of the national affembly may be fpeedily and fuccefsfully terminated; though we are of opinion that, in many inftances, an ungovernable fpirit of innovation has led them to overleap the bounds of moderation, and to tranfgrefs the rules of confiftency, we cannot but hope, as friends to univerfal freedom, that they will derive wisdom from experience; and, profiting by the errors of their neighbours, finally establish a conftitution as pure and perfect as any human inftitution can be. As to the influence which the Gallic revolution may be fuppofed to have on the political fyftem of England, it can only be in proportion to the additional acquifition of strength which the French may derive from the change in their government. We have long known, that the refources of France, when properly employed, would prove, beyond imagination, fertile; but if, in future, England fhall have a more formidable enemy to contend with, the will of courfe be careful, by the formation of continental alliances, to preferve that equality, or rather, that fuperiority, which fhe has hitherto maintained. BRITISH AFFAIRS. Remarks on the State of Politics, during the Illness, and on the Recovery of the King-Trial of Mr. Haftings-Detail of the various important Topics difcuffed in Parliament, after the Difmillion of the Regency Bill-Conclusion. T HE illness of our fovereign, with the important tranfactions which it gave rife to, form the leading features of our domeftic hiftory; features, too, fo prominent, that objects of real magnitude fhrink before them, and retire to the back ground, where, lofing their confequence, they fail to command that attention which their merits require. The various proceedings of parlia ment, on the fubject of the Regency, have been already detailed with the most accurate precifion: few remarks, therefore, remain to be made on this interesting topic. Through that cloud, which, for a while, obfcured the fplendour of the throne, Truth's steady rays fhone with undiminished luftre; while they expofed the selfish views of thofe courtly minions who bafely deferted their fovereign in the hour of calamity, and fought, by the poifoned arrows of treachery, to enlarge thofe wounds which Providence had inflicted, they exhibited, in a juft light, the generous feelings of gratitude, which no change of time nor circumftance can affect, but which acquire fresh force from the diftrefs of their object, and difplay the most enthufiaftic ardour, when their zeal cannot poffibly be afcribed, even by the envenomed tongue of faction, to bafe or unworthy motives. Nor was this the only contraft offered to the eyes of the nation; the pfeudo-patriot, who had arrogantly affumed to himfelf the high-founding title of man of the people, now bafely facrificed the people's rights at the tempt ing fhrine of intereft; and boldly avowed himfelf the champion of prerogative; while the man, on whom the appellation of minifter of thẹ crown had been tauntingly bestowed by his political enemies, fuccefsfully exerting his best talents, in defence of the conftitution, in protecting public liberty against the infidious attacks of thofe who had hitherto profeffed themselves its warmeft advocates, proved himself the true friend of the people. The famous question of right, broached by Mr. Fox in the Houfe of degenerate times of our Eighth Hen- nation, was the refumption of the ry; but credulity itself, could never trial of Mr. Haftings. Mr. Burke have believed, that, in the prefent was the perfon appointed by the age, when the principles of our managers to open the third charge conftitution are fo clearly afcer--that of the Prefents-which he tained, and fo univerfally underftood, it could have found a fingle advocate. During a temporary fufpenfion of the executive power, from an extraordinary caufe, to maintain that it fhould not revert to the people, from whom it originally proceeds, by them to be delegated to the object c their choice, is an affertion wholly fubverfive of civil liberty; it is equivalent to an attempt to prove, that a people, like a bale of goods, can be transferred from one proprietor to another, without their own confent or participa tion. Fortunately for the nation, the parliament had the virtue to oppofe this dangerous doctrine, and to refift every fpecies of undue in fluence, both fecretly and openly exerted, to awe their deliberations, and to bias their decifions. We fhould ill discharge the duty of an historian, were we to difmifs the fubject, without paying a deferved tribute of praife to the minifter, whose fortitude and integrity, on this trying occafion-ftill more than his wifdom and abilities, brilliant and extensive as they are rendered him, at once, an object of national pride, and of national admiration, Like the traveller, who views, from a place of fafety, a precipice which he has narrowly efcaped, we now hudder at the dangers we have avoided and hail with grateful accordingly did, in a fpeech that engroffed the whole time of the court during three audiences: it was decorated, as ufual, with all the fpecious flowers of rhetoric; but candour compels us to acknowledge that it was more remarkable for ornament than ftrength, for brilliancy of eloquence, than foundnefs of argument. It is not our intention, however, to enter into a partial detail of this momentous trial, by a repetition of invectives calculated to excite impreffions the most unfavourable to the party accufed; decifions founded an ex parte evidence, or, in fhort, any opinion promulgated, pendente lite, must be highly repugnant to every principle of juftice. We have only, therefore, to remark, that, in the course of his fpeech, Mr. Burke entered into a large field of matter, apparently. extraneous, and openly charged Mr. Haftings, among other enormities, almost equally criminal, with the murder of Nundcomar. Though, in thefe allegations, the orator experienced no interruption from the court, they were, very properly, made the fubject of a petition, which was prefented to the Houfe of Commons, on the part of Mr. Haftings, by his friend major Scott. prayer of the petition was, that Mr. Burke having introduced, in The the course of the proceedings in Westminster-hali, a variety of matter, utterly falfe and unfounded, the house would enable Mr. Haftings to meet and to refute it, in the most public manner, or afford him fuch other redrefs as in its wifdom might be judged due to him. The falle charges here attributed to Mr. Burke were, his having accufed Mr. Haftings, on the first day of opening the articles, of being concerned in the plot to affaffinate the Shazada; of being an accomplice in the murder of Meeran, fon of the nabob Jaffier Ally Cawn, and a party in the affairs of Deby Sing; and his having, on the Tuesday preceding, exprefsly charged him with having murdered Nundcomar, through the medium of fir Elijah Impey. Major Scott, on prefent ing the petition, declared, upon his honour, and pledged himfelf to prove it to the fatisfaction of every honeft man, that the manager, in the detail of thefe events, was guilty of cool, fyftematic, and intentional mifreprefentation, and that it was not poffible, as he well knew when he spoke, to make Mr. Haftings a party in either tranfaction. This affertion gave a very ferious complexion to the bufinefs, and changed the fituation of Mr. Burke, from that of a plaintiff, to that of a defendant. The caufe of this gentleman was now warmly efpoufed by Mr. Fox, who oppofed the receipt of the petition, which he attributed to motives of perfonal refentment and malice against his right honourable friend. He infifted that all complaints of unjust treatment of a defendant fhould be made to the tribunal which tried him; to the judges who were to decide, and who were alone competent to relieve the party in a cafe of real injuftice; and not to the accufers, to the profecutors themfelves, who had no power to afford redress if neceffary, and whofe duty it was to purfue the culprit, and profecute him to punifliment. Should fuch a complaint be liftened to, and fhould the party accufed be fuffered to arraign the conduct of his accu-' fers, addreffing his charge to them, it would be a deviation from every known and established rule; it would introduce a new fyftem of proceed ing, because it was altogether unprecedented for thofe who were the accufers, to hear the culprit, in the manner of an accufer of themselves, complaining of the mode of profe cution which they had thought proper to adopt, in order to promote more effectually the ends of fubftantial juftice. He conjured gentlemen, for the honour of the houfe, and for the fake of juftice, to confider the glaring impropriety of making the conduct of the managers, in the difcharge of a public truft, matter of perfonal attack, and perfonal violence, The arguments of Mr. Fox were ftrenuoutly oppofed by the chancellor of the Exchequer, who declared he faw not on what grounds the perfon accused, fhould be de barred from the exercise of that right, common to every individual fubject, viz, the right of preferring a petition flating a grievance to that houfe for its confideration and dif, pofal. He admitted, indeed, the impropriety of liftening to fuch of the complaints as fhould have been preferred last year, when the grounds for them occurred; but as to the general affertion, that any words, however injurious to the party of whom they are fpoken, cannot properly be made the fubject of any complaint whatever, he did not think it was a pofition which any man could maintain. He was far from being of opinion, that when the Houfe of Commons had given the managers certain powers neceffary to enable them to conduct the profe them: fuffice it to observe, that the bufinefs concluded by a motion of the marquis of Graham, that the words ufed by Mr. Burke relative to the murder of Nundcomar, while he was fubftantiating the charge of receiving prefents against Warren Haftings, were not authorized by any proceedings of that houfe, and that they ought not to have been used. This well-founded cenfure was paffed by a confiderable majority; and will, we truft, operate as a falutary check on thofe impetuous orators, who love to wanton in the tempting labyrinths of fiction, and who, by a strange perverfion of fenfe, refufe to admit the neceffary diftinction between accufation and conviction. dress the grievance and cure the in jury. He hoped the houfe would not establish the only principle which could leffen its credit, nor ftop its ears to a complaint which stated, that Mr. Haftings had been fpecifically charged with the murder of Nundcomar. Neither the fubject of the complaint was unjuft, nor was the time of making it objectionable. The Houfe of Commons did not mean, because they accufed Mr. Haftings of one thing, that he was to be accufed of another! They never intended, that because he was accufed by them of having taken bribes, that he was to be accufed of having committed murder! Had any ftrong expreffions, implying a charge, been the fole ground of complaint, he granted it would have been trivial; but the fact was far otherwife, the charge was that of a moft heinous and atrocious crime; it was recently made, and the very next day that the house met, Haflings petitioned. When it was confidered, that this murder, with which the manager had collaterally charged him as an accomplice, was the fame as that with which the house had refused to charge fir Elijah Impey as a principal, it was furely matter of pretty ftrong prefumption, that the houfe would not have been willing to vote it as an article of impeachment against Mr. Haftings. The object of their accufation, he faid, would never ceafe to be the object of their justice. Mr. Haftings, or any other perfon accufed by them, was entitled to Mr. The next object of national importance fubmitted to the difcuffion of parliament, was a motion for a repeal of the Teft and Corporation Acts, made by Mr. Beaufoy, the indefatigable champion of the Diffenters. This is a fubject which has been fo frequently difcuffed, and is now fo generally understood, that we fall only briefly advert to the leading points of debate. The advocates for the repeal contended, that the grievance from which the Diffenters folicited relief was a civil, and not a religious oppreffion. They complained not of ecclefiaftical hardfhips, but of being injured as citi zens, of being wronged as Englishmen. After commenting on the injustice of being fubjected to fuch ferious difabilities, as the acts in question imposed, for merely daring understanding in religious opinions, it was maintained, that the pretended toleration which the Diffenters were faid to enjoy, was in fact a real perfecution; a perfecution which deprived them of a part of their civil rights, and which, with equal juftice, and on the fame plea, might equally deprive them of the reft; a perfecution which denied them the management of their property, and which, with the fame juftice, and on the fame plea, might equally take from them the property itfelf; a perfecution which deprived them of the right of defending their liberties and lives, and which, with the fame juftice, and on the fame plea, might equally deprive them both of liberty and life. It was urged, that if one degree of perfecution could admit of juftification, another de gree of it, under different circumftances, might be juftified alfo. Let but the principle be once admitted, and the inquifitions of Portugal and Spain would ceafe to be objects either of ridicule or abhorrence. It was further contended, that the repeal of the facramental ftatutes would rather increafe than diminish the fecurity of the established church, by diffolving that bond of union which connected the Diffenters, and whose chief strength and compactnefs was derived from the perfecution they experienced. The advantage, too, that fect would reap from the repeal, was reprefented as confifting merely in the liberty to ferve their fovereign, when he fhould call upon them for the aid of their integrity and talents; the liberty to serve their fellow-fubjects, when they should elect them to of fices of truft; and the liberty of hazarding their lives in defence of their native land. In oppofition to thefe arguments, it was advanced, that the laws thus reprobated, were the main props, and sturdy bulwark of the church; every attempt to fap the foundation of which fhould be confidered as an attempt deftructive to the conftitution of the church, which was intimately connected with the conftitu tion of the country. Thefe laws were laws of felf-defence for the church, and not meant as a punishment to any defcription of perfons whatever. The principles on which they flood were these first, that it was effential to the happiness of the country, that the legislature fhould fupport the conflitution of the eftablifhed church; and next, that it was neceffary, for that fupport, that no perfon fhould poffefs under the church, who fhould refufe to give a teft of his not being ill affected to it. In anfwer to the affertion of the impropriety of multiplying oaths, it was urged, that the examples of all countries proved their neceffity, for the good order of the ftate. An oath was a religious appeal to the Almighty, neceffary for promoting civil purposes. Such, therefore, was the intention of a facramental test. It had been faid, that the teft was abfurd, because it was not enforced; it was true, there were inftances in which perfons had introduced themfelves into corporations without taking the teft, because they relied on the annual indemnity act to protect them for the confe quences. But this fort of mental fraud could not recommend fuch perfons to the indulgence of the legislature. It was an evafion, and an abufe of an act of parliament, which folemnly and fubftantially required, that the teft fhould be given fairly and truly. The penalties had been reprefented as perfecutions; but they went only to ex◄ clude from offices under government, and if any man would take upon himfelf an office without properly qualifying, the penalty falling upon |