At home all day; wrote to my Sister.
1 Mr. Cranch return'd, in the Evening, and brought a number of English News Papers
with him. All, as common, full of nothing.
A Declamation to be spoken on Wednesday June 7th. 1786.
“Varro, the most learned of the Romans, thought, since Nature is the same wherever
we go, that this single circumstance was sufficient to remove all objections to change
of Place,
{ 18 } taken by itself and stripped of the other inconveniences which attend exile. M. Brutus,
thought it enough, that those, who go into banishment cannot be hindered from carrying
their Virtue along with them. Now, if any one judge that each of these comforts is
in itself insufficient, he must however confess that both of them joined together,
are able to remove the terrors of exile. For, what trifles must all we leave behind
us be esteemed, in comparison of the two most precious things which men can enjoy,
and which we are sure, will follow us wherever we turn our steps, the same Nature,
and our proper Virtue? Believe me, the providence of God, has established such an
order in the World, that of all which belongs to us the least valuable parts can alone
fall under the will of others. Whatever is best is safest; lies out of the reach of
human power; can neither be given nor taken away. Such is this great and beautiful
work of nature, the world. Such is the mind of man, which contemplates and admires
the world whereof it makes the noblest part. These are inseparably ours, and as long
as we remain in one we shall enjoy the other. Let us march therefore intrepidly wherever
we are led by the course of human accidents. Wherever they lead us, on what coast
soever we are thrown by them, we shall not find ourselves absolutely strangers. We
shall meet with men and women, creatures of the same figure, endowed with the same
faculties, and born under the same laws of nature. We shall see the same Virtues and
Vices, flowing from the same general Principles, but varied in a thousand different
and contrary modes, according to that infinite variety of laws and customs which is
established for the same universal end, the preservation of Society. We shall feel
the same revolution of Seasons, and the same Sun and Moon will guide the course of
our year. The same azure vault, bespangled with stars will be every where spread over
our heads. There is no part of the world from whence we may not admire those planets
which roll, like ours, in different orbits round the same central Sun; from whence
we may not discover an object still more stupendous, that army of fixed Stars, hung
up in the immense Space of the Universe, innumerable Suns, whose beams, enlighten
and cherish the unknown worlds which roll around them; and whilst I am ravished by
such contemplations as these, whilst my soul is thus raised up to heaven, it imports
me little what ground I tread upon.”
Bolingbroke, Reflections upon Exile.2