APPENDIX. ' (23) 



teraiy men, it may perhaps be obferved, thai it is on objeas of ^'^^^^f^^^^ 

 this fort that thefe are frequently more occupied and excited 

 than on others which might at firfl fight appear better calcula- 

 ted to occtipy and excite them. On objeds of prefent and im- 

 mediate concern, the mind and the afFedions have certain li- 

 mits to which the adual and known intereft neceffarily con- 

 fines them. The others have a fort of ideal range which no 

 fuch fixed and certain boundary reflrains. The interefl is crea- 

 ted, not found, and the fancy foflers and nouriilies the fubjedl 

 of its own creation, till, it engroffes the attention and excites 

 the pafFions to a degree that mufl appear very extraordinary to 

 thofe who confider it in itg natural and unexaggerated colours* 

 Difputes of literary as well as political enthufiafm, have there- 

 fore been generally the moft obftinate and warm of any ; and 

 this, which is quaintly termed the M^ri^n coAtroverfy, of all 

 fuch difputes the keeneft. Even Mr Hume, placid as he was 

 from nature, and accuftomed, from his earlieft literary life, to 

 contradidlion and attack, loft fomewhat of his ufual temper on 

 the occafion, and fubjoined an angry note to the latter editions 

 of his Hiftory, which I fhall not quote, becaufe, from my re- 

 fpedl for his memory, I am rather inclined to wifti that it had 

 not been written. 



Without venturing any opinion on the queftion itfelf, it 

 may be fufEcient in this place to fay, that Mr Tytler acquired 

 high reputation by his difcuflion of it. The Enquiry was uni- 

 verfally read in Britain, and very well tranflated into French, 

 under the title of " Recherches Hiftoriques et Critiques fur les 

 " principales Preuves de I'Accufation intentee contre Marie 

 " Reine d'Ecoife." The intereft it excited among literary men, 

 may be judged of from the character of thofe by whom it was 

 reviewed on its publication, in the periodical -works of the time. 

 Dr Douglas, now Bifhop of Salifbury, Dr Samuel Johnson, 

 Dr John Campbell, and Dr Smollet, all wrote reviews of 

 Mr Tytler's book, containing very particular accounts of its 



merits J, 



