Account of 
dr omit. 
130 HISTORY of the SOCIETY. 
chronic obftruétion in his bowels, was lingering Yand painful ; 
but had every confolation to footh it which he could derive 
from the tendereft fympathy of his friends, and from the com- 
plete refignation of his own mind. 
A rew days before his death, finding his end approach rapidly, 
he gave orders to deftroy all his manufcripts, excepting fome de- 
tached effays, which he entrufted to the care of his executors; and 
they were accordingly committed to the flames. What were the 
particular contents of thefe papers, is not known even to his moft 
intimate friends ; but there can be no doubt that they confifted, 
in part, of the letures on rhetoric, which he read at Edinburgh 
in the year 1748, and of the leftures on natural religion and 
on jurifprudence, which formed part of his courfe at Glafgow. 
That this irreparable injury to letters proceeded, in fome de- 
gree, from an exceflive folicitude in the author about his poft- 
humous reputation, may perhaps be true ; but with refpect to 
fome of his manufcripts, may we not fuppofe, that he was in- 
fluenced by higher motives? It is but feldom that a philofo- 
pher, who has been occupied from his youth with moral or 
with political enquiries, fucceeds completely to his with in fta- 
ting to others, the grounds upon which his own opinions are 
founded ; and hence it is, that the known principles of an indi- 
vidual, who has approved to the public his candour, his libe- 
rality, and his judgment, are entitled to a weight and an 
authority, independent of the evidence which he is able, up- 
on any particular occafion, to produce in their fupport. A 
fecret confcioufnefs of this circumftance, and an apprehenfion, 
that by not doing juftice to an important argument, the pro- 
grefs of truth may be rather retarded than advanced, have pro- 
bably induced many authors to with-hold from the world the 
unfinifhed refults of their moft valuable labours; and tc con- 
tent themfelves with giving the general fanction of their fuf- 
3 frages 
