434 Essay on
��frequented Button's Coffee-house l ; curiosity was lulled asleep, ^and Biography forgot the best part of her function, which is to /instruct mankind by examples taken from the school of life. This task remained for Dr. Johnson, when years had rolled away ; when the channels of information were, for the most part, choaked up, and little remained besides doubtful anecdote, uncertain tra dition, and vague report.
4 Nunc situs informis premit et deserta VetustasV
The value of Biography has been better understood in other ages, and in other countries. Tacitus informs us, that to record the lives and characters of illustrious men was the practice of the Roman authors, in the early periods of the Republic 3 . In France the example has been followed. Fontenelle, D'Alembert, and Monsieur Thomas* \ have left models in this kind of com position. They have embalmed the dead 5 . But it is true, that they had incitements and advantages, even at a distant day, which could not, by any diligence, be obtained by Dr. Johnson. The wits of France had ample materials. They lived in a nation of critics, who had at heart the honour done to their country by their Poets, their Heroes, and their Philosophers. They had, besides, an Academy of Belles Lettres, where Genius was culti vated, refined, and encouraged. They had the tracts, the essays, and dissertations, which remain in the memories 6 of the Academy, and they had the speeches of the several members, delivered at their first admission to a seat in that learned Assembly. In those speeches the new Academician did ample justice to the
1 It was at Will's coffee-house that J'aime mieux lire, je vous jure, le Dryden 'had a particular chair for panegyriste que le heros. C'est un himself.' Life, iii. 71 ; Works, vii. homme d'un rare merite que ce 300. Button opened his coffee-house Thomas ; et ni Thomas d'Aquin, ni after Dryden's time, under the pa- Thomas Didyme, ni Thomas de tronage of Addison. Ib. p. 449. Cantorbery, n'approchent de lui.'
2 Though now deform'd by dust QLuvres de Voltaire, 1821, liii. 171.
and cover'd o'er with mould.' s * Those tears eternal that embalm
FRANCIS. HORACE, Epis. ii. 2. 118. the dead.'
3 Agricola, c. I. Pope, Epistle to Mr.Jervas.
1 Voltaire wrote on Sept. 23, 6 Apparently Murphy's transla-
1765: 'Je viens de lire le sublime tion of Memoires, unless memories loge de Descartes, par M. Thomas. is a misprint for memoirs.
memory
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