1803.] 
thoufands of the moft fingular and intereft- 
ing heads,caufed them to be fold by auétion, 
which produced three hundred and fifty- 
fix pounds; and had among the purcha- 
fers the late Lord Orford, and other per- 
fons of rank, Thefe occurrences took 
place in the year 1757. 
In order to give a fatisfaftory account 
of Mr. Paterfon’s merit as a bibliogra- 
pher, a: fhort digreffion on the. progrefs 
and {tate of the theoretical and practical 
part of fuch learned avocations, during 
the two preceding generations, appears 
neceffary. Our readers may thereby form 
an opinion of the feveral gradations in 
which he found, he eftablifhed, and he 
left the feience of literary hiftory, and the 
art of bibliography. 
The knowledge of bibliography and 
literary hiftory bears; perhaps, the moft 
recent date, in the annals of the human 
mind: it is the happy refult of thofe per- 
fevering inquiries into the intellectual and 
active powers of man, through which 
we have been able to refer to their com- 
mon ftock, and to trace back to their root 
the manifold, diverging, and apparently 
unconneéted branches of the tree of know- 
ledge ; and it is alfo the immediate con- 
fequence of that overgrowing and amazing 
{cientific wealth, from which we have en- 
deavoured to take the moft valuable ma- 
terials, and the mot conducive method, 
for our exertions and improvement. It 
muft, however, be acknowledged that no 
Tegular work, nor any detailed precept 
was ever given, to forward thefe purfuits, 
by the eminent metaphyficians of the laft 
century, notwithftanding the early ad- 
vice of Sir Francis Bacon; that the bi- 
bliographical {cience, like moft others, 
has an accidental and rather ob{cure ori- 
gin; that neither England nor France, 
nor any other country, juftly confidered 
as the native feat of genius, had iffued a 
publication of the kind ; and that the ul- 
timate fame for the introduction of this 
new branch of ftudies muft be afcribed 
to a nation rather noted for want of bril- 
liant talents, In faét, the firft man who 
attempted to give a fketch of univerfal 
bibliography and literary hittory was the 
learned and laborious Chriftopher Au- 
guitus Hermann, Profeflor in the Uni- 
verity of. Gottingen, in 1718. He 
then publifhed his known work—‘‘Con- 
fpectus Reipublice Literariz, five Via ad 
Hiftoriam Literariam,’’ which pradually 
went through feven editions, the lait of 
which was publifhed in Hanover, in 1763. 
Numberlefs other works, analagous to 
this, were pub lifhed in the fame interval, 
Memairs of Mr, Paterfon. 
43 
in Germany, which it is unneceflary to 
mention in this article. 
No fooner had this fwarm of laborious 
eruditi paved the way to the knowledge of 
authors and books, and opened this new 
field of {cientific purfuits, than it became 
an additional acquifition to the philofophy 
of the age. It was duly experienced that 
the detailed notice of the gradual fteps. of 
our predeceflors, in the feveral departments 
of knowledge, was necellary to carry into 
execution the already-mentioned precept 
of Lord Verulam, to teach iciences hiito- 
rically; how this preliminary knowledge 
might enable the inquirers, to afcertain 
the precife point from which they fhould 
begin their courfe ; how an exact parti- 
tion of labour, and a convenient method 
of claffification, could affift the powers 
of judgment and of memory; and how 
this very method of claffification might be 
fubfervient to the arrangement of a library, 
or, in other words, to the regular and 
local difpofition of objeéts that are the oc- 
cafion of our ideas,and give a fuller {cope 
to our faculties. 
No wonder then, that, about the period 
we allude to, fo many detailed, deferiptive, 
and rational, catalogues of books ap- 
peared, in the feveral countries of Europe, 
and that the art and the tafte of confruét- 
ing libraries became more general than ia 
any preceding age; and the only thing 
which appears to us worthy of remark, 
and rather unaccountable, is that, even 
after the progrefs of philofophy on bi- 
_bliography, the Germans, in this depart~ 
ment, have excelled every other people in 
Europe. It is univerfaily acknowledged, 
that the beft work of the kind that ever 
appeared, about that time, was the catas 
logue of the celebrated library of the 
Count of Bunau, better known under the 
name of ‘* Bibliotheca Bunaviana’’, {0 
remarkable indeed for number, feleétion, 
order, connection, references and aniver- 
{al intereft. : ns 
This was the progrefs and the ftate of 
bibliographical knowledge, when Mir. 
Paterion entered upon the orofeffion of it. 
His fuperior talents, already affilted by a 
proportionate practice, Joon enabled lum to 
jadge of what had hitherto been done inthe 
hiftorical and fyftematical pare of thefe 
purfuits, to imagine what ftill remained to 
be done in either way, and to adopt the 
beft practical principles for the conduéct of 
his avqeations. He regretted that no 
fyftem of univerfal bibliography and lite- 
rary hiftory had been ever exhibited fine 
the attempt of profeflor Hermann, excep 
perhaps the Sketch iste given by Dr, 
I 2 Meuled, 
> 
