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Jorted is good enough; but while they have to contend with people who fend goods of a fuperior kind, they evidently lie under a difadvantage; and it is my opinion, that it would be for the intereft of the Canada merchants to fupply goods of an equal if not fuperior quality to their adverfaries, at every pott where they have thefe formidable rivals to oppofe them.

The great imprudence, and bad way of living of the Canadian traders have been an invincible bar to the emolument of their employers. Many of thefe people, who have been the great eft part of their lives on this inland fervice among favages, being devoid of every focial and benevolent tie, are become flaves to every vice which can corrupt and debafe the human mind; fuch as quarrelling, drunkennefs, deception, &c. From a confirmed habit in bad courfes of this nature, they are held in abhorrence and difguft, even by the Indians, who finding themselves frequently deceived by fpecious pro mifes, never intended to be performed, imagine the whole fraternity to be impregnated with the fame failing, and accordingly hold the generality of the Canadian traders in deteftation and contempt.

On the contrary, the fervants of the Hudfon's Bay Company, imported principally from the Orkney Ifles, are a clofe, prudent, quiet people, strictly faithful to their employers, and fordidly avaricious. When thefe people are fcattered about the country in fall parties among the Indians, the general

tenor of their behaviour is conducted with fo much propriety, as not only to make themfelves efteemed by the natives, and to procure their protection; but they alfo employ their time in endeavouring to enrich themselves and their principals, by their diligence and unwearied affiduity. By this prudent demeanor among the Indians, notwithftanding they have annually expofed themfelves to all the dangers in ident to the trade, for fi teen years paft, they have not fuftained the lofs of a man; and the principal advantage of the Company over the Canadian traders, is more to be attributed to the laudable efforts of their fervants, than even to the fuperior quality of their goods, while the Canadian fervants are fo far from being actuated by the fame principles, that very few of them can be trufted with a fmall affortment of goods, to be laid out for their masters profit, but it is ten to one that he is defrauded of the whole by commerce with Indian women, or fome other fpecies of peculation. By this and various other means, which lower them in the eyes of the natives, as before obferved, they are become obnoxious to the Indians, their faith is not to be relied on, nor their honefly confided in; fo that fcarce a year elapfes, without one or more of them falling victims to their own imprudence, at a time when fatal experience should teach them, that a condu& guided Ly caution and difcretion ought to be the invariable and uniform rule of their behaviour.

On the impoffibility of rendering the French Conflitution fimilar to the British. TOTIIING has been afferted Burke than the facility with which the with more confidence by Mr fragments of the long fubverted liber

* From Macintosh's Vindicia Gallicie.

ty

ty of France might have been formed into a British Conftitution. But of this general pofition he has neither explained the mode, nor defined the limitations. Nothing is more favourable to the popularity of a work than thefe lofty generalities which are light enough to pafs into vulgar currency, and to become the maxims of a popular creed. Touched by definition, they become too fimple and precife for eloquence, too cold and abftract for popularity. But exhibited as they are by Mr Burke, they gratify the pride and indolence of the people, who are thus taught to speak what gains applaufe without any effort of intellect, and imposes filence without any labour of confutation; what may be acquired without being ftudied, and uttered without being understood. Of this nature are these vague and confident afiertions, which, without furnishing any definite idea, afford a ready jargon for vulgar prejudice, flattering to national vanity, and fanctioned by a diftinguished name. It is neceffary to enquire with more precifion in what manner France could have affimilated the remains of her ancient Conftitution to that of the English Le. gillature. Three modes only feem conceivable. The prefervation of the three orders diftinct. The union of the clergy and nobility in one upper chamber, or fome mode of delecting from thefe two Orders a body like the Houle of Lords in England. Unlefs the infinuations of Mr Burke point to one or other of thofe fchemes, I cannot divine their meaning. The first mode (the three orders fitting in feparate houfes with equal privileges) would neither have been congenial in fpirit nor fimilar in form to the conftitution of England. To convert the Convocation into an integrant and co-ordinant member of our legislature, would give it fome femblance of this ftructure. But it would be a faint one. It would be neceffary to arm our cler

gy with an immenfe mafs of property, rendered still more formidable by the concentration of great portions in the hands of a few, to conftitute it in effect the fame body with the nobility, by granting them the monopoly of great benefices, and to bestow on this clerico-military ariftocracy, in its two fhapes of priesthood and nobility, two feparate and independent voices in Legislation. This double body, from its neceffery.dependance on the king, must neceffarily have in both forms become the organ of his voice. The monarch would thus poffefs three negatives, one avowed and difufed, two latent and in perpetual activity on the fingle voice which impotent and illufive formality had yielded on the the third eftate. Such and much more muft the parliament of England become before it could in any respect rosemble the divifion of the French Legislature according to thofe ancient orders which formed the Gothic affemblies of Europe. So monftrous did the arrangement appear, that even under the reign of Defpotifm, the fecond plan was propofed by M. Calonne-that the clergy and nobility should form an Upper Houfe to exercife conjointly with the king and the commons the legislative authority It admits however of the cleareft proof that fuch a conftitution would have been diametrically oppofite in its fpirit and principles to the English government. This will at once be evident from the different defeription of the body of nobles in France and Eugland. In England they are a finall body, united to the mafs of the people by innumerable points of contact, receiving from it perpetual new infufions, and returning to it, undiftinguished and unprivileged, the majority of their children. In France they formed an immenfe infulated caft. feparated from fociety by every barrier that prejudice or policy could raife, receiving few plebeian acceffions, and precluded,

by the indelible character of nobility, the equal patrimony of all their children, from the poflibility of their most remote defcendants being reftored to the general mafs. The nobles of England are a Senate of 200. The nobleffe of France were a tribe of 200,000. Nobility is in England only hereditary, fo far as its profeffed object, the fupport of a hereditary fenate, demands. It is therefore defcendible only to one heir. Nobility in France was as widely inheritable as its real purpofe, the maintainance of a privileged caft, prefcribed. It was therefore neceffarily defcendible to all male children.

There are other points of contraft till more important. The Nobleffe of France were at once formidable from their immenfe body of property, and dependant from the indigence of their Patrician rabble of cadets, whom honourinfpired with fervility and fervility excluded from the path to independence. Theyin fact poffeffed fo large a portion of the landed property, as to be justly, and almoft exclufively confidered as the landed intereft of the kingdom. To this formidable property was Added the revenues of the church, monopolized by their children. The younger branches of thefe opulent families had in general no patrimony but their honours and their fword. They were therefore reduced to feek fo tune and diftinction in military dependence on the Crown. If they were generous, the habits of military fervice devoted them from loyalty; if they were prudent, the hope of military promotion devoted them from intereftto the king. How immenfe therefore and irrefiftible would the Royal inAuence have been in elections, where the majority of the voters were the fervants and creatures of the Crown? What would be thought in England of a Houfe of Lords, which, while it reprefented or contained the whole Landed intereft of the kingdom, fhould

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neceffarily have a majority of its members feptennially or triennially nominated by the King? Yet it would still yield to the French Upper Houfe of M. Calonne ; for the monied and commercial interefts of England, which would continue to be reprefented by the Commons, are important and formidable, but in France they are comparably infignificant. It would have been a government where the Ariftocracy could have been ftrong only against the people, impotent against the crown. This fecond arrangement then is equally repugnant to the theory of the British conftitution as the first. There remains only fome mode of felection of a body from amidft the nobility and clergy to form an Upper House, and to this there are infaperable objections. Had the right of thas forming a branch of the legislature by a fingle act of prerogative been given to the king, it must have ftrengthened his influence to a degree terrible at any period, but fatal in the moment of political reform. Had any mode of election by the provinces, or the legis. lature, been adopted, or if they had been vefted with any control on the nomination of the crown, the new dignity would have been fought with an activity of corruption and intrigue, of which, in fuch a national convulfion, it is impoffible to eftimate the danger. No general principle of felection, fuch as that of opulence or antiquity, would have remedied the evil, for the excluded and degraded nobies would feel the principle, that nobility is the equal and inalienable patrimony of all. By the abolition of nobility, no nobleman was degraded, for to degrade is to lower from a rank that continues to exift in fociety. No man can be degraded when the rank he poffeffed no longer exiits. But had the rank of nobility remained in the mode of which we have been speaking, the great body of the nobles would indeed, in a proper and penal fenfe, have been

degraded

degraded, the new dignity of their former peers would have kept alive the memory of what they once poffeffed, and provoked them to enter

prizes far more fatal than refentment of an indignity that is at least broken by divifion, and impartially inflicted on the greatest and most obscure.

Memoirs of the Life of Dr Robert Henry, Author of the Hiftory of Great Britain, written on a new Plan.

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in the old church, and remained in that station till his death. The degree of Doctor in Divinity was conferred on him by the university of Edinburgh in 1770; and in 1774 he was unanimoufly chofen moderator of the general affembly of the church of Scotland, and is the only perfon on record who obtained that diftinction the first time he was a member of affembly.

R ROBERT HENRY was the fon of James Henry farmer at Mairtown in the parish of St Ninian's, North Britain, and of Jean Galloway daughter of Galloway of Bur rowmeadow in Stirlingshire. He was born on the 18th of February 1718; and having early refolved to devote himfelf to a literary profeffion, was educated firft under a Mr John Nicholfon at the parish-fchool of St Ni nian's, and for fome time at the gram man fchool of Stirling. He complet ed his coufe of academical ftudy at the university of Edinburgh, and afterwards became mafter of the gram mar-school of Annan. He was licenfed to preach on the 27th of March 1746, and was the first licentiate of the prefbytery of Annan after its ereçtion into a feparare pryfbytery. Soon after, he received a call from a cong egation of Prefbyterian diffenters at Carlife, where he was ordained in Nov. 1748. In this ftation he remained 12 years, and on the 13th of Auguft 1760 became paltor of a diffenting congregation in Berwick upon Tweed. Here he married, in 1763, Ann Balderfton, daughter of Thomas Balder on furgeon in Berwick; by whom Le had no children, but with whom he enjoyed to the end of his life a large share of domeftic happiness. He Soon after his removal to Berwick, was removed from Berwick to be one he published a scheme for railing a fund of the ministers of Edinburgh in No- for the benefit of the widows and orvember 1768; was minifter of the phans of Proteftant diffenting minif church of the New Grey Friars ters in the north of England. This from that time till November 1776; idea was probably fuggefted by the and then became colleague-minifter profperity of the fund which had, al

From thefe facts, which contain the outlines of Dr Henry's life, few events can be expected to fuit the purpose of the biographer. Though he must have been always diftinguifhed among his private friends, till he was tranflated to Edinburgh, he had few opportunities of be ing known to the public. The compofition of fermons must have occupied a chief part of his time during his refidence at Carlisle, as his induftry in that ftation is known to have rendered his labours in this department eafy to him during the reft of his life. But even there he found leifure for other ftudies; and the knowledge of claffical literature, in which he eminently excelled, foon enabled him to acquire an extent of information which qualified him for fomething more important than he had hitherto in his view.

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anost 30 years before, been established riod, it arranges, under feparate heads

for a provifion to minifters widows, &c. in Scotland. But the fituations of the clergy of Scotland were very different from the circumftances of diffenting minifters in England. Annuitics and provisions were to be fecured to the families of diffenters, without fabjecting the individuals (as in Scotland) to a proportional annual contribution, and without fuch means of creating a fund as could be the subject of an act of parliament to fecure the annual payments. The acuteness and activity of Dr Henry furmounted thefe difficulties; and chiefly by his exertions, this useful and benevolent inftitution commenced about the year 1762. The management was entrusted to him for several years; and its fuccefs has exceeded the most fanguine expectations which were formed of it. The plan itself, now fufficiently known, it is unnecef. fary to explain minutely. But it is mentioned here, becaufe Dr Henry was accustomed in the last years of his life to fpeak of this inftitution with peculiar affection, and to reflect on its progrefs and utility with that kind of fatisfaction which a good man can only receive from the labour of love and of good works."

It was probably about the year 1763 that he first conceived the idea of his Hiftory of Great Britain; a work already established in the public opinion; and which will certainly be regarded by pofterity, not only as a book which has greatly enlarged the Sphere of history, and gratifies our curiofity on a variety of fubjects which fall not within the limits prescribed by preceding hiftorians, but as one of the most accurate and authentic repo. fitories of hiftorical information which this country has produced. The plan adopted by Dr Heary, which is indifputably his own, and its peculiar advantages, are fufficiently explained in its general preface. In every pe

or chapters, the civil and military his tory of Great Britain; the history of religion; the hiftory of our conftitution, government, laws, and courts of Juftice; the hiftory of learning, of learned men, and of the chief feminaries of learning; the hiftory of arts; the hiftory of commerce, of shipping of money or coin, and of the price of commodities; and the hiftory of man. ners, virtues, vices, cuftoms, language, drefs, diet, and amusements. Under thefe feven heads, which extend the province of an historian greatly beyond its ufual limits, every thing curious or interefting in the hif tory of any country may be comprehended. But it certainly required more than a common fhare of literary courage to attempt, on fo large a scale, a fubject fo intricate and extenfive as the hiftory of Britain from the invafion of Julius Cæfar. That Dr Henry neither over-rated his powers nor his industry, could only have been proved by the fuccefs and reputation of his works.

But he foon found that his refidence at Berwick was an infuperable obftacle to the minute refearches which the execution of his plan required. His fituation there excluded him from the means of confulting the original authorities; and though he attempted to find accefs to them by means of his literary friends, and with their affiftance made fome progrefs in his work, his information was notwithstanding fo incomplete, that he found it impoffible to profecure his plan to his own fatisfaction, and was at laft compelled to relinquish it.

By the friendship of Gilbert Laurie, Efq; late Lord Provost of Edinburgh, and one of his majesty's commissioners of excife in Scotland, who had married the fifter of Mrs Henry, he was removed to Edinburgh in 1768; and it is to this event that the public are indebted for his profecution of the

Hiftory

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