f one class eth of indivi- · Em car to a state, Arofitable la m: whhư of the com 1* *nt* * *- Ör the support Wat Dot adrechinmasters, and me we feel made be LM 1 N PUNOGNE CAN ** 2 *: Mi murs. Ifwe Máni vur qiyomes we hast LO ZEM ONE WAy or another. „PHITE nem or the addaságos vakt Bey ormerir agioved somnexión win the parent Lits el ghect them to a a`ths 204, vn hthough we tossirt fr the ma mumeraties zi 102 marine. Vet the recRun f is matter Pro Samne ha ves great anxiety because we look upon the RÁMIỪA Æ The moaction of Mr LaNanchong's dil as the index to our true poder. Et receives the royal se, we must perforce prepare for mote changes far greater than this super has ever yet experienced. The colonies may still, indeed, be considered as portions of the British men, but hardly worth the cost of Free trade will have done retention. its work. The excise duties cannot be suffered to continue, for they too, according to the modern idea, are oppressive and unjust; and the period, thus foreshadowed by Mr Cobden at the late Manchester banquet, will rapidly arrive: " It is not merely protective duties that are getting out of favour in this country; but, however strong or weak it may be at present, still there is firmly and rapidly growing an opinion decidely opposed, not merely to duties for protection, but to duties for revenue at all. I venture to say you will not live to see another statesman in England propose any customs-duty on a raw material or article of first necessity like corn. I question whether any statesman who has any regard for his future fame will ever propose another excise or customs-duty at all." The whole revenue will then fall to be collected directly and how long the national creditor will be able to maintain his claim against direct taxation is a problem which we decline to solve. The land of Great Britain, like that of Ireland, will be worthless to its owner, and left to satisfy the claims of pauperism; and America, wiser than the old country, will become to the middle classes the harbour of refuge and of peace. We do not believe that these things will happen, because we have faith in the sound sterling sense of Englishmen, and in the destinies of this noble country. We are satisfied that the time is rapidly approaching when a thorough reconstruction of our whole commercial and financial policy will be imperatively demanded from the government a task which the present occupants of office are notoriously incapable of undertaking, but which must be carried through by some efficient cabinet. Such a measure cannot be introduced piecemeal after the destructive fashion, but must be based upon clear and comprehensive principles, doing justice to all classes of the community, and showing undue favour to none. Our observations have already extended to such a length, that we have little room to speak of that everlasting topic, Ireland. "Ireland," says Lord John Russell," is undergoing a great transition." This is indeed news, and we shall be glad to learn the particulars so soon as convenient. Perhaps the transition may be explained before the committee, to which, as usual, Whig helplessness and imbecility has referred the whole question of Irish distress. The confidence of the Whigs in the patience of the people of this country must be boundless, else they would hardly have ventured again to resort to so stale an expedient. It is easy to devolve the whole duties of government upon committees, but we are very much mistaken if such trifling will be longer endured. As to the distress in Ireland, it is fully admitted. Whenever the bulk of a nation is so demoralised as to prefer living on alms to honest labour, distress is the inevitable consequence; and the only way to cure the habit is carefully to withhold the alms. Ministers think otherwise, and they have carried a present grant of fifty thousand pounds from the imperial exchequer, which may serve for a week or so, when doubtless another application will be tabled. This is neither more nor less than downright robbery of the British people under the name of charity. Ireland must in future be left to depend entirely upon her own resources; situated as we are, it would be madness to support her further; and we hope that every constituency throughout the United Kingdom will keep a watchful eye on the conduct pursued by their representatives in the event of any attempt at further spoliation. From all the evidence before us, it appears that our former liberality has been thrown away. Not only was no gratitude shown for the enormous advances of last year, but the money was recklessly squandered and misapplied, no doubt in the full and confident expectation of continued remittances. And here we beg to suggest to honourable members from the other side of the Channel, whether it might not be well to consider what effect free trade has had in ameliorating the condition of Ireland. If on inquiry at Liverpool they should chance to find that pork is now imported direct from America, not only salted, but fresh and preserved in ice, and that in such quantities and at so low a rate as seriously to affect the sale of the Irish produce, perhaps patriotism may ope rate in their minds that conviction which reasoning would not effect. If also they should chance to learn that butter and dairy produce can no longer command a remunerative price, owing to the increased imports both from America and the Continent, they will have made one further step towards the science of political economy, and may form some useful calculations as to the prospect of future rentals. Should they, however, still be of opinion that the interests of the Irish people are inseparably bound up with the continuance of free trade-that neither prices nor useful labour are matters of any consequence-they must also bear in mind that they can no longer be allowed to intromit with the public purse of Britain. The Whigs may indeed, and probably will, make one other vigorous effort to secure their votes; but no party in this nation is now disposed to sanction such iniquitous proceedings, and all of us will so far respond to the call for economy, as sternly to refuse alms to an indolent and ungrateful object. In conclusion, we shall merely remark that we look forward with much interest to the financial exposition of the year, in the hope that it may be more intelligible and satisfactory than the last. We shall then understand the nature and the amount of the reductions which have been announced under such extraordinary circum stances, and the state of the revenue will inform those who feel themselves oppressed by excise duties, of the chances of reduction in that quarter. Meanwhile we cannot refrain from expressing our gratitude to both Lord Stanley and Mr D'Israeli for their masterly expositions of the weak and vacillating policy pursued by the Whig government abroad, and of the false colour which was attempted to be thrown upon the state and prospect of industry at home. Deeply as we lamented the premature decease of Lord George Bentinck at the very time when the value of his public service, keen understanding, and high and exalted principle, was daily becoming more and more appreciated by the country, we are rejoiced to know that his example has not been in vain ; that his noble and philanthropic spirit still lives in the councils of those who have the welfare of the British people at heart, and who are resolute not to yield to the pressure of a base democracy, actuated by the meanest of personal motives, unscrupulous as to the means which it employs, impervious to reason, and utterly reckless of consequences, provided it may attain its end. Against that democracy which has elsewhere not only shattered constitutions but prostrated society, a determined stand will be made; and our heartfelt prayer is, that the cause of truth may prevail. Printed by William Blackwood and Sons, Edinburgh. THE historical and critical essay is a species of literary composition which has arisen, and been brought to perfection, in the lifetime of a single generation. Preceding writers, indeed, had excelled in detached pieces of a lighter and briefer kind; and in the whole annals of thought there is nothing more charming than some of those which graced the age of Queen Anne, and the reigns of the first Georges. But though these delightful essays remain, and will ever remain, models of the purest and most elegant composition, and are always distinguished by just and moral reflections, yet their influence has sensibly declined; and they are turned to, now, rather from the felicity of the expression by which they are graced, than either the information which they contain, the originality by which they are distinguished, or the depth of the views which they unfold. It is still true that he who would attain an English style, familiar but not coarse, and elegant without being ostentatious, must give his days and his nights to the study of Addison." It is not less true, that he who would appreciate the force of which the English language is capable, and acquire the condensed vigour of expression which enters so largely into the highest kind of composition, will ever study the prose of Johnson; as much as the poet, for similar excellencies, will recur to the Vanity of Human Wishes, or the epistles and satires of Pope. But, with the advent of the French Revolution, the rise of fiercer passions, and the collision of dearer interests, VOL. LXV.-NO. CCCCII. the elegant and amusing class of essays rendered so popular by Addison and his followers passed away. The incessant recurrence of moralising, the frequent use of allegory, the constant straining after conceits, which appear even in the pages of the Spectator and the Rambler, are scarcely redeemed by the taste of Addison, the fancy of Steele, or the vigour of Johnson. In inferior hands they became insupportable. Men whose minds were stimulated by the Rights of Man— who were entranced by the eloquence of Pitt who followed the career of Wellington-who were stunned by the thunderbolts of Nelsoncould not recur to the Delias, the Chloes, or the Phillises of a slumbering and pacific age. The proclamation of war to the palace, and peace to the cottage, sent the stories of the coquette, the prude, and the woman of sense to the right-about. What was now required was something which could minister to the cravings of an excited and enthusiastic age; which should support or combat the new ideas generally prevalent; which should bring the experience of the past to bear on the visions of the present, and tell men, from the recorded events of history, what they had to hope, and what to fear, from the passion for innovation which had seized possession of so large a portion of the active part of mankind. The Edinburgh Review was the first journal which gave a decided indication of this change in the temper of the public mind. From the very outset it exhibited that vigour 2 B of thought, fearlessness of discussion, and raciness of expression, which bespoke the prevalence of independent feeling, novel yearnings, and original ideas, among the people. There was something refreshing and exhilarating in the change. Its success was immediate and immense. The longslumbering dominion of the monthly and other reviews, which then had possession of the sceptre of criticism, was at once destroyed. Mediocrity fell into the shade when the light of genius appeared; criticism assumed a bolder and more decided character. Men rejoiced to see the pretensions of authors levelled, their vanity mortified, their errors exposed, their pride pulled down, by the stern hand of the merciless reviewer. The practical application of the maxim, "Judex damnatur cum nocens absolvitur," gave universal satisfaction. Every one felt his own consequence increased, his personal feelings soothed, his vanity flattered, when the self-constituted teachers of mankind were pulled down from their lofty pinnacle. But it was not merely in literary criticism that the Edinburgh Review opened a new era in our periodical literature. To its early supporters we owe the introduction of the CRITICAL AND HISTORICAL ESSAY, which was an entirely new species of composition, and to the frequent use of which the rapid success of that journal is mainly to be ascribed. The essay always had the name of a book prefixed to it: it professed to be a review. But it was generally a review only in name. The author was frequently never once mentioned in its whole extent. His work was made use of merely as a peg on which to hang a long disquisition on the subject of which it treated. This disquisition was not, like the essays of Addison or Johnson, the work of a few hours' writing, and drawn chiefly from the fancy or imagination of the author: it was the elaborate production of a mind imbued with the subject, and the fruit of weeks or months of careful composition. It was sometimes founded on years of previous and laborious study. Thence its great and obvious value. It not only enlarged the circle of our ideas; it added to the stock of our knowledge. Men came to study a paper on a subject in a review, as carefully as they did a regular work of a known and respectable author: they looked to it not only for amusement, but for information. It had this immense advantage-it was shorter than a book, and often contained its essence. It was distilled thought; it was abbreviated knowledge. To say that many of these elaborate and attractive treatises were founded in error - that they were directed to objects of the moment, not of durable interest, and that their authors too often "To party gave up what was meant for mankind " is no impeachment either of the ability with which they were executed, or denial of the beneficial ends to which they ultimately became subservient. What though great part of the talents with which they were written is now seen to have been misdirected-of the views they contained to have been erroneous. It was that talent which raised the counter spirit that righted the public mind; it was those views which ultimately led to their own correction. In an age of intelligence and mental activity, no dread need be entertained of the ultimate sway of error. Experience, the great assertor of truth, is ever at hand to scatter its assailants. It is in an age of mental torpor and inactivity that the chains of falsehood, whether in religion or politics, are abidingly thrown over the human mind. But, from this very cause, the political essays of the Edinburgh Review have been left behind by the march of the world; they have been stranded on the shoals of time; they have almost all been disproved by the event. Open one of the political essays in the Blue-and-yellow, which were read and admired by all the world thirty or forty years ago, and what do you find? Loud declamations against the continuance of the war, and emphatic assertions of the inability of England to contend at land with the conqueror of continental Europe; continual reproaches of incapacity against the ministry, who were preparing the liberation of Spain and the battle of Waterloo; ceaseless assertions that the misery of Ireland was |