, 56 THE IMPROVEMENT OE TIIE MIND. those ancient follies : but it may be answered, that a good diet tionary, or such a book as the Pantheon or History of those Gen- tile Deities, &c. may give sufficient information of those stories, so far as they are necessaryand useful to school-boys. XV. (3.) I will grant yet further, that lads who are de- signed to make great scholars or divines, may by reading these Heathen poets, be taught better to " understand the writings of the ancient fathers against theHeathen religion :" and they learn here " what ridiculous fooleries the Gentilenations believed" as the articles of their faith, " what wretched and foul idolatries they indulged and practised as duties of religion, for want of the light of divine revelation." But this perhaps may be learnt as well either by the Pantheon, or some other collection, at school ; or after they have left the school, they may read what their own inclinations lead them to, and whatsoever of this kind may be really useful for them. XVI. But the great question is, " Whether all these ad- vantages which have been mentioned, will compensate for the long months and years that are wasted among their incredible and trifling romances, their false and shameful stories of the gods and goddesses and their amours, and the lewd heroes and vici- ous poets of the Heathen world ?" Can these idle and ridiculous tales be of any real and solid advantage in human life ? Do they not too often defile the mind with vain, mischievous and impure ideas? Do they not stick long upon the fancy and leave an un- happy influence upon youth ? Do they not tincture the imagina- tion with folly and vipe very early, and pervert it from all that is good and holy. XVII. Upon the whole survey of things it is my opinion, that for almost all boys who learn this tongue, it wouldbe much . safer to be taught Latin poesy (as soon and as far as they can need it) from those excellent translations of David's Psalms, which are given us by Buchanan in the various measures of Horace; and the lower classes had better read Dr. Johnston's Translationof these Psalms, another elegant writer of the Scots nation, instead of Ovid's Epistles ; for he has turned the same psalms perhaps with greater elegancy into elegiac verse, whereof the learned W. Benson, Esq ; has lately published a noble edi- tion, and I hear that these psalms are honoured with an increas- ing use in the schools pf Holland and Scotland. A stanza, or a couplet of these writers would now and then stick upon the minds of youth, and would furnish them infinitely better with pious and moral thoughts, and do something towards making them good men and Christians. XVIII. A little book collepted from the Psalms of both these translators, Buchanan and Johnston, and a few other Christian poets, would be of expellent use for schools to begin their .iq-
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