often various, and their dispositions heterogeneous, the tutor is, for the most part, left to commune with himself. Such a situation, in this view, is not desirable; but the power of habit is unlimited, and, at any rate, this state has its advantages: the increase of opportunities it affords for study are obvious; and though we cannot enjoy the spirit-stirring crack of our jocund cronies, yet if we can spend the same time with Shakespeare or Addison, or Stewart, we are gainers by the privation. I grant we cannot always live with your sages and your demigods; but no conversation at all is preferable to the gossiping and tittle-tattle that many a poor wight is forced to brook,―e. g., your humble servant,-living 'Pelican in the Wilderness' to avoid the cant and slang of the coxcombs, the bloods, the bucks, the boobies, with which all earth is filled."

4.

"ANNAN, August 22, 1815. “*** His (Lord Kaimes's) works are generally all an awkward compound of ingenuity and absurdity, and in this volume ["Essays on the Principles of Morality"] the latter quality, it appears to me, considerably preponderates. It is metaphysical-upon Belief, Identity, Necessity, etc. I devoutly wish that no friend of mine may ever come to study it, unless he wish to learn

""To weave fine cobwebs, fit for skull

That's empty, when the moon is full ;'

and in that case he cannot study under a more proper master. *** [I am] becoming daily more lukewarm about the preaching business."

“* * * I had a sight of 'Waverley' soon after I received your letter, and I cannot help saying that, in my opinion, it is by far the best novel that has been written these thirty years-at least, that I know of. Eben. Cruickshanks, mine host of The Seven Golden Candlesticks, and Mr. Gifted Gilfillan, are described in the spirit of Smollett or Cervantes. Who does not shed a tear for the ardent Vich Ian Vohr, and the unshaken Evan Dhu, when, perishing amid the shouts of an English mob, they refuse to swerve from their principles? And who will refuse to pity the marble Callum Beg, when, hushed in the strife of death, he finishes his earthly career on Clifton Moor, far from the blue mountains of the North, without one friend to close his eyes? 'Tis an admirable performance. Is Scott still the reputed author?”

[In this letter Carlyle mentions reading Euler's "Algebra," Addison's "Freeholder," Cuvier's "Theof the Earth," Molière's "Comedies," the monthly reviews, critical journals, etc.]

ory

6.

“February 20, 1818.

"After an arduous struggle with sundry historians of great and small renown, I sit down to answer the much-valued epistle of my friend. Doubtless you are disposed to grumble that I have been so long in doing so; but I have an argument in store for you. To state the proposition logically: This letter, I conceive, must either amuse you or not. If it amuse you, then certainly you cannot be so unreasonable as to cavil at a little harmless delay; and if it do not, you will rejoice that your punishment has not been sooner inflicted. Having thus briefly fixed you between the horns of my dilemma, from which, I flatter myself, no skill will suffice to extricate you, I proceed with a peaceful and fearless mind.

*** I continue to teach (that I may subsist thereby), with about as much satisfaction as I should beat hemp, if such were my vocation. Excepting one or two individuals, I have little society that I value very highly; but books are a ready and effectual resource. May blessings be upon the head of Cadmus, or the Phoenician, or whoever it was that invented books! I may not detain you with the praises of an art that carries the voice of man to the extremities of the earth, and to the latest generations; but it is lawful for the solitary wight to ex

press the love he feels for those companions so steadfast and unpresuming, that go or come without reluctance, and that, when his fellow-animals are proud or stupid or peevish, are ever ready to cheer the languor of his soul, and gild the barrenness of life with the treasures of bygone times. Now and then I cross the Firth; but these expeditions are not attended with much enjoyment. The time has been when I would have stood a-tiptoe at the name of Edinburgh; but all that is altered now. The men with whom I meet are mostly preachers and students in divinity. These persons desire not to understand Newton's Philosophy, but to obtain a well-plenished manse. Their ideas, which are uttered with much vain jangling, and generally couched in a recurring series of quips and most slender puns, are nearly confined to the Church, or rather Kirk-session politics of the place; the secret habits, freaks, or adventures of the clergy or professors; the vacant parishes and their presentees, with patrons, tutors, and all other appurtenances of the tithe-pigtail. Such talk is very edifying certainly; but I take little delight in it. My theological propensities may be included within small compass; and with regard to witlings, gibers, or such small gear, the less one knows of them it is not the worse.

"My perusal of Smollet's 'Continuation' was a much harder and more unprofitable task. Next I

read Gibbon's 'Decline and Fall,' a work of immense research and splendid execution. Embracing almost all the civilized world, and extending from the time of Trajan to the taking of Constantinople by Mahomet II., in 1453, it connects the events of ancient with those of modern history. Alternately delighted and offended by the gorgeous coloring with which his fancy invests the rude and scanty materials of his narrative, sometimes fatigued by the learning of his notes, occasionally amused by their liveliness, frequently disgusted by their obscenity, and admiring or deploring the bitterness of his skilful irony, I toiled through his many tomes with exemplary patience. His style is exuberant, sonorous, and epigrammatic to a degree that is often displeasing. He yields to Hume in elegance and distinctness, to Robertson in talent for general disquisition; but he excels them both in a species of brief shrewd remark for which he seems to have taken Tacitus as a model, more than any other that I know of. The whole historical triumvirate is abundantly destitute of virtuous feeling, or indeed of any feeling at all. I wonder what benefit is derived from reading all this stuff. What business of mine is it though Timur Bey erected a pyramid of 80,000 human skulls in the valley of Bagdad, and made an iron cage for Bajazet ? or what have I to do with the cold-blooded savage policy of [illegible] and the desolating progress either