lieved by many to be in danger. But those liberties, or at least the freedom of the constitution, has suffered more from a pernicious system of domestic policy, which that violent opposition at first made necessary, than from the so much dreaded military establishment.

When the wheels of government are clogged, and the machine rendered almost stationary, by the arts of an ambitious faction, the whole influence of the crown must be employed, in order to accelerate their motion. The force of opposition must be broken: its ablest members must be drawn over to the side of royalty, by the emoluments of office, or the splendour of titles; by the highest honours and employments of the state. If this cannot be effected, if nothing less will content their pride than an entirely new arrangement of the servants of the crown, a measure always disagreeable to a sovereign, and often dangerous, as it may possibly be attended with the loss of his throne:-if the heads of opposition cannot be taught silence, or induced to change sides, without a total change of administration, the king must either resign his minister, or that minister must secure a majority in the national assembly by other means16 No minister ever understood these means better than sir Robert Walpole. Possessed of great abilities, and utterly destitute of principle, he made no scruple of employing the money voted by parliament, in order to corrupt its members. Having discovered that almost every man had his price, he bought many; and to gain more, he let loose the wealth of the treasury at elections". The fountain of liberty was poisoned in its source.

16. Some men of patriotic principles have fondly imagined, that a good minister must always be able to command such a majority, merely by the rectitude of his measures; but experience has evinced, that in factious times, all the weight of government is often necessary to carry even the best

measures.

17. "To destroy British liberty," says lord Bolingbroke, "with an ar "my of Britons, is not a measure so sure of success as some people may "believe. To corrupt the parliament is a slower, but a more effectual "method." Dissert. on Parties, letter x.

This, my dear Philip, is an evil, interwoven with the very frame of our mixed government, and which renders it, in many respects, inferior to a mere monarchy, regulated by laws, where corruption can never become a necessary engine of state. To say, that it is absolutely necessary, in our government, would perhaps be going too far; but experience proves, that it has generally been thought so, since the revolution, when the powers of the crown were abridged. The opportunity which able and ambitious men have, by the freedom of debate in parliament, and which they have seldom failed to exercise, of obstructing our public measures, renders the influence of the crown in some degree necessary: and that is but a more refined species of corruption, or a milder name for the same thing.

Our patriotic ancestors, who so gloriously struggled for the abolition of the more dangerous parts of the prerogative, certainly did not foresee the weight of this enslaving influence, which the entire collecting and management of an immense public revenue has thrown into the scale of government, by giving rise to such a multitude of officers, created by, and removeable at, the royal pleasure; and by the frequent opportunities of conferring particular obligations, by preference, in loans, lottery-tickets, contracts and other money transactions; an influence too great for human virtue to withstand, and which has left us little more than the shadow of a free constitution'. The revolution was

18. "Nothing," as lord Bolingbroke very justly remarks," can destroy "the constitution of Britain but the people of Britain, and whenever the "people of Britain become so degenerare and base, as to be induced by corruption (for they are no longer in danger of being awed by preroga tive) to chuse persons to represent them in parliament, whom they have "found by experience to be under an influence arising from private inte"rest...dependents upon a court, and the creatures of a minister; or others, "who bring no recommendation, but that which they carry in their purses: "then will that trite proverbial speech be verified in our case, that the corruption of the best things are the worst: for then will that very change in "the state of property and power, which improved our constitution so much, contribute to the destruction of it." Dissert. on Parties, Let. xvii.

VOL. V.

I

an

an over-hasty measure: it guarded only against the direct encroachments of the crown. The subsequent provisions were few and the whigs, formerly so jealous of liberty, were afterward so fully employed, one while in combating their political enemies, in order to preserve the parliamentary settlement of the crown, and at another in opposing the violent faction occasioned, by the Hanoverian succession, which it had been their great object to bring about, that they had no leisure to attend to the new bias of the constitution. In their anxiety for the security of that succession, stimulated by the lust of power, they shamefully neglected the independency of parliament, as well as the freedom of elections, in which it has its origin, till the malady was too inveterate to admit of a speedy cure. The septennial bill was a cruel stab to liberty.

Let us not, however, despair. Some late laws relative to elections, and for excluding from the house of commons contractors and money-jobbers, will greatly contribute to restore, if not to perfect the British constitution. But the friends of monarchy will perhaps question, whether an independent parliament would be a public good in this licentious kingdom? And that question is not without its difficulties. Yet we know that corruption is a public evil; that it is the parent of licentiousness, and of every enslaving vice. And as the reigning family is now fully established on the throne, and without a competitor, government happily can have no occasion for undue influence, in order to carry any wholesome measure. I shall, therefore, conclude my observations on this subject with the memorable words of Lord Bolingbroke: "The integrity of parliament is a kind of PAL66 LADIUM, a tutelary goddess, who protects our state".”and if ever she is finally removed, we must bid adieu to all the blessings of a free people. The forms of our constitution, and the names of its different branches may remain, but we shall not be, on that account, the less slaves.

19 Dissert. on Parties, Let. x.

A. D. 1731.

In consequence of the treaty of Seville, confirmed by another at Vienna, Don Carlos took quiet possession of the duchies of Parma and Placentia, on the succession becoming vacant, the emperor withdrawing his troops. By the treaty of Vienna, the emperor also agreed, That the Ostend company, which had given so much umbrage to France, England, and Holland, should be totally dissolved, on condition that the contracting powers, in the treaty of Seville, should guarantee the PRAGMATIC SANCTION, or domestic law; by which the succession to the hereditary dominions of the house of Austria were secured to the heirs female of the emperor Charles VI. in case he should die without male issue. The proposal was acceded to; and the peace of Europe continued undisturbed, till the death of Augustus II. king of Poland2o.

On this event, Stanislaus Leczinski, whom Charles XII. had invested with the sovereignty of Poland, in 1704, and whom Peter the Great had dethroned, A. D. 1731.

now become father-in-law to Lewis XV. was a second time chosen king. But the emperor, assisted by the Russians, obliged the Poles to proceed to a new election. The elector

20. That prince, when surprised by death, was occupied with a design of rendering the crown of Poland hereditary in his family. With this view he had planned a division of the Polish dominions, hoping thereby to quiet the jealousy of his neighbours. The project, however, he knew to be impracticable, without the concurrence of the king of Prussia. He, therefore, desired Frederic II. to send him the mareschal de Grumkou, that he might open his mind to him. Augustus wanted to pump Grumkou, and Grumkou was no less anxious to discover the sentiments of the king. Mutually actuated by this motive, they contrived to make each other drunk; and that drunken bout was followed by the king of Poland's death, and a fit of sickness in Grumkou, of which he never got the better. (Mem. de Brandenburgh, tom. ii.) Augustus II. was endowed with extraordinary bodily strength, a sound understanding, a social disposition, and many princely accomplishments. It was this Augustus, who, in a fit of gallantry, twisted a horse-shoe in the presence of a fine woman, in order to give her some idea of his personal powers; and, at the same time, presented her a purse of gold, to make her sensible of his generosity. Love perhaps never spoke a more eloquent language.

of

C

of Saxony, son of the late king of Poland, who had married the emperor's niece, was raised, to the throne, under the name of Augustus III. and Stanislaus, as formerly, was forced to abandon his crown.

Though the distance of his situation, and the pacific disposition of his minister, prevented the king of France from yielding effectual support to his father-in-law, a sense of his own dignity determined him to take revenge upon, the emperor, for the insult he had suffered in the person of that unfortunate prince. He accordingly entered into an alliance with the kings of Spain and Sardinia, who also thought themselves aggrieved, and war was begun in Italy and on the frontiers of Germany. The duke of Berwick passed the Rhine, at the A. D. 1734. head of the French army, and reduced fort Kehl. He afterward invested Philipsburgh, in the face. of the Imperial forces, while the count de Belleisle. made himself master of Traerbach. The duke of Berwick was killed by a cannon-ball, in visiting the trenches21; but Philipsburgh was taken nevertheless. The marquis d'Asfeld, who succeeded to the command of the

21. The mareschal of Berwick is justly reputed one of the greatest of modern commanders. No general ever had the coup d'ail quicker or more accurate; whether, in battle, to discover the blunders of an enemy, and make those decisive movements that carry victory with them; or, in a ampaign, to observe and take advantage of positions, on which the success of the whole depends. His character in private life, though no less worthy of admiration, is less known. "It was impossible," says Montesquieu, "to behold him, and not to be in love with virtue, so evident was tranquillity and happiness in his soul. No man knew better how to avoid excess; or, if I may so express myself, to keep clear of the snares of virtue. He had a great fund of religion, and was fond of the clergy, but could not bear to be governed by them. No man ever followed more strictly those precepts of the Gospel which are most troublesome to men of the world; no man, in a word, ever practised religon so much, and talked of it so little. He never spoke ill of any one, nor bestowed any praise upon those whom he did not think deserving of it. In the works of Plutarch I have seen, at a distance, what great men were; in him I behold at a nearer view, what they are." Sketch of an Historical Panegyric.

French