BRITISH CONSTITUTION.

The precious gift of civil liberty has been attained in England, not from the legislative genius of individuals, as at Athens and Sparta; but by improving critical junctures, by frequent changes of the dynasty, by two great revolutions, and by the progressive experience of ages. The first step towards a more restrained despotism was at the accession of William Rufus, when he wrested the crown from the hands of his brother Robert. A genuine love of liberty has ever been predominant among the people; and by degrees, as they found political occurrences favourable, they have been ready to embrace them. The temperament of our ancient nobility was a check on the ferocity of unbridled power. A propensity to servitude was then no characteristic of the great, nor were they so lost to a due sense of personal worth.

SUMPTUARY LAWS.

Among others at Zurich, in the thirteenth century, prostitutes were obliged to wear red caps, and the musicians at weddings were restricted to two fiddlers, two hautboys, and two singers.

LORD CHIEF JUSTICE ELLENBOROUGH.

This was one of the proudest men I ever knew. His condescensions even at dinner-table were too palpably forced, and he seemed to consider himself like a schoolmaster who endeavours to unbend among the youths upon whom he inflicts occasional flagellations. He was nevertheless a man possessed of a dangerous degree of talents, and of a dignified and copious flow of eloquence.

WINDMILLS.

Certain annalists report, that windmills were introduced into Normandy so early as the year 1105. Authors had before observed, that they were first used in the dry countries of Asia Minor. These, together with silk and sugar, were introduced into Italy, from Greece and Constantinople, during the expeditions of the Crusaders.

SPANISH UNIVERSITIES.

These were formerly twenty-two in number; but one-half were suppressed in 1807. A general uniformity prevailed in their modes of instruction, but it rather conduced to superstition than to the preservation or improve ment of real learning. Instead of

system of education, formed on more excellent modern models, was prescribed for the university of Salamanca, and this was to be followed in the others. The universities suppressed were-Toledo, Bona, Onnaté, Orihuela, Avila, Irache, Baeza, Ossuna, Almagro, Gandia, and Siguenza. Those remaining are-Salamanca, Alcala, Valladolid, Seville, Grenada, Valentia, Saragossa, Huesca, Cervera, St. Iago, and Oviedo.

Unhappily, the forms by which university instruction is regulated place them, in point of actual knowledge, a full century behind the rest of the world. They venture to teach nothing till all the rest of the world has adopted it. Just so, too, it is in all societies called learned: they are governed by the ancient members, and the knowledge of these is always one age behind that of the unfettered part of the community.

THE ARGUS-CAPT. PERRY.

I was invited in 1789, at the setting up of the above newspaper, to take a share in it; but, as I was in some degree engaged in the Oracle, I declined the offer. I nevertheless made one of the party, at the house of `Capt. P. in Argyll-street, where the plan for bringing it out was finally arranged. Among other persons present were John Turner, brother to Sir Gregory Page Turner, Thomas Twistleton, brother to Lord Saye and Sele, and Sir Harry Tempest. Nothing could exceed the strange notions which some of them entertained on the business of conducting a newspaper. One desired to have a column set apart for his remarks on the world of fashion, after the manner of Addison, in the Spectator; another insisted on the same space being allotted to him for puns and jeux d'esprit ; and, in consequence, it was agreed that a certain space should be left open for the joint production of two of the proprietors; but the editorship of the whole was assigned to the largest sharer in the work, Capt. Sampson Perry, formerly a surgeon and officer of militia.

There were, at the period of the birth of this paper, a considerable number of peers and commoners neither attached to nor approving the measures of the then ministry, who were denominated the Neutral Squad, at the head of which was Lord Hawke, a man of ordinary abilities, but around

whom

whom the naval achievements of his father shed some lustre. Lady Hawke was the aunt of Mr. Turner; and, through this family connexion, it was expected by the latter gentleman that considerable interest would be derived to the Argus from the growing weight of the Neutral Squad. The French revolution, however, was advancing with hasty strides, and its impetus threw down all trifling considerations of party; and, as the Argus decidedly adopted the principles of the revolution, the alarmed proprietors sold their shares, which were bought in by Capt. P. till he at length became sole

owner.

in

assisted

The Argus was perhaps the boldest in its opposition of any publication in any age. Prosecution did not abate the devotion of its editor; but rather increased his zeal in the cause of democracy and reform. Its opposition to government was manifested in every way,-by argument and by ridicule, prose and in verse. It was by the pungent reasonings of Thomas Paine, and by the satirical epigrams of Robert Merry: in short, it was the rendezvous of all the partizans and literary guerillas then in alliance against that system of government which has continued its ascendancy so far beyond the period assigned to it by Paine, Tooke, &c.

As specimens of the manner in which the lighter arms of the Argus were employed by the author of "the Rights of Man," he wrote the following epigrams on the heir to the Onslow estates, who then signalised himself as a four-in-hand, by driving a team of little cropped horses, compared to tom-tits or tit-mice, and which begat him the nick-name of "Tommy Tit

mouse."

for weeks, when the Argus anticipated them as follows:He wakes and he sleeps, and he sleeps and he wakes;

But no more shall we say, for fear of mistakes.

When George Rose was tacked to his friend Thomas Steele, as joint paymasters, the Argus treated it thus:God bless Tom Steele and Rose, They hate Reforms-as foes. God bless George Rose and Steele,' They love the common-weal.

abate this nuisance in some way or At length the ministry resolved to other;

and prosecutions by the Attorney-General were instituted, and other devices practised, against its proprietor. It continued to exist till December 1792; and, upon its suppression, a sarcastic account was published in the Morning Herald in the following words:"Our neighbour the Argus has of late dealt in so much inflammable matter, that our able tactician, the Attorney-General, has contrived means (such, perhaps, as Marshal Saxe and the Duke of Marlborough sometimes used,) to get a slow but sure match introduced into its arsenal, and has office, even to the very devil.” thereby blown the whole printingup

ORIGIN OF DESPOTISM IN FRANCE.

When the English, in a former age, successfully invading France, had advanced as far as Orleans, and Charles VII. had retired to Bourges, the Assembly of the Three Estates, in the pangs of despair, empowered the king to levy taxes during the war; and the power, thus acquired, was retained, more or less, until the revolution in 1789. In the case of those senators, delay would not have been a waste of time, as the fortune of war soon after turned, by the strange occurrence of one grand incident, the romantic appearance of Joan D'Arc.

MILTON.

There is a simplicity in the style and manner of Milton's prose, that, combined with the strong feelings of a liberal mind, render it very interesting. Whether some of his notions had or had not led him astray, it is evident that his heart was innocent, and under the direction of religion. A knowledge of human nature appears in the following passage, while it forcibly impresses a lesson not more political than moral:-" For this is not the li

berty which we can hope for, that no grievanee

New Market at Vienna.-Regular history furnishes instances of Fortune's shifting government, to which good and evil are made equally subservient. The Counts of Hapsburg, ancestors of the house of Austria, were originally stewards of the Abbê of Seckingen, and butlers to the Bishop of Basil.

grievance shall ever arise in the commonwealth; that, let no man in this world expect. But when complaints are freely heard, deeply considered, and speedily reformed, then is the utmost bound of civil liberty attained that wise men look for." This and other just observations occur in the course of his "Areopagitica." The motives which gave rise to the following necessarily imply a rational tenderness for the preservation of judicious and useful works. Milton had remarked what Horace alluded to, in his Vicum vendentem, thus et odores! "He who kills a man kills a reasonable creature,-God's image: but he who destroys a good book, kills reason itself,-kills the image of God, as it were in the eye. Many a man lives a burthen to the earth; but a good book is the precious life-blood of a masterspirit, embalmed and treasured up, for purposes to a life beyond a life."

THE RECORDER SYLVESTER.

This successful lawyer had the hardest and blackest physiognomy of any man of his time. His indignation must have been terrible to the culprits before him, and even his sardonic smiles afforded no satisfaction. He abounded in anecdote, and used often to relate, with much good humour, the humble steps by which he rose from half-guinea fees to be the head of the principal criminal court in England.

VICISSITUDE OF FORTUNE.

A characteristic trait of this sometimes occurs in the case of ruffians of a more gigantic size. Duke John of Austria, grandson of Rudolph, from being near the seat of sovereign power, the sceptre of state, after killing King Albert, was reduced to the necessity of asking for alms in the

HISTORY.

This may be considered as similar in kind to philosophy, though different, insomuch that it teaches by examples, and inculcates wisdom without the dangers and sufferings of personal experience. It certainly presents no common materials to such as have a portion of intellectual penetration. It is exactly suited to, and calculated for, the statesman. Biography is principally founded on particulars which one single object affords, and is more likely to be edifying and entertaining where the ambition of greatness is not the ruling passion. This is for the private individual. Thus the Odyssey, in general, delights more than the Iliad, with all its numerous troop of variegated characters.

But Walpole asserted, and truly, that all history is a fable; and it is so when historians affect to dive into the causes of events of which they seldom can know any thing. An historian is like one ignorant of mechanics, who can tell the fact of the hour by looking at the dial of a watch, but knows nothing of the concealed springs of movement. Historians generally write as though kings, courts, and ministers, were governed by rational causes, and were superior, instead of being generally inferior in intellect, and in the government of their passions, to other men.

GRECIAN LIBERTY:

AN ODE.

By WILLIAM DUCKETT, of Paris.

"Tis virtue prompts the theme! The highest wisdom fires the song, To him the purest strains belong,

OPI

Russia.

PE, Freedom's Muse, thy sacred store,
With bold and vent'rous wing I soar,
Above each common height!

The sons of Greece once felt thy fire,
And wak'd to rapture ev'ry lyre,
A son of Freedom calls, raise and support

his flight.

Away the low, the venal lays,

That tyrants prais'd, or tyrants praise,

Grecian name.

Kind Nature mourns with sympathetic woe,
The deepen'd shades a darker gloom bestow;
No more with cheerful notes the woods resound,
But mournful turtles breathe their plaints around;
Sad and forlorn, I listen to their moan,
And count the griefs of others by my own;
Condemn'd to prove a joyless, suffering state,
From happier days, the sad reverse of fate!
But hark! from yonder dusky grove draws near
A voice melodious, pleasing to my ear;
Religion calls, thrice welcome, heavenly maid,-
In accents mild rejoicing to persuade.

Cease, cease, mistaken mortal, to complain!
The Sovereign Good inflicts no woe in vain;
Ungrateful thou repay'st his bounteous love,
Whom most he favours he delights to prove,
And teaches by dispensing good and ill,
A due submission to His righteous will.
Thro' all His works the same wise counsel runs;
Her fruits earth yields, not by unclouded suns,
But the swift seasons' ever-varying race
With flowers and fruit adorns fair Nature's face;
From hence instruction learn, each thought compose,
And reap, resign'd, the harvest of thy woes.

VERSES

J. G.

FOUND INSCRIBED ON A SKULL IN A CHURCH-YARD.

By Dr. T. FORSTER.

O EMPTY vault of former glory!
Whate'er thou wert in time of old,
Thy surface tells thy living story,
Tho' now so hollow, dead, and cold;
For in thy form is yet descried

The traces left of young Desire,
The Painter's art, the Statesman's pride,
The Muse's song, the Poet's fire;
But these, forsooth, now seem to be
Mere lumps on thy periphery.

Dear Nature, constant in her laws,

Hath mark'd each mental operation, She ev'ry feeling's limit draws

On all the heads throughout the nation, That there might no deception be;

And he who kens her tokens well, Hears tongues which everywhere agree In language that no lies can tellCourage-Deceit-Destruction-TheftHave traces on the skulcap left. But through all Nature's constancy

An awful change of form is seen, Two forms are not which quite agree, None is replaced that once hath been; Endless variety in all,

From Fly to Man, Creation's pride, Each shows his proper form-to fall Eftsoons in Time's o'erwhelming tide, And mutability goes on With ceaseless combination.

"Tis thine to teach, with magic power, Those who still bend life's fragile stem, To suck the sweets of ev'ry flower,

Before the sun shall set to them;

Calm the contending passions dire,
Which on thy surface I descry,
Like water struggling with the fire
In combat, which of them shall die:
Thus is the soul, in Fury's car,
A type of hell's intestine war.
Old wall of Man's most noble part,
While now I trace with trembling hand
Thy sentiments, how oft I start,

Dismay'd at such a jarring band!
Man, with discordant frenzy fraught,
Seems either madman, fool, or knave;
To try to live is all he's taught-

To 'scape her foot who nought doth save In life's proud race; (unknown our goal) To strive against a kindred soul. These various organs show the place Where Friendship lov'd, where Passion glow'd,

Where Veneration grew in grace,

Where Justice sway'd, where Man was
proud;

Whence Wit its slippery sallies threw
On Vanity, thereby defeated;
Where Hope's imaginary view

Of things to come (fond fool) is seated; Where Circumspection made us fear, Mid gleams of joy, some danger near. Here fair Benevolence doth grow

In forehead high; here Imitation Adorns the stage, where on the Brow Are Sound, and Colour's legislation. Here doth Appropriation try,

By help of Secrecy, to gain A store of wealth against we die, For heirs to dissipate again. Cause and Comparison here show The use of every thing we know. But here that fiend of fiends doth dwell, Wild Ideality, unshaken By facts or theory, whose spell

Maddens the soul and fires our beacon. Whom Memory tortures, Love deludes, Whom Circumspection fills with dread, On every organ he obtrudes,

Until Destruction o'er his head Impends; then, mad with luckless strife, He volunteers the loss of life. And canst thou teach to future Man The way his evils to repair,— Say, O memento,-of the span

Of mortal life? For if the care Of Truth to Science be not given (From whom no treachery it can sever,) There's no dependence under Heaven

That Error may not reign for ever. May future heads more learning cull From thee, when my own head's a skull. Grinstead; Oct. 1822.

NOVELTIES