his knees, he called on God for mercy; while others of the terrified party earnestly besought the magician to give the only remaining proof of his art for which they now were anxious, by dismissing the apparition. But, Schrepfer, though apparently willing, found, or pretended to find this effort beyond his power. However incredible, absurd, or ridiculous it may be thought, the persons who witnessed the scene, protest that near an hour elapsed, before, by the force of his invocations, the spectre could be compelled to disappear. Nay, when at length Schrepfer had succeeded in dismissing it; at the moment that the company began to resume a degree of serenity, the door, which had been closed, burst open again, and the same hidious form presented itself anew to their eyes. The most resolute and collected among them, were not proof to its second appear ance, and a scene of universal dismay ensued. Shrepfer, however, by reiterated exorcisms or exertions, finally dismissed the apparition. The terrified spectators soon dispersed, overcome with amazement, and fully satisfied, as they well might be, of Schrepfer's supernatural powers.

SOME OBSERVATIONS ON DIARIES, SELF-BIOGRAPHY, AND SELF

CHARACTERS.

THE study of Biography is a recent taste in Britain. The art of writing lives has been but lately known; and it was, therefore, an usual complaint with the meagre biographers of the last century, when their subject was a man of letters, that his life could not be deemed very interesting, since he, who had only been illustrious in his closet, could not be supposed to afford any materials for the historian. The life of a prime-minister, or the memoirs of a general, as they contained the detail of political intrigues and political opposition; battles or stratagems; were considered to afford happier opportuniúies for a writer to display the abi

lity of his literary powers, the subtilty of his discernment, and the colouring of his descriptions.

But as the human mind became the great object of our inquiry, and to detect and separate the shades of the passions the great aim of the biographer, reflecting men perceived, that the philosopher, like other men, had his distinct characteristics. And it has now become the labour of criticism, to compose the life of an author; no writer can now successfully accomplish his biographic attempts, unless he possesses a flexibility of taste, which, like the came. leon, takes the colour of that object on which it rests.

Every man, in whatever depart ment he moves, has passions, which will vary even from those who are acting the same part as himself. Our souls, like our faces, bear the general resemblance of the species, but retain the particular form which is peculiar to the individual. He who studies his own mind, and has the industry to note down the fluctuations of his opinions, the fallacies of his passions, and the vacillations of his resolutions, will form a journal to himself peculiarly interesting, and, probably, not undeserving the meditations of others. Nothing which presents a faithful relation of humanity, is inconsiderable to a human being.

There once prevailed the custom of a man's journalising his own life. Many of these journals yet remain in their MS. state, and some, unfortunately for journal-writing, have been published. We are not, however, to decide on the nature of a work by the ineptitude of its performance. The writers of these diaries were not philosophers, for the age was not philosophic. Too often they were alchemists, and sometimes considered themselves as magicians. Some only registered the minutest events of domestic life. Dates of birth, and settlements of marriage, may be pardoned to the individual; but to give the importance of history to the progress of a purge, and to return divine thanks

for the cutting of a corn, (and the edited journal of Elias Ashmole contains few other facts,) is giving importance to objects which can only be observable in the history of any other animal but man. I am acquainted with a worthy gentleman, who, for this half century, is performing the same labours. He can tell where he dined fifty years past, and accompany the information with no concise critique. When he takes one of these little volumes down, he applies to himself the observation of Martial, and says, he has learnt the art of living life twice over. The pleasures of memory are delicious; its objects must, however, be proportionate to the powers of vision, and a meagre or a smart dinner, is an object sufficiently delightful, or terrible, to give play to the recordatory organs of this diarist. I have remarked, however, one thing from his contemptible narrative. He resolved to distinguish the happy cincumstances of his life in red ink. In looking over his diaries, notwithstanding the obscurity of his situation, and the humility of his desires, I cannot find that his pen was often dipt in the crimson ink of felicity.

An observation may be made on the diurnal page. He who can, without reserve or hesitation, form such a journal, may be safely pronounced an honest man. Could a Clive, or a Cromwell, have composed a diary? Neither of these men could suffer solitude and darkness; at the scattered thoughts of casual reflection they started; what would they have done, had memory marshaled their crimes, and arranged them in the terrors of chronology? These diaries form that other self, which Shaftesbury has described every thinking being to possess; and which, to converse with, he justly accounts the highest wisdom. When Cato wishes that the breast of every man were diaphanous, it is only a metaphorical expression for such a diary.

There are two species of minor biography which may be discrimi

nated; detailing our own life, and pourtraying our own character..... The writing our own life has been practised with various success; it is a delicate operation; a stroke too much may destroy the effect of the whole. If once we detect an author deceiving or deceived, it is a livid spot which infects the entire body. To publish one's own life has sometimes been a poor artifice to bring obscurity into notice; it is the ebriety of vanity, and the delirium of egotism. When a great man leaves some memorial of his days, his death-bed sanctions the truth, and the grave consecrates the motive. There are certain things which relate to ourselves, which no one can know so well; a great genius obliges posterity when he records them. But they must be composed with calmness, with simplicity, and with sincerity; the biographic sketch of Hume, written by himself, is a model of attic simplicity. The life of lord Herbert is a biographical curiosity. The memoirs of Sheffield duke of Buckingham is very interesting; and those of Colley Cibber is a fine picture of the self-painter. We have some other pieces of self-biography precious to the philosopher.

Biography should not be written with eloquence; with Rousseau, perhaps, eloquence was only a natural harmony from the voice of truth; but it may also be the artificial tones of deceit. What in Rousseau was nature, may in others be artifice. Self-biographers, like Hume, who state facts with an attic simplicity, appear to speak unreservedly to the reader, and as if they proposed only to supply facts, for others to explain and embellish.

There is another species of miner biograghy, which, I am willing to believe, could only have been invented by the most refined and the vainest nation. A literary fashion formerly prevailed with French authors, to present the public with their own character, and this fashion seems to have passed over to our country; Farquhar has drawn his character in a letter to a lady, and

others of our writers I believe have given us their own miniatures. The French long cherished this darling egotism; and there is a collection of these literary portraits in two bulky volumes. The brilliant Flechier, and the refined St. Evremond, have framed and glazed their portraits. Every writer then considered his character as necessary as his preface. I confess myself much delighted with these self-descriptions of "persons whom no one knows." I have formed a considerable collection of these portraits, and have placed them in my cabinet of curiosities, under the title of strong like nesses of unknown persons. Their vanity is too prominent to doubt their accuracy.

I shall not excite the reader's curiosity, without attempting its gratification; and if he chuses to see what now passes in the minds of many obscure writers, whom he never will know, let him attend to the following character, which may not be so singular as it appears.

There was, as a book in my possession will testify, a certain versemaker, of the name of Cantenac, who, in 1662, published in the city of Paris, the above-mentioned volume, containing some thousands of verses, which were, as his countrymen express it, de sa facon, after his own way. He fell so suddenly into the darkest and deepest pit of oblivion, that not a trace of his memory would have remained, had he not condescended to give ample information of every particular relative to himself. He has acquainted us with his size, and tells us "that it is rare to see a man smaller than himself. I have that in common with all dwarfs, that if my head only were seen, I should be thought a large man.' "This atom in creation then describes his oval and full face ....his fiery and eloquent eyes.... his vermil lips....his robust constitution, and his offervescent passions. He appears to have been a most petulent, honest, and diminufive being.

The description of his intellect, is the object of our curiosity, and I select the most striking traits in his own words. "I am as ambitious as any person can be; but I would not sacrifice my honour to my ambition. I am so sensible to contempt, that I bear a mortal and implacable hatred against those who contemn me, and I know I could never reconcile myself with them, but I spare no attentions for those I love; I would give them my fortune and my life. I sometimes lie; but generally in affairs of gallantry, where I voluntarily confirm falsehoods by oaths, without reflection, for swearing with me is a habit. I am told that my mind is brilliant, and that I have a certain manner in turning a thought, which is quite my own. I am agreeable in conversation; though I confess I am often troublesome; for I maintain paradoxes to display my genius, which savour too much of scholastic subterfuges. I speak too often and too long; and as I have some reading, and a copious memory, I am fond of shewing whatever I know. My judgment is not so solid, as my wit is lively. I am often melancholy and unhappy; and this sombrous disposition proceeds from my numerous disappointments in life. My verse is preferred to my prose; and it has been of some use to me, in pleasing the fair sex; poetry is most adapted to persuade women; but otherwise it has been of no service to me, and has, I fear, rendered me unfit for many advantageous occupations, in which I might have drudged. The esteem of the fair has, however, charmed away my complaints. This good fortune has been obtained by me, at the cost of many cares, and an unsubdued patience; for I am one of those, who, in affairs of love, will suffer an entire year, to taste the pleasures of one day."

This character of Cantenac had some local features; for an English poet would hardly console himself with so much gaiety. The Frenchman's attachment to the ladies,

That I was not informed of this arrangement, reflects no blame on any one: it was, in the first place, most generally known throughout, not the family alone, but all their retainers and dependants; and, in the next place, Lord Ernolf was secured by the pledged affections of his daughter, from any danger to her, and I was supposed too sufficiently warned of the difference of our ranks, to allow me to raise the superstructure of Love on so sandy a foundation. Be that as it will, the edifice was erected, and I even believe a little lurking hope formed a corner-stone of the foundation.

When I learned of her pre-engagement, in the simplest manner imaginable, I own I felt plunged into an abyss of despair; but I continued for several months imbibing deeply the delicious poison of a first love, and it is on that intermediate portion of my life I best love to rest my mental eyes, from the fatigue of viewing the workings of tyranny, and the goadings of malice.

In one of these conversations, I once let fall the name of Goldney. Matilda seemed to recognise it as familiar, and not as bringing with it a pleasing recollection.

She asked me if I had ever known any body of that name. I replied with ardour, and the exuberance of my mind displayed itself alike in my vehemence against the brother, and my tender gratitude to the sister. Matilda confessed that in my portrait of Miss Goldney she saw a strong resemblance to the character of a lady, whom she remembered her mother pitying as unfortunate and ill-used; and some strange and bewildering ideas crossed my brain in consequence of what she further said. She recollected but little, for her mother had been dead some years, but she had sometimes accompanied her in her visits to this Miss Goldney, and the impres sion made on her young and affec tionate mind by the kindness of the lady, had never been effaced. Something too, she retained, of Miss Goldney's living in absolute retire

VOL. I....NO. IV.

ment, of the lowness of her spirits, and the paleness of her cheeks; and to Matilda I now confided the thoughts which these recollections had given birth to.

One while I was delighted with the possibility that the woman who had treated me with so much kindness, might be my mother; at another I felt it an incongruity to suppose that a truth of such importance could, from any motives, have been, in such circumstances, con cealed by a parent. Again could I suspect Miss Goldney, whose life had been a model of purity and vir tue, whose sentiments had been noble and excellent, whose principles had been invariably just, and whose name even the lawless tongue of her brother had never dared to revile ....could I suspect her of having committed such an impropriety, such a crime? Yet, at times, my ingenious fancy formed a romance by which this might be reconciled. She might have been the victim of treachery and falsehood: there were men who would impose on wo men by pretended marriages, or who, having contracted such as proved inimical to their future views, would boldly disown the wretched woman whose hardiness in the cause of innocence was less firm than their effrontery in supporting falsehood.

In all these romances, the Lady Matilda was my confidant and assistant. We talked on the subject till we doubted not that I should make some great discovery that would reinstate the injured fame of my mother, and restore me to my rights in society. Alas! in these visions of futurity glided away all the real happiness destined ever to gild my life; and I busied myself in forming chimeras never to be realized, while I suffered the actual fe licity within my grasp to slip from me unobserved and unenjoyed, in my visionary eagerness after unknown events. But man is the creature of hope and expectation! The most delightful present is overlooked in anxious graspings after

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