322 Biographical Sketch of Baron Edelcrantz. [May, 



sufficiently developed to supply to the literary orphan all with 

 wliich a parent's counsel would have endeavoured to imbue it. 



He became a student of the college at the age of fourteen, 

 and in four years he attained the honour of having the degree of 

 Magister Philosophiae conferred upon him in Abo, on the 24th 

 of July 1772. 



When a young mind happens to possess a great versatility of 

 talent, like that of Clewberg, and is yet unvvedded to any onf; 

 exclusive pursuit, it not unfrequently happens that the tempta- 

 tions to follow each of many various walks of science or of art 

 are so equal, that the votary lingers long upon the threshold of 

 them all, uncertain which shall be made his choice. Nor do we 

 doubt that from this very cause many men, with the resources of 

 whose minds the world has never become acquainted, have lost 

 the fresh and early vigour of their talents, in skimming the 

 surface of a number of studies without collecting their power to 

 fathom the depths of any one. It very often occurs also that 

 the first of many pursuits, in which it is the student's fortune to 

 attract attention or to gain applause, obtains thereby a place in 

 his early esteem, which determines the course of his future 

 studies, and thus often in the walks of science, as in those of 

 politics or of business, the accident of a moment gives the tone 

 to the events of a life or of an era. 



Clewberg had appliedhimself keenly to fathom the profounder 

 depths of mathematical physics ; and it was by a work connected 

 with these investigations that he first fixed the public eye upon 

 his attainments. His work was entitled, " Dissertatio <le Ohser- 

 vationihus dcAlemberti i)i disqiiisilioiiem Newtoinaiia: legi.sRefrac- 

 tioiiis KliiigeHstjcniiaiiam," Ab. 1772. While this production 

 was thus the first that particularly attracted pubhc attention, his 

 eminence in this line of study had already procured for him the 

 distinction of Teacher (Docens) in Mechanical Philosophy and 

 in Literary History. That he had already given his attention to 

 the latter study, we learn from the disputation which he had 

 previously published and defended : De causis Jiorcscentis et 

 marcescentisrei public (R Litteraricc. P. 1 and 2. Ab. 1771,1772. 



At this period of the life of Clewberg, it would seem probable 

 that his whole pursuits were purely academic, and that his am- 

 bition did not aspire to any thing beyond the desire of animating 

 and directing the studies of the youth of the University. And 

 accordingly, we find Count Ulr. iScheffer, on 16th Oct. 1778, as 

 Chancellor of the Academy, appointing him to the office of 

 " Assistant in Philosophy, in consequence of his eminent talents 

 and attainments." 



The early proofs of talent which he gave had fully entitled 

 him to these honours ; and among these, one of the most remark- 

 able was his Dissertatio de Scriptoribiis et fontibus Philusophice 

 naturulis, published in 1776 ; on the 24th January of which year> 



