Unfortunately this conclusion is diametrically opposite to the testimony of historical facts, and the experience of mankind. All governments hitherto have had their adolescence, maturity, old age, and decay, the same as individuals, but the stages of the former differ in the proportion of about a century to a lustrum of the latter. He remarks, indeed, that "all the governments of past nations have perished for want of guaranteeing laws (lois garantes), either of unity or of sociality." But as governments are composed of individuals, they must for ever participate, more or less, in their character. Perhaps, indeed, this theorist only seeks to flatter the Tyrant, by saying, that government is the only creation of man which is susceptible of immortality," for he certainly cannot believe such a proposition; although his attempts are to establish the science of government upon principles as determined as the mathematical sciences.

Some detached observations occur in this volume, on the spirit of a banker, carried into the administration of the state, and the too great familiarity, or equality of monarchs with their subjects.

"All the laws which I have shewn necessary to insure the double constitutive character of government, would be without efficacy if they were not accompanied by institutions, proper to retrace before all eyes, to grave in all minds, and in all hearts, the idea of the importance and of the superiority of men, the depositories of the government.

"When a Minister, who may have been a very good chief of finances, but who assuredly was not a minister of state, adopted a reform in the little military pomp which surrounded Louis XVI. and introduced into the palace of the monarch of the first nation in the world, the parsimony of a banker, whose business it is to economise in every thing, he destroy. ed the institution destined to give splendour to the majesty of the manking (l'homme-roi), and prepared, without wishing it, the overthrow of the constitutive law of unity of power.

"When Marie-Antoinette, whose horrible catastrophe interdicted to her cotemporaries all painful remembrance of her memory; when this unfor tunate Queen, rejecting an etiquette in which she saw but disgrace and monotony, dressed herself like a common woman, and adopted an old fashion, the author of which was perhaps a vile courtezan, she did not know that she corrupted the manners of the royal profession, and that she prepared the overthrow of the constitutive law of unity of power.”

This indirect reproach on the memory of the late Queen, is base and unmanly. Such reasoning is plausible, and may suffice the French; but it is superficial and erroneous in the highest degree, when applied to more rational and enlightened nations. A governnient of pomp, like the present Corsican despotism, may indeed possess unity of power; but it cannot be permanent, as it wants two essential principles, rationality and general utility. Such a government can only exist where there is no virtue in the people, and in that case the country must rapidly depopulate, and its despotic power finally crumble to pieces. But that nation which possesses genuine virtue, must have a government founded upon public utility, and not vanity

or

or childish ambition. The progress of virtue, indeed, among nations appears just in proportion to the decay of Popery.

The accusation of Necker's parsimony occasioning the ruin of Louis XVI. is perhaps not altogether unjust, though here it is only mentioned to Aatter the inordinate luxury of the Usurper. The idea, indeed, of external pomp and haughtiness, being constituents of the regal character, and essential to its power and influence on men, is sufficiently. preposterous. Every honest Englishman is a living testimony of the falsehood of this proposition. Such, however, is the progress of the modern French to a state of nature and to perfection !

Histoire Abregée de la Campagne, &c.

An Abridgment of the History of Napoleon the Great's Campaign in Germany and Italy to the Peace of Presburg, with Details of the principal Facts from that Treaty, till the Return of his Majesty to his Capital. Revised and Corrected from the Observations of a Spectator. PP. 407. 12mo. Paris. 1806. Imported by Deboffe.

THIS is a mere vulgar compilation of the bulletins and addresses, as they appeared in the Parisian newspapers of the day. The maker of this miserable farrago is almost as illiterate as Buonaparte himself, and the few original sentences that he has ventured to add to the pub lished materials, are either childish nonsense, or absolute blasphemy. Of the latter kind may be ranked the motto in his title-Fuit homo missus à Deo. This collection of detached papers, however; in which the Usurper endeavours to justify his conduct to the world, inay amuse those persons who study the ability of the French in the art of deceiving. It is with regret, indeed, we are obliged to remark, that Talleyrand's charges against the conduct of the Emperor of Austria, are urged with considerable effect, and he has, in a certain degree, succeeded in establishing a falsehood, that Buonaparte was the virtuous defender of the oppressed, and the Emperor the treacherous and ambitious tyrant of Bavaria, Suabia, and even Switzerland! Buonaparte, meek, pious, beneficent man, we are told, was engaged in the arts of peace, re-establishing manufactures and agriculture, and thinking of nothing but making his loving subjects happy, and dispensing blessings upon them with as much facility as his Holiness does with his fore-finger on holidays; whilst the then Emperor of Germany is represented as an ambitious, blood-thirsty tyrant, who only sought his own aggrandizement in contempt of humanity or justice! The author has, indeed, made one charge against his idol, that is an excessive love of peace (un amour excessif pour la paix)!! To counterbalance this charge, however, he is afterwards directly called the Messiah, and his conduct to Italy compared with that of Jesus Christ to the lame man, whom he ordered "to rise and walk."

As

As a specimen of the spirit and authenticity of the facts detailed in this history, we translate the following "Portrait de Pitt," after the French success in Germany.

"If the two greatest victims of Pitt are in such profound dejection, what sorrow ought not this impious Minister to experience, whose breath has re-kindled a flame which has just consumed the first throne of Ger. many, a whole Austrian army, and now attacks the fugitive cohorts of Russia! In him is realized the fabulous torments of Prometheus; all the miseries of three Coalitions overwhelm him: his atrocious politics are the source of them: he cannot taste repose, and he dare no longer appear in public. Peace! Peace!' is re-echoed from all parts; and the word peace is his greatest punishment.

"He dispatched from all parts couriers and agents, some secret, and others invested with a diplomatic character like Lord Harrowby. There is nothing which he neglected to annoy his enemy; emissaries were in all parts charged to destroy the magazins in France and her Allies.

"Heaven saw not without indignation such perfidy and atrocity. "While Pitt delighted in these black projects, the pleasures of which he relished, the horizon became dark, a thick fog extended over the City of London*: about four o'clock in the afternoon the vapour became still thicker, and no person remembers to have seen a similar darkness in the day-time.

"It is impossible to tell all the accidents which this fog occasioned on the Thames and in the streets; the lamps gave no light, and it was with difficulty one could pass by the lights in the shop windows; the carriages could not move without driving against each other; the confusion was dreadful, the embarrassments and dangers continual. A great number of persons were grievously wounded; ladies were overturned in their coaches, and severely bruised by these disasters; coachmen fell from their seats, and were trampled to pieces by the feet of their horses; this darkness, joined to that of the night, did not dissipate till the next day.

"This event appeared to the populace of London as a sinister presage to the Allies and to themselves: they publicly cursed the Minister, au thor of such miseries. To these evils were added irreparable losses: Nelson was killed in combat: the fleets of England were sunk by the storms, and her expeditions failed. The clamours of the people resounded to the ears of Pitt; he concealed himself from their murmurs, by shutting himself up in his palace, and feigning to be sick. His physicians ordered him to the baths; happy should he find them sufficiently efficacious to wash away the spots of blood with which he is covered!"

Should any of our readers wish for more extracts from this History, we must refer them to the volume. Nor can we make any remarks on such a tissue of vulgar and palpable falsehoods, recorded as historical facts! Had we attempted to write an eulogium on the late great Minister, we might have produced a more elegant, but certainly not

*." A fog, in fact, covered the City of London during the whole of the 6th of November."

a more

a more honourable one, than the virulent abuse and savage rejoicings of the inveterate enemies of his country at his death. The author, indeed, throughout the whole of this volume, seems much more rejoiced at the death of Mr. Pitt, than at the issue of the battle of Austerlitz: unfortunately il a raison; the losing or gaining of a battle is but the affair of a day, but the death of a great statesman is a loss which ages may not recover. Meantime we think it not unworthy of being recorded on the tomb of the immortal William Pitt, that the fell enemy of his country ordered his death to be announced on all the theatres in Paris, with as much eclat as any of his most splendid victories.

The whole of this History of Buonaparte's Campaign in Germany, is equally as false as the fog in London; yet it is believed in France. We are, indeed, perfectly aware of the design and effect of such false representations; but we are no less firmly persuaded that all influence raised on such a basis, must finally terminate in disgrace and ruin.

Dictionnaire des Beaux Arts.

A Dictionary of the Fine Arts. By A. L. Millin, Member of the Institute, Keeper of Medals, &c. in the Imperial Library, Professor of Antiquities, &c. &c. 3 vols. 8vo. of 820 Pages each. 11. 16s. Paris. 1806. Imported by Deconchy.

THE importance of such a Dictionary is self-evident; but its relative value must depend on the copiousness, accuracy, and general merit of the different subjects discussed. We have already numerous Dictionaries of the Fine Arts, but with a few exceptions, they are better adapted to make us sensible of our wants, than vain of our acquirements in this department of literature. The present editor, indeed, is known as a most laborious and generally accurate compiler, and occasionally an original writer on subjects that require more learning than genius. M. Millin, however, has borrowed largely from the more original and ingenious work on the Fine Arts in Ger man by Sulzer, to which he has added some particulars from Watelet, Levesque, Lord Kaims, Richardson, &c. The author has, very judiciously we think, rejected Poetry and Eloquence from this work, as tending to make it too voluminous, and refers to his Dictionary of Mythology for information on such subje&s. He might, however, have given a much better reason for this supposed omission, namely, that Poetry and Eloquence have been very improperly denominated

* The history of man furnishes millions of heroes, but a very few bundreds of legislators.-Rev.

arts,

arts, as they require no mechanical aid to give them perfection, and should have been much more properly classed among the sciences, being entirely intellectual.' The following is a summary of the plan of this Dictionary.

"I have first endeavoured to give a History of the Arts, for it is in. dispensable to a proper comprehension of their theory. By the History of the Arts, I do not understand that of artists, which is nevertheless con. nected with it, but that of the progress of the arts in different ages, and among different nations. The greater part of the articles of this nature are extracted from my course of public lectures. The Theory of Arts is also an essential part; it is that which teaches artists how to act, and amateurs how to judge. I have here thought it my duty to combine the excellent observations of Sulzer, Watelet, and Levesque, to which I have joined those of the best authors on this subject. Practice cannot be ac. quired but by usage; to wish to give rules would not be to act as an his. torian, but as a master of the art: I have not, therefore, attempted all, but have attached myself principally to the explanation of those which it is necessary to know, in order to understand the practice of the different arts among the ancients and mederns, and also the explanation of technical terms. My intention was, to confine myself to the arts relative to design; but at the instance of the bookseller, I have included music. I confess that I have very little knowledge in the theory or practice of this art; but I have extracted from the best authors, and in the historical part, some original and curious articles will be found. To combine as much as possible in this work, I have joined interesting and necessary details, sufficiently copious, on the manners, customs, and dresses, of the different nations. To the above I have added lists of the best works on every subject, extracted from the bibliography of Blankenburg appended to Sulzer's work."

The first volume occupies the alphabet from A to G inclusive; and notwithstanding the immense number of pages, the most striking defect is the want of terms. By the title Dictionary of the Fine Arts, we understand a book containing all the names and terms, with their explanations, which occur in the arts of sculpture, painting, architecture, music, dancing, &c. That is not the character of the Dictionary before us: in it the editor evinces great negligence of terms; and only gives a slight historical sketch of the various branches of the arts; their changes and progress in the different countries in which they have been cultivated. It is, indeed, rather to be considered as a series of historical essays, arranged in the order of the alphabet, than as a Dictionary explaining the arts, and defining their terms. In architecture, the editor is particularly defective; and it is in vain that we look for explanations or definitions of the architectural terms, abajour, abavents, abbaye, aboutir, abreuvoir, afaissé, afleurer, aleges, and axe, even in the first letter. The following article will convey a fair idea of the style and manner of this Dictionary, and is also one of the original articles of which the author boasts.

"ACADEMY OF Music. It was thus that we formerly called in

France,