jecting revelation for fome time, they to pray for as he ought, till God have generally given up the belief which, at first, they profeffed to have in the moral government of God here and hereafter. At prefent,' fays an eminent writer, there are, I believe, very few unbelievers in revelation, who will pretend to have any ferious expectation of a future life. In foreign countries, this fact is notorious; on which account, they are generally called Atheists; and, indeed, when the doctrine of a future life is abandoned, men may almost as well reject the belief of a God alfo.' When once the belief of a future ftate is difcarded, it may easily be conceived how very unfavourable to virtue must be the adoption of contrary principles; for the motives of reftraint that are merely human and temporary, can never be fo powerful and efficacious as thofe which regard futurity, and that futurity-an eternity! It is, indeed, fcarcely poffible to expect either clearness or confiftency of moral principles upon the light of nature only; and, therefore, as far as the clearness and confiftency of fuch principles is of importance to maskind (and, certainly, they must be of the greatest importance) they afford an evidence of the great expediency, if not of the abfolute necefity of a Divine Revelation, without which fuch an important advantage was not to be expected. Whatever we may now think of the fufficiency of the light of nature, fome of the most intelligent of the heathen philofophers were not infenfible of the darkness in which they were involved, and of the neceffity of fome divine revelation. Socrates, fpeaking of the corruption of his times, faid, that there was no hope of amending men's morals, unlefs God fhould be pleased to fend fome other perfon to inftruct them. Meeting Alcibiades, as he was going to a temple to pray, he endeavoured to convince him that he knew not what fhould difpel the darkness of his mind; and he feems to refer to fome inftructor, whom God might fend for that purpose *. And one of the fpeakers in the celebrated Dialogue of Plato, relating to the last scenes of the life of Socrates, difcourfing on the uncertainty in which they were, with respect to the doctrine of the immortality of the foul, concludes, that it is beft to follow that opinion which fhould appear to be the most proba ble, after their most diligent enquiry; unless they could have a ftill more certain conduct, to carry them through this life, fuch as a divine difcovery of the truth would be. Upon the whole, fuch was the natural state of the heathen world, that it cannot be doubted that a divine Revelation was highly expedient, and even neceffary, for the restoration of virtue and happiness. It must have been of the greateft importance, if it had been nothing more than the interpofition of a competent authority, in favour of thofe rules of conduct which right reafon might have inveftigated, but which reafon, in a variety of cir cumftances (under the influence, for inftance, of bad habits and paffions) might alfa have evaded. Without pretty just notions of God and his moral government; without a fatisfactory knowledge of their duty and future expectations; the human race would have been little better than brute animals. At least, a man defiitute of this knowledge must be incapable of the exalted fentiments and dignity of conduct, which render him an unfpeakably greater and happier being. In a word, whatever ideas be may formed of the natural powers of the human mind, it is hardly poffible not to be fatisfied, from a juft view of the ftate of morals in the heathen world, and of their ignorance with respect to the doctrine of a future ftate, that it was morally impoffible they fhould * Clarke's Evid. of Nat. and Rev. Religion, ever have recovered that degree of ufeful religious knowledge, which they feem to have derived from tradition, in the remote ages of the world, and much lefs that they would ever have made any important additions to their original stock, In fuch a ftate of things, the expectation of fome divine interpofition must have been even reasonable, on account of its being fo exceedingly feasonable and advantageous. And, therefore, it was perfectly confiftent with the wildom and goodness of the Great Parent of the human race, to afford his creatures and offspring that affiftance, which, in their fituation, they fo much wanted, and which they were not capable of procuring for themselves, REFLECTIONS on GOVERNMENT. [From Travelling Memorandums, in a Tour upon the Continent, in 1786, 1787, and 1788, by Lord Gardenftone.'] THE long continued fame and profperity of Marfeilles is, I think, justly afcribed, in a great meafure, to the established form of government. The admirers of Mr. Pope, a numerous class both of males and females, are very apt to quote these lines as excellent : For forms of government let fools conteft, Whate'er is beft administered is beft.' The lines, however, are trivial and bad, both in poetry and fenfe. Pope Owes his exceffive reputation, more to harmony and smoothnefs of rhyme, than to the extraordinary force of genius and foundness of judgment, which are found in the works of our truly great poets, Shakspeare, Milton, Butler, and Dryden. Superficial beauty, however, has always many admirers. I repeat again, that the poetry of thefe lines is trivial, and the opinion expreffed in them is even grofly falfe. A well-contrived and judicious form of government, in the focieties of mankind, has ever been productive of falutary and permanent adminiftration: the greatest characters exhibited in the whole hiftory of the world, are those who have inftituted wife forms of government, or thofe who have hazarded, and, in many instances, have facrificed their lives and fortunes for prefervation of good, or reformation of bad forms. Thefe great men are termed fools by Mr. Pope. Butler, a better, though not fo thriving a poet, conveys much fense in a single line; he says, No argument like matter of fact is,' I think it is impoffible to contest this general pofition in fact; That, under free and republican governments, the focieties of mankind have been more intelligent, more profperous, happy, and famous, than under monarchies;' I mean abfolute monarchies. Indeed, a total fubjection to unlimited power, under one race or family, can with no propriety be denominated a form of government. The Greeks and Romans moft juftly termed this mode of government tyranny, and its fubjects barbarians. Learning, laws, and arts, appearing under monarchies, have ever been de rived from free ftates: the influence tolerable exceffes of defpotifm. It The go Vernment of France is not defpotic, though the limits of the fovereign power are not yet defined and fixed, which was truly the ftate of Britain before the Revolution. ANEC was. ANECDOTES of the NOBILITY of ENGLAND. OUSSEAU, in his celebrated romance, puts the following beautiful eulogy of our nobility into the mouth of an English lord (one of his moft excellent characters) whom he reprefents as vindicating it from the unjust reflections of a German baron: I should be greatly mortified to have no other proof of my merit than that of a man who died 500 years ago. The nobility of England is the most enlightened, as well as the bravest in Europe. It is unneceffary, therefore, to inquire which is the most ancient, for, when we speak of what it is, it is of no confequence what it We are not, indeed, the flaves, but the friends of our fovereign; not the tyrants of the people, but their fuperiors. Guardians of liberty, protectors of our country, and fupporters of the throne, we form an invincible equilibrium between the people and the king. Our first duty is to the nation; our fecond, to the Supreme Magiftrate; and it is not his will and pleasure, but his lawful prerogative that we regard. Supreme Judges in the last refort in the houfe of peers, and fometimes even legislators, we do equal justice to the people and to the king; and we permit no man to fay, God and my Sword,' but only God and my Right.' Such is our refpect able nobility; as ancient as any other, but much prouder of its intrinfic worth than of its ancestors *, To this glorious character there are, no doubt, individual exceptions. Care, however, feems to have been once taken, to preserve this illuftrious body from that dependence and corruption which poverty might produce. In 1478, George Nevile, duke of Bedford, was deprived of his titles, by authority of parliament. For what? For high treafon? No. For high crimes and mifdemeanours? No but for that guilt (if it may be called *Eloifa, Part 2, Let. 62. fuch) in which many a noble peer has been fince involved-for poverty! Blackftone's obfervation on this fingular event deserves attention: A peer cannot lofe his nobility but by death or attainder: though there was an inftance, in the reign of Edward IV, of the degradation of George Nevile, duke of Bedford, on account of his poverty, which rendered him unable to fupport his dignity. But this is a fingular inftance, which ferves, at the fame time, by having happened, to fhew the power of parliament; and, by having happened but once, to fhew how tender the parliament hath been of exerting fo high a power t' Whatever rank an individual nobleman may bear in the scale of moral excellence, it is univerfally fuppofed, that the first ennobled ancestor acquired his honours by fuperior diftinctions in virtue and true heroifm. But this has not been uniformly the cafe. Philip, the fourth earl of Pembroke, whom Mr. Horace Walpole called That memorable Simpleton,' was rude, reprobate, boisterous, and devoted to his horfes and dogs. He was fo mean, at the fame time, as to receive tamely a horfe-whipping from one Ramfay, a Scotchman, at a public horse-race; and, for his civility in not refenting the infult, was rewarded by the peaceful James, by being made a knight, baron, vifcount, and earl on the fame day. His mother, Sidney's fifter, Pembroke's mother,' tore her hair when she heard of her fon's difgrace. He was likewife lord chamberlain to Charles I; and, as Ofborne obferves, in that office, broke with his white rod many wiser heads than his own; but his fear always fecured him, by a quick and ample fubmiffion. CURIOSUS. + Comment. Book 1, ch. 12. His brother William, third earl of Pembroke being then living, he was created, for this meritorious submission, earl of Montgomery. An ACCOUNT of the important Debate in the Houfe of Commons, on Monday April 2, on Mr. Wilberforce's Motion for the ABOLITION of the SLAVE TRADE. T HE houfe having refolved itself into a committee, Mr. Wilberforce rofe, and expreffed much fatisfaction, that in the motion he was about to make, it was not neceffary to trouble the house fo long as on a former occafion. He could not fpeak of the system of the slave trade, he faid, with out warmth and reprobation; for he was convinced that it was a fyftem cruel, un juft, and tyrannical; it was a system which created the worst tyranny, the tyranny of the low-minded, the ignorant, and the bafe; for the man who could raise forty pounds, might obtain dominion over a slave; it was a fyftem that degraded and debased our fellow-creatures to a level with beats; for they were kept in fields to work under the whip, and were frequently branded. It was unneceffary, he faid, for him to go into arguments to prove that regulations for the better treatment of flaves were futile; the evils that had existed, and that did exift, could not be cured but by an abolition of the trade; an abolition alone offered a radical cure. Colonial regulations would be of no avail, when the evidence of a negroe was not admitted, and when the connexion and intereft of the whites inclined them to screen each other in the commiffion of cruelties.-He was `ready frankly to declare, that he did not yet think the negroes were in a fit ftate for emancipation, but was convinced that measures could not be too fpeedily adopted to bring them to fuch a state, for their own happiness, and for the fecurity of our iflands. True liberty was the child of reafon and order; it was his wifh that the negroes might have their minds opened, and by reafon and order be brought to the poffeffion of liberty. The hon. gentleman took notice of the infurrection in St. Domingo, which, he faid, had not been occafioned, as had been infinuated, by difcuffions, or by facieties in this country, nor had it been occafioned by a dispute between the blacks and the whites of that ifland, but by the oppreffive conduct of the whites to the people of colour, who armed for their own defence: the blacks then rofe, and were led on by people of colour, who made them inftruments for their purpose. The various contradictory decrees, and the agreements made and broken, in confequence of the diforder, were fully fufficient to ac count for all the mischief that had happen ed. No man more than himself lamented them; and no man more ardently hoped, that fimilar mischiefs in our own islands might be averted; for that reason he wished his motion to be adopted, for preventing the further importation of Africans into our islands, well knowing that we had at prefent as many as we could manage with fafety, there being, upon a moderate computation, 300,000 blacks in Jamaica, to 20,000 whites: the former were continually increafing by importation, and the latter number continued nearly stationary. He was convinced that an abolition of the trade would be attended with the happiest effects; that it would be felt by the planter, by the islands, by this country, and by the blacks; the negroes would become attached to their mafters; the iflands would be improved; and every moment would tend to render the blacks happier: the increase of their happiness would make the planter richer, and the islands more flourishing. If, therefore, the islands were the only object of the prefent queftion, he was convinced that it would be for their intereft and fafety that the motion fhould be carried; for, by removing the evils that did now exitt, the increafe of the population of the blacks would be rapid and decifive, and do away every argument in fupport of importation. It had been argued, he faid, that the flavetrade was of importance to our navy; but this was controverted even by the mufterrolls of the persons who supported the trade; which documents proved, that, instead of being of advantage to this country, it was extremely injurious, by the mortality it occafioned among our feamen.-The hon. gentleman faid, by a comparison of the Weft India trade and the flave trade, it would be found by the muster-rolls, that out of 12263 men employed in the slavetrade, 2640 died in the average of twelve months. But that out of 7640 employed in the West India trade, on an average of feven months, 118 only died; but deaths alone in the flave trade was not the whole lofs of our feamen, for it would be found that numbers quitted their fhips, and that not more than half the number fhipped from England ever returned. It had alfo been argued, he faid, that the abolition would be injurious to our commerce and general polity, polity, but against both thofe arguments he thought fufficient had been advanced latt year; he was convinced that when we fhould quit the trade, we should foon be enabled to export more of our manufactures for honeft commodities, than we did pow for the blood and flesh of our fellowcreatures.It was idle, and injurious to the character of the country, to affert, that the abolition would be contrary to the general polity of the country; for the trade to Africa formed but a very trivial part of the general trade of the kingdom, and even but a fmall part of the trade of Liverpool and Bristol. If the house confulted the principles of humanity and juftice, they would at once decide in favour of his motion: but on humanity he did not reft alone the merits of his cafe; he looked to the fituation of Africa; that arrefted his heart, and was a cause he never would give up. Africa, by our means, was rendered a fcene of horror that no tongue could exprefs, or mind conceive. General reafoning had always fatisfied his mind, that the conftant purchase of flaves made it the intereft of the princes and chiefs of Africa to procure them by any means, by war, by rapine, or by perfidy, by a promotion of conduct that had rendered a naturally fine and productive country, a continued fcene of devaftation and flaughter for more than three or four thousand miles along the coaft. This was proved by the evidence laid before the laft parliament; by that evidence it was incontrovertibly proved, that when kings or chiefs wanted flaves to fell to the Britifh fhips, they frequently fet fire to the villages at night, and feized the natives as they were endeavouring to efcape. Slavery was made the punishment for the moft trivial offences; and part of the money arifing from the fale of a flave was the perquifite of the judge who condemned, and the man who accused; the laws were therefore turned to oppreffion, and the judge was interefted to condemn. If he were to go into a detail of the cruelties occafioned by our trade, he should never have done; many of them have been stated in the last year, but, one or two of a moft atrocious nature, and aggravated by their having been committed lince the difcuffion in that houfe, he thought it would be neceffary to tate: they would prove that our veffels hovered on the coasts of Africa for the purpofe of promoting war and rapine, and were like vultures hovering over a field of prey. The tranfactions, he would prove, were fuch as would fhew the whole fyftem to be founded in robbery and in blood. Upon a former occafion he had ftated, that feveral negroes had been feized and taken from the coaft of the Cameroon river, by British fhips; a different colour had been attempt ed to be put upon that tranfaction, but it remained unrefuted. A tranfaction of a fimilar kind had come to his knowledge; an Englifh fhip, flaving off the Cameroon, had fent away one cargo to the Weft Indies, but the captain withed to take another; he fent a few white men on a watering party, and with them one black man; a native trader feized him for a debt, which being made known to the captain, he took a ftrange kind of revenge; he formed all his crew on the deck, and told them to blacken their bodies, and habit themselves like negroes, to execute a plan of his to revenge the feizing of the negroe. He armed them, and went to the houfe of the unfortunate trader, who, hearing a noise, beat a drum, to collect his friends. The captain's party fired, and killed three of the trader's children, and wounded his wife in fo defperate a manner that she died in three hours. One of the failors was killed, and the others wounded, and they with difficulty regained their fhip. The captain, however, remained trading as ufual for feveral weeks, as if nothing extraordinary, or out of the common train of his bufinefs, had happened; but the Africans proved that they had feelings, and were capable of taking opportunities to fhew them. One of their chieftains came, with his ufual familiarity, to ask for mufkets, and powder and ball, to go up the country to procure flaves, half of which the captain was to have; the cape tain complied, as he in a court of justice protefted he had frequently done before; he gave the chieftain what he defired, and proved himself to be a true Guinea captain, whofe avarice was gratified by blood, mifery, rapine, and flaughter. The chief tain, however, and his party, had no fooner obtained the mufkets, and powder and that, than they feized the captain, threw him into the boat, and took him to the fhore; where they compelled him, on promife of permitting him to return to his hip, to give an order for all his goods; the goods hav ing been obtained, they releafed the captain, and out-did him in faith and in mercy. Thefe transactions came out in a fuit com menced by the failors against the captain for a recovery of their wages. The facts were given in evidence by the captain himfelf, as matters not uncommon; but they were circumftances which fully proved the manner in which the trade was carried on.The hon. gentleman faid, he would State |