You are now come to an age capable of reflection; and I hope you will
do, what however few people at your age do, exert it, for your own
sake, in the search of truth and sound knowledge. I will confess (for
I am not unwilling to discover my secrets to you) that it is not many
years since I have presumed to reflect for myself. Till sixteen or
seventeen I had no reflection, and for many years after that I made no
use of what I had. I adopted the notions of the books I read, or the
company I kept, without examining whether they were just or not; and I
rather chose to run the risk of easy error, than to take the time and
trouble of investigating truth. Thus, partly from laziness, partly
from dissipation, and partly from the _mauvaise honte_ of rejecting
fashionable notions, I was (as I since found) hurried away by
prejudices, instead of being guided by reason; and quietly cherished
error, instead of seeking for truth. But since I have taken the
trouble of reasoning for myself, and have had the courage to own that
I do so, you cannot imagine how much my notions of things are altered,
and in how different a light I now see them, from that in which I
formerly viewed them through the deceitful medium of prejudice or
authority. Nay, I may possibly still retain many errors, which, from
long habit, have perhaps grown into real opinions; for it is very
difficult to distinguish habits, early acquired and long entertained,
from the result of our reason and reflection.
My first prejudice (for I do not mention the prejudices of boys and
women, such as hobgoblins, ghosts, dreams, spilling salt, &c.) was my
classical enthusiasm, which I received from the books I read, and the
masters who explained them to me. I was convinced there had been no
common sense nor common honesty in the world for these last fifteen
hundred years; but that they were totally extinguished with the
ancient Greek and Roman governments. Homer and Virgil could have no
faults, because they were ancient; Milton and Tasso could have no
merit, because they were modern. And I could almost have said, with
regard to the ancients, what Cicero, very absurdly and unbecomingly
for a philosopher, says with regard to Plato, _Cum quo errare malim
quam cum aliis recte sentire_. Whereas now, without any extraordinary
effort of genius, I have discovered that nature was the same three
thousand years ago as it is at present; that men were but men then as
well as now; that modes and customs vary often, but that human nature
is always the same. And I can no more suppose, that men were better,
braver, or wiser, fifteen hundred or three thousand years ago, than I
can suppose that the animals or vegetables were better then than
they are now. I dare assert too, in defiance of the favourers of the
ancients, that Homer's hero Achilles was both a brute and a scoundrel,
and consequently an improper character for the hero of an epic poem;
he had so little regard for his country, that he would not act in
defence of it, because he had quarrelled with Agamemnon about a--; and
then afterwards, animated by private resentment only, he went about
killing people basely, I will call it, because he knew himself
invulnerable; and yet, invulnerable as he was, he wore the strongest
armour in the world; which I humbly apprehend to be a blunder; for a
horseshoe clapped to his vulnerable heel would have been sufficient.
On the other hand, with submission to the favourers of the moderns,
I assert with Mr. Dryden, that the Devil is in truth the hero of
Milton's poem: his plan, which he lays, pursues, and at last executes,
being the subject of the poem. From all which considerations I
impartially conclude that the ancients had their excellencies and
their defects, their virtues and their vices, just like the moderns:
pedantry and affectation of learning clearly decide in favour of
the former; vanity and ignorance, as peremptorily, in favour of the
latter. Religious prejudices kept pace with my classical ones; and
there was a time when I thought it impossible for the honestest man in
the world to be saved, out of the pale of the Church of England: not
considering that matters of opinion do not depend upon the will;
and that it is as natural, and as allowable, that another man should
differ in opinion from me, as that I should differ from him; and that,
if we are both sincere, we are both blameless, and should consequently
have mutual indulgences for each other.
The next prejudices I adopted were those of the _beau monde_, in
which, as I was determined to shine, I took what are commonly called
the genteel vices to be necessary. I had heard them reckoned so, and
without further inquiry, I believed it; or at least should have been
ashamed to have denied it, for fear of exposing myself to the ridicule
of those whom I considered as the models of fine gentlemen. But now I
am neither ashamed nor afraid to assert, that those genteel vices, as
they are falsely called, are only so many blemishes in the character
of even a man of the world, and what is called a fine gentleman, and
degrade him in the opinion of those very people, to whom he hopes to
recommend himself by them. Nay, this prejudice often extends so far,
that I have known people pretend to vices they had not, instead of
carefully concealing those they had.
Use and assert your own reason; reflect, examine, and analyze
everything, in order to form a sound and mature judgement; let no
[Greek: outos epha] impose upon your understanding, mislead your
actions, or dictate your conversation. Be early what, if you are not,
you will when too late wish you had been. Consult your reason betimes:
I do not say, that it will always prove an unerring guide; for human
reason is not infallible; but it will prove the least erring guide
that you can follow. Books and conversation may assist it; but adopt
neither, blindly and implicitly: try both by that best rule which God
has given to direct us, reason. Of all the troubles, do not decline,
as many people do, that of thinking.