himself master of the subject, fees that the articles of the union would be infringed, and knows how very unpopular this bill is, I can have no doubt that he will fend for the minister for Scotland, and tell him, in a determined tone, "Dundas! Dundas, for fhame! Here is a rock upon which we might have fplit, as Fox did upon his India bill. I'll no more of this Court of Seffion job! It is a monftrous measure! Let it be quafhed!"

We shall now submit to our readers a portion of the letter before us, which we confider as peculiarly characteristic of Mr. Bofwell.

This letter, haftily written upon the fpur of the occafion, is al ready too long. Yet allow me, my friends and countrymen, while I with honeft zeal maintain your caufe, allow me to indulge a little more of my own egotifm and vanity. They are the indigenous plants of my mind; they diftinguish it. I may prune their luxuriancy; but I must not entirely clear it of them; for then I fhould be no longer as I am;" and perhaps there might be fomething not fo good. Virtus laudata crefcit.-Sume fuperbiam quefitam meritis. I last year claimed the credit of being no time-ferver; I think I am giving pretty good proof that I am not fo this year neither. Though ambitious, I am uncorrupted; and I envy not high fituations which are attained by the want of public virtue, in men born without it; or by the prostitution of public virtue, in men born with it, Though power, and wealth, and magnificence, may at first dazzle, and are, I think, most defirable; no wife man will upon reflection, envy a fituation which he feels he could not enjoy. My friend (my Macenas Atavis edite regibus) Lord Mountftuart flattered me once very highly without intending it. "I would do any "thing for you (faid he) but bring you into parliament; for I could 66 not be fure but you might oppofe me in fomething the very next "day." His lordship judged well. Though I fhould confider with much attention, the opinion of fuch a friend, before taking my refolution, most certainly I fhould oppofe him, in any measure which I was fatisfied ought to be oppofed. I cannot exist with pleasure, if I have not an honest independence of mind and of conduct; for though no man loves eating and drinking, fimply confidered, better than I do, I prefer the broiled blade-bone of mutton and humble port of" down-right hippen," to all the luxury of all the statesmen who play the political game all through.

It is my fyftem to regard, in a public capacity, meafures, and not men; in a private capacity, men, and not measures. I can difcufs topics of literature, or any other topics, with mitred St. Afaph, with Wyndham of Norfolk, with Capel Loft, with Dr. Kippis, with Dr. Price, with the Reverend Mr. John Palmer; yet there are points of government in fome of them, and points of faith in others, as to which, had I any thing to do in the administration of this country, I fhould" withstand them to the face." I can drink, I can laugh, I can converfe in, perfect good humour, with Whigs, with Republicans, with Diffenters, with Independents, with Quakers, with Moravians, with Jews. They can do me no harm. My

mind

mind is made up. My principles are fixed. But I would vote with Tories, and pray with a Dean and a Chapter.

While I arraign what ftrikes me as very wrong in Mr. Henry Dundas, and the Lord Advocate in their public conduct, I am ready to meet them on friendly, but equal terms, in private. To the Lord Advocate I am most willing to allow all his merit. He has rifen tố the head of our Bar. No man, with us, ever pufhed the bufinefs of a lawyer to that extent that he has done. He has made it a Peruvian profefion; yet he is free from the fordidness which fometimes attends thofe who get a great deal of money by laborious employment; upon every occafion that I have known him tried, he was generous. And he is a very friendly man, I fhould be exceedingly ungrateful if I did not acknowledge it.

• That Mr. Dundas and he fhould think of attempting fuch a bill as this, must make us wonder, and for a moment, fhew us how weak the ableft men are, upon fome occafions. I may, without offence, account for it, by using the very expreffion of Mr. Dundas himfelf, when attacking, at the bar of the Houfe of Lords, a decree of the Court of Seffion, in the cafe of a schoolmafter, where I was counfel on the other fide. I can fwear to the phrase.- They have been "feized with fome infatuation."

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In characterizing this performance, we must allow, that it is not only argumentative but fpirited. It is withal, how ever, rather defultory. The flashes go from fide to fide, and lofe their force from their want of concentricity. At the fame time, there is in it too great an abundance of extraneous matter; and if the abilities of the writer had been greater than they are, we should have excufed more readily his eternal vanity and egotifm.

ART. X. Philofophical Rhapsodies. Fragments of Akbur of Betlis, Containing Reflections on the Laws, Manners, Cuftoms, and Religions of certain Afiatic, Afric, and European Nations. Collected and now first published, By Richard Jofeph Sullivan, Esq; 3 vols. 8vo. 15s. boards. Becket. 1784.

TH

HE manners, cuftoms, and opinions of nations form an object that is not only curious, but inftructive in the highest degree, They demand,, however, no common fhare of ability. They open a career which ordinary writers should avoid with anxiety. They are apt, however, to be ftruck with the fplendour which furrounds almoft every topic of this fort; and books of travels and voyages are fo common, that little fearch is neceffary for materials. The path is inviting; and the vanity of authors does not allow them to perceive that it is dangerous.

Mr. Sullivan writes under the name of a native of Affyria; a fiction that permitted him to feize many advantages which

he

he has neglected. His range is moft extenfive. He turns his attention to the Tartars, the Chinese, the inhabitants of Japan, the Hindoos, the Arabs, the Egyptians, the Greeks, and the Romans. The grandeur of his fubjects is infinitely in their favour. But the manner in which he treats them is, by no means, commendable. His credulity leads him often into inaccuracies; and his careleffnefs multiplies them. His collections are made with little choice or propriety; and while his facts are feldom to be depended upon, they are produced for the establishment of no regular end or purpose. He cannot think in a system; and his volumes are a chaos. Men of fenfe will throw them afide with difguft; and they will appear uninterefting even to gay and idle men. For they carry along with them no traces of penetration or ingenuity: It is true, indeed, that the author affects to join philofophy with hiftory; but this junction is no eafy matter; and it has been attempted unfuccefsfully by many living authors, whose pretenfions to reputation are much higher than thofe of Mr. Sullivan.

As a fpecimen of his ability, we fhall fubmit to our readers the whole of his fourth fragment:

A little arbitrarily, but not without ingenuity, naturalists have claffed the race of man in fix divifions. To begin with the polar regions: Here he is faid to be brown, fhort, oddly fhaped, and favage; the Tartar is reprefented olive-coloured, middle-fized, ugly, and robuft; the fouthern Afiatic, of a dark olive tint, flender fhape, ftraight black hair and feeble; the negro of Afric, black, fmooth fkinned, woolly-headed, and well fhaped; the American, coppercoloured, with black hair, fmall eyes, and flight limbs; the European and bordering nations, white, of different fhades, with fine hair, large limbs, and much bodily vigour.

Thefe are the fix claffes in which we are placed; and here close the divifions; fyftematical enough, but erroneous and incomplete. Before we get to the end of our fubject, inftances in proof will probably prefent themfelves; for the prefent therefore we will content ourfelves with a difpofition fo regularly made.

• Thus filed off in bodies, to ufe a military phrafe, mankind have been obferved in fome countries to diminish in numbers confiderably, and in others to increase, but not at the fame time, and in fuch perfect ratio, that the increafe of the one can poffibly fill up the cafualties of the other, If we give credit to the calculations that have been made on this head, and which are fuppofed (I will not fay how just y) to be tolerably exact; one tenth part of the people do not now exift that did in former days. An aftonifhing decrease, if true; but whence has it proceeded? Difeafe has not been more prevalent, wars have not been more defolating, nor have any fu pernatural calamities afflicted us, fince our fubmerfion by the flood.

• Some hidden defect, fome latent poison, must work this alarming catastrope. A lingering difeafe of this nature, a decay fo ferious in

its

its progrefs, portends no permanency to mankind: fhould it conti nue, adieu ye dreams, adieu ye phantafies of existence! No crimes, no monstrous enormities, need bring on a second destruction of fuch miferable flutterers of a day. The crowd preffing on each other, will gradually quit the stage. the hour must come when the race will be extinct, when all shall be at an end.

The human fpecies however, (and let us dwell on the fubject while we are able) whether in a favage or a civilized state, fhews itfelf, in its offspring, every where alike; the form is the fame. The capacity for receiving, by imitation, every neceffary information, proves, that in the intellectual faculty, there is little differ ence. The arrangement and culture of the young ideas, therefore, and the fociety into which we may be thrown, are the efficient caufes on which we must reft the fuperior exertion of every particular talent and virtuous difpofition. Properly speaking, indeed, we should stile ourselves factitious, and not natural beings; creatures of art, formed by difcipline and fociety, into mere machines:

"'Tis Education forms the common mind:

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Juft as the twig is bent, the tree's inclin'd."

POPE

'Look at the favage wild in the woods, and with him contraft the man who is polifhed by fociety. What a difference! Not so much in externals; but, in their paffions and inclinations, what a diffimilitude! The happinefs of the one, you will find, requires nothing more than liberty, food, indolence, and repofe; beyond thefe grati fications he has not a thought. The man of cultivated understanding, on the other hand, fickens at the barbarous difpofitions of so fenfeless a wretch; the felicity he delights in, dwells in refinement; in the luxury of eafe, and in fenfual enjoyment; his mind, enlightened and penetrating, foars to the contemplation of this mighty maze, "a wild, where weeds and flowers promifcuous fhoot." He labours in the purfuit of ambition; or he modeftly treads, with refignation, the paths of morality and peace.

And yet the pofitive advantages which the one poffeffes over the other, are not perhaps fo great as might be expected. Society entails anxiety and care; the unfettered state, again, brings with it a total difregard to thought or apprehenfion; to-morrow may provide for the wants which to-morrow may occafion; but we will not give into the idea, that the rude state in man can be equally gratifying and comfortable with that which has been polished by time and attention. A civilized community is certainly preferable to one that is uncultivated, although fome extraordinary virtues may be seen to exist in the characters that form the latter; for candour, fincerity, refolution, and perfeverance; paffive and active courage, together with hofpitality and good faith, are frequently the strongest marked traits in a refined fociety as in a people denominated barbarous and wild.

'With incontrovertible propenfities to fociety, obfervable in every quarter of the univerfe, what infatuation is it in certain writers, paradoxically to conjecture, that man was ordained to roam a folitary being! If no other reason prefented itself, surely the fupe

ΓΙΟΣ

rior advantages which he derives from focial intercourfe would be alone fufficient to prove, that he was deftined to mix with his fellow creatures. Can the affociation of any other animals turn to the fame account? No one, I fancy, will hazard the conjecture. Why then cannot the human fpecie be fuppofed to follow that unerring principle of instinct, which is obferved to regulate the conduct of every other animal of the creation? If the bird, the fish, and the beast of the field, follow invariably the law prefcribed to its immediate class, why fhould we alone differ fo greatly from the predetermined order of Providence? Is man alone, man the firft acknowledged of created beings, is man alone to run counter to the ends, for which he is declared to have been formed? If we had been destined from the beginning to stalk about melancholy and wretched wanderers through the woods, how came it that we fo foon started from the law which had been prescribed to us, and feeling the inconveniency of folitude, that we should fo univerfally have formed ourselves into hordes and affociated bodies?

6 Moft animals herd with each other, from the smallest infect that Aits around the pool, to the towering elephant that ranges through the foreft. Of thefe, though evidently not calculated for fociety, as is the human fpecies, many will be found, it is true, to ftraggle; but are we therefore to conclude, that because they are fometimes fcattered, because they are indifcriminate in their connections, and because they are unreftrained by formal laws, that we should by confequence be doomed to a folitary and a more unfociable existence than it is evident they are? What unaccountable hypotheses! What extravagant chimæras!

The real difpofition of the human fpecies hath been in all ages and in all countries alike. There has always been a natural fympathy and attraction; the instinctive affection of the fexes, has principally ferved to establish the permanency of fociety, by the ties and the obligations it has occafioned. Self-love is predominant in all; our wives, our children, every object that contributes to our felicity, is dear to us. Man is fond of what he can call his own, In fhort, if the propagation of the human race be a natural and inftinctive paffion: if the care of our offspring in helpless childhood, be not repugnant to the feelings of the parent; it then will follow, and rafh is he that will deny it, that fociety is, and must be, natural to man; and that eftranged from each other, the human species never did nor ever can fubfift.'

As this performance excels not in any exactnefs or extent of erudition, nor in any novelty or brilliancy of philofophy, it might have been expected, that the author would have recommended himfelf, by the elegance and charms of fine writing. This, however, is not the cafe. His language, indeed has a confiderable proportion of freedom and facility. But the facility with which he wrote, has only ferved to fritter down the vapidnefs of his fentiment. Nor is his. ftyle difgufting only from its extreme verbofity. It hops and bounds without connection or equality. His tafte is evidently unformed; and he attends not to the rules of

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