INTRODUCTORY DISCOURSE. . 15 



national taste, and has palsied the general prosperity. Whatever apol- 

 ogies may be made for these political discussions, by ascribing them to 

 an honest difference in opinion, there can be none offered for the style and 

 manner in which they are conducted. In reading the classical works; 

 of the ancients we are astonished at the violations of decorum which ap- 

 pear in their most polite and accomplished authors ; who frequently use 

 expressions that no modern writer dare adopt without the ceitainty of 

 condemnation. But if we excel the ancients in this respect, we are far 

 behind them in other branches of literary good morals. The style of our 

 political writings has assumed a character of rude invective, and unres- 

 trained licei>tiousness, uuparralleled in any other part of the world ; and 

 which has greatly tended to injure our national character. This lias 

 principally arisen from the indiscriminate applause that has beea conferred 

 upon certain eminent political writers. We imitate what we are taught 

 to admire; and unfortunately we have aped their boldness of invective, and 

 fierceness of denunciation, without exhibiting those fascinations of genius, 

 which operate like the cestus of Venus ; conceal deformity, and heighten 

 all the charms of beauty and grace. Junius arose in the literary, like a 

 comet in the natural world, menacing pestilence and war ; and denoun- 

 cing, in a style of boldness and invective before unknown and unheard 

 of, the constituted authorities of Great Britain. When we analyze hi? 

 writings, we find no extraordinary power of imagination, RO uncommon 

 extent of erudition, no remarkable solidity of reasoning. His topics 

 are lew ; but he was master of his subject. He possessed, in a singular 

 degree, the vivida vis animi :* his conceptions were distinct and lumi- 

 nous, and he expressed them with peculiar point and sententious com- 

 pression ; but the polished keenness of his invective too often degenera- 

 ted into vulgar scurrility. His importance was greatly enhanced by 

 the mystery which surrounded his person, the paaic which followed his 

 denunciations, and the celebrity which was attached to his literary an- 

 tagonists. He created a new era ra political writing ; his \vorks hav be- 

 come the archetype and the text book of political authors ; and every ju- 

 venile writer, who enters the political lists, endeavours to bend the bow 

 of Clysses ; and, in striving to make up in venom \vhat he wants in vigour 

 mistakes scurrility for satire, ribaldry for wit, and confounds the natroa 

 of Egypt with the salt of Attica. 



Secondly ; after expressing my profound regret that those exalted 

 and highly cultivated minds, which have been engaged in polemic con- 

 troversies, had not bent more of their attention to literary investigations ; 

 I consider it ray duty to remark, with every sentiment of respect and 

 , that the medical profession, instead of making one harmonious 



