BOOK III. Correspondence with Dr Tucker, of his examination, there was a judicious precision of interrogatory, peculiarly fitted to bring out the truth. He suffered no attempt on the part of the counsel to brow-beat, to perplex, or irritate the witness in the delivering of his testimony; as rightly judging all such proceedings to be a contamination of the evidence,-an endeavour to restrain or to pervert the truth, which it is the bounden duty of the Judge to bring forth pure and unsophisticated.. His dictation of the import of the evidence was a model for accuracy and perspicuity. By the later practice of the Court, (since the 23d Geo. III. c. 45.), the engrossing of the evidence in the record is no longer in use. It was found to protract the trials to an unnecessary length, and is now superseded by the Judge's suminary of the proof in his charge to the jury, before they are inclosed to return their verdict. Though disengaged for some years from any continued literary occupation, Lord Kames's epistolary correspondence shews, that his mind retained its usual activity, and delighted in an extensive range of useful speculation. The ingenious Dr TUCKER, Dean of Gloucester, and afterwards of Bristol, had, through the medium of Messrs Foulis of Glasgow, the printers of some of his political Tracts, solicited Lord Kames's acquaintance, and begun a correspondence with him in 1757, on some of those topics of political economy which occasionally employed the attention of both. My printer" (says the Dean)" has given me to understand that your 66 66 Lordship would not be displeased with an overture of this "sort; and such is the celebrity of your character, even in "this distant part of the kingdom, that I cannot but wish. "to cultivate such a correspondence. Self-interest alone "prompts to this desire-the knowledge and instruction to "be gained by it.". The overture was readily accepted, and the letters yet remaining, shew, that the correspondence was carried on for many years with mutual satisfaction*. The reputation of Mr HARRIS of Salisbury for his knowledge in universal grammar, evinced by his Hermes, and his other ingenious and classical writings, had induced Lord Kames, though personally unacquainted with him, to write to him on some grammatical topics which then engaged his attention. In return, he received from Mr Harris the following letter, which is extremely characteristic of the writer: 66 A large share of business before I left the country, and the necessary duty of attending Parliament, since I have been in town, have together prevented my acknowledging a favour which I ought long since to have done.. * CHAP. I. -with Mr Harris of Salisbury, "I + * A few of these letters, the reader, who is conversant in the speculations to which they relate, may not be displeased to find in the Appendix to this volume, No. I. BOOK HI. "I think myself amply paid for all my literary labours, if they can merit approbation from men of learning and ingenuity, I may say in particular the scholars of North Britain, where so strong a relish for Greek and Latin literature still prevails*, while French, and experimental philosophy have almost banished it everywhere else. I don't say that these last studies have not their value; but I can't approve, that, like those Egyptian kine, they should eat up all the rest. The Barrows, the Wallises, and the Halleys of old, were all critical readers and admirers of the Greek mathematicians. Few, I am told, of our modern geometricians either read them, or are able to do so, if we except your learned and most accurate Professor, Dr Simpson. Some of them blamed me, who am (God knows) but moderately versed in these matters, for saying in my Hermes, The Diametre of a square, where, according to them, I should have said, The Diagonal. They did not know that Diametre was Euclid's own word in that very instance: "As many people labour under what an old tutor of mine used to call the Hellenophoby, I can't tell but the Greek scattered through my Hermes may have retarded its sale, by terrifying certain readers from its unpleasing appearance. This gives me little concern, provided I can (according to Milton) *It'were to be wished this compliment were a little more merited than it is in the present day. Milton) fit audience find, though few. Though I hope I have not proved myself a slave to authority, I must confess myself a friend to it. Invention is a divine thing, a gift only bestowed on the chosen few. But to invent and to complete, I am prone to believe was never the character of any one. It was a character indeed given to Homer of old, and to Newton of late; and so far is true, they were inventors of all that was wanting to make their subject perfect. But had not Kepler and Galileo, perhaps Euclid and Archimedes, existed before, there had never, I believe, been Newton; and had not Linus, Musæus, and those other songsters, which the old bard himself mentions, existed before, there had never, I fancy, been Homer. "These are considerations which make me so fond of authority; so desirous to build on foundations already laid to arrange and to explain what others have said; and by a new dress, and proper additions of my own, to give the whole, not only the air, but I think the real character of an original. Indeed, if truth be eternal, what originals can there be else? A man does not make the truths he publishes, as a quack does his medicines: He exhibits what he finds ; what is not only now, but was ever. ""Tis a common language with writers at present, to declaim against systems; they truly are tied to none; they freely pursue truth, wherever they can trace her, whomever she CHAP. I. BOOK III. she may oppose, whomever she may countenance. Infinite are the works of this kind, which come out every day. They grow as fast to maturity, as those teeth sown by Cadmus, and are generally as prone to quarrel with one another. One cause of this species of writing is self-conceit; but another, and a far more frequent, is ignorance and want of literature. If they were not thus to build from their own paltry materials, they would have no materials for building at all. "I have so great a dislike to this practice, that I shall certainly follow the contrary, if ever I pursue my original plan. Whether I shall have time or health to do so, is a matter of much doubt, although I have made some beginnings. "As to what you say about Pronouns, I don't think it much to differ from what I have said myself. I think them, as you do, substantives, only a secondary race. They represent proper names, but they represent them with restriction. If it be said, Cæsar conquers, it is said universally, whether it be the speaker, the person spoken to, or spoken of. But if it be said, I conquer, it means Cæsar, under the restriction of being himself the speaker. Children, in their first essays of speech, appear not to comprehend this restrictive appellation of themselves. The little boy says not, Give me some cake; but, Give Tommy some cake. He comprehends |