201

THE

AMBITION.

HE precepts of morality eftablish and determine the length to which ambition may with propriety be carried: that paffion, the prime mover of human actions, and even of human virtue, and which for this reafon it would be dangerous to exterminate, has this thing in particular, that when it is moderate, it is an estimable sentiment, the confequence and the proof of greatnefs of mind; but when carried to excess, it is the most odious and the moft fatal of all the vices. Indeed it is the only one which has no refpect to blood, to friendship, nor to duty. The mifer is fometimes generous for his relation, the lover will fometimes facrifice even his miftrefs to his friend; but the ambitious man facrifices every thing to the object he poffeffes, or wishes to obtain. Thus, of all the evils which the paffions diffeminate among the human race, the miferies which ambition entails on its votaries are those which leaft excite the compaffion of the fage.

ENGLAND.

It must be confeffed that the great efteem we have for the English nation is due to its learned men. The English people, inferior to the French in what relates to taste and pleasure, but fuperior in worth, or at least in the great number of excellent philofophers which the nation has produced, have gradually communicated to us, in the works of their authors, that precious freedom of thinking of which reafon reaps the advantage, which fome men of genius abuse, and against which only fools repine. Accordingly, fo many pens have been employed in France in celebrating England, that their praifes feem to have calmed the national hatred, at

leaft on our fide: for it must be owned that, on this point, we are fomewhat before the English, and that they have not returned the encomiums we have bestowed on them in an equal degree. May not this referve, by the way, be confidered as a confeffion of our fuperiority? At any rate, the honour they do us in coming to France to catch our taftes, our airs, and even our prejudices, is a fort of tacit and involuntary eulogium, with which our French vanity ought to be fatisfied better than with any other. There feems to be a fort of mutual exchange going on at present between us and the English: inftructed and enlightened by them, we are beginning to have the advantage, to cope with them at least in the phyfical fciences; while they, on the other hand, come to draw from our entertainments and our books, that tafte, thofe graces and that method which were wanting in their own productions. Let us take care that in these they 'do not excel their masters.

AKTS.

The name of Art may be given to any fyftem of knowledge which can be reduced to pofitive and invariable rules, independent of caprice or of opinion; and, in this fenfe, it would be allowable to fay, that many of our fciences are arts, confidered in relas tion to their practical parts. But as there are rules for the operations of the mind, fo there are alfo rules for thofe of the body, that is, for such as, being employed only on corporeal fuba jects, are performed by the hand alone. Hence, the diftinction of arts into li beral and mechanical, and the fuperiority which is given to the former over the lattet. This fuperiority is unquestionably unjuft in many respects;

and

and yet in the lift of prejudices, how ever ridiculous any of them may seem, there is not one perhaps which has not its reason, or, to speak more correctly, its origin; and philofophy, though often unable to correct abuses, may at least trace them to their fource. Strength of body having been the first principle which rendered the right of equality among mankind useless, the weakest, who are always the moft numerous, would join together to oppofe it. They would therefore establish, by the help of laws and of different forms of government, an inequality by confent of which strength would ceafe to be the principle. This laft inequality being fettled, men, as they affociated themselves to preserve it, would not fail to murmur in fecret against it, from that defire of fuperiority which nothing can fubdue in them. They would then feek a kind of indemnification in an inequality not fo arbitrary, and bodily ftrength, now reftrained by laws, not being able to ufurp any fuperiority, men would be obliged to feek, in the difference of their mental powers, another principle of inequality, as natural, as peaceable, and more ufeful to fociety. Thus the more noble part of our being has been in fome measure revenged for the firft advantages which the viler part had ufurped; aud the talents of the mind have been generally acknowledged as fuperior to thofe of the body. The mechanical arts, as they depend upon a manual operation, and are fubje&ted, if I may be allowed the expreffion, to a fort of conftant uniformity, have been abandoned to thofe men whom prejudice has ranked in the loweft clafs. Want, which has forced thefe men to labour oftener than they have been inclined to it by tafte and genius, is made a reafon for defpifing them; fo injurious is poverty to whatever it accompanies! As to the free operations of the mind, they have been the portion of those who have confidered themselves

in this refpect as the favourites of nature. The advantage, however, which the liberal have over the me chanic arts, by the labour of the mind which the first require and by the difficulty of excelling in them, is fufficiently compenfated by the very fuperior utility for the most part of the laft. It is this very utility which has been the caufe of their being reduced to operations merely mechanical, in order to facilitate the practice of them to a greater number of men. But fociety, while it justly refpects the mental powers of those who have inftructed it, ought not to defpife the hands of those who ferve it. The difcovery of the mariners compafs is not of lefs confequence to mankind than the explanation of the properties of the magnetic needle would be to phyfics. In fhort, to confider abstrac tedly that principle of diftinction we are fpeaking of, how many men are there who pretend to the title of learned, whofe knowledge is nothing but a mechanical art! And what real difference is there between a head stuffed with facts unarranged, without order or connection, and the fkill of an artist confined to mechanical execution.

The contempt, which people entertain for the mechanical arts feems to have extended, in fome degree, even to the inventors themselves. The names of those benefactors of the human race, are almost all unknown, while the hiftory of its deftoyers, called Conquerors, is known to every one. It is however among artifts, perhaps, that we are to look for the most admirable proofs of the fagacity of the mind, of its patience and refources. I confefs that the greateft part of the arts could not have been invented but by degrees: and that ages must have been neceffary to bring watches, for instance, to the point of perfection we now fee them arrived at. But is not the

fame

fame thing to be faid of the sciences? How many discoveries, which have immortalifed their authors, have been prepared by the labours of preceding ages, and often even brought to fuch a degree of maturity as to need only one other ftep, to perfection! And ftill, to take our inftances from clock-work, why are thofe who invented the fpring of a watch, or its repeating movement, lefs honoured than thofe who have employed themselves in perfecting algebra? Befides, if I may believe fome philofophers whom the contempt fhewn by the multitude for the arts has not prevented from ftudying them, there are fome machines fo complicated, the parts of which are fo dependent upon one another, that it is difficult to fuppofe the invention due to more than a fingle perfon. Did not fuch an extraordinary genius, whofe name is loft in oblivion, deferve to be ranked with the fmall number of thofe creative minds who have opened to us new paths to science ?

CRIMES.

Crimes may be divided into different claffes; in the first stand those which take away, or unjustly attack the life of another; in the fecond, thofe which attack honour; in the third, thofe which attack property; in the fourth, those which attack the public peace; in the fifth, thofe which attack morals. Punishments ought to be proportioned to the different forts of crimes; thus, thofe of the first kind ought to be punished with death; thofe of the fecond, by infamy; thofe of the third, by privation of goods; thofe of the fourth, by exile or imprisonment; and those of the fifth, by fhame, and public contempt. Such are in general the maxims which natural juftice prefcribes in fuch cafes, and which ought to bc obferved with as few deviations as poffible for a crime ought to be punified not only in proportion to the degree in which the culprit hath violated the law, but in proportion to the importance of that law to the public welfare. This is the rule by which the legiflator ought to judge of the degree of enormity in crimes, and efpecially of the diftinctions to be made in them, according as they relate to religion, or to human fyftems of morals. Hence we may explain why theft, for inftance, is punished by the laws more feverely than crimes that as directly injure religion; why fornication, though much lefs criminal in itself than fecret adultery, is however more injurious to fociety, as it tends to encreafe the number of unhappy citizens, or to facilitate depopulation by the rain of fecundity. DICTIONARII S.

Among the liberal arts which have been reduced to principles, thofe which are employed in the imitation of nature, have been called the fine arts, becaufe to please is their principal object. But this is not the only thing which diftinguishes them from the more neceffary or more useful liberal arts, fuch as grammar, logic, and ethics. Thefe laft have fixed and fettled rules which one man may tranfmit to another; whereas the practice of the fine arts chiefly confists in an invention, which hardly acknowledges a ny laws but thofe of genius; the rules which have been written on thefe arts, are properly fpeaking nothing but the mechanical part of them; they produce nearly the effect of the telescope, they aflift only thofe that fee.

It must be allowed that, fince the revival of letters, we are obliged to Dicionaries for the general diffufion of knowle 'ge among us, and for thofe elements of fcience that infen.

fibly