Where mix'd yet uniform appears
The wisdom of a thousand years;

In that pure spring the bottom view,
Clear, deep, and regularly true,

And other doctrines thence imbibe
Than lurk within the sordid scribe;
Observe how parts with parts unite
In one harmonious rule of right;
See countless wheels distinctly tend
By various laws to one great end,
While mighty Alfred's piercing soul
Pervades and regulates the whole.

In 1744 Mr. Blackstone was elected a fellow of All Souls, and from this period divided his time between the college and the Temple. To the former he performed some very essential services, and was intrusted with the management of its most valuable concerns.

In Michaelmas term, 1746, he was called to the bar; but possessing neither a confident eloquence, nor a prompt delivery, he did not make any considerable figure there. However, with his abilities, a patron alone was wanting to secure his success. His real merits were only known to a few; for though both solid and striking, they required to be set off by extrinsic circumstances. After attending the courts for seven years, and perhaps with as deep a knowledge of the laws of his country as any counsellor of his time, he found that with all his diligence and all his merit he could not open the way to fame; and having previously been elected recorder of Wallingford, and taken the degree of doctor of civil law, he resolved to retire to an academic life, and the limited practice of a provincial counsel. He is not the only great lawyer who has found the difficulty of rising in early distinction. In all the professions, a young adventurer requires some adventitious helps, some lucky incident to develop talents, or powerful friends to force them into notice.

It was fortunate however for his fame and for his

country, that he gained the learned leisure which Oxford allowed him. Having for some years planned his lectures on the laws of England, he now began to execute this immortal work. In 1751, he published his Analysis, which increased his fame as a legal scholar; and four years after, being elected Vinerian professor of the common law, he read his celebrated introductory lecture, which to the purest elegance of diction united the most recondite knowledge of English jurisprudence. Every succeeding lecture increased his reputation; and he became the deserved object of admiration among the legal students, and was considered as an ornament to the university.

Being now generally known as a man of talents, in 1759 he purchased chambers in the Temple, and made another effort at the bar. He continued, however, to read his lectures at Oxford with the highest distinction; and they became so much talked of, that it is said the governor of his present majesty when prince of Wales requested a copy of them for the use of his royal pupil. It is certain that Dr. Blackstone was now daily advancing in fortune and fame. In 1761 he was returned to parlia ment; and appointed king's counsel, after refusing the office of chief justice of the court of common pleas in Ireland. The same year he married a daughter of James Clitheroe, esq of Boston-house, in Middlesex, by whom he left several children; and vacating his fellowship, the chancellor of the university appointed him principal of New Inn hall. The following year he was made solicitor-general to the queen, and was chosen a bencher of the Middle Temple. His celebrated Commentaries on the Laws of England began to be published in 1765, and were completed in the four succeeding years. The reputation which he gained by this work was unbounded; and in consequence it was minutely criticised by such as envied his fame, or disliked some principles which he had laid down. But the basis, and indeed the general execu

tion, will be as durable as the British constitution, of which it treats; and let us add, may both be perpetual!

In May, 1707, Dr. Blackstone was knighted, and appointed a judge in the court of king's bench; and the following month removed to the same station in the common pleas. Having now obtained the summit of his wishes, he resigned all his other appointments, and settled wholly in London. Though never distinguished as a very fluent speaker, he was justly esteemed an able and upright judge, and did honour to the bench. But he did not confine his talents entirely to his vocation: whenever his leisure permitted he was employed in some plan of public utility; either enlarging the bounds of legal knowledge, or promoting the interest and welfare of society.

A life devoted to intense study, early brought upon him the infirmities of age. His constitution was broken by the gout and nervous complaints, the effect of sedentary pursuits. About Christmas, 1779, he was seized with an asthma, which was partially removed; but a stupor and drowsiness ensuing, he died about six weeks after, in the fifty-sixth year of his age, and was buried in the family-vault at Wallingford.

As a lawyer, the character and abilities of sir William Blackstone must be estimated from his works; and his fame may be safely committed to the breasts of the impartial. Every Englishman is under obligations to him for the pains he has taken to make the laws of his country intelligible, and the philosopher will thank him for rendering the study of them easy and engaging.

In private life he was truly amiable; beloved by his friends for the pleasantness of his manners, and endeared to his family by the suavity of his disposition. He was a remarkable economist of time; and as he disliked squandering away his own, so he was averse to waste that of others. In reading his lectures, it could not be remem

bered that he ever made his audience wait even a few minutes beyond the time appointed. No one could have been more rigid in observing the hour and minute of an appointment. Indeed punctuality, in his opinion, was so much a virtue, that he could not bring himself fo think perfectly well of any one who was notoriously defective in its practice.

DOCTOR SAMUEL JOHNSON.
Born 1709.-Died 1784.

From 7th Anne, to 24th George III.

Or this luminary of the eighteenth century, who was confessedly at the head of general literature in a country where knowledge is very widely diffused, so much already has been written by friends and foes, by panegyrists and detractors, with such an amplitude of remark, and diligence of research, that the most industrious cannot glean a new anecdote, nor even throw an air of novelty on the hackneyed theme. It will therefore be sufficient here to select some short biographical notices, and characteristic traits, of this profound writer, and truly good man: happy if the young can be thus lured to the study of his inestimable productions; happier still if they can be engaged to practise his virtues. For the life of Johnson was a perpetual comment on the precepts which he promulgated: in his writings we read the man, exposed to the most incurious eye. Dignified in his mind, he scorned to conceal his genuine sentiments, or to wrap them in the veil of mystery. He spoke and wrote from his own impressions alone, whether right or wrong; he conceded nothing through complaisance, and palliated nothing through fear.

Lichfield had the high honour of producing this prodigy in the literary world. His father was a bookseller

there; a profession formerly, and even now, accompa nied by no mean talents, and which affords considerable facilities of cultivating them. Mr. Johnson seems to have been neither destitute of intelligence nor discernment; but fortune did not smile upon his exertions, and he lost by scheming what he gained by his regular trade. Either from his parents, or a nurse, young Johnson unhappily derived a scrofulous taint, which disfigured his features, and affected the senses of hearing and seeing: and this it was perhaps which gave a melancholy cast to his mind, and even influenced his whole character. For this malady he was actually touched by queen Anne; for, being of a jacobitical family, his parents had great faith in that superstitious practice.

After acquiring the rudiments of reading under an old school-mistress, and an English master, he was sent to the grammar-school at his native city; and had for his associates Dr. James the physician, Dr. Taylor rector of Ashbourne, and Mr. Hector surgeon in Birming ham, with whom he contracted a particular intimacy. At school he is said to have been averse to study, but possessed of such strength of genius as rendered his task9 easy without much application. Some of his exercises have accidentally been preserved, and justify the opinion of his father; who thought that literature was the direction to which his talents were inclined, and resolved to encourage it notwithstanding the narrowness of his own circumstances. To complete his classical studies he was afterwards removed to Stourbridge, where he acted in the double capacity of scholar and usher. His progress at the two grammar-schools he thus describes: " At the first I learnt much in the school, but little from the master; at the last I learnt much from the master, but little in the school."

After passing two years at home in desultory study, he was entered as a commoner of Pembroke college;