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"diftinction."--In the course of the fame conversation he gave us two anecdotes, which I muft alfo fet down. He faid, "the Abbé Raynal, for his bold writings, was banished from Paris-but he has been fuffered to live quietly in the fouth of France.-In his observa"tions on Pennfylvania, he has this expreffion, Peuple "beureux, fans roi! fans pretre "Second anecdote,"The regent Duke of Orleans was certainly one of the greatest wits any age or country has ever produced; "he faid, Pour reufir a la cour, il faut etre fan honneur "et fans humeur §."

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To be continued.

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I THIS morning read over that incomparable comedy, the Merchant of Venice. Had the author compofed. that play only, he would have deferved a place in the firft rank of dramatic writers.A groupe of the finest mor characters are all admirably fupported-Anthonio, Baffanio, and Portia, are each in the highest ftile of Shakespeare's excellence. When Portia, with a noble fimplicity, fays,

"I never did repent of doing good,
"And fhall not now,"

we feel an irrefiftible impreffion, that the poet himfelf must have been a worthy honeft man. I fhall quote one of thofe paffages that ftruck me as remarkably pathetic. When Solarino is about to mention the ruin of Anthonio, affection and forrow almoft ftifle his

utterance.

Happy people! that has neither king nor priests!

To fucceed at court, one must be without honour, and without a will of one's own.

"It is true, without any flips of prolixity, or croff. ing the plain high-way of talk, that the good An "thonio, the honeft Anthonio-O that I had a title good enough to keep his name company!"

Gratiano is likewife a character of exquifite entertainment. His reply to Baffanio, who had exhorted him to caution, is in that fort of folemn ludicrous file, almost entirely peculiar to Shakespeare.

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Signior Baffanio, hear me ;

"If I do not put on a sober habit,

"Talk with refpe&t, and fwear but now and then," &c.

In his addrefs to Shylock, however, in the beginning of the fourth act, he kindles into the most gene rous and eloquent indignation.We fee, with much fatisfaction, that good humour does not merely play on the furface of his mind, but is ingrafted on a manly feeling heart-During the trial that follows, he preferves a ftrict and becoming filence: But the moment that his friend is out of danger, the poet, ever attentive to chastity of character and to nature, reprefents him relapfing into the moft tumultuous exultation. There is a whimfical portrait of this charming phantom drawn by Baffanio, which I beg leave to recommend to James Bofwell, Efquire, as a motto for the title page of his Life of Dr. Samuel Johnfon, if print and paper shall ever be prostituted on a fecond edition.

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66

:

Gratiano fpeaks an infinite deal of nothing, more " than any man in all Venice his reafons are as two grains of wheat hid in two bushels of chaff! you "hall feek all day e'er you find them; and when you "have them, they are not worth the fearch.”

The learned and facetious Lord Monbeddo, was converfing fome years ago on this laft topic: "I have lived," faid his Lordship, " to fee my country hum"bled in arts, and humbled in arms; but I never expected to have feen England humbled to the admira"tion of Dr. Samuel Johnson."

46

Laurence-Kirk,

June 24, 1771.

TIMOTHY THUNDERPROOF.

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Sophia's fourth letter to the Editor of the Bee, on the fubject of the Education of young Ladies.

SIR

I AM charmed to think that my artless description of the mode of education I adopted for my daughters, has given any fatisfaction to the public, and that my communications fhould have been in any degree ferviceable to your publication, which I truly admire, and should be happy to promote.

When I had advanced fo far as I have defcribed in my last letter, with the education of my Alathea, I found her fifter growing up to profit by the fame mode of inftruction, which I adminiftered, and was fuccefsful. Two of the clergyman's daughters continued in my academy (as I may so say) day scholars, and a piece of my husband's was my boarder; fo my fchool confifted of fix, and I did equal justice to them all.

Being fortunately capable of giving my young ladies a learned education, I did not fail to give them every inftruction that youths of the other fex receive at the fame age: In grammar, in the languages, and in the fciences, in the belles lettres, and in the beaux arts. While I was thus happily and profitably engaged, we received a vifit from an old maiden fifter of my huf band's, who was rich, and from whom Eugenius had confiderable expectations for his family. The day after Mrs. Grizzel's arrival, fhe was prefent at my inftruction of the children, with which the feemed not to be difpleased; but after tea in the afternoon, the opened pretty fully to me on the subject of her disapprobation of the plan I had adopted. Sifter, faid fhe, you have got a very numerous family indeed, and have brought upon yourself a great deal of trouble, for which I wish you may be rewarded according to your expectation; but I

hope you will not take it amifs, if I tell you, that I think giving young ladies a learned education very preposterous, and may hereafter give you and my brother much uneafinefs. After all you can do for them in this way, you will never be able to raise your girls above the attainments of a young school-boy; and filling their mind with a fmattering of learning, you will render them pedantic, troublefome, preticufes, difagreeable to the women, and troublesome to the men, by their pretenfions to fuperior knowledge. My brother has a handfome eftate; and the world will expect that his daughters fhould either have an accomplished French governefs, or be fent to an eminent boarding fchool at London, that they may be inftructed in all the fashionable accomplishments, and learn that maniere which i indifpenfibly neceffary for their proper introduction into our polite circles, and for their establishment in marriage. Madam, faid I, your brother approves of my plan of education, and though I allow, that a fmattering of learning would be injurious to my daughters, I do not foresee the fame confequence from the mode I have adopted of carrying them forward as far as their genius or the other engagements of their fex will permit. Mrs. Grizzel fhook her head, and with great deliberation and politeness ended the converfation, by faying, fhe had done what The thought her duty, and fhould remain filent for the future on the fubject of female education.

This converfation had hardly clofed, when my excellent Eugenius entered the room, and seeing my countenance a little clouded, he took me by the hand, and propofed to us a walk, which Mrs. Grizzel declined on account of an obftinate rheumatifm, with which he had been long moft grievoutly afflicted. Away we fallied to the garden, with the children, the parfon, and an accomplished gentleman in the neighbourhood who had come to play duets on the German flute with the parfon, which they performed in a little caffirio in the hrubbery. Eugenius and I repaired to a feat adjoinVOL. III.

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ing, and having fat down on a bank of violets, Eugenius asked me the cause of my being difcontented when he came into the drawing room; I told him, and asked him if he was moved by the arguments of his fifter. Eugenius, with a look of divine complacency, addreffed me thus Sophia, my dear Sophia, bear with the prejudices of my fifter; they are the prejudices of a whole world, but they will be gradually removed, and can be removed only by the fuccefs of experiments such as those in which you are now engaged; had I any doubts of their fuccefs, I would not consent to their being tried upon my daughters; but perfuaded as I am of their being founded upon the principles of eternal reason, I befeech of you to proceed with unremitting zeal and application, to complete them according to your plan. The great difficulty to be furmounted in the foundation of a new and proper system of education for women, is to find a groupe of women capable of teaching their ówn fex, that there may be no Abelards to bring the practice of it into disrepute. Form the clergymen's daughters for this important purpofe; others following their mitructions and example, will be formed in the fame manner; and fucceeding generations will feel the effects of the Catholic tradition, and blifs the apostles of the philofophy of women.

The caufe, my dear Sophia, of the inefficacy of the accomplishment of women, to render them independent and happy in their own resources, is, that the mind and its philofophy enters not into the knowledge which they have acquired of the mechanism of mufic, poetry, needlework, or any of their amusements; so that their enjoyment is not intellectual, and muft yield in the theatre of the real world to fenfual delights, which have a higher influence on the nervous fyftem than they have: then farewell industry and the progreffive improvement in science and the fine arts, and will come every thing that can fupply their places with more fenfual enjoyments; farewell every thing that renders women the 05

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