temptress, and to the multitude, her naked antics were dignity, her blasphemies the language of nature, and her unspeakable bloodshed the inevitable price of freedom. A crowd of writers, some of remarkable popular ability, and all of popular fame, laboured to increase and envenom the national frenzy, some by dazzling the people with projects of confiscation, others, by exciting their jealousy of rank, and others, by alluring the uneducated pride of the mind, and playing before it theories of unlimited progress, and brilliant perfectibility. Those arts had nearly succeeded; the soberness and sincerity of the national spirit were universally silenced for the time; the haughty effrontery and contemptuous scoffing of the new school of freedom and philosophy, bore down all idea of resistance; and the purer understanding of England seemed spell-bound, like Milton's noble Lady; "In stony fetters fixt and motionless," while the shapes of this revolutionary revel were triumphing and glittering before her. But, a more powerful presence was to come, and rebuke them; a genius of a loftier rank, and borrowing its strength from sources above the cup of the enchanter, burst in, broke his wand, and turning the revellers into their true shapes of grossness and vice, freed the captive of the spell. This was the achievement of Burke, and none was ever more effective, or more essential to the peace of an empire. It is in no affectation of public danger, that those who wish well to their country, now call on it, to prepare. The whole course of public measures, for the last seven years, has been republican. The changes of public men within that period have scarcely affected this strong tendency of things. If the feeble have given way, and the corrupt have only made the course more headlong; the firmest helmsmen of the State have felt the current too strong for them, to return. Whether yielding, or resisting, every has brought us nearer the verge of that mighty cataract, of which we already hear the roar. hour The Extracts from Burke's published works are made in an order illustrative of his personal feelings, his public career, and the national exigencies of his time. They are accompanied with notices of the events of his private life, chiefly from his Biography by Mr Prior; and with remarks connected with the circumstances of the anxious period in which we live; the whole forming an anti-revolutionary MANUAL of the wisdom of the wisest of men. CONTENTS OF VOLUME FIRST. Value of Biography-Birth of Burke-Early Scenery-Education -Fondness for Milton-Destined to the Bar-Arrival in Lon- don-Proposes to go to America-Attacks Bolingbroke-John- Election for Bristol-Speech at the Hustings-Popular Delusions Prevents the Rockingham Secession-Franklin-Absentee Tax- Alliance of France with America-Burke loses his Seat for Bris- Public Opinion of the Speech-On Economical Reform-Elo- quence of Public Men-Burke Retires from Bristol-Fine |