he sank under his continued studies, and perished a martyr to
literature. Our literary history abounds with instances of the sad
effects of an over indulgence in study: that agreeable writer,
Howel, had nearly lost his life by an excess of this nature,
studying through long nights in the depth of winter. This severe study
occasioned an imposthume in his head; he was eighteen days without
sleep; and the illness was attended with many other afflicting
symptoms. The eager diligence of Blackmore, protracting his studies
through the night, broke his health, and obliged him to fly to a
country retreat. Harris, the historian, died of a consumption by
midnight studies, as his friend Hollis mentions. I shall add a
recent instance, which I myself witnessed: it is that of John
Macdiarmid. He was one of those Scotch students whom the golden
fame of Hume and Robertson attracted to the metropolis. He mounted the
first steps of literary adventure with credit; and passed through
the probation of editor and reviewer, till he strove for more
heroic adventures. He published some volumes, whose subjects
display the aspirings of his genius: "An Inquiry into the Nature of
Civil and Military Subordination;" another into "the System of
Military Defence." It was during these labours I beheld this
inquirer, of a tender frame, emaciated, and study-worn, with
hollow eyes, where the mind dimly shone like a lamp in a tomb. With
keen ardour he opened a new plan of biographical politics. When, by
one who wished the author was in better condition, the dangers of
excess in study were brought to his recollection, he smiled, and,
with something of a mysterious air, talked of unalterable confidence
in the powers of his mind; of the indefinite improvement in our
faculties: and, with this enfeebled frame, considered himself
capable of continuous labour. His whole life, indeed, was one
melancholy trial. Often the day cheerfully passed without its meal,
but never without its page. The new system of political biography
was advancing, when our young author felt a paralytic stroke. He
afterwards resumed his pen; and a second one proved fatal. He lived
just to pass through the press his "Lives of British Statesmen," a
splendid quarto, whose publication he owed to the generous temper
of a friend, who, when the author could not readily procure a
publisher, would not see the dying author's last hope disappointed.
Some research and reflection are combined in this li