and evil not so necessary and unavoidable as to paralyze us with despondency.

I have strong doubts as to the permission of those phenomena that have been termed supernatural, since the era of the apostles; and if there be any who think they have witnessed such things, they should reflect that there is this hazard in divulging them-they voluntarily wedge themselves up into the very awkward dilemma of being considered either as liars or fools. To withhold our assent to such things if we have witnessed them is difficult; but to give our assent to them because they have beer witnessed by others, is absurd. In this latter case, the reasoning of Dr. Hume will apply, and is conclusive against all such phenomena subsequent to the era stated above; for here, we trust not to experience, but to testimony, and it is contrary to our experience that such superhuman appearances should be true, but it is not contrary to our experience that the human testimony by which they are supported, should be false. I know not which is most detrimental to the happiness of mankind: to believe in such things if they have never happened, or to disbelieve them if they have. But it is obvious that to deny them, even in opposition to our own experience, would savour less strongly of presumption, than to admit them on the bare testimony of others, would of weakness; and the advocates of supernatural appearances having hap. pened in modern times, are sure to be in the minority, not only as to number, but also as to weight.

Early impressions are not easily erased; the virgin wax is faithful to the signet, and subsequent

impressions serve rather to indent the former ones, than to eradicate them. To change the metaphor, we might say that the now cask takes its odour from the first wine that it receives; what may be poured in afterwards will be contained, but the first is imbibed. Rousseau carried his envy, hatred, and malice, of all literary contemporaries, almost to phrensy. A social savage on this point, he recoiled as sullenly from the courtesy of Hume as from the caustic of Voltaire. This enigma in his character may be solved by recollecting, that when he was clerk to M. Dupin, he was not permitted to dine at his table on those days that the literati assembled there. Even then, he felt his own powers, and despised him who, like the base Judean, threw a pearl away richer than all his tribe.' Therefore, he commenced his campaign with no very charitable feelings for his contemporaries; 'but entered,' says Grimm, 'the field of literature, as Marius reentered Rome, breathing revenge, and remembering the marshes of Minturnæ.'

In all places, and in all times, those religionists who have believed too much, have been more inclined to violence and persecution than those who have believed too little-I suspect the reason is, that indifference is a much less active principle than enthusiasm.

We seek the society of the ladies with a view to be pleased, rather than to be instructed; and are

* I here allude to Rousseau's appreciation of himself; but he was a pearl, I should have no objection to buy at my price, if I could only sell him at his own.

more gratified by those who will talk, than by those that are silent; for if they talk well, we are doubly delighted to receive information from so pleasant a source, and if they are at times a little out in their conclusions, it is flattering to our vanity to set them right. Therefore, I would have the ladies indulge with somewhat less of reserve in the freedom of conversation, notwithstanding the remark of him who said with more of point than of politeness, that they were the very reverse of their own mirrors: for the one reflected without talking, but the other talked without reflecting.

If an author write better than his contemporaries, they will term him a plagiarist; if as well, a pretender; but if worse, he may stand some chance of commendation, as a genius of some promise, from whom much may be expected by a due attention to their good counsel and advice. When a dull author has arrived at this point, the best thing he can do for his fame, is to die before he can follow it; his brother dullards will in this case club their efforts to confer upon him one year of immortality, a boon which few of them could realize for themselves; and this year of fame may be even extended to two, provided the candidate can be proved to have died on classic ground, and to have been buried within the verge of the meanderings of the Tiber, or the murmurings of the Melissus.

A torrent of declamation, where all is sound and verbiage, has often served the ends of the oppressor, and proved more fatal to the oppressed, than any force of argument or reason that could be brought against him; as an expert swimmer is in more danger from the foam of the surf, than from the deepest water of the ocean; for although the former has no profundity, it has also no buoyancy, neither can the voice of distress be heard amidst the roar of the breakers.

The British constitution is the proudest political monument of the combined and progressive wisdom of man: throughout the whole civilized world its preservation ought to be prayed for, as a choice and peerless model, uniting all the beauties of proportion, with all the solidity of strength. But nothing hunan is perfect, and experience has shown that this proud monument of human wisdom wants that which its earlier designers had conceived that it possessed; a self-preserving power. Those, therefore, are its truest friends who are most vigilant and unremitting in their efforts to keep it from corruption, and to guard it from decay; whose veneration, as it regards what it has been, and whose affection, as it relates to what it may be, is exceeded only by their fears for its safety, when they reflect upon what it is. And it is a feeling as dishonourable to those who entertain it, as unmerited by those against whom it is entertained, to. suspect that those hearts and hands that are most zealous and vigilant in preserving this beautiful fabric from decay, would not be equally brave and energetic in defending it from danger.

It is much easier to ruin a man of principle, than a man of none, for he may be ruined through his scruples. Knavery is supple, and can bend; but honesty is firm and upright, and yields not. It was upon this ground that Bossuet, bishop of

Meaux, recommended Louis the Fourteenth to secure the approbation of Fenelon, archbishop of Cambray, as to his marriage with Madame de Maintenon.

A calumniator will sometimes tell truths that are injurious to himself, if, by doing so, he can gain believers as to those falsehoods which he circulates of another. Thus Rousseau, who had much method in his madness, and more malice, has shown that his reputation was less dear to him than his revenge; for he bespatters himself with infamy in his confessions, only to make that dirt stick the stronger which he accumulates upon others, and affects the greatest candour, only to exercise the greatest cruelty.

The French revolution* was a machine invented and constructed for the purpose of manufacturing liberty; but it had neither lever-clogs, nor adjusting powers, and the consequences were, that it worked so rapidly that it destroyed its own inventors, and set itself on fire.

* That France, having no materials to work with, but such as could be found in the heads of Frenchmen, should merge into a military despotism, required no prophet to foretel. Bonaparte said that on his return from Egypt, he found the constitution in abeyance, and the crown upon the ground. He stooped down and picked it up. He had not, like Washington, the courage to spurn the glittering bauble, but he had the heart to make despotism palatable.He gave to Frenchmen conquest in the room of freedom: and while he contracted their liberties, enlarged their prison; holling cut to them this compensation, You shall be masters of Europe, but my slaves !