Memoirs of John Horne Tooke

Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER li. I786. Mr. Home Toolte publishes the Jirst edition of the Diversions of Parley. THE year I786 forms an important epoch in Mr. Tooke's life, for it was then that he published vol. i of the EIIEA HTEPOENTA, or the Diversions of Purley. From early youth he had addicted himself to a course of study,...
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Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER li. I786. Mr. Home Toolte publishes the Jirst edition of the Diversions of Parley. THE year I786 forms an important epoch in Mr. Tooke's life, for it was then that he published vol. i of the EIIEA HTEPOENTA, or the Diversions of Purley. From early youth he had addicted himself to a course of study, by which he was well qualified to obtain distinction on the present occasion; nor was it a subject unsusceptible of labour, or of genius, for, to use his own words, although, as the foundation of all other knowledge, grammar be one of the first things taught, it is always the least understood. In compliance with the custom of the ancients, he adopted the didactic form of a dialect, in which himself and his old friend Dr. Bea- don were the two principal speakers; a third person being admitted merely out of compliment, which was also extended to his resi- dence-f-, by the name of which, the work in question has been nsually designated. Of that work, which, by its acateness, originality, and profnndity, first produced a great change in the public mind, and finally obtained for him the reputation of the greatest philologist of the age, I shall content myself with a brief account: This ' humble offering' is dedicated to the university of Cambridge, by one of her grateful sons, who always considers acts of voluntary justice towards himself, as favours. And particularly to her chief ornament for virtue and talents, the reverend Dr. Beadon, master of Jesus College. In the introduction, the author declare grammar to be absolutely necessary in tbe search after philosophical truth; which, if not the most useful, perhaps, is at least the most pleasing employment of the human mind. And I think it no less necessary, adds he, in the Mr. W. Tooke. f Purley....