of the subordinate functionary being of higher rank than the supreme. Lord Hobart appealed to the Court of Directors, but their decision was superseded by the return of Lord Hobart, who was succeeded by Lord Clive; and in the beginning of 1798, Sir John Shore, who a few months before his retirement, was raised, as we have seen, to the peerage, returned to England, having been succeeded by Lord Mornington.

Lord Teignmouth lived in habits of familiar intercourse with Sir William Jones at Calcutta, and succeeded him as president of the Asiatic Society. In that capacity, he delivered, on the 22d May 1794, a warm and elegant eulogy of his prede cessor, and in 1804 published memoirs of his life, writings, and correspondence. It is, upon the whole, a pleasing piece of biography, recording almost every thing interesting in his public and private character, partly in his own familiar correspondence, and transferring to the reader much of the respect and admiration for that extraordinary man, with which the writer was himself impressed. The work is closed with a delineation of Sir William Jones's character, which, though it might have exhibited greater force and discrimination, could not well have been presented in chaster and more

interesting colours. The fault of the work is the redundancy of the materials which Lord Teignmouth deemed it necessary to work up into it. For instance, the long and verbose correspondence between Jones and Revicksky, afterwards imperial ambassador to the court of St. James, chiefly in Latin, is translated and incorporated with the book, the originals being given in the Appendix ; but the greater part of these letters contribute little to the development of Sir William Jones's mind or feelings; and though they give occasional intimations of his studies, and general remarks upon Asiatic literature, yet they are too slight to satisfy curiosity, and too declamatory and enthusiastic to be instructive or amusing. There is something sickening too in the mutual eulogium with which each bespatters the other. They display, however, the astonishing command of Jones over the Latin idiom. At the same time, it is scarcely possible to suppress an angry, almost a contemptuous, feeling, when we perceive to what an extravagant eminence he is inclined to raise the Asiatic poets. "In harum litterarum," he says of the classics, "amore non patiar ut me vincas, ita enim incredibiliter illis delector, nihil ut suprà possit: equidem poesi Græcorum jam inde a puero ita delectabar, ut ni

hil mihi Pindari carminibus elatius, nihil Anacreonte dulcius, nihil Sapphús, Archilochi,* Alcæi, ac Simonidis aureis illis reliquiis politius aut nitidius esse videretur. At cum poesem Arabicam et Persicam degustarem, illico exarescere The

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remainder of the letter is lost: but that a classical scholar should avow that his enthusiam for the Greek poets became frigid when he had made himself acquainted with Asiatic poetry, is scarcely credible. Dr. Parr has more than once, in the hearing of the individual who is writing these pages, thundered out his reprehension of his old friend and pupil, for having thus given utterance to what he called "a damnable heresy."

Lord Teignmouth inserted also the correspondence of Jones with Schultens, the celebrated Dutch orientalist. The letters are written with the

flowing pure Latinity, which distinguishes those to Revicksky. They are obviously the product of a mind disciplined to a severe classical taste, but not remarkable for depth of thought or fertility of sentiment. Every thing is panegyric and hyperbole. The relative merits of the Asiatic and European writers are contrasted, but no vigour of conception fixes the attention, and they are barren of the nice

Might one be permitted to ask, what remains of Archilochus Sir William Jones could have had access to?

and happy discrimination essential to comparative criticism. It is in his letters to his friends in England, on political subjects, that we must trace the more genuine picture of his mind. These contain greater variety of thought and strength of feeling, and certainly more striking indications of a mascuEine understanding, than can be found in any other parts of this various, diligent, but much too highlyrated man's writings. That Jones went out to India strongly tinctured with republican opinions, is no longer questionable. Lord Teignmouth, however, seems influenced by an amiable disinclination to attribute them to Sir William Jones. Yet Paley said of him, “ he was a great republican when I knew him; the principles, which he then avowed so decidedly, he certainly never afterwards disclaimed." This is corroborated in one of his latest letters, in which he remarks, with some emphasis, that “the political opinions he had imbibed in early life he still held, and should never relinquish." These opinions he re-asserted three years only before his death, in a letter to Dr. Price, dated "Krishnagur, September 14, 1790," thanking him for a copy of his celebrated sermon. In this letter, Sir William Jones exclaims: "When I think of the late glorious revolution in France, I cannot help applying to my poor infatuated country the

words which Tully once applied to Gaul: "Ex omnibus terris Britannia sola communi non ardet incendio." It is singular that Lord Teignmouth should have expunged this passage from the letter to Dr. Price; a writer in the Asiatic Journal called public attention to the omission.* If intentional, the omission was unfair and disingenuous; for, as Paley remarked, "the sentiments of such a man as Sir William Jones ought neither to be extenuated nor withheld." On the other hand, it may be perceived, from other letters of Jones, that he was a friend to our mixed constitution, as established at the revolution;-a sentiment decidedly adverse to unqualified republicanism.

We believe that the truth, as it generally does, lies in the mean. Sir William Jones went out to India with decided notions as to the duty and right of resistance, as established by the revolution of 1688. His celebrated dialogue asserts the right and the correlative duty of resistance, but limited by the principles avowed by Lord Somers and the great leaders of that event; and it was upon these grounds successfully defended by Lord Erskine, on the trial of the Dean of St. Asaph. Of the French revolution, in its commencement, Lord Teignmouth admits, that he entertained a favourable opinion; See vol. iv. p. 203.