of course endeavours to repeat, to extend, and to prolong it but the objects which fall under the notice of his own fenfes, and his perfonal experience, are infufficient in number and importance to fatisfy his capacity. He is led to enquire what paffed among his forefathers, and in his turn is requested by his progeny to communicate his own remarks, fuperadded to the information of his ancestors.

Such, probably, is the origin of Tradition; a mode of communicating knowledge, once univerfal, and ftill, perhaps, fubfifting in the newly discovered iflands of the Pacific Ocean, on the banks of the Senegal, and at the foot of the Andes. Beneath the fhade of his plantain, the patriarch Indian ftill recites the divine origin of his tribe or family the warlike actions of his anceftor, and of his own perfonal prowefs. The attentive audience carry away the tale, and fupply the defects of memory by the aid of imagination. The ftory fpreads, time gives it a fanction, and. at laft it is found to conftitute the most authentic hiftory, however obfcure and fabulous, of the origin of a nation, after it has emerged from barbarifm, and is become the fear of arts and learning.

In the earlieft and rudeft ftate of literature, if we may give that appellation to the efforts of the intellectual faculties where letters are unknown, is often produced the most animated, and perhaps moft perfect, though leaft artificial, poetry. Hiftoric truth is, indeed, little regarded, as it is addreffed to reafon rather than to fancy; but poetic compofition appears with marks of genius approaching to infpiration. From his memory, er his invention, or from both, the favage is heard to pour forth the fong of war, and to warble the notes of love, warm with the fentiments of a feeling heart, and compenfating the want of regularity and grace, by the ftrength and vivacity of natural expreffion.

If we believe the reprefentations of fome writers, poems equal in length to the moft celebrated Epopeas of Greece and Rome, have been handed down, without the aid of letters, from the remoteft antiquity to the prefent day; and in our own country and times, traditionary tales, poetic and profaic, are known

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to abound in that lowest class among us, who are yet unacquainted with the elements of learning. The tenant of the cottage, ftupid and incurious as he may appear to the polite obferver, has his fund of entertaining knowledge, and knows how to enliven the winter evening with tales of fairies, giants, and inchantments, which he believed on the word of his progenitors, and which his hearers receive with equal pleasure and credulity, intending to tranfmit them to the rifing generation.

The early appearance, and the univerfality of traditional learning, feems to establish the opinion, that the love of knowledge is among the firft and importunate defires inherent to the human heart. We see it believing abfurdity, and admiring nonfenfe; we see it bearing one of the ftrongeft characteristics of natural inclinations, a proneness to neglect reason in pursuit of gratification.

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This ardent love of knowledge which gave rife to tradition, foon invented improvements which fuperfeded its general neceffity. Tradition was foon found to be attended with great inconveniences, and to be defective in its most perfect ftate. A thousand important circumstances muft neceffarily elude the moft retentive memory, and befide the evils refulting from the weaknefs of that faculty, and from the general inclination to exaggerate and embellish the fimplicity of truth, the want written ftandards to appeal to, afforded conftant opportunities for impofition. Uprightnefs of intention, and ftrength of memory, were not always united in those who undertook the recital of events. Accuracy and juftness of representation were rare, and the civil hiftory of every people, without a fingle exception, is, in its first periods, dark and incoherent, fuch indeed as might be expected from oral authority.

The inventor of means to fupply the defects of memory, and to preclude the opportunity of deceit, it is obvious to conclude, would be confidered as a great benefactor to mankind, and elevated by the exuberant gratitude of a rude age, above the rank of humanity. To Theuth, the inventor of letters among the Egyptians, and to the fame perfonage, under the name

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of Hermes among the Greeks, divine honours were paid; an apotheofis furely more juftifiable on principles of reafon, than that of Bacchus the cultivator of the vine, or of Hercules, the cleanfer of a stable.

To communicate their discovery, the inventors of literary fymbols found it neceffary to mark them on fome fubftance fufceptible of impreffion or penetration. What that substance was is a fubject of curious, but unimportant, enquiry. The original mode of infcribing the newly difcovered characters, however conducted, was probably very imperfect; but as it happens in all difcoveries of momentous confequence, the idea of it once started, was pursued with that general ardour and attention, which never fails to produce a great improvement. The ftone, the palm leaf, the biblos or bark of the linden tree, the leaden tablet, the papyrus manufactured into the charta, the parchment, and the pugillares, respectively served, as progreffive advancement fuggested, or as convenience required, to receive the written lucubrations of the antient poet, philofopher, legiflator, and hiftorian.

That many of the nobleft efforts of antient genius, though committed to writing on fubftances fo frail as the papyrus, and fo fubject to erafure as the waxen tablet, should have reached the prefent age, is an event only to be accounted for by fuppofing, that their confpicuous beauties occafioned uncommon vigilance and folicitude in their preservation.

At a very late period, a fubftance formed of macerated linen, was found fuperior in beauty, convenience, and duration, and better adapted to the purposes of literature, than all the prior devices of mechanical ingenuity. It derived its name from the flag that grew on the banks of the Nile, which, though it in fome degree refembled, it greatly excelled. Porous, yet of firm contexture, it admitted the infcription of characters with a facility, equalled only by the retention with which it preferved them. By the eafe with which it is procured and infcribed, it refcued the antient authors from the poffibility of oblivion, and may ftrictly be faid

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to have formed that monument more durable than brass, which a celebrated poet prophefied to himself with a confidence, juftified at length by the accomplishment of his prediction.

No. CXXXVII. ON THE CIRCUMSTANCES WHICH LED TO THE DISCOVERY OF THE ART OF PRINTING, WITH MISCELLANEOUS REMARKS ON IT.

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HE bufinefs of transcribing the remains of Grecian and Roman literature, became an useful, an innocent, and a pleafing employ to many of thofe who, in the dark ages, would elfe have pined in the liftlefs languor of monaftic retirement. Exempt from the avocations of civil life, incapable of literary exertion from the want of books and opportunities' of improve ment, they devoted the frequent intervals of religious duty, to the tranfcription of authors whom they often little unde rftood. The fervile office of a mere copyift was not difdained by those who knew not to invent; and the writers in the fcriptorium were infpired with an emulation to excel, in the beauty and variety of their illuminations, the fidelity of their copy, and the multitude of their performances.

But when every letter of every copy was to be formed by the immediate operation of the hand, the most perfevering affiduity could effect but little. They appear not to have been written with the rapidity of a modern tranfcriber, but with a formal ftiffness, or a correct elegance, equally inconfiftent with expedition. They were therefore rare, and confequently much valued, and whenever fold, were fold at a great price. Few indeed, but crowned and mitred heads, or incorporated communities, were able to procure a number fufficient to merit the appellation of a Library; and even the boafted libraries of princes and prelates, were fuch, as are now easily exceeded by every private collection. To be poor, with whatever ability or inclination, was,

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at one time, an infurmountable obstacle to literary improvement: and, perhaps, we indulge an unreasonable acrimony in our general cenfure of Monkish floth and ignorance, not confidering that an involuntary fault ceafes to be blameable; that ignorance is inevitable where the means of information are scarce; and that floth is not to be avoided, where the requifites of proper employment are not attainable without great expence, or earneft folicitation..

It was, perhaps, lefs with a view to obviate thefe inconveniencies, than from the interested motives of deriving greater gain by exacting the ufual price for copies multiplied with more eafe and expedition, that a new mode was at length practifed, derived from the Invention of the Art of Printing, a discovery which, of all thofe recorded in civil hiftory, is of the most important and extenfive confequence.

That the firft productions of the prefs were intended to pafs for manufcripts, we are led to conclude from the refemblance of the type to the written characters, from the omiffion of illuminations which were to be fupplied by the pen to facilitate the deception, and from the inventor's concealment of his procefs, fo far as to incur fufpicion of witchcraft or magic, by which alone the firft obfervers could account for the extraordinary multiplication of the tranfcripts or copies.

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But the deceit was foon detected. femblance in the fhape of the letters, in the place and number of the words on every page, the fingular correctness, and above all the numerous copies of the fame author, inevitably led to a discovery of the truth. To conceal it, indeed, was no longer defired, when experience had fuggefted the great lucrative advantages, and the practicability of multiplying books without end by the process newly invented. It foon appeared, though it was not obvious at firft, that the new mode would be more agreeable to the reader, as well as eafier to the copyift, and that printed books would univerfally fuperfede the use of manufcripts, from a choice founded on judicious preference. The art was foon professed as a trade, and the business of copying, which had once afforded only amusement or gain to the curious and the idle, became the conftant employment and fupport

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