For the cold horrors of the funeral rite, Is real bliss" to what we fear of death.""-p. 264. Frequent use has been made of the stores of French literature lately opened to us. We suspect that Mr. Bland has a great predilection for the French wits. He seems to be familiar with the productions of Du Fresnoy, and Baraton, and Chardon, and Moncrif, and does not hesitate to avail himself of the miscellaneous nature of the illustrations, by introducing them in an English dress, as often as any similitude of thought or subject allows. Two valuable recent publications have contributed whatever was wanting to make us thoroughly acquainted with the taste in writing and conversation which prevailed among the Parisian beaux esprits of the last century. The anonymous treatise De la Littérature Française pendant le 18me Siècle, describes the result of their hours of seriousness and study; and Baron Grimm's more desultory work has supplied all that remained to be learned respecting their movements in private life, when no part was to be acted, no character to be kept up; in their jests and quarrels, in their parties and retirements. 'Nam veræ voces tum demum pectore ab imo Ejiciuntur, et eripitur persona, manet res.' From this source Mr. Bland has gleaned two or three happily expressed trifles which are not above the level of what we expected from the heartlessness and frivolity which characterised what was called la société of the French metropolis. The following are favourable specimens of the peculiar character of French sprightliness. The original of the portrait in the first is to be seen in every circle of all societies. 'Avoir l'esprit bas et vulgaire, Manger, dormir, et ne rien faire, Dire seulement-Je suis belle.' 'To have a talent base and low, To live in state of vegetation, To eat, drink, nothing learn, nor know, Such is the genius of Miss Kitty, Who seems, for all her conversation, To say Look at me, I am pretty.' B. p. 174. 'Le premier jour du mois de Mai If what I thought on pleased thee, Fanny, To me was happier far than any.'-B.—p. 376. D'aucun Dieu l'on n'a dit tant de mal et de bien. . On earth their influence from above, So much has never yet been said, Both good and evil, as of love. Yet, for whatever joy we bless, Or for whatever pain we flout him, His is the worst unhappiness Who knows not what to say about him.' M.-p. 401. We have noticed several instances where, in our opinion, the sense of the original has been misconceived. 'And thou O lamp, bear'st witness to her alter'd vow,'-p. 7. conveys to the English reader no idea of the turn in the Greek. * λυχνε, συ δ' εν κολποις αυτον ὅρας ἑτερων. The idea in the last line of the following stanza is very poetical, but in our conception very different from that conveyed by the original. UNCERTAIN, 443, (444.) iii. 245. Death the universal Lot. B. 'The bath, obsequious beauty's smile, Οίνος και τα λοετρα και η περι Κυπριν ερωη, Allusion Allusion has been made to the immortality of Cleombrotus the. Ambraciot, from the time of Cicero to that of Milton. The force of the celebrated epigram of Callimachus on this subject, is quite lost in the paraphrastic translation of the concluding line. ἕν, το περί ψυχης, γραμμ' αναλεξαμενος. But Plato's reason caught his youthful eye, The desultory and miscellaneous nature of the notes which form so large a part of this volume, opens a wide field for remark, but our extracts have been already so considerable that we cannot venture upon them. Briefly, however, we may observe, that amidst much ingenious and amusing criticism, there are to be found in them a laborious trifling which occasionally fatigues us, and an effort altogether disproportioned to the effect meant to be produced. Were this part of the work reduced to half its present bulk, (and we hope that opportunities will not be wanting,) we might then expect to receive a volume of which the Illustrations should not be unworthy of the text. ART. VII. An Inquiry into the State of National Subsistence, as connected with the Progress of Wealth and Population. By W. T. Comber. London: Cadell and Davies. 1808. 8vo. pp. 382. IN N calling the attention of our readers to a work which was published five years ago, we are aware that we deviate from our usual practice: but the deviation is, we hope, excusable; because that work has derived, from very recent circumstances, a degree of importance which it did not possess when it was first presented to the public. A select committee of the House of Commons, appointed at an early period of the last session, to inquire into the Corn Trade of the united kingdom,' have, in their report to the House, proposed the repeal of the existing system of laws for the control of the importation and exportation of corn, and in lieu of such system, the chairman of that committee has proposed to the House a series of resolutions, of which the object is to secure to this country a corn-trade unfettered by regulations, but subject to duties, so graduated, as to protect the British growers and consumers, against those great and sudden variations in the price of grain, which have hitherto been occasioned by correspondent fluctuations in the supply and demand. Thus far, the opinions of the chairman of the committee exactly coincide with those of Mr. Comber, whose inquiry we will now proceed to examine. The The author designates himself, in his preface, as a practical writer,' and laments that his habits (commercial habits we presume) have been adverse to the cultivation of the higher attainments of literature;' yet he appears to have studied, with much attention, the best writers on political economy; and we think that the diligence with which he has collected a large stock of useful materials, and the candour and good sense with which he uses them, afford a full compensation for the few faults of his style; which, perhaps, is sometimes too diffuse, and rather too much laboured, but never so far as to become perplexed or unintelligible. His 'Inquiry,' indeed, is carried to a length which many of his readers may be inclined to think excessive; but he excuses himself by alleging the necessity of combating the many strange and contradictory theories which some modern writers have endeavoured to substitute for the wise and sober doctrines of Dr. Smith: Writers, (says he,) from the bias of their own minds, have given a latitude and universality to principles, evidently secondary in their nature, and limited in their operation, which form the basis of particular theories. Some, with Mr. Malthus, deduce all the political and moral evils which exist in society, from an excess of population, inferring a deficiency of the means of subsistence, and the decay of our wealth and prosperity, from this cause; and, as a practical result, recommend discouragements to the further increase of the species. Others, viewing population as a means of increasing wealth, consider depopulation and decline as synonymous; they regard the actual production of subsistence as already superabundant, which, by enabling every order in the state to consume an increased quantity, generates luxury; and consider this as inevitably producing a decay of industry, which will be followed by depopulation and decline. While some trace all our riches to our commerce, and triumphantly produce the imports and exports as the barometer of national wealth, others as confidently deny that commerce is any means of increasing wealth, whatever it may be of distributing it. By some it has been contended, that the increase of taxes, by raising the price of our manufactures to the foreign consumer, has a tendency to occasion a decay of the employments of industry, and to increase the number of the poor; whilst others contend, that by prolonging the action of necessity, they stimulate to industry, and are one of the chief causes of national wealth.' Instead of entangling himself in the labyrinth of theory, our author undertakes to trace, from the commencement of English history, the circumstances which have actually attended, in this country, the progress of wealth, population, and agriculture; occasionally commenting on, the facts which he produces, and applying them to each of the conflicting systems above-mentioned; but particularly to that of Mr. Malthus, whom he justly considers as the most formidable of all the dissenters from the orthodox tenets of political political economy. Such a task, it is obvious, could not be completed within very narrow limits; but as only a small portion of Mr. Comber's Inquiry is immediately suited to our purpose, we must confine ourselves to a very short and imperfect sketch of that part of his agricultural history, which is antecedent to the establishment of any regular code of laws, for the encouragement of tillage. te It must, indeed, be confessed, that no degree of industry can enable an historian to glean, from the early annals of this country, a certain knowledge of the number of its inhabitants, or of the quantity of subsistence afforded by agriculture, at different remote periods. The first document of this kind, which our author has quoted, occurs in the reign of Edward III, at which time (i. e. in 1377) the population of England and Wales appears to have amounted to no more than two and a half millions of souls. The next estimate of the population is in 1575, during the reign of Elizabeth, when the number of inhabitants was found to be 4,600,000; by which it appears, that the population of England and Wales had doubled itself during the two last centuries; and lastly, the returns made to the legislature under the population act in 1801, have shewn, that after an interval of 225 years, the population had been once more doubled. These documents, though perhaps not strictly accurate, are sufficient to prove, that though the progress of popu lation, and of subsistence in this country, may have been occasionally interrupted during some short intervals, yet during the last four hundred years at least, a great augmentation has taken place in the produce of each succeeding century; an augmentation which has lately proceeded with a uniformly accelerated rapidity. This increase, indeed, has been viewed, by some philosophers, as a just subject of alarm. Mr. Malthus, to whom we owe our thanks for the boldness with which he has opposed some errors of modern philanthropists, and for the just and popular arguments by which he has demonstrated the impossibility of supplying, from the contributions of the rich and idle, those means of subsistence which can only be secured by the labour of the industrious, has been grievously scared by this new phantom. Because mankind have a tendency to propagate their species, and to devour the fruits of the earth, whilst that earth does not possess a reciprocal power of increasing its own surface, he thinks that the limited quantity of provender in the whole world must, ultimately, be insufficient for the growing number of mouths; and hence he concludes that our only chance of retarding that starvation, which will be our inevitable lot, is to practise celibacy, and to employ as many as possible of our manufacturers (who are far too numerous, and frightfully prolific) in raising corn for exportation. Our author replies, that this opinion, like some others inculcated by |