to conciliate, or gratitude to bind the dependant to his benefactor; brother warred with brother ; the son with his father, wherever there appeared the least hesitation in dooming to destruction all who possessed wealth, rank, or principle. For about five years all Europe gazed with affright and astonishment at this spectacle, which, embodying the crimes and barbarities of the world within the compass of a single state, rendered a government detestable, a people infamous, and liberty thus abused the direst of all curses.

In England, the first movements of the Revolution were hailed as the regeneration of a large portion of the human race. Mr. Fox and Mr. Pitt tendered it their tribute of admiration. Mr. Burke alone was more cautious or more penetrating. He professed to admire the principle; but, either from that uncommon sagacity he had ever displayed on great national questions, from his greater age and consequent experience, from a greater knowledge of mankind, or from a clearer insight into the French character, he entertained from the first some extraordinary misgivings as to its mode of operation and result.

Few things in political history are more interesting than to trace the first symptoms of this hesitation to approve, what other and even great men thought it almost their duty, instantly, and by acclamation, to admire. Among his first sentiments on this topic committed to paper, if not the very first, was a letter to Lord Charlemont, dated 9th of August 1789, about three weeks after the

storming of the Bastille, in which he opens his mind without reserve :

"As to us here, our thoughts of every thing at home are suspended by our astonishment at the wonderful spectacle which is exhibited in a neighbouring and rival country. What spectators, and what actors! England gazing with astonishment at a French struggle for liberty, and not knowing whether to blame or to applaud.

"The thing, indeed, though I thought I saw something like it in progress for several years, has still somewhat in it paradoxical and mysterious. The spirit it is impossible not to admire; but the old Parisian ferocity has broken out in a shocking manner. It is true, that this may be no more than a sudden explosion; if so, no indication can be taken from it; but if it should be character, rather than accident, then that people are not fit for liberty, and must have a strong hand, like that of their former masters, to coerce them.

"Men must have a certain fund of natural moderation to qualify them for freedom, else it becomes noxious to themselves, and a perfect nuisance to every body else. What will be the event, it is hard, I think, still to say. To form a solid constitution requires wisdom as well as spirit; and whether the French have wise heads among them, or if they possess such, whether they have authority equal to their wisdom, is yet to be seen. In the mean time the progress of this whole affair is one of the most curious matters of speculation that ever was exhibited."

Nothing can be more unambiguous and unreserved, or more consistent with the active part he afterwards took, than this avowal made in the confidence of friendship-that the spirit to aim at liberty was praiseworthy, but that his ultimate approval must depend upon the manner in which that desire should be carried into effect. The apprehensions which overshadowed his mind are obvious in this letter, and similar sentiments were communicated, both verbally and in writing, to other friends. His judgment might be said (without a figure) to be suspended over it like the sword of Damocles, and with almost equal power to destroy.

In the mean time, with his accustomed diligence, no means were left untried of procuring information, desiring all his acquaintance in Paris, and all who were going thither, to transmit him whatever they could collect, whether of a private nature, or the more public documents which might appear on either side. Among his correspondents at this moment, besides M. Dupont and other natives of distinction, of the reasonable class of wellwishers to freedom, were others of a different stamp; Mr. Christie, the noted Thomas Paine, and the equally notorious Baron (otherwise Anacharsis) Clootz; the two latter men, more especially, who, though the very fanatics of revolution and republicanism, were fated to supply unintentionally, on their part, some of the materials which Mr. Burke, with equal speed and dexterity, sharpened into their most powerful antidotes.

To another correspondent, M. de Menonville, a

relation of the Baron de Menou and a member of the National Assembly, who requested his opinion of their affairs towards the end of September, 1789, he wrote early in the following month, plainly exhibiting the gradual development of his opinions and apprehensions, as events took a more decided

turn:

"As you are pleased to think, that your splendid flame of liberty was first lighted up at my faint and glimmering taper, you have a right to call upon me for my sentiments on whatever relates to that subject. ****

"You may easily believe, that I have had my eyes turned with great curiosity, and no small concernment, to the astonishing scene now displayed in France. It has certainly given rise in my mind to many reflections, and to some emotions. These are natural and unavoidable; but it would ill-become me, to be too ready in forming a positive opinion upon matters transacted in a country, with the correct political map of which I must be very imperfectly acquainted. Things, indeed, have already happened so much beyond the scope of all speculation, that persons of infinitely more sagacity than I have ought to be ashamed of any thing like confidence in reasoning upon the operation of any principle, or the effect of any measure. It would become me least of all to be so confident, who ought at my time of life to have well learned the important lesson of selfdistrust-a lesson of no small value in company with the best information-but which alone can

make any sort of amends for our not having learned other lessons so well as it was our business to have learned them. * * * *

"You hope, Sir, that I think the French deserving of liberty. I certainly do. I certainly think that all men who desire it, deserve it. It is not the reward of our merit, or the acquisition of our industry. It is our inheritance. It is our inheritance. It is the birthright of our species. We cannot forfeit our right to it, but by what forfeits our title to the privileges of our kind, I mean the abuse or oblivion of our national faculties; and a ferocious indocility, which makes us prompt to wrong and violence, destroys our social nature, and transforms us into something little better than a description of wild beasts. To men so degraded a state of strong constraint is a sort of necessary substitute for freedom; since, bad as it is, it may deliver them in some measure from the worst of all slavery, that is, the despotism of their own blind and brutal passions. You have kindly said that you began to love freedom from your intercourse with me. Permit me then to continue our conversation, and to tell you what the freedom is that I love. It is not solitary, unconnected, individual, selfish liberty. It is social freedom. It is that state of things in which the liberty of no man, and no body of men, is in a condition to trespass on the liberty of any person, or any description of persons, in society. This kind of liberty is, indeed, but another name for justice, ascertained by wise laws, and secured by well-constructed institutions. I am sure that