Your right hand would touch the east, and your left the west. You grasp at more than you are equal to From Europe you reach Asia; from Asia you laid hold on Europe; and, if you conquer all mankind, you seem disposed to wage war with woods and snows, with rivers and wild beasts; and to attempt to subdue Nature. But have you considered the natural course of things? Have you reflected, that great trees are many years in arriving at their height, and yet are cut down in an hour? It is foolish to think of the fruit only, without considering the height you have to climb to come at it. Take care lest, while you strive to reach the top, you fall to the ground with the branches, you have laid hold of." The whole of this speech, though spoken by a barbarian, is superior to any other preserved in Thucydides, Xenophon, Polybius, or Livy; Sallust, Tacitus, Davila, or Guicciardini. VIII. The argument, relative to the superior excellence of ancient and modern genius, acquires new light from the ingenuity of Fontenelle and the rejoinder of Du Bos2. "The question," said Fontenelle, "is reducible to this point, viz.: whether trees do, or do not, grow in our times as luxuriantly as in the time of the Greeks and Romans. The surest way to determine this point is to consult na ⚫ Montesquieu has an admirable illustration:-"Quand les sauvages de la Louisiane veulent avoir du fruit, ils coupent l'arbre au pied et cueillent le fruit. Voilà le gouvernement despotique." V. 13. Shakespeare has an affecting instance in Othello, act v. sc. 2.; another in Measure for Measure, act ii. sc. 2.; again in the Comedy of Errors, act ii. sc. 2. 2 Reflect. on Poetry, Painting, and Music, vol. ii. ch. 19. tural philosophy. She has the secret of abridging many disputes, that rhetoric would protract to eternity.""With all my heart," rejoined Du Bos; "I freely give my consent. What answer does she give us? She tells us two things essential to our argument. The first is, that some plants have, in all times, attained greater perfection in one country than another: the second, that even in the same country trees and plants do not produce every year fruits of equal goodness." Some writer has resembled the human heart to certain medicinal trees, which yield not their healing balm, until they have themselves been wounded: a simile and a sentiment forcibly reminding us of the "Non ignara mali” of the gentle, but unfortunate, Dido. Montesquieu', anticipating the difficulty of searching into the origin of the feudal laws of the Franks, has an illustration also finely suited to our subject. "The feudal laws," says he, 66 present a very beautiful prospect. A venerable oak raises its head to the skies; the eye sees from afar its spreading branches; upon drawing nearer it perceives the trunk, but does not discover the root; the ground must be dug to discover it." Similar illustrations are to be met with among Asiatic writers. Ferdousee thus concludes his satire upon Sultan Mahmoud: "That tree, the nature of which is bitter, were you to plant it in the Garden of Eden, and water it with the ambrosial stream of Paradise, and were you to manure its roots with virgin honey, would, after all, discover its innate disposition, and only yield the acrid fruit that it had ever yielded." The Javans have a 1 Spirit of Laws, xxx. ch. 1. 2 Asiat. Journ. v. p. 338. fable', which they use to prove the relative connexion that one person has with another. "The forest and the tiger lived together in close friendship; so that no one would approach the forest, for the tiger was always in the way; nor the tiger, for the forest always afforded him shelter. Thus they remained both undisturbed, on account of the mutual security they afforded to each other: but when the tiger abandoned the forest, and roamed abroad, the people seeing that the tiger had quitted it, immediately cut down the forest, and converted it into plantations. The tiger, in the mean time, taking shelter in a village, was seen by the people, who soon found means to kill him. In this manner both parties, by abandoning their mutual duties to each other, were lost." IX. So natural is the love for particular trees, that a traveller seldom fails to celebrate those by which his native province is distinguished. Thus the native of Hampshire prides himself upon his oaks; the Burgundian boasts of his vines; and the Herefordshire farmer of his apples. Normandy is proud of her pears, which she fancies equal to those that grew in Camoens's Island of Venus: Ah! if ambitious, thou wilt own the care, Book ix. Raffles's Hist. Jav. i. 258. 4to. VOL. I. G Provence celebrates her olives, and Dauphiné her mulberries; while the Maltese are in love with their own orange trees. Norway and Sweden celebrate their pines; and Syria her palms, producing a fruit, of which the Syrians make bread, wine, honey, and vinegar; and from its body a species of flax, which they convert into cloth. The Paphians were proud of their myrtles, the Lesbians of their vines; Rhodes loudly proclaimed the superior charms of her rose trees; Media of her citrons; India of her ebony, and Idumea of her balsams. This tree furnished the Judeans with an odoriferous perfume for their banquets of milk and honey; a remedy for many of their disorders; and a preservative wherewith to embalm their dead. Its medicinal qualities are beautifully alluded to by Jeremiah, when bewailing the sins and misfortunes of the Jews. "Is there no balm in Gilead? is there no physician there? Why, then, is not the health of the daughters of my people restored'?" And again, where, prophesying the overthrow of Pharaoh's army at the river Euphrates, he says, "Go up into Gilead and take balm, oh virgin, the daughter of Egypt: in vain shalt thou use many medicines; thou shalt not be cured 2." The Druses boast of their mulberries, and Gaza of her pomegranates; whose soft rubies laugh, Bursting with juice, that Gods might quaff. Enchanted Fruit, l. 240. Switzerland speaks of her lime trees, Bairout of her figs and bananas, and Damascus of her plums. Equally vain are the Chinese of their celebrated tea tree; the leaves of which were totally unknown to the ancients, and for many years the martyr of prejudice in Europe: yet imported with so much benefit, expense, and profit, as at once to confound the physician and the merchant. But a few years since, and the name of this plant was so unknown in our hemisphere, that a voyage to China would have been esteemed as unproductive' as a voyage to the Straits of Magellan: now its virtues engage more of our capital than all other articles of foreign com merce. X. The inhabitants of Jamaica never cease to praise the beauty of their manchenillas; while those of Tobasco are as vain of their cocoas. The natives of Madeira, whose Spring and Autumn reign together, take pride in their cedars and citrons; those of Antigua in their tamarinds; while they esteem their mammee sappota equal to any oak in Europe, and their mangos superior to any tree in America. Equally partial are the inhabitants of the plains of Tahta to their peculiar species of fan palm; and those of Kous to their odoriferous orchards. The Hispaniolans, with the highest degree of pride, challenge any of the trees of Europe or Asia to equal the height of their cabbage trees; towering to an altitude of two hundred and seventy feet! Even the people of the Bay of Honduras have imagination sufficient to conceive their log-wood to be superior to any trees in the world; while the Huron savages inquire of Europeans, whether they have any thing to compare with their immense cedar trees. |