COLLECTED FROM GOOD AUTHORITIES,
By JOHN ROBISON, A. M.
PROFESSOR OF NATURAL PHILOSOPHY, AND SECRETARY TO THE
ROYAL SOCIETY OF EDINBURGH.
Nam tua res agitur paries cum proximus ardet.
The THIRD EDITION.
To which is added a Postscript.
PHILADELPHIA:
PRINTED FOR T. DOBSON, No. 41, SOUTH SECOND
STREET, AND W. COBBET, No. 25, NORTH
SECOND STREET.
1798.
TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE
WILLIAM WYNDHAM,
SECRETARY AT WAR, &c. &c. &c.
S I R,
It was with great satisfaction that I learned from aFriend that you coincided with me in the opinion, that theinformation contained in this Performance would make auseful impression on the minds of my Countrymen.
I have presumed to inscribe it with your Name, that Imay publicly express the pleasure which I felt, when I foundthat neither a separation for thirty years, nor the pressure ofthe most important business, had effaced your kind remembranceof a College Acquaintance, or abated that obligingand polite attention with which you favoured me in thoseearly days of life.
The friendship of the accomplished and the worthy is thehighest honour; and to him who is cut off, by want of health,from almost every other enjoyment, it is an inestimable blessing.Accept, therefore, I pray, of my grateful acknowledgments,and of my earnest wishes for your Health, Prosperity,and increasing Honour.
With sentiments of the greatest Esteem and Respect,
I am, SIR,
Your most obedient,
and most humble Servant,
JOHN ROBISON.
Edinburgh,
September 5, 1797.
Quod si quis verâ vitam ratione gubernet,
Divitiæ grandes homini sunt, vivere parcè
Æquo animo: neque enim est unquam penuria parvi.
At claros se homines voluêrunt atque potentes,
Ut fundamento stabili fortuna maneret,
Et placidam possent opulenti degere vitam:
Nequicquam,—quoniam ad summum succedere honorem
Certantes, iter infestum fecêre viaï,
Et tamen è summo quasi fulmen dejicit ictos
Invidia interdum contemptim in Tartara tetra.
Ergo, Regibus occisis, subversa jacebat
Pristina majestas soliorum, et sceptra superba;
Et capitis summi præclarum insigne, cruentum,
Sub pedibus volgi magnum lugebat honorum:
Nam cupidè conculcatur nimis ante metutum.
Res itaque ad summam fæcem, turbasque redibat,
Imperium sibi cum ac summatum quisque petebat.
Lucretius, V. 1116.
Being at a friend's house in the country duringsome part of the summer 1795, I there saw a volumeof a German periodical work, called Religions Begebenheiten,i. e. Religious Occurrences: in which therewas an account of the various schisms in the Fraternityof Free Masons, with frequent allusions to the originand history of that celebrated association. This accountinterested me a good deal, becau