tyranny, and his ethics to encourage
licentiousness. Though an enemy to religion, he partakes nothing of
the spirit of scepticism; but is as positive and dogmatical as if human
reason, and his reason in particular, could attain a thorough conviction
in these subjects. Clearness and propriety of style are the chief
excellencies of Hobbes's writings. In his own person, he is represented
to have been a man of virtue; a character nowise surprising,
notwithstanding his libertine system of ethics. Timidity is the
principal fault with which he is reproached; he lived to an extreme old
age, yet could never reconcile himself to the thoughts of death. The
boldness of his opinions and sentiments form a remarkable contrast to
this part of his character. He died in 1679, aged ninety-one.

Harrington's Oceana was well adapted to that age, when the plans of
imaginary republics were the daily subjects of debate and conversation;
and even in our time, it is justly admired as a work of genius and
invention. The idea however, of a perfect and immortal commonwealth,
will always be found as chimerical as that of a perfect and immortal
man. The style of this author wants ease and fluency; but the good
matter which his work contains, makes compensation. He died in 1677,
aged sixty-six.

Harvey is entitled to the glory of having made, by reasoning alone,
without any mixture of accident, a capital discovery in one of the most
important branches of science. He had also the happiness of establishing
at once his theory on the most solid and convincing proofs; and
posterity has added little to the arguments suggested by his industry
and ingenuity. His treatise of the circulation of the blood is further
embellished by that warmth and spirit which so naturally accompany the
genius of invention. This great man was much favored by Charles I.,
who gave him the liberty of using all the deer in the royal forests
for perfecting his discoveries on the generation of animals. It was
remarked, that no physician in Europe, who had reached forty years of
age, ever, to the end of his life, adopted Harvey's doctrine of the
circulation of the blood; and that his practice in London diminished
extremely, from the reproach drawn upon him by that great and signal
discovery. So slow is the progress of truth in every science, even when
not opposed by factious or superstitious prejudices. He died in 1657,
aged seventy-nine.

This age affords great materials for history