University of Virginia Library

LETTER XXIII.

I have just received your letter of the 17th, and
thank you for it, as I am always gratified at hearing from
you. Perhaps you could not do better than to begin Hume
(as you have read it once) with the reign of Elizabeth, and
read with attention that important period, and also the reign
of Charles I., the Protectorate, and Charles and James II.
The civil wars cannot be studied too deeply.

I have very pleasing intelligence of your old companion
St. George. He was well, at Paris, on the 25th of October;
has made great proficiency in drawing, and will soon begin
sculpture on fine stones, (seals, &c.,) and painting.

Voltaire is a most sprightly, agreeable writer, but not always
to be depended upon for facts. His Charles XII. and
Peter are his most accurate works. The Siécle de Louis
XIV. is, upon the whole, not an unfaithful history; and, as a
picture of the manners of that age, is unique. Compare
the Dutch now, with what they were then. I sometimes
try to believe that their present degradation is a visitation of
God for the massacre of the De Witts. May we, my dear
son, take warning of the fate of that once powerful republic.
Their cruel task-master is now forging chains for us.

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God bless you—and make you good, and learned, and
happy. The two first are in your own power.