moft clear-fighted were not able to dif, cern, nor the most provident to divine. A very little time before its catastrophe, there was a kind of exterior fplendour in the fituation of the crown, which usually adds to government ftrength and authority at home. The crown feemed then to have obtained fome of the most fplendid objects of state ambition. None of the continental powers of Europe were the enemies of France. They were all, either tacitly difpofed to her, or publicly connected with her; and in those who kept the moft aloof, there was little appearance of jealousy; of animofity there was no appearance at all. The British nation, her great preponderating rival, he had humbled; to all appearance she had weakened; certainly had endangered, by cutting off a very large, and by far the most grow ing part of her Empire. In that its acmé of human prosperity and greatness, in the high and palmy state of the monarchy of France, it fell to the ground without a ftruggle. It fell without any of thofe vices in the monarch, which have fome times been the causes of the fall of kingdoms, but which exifted, without any visible effect on the ftate, in the highest degree in many other princes; and, far from deftroying their power, had only left fome flight ftains on their character. The financial difficulties were only pretexts and inftruments of thofe who accomplished the ruin of that monarchy.They were not the causes of it. Deprived of the old government, deprived in a manner of all govern ment, France fallen as a monary, to common fpeculators might have appeared more likely to be an object of pity or infult, according to the difpofition of the circumjacent powers, than to the fcourge and terror of them all but out of the tomb of the murdered monarchy in France, has arifen a vaft, tremendous, unEd. Mag. Jan. 1797. formed spectre, in a far more terrific guife than any which ever yet have overpowered the imagination, and fubdued the fortitude of man. Going Itraight forward to its end, unappalled by peril, unchecked by remorfe, defpifing all common maxims and all common means, that hideous phantom overpowered those who could not believe it was poffible the could at all exift, except on the principles, which habit rather than nature had perfuaded them were neceffary to their own particular welfare and to their own ordinary modes of action. But the conftitution of any political being, as well as that of any phyfical being, ought to be known, before one can venture to fay what is fit for its confervation, or what is the proper means of its power. The poifon of other states is the food of the new republic. That bankruptcy, the very apprehenfion of which is one of the causes affigned for the fall of the monarchy, was the capital on which the opened her traffic with the world. The republic of regicide with an annihilated revenue, with defaced manufactures, with a ruined commerce, with an uncultivated and half depopulated country, with a discontented, diftreffed, enflaved, and famished people, paffing with a rapid, eccentric, incalculable courfe, from the wildest anarchy to the fternest defpotifm, has actually conquered the finest parts of Europe, has diftreffed, united, deranged, and broke to pieces all the reft; and fo fubdued the minds of the rulers in every nation, that hardly any resource prefents itfelf to them, except that of entitling themselves to a contemptuous mercy by a difplay of their imbecility and meannefs. Even in their greatest military efforts and the greatest difplay of their fortitude, they seem not to hope, they do not even appear to wish, the extinction of what fubfifts to their certain ruin. Their D ambition ambition is only to be admitted to a more favoured clafs in the order of fervitude under that domineering power. This feems the temper of the day. -At first the French force was too much defpifed. Now it is too much dreaded. As inconfiderate courage has given way to irrational fear, fo it may be hoped, that through the me. dium of deliberate fober apprehenfion, we may arrive at fteady fortitude. Who knows whether indignation may not fucceed to terror, and the revival of high fentiment, fpurn ing away the delufion of a fafety purchased at the expence of glory, may not yet drive us to that generous defpair, which has often fubdued diftempers in the ftate for which no remedy could be found in the wifeft councils. quent writer and ingenious fpecula. tor, Dr Browne, upon fome reverses which happened in the beginning of that war, published an elaborate philofophical difcourse to prove that the diftinguishing features of the people of England had been totally changed and that a frivolous effeminancy was become the national character. Nothing could be more popular than that work. It was thought a great confolation to us, the light people of this country, (who were and are light, but who were not and are not effeminate,) that we had found the caufes of our misfortunes in our vices. Pythagoras could not be more pleafed with his leading discovery.But while in that fplenetic mood we amufed ourfelves in a four critical fpeculation, of which we were ourfelves the objects, and in which eveOther great ftates, having been ry man loft his particular fenfe of the without any regular certain courfe of public difgrace in the epidemic naelevation, or decline, we may hope ture of the distemper; while, as in that the British fortune may fluctu- the Alps, goitre kept goitre in counate alfo; because the public mind, tenance; while we were this abanwhich greatly influences that fortune, doning ourfelves to a direct confefmay have its changes. We are there- fion of our inferiority to France, and fore never authorifed to abandon while many, very many, were ready our country to its fate, or to act or to act upon a fenfe of that inferiority, advise as if it had no refource. There a few months effected a total change is no reason to apprehend, becaufe in our variable minds. We emerged ordinary means threaten to fail, that from the gulph of that fpeculative no others can fpring up. While our defpondency; and were buoyed up heart is whole, it will find means, or to the highest point of practical vimake them. The heart of the citi- gour. Never did the mafculine fpizen is a perennial fpring of energy rit of England difplay itself with to the ftate. Because the pulfe feems more energy, nor did its genius to intermit, we must not prefume foar with a prouder pre-eminence that it will ceafe inftantly to beat.-over France, than at the time when The public must never be regarded frivolity and effeminancy had been as incurable. I remember in the be- at leaft tacitly acknowledged as their ginning of what has lately been call- national character, by the good peoed the feven years war, that an elo- ple of this kingdom. STATE OF THE BRITISH EMPIRE AT THE CLOSE OF THE LAST CENTURY, CONTARSTED TO ITS PRESENT POWER, FINANCE, AND COMMERCE. [From the fame.] LET the portion of our history brought before us. We shall find, from the year 1689 to 1713 be that in all that period of twenty-four years, years, there were hardly five that could be called a feafon of peace; and the interval between the two wars, was, in reality, nothing more than a very active preparation for renovated hoftility. During that period, every one of the propofitions of peace came from the enemy: the first, when they were accepted, at the peace of Ryfwick; the fecond, where they were rejected at the congrefs at Gertrydenburgh; the last, when the war ended by the treaty of Utrecht. Even then, a very great part of the nation, and that which contained by far the most intelligent ftatefmen, was against the conclufion of the war. I do not enter into the merits of that question as between the parties. I only state the exiftence of that opinion as a fact, from whence you may draw fuch an inference as you think properly arifes from it. hoftile nations. Ireland, now fo large a fource of the common opulence and power, which wifely managed, might be made much more beneficial and much more effective, was then the heaviest of the burdens.An army not much less than forty thousand men, was drawn from the general effort, to keep that kingdom in a poor, unfruitful, and refourceless subjection. Such was the ftate of the Empire. The state of our finances was worfe, if poffible. Every branch of the revenue became less productive after the revolution. Silver, not as now a fort of counter, but the body of the current coin, was reduced so low, as not to have above three parts in four of the value in the fhilling. It required a dead expence of three millions fterling to renew the coinage. Public credit, that great but ambiguous principle, which has fo often It is for us at prefent to recollect been predicted as the caufe of our what we have been; and to confider certain ruin, but which for a centuwhat, if we pleafe, we may be ftill. ry has been the conftant companion, At the period of thofe wars, our and often the means, of our profperiprincipal ftrength was found in the ty and greatnefs, had its origin, and refolution of the people; that in the was cradled, I may fay, in bankruptrefolution of a part only and of the cy and beggary, At this day we then whole, which bore no propor- have feen parties contending to be tion to our existing magnitude. Eng- admitted, at a moderate premium, to land and Scotland were not united at advance eighteen millions to the exthe beginning of that mighty struggle. chequer. For infinitely fmaller loans, When, in the courfe of the contest, the Chancellor of the Exchequer of they were enjoined, as it was in a that day, Montagu, the father of raw, an ill-cemented, an unproduc- públic credit, counter-fecuring the tive union. For the whole duration ftate by the appearance of the city, of the war, and long after, the names, with the Lord Mayor of London at and other outward and visible figns his fide, was obliged, like an agent of approximation, rather augmented at an election, to go cap in hand than diminished our infular feuds. from shop to shop, to borrow an hunThey were rather the caufes of new difcontents and new troubles, than promoters of cordiallity and affection. The now fingle and potent Gr. Britain was then not only two countries, but, from the party heats in both, and the divifions formed in each of them, each of the old kingdoms within it felf in effect was made up of two dred pounds, and even fmaller fums. When made up in driblets as they could, their beft fecurities were at an interest of twelve per cent. Even the paper of the bank (now at par with cafh, and even fometimes preferred to it,) was often at a discount of twenty per cent. By this the ftate of the reft may be judged. As to our commerce, the imports and exports of the nation, now fix and forty million, did not then a mount to ten. The inland trade, which is commonly paffed by in this fort of estimates, but which, in part growing out of the foreign, and connected with it, is more advantageous, and more fubftantially nutritive to the state, is not only grown in a proportion of near five to one as the foreign, but has been augmented, at least, in a tenfold proportion. When I came to England, I remember but one river navigation, the rate of carriage on which was limited by an act of Parliament. It was made in the reign of William III. I mean that of the Aire and Calder. The rate was fettled at thirteen-pence. So high a price demonftrated the feebleness of thefe beginnings of our inland intercourse. In my time, one of the longeft and fharpefts contefts I remember in your Houfe, and which rather refembled a violent contention among national parties than a local difpute, was, as well as I can recollect, to hold the price up to three-pence. Even this, which a very fcanty juftice to the proprietors required, was done with infinite difficulty. As to private credit, there were not, as I best remember, twelve bankers fhops at that time out of London. In this their number, when I first saw the country, I cannot be quite exact; but certainly thofe machines of domeftic credit were then very few indeed. They are now in almost every market-town and this circumftance (whether the thing be carried to an excess or not) demonftrates the aftonishing increase of private confidence, of general circulation, and of internal commerce; an increase out of all proportion to the growth of the foreign trade. Our naval ftrength in the time of King William's war was nearly matched by that of France; and though conjoined with Holland, then a maritime power hardly infe rior to our own, even with that force we were not always victorious. Tho' finally fuperior, the allied fleets experienced many unpleasant reverses on their own element. In two years, three thoufand veffels were taken from the English trade. On the continent we loft almost every battle we fought. In 1697, it is not quite an hundred years ago, in that state of things, amid the general debafement of the coin, the fall of the ordinary revenue, the failure of all the extraordinary fupplies, the ruin of commerce and the almost total extinction of an infant credit, the Chancellor of the Exchequer himself whom we have just feen begging from door to doorcame forward to move a refolution, full of vigour, in which far from being difcouraged by the generally adverfe fortune, and the long continuance of the war, the Commons agreed to addrefs the Crown in the following manly, spirited, and truly animating ftyle: "This is the eighth year in which your Majefty's most dutiful and loyal fubjects the Commons in Parliament affembled, have affifted your Majesty with large fupplies for carrying on a juft and neceffary war, in defence of our religion, and prefervation of our laws, and vindication of the rights and liberties of the people of Eng. land." Afterward they proceed in this manner :- "To fhew to your Majef ty and all Christendom, that the Commons of England will not be amused or diverted from their firm refolutions of obtaining by war, a fafe and honourable peace, we do in the name of those we reprefent, renew our affurances to fupport your Majefty and your government against all your enemies at home and abroad; and that we will effectually affift you in carrying on the war against France." The amusement and diversion they speak of, was the fuggeftion of a treaty treaty propofed by the enemy, and announced from the throne. Thus the people of England felt in the eighth, not in the fourth year of the war.No fighing or panting after negocia tion; no motions from the Oppofition to force the Miniftry into a peace; no meffages from minifters to palfy and deaden the refolution of Parliament or the spirit of the nation. They did not fo much as advise the King to listen to the propofitions of the enemy, nor to feek for peace but through the mediation of a vigour ous war. This addrefs was moved in an hot, a divided, a factious, and, in a great part, difaffected House of Commons, and it was carried nemine contradicente. While that firft war (which was ill fmothered by the treaty of Ryf. wick,) flept in the thin afhes of a feeming peace, a new conflagration was in its immediate causes. A fresh and a far greater war was in preparation. A year had hardly elapfed when arrangements were made for renewing the conteft with tenfold fury. The fteps which were taken, at that time, to compofe, to reconcile, to unite, and to discipline all Europe against the growth of France, certainly furnish to a statesman the finest and most interesting part in the hiftory of that great period. It formed the mafter-piece of King William's policy, dexterity, and perfeverance. Full of the idea of preferving, not only a local civil liberty united with order, to our country, but to embody it in the political liberty, the order, and the independence of nations united under a natural head, the King called upon his Parliament to put itself into a pofture" to preferve to England the weight and influence it at prefent had on the councils and affairs abroad. It will be requifite Europe fhould fee you will not be wanting to yourselves." Baffled as that monarch was, and almost heart-broken at the difap pointment he met with in the mode he first proposed for that great end, he held on his courfe. He was faithful to his object, and in councils, as in arms, over and over again repulfed, over and over again he returned to the charge. All the mortifications he had fuffered from the last parliament, and the greater he had to apprehend from that newly chofen, were not capable of relaxing the vigour of his mind. He was in Holland when he combined the vast plan of his foreign negociations. When he came to open his defign to his minifters in England, even the fober firmnefs of Somers, the undaunted refolution of Shrewsbury, and the adventurous fpirit of Montagu and Orford, were staggered. They were not yet mounted to the elevation of the King. The cabinet met on the fubject at Tunbridge Wells, the 28th of August 1698; and there Lord Somers, holding the pen, after expreffing doubts on the state of the continent, which they ultimately refer to the king, as beft informed, they give him a most difcouraging portrait of the fpirit of this nation. So far as relates to England,' say these minifters, it would be want of duty not to give your majefty this clear account, that there is a deadness and want of Spirit in the nation univerfally, fo as not to be at all difpofed to entering into a new war. That they seem to be tired out with taxes to a degree beyond what was difcerned, till it appeared upon occafion of the late elections. This is the truth of the fact upon which your Majefty will determine what refolution ought to betaken.' His Majefty did determine; and did take and purfue his refolution. In all the tottering imbecility of a new government, and with parlia ment totally unmanageable, he perfevered. He perfevered to expel the fears of his people, by his fortitudeTo fteady their fickleness, by his conftancy-To expand their narrow pru dence, |