"When vice prevails, and impious men bear fway,

The post of honour is a private ftation."

The Westminster Elector would perfuade Mr. Fox that, as all his oppofition to prefent measures is in every inftance totally unavailing, it would redound most to his credit to retire from a station in which he is not only uselessly but ridiculously employed. Quit, (fays he,) a fyftem that is a fcourge of humanity!-Leave an affembly that has fophiftry for its cloak, and venality for its bafis. Degrade yourself no longer. Retire to the bofom of fociety, and to your conflituents in particular then let the ftorm come on!'

We do not clearly apprehend what line of conduct this nameless friend would with his Right Hon. Reprefentative to purfue, fuppofing the storm to come on,' during his political recefs. What kind of ftorm the letter-writer forefees, we have in vain tried to discover: fome political whirlwind, tornado, or hurricane, no doubt. Paine ftyles this the Age of Reason: fhould he not rather have said the age of burricanes?

Whatever may be the real drift of this questionable performance, we think the Westminster politician's counfel is conveyed in fo wild a ftrain of language, that it will probably attract very little of Mr. Fox's attention:-yet it is not wanting in ftrokes of eloquence, which bespeak the writer's ability of expreffion, if it does not manifest a found judgment and good difcretion.

Art. 27. The Measures of Miniftry to prevent a Revolution, the certain Means of bringing it on. 8vo. pp. 71. 1s. 6d. Eaton. 1794. Moft writers have contented themfelves with reprefenting the prefent war as unneceffary, ruinous, and fubverfive of the principles of liberty: but the author of this publication goes farther; he defcribes it by implication as impious, as waged not fo much against man, as against heaven; as undertaken in oppofition to the will and power of God himself..

So fully, (fays he,) has every thing I have feen, convinced me of the omnipotence and wifdom of God, and of the weakness and folly of man, that I fought but to be affured, whether what I faw was the capricious doings of a few individuals, or the work of the Almighty, to be perfuaded what part I fhould take the awful fiilnefs under which this ftupendous phenomenon (the French revolution) made its appearance; the force with which its irrefiftible torrent overwhelms all oppofition; and the horror it fpreads through all Europe in its courfe, flashed conviction on my mind, it was the fublime act of the Omnipotent. From that inftant I ceafed all womanifh complaint; fatisfied it was the act of God, I applied my felf to account for what I prefumed not to condemn.'

The interference of the Almighty in the general government of the univerfe is recognized by all who admit a divine providence; and confequently every thing that happens may, in fome degree, be faid to be the act of God; for whatever is not done by his immediate will, is done at least by his permiffion. The author, therefore, cannot be faid to have given us a very diftin& idea of the nature of the French revolution in calling it an act of the Almighty; for he might fo call it, though it were a fcourge from heaven, as a punishment for the

crimes of men; calamities and bleflings coming equally from God. If the Almighty were pleafed fo to communicate his pleasure to mankind that they could not poffibly mistake it, they might then indeed be charged with impiety, if they prefumed to refift what they muft in that cafe know to be his will: but, as the Supreme Being has rarely interpofed in a fupernatural way, and carries on his government of the fublunary world by the agency of human events, which he directs to his own purpofes, a nation may, without impiety, refist what it does not know to be the will of heaven, and oppose force to meafures in which it fees no other than human agents. We with the author had pointed out the means by which man might be enabled to difcover, to a certainty, in any tranfaction, the interpofition of providence; and to fee fo clearly the finger of God in it, that he must inftantly feel an inward fenfe and conviction of the impiety of an attempt to controul measures originating in the wifdom of the Supreme Being but here the writer fo far difappoints us, that he laughs to fcorn the books which Chriftians of every denomination respect as containing communications of the divine will to man. Strip (fays he,) all religions of their ceremonies, of their miracles, of their prophecies, and their revelations; reduce them to a religion of reafon, contemplating God's works, &c. &c.' Here is a fentence of death paffed in a moment on Chriftianity, which refts its foundation on revelations, prophecies, and miracles but our author fteps far beyond the deftruction of revealed religion; for, in our opinion, if he does not actually attempt to fhake the throne of the Almighty, or to rob him of exiftence, he unquestionably, though perhaps unintentionally, exhibits him in a light which could not render him an object of love and gratitude in the eyes of men. We would ask, has God ever revealed his will? if he has, we ought not to cast away revelation. If he has not revealed himself to his creatures, what would our author make him? a Being regardless of his own works; who created man through mere caprice, for no good purpose which reason alone can discover, and who abandons him to pain of body and mind with the most unfeeling neglect. If God has not revealed his will, man cannot poffibly find out why he was created, and confequently can have no other rule of conduct in life than that which is founded on the principle do as you would be done by;" which, after all that is faid in praife of it, is at beft but a felf.fh principle, because it teaches men to do good not merely for the fake of good, and to avoid evil not through deteftation of it, but because the former may be productive of advantages to us, and the latter may expofe us to inconvenience and retaliation. In a word, if God has not revealed himself to us, we cannot, by the mere force of reafon, difcover what would pleafe or what wou.d difpleafe him; nay that very reafon, if all idea of revelation were abandoned, would tempt men either to deny the existence of a Supreme Being,-or, which would be infinitely more impious and blafphemous, to confider him as the author of moral evil, as a Being who railes up creatures merely that they may fuffer hunger, thirst, pain, infirmity, and death, while he locks op unpitying and unmoved. It is in revelation that we find the vindication of God's

goodness; it is there that we find him to be a tender parent, a mer

ciful as well as a juft Deity, who punishes us not for his own gratifi-. cation but for our good, and who expofes us to fufferings that we may be weaned from worldly enjoyments, and entitled to thofe in another region, which are worthy of him and of thofe whom he has created in his own likeness, by endowing them with reason and a spiritual exiftence capable of eternal duration.

We have faid thus much concerning revealed religion, (we speak not of its particular denominations,) for the purpofe of fhewing that it is of the utmost importance to man and to fociety; and, confequently, that author would injure both who fhould endeavour to write it down. We are the more earneft in this matter, as we are in our hearts fo devoted to liberty that we almoft idolize it; the cause of liberty, we know, is injured by attacks on revelation; and we are forry to obferve that molt of the public writers, who have lately undertaken to patronize freedom in this country, have made it a point to attack revealed religion as if it were incompatible with liberty; an opinion which both reafon and experience difpofe us molt directly to contradia. As we are convinced also that nineteen-twentieths of the people of England think with us on this head, we are fure that the progrefs of liberty mutt neceffarily be retarded, when it is reprefented to be at variance with what man cannot afford to give ap-religion; which comforts him in affliction, and enables him patiently and refignedly to bear with the unavoidable ills of this life, by holding out to him the profpect of one in which his fufferings will be turned into never-ending joys. We fpeak of revealed religion in general; not of any particular creed or form of worship: it is for the effence, not for the civil eftablishments, of religion that we are advocates.

The prefent author tells us, page 5, that when near thirty millions (of individuals) are impelled, this motion is like that of the heavenly bodies, not a subject for criticifm or condemnation; they a not from caprice, but from the impulfe God has engendered in their frame at the creation, which to arraign is to arraign the Almighty.' Here is unquestionably the most auguft foundation on which any writer has ever yet attempted to reft the defence of the French revalution, the will of heaven: but unfortunately the author forgets that, by giving to this revolution fo celestial an origin, he robs the French of the very thing for which they are contending-liberty for, if they be pushed forward by the divine impulfe, they are not free agents. and have as little claim to the right of private will, as the earth has in its diurnal motion; which it never voluntarily gave to itself, and which it can never ftop at pleasure. If this revolution then be jure divino, the prefent war certainly ought no longer to be called what many have hitherto termed it, rafh, impolitic, and unneceffary, but downright impious :-but we believe that the jure divino doctrines, as applied to temporal affairs, perished with the reign of the Stuarts, and are not likely to be revived.

Paffing from the French revolution to our conftitution, he fays that 'influence, as it is termed by the courtiers, and corruption, as it is called by the people, has, fince the union of the commons and the crown, become the acknowledged fpring of the English government, not like the pelican feeding its young with its vital blood, "but like annatural

8

natural monsters fattening on the blood of those whom duty ordained they should fofter and protect.' He laments the good old times in which the commons, almost conftantly at variance with the crown, granted fupplies with a very sparing hand; and he contrasts them with those times which have elapfed fince the revolution of 1688, when the above falutary variance having ceafed, and a coalition having taken place, as he fays, between the Houfe of Commons and the Executive Power, fupplies were granted with fuch profufion and extravagance that the nation has been loaded with an enormous debt. The rife and progrefs of the debt he has, we believe, ftated with accuracy.

We lament as fincerely as the author the alarming growth of the influence of the crown: but we cannot agree with him that it ought to be confidered as the cause, at leaft the fole caufe, of the prefent debt of the nation :-fome part of it may be attributed to this influence, but by far the greater part of it ought to be fet down to other caufes. A new fyftem took place all over Europe toward the clofe of the last century; ftanding armies were established in all the arbitrary states of Europe; and even thofe that were free were under the neceflity, for their own felf-defence, of following their baneful example. Here was a fource of expence unknown to our ancestors, but which, with all its bad confequences, was attended with this good one, that it gave the Commons a weight and influence in the government of the country, and a controul over the crown, which they had never before poffeffed to fuch a degree. England, it is true, has been engaged in wars of ambition fince the revolution: but they have not always been the wars of the crown exclufively; in fome inftances, as during the administration of Sir Robert Walpole, the crown might be faid to have been forced by the people into a war with Spain; which, by an almost neceffary confequence, brought on one with France, the expences of which were immenfe. Spain alfo provoked this country into two expenfive preparations for war, in forcibly difpoffeffing us of Falkland's Islands, and in feizing our fhips on the North-weft Coaft of America, which cost us many millions; and as to the American war, which added to our debt 80,497,221 1. truth compels us to fay that the people and the crown feemed to contend which fhould have the merit, as it was then called, of giving it the greater fupport. The statement, therefore, made by the author, by no means proves his propofition that the national debt has been occafioned by the good understanding that has fubfifted fince the revolution between the Houfe of Commons and the crown, or by the influence which is fuppofed to have produced this underflanding. That an undue influence has existed no one can pretend to deny; the record of it is to be found in a folemn refolution of the House of Commons.

The writer endeavours to elucidate his propofition by adducing the cafe of Ireland.

Here feveral very great objections might be made to his statement, and to the inferences that might be drawn from them, refpecting the peculiar circumftances of our fifter land: but we are prevented from advancing them, by our want of room.

In page 25, is the following paffage: Englishmen, fuppofe yourfelves in the fituation of the people of France, reftored to freedom

from

from abject flavery and oppreffion, by a revolution, unexampled for its magnitude, its mildness, and the little blood it has caufed to be Thed, &c.' We wish the author had fixed fome period at which this description could, with truth, be applied to the French revolution; for undoubtedly the man who, fpeaking generally of it, fhould fay that it was unexampled for the torrents of blood fhed in confequence of it could not be contradicted. We speak not of the French blood spilled by the hands of foreign enemies, but by those of Frenchmen themselves; above 80,000 have perished by the hands of the common hangmen, and more than 250,000 have fallen in the civil war in La Vendée; not to mention the thousands and tens of thousands languishing in exile in foreign lands, and through agony of mind and body drawing toward their end. We with, therefore, that our political writers would be lefs forward than they are to make a common caufe between liberty and the French revolution in general; they ought to confine themselves, in their comparifon, to that period in which an auguft body of reprefentatives, fpeaking the fentiments of nineteen out of every twenty of their conflituents, were labouring to affert the freedom of their country, and to fecure it to their pofterity by a wife and excellent conftitution. Liberty is not fanguinary; fhe is difgraced rather than fupported by men of blood, and her empire is no where fo fecure as where the fanguinary effufion is rarely feen; the reigns only in the affections and hearts of mankind, while defpotifm is obliged to maintain itself by terror, created and constantly fed by executions.

The author's obfervations refpecting a reform in the laws and courts of justice, the abolition of monopolies, and other points relative to commerce, meet our warmeft approbation; as well for the principles and fentiments which they exprefs, as for the ftyle in which the obfervations are conveyed to the public: we refer our readers to p. 33-35

In page 42 we find a pofition laid down which reafon will neceffarily controvert: If men were perfectly wife and perfectly virtuous, they would have no occafion for government at all.' It has been a received maxim, because it was founded in truth, that government (we fpeak not of the species,) muft neceffarily exift, wherever there is fociety; a maxim which no man, in our opinion, can decently controvert, at least without fuppofing that man is not only perfectly virtuous and perfectly wife, but that he is poffeffed, at the inftant of his birth, of as much knowlege, and of as much power of availing himfelf of it, as at the age of 30 or 40. Nay, though this fhould be conceded by us, we would still maintain the neceffity of a government: but we must decline the task of affigning our reafons, which might lead us too far from our province of reviewing.

In another place, our author fays that protection feems to be the fole ufe of government. This furely is contrary to the general experience which tells us that man is governed by his hopes as well as by his fears; that encouragements ought to be offered to the ingenious to devife means of bettering the condition of mankind, increafing their comforts, and improving the general state of fociety. A wife legislator would feel the neceffity of rewards ftill ftronger, perhaps, than that of punishments; the former produce the happiness of society; the latter are calculated only to prevent it from being disturbed.

Though