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MONTHLY MIRROR,

FOR

DECEMBER, 1804.

Embellished with

▲ PORTRAIT OF MRS. JORDAN, ENGRAVED BY RIDLEY, FROM AN ORIGINAL MINIATURE BY BARBER.

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PRINTED, FOR THE PROPRIETORS,

By J. Wright, No. 38, St. John's Square, Clerkenwell.

And published by Vernor and Hood, in the Poultry;

Sold, also, by all the Booksellers in

the United Kingdom.

400

PROVINCIAL DRAMA, &c.

Manchester

425

News, &c.

426

CORRESPONDENCE.

The Biography of Mrs. JORDAN, Mrs. POWELL, &c. is deferred for a short time.

Ode to Buonaparte's threaten'd Invasion, by C. F. HAMILTON, the first opportunity.

Also the Anacreontic by LEOPOLD.

The Lines by W. H. W. have much merit, but are not sufficiently accurate for insertion.

We do not perceive the humour of INQUISITOR's Letter.

The favours promised by CIVIS will be welcome. If this gentleman will fayour us with his address, a mode of conveyance shall be pointed out.

S. S. S. is informed that the play she enquires after has not been published, unless piratically.

Our Manchester correspondent shall be attended to in our next.

We thank E. D. for his communications. It is presumed that the observation to which E. D. alludes was suggested by the natural picture of sorrow the lines in question presented.

J. T.'s paper is at length found.

Having no title, it was overlooked in our former search. We must decline inserting the article.

EDWARD's Verses shall be inserted. We are obliged to this correspondent for his information. To the latter part of his letter, grateful as we feel for the compliment he pays us, we can only reply by referring him to our publishers.

The SHANDEAN CHAPTER is received. It is a very clever imitation, but there are indecent allusions in it which will not allow us to give it a place in this work. The original letters will be most acceptable.

Mr. SEYMOUR will shortly publish his valuable Notes on SHAKSPERE, with Additions from the manuscripts left by LORD CHEDWORTH. The work is to be dedicated to Mr. SHERIDAN.

MONTHLY MIRROR,

FOR

DECEMBER, 1804.

THE LATE REV. RICHARD GRAVES.

On the 23d of November, 1804, died, in the ninetieth year of his age, after an illness of a few days, the Rev. Richard Graves, Rector of Claverton and Crosscombe; whom to know was to love, admire, and reverence; whom to remember is to cherish in the bosom a continual lesson of benevolence and piety. He held the rectory of Claverton fifty-five years, during which period he was never absent from his parish for the space of a month at any one time.

On the day preceding his dissolution, he received the sacrament from the hands of a neighbouring clergyman, and awaited the approach of death with that earnest spirit of religious peace and cheerfulness, which gave the characteristic form to his conduct and manpers, and distinction to every part of his life.

Mr. Graves possessed from nature an extraordinary vivacity of constitution, to which the active employments of his choice and station gave a full scope, and which a rigid temperance maintained unimpaired to the end of a long life. His mind was highly culti vated at a very early period, not from the severity of precept, but from its own spontaneous efforts to trace the sources of refined and virtuous pleasure. At college he was the intimate associate of Shenstone, Jago, Sir W. Blackstone, and whomever else of distinguished character the university of Oxford then contained; and he approv ed himself in no respect their inferior, either in the vigour of his talents, the rectitude of his heart, or the fervency of his projects for future utility.

The example of his life has been uniformly of that kind from which society derives its essential advantages and actual comforts. His attention was not devoted to any speculative reforms of human nature, but was exerted, minutely and continually, in the department immediately subject to his inspection, to check the progress of errors that lead imperceptibly to calamity, and to direct the lis tening proselyte to his own profit and happiness.

In his view of worldly actions, he contemplated the vices of mankind, with the most minute strictness of discrimination; and, when called on by his duty, he investigated them with severity, reproved them with earnestness, but corrected them with lenity. A first offence met his compassion, not his anger; but he was slow to pardon its repetition.

A natural politeness, a simplicity of manners, equally unassumed and unassuming, covered (and from his ordinary acquaintance almost concealed) an ardent and energetic spirit, which never submitted to unjust aggression, and never stooped to dissimulation or dependence. He endured affliction with the courage of a mind conscious of its own uprightness, and frequently diverted the thoughts of sorrow by the exercise of his literary pursuits.

He had many of the eccentric habits of genius, but "the love of order" was the prevailing principle of his mind. The familiar intercourse of his domestic hours exhibited an unvarying tenor of affection, cheerfulness and piety. He was, in his heart, as in his profession, attached to the truths of revelation. It was his declaration to an intimate friend, that, after all the researches of reading or speculative enquiry, he thought "No man" to use his own words "could help being a christian."

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Mr. Graves was born in the year 1715, of an ancient family at Mickleton, in Glocestershire. He was originally designed for the practice of medicine, but afterwards turned his thoughts to the church, in the doctrines of which he was uncommonly skilled. He established a school at Claverton, and continued it for many years with the highest credit. He was first distinguished in the literary world as the author of the Spiritual Quixote, to which he successively added a great number of ingenious and interesting publications in verse and prose, in a clear, familiar, and lively style, partaking of the graces of Addison and Goldsmith. His sermons are written in the same unaffected manner, and find an easy access to the heart. They are the only work to which he affixed his name, but there is no volume in the long catalogue of his writings, which does not bear the marks of his genius, philanthropy, and virtue.

A COMPARISON

BETWEEN THE CHARACTERS OF THE

EMPEROR CHARLES THE FIFTH,

AND

FRANCIS THE FIRST, KING OF FRANCE.

THE Success which accompanied the Emperor Charles the Fifth in all his undertakings, has in a manner dazzled the eyes of those historians who have recorded the events of his reign. In admiring his well planned political schemes of conquest, and reflecting upon the good fortune which always attended him, they seem to wish that his character should be estimated by the splendour of his victories, and the success of his arms; while those more amiable qualities which

ought particularly to adorn the monarch, are entirely glossed over, or but slightly touched upon.

The extensive empire over which Charles the Fifth reigned, and the great supplies both of money and troops always at his command, cannot fail of presenting him to the mind as the most formidable and powerful monarch, that ever graced a throne; and, indeed, had it not been for the more than common abilities of his rivals, all Europe, through his means, might at this time have been groaning under the pressure of political despotism, and religious persecution.

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The memorable period, during which the Emperor Charles acted so considerable a part, may be looked upon as the most interesting time recorded in the annals of history, as it made a total change in all the establishments of Europe. It was then that the dark clouds of superstition were dispersed. Religion appeared divested of maof those meretricious ornaments which hitherto had served only to disguise her native simplicity, and which had rendered her plain dictates obscure and mysterious, to all but a domineering herd of priests, whose interest it had been to keep the rest of society insuperstitious ignorance and fanatic error. Tyranny of every kind was then checked by the revival of learning, and by the consequent expansion of knowledge among the people, who had never before ventured to think for themselves, but who, when once they had tasted the blessings of civil and religious liberty, could never again be brought back to bear the yoke of superstition and the chain of tyranny.

"Ah! who mid the darkness of night would abide,
"That can taste the pure breezes of morn?
"Or who, that has drank of the chrystalline tide,

"To the feculent flood would return ?"

When once the ice was broken, continual improvement was made, and the people every day gained fresh knowledge. The art of printing, at that time newly invented, tended greatly to spread the discoveries which were effected in religion and morality, and the mind, till then unaccustomed to the exercise of reason, seized on every thing with avidity.

This knowledge prepared the people for a reformation in the church, and caused the doctrines of Luther to be received with enthusiasm. When we behold him, and a few followers only, opposed to the whole power of the Romish church, and when, at the hazard of his life, he openly dared to expose the abuses and corruptions of the court of Rome, we cannot but admire the firmness of his mind, and his consciousness of rectitude.

Luther's doctrines at that time began gradually to undermine the pillars of the Catholic religion, which, in the course of three

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