128 On the Ufes of Claffical Education. 
ornaments.—Their attention. is at the utmoft extend- 
ed toa choice of words, to a curious grammatical con- 
nexion, or to the nice intricacies of idiomatical 
phrafeology. 
At the revival of letters a race of commentators 
were ufeful, if not neceffary ; they were the pioneers 
of literature, who cleared the way for more refpecta- 
ble adventurers. But in the prefent ftate of liter- 
‘ature, can we behold without regret a man of genius 
dedicating a life to a few barren and fruitlefs verbal 
Criticifms, to the regulating of a few phrafes, or cor- 
recting in a few inftances the quantity and metre of 
an obfcure Author; when, had he applied his 
talents as they ought to have been applied, he, 
perhaps, would have produced an original compofi- 
tion, more valuable than the production on which 
he has fo unworthily beftowed his labour ? 
To write Latin decently and intelligibly, may 
occafionally prove a convenience to a literary man ;_~ 
chiefly in facilitating his commerce with foreign 
literati; but furely the attempt (for it is but an 
attempt) to compofe poetical productions in Greek 
and Latin, is, at beft, only a fpecies of elegant 
trifling. If life be fhort, and fcience of unbounded 
extent; if our duties be many, and but few our 
opportunities of qualifying for them, and performing 
them as we ought, are we juftified in neglecting 
folid and ufeful branches of knowledge; are we to 
purfue ftraws, and leaves, and Goffimer, while we 
leave 
