their revolutionary guilt; and those who will not believe that the system of their tyranny was sufficient to produce it, must attribute it to the terrible excitement of sudden liberty acting on the passions of an ignorant population. The quickness of French intellect can seize an object with rapidity, but is little capable of discussing it with depth. The people saw they were enfranchised, and in the former gaolers of their minds they fancied they perceived the causes of their imprisonment. Revenge hurried them blindly on; and royalty, priesthood, and nobility, suffered, in their representatives, the punishment that, could it have been fairly apportioned, would have been sent back upon the tyranny of ages. But whatever the particular causes might be, the public mind became familiarized with horror, and tinged with a shocking ferocity. Thirty years have softened down this feeling in those remote from the bustle of political life. At this moment the mass of the people, the peasantry and the small proprietors, are, in their rural retreats, a model of independence with civility, and humanity with courage. But this unfortunately is not the class that gives the tone to national peculiarities; the contagion has still left its stain upon the towns, and is incalculably the greatest evil of the revolution.

The military spirit which so deeply pervaded France, and bore her victorious armies o'er the earth, is generally ascribed to the Revolution. This is a short-sighted view of a feeling which has existed since France became a nation. It was ever her distinguishing trait. In all ages and in all circumstances it was displayed, proportioned in its vigour to her political situation. The difference is, that freemen fight better than slaves; and though under the monarchy her efforts were probably less vigorous than of late, yet if we compare the enthusiasm of the republic with the fanaticism of the crusades (which latter arose from a revolution in feeling not less striking than the other), we shall see the same energies, the same excesses, the same infatuation. But in one case the impulse was religion, in the other, liberty; the hostility in the 11th century was against the foes of their faith, that of the 18th, against the opponents of their politics. It is not then the passion for conquest, but the spirit in which it was waged, that we must rank high on the list of revolutionary ills. Republican France made war like a thirsting tiger. She seemed to fight fo

food, not fame. Blood was the aliment of her ambition, and when satiated with that of her foes, she turned homewards for a fresh supply. The force of her example was infectious and far-spreading. Her tactics were adopted; her atrocities retaliated; Europe became a military school; "death was on every head, and vengeance in every heart;*" and if war, in its fairest form, implies a perpetual violation of humanity," what execration is sufficiently strong for those who displayed it to the world in its foulest aspect? The contests of the Revolution, and those arising from it, have fixed, by their virulence as well as their duration, a warlike feeling in every country within the circuit of its action, and entailed it upon them from generation to generation. This, as a general evil, is felt by the world at large; its peculiar effect on France herself was to check the blossoms of her freedom, and fit the land for chains. A military government is ever the cradle of despotism. Each convulsion of the state but rocks the growing monster into strength, till he springs, like the sons of Callirhoe, at once from infancy to manhood, ready to strike and able to enslave. Look to France-observe her opening struggles, her early breathings of enfranchisement, her vows, her sacrifices, her victories! -How long did their accumulated triumphs last? In what did they end? Ten years of independence, bloody, chequered, and imperfect-sunk into a slavery far worse than that she had shaken off, because the one was the imperceptible growth of centuries, formed against the will of the people, and unable to resist their power; the other was of their own creation, built upon their weakness and cemented with their blood. Chance shook the yoke from off their shoulders. The idol they had set up fell from its own weight. France received a new king, and gained a glorious constitution; the first of which she has the folly to decry, and the second the absurdity to call a benefit of her own making.

The atrocities inflicted on religion and its ministers, come next to be considered; but it was long doubtful whether religion in the abstract was injured, or the contrary. All the abuses of the church at once uprooted; the degrading superstitions thus destroyed; the emancipation of the mind thus effected; from

*Voyage du Jeune Anacharsis, speaking of the wars of savage Greece. + Gibbon.

these what mighty good might not the world have fairly looked for? But when all form and all faith was openly abjured; when religion was trampled under foot, and profligate impiety placed upon her pedestals; the earth to its remotest ends rung with reproach, and shrunk with horror. The hopes of philosophy were lost in contemplating these fearful scenes; and all sects, in every country, joined in the belief that religion in France was for ever overthrown. Look to the result. The phrenetic convulsion soon passed by, and religion re-entered her temples in triumph. Unhumiliated by her disgrace, untaught by her calamities, she came not in the meekness of reform, but rushed back in all the pride of ceremony and procession; took her stand upon the base of her former corruption; and defied the lights of reason and of truth. Had Buonaparte established the Reformed religion instead of that of Rome, (and it is certain that he would have done so had one been as good an instrument as the other,) the benefits accruing from the revolution would have perhaps overbalanced its evils. But we see that France has abandoned that hope. We see her relapsed into that faith, whose leading dictates are blind belief and unquestioning submission; and we have nothing finally to expect for this fickle country, but a probable return to her former servitude, with a recurrence of the frightful means that must attend a fresh emancipation. Coming to such a conclusion as this, one would naturally exclaim, "What have been the benefits of this highly-vaunted event? In what has France been a gainer, or how has the world been improved?" The advantages to France were nevertheless immense, had she known how to preserve them. The distribution of property, though effected by much individual injustice; the consequent independence and comparative wealth of the peasantry; the spreading of education; the encouragement of manufactures; the overthrow of prejudice-these were the manifold and mighty results effected by the revolution; but a wide distinction exists between this enumeration and the blessings she now enjoys. These, arising solely from the abuse of those which the revolution gave her, and from the conquest of the country by the other powers of Europe, are, the return of a family, who, let faction clamour as it may, must feel themselves more than any other fully identified with France. If the

Bourbons are false to France, on whom can she depend? If the pride, the pleasure, the glory of being for centuries identified with her, cannot keep the current clear in the blood of her hereditary rulers, in what upstart adventurer is she to look for purity? Political equality; trial by jury; a representative government! these are her present blessings. Had she them under the republic? Had she them under the Emperor? These self-answering questions lead but to others. What does she require? How is she to be improved? What nation is so happy, so rich, so unincumbered, so soon to be great?

It is then clear that the invaluable goods which she now possesses-her king, her charter, and the associated host of happiness which surrounds them -are far from being the actual results of the revolution. They arose from her conquest, and might have been had without the cost of oceans of blood and years of degradation. The chief benefits of the revolution were temporary to France. She murdered her mild and merciful monarch, to erect a cold usurper in his stead; she plunged religion in the depths of disgrace, to return to the sway of a superstitious creed; she revelled in the drunkenness of disbelief, and awoke to the embraces of intolerance, The momentary freedom which she won, was bartered soon for the chains of Imperial despotism; the independence of her people was thrown at the feet of her tyrant; the incipient cultivation of their minds was sacrificed to his policy; their bodies were offered in hecatombs at the shrine of his ambition; and but for his fall, they would at this day have been ground down in ignorance and thraldom. But one splendid advantage arose from the revolution; one noble gift to France, to Europe, to the world; one blessing, alike the property of us, and the unimpaired, inevitable birthright of posterity-its EXAMPLE. Not that of shaking off the yoke of tyranny-that was not new to men, nor wanting to the world; but that terrible example of excess, that hideous spectacle of horror, which terrifies mankind from trusting to the impulse of their passions, and makes nations pause upon the threshold of revolt. This is no fanciful assertion. It has been already acted on. Spain has arisen, but she has not bathed herself in blood. Naples has awoke, but not in an attitude of terror. Germany has threatened revolution; but has she not been

held back by the fear of following that of France? France herself is threatened monthly, weekly, hourly-Why does she not act? We too have our threateners! Who among them would dare the trial even with the prospect of success? We trust, not one; and we are convinced that the feeling which has guided the honourable advance of Spain, which leads the present progress of events in Naples, which stays the steps of German innovation, gives France tranquillity, and England hope, is the dread which all men and all nations feel

at venturing upon the path reddened by the stains of that bloodiest of revolutions.

We trust that the example may not be lost; not half effective, but entirely so. That princes, as well as people, may feel its influence sink deep into their hearts. That while the governed, thinking themselves distressed, will rather bend to the servility of supplication, than try force for their relief, the rulers will weigh well the value of complaint, and know that unsatisfied distress must ever lead to desperation.

Though these inclosed fire-places certainly save a deal of fuel, by reflecting the heat and preventing its escape, yet they must be prejudicial to health. The contrivance can only be defended on the same principles which the gentleman made use of to some robbers (in the suspense of his reasoning powers through alarm) "My good friends, pray spare my money and take my life."

HINTS TO LADIES OF FASHION.

How many useful lessons in life may we receive from observing the instincts and habits of animals to whom we deny reason. Many a splendid beauty, thus instructed, would quit the ball-room before midnight with great advantage to the freshness of her bloom and the lustre of her eyes, if she were told that the glow-worm is never seen to shine after eleven o'clock p. m.

THE SAME.

Many a grave doctor in both univesities seems to have taken a lesson from the exterior and habits of the Athenian bird sitting in an ivy-bush. A bushy

*White's History of Selborne.

wig, an occasional harsh snapping of the beak, with most solemn gravity of countenance, have given them an air of importance which nature, unassisted, would never have bestowed.

LOVE OF ROMANCES.

Nothing proves the discontent of mankind so clearly as the love of those tales which bring them into a new world. The readers of romances wish for magicians to build and furnish their palaces, angels to live in them, and fairies to be always within call to execute every command of whim and caprice.

GRUMBLERS.

The late Gilbert Wakefield, in a life written by himself, says, on such a day I

entered this planet. Poor man, it seems he mistook his way, as he never was satisfied with the place or its inhabitants. Now, all grumblers seem in the same predicament: a man whose genius and disposition qualified him to inhabit the planet Saturn, might have by ill chance entered that of Venus, &c. ;

And so when mortals go astray,
The stars are more in fault than they.

COURTSHIP.

Should a man in purchasing an horse praise it up to the skies, could he then expect to have it at his own valuation? would not the seller raise his? So in courtship, when the poor lover overrates the charms of his mistress by flattery and exaggerated praise, can he wonder that the lady does not think that he bids high enough for so much excellence ? and does not take sighs and tears as part of the purchase?

ing, yet surely with injustice. A judge encompassed with his professional amplitude of flowing wig, would be thought uncandid in condemning the snug scratch of the attorney. Gardens and territories require a very different dress.

SINGULAR ABUSE.

And play their God an engine on their foe.
Pope.

Men are very apt to abuse the religious opinions of those with whom they chance to have any quarrel. I remember a man who underwent a dry beating from his adversary, and called him an it not have been more appositely said, if Anabaptist rascal ever afterwards. Would he had suffered a ducking from him?

FALSETTO.

Some women affect tones of excessive softness mixed with a good deal of what is called a whine. These often prove great scolds and tyrants to their husbands and children. Some naturalists tell us that the hyæna and the crocodile absolutely shed tears when they whine over the dying carcases that they are then preying upon. Perhaps shedding tears may be an addition, and the noise they make may resemble the falsetto abovementioned.

MUSIC AND PAINTING.

The strong analogy between these, which appeal to the two different faculties of seeing and hearing, is yet very manifest. Some German pieces of music which introduce a deep and growling base in order to set off a gay air, remind us of a picture of Rembrandt, where a small light peeping out of the broad shadows of surrounding darkness, brings to view a little old woman spinning by a small window in a large room.

HATCHMENTS (CORRUPTED FROM
ACHIEVEMENTS.)

When in passing a noisy narrow street in London, I have seen this fatal sign of the lamented death of Mr. Alderman, to which the usual motto In Cælo Quies is affixed, I could scarce withhold a smile, when I considered what a consolation this motto must hold out to all the surviving inhabitants of the street who could read it, though it might stop the sale of the house to those who preferred quietness to wealth.