we are morally and religiously bound, as well as by our laws, to transmit to posterity." But, far as Sir PHILIP goes, he does not carry his principles beyond the line drawn by JUNIUS. The latter concludes his argument on the Middlesex question with sentiments, and even language, resembling the above. "We owe it to our ancestors to preserve entire those rights, which they have delivered to our care: we owe it to our posterity, not to suffer their dearest inheritance to be destroyed. But if it were possible for us to be insensible of these sacred claims, there is yet an obligation binding upon ourselves, from which nothing can acquit us; a personal interest, which we cannot surrender*." Both writers consider, that the constitution of the country is a settled, sacred thing, consisting of many relative parts, each having certain rights and that none of these component parts have power to abridge or destroy the rights of themselves, or of any of the rest, without a virtual dissolution of all government. Consistently with this view both of them maintain, that there are many particular things which " cannot be done by King, Lords, and Commons." They cannot disfranchise a borough with a general view to improvement. They cannot take the trial by jury out of the English constitution. They

JUNIUS, i. 223.

† JUNIUS, i. *288.

cannot limit the constitutional powers of Juries, to return a general verdict in all cases whatsoever. "These are rights, my lord, which you can no more annihilate, than you can the soil to which they are annexed." Nor can the people, on their part, exercise despotic power. They cannot annul their own privileges or those of the government; as is stated in the Essay, and the quotations following. But by these restrictions, we are not to conclude that all improvement is prevented. They operate negatively; and while they secure to every branch of the constitution its proper advantages, they leave an indeterminate field for promoting that which is the true object of all government-the happiness of the people,

CHAPTER XIV.

OUR last chapter, containing an entire Essay from the pen of Sir PHILIP FRANCIS, presents a full and unmutilated specimen of his style of writing. Whatever resemblance it may bear to JUNIUS, is thence shewn to be a fair one; and while so many instances of likeness are seen in a certain given space, not selected for the purpose of setting them off to greater advantage, but introduced for a different and a definite object, some idea may be formed of the relation which exists between other productions of the same author and JUNIUS. But still it may be urged, that instances of verbal agreement would be found in those other works which, from their singularity, would add strength to the general effect; and that if so many are met with in one Essay, numberless associations both in sentiment and language, worthy of particular enumeration, would occur to the inquiring eye, in works of a larger kind. The remark is just; and in order to answer this common expectation as satisfactorily as possible, we shall lay before the

reader some strong parallel passages which chance has thrown in our way, in addition to those which have been already noticed. As it seldom happens that others attribute to proofs of this kind the authority they possess in the estimation of him who first meets with them, and as the present cause rests on better evidence than even similar ideas in corresponding forms of language, regard will be had to worth, rather than number, in making the selection.

But the circumstance from which many of the following quotations derive their chief title to consideration is this: that they are very nearly coeval in their origin with the Letters of JUNIUS; that they are the ordinary expressions of the writer at a great distance from England, when, having no expectation that they would ever tend to illustrate the present or any other literary question, he could have had no motive either to imitate the style of JUNIUS, or to depart from that which was natural to himself.

The peculiarity of our first example is heightened by the fact of its being not only varied from in many instances by JUNIUS, but also by Sir PHILIP. In the former, it might be supposed to favour the opinion that two persons were concerned in writing the Letters; but what shall we infer from the equally fluctuating practice of the latter?

JUNIUS." As it is, whenever he changes his servants, he is sure to have the people in that instance of his side.” (iii. 116.)

-"I am persuaded he would have the reasonable part of the Americans of his side." (iii. 160.)

"Here, my lord, you have fortune of

your side." (ii. 169.)

"I have no doubt that with an act of Parliament of my side, I should have been too strong for them all." (Ed. 1772. ii. 279.)

"One would think that all the fools were of the other side of the question." (i. *295) "We have the laws of our side, and want

nothing but an intrepid leader." (ii. 143.)

"It is true he professes doctrines which would be treason in America, but in England, at least, he has the laws of his side." (iii. 84.)

FRANCIS.---But he who knows that he has the law of his side, will never think of appealing to necessity for a defence of the legality of his measures." (Parliamentary Debates, xxiii. 433.)

My reply to the preceding minute is intended for my own justification, and to satisfy the Court of Directors, that if I persist in a conduct opposed to the decided sense of the majority, it is not from obstinacy or passion, but that I have some reason of my side, and that I am not so ill