been quoted from Pliny: he thus mentions him in another place :-" Sed idem Aristoteles, vir immensæ subtilitatis, qui id ipsum fecit, rationem convexitatis mundi reddit, qua contrarius Aquilo Africo flat." The obscurity with which he is reproached, must in justice be partly attributed to his subjects, and to the profundity with which he treats them. He soars into the clouds, and dives into the deep. He aims at developing all the secrets of nature : the precipices are his pathway: the ordinary road of truth is left to common minds; and he delights to travel where he can have but few companions. His writings have more force than elegance; and they certainly are, however pardonably, deficient in clearness. This fault is in some measure produced by the extreme conciseness of his style; which occasions a constraint and embarrassment in his elocution. His manner seems more calculated to surprise than to persuade it would be necessary, it has been observed, to hear him speak to understand his doctrine. An affectation of obscurity on some occasions conceals what Pythagoras concealed under symbols, and Plato under allegories. This disposition to outrun those whom he professes to guide, has been very instrumental in undermining his popularity with the moderns: and Bacon, in his Essays, accuses him of ostentation: but strangely enough, he associates Socrates and Galen in the charge. Casaubon, on the contrary, in his notes on Laertius, in the same spirit in which he panegyrises him in the Commentary on Persius, says that none but sophists and rhetoricians, proverbially superficial, ever speak ill of him. He quotes the sentiment of an ancient philosopher to

that effect, who says that the criticisms of his censurers recoil upon themselves.

With respect to his style, it meets with Cicero's approbation in his Brutus. "Quis Aristotele ner. vosior, Theophrasto dulcior? Lectitavisse Platonem studiose, audivisse etiam Demosthenes dicitur: idque apparet ex genere et granditate verborum." Rapin thinks he can never say enough on the discovery of the syllogism. "Et cette construction du syllogisme, qui est la véritable Logique d'Aristote est si parfaite en son genre, qu'on n'a pû depuis y rien ajoûter, ny rien diminuer, sans la gâter. Quand on a le sens droit, on ne peut souffrir d'autre manière de raisonner, ny d'autres principes du raisonnement, que ceux d'Aristote. Et comme l'on dispute de tout temps contre la raison: parce que c'est d'ordinaire l'opinion qui gouverne le monde: les siècles sénséz ne se sont distinguez des autres, que par l'estime qu'ils ont faite de la Logique d'Aristote."— Réflexions sur la Logique.

Among the moderns who have formed themselves on the ancients Descartes holds a distinguished place. He was one of the first who united Geometry with Physics. To exquisite skill in the former, he added a strong imagination, fertile in new and curious ideas. It is true, he raised for himself a superstructure on a sandy foundation; and therefore it did not stand: but at all events he performed the service of Samson, in pulling down the temple of the Philistines. His principles of motion, figure, and extension, were nearly the same with those of Democritus and Epicurus. An amusing story is told by Rapin, that Father Mersene, who was his resident at Paris,

having mentioned one day in a company of learned men, that Monsieur Descartes, who had acquired a high character in Geometry, was drawing up a system of Natural Philosophy, in which he admitted a vacuum, the system was ridiculed by Robertoul and some others, who prophesied that on such a foundation it would come to nothing. Father Mersene wrote to him, that a vacuum was just then out of fashion at Paris. On this information, Descartes felt himself obliged to change his scheme, in conformity with the notions of the Natural Philosophers in vogue, for whose support he was a candidate, and to admit the plenum of Leucippus. "Ainsi l'exclusion du vuide devint par politique un de ses principes." To obviate the difficulties started by Gassendi, he invented his doctrine of subtle matter, which was to suit itself to all the solid interstices, between the larger solid bodies, necessarily clogging and interfering with each other, unless we allow some fluid, yielding matter to give way to the motions of the other. Thus did he endeavour in some measure to reconcile the two opinions of the plenum and the vacuum: to which temporising conduct he was probably induced, not merely by the ambition of being the most fashionable philosopher, but by the strong hint given to the learned world in general, in the person of Galileo, who was at this time thrown into the Inquisition, for asserting the earth's motion. The consequence of this complaisance to the taste of the age was, that Descartes was not himself satisfied with his own after-thought of the plenum and subtle matter, and therefore supports it with less than his natural power, especially in what regarded the principle of motion. Divines have

with much justice objected to his metaphysics, from the sceptical tendency they encourage. They are set forth in his Meditationes de prima Philosophia. In the first of these he propounds the reasons why we ought to doubt of all things in general, the advantage of which he states to consist in delivering us from all kinds of prejudices arising from education and commonly received but unexamined impressions; and even disengaging our minds from sense, that we may not any longer doubt of the things, which we shall afterwards discover to be true. But is it certain that we shall discover these truths? Does he not ask us to give up much more than he can satisfactorily engage to replace by his system? His method resembles that of the Pythagoreans, spoken of by Aristotle, who do not so much endeavour to assign a reason for the things which they explain, as to make every thing bend to the principles they have assumed; in like manner he seems not to consider his system as made to suit the sensible, and therefore we may suppose actual constitution of things, but the sensible and actual constitution of things as made to suit his system.

CHARACTER OF TIMON THE MISANTHROPE.

̓Αντώνιος δὲ τὴν πόλιν ἐκλιπὼν καὶ τὰς μετὰ τῶν φίλων διατριβὰς, οἴκησιν ἔναλον κατεσκεύαζεν αὐτῷ περὶ τὴν Φάρον, εἰς τὴν θάλασσαν χῶμα προβαλών· καὶ διῆγεν αὐτόθι φυγάς ἀνθρώπων, καὶ τὸν Τίμωνος ἀγαπᾶν καὶ ζηλοῦν βίον ἔφασκεν, ὡς δὴ πεπονθὼς ὅμοια· καὶ γὰρ αὐτὸς ἀδικηθεὶς ὑπὸ φίλων καὶ ἀχαριστηθεὶς, διὰ τοῦτο πᾶσιν ἀνθρώποις ἀπιστεῖν καὶ δυσχεραίνειν. Ὁ δὲ Τίμων ἦν Αθηναῖος, ὃς καὶ γέγονεν ἡλικίᾳ μάλιστα κατὰ τὸν Πελοποννησιακὸν πόλεμον, ὡς ἐκ τῶν ̓Αριστοφάνους καὶ Πλάτωνος* δραμάτων λαβεῖν ἐστιν. Κωμῳδεῖται γὰρ ἐν ἐκείνοις ὡς δυσμενής καὶ μισάνθρωπος· ἐκκλίνων δὲ καὶ διωθούμενος ἅπασαν ἔντευξιν, ̓Αλκιβιάδην νέον ὄντα καὶ θρασὺν ἐσπάζετο καὶ κατεφίλει προθύμως. Απημάντου δὲ θαυμάσαντος, καὶ πυθομένου τὴν αἰτίαν, φιλεῖν ἔφη τὸν νεανίσκον, εἰδὼς ὅτι πολλῶν ̓Αθηναίοις κακῶν αἴτιος ἔσοιτο. Τὸν δὲ ̓Απήμαντον μόνον, ὡς ὅμοιον αὐτῷ καὶ ζηλοῦντα τὴν διαίταν, ἔστιν ὅτε προσίετο· καὶ ποτὲ τῆς τῶν χοῶν † οὔσης ἑορτῆς, εἰστιῶντο καθ ̓ αὑτοὺς οἱ δύο. Τοῦ δ ̓ Απημάντου φής σαντος, ὡς καλὸν, ὦ Τίμων, τὸ συμπόσιον ἡμῶν; Εἴγε σὺ, ἔφη, μὴ παρῇς. Λέγεται δὲ, ̓Αθηναίων ἐκκλησιαζόντων, ἀναβὰς ἐπὶ τὸ βῆμα ποιῆσαι σιωπὴν καὶ προσδοκίαν μεγάλην διὰ τὸ παράδοξον· εἶτα εἰπεῖν, Εστι μοι μικρὸν οἰκόπεδον, ὦ ἄνδρες Αθηναῖοι, καὶ συκῆ τις ἐν αὐτῷ πέφυκεν, ἐξ ἧς ἤδη συχνοὶ τῶν πολιτῶν ἀπήγε ξαντο. μέλλων οὖν οἰκοδομεῖν τὸν τόπον, ἐβουλήθην δημοσία προειπεῖν ἵνα ἂν ἄρα τινὲς ἐθέλωσιν ὑμῶν, πρὶν ἐκκοπῆναι τὴν συκῆν, ἀπάγξωνται. Τελευτήσαντος δὲ αὐτοῦ καὶ ταφέντος "Αλησι παρὰ τὴν θάλασσαν, ὤλισθε τὰ προύχοντα τοῦ αἰγιαλοῦ· καὶ τὸ

* The comic writer of that name.

This feast took place on the second or middle day of the