Le Sage became the subject of regret to his Chapter, and the enlightened society to which he was endeared by his virtues.” The interesting account of Monsieur de Tressan having conducted Le Sage to an honoured tomb, we have but to add, that an epitaph, placed over his grave, expressed, in indifferent poetry, the honourable truth, that he was the friend of Virtue rather than of Fortune.1 Indeed when the giddy hours of youth were passed, his conduct seems to have been irreproachable; and if, in his works, he has assailed vice rather with ridicule than with reproach, and has, at the same time, conducted his story through scenes of pleasure and of license, his Muse has moved with an unpolluted step, even where the path was somewhat miry. In short, it is highly to the honour of Le Sage, that-differing in that particular from many of his countrymen who have moved in the same walk of letters,-he has never condescended to pander to vice by warmth or indelicacy of description. If Voltaire, as it is said, held the powers of Le Sage in low estimation, such slight regard was particularly misplaced towards one, who, without awakening one evil thought, was able, by his agreeable fictions, to excite more lasting and more honourable interest than the witty Lord of Ferney himself, even though Asmodeus sat at his elbow to aid him in composing Candide and Zadig. 1 "Sous ce tombeau Le Sage abattu, CHARLES JOHNSTONE. Or the author of the Adventures of a Guinea, a satire which, from its resemblance to the Diable Boiteux, arranges naturally with those of the author of Gil Blas, we can say but little. CHARLES JOHNSTONE was an Irishman by birth, though it is said a Scotsman by descent, and of the Annandale family. If so, we have adopted the proper orthography, though his name seems to have sometimes been spelt Johnson. He received a classical education; and, being called to the Bar, came to England to practise. Johnstone, like Le Sage-and the coincidence is a singular one-was subject to the infirmity of deafness, an inconvenience which naturally interfered with his professional success ;—although, by a rare union of high talents with eloquence and profound professional skill, joined to an almost intuitive acuteness of apprehension, we have, in our time, seen the disadvantage splendidly surmounted. But Johnstone possessed considerable abilities, of which he has left at least one admirable example, in the Adventures of a Guinea. His talents were of a lively and companionable sort, and as he was much abroad in the world, he had already, in his youth, kept such general society with men of all descriptions, as enabled him to trace their vices and follies with a pencil so powerful. Chrysal is said to have been composed at the late Lord Mount Edgecomb's, in Devonshire, during a visit to his lordship. About 1760, the work was announced in the newspapers as "a dispassionate distinct account of the most remarkable transactions of the present times all over Europe." The publication immediately followed, and, possessing at once the allurement of setting forth the personal and secret history of living characters, and that of strong expression and powerful painting, the public attention was instantly directed towards it. A second edition was called for almost immediately, to which the author made several additions, which are incorporated with the original text. But the public avidity being still unsatisfied, the third edition, in 1761, was augmented to four volumes.1 The author, justly thinking that it was unnecessary to bestow much pains in dovetailing his additional matter upon the original narrative, and conscious that no one was interested in the regular transmission of Chrysal from one hand to another, has only connected the Original Work and the Continuation by references, which will not be found always either accurate or intelligible,-a point upon which he seems to have been indifferent. 1 ["Dr Johnson told me,” (1773,) says Boswell, “he did not know who was the author of the Adventures of a Guinea;' but that the bookseller had sent the first volume to him in manuscript, to have his opinion if it should be printed; and he thought it should."— CROKER'S Boswell, vol. ii., p. 500.] After this successful effort, Mr Johnstone published the following obscure and forgotten works: "The Reverie; or, a Flight to the Paradise of Fools." 2 vols. 12mo, 1762. A satire. "The History of Arsaces, Prince of Betlis." 2 vols. 12mo, 1774. A sort of political romance. "The Pilgrim; or, A Picture of Life." 2 vols. 12mo, 1775. "The History of John Juniper, Esq. alias Juniper Jack." 3 vols. 12mo, 1781. A romance in low life. These publications we perused long since, but remember nothing of them so accurately as to induce us to hazard an opinion on their merits. So late as 1782, twenty years after the appearance of Chrysal, Mr Johnstone went to seek fortune in India, and had the happy chance to find it there, though not without encountering calamity on the road. The Brilliant, Captain Mears, in which he embarked, was wrecked off the Joanna Islands, and many lives lost. Johnstone, with the captain and some others, was saved with difficulty. In Bengal, Johnstone wrote much for the periodical papers, under the signature of Oneiropolos. He became joint-proprietor of one of the Bengal newspapers, acquired considerable property, and died about the year 1800; and, as is conjectured, in the seventieth year of his age. Most of these facts have been transferred from Mr Chalmers's Biographical Dictionary. It is only as the author of what has been termed the Scandalous Chronicle of the time, that Johnstone's literary character attracts our notice. We have already observed, that there is a close resemblance betwixt the plan of Chrysal and that of the Diable Boiteux. In both works, a Spirit, possessed of the power of reading the thoughts, and explaining the motives of mankind, is supposed to communicate to a mortal a real view of humanity, stripping men's actions of their borrowed pretexts and simulated motives, and tracing their source directly to their passions or their follies. But the French author is more fortunate than the English, in the medium of communication he has chosen, or rather borrowed, from Guevara. Asmodeus is himself a personage admirably imagined and uniformly sustained, and who entertains the reader as completely by the display of his own character, as by that of any which he anatomizes for the instruction of Don Cleofas. Malicious as he is, the reader conceives even a kind of liking for the Fiend, and is somewhat disconcerted with the idea of his returning to his cabalistic bottle; nay, could we judge of the infernal regions by this single specimen, we might be apt to conceive, with Sancho Panza, that there is some good company to be found even in hell. Chrysal, on the other hand, is a mere elementary spirit, without feeling, passion, or peculiar character, and who only reflects back, like a mirror, the objects which have been presented to him, without adding to or modifying them by any contribution of his own. The tracing of a piece of coin into the hands of various possessors, and giving an account of the actions and character of each, is an ingenious medium for moral satire, which, however, had been |