Who saw, and pitying saw, the ills endur'd And number dupes like For thee what praise shall sound? if such there need, (1) But, like other citadels, it is often given up to the enemy. My opinion of newspapers has undergone no change since the verse was written. There can be no liberty where there is not a free public press. But, as in other things, so here, that which is our safeguard may easily be turned to our destruction. As the public press is now generally conducted where it is most free, the political evil it teaches nearly equals the political good, while in morals its mischief is almost unmitigated. This the journalists themselves admit. What indeed can we expect, while ignorant and mercenary men are the guides of public opinion, but the spread of political error? and while the trade of these men is, to use the language of Mr. Wм. L. SE respecting it, the manufacture of facts, and their disposition, as with the Commercial Advertiser and with the Courier, to admit to their columns any filth, nay, rather, to give it a preference, provided it come in the shape of story or anecdote, what, but that the morals of the young should be contaminated? The eye grow bright that languor render'd dim, And vigor springing in each wasted limb, Shall know the poor man's friend that smooth'd her cares, And SADLER's name be murmur'd in her prayers! (1) (UNFINISHED.) (1) Mr. SADLER was a Member of Parliament, who undertook to plead before his country the cause of the victims of Avarice. The name preceding, for which I have substituted asterisks, belonged to another Member, who was generally thought, at the time, to have been duped by the manufacturers into a favorable representation of their interests. TRIFLES. Tenues ignavo pollice chordas Pulso..... STAT. Sylv. IV. Quanto rectius hoc, quam tristi lædere versu Pantolabum scurram, Nomentanumque nepotem! HOR. Serm. 11. 1. TRIFLES. I. TRIOLET. SYBIL plays the prude with me. SYBIL plays the prude with me. Would not have the same to tell. SYBIL plays the prude with me. 'T is because she loves me well. II. RONDEAU. THY soft pure breast, my SYBIL, is the seat Of gentle wishes and affections sweet: Gentle and sweet as angels', though not fed With aught so dainty as celestial bread, |