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Suetonius relates of Augustus Cæsar, that he was afraid of being alone in the dark. “ Instances of this kind are so plentiful every where, that if I add one more, it is only for the pleasant oddness of it. It is of a young gentleman, who having learnt to dance, and that to great perfection, there happened to stand an old trunk in the room where he learnt. The idea of this remarkable piece of household-stuff had so mixed itself with the turns and steps of all his dances, that though in that chamber he could dance excellently well, yet it was only whilst that trunk was there, nor could he perform well in any other place, unless that or some such other trunk had its due position in the room." 'That which thus captivates their reasons, and leads men of sincerity blindful from common sense, will when examined, be found to be what we are speaking of: some independent ideas, of no alliance to one another, are by education, custom, and the constant din of their party, so coupled in their minds, that they always appear there together; and they can no more separate them in their thoughts, than if there were but one idea, and they operate as if they were So. This gives sense to jargon, demonstraton to absurdities, and consistency to nonsense, and is the foundation of the greatest, I had almost said of all the errors in the world if it does not reach so far, it is at least the most dangerous one, since so far as it obtains, it hinders men from seeing and examining."

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I am tempted to add a passage to the like effect from Dugald Stewart, who, of all the moderns, has perhaps, contributed the most to unite the study of mental philosophy with practical hints for the education of the statesman, the man of literature, and the philanthropist.

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When a child hears either a speculative absurdity, or an

erroneous principle of action recommended and enforced daily, by the same voice which first conveyed to it those simple and sublime lessons of morality and religion which are congenial to its nature, is it to be wondered at, that, in future life, it should find it so difficult to eradicate prejudices which have twined their roots with all the essential principles of the human frame?" But, upon this subject, there is no better treatise than the fourteenth Satire of Juvenal. He says that men make children of their opinions and manners, not less than of their faces; one of his examples is a jew-boy shaking his head at pork.

However, it would be as injurious, as it would be futile, to be always endeavouring to pour old wine into new bottles. In Wordsworth's Russian Fugitive, which is founded on a true story, the fair fugitive escapes from Moscow by night, and runs to the cottage of her former nurse. On meeting her, their mutual affection is rekindled by the repetition of nursery nonsense.

Have you forgot, and here she smiled,

The babbling flatteries

You lavished on me, when a child
Disporting round your knees.

I was your lambkin, and your bird,

Your star, your gem, your flower,

Light words that were more lightly heard
In many a cloudless hour.

At all events, it would be, as Cicero says, on another occasion, taking the sun away from the world, if we were to take away toys and games from children. It is related that the Grecian geometrician Archytas devoted much attention to the subject of toys for children, and that many of the earliest toys are of his invention. Several toys and games have been handed from nation to nation, and from age to age;

they are some of the most striking examples of a true and uncorrupted tradition. On the general importance of toys to mankind we have a passage in Pope's happiest manner :

Behold the child, by nature's kindly law,
Pleas'd with a rattle, tickled with a straw;
Some livelier plaything gives his youth delight,
A little louder, but as empty quite.

Scarfs, garters, gold amuse his riper stage,
And beads and prayer books are the toys of age.
Pleas'd with this bauble still, as that before,
Till tir'd he sleeps, and life's poor play is o'er.
Meanwhile opinion gilds with varying rays
Those painted clouds that beautify our days.
Each want of happiness by hope supplied,
And each vacuity of sense by pride!
Then build as fast as knowledge can destroy,
In folly's cup still laughs the bubble joy.

Pope probably had in view a passage in Garth's Dispensary. Garth, though now seldom read, may he considered the intermediate link between Dryden and Pope, in point of time and also in manner, especially as to the uniform conclusion of the sense with the couplet. Pope pays many compliments to Garth, and mentions him among his early patrons. He is an interesting character, particularly as contrasted with his contemporary Arbuthnot both in medicine, politics, and literature. The passage in the Dispensary is—

Children at toys, as men at titles, aim,
And, in effect, both covet but the same.
This Philip's son proved in revolving years,

And first for rattles, then for worlds, shed tears.

An interesting anecdote of Sir Isaac Newton may be mentioned in connection with the last cited passages. He said, a little before he died,-"I don't know what I may seem to the

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world, but, as to myself, I seem only like a boy playing on the sea shore, and diverting myself in now and then finding a smoother pebble or a prettier shell than ordinary, while the great ocean of truth lay all undiscovered before me." A similar idea occurs in the Paradise Regained

:

Who reads

Incessantly, and to his reading brings not
A spirit and judgment equal or superior,
Uncertain and unsettled still remains.
Deep versed in books, and shallow in himself,
Crude, or intoxicate, collecting toys,
And trifles for choice matters, worth a sponge,
As children gathering pebbles on the shore.

In Strutt's "Sports and Pastimes of the People of England" will be found a number of curious particulars concerning the toys and games of English children in early times. I may mention a picture which he gives from a manuscript of the fourteenth century representing four persons playing at Bobcherry. Dr. Johnson in his Dictionary defines the game as one in which " the cherry is hung so as to bob against the mouth." But in the picture the cherry is hung so that the players must jump up to catch it with their mouths, and I apprehend this is the orthodox way of playing the game; if so, Dr. Johnson's definition is, at least, defective. The importance of a right understanding of the game of Bob-cherry may be collected from Scriblerus. This Satire is printed with Pope's works, but of the best parts are from the many of Arbuthpen not. The fifth chapter of Scriblerus is a Dissertation upon Playthings." After relating how the toys of young Scriblerus were made conducive to his education, as that marbles taught him the doctrine of percussion, a top that of the centrifugal force, the chapter concludes thus-" others of his sports were

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further caused to improve his tender soul even in virtue and morality. We shall only instance two of the most useful and instructive. Bob-cherry, which teaches at once two noble virtues, patience and constancy; the first in adhering to the pursuit of one end, the latter in bearing a disappointment. Besides which, he taught him as a diversion, an odd and secret manner of stealing, according to the custom of the Lacedemonians; wherein he succeeded so well, that he practised it to the day of his death." Johnson quotes this authority for Bob-cherry, and gives it as Arbuthnot's.

Ben Jonson, in his dedication of Lady Digby's cradle, has some verses on toys, which are chiefly curious as exhibiting an instance of the use of the Sapphic metre which the writers in the Anti-jacobin so happily applied in the "Knifegrinder." Paper boats with sails of silk is the only toy he mentions which is not to be found in every nursery; it may be easily added. He mentions also the coral, the earliest toy given to children; this is however better described by Rogers. First, how its little breast with triumph swells, When the red coral rings its golden bells.

There appears to have been about the time of king James, a great rage for hobby-horses; they are mentioned in Shakspeare, and in Ben Jonson's Bartholemew Fair a character Lanthorn Leatherhead, supposed to be meant for Inigo Jones, is introduced as a hobby-horse seller. This play, though acted in 1614 considerably before the accession of Charles I, was highly popular, after the Restoration, on account of its ridicule of the Puritans, particularly in the character of Zeal-o-the-land • Busy. Pepys frequently mentions the play, and says that the oftener he saw it the more he liked the wit of it. The following passage occurs relative to toys :

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