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technical skill. Here, then, is a society of men who invite accusation,-who receive it (almost unknown to themselves) with pleasure,-and who, if they hate dulness and inoccupation, can have very little pleasure in the innocence of their fellow-creatures. The natu ral consequence of all this is, that (besides that portion of rumour which every member contributes at the weekly meeting), their table must be covered with annonymous lies against the characters of individuals. Every servant discharged from his master's service, every cowardly assassin of character,-now knows where his accusation will be received, and where they cannot fail to produce some portion of the mischiev ous effects which he wishes. The very first step of such a society should be, to declare, in the plainest manner, that they would never receive any anonymous accusation. This would be the only security to the public, that they were not degrading themselves into a receptacle for malice and falsehood. Such a declaration would inspire some species of confidence; and make us believe that their object was neither the love of power, nor the gratification of uncharitable feelings. The society for the suppression, however, have done no such thing. They request, indeed, the signature of the informers whom they invite; but they do not (as they ought) make that signature an indispensable condition.

most possible good to the cause of vice. We regret, that mankind are as they are; and we sincerely wish that the species at large were as completely devoid of every vice and infirmity as the president, vice-president and committee of the suppressing society; but, till they are thus regenerated, it is of the greatest consequent to teach them virtue and religion in a manner which will not make them hate both the one and the other. The greatest delicacy is required in the application of violence to moral and religious sentiment. We forget that the object is, not to produce the out--every villain who hates the man he has injured.ward compliance, but to raise up the inward teeling, which secures the outward compliance. You may drag men into church by main force, and prosecute them for buying a pot of beer,-and cut them off from the enjoyment of a leg of mutton;-and you may do all this, till you make the common people hate Sunday, and the clergy, and religion, and every thing that relates to such subjects. There are many crimes, indeed, where persuasion cannot be waited for, and where the untaught feelings of all men go along with the violence of the law. A robber and a murderer must be knocked on the head like mad dogs; but we have no great opinion of the possibility of indicting men into piety, or of calling in the quarter sessions to the aid of religion. You may produce outward conformity by these means; but you are so far from producing (the only thing worth producing) the inward feeling, that you incur a great risk of giving birth to a totally opposite sentiment.

Nothing has disgusted us so much in the proceedings of this society, as the control which they exercise over the amusements of the poor. One of the specious titles under which this legal meanness is gratified is, Prevention of Cruelty to Animals.

Of cruelty to animals, let the reader take the following specimens:

Running an iron hook in the intestines of an animal; presenting this first animal to another as his food; and then pulling this second creature up, and suspending him by the barb in his stomach.

Riding a horse till he drops, in order to see an innocent animal toru to pieces by the dogs. Keeping a poor animal upright for many weeks, to communicate a peculiar hardness to his flesh. Making deep incisions into the flesh of another animal, while living, in order to make the muscles more firm. Immersing another animal, while living, in hot wa

ter.

The violent modes of making men good, just alluded to, have been resorted to at periods when the science of legislation was not so well understood as it now is; or when the manners of the age have been peculiarly gloomy or fanatical. The improved knowledge, and the improved temper of later times, push such laws into the back ground, and silently repeal them. A suppressing society, hunting every where for penalty and information, has a direct tendency to revive an cient ignorance and fanaticism,--and to re-enact laws which, if ever they ought to have existed at all, were certainly calculated for a very different style of manners, and a very different degree of information. To compel men to go to church, under a penalty, appears to us to be absolutely absurd. The bitterest enemy of religion will necessarily be that person who is driven to a compliance with its outward ceremonies, by informers and justices of the peace. In the same manner, any constable who hears another swear an oath, Now we do fairly admit that such abominable cruhas a right to seize him, and carry him before a ma- elties as these, are worthy of the interference of the gistrate, where he is to be fined so much for each exe-law: and that the society should have punished them, cration. It is impossible to carry such laws into exe- cannot be matter of surprise to any feeling mind. But cution and it is lucky that it is impossible,-for their stop, gentle reader! these cruelties are the cruelties execution would create an infinitely greater evil than of the suppressing committee, not of the poor. You it attempted to remedy. The common sense and must not think of punishing these. The first of these common feeling of mankind, if left to themselves, cruelties passes under the pretty name of angling; would silently repeal such laws; and it is one of the and therefore there can be no harm in it-the more evils of these societies, that they render absurdity particularly as the president himself has one of the eternal, and ignorance indestructible. Do not let us best preserved trout streams in England. The next be misunderstood: upon the object to be accomplish- is hunting: and as many of the vice-presidents and of ed, there can be but one opinion;-it is only upon the the committee hunt, it is not possible there can be any means employed, that there can be the slightest dif- cruelty in hunting. The next is, a process for making ference of sentiment. To go to church is a duty of braun-a dish never tasted by the poor, and therefore the greatest possible importance; and on the blasphe- not to be disturbed by indictment. The fourth is the my and vulgarity of swearing, there can be but one mode of crimping cod; and the fifth of boiling lobopinion. But such duties are not the objects of legis- sters-all high-life cruelties, with which a justice of lation; they must be left to the general state of pub- the peace has no business to meddle. The real thing lic sentiment; which sentiment must be influenced by which calls forth the sympathies, and harrows up the example, by the exertions of the pulpit and the press, soul, is to see a number of boisterous artisans baiting and, above all, by education. The fear of God can a bull, or a bear; not a savage hare, or a carnivorous never be taught by constables, nor the pleasures of re- stag-but a poor, innocent, timid bear-not pursued ligion be learnt from a common informer. by magistrates, and deputy lieutenants, and men of

Beginning with the best intentions in the world, such societies must, in all probability, degenerate into How reasonable creatures' (says the society) can ena receptacle for every species of tittle-tattle, imperti-joy a pastime which is the cause of such sufferings to brute nence, and malice. Men, whose trade is rat-catching, their own amusement, to stimulate those animals, by means animals, or how they can consider themselves entitled, for love to catch rats; the bug-destroyer seizes on his of the antipathies which Providence has thought proper to bug with delight; and the suppressor is gratified by place between them, to worry and tear and often to destroy finding his vice. The last soon becomes a mere each other, it is difficult to conceive. So inhuman a prac tradesman like the others; none of them moralize, or tice, by a retribution peculiarly just, tends obviously to renlament that their respective evils should exist in the der the human character brutal and ferocious,' &c., &c. world. The public feeling is swallowed up in the pur- sees clearly that no part of this description can possibly ap(Address, p. 71, 72.) We take it for granted, that the reader suit of a daily occupation, and in the display of a ply to the case of hunting.

to this higher species of suppression, and sacrificed men of consideration to that zeal for virtue which watches so acutely over the vices of the poor? It would give us very little pleasure to see a duchess sent to the Poultry compter; but if we saw the socie ty flying at such high game, we would at least say they were honest and courageous, whatever judgment we may form of their good sense. At present they should denominate themselves a society for suppressing the vices of persons whose income does not exceed £500 per annum; and then, to put all classes upon an equal footing, there must be another society of barbers, butchers, and bakers, to return to the higher classes that moral character by which they are so highly benefited.

To show how impossible it is to keep such societies within any kind of bounds, we shall quote a passage respecting circulating libraries, from their proceedings.

Your committee have good reasons for believing, that the circulation of their notices among the printsellers, warning them against the sale or exhibition of indecent representations, has produced, and continues to produce the best effects.

education, but by those who must necessarily seek where they have directed the attention of the society their relaxation in noise and tumultuous merriment-by men whose feelings are blunted, and whose understanding is wholly devoid of refinement. The society detail, with symptoms of great complacency, their detection of a bear-baiting in Blackboy Alley, Chick Lane, and the prosecution of the offenders before a magistrate. It appears to us, that nothing can be more partial and unjust than this kind of proceedings. A man of ten thousand a-year may worry a fox as much as he pleases-may encourage the breed of a mischievous animal, on purpose to worry it; and a poor labourer is carried before a magistrate for paying sixpence to see an exhibition of courage between a dog and a bear! And cruelty may be practised to gorge the stomachs of the rich-none to enliven the holidays of the poor. We venerate those feelings which really protect creatures susceptible of pain, and incapable of complaint. But heaven-born pity, now. a-days, calls for the income tax, and the court guide; and ascertains the rank and fortune of the tormentor before she weeps for the pain of the sufferer. It is astonishing how the natural feelings of mankind are distorted by false theories. Nothing can be more But they have to lament that the extended establishments mischievous than to say, that the pain inflicted by the dog of a man of quality is not (when the strength of of circulating libraries, however useful they may be, in a the two animals is the same) equal to that produced knowledge, are extremely injurious to morals and religion, variety of respects, to the easy and general diffusion of by the cur of a butcher. Haller, in his Pathology, by the indiscriminate admission which they give to works expressly says, that the animal bitten knows no differ- of a prurient and immoral nature. It is a toilsome task to ence in the quality of the biting animal's master; and any virtuous and enlightened mind, to wade through the it is now the universal opinion among all enlightened catalogues of these collections, and much more to select men, that the misery of the brawner would be very such books from them as have only an apparent bad tenlittle diminished, if he could be made sensible that he dency. But your committee being convinced, that their attention ought to be directed to those institutions which poswas to be eaten up only by persons of the first fashion.sess such powerful and numerous means of poisoning the The contrary supposition seems to us to be absolute minds of young persons, and especially of the female youth, nonsense; it is the desertion of the true Baconian phi- have therefore begun to make some endeavours towards losophy, and the substitution of mere unsupported their better regulation.'-Statement of the Proceedings for conjecture in its place. The trespass, however, which 1804, pp. 11, 12. calls forth all the energies of a suppressor, is the sound In the same spirit we see them writing to a country of a fiddle. That the common people are really enjoy-magistrate in Devonshire, respecting a wake advering themselves, is now beyond all doubt: and away tised in the public papers. Nothing can be more prerush secretary, president, and committee, to clap the sumptuous than such conduct, or produce, in the minds cotillion into the compter, and to bring back the life of impartial men, a more decisive impression against of the poor to its regular standard of decorous gloom. the society. The gambling houses of St. James's remain untouched. The peer ruins himself and his family with impunity; while the Irish labourer is privately whipped for not making a better use of the excellent moral and religious education which he has received in the days of his youth.

The natural answer from the members of the socie ty (the only answer they have ever made to the ene mies of their institution) will be, that we are lovers of vice,-desirous of promoting indecency, of destroying the Sabbath, and of leaving mankind to the unre strained gratification of their passions. We have only It is not true, as urged by the society, that the vices very calmly to reply, that we are neither so stupid of the poor are carried on in houses of public resort, nor so wicked as not to concur in every scheme which and those of the rich in their own houses. The socie- has for its object the preservation of rational religion ty cannot be ignorant of the innumerable gambling- and sound morality:-but the scheme must be well houses resorted to by men of fashion. Is there one concerted, and those who are to carry it into execu they have suppressed, or attempted to suppress? tion must deserve our confidence, from their talents Can anything be more despicable than such distinc- and their character. Upon religion and morals detions as these? Those who make them seem to have for peuds the happiness of mankind;-but the fortune of other persons' vices all the rigor of the ancient Puritans knaves and the power of fools are sometimes made to -without a particle of their honesty, or their courage. rest on the same apparent basis; and we will never (if To suppose that any society will attack the vices of we can help it) allow a rogue to get rich, or a blockpeople of fashion, is wholly out of the question. If head to get powerful, under the sanction of these awful the society consisted of tradesmen, they would infalli- words. We do not by any means intend to apply bly be turned off by the vicious customers whose plea- these contemptuous epithets to the Society for the Supsures they interrupted: and what gentleman so fond pression. That there are among their number some of suppressing as to interfere with the vices of good very odious hypocrites, is not impossible; that many company, and inform against persons who were really men who believe they come there from the love of genteel? He knows very well that the conseqence of virtue, do really join the society from the love of such interference would be a complete exclusion from power, we do not doubt: but we see no reason to elegant society; that the upper classes could not and doubt that the great mass of subscribers consist of would not endure it; and that he must immediately persons who have very sincere intentions of doing lose his rank in the world, if his zeal subjected fash- good. That they have, in some instances, done a ionable offenders to the slightest inconvenience from great deal of good, we admit with the greatest plea. the law. Nothing, therefore, remains, but to rage sure. We believe that in the hands of truly honest, against the Sunday dinners of the poor, and to prevent a bricklayer's labourer from losing, on the Seventh day, that beard which has been augmenting the other We see at the head of this society the names of several noblemen, and of other persons moving in the fashionable world. Is it possible they can be ignorant of the innumerable offences against the law and morality which are committed by their own acquaintances and connections? Is there one single instance

six.

intrepid, and, above all, discreet men, such a society might become a valuable institution, improve in some degree the public morals, and increase the public happiness. So many qualities, however, are required to carry it on well,—the temptations to absurdity and impertinence are so very great,-that we ever despair of seeing our wishes upon this subject realized. In the present instance, our object has been to suppress the arrogance of suppressors,-to keep them within

due bounds—to show them that to do good requires a little more talent and reflection than they are aware of, and, above all, to impress upon them that true zeal for virtue knows no distinction between the rich and the poor; and that the cowardly and the mean can never be the true friends of morality, and the promoters of human happiness. If they attend to these rough doctrines, they will ever find in the writers of this journal their warmest admirers, and their most sincere advocates and friends.

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1809.) Characters of the late Charles James For. By Philopatris Varvicensis. 2 vols. 8vo.

nians. But when the attorney-general for the time being ingratiates himself with the court, by nibbling at this valuable privilege of the people, it is very easy to treat hostility to his measures as a minute and frivolous opposition to the government, and to persuade the mass of mankind that it is so. In fact, when a nation has become free, it is extremely difficult to persuade them that their freedom is only to be preserved by perpetual and minute jealousy. They do not observe that there is a constant, perhaps an unconscious, effort on the part of their governors, to diminish, and so ultimately to destroy, that freedom. They stupidly imagine that what is, will always be; and, contented with the good they have already gained, are easily persuaded to suspect and vilify those friendsthe object of whose life it is to preserve that good, and to increase it.

It was the lot of Mr. Fox to fight this battle for the THIS singular work consists of a collection of all greater part of his life; in the course of which time the panegyrics passed upon Mr. Fox, after his de-ne never was seduced by the love of power, wealth, cease, in periodical publications, speeches, sermons, to the interests of the few. He rightly thought, that nor popularity, to sacrifice the happiness of the many or elsewhere,-in a panegyric upon Mr. Fox by Philo patris himself, and in a volume of notes by the said kings, and all public officers, were instituted only for the good of those over whom they preside; and he Philopatris upon the said panegyric. acted as if this conviction was always present to his mind; disdaining and withstanding that idolatrous ly suffer, but invite ruin from that power which they tendency of mankind, by which they so often not onthemselves have wisely created for their own happi men more than their favour; and while others were He loved, too, the happiness of his country. exhausting the resources, by flattering the ignorant prejudices and foolish passions of the country, Mr. Fox was content to be odious to the people, so long as he could be useful also. It will be long before we witness again such pertinacious opposition to the alarming power of the crown, and to the follies of our public measures, the necessary consequence of that again with such e..raordinary talents, it is perhaps, power. That such opposition should ever be united in vain to hope.

Of the panegyrics, that by Sir James Mackintosh appears to us to be by far the best. It is remarkable for good sense, acting upon a perfect knowledge of his subject, for simplicity, and for feeling. Amid the languid or turgid efforts of mediocrity, it is delightful to notice the skill, attention, and resources of a superior man,—of a man, too, who seems to feel what he writes,-who does not aim at conveying his meaning in rhetorical and ornamented phrases, but who uses plain words to express strong sensations. We cannot help wishing, indeed, that Sir James Mackintosh had been more diffuse upon the political character of Mr. Fox, the great feature of whose life was the long and unwearied opposition which he made to the low cunning, the profligate extravagance, the sycophant mediocrity, and the stupid obstinacy of the English

court.

ness.

Mackintosh upon Mr. Fox, we cannot help making. One little exception to the eulogium of Sir James We are no admirers of Mr. Fox's poetry. His Vers de Société appears to us flat and insipid. To write verses was the only thing which Mr. Fox ever attempted to do, without doing it well. In that single instance he seems to have mistaken his talent.

Immediately after the collection of panegyrics which these volumes contain, follows the eulogium of Mr. Fox by Philopatris himself: and then a volume of notes upon a variety of topics which this eulogium has suggested. Of the laudatory talents of this Warwickshire patriot, we shall present our readers with a specimen.

To estimate the merit and the difficulty of this opposition, we must remember the enormous influence which the crown, through the medium of its patronage, exercises in the remotest corners of the kingdom, the number of subjects whom it pays, the much greater number whom it keeps in a state of expectation, and the ferocious turpitude of those mercenarics whose present prospects and future hopes are threatened by honest, and exposed by eloquent men. It is the easiest of all things, too, in this country, to make Englishmen believe that those who oppose the government wish to ruin the country. The English are a very busy people; and, with all the faults of their governors, they are still 'a very happy people. They have, as they ought to have, a perfect confi- Mr. Fox, though not an adept in the use of political dence in the administration of justice. The rights wiles, was very unlikely to be the dupe of them. He was which the different classes of men exercise the one conversant in the ways of man, as well as in the contents over the other are arranged upon equitable principles. of books. He was acquainted with the peculiar language Life, liberty and property are protected from the vio- of states, their peculiar forms, and the grounds and effects lence and caprice of power. The visible and imme-investigated the science of politics in the greater and the of their peculiar usages. From his earliest youth, he had diate stake, therefore, for which politicians play, is smaller scale; he had studied it in the records of history, not large enough to attract the notice of the people, both popular and rare-in the conferences of ambassadors and to call them off from their daily occupations, to in the archives of royal cabinets-in the minuter detail of investigate thoroughly the character and motives of memoirs-and in collected or straggling anecdotes of the men engaged in the business of legislation. The peo- wrangles, intrigues, and cabals, which, springing up in the ple can only understand, and attend to the last results secret recesses of courts, shed their baneful influence on of a long series of measures. They are impatient of and the tranquillity of kingdoms. But that statesmen of the determinations of sovereigns, the fortune of favourites, the details which lead to these results; and it is the all ages, like priests of all religions, are in all respects alike, casiest of all things to make them believe that those is a doctrine the propagation of which he left, as an ingloriwho insist upon such details are actuated only by fac-ous privilege, to the misanthrope, to the recluse, to the tious motives. We are all now groaning under the factious incendiary, and to the unlettered multitude. For weight of taxes: but how often was Mr. Fox followed himself, he thought it no very extraordinary stretch of by the curses of his country for protesting against the penetration or charity, to admit that human nature is every two wars which have loaded us with these taxes? He boasted of no very exalted heroism, in opposing the where nearly as capable of emulation in good, as in evil. the one of which wars has made America independ- calmness and firmness of conscious integrity to the shuffling ent, and the other rendered France omnipotent. The and slippery movements, the feints in retreat, and feints in case is the same with all the branches of public liber- advance, the dread of being over-reached, or detected in ty. If the broad and palpable question were, whether attempts to over-reach, and all the other humiliating and every book which issues from the press should be sub-mortifying anxieties of the most accomplished proficients jected to the license of a general censor, it would be impossible to blacken the character of any man who, so called upon, defended the liberty of publishing opi

in the art of diplomacy. He reproached himself for no guilt, when he endeavoured to obtain that respect and confidence which the human heart unavoidably feels in its intercourse with persons who neither wound our pride, nor

leaving his readers with a disposition to laugh, where they might otherwise learn and admire.

I have been asked, why, after pointing out by name the persons who seemed to me most qualified for reforming our penal code, I declined mentioning such ecclesiastics as might with propriety be employed in preparing for the use of the churches a grave and impressive discourse on the authority of human laws; and as other men may ask the same question which my friend did, I have determined, after some deliberation, to insert the substance of my answer in this place.

take aim at our happiness, in a war of hollow and ambigu- | show the various methods in which the parts of speech ous words. He was sensible of no weakness in believing can be marshalled and arrayed. This, which would that politicians who, after all, "know only as they are be tiresome in the ephemeral productions of a newspa known," may, like other human beings, be at first the inVoluntary creatures of circumstances, and seem incorrigible per, is intolerable in two closely printed volumes. from the want of opportunities or incitements to correct Again, strange as it may appear to this author to themselves; that, bereft of the pleas usually urged in vin- say so, he must not fall into the frequent mistake of dication of deceit, by men who are fearful of being de- rural politicians, by supposing that the understandings ceived, they, in their official dealings with him, would not of all Europe are occupied with him and his opinions. wantonly lavish the stores they had laid up for huckstering His ludicrous self-importance is perpetually destroying in a traffic, which, ceasing to be profitable, would begin to the effect of virtuous feeling and just observation, be infamous; and that, possibly, here and there, if encouraged by example, they might learn to prefer the shorter process, and surer results of plain dealing, to the delays, the vexations, and the uncertain or transient success, both of old-fashioned and new-fangled chicanery.'-(I. 209-211.) It is impossible to read this singular book without being everywhere struck with the lofty and honourable feelings, the enlightened benevolence, and sterling honesty with which it abounds. Its author is everywhere the circumspect friend of those moral and religious principles upon which the happiness of society rests. Though he is never timid, nor prejudiced, nor If the public service of our church should ever be dibigoted, his piety, not prudish and full of antiquated rectly employed in giving effect to the sanctions of our and affected tricks, presents itself with an earnest as- penal code, the office of drawing up such a discourse as I pect, and in a manly form; obedient to reason, prone have ventured to recommend would, I suppose, be assigned to investigation, and dedicated to honest purposes.to more than one person. My ecclesiastical superiors will, The writer, a clergyman, speaks of himself as a very I am sure, make a wise choice. But they will hardly conindependent man, who has always expressed his opin-demn me for saying, that the best sense expressed in the ions without any fear of consequences, or any hope of bettering his condition. We sincerely believe he speaks the truth; and revere him for the life he has led. Political independence-discouraged enough in these times among all classes of men-is sure, in the timid profession of the church, to doom a man to eternal poverty and obscurity.

There are occasionally, in Philopatris, a great vigour of style and felicity of expression. His display of classical learning is quite unrivalled his reading various and good: and we may observe, at intervals, a talent for wit, of which he might have availed himself to excellent purpose, had it been compatible with the dignified style in which he generally conveys his sentiments. With all these excellent qualities of head and heart, we have seldom met with a writer more full of faults than Philopatris. There is an event recorded in the Bible, which men who write books should keep constantly in their remembrance. It is there set forth, that many centuries ago, the earth was covered with a great flood, by which the whole of the human race, with the exception of one family, were destroyed. It appears also, that from thence, a great alteration was made in the longevity of mankind, who, from a range of seven or eight hundred years, which they enjoyed before the flood, were confined to their present period of seventy or eighty years. This epoch in the history of man gave birth to the twofold division of the antediluvian and the postdiluvian style of writing, the lat ter of which naturally contracted itself into those in ferior limits which were better accommodated to the abridged duration of human life and literary labour Now, to forget this event, to write without the fear of the deluge before his eyes, and to handle a subject as if mankind could lounge over a pamphlet for ten years, as before their submersion, is to be guilty of the most grievous error into which a writer can possibly fall. The author of this book should call in the aid of some brilliant pencil, and cause the distressing scenes of the deluge to be portrayed in the most lively colours for his use. He should gaze at Noah and be brict. The ark should constantly remind him of the little time there is left for reading; and he should learn, as they did in the ark, to crowd a great deal of matter into a very little compass.

But I

best language may be expected from the Bishops of Landaff,
Lincoln, St. David's, Cloyne, and Norwich, the Dean of
Christ Church, and the President of Magdalen College,
Oxford. I mean not to throw the slightest reproach upon
other dignitaries whom I have not mentioned.
should imagine that few of my enlightened contemporaries
hold an opinion different from my own, upon the masculine
understanding of a Watson, the sound judgment of a Tom-
and good nature of a Bennet, the calm and enlightened
lin, the extensive erudition of a Burgess, the exquisite taste
benevolence of a Bathurst, the various and valuable attain
ments of a Cyril Jackson, or the learning, wisdom, integrity,
and piety of a Martin Ruth.'-(pp. 524—525.)

In the name of common modesty, what could it have signified whether this author had given a list of eccle siasticts whom he thought qualified to preach about human laws? what is his opinion worth? who called for it? who wanted it? how many millions will be influenced by it?-and who, oh gracious Heaven! who are a Burgess, a Tomlin,-a Dennet,-a Cyril Jackson,-a Martin Routh ?-A Toma Jack,-a Harry, -a Peter? All good men enough in their generation doubtless they are. But what have they done for the broad a? what has any one of them perpetrated, which will make him be remembered, out of the sphere of his private virtues, six months after his decease? Surely, scholars and gentlemen can drink tea with each other, and eat bread and butter, without all this laudatory crackling.

Philopatris has employed a great deal of time upon the subject of capital punishments, and has evinced a great deal of very laudable tenderness and humanity in discussing it. We are scarcely, however, converts to that system which would totally abolish the punishment of death. That it is much too frequently inflicted in this country, we readily admit; but we suspect it will be always necessary to reserve it for the most pernicious crimes. Death is the most terrible punishment to the common people, and therefore the most preven tive. It does not perpetually outrage the feelings of those who are innocent, and likely to remain innocent, as would be the case from the spectacle of convicts working in the highroads and public places. Death is the most irrevocable punishment, which is in some sense a good; for, however necessary it might be to inflict labour and punishment for life, it would never be Philopatris must not only condense what he says in done. Kings and legislatures would take pity after a a narrower compass, but he must say it in a more nat-great lapse of years; the punishment would be remit aral manner. Some persons can neither stir hand nor ted, and its preventive efficacy, therefore, destroyed. foot without making it clear that they are thinking of We agree with Philopatris, that the exceutions should themselves, and laying little traps for approbation. In be more solemn; but still the English are not of a very the course of two long volumes, the Patriot of Warwick is perpetually studying modes and postures:-the subject is the second consideration, and the mode of expression the first. Indeed, whole pages together seem to be mere exercises upon the English language, to evince the copiousness of our synonymes and to

dramatic turn, and the thing must not be got up too finely. Philopatris, and Mr. Jeremy Benthan before him, lay a vast stress upon the promulgation of laws, and treat the inattention of the English government to this point as a serious evil. It may be so-but we do not happen to remember any man punished for an of

A

fence which he did not know to be an offence; though he might not know exactly the degree in which it was punishable. Who are to read the laws to the people? who would listen to them if they were read? who would comprehend them if they listened? In a science like law there must be technical phrases known only to professional men: business could not be carried on without them: and of what avail would it be to repeat such phrases to the people? Again, what laws are to be repeated, and in what places? Is a law respecting the number of threads on the shuttle of a Spitalfields weaver to be read to the corn-growers of the Isle of Thanet? If not, who is to make the selection! If the law cannot be comprehended by listening to the viva voce repetition, is the reader to explain it, and are there to be law lectures all over the kingdom? The fact is, that the evil docs not exist. Those who are not likely to commit the offence soon scent out the newly devised punishments, and have been long thoroughly acquainted with the old ones. Of the nice applications of the law they are indeed ignorant; but they purchase the requisite skill of some man whose business it is to acquire it; and so they get into less mischief by trusting to others than they would do if they pretended to inform themselves. The people, it is true, are ignorant of the laws; but they are ignorant only of the laws that do not concern them. A poacher knows nothing of the penalties to which he exposes himself by stealing ten thousand pounds from the public. Commissioners of public boards are unacquainted with all the decretals of our ancestors respecting the wiring of hares; but the one pockets his extra per centage, and the other his leveret, with a perfect knowledge of the laws-the particular laws which it is his business to elude. Philopatris will excuse us for differing from him upon a subject where he seems to entertain such strong opinions. We have a real respect for all his opinions:-no man could form them, who had not a good heart and a sound understanding. If we have been severe upon his style of writing, it is because we know his weight in the commonwealth: and we wish that the many young persons who justly admire and imitate him should be turned to the difficult task of imitating his many excellencies, rather than the useless and easy one of copying his few de

fects.

OBSERVATIONS ON THE HISTORICAL WORK

OF

THE RIGHT HONOURABLE CHARLES JAMES FOX. (EDINBURGH REVIEW, 1809.) Observations on the Historical Work of the Right Honourable Charles James Fox. By the Right Honourable George Rose: pp. 215. With a Narrative of the Ecents which occurred in the Enterprise of the Earl of Argyle in 1685. By

Sir Patrick Hume. London, 1809.

Marchmont, who left him his family papers, with an injunction to make use of them, if it should ever be. come necessary.' Among these papers was a narrative by Sir Patrick Hume, the earl's grandfather, of the occurrences which befell him and his associates in the unfortunate expedition undertaken by the Earl of Argyle in 1685. Mr. Fox, in detailing a history of that expedition has passed a censure, as Mr. Rose thinks, on the character of Sir Patrick; and to obviate the effects of that censure, he now finds it neces sary' to publish this volume.

All this sounds very chivalrous and affectionate; but we have three little remarks to make. In the first place, Mr. Fox passes no censure on Sir Patrick Hume. In the second place, this publication does by no means obviate the censure of which Mr. Rose complains. And, thirdly, it is utterly absurd, to ascribe Mr. Rose's part of the volume, in which Sir Patrick Hume is scarcely ever mentioned, to any anxiety about his reputation.

In the first place, it is quite certain that Mr. Fox passes no censure on Sir Patrick Hume. On the contrary he says of him, that he had early distinguished himself in the cause of liberty;' and afterwards rates him so very highly as to think it a sufficient reason for construing some doubtful points in Sir John Cochrane's conduct favourably, that he had always acted in conjunction with Sir Patrick Hume, who is proved by the subsequent events, and, indeed, by the whole tenour of his life and conduct, to have been uniformly sincere and zealous in the cause of his country. Such is the deliberate and unequivocal testimony which Mr. Fox has borne to the character of this gentleman; and such the historian, whose unjust censures have compelled the Right Honourable George Rose to indite 250 quarto pages, out of pure regard to the injured memory of this ancestor of his deceased patron.

Such is Mr. Fox's opinion, then, of Sir Patrick Hume; and the only opinion he any where gives of his character. With regard to his conduct, he observes, indeed, in one place, that he and the other gentlemen engaged in the enterprise appear to have paid too little deference to the opinion of their noble leader; and narrates, in another that, at the breaking up of their little army, they did not even stay to reason with him, but crossed the Clyde with such as would follow them. Now, Sir Patrick's own narrative, so far from contradicting either of these statements, confirms them both in the most remarkable manner. There is scarcely a page of it that does not show the jealous and controlling spirit which was exercised towards their leader; own account makes infinitely more strongly against and with regard to the concluding scene, Sir Patrick's himself and Sir John Cochrane, than the general statement of Mr. Fox. So far from staying to argue with their general before parting with him, it appears that THIS is an extraordinary performance in itself;-but Sir Patrick did not so much as see him; and that the reasons assigned for its publication are still more Cochrane, at whose suggestion he deserted him, had in extraordinary. A person of Mr. Rose's consequence, a manner ordered that unfortunate nobleman to leave incessantly occupied, as he assures us, with official their company. The material words of the narrative duties which take equally,' according to his elegant expression, from the disembarrassment of the mind 'On coming down to Kilpatrick, I met Sir John (Cochrane,) and the leisure of time,' thinks it absolutely necessary with others accompanieing him; who takeing mee by the hand, to explain to his country the motives which have led turned mee, saying, My heart, goe you with me? Whither goe him to do so idle a thing as to write a book. He you, said I? Over Clide by boate, said he.-I: Wher is Arwould not have it supposed, however, that he could be countrey, you cannot see him.-1: How comes this change of gyle? I must see him.-He: He is gone away to his owne tempted to so questionable an act by any light or ordi- resolution, and that wee went not together to Glasgow ?-He dinary consideration. Mr. Fox and other literary It is no time to answer questions, but I shall satisfy you afterloungers may write from a love of fame, or a relish forward. To the boates wee came, filled 2, and rowed over,' &c. literature; but the official labours of Mr. Rose can only be suspended by higher calls. All his former publications, he informs us, originated in a sense of public duty and the present, is an impulse of private friendship.' An ordinary reader may, perhaps, find some difficulty in comprehending how Mr. Rose could be impelled by private friendship' to publish a heavy quarto of political observations on Mr. Fox's history: -and for our own part, we must confess, that after the most diligent perusal of his long explanation, we do not in the least comprehend it yet. The explanation, however, which is very curious, it is our duty to lay before our readers.

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Mr. Rose was much patronized by the late Earl of

are these:

-An honest gentleman who was present told mee afterward the manner of his parting with the Erle. Argyle being in the sion in the Erle's countenance and speach. In end he said, roome with Sir John, the gentleman coming in, found confuSir John, I pray advise mee what shall I doe; shall I goe over Clide with you, or shall I goe to my owne countrey? Sir John answered, My Lord, I have told you my opinion; you have some Highlanders here about you; it is best you go to your owne countrey with them, for it is to no purpose for you to go over Clide. My lord, faire you well. Then call'd the gentleman, Come away, Sir; who followed him when I met with him.'-Sir P. Hume's Narrative, pp. 63, 64.

Such are all the censures which Mr. Fox passes upon this departed worthy; and such the contradiction which Mr. Rose now thinks it necessary to exhibit. It

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