ON THE PHILOSOPHY OF SPORTS. 1/ 



Is there no poiribility of attaining the height of 

 convivial feUcity, without the rifk of flagger- 

 ing down headlong into the muddy regions of 

 excefs ? It were a leflbn worth the learning. 

 If it mull be determined negatively, I have 

 done fcrmonizing — I commit the tafk to the 

 hands of profefiTional men. May all fportfmen 

 enjoy the pleafure as they lift, and bravely en- 

 counter the confequence. Vivent les Dodeurs. 



I fliall pretend to much impartiality on this 

 head ; for I declare I never rode a hunting in 

 my life, although I have pollened, fent into the 

 Held, and fold many a good hunter. 



But a proportion has in general two fides, 

 and he who cannot, or will not, take the pains 

 to examine both, had perhaps better not have 

 confideied either. I do not w^ifh to be under- 

 ilood as writing an unreferved panegyric even 

 on fox-hunting, as at prefent praftiled. It is 

 attended, I fear, in every hunt, with a number 

 of ffrofs and ufelefs acls of crueltv, which can- 

 not fail of the efFeft of hardening and debafmg 

 the hearts, particularly of the vulgar and ill- 

 informed ; hence, as I have before obferved, 

 the erroneous, but prevalent principle of hunt- 

 ing, is the occafion of moft of the cruelties 

 pra6lifed upon helplefs beafts. But the gradu- 

 ally opening light of reafon has already dif- 

 pelled the far greater number of thefe errors 

 of nature in all the various concez'ns of life, 



VOL. ij. c and 



