We have a scientific man or two among us,
for instance, who would be entitled to smile at the good Doctor's
estimate of their labors, as I give it here:
"Of those that spin out life in trifles and die without a memorial, many
flatter themselves with high opinion of their own importance and imagine
that they are every day adding some improvement to human life."--"Some
turn the wheel of electricity, some suspend rings to a loadstone, and
find that what they did yesterday they can do again to-day. Some
register the changes of the wind, and die fully convinced that the wind
is changeable.
"There are men yet more profound, who have heard that two colorless
liquors may produce a color by union, and that two cold bodies will grow
hot if they are mingled; they mingle them, and produce the effect
expected, say it is strange, and mingle them again."
I cannot transcribe this extract without an intense inward delight in its
wit and a full recognition of its thorough half-truthfulness. Yet if
while the great moralist is indulging in these vivacities, he can be
imagined as receiving a message from Mr. Boswell or Mrs. Thrale flashed
through the depths of the ocean, we can suppose he might be tempted to
indulge in another oracular utterance, something like this:----A wise
man recognizes the convenience of a general statement, but he bows to the
authority of a particular fact.
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