it

it, but was soon wearied, and laid it aside in disgust: the other returned the bookseller's hands; and it is said that Mr. G. himself happened unluckily to be in the shop at the same time.)

upon

Does the Bishop comply with his own precept in the next page ? (p. 175.) "Old age should lenify, should soften men's manners, and make them more mild and gentle; but often has the contrary effect, hardens their hearts, and makes them more sour and crabbed."— He is speaking of Dr. Johnson.

Have I ever insinuated that preferment-hunting is the great occupation of an ecclesiastical life? (Memoirs, passim); that a minister's influence and a bishop's patronage are sometimes pledged eleven deep? (p. 151.); that a prebendary considers the audit week as the better part of the year? (p. 127.); or that the most eminent of priests, the pope himself, would change their religion, if any thing better could be offered them? (p. 56.) Such things are more than insinuated in the Bishop's Life, which afforded some scandal to the church, and some diversion to the profane laity.

None of the attacks from ecclesiastical antagonists were more malignant and illiberal than some strictures published in the English Review, October, 1788, &c. and afterwards reprinted in a separate volume, with the signature of John Whitaker, in 1791. I had mentioned them to Mr. Gibbon, when first published, but so far was he from supposing them worth his notice, that he did not even desire they should be sent to him, and he actually did not see them till his late visit to England a few months before his death. If Mr. Whitaker had only pointed his bitterness against Mr. Gibbon's opinions, perhaps no inquiry would have been made into the possible source of his collected virulence, and deliberate malignity.

I have in my possession very amicable letters from the Rev. Mr. Whitaker to Mr. Gibbon, written some time after he had read the offensive 15th and 16th chapters of the Decline and Fall. When Mr. Gibbon came to England, in 1787, he read Whitaker's Mary Queen of Scots, and I have heard him VERY incautiously express his opinion of it. Some good-natured friend mentioned it to Mr. Whitaker. It must be an extraordinary degree of resentment that could induce any person, of a liberal mind, to scrape together defamatory stories, true or false, and blend them with the defence of the most benign religion, whose precepts inculcate the very opposite practice. Religion receives her greatest injuries from those champions of the church who, under the pretence of vindicating the Gospel, outrageously violate both the spirit and the letter of it.

Mr. Whitaker affects principally to review the fourth, fifth, and sixth volumes, but he has allotted the first month's review to an attack on the first three volumes, or rather on the first, which had been published twelve years and a half before it occurred to him that a review of it was necessary.-S.

CHAP. X.

Mr. Gibbon leaves London, and settles at Lausanne, in the House of his Friend M. Deyverdun; his Reasons for doing 80.- Reflections on his change of Situation. - Short Characters of Prince Henry of Prussia and of Mr. Fox, both of whom he sees at Lausanne. Proceeds in, and finishes his History. Interesting Remarks on concluding it. — Pays a Visit to Lord Sheffield in England. Remarks on Lord Sheffield's Writings; publishes the remainder of his History; returns to Lausanne; his manner of employing his time. The Death of M. Deyverdun.— Observations of the Author upon the French Revolution, the Government of Berne, and his own Situation. The Memoirs end.

FROM my early acquaintance with Lausanne I had always cherished a secret wish, that the school of my youth might become the retreat of my declining age. A moderate fortune would secure the blessings of ease, leisure, and independence: the country, the people, the manners, the language, were congenial to my taste; and I might indulge the hope of passing some years in the domestic society of a friend. After travelling with several English', Mr. Deyverdun was now settled at home, in a pleasant habitation, the gift of his deceased aunt: we had long been separated, we had long been silent; yet in my first letter I

1 Sir Richard Worsley, Lord Chesterfield, Broderick Lord Middleton, and Mr. Hume, brother to Sir Abraham.

exposed with the most perfect confidence my situation, my sentiments, and my designs. His immediate answer was a warm and joyful acceptance; the picture of our future life provoked my impatience; and the terms of arrangement were short and simple, as he possessed the property, and I undertook the expense of our common house. Before I could break my English chain, it was incumbent on me to struggle with the feelings of my heart, the indolence of my temper, and the opinion of the world, which unanimously condemned this voluntary banishment. In the disposal of my effects, the library, a sacred deposit, was alone excepted. As my post-chaise moved over Westminster Bridge, I bade a long farewell to the "fumum et opes strepitumque Romæ." My journey by the direct road through France was not attended with any accident, and I arrived at Lausanne nearly twenty years after my second departure. Within less than three months the coalition struck on some hidden rocks: had I remained on board, I should have perished in the general shipwreck. (1)

Since my establishment at Lausanne, more than seven years have elapsed; and if every day has not been equally soft and serene, not a day, not a moment, has occurred in which I have repented of my choice. During my absence, a long portion of human life, many changes had happened: my elder acquaintance had left the stage; virgins were ripened into matrons, and children were grown to the age of manhood. But the same manners were transmitted from one generation to another: my

friend alone was an inestimable treasure; my name was not totally forgotten, and all were ambitious to welcome the arrival of a stranger and the return of a fellow-citizen. The first winter was given to a general embrace, without any nice discrimination of persons and characters. After a more regular settlement, a more accurate survey, I discovered three solid and permanent benefits of my new situation. 1. My personal freedom had been somewhat impaired by the House of Commons and the Board of Trade; but I was now delivered from the chain of duty and dependence, from the hopes and fears of political adventure: my sober mind was no longer intoxicated by the fumes of party, and I rejoiced in my escape, as often as I read of the midnight debates which preceded the dissolution of parliament. 2. My English economy had been that of a solitary bachelor, who might afford some occasional dinners. In Switzerland I enjoyed at every meal, at every hour, the free and pleasant conversation of the friend of my youth; and my daily table was always provided for the reception of one or two extraordinary guests. Our importance in society is less a positive than a relative weight; in London I was lost in the crowd; I ranked with the first families of Lausanne, and my style of prudent expense enabled me to maintain a fair balance of reciprocal civilities. 3. Instead of a small house between a street and a stable-yard, I began to occupy a spacious and convenient mansion, connected on the north side with the city, and open on the south to a beautiful and boundless horizon. A garden of four acres had been laid out

by the taste of Mr. Deyverdun: from the garden a rich scenery of meadows and vineyards descends to the Leman Lake, and the prospect far beyond the Lake is crowned by the stupendous mountains of Savoy. My books and my acquaintance had been first united in London: but this happy position of my library in town and country was finally reserved for Lausanne. Possessed of every comfort in this triple alliance, I could not be tempted to change my habitation with the changes of the

seasons.

My friends had been kindly apprehensive that I should not be able to exist in a Swiss town at the foot of the Alps, after having so long conversed with the first men of the first cities of the world. Such lofty connections may attract the curious, and gratify the vain; but I am too modest, or too proud, to rate my own value by that of my associates; and whatsoever may be the fame of learning or genius, experience has shown me that the cheaper qualifications of politeness and good sense are of more useful currency in the commerce of life. By many, conversation is esteemed as a theatre or a school but, after the morning has been occupied by the labours of the library, I wish to unbend rather than to exercise my mind; and in the interval between tea and supper I am far from disdaining the innocent amusement of a game at cards Lausanne is peopled by a numerous gentry, whose companionable idleness is seldom disturbed by the pursuits of avarice or ambition : the women, though confined to a domestic education, are endowed for the most part with more taste and knowledge than