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country with his son, the University of St. Andrew's conferred upon him the degree of Doctor of Laws; and the example was followed by the Universities of Edinburgh and Oxford. He was also elected a member of many of the learned societies throughout Europe.

No philosopher of the age now stood on a prouder eminence than this extraordinary man, who had originally been one of the most obscure of the people, and had raised himself to all this distinction almost without the aid of any education but such as he had given himself. Who will say, after reading his story, that anything more is necessary for the attainment of knowledge than the determination to attain it ?—that there is any other obstacle to even the highest degree of intellectual advancement which may not be overcome, except a man's own listlessness or indolence? The secret of this man's success in the cultivation of his mental powers was, that he was ever awake and active in that business; that he suffered no opportunity of forwarding it to escape him unimproved; that, however poor, he found at least a few pence, were it even by diminishing his scanty meals, to pay for the loan of the books he could not buy; that, however hard-wrought, he found a few hours in the week, were it by sitting up half the night after toiling all the day, to read and study them. Others may not have his original powers of mind; but his industry, his perseverance, his self-command, are for the imitation of all; and, though few may look forward to the rare fortune of achieving discoveries like his, all may derive both instruction and encouragement from his example. They who may never overtake the light may at least follow its path, and guide their footsteps by its illumination.

Were we to pursue the remainder of Franklin's history, we should find the fame of the patriot vying with that of the philosopher in casting a splendour over it; and the originally poor and unknown tradesman standing before kings, associating as an equal with the most eminent statesmen of his time, and arranging along with them the wars and treaties of mighty nations. When the struggle of American Independence commenced, he was sent as ambassador from the United States to the Court of France, where he soon brought about an alliance between the two countries, which produced an immediate war between the latter and England. In 1783, he signed, on the part of the United States, the treaty of peace with England, which recognised their Independence. Two years after he returned to his native country, where he was received with acclamation by his grateful and admiring fellow-citizens, and immediately elected President of the Supreme Executive Council. He closed his eventful and honourable life on the 17th of April, 1790, in the eighty-fifth year of his age.

CHAPTER XV.

DEVOTION TO KNOWLEDGE IN EXTREME POVERTY :-ERASMUS; KEPLER; SCHAEFFER; BULLINGER; MUSCULUS; POSTELLUS; CASTALIO; ADRIAN VI.; PERRIER; CLAUDE LORRAINE; SALVATOR ROSA; MARMONTEL; HOCHE; LAGRANGE; DR. JOHNSON; DR. PARR; SPAGNOLETTO; LE JAY; CASTELL; DAVIES; TYTLER; WILLIAM DAVY.-IN EXILE AND IMPRISONMENT:—OVID; BOETHIUS; BUCHANAN; TASSO; SMART; MAGGI; LE MAISTRE; LORENZINI; PRYNNE; MADAME ROLAND; RALEIGH; LADY JANE GREY; JAMES I. (OF SCOTLAND); LOVELACE.

IN attempting to illustrate such a subject as the triumphs of the Love of Knowledge, and to set forth the exceeding might of that passion, the delight with which the indulgence of it is fraught, and the obstacles of all sorts in the way of its gratification which it has so often overcome, the materials which present themselves are so abundant and so various, that the chief difficulty in using them is which to choose. The examples we have already cited may be considered sufficient to show how perfectly practicable it is to unite the pursuit of literature with that of any description of business or professional occupation. We shall now proceed to notice some aspirants after knowledge, who have had other difficulties to struggle with than those arising from either the seducing excitements or engrossing cares and toils of active life.

Anecdotes illustrating the devotion with which knowledge has been pursued under the pressure of severe penury, or other forms of worldly misfortune, are evidences, not of any calamities to which literature has a peculiar tendency to expose its votaries, but rather of the power with which it arms them to conquer and rise superior to calamities. Students, and authors, and men of genius, have their share of adversity with others; but few others enjoy their peculiar advantages, if not for warding it off, at least for bearing up against it. The man who is most to be pitied under misfortune is he whose whole happiness or misery hangs on outward circumstances. The scholar has sources of enjoyment within himself of which no severity of fortune can altogether deprive him. Hence, a man who is truly in love with philosophy will often make light of sufferings and privations which to another would be almost intolerable: if his body be in want, his mind has store of riches. When ERASMUS was a poor student at Paris, he was indeed very anxious to be a little richer; but, almost in rags as he was, it was not fine or even comfortable raiment after which he principally longed. "As soon as I get money," says he, in a letter to a friend, "I will buy, first Greek books, and then clothes." "It is the mind," says Shakspeare, “that

Kepler-Schaeffer-Bullinger-Musculus.

175 makes the body rich :" and so the young scholar felt. Of his two contemplated purchases, it was not the clothes, he knew, but the Greek books, that were to bring him anything permanent, in the way either of enjoyment or of distinction.

And similar to those of Erasmus have been the feelings of many another aspirant after intellectual eminence, when struggling, like him, with the inconveniences of indigence, or braving every variety of labour and privation in pursuit of the object on which his heart was set. The illustrious KEPLER spent his life in poverty; yet, amidst all his difficulties, he used to declare that he would rather be the author of the works he had written than possess the duchy of Saxony. There is hardly any severity of endurance to which ardent spirits have not subjected themselves, under the inspiration of an attachment to literature or the arts. The German naturalist, SCHAEFFER, was so poor when he entered the University of Halle, that for the first six months of his attendance his whole expenditure did not exceed a few halfpence a-day: a little bread and a few vegetables boiled in water were his only food; and, although the winter was a very rigorous one, no fire ever warmed his chimney. Yet all this he bore cheerfully, counting the opportunity he enjoyed of pursuing his studies as more than a compensation for it all. This heroism, indeed, has never been uncommon among German scholars. We have already mentioned the cases of Heyne and Winckelman. The latter, according to a practice not unusual among poor students in that country, was wont, while attending the grammar-school, to support himself chiefly by singing at night through the streets; and not himself only, but in a great measure his father also. But Winckelman's expenses were always on the very humblest scale. Even when his fondest wishes were at last crowned by an opportunity having been afforded him of visiting Rome, he considered himself in possession of an ample revenue in the pension of a hundred crowns, which he was allowed, by his patron Father Rauch, in addition to his board, which he had free. The learned theologian, HENRY BULLINGER, one of the distinguished names of the Reformation, had also supported himself at school for several years by his talents as a street-musician. His contemporary and fellow-labourer in the same cause, WOLFGANG MUSCULUS, had commenced his career as a scholar in a similar manner, having for some time sung ballads through the country, and begged his way from door to door, in order to obtain a pittance wherewith to put himself to school: till he was at length charitably received into a convent of Benedictine monks, who, greatly to his delight, offered to educate him, and admit him of their order. Musculus was afterwards, on embracing the tenets of the Lutherans, reduced to such distress, that he was obliged to send his wife to service, and to bind himself apprentice to a weaver of Strasburg, who no sooner discovered his heretical opinions than he

turned him out of doors. He had then no other resource but to offer himself as a common labourer to assist in repairing the fortifications of the city. Yet even in this condition he employed every moment he could spare in study; and applied himself, in particular, with so much ardour to the Hebrew language, that he placed himself eventually almost at the head of the scholars by whom that branch of learning was cultivated in his time.

Another great Orientalist of that age, and in many respects one of the most extraordinary characters of any age, WILLIAM POSTELLUS, was, when a mere boy, so fond of reading, that he would often, it is related, while engaged with his book, forget to take his meals. Having set out from his native village in Normandy, for Paris, in the expectation of finding means to pursue his studies in that capital, he was attacked, in the course of his journey, by robbers, who took from him all the little he had in the world, and used him besides so barbarously, that he was obliged to take refuge in a hospital, where he lay for two years before his health was restored. On his recovery, he bent his steps once more towards Paris; being at the time, however, in such a state of destitution, that he had no way of obtaining wherewithal to buy himself a coat, except by offering his services as a reaper to assist in cutting down the crop which then happened to be ready for the sickle. Having arrived at Paris, he thought himself fortunate in being received as a domestic into the College of St. Barbe, not doubting that even this situation would afford him, in some degree, those opportunities of improvement which he so ardently longed for. Accordingly, having contrived to get possession of a Greek and a Hebrew grammar, he soon made himself master of both these languages, solely by his own efforts; and, although the fragments of time he could steal from the duties of his humble place were all the leisure he had for study, he afterwards became one of the greatest scholars of his time, being distinguished especially for his knowledge both of ancient and modern languages, of which there was scarcely one that he was not familiar with. To his vast acquirements, however, he added, in the latter part of his life, no little extravagance both of opinion and conduct: and, indeed, some of his notions could have proceeded from nothing else than partial derangement. But it does not belong to our present purpose to pursue this part of his history. Some of his works exhibit an extraordinary mixture of learning and genius, with the most singular delusion and absurdity.

SEBASTIAN CASTALIO, whose elegant Latin version of the Scriptures we have mentioned in a former chapter, was for many years of his life so poor, that, having a wife and family to support, he was obliged to employ the whole day in labouring in the fields, and could give only the earlier part of the morning to study. Yet, even in these circumstances

Calvin, with whom he had quarrelled, having, in the heat of controversy, allowed himself directly to charge him with theft, because he was in the habit of occasionally bringing home with him a little wood to serve for fuel, was answered by Castalio in a mild but dignified remonstrance, in which he admits that, as he dwelt on the banks of the Rhine, he had indeed been sometimes accustomed to employ himself, at leisure hours, in catching with a hook the floating wood which it carries down in its inundations, in order to warm his family,—the wood being in fact, he remarks, public property, and belonging to the first taker. And this he did, he says, being at the time wholly occupied with his translation of the Scriptures, and resolved rather to beg than to quit it. Such a love for literature as this would have almost made beggary honourable.

literature was the great consolation of his life.

Pope ADRIAN VI. was the son of a poor barge-builder of Utrecht, who, desirous of procuring for his son a good education, and yet unable to pay for it, found means at last to get him admitted among the boys educated gratuitously at the University of Louvain. While attending this seminary, however, the pecuniary resources of the young scholar were so extremely scanty, that he was unable to afford himself candles whereby to study at night. But he did not on that account spend his time in idleness. He used to take his station, we are told, with his book in his hand, in the church porches, or at the corners of the streets, where lamps were generally kept burning, and to read by their light. After passing through a succession of ecclesiastical preferments, which he owed to his eminent acquirements and unimpeachable character, Adrian was appointed preceptor to the young Archduke Charles, grandson to Ferdinand, King of Spain, who afterwards became so powerful and celebrated as the Emperor Charles V. To this connection he was indebted for his elevation to the papal throne, which he ascended in the sixty-second year of his age, and occupied for two years, having died in 1523. The short time he held this lofty station was not, however, the happiest period of Adrian's life, as the following inscription, which he desired to be placed over his tomb, may testify :— "Here lies Adrian VI., who esteemed no misfortune which happened to him in life so great as his being called to govern." A striking lesson to that ambition whose aim is only high place and domination, as if man were ever to find true satisfaction in that which is not within himself, but has both its support and its object, its beginning and its end, in the changing and perishing things around him. Thus, too, felt the contemporary of Adrian, the great Cardinal Ximenes, when, after having arrived at the dignities of Archbishop of Toledo, Regent of Spain, and one of the Princes of the Church, he used to sigh for the groves of his beloved Castagnar (the religious establishment embosomed among the chestnuts), where, when only a simple monk, he had lived

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