TRAVELS 
136 
that they are mod flourifhing. When they are more and more 
extended, when numbers of drangers are introduced, when they 
are honoured with public celebrity, and the countenance and in¬ 
terference of kings and princes, fimplicity and fincerity of inten¬ 
tion, mutual goodnefs, and a love of truth, are exchanged for va¬ 
nity, pomp, and faction. 
There is, perhaps, no country in Europe where indruClion is fo 
imiverfally diffufed among the very lowed of the people as in 
Sweden, except Iceland, Scotland,* and the late fmall republic of 
Geneva. All the people in towns, villages, and hamlets, without 
exception, are taught to read. It was not without reafon, there¬ 
fore, that Gudavus III. who kept a watchful eye on every event 
that might influence the date of fociety, interdicted all mention 
in the Swedifh journals of a French revolution, .either good or bad. 
He wifhed the people not only to be prevented from thinking of it, 
and reafoning about it; but as much as poffible to be kept in the 
dark as to its very exidence. The effects to be .deflred or dreaded 
in any country from the productions of the prefs, are, no doubt, 
in proportion to the degree and extent of education which the 
people at large have received. It does not follow, from the cir- 
cumdance of the Swedes being all taught to read, and attached to 
* In Scotland I find there is fcarcely any perfon, no not even a beggar, who 
cannot both read and write ; nor any in Iceland who cannot read, write, and caft 
accounts. In every family in Iceland tlie children are inftrufted in reading, writ¬ 
ing, and arithmetic, at home, by their parents or other relatives. When the bov.s 
are fent to fchool it is to acquire Latin, and other accomplifhments, fuch as fome 
knowledge of geography, and of the elements of mathematics. 
edabli flied 
