emperours themselves took pleasure in presiding at these assemblies of the learned. Domitian had already added a publick library to the publick schools.

There were twenty two libraries at Rome, either publick or private. Lucullus, Atticus, and Cicero, possessed very valuable collections. Julius Caesar instituted the first publick library, and Varro was appointed librarian; then followed that founded by Augustus on the Palatine hill, called the library of Apollo; that in the temple of peace, called the Ulpian library; that of the capitol, and that of Tivoli. These libraries were arrayed in stalls, and set off with great magnificence.

M. Aurelius augmented the number of professors.....he dedicated a statue to Frontinus, the professor of grammar. Gordian elevated several grammarians to the first dignities of the state. This emperour acquired by descent the famous library of Q. Serenus Sammonicus, which contained sixty two thousand volumes. Aurelian ordered every year copies to be made of the works of Tacitus, from whom he used to boast that he was descended; he encouraged the study of jurisprudence, which now became the fashionable pursuit, and was publickly professed and taught.

The Gauls, Spain, Egypt, Greece, Macedon, and other large provinces of the Roman empire, had their own theatres, amphitheatres, temples, and schools of learning.

But this great empire was soon torn to pieces by factions, her throne was set up to auction, her praetorians and legionaries sold the state. The schools were abandoned, the publick treasury was only open to reward the soldier who had set his commander on the throne of the world, but shut against the claims of learned men and publick teachers, who were looked upon as useless incumbrances on society. The fall of letters hastened the fall of the empire, and the ruin of the empire completed the ruin of letters.

Constantine the Great had established publick schools at Byzantium; he had erected libraries and monuments of the Fine Arts. The last had received a new life; but the western empire declined daily. Under Augustulus, hordes of barbarians advanced to Rome, which was possessed by the Heruli, the Goths, the Ostrogoths. The last mentioned nation had, however, a wise leader in Theodorick, who felt the necessity of some establishments for instruction. Cassiodorus, his prime minister, founded, at Rome, the first school for the explanation of the sacred writings, about the commencement of the sixth century. Rome had possessed many learned pontiffs since Celestin, who called a council to condemn the Nestorian heresy. Another council, under Valentinian, assembled fifty six bishops at Rome. That convoked by Saint Leo against the Manichaeans is not the least famous, any more than those remarkable ones which were held under Gelasius, Symmachus, &c. Justinian, after having gathered the laurels due to the military achievments of his generals, Narses and Bellisarius, aspired to the fame of a legislator and a protector of learning. A disciple of the great Theophilus, he conceived the project of a new code of laws, which he engaged the ablest lawyers of his time to execute.

The Lombards shewed no great devotion to the cause of literature. We hardly know whether they had any publick schools; yet they cultivated jurisprudence and the law of feudal tenures. The collection of Lombard Institutes, proves that there was no deficiency among them of political knowledge. Alboin, cruel as he was, appears to have governed with wisdom; the invention of several warlike instruments, and improvements in military tacticks, is attributed to him. But the prince who signalized himself most among them, by his laws, and by the science which he discovered himself to possess, was Luitprand, the seventeenth of their race.

The best informed Romans of this epoch employed themselves in the search of ancient MSS. but we can discover no traces of a school, except for the study of grammar and of the Scriptures. To the grammarians of this age we are indebted for two or three MSS. of Virgil, Terence, and Martianus Capella. The first bears the title of a Roman consul, who was the corrector of it; it is that MSS. which is known to the learned by the appellation of the Florentine Virgil.

Two nations only have yet filled the page of history; the Greeks and Romans. The rest of Europe was inhabited by ignorant people, known to us hardly by name. The Gauls, the Germans, the Britons, were called barbarians; their druids and bards were at the same time priests, poets, and astronomers; they taught in woods like the Pythagoreans, but without their community of life, or mystery of science, which were adopted by those philosophers as the fundamental laws of their school.

Marseilles, in 164th. year of Rome, was inhabited by a Grecian colony. This city became famous in a very short time. The youth of the Gauls and of Italy crowded to her schools, which possessed a high reputation under the Romans, and maintained it after the fall of the empire. The same was the case with Lyons, Bordeaux, Autun, Narbonne, Toulouse, down to the fifth century, which was the epoch during which Eusebius professed philosophy at Lyons; Victor, the arts of oratory and poetry in Burgundy; Securius Melior, that of eloquence in Auvergne.

The irruption of the northern nations proved the destruction of letters. The history of these times presents us only a series of unheard of cruelties, and unexampled acts of perfidy. Clotaire II. gave the French the enjoyment of a few peaceable moments; he had some taste for learning. His son, Dagobert, in spite of his debaucheries, paid more attention to it than any of his predecessors; but his efforts were useless, and superstition got the mastery of his genius.

Germany, which had been the cradle of these ignorant invaders of the Roman empire, was not in a state of greater advancement; her bards and druids were less instructed than those of Gaul. Even the Saxons, who passed for the most polite of her tribes, had no establishments for publick instruction.

Spain, whilst part of the Roman empire, had profited by the illumination of the capital of the universe. We cannot tell whether there were or not any schools in Spain during the time of the Visi

VOL, VII,

goths; but it is certain that in the fifth and sixth ages there were institutions of that nature, institutions which owed their origin there to the spirit of christianity.

Among the Arab conquerors of Spain learning was sedulously cultivated. They established an historical academy at Xativa, and other academies formed for the accommodation of learned and ingenious men who met together to communicate knowledge, and devise the means of cultivating the sciences with most effect. In their numerous colleges, schools, and universities, grammar, law, theology, in short, all the sciences, and even the fine arts had their professors. The most celebrated among them were those of Murcia, Granada, and Malaga. Small towns, and even villages, had their colleges, many of which were founded by Hakem, the protector of sciences, and father of the academy at Cordova.

We now arrive at the age of Charlemagne, who has been styled a new star, equally brilliant for military and political talents, and a taste for literature. All the princes and sovereigns of the time were penetrated with respect for so extraordinary an hero. The bishops, who, by their spiritual power, had acquired some ascendancy over the civil government, when met at the council of Frankfort, were astonished to see among them a king adorned with all the lustre of majesty come to judge them as their supreme arbiter; and they willingly submitted to this great man. The idea which he conceived of opening publick schools in his own palace, is truly great. I have said, that to him is owing the establishment of an academy; to him also is owing the reformation of the art of writing, to which he gave a more agreeable form, and which marks an epoch in diplomatick history. The emperour, and his sister Ada, an abbess in Germany, caused many copies of the Gospel to be written in letters of gold.

It has been pretended by some historians that classical books were unknown in France at the time of Charlemagne. The celebrated letter of the emperour to Paul Warnefrid, if it were genuine, might be a proof to the contrary; for Charles says, or is made to say, in this letter, that in Greek he could rival Homer, and in Latin Virgil, &c. But what ought to surprise us the more in this letter is, that we observe there that this very Warnefrid taught the Greek and Hebrew languages. Another kind of literature peculiar to Charlemagne is that of enigmas; it was, in fact, the court jargon of the day.

The following curious specimen of verses is attributed to Charlemagne, and is said to have been prefixed by him to a copy of the Gospels, which he sent to Pope Adrian.

Hadriano summo papae pariterque beato,
Rex Carolus salve mando valeque Pater.

Praesul apostolicae munus hoc sume cathedrae ;
Viles sunt visu, stemma sed intus habent.

SILVA, N°. 53.

Jam silvae steriles.

LUCAN ix. 966.

THEOCRITUS.....SOLOMON.

LANGHORNE, in his comment on Collins's Oriental Eclogues, has adopted from another critick an opinion, "that Theocritus borrowed some of his finest images and descriptions from Solomon." He observes, that "as the Septuagint translation of the Old Testament was performed at the request, and under the patronage of Ptolemy Philadelphus, it were not to be wondered at if Theocritus, who was entertained at that prince's court, had borrowed some part of his pastoral imagery from the poetical passages of those books." "His Epithalamium," he continues, "on the marriage of Helen gave him an open field for imitation; therefore, if he has any obligations to the royal bard, we may expect to find them there. The opening of the poem is in the spirit of the Hebrew song, and the figures in his description of Helen plainly de clare their origin."

ENGLISH CUSTOM OF DRINKING HEALTHS.

The English, though possessed of a great deal of pride, are generally, as regards themselves individually, characterized by a certain degree of reserve, modesty and decorum. Yet they have one custom which is an open violation of all these. I allude to the practice at their publick dinners of drinking the healths of persons present, which is prefaced by the most exaggerated praises; after these are concluded, the company empty their glasses with "three times three." The individual who has been bepraised, then rises, and either puffs the person who has just puffed him, or, what is not quite so bad, bestows his flattery on the whole company.

I was a witness of the grossness of this custom at a lord mayor's feast in Guildhall, where I happened to sit near the new and old mayor, and the cabinet ministers, many of whom, as well as other characters of the first distinction, were present, as is usual on this occasion. After the king and royal family had been drank, they commenced giving the healths of the late, and actual mayor, the new members of parliament, &c. each of whom had of course to make a speech. Mr. S. who was the retiring mayor, and who had been chosen one of the four city members of parliament, distinguished himself. He was seated on the right hand of the new mayor, and when the other toasts were finished, he rose, and proposing the health of his successor, made the most fulsome panegyrick upon him. As soon as it was over, the mayor, determined not to be outdone, rose and said, "Gentlemen, I beg leave to propose to you the health of Mr. S. a gentleman whose conduct I am sure

has not only given satisfaction to this city, but to the whole world!” When the health of the new members was drank, each of whom had to return thanks separately, the late mayor arose in his turn, and said, with a self complacency that could hardly be surpassed; "My lords and gentlemen, I return you my thanks for the honour you have now done me, and I beg leave to say that the conduct of Mr. S. the representative, shall never disgrace that of Mr. S. the lord mayor!" It was easy to perceive that some of the distinguished courtiers were inwardly amused at the bonhommie of these citi

zens.

A NEW NOTE ON SHAKESPEARE.

"GADSHILL," in Henry IV. part I. says Steevens in his edition of Shakespeare, "receives his title from a place on the Kentish road, where many robberies have been committed."

In an action against the hundred of Gravesend, for a robbery on Gadshill, upon the statute of 13 Ed. 1. it seemed hard to the inhabitants, that they should answer for robberies committed on Gadshill, because they are there so frequent, that if the inhabitants should answer for all of them, they would be utterly undone. And Harris, Serjeant, was of counsel for the hundred, and pleaded, "that time out of mind, &c. felons had used to rob on Gadshill, and so prescribed to be discharged."

A joke is a rare thing in a book of reports, but this may be found in 2. Leonard, page 12. It will be understood by any common lawyer, but that the lay gens may also perceive it, it will be sufficient to observe that prescription, in the law, is when a man can shew no other title to what he claims, than that he, and those under whom he claims, have immemorially used to enjoy it.

GRECIAN PICTURES AND STATUES.

Winkelman, in his Reflections on the Painting and Sculpture of the Greeks, a work elegantly translated more than forty years ago by Fuseli, observes, "that the fairest youths danced undressed on the theatre; and Sophocles, the great Sophocles, when young, was the first who dared to entertain his fellow citizens in this manner. Phryne went to bathe at the Eleusinian games exposed to the eyes of all Greece, and rising from the water became the model of Venus Anadyomene. During certain solemnities the young Spartan maidens danced naked before the young men; and strange as this may seem, it will appear more probable when we consider that the christians of the primitive church, both men and women, were dipped together in the same font. Then," he continues, " every solemnity, every festival afforded the artist opportunity to familiarize himself with all the beauties of nature.' To these and similar causes the abbé, with something more than a slender probability to support his supposition, ascribes the amenity attributed by Pliny to every picture and statue which in his time bore the name or car ried the stamp of Apelles and Phidias.