inferiors, and humble to men like Walpole, but not without solid good qualities. STEPHEN, LESLIE, 1891, Dictionary of National Biography, vol. XXV, p. 221. HISTORY OF MUSIC 1776 I have been three days at Strawberry, and have not seen a creature but Sir John Hawkins's five volumes, the two last of which, thumping as they are, I literally did read in two days. They are old books to all intents and purposes, very old books; and what is new, is like old books, too, that is, full of minute facts that delight antiquaries. My friend, Sir John, is a matter-of-fact man, and does now and then stoop very low in quest of game. Then he is so exceedingly religious and grave as to abhor mirth, except it is printed in the old black letter, and then he calls the most vulgar ballad pleasant and full of humour. He thinks nothing He thinks nothing can be sublime but an anthem, and Handel's choruses heaven upon earth. However, he writes with great moderation, temper and good sense, and the book is a very valuable one. I have begged his Austerity to relax in one point, for he ranks comedy with farce and pantomime. Now I hold a perfect comedy to be the perfection of human composition, and believe firmly that fifty Iliads and Æneids could be written sooner than such a character as Falstaff's.-WALPOLE, HORACE, 1776, To the Countess of Ossory, Dec. 3; Letters, ed. Cunningham, vol. VI, p. 395. In which, however, there is much original and valuable information, as in all his other works, so unjustly censured in my opinion. Sir John's principal fault was digression from his subject; but if you excuse that, you are well repaid by the information you receive.-MATHIAS, THOMAS JAMES, 1794-98, The Pursuits of Literature, Eighth ed., p. 98. Contemporary judgment awarded the palm of superiority to Burney and neglected Hawkins. Evidence of the feeling is found in a catch which was formerly better known than it is now: "Have you Sir John Hawkins' History? Which in performance is made to sound:"Sir John Hawkins! Burn his history! How d'ye like him? Burn his history! Burney's history pleases me," Posterity, however, has reversed the decision of the wits; Hawkins' "History" has been re-printed, but Burney's never reached a second edition. The truth lies between the extremes. Burney, possessed of far greater musical knowledge than Hawkins, better judgment, and a better style, frequently wrote about things which he had not sufficiently examined; Hawkins, on the other hand, more industrious and painstaking than Burney, was deficient in technical skill, and often inaccurate.-HUSK, WILLIAM H., 1879, A Dictionary of Music and Musicians, ed. Grove, vol. 1, p. 699. Hawkins, though a worse writer than Burney, was a more painstaking antiquary, and his book has therefore a more permanent value for students of musical history. -STEPHEN, LESLIE, 1891, Dictionary of National Biography, vol. XXV, p. 221. LIFE OF SAMUEL JOHNSON 1787 Mr. Urban:- Have you read that divine book, the "Life of Samuel Johnson, LL.D., by Sir John Hawkins, Knt.?" Have you done anything but read it since it was first published? For my own part, I scruple not to declare that I could not rest till I had read it quite through, notes, digressions, index and all; then I could not rest till I had gone over it a second time. I begin to think that increase of appetite grows by what it is fed on; for I have been reading it ever since. I am now in the midst of the sixteenth perusal; and still I discover new beauties. I can think of nothing else; I can talk of nothing else. In short, my mind is become tumid, and longs to be delivered of those many and great conceptions with which it has laboured since I have been through a course of this most perfect exemplar of biography. The compass of learning, the extent and accuracy of information, the judicious criticism, the moral reflections, the various opinions, legal and political, to say nothing of that excess of candour and charity that breathe throughout the work, make together such a collection of sweets that the sense aches at them. To crown all, the language is refined to a degree of immaculate purity, and displays the whole force of turgid eloquence. Read Hawkins once, and you can read no more, For all books else appear so mean, so poor, He has thrown a heap of rubbish of his own over poor Johnson, which would have smothered any less gigantic genius-EDGEWORTH, MARIA, 1809, Letters, vol. 1, p.167. Sir John Hawkins, whose "Life of Samuel Johnson, LL.D.," 1787, comes next in importance to Mrs. Piozzi's "Anecdotes," has suffered considerably; and his book, which immediately after Johnson's death was advertised as "forthcoming," is, to use the words of a recent writer, "spoken of with contempt by many who have never taken the trouble to do more than turn over its leaves." That the author seems to have been extremely unpopular can scarcely be denied. -DOBSON, AUSTIN, 1898, Boswell's Predecessors and Editors, Miscellanies, p. 116. Adam Smith 1723-1790 He was the son of Adam Smith (lawyer and Customs' comptroller at Kirkcaldy), and Margaret Douglas of Strathendry; and he was born probably at the beginning of June, 1723. He was a student at Glasgow University from 1737 to 1740, and at Balliol College, Oxford (as Snell Exhibitioner) from 1740 to 1747. After a year and a half at Kirkcaldy he came to Edinburgh and lectured on belles lettres (1748-50). In 1751 he was made Professor of Logic at Glasgow University, and in 1752 Professor of Moral Philosophy. In 1759 he published his "Theory of Moral Sentiments." In 1764 he was persuaded by Charles Townshend to go abroad with the young Buccleuch to Toulouse, Geneva, and Paris, resigning his chair of Moral Philosophy. He was back in London in 1766 and at Kirkcaldy in 1767, devoting himself to his "Inquiry Into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations," which appeared in 1776, just before the death of Hume. In 1778 he became a Commissioner of Customs in Edinburgh. In 1787 he was chosen Rector of his old University, and on 17th July, 1790, he died at his residence, Panmure House, Canongate. He is buried in Canongate Churchyard. His last years were saddened by the loss of his mother and his cousin (Miss Jane Douglas), the former of whom died in 1784, and the latter in 1788.-BONAR, JAMES, 1894, A Catalogue of the Library of Adam Smith, Introduction, p. ix. PERSONAL Adam Smith, though perhaps only second to David in learning and ingenuity, was far inferior to him in conversational talents. In that of public speaking they were equal-David never tried it, and I never heard Adam but once, which was at the first meeting of the Select Society, when he opened up the design of the meeting. His voice was harsh and enunciation thick, approaching to stammering. His conversation was not colloquial, but like lecturing, in which I have been told he was not deficient, especially when he grew warm. He was the most absent man in company that I ever saw, moving his lips, and talking to himself, and smiling, in the midst of large companies. If you awaked him from his reverie, and made him attend to the subject of conversation, he immediately began a harangue, and never stopped till he told you all he knew about it, with the utmost philosophical ingenuity. He knew nothing of characters, and yet was ready to draw them on the slightest invitation. But when you checked him or doubted, he retracted with the utmost ease, and contradicted all he had been saying. His journey abroad with the Duke of Buccleuch cured him in part of these foibles; but still he appeared very unfit for the intercourse of the world as a travelling tutor. But the Duke was a character, both in point of heart and understanding, to surmount all disadvantages - he could learn nothing ill from a philosopher of the utmost probity and benevolence. If he [Smith] had been more a man of address and of the world, he might perhaps have given a ply to the Duke's fine mind, which was much better when left to its own energy. Charles Townshend had chosen Smith, not for his fitness for the purpose, but for his own glory in having sent an eminent Scottish philosopher to travel with the Duke.-CARLYLE, ALEXANDER, 1753-56-1860, Autobiography, p. 226. Sir, I was once in company with Smith, and we did not take to each other; but had I known that he loved rhyme so much as you tell me he does I should have hugged him.-JOHNSON, SAMUEL, 1763, Life by Boswell, ed. Hill, vol. 1, p. 495. Poor Smith! We must soon lose him, and the moment in which he departs will give a heart-pang to thousands. Mr. Smith's spirits are flat, and I am afraid the exertions he sometimes makes to please his friends do him no good. His intellect as well as his senses are clear and distinct. He wishes to be cheerful, but nature is omnipotent. His body is extremely emaciated, and his stomach cannot admit of sufficient nourishment; but, like a man, he is perfectly patient and resigned. SMELLIE, W., 1790, Letter to Patrick Clason, Memoirs of Smellie, ed. Kerr, vol. 1, p. 295. I have been surprised, and I own a little indignant, to observe how little impression his death has made here. Scarce any notice has been taken of it, while for above a year together, after the death of Dr. Johnson, nothing was to be heard of but panegyrics of him. Lives, Letters, and Anecdotes, and even at this moment there are two more lives of him about to start into existence. Indeed one ought not, perhaps, to be very much surprised that the public does not do justice to the works of A. Smith, since he did not do justice to them himself, but always considered his "Theory of Moral Sentiments" as a much superior work to his "Wealth of Nations." ROMILLY, SIR SAMUEL, 1790, Letter to M. Dumont, Aug. 20; Memoirs, vol. I, p. 404. There was no situation in which the abilities of Mr. Smith appeared to greater advantage than as a professor. In delivering his lectures he trusted almost entirely to extemporary elocution. His manner, though not graceful, was plain and unaffected, and as he seemed to be always interested in his subject, he never failed to interest his hearers. Each discourse consisted commonly of several distinct propositions, which he successively endeavoured to prove and illustrate. These propositions, when announced in general terms, had, from their extent, not unfrequently something of the air of a paradox. In his attempts to explain them, he often appeared, at first, not to be sufficiently possessed of the subject, and spoke with some hesitation. As he advanced, however, the matter seemed to crowd upon him, his manner became warm and animated, and his expression. easy and fluent. On points susceptible of controversy you could easily discern, that he secretly conceived an opposition to his opinions, and that he was led upon this account to support them with greater energy and vehemence. By the fulness and variety of his illustrations the subject gradually swelled in his hands and acquired a dimension which, without a tedious repetition of the same views, was calculated to seize the attention of his audience, and to afford them pleasure, as well as instruction, in following the same object, through all the diversity of shades and aspects in which it was presented, and afterwards in tracing it backwards to that original proposition or general truth, from which this beautiful train of speculalation had proceeded. MILLAR, JOHN, c1793, Letter, Stewart's Works, vol. vi, p. 10. Of the intellectual gifts and attainments by which he was so eminently distinguished; of the originality and comprehensiveness of his views; the extent, the variety, and the correctness of his information; the inexhaustible fertility of his invention; and the ornaments which his rich and beautiful imagination had borrowed from classical culture;-he has left behind him lasting monuments. To his private worth the most certain of all testimonies may be found in that confidence, respect, and attachment, which followed him through all the various relations of life. The serenity and gaiety he enjoyed, under the pressure of his growing infirmities, and the warm interest he felt to the last, in everything connected with the welfare of his friends, will be long remembered by a small circle, with whom, as long as his strength permitted, he regularly spent an evening in the week; and to whom the recollection of his worth still forms a pleasing, though melancholy bond of union. The more delicate and characteristical features of his mind, it is perhaps impossible to trace. That there were many peculiarities, both in his manners, and in his intellectual habits, was manifest to the most superficial observer; but although, to those who knew him, these peculiarities detracted nothing from the respect which his abilities commanded; and although, to his intimate friends, they added an inexpressible charm to his conversation, while they displayed, in the most interesting light, the artless simplicity of his heart; yet it would require a very skillful pencil to present them to the public eye. He was certainly not fitted for the general commerce of the world, or for the business of active life. The comprehensive speculations with which he had been occupied from his youth, and the variety of materials which his own invention continually supplied to his thoughts, rendered him habitually inattentive to familiar objects, and to common occurrences; and he frequently exhibited instances of absence, which have scarcely been surpassed by the fancy of La Bruyère. Even in company, he was apt to be ingrossed with his studies; and appeared, at times, by the motion of his lips, as well as by his looks and gestures, to be in the fervor of composition. I have often, however, been struck, at the distance of years, with his accurate memory of the most trifling particulars; and am inclined. to believe, from this and some other circumstances, that he possessed a power, not perhaps uncommon among absent men, of recollecting, in consequence of subsequent efforts of reflection, many occurrences which, at the time when they happened, did not seem to have sensibly attracted his notice. . In his external form and appearance, there was nothing uncommon. When perfectly at ease, and when warmed with conversation, his gestures were animated, and not ungraceful; and, in the society of those he loved, his features were often brightened with a smile of inexpressible benignity. In the company of strangers, his tendency to absence, and perhaps still more his consciousness of this tendency, rendered his manner somewhat embarrassed, an effect which was probably not a little heightened by those speculative ideas of propriety, which his recluse habits tended at once to perfect in his conception, and to diminish his power of realizing. He never sat for his picture; but the medallion of Tassie conveys an exact idea of his profile, and of the general expression of his countenance. STEWART, DUGALD, 1793, Account of the Life and Writings of Adam Smith. Those persons who have ever had the pleasure to be in his company may recollect that even in his common conversation the order and method he pursued, without the smallest degree of formality or stiffness, were beautiful and gave a sort of pleasure to all who listened to him.PLAYFAIR, WILLIAM, 1805, Life of Adam Smith. At the age of twenty-nine, he filled the chair of Moral Philosophy in the University of Glasgow; a place for which he was admirably suited by his power of communication as well as by the habits of his mind, as he spoke with great fluency when once engaged in his subject, and was listened to with the enthusiasm which his ability, accompanied by a popular manner, might be expected to inspire. It is much to be regretted, that his lectures. were destroyed by his own hand before he died. The course of Natural Theology was one which would have great interest for readers of the present day; and such was the variety of suggestions always flowing from his active and fertile mind, that every part must have contained much to interest and instruct mankind. -PEABODY, WILLIAM B. O., 1846-50, Men of Letters and Science, Art. II, Literary Remains, ed. Peabody, p. 262. When a young man [in 1789], I went to Edinburgh, carrying letters of introduction (from Dr. Kippis, Dr. Price, &c.,) to Adam Smith, Robertson, and others. When I first saw Smith, he was at breakfast, eating strawberries; and he descanted on the superior flavour of those grown in Scotland. I found him very kind and communicative. He was (what Robertson was not) a man who had seen a great deal of the world. Once, in the course of conversation, I happened to remark of some. writer, that "he was rather superficial, a Voltaire.' "Sir," cried Smith, striking the table with his hand, there has been but one Voltaire!"-ROGERS, SAMUEL, 1855? Table Talk. In person he was a grave, preoccupiedlooking man, of a stout middle size, with large features and large grey eyes, absentminded in company, often incontinently talking to himself, and keeping up his rather poor constitution by strict regularity and temperance. He was warm and affectionate in disposition, exceedingly unreserved, with simple frankness expressing the thoughts of the moment, and with ready candour retracting his opinion if he found that he had spoken without just grounds. His intellectual proceedings were calm, patient and regular; he mastered a subject slowly and circumspectly, and carried his principles with steady tenacity through multitudes of details that would have checked many men of greater mental vigour unendowed with the same invincible persistence.-MINTO, WILLIAM, 1872-80, Manual of English Prose Literature, p. 476. In 1778 he was appointed, at the request of the Duke of Buccleuch, one of the commissioners of his majesty's customs in Scotland, and removed to Edinburgh, taking his mother with him; it is scarcely necessary to mention that he continued all his life a bachelor. Here he spent the last twelve years of his life. Henceforth he became an object of curiosity to all people of literary culture; and his person was scrutinized, as he walked the streets, by the curious, and his peculiar habits reported. Many a youth, studying in Edinburgh, was proud to relate in after years that he had seen him—a fine gentleman of the old school, a little above the ordinary size, with a manly countenance lighted by large gray eyes, wearing a cap, a long, wide great-coat, breeches, and shoebuckles.-MCCOSH, JAMES, 1874, The Scottish Philosophy, p. 166. Adam Smith, who taught the nations economy, could not manage the economy of his own house. Choked with books and absorbed in abstractions, he was feeble and inefficient in active life-incapable of acting on his own conclusions.-MATHEWS, WILLIAM, 1887, Men, Places and Things, p. 134. There is much, besides the contents of his published works, to draw to Adam Smith the attention of those who are attracted by individual power. Scotchmen have long been reputed strong in philosophic doctrine, and he was a Scot of Scots. But, though Scotland is now renowned for her philosophy, that renown is not of immemorial origin; it was not till the last century was well advanced that she began to add great speculative thinkers to her great preachers. Adam Smith, consequently, stands nearly at the opening of the greatest of the intellectual eras of Scotland; and yet by none of the great Scotch names, which men have learned since his day, has his name been eclipsed. The charm about the man consists, for those who do not regard him with the special interest of the political economist, in his literary method, which exhibits his personality and makes his works thoroughly his own, rather than in any facts about his eminency among Scotchmen. You bring away from your reading of Adam Smith a distinct and attractive impression of the man himself, such as you can get from the writings of no other author in the same field, and such as makes you wish to know still more of him. Unhappily, we know very little of Adam Smith as a man, and it may be deplored, without injustice to a respected name, that we owe that little to Dugald Stewart.-WILSON, WOODROW, 1888, An Old Master, The New Princeton Review, vol. VI, pp. 211, 212. A common misconception regarding Smith is that he was as helpless as a child in matters of business. One of his Edin burgh neighbors remarked of him to Robert Chambers that it was strange a man who wrote so well on exchange and barter was obliged to get a friend to buy his horse corn for him. This idea of his helplessness in the petty transactions of life arose from observing his occasional fits of absence and his habitual simplicity of character, but his simplicity, nobody denies, was accompanied by exceptional acuteness and practical sagacity, and his fits of absence seem to have been neither so frequent or prolonged as they are commonly represented. Samuel Rogers spent most of a week with him in Edinburgh the year before his death, and did not remark his absence of mind all the time. Anyhow, during his thirteen years' residence at Glasgow College, Smith seems to have had more to do with the business of the College, petty or important, than any other professor, and his brethren in the Senate of that University cannot have seen in him any marked failing or incapacity for ordinary business. They threw on his shoulders an ample share of the committee and general routine work of the place, and set him to audit accounts, or |