literary productions, and so many splendid and valuable discoveries, extended only over a space of not quite thirty years. He had not completed his fiftyfirst year when he died. Nor was Davy merely a man of science. His general acquirements were diversified and extensive. He was familiar with the principal continental languages, and wrote his own with an eloquence not usually found in scientific works. All his writings, indeed, show the scholar, and the lover of elegant literature, as well as the ingenious and accomplished philosopher. It not unfrequently happens that able men, who have been their own instructers, and have chosen for themselves some one field of exertion in which the world acknowledges, and they themselves feel, their eminence, both disregard and despise all other sorts of knowledge and acquirement. This is pedantry in its most vulgar and offensive form; for it is not merely ignorant, but intolerant. It speaks highly in favour of the right constitution and the native power of Davy's understanding, that, educated as he was, he escaped every taint of this species of illiberality; and that while, like almost all those who have greatly distinguished themselves in the world of intellect, he selected and persevered in his one favourite path, he nevertheless revered wisdom and genius in all their manifestations.

CHAPTER VI.

Diversities of Intellectual Excellence: - Painters - Benjamin West.

THE ambition of intellectual excellence is, in truth, the same passion, by whichsoever of the many roads that lie open to it it may choose to pursue its object. The thing that is interesting and valuable is the purity and enduring strength of the passion. These are the qualities that make it both so inestimable in the possession, and so instructive in the exhibition. The mere department of study in which it displays itself is of inferior importance; for, even if it should be contended that, of the various pursuits which demand the highest degree of intellectual application and devotion, one is yet better calculated than another to promote by its results the general improvement or happiness of mankind, it will scarcely be argued that even those of inferior value in this respect should not also have their followers. The arrangements of providence, by forming men at first in different moulds, and placing them afterwards in different circumstances, regulate, doubtless with more wisdom and success than could be attained by any artifice of human polity, the distribution of taste, and talent, and enterprize, over the varied field of philosophy and art, no part of which is thus left altogether uncultivated. One man, from his original endowments, or his particular advantages of training or situation, is more fit for one line of exertion, another for another; and, although the pursuits to which they are in this manner severally attracted may not, in the

why we should regret that there are labourers to engage in each. Indeed, the more truly enlightened any mind is, the less ready will it be to look with a feeling either of contempt or of slight respect upon any pursuit which has had power to call forth in an eminent degree the resources of the human intellect. The ground is holy wherever genius has won its triumphs. The further the domain of science is explored, the more, in all probability, will it be found to be pervaded and connected, in all its parts, by a principle of order, consistency, and unity; and the more confirmations shall we discover of what are almost already universally admitted axioms of philosophy, that no truth is without its worth, and no sort of knowledge without some bearing upon every other.

We are now about to notice the exertions made in pursuit of knowledge by some individuals, whose paths have been very different from those of the distinguished discoverers and inventors with whom we have just been engaged. But we shall find that, in every variety of intellectual enterprise, the same devotion and diligence have been exhibited by ardent and generous spirits; and that everywhere these qualities are the indispensable requisites for the attainment of excellence. By no class of students, perhaps, has a greater love of their chosen pursuit been displayed than by Painters. We have already had occasion, indeed, to mention many names from this department of biography, in illustration of the force with which a passion for knowledge has often contended against the most depressing discouragements, and eventually subdued everything that would have prevented its gratification. In our former volume, we noticed the early difficulties and subsequent eminence of Salvator Rosa, Claude Lorraine, the Caravaggios, our own Opie, and many others. We will now proceed to sketch somewhat more in detail the

unpromising circumstances of birth and original situation through which some of the other most distinguished names in the recent history of English art have had to struggle into light.

The first individual we shall mention was not, indeed, strictly speaking, a native of this country, though he was born a subject of the British crown; but, as an artist, he belongs, nevertheless, to England. We speak of the late BENJAMIN WEST. He was born at Springfield, near Philadelphia, in North America, in the year 1738. His parents were Quakers, and he was the youngest of a family of ten children. It is related, that his mother brought him into the world immediately after being frightened almost into convulsions by a sermon, in which the preacher scarcely relieved the horrors of a description which he gave of the coming destruction of the world on this side of the Atlantic, by the assurance which he added of the happy destiny in reserve for America, where a new and better order of things was forthwith to arise and be perpetuated, after all vice and evil should have been swept from the earth by that visitation of vengeance. This incident, seemingly of little importance, afterwards exercised considerable influence on the boy's history. The preacher, flattered by what he probably deemed a proof of the powers of his oratory, continued to regard the child with feelings both of pride and kindness; and took pains to persuade his father that, born in such extraordinary circumstances, he would undoubtedly turn out no We shall find immediately that these predictions were not thrown away either upon the father or the son.

common man.

Meanwhile, however, Benjamin, as might be supposed, grew up without anything marvellous appearing about him, till he had completed his sixth year. Soon after this, one of his sisters, who was married,

came to pay a visit to her parents, and brought her child with her. One day, Benjamin's mother having taken her daughter out with her to the garden, they left the child asleep in its cradle, and he was appointed to watch it. As he sat looking at his little niece, she happened to smile in her sleep; and he was so struck with the beauty of the infant, that, there being some paper and pens on the table, with red and black ink, he immediately attempted to make a drawing of her face. His effort, it would seem, was not altogether unsuccessful; for when his mother and sister returned, the former exclaimed at once, on obtaining a sight of the paper, which he tried to conceal, I declare he has made a likeness of little Sally.' Re-assured by this, he was in an ecstasy of delight with his new-found art, and immediately offered to make drawings with his black and red ink of the flowers his sister had brought from the garden. So true and delicate a sensibility, thus early awakened, to the beauty of mere expression, showed the genius of the future painter even more than any skill in delineation he can well be supposed to have displayed in this first attempt. Perhaps the circumstance of the boy having been nurtured among the quiet and gentle affections of a Quaker family was not unfavourable to the growth of so much of the poetical feeling, at least, as he showed on this occasion.

When his father saw this drawing he began to ponder more deeply than ever on the prophecies of his friend the preacher, the fulfilment of which he, doubtless, thought was already begun. As for his son, he went on making ink sketches of birds and flowers, to his own great delight and the admiration of the simple neighbours. For a year he had no other colour than ink, and only a pen for a pencil; nor, in all likelihood, was he aware that any better