THE PURSUIT OF KNOWLEDGE UNDER DIFFICULTIES; ILLUSTRATED BY ANECDOTES. CHAPTER I. Amusement in the Pursuit of Knowledge; Pursuit of Knowledge by persons of rank or wealth: Democritus; Anaxagoras; Nicephorus Alphery; Marcus Aurelius; Julian; Charlemagne ; Alfred; James I, of Scotland; Elizabeth; Alphonso X. WE remarked, at the close of our former volume, that the moral habits which the Pursuit of Knowledge has a tendency to create and foster, form one of its chief recommendations. Knowledge is, essentially and directly, power; but it is also, indirectly, virtue. And this it is in two ways. It can hardly be acquired without the exertion of several moral qualities of high value; and, having been acquired, it nurtures tastes, and supplies sources of enjoyment, admirably adapted to withdraw the mind from unprofitable and corrupting pleasures. Some distinguished scholars, no doubt, have been bad men; but we do not know how much worse they might have been, but for their love of learning, which, to the extent it did operate upon their characters, could not have been otherwise than beneficial. A genuine relish for intellectual enjoyments is naturally as inconsistent with a devotion to the coarser gratifications of sense, as the habit of assiduous study is with that dissipation of time, of thought, and of faculty, which a life of vicious pleasure implies. But knowledge is also happiness, as well as power and virtue; happiness both in the acquisition and in the possession. And were the pursuit of it nothing better than a mere amusement, it would deserve the preference over all other amusements, on many accounts. Of these, indeed, the chief is, that it must almost of necessity become something better than an amusement, — must invigorate the mind as well as entertain it, and refine and elevate the character while it gives to listlessness and weariness their most agreeable excitement and relaxation. But, omitting this consideration, it is still of all amusements the best, for other reasons. So far from losing any part of its zest with time, the longer it is known the better is it loved. There is no other pastime that can be compared with it in variety. Even to him who has been longest conversant with it, it has still as much novelty to offer as at first. It may be resorted to by all, in all circumstances; by both sexes, by the young and the old, in town or in the country, by him who has only his stolen half hour to give to it, and by him who can allow it nearly his whole day, in company with others, or in solitude, which it converts into the most delightful society. Above all, it is the cheapest of all amusements, and consequently the most universally accessible. Causes which will suggest themselves to the reflection of every reader, and which, therefore, we need not here stop to explain, have hitherto, in a great measure, excluded our labouring population from the enjoyments of science and literature; but this state of things is passing away, and the habit of reading is extending itself rapidly, even among the humblest ranks. Nothing can be more natural than this. A book is emphati cally the poor man's luxury; for it is of all luxuries that which can be obtained at the least cost. By means of itinerating libraries for the country, and stationary collections for each of our larger towns, almost every individual of the population might be enabled to secure access for himself to an inexhaustible store of intellectual amusement and instruction, at an expense which even the poorest would scarcely feel. As yet these advantages have been chiefly in the possession of the middle classes, to whom they have been a source not more of enjoyment than of intelligence and influence. Among the highest orders of society, the very cheapness of literary pleasures has probably had the effect of making them to be less in fashion than others of which wealth can command a more exclusive enjoyment. Even such distinction as eminence in intellectual pursuits can confer must be shared with many of obscure birth and low station; and on that account alone has doubtless seemed often the less worthy of ambition to those who were already raised above the crowd by the accidents of fortune. Yet, whatever enjoyment there may really be in such pursuits will not, of course, be the less to any one, because he happens to be a person of wealth or rank. On the contrary, these advantages are perhaps on no other account more valuable, than for the power which they give their possessor of prosecuting the work of mental cultivation to a greater extent than others. He has, if he chooses, a degree of leisure and freedom from interruption, greatly exceeding what the generality of men enjoy. Others have seldom more than the mere fragments of the day to give to study, after the bulk of it has been consumed in procuring merely the bread that perisheth; he may make literature and philosophy the vocation of his life. Το many have willingly embraced comparative poverty in preference to riches. Among the philosophers of the ancient world, some are said to have spontaneously disencumbered themselves of their inheritances, that the cares of managing their property might not interrupt their philosophic pursuits. Crates, Thales, Democritus, Anaxagoras, are particularly mentioned as having made this sacrifice. But in those days, it is to be remembered, knowledge was only to be obtained by travelling into foreign countries, and those who sought it were therefore obliged, before setting out on the search, either to relinquish altogether the possessions they had at home, or to leave them in charge of trustees, who generally took advantage of their stewardship to embezzle or squander them. Doubtless no one of the celebrated persons we have enumerated would have thrown away his patrimony, if he could have retained it with as little inconvenience as such an incumbrance can_possibly occasion a philosopher in our own times. The only worldly imprudence, even, of which they can be fairly accused, is, that of having preferred knowledge to wealth, when it was necessary to make a choice between the two; or that of having allowed themselves to be too easily cheated of the latter, in their enthusiastic devotion to the former. Bayle, who had himself a strong sympathy with this love of a quiet in preference to a splendid life, states the matter correctly in the case of Democritus, when he says, in his article on that great father of natural philosophy, The spirit of a great traveller reigned in him; he journeyed to the heart of India, in quest of the riches of learning, and bestowed but little thought on those other treasures which he had almost at his door.' Anaxagoras, in like manner, although he did not travel so far from home as Democritus, still owed the loss of his 6 |