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"materials where they are wanting, and fancy adds colouring, and every befitting ornament. The work pleases the eye, and wants nothing but solidity and a good founda"tion. It seems even to vie with the works of nature, till "some succeeding architect blows it into ruins, and builds

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as goodly a fabric of his own in its place."

"Success in an inquiry of this kind," he observes farther, "it is not in human power to command; but perhaps it is possible, by caution and humility, to avoid error and de"lusion. The labyrinth may be too intricate, and the thread "too fine, to be traced through all its windings; but, if we stop where we can trace it no farther, and secure the ground "we have gained, there is no harm done; a quicker eye 66 may in time trace it farther."

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The unassuming language with which Dr Reid endeavours to remove the prejudices naturally excited by a new attempt to philosophize on so unpromising, and hitherto so ungrateful a subject, recalls to our recollection those passages in which Lord Bacon-filled as his own imagination was with the future grandeur of the fabric founded by his hand-bespeaks the indulgence of his readers, for an enterprise apparently so hopeless and presumptuous. The apology he offers for himself, when compared with the height to which the structure of physical knowledge has since at

tained, may perhaps have some effect in attracting a more general attention to pursuits still more immediately interesting to mankind; and, at any rate, it forms the best comment on the prophetic suggestions in which Dr Reid occasionally indulges himself concerning the future progress of moral speculation.

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"Si homines per tanta annorum spatia viam veram inve"niendi et colendi scientias tenuissent, nec tamen ulterius progredi potuissent, audax procul dubio et temeraria foret opinio, posse rem in ulterius provehi. Quod si in via ipsa "erratum sit, atque hominum opera in iis consumpta in qui"bus minime oportebat, sequitur ex eo, non in rebus ipsis "difficultatem oriri, quæ potestatis nostræ non sunt; sed in "intellectu humano, ejusque usu et applicatione, quæ res "remedium et medicinam suscipit *.”. De nobis ipsis "silemus: de re autem quæ agitur, petimus, Ut homines "eam non opinionem, sed opus esse cogitent; ac pro certo habeant, non sectæ nos alicujus, aut placiti, sed utilitatis et amplitudinis humanæ fundamenta moliri. Præterea, ut "bene sperent; neque Instaurationem nostram ut quiddam "infinitum et ultra mortale fingant, et animo concipiant ; quum revera sit infiniti erroris finis et terminus legitimust."

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* Nov. Org. 94.

Instaur. Mag....Præfat.

The impression produced on the minds of speculative men, by the publication of Dr Reid's Inquiry, was fully as great as could be expected from the nature of his undertaking. It was a work neither addressed to the multitude, nor level to their comprehension; and the freedom with which it canvassed opinions sanctioned by the highest authorities, was ill calculated to conciliate the favour of the learned. A few, however, habituated, like the author, to the analytical researches of the Newtonian school, soon perceived the extent of his views, and recognised in his pages the genuine spirit and language of inductive investigation. Among the members of this university, Mr Ferguson was the first to applaud Dr Reid's success; warmly recommending to his pupils a steady prosecution of the same plan, as the only effectual method of ascertaining the general principles of the human frame; and illustrating happily, by his own profound and eloquent disquisitions, the application of such studies, to the conduct of the understanding, and to the great concerns of life. I recollect, too, when I attended (about the year 1771) the Lectures of the late Mr Russell, to have heard high encomiums on the Philosophy of Reid, in the course of those comprehensive discussions concerning the objects and the rules of experimental science, with which he so agreeably diversified the particular doctrines of physics.-Nor must I omit this opportunity of paying a tribute to the memory of my old friend, Mr Stevenson, then Professor of Lo

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gic; whose candid mind, at the age of seventy, gave a welcome reception to a system subversive of the theories which he had taught for forty years; and whose zeal for the advancement of knowledge prompted him, when his career was almost finished, to undertake the laborious task of newmodelling that useful compilation of elementary instruction, to which a singular diffidence of his own powers limited his literary exertions.

It is with no common feelings of respect and of gratitude, that I now recal the names of those to whom I owe my first attachment to these studies, and the happiness of a liberal occupation, superior to the more aspiring aims of a servile ambition.

From the University of Glasgow, Dr Reid's Inquiry received a still more substantial testimony of approbation; the author having been invited, in 1763, by that learned body, to the professorship of Moral Philosophy, then vacant by the resignation of Mr Smith. The preferment was in many respects advantageous; affording an income considerably greater than he enjoyed at Aberdeen; and enabling him to concentrate to his favourite objects, that attention which had been hitherto distracted by the miscellaneous nature of his academical engagements. It was not, however, without reluctance, that he consented to tear himself from a spot where

he had so long been fastening his roots; and, much as he loved the society in which he passed the remainder of his days, I am doubtful if, in his mind, it compensated the sacrifice of earlier habits and connections.

Abstracting from the charm of local attachment, the University of Glasgow, at the time when Dr Reid was adopted as one of its members, presented strong attractions to reconcile him to his change of situation. Robert Simson, the great restorer of ancient geometry, was still alive; and, although far advanced in years, preserved unimpaired his ardour in study, his relish for social relaxation, and his amusing singularities of humour. Dr Moor combined with a gaiety and a levity foreign to this climate, the profound attainments of a scholar and of a mathematician. In Dr Black, to whose fortunate genius a new world of science had just opened, Reid acknowledged an instructor and a guide; and met a simplicity of manners congenial to his own. The Wilsons (both father and son) were formed to attach his heart by the similarity of their scientific pursuits, and an entire sympathy with his views and sentiments. Nor was he less delighted with the good-humoured opposition which his opinions never failed to encounter in the acuteness of Millar, then in the vigour of youthful genius, and warm from the lessons of a different school. Dr Leechman, the friend and biographer of Hutcheson, was the official head of the College; and