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that legal equality of all, so dear to Frenchmen. The enormous expenses of the Spanish campaign, and the ill-concealed abuses which increased the amount, did not add to the popularity of the ministers.

The royalists, and the Jesuit party, were now at more open war with the liberals, two of whose journals were prosecuted. The government became more and more alienated from the feelings of the people; and the state of things in Portugal, South America, and Greece, augmented the excitement. The failure of the law to crush the freedom of the press, was followed by violent demonstrations of joy, illuminations, and riots attended with bloodshed. The national guard testified their feelings against the ministry, at a review of 45,000 men in the Champ de Mars, and the next morning they were disbanded.

An'ordonnance established a rigorous censorship of the press, which had been denied by the legislature, and this, the most obnoxious of all measures, was made to tell its own tale, by whole columns of the journals appearing blank. De Villèle saw that the ministry was losing ground: he dissolved the Chamber, and seventy-six new peers were created. The elections were unfavourable to the ministry, and, in the rejoicings at Paris, fifty persons were killed by the gendarmes.

The triumph of the liberals was followed by the resignation of de Villèle, a man of talent, but not possessed of grasp enough for the crisis: a slave to circumstances, without a grand principle; often acting contrary to his convictions, in order to obviate the difficulty of the moment, or to avoid resigning; and who drove the chariot of the monarchy to the verge of an abyss, from which it was scarcely possible for it to be recovered.

De Martignac was at the head of the next ministry, in January 1828; and he appears to have been soon convinced that it was not in his power to save the throne. Most of the members of the administration had been supporters of de Villèle; but their measures were more moderate and liberal than his. They had to manage four or five different parties in the Chamber, besides the court. The liberal party carried, by a small majority, the insertion, in the address to the King, of the words système déplorable, as applicable to de Villèle's administration; and after gaining strength by the informality of some of the elections, they proposed the impeachment of the late ministry, charging Villèle with 'high treason against the ple,' with causing the Spanish war, the disbanding of the national guards, the support given to the Jesuits, and the Trappists, the creation of seventy-six peers, and with in

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terfering in the elections. The impeachment fell to the ground, but it manifested the state of parties. The ministers conceded the dismissal of obnoxious préfets, more liberty to the press, and a law to regulate the jury, and the elections, the purity of which had been much corrupted by their predecessors. The ordinance which the King was obliged to grant, calculated to check the influence of the Jesuits, raised the hostility of the clergy, who pronounced it to be a conspiracy against religion; but the Pope advised them to yield.

The ministry were not cordially supported by the King, nor, on the other hand, had the coté gauche, or liberal side of the Chamber, sufficient confidence in them: hence they had no solid basis. The King thought they were too much influenced by popular opinion; but, after de Villèle's strong anti-popular measures, the concessions they made, appeared to the nation like an acknowledgment of the weakness of a government, which only gave what was wrung from it, instead of spontaneously devising liberal things. The former administration had trodden on the extreme limit of authorized power, and this aggression had not overawed the liberal party: the concessions of the present administration were a kind of retreat, not a pacification. Hostility to the Bourbons was gaining ground, and there was an increasing impression that they could not stand.

One of the most popular deeds of this ministry, was their determination not to remove, on accouut of political opinions, any of the officers who commanded the troops in the Morea. This declaration added to the displeasure of the ultra-royalists, while loud complaints were heard from the liberals, in consequence of a measure of a very different character; the granting of pensions to peers whose income was less than 30,000 francs. At length, the ministry could command neither party, and Charles determined on the experiment of a decidedly royalist go

vernment.

De Villèle's ministry had been characterized as le ministère déplorable-that of de Martignac, as le ministère phraséologiste-and now, on the 8th of August, 1829, came le ministère impossible, composed of the Prince de Polignac, a bigotted Romanist, who was completely identified with the old regime, Labourdonnaye, a violent partisan of the coté droit, or aristocratical side of the Chamber, and other high royalists. The nation saw, in the King's choice,

* How different a spirit actuated the framers of the English Reform Bill! many persons of the most liberal politics were not more gratified, than surprised, at the extent and generosity of the plan,

open war with free institutions, and that the attempt to bring the monarchy into union with them was abandoned: hence the cry against the ministry was universal. Labourdonnaye soon resigned; and, after various changes in the cabinet, de Polignac alone retained his place, to guide his new colleagues to the edge of that precipice over which they were about to plunge both themselves, and their infatuated sovereign.

The King's speech, on the 2d of March, 1830, as remarkable for its graceful emphasis, as for its lofty spirit, caused an instant depression in the funds. The address of the Deputies was carried against the ministers, condemning their presumed line of policy, and respectfully warning the King, of the consequences of continuing in office an administration to which the nation was strongly hostile. Charles replied that his resolutions were fixed, and that his ministers would represent his views.The Chambers were immediately prorogued, and great excitement followed all over France, accompanied with a furious paper war. Associations were formed for printing pamphlets to oppose the government. The names of the majority who voted the address, were published in various forms, and to have been un des 221, was a badge of honour. The ministers purified, as it was called, every branch of the administration, and many préfets, and other offices, who were not sufficiently subservient, were dismissed, journalists were prosecuted, and the sale of snuff-boxes and other articles, inscribed '221,' were prohibited.

The anniversary of the entry of Charles X. into Paris, was celebrated with much pageantry, and the deluded monarch, and his ministers, were securely dreaming, amidst the full pomp of monarchy, on the brink of ruin. The Chamber of Deputies was dissolved, to re-assemble in August; and the King sought to influence the elections, by a weak and ridiculous proclamation-while the ministers plied all the manœuvres used by de Villèle, in 1824. The success of the French arms at Algiers, was known in Paris on the 9th of July; aud amidst fêtes, and Te Deums, and illuminations, the ministry seemed to think they saw the prelude to gaining a triumph over liberty at home, and some of their abettors broached this doctrine.

De Polignac became more violent and determined, and at the same time more detested; while the priests enchained the conscience of the monarch, and blinded his mental vision. The elections increased the opposition to two hundred and eighty votes. The ministers immediately concerted with the King to suspend the liberty of the press --and with the will, but without the talent for despotism,

they drew up a miserable state-paper, which attempted to shield, by sophistry, what no reasoning could reconcile with the charter. The celebrated and fatal ordonnances, were issued on the 26th of July, one dissolved the Chamber, and consequently annulled all the elections; a second entirely extinguished the freedom of the press; and a third commanded a new and aristocratical law of election. Most of the liberal journalists determined that their papers should appear in spite of the ordonnances; and their seizure, on the 27th of July, was the signal of revolution. Desperate conflicts now began, between the people and the soldiery; the Marseillaise Hymn, the song of the revolution, was on innumerable tongues; and all Paris was in arms. The pavements, and public carriages, were converted into barricades, across the streets and boulevards; and, for three days, the contest was going on, in various parts of the city in the mean time, Charles had fled, the tricoloured flag waved over the royal palaces, and the Bourbons had ceased to reign.

Upwards of 3,000 individuals were killed, or wounded, during the progress of this revolution-another awful example of the consequences of attempting to maintain arbitrary power, in opposition to the growth and developement of the national mind! No crisis ever bore more completely the aspect of a struggle for principles. It was a moral revolution, like that of America, not a scene of anarchy and plunder among citizens, but of a people fighting for their liberties, against the instruments of arbitrary power. It is melancholy that so much blood must be shed, to teach princes that they can no longer hold their crowns as an independent patrimony, apart from the voice of those over whom they reign! The proudest monarchs must be exiles from their thrones, to proclaim to all other potentates, that their power, and their grandeur, exist but for the good of the community: that hereditary government is but a form, in which the majesty of nations may be embodied most safely for themselves, and that when any legitimate ruler ceases to reign for the public weal, tramples on the sacred claims of freedom, and forgets the intersts of millions in his own will, the time is come for a higher power to utter forth its mandate, that kings may know that the source of all sovereignty, on earth, is in the people, before the indignant thunders of whose voice, no tyranny can stand.

RELIGION IN FRANCE.

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LETTER XXIII.

Religion in France-History of Protestantism--Persecutions--Present state of Protestantism--Institutions, and exertions--Toleration -Moral state of France-Infidelity--Romanism-Demoralization of the capital-Versailles-St. Cloud-Mont Calvaire--Ruel--St. Denis--Amiens.

THE entire population of France is estimated at 33,000,000, of whom only about a million and a-half are nominally Protestant: the rest are Roman Catholics and unbelievers. Though, in the large towns, the majority of the men may with propriety be regarded as of an infidel character, the great body of the people are still, in a considerable degree, attached to the Romish religion. There has been a gradual re-action, of late years, in its favour, and this has no doubt been very much owing to the bitter experience which many thousands have had, of the effects of infidelity, and their ignorance of a system which can better meet the wants of the immortal spirit, and lay a more satisfactory foundation for human hope, than Romanism.

The hierarchy and ecclesiastics consist of 14 archbishops, of whom two are also cardinals, 66 bishops, 174 vicars-general, 680 canons, and 29,495 inferior clergy, making a total of 30,429. The amount which is to be paid from the treasury for their support, during the year 1836, is 33,976,600 francs, or 1,359,064 pounds sterling; and for 1837, it is likely to be rather more than 34,000,000 of francs. The ministers of the established Protestant church are in number 596, of whom 366 are Reformed, and 230 Lutheran, the latter being chiefly confined to those parts of France which are adjacent to Germany. Each denomination has a Theological College, in which the candidates for the ministry are educated: that of the Reformed Church is at Montauban, and that of the Lutheran at Strasburg. The sum appropriated by the government for the maintenance of the Protestant worship, during the year 1837, is 856,000 francs, or 34,240 pounds; and it is probable that it will be increased, for the following year, to 890,000 francs, or 35,600 pounds.

The history of the Reformed religion in France, has been a truly mournful one. After the sanguinary wars of the League, the Huguenots obtained from Henry IV., in 1598, the celebrated Edict of Nantes, which guaranteed their civil and religious liberties. The measures of Louis XIII. again roused them to defend their rights by arms,