lsams. The man of genius amidst many a circle may exclaim with
Themistocles, "I cannot fiddle, but I can make a little village a great
city;" and with Corneille, he may be allowed to smile at his own
deficiencies, and even disdain to please in certain conventional manners,
asserting that "wanting all these things, he was not the less Corneille."

But with the great thinkers and students, their character is still more
obdurate. ADAM SMITH could never free himself from the embarrassed manners
of a recluse; he was often absent, and his grave and formal conversation
made him seem distant and reserved, when in fact no man had warmer
feelings for his intimates. One who knew Sir ISAAC NEWTON tells us, that
"he would sometimes be silent and thoughtful, and look all the while as if
he were saying his prayers." A French princess, desirous of seeing the
great moralist NICOLLE, experienced an inconceivable disappointment when
the moral instructor, entering with the most perplexing bow imaginable,
silently sank into his chair. The interview promoted no conversation, and
the retired student, whose elevated spirit might have endured martyrdom,
shrunk with timidity in the unaccustomed honour of conversing with a
princess and having nothing to say. Observe Hume thrown into a most
ridiculous attitude by a woman of talents and coterie celebrity. Our
philosopher was called on to perform his part in one of those inventions
of the hour to which the fashionable, like children in society, have
sometimes resorted to attract their world by the rumour of some new
extravagance. In the present, poor HUME was to represent a sultan on a
sofa, sitting between two slaves, who were the prettiest and most
vivacious of Parisians. Much was anticipated from this literary
exhibition. The two slaves were ready at repartee, but the utter
simplicity of the sultan displayed a blockishness which blunted all edge.
The phlegmatic metaphysician and historian only gave a sign of life by
repeating the same awkward gesture, and the same ridiculous exclamation,
without end. One of the fair slaves soon discovered the unchangeable
nature of the forlorn philosopher, impatiently exclaiming, "I guessed as
much, never was there such a calf of a man!"--"Since this affair," adds
Madame d'Epinay, "Hume is at present banished to the class of spectators."
The philosopher, indeed, had formed a more correct conception of his own
character than the volatile sylphs of the Parisian circl