disclaimed by every one of them, by the greatest of our kings, Edward the First and Third, and Henry the Eighth, with such candour and free will, as enforced confidence in them; by the others, in truth, because they could not help it. I hope I shall stand excused, if I add, that the majority of those who engaged in the civil war, either for king Charles, or against him, were of the same opinion. For, had he not given up this point, (and, indeed, he did it with all the appearances of the greatest sincerity) he would not have got three thousand men to appear for him in the field. But, unfortunately for his family, and us, (for we still feel the effects of it from the popish education his offspring got abroad) his concession came too late. He had lost the confidence of too many of his people, and a party of republicans were formed; all reasonable securities were certainly given; but, upon pretence that he could not be depended upon, his enemies prevailed on too many to insist on such conditions, as would have left him but a king in name, and unhinged the whole frame of government. Thus did the partizans of absolute monarchy on one side, and the republicans, with a parcel of crafty, ambitious men, who, for their own private views, affected that character, on the other, rend the kingdom between them, and obliged the honest, and the friends to the old constitution, to take side either with one party or other, and they were accordingly, for their moderation and desire of peace, and a legal settlement, equally despised whichever they joined with.

I shall make but one observation

more; that, though it is very false reasoning to argue from events, when referred to the decision of God, as to the matter of right in question; I cannot help being struck with observing, that though this has been a question of five hundred years standing in England, the decision of providence hath constantly been in favour of the people. If it has not been so in other countries for two hundred or two hundred and fifty years past, which is the utmost, let us investigate the causes of the difference, and act accordingly. The ancients tell us it is impossible that a brave and virtuous nation can ever be slaves, and, on the contrary, that no nation that is cowardly, or generally vitious, can be free. Let us bless God, who hath for so long a time favoured these realms. Let us act towards the family that reigns over us, as becomes free subjects, to the guardians of liberty, and of the natural rights to mankind; but above all, let us train posterity, so as to be deserving of the continuance of these blessings, that Montesquieu's prophecy may never appear to be justly founded.

"England (says he) in the course of things, must lose her liberties, and then she will be a greater slave than any of her neighbours."

The true Enjoyments of Life. From Moral Tales, &c. by Dr. Perci

val.

MAY he survive his relatives

and friends! was the imprecation of a Roman, on the person who should destroy the monument

of his ancestors*. A more dreadful curse could scarcely be denounced. I remember to have seen it somewhere recorded, that an emperor of China, on his accession to the throne, commanded a general release from the prisons, of all that were confined for debt. Amongst the number was an old man, who had been an early victim to adversity, and whose days of imprisonment, reckoned by the notches which he had cut on the door of his gloomy cell, expressed the annual revolution of more than fifty

suns.

With faultering steps he departed from his mansion of sorrow; his eyes were dazzled with the splendour of light, and the face of nature presented to his view a perfect paradise. The gaol, in which he had been imprisoned, was at some distance from Pekin; and he directed his course to that, city, impatient to enjoy the gratulations of his wife, his children, and his friends.

With difficulty he found his way to the street in which formerly stood his decent habitation; and his heart became more and more elated at every step which he advanced. He proceeded, and looked with earnestness around, but saw few of those objects with which he was formerly conversant. A magnificent edifice was erected on the site of the house which he had inhabited. The dwellings of his neighbours had assumed new forms;

and he beheld not a single face of which he had the least recollection. An aged pauper, who stood with trembling knees at the gate of a portico, from which he had been thrust by the insolent menial who attended it, struck his attention.He stopped to give him a pittance out of the bounty with which he had been supplied by the emperor's liberality; and received, in return, the sad tidings that his wife had fallen a lingering sacrifice to penury and sorrow; that his children were gone to seek their fortunes in unknown climes; and that the grave contained his nearest and most valuable friends. Overwhelmed with anguish, he hastened to the palace of his sovereign, into whose presence his hoary locks and mournful visage soon obtained admission; and casting himself at the feet of the emperor, Great prince, he cried, remand me to the prison from which mistaken mercy hath delivered me! I have survived my family and friends; and in the midst of this populous city, I find myself in dreary solitude. The cell of my dungeon protected me from the gazers at my wretchedness; and whilst secluded from society, I was less sensible of the loss of social enjoyments. I am now tortured with the view of pleasures in which I cannot participate; and die with thirst, though streams of delight surround me.

If the horrors of a dungeon, my

Fleetwood's Inscrip. Antiq.

Alexis,

Alexis, be preferred to the world at large, by the man who is bereft of his kindred and friends, how highly should you prize, how tenderly should you love, and how studious should you be to please those near and dear relations, whom a more indulgent providence has yet preserved to you? Listen to the affectionate counsels of your parents; treasure up their precepts; respect their riper judgment; and enjoy, with gratitude and delight, the advantages resulting from their society. Bind to your bosom, by the most endearing ties, your brothers and sisters; cherish them as your best companions, through the variegated journey of life; and suffer no jealousies or feuds to interrupt the harmony which now reigns, and, I trust, will ever reign in this happy family. Cultivate the friendship of your father's friends; merit the approbation of the wise and good; qualify yourself, by the acquisition of knowledge and the exercise of the benevolent affections, for the intercourse of mankind; and you will at once be an ornament to society, and derive from it the highest felicity.

the volubility and lustre of the globules of rain, that lie upon the leaves of colewort, and of other vegetables; but I dare say, you have never taken the trouble of inspecting them narrowly. Mr. Melville, a young philosopher of uncommon genius, was struck with the phenomenon, and applied his attention to the investigation of it. He discovered that the lustre of the drop is owing to a copious reflection of light, from the flattened part of its surface, contiguous to the plant; and that when the drop rolls over a part, which has been wetted, it instantly loses all its brightness, the green leaf being seen through it. From these two observations he concludes, that the drop does not really touch the plant, whilst it retains a mercurial appearance, but is suspended by the force of a repulsive power. there could not be any copious reflection of white light, from its under surface, unless there was a real interval between it and the plant. And if no contact be supposed, it is easy to account for the wonderful volubility of the drop, and why no traces of moisture are left wherever it rolls.

For

From this reasoning we may

needle is made to swim on water, it does not touch the water, but forms around it, by a repulsive power, a bed, whose concavity is much larger than the bulk of the needle. And this affords a much better explanation of the fact, than the common one, deduced from the tenacity of the water. For the needle may be well conceived to swim upon a fluid lighter than itself, since the quantity of water thus displaced,

displaced, by repulsion, must be equal to the weight of it. And this instance leads us to a just and necessary correction of the hydrostatical law, that the whole swimming body is equal in weight to a quantity of the fluid, whose bulk is equal to that of the part immersed. For it should be expressed, that the weight of the swimming body is equal to that of the weight of the quantity of fluid displaced by it.

A very ingenious friend of mine, during his residence at the university, undertook a course of experiments, to ascertain the heat or cold produced by the solution of certain substances in spirit of wine. Whenever he withdrew the thermometer from the spirit, and suspended it in the air, he uniformly observed, that the mercury sunk two or three degrees, although the spirit of wine, in which the instrument had been immersed, was even colder than the surrounding atmosphere. This fact he communicated to the professor of chemistry; who immediately suspected, that fluids by evaporation generate cold; an hy pothesis which he afterwards verified by a variety of beautiful and decisive trials.

When Sir John Pringle and Dr. Franklin were travelling together in Holland, they remarked, that the track-schuyt, or barge, in one of the stages, moved slower than usual, and enquired the reason of it. The boatman informed them, that it had been a dry season, and that the water was low in the canal. He was asked, if the water was so low that the boat touched the muddy bottom of the canal; to which he answered in the negative, adding, however, that the

difference in the quantity of water was sufficient to render the draught more difficult to the horse. The travellers, at first, were at a loss to conceive how the depth of the water could affect the motion of the boat, provided that it swam clear of the bottom. But Dr. Franklin, having satisfied himself of the truth of the boatman's observation, began to consider it attentively, and endeavoured to account for it in the following manner. The barge, in proceeding along the canal, must regularly displace a body of water, equal in bulk to the space which she occupies; and the water so removed must pass underneath, and on each side of her. Hence, if the passage, under her bottom, be straitened by the shallows, more of the water must pass by her sides, and with greater velocity, which will retard her course, because she moves the contrary way. The water, also, becoming lower behind than before the boat, she will be pressed back by the weight of its difference in height; and her passage will be obstructed by having that weight constantly to overcome.

However satisfactory this reasoning might appear to be, Dr. Franklin determined to ascertain the truth of it by experiment; deeming the subject of considerable importance to the inhabitants of a country, in which so many projects for navigable canals have been adopted. And he concludes, from many well concerted trials, the relation of which would now be tedious to you, that if four men or horses be required to draw a boat, in deep water, four leagues in four hours, five will be necessary to

draw the boat, the same distance in the same time, in shallow water. I shall give you one instance more of the advantages of sagacious attention, which may, perhaps, be more amusing to you, than those which I have recited.

A playful boy, whose business it was to open and close alternately, the communication between the boiler and the cylinder of a fire engine, perceived that this trouble might readily be saved. Whenever, therefore, he wished to be at liberty to divert himself with his companions, he tied a string from the handle of the valve, which formed the communication, to another part of the machine that was in motion; and the valve then performed its office without assistance, The boy's idleness being remarked, his contrivance soon became known, and the improvement is now adopted in every fire engine,

been for a long time regarded as gay, was not always so. The emperor Julian says of the Parisians, "I like them, because their character, like mine, is austere and serious."

The characters of nations therefore change; but at what period is the alteration most perceptible? At the moment of revolution, when a people pass on a sudden from li berty to slavery. Then from bold and haughty they become weak and pusillanimous; they dare not look on the man in office: they are inthralled, and it is of little consequence by whom they are inthralled. This dejected people say, like the ass in the fable, who. ever be my master, I cannot carry a heavier load. As much as a free citizen is zealous for the glory of his nation, so much is a slave indifferent to the public welfare. His heart, deprived of activity and energy, is without virtue, without spirit, and without talents; the faculties of his soul are stupified; he becomes indifferent to the arts, commerce, agriculture, &c. It is not for servile hands, say the English, to till and fertilise the land. Simonides entered the empire of a despotic sovereign, and found there no traces of men. A free people are courageous, open, humane, and loyal. A nation of slaves are base, perfidious, malicious, and barbarous; they push their cruelty to the greatest excess. If the severe officer has all to fear from the resentment of the injured soldier on the day of battle, that of sedition is in like manner for the slave oppressed, the long expected

day.