LETTER TO 



into so much litigation." The fact here men- 

 tioned, though highly important, may not to 

 many, however, appear so surprising as it did 

 to your Lordship. Learned occupations, by 

 withholding their followers, for the most part, 

 from the busy paths of life, necessarily exempt 

 them from many occasions of dispute, to which 

 other persons are exposed; but few are more 

 ready, than literary men, to embrace such oc- 

 casions of dispute as are presented to them. 

 In whatever regards the fruits of their mental 

 labours, this is universally acknowledged to be 

 true ; the title of genus irritabik, though more 

 especially given to poets, is found to be ap- 

 plicable, in a greater or less degree, to every 

 description of authors. Some of the malevolent 

 passions, indeed, frequently become in learned 

 men more than ordinarily strong, from want 

 of that restraint upon their excitement which 

 society imposes. Perhaps too, from a well- 

 known law of human nature, their moral feel- 

 ings may be less correct than those of many other 

 men, in consequence of the great and frequent 

 exercise, which is given to the powers of their 

 understandings. Physicians, therefore, as men 

 of learning, have their causes of dissension with 

 each other ; as men seeking wealth by their 

 learning, or affectation of learning, they have 

 many more. The great bulk of mankind being 



