Page:Passages from the Life of a Philosopher.djvu/41



father, with a view of acquiring some information which might be of use to me at Cambridge, had consulted a tutor of one of the colleges, who was passing his long vacation at the neighbouring watering-place, Teignmouth. He dined with us frequently. The advice of the Rev. Doctor was quite sound, but very limited. It might be summed up in one short sentence: "Advise your son not to purchase his wine in Cambridge."

Previously to my entrance at Trinity College, Cambridge, I resided for a time at Totnes, under the guidance of an Oxford tutor, who undertook to superintend my classical studies only.

During my residence at this place I accidentally heard, for the first time, of an idea of forming a universal language. I was much fascinated by it, and, soon after, proceeded to write a kind of grammar, and then to devise a dictionary. Some trace of the former, I think, I still possess: but I was stopped in my idea of making a universal dictionary by the apparent impossibility of arranging signs in any consecutive