irtue
strengthened; the world and mankind were shown to him without a mask;
and he was taught to consider everything as trifling and unworthy of the
attention of a wise man except the pursuit of knowledge and practice of
virtue in that state wherein God hath placed us."

To this character Mr. Mason has added a more particular account of
Gray's skill in zoology. He has remarked that Gray's effeminacy was
affected most "before those whom he did not wish to please;" and that he
is unjustly charged with making knowledge his sole reason of preference,
as he paid his esteem to none whom he did not likewise believe to be
good.

What has occurred to me from the slight inspection of his letters in
which my undertaking has engaged me is, that his mind had a large grasp;
that his curiosity was unlimited, and his judgment cultivated; that he
was a man likely to love much where he loved at all; but that he was
fastidious and hard to please. His contempt, however, is often employed,
where I hope it will be approved, upon scepticism and infidelity. His
short account of Shaftesbury (author of the "Characteristics") I will
insert:--

"You say you cannot conceive how Lord Shaftesbury came to be a
philosopher in vogue; I will tell you: first, he was a lord; secondly,
he was as vain as any of his readers; thirdly, men are very prone
to believe what they do not understand; fourthly, they will believe
anything at all, provided they are under no obligation to believe
it; fifthly, they love to take a new road, even when that road leads
nowhere; sixthly, he was reckoned a fine writer, and seems always to
mean more than he said. Would you have any more reasons? An interval of
about forty years has pretty well destroyed the charm. A dead lord ranks
with commoners; vanity is no longer interested in the matter, for a new
road has become an old one."

Mr. Mason has added, from his own knowledge, that though Gray was poor
he was not eager of money, and that out of the little that he had he
was very willing to help the necessitous. As a writer, he had this
peculiarity--that he did not write his pieces first rudely, and then
correct them, but laboured every line as it arose in the train of
composition; and he had a notion, not very peculiar, that he could not
write but at certain times, or at happy moments--a fantastic foppery to
which my kindness for a man of learning and virtue wishes him to have
been superior.

Gray's poetry is now to be cons