this man evinced a wonderfully
retentive memory, and a fair share of powers of argument; bringing
everything, however, to the standard of his _own times_. It was in
vain we strove to edge in the great _Whig and Tory Reviews_ of the
northern and southern hemispheres! The obdurate champion of other
times would not listen a moment, or stir one inch, in favour of these
latter publications. When he quitted us, we found that he was a ----
of considerable consequence in the neighbourhood, and had acquired his
fortune from the superior sagacity and integrity he had displayed in
consequence of having been educated at the free-school in the village
of ----, one of the few public schools in this kingdom which has not
frustrated the legitimate views of its pious founder, by converting
that into a foppish and expensive establishment which was at once
designed as an asylum for the poor and an academy to teach wisdom and
good morals."

[Footnote 91: See the opening the fourth book of "_The
Task_;" a picture perfectly original and unrivalled in its
manner.]

[Footnote 92: It is not less true, than surprising, that the
ridiculous squabbles, which disgraced both this theatre and
the metropolis, have been deemed deserving of a regular
series of publications in the shape of numbers--1, 2, 3, &c.
As if the subject had not been sufficiently well handled in
the lively sallies and brilliant touches of satire which had
before appeared upon it in the _Monthly Mirror_!]

Philemon was about to reply, with his usual warmth and quickness, to
the latter part of these remarks--as bearing too severely upon the
eminent public seminaries within seventy miles of the metropolis--but
Lysander, guessing his intentions from his manner and attitude, cut
the dialogue short by observing that we did not meet to discuss
subjects of a personal and irritable nature, and which had already
exercised the wits of two redoubted champions of the church--but that
our object, and the object of all rational and manly discussion, was
to state opinions with frankness, without intending to wound the
feelings, or call forth the animadversions, of well-meaning and
respectable characters. "I know," continued he, "that you, Philemon,
have been bred in one of these establishments, under a man as
venerable for his years as he is eminent for his talents and worth;
who employs the leisure of dignified retirement in giving to the wo