he loft the ability to perform, juft when the great oc cafion called for all his efforts to engage.

The fame ambition that prompted him to be a politician, actuated him as a philofopher. His aims were equally great and extenfive in both capacities: unwilling to fubmit to any in the one, or any authority in the other, he entered the fields of fcience with a thorough contempt of all that had been established before him, and feemed willing to think every thing wrong, that he might fhew his faculty in the reformation. It might have been better for his quiet as a man, if he had been content to act a fubordinate character in the ftate; and it had certainly been better for his memory as a writer, if he had aimed at doing less than he attempted. Wifdom in morals, like every other art or fcience, is an accumulation that numbers have contributed to increase; and it is not for one fingle man to pretend, that he can add more to the heap, than the thousands that have gone before him. Such innovations more frequently retard, than promote knowledge; their maxims are more agreeable to the reader, by having the glofs of novelty to recommend them, than those which are trite, only because they are Such men are therefore followed at firft with avidity, nor is it till fome time that their disciples begin to find their error. They often, though too late, perceive that they have been following a fpeculative enquiry, while they have been leaving a practical good; and while they have been practifing the arts of doubting, they have been lofing all firmness of principle, which might tend to establish the rectitude of their private conduct. As a moralift therefore Lord Bolingbroke, by having endeavoured at too much, feems to have done nothing: but as a political writer few can equal and none can exceed him. As he was a practical politician,

true.

his writings are lefs filled with thofe fpeculative illu fions, which are the refult of folitude and feclufion. He wrote them with a certainty of their being oppofed, fifted, examined, and reviled; he therefore took care to build them up of fuch materials, as could not be eafily overthrown: they prevailed at the times in which they were written, they ftill continue to the admiration of the prefent age, and will probably laft for ever,

THE

THE

PREFACE

TO

DR, BROOKES's

NEW AND ACCURATE SYSTEM OF

NATURAL HISTORY.

PUBLISHED IN THE YEAR 1763.