tion. But what is the great calamity of our times, is the universal degene racy amongst all ranks, and especially the corruption of our nobility and magistracy and clergy, from which sources vice and wickedness flow down throughout all other conditions of men. And unless God in his good Providence put some stop to this evil, or find out some cure for this cause of our misery, we shall grow more and more fit for Popery, for the deceptions, impieties, the ruin and damnation that attend it. I have been apprehensive that our present calamities will grow to a yet farther heighth, and that a very severe scourge will now or soon come upon these unhappy nations, that God's floor may be more thoroughly purged, and the land may have some rest from the iniquities of those who dwell therein. May God prepare us for his pleasure, and hide us under the shadow of his wing till the indignation be overpast, or bring us by the storm if it reaches us, to that peaceful world of righteousness that remains for his people. I pray God succeed and reward all your cares for his glory, and the salvation of souls.

I am, Dear Sir,

With very great esteem, Your affectionate friend and brother,

SAMUEL CHANDLER.

Letter III. from Rev. D. Wilkins to Rev. Mr. Toms.

[This was occasioned by Mr. Toms's circulation of a printed paper which we subjoin. The Rector's letter is a curious proof of the height of ecclesiastical claims at the time when it was written. ED.]

SIR, TOT

Hadleigh, March 13, 1744-5.

Nor having had either the favour

of seeing you at my house, or of meeting you any where in my parish, I take this opportunity of acquainting you, that I very much disapprove your distributing printed papers in so public a manner among my parishioners without my leave first had and obtained. As I am not only Rector of this parish, but also the Archbishop's commissary in this jurisdiction, so this public way of handing papers about would not be allowable even to a clergyman of the Church of England, if there was another church

of

in this parish, without my consent and approbation: much less to any other that dissents from the Church. Besides, your promiscuous way treating our parishioners all alike, might seem to intimate that I and Mr. Gurdon are neglectful or remiss in our duty of informing our people in the way of keeping Christmas, the reasons of keeping a public fast, and the rules of the conduct of a Christian; that they must in all this be instructed or reminded by you.

I cannot nor will I ever by any means hinder you from making your good intentions (for good and highly commendable they are) known to your congregation, even by such circular papers; only I desire that whatever is for the future distributed, though with so pious and useful a design, in a public promiscuous way, may not be done without my knowledge or concurrence.

If your affairs will permit, shall be glad at your leisure to see you and my good friend, Mr. Glanfield, at my house,

Who am, Sir, Your very

humble servant,

D. WILKINS.

Directions for the Religious Observation of Christmas Holy Days.

1. Keep in mind, through all the season, whose birth it is you are to rejoice at; and often devoutly repeat the Angels' Song at his nativity.

2. Meditate on the amazing love of God the Father and the Son shewn in Christ's incarnation; and observe well that the design of it was to destroy sin and wickedness.

3. Improve the opportunities which offer for religious worship, and imitate also the trader's example: compute

your past gains and losses in religion,

and examine whether you have laid up any treasure in heaven this year, or are any thing richer towards God.

4. Remember, through the holy days, that nothing can be more opposite to the end of Christ's coming into the world, and the commands of his gospel, than mispending and abusing precious time, and giving into gaming. and to excesses, which lead to drinkenness, gluttony, &c.

5. Be careful therefore lest your temper and practice should highly offend him, and disgrace his religion at

the very season you pretend to honour the holy Jesus, and to have special zeal for his cause.

6. Wisely choose your associates, and shun the company of irreligious and intemperate men and their entertainments or where this cannot be done, draw a comparison between their words and actions and your Saviour's, which may well inflame your love of him, and fix your abhorrence of their principles and practices.

7. Forget not that charity to the poor, or the smallest good office (if

you are able to do no more) to the necessitous, especially if religious, will now and always be very pleasing to the Redeemer, if it proceeds from principle of faith, love and obedience.***

8. Think seriously, that however you may rejoice for Christ's birth, if you are not born again of the spirit, and thereby turned from your sins unto God, and interested in the death and mediation of Jesus; his second coming will be most dreadful to you, and issue in your condemnation to eternal punishment.

[A singular work has just appeared, entitled "Armata, a Fragment," a thin 8vo. volume, published by Murray, Albemarle Street, which is attributed to the pen of LORD ERSKINE. The internal evidence of the author is decisive: his vigorous genius is imprinted on every line.

The work is properly speaking a Romance, but is at the same time too true a picture of the modern history and present state of England, for which "Armata" may be considered by the reader as another name.

Our extracts will be sufficiently intelligible without further preface, or

note and comment.

Y

Mr. Fox.

ED.]

dation of the world. Such were his qualifications for the office of a statesman: and his profound knowledge, always under the guidance of the sublime simplicity of his heart, softening without unnerving the giant strength of his intellect, gave a character to his eloquence which I shall not attempt to describe, knowing nothing by which it may be compared.

Mr. Pitt.

The astonishing events which are soon to close my narrative, could not, in my opinion,) have happened as they upon any human calculation, (at least did, without the commanding talents of an extraordinary young man, who yet might not have flourished at so

more unshaken from the recollection that I held it at the very time, in common with a man whom to have known as I did would have repaid all the toils and perils you have undergone.look upon you, indeed, as a benighted traveller, to have been cast upon our shores after this great light was set.Never was a being gifted with an understanding so perfect, nor aided by a perception which suffered nothing to escape from its dominion.-He was never known to omit any thing which in the slightest degree could affect the matter to be considered, nor to confound things at all distinguishable, however apparently the same; and his conclusions were always so luminous and convincing, that you might as firmly depend upon them as when substances in nature lie before you in the palpable forms assigned to them from the foun

another man who had justly acquired a great reputation in our country by superior eloquence, always exerted in the cause of freedom; nor could his descendant, eloquent as he was, have risen to so premature an eminence but by treading in his father's steps, pleading the cause of public reformation, which at that time was highly popular, and of which he too took the lead from his very earliest youth: neither could even this illustrious course have produced the events which followed, but on the contrary might have averted them, if he had not turned short round on a sudden and not only renounced his former opinions, but sounded the alarm when others persevered in the sentiments they had imbibed from his own lips. But history is a libel when it departs in any thing from the truth.It must be admitted that the influence

of the Capetian revolution had given an inflamed and dangerous character to the proceedings of many who had mixed themselves with this cause, demanding the most prompt vigilance of our government, and the firmest exccution of the laws; but perhaps no man existing was therefore so well qualified as himself to have changed those turbulent excesses, and turned them, upon his own principles, into a safer course; a duty which, without assorting himself unfitly, he had the happiest opportunity of fulfilling, through an association, of his own equals in rank and eminence, who were then discountenancing by their influence and example every departure from sound opinions and declarations recently published by himself in his own name, and widely circulated amongst the people: yet the birth of this very association, (as far at least as times coincide,) was made the signal of universal alarm, and a proclamation by his authority almost instantly followed, which being the obvious forerunner of war, put wholly out of the question that politic and huniane consideration for the suffering people of Capetia, which I shall die in the opinion of having been at the period before related the interest and the duty of the whole civilized world.

I take no delight in these observations.-Posthumous reputation is often held too lightly. We consider that the dead can gain nothing by our applauses, nor suffer from our censures: but supposing a man whilst living to have stood alone like a rock in the ocean, without children or kindred to represent him, I should still remember that this life was but a portion of an immortal existence, and fame being the highest inheritance, I should feel like a felon if I robbed him of what I believed to be his own. I knew, then, this great ministerin his youth, and foresaw his future destination.-His understanding was vigorous and comprehensive-his reasoning clear and energetic -his eloquence powerful and commanding and as he was supported throughout his eventful career by immense numbers of disinterested and independent men, it would be unjust not to believe that he was himself disinterested and independent. His memory after death received this tribute from many illustrious persons who had differed from him in opinion, and it is

not only held by his friends and ad-, herents in affectionate remembrance but in reverence as the saviour of his coun try. Having from a sense of justice recorded this last testimony of an exalted reputation, I hold it to be a solemn duty to question and deny it, being convinced that if we revere, or even abide by the system which characterized his administration as having formerly saved his country, we shall not save it Now. Mr. Burke.

When the war with Hesperia was approaching, a warning voice, as it were out of Heaven itself, from its wisdom and eloquence, though drowned by the clamours of ignorance and folly in the outset, yet in the end alarmed the people into a sense of the ruin they were rushing on; but, alas! this very voice, which had breathed so happily the gentle accents of peace, was now heard louder than the trum pet of war, to collect our world to battle; spreading throughout the land an universal panic, until the public councils complained of sedition, but the forum of the complaint only inflamed it.-Instead of leaving it to the sovereign, in the ordinary course of law, to bring the suspected to trial, the evidence was collected by the great public councils; was exalted into treason of the highest order, and published by their cominand-It was no doubt within their jurisdiction, and was their highest duty to protect the state; to proclaim a conspiracy if they believed it

existed, and to direct prosecutions against the offenders; but it was repugnant to the very elements of the Armatian constitution, to involve individuals in the accusations, and to circulate amongst the people the accusing testimonies stamped with their supreme authority, when inferior tribunals were afterwards to judge them.

In any other nation the consequences to the accused must have been FATAL: but there is a talisman in Armata which, whilst it is preserved inviolate, will make her immortal,— HER COURTS OF JUSTICE SPOKE ALOUD TO HER PARLIAMENT: -THUS FAR SHALT THOU GO, AND NO FARTHER.

In returning to, or rather beginning an account of this extraordinary composition, whose author was only in metaphor brought before you, your surprize at its warlike stimulus will be

increased, because I could have subscribed almost to the whole of it except in its REMOTEST APPLICATION.

He set out by truly and perhaps seasonably observing, that men were not the insects of a summer, but beings of a superior order, the heirs of immortality that they should therefore look up with pious reverence, and downwards with anxious care to their posterity that when they had accomplished a structure sufficient to maintain social order, much more to govern a great and enlightened people, it was more convenient to repair it when time had defaced it, and to improve it if originally defective, than to tumble it down in a moment to its foundations-that society was not a gang of miscreants, plundering and murdering one another, reviling all the institutions ordained to lead us in the paths of happiness and virtue, but a pyramid of human beings, rising in majestic order and harmonious in all its parts-that it was fit religion should consecrate such a structure that her ministers should therefore be held in high respect, and should not be supported on the alms of those whom it was their duty to correct— that government should also preserve an attitude of dignity and wisdom, composed of high magistrates, invested with corresponding authorities and supported by revenues to secure obedience and independence that a people, above all, for whose happiness this system was fashioned and supported, should in their morals and manners be assimilated; that they should not be buried like dogs, as if they were to sleep for ever, but be remembered by monumental inscriptions, recording the achievements of those who had lived before them and reminding the living that their histories would be read by those who were to follow then-that societies, however wisely constructed, were subject nevertheless to be shaken by the follies and wickedness of mankind, and that in those awful conjunctures the utmost fortitude became neressary to those who were to ride in such storms, yet tempered with a spirit of gentleness and mercy, shrinking back when called upon to strike, though justice and even necessity might demand the blow.'-He summed up all by a most eloquent reprobation of an unprincipled regicide, declaring in language which I hope will always be remembered, that the immolation of

the unhappy prince whom fate had set upon this volcanic pinnacle, and who without any crimes of his own, must, in the harshest construction, have been the victim of the crimes of others, was base and inhuman; and in its wanton aggravation by indignity and insult, embittered by the foul murder of his queen and their helpless infants, cast a dismal shade over the moral world, suffering, as it were, an eclipse by the interposition of some infernal spirit between the Divine Creator and the beings who must perish but in his light.

Believe me, I feel for the hallowed shade of departed genius, and have endeavoured not to degrade, though it it is beyond my power to do justice to such a distinguished composition; but you have no doubt been looking in vain all this while, and through all this eloquence, for any possible incitement to war, though intended by himself and others to justify and provoke it.—If the work had been undertaken to illustrate the principles and duties of civil society in the pure abstract, it would have been as just as it was beautiful; but as a picture of Capetia, before her revolution, it was unfounded almost throughout, and in all that followed it was only an exquisite and in many parts a sublime exposure of the unhappy state to which she had been reduced by the desertion of Armata from her post: and how the rushing into battle with this delirious people was either to reform them or to secure ourselves, it is past my compre hension even to imagine.

Buonaparté.

No victory in human annals ever produced results so sudden and extraordinary.-The adversary, whose ambition and whose boast had been our destruction-who had built a thousand vessels to convey his armies to our shores-and who was then erecting a column, even within our view, to be crowned with his colossal stature pointing at us with his finger for his own, now fled when no one was pursuing, and gave himself up as a prisoner to the commander of a single ship.

Such a fate of so wonderful a

being affords a convincing proof that our apparent destinies may generally be referred to ourselves.-In the earliest and most flourishing periods of his astonishing career, he was (in my opinion) more sinned against than

sinning; and even when he was pushing on his legions to the most distant territories, I was for a while in spirit on his side, because I thought there was a conspiracy of governments against him inconsistent with the principles of our own. Some have thought he was so weak as not to see that there was no security for his own Sovereignty whilst the sovereigns combined against him had an unlimited power over the persons and resources of their subjects; but my belief is that he foresaw this danger though he upheld their governments, because he feared a worse in their subversion. He had seated himself upon an imperial throne with a mock and servile representation, and trembled at the influence of free constitutions.-This was the rock on which he split.-If by politic and moral conventions when the sword was in his hand to enforce them, instead of by a system of oppression and subversion, he had balanced in their own states the princes who opposed him, giving an interest to their people to support him, he might have surrounded him self with grateful and independent nations, to have guarded and almost adored him; but he left them insulted, pillaged, degraded, and in the hands of their uncontrouled and justly incensed kings, who of course made use of them to destroy him.-They were no longer mercenary, reluctant armies, but nations embodied against their oppressors.

From the moment I marked this base and senseless policy I foresaw his ruin, because he was now opposing the progression of a world which, in spite of all obstacles, will advance, because God has ordained it.

It is a grand and useful example, when the ends of men who abuse mighty trusts are thus signally disas. trous. We see distinctly the Divine Providence superintending and judging us, and when I visited Capetia whilst Armata was passing through her provinces in triumph, the evidence of it was decisive. This mighty man, who had shaken the earth, collected all its spoils, and overwhelmed its dominions, was not to be seen or heard of even in his own capital, amidst the trophies of his universal conquests.

I was moved by this just description, and said to Morven, that it

reminded me of a passage in our Sacred Scriptures most divinely eloquent, and which, since the days of the Psalmist, had never been so strikingly illustrated:

I myself have seen the ungodly in great power, and flourishing like a green lay-tree.I passed by, and lo, he was gone. I sought him, but his place was no where to be found.'

So prosperous a conclusion of a war so protracted and ruinous, was a fair and a national occasion of triumph to its authors and supporters; but giving them all just credit for honest intentions, and for their vigorous exertions, it is the office of impartial history to condemn them.They them selves created the mighty antagonist.Their mistaken counsels rendered his subjugation indispensable, and his dominion so powerful, that it could not be overthrown without almost the ruin of their country.-Allowing them, even, for argument's sake, all the pre-eminence over their opponents they contend for, what would there be in the comparison to boast of? because supposing the storm to have been inevitable, and in the end to have been skilfully weathered by them, which of two pilots would you prefer?

him who, though he saw it gathering, sailed out in the midst of it, and though laden with money only escaped by throwing overboard the cargo, or the other who, seeing the tempest also, would have remained in the harbour till it was overblown?

Agriculture.

To continue this momentous subject, be assured that the very being of your country, above all at this moment, depends upon your making your own so support your most extended population, and that to consider population as an evil, is to be wiser than God, who, in your earth as in mine, commanded man to increase and inultiply, and who, I am persuaded, throughout all creation, has ordained that nothing should go backward or stand still.

If there were no other proof of the pre-eminence of agriculture, let it be remembered that it is the greatest scource of labour, and in a proportion little understood, because it not only comprehends the direct and immediate labour upon and in its bowels, but the labours also of various arts and manufactures, whose raw materials it prouces. LABOUR, indeed, is the salt of