But the unexpected, the unexampled, the dailyincreasing profperity of Great-Britain, the harmony, the loyalty, and the happiness of its inhabitants, furnished a difappointment too fevere to be endured with any degree of composure. These were scenes which harrowed up the foul of the envious and malignant Fiend, who, like his progenitor, bent his courfe to this Paradife of the globe, eager to deftroy that felicity which it was not in his nature either to partake of or endure.

That

Ir is difficult, under any circumftances, to find pity for thofe, whofe character, conduct, and defigns, merit only execration; and yet one can hardly refufe to commiferate the extreme feverity of their disappointment, who built their hopes upon the fuccefs of thefe fictitious "Rights of Man" in this country. fuccefs has been exactly fuch as was merited, and as might reasonably have been expected, Indignation at the defign, deteftation of the Author's character, and contempt for his performance, conftitute the public fentiment upon this occafion. And at length JUSTICE, with flow but steady pace, feems advancing to gratify

the

the universal wifh, by vindicating the infulted dignity of the country.

THE good fenfe of the English People is no more to be deluded by artifice than their vigour is to be vanquished by force. They are not to be perfuaded to part with the fubftance for the fhadow. They can diftinguish between the fincere and honeft advice of rational friends, and the wily enfnaring addreffes of infidious foes. They can detect treachery, and defeat malice. They are not fo fhort-fighted as to believe, that in 1792 the man would counfel them to their good, who a few years before was labouring at their deftruction. And fenfible that under the friendly influence of their moft excellent Conftitution, and of the happieft poffible form of Government, they not only enjoy the greatest degree of personal freedom, as well as of perfonal fecurity, that can exist in fociety, but have alfo rifen, within the fhort space of eight years, from penury to affluence, and from deep and accumulated diftrefs to brilliant and unprecedented profperity; rejoiced alfo that the fruits of these great and manifold advantages have already begun to appear in an alleviation of their bur

thens,

thens, they are not to be induced to ftop the career of their greatnefs, and to replunge into a ftate of confufion and calamity worse even than that from which they have so happily emerged.

PROTEST

AGAINST

PAINE's "" Rights of Man :”

ADDRESSED TO THE

MEMBER S

OF A

BOOK SOCIE T Y.

AVING been unsuccessful in my endeavours, as a

H Member of your Committee, to prevent the intro

duction of Mr. Paine's "Rights of Man" into the Society, I confider it as due to myself, as well as a proper mark of refpect to the Society at large, thus to enter my Protest against the Vote by which it was refolved to prefent that book to your inspection. My wifh is, to obviate the fuppofition that I concurred in fuch a refolution; but left I should be thought to object on trivial grounds, I feel it incumbent upon me to affign at large the reasons upon which my Proteft is founded.

In the first place, I cannot reconcile it to my own feelings to contribute in any degree to the circulation of a work, the palpable defign of which is to disturb the tranquillity and invade the happiness of the State; and which appears to be folely intended to excite difaffection towards Government, to ftimulate the people to fedition and rebellion, and to involve this free and happy country in fcenes of confufion and anarchy.

I SHOULD alfo confider myself as guilty of an infult upon your feelings, were I to put into your hands a work containing a most indecent and malignant attack upon that CONSTITUTION which is defervedly your pride and boaft as Britons, and which preferves inviolate your rights and privileges as free citizens; a Conftitution obtained by the glorious ftruggles of your ancestors-founded upon experience-matured by time-which has ftood the teft of ages-the effence of which is focial liberty-the fcope of which is focial happinefs;-in fhort, a Conftitution which you enjoy as your inestimable birthright, which calls for your gratitude to its venerable founders, and which it is your bounden duty to tranfmit unimpaired to posterity.

If a book of which the tendency is generally admitted to be immoral and diffolute, were propofed in your Society, every Member of it would fpurn at the idea of its being fubmitted to your notice. And can any publication be in effect more grofsly or deftructively vicious and immoral, than one which tempts to a violation of the important duties of fubjects-which tends to disturb the public order-to weaken or diffolve the bands which, by connecting Government and People, keep Society together-to withdraw that respect to the ruling powers which is prefcribed both by reason and religion—to diminish the authority of the laws, and thereby to remove the restraints which are neceffary to control the paffions of mankind— and finally, to facrifice domestic tranquillity and national profperity for inteftine commotions and civil difcord?

If a plan were published for the purpose of inftructing and encouraging evil-difpofed perfons to fet fire to the habitations of individuals, who would affift in the propagation

of