nvita fatebitur usque
Invidia.--HOR., 2 Sat. i. 75.

* * * * *

_Sheer Lane, February 6._

I find some of the most polite Latin authors, who wrote at a time when
Rome was in its glory, speak with a certain noble vanity of the
brightness and splendour of the age in which they lived. Pliny often
compliments his Emperor Trajan upon this head; and when he would
animate him to anything great, or dissuade him from anything that was
improper, he insinuates, that it is befitting or unbecoming the
_claritas et nitor saeculi_, that period of time which was made
illustrious by his reign. When we cast our eyes back on the history of
mankind, and trace them through their several successions to their first
original, we sometimes see them breaking out in great and memorable
actions, and towering up to the utmost heights of virtue and knowledge;
when, perhaps, if we carry our observation to a little distance, we see
them sunk into sloth and ignorance, and altogether lost in darkness and
obscurity. Sometimes the whole species is asleep for two or three
generations, and then again awakens into action, flourishes in heroes,
philosophers, and poets, who do honour to human nature, and leave such
tracts of glory behind them, as distinguish the years in which they
acted their part from the ordinary course of time.

Methinks a man cannot, without a secret satisfaction, consider the glory
of the present age, which will shine as bright as any other in the
history of mankind. It is still big with great events, and has already
produced changes and revolutions which will be as much admired by
posterity, as any that have happened in the days of our fathers, or in
the old times before them. We have seen kingdoms divided and united,
monarchs erected and deposed, nations transferred from one sovereign to
another; conquerors raised to such a greatness as has given a terror to
Europe, and thrown down by such a fall, as has moved their pity.

But it is still a more pleasing view to an Englishman, to see his own
country give the chief influence to so illustrious an age, and stand in
the strongest point of light amidst the diffused glory that surrounds
it.

If we begin with learned men, we may observe, to the honour of our
country, that those who make the greatest figure in most arts and
sciences, are universally allowed to be of the British nation; and what
is more remarkable, that men of the greatest learning ar