Hudibras pleasantly says
of them, they
"Have _lights_, where better eyes are blind,--
As pigs are said to see the wind."
The author of the Reflections has _heard_ a great deal concerning the
modern lights, but he has not yet had the good fortune to _see_ much of
them. He has read more than he can justify to anything but the spirit of
curiosity, of the works of these illuminators of the world. He has
learned nothing from the far greater number of them than a full
certainty of their shallowness, levity, pride, petulance, presumption,
and ignorance. Where the old authors whom he has read, and the old men
whom he has conversed with, have left him in the dark, he is in the dark
still. If others, however, have obtained any of this extraordinary
light, they will use it to guide them in their researches and their
conduct. I have only to wish that the nation may be as happy and as
prosperous under the influence of the new light as it has been in the
sober shade of the old obscurity. As to the rest, it will be difficult
for the author of the Reflections to conform to the principles of the
avowed leaders of the party, until they appear otherwise than
negatively.
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