Page:Modern Literature Volume 3 (1804).djvu/210

This page needs to be proofread.
  • sophy and powers of reasoning, than beneath

Rousseau in creative fancy and persuasive eloquence; and twenty pages of Hume could effect more towards any purpose he chose, than a thousand pages of St. Leon; and St. Leon's chief work is a mere expatiation on a principle of Hume, carried to greater extravagance than Hume himself ever attempted; but as St. Leon has imitated Hume, in attempting to sap the foundations of morality and religion, let him remember that such writings constitute but a small part of Hume's literary labours; and that he has left one work of unusual magnitude replete with sound wisdom, and (with certain exceptions) one of the most beneficial to mankind, that graced the eighteenth century. Meaning no sneering insult to St. Leon, I shall not affect to compare him to Hume, but immeasurably below that philosopher, as this