therefore paffed weeks and months in transferring large quotations to a common-place book. Yet, why any part of a book, which can be confulted at pleasure, should be copied, I was never able to discover. The hand has no clofer correfpondence with the Memory than the eye. The act of writing itfelf distracts the thoughts, and what is read twice is commonly better remembered than what is tranfcribed. This method therefore confumes time without affifting Memory.

THE true Art of Memory is the Art of Attention. No man will read with much advantage, who is not able, at pleasure, to evacu ate his mind, or who brings not to his Author an intellect defecated and pure, neither turbid with care nor agitated by pleasure. If the repofitories of thought are already full, what can they receive? If the mind is employed on the past or future, the book will be held before the eyes in vain. What is read with delight is commonly retained, because pleasure always fecures attention; but the books which are confulted by occafional neceffity, and perufed with impatience, feldom leave any traces on the mind.

No 75. Saturday, September 22.

N the time when Bafora was confidered

IN

as the School of Afia, and flourished by the reputation of its profeffors and the confluence of its ftudents, among the pupils that liftened round the chair of Albumazar was Gelaleddin, a native of Tauris in Perfia, a young man amiable in his manners and beautiful in his form, of boundless curiofity, inceffant diligence, and irresistible genius, of quick apprehenfion and tenacious memory, accurate without narrowness, and eager for novelty without inconstancy.

No fooner did Gelaleddin appear at Baffora, than his virtues and abilities raised him to distinction. He paffed from class to clafs, rather admired than envied by those whom the rapidity of his progress left behind; he was confulted by his fellow ftudents as an oraculous guide, and admitted as

a competent auditor to the conferences of the

Sages.

AFTER a few years, having paffed through all the exercises of probation, Gelaleddin was invited to a Profeffor's feat, and entreated to increase the splendour of Baffora. Gelaleddin affected to deliberate on the proposal, with which, before he confidered it, he refolved to comply; and next morning retired to a garden planted for the recreation of the ftudents, and entering a folitary walk, began to meditate upon his future life.

"IF I am thus eminent, faid he, in the "regions of Literature, I shall be yet more confpicuous in any other place; if I should "now devote myself to ftudy and retire"ment, I must pass my life in filence, un"acquainted with the delights of wealth, the "influence of power, the pomp of great"ness, and the charms of elegance, with all "that man envies and defires, with all that "keeps the world in motion, by the hope "of gaining or the fear of lofing it. I will "therefore depart to Tauris, where the PerG 3

'fian Monarch refides in all the splendour "of abfolute dominion: my reputation will

fly before me, my arrival will be congra"tulated by my kinsmen and my friends; I "shall see the eyes of those who predicted

46

my greatness sparkling with exultation,

and the faces of thofe that once defpifed me, "clouded with envy, or counterfeiting kind

nefs by artificial fmiles. I will fhew my "wisdom by my difcourfe, and my modera"tion by my filence; I will inftruct the mo"deft with easy gentleness, and repress the "oftentatious by feasonable fupercilioufnefs. "My apartments will be crouded by the in"quifitive and the vain, by thofe that ho"nour and those that rival me; my name "will foon reach the Court; I fhall ftand

before the throne of the Emperor; the "Judges of the Law will confefs my wisdom, "and the Nobles will contend to heap gifts

upon me. If I fhall find that my merit,

like that of others, excites malignity, or "feel myself tottering on the feat of eleva❝tion, I may at last retire to academical ob"fcurity, and become, in my lowest state, "a Profeffor of Baffora."

HAVING thus fettled his determination, he declared to his friends his defign of vifiting Tauris, and faw with more pleasure than he ventured to exprefs, the regret with which he was difmiffed. He could not bear to delay the honours to which he was deftined, and therefore hafted away, and in a short time entered the capital of Perfia. He was immediately immersed in the croud, and passed unobferved to his father's houfe, He entered, and was received, tho' not unkindly, yet without any excess of fondness or exclamations of rapture. His father had, in his abfence, fuffered many loffes, and Gelaleddin was confidered as an additional burthen to a falling family.

WHEN he recovered from his furprize, he began to display his acquifitions, and practised all the arts of narration and difquifition; but the poor have no leifure to be pleased with eloquence; they heard his arguments without reflection, and his pleafantries without a smile. He then applied himself fingly to his brothers and fifters, but found them all chained down by invariable attention to their own fortunes, and infenfible of any other excelG 4

lence