given birth to all this ferment, remained an exile in Wales, shifting frequently the scene of his retreat. In the simple manners of that mountainous country he found an asylum, which he judged it imprudent to exchange for one which might probably prove more hazardous beyond sea.

"But the zeal of his enemies was not easily baffled. After many fruitless attempts, they engaged the Lord Powis in their interest, a very powerful person in those parts; and in whose lands the Lord Cobham was supposed to lie concealed.

"This nobleman, working upon his tenants by such motives as the great have ever in reserve, had numbers soon upon the watch. This vigilance the Lord Cobham could not escape. In the midst of his fancied security, he was taken, carried to London in triumph, and put into the hands of the archbishop of Canterbury.

"Lord Cobham had now been four years in Wales, but found his sufferings had in no degree diminished the malice of his enemies. On the contrary, it showed itself in stronger colours. Those restraints under which the clergy acted before, were now removed. The superiority which they had obtained, both in the parliament and in the cabinet, laid every murmur asleep; and they would boast, in the prophet's language, that not a dog durst move his tongue against them.

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Things being thus circumstanced, Lord Cobham, without any divination, foresaw his fate. His fate indeed remained not long in suspense. With every instance of barbarous insult, which enraged superstition could invent, he was dragged to execution. St. Giles's Fields was the place appointed; where both as a traitor, and a heretic, he was hung up in chains upon a gallows; and, fire being put under him, was burnt to death.

"Such was the unworthy fate of this nobleman; who, though every way qualified to be the ornament of his country, fell a sacrifice to unfeeling rage, and barbarous superstition."

As men are governed by motives, and motives arise out of interests, interests are the source from which all inferences, from the actions of men of former times, to the actions of those of the present, are safely to be drawn. Where interests are the same in kind and degree, actions the same in kind and degree may certainly be expected. Where interests are the same in kind but less in degree, actions will be the same in kind but less in degres. Where interests of one kind are counteracted by interests of another; where the love of wealth, or of power, or of vengeance, act under the eye, for example, of an intelligent public, and where the public voice has influence upon the governing power, the actions to which these interests would prompt, must be well guarded, and cautiously chosen. With these reflections present

to his mind, the person who reads the ancient history of the English Church cannot fail to draw the proper conclusions.

One practical suggestion, though always obvious, is always so useful, that we cannot forbear to bring it to view. In such cases, whatever disapprobation may be excited; on individuals it can never with propriety fall; whether the individuals of popish, or those of protestant times. As individuals are influenced if not formed by their situations, it is the situations on which our attention ought to be fixed. The individuals who are placed in situations which have a tendency to render them hostile to the best interests of their species, are objects of pity rather than of hatred. Change the situation, and the men also will change. We should look to the situation, which is the cause; rather than to the conduct of the individual, which is only the effect. Whether ecclesiastical corporations be, or be not, a thing which creates interests in opposition to those of mankind at large, is a question which is open for discussion; but in whatever manner that be decided, the actions of individual clergymen, with proportioned exceptions, have been and will be, like those of other men, governed by the situation in which they are placed.

[To be continued.]

An Appeal to the Allies, and the English Nation, in behalf of Poland.

IN placing the title of a political pamphlet at the head of an article in THE PHILANTHROPIST, our readers will not suspect us of a design to lead them into the field of political controversy; to entertain them with a dissertation upon the balance of Europe; or a critical essay upon the character and interests of the European princes and states.

But it may not be improper to embrace the opportunity, such as it is not very prolific in hope-to breathe a sentiment in favour of the happiness of mankind; and amid the loud and importunate voices which interest and prejudice employ to perpetuate scenes of malignity and mischief, to endeavour to insinuate into the minds even of a few, some considerations of justice and philanthropy. It were something, when so many are spending all their ardour in recommending to favour the interests of this prince and that prince, of this dynasty and that dynasty; or in exposing others to infamy and execration; that some persons would say a word in favour of poor human nature; would only

entreat us to consider how that is likely to fare, amid the changes which are in contemplation; and endeavour to make us found something of our joy or our sorrow, our hopes or our fears, upon the prospect of happiness or misery, of liberty or slavery, of knowledge or ignorance, to the millions whose fate is now at stake, and of whom the fate seems to excite an interest in the bosoms of a number wonderfully small.

What, at first consideration, would appear calculated to augment our sympathy, the multiplication of the beings in whose happiness or misery we take an interest, appears, with the ordinary part of mankind, to have altogether a contrary effect—to deaden the sensibility, to obscure the conception, and make them feel much less either for their joy or their sorrow; have much less concern about their fate; and much less desire to make any effort or sacrifice either to save them from calamity, or augment their happiness. The greater the number to whom the happiness is extended, the greater the number whom the calamity involves, the greater, in the eye of reason, is the good in the one case and the evil in the other. But such is not the progress of vulgar feeling; which is intense in proportion to the narrowness of the object; cold and languid in proportion to its magnitude and extent. For one individual, strongly urged upon the attention, either by closeness of connection or elevation of place, the gross of mankind can feel; with him they can sympathize; for his pains or pleasures they can make a stir. Upon the pains and pleasures of their fellow-creatures taken in masses they appear to look as matters of indifference. The condition of this or that body of human beings, provided only the individual or individuals at the head of them have reason to be content, seems to present itself to few, as any thing better than an object of vain and idle speculation.

It is to counteract this miserable tendency, that is one of the main objects of THE PHILANTHROPIST; to enlarge the benevolent feelings of mankind; to make their narrow sympathies gradually expand; to give them habits of attending to masses; and of estimating the feelings of multitudes at their value; to correct that woful inversion of feeling which is now so prevalent, of estimating the pains and pleasures of one man, as more than those of a million, and those of a million as less than those of one.

It is because the tract now before us possesses more of the spirit of philanthropy, than almost any of the political productions of the day, and because we are happy to say that it has attracted more of public attention than from the general apathy concerning the interests of humanity was to be expected, that we have

deemed it useful to call an article in THE PHILANTHROPIST by its name.

There is this difference, that the tract addresses itself chiefly to monarchs and ministers, and endeavours to find motives to persuade them to attend to the interests of humanity in the management of the new power which events have for the time placed in their hands. The sacrifices, we must say, are not slight which the author makes to gain their favourable opinion, both in compliment to their virtues, and in deference to their principles. On this feature of the pamphlet we have no praise to bestow. We never can approve of any compromise of principle. And the encouragement which is given to the flattery of courtiers and, newspapers, by the still more hyperbolical flattery of men of talents, tends to uphold that corruption of princes which is the subject of so many complaints, and for which the flatterers, if ever the tide of prosperity turns, are sure to manifest the least indulgence.

It is to the people of England that we address ourselves; and on a subject like this we trust that it is not necessary to sacrifice principle. We own that it is through the people, that we have any hope of rendering princes and ministers philanthropists. Mere exhortations to humanity, addressed in opposition to immediate and powerful interests, have, with exceptions wonderfully small, proved always unsuccessful. But princes and ministers are insensibly led into a conformity with the sentiments of the people among whom they live. The general tone of thinking and of feeling in a nation, has a compulsive force on all who come within its sphere. The princes of England, of the present day, can no more resemble the princes, of the time of William the Conqueror, for example, and of his more immediate successors, than they can resemble beings more perfect than have yet appeared in the human form. Their character and sentiments, speaking generally, are necessarily formed by those of the people among whom they live. If ever the condition of the masses of mankind comes to have that superior regard in the minds of men in general, to which it is indisputably entitled, it will possess a correspondent share of regard in the minds of princes, and not before. It is by the instruction of the people, and principally by a better education, that this enlargement of mind, this more exalted virtue, this more productive and useful philanthropy, is to be produced. Till then, it is by the interests of princes, in the vulgar sense of the word, that princes, like other men, will be governed. And we much dread that the persuasions of the author of the tract before us, to induce their

imperial and royal majesties of Austria, Russia, and Prussia, to resign their acquisitions in Poland, and generously restore the Poles to liberty and independence, will not be of much avail. The declared and strong sense of the people of England, however, would have its effect upon the government of England; and the government of England could not fail to have an influence upon the interests and counsels of the monarchs in question.

The friends of humanity all over the world are indebted to the author of the tract before us, for the eloquence with which he has deplored the wrongs of the Poles, and endeavoured to excite an interest for their sufferings. If people would set apart a few moments to consider; and would only reflect that all the miseries which have been endured by any family, whom they most deeply deplore, by that of Louis the Sixteenth, for example, have been suffered, not by one family, but by hundreds and thousands of families, among the unhappy Poles; that no ruin can exceed that which has fallen upon a great proportion of all the families in Poland above the state of slaves, and even upon the slaves themselves; and that the imagination cannot conceive an excess of suffering beyond that to which they have been condemned; even this mental picture might be expected to produce some effect. People ought to be instructed, that to obtain a proper conception of the value of the pains or pleasures of a mass of their fellow-creatures, some reflection is necessary. The sufferings of an individual, of whom the idea is lively, convey themselves into the imagination instantaneously, and without effort. The idea of a multitude is in itself indistinct and obscure ; and it gives birth to no distinct and lively emotion. It is necessary to think of an individual, and of his pains and pleasures; and afterwards to consider these, multiplied to the extent of the case; and thus to form a computation of what is suffered or enjoyed. The greater part of mankind, however, who act by immediate feeling, and are not guided by computation, have not strength for this line of proceeding; and a better education is needed to give it them. And hence it proceeds, that the condition of human beings, when contemplated in masses, is regarded with the indifference with which it generally is. The following are some of the details of Polish suffering:

"The plan of confiscating the lands of all persons who attempt anything against the state, and rewarding services with those lands, has been peculiarly fruitful of misery to the country. Each par tition has been followed with an enormous transference and destruction of property. Every movement of the Poles or march of foreign troops has had a similar consequence; and at all times an