ourselves and to mankind, not less than to his memory; and I hope his
great soul, if it hath any knowledge of what is done here below, will
not be offended at the smallness even of my offering.

Ah, how little, when among the subjects of The Friend I promised
"Characters met with in Real Life," did I anticipate the sad event,
which compels one to weave on a cypress branch those sprays of laurel
which I had destined for his bust, not his monument! He lived as we
should all live; and, I doubt not, left the world as we should all
wish to leave it. Such is the power of dispensing blessings, which
Providence has attached to the truly great and good, that they cannot
even die without advantage to their fellow-creatures; for death
consecrates their example, and the wisdom, which might have been
slighted at the council-table, becomes oracular from the shrine.
Those rare excellences, which make our grief poignant, make it
likewise profitable; and the tears which wise men shed for the
departure of the wise, are among those that are preserved in heaven.
It is the fervent aspiration of my spirit, that I may so perform the
task which private gratitude and public duty impose on me, that "as
God hath cut this tree of paradise down from its seat of earth, the
dead trunk may yet support a part of the declining temple, or at
least serve to kindle the fire on the altar."



ESSAY III.



Si partem tacuisse velim, quodeumque relinquam,