rged on their resistless
course, till they were arrested by the Atlantic on the one side, and
the Indian ocean on the other--of the stern crusaders, who, nursed
amid the cloistered shades and castellated realms of Europe, struggled
with that devastating horde "when 'twas strongest, and ruled it when
'twas wildest"--of the long agony, silent decay, and ultimate
resurrection of the Eternal City--are so many immortal pictures,
which, to the end of the world, will fascinate every ardent and
imaginative mind. But, not withstanding this incomparable talent for
general and characteristic description, he had not the mind necessary
for a philosophical analysis of the series of causes which influence
human events. He viewed religion with a jaundiced and prejudiced
eye--the fatal bequest of his age and French education, unworthy alike
of his native candour and inherent strength of understanding. He had
profound philosophic ideas, and occasionally let them out with
admirable effect; but the turn of his mind was essentially
descriptive, and his powers were such, in that brilliant department,
that they wiled him from the less inviting contemplation of general
causes. We turn over his fascinating pages without ever wearying; but
without ever discovering the general progress or apparent tendency of
human affairs. We look in vain for the profound reflections of
Machiavel on the permanent results of certain political combinations
or experiments. He has led us through a "mighty maze;" but he has made
no attempt to show it "not without a plan."

Hume is commonly called a philosophical historian, and so he is; but
he has even less than Gibbon the power of unfolding the general causes
which influence the progress of human events. He was not, properly
speaking, a philosophic historian, but a philosopher writing
history--and these are very different things. The practical statesman
will often make a better delineator of the progress of human affairs
than the philosophic recluse; for he is more practically acquainted
with their secret Springs: it was not in the schools, but the forum or
the palace, that Sallust, Tacitus, and Burke acquired their deep
insight into the human heart. Hume was gifted with admirable sagacity
in political economy; and it is the good sense and depth of his views
on that important subject, then for the first time brought to bear on
the annals of man, that has chiefly gained for him, and with justice,
the character of a