he professes himself the master; and offers to read, ad aperturam libri-the examiner opening as many of the authors, in what places he pleases, or to which chance may direct him. I have before me a list of thirty-nine authors, which he professed on that occasion. All who pass from a lower to a higher class, undergo a Black Stone examination, (so called from the students' sitting at the end of a long table on a black marble slab ;) but the competition for prizes lies among those few who have the courage to dare bravely, and to meet the cleverest and boldest of their companions in literature.

At the age of nine, he began to learn FRENCH, under his beloved mother, who spoke that language with fluency and correctness. After his progress in Latin, he found this very easy; and soon read through many of the Poets, Racine, Moliere, Crebillon, Delille, &c.; together with Pascal, Fenelon, Du Bosc, Saurin, &c. It was originally intended that, after he had been four years at Glasgow, he should spend a year either at

Paris, or at the University of Montaubon; but this purpose, at his particular request, we had for some time relinquished.

The next year he entered upon the study of GREEK. It was impossible that he should not admire the Greek historians and poets; though he thought even they had been over-rated. That the expatriation of the Greeks, by the capture of Constantinople, and the consequent diffusion of Greek literature, contributed most materially to the revival of learning in Europe; and that nothing then existed which could bear comparison with the chaste and beautiful writings of the ancients, he readily admitted: but he thought it mere pedantry to offer a homage to them, which should imply a contempt for the moderns. He thought, and others thought with him, that whatever might be the powers of the ancients, they did not surpass, in any department, writers who have lived since the revival of learning; while, in some departments, they fell far short of them. During one of his vacations, after he went to College, he wrote a very elaborate essay on

"The advantages of classical literature," in which he said all that he could say in favor of the ancients; but his sentiments on the comparative worth and beauty of the classical and more recent writers remained unchanged.* Of the Greek philosophers he used to say, "It is classical treason to declare it; and, therefore, I must take care before whom I expose myself; but I think most of these are mere drivellers." He was particularly struck with this when we read together the Ethics of Aristotle. He thought that, as a philosopher, Cicero threw all the Greeks into the shade. This might be true, without any disgrace to them: for he enjoyed the advantage of all their lights.

In this Essay, he says, "Let us consider the poetry of Greece and Rome as affording the best models for imitation. When I speak thus highly of the poetry of the ancients, I do not mean to depreciate that of the moderns. There is about some men a sort of servile adoration paid to the authority of antiquity-but arising from any thing rather than from a true perception of the beauties they affect to admire-which leads them to sacrifice, at a shrine that prejudice, not reason, has erected, all the most unquestionable claims of cotempo-. rary genius."

My dear son, however, moving, as he did among the fine writings, and curious but unsatisfying speculations of the classics, learned

to perceive, more and more, the necessity and advantages of that divine revelation, which has thrown open to the most uneducated christian, and placed among the first principles of his knowledge, the truths for which so many powerful minds had been for ages searching in vain. "The world by wisdom knew not God."* He saw that while philosophers, toiling in the dark, had only accumulated a mass of errors, with here or there a particle of truth, rather "received by tradition from their fathers," than elicited by their own efforts, God had "revealed" his perfections, the nature of his government, and the riches of his grace, "to babes." He excepted from the mass of trifling philosophers, one distinguished man. His great favourite of pagan antiquity was Socrates, § who had, as he thought, drawn moral

† 1 Pet. i. 18.

Matt. xi. 25.

* 1 Cor. i. 21. The writer and his son had read the different reviews of Mitchell's Aristophanes; from which they learned that that accomplished and elegant scholar had, as it was natural to ex

science out of the obscurity, in which the miserable sophistry of the rest had involved it. This excellent man he ever designated, "the St. John of heathenism:" and he wondered how any scholar could maintain, that that almost inspired sage virtually abandoned the principle of the divine unity, for which he dared to die, by requesting, as Plato, in his Phædo, relates, that his attendants would offer a cock to Esculapius. Is it forgotten that he did this—if, indeed, he really did it at allonly as he was just sinking under the stupifying influence of poison? My son also greatly admired the distinguished disciple of Socrates, Xenophon, whose Memorabilia, Cyropædia,` and Anabasis, he read through. Besides, portions of almost all the different Greek classics,

pect in translating a work so intimately connected with the fate of the Athenian philosopher, made some remarks on the character of Socrates. My impression is, that his animadversions were unfriendly to the sage. I have not the talents -nor would this be a proper place-to discuss the question of his claims to the unqualified admiration of posterity: but William, whatever he may have heard or read, retained to the last the favourable opinion which he had formed, some years before, on reading the Memorabilia.