ier, Gibbon, Sir Joseph Banks, D'Alembert. We shall commence with
the lives less known to the generality of readers than those of our
great moralist and great political economist, reserving ourselves for
sketches of their career, as our space may allow.

* * * * *

Lord Brougham commences his life of Sir Joseph Banks by a species of
apology, for placing in the ranks of philosophers a man who had never
written a book. But no one has ever doubted that a man may be a
philosopher, without being an author. Some of the greatest inventions of
philosophy, of science, and of practical power, have been the work of
men who never wrote a book. In fact, the inventor is generally a man of
few words; his disciples, or rivals, or imitators, are the men of
description. The inventor gives the idea, the follower gives the
treatise; but the inventor is the philosopher after all. The question,
however, with Sir Joseph Banks is, whether he was any more an inventor
than a writer. It does not appear that he was either. Of course, he has
no right to rank among men of science. But he had merits of his own, and
on those his distinctions ought to have been placed. He was a zealous,
active, and influential friend of philosophers. He gave them his time,
he received them in his house, and he assisted their progress. He
volunteered to be the protector of their class; he sympathised with
their pursuits; and, while adding little or nothing to their
discoveries, he assisted in bringing those discoveries before the world.
He loved to be thought the patriarch of British science; and, like the
patriarch, he retained his authority even when he was past his labour.
If he filled the throne of science feebly, none could deny that he
filled it zealously. The true definition of him was, an English
gentleman occupying his leisure with philosophical pursuits, and
encouraging others of more powerful understanding to do the same.

Sir Joseph Banks was of an old and wealthy family, dating so far back as
Edward III.; first settled in the West Riding of Yorkshire, and
afterwards in the county of Lincoln. He was born in London in January
1743. At the age of nine he was sent to Harrow, and at thirteen to Eton,
where the tutors observed, as has happened in many other instances, that
he was fonder of play than of books. In about a twelvemonth, however, he
became studious, though not to the taste of his schoolmasters. The
origin of this chang