NO. II. Oh! what are thousand living loves To one, that cannot quit the dead.BYRON. Well-though the clouds of sorrow haste, And shut out sunshine from my soul, My musing thought would dwell on thee, Sad alteration!-here alone, Where we so oft together sate, With hearts, where Love's commingling tone I gaze around me-where art thou, Whose glance was sunshine to the spot? Oh! nevermore-oh! nevermore And see thee in my waking dreams. To foreign climes my wandering way; The fleur-de-lis with purple vest,- Oh! do not breathe on Ida's lute "Twould make her vanish'd form appear, Since Ida's breathing now is mute→→ Since Ida's voice I cannot hear. All music, and all melody, The azure stream, and leafy tree, The glories of the earth and sky Are stripp'd of half their charms for me! Then welcome be the flapping sail, And never may the breezes fail, But when they bring us back again! And I will wander o'er the deep, And brave the tempest's threat'ning harms, Since not a shore to which we sweep To me can proffer Ida's arms! Oh! Ida, ever lost and dear, Soon come the day, and come it must, 1 When I shall seek thy happier sphere, chua 995 ande And leave this perishable dust. Then grief shall flee my troubled eyes, And through the fields of paradise NAUTA. ཝཱ LORD LAUDERDALE'S PROPOSED ADDRESS TO THE KING. THIS small pamphlet is in pretty general circulation, although, in a technical sense, it is not, perhaps, a published work, But the matters which it embraces are so profoundly interesting at the present period, and the name of the author stands so high for acuteness and subtlety at least, if not for depth and wisdom, that if we commit a slight trespass, by making the pamphlet the subject of a few remarks, we feel assured, that our motives will plead our excuse. No man, indeed, who prints the sketch of an address, "submitted to the consideration of all who wish to call the attention of their Sovereign, and of Parliament, to the real grievance under which the nation is now suffering,' can object to the attention we are now about to give to his call-as we are certainly of the number of those who are anxious to detect and disencumber ourselves of this "real grievance." The noble author of this address has been long known to the public in various and rather opposite characters. We shall not attempt to revive the remembrances connected with his youthful enthusiasm, because we think he has, in a great measure, atoned for - these juvenile indiscretions by a wholesome application to more severe studies. It is impossible, however, to deny, that even in his more dry and abstruse speculations, the original bias of his political prejudices makes a frequent and not very seasonable appearance; and that in his case, more than in that of any writer professedly speculative, it would seldom be difficult to detect the bearing of his more practical creed. That Lord Lauderdale is, in his works on political economy, very ingenious, abstract, and metaphysical, is true; but still we think, that behind the cloudy region of his metaphysics, it is not difficult to recognize the embodied substantial figure of whiggism. Although he has favoured the world with a series of transitory lucubrations upon almost every political question that has occurred for the last fifteen years, connected with political economy, he has generally contrived, if not to render his science subservient, at least to make it opportunely coincident, * with his known party feelings. With him the Sinking Fund has been wrong -the Bank has been wrong-the system of taxation has been wrong-the measures adopted, whether for the increase or diminution of the public debt, have all been deeply and destructively impolitic. The rapid payment of the debt he told us distinctly, in his Inquiry into National Wealth, would be utter ruin and subversion,-probably because Mr Pitt was the author and advocate of the Sinking Fund,-the vast unrepressed increase of the same debt, creating property unconnected with popular influence, he now tells us, in this Sketch, is the chief operating cause of all the evils that menace the stateof all the discontent which lurks in its bosom of all the calamities that are yet in store for us, unless by a change of Ministers we drive from the helm of affairs the foolish men, who dare to "glory" in the present state of things, which, in the opinion of the author, so far from being a subject of triumph, is one of just shame and reproach. We are not aware, indeed, that the man who attempted by one single blow to destroy, not merely the system of Adam Smith, but the whole received system of political economy,-who waged war with the very axioms of crime, and tried to rear a system upon mere sophisms,-and who produced a voluminous work, with these rare and wholesome views, which has fallen by the universal consent of all thinking persons, into the most profound oblivion,-is exactly the person to be trusted for an opinion upon any subject connected with the national economy. But so it is, that the adventurous author has now come forward to guide his fellow-citizens, and counsel his sovereign in the most arduous crisis of public affairs, and, as might have been expected from the abstract undistinguishing cast of his intellect,-has at once referred all the evils we endure, and all the danger to which we are exposed, to a neglect of the principles of that science of political economy in which, despising the scepticism of the world, he ardently imagines himself to be an undoubted master. * Sketch of an Address to his Majesty; submitted to the consideration of all who wish to call the attention of their Sovereign, and of Parliament, to the real grievance under which the nation is now suffering. By the Earl of Lauderdale. 1821. VOL. VIII. 4 D The scope of his proposed address may be explained in a few sentences. Mankind, in Lord Lauderdale's opinion, are necessarily governed by those who can administer to their mere physical wants and desires,—and the influence of property must, of course, predominate in one shape or other over every less urgent consideration. Rulers we must indeed have, and a system of legislation, and of distributive justice, and of general and local police,-but it is the influence of property that truly imparts to the entire system its force and efficacy, that secures for it free and willing obedience, and prevents murmur and discontent. All the forms of authority which pretend to govern man, must emanate from, and be in close sympathy with that local and territorial influence, which, by gratifying the physical wants of the governed, ensures their homage and con tentment. Such are the general principles-and now for their application to the present distracted state of our internal affairs. It is the opinion of Lord Lauderdale, that before the accession of his late Majesty to the throne, the relations betwixt the governing power and those who were subject to it, were, generally speaking, sustained by that territorial influence to which we have alluded. In support of his opinion as to the supremacy of this influence over the claims of allegiance and the power of government itself, he refers to the Scottish rebellions, where a dependdent tenantry risked their fortunes and their lives in obedience to their territorial chiefs, and in open defiance of the supreme power of the state. He does not, of course, mean to say, that the direct despotism of property was equally strong over the whole of the island, as it was in the mountainous parts of Scotland, but he maintains that such as it existed, even in England, about the middle of the last century, it has been since manifestly and dangerously relaxed. The enormous increase of our public debt creates a vast property unconnected with local or individual influence ;the difficulties to which taxation has exposed the old proprietors-their consequent expulsion-the more sordid transactions driven with the tenants by the speculators, who purchase and sell land as ordinary merchandisethe unparalleled increase of our manufacturing population, produced by the peculiar circumstances of the late war, and suddenly arrested by its termination,-have, in the opinion of the noble author, so entirely dislocated society, and produced such a mass of human beings, no longer united by any of the accustomed ties, that we cannot wonder to see constituted authority despised, since it is no longer maintained by its wonted dependences. Formerly, the great mass of our population was territorially connected with one or other branch of the legislature with one or other of the conflicting parties in the state-and the consequence was, that opposition to constituted power never trespassed beyond the example set in the great council of the nation. There might be whigs and tories, but there were no radicals,-none who imagined an equal contempt of both parties, and compassed in their own wild fancies the subversion of the state.-This vast and unmanageable change in the state of property, the proposed addresser imputes to the system which the present Ministers adopted from their great predecessor, and had the felicity, or, as Lord Lauderdale thinks, the misfortune, of perfecting; and the fact, that they still continue to boast of this system, is, in his opinion, a sufficient reason for their removal from office,if the object be to propitiate the revolted interests of the country.-It is remarkable, however, that this is the only remedy on which the noble author even professes to be explicit, for as to the scheme of reaction, by which the former state of mutual dependence is to be in whole or in part restored, he prudently leaves that, without suggestion or comment, to the wisdom of the legislature. There is one passage in this singular pamphlet in which we cordially concur, and as it gives a very distinct view of the subject of which it treats, and puts to flight the stupid commonplaces as to the increase of corruption, and the tendency to its further growth in our own times and those which have immediately preceded them, we shall quote it at length, for the edification of all radical declaimers. "To us it appears, that the three several branches of the Legislature stand in the same relation to each other that they have done ever since your Majesty's family sat on the throne; that the House of Lords is, with the exception of the change which has taken place in consequence of the union with Ireland, constituted on the same principle; and that the same observation extends to the Commons' House of Parliament; for your Majesty must be aware, that at that time, as at present, Old Sarum and Midhurst had a right to send the same number of representatives to that House which are delegated from the county of York. "We have indeed seen changes of some importance take place: "We have seen the judges of the land rendered independent, by having their offices conferred on them for life. "We have seen attempts to secure the independence of the House of Commons, by the abolition of so many offices tenable with a seat in that House, that, though we find on record, in times of general contentment throughout your Majesty's dominions, the names of upwards of 150 placemen voting in that assembly, we know not, at this moment of discontent and irritation, how any man can with truth allege that there exists in that House even one half of that number of placemen. "We have seen also the independence of the House of Lords provided for on similar principles. "We have seen many of the offices of state, in which enormous fortunes have been made, by the use of public money, regulated in such a manner that no public officer can now enjoy any emolument beyond the defined salary annexed to his situ ation. "We have seen contractors with Government excluded from Parliament, and loans contracted in a manner which puts it no longer in the power of a Minister of the Crown to shew favour to his friends. "And we have seen the purity of election provided for, by the exclusion of all revenue officers from a right of suffrage; as well as by regulations far more numerous than all those contained in the statute book at the commencement of the reign of our deceased sovereign. "All these regulations may, indeed, be considered as in a degree operating a change in the constituted authority of the country; but it would be wasting your Majesty's time, to go into any details to shew that they are alterations of a nature, which, far from creating irritation and discontent, ought, according to the opinions of those who are daily libelling our Government, to sooth and render the constitution under which we have the happiness of living more dear to those who are born to enjoy the blessings of it. We must, therefore, humbly submit to your Majesty, that we cannot perceive any alterations in the constituted authority of the country capable of giving a new direction to the power vested in it, such as can account for the melancholy state of public sentiment which unfortunately now prevails." This is all very just and sound. But we must now take leave to make a few remarks upon the leading principles of his Lordship's theory, which, indeed, is brought forward in a shape rather abstract and metaphysical.--Should this address ever be adopted, and presented to his Majesty, we believe it will be the first instance in which our gracious Sovereign has been publicly regaled with a dish of genuine Scotch philosophy. It is a great objection to any theory, that, if it be true, there seems no practicable remedy for the evils of which it professes to develope the cause. We are not much obliged to an author who curiously traces the causes and progress of a distemper in the political system, and whose very statement of them shuts out all hope of cure. The noble author has not, in the present instance,even indicated a remedy-andwe are sure, that if any feasible scheme had occurred to him, his intrepidity would not have shrunk from the announcement of it. But he comes for ward, burdened with his "real grieVance," and in despair casts it at the looks ill, either for Lord Lauderdale's feet of parliamentary wisdom. This theory, or for the country.-But, if the root of our present evils be in truth a revolution in the state of property, generated by the events of the late war, we do not well see by what species of counter-revolution the evil is to be removed. We can contract debts, indeed, but without the aid of Mr Heathfield, it is not so easy to extinguish them. cial successes, may create mercantile The events of a war, or great commerand monied capitalists; but we do not know by what scheme, when they are once generated,—be their local or individual influences ever so small-they and their capital are at once to be de stroyed. They may, indeed, purchase land, but they cannot be compelled to do this; and even if they were to do it universally, they would only displace the actual proprietors, and change situations with them of course. Lord Lauderdale's theory can be satisfied only by destroying, in some shape or other, the superfluous uninfluential wealth, and the rude independent population, which, in their different spheres, produce discontent and radicalism; and we should, therefore, advise him to reverse his former pursuits, and, instead of puzzling himself with the needless and baneful "inquiry into the means and causes of the increase of wealth," set himself seriously to consider what may be the fittest mode of its extinction. the condition of servitude, and diversified society by the introduction of other classes besides proprietors, and their immediate dependents. The theory of Lord Lauderdale is at variance, in short, with all that is truly liberal, and finely characteristic of the system of this country. It was ever the boast of the domestic policy of England,-propitious to arts and commerce, and to the reciprocal independence of all classes, that it has shattered the simple and savage relations, which, while they maintained even constituted authority but imperfectly, perpetuated the servitude and brutality of man. The assured independence of the middle, and even the labouring classes, has hitherto been the principle and the pride of England's liberal system, while respect for the constitution, obedience to the laws, and general domestic tranquillity, have been secured, upon finer and more generous principles than this noble author imagines can ever exercise any very effective controul over the mind of man.-It is by excluding, in a great measure, from his theory, the higher feelings, which are not less present in their influence, that they appear for the present in a state of perversion and depravity, that we conceive the author to have essentially and egregiously erred; it is by omitting, in his enumeration, the progress of intellect and knowledge If it be true, that constituted authority cannot well be maintained in this land, but in connection with and subserviency to territorial interests,—if the landholder must invariably be the legislator; and, in his legislative capacity, is to be obeyed only because of the favours which, as a territorial proprietor, he can confer, and the submission thereby enforced, the feudal system, if not in its most barbarous forms, yet, in its essential principle, must be revived to save the state from destruction. The revival, indeed, is impossible, and the subversion is therefore certain and inevitable. The very essence of the feudal system, is the influence of property over rude and servile dependence; and the influence, too, of that very species of property land, upon which the noble author mainly relies-every other form of wealth being naturally detached and independent, and incapable, of course, of giving that specific local influence, upon which, in the author's opinion, the vigour of constituted authority, and the stability of order must for ever depend. This is high aristocracy omnipotent as it must be, either and renovated feudalism, indeed; and the very mention of such doctrines, by noble personage, must excite a smile in every one who recollects the history of the last thirty years, and the very conspicuous part played in some of its scenes by the Earl of Lauderdale himself. Be this as it may, however, we take leave to maintain, that his theory is erroneous and absurd. The wisest and ablest of our English writers have Concurred in ascribing the spirit of freedom which has distinguished our people,-their feeling of personal independence, and just passion for public liberty,to that very disconnection betwixt the class of territorial proprietors, and the mass of the population, which Lord Lauderdale so feelingly deplores,-to the rupture of feudalism, and its multiplied bondage, -to the progress of arts, manufactures, and commerce, which have bestowed the enjoyment of property, without for good or evil,-that we think he has shewn his incapacity to read well the signs of the times; it is by wholly neglecting the moral and political feelings of man, stimulated as they have been by education, by the facilities for diffused intelligence, by the events and examples of recent history, that we think he has evinced a remarkable ignorance of what is passing at this moment in our own island, and throughout a great part of Europe. And we are not surprised, that with this evident imperfection of his theory, as to the causes of our present disorders, it should imply a practical conclusion, which the entire physical as well as moral power of the age will combine in repelling. We are aware, indeed, that Lord Lauderdale may disown this conclusion, and can well believe that he never intended to carry his principle to that extreme to which it directly and unequivocally points; |