tive of this great evil, with many others. The state will be wanting in one great and essential particular, viz.; a watchful, a constantly-inspecting eye marking every fresh abuse, and an arm instantly uplifted to lop it off. Mark the consequence of this serious deficiency; that is, take a view of the natural course of monarchy in a nation without the aid of a system of popular representation. The kingdom is under the complete arbitrary control of one man, whose will is biassed by a thousand motives-the wishes of his friends, his flatterers-the inducements of avarice, of renown, or revenge -whatever, in a word, may be supposed to actuate the soul of a man placed above his fellow-creatures, and commanding a thousand avenues of wealth and pleasure. The great and necessary evil inherent to such a man's position is that there is no constitutional check provided to restrain his caprices-his flatterers, of course, are too attentive to their own interests to seek the real advancement of his. Thus every day of arbitrary government is an accumulation of objects of disgust and emnity, tyranny and oppression, which want only a favourable crisis to break upon the public eye. There is no suspicion that a day of retribution will ever come -that the rude hand of democracy will ever be lifted up to dash to the ground the sceptre of a hundred kings. Meanwhile abuse follows upon the neck of abuse, one oppressive law creeps upon another in perfect tranquillity; except perhaps the angry murmur of some discontented democrat, who, for the daring crime of questioning the wisdom of his superiors, ends his murmurs and his life in the dungeon or the gallies. For a time this system of despotism is held together, perhaps by the strong hand of a tyrant of stern and vigorous mind; but the despot, who, like Cromwell, is possessed of firmness and ability, should always remember, when they reckon on the security of an arbitrary government, that genius is not always hereditary-the reins, which for some time have been held with skill and courage, may drop from the father's hands into the son's, which are scarcely able to grasp them; men, while they look at the new government, see all the father's defects and vices, without the father's strength and sternness, and accordingly despise and deride. While ten thousand abuses are hanging round the government, so thickly as entirely to obscure its excellences, a hundred hands are lifted to destroy it, while scarce a finger is raised to protect it. There is no representative barrier to stand between the people and the throne; and the first burst of indignation covers it with ruin and reddens it with blood!

Here is the essential evil in an arbitrary government—that it is able to practise every kind of mischief, and to revel in every kind of abuse, without check or restraint. The utility of a representative body consists greatly in keeping the genius of the government always on an equality with the civilization of the governed; so that when the latter is in an advanced state of national improvement, the former may not by its discordance and its barbarism, excite disgust and hatred. Wherever this latter state of society exists, i. e. wherever the institutions of society have not kept up with the sentiments of society, the most dreadful convulsions are to be apprehended. In such a state it is instantly perceived that there is something monstrous in the organic structure of the system, which will never be rectified but by a revolution-dissatisfaction, and complaint, contempt and defiance, will be its harbinger, like the low "distant murmurs of dread sound" which, when heard in the neighbourhood of the volcano, are prophetic of a terrible eruption.

We have dwelt on the subject at such a length because it will unfold to you the state of France immediately previous to the Revolution. None can make a more flagrant mistake than they who imagine that the Revolution was produced by the despotic acts of the existing government-nothing can be more false; it arose from the accumulation of abuses which the unbroken continuance of the feudal system and the absence of a representative system necessarily heaped together. If we look at the kingdom of France-at its internal condition-just before the Revolution, we shall be surprised at its national prosperity. Mr. Burke, in his splendid work on the French Revolution, exhibits several standards by which we may estimate the prosperity of France (p. 189). He first refers to the state of its population, and quotes the calculations of Mr. Neckar," who reckons, and upon apparently sure principles, the people of France, in the year 1780, at twenty-four millions six hundred and seventy thousand." That was the population of 1780. Now Dr. Price, "taking ground on M. Neckar's data," computes that the French population increased so rapidly that, in the year 1789, he rates the people of that kingdom at thirty millions. Supposing then that we even abate two or three millions of Dr. Price's sanguine calculation, even then the fact of such a rapidly-increasing population, on a space of about twenty-seven thousand square leagues, in a country not universally fertile, is certainly conclusive of the prosperity of the kingdom. "It is," in the language of Mr. Burke, "a good deal more than the proportionable population of this island, or even than that of England, the best peopled part of the United Kingdom.” (p. 191.)

The wealth of the country is the next standard by which Mr. Burke would have us judge of the government and the state of France previous to its Revolution. Although it was not in this respect equal to England, yet, as Mr. Burke says, "the wealth which will not endure a comparison with the riches of England may constitute a very respectable degree of opulence," and again quotes from M. Neckar, who "affirms that, from the year 1726 to the year 1789 (i.e. a year or two before the Revolution), there was coined at the mint of France, in the species of gold and silver, to the amount of about one hundred millions of pounds sterling." Then "he calculates the specie then actually existing in France at about eighty-eight millions of the same English money; and was so far from considering this influx of wealth as likely to cease, when he wrote in 1785, that he presumes upon a future annual increase of 2 per cent. upon the money brought into France during the periods from which he computed."

With respect to the government of the ill-fated Louis XVI., nothing can be imagined more averse to rigour and injustice: his character was mild to an error-indeed his virtues cost him his crown. The despotic sceptre which he wielded, as the hereditary sovereign of France, was only despotic in appearance: it was not his fault that his government was arbitrary; he took it as he found it; but no man was ever more open to conviction, or more ready to yield to the wishes of his subjects. "He was a man more sinned against than sinning." He was too good for his age. Never has there been seen on the theatre of human affairs a spectacle which more convincingly proves the essential evils of tyranny than the reign of this unfortunate, but good-hearted monarch. It proved that good men-men averse to cruelty-are by nature unfit to be tyrants. If he had possessed the capacity to rule with terror, he had not the will; and had he possessed the will, he had not the capacity. He was a monarch just suited to the limited

monarchy of Great Britain-in such a situation no man could have been more beloved and respected. To say that he was cruel-that he was the cause of all the evils of the Revolution-is absurd and insane; he was one so altogether abhorrent of shedding blood that he could not even muster courage to have it spilt in defence of himself and his family, much less for caprice or revenge. Whether we look then to the prosperity of the nation or to the character of the French government at the time of the Revolution, we certainly see nothing to warrant such a terrible outburst of popular indignation as that which then swept away every vestige of monarchial institutions. No, we must trace the predisposing causes farther back— we must ascribe it to the inevitable evils of an arbitrary government which the longer it endures furnishes only materials for its own destruction at some future crisis. If then we take a momentary view of the state of France immediately preceding the Revolution, we shall perceive the truth of what has been before stated, viz., the continuance of feudal principles of government causing the Revolution of France. For instance, there was a line of demarcation very vividly and broadly drawn between the nobility of birth and the nobility of talent and wealth, and offices given freely to the former were withheld from the latter. The highest stations in the army were filled almost exclusively by men of family. These partialities, so palpably unjust and insidious, contributed of course to the ruin of the nobility; and when the aristocracy fall, the throne generally falls with it. Again, look at the states-general of France, which was an assembly composed of the nobility, clergy, and burghers of France, and which was occasionally convened to deliberate and legislate. If this body could have met with any regularity, like the commons of England-if they had possessed the political power of influencing the decisions of the court-if they had formed as integral a portion of the government of France as the representatives of our counties and towns do of England-we make no doubt but the history of the world would never have been disgraced with the narrative of the butcheries of the French Revolution. But the truth is that the only barrier to popular resentment and revolutionary fury which a nation can possess was in France always unfixed, wavering, and irregular. We can tell but little of the states-general of France. In the words of M. Guizot (in the tenth lecture of the admirable work from which we have before quoted), "There is no one who can state with any precision what was fixed or regular in the statesgeneral of France, what was the number of their members, what the subjects of deliberation, or what the periods of convocation and the duration of their sessions. We know nothing of all these things; it is impossible to draw from history any clear and general results on this subject. When we inquire into the character of these assemblies in the history of France, they appear to have been purely accidental-a sort of political shift, on the part of the people, as well as on that of the kings—a last shift to the kings when they had no money, and were at their wit's ends for expedients ; and a last shift to the people, when evil became so intolerable that the usual remedies for alleviation were exhausted in vain: they were sometimes perfectly innocent, and sometimes vastly terrible. If the king was the strongest, their humility and docility were extreme; if the situation of the crown was disastrous if it had an absolute occasion for the assistance of the states, they fell into factious opposition, and became the instruments either of some aristocratic intrigue or of some ambitious schemes: thus their labours seldom or ever survived them; they promised and attempted much, but did

nothing. Not one of the great measures which have really acted on society in France-not one important reform in government, legislation, or administration has emanated from the states-general: they never were a means of government, nor ever entered into a political organization; they never attained the object for which they were formed, viz. the fusion into one single body of the different societies which subdivided the country."— (Lecture X, p. 58.)

We have introduced to you this rather lengthened, but most interesting, extract from M. Guizot, to show you the dreadful deficiency of the French constitution, and the great first cause of the French Revolution. What we have said on this division of our subject, we will sum up in a few words. The absence of a regularly-constituted representative system in a monarchy, and the prevalance in its stead of strictly feudal systems, is invariably followed by innumerable abuses, which cluster day after day round the fabric of the constitution. The increase of these abuses in the course of time, together with other concurrent circumstances, become so enormous, and so prominent, and so revolting, that at a favourable opportunity—at one of those national crises, which will surely open sooner or later-the whole disgust of the nation is thrown into one dreadful outbreak of fury which clutches every antagonist, and involves society in inextricable disorder. And this was the first cause of the Revolution of France.

(To be continued.)

B. K.

TABLE TALK.

GAIETIES AND GRAVITIES.

Why is Cold Weather productive of Benevolence?—Because it makes people put their hands in their pockets.

Thinking leads Man to Knowledge.-He may see, and hear, and read, and learn whatever he pleases, and as much as he pleases he will never know anything of it, except that which he has thought over, that which by thinking he has made the property of his mind. Is it then saying too much, if I say that man, by thinking only, becomes truly man?-PESTALOZZI.

An Unsophisticated Witness.-During the sessions at Wakefield, a witness was asked if he was not a husbandman, when he hesitated for a moment, then coolly replied, amid the laughter of the court, "Nae, sir, I 'se not married."

Sam Slick on Steam.-By and by folks won't be of no use at all; there won't be no people in the world but tea-kettles; no mouths but safety valves; and no talking but blowing off steam. If I had a little biler inside of me, I'd turn omnibus.

Dr. Arnold on Conservatism.-There is nothing so revolutionary, because there is nothing so unnatural and convulsive to society, as the strain to keep things fixed, when all the world is, by the very law of its creation, in eternal progress; and the cause of all the evils in the world may be traced to that natural but most deadly error of human indolence and corruption-that our business is to preserve, and not improve. It is the ruin of us all alike, individuals, schools, and nations.

A shopkeeper the other day stuck upon his door the following laconic advertisement: "A boy wanted." On going to his shop next morning, he beheld a smiling little urchin in a basket, with the following pretty label: "Here he is."

Interior of the Earth.-The increase of temperature observed in mines is about one degree Fahrenheit for every fifteen yards of descent; and should the same increase go on in the same ratio, water will boil at the depth of two thousand four hundred and thirty yards, lead melt at the depth of eight thousand four hundred yards, every thing be red hot at the depth of seven miles, gold melt at the depth of twenty-one miles, castiron at the depth of seventy-four miles, soft iron melt at the depth of ninety-seven miles, and, at the depth of one hundred miles, there must be a temperature equal to the greatest artificial heat yet observed-a temperature capable of fusing platina, porcelain, and indeed every refractory substance with which we are yet acquainted. These temperatures are calculated from Guyton Morveau's corrected scale of Wedgwood's pyrometer; and, if we adopt them, we find that the earth is fluid at the depth of a hundred miles from the surface, and that even at its present state very little more than the soil on which we tread is fit for the habitation of organized beings.-Mechanic's Magazine.

The English are like fiddle-strings-the more you screw them the more you'll get out of them.

The Life in an Oyster.-The liquor of an oyster contains incredible multitudes of small embryo covered with little shells, perfectly transparent, swimming nimbly about. One hundred and twenty of these in a row would extend an inch. Besides these young oysters, the liquor contains a great variety of animalculæ, five hundred times less in size, which emit a phosphoric light. Nor does the list of inhabitants conclude here; for, besides these, there are three distinct species of worms, called oyster-worms, which shine in the dark like glowworms. The sea-star, cockles, and muscles are the great enemies of the oyster; the first gets into the shell, when it opens, and sucks them out. While the tide is flowing, oysters lie with the hollow side downward, but on the return on the other side. Journal of Natural History.

American Tombstone.-"Sacred to the Memory of Jonathan Thompson, a pious Christian, and an affectionate husband. His disconsolate widow continues to carry on the tripe and trotter business at the same place as before her bereavement."

Cowley on Liberty.-The liberty of a people consists in being governed by laws which they have made themselves, under whatever form it be of government-the liberty of a private man in being master of his own time and actions, as far as they consist with the laws of God and his country.

A Sharp Retort.-A very ignorant nobleman observing one day at dinner a person eminent for his philosophical talents intent on choosing the delicacies of the table, said to him, "What-do philosophers choose delicacies?" Why not," returned the other, "do you think, my lord, that the good things of this world were made only for blockheads."

Effects of Emphasis.-A writer on English grammar gives the following example of wrong eloquence. A clergyman, on reading 1 Kings xiii. 27, generally placed the emphasis on the words denoted by italics: "And he spake to his sons, saying, Saddle me, the ass. And they saddled him."

Price of Tea in 1680.-These are to give notice to persons of quality that a small parcel of most excellent tea is by accident fallen into the hands of a private person to be sold; but, that none may be disappointed, the lowest price is thirty shillings a pound, and not any to be sold under a pound weight, for which they are desired to bring a convenient box. Inquire at Mr. Thomas Eagle's, at the King's Head, in St. James' Market.

London Gazette, Dec. 16, 1680. The World's Friend.-Fenelon says, "I love my family better than myself; my country better than my family; but my whole species more than my country."

An Americanism.-A briefless barrister ought never to be blamed; for it is decidedly wrong to abuse a man without a cause.

Love of one's Country.—An Irish gentleman entered a bookseller's shop in Dublin the other day with a valuable work, which he said was to be bound in a superior style. "And how will you have it done," said the bookbinder, "in Russia?" "In Russia! Certainly not," was the reply; "if you can't do it here, I'll take it to the bookbinder over the way."

Mind your P's and Q's.-The origin of this expression seems to have been the practice of chalking on the walls of tap-rooms the pints and quarts ordered by the guests. Thus, when a man was becoming liberal towards either himself or his friends beyond his means, he was significantly cautioned to mind his P's and Q's, or he might order more than he could pay for.