ESSAY V.

OF AN EARLY TASTE FOR READING.

THE firft indications of genius disclose them

felves at a very early period. A fagacious obferver of the varieties of intellect, will frequently be able to pronounce with fome confidence upon a child of tender years, that he exhibits marks of future eminence in eloquence, invention or judgment.

The embryon feed that contains in it the promife of talent, if not born with a man, ordinarily takes its station in him at no great distance from the period of birth. The mind is then, but rarely afterwards, in a state to receive and to fofter it.

The talents of the mind, like the herbs of the ground, feem to diftribute themselves at random. The winds difperfe from one fpot to another the invifible germs; they take root in many cafes without a planter; and grow up without care or obfervation.

It would be truly worthy of regret, if chance,

fo

fo to speak, could do that, which all the fagacity of man was unable to effect *; if the diftribution of the nobleft ornament of our nature, could be fubjected to no rules, and reduced to no fyf

tem.

He that would extend in this refpect the province of education, muft proceed, like the improvers of other fciences, by experiment and obfervation. He must watch the progrefs of the dawning mind, and difcover what it is that gives it its first determination.

The fower of feed cannot foretel which feed fhall fall useless to the ground, destined to wither and to perish, and which fhall take root, and difplay the moft exuberant fertility. As among the feeds of the earth, so among the perceptions of the human mind, some are referved, as it were, for inftant and entire oblivion, and fome, undying and immortal, assume an importance never to be fuperfeded. For the first we ought not to torment ourselves with an irrational anxiety; the last cannot obtain from us an attention fuperior to their worth.

*This fuggeftion is by no means inconfetent with the remark in Effay III. that the production of genius perhaps never was the work of the preceptor. What never yet hás been accomplished, may hereafter be accomplished.

There

There is perhaps nothing that has a greater tendency to decide favourably or unfavourably respecting a man's future intellect, than the question whether or not he be impressed with an early tafte for reading.

Books are the depofitary of every thing that is moft honourable to man. Literature, taken in all its bearings, forms the grand line of demarcation between the human and the animal kingdoms. He that loves reading, has every thing within his reach. He has but to defire; and he may poffefs himself of every species of wifdom to judge, and power to perform.

The chief point of difference between the man of talent and the man without, confifts in the different ways in which their minds are employed during the fame interval. They are obliged, let us fuppofe, to walk from TempleBar to Hyde-Park-Corner. The dull man goes ftraight forward; he has fo many furlongs to traverse. He obferves if he meets any of his acquaintance; he enquires refpecting their health and their family. He glances perhaps the fhops as he paffes; he admires the fashion of a buckle, and the metal of a tea-urn. If he experience any flights of fancy, they are of a fhort extent; of the fame nature as the flights of a foreft-bird, clipped of his wings,

and

and condemned to pass the rest of his life in a farm-yard. On the other hand the man of talent gives full fcope to his imagination. He laughs and cries. Unindebted to the fuggeftions of furrounding objects, his whole foul is employed. He enters into nice calculations; he digefts fagacious reafonings. In imagination he declaims or defcribes, imprefied with the deepeft fympathy, or elevated to the loftiest rapture. He makes a thoufand new and admirable combinations. He paffes through a thousand imaginary fcenes, tries his courage, tasks his ingenuity, and thus becomes gradually prepared to meet almost any of the many-coloured events of human life. He confults by the aid of me-mory the books he has read, and projects others for the future inftruction and delight of man 71 kind. If he obferve the paffengers, he reads, their countenances, conjectures their paft hif tory, and forms a fuperficial notion of their wisdom or folly, their virtue or vice, their fatif-, faction or mifery. If he obferve the scenes that occur, it is with the eye of a connoiffeur or an artift. Every object is capable of suggesting to him a volume of reflections. The time of these two perfons in one refpect refembles; it has brought them both to Hyde-Park-Corner., In almoft every other refpect it is diffimilar.

What

What is it that tends to generate these very oppofite habits of mind?

Probably nothing has contributed more than an early taste for reading. Books gratify and excite our curiofity in innumerable ways. They force us to reflect. They hurry us from point to point. They prefent direct ideas of various kinds, and they fuggeft indirect ones. In a well-written book we are prefented with the matureft reflections, or the happieft flights, of a mind of uncommon excellence. It is impoffible that we can be much accuftomed to fuch companions, without attaining fome resemblance of them. When I read Thomfon, I become Thomfon; when I read Milton, I become Milton. I find myself a fort of intellectual camelion, affuming the colour of the fubftances on which I reft. He that revels in a well-chofen library, has innumerable difhcs, and all of admirable flavour. His tafte is rendered fo acute, as easily to diftinguifh the niceft fhades of difference. His mind becomes ductile, fufceptible to every impreffion, and gaining new refinement from them all. His varieties of thinking baffle calculation, and his powers, whether of reafon or fancy, become eminently vigorous. Much feems to depend in this cafe upon the period at which the tafte for reading has comD menced.