be confirmed by a very copious induction of instances, drawn not only from poets1 and novelists, but from painters, and, perhaps, still more remarkably, from comedians, many of whom have combined the most exquisite taste for the pathetic with the highest comic powers-nay, in some instances, with the broadest and most farcical buffoonery. Nor is this wonderful, inasmuch as both talents are founded on a peculiarly strong sympathy with the feelings of others; and, of course, both imply a peculiarly lively imagination. Hence the delight which writers, who excel in either, take in minute specifications of picturesque circumstances, in order to present the ludicrous or the pathetic object to the reader, as nearly as possible in the same point of view in which it was seen or fancied by themselves. A farther proof of the close affinity between these apparently opposite qualities, is afforded by the affinity between those external expressions of the countenance which they have both a tendency to produce. That laughter and crying are separated from each other by a thin partition, is a very old remark; and is every day manifested in the quick transitions from the one to the other in the case of children, and in those persons whose nervous irritability is preternaturally great. In some nervous diseases, too, particularly in paralytic affections, a proneness to shed tears is, I believe, invariably accompanied with a proneness to involuntary laughter on the most trifling occasions. It is not that the morbid state of the body renders the mind then more susceptible than when in health, but that the will loses its command over the external expressions of our passions, so as to render these natural signs, whether visible or audible, perceptible to the bystanders, even when the passion is felt in the slightest degree. An old English author, Sir Henry Wotton, seems to have been much

mour."

1 Horace fixes on these two quali- vein of tenderness and of refined huties as the characteristical excellencies of Virgil, and seems to consider them as the natural growth of a country education. "The Muses, delighting in rural scenes, have bestowed on Virgil a

"Molle atque facetum Virgilio annuerunt gaudentes rure Camœnæ."Horat. Serm, lib. i. Sat. 10, [44.]-See

Note D.

struck by these remarkable phenomena in the constitution of Human Nature. "Heere I must remember in truth, with much marvelle, a note which I have received from excellent artizans, that though gladnesse and grief be opposite in nature, yet they are such neighbours and confiners in arte, that the least touch of a pencil will translate a crying1 into a laughing face; which instance, besides divers others, doth often reduce into my memorie, that ingenious speculation of the Cardinal Cusanus, touching the coincidence of extreames."

SECTION V.-THE SEXES.

According to Plato, (whose opinion I state in the clear and concise language of Mr. Gray,) "there is no natural difference. between the sexes, but in point of strength. When the entire sexes are compared together, the female is doubtless the inferior; but in individuals, the woman has often the advantage of the man."2

In this opinion I have no doubt that Plato is in the right. The intellectual and moral differences between the sexes seem to me to be entirely the result of education; using that word in its most extensive sense, to comprehend not merely the instruction received from teachers, but the habits of mind imposed by situation, or by the physical organization of the animal frame.3

1 "The coincidence of extreme affections is represented by Homer in the person of Hector's wife, as painters and poets have always had a kind of congeniality."

Ως εἰπὼν ἀλόχοιο φίλης ἐν χερσὶν ἔθηκε
Παῖδ' εόν· ἡ δ ̓ ἄρα μιν κηώδει δέξατο κόλπῳ,
Δακρυόεν γελάσασα.—Ilias, Ζ. 482.

"She took her sonne into her arms weepingly
laughing."

Elements of Architecture, by Sir Henry Wotton, 1624. Printed in the

Third Volume of Somers' Tracts, by
Sir Walter Scott, p. 622.

2 Plato, De Republica, Book v. [2 5.] See Gray's Works, by Mathias, vol. ii. pp. 437, 438.

3 Voltaire thinks women upon a level with men in every talent but invention. "On les accorde tous les talens," says Condorcet, "hors celui d'inventer. C'est l'opinion de Voltaire, l'un des hommes qui ont été les plus justes envers elles, et qui les ont le mieux connues. Mais cette

It must be remembered, too, that certain intellectual and moral habits are the natural and necessary consequences of that difference in point of strength which Plato allows to distinguish the Sexes. The form of the male is evidently much the better fitted for bodily exertion, and a less measure of exercise seems to be sufficient to preserve the female in health. Hence the sedentary habits early acquired by the other sex, and that comparative timidity which results from a want of familiarity with those external injuries to which the stronger sex is daily exposed.1 This timidity, it is to be observed, by no means implies an impatience under present suffering; for the female, though less courageous than the male, is commonly more resigned and patient under severe affliction. The mental constitutions, in this respect, of the sexes are happily adapted to the different provinces allotted to them in life; the male being the natural protector of the female in moments of danger and sudden alarm; the female destined to be his comfort and support in seasons of sorrow, and of protracted suffering.

From the greater delicacy of their frame, and from the numerous ailments connected with their sexual temperament, combined with their constant familiarity with distresses which are not their own, the sympathy of women with the sufferings. of others is much more lively, and their promptitude to administer relief, wherever it is possible, is much more eager than in the generality of men. To the truth of this remark, every day's experience bears witness; and from the testimony of travellers, it appears, that the observation extends to women in all the different stages of society. The strong testimony of

Ledyard (the celebrated pedestrian traveller) on this point, may be regarded as perfectly decisive.1

In consequence of the greater nervous irritability of women, their muscular system seems to possess a greater degree of that mobility by which the principle of sympathetic imitation operates. Hence their proneness to hysteric affections, and to that species of religious enthusiasm which is propagated by contagion. Hence also their tendency to mimicry, and the niceness of their tact with respect to the more delicate features of character. To this nice tact that peculiar quickness and facility of association which I have on a former occasion ascribed to them, cannot fail to contribute powerfully.2

In the present state of the civilized world, the scientific or the professional pursuits of young men, establish very early in their understandings the influence of the stricter and more philosophical principles of association; while the minds of young women, like those of well educated men of independent fortune, are left much more open to the effects of casual impressions, and of such associations as regulate the train of thought in a mind which has no particular object in view.

To these early habits I think it is owing, that, in general, women are inferior to well educated men in a power of steady and concentrated attention; or in what Newton called a capacity for patient thought. An additional disqualification for abstruse researches arises from their inaptitude to employ skilfully language as an instrument of thought; an art to

1 Though this has been already quoted in so many publications, that it must of course be known to most of my readers, yet I cannot deny myself the pleasure of giving it a place in a note.

"To a woman, whether civilized or savage, I never addressed myself in the language of decency and friendship, without receiving a decent and friendly answer. With men it has often been otherwise.

"In wandering over the barren plains of Denmark, through Sweden, Lapland,

Finland, Russia, and the wide-spread regions of the Tartar,-if hungry, dry, cold, wet, or sick, the women have ever been friendly to me, and uniformly so: and to add to this virtue, these actions have been performed in so free and kind a manner, that if I was thirsty, I drank the sweetest draught, and if hungry, I ate the coarse meal with a double relish."

Elements, vol. i. p. 265. See also the note in pages 256, 257.

which the scientific studies of young men must necessarily train them in a greater or less degree. Will it be thought a fanciful idea if I farther suggest, that in this part of the world, the grammatical education which boys receive while learning Latin, by teaching them experimentally the aid which the memory derives from general rules, prepares them for acquiring habits of generalization when they afterwards enter on their philosophical studies ? To this I am disposed to ascribe, in a great measure, the little curiosity which girls commonly discover about the causes of physical phenomena; for what is vulgarly called a knowledge of causes (as I have frequently remarked in these volumes) is nothing else than a knowledge of general rules. Many splendid exceptions, however, occur to these remarks; insomuch that it is impossible to name a

Latin, I observe with pleasure, is now beginning to enter more and more into the system of female education; and nothing could have so long delayed so obvious an improvement, but those exceptionable passages with which the Latin classics abound, and from which it is devoutly to be wished that the more common school-books were carefully purged, in editions fitted for the perusal of youth of both sexes.

In consequence, however, of the method which has been hitherto followed in the classical education of females, it is not likely to have the same tendency to prepare their minds for scientific pursuits with the grammatical discipline to which schoolboys are subjected; for, as far as I have had access to know, girls are generally taught Latin on the plan recommended by Marsais in the French Encyclopédie. In this their instructors, in my opinion, act judiciously; for although I should be sorry to see any such innovation introduced into our grammar schools, I think that any plan which facilitates the acquisition of the language is desirable for the other sex; few of whom, it may be presumed,

VOL. IV.

would aim at a more critical acquaintance with grammatical minutice than is necessary to enable them to relish the beauties of classical authors. The mild Melanchthon would, I am sure, have been disposed to relax, in favour of their teachers, the severity of those penal statutes with which he wished to repress the heresy of certain schoolmasters, who in his times were beginning to depart from the orthodox methods of their predecessors.

"Pessimè de pueris merentur Præceptores, qui aut regulas nullas tradunt, aut certè statim abjiciunt, et magnificè promittunt, fore, ut usu loquendi discan- * tur CONSTRUCTIONES. Nam illi qui non norunt regulam, etiamsi legunt exempla in auctoribus linguæ, tamen loqui non satis audent, quia non habent certam rationem, ad quam dirigant compositionem verborum. Quare publicè debebant in tales præceptores pœnæ constitui, qui præcepta fastidiunt. Omninò enim danda est opera, ut tamdiu in ipsa arte detineantur adolescentes, donec perfecti grammatici, donec architecti sermonis, et absoluti artifices eva serint." [Oratio De Schol. instit.]