XXXVIII.

BIRTH.

There are men of erudition, and authors also, without talent. Books without end may be made by those who want talent; and some of them useful. But it is talent, which consecrates the importance of an author to the world.

Books are easily compiled: great information, vast erudition, are acquirable without great difficulty. Original powers of thinking are rare. Brilliance, strength, profundity, wisdom, in those powers, are rarer still.

The public are severe in examining the pretensions to notice, which an individual urges in his own favour. If they are in any respect not true, or not legitimate grounds though true, sneers, ridicule, scorn are the consequences.

BIRTH is a pretension, which is seldom admitted. There is a general tendency to be sceptical as to the facts: but if admitted, they are not considered solid claims to distinction.

The public probably carries the prejudice the other way, a great deal too far but the matter requires to be managed very delicately, and applied with great skill, to raise any of that favour, even in the minds of the most candid and intelligent, which it is intended to effect.

Among the impolicies involved in its nature is this that its elevation is an elevation to an equality with all the fools and mean wretches, who may enjoy the same descent; in lieu of an equality with the worthy rivals, whom, if this test be admitted, it depresses.

« A master-mind! » What is a master-mind? What are the marks and proofs of it? Who may be confident of possessing it? It is imagination; sentiment; the faculty of reasoning; the talent to examine, distinguish, and decide: the command of language! There must be added to this energy, elevation of spirit; enthusiasm; love of the sublime; devotion to the past, and the future; a preference of the immaterial to the material; and an emancipation from vulgar desires and passions!

Can the frailties of humanity; can the intermixture of some common faults, destroy the character? Is all the private and selfish prudence of an individual who gives his whole petty mind to his own individual interests, required in this character ? If required, that which is impossible, is required!

No man is, or ought to be, of any interest in the world but by his virtues, his genius or powers of intellect, or his knowlege. Rank, property, and high birth, may perhaps be considered to give a claim: but they are nothing, if unillustrated by one of the others!

XXXIX.

THE SA M E.

It would be difficult to define with precision what would make the Memoirs of a particular Family interesting to the Public. The most probable seem to be facts that ally it historically with events of a public nature.

There are not a great many Historical Families in Europe. It creates a mysterious sort of veneration, when they lose their origin in the darkness of Time: when the source, like that of the Nile, extends beyond research when the æra cannot be found, at which it had not risen above the ground!

It has been pretended, that the lustre of a family, if true, does not rest upon the written history of it. The facts, it is said, will speak for themselves.

But the facts may be scattered, overlaid with rubbish, and can only shine in judicious, and elegant combination. They may be like diamonds in the mine, incrusted in dirt.

Five degrees of distinguished Descent may be pointed out: premising, that when speaking of one family opposed to another, the male line is to be understood; and that the circumstances to be mentioned, as raising one in the scale of eminence above another, are to be considered as adjuncts. I. The first degree is mere antiquity.

II. The second is antiquity combined with possession of the same territories.

III. The third, the addition of high alliances.

IV. The fourth, Historical celebrity.

V. All these, combined with the highest rank in point of dominion and power, form the top of the scale.

According to all these tests it is impossible to hesitate to what sovereign House of Europe to give the preeminence. In all these qualities the HOUSE OF BOURBON is so superior as to leave every other House at an interminable distance. It is probable that the Houses of BRUNSWICK, Loraine, and SAVOY are quite as ancient but they want the same splendor in most, if not all, of the adjuncts. BADEN is also classed with these in point of antiquity, by Koch, who asserts that none of the other SOVEREIGN HOUSES of Europe can go beyond the 12th century. He means of course to confine this assertion to the possession of their present sovereignty. For otherwise the House of HESSE (a branch of the Dukes of Brabant), and perhaps others, can go ages further back.

XLI.

THE SA M E..

To spring from those, who have commanded in the world, not merely by their rank and territory, but by their intellectual superiority, is a subject of fair gratification.

Even the general reader is prepared to recieve with a lively interest whatever is connected with history: and especially with those parts of history, which are striking or instructive in themselves. The worthies of a single Nation which has filled an important part in the world, excite a strong and just attention in our minds. But how much more those of all the principal Nations from whose alliances, or conflicts, with each other, the whole picture is formed! Groups drawn

from such an extended surface throw a multiplied light on each other. France, England, Flanders, Spain, Italy, and Germany, all afford materials, with which all the intelligent parts of Europe are linked by a thousand ties.

XLII.

MÉMOIR S.

It is easy to understand why the public take an interest in Memoirs, which disclose all the minutiae of a man's life; and lay every thing bare to a prying curiosity.. They love to gratify a gossipping appetite; to indulge their thirst for the degradation of others; and to find out that Genius has its weaknesses, and its mortifications, like themselves. Just in proportion as they are pleased, is the object of their enquiry humiliated.

The very cause of the taste of these anecdote-hunters, is that, which should prevent an author from furnishing them food of this kind regarding himself.

I know not why there should be more deceit in the exhibition of the best and happiest parts of a man's mental and moral character, than in a portrait, which paints him in his best looks, and most becoming dress.

Nemo omnibus horis sapit :

And no one is an hero to his Valet-de-Chambre.

It is well for frail humanity to be sometimes good; and sometimes great to have occasional fits of noble thought, or tender and beneficent virtue !