1769. Inflance of the wretched State to which England was reduced at the Time of the Reformation. From Lewis's Pa triot King, &c.

"T TH

HOMAS Freburn's wife of Pater-nofter-Row, London, longed for pig. Fisher, a butter woman, brought him a pig ready for the fpit, but carried a foot of it to Dr. Cocks, dean of Canterbury, whilst at dinner. One of the dean's guests was Garter king at arms, Freburn's landlord, who fent to know if any of his family were ill, that he eat fleth in Lent. All well, quoth Freburn, only my wife longs for pig. His land. lord fends for the bishop of London's apparitor, and orders him to take Freburn and his pig before Stockfly the bishop. Stockily fends him and his pig to judge Cholmly, who not being at home, he and the pig were brought back to the bishop, who committed them both to the Compter. Next day, being Saturday, he was carried before the lord-mayor, who faid on Monday next he should ftand in the pillory, with one half of the pig on one fhoulder, the other half on the other. The wife defired the might fuffer as the pig was on her account. A ftring was put through it, and it was hung about his neck, which he thus carried to the Compter again. Through Cromwell's interceffion, the poor man at laft gained his liberty, by a bond of twenty pounds for his appearance. This mifchief-making pig, was by order of the right reverend father in God the bishop of London, buried in Finfbury-field, by the hands of his lordfhip's apparitor. And Freburn was by his landlord turned out of his houfe, and could not get another in four years."

Voltare's Account of the Encyclopedia: From bis Letters to the Prince of lately tranflated.

OU ask me fome particulars

your orders: This immenfe project was conceived by M fheurs Diderot and D'Alembert, two philofophers, who do honour to France: one of them has been distinguished by marks of generofity from the emprefs of Ruflia; the other by the refufal of a fplendid fortune offered him by that emprefs, but hich that very philofophy of his Feb. 1769.

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would not permit him to accept. The Chevalier Jaucourt, of a family on which he himself reflects a luftre, both by his vast store of knowledge, and by his virtues, joined with thefe two men of literature, and fignalifed himself by an indefatigable labor.

They were affifted by the count of Heronville, lieutenant-general to the king of France, profoundly verfed in all the arts which are included in, or have affinity to, your great art of war; they had alfo the aid of the count of Treffan, another lieutenant-general, whofe various merits are univerfally acknowledged; and of Monfieur de St. Lambert, who, making better verfes than Chapelle, has withal not gone the lefs deep into whatever relates to arms. There are other general officers who have furnished excellent memorials on tactics.

This dictionary was alfo enriched, by able engineers, with every thing concerning the attack and defence of places. Prefidents and counsellors of parliament have furnished feveral articles on the civil law. In fhort, there is no fcience, no art, no profeffion of which the greatest masters have not emulously contributed to make this dictionary a valuable work. It is on earth the firft, and perhaps the laft example of fuch a confiderable number of men of fuperior worth, eagerly concurring, without intereft, without any private view, not even that of reputation, (for fome have concealed themfelves) to form that immortal depofite of the treafures of human knowledge and understanding.

This work was under the auspices, and under the eyes of the Count D'Argenfon, a minifter of ftate, capable of understanding it, and worthy of protesting it. The porch of this prodigious edifice is a preliminary difcourse, compofed by Monfieur D'Alembert. I dare aver, that this discourse, which received the applaufe of all Europe, ap

cartes, and equal to the best of the illof trious Chancellor Bacon's writings on this fubject. If in the body of the dictionary itfelf there are fome frivolous articles, and others that favor more of the declaimer than of the philofopher; this fault is abundantly repaired by the prodigious quantity of profound and ufeful articles. The editors could

K

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not well refufe certain young adventurers, who had a mind to exhibit, in this collection, their productions, in company with the mafter-pieces of great men. An over-politenefs was the cause of great injury to this work; it is the faloon of Apollo, in which indifferent painters have fometimes mixed their paintings with thofe of a Vanloo, and a Lemoine. But your highness will, doubtlefs, have obferved, that this collection is precifely the reverse of other collections; that is to fay, that the good is greatly predominant over the bad.

You will easily think that, in fuch a town as Paris, fuller as it is of men of literature than ever were Athens and Rome, thofe who were not admitted into this important undertaking, fet themselves against it. The Jefuits began; they had wanted to be employed on the articles of theology, and had been refufed. This was enough for them to accufe the Encyclopedifts of irreligion; that was a thing of courfe. The Janfenifts, feeing that their rivals had founded the alarm, did not remain quiet. They were in fome meafure engaged to fhew more zeal, than those whom they had so much reproached for their eafy morality.

As the Jefuits exclaimed against the impiety of the work, the Janfenifts howled at it. There happened to be a convulfionary, or convulfionist, one called Abraham Chaumeix, who lodged an accufation in form, intitled, Prejugés legitimes contre L'Enciclopedie, or, Juft prejudices against the Enclyclopedia, of which the first volume had fcarce appeared: It was a strange affemblage this of the word prejudice which properly fignifies illufion; and the word juft, which belongs only to what is reasonable. He carried; however, his moft unjuft prejudices fo far as to fay, that if the poifon did not appear in the first volume, it would, doubtless, be perceived in the following ones; which was as much as to render the Encyclopedifts guilty not of what they had faid, but of what they would fay.

As witneffes are neceflary in a criminal procefs, he produced St. Auguftin and Cicero; and thefe witnesies were fo much the more unexceptionable, for that it could not be fufpect

Feb.

ed that Abraham Chaumeix had any the leaft acquaintance with them. The cries of fome, poffeffed with a spirit of malignancy, joined with those of this fenfelefs wretch, excited a perfecution that lafted but too long; yet, what came of it at length? That happened which happened to found philofophy, to the emetic, to the circulation of the blood, to inoculation: All these were for a time profcribed, and have at length triumphed over ignorance, ftupidity, and envy; the dictionary of the Encyclopedia, notwithstanding its faults, ftill fubfifts, and Abraham Chaumeix is gone to hide his rage at Moscow. It is faid the empress has compelled him to good manners; if so, it is one of the prodigies of her reign.'

A Genuine Letter from a Noble Lord to a R. R. Prelate.

I

My Lord, *****, June 15, 1754 WAS yesterday informed that your lordship had laid your commands upon Mr. ********, the vicar of this parish, to repair to his living; your lordship, it feems, being no longer difpofed to difpenfe with his nonrefidence. The vicar and his friends give out, that this order is occasioned by a vote the vicar gave at a late election contrary to your lordship's judgment.

I do not pay the leaft regard to this reprefentation, nor have I any fufpicion that your lordship was determined in this matter by any other conf:deration than a pious concern for the good of the parishioners. And on that account, I make myself fure your lordship will no longer infift upon Mr. ********'s refidence with us, after your lordship is informed that it is likely to have a contrary effect.

In fhort, my lord, the parishioners of ****** defire to fee no more of their prefent vicar than they usually do, which is for about a fortnight or three weeks annually in partridge time. They are a ferious good fort of people, and the diligence, fobriety, good fenfe, and humanity of their prefent curate, are highly acceptable and edifying to them. This worthy man muft of courfe be difmiffed if the vicar comes to refide, and the people think they fhall be no gainers by the exchange.

We acknowledge, my lord, that

Mr.

1769.

Mr. ******* has his accomplishments. He is a polite gentleman, plays a good fiddle, dances gracefully, knows whisk perfectly, is no contemptible marks man at a partridge, or a woodcock, of an excellent tafte, and exquifite judgment on the merit of claret and port, and by the ftrength of his head, is able to carry off his full fhare of either, always with decency, and not feldom with glory. But the misfortune is, that the poor people of his parish have no opportunities of fitting under his ministry, when and where he is difplaying these admirable talents; and when it comes to their turn to profit by his paftoral gifts, it is an univerfal complaint, that their attention cannot keep pace with his expedition, in reading the leffons and the prayers, and that their capacities cannot fathom the depth of his differta tions on the idea of Deity, Eternal Relations, or the Dignity of the Church; which laft point he always contrives to touch upon either in the exordium or peroration of his discourse.

When the vicar is with us, the curate migrates to his master's other living, above fifty miles off, (though certined, by the bye, to be only thirty) and whatever occafional duties are wanted in the interval, the parishioners are, for the most part, obliged to have recourse to a neighbouring clergyman, as the vicar's engagements are not to be broken by fuch trifling avocations.

Some little time before your lordfhip's promotion to the epifcopal bench, a motion was made in our houfe for a bill to compel the incumbents of benefices yielding 150l. per ann. or upwards, clear of reprifals, to conftant refidence. The bench were in general against the motion, on account of the difcouragement this would be to learn ing, (as the motion was in effect defigned to exclude pluralities) and the hardship it would be on men of fuperior parts, to be confined to the performance of the ordinary parochial duty, which might be difcharged by curates of much inferior qualifications; and to these were added an argument taken from the obligation there was upon the ftate to protect the church in her rights and privileges.

I did not, I own, comprehend the force of this reafoning, but, however, I ftruck in with the party against the

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motion, upon a plainer and more intelligible argument of my own, taken from the inconvenience of confining numbers of the more opulent and fathionable clergy to their respective cures; with their intriguing, ambitious, fecular, and fenfual spirit about them. I thought then, and I continue ftill to think, that they would be very bad examples to the people, and do more harm by their practice, than they would do good by their inftructions. I expreffed my opinion, that where a man's confcience would not difpofe him to take the care of his parish perfonally upon himself, he must have fome very unclerical qualities, which it could not be expedient for his people to imitate. I have known refident clerks, and fo perhaps has your lordship, who have greatly contributed to corrupt their parishioners, by their unedifying converfation, and the influence their fuperior fortune gave them. It is true, a curate may be vicious and diforderly as well as a rector or vicar; but their bad example feldom does any very extenfive mifchief. Their fcanty ftipend, and fubordination to their principal, prevent their rifing to any great degree of eftimation, except what they purchafe by a virtuous conduct, and an attention to their duty; and a poor fcoundrel may always lay his account with being contemptible. But this is a fubject which, being capable of fo clear illuftration from facts, there is no occafion to enlarge upon. And I have now only to request your lordship to confider me as the amanuenfis of my well-meaning neighbours, fave only, that being interefted in the fuccefs of their application as a parishioner, I most heartily join in their request; and am, my lord, your lordship's most obedient fervant,

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other enemies fince the figning of the last treaty of peace with the Bourbon family. I fhall give it you in the words of an able writer, who thus defcribes his political operations: " our great political adventurer, when in the wantonnefs of his power, and poverty of his understanding, he undertook the reformation of British America, with the British and American commerce, and multiplied his impofitions, reftric. tions, and regulations, fubjecting the whole to military execution, in former times deemed by the wife fit only for commercial deftru&ion, together with his memorable taxation to the enforcement of fuch unconftitutional, ftrange, and unnatural judicatures as the earth before never faw, might as well, I conceive, have formed a fcheme to take the tools out of the hands of a confiderable part of the manufacturers of Birmingham and Leeds, as his devices directly tended to diftrefs the principal trading colonies, and take from them their little money wanted to drive about the wheels of trade neceffary to the manufactures and commerce of this kingdom. I do not believe that at making the peace he fouled his fingers, though fome others will never be able to make their's clean; but he was as folicitous to enforce in effect the laws made again British commerce by our late enemies, as if he had been paid for it. By one ftroke of his policy he made a prefent to the

French and Dutch of a branch of the British commerce, whofe annual profit, without reckoning other advantages, was 200000!. and his whole refined fyftem may be reduced to the few articles of impoverishment, embarroffment, oppreffion and confufion! But all that has been or can be faid of him in these or other refpects falls far fhort of his attempt to fubject the worthy families in America to have foldiers quartered upon them, whereby they must pay fo dear for their infamous thackles. Truth will fooner or later fwim uppermoft, and they who laboured to fupport him in this attempt, do, I hope, expect to be tranfmitted to pofterity in their proper colours."

This is a very characteristic draw ing, by a masterly hand. How dangerous mult it be to have fuch a mifChievous mind and heart employed in

Feb.

the public adminiftration! The ignorance of juft political principles is glaring! "Since to preferve the freedom of Britons, it is neceffary that all parts and perfons of good citizens throughout the empire be free: Freedom be ing the common right of all, and the integrity of it once broken, the torrent of power will overflow and deluge the fyftem. "For, faid Addifon, if liberty only spreads among particular branches, there had better be none at all; fince fuch partial liberty only aggravates the misfortunes of thofe deprived of it." And even a Clarendon could fay, that the chearfulness of fubmiffion is the firength of it.

When, upon a difcontent of one of the colonies, occafioned by a right to certain lands which lay within it, and Lord Granville was urged to fubdue by military force; he wifely replied,

he had no notion of inftructing the king's subjects in their allegiance with great and small shot."--Common sense would teach men who fought the public good, that population, riches, true religion, virtue, magnanimity, arts, fciences and learning, are all of them the produce of liberty."

But befides a deplorable want of just concern for public good, the most fhameful ingratitude and infolent outrage is committed on the American colonies, by putting them under the furly brow of a military force, in order to enforce oppreffive measures, "when thefe very colonics have in the courfe of feveral years by their imports annually paid a million of our public charges, 30 per cent. upon the manufacturers price, and 40 per cent. upon an average more than they bouli have paid for the like imports from other nations ."Mark this.

It is not poffible we can do lefs than conclude a deteftable scheme, either of dejpotism or of fubverfion, at the bottom of fuch political manoeuvres, which are big with fuch manifeft mifchiefs to the British constitution.

But with afurance we can add, "it was ever a great difhonour, as well as injury to a free people, to be fubject to the domination of the favourites of princes; but what is ftill worse, fome men would have them fubject to the domination of the favourites of their fellow fubjects."---Shocking

idea!

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