lege in themselves the ridicule they caft upon ftrangers, and take example from I do not know what Tartar, who, on this fubject, had the addrefs to make the great Lama himself blush at his injuftice.

This Tartar had travelled through the North, vifited the country of the Laplanders, and even purchafed a wind of their forcerers. On his return to his native country, he related his adventures; and the great Lama refolving to hear him, was ready to burft his fides with laughing at his ftory. Of what folly, cried he, is the human mind capable! What fantanftic cuftoms! How credulous are the Laplanders! Are these men? Yes, indeed, replied the Tartar: I might inform you of fome→ thing even kill more furprifing. Thefe Laplanders, with their ridiculous wizards, laugh no lefs at our credulity than thou doft at theirs. Impious! cried the Great Lama, dareft thou pronounce this blafphemy, and compare my religion with theirs? Eternal Father, replied the Tartar, before the fecret impofition of thy hand on my head had washed me from my fin, I would have reprefented that thou oughteft not to have engaged thy fubjects to make a profane use of their reafon. If the fevere eye of examination and doubt was fpread over all the objects of human belief, who knows whether thy worship itself would be sheltered from the raillery of the incredulous? Perhaps, thy holy urine, and thy facred excrements, which thou doft diftribute in presents to the princes of the earth, would appear lefs precious; perhaps they would not find they had ftill the fame favour: they would no longer put it powdered into their ragouts, nor any longer mix it in their fauces. Already, in China, does impiety deny the nine incarnations of Vifthnou.. Thou, whofe penetrating view comprehends the paft, the prefent, and the future, haft often repeated it to us: it is to the talifman of blind belief that thou owest thine immortality, and thy power on earth without this entire fubmiffion to thy doctrines, thou wouldest be obliged to quit this aboad of darkness, and afcend to Heaven thy native country. Thou knowest that the Lamas fubject to thy power, are one day to raise altars to thee in all the countries of the world. Who can affure thee, that they will execute this project, without the affiftance of human credulity; and that without it, enquiry, which is always impious, will not take the Lamas for Lapland wizards, who fell winds to the fools that buy them? Excufe then, O living Fo, the difcourfe dictated by my regard for thy worship; and may the Tartar learn of thee to refpect the ignorance and credulity which Heaven, ever impenetrable in its views, feems to ordain, in order to make the earth fubmit to thee.

• Few men perceive the ridicule of their own nation, which they cover from the eye of reason, while under a foreign name, they laugh at their own folly: but there are still fewer nations capable of improving by fuch advice. All are fo fcrupulously attached to the intereft of their own vanity, that in every country they give the title of wife only to thofe who, as Fontenelle fays, are the fools of the common folly. How fantastic foever a fable is, it is in fome nations believed, and whoever doubts of its truth, is treated by that nation as a fool. In the kingdom of Juda, where they adore the ferpent, what man dare deny the tale which the Marabouts tell of a hog, which, fay they, infulted the divinity of the ferpent, and eat him up. An holy Marabout, they add, perceived it, and carried his complaints to the King. In an inftant, fentence of death was paffed upon all the swine: the execution followed, and the whole race was going to be extirpated, when the people reprefented to his Majefty, that it was not juft to punish fo many innocent fwine for one guilty hog. Thefe remonftrances fufpended the Prince's wrath: they appeafed the grand Marabout, the maffacre ceafed, and the hogs were ordered to behave with more refpect to the deity for the future. Thus, cry the Marabouts, the ferpent, to be revenged on the impious, kindled the wrath of Kings, that the whole univerfe might acknowlege his divinity, his temple, and his high pricft, at the order of the Marabout appointed to serve him, and of the Virgins confecrated to his worship. If retired at the bottom of his fanctuary, the ferpent- god, invifible even to the fight of the King himself, receives not his questions, and makes no answer to his requefts, but by the mouth of the priest; it is not for mortals to pry into these myfteries with a profane eye: their duty is to believe, to proftrate themselves, and adore.'

The Reader will fee, from the above paflages, that credulity in the abfurdities of falfe religion, is placed, by our Author, in a moft ridiculous point of view: as he has publickly dif claimed, however, any intention to offend against the facred truths of Chriftianity, and as no fuch intention can be indifputably proved from the work itfelf, we fhall, however infifted on by his adverfaries, pafs this point over. We cannot, neverthelefs, acquit him of afferting the principles of religion to be inadequate to the purpofes of morality. This he has infinuated in terms too plain to be mistaken.

With what furprize,' fays he,ought the virtuous citizen, and the Chriftian, filled with that fpirit of charity to often recommended in the gospel, to be feized, when he cafts his eye upon the past ages of the world! He there fees different religions invoke all the rage of fanaticifm, and glut themselves with hu

man blood.

• There

f

1

There the different fects of Chriftians exafperated against each other, tear in pieces the empire of Conftantinople: farther ftill arifes in Arabia a new religion, which commands the Saracens to lay wafte the earth with fire and fword. The irruption of thefe barbarians is fucceeded by a war against the infidels. Under the standard of the cross entire nations defert Europe, and fpread like an inundation over Afia; they commit on the road the most baie and fcandalous robberies, and are buried in the fands of Arabia and Egypt. At length fanaticism arms afresh the hands of Chriftian princes, and orders the Catholics to maffacre the Heretics: then again appears on the earth the tortures invented by the Phalarifes, the Bufirifes, and the Neros; it prepares, it kindles in Spain, the flaming pile of the inquifition; while the pious Spaniards leave their ports, and traverfe the feas, to plant the crofs and defolation in America. If we caft our eyes to the north, the south, the east, and the weft, we every where fee the facred knife of religion held up to the breafts of women, children, and old men; the earth fmoaking with the blood of victims, facrificed to the falle gods, or to the fupreme Being; every place offers nothing to the fight but the vaft, the horrible carnage, caufed by a want of toleration. What virtuous man, and what Chriftian, if his tender mind is filled with the divine love that exhales from the maxims of the gofpel, if he is capable of feeling the complaints of the miferable, and if he has fometimes dried up their tears, would not at this fight be touched with compaffion for human nature, and endeavour to found probity, not on principles fo venerable as thofe of religion, but on thofe that cannot be fo easily abufed, fuch as the motives of perfonal intereft ?"

We fhall leave our Readers to their own reflections on the above paffage, and confider our Author's third and fourth eflays, and the merit of the tranflation, at another opportunity.

K-n-k

An Effay on Tafte. By Alexander Gerard, M. A. Professor of moral philofophy and logic, in the Marichal College of Aberdeen. With three differtations on the fame fubject, by M. De Voltaire, M. D'Alembert, F. R. S. M. De Montefquieu. 8vo. 4s. Millar.

T

HERE is fcarce any paffion that has a more prevailing influence over the fashionable part of mankind in the prefent times, than the ambition of being thought men of taste. Poets, Painters, Philofophers, and Critics, are not the only

Mm 3

per

persons who are actuated by this ambition; gamefters, jockeys, beaus, bucks, and debauchees pretend, all of them, to be men of taste. Yet, notwithstanding this general pursuit, and the various attempts that have been made by modern writers to trace the fources, and fix a standard of tafte, there are very few perfons who have their ideas adjusted, with any degree of precifion, upon this fubject; and the word tafte, though in almoft every body's mouth, is ufed in a very loofe and indeterminate fenfe. How far the ingenious author of the Effay now before us has contributed towards fetting the fubject in a clearer light, we shall not take upon us to determine; this, however, we will venture to affirm, that he has treated it with greater accuracy and perfpicuity than any other author that we are acquainted with, and has fhewn no inconfiderable abilities, both as a philofopher and a critic. Those who are converfant with the writings of Shaftesbury, Hutcheson, and Hume will readily perceive that he has borrowed many of his fentiments from these writers, whom he feems to have studied with great care and attention, and is, indeed, poffeffed of no fmall fhare of their fpirit and manner of enquiry. But we fhall proceed to give our readers a fhort view of what is contained in his essay.

He fets out with obferving, that a fine tafte is neither wholly the gift of nature, nor wholly the effect of art. It derives its origin from certain powers natural to the mind; but thefe powers cannot attain their full perfection, unless they be affifted by proper culture. Tafte, we are told, confifts chiefly in the improvement of thofe principles, which are commonly called the powers of imagination, and are confidered by modern philofophers as internal or reflex fenfes, fupplying us with finer and more delicate perceptions, than any which can be properly referred to our external organs.

The effay is divided into three parts, in the firft of which Mr. Gerard refolves tale into what he calls its fimple principles, viz. the fenfes of novelty, of fublimity, of beauty, of imitation, of harmony, of ridicule, and of virtue. These principles he explains and illuftrates in a very clear and entertaining manner; after which he endeavours to discover, in the second part, how these fenfes co-operate in forming tafle, what other powers of the mind are combined with them in their exertions, what conftitutes that refinement and perfection of them which we term good taste, and by what means it is obtained.

This fecond part is divided into feven fections; we shall give a general view of what is contained in each of them. In the first our author treats of the union of the internal fenfes, and the affiftance they receive from delicacy of paffion.

Any

Any one of the internal fenfes, it is faid, exifting in vigour and perfection, forms a particular branch of taste, and enables a man to judge in fome one fubject of art or genius: but all of them must at once be vigorous, in order to confti ute taste in its just extent. This union is neceflary, not only for giving it a proper compass, but also for perfecting each of its exertions.

Our fentiments and emotions, Mr. Gerard obferves, receive an immenfe addition of ftrength from their reciprocal influence on one another. Concomitant emotions, related by their feeling, their direction, or their objects, or even without any relation exifting in the mind together, run into one, and by their mixture produce an intenfe fenfation. Hence different gratifications, either of the fame or divers fenfes, occurring to the mind at once, give it a complicated joy. The ftillness and ferenity of a fummer morning, the fweet fragrance of flowers, the mufic of birds, and a thoufand other agreeable circumstances are commonly obferved to beftow extraordinary force on the grandeur or beauty of rural fcenes.

Tho' each object of tafte has fome leading character by which it is peculiarly fitted to produce one principal fenfation, it may, at the same time, by its fubordinate qualities, produce attendant feelings, which will render the principal one higher and more intenfe, by their confpiring with it; but if the principles of tafte, adapted to them, are weak or deficient, we not only lose entirely fome of the pleafures, which the object might convey, but cannot even enjoy any of them with perfect relish, as we are infenfible to the heightenings, which each receives from its connection with the reft.

After briefly pointing out the various ways, by which our interior fenfes, merely by their union, tend to form and perfect taste, our author goes on to mention a principle, diftinct from all the internal fenfes, from which tafte will, in many inftances, he fays, receive affiftance. This principle is fuch a fenfibility of heart, as fits a man for being easily moved, and for readily catching, as by infection, any paffion that a work is fitted to excite. The fouls of men are far from being alike fufceptible of impreffions of this kind. A hard-hearted man can be a spectator of very great diftrefs, without feeling any emotion: a man of a cruel temper has a malignant joy in producing mifery. On the other hand, many are compofed of fuch delicate materials, that the smallest uneafinefs of their fellow creatures excites their pity. A fimilar variety may be obferved, in refpect of the other paffions. Perfons of the former caft will be little affected by the moft moving tragedy; thofe of the latter turn will be interested by a very indifferent one. A performance, which can infuse Mm 4

the