when the servants of the householder came to inform their master, that tares were sprung up among the wheat, and enquired whether they should go and pluck them up, he replied in these memorable words; words of intelligible purport and indisputable application: NAY; lest, while ye gather up the tares, YE ROOT UP ALSO THE WHEAT WITH THEM-LET BOTH GROW TOGETHER UNTIL THE HARVEST: and in the time of harvest, I will say to the reapers, Gather ye together first the tares, and bind them in bundles to burn them; but gather the wheat into my barn;" a passage demonstrative of a most sublime intellect and unparalleled philanthropy." a "These are a summary of my reasons for a liberty of the press perfectly unrestrained, on all possible topics of investigation and debate. Through the benign influence of this liberty, and a vigorous cultivation of our intellect under a political system, at once generous, humane, and energetic, philosophy in all her branches would expand with genial fertility, taste and learning would thrive with full luxuriance, reason would reign triumphant, and revelation would speedily wave the cross on her victorious banners through the extremities of the globe. a Matt. xiii. 24-31. A cubic inch of air can dilate itself through the prodigious sphere of Saturn's orbit. Man would approximate by illimitable advances to that perfection which the gospel exhorts him to attain. 'The kingdoms of the world would become the kingdoms of our Lord and of his Christ.' Pains and penalties, imprisonments and murders, the diabolical implements of corrupt unregenerated men! would be superseded by gentleness and philanthropy, persuasion, mutual forbearance, universal love. Tyranny, with all her lictors, a foul and sanguinary train! would be confounded and consumed by the brightness of the divine presence, and their memorial blotted out for ever. From the rising of the sun to the going down thereof, incense would be offered to the name of JESUS, and a pure offering.' Phosphore! redde diem! Quid gaudia nostra moraris? In such animated strains did our friend address himself, to ears, alas! "deaf to the voice of the charmer"-thus " rapt into future times"-was he willing, in the contemplation of felicity, to be enjoyed by those whom he Letter to Sir John Scott, with MSS. additions, &c. could never know, to forget the afflictions which his enemies were now preparing for himself and his beloved family. To return to the order of Mr. Wakefield's publications. In the summer of 1794, while passing a few days in the country, he wrote "Remarks on the General Orders of the Duke of York to his Army." About this time the National Convention of France, at the instance of Barrere, and under the influence of Robespierre, had made a decree, (which, however, appears never to have been obeyed), "that their soldiers should give no quarters to the British or Hanoverian troops.' This sanguinary measure they pretended to justify by imputing to Mr. Pitt's administration a design, in connexion with some persons in Paris, to assassinate the more zealous members of the National Convention. Such a charge, however the violent language sometimes adopted by that administration, might render it plau "The sanguinary proposal of Barrere was never, as far as we have been able to inform ourselves, complied with in a single instance: on the contrary, on many occasions, the French officers and soldiers behaved with singular humanity and liberality to their British opponents." "N. An. Reg." for 1794. xv. 368. sible, was never substantiated by any satisfactory proof. It must therefore be justly classed among those calumnies which are so often circulated by hostile governments. The publication of this decree of the Convention was immediately followed by the "General Orders," which Mr. Wakefield examined in a few pages of Remarks. This pamphlet, which was soon out of print, appears to have been a hasty production, executed while the author's mind was strongly impressed with an idea by no means peculiar to himself, that "a speculative condemnation of cruelties is but an equivocal evidence of a disposition truly compassionate and humane." In very strong terms he expresses his horror at the sanguinary scenes that were then too often exhibited in France. In language scarcely less forcible,he attributes to the unhappy interference of this country, the extent and aggravation of those disorders. The same uncourtly opinion has been not unfrequently avowed by many other great • "Remarks," &c. p. 11. f" I should abhor myself as a character completely brutalised, if I did not contemplate with feelings undefinable by language, those executions, and particularly of the females, which have stained the scaffolds of France." Remarks," p. 11. |