circle of friends at his hospitable board. He smiled, read it to the company, and, with their permission, immediately answered it in the following words :

« Sir,

'Stalbridge, Nov. 1, 1736.

"My clerk being a very mean scribe, at his request, I answer the several queries in your letter.

As to

My disorder was an acute fever, under which I laboured for a month, attended with a delirium, during ten days of the time, and originally contracted, as I have good reason for thinking, by my walking four miles in the middle of a very hot day in July. From this complaint I am perfectly recovered, by the blessing of God, and the prescriptions of my son, who is a physician in this neighbourhood: I have since my illness, officiated both in the church and at funerals; the report of my relapse was probably occasioned by my having a slight complaint in my bowels, about three weeks ago, but which did not confine me. the present state of my health: my appetite, digestion, and sleep, are good, and, in some respects, better than before, particularly the steadiness of my hands: I never use spectacles, and, I thank God, I can read the smallest print by candle-light; I never have had reason to think that the seeds of the gout, stone, rheumatism, or any other chronic disease, are in my constitution. Although I entered on my eighty-first year the second of last March, the greatest inconvenience I feel from old age, is, a little defect in my hearing and memory: these are mercies, which, as they render the remaining dregs of life tolerably comfortable, I desire with all humility and gratitude to acknowledge; and I heartily pray that they may descend, with all other blessings, to my successor, whenever it shall please God to call me.

"P. S. My clerk's name is Robert Dowding; your letter cost him four-pence, to the foot post from Sherborne."

Such an answer, from so good and venerable a character, and under such circumstances, could not fail producing unpleasant sensations in the breast of the gentleman who received it; he was not himself without many good qualities, and, except in the present instance, did not appear deficient in feeling and propriety of conduct. The purpose for which this article is introduced, will be effectually answered, if fellows of colleges, and expecters of fat livings, valuable sinecures, and rich reversions, may happily be taught to check the indecorous ardour of eager hope; much of censure, and much of ridicule will be avoided, and they will not incur the risk of public reprehension, such as was bestowed not many years ago, by a Nottinghamshire vicar, whose frame was more robust, and manners less courteous, than the gentle rector of Dorset. This testy old gentlemant during an indisposition brought on by the good cheer and the poten, ale of one of his right honourable neighbours, was exasperated by certain insidious, oft-repeated, and selfish inquiries concerning his health. After his recovery, he sent the following placard, which he desired a friend to fix on the principal gate of the college to which the vicarage belonged.

"To the Fellows of –

"Gentlemen, in answer to the very civil and very intelligible inquiries, which have of late been so assiduously made, concerning the state of my health, I have the pleasure to inform you that I never was better in my life; and as I have made up my mind on the folly of dying to please other people, I am resolved to live as long as I possibly can.

"To prevent your again putting yourselves to unnecessary trouble and expense, I have directed my apothecary to give you a line, in case there should be any immediate probability of a vacancy, and am "Your humble servant,

**********

APPARITIONS.-When Doctor Johnson was rallied for his faith in ghosts, he used to call over the names of the various eminent characters who, at different periods, had been of his opinion; among these he generally mentioned Doctor Fowler, bishop of Gloucester in the early part of the eighteenth century. Of that prelate the following conversation with judge Powell is recorded on good authority :

"Since I saw you," said the lawyer, a humorist as well as a worthy man, who had often attacked the opinions of the prelate, " since I saw you I have had ocular demonstration of the existence of nocturnal apparitions."

"I am glad, Mr. Justice, you are become a convert to truth; but do you say actual ocular demonstration? Pray let me know the particulars of the story at large."

"My lord, I will. It was, let me see, last Thursday night, between the hours of eleven and twelve, but nearer the latter than the former, as I lay sleeping in my bed, I was suddenly awakened by an uncommon noise, and heard something coming up stairs and stalking directly towards my room; the door flying open, I drew back my curtain, and saw a faint glimmering light enter my chamber."

"Of a blue colour no doubt."

"The light was of a pale blue, my lord, and followed by a tall meagre personage, his locks hoary with age, and clothed in a long loose gown; a leathern girdle was about his loins, his beard thick and grizzly, a large fur cap on his head, and a long staff in his hand. Struck with astonishment, I remained for some time motionless and silent; the figure advanced, staring me full in the face: I then said Whence and what art thou;' the following was the answer I received-'I am watchman of the night, an't please your honour, and made bold to come up stairs to inform the family of their street door being left open, and that if it was not soon shut, they would probably be robbed before morning." Doctor Fowler seized his hat and departed.

AQUINAS, THOMAS, a native of the ancient city of Aquino, in the kingdom of Naples, and a dominican of the thirteenth century. He is one of the few instances in the Roman calendar, of a saint who deserved canonisation as much for personal worth as intellectual vigour ; yet, his superiority, like that of other eminent men, was not generally

acknowledged, nor precisely ascertained, till he had descended into the grave; it was almost fifty years after the death of St. Thomas, that his remains were disinterred and conveyed from Italy to Thoulouse, in Languedoc, with considerable solemnity and splendour. His works, in eighteen volumes folio, are approaching the land of oblivion; yet they rendered their learned and indefatigable author so much the idol of his day, that he is more frequently referred to by his contemporaries, under the title of divine scholiast, angelic doctor, and eagle of theology, than by his patronymic appellation. Yet, before we forget or condemn Aquinas, let us recollect the times in which, and the persons with whom he lived; taste and common sense had been for ages corrupted or perverted; subtlety was considered as the criterion and touchstone of literary excellence; the moral or theological nut was considered of little value if it did require the screw of a scholastic vice, or the sledge hammer of a sturdy polemic, to demolish the thick shell of sophistry in which it was encrusted; he who could burst from obscurity, so situated, and excel, as St. Thomas certainly excelled, in spite of so many obstacles, must have been a man of genius as well as application. If the venerable writers of that period, to whom, as the conduits and cisterns of learning in an age of ignorance and superstition, we are very much obliged, if they are permitted to see and to know what is now passing in the world, with what pity, or contempt, will they regard the present degenerate race of readers, who cannot approve, and often will not read a book without the previous helps of a literary way-warden, a critical surveyor of the highways of learning, who must remove all difficulties, level all inequalities, and produce a work which he who runs may read.

The subject of our present article had resolved, at an early age, to devote his life to religion, study, and retirement, but was opposed in this resolution by his parents, who, finding advice and argument of no avail, had recourse to corporal punishment: this proving ineffectual, a brother of the devotee, probably judging of his feelings by his own propensities, had recourse to a more seducing species of persuasion, which has confounded the wisdom of sages and palsied the vigour of herces. A woman of exquisite beauty, but loose manners, was instructed to apply to the recluse for religious advice; under this pretence, her visits to him were frequent, and it was not till the young man felt his passions inflamed by gazing on her charms, that, suspecting her real character, his prudence took the aların. The frail fair one, observing the impres sion she had made, at once professed her real intentions, dared him to hesitate between dry books and a pretty woman, and, confident of victory, rushed into his arms. Most men can judge of the trying situation in which Aquinas was placed; after a short struggle between passion and duty, and probably strengthened by religious conviction as well as previous discipline, he disengaged her arms from his neck, and firmly grasping them, in doing which, his frame, remarkably muscular, gave him great advantage, he led out this attempter of a crime, never yet imagined or provided for in the statute book; pushing her forth with gentle violence, he immediately secured the door, and returning to silence and darkness, passed the next four and twenty hours in thanks

giving, fasting, and prayer. Let us not withhold our approbation from any system, which, shedding so salutary an influence, could thus enable him, in the dawn of rising manhood, to resist a temptation which would have fascinated the senses of the man who relates it, and have bewildered the reason of nine out of ten of his readers.

Part of a conversation is extant, between the subject of this article and Sinbaldi de Fiesca, a noble Genoese, who, during more than eleven turbulent years, governed the catholic church, by the name of Pope Innocent the Fourth. Aquinas having occasion to visit the Pontiff, a very large sum of money was brought into the room where they were sitting: "The times are no more," said Innocent, pointing at the cash which was piled in rouleaus on the table; " the times are no more, when the church can say 'Gold and silver I have not.' True, holy father," replied Thomas; "such times, indeed, are no more, neither can we now say to the sick of the palsy, as was then said with effect, "Take up thy bed, and walk.’

Henry the Eighth, King of England, that strange inconsistent compound of tyranny and generosity, lust and vanity, profusion and rapaciousness, admired, and frequently quoted the writings of Thomas Aquinas; unfortunately, in the business of prosecuting the royal divorce, a passage from his favourite author was produced point blank against him, and the libidinous tyrant would never after open his volumes, or mention his name. The words which cut down King Harry are a proof of the honesty, vigour, and independence of our catholic saint, more especially when we recollect the period at which they were written: "The laws laid down in the book of Leviticus, concerning the forbidden degrees of marriage, are moral and eternal, and cannot be dispensed with but by an authority equal to that which enacted them."

That portion of the volumes of Thomas Aquinas, under the title of Opuscula, appears to be the best part of his works; in his Tractatus de Regimine Principum, are many solid arguments in favour of a limited aristocracy.

Turning over, in a cursory way, his books, which require some exertion of body as well as mind, to move from an upper shelf, and read, his comments on the following questions caught my eye:

Whether a servant is bound to obey a wicked master?

Which a man should love best, his parents, his benefactor, or his wife? Whether a priest ought to have his head shaved?

Which is the greatest sinner, he who persists in an uninterrupted course of iniquity, or he who has repented, and sins again?

Whether the prayers of the living can render any service to the dead? Whether the Scripture expression of "the worm which never dies," is to be allegorically or literally understood?

This writer always used the following prayer on commencing his studies.

ALMIGHTY GOD, who art the creator of all things, and the fountain of knowledge as well as power, brighten the understanding of thy servant, and remove that darkness which, through ignorance and sin, envelopes his mind. Thou who canst make the tongues of infants

eloquent, guide my pen, inspire my tongue, and pour upon my lips thy heavenly grace: give me quickness to comprehend and memory to retain, and as a preacher of thy word vouchsafe unto me a happy talent of communicating what I know unto others. Teach me to value all human knowledge only so far as it may prove instrumental in finding for myself, and teaching to my fellow-creatures, the best way of rendering us acceptable in thy sight, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

ARBUTHNOT, DR. a court physician in the reign of Queen Anne, an intimate friend of Swift and of Pope; in wit and humour fully equal to the Dean, without his acrimonious virulence and gross indelicacy, and possessing a considerable share of the poet's genius, undebased by malignancy, and querulous discontent. Their arrogant irritability kept them in hot water the greater part of their lives, whilst the equal temper and undiminished cheerfulness of the physician were conspicuous and exemplary; frequently under circumstances which would have excused, if not justified, despondency and complaint. I have often said, that if a character were to be selected from past times, whose footsteps I must follow, whose fortune and fate I must exactly undergo; upon the principle that there is as much merit in patient suffering as in acting, I would fix, without hesitation, on the subject of this article for my model. His mild manners and unassuming virtues in prosperity; his temperate complaints, calm resignation, and unaffected piety, in adversity, and during a tedious and trying sickness, have always powerfully affected my mind; they incontestibly prove the impotence of misfortune to derange or exhaust the internal resources of a good man. Notwithstanding the attacks of that most harassing of all diseases, an asthma, which almost deprived him of food, breath, and repose; and under the natural and laudable feelings of a father for a numerous offspring, he preserved his customary tranquillity of mind, and appeared more sensible of the anguish of those around him than his own sufferings. So worthy a man, serene and erect amidst the clouds and storms of life, is an object which the philosopher may contemplate with reverence, and the afflicted Christian with cordial consolation. "I am as well," said Arbuthnot, who died a few weeks after writing the letter I quote; "I am as well as a man can be, who is gasping for breath, and has a house-full of men and women unprovided for:" but the Almighty saw and fulfilled the wishes of a good heart; every branch of his family passed through life with competence, honour, and that useful accompaniment, hereditary worth.

The following crude reflection, on the death of this amiable man, occurs in a letter written by Mr. Pulteney, afterwards Earl of Bath, to the Dean of St Patrick's. "Arbuthnot is dead; he lived the last six months of his life in a very bad state of health, hoping every night would be his last; he was weary of the world, not so much from disease, as that he was tired of so much bad company." This observation, supposing it to be fact, is remarkable in a man of Arbuthnot's humour, whose mind seemed always pregnant_with_comic ideas, who had a remarkable dexterity in finding out and displaying the minutest ridicu