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wants of a man, who would rather have been Cincinnatus with his plough, than Lucullus with all his wealth, yet I wish to complete the fyftem of Indian laws while I remain in India, because I wish to perform whatever I promise, with the least poffible imperfection; and in fo difficult a work doubts must arise, which the pundits alone could remove. You continue, I hope, to find the gardens healthy; nothing can be more pleasant than the house in which we live; but it might juftly be called the temple of the winds, especially as it has an octagonal form, like that erected at Athens to those boisterous divinities. I cannot get rid of the rheumatifm which their keen breath has given me, and fubmit with reluctance to the neceffity of wrapping myfelf in shawls and flannel. We continue to be charmed with the perfpicuity, moderation, and eloquence of Filangieri.

Of European politics I think as little as poffible; not because they do not intereft my heart, but because they give me too much pain. I have "good will towards men, and

with peace on earth;" but I fee chiefly under the fun, the two claffes of men whom Solomon defcribes, the oppreffor and the oppreffed. I have no fear in England of open despotism, nor of anarchy. I fhall cultivate my fields and gardens, and think as little as poffible of monarchs or oligarchs.

years

I am, &c.

It would not be eafy to give expreffion to the feelings excited by the perufal of this letter, nine after the date of it. In recalling the memory of domeftic misfortunes, which time had nearly obliterated, it revives with new force the recollection of that friend, whose sympathy endeavoured to foothe the forrows of a father for the lofs of his children. The transition by Sir William Jones to the circumstances of his own fituation is natural, and the conjugal bofom may perhaps fympathize with a fond husband, anticipating the affliction of the wife of his affection, and his own efforts to console her; that wife however ftill furvives to lament her irreparable lofs in the

death of Sir William Jones himself, and has had for fome years the happiness to console, by the tendereft affiduities, the increasing infirmities of an aged mother*.

The friends of Religion, who know the value of the "fure and certain hopes" which it infpires, will remark with fatisfaction, the pious fentiments expreffed by Sir William Jones a few months only before his own death. They will recollect the determination which he formed in youth, to examine with attention. the evidence of our holy Religion, and will rejoice to find unprejudiced enquiry terminating, as might be expected, in a rational conviction of its truth and divine authority.

Of this conviction, his publications, though none of them were profeffedly religious, afford ample and indubitable teftimony; and I cannot deem it a fuperfluous task (to me, indeed, it will be most grateful) to select from them, and from fuch other materials as I pof

Mrs. Shipley died on the 9th of March, 1803, in her 87th year. She retained all her faculties to that prolonged period.

fefs, his opinions on a fubject of undeniable importance.

Amongst the papers written by Sir William Jones, I find the following prayer, composed by him on the first day of the year 1782, about fifteen months before his embarkation for India, and more than twelve

years before

his death:

A PRAYER.

Eternal and incomprehenfible Mind, who, by thy boundless power, before time began, createdst innumerable worlds for thy glory, and innumerable orders of beings for their happinefs, which thy infinite goodness prompted thee to defire, and thy infinite wisdom enabled thee to know! we, thy creatures, vanish into nothing before thy fupreme Majefty; we hourly feel our weakness; we daily bewail our vices; we continually acknowledge our folly; thee only we adore with awful veneration; thee we thank with the moft fervent zeal; thee we praise with astonishment and rapture; to thy power we humbly submit; of thy goodness we devoutly implore protection; on thy wisdom we firmly and cheerfully rely.

We do but open our eyes, and instantly we perceive thy divine exiftence; we do but ex

ert our reafon, and in a moment we discover thy divine attributes: but our eyes could not behold thy Splendour, nor could our minds comprehend thy divine effence; we fee thee only through thy ftupendous and all-perfect works; we know thee only by that ray of facred light, which it has pleased thee to reveal. Nevertheless, if creatures too ignorant to conceive, and too depraved to pursue, the means of their own happiness, may without prefumption exprefs their wants to their CREATOR, let us humbly fupplicate thee to remove from us that evil, which thou haft permitted for a time to exist, that the ultimate good of all may be complete, and to fecure us from that vice, which thou fuffereft to spread fnares around us, that the triumph of virtue may be more confpicuous. Irradiate our minds with all ufeful truth; instil into our hearts a spirit of general benevolence; give understanding to the foolish; meekness to the proud; temperance to the diffolute; fortitude to the feeble-hearted; hope to the defponding; faith to the unbeliev

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