beauty, genius, and virtue of women, and their transcendant superiority, in every respect, over men.

The following sentence will give some idea of the sort of eloquence, with which he prefaces this grave proposal to Her Majesty :-" The dispute about the proper sphere of women is idle. That men should have attempted to draw a line for their orbit, shows that God meant them for comets, and above our jurisdiction. With them the enthusiasm of poetry and the idolatry of love is the simple voice of nature." There are, indeed, many passages of this boyish composition, a good deal resembling in their style those ambitious apostrophes, with which he afterwards ornamented his speeches on the trial of Hastings.

He next proceeds to remark to Her Majesty, that in those countries where "man is scarce better than a brute, he shows his degeneracy by his treatment of women," and again falls into metaphor, not very clearly made out :-"The influence that women have over us is as the medium through which the finer Arts act upon us. The incense of our love and respect for them creates the atmosphere of our souls, which corrects and meliorates the beams of knowledge." ~

The following is in a better style :-" However, in savage countries, where the pride of man has not fixed the first dictates of ignorance into law, we see the real effects of nature. The wild Huron shall, to the object of his love, become gentle as his weary rein-deer ;-he shall present to her the spoil of his bow on his knee ;-he shall watch without reward the cave where she sleeps ;-he shall rob the birds for feathers for her hair, and dive for pearls for her neck ;-her look shall be his law, and her beauties his worship!" He then endeavours to prove that, as it is the destiny of man to be ruled by woman, he ought, for his own sake, to render her as fit for that task as possible :-" How can we be better employed than in perfecting that which governs us? The brighter they are, the more we shall be illumined. Were the minds of all women cultivated by inspiration, men would become wise of course. They are a sort of pentagraphs with which na

ture writes on the heart of man ;—what she delineates on the original map will appear on the copy."

In showing how much less women are able to struggle against adversity than men, he says," As for us, we are born in a state of warfare with poverty and distress. The sea of adversity is our natural element, and he that will not buffet with the billows deserves to sink. But you, oh you, by nature formed of gentler kind, can you endure the biting storm? shall you be turned to the nipping blast, and not a door be open to give you shelter?"

After describing, with evident seriousness, the nature of the institution of Madame de Maintenon, at St. Cyr, he adds the following strange romantic allusion: "Had such a charity as I have been speaking of existed here, the mild Parthenia and my poor Laura would not have fallen into untimely graves."

The practical details of his plan, in which it is equally evident that he means to be serious, exhibit the same flightiness of language and notions. The King, he supposes, would have no objection to "grant Hampton-Court, or some other palace for the purpose," and "as it is (he continues, still addressing the Queen) to be immediately under your majesty's patronage, so should your majesty be the first member of it. Let the constitution of it be like that of a university, Your Majesty, Chancellor; some of the first ladies in the kingdom sub-chancellors; whose care it shall be to provide instructors of real merit. The classes are to be distinguished by age,-none by degree. For, as their qualification shall be gentility, they are all on a level. The instructors shall be women, except for the languages. Latin and Greek should not be learned ;-the frown of pedantry destroys the blush of humility. The practical part of the sciences, as of astronomy, &c. should be taught. In history they would find that there are other passions in man than love. As for novels, there are some I would strongly recommend; but romances infinitely more. The one is a representation of the effects of the passions as they should be, though extravagant; the other, as they are. The latter is falsely called nature, and is a pic

ture of depraved and corrupted society; the other is the glow of nature. I would therefore exclude all novels that show human nature depraved :-however well executed, the design will disgust."

He concludes by enumerating the various good effects, which the examples of female virtue sent forth from such an institution, would produce upon the manners and morals of the other sex; and in describing, among other kinds of coxcombs, the cold, courtly man of the world, uses the following strong figure: "They are so clipped, and rubbed, and polished, that God's image and inscription is worn from them, and when He calls in his coin, He will no longer know them for his own."

There is still another Essay, or rather a small fragment of an Essay, on the letters of lord Chesterfield, which, I am inclined to think, may have formed a part of the rough copy of the book, announced by him to Mr. Linley as ready in the November of this year. Lord Chesterfield's Letters appeared for the first time in 1774, and the sensation they produced was exactly such as would tempt a writer in quest of popular subjects to avail himself of it. As the few pages which I have found, and which contain merely scattered hints of thoughts, are numbered as high as 232, it is possible that the preceding part of the work may have been sufficiently complete to go into the printer's hands, and that there,-like so many more of his "unshelled brood,"-it died without ever taking wing. A few of these memorandums will, I have no doubt, be acceptable to the reader.

"Lord C.'s whole system in no one article calculated to make a great man.-A noble youth should be ignorant of the things he wishes him to know;-such a one as he wants would be too soon a man.

"Emulation is a dangerous passion to encourage, in some points, in young men; it is so linked with envy if you reproach your son for not surpassing his school-fellows, he will hate those who are before him. Emulation not to be encouraged even in virtue. True virtue will, like the Athenian, rejoice in being surpassed ;-a friendly emulation cannot exist in two minds;-one must hate the perfections in which he is eclipsed by the other; -thus, from hating the quality in his competitor, he loses the respect for it in himself:-a young man by himself better educated than two.—A Ro man's emulation was not to excel his countrymen, but to make his country

excel: this is the true, the other selfish.—Epaminondas, who reflected on the pleasure his success would give his father, most glorious ;—an emulation for that purpose, true.

"The selfish vanity of the father appears in all these letters-his sending the copy of a letter for his sister.-His object was the praise of his own mode of education.-How much more noble the affection of Morni in Ossian; "Oh, that the name of Morni,' &c. &c.*

"His frequent directions for constant employment entirely ill founded: —a wise man is formed more by the action of his own thoughts than by continually feeding it. 'Hurry,' he says, 'from play to study; never be doing nothing.'-I say, 'Frequently be unemployed; sit and think.' There are on every subject but a few leading and fixed ideas; their tracks may be traced by your own genius as well as by reading :—a man of deep thought, who shall have accustomed himself to support or attack all he has read, will soon find nothing new: thought is exercise, and the mind, like the body, must not be wearied."

These last two sentences contain the secret of Sheridan's confidence in his own powers. His subsequent success bore him out in the opinions he thus early expressed, and might even have persuaded him that it was in consequence, not in spite, of his want of cultivation that he succeeded.

On the 17th of January, 1775, the comedy of The Rivals was brought out at Covent-Garden, and the following was the cast of the characters on the first night :

"Oh, that the name of Morni were forgot among the people; that the heroes would only say, 'Behold the father of Gaul?" " Sheridan applied this, more than thirty years after, in talking of his own son, on the hustings of Westminster, and said that, in like manner, he would ask no greater distinction than for men to point at him and say, "There goes the father of Tom Sheridan.”

This comedy, as is well known, failed on its first representation,-chiefly from the bad acting of Mr. Lee in Sir Lucius O'Trigger. Another actor, however, Mr. Clinch, was substituted in his place, and the play being lightened of this and some other incumbrances, rose at once into that high region of public favour, where it has continued to float so buoyantly and gracefully ever since.

The following extracts from letters written at that time by Miss Linley (afterwards Mrs. Tickell) to her sister, Mrs. Sheridan, though containing nothing remarkable, yet, as warm with the feelings of a moment so interesting in Sheridan's literary life, will be read, perhaps, with some degree of pleasure. The slightest outline of a celebrated place, taken on the spot, has often a charm beyond the most elaborate picture finished at a distance.

"MY DEAREST ELIZA,

Bath.

"We are all in the greatest anxiety about Sheridan's play, though I do not think there is the least doubt of its succeeding. I was told last night that it was his own story, and therefore called "The Rivals;" but I do not give any credit to this intelligence. * * *

"I am told he will get at least 7001. for his play."

"Bath, January, 1775.

"It is impossible to tell you what pleasure we felt at the receipt of Sheridan's last letter, which confirmed what we had seen in the newspapers of the success of his play. The knowing ones were very much disappointed, as they had so very bad an opinion of its success. After the first night we were indeed all very fearful that the audience would go very much prejudiced against it. But now, there can be no doubt of its success, as it has certainly got through more difficulties than any comedy which has not met its doom the first night. I know you have been very busy in writing for Sheridan, I don't mean copying, but composing--it's true, indeed; you must not contradict me when I say you wrote the much-admired epilogue to the Rivals. How I long to