received their compliments with the greater pleasure, as they appeared to be not fo much the effect of accidental circumftances, as demonftrations of an affection long restrained by fear.

However interesting these marks of public regard might be, fhe had a still more tender pleasure to enjoy, in feeing, for the first time, and embracing, her Sovereign in her grandfon. This interview was a fcene that drew tears from all present. For her grand-daughter Nathalia, fifter to the Emperor, a stranger likewife to her, was introduced to her at the fame time.

Eudoxia fainted in their embraces, and it was long before The returned to herself. She continued above an hour, her eyes open and fixed, without being able to utter a fyllable. Such is the ordinary effect of strong paffions!

She had foon the pleafure of affifting at her grandfon's coronation, and occupied the first place among the Imperial family. She attended likewife at the marriage-ceremony.

Thus reftored to all the rights to which her marriage had entitled her, a penfion was affigned her of 60,000 roubles. She was mentioned in the public prayers immediately after the Emperor. The anniversaries of her name and birth-days were celebrated at court, and in all public places, and nothing, in fhort, due to her high rank was omitted.

She lived even to fee Menzikoff, originally her inveterate enemy, plunged from his high ftation into the depth of ruin and difgrace. But M. D'Eon adds, that he believes fhe had soo much elevation of foul to find any fatisfaction in this event.

Without officiously contributing to the misfortunes even of her enemies, he enjoyed the decline of life in ease and serenity; but fated, as it fhould feem, to taste of no unembittered pleasure, she had hardly feen her grandfon eighteen months upon the throne, when death prematurely deprived her of the Princess Nathalia, and fome weeks after, of the Emperor Peter II. who died of the fmall-pox, in 1730.

Her condition was not altered by thefe melancholy events, but her future pleasure was buried with her two amiable defcendants.

The Princess Ann, who fucceeded to the throne, treated her with great kindness and attention; but in the year 1737, fhe fell into a languid ftate and died. Happy, fays her hiftorian, if the viciffitudes of this world had led her to feek for certainty in the interefts of another.

This interesting story*, containing a portion of modern hiftory but little known, has led us fomewhat beyond our ufual limits;

It would have been but reasonable to have expected proper vouchers for a narrative so remarkable; but if this be the first publication

limits; and left us only room to fay, that the rest of the Chevalier's works, in the prefent collection, will abundantly gratify the curiofity of the reader.

lication on the fubject, written authorities could not be exhibited; fo that for the authenticity of the flory we have nothing more to depend upon than the veracity of the Narrator. It is not, however, to be fuppofed that a perfon of the Chevalier D'Eon's confequence, who had appeared in the character of Minifter Plenipotentiary to a powerful Prince, fhould rifque his credit on an infupportable relation of tranfactions at a period within the memory of men.

ART. II.

Journal de Voyage de Michel de Montaigne, &c.-Memoirs of a Journey into Italy by Way of Switzerland and Germany, in 1580 and 1581. By Michael de Montaigne; with Notes, by M. de Querlon, 2 Vols. Izmo. Rome. 1774.

WE

E cannot with any propriety fay of this work, what Balzac has faid of the works of Montaigne in general, C'est un guide qui egare; mais qu'il mène en des païs plus agréables qu'il n'avoit promis; that he is a guide who leads you out of your way, but who conducts you through countries more agreeable than he had promifed.

But, however deficient these travels may be thought, when confidered under the idea of a particular ipecies of entertainment, yet, as the remains of Montaigne, they cannot but call forth curiofity and regard.

This extraordinary man, fo fingular in his writings, has from thence led the world into an idea, that he was no less fingular in his life; that, immured in the profoundest folitude, he either felt or affected an averfion to fociety; and that his conduct bore the teftimonies of a man chagrined with the infirmities of his nature.

For our parts, we have generally diffented from this opinion. We have confidered Montaigne as a man who formed very rational notions of folitude and fociety, and we remember that he has fomewhere faid, himself, il eft plus fupportable d'eftre toujours feul, que de ne le pouvoir jamais eftre; it is more fupportable to be always alone, than never be able to be alone at all. To thofe who may think that occafional reflection and retirement are neceffary for the revifal and repair of fuch beings as we are, M. de Montaigne's fentiment will appear to be extremely juft.

The account of the life of Montaigne, which the Prefident Bouhier publifhed many years ago in London, is inadequate even to the object of conveying any proper idea of that celebrated moralift. Many lights and much intelligence, on the fubject, have been collected fince that time by M. de Mon

tefquieu,

tefquieu, the younger, the Abbé Bertin, and others, which united might compofe a more perfect memoir.

The Editor of these volumes has, in a preliminary discourse of fome length, favoured us with certain anecdotes and relations of this kind, which ferve to confirm us in the more favourable ideas we had entertained of the focial character of Montaigne.

With a large share of natural vivacity, paffion, and fpirit, his life was far from being that of a fedentary contemplatift, as those may be inclined to think, who view him only in the fphere of his library and in the compofition of his effays. His early years by no means paffed in the arms of leifure. The troubles and commotions whereof he had been an eye-witness during five reigns, which he had feen pafs fucceffively before that of Henry the Fourth, had not in any degree contributed to relax that natural activity and reftlefsnefs of fpirit. They had been fufficient to call it forth even from indolence itself. He had travelled a good deal in France, and, what frequently answers a better purpose than any kind of travel, he was well acquainted with the metropolis, and knew the court. We fee his attachment to Paris in the third book of his Eflays, c. 9. Thuanus De Vita, lib. 3. obferves, that Montaigne was equally fuccessful in making his court to the famous Duke of Guife, Henry of Lorraine, and to the King of Navarre, afterwards Henry the Fourth, King of France. He adds, that he was at his eftate at Blois, when the Duke of Guife was affaffinated, 1558. Montaigne forefaw, faid he, that the troubles of the nation would only end with the life of that Prince, or of the King of Navarre: and this inftance we have of his political fagacity. He was fo well acquainted with the character and difpofition of thofe Princes, fo well read in their hearts and fentiments, that he told his friend Thuanus, the King of Navarre would certainly have returned to the religion of his ancestors (that of the Romish communion) if he had not been apprehensive of being abandoned by his party.

Montaigne, in fhort, had talents for public bufiness and negociation, but his philofophy kept him at a distance from political disturbances; and he had the addrefs to conduct himself without offence to the confending parties, in the worst of times.

Though his philofophical knowledge be lefs ftrongly marked in his Effays, it were eafy to fee that his collective knowledge of human life and character could only be acquired in the walks of men. It is not in the clofet we find fuch informations as thefe; it must be from a familiar attention, and a near infight into the moral actions and principles of society.

It were no wonder, then, if among other means of acquiring this knowledge, our philofopher had recourfe to travel; but the APP. Rev. Vol. li,

LI

time

time of life when he fet out, being at least 47, and other eir cumftances, incline us rather to find the motive in his health; on which account he was folicitous to try the mineral waters of different countries; and he generally travelled on horseback for the fame reason, hardly ever finding himself better, to use his own curious mode of expreffion, que le cul fur la felle. The gravel which he said he had acquired de la liberalité des ans, and the cholic, left him but few intervals of eafe. Yet had he, as we find in his Effays, no opinion of medicine. The ufe of mineral waters he thought the fimpleft and the fafeft. He had tried the most celebrated in France, and was defirous to vifit those of Lorraine, Switzerland, and Tufcany. Hence the origin of the books before us, in which we find him paffing from one watering-place to another, to fupport a fhattered conftitution, and in which his attention to that particular object has rendered this pofthumous work frequently infipid and uninterefting.

We are not, however, to confider this journal of travels as a work which the Author bad the leaft idea of publishing. It feems to have been intended rather for the purposes of private recollection, and as a kind of domestic record of the progress he had gone through, and the little incidents he had met with.

Yet ftill it is curious, as it exhibits the fpirit, the genius, and. manners of Montaigne, in a way that cannot be mistaken. The fame egotism, the fame felf attention. You see nobody but Montaigne: nobody is spoken of but Montaigne; though he has feveral fellow-travellers, they are non-entities here. And it is not only curious, but is rendered even valuable, by many characteristic and altogether peculiar ftrokes of his pencil, The fingular light in which he contemplated his objects; that energy, fincerity, and ardour, with which his philofophic genius impregnated all his ideas are obvious in this publication. It may at the fame time be confidered as an hiftorical monument of the ftate of Rome, and of a great part of Italy, fuch as he found it towards the clofe of the fixteenth century.

But let us hear what his Editor, M. De Querlon, fays on this fubject, in his preliminary difcourfe.

At the time of Montaigne's travelling into Italy, (1580) that beautiful country, covered with the ruins and fragments of antiquity, had for two centuries been the region of the arts. It had been enriched by the works of Palladio, Vignole, Michael Angelo, Raphael, Julio Romano, Corregio, Titian, Paul Veronefe, Tintoret, &c. It is true, Guido, Albano, Dominichino,

Published about 180 years after the death of the Author. The MS. was lately found in an old cheft in the Chateau de Montaigne, in the province of Perigord.

6

Lanfranc,

Lanfranc, Peter of Cortona, Annibal Caraccio, and a number of great mafters befide, that followed the former, had not yet produced that immenfe quantity of noble works which adorn the churches and palaces of Italy. Gregory XIII, at that time Pope, was much lefs taken up with attending to the arts, than with the promotion of public inftitutions and public works. Sextus the Fifth who came to the fee four years after this journey, added much more to the embellishment of Rome, in less than fix years than Gregory had done in twice that time. Nevertheless this capital, with thofe of Florence and Venice, and many others that Montaigne vifited, had objects fufficient to attract the attention of the traveller, by their riches, and by monuments of every kind, which the arts had already exhibited. Thus our traveller found matter enough for obfervation. With that keen and animated imagination, that picturesque turn which diftinguishes his Effays, could he, poffibly, with coldness behold the furrounding arts of Greece? If the journal of his travels contains few defcriptions of ftatues, pictures, and the rest of thofe objects with which modern travellers fill their narratives, and generally copy from one another; it is, as he fays, because there were books enough at the time, wherein all these matters were to be found.'

Here we agree with M. Querlon, but, though not prodigally defcriptive, it is evident, that he was particularly ftruck with the noble monuments of antiquity which he beheld. It was there he fought the GENIUS of immortal Rome; that GENIUS, which was for ever prefent with him, and familiar to his fancy and his foul! which he had pursued with the most penetrating eye through the remains of claffic art, through the pure philofophic page of the NATURAL PLUTARCH! That GENIUS, like the Roman hero, who was found mournfully reclining on the ruins of Carthage, retained a melancholy dignity amid the monuments that furrounded him, and looked awfully on the afhes of the great capital of the world.

But let us remember that Montaigne holds the pencil on this fubject; and refer the Reader to his more animated hand.

AR T. III.

Monde Primitif, &c.-The Primitive World analyfed and compared with the Modern World, with respect to the Natural History of Speech, or Grammar Univerfal and Comparative. By M. Court De Gebelin, &c.

IN

N this fecond volume of his magnificent work, M. De Gebelin has armed himself for the reduction of an ideal world. So confidered, at least, has been the theory of univer

For an account of the first volume, see our last Appendix, published in July 1774.

L12

fal