fentiments) with but little fagacity. They who infift that the sciences are useful in refined fociety are certainly right, and they who maintain that barbarous nations are more happy without them, are right alfo ; but when one fide for this reafon attempts to prove them as univerfally useful to the folitary barbarian, as to the native of a crowded commonwealth; or when the other endeavours to banish them as prejudicial to all fociety, even from populous ftates as well as from the inhabitants of the wilderness, they are both wrong; fince that knowledge which makes the happiness of a refined European, would be a torment, to the precarious tenant of an Afiatic wild.

Let me, to prove this, tranfport the imagination for a moment to the midft of a foreft in Siberia. There we behold the inhabitant, poor indeed, but equally fond of happiness with the moft refined philofopher of China. The earth lies uncultivated and uninhabited for miles around him; his little family and he the fole and undifputed potteffors. In fuch circumftances Nature and Reafon will induce him to prefer a hunter's life to that of cultivating the earth. He will certainly adhere to that manner of living which is carried on at the fmalleft expence of labour, and that food which is moft agreeable to the appetite; he will prefer indolent though precarious luxury to a laborious though permanent competence, and a knowledge of his own happinefs will determine him to persevere in native barbarity.

In like manner his happiness will incline him to bind himself by no law: laws are made in order to fecure prefent property, but he is poffeffed of no property which he is afraid to lofe, and defires no more than will be fufficient to fuftain him; to enter into compacts with others, would be undergoing a voluntary obligation without the expectance of any reward. He and his countrymen are tenants, not

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rivals,

rivals, in the fame inexhauftible foreft; the increafed poffeffions of one by no means diminishes the expectations arifing from equal affiduity in another; there are no need of laws therefore to repress ambition, where there can be no mischief attending its moft boundlefs gratifications.

Our folitary Siberian will, in like manner, find the fciences not only entirely ufelefs in directing his practice, but difgufting even in fpeculation. In every contemplation our curiofity must be first excited by the appearances of things, before our reason undergoes the fatigue of inveftigating the causes. Some of thofe appearances are produced by experiment, others by minute enquiry; fome arife from a knowledge of foreign climates, and others from an intimate ftudy of our own. But there are few objects in comparifon which prefent themfelves to the inhabitant of a barbarous country; the game he hunts, or the tranfient cottage he builds, make up the chief objects of his concern; his curiofity therefore must be proportionably lefs; and if that is diminished, the reafoning faculty will be diminished in proportion.

Befides, fenfual enjoyment adds wings to curiofity. We confider few objects with ardent attention, but those which have fome connection with our wishes, our pleasures, or our neceffities. A defire of enjoyment first interests our paffions in the purfuit, points out the object of inveftigation, and Reason then comments where Senfe has led the way. An increase in the number of our enjoyments therefore neceffarily produces an increafe of fcientific refearch; but in countries where almoft every enjoyment is wanting, Reafon there feems deftitute of its great infpirer, and fpeculation is the business of fools when it becomes its own reward.

The

The barbarous Siberian is too wife, therefore, to exhauft his time in queft of knowledge, which neither curiofity prompts, nor pleasure impels him to pursue. When told of the exact admeasurement of a degree upon the equator at Quito, he feels no pleafure in the account; when informed that fuch a difcovery tends to promote navigation and commerce, he finds himself no way interested in either. A difcovery which fome have purfued at the hazard of their lives, affects him with neither aftonishment nor pleasure. He is fatisfied with thoroughly understanding the few objects which contribute to his own felicity, he knows the propereft places where to lay the fnare for the fable, and discerns the value of furs with more than European fagacity. More extended knowledge would only ferve to render him unhappy, it might lend a ray to fhew him the mifery of his fituation, but could not guide him in his efforts to avoid it. Ignorance is the happinefs of the poor.

The mifery of a being endowed with fentiments above its capacity of fruition, is most admirably defcribed in one of the fables of Locman the Indian moralift. "An elephant that had been peculiarly "ferviceable in fighting the battles of Wiftnow, was ordered by the god to wish for whatever he

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thought proper, and the defire should be at"tended with immediate gratification. The ele"phant thanked his benefactor on bended knees, "and defired to be endowed with the reafon and "the faculties of a man. Wiftnow was forry to "hear the foolish requeft, and endeavoured to "diffuade him from his mifplaced ambition; but finding it to no purpofe, gave him at last such a portion of wisdom as could correct even the Zen"davefta of Zoroafter. The reafoning elephant "went away rejoicing in his new acquifition, and

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"though

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though his body ftill retained its antient form he "found his appetites and paffions entirely altered. "He firft confidered that it would not only be more "comfortable, but alfo more becoming to wear "cloaths; but unhappily he had no method of making them himfelf, nor had he the ufe of fpeech to demand them from others, and this. "was the first time he felt real anxiety. He foon perceived how much more elegantly men were "fed than he, therefore he began to loath his usual "food and longed for thofe delicacies which adorn "the tables of princes; but here again he found it 'impoffible to be fatisfied; for though he could eafily obtain flesh, yet he found it impoffible to "drefs it in any degree of perfection. In fhort, every pleasure that contributed to the felicity of "mankind, ferved only to render him more mifera"ble, as he found himfelf utterly deprived of the power of enjoyment. In this manner he led a repining, difcontented life, detefting himself, and "difpleafed with his ill-judged ambition, till at last his benefactor Wiftnow, taking compaffion on his forlorn fituation, reftored him to the ignorance "and the happiness which he was originally formed "to enjoy."

No, my friend, to attempt to introduce the sciences into a nation of wandering barbarians, is only to render them more miferable than even Nature defigned they thould be. A life of fimplicity is beft fitted to a ftate of folitude.

The great law-giver of Ruffia attempted to improve the defolate inhabitants of Siberia, by fending among them fome of the politeft men of Europe. The confequence has fhewn, that the country was as yet unfit to receive them; they languished for a time with a fort of exotic malady, every day degenerated from themselves, and at laft, inftead of ren

dering the country more polite, they conformed to the foil, and put on barbarity.

No, my friend, in order to make the fciences useful in any country, it must first become populous; the inhabitant muft go through the different ftages of hunter, fhepherd, and husbandman: then when property becomes valuable, and confequently gives caufe for injuftice; then when laws are appointed to reprefs injury, and fecure poffeffion, when men, by the fanction of thofe laws, become poffeffed of fuperfluity, when luxury is thus introduced and demands its continual fupply, then it is that the fciences become neceffary and ufeful; the ftate then cannot fubfift without them; they must then be introduced, at once to teach men to draw the greateft poffible quantity of pleasure from circumfcribed poffeffion; and to reftrain them within the bounds of moderate enjoyment.

The fciences are not the cause of luxury, but its confequence, and this deftroyer thus brings with it an antidote which refifts the virulence of its own poifon. By afferting that luxury introduces the fciences, we affert a truth; but if with thofe, who reject the utility of learning, we affert that the fciences alfo introduce luxury, we fhall be at once falfe, abfurd, and ridiculous.

Adieu.