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dregs, as Voltaire distinguishes the upper and lower orders of society, contend only for the name; the middle classes for the essence of liberty. When therefore, my Lelius, you say that the people have no honest regard for liberty, you are mistaken; and much mistaken. For truly has Pliny remarked, --and in his panegyric on Trajan too,-that people never love their prince so much, but that they love liberty more.

In regard to the neutrality your friend Priscus recommends, let me remind you, that Solon declared every man vicious, who, in any civil dissension, should continue neuter a Aulus Gellius affirms the penalty to have been no less than the banishment of the delinquent, and the confiscation of his effects and Cicero once had the intention of proposing a law, that an offence of that kind should be esteemed capital. Hypocrites there are of liberty, who would stifle the occasional excesses of its more ignorant admirers, by imposing a nightmare upon all its sons; as the women of the Fox islands, to stifle the cries of their children, sometimes take them to the seashore, and hold them in the water till they are dead. Like the Legate of the sovereign pontiff, they become ambassadors of intrigue to palsy the liberty of action. But every country, that submits to be a land of slaves, deserves to be a land of ruin. Patriotism is that virtue, which "all generations call blessed :" and yet, would they wither it in the bud; and make it languish, as the human intellect withers and languishes, beneath the influence of a pestilence.

How sleep the brave, who sink to rest,
By all their country's wishes blest!
When Spring, with dewy fingers cold,
Returns to deck their hallow'd mould;
She there shall dress a sweeter sod,

Than Fancy's feet have ever trod.

A few words shall now satisfy us. 1. It is incumbent on the people to show no little indulgence to princes, on two particular accounts. First, because they are compelled to see

a Plut. in Vit. Solon.

b Aulus Gell. Not. Att. 1. ii. c. 12.

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Epist. ad Attic. iii. 1.

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through spectacles, formed of other person's eyes:-and secondly, because every prince, from Heliogabalus to John Lackland; and thence to Napoleon of France; has been almost suffocated with praise. 2. We ought to remember, that though most men, either in public or in private, can chaunt the glory of liberty; it is not liberty for others, but liberty for themselves, that they so earnestly desire. Who could brawl more intemperately for liberty, than the Spartans? And yet their conduct to their slaves was enough to bring a curse upon the whole peninsula of Greece! In truth, most men are tyrants: and if all tyrants were kings, there would be nearly as many kings as subjects. And this was, doubtless, one of the reasons, why Napoleon hesitated so little in renewing the despotism of France. Knowing the appetites of men, perhaps a greater insult was never hazarded to a country, than when he converted his infancy of authority into a manhood of power, under the specious pretence of being the friend and father of freedom. Promising every thing, he finished in being the only free agent in all his dominions : Toto jam liber in orbe

Solus Cæsar erit.

What a solitude!- Placing, however, a sentinel over the tongue and the pen; and proscribing liberty, as he had before affected to value it, like the wasp and the hornet, he lost his sting and strength together.

Let us now refer to two beautiful maxims. They are taught us by men of wisdom and authority: no poison, therefore, lurks concealed in their buds. 1. "A prince is not born for himself; but for his subjects. In elevating him, the people confide to him power and authority; reserving for themselves, in exchange, his cares, time, and vigilance." This political canon is laid down by a Catholic priest.-Massillon and it derives no little authority from the source, whence it proceeds:

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May not this be applied, also, to the Southern States of North America? Oh shame! shame shame!

for Catholicism has been (hitherto) the prolific and affectionate parent of bigotry and despotism. As this canon has been universally acknowledged to be legitimate; it, of necessity, follows, that the minister, who presumes to infringe upon the established liberties of a country, out of an insidious respect to royal authority, is nothing more, and nothing less, than a pander to his sovereign, and an enemy to his country. A minister should be deposed, upon the second bad symptom he exhibits. Nor ought he to be permitted to furnish a third: lest he finishes in imitating the example of the Marquis de Pombal; during whose administration not less than 3970 persons died in the prisons of Portugal, without conviction of crime. During the continuance of the Spanish Inquisition, too, (from 1481 to 1820), 291,450 persons were sentenced to be imprisoned, and their properties confiscated: 17,690, to be burnt in effigy and 32,382 to be burnt alive!

2. "A man in a state of slavery," says the first of poets, "has lost the best half of himself." What has been lost, a people have a right to recover: and the longer the time they defer, the more difficulty and danger will await the attempt. But in every contemplation of change, we must be essentially certain, that the benefit can be purchased at no other price. And in the attempt to gain what has been lost, men ought to be cautious, that they do not resemble the savage of Louisiana, who, desirous of fruit, "cuts down the tree to come at it "." But this is not sufficient. The ardour of liberty must be

Excess of liberty is the worst

checked by a reverence of it. species of despotism: for it creates a tyrant in every man we meet. We must neither seek it as a lover, as a warrior, nor with too much familiarity. We must seek it, as a son seeks a father he has lost; calmly, manfully, vigorously; and with a resolution, to be changed neither by power, circumstances, nor time.

There is, in the contemplation of change, one great geneMontesquieu.

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ral fear, of which insidious ministers amply avail themselves : the fear, lest, in repairing the walls, the fabric should fall to the ground. This ought, assuredly, to be guarded against; and with the utmost solicitude. But liberty is worth any price, and any hazard. Lord Kames says, and says justly, what Tacitus had said before him, "that it is far better to have a government liable to storms, than to breathe the dead repose of despotism." But such outrages have been committed in the name of liberty, that it has almost become necessary to invent some new word to give effect to its excellencies and beauties. Robespierre, odious and detestable as he assuredly was, is less to be abhorred for his ignorance and cruelty, than for the disgrace, which he brought upon the name of freedom. License being even a greater insult to liberty, than the Inquisition is to the science of legislation: both being, in fact, a terror and a persecution to all the faculties of the soul.

If, from the liberty of nations, we recur to the freedom of individuals, we may safely pronounce that man to be the most free, and consequently the most happy, who has learned to consider genius the only rightful claimant of prerogative, and virtue the only symbol of nobility: who, smiling at the caprice of fashion, disregarding the idle opinions of the weak, and despising the notions of the worldly, has formed his plan in temperate independence of common customs and of common society. Whose resources centre in himself: whose mind contains the riches of exalted precepts: and whose soul is superior to his fortune. Master, as it were, of his own destiny; esteeming content the synonym of happiness, and bearing ever in his mind that noble axiom, which teaches, that the fewer are our wants, the greater are our pleasures, he despises the oppressor; he ridicules the proud; and pities the ignorance and folly of malevolence. Beholding Nature with a lover's eye, and reading in her sacred volume the transcript of the Deity, his mind to him is " a kingdom :" And fixing his habitation, if possible, at the foot of a high mountain, surrounded

by all that is graceful or magnificent in Nature, he enjoys the sublimity of the scene with a tranquillity, which neither the smiles nor the frowns of fortune can exalt or depress.

Creation's heir! the world, the world is his!

VALE OF LLANGOLLEN.

IF scenes, so common and simple, as shrubberies and gardens, have power to assist in strengthening the mind, much greater effect in weaning us from its follies and vices, may nobler scenes be supposed to produce. Colonna, accompanied by Blanche, one evening ascended a high mountain in the neighbourhood of Llangollen. The sun was shooting its evening rays along the vale, embellishing every thing they touched. It having rained all the morning, the freshness, with which spring had clad every object, gave additional impulse to all their feelings. Arrived at the summit, the scene became truly captivating: for Nature appeared to have drawn the veil from her bosom, and to glory in her charms. The season of early spring, which, in other countries, serves only to exhibit their poverty, displayed new beauties in this. Nature had thrown off her mantle of snow, and appeared to invite the beholder to take a last look of her beauties, ere she shaded the cottage with woodbine, or screened with leaves the fantastic arms of the oak. The clouds soon began to form over their heads, and a waving column lightly touched their hats. Around-was one continued range of mountains, with Dinas, rising above the river. Immediately below, lay a beautifully diversified vale, with the Dee,-Milton's "wizard stream,"-winding through the middle of it: while on the east side of the mountain, several villages appeared to rest in calm repose. This beautiful scene was soon converted into a sublime one. For the clouds assuming a more gloomy character, the tops of all the mountains around became totally

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