has produced this difgraceful effect; but that it has not a fimilar operation on all, is abundantly evinced by fuch examples as thofe of a Judd, and a White *, and of many whofe munificence now flows in other channels, not less copious or useful. *The founder of St. John's College in Oxford, and a Lord Mayor of London. He was a member of the Merchant Taylors Company, and allotted thirty-feven fellowships in the college to their very ancient and capital ichool, founded and nobly fupported at their expence, UNAIDED BY ANY ENDOWMENT. I hope it will not be difagreeable if I add the following anecdote from Mr. Warton, of the favourite school and college of Sir Thomas White. "RICHARD MULCASTER, from King's College, in Cambridge, was removed to a ftudentship of Christchurch in Oxford, about the year 1555, and foon afterwards, on account of his diftinguithed accomplishments in philology, was appointed first master of Merchant Taylors fchool in London. Merchant Taylors fchool was then just founded as a profeminary for St. John's College, in a house called THE MANOR OF THE ROSE, IN ST. LAURENCE POUNTNEY, BY THE COMPANY OF MERCHANT TAYLORS. St. John's College had been then established about feven years, which Mulcafter foon filled with excellent fcholars till the year 1586. In the Latin plays acted before queen Elizabeth, and James the First, at Oxford, the ftudents of this college were diftinguished. This was in confequence of their being educated under MULCASTER." Sir Thomas White gave one of his fellowships to Tunbridge-School. Charitable Charitable foundations, unthought of in many other countries, and fuch as reflect honour on human nature, are continually raised and supported by the citizens of London. Thus are we able to trace much of the national learning and the national beneficence, thofe eminent qualities which have added an unrivalled brilliancy to the British character, to the fame fertile fource. Yes, Gentlemen; an impartial review will justify the affertion, that learning in England is more indebted for thofe nurseries of it, the grammar fchools eftablished in almoft every town * in the king *Two of the greateft grammar-schools in the capital of the British empire are feverally fupported by the Merchant Taylors and the Mercers Companies. The Charterhoufe was alfo founded by a citizen; and I believe it would be easy to enumerate a very confiderable number of FREE or GRAMMAR SCHOOLS founded and fupported in this country by CITIZENS; a truth mot honourable to the COMMERCIAL CHARACTER. Many of the other City Companies have Free Schools in the country, and from all thefe together have chiefly originated the OFFICIATING clergy, and much of that light which has fo remarkably enlightened the MIDDLE RANKS of this illuftrious nation. I beg leave to remark. that a FREE school. (fchola libera) does not always fignify, as it is commonly 2 2 kingdom, and confequently for the nobleft productions of learning, to city corporations, 66 commonly fuppofed, a fchool in which children of any defcription are to be taught FREE OF COST;" but a LIBERAL or genteel fchool, in oppofition to inferior schools, where only mechanical or low qualifications are taught. By "FREE" fays the learned Mr. Bryant, fpeaking of the word in its antient fignification, is fignified any "thing genteel or liberal: alfo any thing elegant "and graceful." Such, indeed, are the schools in which is chiefly to be fought a LIBERAL EDUCATION, or that kind of improvement which is recommended in this book, and which Plato defcribes in the following paffage tranflated by Mr. Harris. Socrates denies not the usefulness of education in the practice of lucrative and mechanical arts; but he afferts, that the more comprehenfive kind of it, which he calls LIBERAL, tends to effect more generous and more valuable purposes. Ἡδὺς ἔι, ὅτι ἔοικας δεδιότι τοὺς πολλοὺς μὴ δοκῆς ΑΧΡΗ ΣΤΑ ΜΑΘΗΜΑΤΑ προσατειν" Τὸ δ' ἐτὶν ου πάνυ φαῦλον, αλλα χαλεπὸν πιςευσαι, ὅτι ἐν τόύοις τοις μαθήμασιν έκασε Τους ΟΡΓΑΝΟΝ ΤΙ ΨΥΧΗΣ ΕΚΚΑΘΑΙΡΕΤΑΙ, ΚΑΙ ΑΝΑΖΩΠΥΡΕΙΤΑΙ, ΑΠΟΛΛΥΜΕΝΟΝ ΚΑΙ ΤΥΦΛΟΥΜΕΝΟΝ ΥΠΟ ΤΩΝ ΑΛΛΩΝ ΕΠΙΤΗΔΕΥΜΑΤΩΝ, ΚΡΕΙΤΤΟΝ ΟΝ ΣΩΘΗΝΑΙ ΜΥΡΙΩΝ ΟΜΜΑΤΩΝ ΜΟΝΩ ΓΑΡ ΑΥΤΩ ΑΛΗΘΕΙΑ ΟΡΑΤΑΙ. You are pleafant, fays he, in your feeming to fear the multitude, left you should be thought to enjoin certain fciences that are USELESS. 'Tis indeed no contemptible matter, though a difficult one, to believe, that through thefe particular fciences the SOUL HAS AN ORGAN PURIFIED porations, and to individual citizens, than to others, who, from their hereditary rank and power, might have monopolized the enviable privilege of calling forth genius, and of diffufing, by well-established foundations, the polish and the light of learning throughout an empire. From you, then, who appear to inherit the sentiments, with the trust reposed in your predeceffors, every attempt to improve the modes of education, originating from a place which you have ever patronized with peculiar partiality, will for that reafon be fure to find a favourable reception. PURIFIED AND ENLIGHTENED, WHICH IS DESTROYED AND BLINDED BY STUDIES OF OTHER KINDS; ΑΝ ORGAN BETTER WORTH SAVING THAN A THOUSAND EYES; IN AS MUCH AS TRUTH BECOMES VISIBLE THROUGH THIS ALONE. PLATO de Repub. INTELLECTUAL GOOD (fays the liberal writer from whom the above tranflation is taken), is the good of that part which is moft excellent within us; it is a good accommodated to all places and times, which NEITHER DEPENDS ON THE WILL OF OTHERS, nor on the affluence of external fortune; it is a good which decays not with decaying appetites, but often rifes in vigour when thofe are no more. a 3 I have |