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Or where in silence all is drown'd,
Fell murder walks his nightly round.
No room for peace-no room for you—
Adieu, celestial Nymph! adieu.

"Shakspeare, no more thy sylvan son, Nor all the art of Addison,

Pope's heaven-strung lyre, nor Waller's ease, Nor Milton's mighty self must please.

Instead of these, a formal band

With furs and coifs around me stand,
With sounds uncouth and accents dry
That grate the soul of harmony.
Each pedant sage unlocks his store
Of mystic, dark, discordant lore,
And points with tottering hand the ways
That lead me to the thorny maze.

"There, in a winding close retreat,
Is Justice doom'd to fix her seat;
There, fenced by bulwarks of the law,
She keeps the wondering world in awe ;
And there, from vulgar sight retired,
Like Eastern queens, is more admired.
O let me pierce the secret shade,
Where dwells the venerable maid,
There humbly mark, with reverend awe,
The guardian of Britannia's law;
Unfold with joy her sacred page,
The united boast of many an age;
Where mix'd, yet uniform, appears
The wisdom of a thousand years;
In that pure spring the bottom view,
Clear, deep, and regularly true;
And other doctrine thence imbibe,
Than lurk within the sordid tribe ;

Observe how parts with parts unite
In one harmonious rule of right;
See countless wheels distinctly tend,
By various laws to one great end,
While mighty Alfred's piercing soul
Pervades and regulates the whole.

"Then, welcome business-welcome strife,
Welcome the cares-the thorns of life,
The visage wan-the poreblind sight,
The toil by day-the lamp at night,
The tedious forms-the solemn prate,
The pert dispute-the dull debate,
The drowsy bench-the babbling hall :
For thee, fair Justice, welcome all.
Thus let my noon of life be past;
Yet let my setting sun at last,
Find out the still, the rural cell,

Where sage Retirement loves to dwell.
There let me taste the homefelt bliss
Of innocence and inward peace ;
Untainted by the guilty bribe-
Uncursed amid the harpy tribe-
No orphan's cry to wound my ear,
My honour and my conscience clear.
Thus I calmly meet my end,

Thus to the grave in peace descend!"

CHAP. XXVIII.

LIBERTY OF THE PRESS.

"THE last thirty years of the reign of GEORGE THE THIRD will be remembered as one of the most remarkable epochs in the moral history of the world. Among other memorable things, it will hereafter be celebrated for the extraordinary elevation which the oratory both of the bar and the senate attained. It will require other events and circumstances equally stupendous with those of the past, to call forth again the energies of eloquence to the same degree of effect and splendour. But perhaps no single occurrence in all those mighty and manifold exertions is more interesting than the trial in the Court of King's Bench of Mr Peltier, for a libel on Buonaparte. It was considered as the first attempt of that magnificent adventurer to overthrow the liberty of the British press; and it was instituted at a time when many gathering and darkening circumstances indicated that a war was coming on in which the very existence of the British state would be put to the most imminent peril, by all the efforts that prodigious power and boundless profligacy could exert,-in every shape that force and fraud, either combined or separate, can employ. But although the speech of Sir James Mackintosh on that occasion is one of the most splendid compositions of the time, it has not obtained that durable popularity of which so noble an effort

might have been deemed beyond all question secure."

The Nymph, in making this observation, took down the published speech from the shelf, where it lay covered with dust, and read the following extract relative to the press, which is in itself not only very beautiful, but may be considered as a curious memorial, illustrative of the popular opinions and apprehensions of the time :

"I am convinced, by circumstances which I shall now abstain from discussing, that this is the first of a long series of conflicts, between the greatest power in the world, and the only free press now remaining in Europe. Gentlemen, this distinction of the English press is new-it is a proud and melancholy distinction. Before the great earthquake of the French revolution had swallowed up all the asylums of free discussion on the continent, we enjoyed that privilege, indeed, more fully than others, but we did not enjoy it exclusively. In great monarchies, the press has always been considered as too formidable an engine to be intrusted to unlicensed individuals. But in other continental countries, either by the laws of the estate, or by long habits of liberality and toleration in magistrates, a liberty of discussion has been enjoyed, perhaps sufficient for most useful purposes. It existed, in fact, where it was not protected by law; and the wise and generous connivance of governments was daily more and more secured by the growing civilization of their subjects. In Holland, in Switzerland, in the imperial towns in Germany, the press was either legally or practically free. Holland and Switzerland are no more; and since the commencement of this prosecution, fifty imperial towns have been erased from the list of independent states, by one dash of the pen. Three or

four still preserve a precarious and trembling existence. I will not say by what compliances they must purchase its continuance. I will not insult the feebleness of states, whose unmerited fall I do most bitterly deplore.

"These governments were in many respects one of the most interesting parts of the ancient system of Europe. Unfortunately for the repose of mankind, great states are compelled, by regard to their own safety, to consider the military spirit and martial habits of their people as one of the main objects of their policy. Frequent hostilities seem almost the necessary condition of their greatness; and, without being great, they cannot long remain safe. Smaller states, exempted from this cruel necessity—a hard condition of greatness, a bitter satire on human nature-devoted themselves to the arts of peace, to the cultivation of literature, and the improvement of reason. They became places of refuge for free and fearless discussion; they were the impartial spectators and judges of the various contests of ambition, which from time to time disturbed the quiet of the world. They thus became peculiarly qualified to be the organs of that public opinion, which converted Europe into a great republic, with laws which mitigated, though they could not extinguish ambition; and with moral tribunals, to which even the most despotic sovereigns were amenable. If wars of aggrandizement were undertaken, their authors were arraigned in the face of Europe. If acts of internal tyranny were perpetrated, they resounded from a thousand presses throughout all civilized countries. Princes, on whose will there were no legal checks, thus found a moral restraint, which the most powerful of them could not brave with absolute impunity. They acted before a vast audience, to whose applause or condemnation they could not be utterly indifferent. The very constitution of human nature, the unalterable laws of the mind of man, against which all rebellion is fruit

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