in the lightest matters enough to make the heart ach; and the gayeft ftory from him affects you like a paffing bell. All his lies are full of terror, and all his truths are very fad ones. If you arę not aware of the delufive humour that prompts him, he will make you out of love with your felf and every thing about you. The Sanguine temperament is as oppofite to the Melancholick, as light is to darkness, and runs, in hiftory, into the contrary extremes. The Melancholick makes every evil more frightful than it is. The Sanguine hardly fees the half of any one. The Melancholick dwells for ever on calamity; the Sanguine skips over it. The Melancholick oppreffes the heart; the Sanguine charms the fancy. The Melancholick preaches; the Sanguine laughs, and hardly brings you to the ferious confideration of any matter, The Sanguine writer is very aukward at exhibiting an ugly truth, but very handy at a beautiful one. He stays not long on forrowful matters, but dwells for ever on fuch as are delightful. There is but little occafion to fay any thing of the illufions of Choler in hiftory, every one knows them in ordinary life, where they are much the fame. The hiftorian of a Cholerick complexion, who has not the art of guarding againft its deceptions, neither fhews nor fees any thing that difpleafes him in a true light: His way of fpeaking is clamorous and unequal: He calls names. Every one whofe conduct he likes not, is knave or fool; and every thing is monftrous with which he is diffatisfied. Such an author ought never to be read without an abatement of at least two thirds of the fire of his conceptions. The The Phlegmatick writers certainly excel all others in accounts of fact. The Phlegmatick have no eyes, as we faid before, for the infide, but he has excellent ones for the outfide, and gives a detail of a thoufand particulars there which escape men of other complexions: He relates every thing he fees and hears with the moft religious exactnefs, not omitting the fmalleft or moft indifferent matter or circumftance: He remembers, tho' it be of neither ufe nor entertainment, nor any thing at all to the purpofe He is neither ravifh'd with beauty, nor frighted with deformity; neither elated with fuccefs, nor deprefs'd with misfortune. He is fubject to none of thofe fluries of imagination. that tranfport and bewilder other men. His phlegm keeps that faculty under fo tight a rein that it never runs away with him, or throws him out of his road. His mifchief is to be dull and tedious, and in point of reafoning apt to forget and involve himself in tautology and contradiction. As to the curiofities, &c. contained in this author, we shall mention fome of them in our next Journal. ARTICLE V. LETTERS, giving an Account of several Converfations upon important and entertaining Subjects. Written originally in French French by M. de Saint Hyacinthe. F.R.S. Printed by J. Bettenham, and fold by F. Hooke at the Flower-de-Luce overagainst St. Dunstan's Church in Fleetftreet, J. Stagg in Westminster-Hall, and W.Darres at the Crown in Panton-street, near Leicester Square. 1731. TH HIS work, tho' in two small volumes in 8vo, will give us opportunity to enlarge upon them in our next Journal. For the prefent, we must say that it is full of wit and found reafoning, and that the subjects are no less ferious than diverting. The following lift will give to our readers fome idea of them. Letters contained in the First Volume. I. Characters of the Count and Countefs de Pof the Marchioness and Chevalier de A-, of Mr. de V, and of Mr. de L-. II. That Study is preferable to all other pleafures. That the Delight arifing from the Knowledge of Truth, is fuperior to all others. Definitions of Truth, Error, Lying, Fiction. III. Falfe Images of Philofophy; its true Character. First Principle of Certainty. Character and Definition of Evidence. Whence Difference in Sentiments proceeds. Variety of the Learned; their Opinions of each other. Reflections upon Mr. Huet's Treatife, Entitled, Cenfura Philofophicæ Cartefianæ. IV. Characters of the Counsellor, the Lady, and the Abbe. Importance of preferving the Decen cies of ones State and Condition. chioness's Paffion for Philofophy. The Mar V. 1. The method of Preferving our felves in a proper State for the Search and Discovery of Truth. 2. Of Practice. 9. Of Method. VI. A Converfation upon the foregoing beads. His Character. Generous Action of that Lord. His Difpute with two Capuchin Friars. Letter to Monf. the Count de P. The Count's Anfwer. IX. Defcription of a lewd Houfe. Adventure of an English Girl whom my Lord D met with there, and what he did upon her account. My Lord compared to St. Auftin. I. That without a God, the Rewarder of Good and Evil, there is no real diftinction between moral Good and Evil. Of Remorse, Honour, and Virtue. II. My Lord D's regret at the Departure of the two Capuchins. His Converfation with the the Bishop of T- upon Sermons, and the Teft-Act. Bishop of T's Opinion of Calvin, Beza, and the Eucharift. Character of the Bishop of Bangor, now Bishop of Salisbury. Impreca Imprecation of two Travellers on the Subject of Tranfubftantiation. Requests to my Lord D. III. Arrival of the two Marchioness's and Mar- V. The Count's Objection as to the Idea of God. Examination of that Objection. Account of Spinofa's Syftem. VI. Beginning of a Hiftory. The Marchioness's Anger. What a Caufe and what an Effect is; that one and the fame thing may be Caufe and Effect at the fame time. That there may be feveral firft Causes. That there are fome Caufes which are the Effects of no other: That a Being neceffarily existing, must be a poffible and neceffary Caufe, but not a neceffitated Caufe. Several Reflections. VII. Fishing, Dinner, Converfation on the Principles of Religion and Morality. What Priefts may be fav'd. Encomium of the good Dean. Character of a good Prieft. Dance of Fishermen. Hiftory of Hipolitus de Hayon. This book is to be followed by fome other volumes; but it is to be wifh'd that we cou'd fee foon the original in the French tongue, there being no more publifh'd at the Hague than the first five letters. The kind reception they have already met with from the Publick, will proba bly |