Eaft, which have contributed more than is eafily conceivable to the rapid and astonishing increafe of luxury, i. e. of the confumption of fuperfluities, which has an immediate and irrefiftible tendency to raife the price of the neceffaries of life-while by the exceffive influx of wealth the value of money is perpetually decreafing. Thus the blood We have fo profufely fhed in our fuceffive wars, the treasures we have lavithed, and the treafures we have extorted, all combine to induce a ftate of political debility, languor, and decay, in which it may be truly affirmed that the whole head is fick, and the whole heart is faint." And as there is no profpect of a change of fyftem, it must neceffarily terminate in a catastrophe, which will be the more dreadful in proportion as it is procraftinated by artificial and temporary expe

dients.'

In the third volume, Mr. Belfham enters fully into the hiftory of the government of Bengal under Mr. Haftings. In the course of this narrative, as well as in a former part of the work, in which he relates fome of the tranfactions under Lord Clive, our author brings abundant proofs of the injustice and inhumanity of the general principles on which this great monopoly is conducted: but he directs the charges of extortion and oppreffion against Mr. Haftings with a more decided tone than ought to have been affumed by an hiftorian, while the caufe of the accused was ftill fub judice, in the fupreme court of the nation: nor will the decifion of this court in favour of Mr. H. fince Mr. B. wrote, fupport the author's fentiments*.

The state of public affairs refpecting America, in the year 1781, at the meeting of parliament, is ftrongly reprefented in the following paffage :

In the fpeech from the throne his Majesty obferved, "that the war was fill unhappily prolonged, and that, to his great concern, the events of it had been very unfortunate to his army in Virginia, having ended in the total lofs of his forces in that province. But he could not confent to facrifice, either to his own defire of peace or to the temporary ease and relief of his fubjects, thofe effential rights and permanent interefts upon which the ftrength and fecurity of this country must ever principally depend." His Majefty declared," that he retained a firm confidence in the protection of Divine Providence, and A PERFECT CONVICTION of the JUSTICE of his CAUSE;"-and he concluded by calling "for the concurrence and fupport of Parliament, and a VIGOROUS, ANIMATED, and UNITED EXERTION OF the FACULTIES and RESOURCES of his PEOPLE." Upon the whole, this fpeech was plainly indicatory of a fixed and refolute determination to profecute a war, of which it might well be fuppofed, that "fools as grofs as ignorance made drunk" might by this time have seen the hopeleffness and the abfurdity.

See a publication on this fubje&t, in reply to Mr. Belfham, in this month's Catalogue, Clafs Eaft Indies.

• The

< The Monarch had now fwayed the fceptre of these kingdoms more than twenty years, and, in a courfe of a long and variegated feries of events, his character both perfonal and political was completely matured and developed.

If we wish to re

verfe the medal, a view of the private life and domestic habits of the King will indeed difcover a life paffed without any remarkable deviation from the rules of propriety and decorum, and much less any direct violation of the higher and more ferious obligations of morality and religion. But the virtues of the man, were they fuch as to catitle him to the honours of papal canonization, unfortunately afford to the public a most inadequate and wretched compenfation for the errors and imperfections of the monarch.

The fpeech from the throne underwent, as may well be imagined, the fevereft animadverfion. Mr. Fox faid he had expected, and he knew it had been expected by many others, to hear on this occafion his Majesty declare from the throne, that he had been deceived and impofed upon by milinformation and mifreprefentation; that, in confequence of his delufion, the Parliament had been deluded, but that now the deception was at an end; and requeiting of his Parliament to devise the most fpeedy and efficacious means of putting an end to the public calamities: inflead of which, they had heard a fpeech breathing little elfe than vengeance, mifery, and blood. Thofe who were ignorant of the perfonat character of the Sovereign, and who imagined this fpeech to originate with him, might be led to fuppofe that he was an unfeeling defpot, rejoicing in the horrid facrifice of the liberty and lives of his fubjects, who, when all hope of victory was wanifhed, ftill thirfted for revenge. The Minifters who advifed this fpeech, he affirmed to be a CURSE to the country, over the affairs of which they had too long been fuffered to prefide. From that unrivalled pre-eminence which we fo lately poffeffed, they had made us the object of ridicale and fcorn to the furrounding nations." But," faid he, “the time will surely come when an oppreffed and irritated people will firmly call for SIGNAL PUNISHMENT on thofe whole counfels have brought the Nation fo near to the brink of deftruction. An indignant Nation will furely in the end compel them to make fome faint atonement, for the magnitude of their offences, on A PUBLIC SCAFFOLD." He concluded with moving, "That of the Addrets propofed the whole be omitted excepting the first paragraph, and the following words inferted:" And we will without delay apply ourfelves with united hearts to propofe and digeft fuch counfels as may in this crifis excite the efforts, point the arms, and, by a total change of fyftem, command the confidence of all his Majefty's fubjects."

This amendment was vigoroufly supported by Mr. Pitt, who declared, "That the duty he owed his Sovereign and his Country compelled him to exert every effort to prevent the Houfe from precipitately voting an Addrefs, which pledged them to the fupport of that fatal fyftem which had led this country, ftep by step, to the moft calamitous and difgraceful fituation to which a once flourishing and glorious empire could be reduced,-Was it becoming the Parliament of a free

K4

people

people to echo back the words which a Minifter, long practifed in the arts of delufion, had dared to put into the Royal mouth? He implored the Houfe not to vote an Addrefs fraught with treachery and falfehood, which could not have been framed by any who felt for the honor of the King, the dignity of Parliament, or the intereft of the Nation."

An amendment of the fame import was moved in the Upper Houfe by the Earl of Shelburne, and fupported by the Duke of Richmond, who declared the misfortunes of this country to be owing to that wretched fyftem of government which had been early adopted in the reign of his prefent Majefty, and to the influence of that INTERIOR CABINET which (he faid) had been the ruin of this country;" and he recalled to the recollection of the Houfe the memorable declaration of the late Earl of Chatham," that he was duped and deceived, and that he had not been ten days in the Cabinet before he felt the ground rotten under his feet."

In both Houfes, however, the Addreffes were carried by great majorities, and a moft melancholy and alarming profpect prefented itfelf to the Nation, of a fatal perfeverance in a war which, from an involuntary and irrefiftible conviction univerfally impreffed, was now regarded as defperate, and paffionately deprecated as tending to certain and remedilefs ruin.'

At the beginning of the fourth volume, which opens with the difmiffal of the coalition adminiftration, Mr. B., who feems well acquainted with both the former and prefent ftate of political parties in this country, makes the following obfervations on the diftinct characters of modern Whigs and Tories:

The established appellations of WHIG and TORY, as defcriptive of the two grand political parties which under thefe or equivalent terms of diftinction will doubtlefs fubfiit fo long as the prefent Conftitution of Government fhall remain, though greatly changed from their original fignification, it would nevertheless be faftidious to reject. The gradations of fentiment and principle which mark their progrefs it is however of indifpenfable importance occafionally to fpecify. The principles of Whiggifm may indeed in this refpect be faid to have gained a complete triumph over thofe of the antient Tories, inasmuch as the once favorite maxims of Toryifm-paffive obedience, non-refiftance, and the divine and indefeasible right of monarchy-have fallen into general contempt. Nor can any doctrines bearing the most diftant analogy to thefe monftrous abfurdities be now maintained, without the ufe of fuch artificial and ambiguous phrafeology as, however magnificent in found and thow, fall vanish from the touch of reafon as mifts and vapors from the noon-day fun.

Agreeably then to the viciffitudes which have in a long feries of eventful years taken place in the views and fentiments of the oppofing parties of the State, à WHIG mut now be understood to mean a man who, in addition to the fpeculative principles of liberty civil and religious which have defcended to him from his ancestors, entertains a lively and well-founded jealoufy left the prerogative of the Crown fhould, in confequence of the prodigious increafe of its influence, ul

timately

timately abforb the whole power and authority of the other branches of the government, and with them the liberties of the nation at large, in its vaft and tremendous vortex. A modern Whig acknowledges and deeply regrets the improvidence of his ancestors in contributing, by the facility of their compliances, to the accumulation of an immenfe public debt, and the establishment of a standing army, both of which are yet in a state alarmingly progrefive. He can fcarcely forgive thofe ex-. travagant ebullitions of loyalty which could facrifice themoft facred principles of the Conftitution to the interelt or ambition of the reigning family, in prolonging by a moft unjustifiable ftretch of power the exiftence of Parliaments to a term of dangerous duration, and in furnishing to a Minister, little fcrupulous of expedients, and regardless of confequences, the means of univerfal and unbounded corruption. Whatever palliations of the fatal fyftem then adopted, the peculiarity of that Minister's fituation, and the fituation of the country at large in a political view, might then afford, had, it was affirmed, been long fince entirely at an end; but the fame fyllem is nevertheless refolutely and uninterruptedly purfued, recovering Antæus-like from every apparent or accidental fall with renewed and redoubled vigour.

On the other hand, the modern Tories, although the defcendants of those who long entertained a molt inveterate enmity against the family upon the throne, and who from motives not of the pureft patriotifm vehemently oppofed in the former reigns the unconstitutional measures of the Whigs, having at length entirely fhaken off their old attachments, and being taken into favor and invefted with power under the marked and too partial protection of the Court, fuddenly became its open and zealous advocates-combining, as far as the fpirit of the times would admit, the fpeculative errors of one party with the practical errors of the other. The neceffity of ftrengthening the prerogative of the Monarch, and of fupporting the DIGNITY of the CROWN, was from this time the inceffant theme of their argument and declamation. Conceffions and indulgencies were in their eftimation things incompatible with the majefty of the regal character. The high, harsh, and peremptory tone of AUTHORITY uniformly marked every act of Government under the almoft conftant predominance of this dangerous faction during the prefent reign, from the commitment of a printer, or the profecution of a libeller, to those meafures of provocation and oppreffion terminating in a war which rent in twain and had well nign fubverted the empire.

This party, now grown ftrong and confident by an unexpected return of profperity, affumed with oftentatious audacity the appellation of the KING'S FRIENDS, in which novel capacity they hefitated not to give their eager and ardent fupport to thofe measures of Court policy, which had been ever reprobated by the Tories of eider days as in the highest degree pernicious and unconflitutional. The STANDING ARMY, fo long the theme of their invective and reproach, was now affirmed to be neceflary for the prefervation of the national tranquillity; the public debt was pronounced a public benefit; the connection with Hanover was honorable and ufeful; the influence of the Crown was the happy means of confolidating the harmony of the

different

different branches of Government; a long Parliament was said to be attended with no fuch inconvenient confequences as had been previously and erroneously apprehended; and every attempt to restore that equality in the reprefentation, or rather to remove thofe glaring inequalities fo inconfiftent with the fpirit of the Conftitution and the practice of former ages, was oppofed and rejected by them in terms of unbounded obloquy and deteltation, as leading to nothing less than the abfolute fubverfion of Government. They profeffed on all occafions their dread of innovation and novelty-not adverting to the conftant declaration of the antient Tories, that the things to which they objected were themselves innovations wholly extraneous to the Conftitution and that they who merely wished to refore were moit unjustly accused of a fondness for innovation, or a dangerous propenfity to tamper with the Conftitution by trying new and hazardous experiments.

6

Although the high and prepofterous notions once prevalent refpecting the AUTHORITY of the CHURCH had, in common with the old opinions relative to Civil Government, gradually fallen into difrepute, the Tories of the prefent reign have been invariably characterized by the ftrength of their attachment to the Ecclefiaftical Eftablishment, which they are delighted to applaud and extol as a model of purity and perfection. Any fuggeftions of the expediency of a reform in the Church, whether in relation to the irregularities of its difcipline, or the errors of its doctrine as exhibited in a fet of obfolete and unintelligible articles of faith, are received by this clafs of men with a fort of horror, as leading to foul fufpicions of fectarian herefy or atheistical profaneness; while the Diffenters of all denominations are on the contrary viewed by them with eyes of jealousy and hatred, and affiduoufly held up on all occafions as the inveterate enemies of at least one part of the Conftitution, and as the doubtful friends at best of the other: and every idea of enlarging the limits of the toleration allowed them by law, and much more of extending to them the common privileges of citizens, they have uniformly exclaimed against with affected terror and real malignity.'

We remark, through the whole of this interefting publication, a happy union of eafe and ftrength in the compofition; and, in the sentiment, a no lefs felicitous and much more difficult combination of temperance and firmness. We admire the au thor's steady attachment to the conftitutional principles of freedom, and have only to exprefs our furprize that he should have any hefitation in following this principle to its full extent, in the cafe of the Roman catholics of Ireland.

ART. II. Selections from M. Pauw, with Additions by Daniel Webb, Efq. 8vo. PF. 235. 4. Boards. Dilly. 1795.

OUR

UR philofophical readers are no ftrangers to the ingenuity and the eccentricity of M. Pauw's fpeculations. They bave more than once paffed under our animadverfion in our

E.