556 MEMOIR OF 



a task to the execution of which, few men could bring adequate 

 knowledge or capacity ; and, even if it could have been execu- 

 ted, there were still fewer readers who could preserve any con- 

 tinuity of interest in a progress so eccentric, or be able to 

 make perpetual transitions from the subtleties of metaphysics 

 to the details of husbandry, or from the refinements of philo- 

 sophical criticism, to the technical questions of Scotch law. 

 The emblem of Lord Kames's genius was not that of the Gan- 

 ges or the Indus, which roll forward their condensed streams, 

 and fill the eye of the spectator with their simple and increa- 

 sing majesty ; but that of the Rhine or the Nile, which divide 

 the volume of their waters into innumerable branches, and, 

 while they fertilize a wider surface, yet perplex the eye, that 

 labours to number and pursue them. What fidelity and affec- 

 tion could do, upon a subject so difficult, Lord Woodhouselee, 

 I apprehend, has done* He has given the portrait of Lord 

 Kames, with all his various and characteristic features ;— he 

 lias surrounded 1dm zcitli his contemporaries, and sketched out, 

 in many pleasing and interesting details, the literary history 

 of the age in which he lived ; — and his work, like those of Pla- 

 to and of Xenophox, will descend to posterity with an interest 

 which no other can now possess, that of being executed from 

 the living subject, and of blending the veneration of the dis- 

 ciple with the fidelity of the historian. 



In the year 1811, Lord Woodhouselee was appointed to 

 the Justiciary Bench, on the elevation of the Lord Justice- 

 Clerk Hope to the President's chair. 



Although Lord Woodhouselee was now advancing in age, 

 and his strength declining, yet the publication of the Memoirs 

 of Lord Kames did not put a period to his literary activity. 

 It was now too late, indeed, for him to resume any of the lite- 

 rary projects which he had once hoped to accomplish : but he 



returned 



