literature, but desired to have something of substantial and of permanent worth for their money, something which might form a body of edifying Sunday reading to themselves and to their children. The range of books embraced by these considerations was very narrow: a folio Family Bible; Fox's Book of Martyrs; Life of Christ; Josephus's Antiquities of the Jews; Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress; Hervey's Meditations; Drelincourt on Death (with Defoe's Preface, containing the Ghost Story of Mrs Veal); Baxter's Saints' Rest; Watt's World to Come; Gesner's Death of Abel; Sturm's Reflections, &c. Those who launched forth beyond this range into profane literature were for the most part content with Robinson Crusoe, Pamela, the Arabian Nights' Entertainments, and Henry Earl of Moreland. This was a selection of books not to be despised. They were all good, and some of them immortal works. But the thing was that you could see no other books than these. The selection from these books varied, and it was rare to see the whole or a great part of them together; but whenever a book was to be seen, it was sure to be some one of these. Periodical literature had not reached even the class of tradesmen in any other shape than that of religion. The only periodicals within their reach were of a religious kind, being the magazines of their respective denominations, which were sold at sixpence each. Tradesmen doubtless read the newspapers, but the use of them (except in public-houses) had not descended below their class; and I can declare that I never saw a newspaper, to read, till I was nearly twenty years of age, and after I had been, in fact, removed out of the position to which these first experiences apply. From this account it will appear that my studies, founded upon the books to be found under these circumstances, could not but be of an essentially religious tone. At a later period I fell in with books of a different description in the same class, and was enabled to satiate myself with controversies on the five points, and to treasure up the out-of-the-way knowledge to be found in such books as Dupin's Ecclesiastical History. The day came when I plunged into the sea of general literature, and, being able to get nothing more to my mind, read poems, novels, histories, and magazines without end. A day came in which any remarkable fact that I met with was treasured up, in my tenacious mind, as a miser treasures gold; and when the great thoughts which I sometimes found filled my soul with raptures too mighty for utterance. Another day came, in which I was enabled to gratify a strange predilection for metaphysical books; and, with all the novelists, poets, and historians within the reach of my arm, gave my days to Locke, Hartley, Tucker, Reid, Stewart, and Brown. I think little of these things now, and my taste for them has gone by; but, although I now think that my time might have been more advantageously employed, my mind was doubtless thus carried through a very useful discipline, of which I have since reaped the benefit. But amid all this, the theological bias, given by my earlier reading and associations, remained; and the time eventually came when I was enabled to return to it, and indulge it with redoubled ardour: and after that another time arrived, when I could turn to rich account whatever useful thing I had learned and whatever talent I had cultivated, however remote such acquirement or cultivation might have at first seemed removed from any definite pursuits. This point is one of some importance; and as I am anxious to inculcate upon my younger readers the instruction it involves, it may be mentioned, as an instance, that an acquaintance with the Hebrew language, which has eventually proved one of the most useful acquirements I ever made, was originally formed with no higher view than that of qualifying myself to teach that language to the sons of a friend whose tuition I had undertaken. INDEX OF SUBJECTS. The name of the author of each extract is printed in italic. Bacon, Character of Lord. Ben Jonson, Vice, The Selfishness of, Colton, 201. Author of Civilisation, The Great, Ray, 115. B. Coleridge, Power of his Conversation, Henry BACON, Character of Lord, Ben Jonsona Coleridge, 422. Distinction, A, Seward, 204. Fashion, Cowper, 477- Fears, Idle, Bacon, 205. Fielding and the Rabble, Fielding, 480. Fleetwood, Sir Miles, Recorder of London, Genius, Cowper, 478. Keats, Coleridge's First Interview with, Levelling, Johnson, 474. Parver the Quaker and his Translation of William Temple, 475. Rage, Hartley Coleridge, 476. CAIUS MARIUS, Plutarch, 409. Character of Louis the Eleventh, The, Comines, Character of Polybius the Historian, The, Dry Charity, Christian, J. B. Sumner, 424 Truth, Impediments to the Progress of, Rev. Chemical Philosopher, The, S. H. Davy, 211. R. Hall, 476. Christians, Primitive, W. Cave, 260. ** Civilisation, The Great Author of, Ray, 115. Coleridge, 422. Coleridge's First Interview with Keats, Henry FALKLAND, The Death of Lord, Clarendon 19 Fanshawe, Lady, Lady Fanshawe, 160. Coming of Our Saviour, The, Thos. Burnet, Fashion, Cowper, 477. 507. ton, 58. Fielding and the Rabble, Fielding, 480. Conversation, Power of Coleridge's, Henry Fleetwood, Sir Miles, Recorder of London, HAPPINESS in Solitude, F. 7. Rousseau, Hatfield, Broadoak, The Old Oak-Tree at, F. Haymaking, Lines on, Joanna Baillie, 258. Household, The Royal, in 1780, Burk Hymn of Heavenly Beauty, Spenser, 83 Introduction to the Night Thoughts, Young, Merry Devil of Edinonton, The, Anonymous, 339 It will never do to be Idle, Anonymous, 233. J. 118. Miser, John Elwes, The, Topham, 314. JAMES the First, Court of, Sir J. Harrington, More, Sir Thomas, Aubrey, 202. 157. Morning, Hymn to, Milton, 109. Moskito Indian of Juan Fernandez, The, Dam Mountain of Miseries, The, Addison, 45 N. KEATS, Coleridge's First Interview with, NASEBY Field, Carlyle, 478. L. LABOUR in Utopia, Sir T. More, 51a. Last of the Incas, The, Wm. H. Prescott, 427. Light, Hymn to, Extract from, Cowley, 107. Literature of the Age of Elizabeth, The, Haz- London, 1750, An Earthquake in, Horace London, Sir Miles Fleetwood, Recorder of, Long Life, Health and, Sir W. Temple, 498. 395. Luxury of the Roman Nobles, A. Marcellinus, M. MAIDEN Brief, My, Anonymous, 469. Mariners of England, The Old, Chas. Kings- ley, 179. Marius, Caius, Plutarch, 409. Martinus Scriblerus, Arbuthnot, 330. New Testament, On the, Doddridge, 375. Nobles, Luxury of the Roman, A. Marcel- North America, 1784, The Savages of, D, O. OAK-TREE at Hatfield, Broadoak, The Old, Old Mariners of England, The, Chas. Kings Opium, The Pains of, Thos. De Quincey, Origin of Duelling, Bassompierr, 358. P. PAINS of Opium, The, Thos. De Quincey, Parver the Quaker and his Translation of the Perfection, Examples of Spiritual, Bates, 4. 211. Philosophic Vagabond, The History of a, Pliny the Elder, Death of, Pliny the Younger, Massacre of St Bartholomew, The, Mad. de Poet Described, The, S. Johnson, 397. Mornay, go. Poet? What is a, Wordsworth, 539. Mental Stimulus Necessary to Exercise, An- Polybius the Historian, The Character of drew Combe, 124. Mercy, God's, Jeremy Taylor, 301. Dryden, 249. Prayer, Jeremy Taylor, 50. |