862  Hazlitt  on  the  Metric  System.  {Kra-j]^T\g^rm' 
aspect  and  one  which  is  more  likely  to  affect  the  people  than  the 
point  of  view  taken  by  Spencer. 
•William  Hazlitt  was  born  at  Maidstone,  England,  on  the  tenth 
of  April,  1778,  and  died  on  the  eighteenth  of  September,  1830.  He 
was  thus,  as  Spencer  was  not,  a  contemporary  of  the  changes  in 
France  which  brought  about  the  introduction  of  the  metric  system. 
His  reputation  was  founded  on  many  literary,  historical,  and  philo- 
sophical essays.  His  style  is  vigorous ;  his  thought  clear ;  his  attitude 
strongly  tinctured  by  prejudices.  The  following  quotation  is  taken 
from  his  "Life  of  Napoleon  Buonaparte,"  Chapter  15,  page  375. 
"  Nothing  renders  a  government  unpopular  or  excites  hatred  and 
contempt  sooner  than  a  disposition  to  interfere  in  trifles,  and  with- 
out any  reason  but  the  itch  of  governing.  The  new  system  of 
weights  and  measures  was  another  grievance  complained  of.  The 
want  of  uniformity  in  French  weights  and  measures  was  an  incon- 
venience that  had  long  been  felt ;  and  it  was  expected  among  other 
things  that  the  revolution  would  have  corrected  this  evil.  The 
remedy  was  in  fact  simple  and  at  hand ;  it  was  to  render  the  system 
of  weights  and  measures  in  use  in  the  city  of  Paris,  and  which  had 
also  been  employed  by  the  government  and  artists  for  centuries, 
common  throughout  all  the  provinces.  Instead  of  this,  the  govern- 
ment, who  at  that  time  did  everything  on  a  grand  scale  of  abstrac- 
tion, consulted  the  algebraists  and  geometricians  upon  a  question  of 
practical  utility  who  soon  hit  upon  a  system  which  neither  agreed 
with  the  regulations  of  the  public  administration,  with  the  tables 
of  dimensions  used  in  all  the  arts,  nor  with  those  of  any  of  the  exist- 
ing machines.  Nor  would  other  nations  have  agreed  to  this,  which 
was  meant  to  be  a  universal  benefit  to  the  world.  -What  would  the 
English,  for  instance,  have  said  to  it?  The  new  system  not  only  was 
at  variance  with  common  sense  and  custom,  and  required  all  the 
calculations  of  the  arts  and  sciences  to  be  reversed,  but  was  in  itself 
impracticable  and  unintelligible.  It  converted  the  commonest  affairs 
of  life  into  an  abstruse  mathematical  calculation.  Thus  a  soldier's 
ration  is  expressed  by  twenty-four  ounces  in  the  old  nomenclature ; 
this  is  a  very  simple  process ;  but  when  translated  into  the  new  one, 
it  becomes  seven  hundred  and  thirty-four  grammes  and  two  hundred 
and  fifty-nine  thousandths.  All  the  dimensions  and  lines  that  com- 
pose architectural  works,  all  the  tools  and  measures  used  in  clock 
making,  jewellery,  paper  making,  and  the  other  mechanic  arts,  had 
been  invented  and  calculated  according  to  the  ancient  nomenclature, 
