30 STUDIES OF NATURE. 



them. There is not, perhaps, a great Family of 

 that period, but what has the honour to boaft 

 of having brought forward, and raifed into diftinc- 

 tion, fome one man of obfcure birth, or of the 

 inferior nobility, who afterwards rendered himfelf 

 illuftrious, by means of fuch fupport, in arts, in 

 literature, in the church, or in the army. 



Thefe grandees acted thus, in imitation of the 

 Sovereign, or, perhaps, from a remainder of the 

 fpirit of the magnificence of the feudal govern- 

 ment, which then expired. Be this as it may, 

 they were handfome, becaufe they were contented 

 and happy ; and this noble emotion of foul to- 

 ward beneficence, has imprefled on their phyfio- 

 nomy a majeftic character, which will ever diftin- 

 guiQi them from the men of preceding ages, and 

 flill more from that which has fucceeded. 



Obfervations of this kind are not an object of 

 curiofity merely ; they are of much more import- 

 ance than is generally apprehended ; for it follows, 

 as a necefTary confequence, that, in order to form 

 in a Nation beautiful children, and, of courfe, 

 handfome men, in both the phyfical and moral 

 fenfe of the word, it is not necefTary, according to 

 the doctrine of certain medical men, to fubject the 

 human fpecies to regular purgations, and under 

 particular afpects of the Moon. Children reftricted 



to 



