fitted only to minister to, the avarice and luxury of those whom heretofore they looked upon as greatly their inferiors. "It will readily be perceived that the land proprietors are those I mean to treat of. To these, and, their unoccupied descendents, the epithet of gentleman was formerly only applied; now-a-days we have not only gentlemen of the law, of physic, of divinity, and trade, (whose professions seem to be entitled to it,) but the appellation is surely abused and prostituted when applied to some lower orders; and evidently so, when bestowed upon an impudent varlet out of livery, who forsooth is dignified with the appellation of Gentleman, tho' perhaps it is bestowed with great impropriety even upon his master. Though the profession of divinity is most honourable and respectable, when the professors of it behave in a suitable and becoming manner, yet it does not appear to me that they ought to affect the appellation of gentlemen. The idea of the sphere they act in, impresses one with the notion of some characteristic epithet, less worldly, and more suitable to their profession; and surely those who affect it, as conceiving it attached to their profession, though of low birth, and illiberal education, most certainly disgrace it, and bring themselves into contempt, by which means the profession itself is liable to suffer, though undeservedly. Though I have described the land proprietor as unoccupied, yet I would not be understood to mean that he should be so far from it; every man in his station ought to be employed; and it is incumbent upon him to act in his sphere for the good of society. The question is, how a mere country gentleman can employ himself properly? To be sure very many do not, but, on the contrary, mispend their time, and waste their fortunes, in frivolous, and often in vicious pursuits. But are there no innocent amusements, no rational occupations to be found in a country life? Are these confined to courts and great cities only, where there is a constant bustle and struggle to get wealth and power, and then as constant a vying with each other, how to dissipate and waste, what, indeed, has often been acquired by unwarrantable means? "Have rational creatures, or, as the king of Prussia defines them, rather reasoning animals, nothing else to do here, but to amass wealth, for their profligate giddy heirs to throw away? よ "But who then is the gentleman properly to be called so? The foundation of gentility, no doubt, is to be allowed to consist in a great measure in wealth and contentment. If a moderate estate has been transmitted by ancestors who could say they came fairly and honestly by it, and looking round them, could see much greater opulence without envy, because they beheld much greater numbers in a far inferior situation, artd so could say it is enough, and more perhaps, than falls to my share, if everyone had his due, therefore I I will spare as I ought to some, who deserve, but who have been denied the gifts of fortune; more has been bestowed upon me, than upon many others, of superior merit and endowments, so I conclude that there is a trust reposed in me, to bestow part upon others who stand in need of my assistance. Generasity seems to be the main characteristic of a gentleman, and generous, in the old Roman language, corresponds to what we mean by that term. 7 I would not be understood to mean however that the person who has had a competent Lestate transmitted to him, is in all events to rest satisfied with it, and never, attempt to rise to a superior degree of rank and wealth. By no means: let every man try his talents and abilities, and if he continues to carry true gentility along with him, the more wealth he acquires, the more influence he has in the management of public affairs, or in the distribution, of justice, &c. the more his friends and country will feel the happy effects of his generous and disinterested behaviour, in whatever sphere he acts. But many persons of good fortunes, and not destitute of merit, L have not talents for higher stations: it is well it is so, otherwise there would be too many candidates for high offices; and it would be well if those who aspire to them, would first well weigh and consider their abilities before they did attempt to aspire to them. "But are inferior talents, and those who are willing to submit to be governed, to be quite despised and neglected? I imagine that no state can ever have the happiness of good and able rulers, unless a sufficient number of those who are to be governed, can make it appear that they deserve to be justly and well governed: many such there are, it is to be hoped, in this country especially, and yet it is to be lamented how few know how to assert the privilege of their birthright upon proper occasions; hence the abuse of power in those who take the lead, and of clamour by those of ins ferior ranks against things that are at least indifferent, while measures of a real destructive tendency are overlooked. " Literary Olla. No. 10. (FROM THE BEE, OCTOBER 2. 1793.), Mr Gray. Hon. Horace Walpole.-Mr West. TO THE HON. DAVID MONTAGU ERSKINE. ~The insect youth are on the wing, To contemplation's sober eye, L And they that creep and they that fly, Shall end where they begam But flutter thro' life's little day, 13 THESE, nephew! with other charming lines of the excellent GRAY, were sent inclosed in a letter to his accomplished and beloved young friend WEST, the son of the Lord Chancellor of Ireland. But "his sun was set---his spring was gone," before the letter arrived at his residence in Hertfordshire; and he died I believe on the first of June, the same day that brought me into the world; so that if I believed in the metempsychosis, I might be foolish enough to imagine that I am the very person to whom this pretty little copy of verses was addressed. When I was sitting in my garden, under the shade of a weeping beech of singular beauty, which spreads its foliage over an area of near four hundred feet in circumference, admitting the light agreeably without the scorching or glaring rays of the sun, I had in my hand the life and the letters of the elegant author of the immortal elegy in a country church yard. Ah! said I, happy Walpole, happy West, to have had such a man for your fellow-traveller, friend and preceptor; but I also had a Gray |