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TRAVELS 
fcience affe&ed, unnatural, and guarded. It was like the farce adted 
by Catharine II. when file ordered the body of Peter III. emperor 
of Ruffia, to be expofed on a platform in front of the palace, for 
the infpedion of medical men and all the world, while centinels 
were placed at the different avenues for driving back any one who- 
ftiould have the curiofity and the boldnefs to approach it. 
It has been obferved of academies, that they are of ufe only fo- 
long as the encouragement they hold opt is neceffary to the pre- 
fervation and progrefs of fcience. In times of ignorance, and 
abounding in prejudice, it has been faid, fuch focieties are ufeful 
as a barrier againft mountebanks and other impoftors, and for 
maintaining a due influence and authority over public opinion. 
But this influence and authority is the very thing to be dreaded. 
Governments diredt the academies, and the academies the people; 
and thus the fciences bend under defpotifm : and as they are obe¬ 
dient to the nod, fo they imitate the ways and manners of courts. 
They become fond of pomp and fhew, and more defirous of 
adorning their focieties with men of titles and rank than with 
thofe of genius and learning. A remarkable inftance of this pro- 
penfity, I have heard, happened within the memory of the pre- 
fent generation, where the Prefident of an illuftrious fociety in Eu¬ 
rope had a throne eredled for himfelf in place of the ufual chair, 
with adjacent feats a little lower, for foreign ambaffadors and other 
perfonages of great diftin&ion, fome on his right hand and others 
on his left. 
The Academy of Belles-Lettres at Stockholm, having no other 
fund 
