Outlines of an Historical View of the Progress of the Human Mind

and permanent utility. That work is the performance now given to the world. It has relation to a number of others, in which the rights of men had previously been discussed and established;

Has superstition received its last blow?

in which superstition had received its last and fatal blow; in which the methods of the mathematical sciences, applied to new objects, have opened new avenues to the moral and political sciences; in which the genuine principles of social happiness have received a developement, and kind of demonstration, unknown before; lastly, in which we every where perceive marks of that profound morality, which banishes even

Are the frailties of self-love banished?

the very frailties of self-love—of those pure and incorruptible virtues within the influence of which it is impossible to live without feeling a religious veneration.

This prayer I unite most devoutly.

May this deplorable instance of the most extraordinary talents lost to the country—to the cause of liberty—to the progress of science, and its beneficial application to the wants