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difputation, becaufe pertinacity is a com- 
mon, I had almoft faid an univerfal vice of 
young men. I well remember it in myfelf. 
I well remember that I was moft tenacious 
of my opinions, when I was moft ignorant; 
and that, in proportion as I acquired more 
knowledge, I became more diffident. Since 
I kneel at the chair of confefiion, I will 
tell you, very honeftly, that I recollect many 
inftances in myfelf, of juvenile arrogance 
and felf-fufficiency, for which I ought to 
have been feverely chaftized. My father had 
from Nature too much of the milk of human 
kindnefi to treat me as I deferved. 
Here I clofe my biographical fketches for 
the prefent. Bacon, Milton, Newton, Locke, 
are the four great pillars which fupport the 
monument of Britifh genius : a monument, 
which, without national partiality, we may 
affirm, ftands eminently fuperior to that of 
any other nation. I have fpoken of them 
chronologically; but, Sir Ifaac Newton, 
doubtlefs, deferves the firft place in the 
group. Bacon had the merit of difcover- 
ing, that former philofophers began at the 
wrong end; that philofophical doctrines 
built upon hypothetical principles, were in- 
capable of demon ftration, and therefore 
D 4 might 
