Warbeck's encomium on England deserves to be extracted. Thou precious jewel in Europa's crown! (66 > Flows in thine own rich veins. Seek none but there; For none will ever be so true to thee, “ As thou may'st to thyself. p. 261, 262. - ↓* We add but a few sentences from the Queen's dying scene. She is speaking to her attendants. A } T. Love me when I am dead; and love my child, Dra edi I have not said a prayer o'er him since morning. 'Tis life transfused; and I but breathe my soul, y: And lo, in this Might Richmond envy me; for he but lives, owen I'm, on the sudden, weak. 3 J 9q9 I feel sweet sleep again, and heavenly dreams SA p "Sir T. Broughton. Her touch is death, And she hath breathed her last.-Oh, blessed spirit, For thou art lovely, calm, and beauteous still! That our last rising may proclaim our worth. p. 307-312. These few extracts may serve to give the judicious reader a pretty just conception both of the faults and the beauties of the singular volume before us. It is evidently the work of a person of eno ordinary accomplishments and intellectual activity possessed of considerable taste and fancy-and of a just relish for the higher kinds of poetical beauty ;-but actuated, in this instance, by an ambition too lofty to be gratified, or even indulg ed without hazard, in this age of the world. There is something delicious, however, to our ears, even in the faintest echoes of those enchanting strains which were born in the golden days of our poetry; and our sympathy with the unexpected nationality of Mr Chenevix's taste is so strong and so pleasant, that we are not sure with all our efforts to be severe-whether we have not said more in his praise than will be sanctioned by judges absolutely impartial. ART. XII. Considerations on the Causes, Objects and Conse quences of the Present War; and on the Expediency, or the Danger, of Peace with France. By William Roscoe, Esq. London, Cadell & Davies. WE E will fairly confess, that it is not with a view to enlarge upon the contents of this publication, that we have prefixed its title-page to the present article: But we wish to take an opportunity of once more calling the attention of our readers to that subject, in comparison of which all other political questions sink into insignificancy-the Prospect of Peace. It is long since we discussed this subject at any length; and, even at present, we do not mean to do more than begin the renewed consideration of it,confident that time will only strengthen the inducements to entertain this question, however it may seem to multiply the obstacles which lye in the way of its decision. To pretend that there is no doubt or difficulty in the matter-to see only the fair side, namely, the temptations to get out of the war, without looking at the dangers which may arise from peace, and to shut our eyes against the obvious impediments that retard its accomplishment, must appear to all persons, and most justly, extremely weak and thoughtless. Nor is it less so, to regard this question as depending on fixed, abstract principles, uninfluenced by times and circumstances, and to speak of Peace as we would of Reform, or the Liberty of the Press, or the Abolition of the Slave Trade. There are, indeed, certain parts of the subject which are of this description. We hold, for instance, that no principles can be better established than those which should lead England to de sire conciliation and friendship with all nations not under French influence; and even to seek peace with France herself, as often and as long as her honour and safety will allow. But then it is equally clear, that these principles do not carry us very far on our road towards the practical decision of the question, which must, in every case, resolve itself into an inquiry, whether the proposed time and terms come within this undeniable rule. Having premised thus much, in order to exempt ourselves from the blame justly attached to those who rather clamour than argue for peace, we may perhaps be permitted to observe, that if there are obstacles, and formidable ones too, to the attainment of that desirable object, in the unparalleled power, ambition, and animosity of the enemy, there are others of no slight account, in the feelings, or the forgetfulness of feeling, which have been engendered among ourselves, by the duration and the character of the war, and by the arts of those whose interest it is to prolong it. It is a remark of Mr Hume's, that all the wars which England has ever waged, have been persisted in by her long after the period of their legitimate termination; and it is proper at least to put us on our guard against the hazard of a similar miscalculation in the present circumstances of the world. It does not, indeed, depend entirely on ourselves, whether we shall again have peace in the lifetime of the present generation; -but at whatever time it may happen, it will of course require our cooperation;-and it is a step, and perhaps no slight one on the way to its attainment, to endeavour to dispel those prejudices by which our cooperation might be unreasonably withheld, and to bring one at least of the partics to that calm and impartial state of feeling from which there is reason to think that both have departed-though no doubt in very different degrees. With this view, therefore, we now propose, in the first place, to take a deliberate survey of the benefits which this kingdom might reasonably expect to derive from a termination of the war. This, at first sight, may appear a very idle and superfluous undertaking, but it really is not so. War has become, from t to its long duration, almost the natural, certainly the ordinary and habitual, state of the country. It is about twenty years since we were clearly at peace-a period of war quite unexampled in modern history. Equally novel have been the extent and variety of warlike operations, and the consequent excitement of national feeling, by hatred, rage, enthusiasm, glory, curiosity-by the alternations of hope and fear-of sympathy and selfishness of anxiety before, and self-gratulation after escapes-or despair after disasters. The burthens and actual sufferings entailed by these varied operations, have been proportionably great, and exceeding all former experience or even imagination; and nations having both done and suffered what would in former ages have been thought impossible, men's minds have become unhinged in all calculations; and they are now prone believe in absolute impossibilities, for no better reason than that they have already been deceived or mistaken. Consider only the effects of all this, and the strange, diseased, unnatural frame of mind which it has induced. The great bulk of society, that is, of the most active and important class of men, those from twenty to forty years of age, have passed their whole lives, politically speaking, in a state of universal war; and they only know from history, that there ever was such a thing as peace in the world. The rest are, by twenty years' experience-by far the largest portion of their lives, and the latest portion-so far habituated to war, that it requires a strong effort to disengage themselves, and recollect what peace was. Hence the notion generally prevailing of war, is that of a very usual and natural state of things, in which there are regularly a certain number of soldiers raised and killed-sailors impressed and drownedgazettes with promotions and appointments-victories and defeats debates about measures of conquest or finance and taxes heavy, but only gradually increasing. That peace is a sweet prospect a fine theme to talk about-something vastly delightful if it were possible-all freely admit; but they admit it much as they would the delights of the millennium, without any precise notion of its advantages, or any definite wish for its arrival, or the smallest idea that they shall ever live to see it. The state of war is that which they are accustomed to things have gone on long so, and may long so continue. We used to think we could never bear a twentieth part as much as we have borne with ease; so we may even go on and bear a little more; and, should nothing worse happen than that things remain as they are, or slowly grow worse, they will last our time at any rate; and we need not be very much alarmed for our own sake or our posterity's. The deeprooted prevalence of such habits of thinking, makes i quite ne cessary that we should begin with stating plainly and fairly, in what manner a peace will affect the country, and come home to the comfort and daily enjoyments of every individual it contains. If this exposition should fail of producing any better effect--if it do not wean men from the love of war, or rather awaken their feelings from the callousness which now binds them it may at least do thus much for humanity--it may propagate a more universal hatred of those men, wherever they be over which state soever they are permitted to rule by an offended Deity what ever country they disgrace by belonging to it whose ambition or whose foolish intrigues perpetuate the countless, the unutter able miseries of savage war. There is no need of dwelling upon the ordinary topics con nected with this great subject, that if peace were made, we should no longer send so many of our fellow-creatures to perish by the sword,that the hearts of thousands would no more ache each time the firing of cannon announced some advantage, that our seamen would in safety carry our commerce over the world, and no longer be deprived of the privilege of personal liberty these, and other things of the same kind, are so ob vious as to require no mention, even in an enumeration like the present, the professed purpose of which is to dwell upon trite subjects, and arrest the attention to considerations never very remote from the view. But let us only fix our eyes upon the immediate effects which a peace must produce upon the Com merce and Manufactures of the country.Does any one wish to have a criterion whereby he may estimate their amount? Let him only look to the recent events let him contemplate the influence of a partial pacification-of the renewal of trade with America, by the repeal of the Orders in Council. He will there see how repugnant war is to the happiness of man. In one day the whole manufacturing counties of England, from a cheerless waste of idleness listlessness wretchedness and discontent, became a scene of busy-happy-cheerful and peaceful men. The measures of the government did not remain a dead letter they were not like some barren victory or some success gained only to be looked at and talked of they did not stand forth merely in a Gazette to be stared at, and turned into bad sentences, and worse rhyme-they came home, indeed, to the bosoms of men they pervaded the cottages of the best part of the country→→ and hundreds of thousands not only thought that a national benefit had been gained-but, what is ten thousand times better, they felt it in their own persons for they had bread, and fuel, and covering for themselves and their little ones, instead of starving with hunger, cold and nakedness, as they had done but the moment before. |