respect; I read its critiques, stupid and prosing as they generally are, with an interest not at all derived from themselves; but from my certainty that they tell me how the intellect of England is at the present moment employed.*

But as my business in writing to you is not to discuss the beau ideal of a review, but to consider an individual Number of one actually existing, I shall begin with the beginning. The first article is Lacretelle's History of the Constitutional Assembly; a clever paper, in a proper spirit, by Mr Croker, I opine. It is, indeed, excellent throughout, and I quarrel only with its concluding paragraph. After pronouncing a just eulogium on Burke, he quotes a character of that great man from an old Number of the Edinburgh Review that long since had been consigned to the pastry-cook. Burke, teste Jeffrey, was a man of no judgment, no principles, no firmness, no honesty-he was no philosopher, no man of business, no orator! There is a critic six feet and a half high, for you! In the opinion of the great Jeffrey-the gentleman who actually can speak to their lordships in court, until he comes to a pain in his leg from standing, the only period of Jeffrey's harangues-Burke was no speaker. We have here nicely balanced orator Jeffrey versus noorator Burke, and the Irishman is found wanting. So saith the Prince of Critics and the King of Men, as Hazlitt, the gallant of Southamptonstreet, Holborn, styles his friend.Burke's shade may, however, derive some consolation from the fact, that the same great and ingenious person discovered also that Swift was no wit, Wordsworth no poet, Pindar unable to write Greek, Addison not worth reading, Socrates a scoundrel, Burns nothing but a blackguard. In a word, that they were not to be named in a day with Jeffrey the great, the advocate who domineers in the Jury Court, and actually writes thirty pages full of words at a time for the Edinburgh Review. But, to be serious, why did C. quote such trash? Would he turn up the pages of the heroes of the Dunciad for a character of Pope? or if

he did casually come in contact with any such trumpery, would he have given himself the trouble of even expressing disgust? Of course, he would not-he would merely laugh at the poor creature; and yet there never was such a fathomless distance between Dennis and Pope, as between Jeffrey and Burke.

The ninth and tenth articles, on Madam Campan's Marie Antoinette,-the Dutchess of Angouleme's Narrative of the Journey to Varennes,-her Private Memoirs of what passed in the Temple, -and Louis XVIII.'s Narrative of his Journey, are by the same accomplished hand, and in the same spirit, as the first article. I think C., however, rather hard on poor Louis, and that your own review was much fairer; but he does ample justice to the sublime, simple, and touching Memoirs of the Daughter of France. I defy any man of human feelings to read the 473d page of the Quarterly, the heart-rending page which gives an account of the sufferings of the poor child who had the misfortune to be Louis XVII. the poor, dear, innocent, unhappy, little creature, in his privations, his terrors, his neglect, his loneliness, and his almost sublime silence

without emotion. It proves how fact surpasses fiction. No writer would have dared to imagine such a character as the docile, courteous, obedient child, who never spoke again, after having been forced by monsters in human shape to sign a deposition against his mother. Well does the Quarterly remark, that even the Queen's own appeal to the maternal hearts of her hearers, was not so pathetic, so irresistible a touch as this.

The Reviewer remarks on these things, like a man whose heart is worthy of his genius. Why does Croker do nothing of his own? Surely, surely he might be the Swift of our time if he pleased.

The second article is on Burton's Rome, with sufficient learning and pleasantry to reward its perusal. The reviewer talks a little twaddle about church ceremonies, fretted vaults, stately columns, &c. which so good a Presbyterian as I am cannot swallow, but certainly shall not fight about.

Article third is on Arago's Voyage Round the World, and a capital cutting up of an empty French coxcomb it is. We may expect, I suppose, a reclamation from Arago-at least I hope so. He is a most superlative jackass.

The fourth article, on the Poor Laws, is a very superficial and moderate affair; but is perhaps quite as well on that account; for there is not a human being who will now read a grave treatise on so unpromising a subject. The evil, as it prevails in England, is confessedly enormous; but the privilege of murmuring now alone remains, all classes appearing to abandon exertion as hopeless, under the weight of this irremediable calamity. The fundamental principle of the English Poor Laws, viz. that the Legislature can by its fiat create unlimited means of subsistence, and an unlimited demand for labour, is now universally disowned; but it is easier to disavow the principle, than to recal its practical effects; and the whole subsequent legislation of the sister kingdom, has been a wretched struggle in detail, to counteract the master-principle of misgovernment, which, in the first instance, struck down the moral feeling of independence. Some of the wisest and ablest of Englishmen have retired from this intractable subject in despair; but the Reviewer, who is neither very wise nor very able, manages it with a freedom and facility which are quite decisive of his incapacity. The drift of his argument—although there is much discreet reserve in the expression-is the absolute defence of the existing Poor Laws of England as to their principle, coupled with some hints neither very new nor important as to improvements in the mode of their execution. In a strain of reasoning at once original and profound, we are taught, that to assist the poor, " is not only a precept of the Christian religion, a maxim of moral virtue, but an instinctive feeling of human nature;" and this being the main argument for compulsory, instead of voluntary aid, we are led to infer, that, in the opinion of this judicious writer, the due enforcement of Chris

tian and moral maxims, is just the proper subject for acts of Parliament. When we add the precious discovery, that compulsory assessments will be rather more equal in their operation than voluntary contributions, the sum of this conclusive argument in behalf of the English Poor Laws is exhausted; and it is upon a foundation thus deep and solid, that this wiseacre of the Quarterly Review has placed the defence of a system, which the wisest men of England have long pronounced indefensible, and the nation at large has felt to be all but intolerable.-This weightier controversy is preceded by a brief skirmish with our countryman Dr Chalmers, who some years ago took up this business of the poor with characteristic enthusiasm-which, it is a pity to observe, however, so prematurely evaporated-and although the Doctor's singular hurry and heedlessness appear to have given the Reviewer some petty advantages in the detail of the question, it is by no means so clear as he supposes, that the " answers to these (the Reviewer's) questions must overthrow Dr Chalmers's system." Mark the fairness of the weapons employed for this imaginary overthrow. Dr Chalmers alleges, as a proof of the defects of the existing system for relief of the poor in Glasgow, that, under it, the assessment was quadrupled from 1803 to 1818; and the Reviewer rebuts this objection of an assessment quadrupled during one period, by appealing to an increase of less than a third of the population during a different period. Again, the Doctor refers to the fact, that the voluntary contributions of his parishioners were found for three years more than adequate to the relief of all the new cases of pauperism that occurred, leaving, in fact, after such relief, a considerable surplus; and the Reviewer disputes the inference deducible from this fact, by stating, that during the same period the poor-rates were reduced even in England, and by hazarding the ridiculously ignorant assumption, that the parish of St John's, Glasgow, is, compared with other parishes of the city, remarkably free of pauperism.*

VOL. XIV.

L

And it is thus that this heavy champion of English pauperism demolishes the hardy presbyterian declaimer.The Doctor is perhaps not just the man whom, except for practical purposesfor fervid zeal and assiduous ministration in the hovels of poverty and vice -we should select as the champion of a great reform in the management of the poor; and the more is the pity that his singular retreat from the world should limit for the future his contributions to this good cause to the periodical accumulation of lumbering pamphlets, of which we have already had more than enough; but he is not just a person, after all, to be "overthrown" by any ordinary contributor to the Quarterly Review, nor can what he has done be so easily obliterated as seems to be imagined by an obsolete apologist of the English poor-laws.

Article fifth. Theodore Ducas-a common-place review of a commonplace book.

The sixth article is such as the Quarterly only can furnish. It is a review of Captain Franklin's stupendous journey. Mr Barrow brings every qualification desirable for the consideration of such a work: profound geographical knowledge, clear and accurate views of all the subjects connected with voyages of discovery, and a lucid style and arrangement. Compare his articles with the drossy, mock-scientific, dogmatic, and impertinent mumpings of the Blue and Yellow on the same subject, full of ignorance, self-conceit, self-puffery, and insolent abuse of other people. Compare, in particular, their article on the North-West Passage with this masterly one.

Had I not the fear of the criticism of the Jury-Court before my eyes-that awful band of reviewers, whose fiat decides all literary questions, Hebrew, Samaritan, Chaldee and Masoretic, Thermometrical and Frigorific, I should say, that a more stupid and presumptuous collection of betises was never thrown together by the merest smatterer in literature. Read, for instance, Barrow's and Parry's Remarks (p. 406-408) on the Navigation of the Arctic Seas, and then turn to read, if you can, the Blue and Yellow's pyet

(mind I do not say parrot, but) pyet attempt at waggery, their nauseating stuff about the Polar basin, Don Quixote and Mambrino's helmet.

In nothing, indeed, as in such articles, is the vast superiority of the Quarterly over the Edinburgh so clearly dis

cernible.

As many idle conjectures concerning the fate of Captain Parry are afloat, and many tormenting speculations vented on the tardiness of his return, too much publicity cannot be given to the fact, that Parry himself "calculated upon three summers, and only wished, that, if not heard of in the beginning of 1824, a vessel with provisions might be sent into Behring's Straits in the autumn of that year." P. 409. Mr Barrow concludes by remarking

"With regard to risk, we apprehend none beyond that to which all navigation in the icy seas is liable, and which the longfrequented whale-fishery, conducted in vessels not half so strong, nor half so well manned, has proved to be little more than common sea risk. Indeed, with ships as strong as wood and iron can make them; stored with provisions and fuel for nearly four years; with a commander excelled by none in the various duties of his profession; endued with intellectual faculties of the highest order, and full of zeal and energy tempered with due prudence and discretion; with experienced officers, and crews of picked seamen ;-we cannot persuade ourselves that any reasonable ground of alarm for their safety need be entertained." I hope, and trust not.

In Mr B.'s remarks on the ornaments of this book of travels, he pays them a well-deserved compliment, but goes sadly out of his way to abuse what he calls "the greasy daubs of lithography." Now, this is unjust to a most useful art, which they are daily bringing to more and more perfection. If Mr Barrow would just cast his eyes over Francis Nicholson's plates, he would, I think, be inclined to retract his censure. Be the defects of lithography what they may, it at all events gives you the picture from the very hand of the painter; and I trust the unworthy jealousy among line engravers, which has already turned it three times out of the country, will not again prevail to banish it from us a fourth time. To Mr Finden's merits I readily subscribe; indeed, I should be blind if I did not; but a more complete apropos des bottes never occurred than in the way Barrow here brings him forward. He mentions that the etchings are finished in line-engraving

by Mr Finden, a young and promising artist; and then, apropos of Mr Finden, an asterisk directs to a note, in which we are informed, that "his engravings of Captain Batty's Welch scenery are beautiful specimens of this branch of the art." How naturally a puff on Welch scenery comes in, in a disquisition on a journey to the Polar Sea! But the whole is explained when we learn that Batty, a very worthy fellow, is the reviewer's sonin-law, and that his book does not sell so well as it ought! There are tricks in a' trades, Mr North. To crown the whole, Murray is about bringing out another edition of Franklin, to be ornamented not by etchings -not by line-engravings-not by Mr Finden-but by those very greasy daubs of lithography" which are scorned by his reviewer, and used as a peg to hang a note-puffatory upon.

66

Moore's (not Tom, but Abraham) Moore's Pindar is the subject of the next paper. As I have neither original nor translation by me here in this rustic sojourn, I cannot give an opinion on the merits of the critique. It appears too verbal, too fond of cavilling at words, and carping at trifles; but it is a most readable article. Moore had. certainly (I judge by the specimens here given) a fine ear for versification, and I have no doubt but that the book is an accession to our literature. What could have possessed the reviewer to conclude his review of the work of such a man by such a piece of classical cant as he does. There is no man more truly devoted to classical literature than I am-nobody more willing to pay knee tribute to the glorious old writers of Greece-nobody more ready to defend against the mean and grovelling shopkeeping spirit of innovation the grand institutions for the education of the flower of England's youth-but as I hate cant in religion -cant in politics—cant in criticism— cant in taste-so do I detest cant in these subjects too. Homer and Pindar, great and sublime as they are, do not of themselves "sooth, purify, or exalt" the human heart. The mightiest scholars-alas! for the obliquities

of our nature-have been stained and sullied by crimes the most atrocious, by sensualities the most grovelling. Why did the reviewer choose such a time for such an observation? Moore, whose book he was reviewing, was an accomplished scholar, a man "initiated early, and imbued deeply, in the manliness and taste of Grecian literature." Yet he was a whig, and an outcast; a man obliged to fly for having robbed his patron Earl Grosvenor to an immense amount-a mere model of peculation and ingratitude. No, sir, there is another book, which alone truly sooths, purifies, and exalts-a book that bids us "Fear God, and honour the King," but that, to Mr Moore's party, is a sealed volume. Without a knowledge of its contents, the most intimate acquaintance with the glory and grandeur of the all but divine poets of Greece, will avail nothing to the purification of soul.

The eighth article, on the Navigation Laws-I feel I am not equal to the subject. It will require a separate and well-thought-on paper, not such light sketches as I am here throwing off. I participate in the fears of the reviewer, that we are letting theory go too far. I tremble at meddling with the institutions of our ancestors, even though I have Mr Ricardo's assertion that he is a wiser man than any of them. Above all, I dread tampering with our right arm of strength, the navy. Woe to us when we lose the watery wall! Under the old Navigation Laws were fostered Russels, and Boscawens, and Rodneys, and St Vincents, and Duncans, and the mighty glories of Nelson-I will not say that it was altogether in consequence of these lawsbut if it were, then those who have altered them have undertaken a fearful responsibility. But I own I am not competent to the consideration. I leave it to abler hands, contenting myself with expressing my humble, but earnest hopes, that the fine-drawn speculations of theorists, will not be allowed to trifle with what Sir Walter Scott emphatically and most truly calls, "the sheet anchor of the empire, the British Navy.”*

The ninth and tenth articles I have already noticed, and, for the present, I pass the eleventh, in order to consider it in connexion with the last. The twelfth is by Southey, an amusing and instructive account of the Theophilanthropists of France-indeed all the Doctor's histories of sects are amusing and instructive-which at last diverges easily enough into an ardent picture of the progress of infidelity among ourselves and concludes with an admirable precis of the proofs of the Christian religion. This is in truth an excellent paper, but I do not participate altogether in the views taken by Southey of the dangers to which religion is exposed. I never fear the contest of the good and the evil principle. Give us a fair stage, and no favour, and we shall still hold the mastery. Southey says, that more than eleven millions of newspapers are annually circulated among us, and at least two-thirds of the number aim at the destruction of sound principles. I doubt that it is fact. But, even admitting it, the glorious army of the gentlemen of the press does not strike me as a vastly formidable body by any means. All the educated classes of society merely despise them they know that with few, very, very few exceptions, they are a mean, illiterate, stupid gang of blockheads, who can just turn off articles, false in fact, lumpish in argument, vulgar in manner, and ungrammatical in style. Take them as a body, I assert that it would be impossible, on any principle of selection, to bring together so utterly contemptible a pack of hounds as the London "gentlemen of the press," from the editors who jabber broken English for their political readers, down to the footman who writes fashionable intelligence for the beau monde. The dissection, the utter dissection of a newspaper, would afford you a capital article, but it should be done by some one residing in London. Believe me, and Dr Southey, too, may believe me, that even the pot-house vulgarian is not much gulled by them. If infidelity prevails, and it does prevail nowhere but in London, we must seek other causes than the agency of the " gentlemen of the press." The hounds may yelp in to join the cry, to be sure, but their melody is of no great avail. WE -I mean the men who wield the pen at the opposite of the question-can put them down. I speak it without

fear of contradiction. Do not we all remember the time when the Whigs had everything their own way; when a man hardly dared avow himself a Tory, for fear of being pronounced an illiberal blockhead; when the Edinburgh Review was the acknowledged lord of literature and politics; when Tom Moore was the wit in verse, and Sydney Smith the wit in prose; when, in a word, all was their own? And how is it now? Why, Whig and jack-ass are convertible terms; it is a byword of reproach; they are our butts, our common-places of fun, our Listons, our Grimaldés. Blue and Yellow is waste paper-Tom Moore is obliged to submit his poetry to the care of a lawyer, before he dares print it-Sydney Smith is compelled to transport himself to Botany Bay, in quest of bad jokes—and, in short, they are laughed at by us, blackguarded by Cobbett and his crew, and pelted by the mob. They are now a nerveless, knotless, pluckless, powerless, as well as a Godless faction. We, North, we of this Magazine, began the good work; we seized their cannon, and turned it on themselves; our example was followed by others, and now they find they can only defend themselves from the whizzing shafts of our ridicule, by skuiking under the protection of laws, which they had, during their own triumphant career, denounced as absurd and tyrannical.

So will it be with the anti-religionists. Southey attaches too much importance to their writings, being himself a litterateur. They, too, could be written down; and the heart of England, sound at the core, is against them. I have often been tempted to wish that the system of prosecution was dropped. I am aware that it is a very ticklish question; but, feeling confident as I do, that God will never give us up to be conquered by the devil, if we stand firm to one another, knowing the vast superiority of intellect on our side, remembering the triumphs of Christianity in every age, I should not fear the diffusion of thousands of copies of the works of Tom Paine and villains of his stamp, while we have hearts and heads to oppose them. I expect much from the system of education pursued towards the rising generation. I expect much from the increased energy and zeal of the clergy of the Church of England,