Is India still the fountain of knowledge? and can she boast of her sages, the oracles of wisdom, who attract inquirers and disciples from distant regions? Is the condition of Egypt improved by the flight of three thousand years? or have her pyramids been surpassed by the labors of subsequent times? What was Greece once? what is she now? Characterised in the first instance by whatever was bright in genius, rich in intellect, excellent in art-in the latter by whatever is degraded and servile in human nature. Contrast republican with papal Rome. Examine the names that grace the rolls of antiquity, from the first to the second Brutus, and ask whether the inhabitants of modern Rome will be as well known at the distance of two thousand years, as their illustrious predecessors. Alas the scene is changed! and for century after century the peasant and the slave have trampled on the dust of heroes, as unconscious of their worth as the cattle that crop the herbage on their remains. Such is the boasted improvement of the human race; such the permanency of knowledge in nations where she has once established her seat! The tree perishes; and the transplanted scions will, unless they be carefully fostered, experience in their turn a similar fate.

Dismissing then the idea that there is in the human mind an

inherent tendency towards either improvement or deterioration, let us now briefly inquire into the other causes which are supposed to have contributed to those vicissitudes which it has successively experienced. Of these causes, few have been more strongly insisted on than those occasioned by diversity of climate and local situation."There are even countries," it has been observed by an eminent French writer, "where the inhabitants have never received the first rudiments of improvement, and where it is probable they never will make any proficiency;" and he conceives he can exactly ascertain within what degrees of the equator such countries lie. To this it may be replied, that had such been the case, letters and arts must have been permanently confined to those countries only which are more favored in point of situation than the rest of the globe. But the assertion is not borne out by experi ence. "Under the same climate," says a judicious foreign author,2 2" the Greeks rose from a wild and barbarous people, till they became the masters of the world; and that very Greece, which was so many years the garden of Europe, afterwards became a sterile desert. Boeotia lay in the vicinity_of Attica, and consequently enjoyed the same climate; yet the Boeotians were accounted as stupid as the Athenians were acute. The splendor of Grecian science was diffused not only through Greece itself, but extended to colonies far distant from the metropolis, and very. different with respect to climate." It requires indeed no very extensive acquaintance with history to discover, that the progress of letters and arts is not restricted by rivers or mountains; or that neither heat nor cold are uniformly hostile to the progress of learning; which at one time chose its residence amidst the sultry plains of Egypt, and at another rested on the frozen shores of Iceland., Such indeed is the constitution of man, that in many instances the facility of success deadens the desire of it, and the obstacles which, he encounters only serve to give a keener edge to his exertions. "In those northern ungenial climates," says the learned President of the Linnæan Society," where the intellect of man indeed has flourished in its highest perfection, but where the productions of nature are comparatively sparingly bestowed, her laws have been most investigated, and best understood. The appetite of her pupils was whetted by their danger of starvation, and the scantiness of her supplies trained them in habits of economy, and of the most acute observation."

It has been asserted by many writers, in accounting for the vicissitudes of the arts and sciences, that they contain within themselves the principles of their own destruction; insomuch, that when

The Abbé du Bos.

2 The Abate Andres.

• Sir J. E. Smith's Review of the Modern State of Botany.

they have arrived at their highest excellence, they, in the course of human affairs, perish and decay. Thus Mr. Hume asserts, that "whe: the arts and sciences come to perfection in any state, they naturally, or rather necessarily, decline, and seldom or never revive in that nation where they have formerly flourished;" and the judicious Tiraboschi admits, that "it is common to all the studies that are connected with the progress of taste, such as eloquence, poetry and history, as well as to the three sister arts, that when they have arrived at perfection, they as certainly return to that level from which they rose." This the learned Italian has endeavored to account for, by supposing that it is occasioned by an overstrained refinement, or a desire of excelling even those who may be considered as the just standards of eloquence and of taste. "Thus," says he, "Asinius Pollio reprobated the style of Cicero, as weak, languid and unpolished, and introduced, in its stead, a kind of declamation so dry, meagre and affected, that it seemed to recall the rudeness of the early ages. The two Senecas, the rhetor and the philosopher, followed, and by refining still further on the matter and the style, reduced the art to a still lower ebb." But whilst we may assent to the truth of these observations, we cannot but perceive that they contain little more than the mere statement of a fact, in which we must all agree; and that we must still recur to the question, to what cause is this alteration in the public taste, this decline of liberal studies, to be attributed? The ball will not rebound till it has reached the mark; and it may with confidence be asserted, that neither literature nor art have ever yet attained their highest degree of perfection. We must therefore endeavor to discover the causes of this decline in some essential alteration in the condition and manners of a people, which degrades their dignity, perverts their moral character, and corrupts and extinguishes their taste. Thus, instead of supposing that the style of Cicero had attained such a degree of excellence, as to afford no opportunity for future orators to display their powers, will it not be more to our purpose to inquire, what was the character of the age in the time of Cicero, and at the period when this decline took place? In the former, Rome was free, and the orator, fearless of offence, discussed in language as unrestrained as it was eloquent, affairs of the highest importance to individuals or the state. In the latter the people, after a series of oppression, as disgraceful to the sufferers as odious in their tyrants, lost, with the dignity of their subject, the energy and simplicity of their style. The same circumstances occurred in Italy in the beginning of the sixteenth century; when the independent states of that country fell under the dominion of despotic princes, and the free and vigorous mode of composition that distinguished the revivors of learning, gave way to a more verbose, affected and

enervated manner; till, with their independence and strength of character, the people lost that truth of feeling and correctness of taste, which can be permanently established on no other foundation. Thus whenever we find that a change has taken place in the literary taste of a nation, we may frequently discover the cause of it in the change of opinions and manners consequent upon the events of the times, and the different combinations of society; and although we may not always be able to trace these causes with precision, this will scarcely justify us in denying one of the first maxims of philosophy, and supposing that in matters of taste, effects are produced without a cause.

From these considerations it will perhaps appear, that instead of attributing the progress or decline of letters and arts to the influence of climate, or to any stated and unavoidable vicissitude, we are to seek for them in the unceasing operation of moral causes, in the relations of society, and the dispositions and propensities of the human mind. One of the most important of these relations is that by which we are connected with the government under which we live; and accordingly many writers have sought in the nature of such government, the causes of the improvement or deterioration of the human race. That the enjoyment of civil liberty is indispensable to the cultivation of literature, is an opinion which has been very generally advanced. "It is impossible," says Mr. Hume, " for the arts and sciences to arise at first among any people, unless that people enjoy the blessing of a free government." In illustrating this position, he observes that a despotic monarch, governing a large tract of country, never conceives the idea of securing the happiness of his people by established laws, but delegates his full power to inferior magistrates; each of whom "governs the subjects with full authority as if they were his own, and with negligence or tyranny as belonging to another." "A people governed after such a manner," he adds, " are slaves, in the full and proper sense of the word, and it is impossible they can ever aspire to any refinements of taste or reason. They dare not so much as pretend to enjoy the necessaries of life in plenty or security. To expect therefore that the arts and sciences should take their first rise in a monarchy, is to expect a contradiction." But although this sentiment in various forms, and with various modifications, has been often asserted, this has not deterred others from avowing a contrary opinion. Amongst these, one of the most strenuous is the Abate Andres, whose learned and extensive work on this subject gives great weight to his authority. "To contend,” says this author, "that the genius is depressed under a monarchical government, or that in a republic it acquires with the enjoyment of liberty a greater degree of elevation, is to assert a sophism, which is confuted by public experience NO. XXII. Pam. VOL. XI.

2 L

-as if a Corneille, or a Bossuet, had found the sublimity of their talents depressed by their having lived under a powerful monarchy; or as if Galileo, Lord Bacon, or Descartes, had lost, in the vexations they experienced, their freedom and elevation of mind!" The age of Louis XIV. was a period of high civilization and distinguished literary excellence." Perhaps," says the lively historian of that period, "it is that of all the rest which approaches the nearest to perfection." Yet this improvement was not the re sult of a free government, but the spontaneous growth of a country which had long been a stranger to political and civil liberty, and which even gloried in its subjection to despotic control. A review of these circumstances, then, so far from satisfying our enquiries, would serve rather to convince us that the progress or decline of literature depended wholly upon other causes, and that particular modes of government are either equally indifferent to it, or at most affect it only in a very slight and unimportant degree,

In attempting to decide upon these opposing facts and discordant opinions, it may, in the first place, be observed, that it is not on the professed or nominal form of a government, that its apti tude, or inaptitude to the promotion of literature, depends. A jealous and suspicious government, whether it be a monarchy or a republic, or by whatever name it may be distinguished, locks up the faculties and deadens the energies of a people. The truth seems to be that all governments derive their support from publie opinion, and that when any government, whatever its denomination may be, is firmly established, it can admit of a degree of liberty in its subjects, which might be supposed likely to prove injurious, or fatal, to a more precarious or unsettled authority. The favorable opinion of his subjects was perhaps never conciliated by any prince in a greater degree than by Louis XIV. By whatever qualifications this confidence was obtained, it is certain that his administration enjoyed a degree of stability and splendor beyond that of any other European potentate. In proportion to the liberty conceded, was the proficiency made by his subjects. Within the precincts of that court, Fenelon produced his immortal work, which would have done honor to a Spartan legislator; and Boileau, with a freedom which an arbitrary government has seldom tolerated, dared to oppose the whole strength of his genius to the favorite pursuit of his monarch, that of military glory, and endeavoured, by the precepts of wisdom and the blandishments of wit, to abate that inordinate ambition which proved so fatal, not only to the repose of his own subjects, but to that of Europe in general.

2

According then to the degree of confidence which any government has in its own stability, will, in general, be the liberty allowed to the expression of the public sentiment, and in proportion to this liberty will be the proficiency, made in literary pursuits. Nor