which there is clearly a real motive, to revenge the murder of his father. Orestes was suffering neither under delusion nor false impressions, nor was there any perversion of the natural feelings and affections (for such perversion must be without just cause); he reasoned rightly on real grounds, the power of doing which constitutes, in general terms, soundness of mind. His insanity commenced after the commission of the deed, and took its origin in remorse and horror at the magnitude of his crime. It was, however, only of temporary duration, and we find that he had entirely recovered at no long period afterwards.

Horace was fully aware of the great difficulty of distinguishing between these two species of insanity; for crime is, as has been before observed, the effect of an aberration of reason; and the man who commits a murder while under the influence of evil passions is not really in a sound state of mind. Struck with this view of the case, Horace asks

ર au commotæ crimine mentis, Absolves hominem, et sceleris damnabis eundem, Ex more imponens cognata vocabula rebus ?"

It has been frequently remarked, that no knowledge is so difficult of acquirement as self-knowledge; and yet none is of more importance to man, whether as regards his happiness in this world or his prospects in that to come. It would, indeed, be well if we were to commence the task of self-examination, and to put to our own breasts the question which the poet puts to the stoic philosopher :

"Quâ me stultitia, quoniam non est genus unum
Insanire putas ? Ego nam videor mihi sanus :"

and fortunate if the result of the examination induces the confession, however humiliating, proceeding from a conviction of our own innate depravity:

race.

"Stultum me fateor (liceat concedere veris)

Atque etiam insanum."

Thus much and more may be elicited from a single satire of HoHow much of philosophy, of knowledge of mankind, of shrewd observation, and, in many cases, of excellent moral precept, may we not derive from the same source! This, I think, is at least an argument in favour of a classical education, and a proof that the

time spent in the acquirement of the dead languages need not be considered as entirely thrown away.

But it is time to conclude, lest my readers exclaim, as our favourite poet to Damasippus :

"O major, tandem parcas, insane, minori !"

Cheltenham, May, 1837.

[We consider the utility or otherwise of classical pursuits to be placed on its right footing in Dr. Caldwell's Thoughts on the Study of the Greek and Latin Languages, to which excellent treatise we refer our readers.-EDS.]

THE IMPORTANCE OF CONSULTING THE BIAS OF YOUTH IN THE CHOICE OF A BUSINESS OR PROFESSION,

EXEMPLIFIED IN THE CASE OF LINNEUS.

[FROM A MS. MEMOIR].

AFTER spending three years more under the private tuition of Gabriel Hök, who ultimately married his eldest sister, Linneus was advanced to a higher grade in the school, and was, in consequence, privileged with more frequent opportunities than he had before enjoyed of indulging and cherishing his attachment to Botany-opportunities which he eagerly embraced, almost, indeed, to the utter neglect of the important branches of learning which he had been placed there to acquire. His highest pleasure was to escape from the thraldom of the school, in order to ramble, unfettered, in the country; not to avoid his task, or to indulge that listlessness of disposition which so generally influences truants in their stealthy rambles, but to hold secret and delightful converse with the fairies of the meadows.

On his removal, at seventeen years of age, to the gymnasium, or high school, he manifested, more decidedly than ever, his unconquerable aversion to the studies necessary to prepare him for the proper discharge of the sacred office. Rhetoric, Metaphysics, Ethics,

and Theology, had no charms for him; nor did Hebrew and Greek, languages in which the great treasures of divinity were deposited, find in him an admirer. He devoted himself almost exclusively to the Mathematics and Physical Sciences; to aid his progress in the latter of which, he formed a small collection of books, consisting principally of Floras, and some of these, though then beyond his comprehension, he even committed to memory. Indeed, he was generally known, amongst both tutors and scholars, by what was doubtless considered the contemptuous appellation of "the little botanist."

The result of so manifest a dislike to theological studies, and of so determined an adherence to the natural sciences, in a community totally unable to appreciate their value and importance, was that, when his father came to Wexiö in the expectation of finding him, as he was then in his nineteenth year, almost prepared to enter on the great duties of the Christian ministry, he had to endure the bitter disappointment and mortification of learning, from the prejudiced and narrow-minded tutors, that his son had neither taste nor talent for classical and biblical literature, that to incur further expense in his education would be the height of folly, and that the most proper and prudent plan he could adopt would be to bind him apprentice to a shoe-maker or tailor!

Thus was he whom, shortly after, Sweden was proud to call her son, and whom kings delighted to honour, on the point of being sacrified to ignorance and bigotry, and probably of being lost for ever, as a man of science, to himself and to mankind, in the unintellectual details of an ignoble mechanical employment. It is not unfrequently the case that attempts are thus made to thwart the obvious bias of youth, in order to promote some darling project or to serve some contemptible policy. With ordinary minds, easily influenced by external circumstances, this, it is true, may be a task of no difficult accomplishment; but in such as bear the genuine impress of genius, the impulse communicated by some early determination of their powers and predilection generally continues, through life, unchanged and undiminished. In the instance of Linneus, the whole course of his education hitherto had been directed to prepare him for an office for which, however dignified, he had no inclination whatever, and to turn the current of a taste which, formed almost at his birth, had grown deeper and stronger with his growth, and which neither severity of treatment, the insolence of contempt, nor the stern obligations of filial duty, could weaken or destroy. Yet it is only candid to admit that, although the result bears out this

VOL. VI.-NO. XX.

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sentiment in the case of Linneus, youthful propensities are often too capricious or unreasonable to justify parents in yielding to inclinations not less unequivocally expressed than in the instance in question. Nor should it be concealed that Botany, besides holding out no immediate or remote hopes of subsistence or honour, was not by any means regarded, at the period and place alluded to, even among the learned, with that respect, as a science, which the labours and fame of Linneus and of other modern cultivators have secured for it.

Honoured, however, be the name of the man who rescued talents so promising from the degradation which the father of Linneus was thus persuaded to think advisable and necessary. The venerable minister was grieved and vexed that so much time should have been spent, as he thought, to so unprofitable a purpose, and that his income, limited as it was, should have been burdened with expenses which had proved so useless and unavailing. Whilst under the influence of these feelings he had occasion to consult Rothman, an eminent physician, and professor of medicine in the college of Wexiö, respecting a complaint with which he had for some time been troubled. After describing his symptoms, he could not refrain from telling the professor, in the fulness of his heart, the sad and painful disappointment which he had recently suffered, and which threatened to dispel, in a moment, the bright visions of hope that had hitherto promised to cheer the evening of his days. Rothman was much interested by the recital, and told his patient that he could not only effect his restoration to health of body, but that he could also, in that instance at least, "minister to a mind diseased." He said that if the sciences to which the youth had devoted himself disqualified him for theological studies, his diligence and taste held out an assurance that in medicine he would become useful and eminent, and that he would ultimately distinguish himself in the wide, but almost untrodden, field of Natural History. So confident was Rothman of the correctness of these views and expectations that, to remove all scruple and uneasiness from the mind of his father, he generously offered to take the young outcast into his own house and under his own especial charge, during the remainder of his term at the gymnasium. This promise he punctually performed, and, in addition, gave him private lessons in Physiology, and explained to him the principles of the Tournefortian System of Botany, which was then universally and, considering the state of science, deservedly popular.

Thus, through the penetration and benevolence of Dr. Rothman, the prospect of a new career was opened before Linneus, and he

was not slow to avail himself, to the utmost, of the high advantages it afforded. He passed his examination in Physic in a manner highly satisfactory to his tutor and creditable to himself; and in Botany, which he had before studied without reference to system, he laboured so incessantly that he was soon enabled to assign every plant he gathered its proper place in the classification of the great Tournefort-a classification which, though highly ingenious, Linneus quickly discovered to be defective.

It is probable that, notwithstanding the bright and flattering anticipations of Rothman, and the pleasing change which the young naturalist, in consequence of his liberality, enjoyed, his parents did not view the hopeless overthrow of their favourite scheme with any high degree of complacency and satisfaction. In the church, comfort, respectability, and a competency, were morally certain; while in the unbeaten path which he seemed perversely determined to pursue, honour and emolument appeared to them as empty sounds, or as phantoms of the imagination that would inevitably allure him to poverty and ruin. So little, even yet, were they acquainted with the rich intellectual endowments of their son, and so little able to enter into the lofty projects and to conceive the buoyancy of hope of a great and aspiring mind, which often, indeed, makes its way to riches and to fame where dull and easy mediocrity would starve in penury and neglect.

L. L.

[Of course, every one professing himself a naturalist is familiar with the history of the "immortal Swede;" but as it may prove interesting and instructive to others, especially as treated by our intelligent correspondent, we have much pleasure in publishing it in the form above presented.—EDs.]