Je jouis de moi-même et je méprife le refte des hommes. Logé dans un petit coin de ce vaste amas de boue et de pousfiére, je goûte tranquillement les fruits de ma philofophie au milieu d'un tourbillon d'inconftance et de mauvaife foi. Ici, j'attends la mort avec indifférence; je jouis de la vie avec la même infenfibilité: il n'y a que pour vous que mon cœur s'attendrit fur la terre. Adieu. Recevez mes tres-humbles falutations. J. J. ROUSSEAU.

TRANSLATION.

A Letter from Mr. J. J. Rouffeau, to M. D.

Dear Sir,

'TIS

IS only to you, that I break that filence, which I had refolved with myself inviolably to obferve. Without giving an answer to all thofe infamous libels, which have been published againft me, I will impart to you the motives of my conduct, and the fentiments of my heart. I have known men; I know them ftill; and I do them juftice. Deceived by their vain promifes, and by the infincere proofs of a friendship still more infincere, I am become the victim of my own magnanimity and my own candour.-Go, falfe and deceitful man! go, learn from the animals, which thou calleft ftupid. Lefs fenfible, perhaps, but certainly more humane than thou; they will teach thee to be mild and gentle towards the individuals of thy own fpecies. And thou, Scotch David! triumph in my pretended defeat.

You know it, my dear friend: I am not afraid to appeal thus to you; there is still one who deferves that honourable title; you know it: The voice of fame hath spread throughout your island, what my pretended protector hath done for me. True it is, his promifes were fair; but his actions contradicted them. His name was fufficiently famous: His philofophic fpirit was visible in his writings; but his heart, his generous heart, was by no means fo. He wanted a victim: He found one in a man, perfecuted for truth; and under pretence of procuring me a safe asylum, he made me ferve the purposes of his ridiculous vanity. Pretended philofopher, as he is, he hath erected the ftandard of malice and deceit.

Philofophy does not teach us to be inhuman, perfidious, barbarous, unjust. No, Sir; if, in order to be a philofopher, I muft blacken the reputation of my fellow-citizens; publish to all the world what ought to be buried in eternal oblivion; contrive and conduct fecret plots, and be the principal leader of a band of confpirators: in a word, if, in order to be a philofopher, I must renounce humanity, juftice, honefty, I renounce philofo

phy,

phy, and the name of philofopher; and I leave that title and character to worthy David. For my own part, I am content with that of a virtuous man.

O! my friend, how deceitful are men! how falfe, how perfidious! Nourished with malice from their infancy; their greatest pleasure confifts in ridiculing and perfecuting virtue, and in infulting the virtuous. Virtue! amiable virtue! fuch furely ought not to be thy lot. Happy times! when men, inhabiting the woods, fed on the acorns, which bountiful nature produced in abundance without culture. From the moment they began to build cities, and to unite in fociety, vices, the basest and moft infamous, have taken up their abode among them. Sincerity, integrity, honefty, are banished for ever from the earth: Perjury, deceit, hypocrify, and all the other vices, have established themselves, as it were, upon a throne, and receive the incense of mortals. Monftrous divinities! adored by monsters; I defpife your altars, and the incenfe of your foolish adorers. Honefty, integrity, fincerity, fhall always be my gods upon earth: To them I will facrifice; and if I be an idolator, I glory in my idolatry.

Thus, my dear friend, into your bofom do I pour out my heart. You are not my enemy; your heart is too tender. Pity, the first of all the focial virtues, tender pity, is natural to you: You can compaffionate an unhappy man, who hath fallen a victim to the knavery of the wicked: They have leagued against me; they have attacked me with more than common fury. Every one hath fhot his bolt at me. The first flash appeared in the heart of my ungrateful country; the thunder burst in France; the lightning reached as far as England. What has been the confequence of all this combustion? a smoke, which my patience hath diffipated. The three-fold brafs of Horace hath defended me against all the ftrokes, which must otherwife have overwhelmed me. The ftruggle has.coft me fome fighs in fecret; but my heart was never dejected. Let ma lice once more break loose against me with unbridled fury; let her discharge upon me her keenest and most envenomed arrows; I fhall only be the more impregnable. Weak efforts of a malice still more weak; they will ftrike against a rock, and rebound upon the heads of their authors.

I enjoy myself, and I defpife the reft of mankind. Lodged in a narrow corner of this vast heap of duft and dirt, I quietly taste the fruits of my philofophy in the midst of a hurricane of inconftancy and deceit. Here I wait death with indifference; and I enjoy life with the fame indifference: Nor is there any perfon upon earth but yourself, to whom my heart retains the leaft degree of tenderness. Adieu, Sir; accept my most humble refpects. J. J. ROUSSEAU.

Sf

An

AN IMPARTIAL REVIEW OF NEW BOOKS, PAMPHLETS, &c.

The London Merchant. A Tale.

From the French of Madame

de Gomez. Small 8vo.

Is. 6d. Almon.

T

HE fubject of this tale is, in brief, as follows: Kite, a London merchant, while bleft with the fmiles of fortune, is furrounded by a crowd of flatterers, who profefs for him the greatest friendship; but the moment he is vifited with the stroke of adverfity, they all defert him: all but Lord Meffex, who being deeply in love with his daughter, Amarillis, endeavours to obtain that young lady for his miftrefs, by offering to deliver the father from all his difficulties. Amarillis, however, rejects his propofal with the higheft indignation: and in this fhe is encouraged by her mother Mrs. Kite; when Meflex, charmed by the virtuous conduct of the mother and the daughter, efpoufes Amarillis, and re-establishes her parents in their former affluent circumftances.-The ftory is happily conceived, though but indifferently executed. It has at least this uncommon advantage, that it contains multum in parvo; and in the hands of fome of our modern novelifts, might have been wiredrawn in fuch a manner, as to fill four or five volumes; each. of them double the fize of the prefent.-Some of our wou'dbe-critics have talked, as if they doubted, whether the original were really a French compofition. We are not obliged to anfwer for their ignorance; and we would advife them, for the future, not to be fo very forward in difplaying that ignorance. to the public. The intelligent reader, however, need not be told, that the name of Madame de Gomez is fufficiently known in the learned world; and that this very work of hers may be eafily found in the shop of any bookfeller who deals in French publications.

Poems on various Subjects, viz. The Nunnery, the Magdalens, the Nun, Ruins of an Abbey, Yarico to Inkle, Il Latte, Fugitive Pieces. By Mr. Jerningham. 12mo. and Evo. 2s. 6d. Robfon.

HE poems which compofe this little volume, were pub

TH lifhed at different times, and were very favourably re

ceived by the world. The author is, at leaft in his numbers,

a pro

a profeffed imitator of the celebrated Mr. Grey: and it may be fafely affirmed, that he is no unfkilful imitator. He appears, indeed, to be endowed by nature with a good ear, a delicate tafte, a found judgment, and a lively rather than a vigorous fancy. 'Tis hard to fay, which is his moft capital performance. The Nunnery, the Magdalens, the Nun, and the Ruins of an Abbey, are all of them very fine compofitions; remarkable equally for the harmony of the verse, and the beauty of the imagery.

A

Criticism on Priestley's Electricity, continued.

GREEABLE to our promife in our laft number, we shall now proceed to relate fome of the most important discoveries that have been made, and the moft curious experiments that have been performed in this admirable fcience.

Mr. Prieftly obferves, page 2d, "that from λrpov, the "Greek name for amber, is derived the term ELECTRICITY, "which is now extended to fignify, not only the power of at

tracting light bodies, inhererent in amber, but other powers "connected with it, in whatever bodies they are fuppofed to "refide, or to whatever bodies they may be communicated." This power (of amber) was known to Thales of Miletus, the father of the Ionic philofophy. It is likewife mentioned by Gaffendus, Kenelm Digby, and Sir Thomas Brown; but no advances were made in electricity, till the fubject was undertaken by William Gilbert, who, in his excellent treatife de Magnete, relates a great variety of electrical experiments. Gilbert was fucceeded in these curious researches, by Mr. Bayle, Otto Guerick, Dr. Wall, Sir Ifaac Newton, and others." Hawkesbee, "who wrote in 1709, diftinguished himself by experiments "and discoveries in electricity. He firft obferved the great "electric power of glafs, the light proceeding from it, and "the noife occafioned by it, together with a variety of phoeno"menas relating to electric attraction and repulfion." Hawkefbee's experiments were ftill further improved by Mr. Stephen Grey, a penfioner at the Charter-houfe, who likewife made feveral new discoveries of his own, particularly, he found out the communication of electricity from native electrics to bodies, in which it is not capable of being excited; and he also eftablifhed a more accurate diftinction of electrics from non-electrics. Hitherto," fays Dr. Prieftly, page 45, "the fpirit "of electricity feems to have been confined to England; but, "about this time, viz. about 1734, we find that it had paffed "the feas, and that ingenious foreigners were ambitious of diftinguishing themfelves, and acquiring reputation in this new "field of glory. Mr. du Faye, intendant of the French King's

Sf2

"gardens,

"gardens, and member of the academy of fciences at Paris, "affiduously repeated the experiments of Mr. Grey, and like"wife added to the common stock, several new ones of his 66 own.

"'Twas he that first observed the electric spark from a living "body, and which makes a principal part of the entertainment "of gentlemen and ladies, who came to fee experiments in elec❝tricity; and he was accompanied at that time, as in most of "his other experiments, by the Abbé Nollet, who afterwards, "we fhall find, did himself obtain a distinguished name among "electricians. Mr. du Faye, having got himself fufpended on "filk lines, obferved, that as foon as he was electrified, if an"other perfon approached him, and brought his hand within "an inch, or thereabouts, of his face, legs, hands, or cloaths, "there immediately iffued from his body one or more pricking "fhoots, attended with a crackling noife. He fays, this ex"periment occafioned to the perfon, who brought his hand 66 near him, as well as to himself, a little pain, resembling that "of the fudden prick of a pin, or the burning from a spark of fire; and that it was felt as fenfibly through his cloaths, as on his bare face or hands. He alfo obferves, that in the "dark, thofe fnappings were so many sparks of fire.”—Mr. du Faye likewife difcovered, that electric bodies attract all thofe which are not fo, and repell them as foon as they become electric, by the vicinity or contact of the electric body. He also found out, that there are two diftinct kinds of electricity, very different from one another; one of which he called vitreous, the other refinous electricity; though these are probably no more than what have fince gone by the name of pofitive and negative electricity.

[To be continued.]

The Speeches, Arguments, and Determinations of the Right Honourable the Lords of Council and Seffion in Scotland, upon that important Caufe, wherein his Grace the Duke of Hamilton, and others, were Plaintiffs, and Archibald Douglas of Douglas, Efq; Defendant. With an introductory Preface, giving an impartial and diftinet Account of this Suit. By a Barrister at Law. 8vo. 5s. Almon.

THE

HE introductory preface, prefixed to thefe fpeeches, contains a very full, and, as far as we are able to judge, a very fair account of this great caufe, which has fo long engaged the attention of the inhabitants of North Britain, and now begins to attract the notice of thofe of this part of the island. The affair, it must be owned, is very involved and complicated; so very complicated indeed, that we are not in the leaft furprifed, that the

Lords