military prowess? and is it an extravagant conjecture, that in process of time the same fate may overwhelm us, which destroyed the empires before us?

But it is time to restrain' the lawless efforts of imagination, and to recall the attention of the mind from a speculation, in whose windings and labyrinths our directing clue may be lost; where the powers of delusion may fascinate the mental eye, and involve us in inextricable darkness and error.

If the reader will indulge me a few moments longer in the self-created phantoms of my brain, I shall give way to the melancholy-pleasing ideas of my fancy; and pursuing my speculation, suppose what may be the probable state of Great Britain at that period, when we shall no longer exist as an independent nation; when the chains of slavery shall have galld our limbs, and liberty be only that magni nominis umbra,' tható shadow of a mighty name,' which

wrinkled Beldams
Teach to their grand-children as somewhat rare,
That anciently appeared, but when, extends

Beyond their Chronicle.-Gray's AGRIPPINA. Perhaps the inquisitive genius of curiosity may then visit this island, from the same motives which now attract the traveller to the venerable ruins of Athens or Rome : the antiquary may collect a series of British, with as much avidity, as he now arranges his Roman or Grecian coins; a true George the Third may engage the attention of a Virtú as much as a genuine Augustus or Trajan; the older edition of Shakspeare, Milton, or Pope, may authorize a different reading, as much as an older manuscript of Homer, Cicero, or Virgil; the monumental records of Westminster-abbey may be considered as the authentic testimonies of illustrious actions, as much as the inscriptions collected by Montfaucon, or the Arundelian marbles at Oxford. The ruins of a university may attract the admiration of the traveller ; the plans and designs of the different buildings may be preserved with that reverence which we now pay to the ruins of Palmyra or Balbec. May not the same spirit which inspired Cicero when he beheld the porticos of Athens, seize some future philosopher? the one has paid, the other will pay the homage of admiration due to departed genius. As the one beheld with reverential awe those seats which had been dignified by the presence of a Socrates, a Plato, and an Aristotle; the other may behold with pious gratitude those, where the immortal Milton planned his Paradise Lost; a Newton pierced through the clouds of philosophical error; and the comprehensive mind of a Bacon burst the fetters of scholastic pedantry, and boldly asserted the incontrovertible laws of nature, truth, and learning. To contract myself to a narrower sphere, may not reflection heave a sigh, when she beholds the vestiges of this nursery of genius, where so many patriots, philosophers, and poets, each in their respective lines the boast of their native soil, first caught that generous enthusiasm for solid glory, which proved the source of such renown to themselves and their country; by which they reflected a mutual light on each other; and which enabled the one to immortalize by his pen, those exploits which the more active abilities of the other had imboldened him to perform.-A.

I beg leave to lay before my readers the following Poem, produced by reflections of a similar kind.

THE SLAVERY OF GREECE.
Unrivall'd Greece! thou ever honour'd name,
Thou nurse of heroes dear to deathless fame!
Tho' now to worth, to honour all unknowv;
Thy lustre faded, and thy glories flown,
Yet still shall memory with reverted eye
Trace thy past worth, and view thee with a sigh.

Thee freedom cherish'd once with fostering band,
And breath'd undaunted valour through the land,
Here the stern spirit of the Spartan soil,
The child of poverty, inur'd to toil.
Here lov'd by Pallas and the sacred nine,
Once did fair Athens' tow'ry glories shine.
To bend the bow, or the bright falchion wield,
To lift the bulwark of the brazen shield,
To toss the terror of the whizzing spear,
The conqu’ring standard's glittring glories rear,
And join

the mad’ning battle's loud career,
How skill'd the Greeks; confess what Persians slain
Weré strew'd on Marathon's ensanguin'd plain;
When heaps on heaps the routed squadrons fell,
And with their gaudy myriads peopled hell.
What millions bold Leonidas withstood,
And sealed the Grecian freedom with his blood;
Witness Thermopylæ! how fierce he trod,
How spoke a Hero, and how mov'd a God!
The rush of nations could alone sustain,
While half the ravaged globe was arm'd in vain.
Let Leuctra say, let Mantinea tell,
How great Epaminondas fought and fell !

Nor war's vast art alone adorn'd thy fame,
• But mild philosophy endear'd thy name.'
Who knows not, sees not with admiring eye,
How Plato thought; how Socrates could die?

To bend the arch, to bid the column rise,
And the tall pile aspiring pierce the skies,
The awful fane magnificently great,
With pictur’d pomp to grace, and sculptur'd state,
This science taught; on Greece each science shone,
Here the bold statue started from the stone;
Here warm with life the swelling canvas glow'd ;
Here big with thought the poet's raptures flow'd :
Here Homer's lip was touch'd with sacred fire,
And wanton Sappho tun'd her amorous lyre;
Here bold Tyrtæus rous'd the enervate throng,
Awak'd to glory by th' aspiring song;
Here, Pindar soar'd a nobler, loftier way,
And brave Alcæus scorn'd a tyrant's sway;
Here gorgeous Tragedy with great control
Touch'd every feeling of th’ impassion'd soul;
While in soft measure tripping to the song
Her comic sister lightly danc'd along.--

This was thy state ! but oh ! how chang'd thy fame,
And all thy glories fading into shame.

What? that thy bold, thy freedom-breathing land
Should crouch beneath a tyrant's stern command !
That servitude should bind in galling chain,
Whom Asia's millions once oppos'd in vain;
Who could have thought? who sees without a groan,
Thy cities mouldering, and thy walls o'erthrown.
That where once tower'd the stately solemn fane,
Now moss-grown ruins strew the ravag'd plain,
And unobserv'd but by the traveller's eye,
Proud, vaulted domes in fretted fragments lie,
And the fall’n column on the dusty ground,
Pale ivy throws its sluggish arms around.

Thy sons (sad change !) in abject bondage sigh ;
Unpitied toil, and unlamented die.
Groan at the labours of the galling oar,
Or the dark caverns of the mine explore.
The glitt'ring tyranny of Othman's sons,
The pomp of horror which surrounds their thrones,
Has awed their servile spirits into fear,
Spurn’d by the foot they tremble and revere.
The day of labour, night's sad, sleepless hour,
Th' inflictive scourge of arbitrary power,
The blondy terror of the pointed steel,
The murderous stake, the agonizing wheel,
And (dreadful choice) the bowstring, or the bowl,
Damps their faint vigour, and unmans the soul.
Disastrous fate! still tears will fill the eye,
Still recollection prompt the mournful sigh ;
When to the mind recurs thy former fame,
And all the horrors of thy present shame.

So some tall rock, whose bare, broad bosom high, Tow'rs from the earth, and braves th' inclement sky; On whose vast top the black’ning deluge pours, At whose wide base the thund'ring ocean roars ; In conscious pride its huge gigantic form Surveys imperious and defies the storm. Till worn by age, and mould'ring to decay, Th' insidious waters wash its base away, It falls, and falling cleaves the trembling ground, And spreads a tempest of destruction round.

B.

N° 6. MONDAY, DECEMBER 11, 1786.

Turba clientum.

A crowd of correspondents. WHATEVER satisfaction the reader may receive from the perusal of the following letters, he is to attribute it to the favours of my unknown correspondents; with whom I have taken the liberty allowed me of omitting some passages, which could not be inserted, without incurring, on my side, the imputation of vanity. As I have been forced to adapt their productions to the limits of my work, a few paragraphs which had not an immediate reference to the subject, have been also suppressed, but not a line added.

• To Mr. GREGORY GRIFFIN.

Nunc adhibe puro
Pectore verba, puer, auno te melioribus offer.--Hor.

Now pliantly inure
The mind to virtue, while your heart is pure;
Now suck in wisdom.-FRANCIS.

6

• SIR

Fully sensible that the noblest pursuit, which can possibly engage the attention of a human being, next to the practice of virtue itself, is the study of diminishing the numberless mad votaries, who daily flock to the alluring banners of yice; and by pointing out the latent quicksands where so many heedless thousands have perished, exhort others to avoid a similar destruction, by a sudden reform of their pernicious courses, and by eagerly embracing the proffered offers of repentance; a mind eager to add