will be done to their memory, if I think he has in some respects improved upon his teachers.

A man with such talents, and such a temper, must have been generally beloved and admired; which he was almost universally: the exceptions being so few, as would barely suffice to exempt him from that woe of the Gospel, which is pronounced against the favourites of the world. But his undisguised attachment to the doctrines of the church of England, which are still, and, we hope, ever will be, of the old. fashion, would necessarily expose him to the unmannerly censures of some, and the frigid commendations of others, which are sometimes of worse effect than open scandal. But he never appeared to be hurt by: any thing of this sort that happened to him. An anonymous pamphlet, which the public gave to the late Dr. Kennicott, attacked him very severely; and soon received an answer from him, which, though very close and strong, was the answer of a wise and temperate man. He also, in his turn, not foreseeing so much benefit to the Scriptures, as some others did, from Dr. Kennicott's plan for collating Hebrew manuscripts, and correcting the Hebrew text, wrote against that undertaking; expressing his objections and suspicions, and giving his name to the world, without any fear or reserve. But so it came to pass, from the moderation and farther experience of both the parties, that, though their acquaintance began in hostility, they at length contracted a friendship for each other which brought on an interchange of every kind office between them, and lasted to the end of their lives, and is now subsisting between their fa

milies. To all men of learning, who mean well to the cause of truth and piety while they are warmly opposing one another, may their example be a lasting admonition! But let not this observation be carried farther than it will go:

-Non ut

Serpentes avibus geminentur, tigribus agni.

In his intercourse with his own family, while the treasures of his mind afforded them some daily opportunities of improvement, the sweetness of his humour was to them a perennial fountain of entertainment. He had the rare and happy talent of disarming all the little vexatious incidents of life of their power to molest, by giving them some unexpected turn. And occurrences of a more serious nature, even some of a frightful aspect, were treated by him with the like ease and pleasantry; of which I could give some remarkable instances.

Surely the life of such a man as this ought not to be forgotten! You and I, who saw and heard so much of it, shall, I trust, never recollect it without being the better for it; and, if we can succeed in showing it so truly to the world, that they also may be the better for it, we shall do them an acceptable service. I have heard it said, and I was a little discouraged by it, that Dr. Horne was a person whose life was not productive of events considerable enough to furnish matter for a history. But they, who judge thus, have taken but a superficial view of human life, and do not rightly measure the importance of the different events which happen to different sorts of

men. Dr. Horne, I must allow, was no circumnavigator; he neither sailed with Drake, Anson, nor Cook; but he was a man whose mind surveyed the intellectual world, and brought home from thence many excellent observations for the benefit of his native country. He was no military commander; he took no cities; he conquered no countries; but he spent his life in subduing his passions, and in teaching us how to do the same. He fought no battles by land or by sea; but he opposed the enemies of God and his truth, and obtained some victories which are worthy to be recorded. He was no prime minister to any earthly potentate; but he was a minister to the King of heaven and earth; an office at least as useful to mankind, and in the administration of which no minister to any earthly king ever exceeded him in zeal and fidelity. He made no splendid discoveries in natural history; but he did what was better; he applied universal nature to the improvement of the mind, and the illustration of heavenly doctrines. I call these events: not such as make a great noise and signify little, but such as are little celebrated, and of great signification. The same difference is found between Dr. Horne and some other men who have been the subject of history, as between the life of the bee and that of the wasp or hornet. The latter may boast of their encroachments and depredations, and value themselves on being a plague and a terror to mankind. But let it rather be my amusement to follow and observe the motions of the bee. Her journeys are always pleasant; the objects of her attention are beautiful to the eye, and she

passes none of them over without examining what is to be extracted from them; her workmanship is admirable; her economy is a lesson of wisdom to the world she may be accounted "little among them "that fly," but the fruit of her labour is the "chief "of sweet things."

You know, sir, to what interruptions my life has been subject for thirty years past, and there is some tender ground before us, on which I am to tread as lightly as truth will permit; you will pardon me, therefore, if my progress hath not been so quick as you could have wished; and believe me to be, as I have long been,

Dear Sir,

Your most affectionate and

obliged, humble servant,

WILLIAM JONES.

e Mr. Jones died in 1800.