“The painting-room must be like Eden before the Fall; no joyless turbulent passions must enter there”—­exclaims the enthusiast RICHARDSON.  The home of the literary character should be the abode of repose and of silence.  There must he look for the feasts of study, in progressive and alternate labours; a taste “which,” says GIBBON, “I would not exchange for the treasures of India.”  ROUSSEAU had always a work going on, for rainy days and spare hours, such as his “Dictionary of Music:”  a variety of works never tired; it was the single one which exhausted.  METASTASIO looks with delight on his variety, which resembled the fruits in the garden of Armida—­

  E mentre spunta l’un, l’altro mature. 
  While one matures, the other buds and blows.

Nor is it always fame, or any lower motive, which may induce the literary character to hold an unwearied pen.  Another equally powerful exists, which must remain inexplicable to him who knows not to escape from the listlessness of life—­it is the passion for literary occupation.  He whose eye can only measure the space occupied by the voluminous labours of the elder Pliny, of a Mazzuchelli, a Muratori, a Montfaucon, and a Gough, all men who laboured from the love of labour, and can see nothing in that space but the industry which filled it, is like him who only views a city at a distance—­the streets and the edifices, and all the life and population within, he can never know.  These literary characters projected their works as so many schemes to escape from uninteresting pursuits; and, in these folios, how many evils of life did they bury, while their happiness expanded with their volume!  Aulus Gellius desired to live no longer than he was able to retain the faculty of writing and observing.  The literary character must grow as impassioned with his subject as AElian-with his “History of Animals;” “wealth and honour I might have obtained at the courts of princes; but I preferred the delight of multiplying my knowledge.  I am aware that the avaricious and the ambitious will accuse me of folly; but I have always found most pleasure in observing the nature of animals, studying their character, and writing their history.”

Even with those who have acquired their celebrity, the love of literary labour is not diminished—­a circumstance recorded by the younger Pliny of Livy.  In a preface to one of his lost books, that historian had said that he had obtained sufficient glory by his former writings on the Roman history, and might now repose in silence; but his mind was so restless and so abhorrent of indolence, that it only felt its existence in literary exertion.  In a similar situation the feeling was fully experienced by HUME.  Our philosopher completed his history neither for money nor for fame, having then more than a sufficiency of both; but chiefly to indulge a habit as a resource against indolence.[A] These are the minds which are without hope if they are without occupation.