Works

priated to a particular ftudy or occupation. The arrangement of what was to be learned, or practised, during this period, admits of a fourfold divifion.

The firft, comprising thirty years, is af figned to the acquisition of knowledge as preparatory to active occupation.

The second, of twenty years, is dedicated principally to public and profeffional employ

ment.

Of the third, which contains ten years, the first five are allotted to literary and scientific compofition, and the remainder to the continuation of former pursuits.

The last ten, conftituting the fourth divifion, which begins with the fixty-first year, are devoted to the enjoyment of the fruits of his labours; and the conclufion of the whole is specified to be a preparation for eternity.

The Andrometer is to be confidered as a mere sketch, never intended for publication. In the construction of it, Mr. Jones probably had a view to thofe objects, the attainment of which he then meditated. We are not to

conclude, that the preparation for eternity, which ftands at the top of the scale, was to be deferred until the feventieth year; it is rather to be confidered as the object to which he was perpetually to look, during the whole course of his life, and which was exclusively to engross the attention of his latter years. He was too well convinced of the precarious tenure of human exiftence, to allow himfelf to reft the momentous concern of his eternal welfare, on the fallacious expectation of a protracted life; he knew moreover too well the power of habit, to admit a fuppofition, that it could be effectually refifted or changed at the clofe of life. Neither are we to fuppofe, that moral and religious leffons which constitute the occupation of the eighth year, were from that period to be discontinued, although they are not afterwards mentioned; but the meaning of Mr. Jones probably was, that they should be feriously and regularly inculcated at an age, when the intellectual faculties had acquired ftrength and expansion by preceding exercises. That the order of

arrangement in the Andrometer, could never be strictly adhered to in the application of our time, and cultivation of our talents (if it were intended) is evident; but to those who from their fituation are enabled to avail themfelves of the fuggeftions which it furnishes, it will supply useful hints for improvement, and ferve as a standard of comparison for their progrefs. With respect to Mr. Jones himself, if his own acquifitions in his thirtieth year, when he conftructed the Andrometer, be compared with it, they will be found to rife to a higher degree in the scale.

With thefe explanations, I present it to the reader; reverfing, for the fake of convenience, the order of the fcale.