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But the mischief, which, according to this new doctrine, we must expect, is, that, now we are no longer at war, our poetry will dwindle once more into mere Queen Anneism; that Lord Byron will forthwith put his pen upon the peace establishment, and Walter Scott himself turn Pastoral Master-General to the department of rills and roses. Nay, the great Review, too, must partake of the soft infection; and even now, the symptoms are apparent; inasmuch as that very work, which, animated of course by the war, had formerly eulogized Pope with such eloquent enthusiasm, has already, since the piping times of peace, lowered its lofty phraseology, and talked of bis powers with tameness and indifference.

I am, Sir, your obedient servant,

COLLATOR.

SHERIDAN VINDICATED.

liament, therefore I feel roused to a degree of eight syllable Upon the above passage, your Correspondent has inverse; and as for old English, it has become quite indis-sinuated a heinous charge against her son Richard Brinspensable, ever since the battle of Trafalgar." Thus, Sir, ley Sheridan, namely that of having defrauded his deyou see, the conclusions follow each other as naturally as ceased mother of the fame due to this finished comedy, by the quotient produced from multiplying by the shovel and suppressing the manuscript, and pilfering from it the tongs, and dividing by the poker. Of course the old idea basis or materials of his comedy of the Rivals! I give here is entirely exploded, that arts flourish most when arms the words of this infamous accusation-"What" is "more have ceased. probable than that Mr. Sheridan, who certainly has been esteemed not scrupulously nice respecting such subjects, should take advantage of a manuscript of this description existing in the family, to raise himself a reputation as a dramatic writer, without the labor and anxiety of being one ?"-Now, Sir, I shall first notice that Dr. Watkins, who, in his interesting work, has certainly manifested no bias in favor of the late Mr. Sheridan, does not hint any such odious charge against him; and I shall shew by a few facts that the whole known chain of circumstances and probabilities are against the insinuated accusation of your correspondent. In the beginning of 1762, Richard Brinsley Sheridan was sent to school at Harrow, where he remained until his eighteenth year, which was in 1769. During that time he was at a distance from bis parents. In September 1764, they took his elder brother and his sister with them to France and settled at Blois. Within less than two To the Editor of the Literary Gazette. years after her arrival there, she wrote the "finished Sir, I read with much pleasure, in your first num- comedy," mentioned by your correspondent, called "A ber, your just condemnation of a recent attempt to exalt Trip to Bath;" and the two last volumes of Sidney the character of the Writers of Scotland, by a grave asser- Biddulph. This fact is proved by her husband, who in tion in the Edinburgh Review that "the Writers, who a letter from Blois to Mr. Samuel White of Dublin, in adorned the beginning of the last century, have been August 1766, says, she wrote them "since our_arrival eclipsed by the Writers of our own time." I admire the here." Thus the "finished comedy" was written in rich imagination of Scott, the tender pathos of Camp- France, while her son Brinsley was in England; and bell, the fine fancy and feeling of Byron and Moore, and when he was only in his fifteenth year. In that same the devotional fervor and chaste flights of Montgomery, letter, her husband states "I am reduced to my last without losing my relish for the works of Dryden, Pope, Louis," and adds, "I must conjure you by all that is Addison, Parnel, Gay, Swift, and their select contempo- sacred in friendship, to raise a hundred pounds for me as raries. I consider every attempt to rob our ancestors of speedily as possible, and convey it to W. Whately, Esq. their fame, as an attempt to rob our common country, Banker in London, for my use." In the midst of his distress, which is entitled to the sum total of all our glory in arts in a strange country, before he received the requested and arms. A sentiment in your last paper fully ex-loan, Mrs. Sheridan died almost suddenly, on the 26th of presses mine-"We would divide our own time from September 1766 and as already noticed, her son R. the past, not to overturn the monuments consecrated to Brinsley did not join his father's family until three years the dead, but to do justice to the fame of the living." after, in 1769; during all which time the entire of his I am sorry to perceive by a letter under the head of "She-mother's manuscripts remained out of his reach; at a `ridan's Rivals," in your last Gazette, that the wish to rob distance from him; and exposed to all the hazards of the dead of their fame is not confined to the Edinburgh his father's itinerant life from France to England and Reviewers. The Writer states that, "Mention is made,” Ireland, and from Ireland to England again. The cirin Dr. Watkins's Life of Mr. Sheridan, "of a finished cumstance of "the finished comedy," baving never after comedy called A Trip to Bath' left by Mrs. Sheridan, been brought forward by her husband, fully warrants a mother to the subject of the Biography, at her death." belief that the manuscript was mislaid or irrecoverably lost, Her husband had mentioned this finished comedy in his let-in his removals from place to place during so many years. ters from Blois in 1764. Your Correspondent quotes from Mrs. Sheridan had made a very large sum by the unDr. W.'s work-" It is known to have obtained the sanc-precedented success of her first comedy, "The Distion of Garrick and Murphy, and through them, I believe, covery." She had, also, received the profits of a benefit Dr. Johnson was prevailed upon to give it a perusal with night; the purchase money of the copy-right from Millar, his judgment upon its merits, which was decidedly in its the bookseller, and a free gift of one hundred pounds favor. Notwithstanding the stamp, which this manuscript more from him, for the "uncommon great" sale of her received from such high authorities, it never made its ap-second comedy "The Dupe," The saleable quality of pearance before the Public; this is the more unaccount- Mrs. Sheridan's dramatic works was thus established in able, considering the peculiar circumstances and profes-1763. It is not at all probable that her husband, if the sional pursuits of Mr. Sheridan, who caused the two re-finished comedy had not been lost, would have retained it maining volumes of Sidney Biddulph to be printed, but in his hands for three years from her death, in 1766, totally neglected the other literary remains of the Author." until the return of his son, Richard Brinsley, from Harrow,

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in 1769, without endeavouring to convert it into money, of letters. By this institution might be brought together, from while her dramatic fame was still fresh in the mind of the all parts of the world, persons versed in every art and science, pubhe. This is rendered still more improbable by the and in every branch of literature. Some would doubtless facts that her husband was pennyless when she died; attend, without any specific mission, and attracted only by the was obliged to borrow money to defray the expences of universities, academies, and literary corporation"; but all should pleasure of being present; others might be sent to represent her funeral, and continued to struggle with want, debts, possess an equal right to be present at the sittings of the asand difficulties during the three years before Richard'ssembly. The genius which creates, the liability which brings return. He must also have felt an anxious wish to add to perfection, the imagination which embellishes, and the to the fame of his deceased wife, by giving publicity to philanthropy which converts the whole into fresh means of the finished comedy, the Trip to Bath, if it had not been human happiness, thus united, would derive new energy, and mislaid or lost. We are told that this comedy had been act with increasing intensity, from the concentration of instruc approved of by Garrick, Murphy, and Johnson. Her tion, and from the interchange of sentiment. husband, therefore, if he had had the manuscript at her death, must have been certain by its success, on the stage and in the closet, of about a thousand pounds. It remains, therefore, for the defamers of her son in his grave, to shew any probability for a supposition that her husband had them benevolence and charity-to insist longer upon this point, manuscript for three years after she died, and that he chose so far to suppress her fame, and continue to struggle in distress, in preference to raising a large sum by selling it to the managers and booksellers. All my reasoning is strengthened by the fact, that he sold the two last volumes of her Sydney Biddulph after her death; and that the property and retention of her manuscripts rested with him for two and twenty years afterwards, until his decease in C. Y.

1758.

Essentially allied to knowled ye and to virtue, the genius of Christianity adopts and sanctifies every institution that tends to enlighten and to ameliorate the condition of humanity. Hostile alone to error, it opens its bosom to the wanderer, whatever be his sect, his colour, or origin, and enjoins towards would be to deny the spirit of the Christian doctrine. Nor are the principles of sound policy at variance with Christianity, thus understood. For, reposing upon the same bases, it will always lead to consequences, favourable to liberty and to public order. The Evangelists must ever indeed form a bulwark against despotism, which constantly endeavours to found itself upon a supposed demonstration of the will of heaven in

its favour.

No one, I delight to believe, will complain of these truths, notwithstanding their severity; for it would avow the objectur an accomplice in the guilt they denounce Time may perhaps produce the phanomenon,—as yet unseen, of a pritice, who loves, without restriction, the liberty of the press, and for his

Pian of a general Association of learned and scientific men, and of Artists of all Nations, for accelerating the progress of C-name history preserves an unsullied page That name thad dazation, of Morals, and of Illumination. By the Abbe Gregoire, Ez Baad1p of Elonus. Translated and arranged by Sir T. Charles Morgan, M. D. (Continued.)

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the king, who illustrated it, lived in our days,) wured have beca ALFRED, he who wished his subjects to be free as their thoughts. But whatever be the disposition of rulers, it is not in t' e nas ture of things that the press should continue siackled In spite of every obstacle it will burst forth; as air, when confined, acquires new elasticity by its compression The teriy of the press is dangerous only to the perverse and to the desigas ing: it can never injure a government, founded on the principles of justice. It would, on the contrary, mark the errors, which are thrown into circulation, make manifest intrigues, indicate abuses for reformation, and useful projects for adop tion; and thus it would contribute to the glory of the government and the happiness of the people; for the interests of both are the same, since it is so contrived by Providence, that nothing is really useful, but that which is at the same time just and true.

When England began the discussion of the first principles of hier government, James II asked his courtiers if the sovereignty really vested of night with the people. "That,” said the party addressed, “is a point for kings to believe, but not a subject to be dwelt upon by the people." The answer was

The schools of antiquity formed an assemblage of scholars derived from several different nations; and in the periodic festivals of Greece and Rome (the Olympic and Secular games, the bearned found a place, as accessories to the ceremony; but er of these institutions form an exact type of the Congress At the commencement of the last century, Italy abounded in mes, which held meetings for the recitation of sonnets, fce reading solemn and formal discourses. MURATORI feelthe inutuity of establishments thus arranged, proposed to te them into one society, which, being open to every species un ta ent, ahotid interest itself in the perfection of all. This p-a wurd have embraced the whole literary republic of Italy, MERATURt himself would have been the principal SLBC..t It was not however part of ais p'an, to hold meetingi, in any fixed place, but to unite the members, scattered qven the whole of Italy, by the establishment of archons, (one hom he designed to be president, of counselors, censors, secretary, whose functions were to have been triennial • project, though rich in profound views, was never put * In point of fact, the Christian religion has subsisted ur jer * OLTES in Switzerland, there existed, for many years, an every form of government; and its doctrines have been wrested m) y (purely national indeed) but which in some measure to support every system in its turn. Where the superior clergy tra" and the ideas of Muratori; and at the end of the last have prevailed in the hierarchy, they have united with the ren ary, the arrival of many foreigners of scientific distinction government against the people, and tave advocated divine right, un Paris, to assist the French philosophers in fixing the fund-though contradictory at once to natural religion and to reveamer, al verity of their new system of weights and measures,lation. Where the interior clergy have become powerful, they gave a stil- clearer image of the proposed Congress.—On the have sided with the people and have made Christianity a repub. us of these facts, rests the possibility of assembling a diet, lican code. Generally speaking, the existence of the Christ in mig”-t form an œcumenical representata on of the republic hierarely has been favoural e touberty, by the esta), st međ of an imperoom in imperio, a t' ird order in the state, ne itra iz oz the power of the sword, and prevaring mankind for the entire of learning, which has gradually migrated into that of opraa The clergy struggled for power for themwives, and the pecfis have in many countries profited by their conquests In.

irssone sopra il buon gusto intorno le scienze e le arte, WINDO PRITANIO the academic appellation of Merazont, Venera 1708. reprinted with anginentations in 1766 beaza, 2 vols. in 12mo,

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• How unfortunate the discrepance between the principien and practice, m all sects of religión!

liament, therefore I feel roused to a degree of eight syllable Upon the above passage, your Correspondent has inverse; and as for old English, it has become quite indis- sinuated a heinous charge against her son Richard Brinspensable, ever since the battle of Trafalgar." Thus, Sir, ley Sheridan, namely that of having defrauded his deyou see, the conclusions follow each other as naturally as the quotient produced from multiplying by the shovel and tongs, and dividing by the poker. Of course the old idea is entirely exploded, that arts flourish most when arms have ceased.

But the mischief, which, according to this new doctrine, we must expect, is, that, now we are no longer at war, our poetry will dwindle once more into mere Queen Anneism; that Lord Byron will forthwith put his pen upon the peace establishment, and Walter Scott himself turn Pastoral Master-General to the department of rills and roses. Nay, the great Review, too, must partake of the soft infection; and even now, the symptoms are apparent; inasmuch as that very work, which, animated of course by the war, had formerly eulogized Pope with such eloquent enthusiasm, has already, since the piping times of peace, lowered its lofty phraseology, and talked of bis powers with tameness and indifference.

I am, Sir, your obedient servant,

COLLATOR.

SHERIDAN VINDICATED.

more

ceased mother of the fame due to this finished comedy, by suppressing the manuscript, and pilfering from it the basis or materials of bis comedy of the Rivals! I give here the words of this infamous accusation-"What" is " probable than that Mr. Sheridan, who certainly has been esteemed not scrupulously nice respecting such subjects, should take advantage of a manuscript of this description existing in the family, to raise himself a reputation as a dramatic writer, without the labor and anxiety of being one ?"-Now, Sir, I shall first notice that Dr. Watkins, who, in his interesting work, has certainly manifested no bias in favor of the late Mr. Sheridan, does not hint any such odious charge against him; and I shall shew by a few facts that the whole known chain of circumstances and probabilities are against the insinuated accusation of your correspondent. In the beginning of 1762, Richard Brinsley Sheridan was sent to school at Harrow, where he remained until his eighteenth year, which was in 1769. During that time he was at a distance from bis parents. In September 1764, they took his elder brother and his sister with them to France and settled at Blois. Within less than two To the Editor of the Literary Gazette. years after her arrival there, she wrote the "finished Sir, I read with much pleasure, in your first num- comedy," mentioned by your correspondent, called "A ber, your just condemnation of a recent attempt to exalt Trip to Bath;" and the two last volumes of Sidney the character of the Writers of Scotland, by a grave asser- Biddulph. This fact is proved by her husband, who in tion in the Edinburgh Review that "the Writers, who a letter from Blois to Mr. Samuel White of Dublin, in adorned the beginning of the last century, have been August 1766, says, she wrote them "since our arrival eclipsed by the Writers of our own time." I admire the here." Thus the "finished comedy" was written in rich imagination of Scott, the tender pathos of Camp- France, while her son Brinsley was in England; and bell, the fine fancy and feeling of Byron and Moore, and when he was only in his fifteenth year. In that same the devotional fervor and chaste flights of Montgomery, letter, her husband states "I am reduced to my last without losing my relish for the works of Dryden, Pope, Louis," and adds, "I must conjure you by all that is Addison, Parnel, Gay, Swift, and their select contempo- sacred in friendship, to raise a hundred pounds for me as raries. I consider every attempt to rob our ancestors of speedily as possible, and convey it to W. Whately, Esq. their fame, as an attempt to rob our common country, Banker in London, for my use." In the midst of his distress, which is entitled to the sum total of all our glory in arts in a strange country, before he received the requested A sentiment in your last paper fully ex-loan, Mrs. Sheridan died almost suddenly, on the 26th of presses mine-"We would divide our own time from September 1766 and as already noticed, her son R. the past, not to overturn the monuments consecrated to Brinsley did not join his father's family until three years the dead, but to do justice to the fame of the living." after, in 1769; during all which time the entire of his I am sorry to perceive by a letter under the head of "She- mother's manuscripts remained out of his reach; at a `ridan's Rivals," in your last Gazette, that the wish to rob distance from him; and exposed to all the hazards of the dead of their fame is not confined to the Edinburgh his father's itinerant life from France to England and Reviewers. The Writer states that, " Mention is made," Ireland, and from Ireland to England again. The cirin Dr. Watkins's Life of Mr. Sheridan, "of a finished cumstance of "the finished comedy," baving never after comedy called A Trip to Bath' left by Mrs. Sheridan, been brought forward by her husband, fully warrants a mother to the subject of the Biography, at her death." belief that the manuscript was mislaid or irrecoverably lost, Her husband had mentioned this finished comedy in his let-in his removals from place to place during so many years. ters from Blois in 1764. Your Correspondent quotes from Mrs. Sheridan had made a very large sum by the un. Dr. W.'s work-" It is known to have obtained the sanc-precedented success of her first comedy, "The Distion of Garrick and Murphy, and through them, I believe, covery." She had, also, received the profits of a benefit Dr. Johnson was prevailed upon to give it a perusal with night; the purchase money of the copy-right from Millar, his judgment upon its merits, which was decidedly in its the bookseller, and a free gift of one hundred pounds favor. Notwithstanding the stamp, which this manuscript more from him, for the "uncommon great" sale of her received from such high authorities, it never made its ap- second comedy "The Dupe." The saleable quality of pearance before the Public; this is the more unaccount- Mrs. Sheridan's dramatic works was thus established in able, considering the peculiar circumstances and profes-1763. It is not at all probable that her husband, if the sional pursuits of Mr. Sheridan, who caused the two re-finished comedy had not been lost, would have retained it maining volumes of Sidney Biddulph to be printed, but in his hands for three years from her death, in 1766, totally neglected the other literary remains of the Author." until the return of his son, Richard Brinsley, from Harrow,

and arms.

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in 1769, without endeavouring to convert it into money, of letters. By this institution might be brought together, from while her dramatic fame was still fresh in the mind of the all parts of the world, persons versed in every art and science, public. This is rendered still more improbable by the and in every branch of literature. Some would doubtless facts that her husband was pennyless when she died; pleasure of being present; others might be sent to represent attend, without any specific mission, and attracted only by the was obliged to borrow money to defray the expences of universities, academies, and literary corporations; but all should her funeral, and continued to struggle with want, debts, possess an equal right to be present at the sittings of the asand difficulties during the three years before Richard's sembly. The genius which creates, the liability which brings return. He must also have felt an anxious wish to add to perfection, the imagination which embellishes, and the to the fame of his deceased wife, by giving publicity to the finished comedy, the Trip to Bath, if it had not been mislaid or lost. We are told that this comedy had been approved of by Garrick, Murphy, and Johnson. Her husband, therefore, if he had had the manuscript at her death, must have been certain by its success, on the stage and in the closet, of about a thousand pounds. It remains, therefore, for the defamers of her son in his grave, to shew any probability for a supposition that her husband had the manuscript for three years after she died, and that he chose so far to suppress her fame, and continue to struggle in distress, in preference to raising a large sum by selling it to the managers and booksellers. All my reasoning is strengthened by the fact, that he sold the two last volumes of her Sydney Biddulph after her death; and that the property and retention of her manuscripts rested with him for two and twenty years afterwards, until his decease in

1788.

C. Y.

Plan of a general Association of learned and scientific men, and of Artists of all Nations, for accelerating the progress of Civilization, of Morals, and of Illumination. By the Abbé Gregoire, Ex-Bishop of Blois. Translated and arranged by Sir T. Charles Morgan, M. D. (Continued.)

The schools of antiquity formed an assemblage of scholars derived from several different nations; and in the periodic festivals of Greece and Rome (the Olympic and Secular games) the learned found a place, as accessories to the ceremony; but neither of these institutions form an exact type of the Congress under consideration.

philanthropy which converts the whole into fresh means of
human happiness, thus united, would derive new energy, and
act with increasing intensity, from the concentration of instruc
tion, and from the interchange of sentiment.
Essentially allied to knowledge and to virtue, the genius of
Christianity adopts and sanctifies every institution that tends
to enlighten and to ameliorate the condition of humanity.
Hostile alone to error, it opens its bosom to the wanderer,
whatever be his sect, his colour, or origin; and enjoins towards
would be to deny the spirit of the Christian doctrine. Nor are
him benevolence and charity-to insist longer upon this point,
the principles of sound policy at variance with Christianity,
thus understood. For, reposing upon the same bases, it will
always lead to consequences, favourable to liberty and to
public order. The Evangelists must ever indeed form a bul-
wark against despotism, which constantly endeavours to found
itself upon a supposed demonstration of the will of heaven in
its favour.2

notwithstanding their severity; for it would avow the objector
No one, I delight to believe, will complain of these truths,
an accomplice in the guilt they denounce. Time may perhaps
loves, without restriction, the liberty of the press, and for his
produce the phænomenon,-as yet unseen, of a prince, who
name history preserves an unsullied page. That name (had
the king, who illustrated it, lived in our days,) wou'd have been
ALFRED, he who wished his subjects to be free as their thoughts.
But whatever be the disposition of rulers, it is not in the na-
ture of things that the press should continue shackled. In
spite of every obstacle it will burst forth; as air, when con-
fined, acquires new elasticity by its compression. The liberty
of the press is dangerous only to the perverse and to the design-
ing: it can never injure a government, founded on the prin-
ciples of justice. It would, on the contrary, mark the errors,
which are thrown into circulation, make manifest intrigues,
indicate abuses for reformation, and useful projects for adop-
tion; and thus it would contribute to the glory of the govern-
ment and the happiness of the people; for the interests of
both are the same, since it is so contrived by Providence, that
nothing is really useful, but that which is at the same time
just and true.

At the commencement of the last century, Italy abounded in academies, which held meetings for the recitation of sonnets, and for reading solemn and formal discourses. MURATORI feeling the inutility of establishments thus arranged, proposed to unite them into one society, which, being open to every species of talent, should interest itself in the perfection of all. This plan would have embraced the whole literary republic of Italy, When England began the discussion of the first principles of of which MURATORI himself would have been the principal her government, James II. asked his courtiers if the soveornament. It was not however part of his plan, to hold meet-reignty really vested of right with the people. "That," said ings, in any fixed place, but to unite the members, scattered the party addressed, "is a point for kings to believe, but not a over the whole of Italy, by the establishment of archons, (one subject to be dwelt upon by the people." The answer was of whom he designed to be president) of counsellors, censors, and a secretary, whose functions were to have been triennial. This project, though rich in profound views, was never put

into execution.'

At OLTEN in Switzerland, there existed, for many years, an assembly (purely national indeed) but which in some measure realized the ideas of MURATORI; and at the end of the last century, the arrival of many foreigners of scientific distinction at Paris, to assist the French philosophers in fixing the fundamental unity of their new system of weights and measures, gave a still clearer image of the proposed Congress.-On the basis of these facts, rests the possibility of assembling a diet, which might form an œcumenical representation of the republic

Reflessione sopra il buon gusto intorno le scienze e le arte, di LAMINDO PRITANIO the academic appellation of MURAIORI, 12mo. Venezia 1708. reprinted with augmentations in 1766. Venezia, 2 vols. in 12mo.

'How unfortunate the discrepance between the principles and practice, in all sects of religion!

2 In point of fact, the Christian religion has subsisted under every form of government; and its doctrines have been wrested to support every system in its turn. Where the superior clergy have prevailed in the hierarchy, they have united with the government against the people, and have advocated divine right, though contradictory at once to natural religion and to revelation. Where the inferior clergy have become powerful, they have sided with the people and have made Christianity a republican code. Generally speaking, the existence of the Christian hierarchy has been favourable to liberty, by the establishment of an imperium in imperio, a third order in the state, neutralizing the power of the sword, and preparing mankind for the empire of learning, which has gradually migrated into that of opinion. The clergy struggled for power for themselves, and the people have in many countries profited by their conquests. TR.

nience. If no novelty should be adopted, but such as is abso-
lutely free from objection, the world would inevitably reinain
at its minimum of improvement. Let us then proceed to con-
sider the composition of the congress, and to make some
necessary remarks on the literary character.
(To be continued).

fallacious, and contrived by a truc courtier, to elude the ques- the good and the evil, and weigh advantages against inconvetion. If princes were, indeed, penetrated with this truth, they would associate themselves with all that is truly grand and generous, and would call forth and recompense every species of talent which tends to the perfection of civilization; and in thus recognizing the delegated nature of their authority, they would find in the love of the people a principle of security and of permanence, to which despotism, from its very nature, must ever be a stranger. On the other hand, it requires but little foresight to perceive the impossibility of re-establishing arbitrary power upon the basis of ignorance; and of replunging Europe into the darkness of the middle ages.

LETTERS FROM LONDON.
LETTER IV.

My hostess having procured some passes from her young ladies' music-master, we went last night to a place To reduce these observations to our subject, it must be re- of amusement called the Opera, and seated ourselves in marked, that an unlimited freedom of discussion is necessary to the utility of the congress. If, instead of an assembly of the pit, whence we commanded a prospect of the whole freemen, it should be sought to procure the flattery of a troop house. You cannot imagine a finer sight. Hundreds of of slaves, it would be infinitely better that the project remain little rooms, lined with crimson, stood piled one over the for ever unexecuted. Nor would the public authorities have other, and were full of feathers, diamonds, and ladies. any thing to fear from an assembly, over whose proceedings Some of these rooms stood on the stage itself, which was they would necessarily have a control, if they tended to dis-quite proper, considering that the people in them were turb the public tranquillity: and there is, indeed, little danger evidently actors. Indeed, so the whole company appeared of such an event from speculative opinions confined to points purely abstract, and discussed by individuals who would be, too, and perhaps, those who trod the stage were the only ez professo, bound to respect the civil power, and to obey the real spectators; at least, they were the only persons present, who passed altogether unnoticed, and seemed quite With respect to situation, those cities which unite the pur-unconnected with the entertainment of the evening. Nosuits of literature with the operations of commerce, will, by body, except some foreigners who sat about me, paid any their habits of pecuniary calculation, at once perceive the ad- attention to the stage; however, their enthusiasm alone vantage resulting to the chosen seat of such an assembly. In the very nature of things, it would become an established mart all besides. I know not what they meant by a tenor and was more than sufficient to compensate for the neglect of and open fair for literary productions. Among the possible obstacles to our project, it will not be a baritono, but from what they said, I could gather that expected to place those which arise from great and rare casual- the civilization of society depended in a great measure ties. Lisbon may experience another earthquake, Smyrna a upon them. One singer, they asserted, had the happiness plague, London a fire, or Paris an invasion. Such events come of heaving up her notes from a considerable depth. Yet not into the ordinary calculations of life; yet even these might I pitied her extremely, for, by the faces she made, it was be foreseen and obviated, in the details of organization, which evident the process put her to great pain. the congress would discuss in their first sittings.

laws.

The greatest obstacle to the regular assemblies of the literati, lies in the frequency of European wars; but we may yet hope that war will not always produce an indiscriminate carnage, confounding sex and age; and that it may become a principle in the law of nations, to consider the children of science as at peace with the whole world.

It may be asked if the present be a fit time for the execution of our plan; and there is no reason why the question may not be answered in the affirmative. The exaggerated feelings of the revolution have relapsed into a calm; and the nations of Europe feel intimately the necessity for repose. A closer calculation of interests has taught them the absurdity of destroying each other in the quarrels of a few individuals-in quarrels which would very soon be adjusted if the world once agreed to follow the example of that tribe of the Franks who, as AGATHIAS relates, forced the parties concerned to descend personally into the arena, and to fight it out with each other. The operation of recent events has, however, tended so to mingle the nations of Europe together, that they have become less French, English, or German, and thereby are rendered more European.

"Ah. Madame, is it not a charming soprano?" exclaimed a yellow little foreigner, turning short round upon me. Really," replied I laughing, "I must say 'tis one of the finest asthmas I ever heard in my life." What are you about, my dear?" cried my female companion, quite shocked. "About!" echoed the bowing Frenchman, "about the wittiest lady in the world!"

Delighted with his repartee, he naturally became pleased with the object of it, so began chattering away, and soon initiated me into the mysteries of the whole Italian Opera; which is, indeed, a most comical device. The dialogue being in Italian, not one in a hundred can know the plot of the play-a great advantage to the author, who may thus write regular nonsense with impunity. The dramatis personæ consist, for the most part, of distressed kings and princesses, who conduct their affairs in recitative, and on all trying occasions, come out with a song. The fate of an empire is sometimes announced by a cadenza. Is the heroine in a fret? she sings. Is the hero in a rage? he sings too. Does he purpose to attack a citadel? he sings to his soldiers on the breach, and his soldiers sing to him, and the enemy on the battlements sing to both, and then all three sing to each other; after which, the battle goes

It has been asserted that the project of a congress would meet with opposition even amongst the learned themselves, and the objection affords a new motive for laying it open for their consideration. It is, however, more probable, that to establish such an assembly would anticipate and realize their general wish. The restlessness of talent, the spirit of investi- on swimmingly. gation, the incessant desire of extending knowledge, would People may say that this is unnatural. But if the rolling find, in the execution of this design, a means of satisfaction spheres themselves are set to music, why should not an and of fulfilment. Among the members of the republic of let-affair of state have its music too? Certain I am, that a ters, there doubtless would be found some who would attach

little or no value to the proposal. If it be bad, their reasonable few fiddles at St. Stephen's would do as much service to censure would condemn it; if good, it would still be improved the nation as half its orators.

by the discussion. In the scales of the balance we must place As soon as the opera was over, the house began to fill,

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