tween landlords and tenants, and encourages land-jobbers to avail themselves of their large capitals, and to take great tracts of country, which they do not cultivate themfelves, but let out to under-tenants at profit rents. Thus the wretched holder of Jand at fecond-hand is obliged to work for the support of two Jandlords; and it often happens that there are three or four between the actual occupier of the foil and its owner, every one of whom is faddled on the industry of the man who tills the foil. This race of beings is called in Ireland Middle-men, are almost peculiar to that country, and are a dead weight on its agriculDr. C. fhews that this fyftem of pampering men who do not work, but fuck the blood of those who do, ought to be gradually abolished; and that, for this purpose, the landlords of Ireland ought to come to an agreement not to let a farm to any man who fhould not be bound to occupy it himself. He thinks that the bounties paid by the Irish parliament, amounting to 40,000l. per ann. for the encouragement of the linen manufacture, might now be diminished,-this manufacture having risen to great perfection,-and that the favings might be employed to greater advantage in encouraging fome other fabric. At the fame time, he is by no means a friend to bounties in general; for he justly obferves that, if a manufacture cannot be carried on without fuch aid, it must neceffarily be a lofing bufinefs, and ought not to be encouraged, as it muft diminish inftead of augmenting the general capital of a ftate, which is the common fund for the employment of its people. It is only to infant eftablishments that he would allow a bounty, and then very fparingly. He thinks it would be advifable to prohibit the exportation of wool in its raw ftate, as a measure which, checking the rage for grazing in Ireland, would occafion an extenfion of tillage. To protecting duties, fo often demanded by the Irish manufacturers, he is a decided enemy; because the loading imported manufactures with additional burdens would be of advantage only to fome individual manufacturers, while the people at large would be made to pay dearer for those articles, for the benefit of thofe perfons. The home market he thinks fufficiently fecured to the native manufacturers, by the freight, infurance, &c. to which imported goods are fubject: and if, with thofe advantages, the native manufacturers of Ireland cannot monopolize the home custom, it must be, he prefumes, becaufe their goods are inferior in quality; and fuch the people ought not to be compelled to purchafe, when they can procure a supply at a cheaper rate from abroad.

He objects ftrongly to another meafure loudly required by Irish manufacturers,-prohibiting the exportation of linen and woollen

4

woollen yarn from Ireland; and his objection refts on this ground, that fuch a prohibition would throw the very great number of perfons, at prefent employed in fpinning these two articles, entirely on the mercy of the linen, woollen, and cotton manufacturers at home, by confining the fale of their produce to a fingle market.

Commerce, in its confined fenfe of a mere trade of import and export, he confiders rather as the effect than the fource of employment. He recommends it to Ireland not to look on it as a lofs that he is not the carrier of her own trade; for the money employed by those who are the carriers affords fmaller returns, and tends lefs to augment the capital, and confequently the employment of a people, than, perhaps, in any other bufinefs whatever. None can embark in it but nations already abounding in riches. The carrying-trade, according to Dr. Smith, is the natural effect and fymptom of national wealth, not the cause of it; and, as Ireland is not a wealthy nation, Dr. C. would have her leave this trade to the English and Dutch, and employ what little capital fhe has in a more profitable way.

The abfurdity of the narrow policy which made this country think, in times paft, that a guinea gained by Ireland was loft to England, appears, every day, to be more and more glaring. During the American war, Ireland lent 8000 men to fight the battles of England: but the restraint laid on her trade had fo completely impoverished her, that he was on the point of being obliged to difband five regiments which he was no longer able to pay, and England was under the neceffity of placing them on her own eftablishment. When it was judged expedient that the fmall remaining regular force in Ireland fhould encamp, and be ready to oppofe the then threatened invafion, the Irish exchequer was fo low, that it could not enable the troops to take the field; and England was obliged to fend ever 50,000l. to Ireland for that purpofe.-Soon afterward, the commercial reftraints under which the latter had laboured were removed; and the confequence, in the fhort fpace of 14 years, has been, that Ireland was enabled to add 5000 men to her regular military establishment for the ufe of England, and to embody a militia of 16,000 more; raifing her military force from 16,000 men to 37,000; and thus, while he gives the greatest part of her army to affift England in the prefent war, fhe is able at the fame time to provide for her own internal defence.

One ground of jealoufy, and perhaps the chief one at prefent, is, that the fooner Ireland beconies rich, the fooner fhe will endeavour to break her connexion with England. Such an

event may or may not be in the womb of time: but certain it is, that the richer Ireland is, the more useful the may be to England while the continues to be connected with her. muft ftrike every reader that England, inftead of being, as yet, a lofer by the emancipation of Ireland, is at this moment a great gainer by the affiance which the derives from her fifter ifland, and which Ireland could not have the means of affording, had her commercial restraints been continued.

Having thus accompanied Dr. C. to the end of his literary journey, we now take leave of him with regret; declaring that, fince the appearance of Dr. Adam Smith's celebrated work, we have not feen a more able performance, on the fame fubject, than that which we have now reviewed. The author, rifing above the prejudices of party and of education, thinks and writes like a citizen of the world: though Ireland was the fpot more immediately under his confideration, it is evident that the principles, on which he builds his system for her future happiness, breathe beneficence to all mankind, and reprobate that wretched little policy which, counteracting the example and the commands of Heaven, that gives its light and bleffings to the whole world indifcriminately, would confine the comforts of life to a very limited portion of the children of Adam. Ireland may rejoice in poffeffing an advocate who, understanding the character of her inhabitants, and being acquainted with their moral and political vices as well as with their virtues, is blessed with a heart that prompts him to make the correction of the former and the improvement of the latter the objects of his ftudy, and with a judgment which so eminently qualifies him for fo important and arduous an undertaking. May we venture to fuggeft to him that, as habits of industry are not very eafily acquired by the adult, but are to be confidered as the fruit of feeds fown in early youth, fo no fyftem for giving employment to a people can poffibly answer that purpose, without the co-operation of a judicious national education? The internal ftate of Ireland, with respect to religious defcriptions of men, makes it infinitely more difficult to devife a plan of education for that country than for any other that we know: but, though it may be difficult, it certainly is not impoffible. If there be a man in Ireland fuited to fuch a task, and none but a man who is thoroughly acquainted with Ireland can be fuited to it, we do not hesitate to lay it muft be Dr. Crumpe. He does not appear to be under the influence of little felfifh paffions; his views are wide and extended; his object is the happiness of all his fellow creatures; and his fentiments are fuch as liberality the most unbounded would be proud to acknowlege. With refpect to his qualification in

point of judgment for fuch a task, the work before us is the beft poffible evidence. May we then hope that he will one day favour the public with a plan of a national education for Ire land?

ART. IX. A Letter to Dr. Priestley's Young Man: With a Poftfcript concerning the Rev. D. Simpfon's Effay, &c. in Answer to Evan fon's Diffonance and Volney's Ruins. By Edward Evanfon. 8vo. pp. 120. 28. Law. 1794.

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N the true fpirit of a controverfialist, Mr. Evanfon returns to the charge with a full confidence of fuperiority in argu ment; and, we are forry that we are still obliged to add, not without unbecoming expreffions of disrespect for his antagonist, So great a part of the reply is taken up in personal altercation, in expofing small misapprehenfions and inadvertencies, or in fettling points of little moment to the main question, that we fhall not find it neceffary to detain our readers long on this article.

The main point at iffue between Dr. Priestley and Mr. Evanfon is, whether the whole credit of the Chriftian revelation is to reft on prophecy. Both parties are agreed in ac knowleging the divine authority of the Chriftian religion on fupernatural evidence: but, while Dr. Priestley adheres to the old plan of appealing to the joint teftimony of prophecy and miracle, Mr. Evanfon abandons the latter ground, except where miracles are introduced, or accompanied, by predictions. He confiders the evidence of miracles as refting on the teftimony of fallible and interested men, but that of prophecy as an immediate appeal to divine omniscience; and he is inclined to pay no more credit to fuch relations, unattended by prophecy, than to fimilar narratives of wonderful circumftances in pro phane hiftory; and, where he admits the reality of miracles, he denies that they afford, even to the fpectators, a fufficiently firm and fatisfactory foundation for their religious faith. This he infers from the small number of converts which were made by the miracles of our Saviour, and from the frequent revolts of the Ifraelites to idolatry, immediately after the Mosaic miracles.

Mr. Evanfon treats with great contempt Dr. Priestley's proofs refpecting the time in which the Gofpels were written, and complains of the conduct of his opponents in fometimes rejecting, and sometimes admitting, the teftimony deduced from the traditions of the fecond century, juft as ferves their present purpose. He continues to lay great ftrefs on the incompetency of thefe teftimonies, on account of the credulity or the impofture which is found among thefe early teachers of ChriftiREV. DEC. 1794.

Ff

anity,

anity. A question arifes between the difputants concerning the meaning of a paffage in Tertullian, in which Mr. Evanfon, fomewhat rudely indeed, but not unfuccefsfully, contradicts the Doctor's interpretation. Mr. E.'s remarks on the evidence adduced by Dr. P. to afcertain the date of Matthew's Gospel may deferve fome attention. Our readers will find them by turning to p. 27-30.

That Silas, or Sylvanus, and Luke, were the same person, is a point of which Mr. Evanfon is very tenacious, and which, we muft own, he fupports with a confiderable degree of plaufibility. Refpecting his principal fubject, the diffonancy of the gofpels, he ftill relies very ftrongly on fundry inconfiftencies and contradictions, from which, in Dr. P.'s opinion, nothing can be inferred but that the authors did not write in concert, and did not copy from one another. On the contrary, fays Mr. Evanfon, my mind is fo conftituted, that whenever I fee or hear two inconfiftent contradictory stories or propofitions, I am fure one of them, at least, must be false; and I neceffarily conclude that he who tells me the falfehood, if he does it wilfully, is not an honeft man: if ignorantly, and because he was himself deceived, that he is ill informed and credulous; and, in either cafe, I can place no confidence in any thing he tells me, fo far as depends on his teftimony alone.' Has not Mr. Evanfon, we may be allowed to afk, ever heard two witnesses examined in a court of judicature, who have differed in fome parts of a circumftantial detail, but who have fo far agreed in the main fact, as to be admitted by the court both as honest and competent?

As, in the former part of this controverfy, we have found purselves under the neceffity of paffing over the details, and of giving a single specimen, we muft ftill purfue nearly the fame plan, and only farther quote Mr. Evanfon's rejoinder to Dr. P.'s reply respecting the use which Matthew makes of the word Decapolis, as the name of a particular province in Palestine; which, Mr. E. afferts, appears from Jofephus and Pliny never to have existed, and which was never ufed, by any other writer, to fignify any thing else than a decad of detached Jewish cities, annexed by the Romans to the government of Syria.

Mr. E. addreffing himself to Dr. Priestley's young man, fays, • He only tells you that the objection is a mere unfounded conjecture of my own; and that " Jofephus gives this district this appropriate name.' In proof of the latter he quotes a paffage from his life, where, according to the Doctor's tranflation, the word Decapolis is twice used. I affure you however, Sir, that in both those inftances the original has the ten cities; and that Jofephus, except in that one cafe which I have quoted, where he fays Scythopolis was the largest city of the decad, dever ufes the term Decapolis, but calls them the ten cities of Syria.