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Every man who reads this paffage will fee, that in its ftyle, its fentiment, and its mode of reafoning, it is -addressed exclusively to the populace, its favourite readers; and that the writer ftudies to avail himself of the prejudices, and to abuse the ignorance, of the lower orders. This is the argument with which the Jacobins wrought upon the paffions of the Parifian Poiffardes. It was with the fame weapon the Jacobins of England fought to produce a revolution here. Men placed at the very bottom of fociety, whofe minds are without cultivation, and whofe hands are daily employed in procuring food and raiment, will be too apt to examine a Prime Minister by their own wants. They will be apt to place his ambition in a fine fuit of clothes, or a good dinner; and make the Minifter exclaim, in the words of the hero in the farce of The Tailors,

"If fate but favour us, our future days

Shall roll in peace, and luxury, and cafe,

And all be crown'd with punch, with pork, with pease." This revolutionary cant must not, however, be dif miffed thus lightly. The writer fays he has read a lift of four Cabinet dinners in one day, and from thence he infers, that the life of the Minifters is one round of feafting, gluttony, and diffipation, to the injury and neglect of public bufinefs. When a member of the Cabinet invites to dinner a party, generally including fome of his colleagues in office,' it is called a Cabinet dinner. There are, we believe, eight Cabinet Minifters; and we grant it very poffible, that four of them may have entertained fome friends upon the fame day; but is any man, therefore, to infinuate to the poor and hungry, that the Cabinet Minifters dined four times in one day? or, that a Cabinet dinner is a ne plus ultra of luxury and gluttony, blunting all the mental faculties of the hoft, and totally difqualifying him and his guests for public bufinefs? If a Cabinet

dinner.

dinner be, in fact, only an ordinary dinner, we see no crime, unless it be one to dine every day. The new Ministers have not been fufficiently long in office to have committed any political fins, which they are called upon to expiate in fackcloth and afhes, in penitence and prayer.-We fee no good reason why they thould abjure a good coat, or enter a Cabinet as they would enter a convent, folemnly renouncing all the good things of the world, which they poffeffed before. This enemy of good dinners, in the Jacobin print, this advocate for cucumber times, is probably a pupil of Mr. Ritfon. "Flesh-eatings," fays that gentleman, "by clogging and cloying men's bodies, render their very minds and intellects grofs likewise; for it is well known, that wine, and flesh-eating, make the body strong and lufty, but the mind weak and feeble." We queftion, however, whether Mr. Ritfon, if he was a loyal man, would not have foregone his regimen in the cafe of the prefent Minifters. It has been objected to Mr. Fox, that he is too pacific and mild; that he will tamely bear the infults of Bonaparte, and lick the hand that ftrikes him. Now, according to the advocates for vegetable diet, animal food makes men furious, and fond of fighting; and, confequently, a good dinner of English roaft beef muft correct, in the cafe of Mr. Fox, the over-tamenefs of his difpofition; it muft infpire him with military ardour, and make him defpife all the difficulties in the way of a march to Paris, of a catamaran enterprife, or of any other valiant fcheme, meditated by his predeceffors in office.

NEW OPPOSITION.

[From the Morning Chronicle.]

MR. EDITOR,

EVERY man muft hail the organization of the New Oppofition as an important event in political history, and particularly as a feasonable relief to that uniformity

of

of talent which was expected to pervade our parliamentary debates. Much praife likewife is due to the gentlemen who have enlifted in this new corps, for the willingness they exprefs to inftruct the Ministry in their duty. Having but an indifferent opinion of the faid Ministry, how good is it of them to begin with the fimpleft mode of inftruction-that of catechifing ; and how tenderly and parent-like do they conduct this business, by asking first the most fimple and childish questions! Doubtlefs, as they advance, they will proceed to fubjects more and more difficult, and perhaps incomprehenfible.

Befides, Mr. Editor, this new method of tutoring a miniftry is entitled to our praise on another account. It is extremely difinterested; for I defy one of the Oppofition to ask a question that has not a direct tendency to criminate himself.

April 3.

I am, Sir, yours,

PUNCTUM INTERROGATIONIS.

MR. R-SE's WIT!!!

[From the Morning Herald.]

WHATEVER certain political fceptics may have fneeringly infinuated to the contrary-that Mr. R-fe is become a wit, and even of the first water, no one will be hardy enough now to deny. How he became fo, may puzzle an ordinary understanding to account for. Those who recollect his pious ejaculations of "I vow to God!" and " God be my judge!" &c. naturally afk, why a luminous mind, that thus derived its parliamentary morals by divine inspiration, might not receive his parliamentary wit from the fame fource alfo? Although this opinion is certainly favoured, and moft fervently believed, by Mr. W, and the whole host of faints, the fact turns out, that the wit

of

of the Right Honourable Orator, it must be confeffed, has not been derived from fo pure a fource.

When the present Miniftry stepped fo unexpectedly into the shoes of the cafhiered fervants of the Crown, Mr. R-se fhrewdly conceived, that they muft of neceffity throw off a few of their old habits; and therefore he looked out in time to pick up fomething from their threadbare wardrobe, that might fit a little gracefully upon his own perfon, in the new character of an Oppofitionist. It struck his whimsical fancy to keep an eye on Sheridan, and watch what garment this waggith wolf would throw off preparatory to his drefs in fheep's clothing and in this fpeculation he fucceeded; for no fooner did he behold the modern Congreve doff his last pair of blue and buff breeches, than he fnatched them up, and flided into them with an adroitnefs that escaped perception! The effect was marvellously electrical! A thrilling glow flushed through every vein, and a cacoethes of the most felicitous kind was the immediate confequence:-a cacpethes, not like that which is felt by a Hampfbire hog, when over-gorged with peas! -it was no itch for fcratching, or clawing confiitutionally, for place, profit, or penfion; but an itch for fupremacy in wit and attic elocution-

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To what a tranfcendant height so natural a genius has reached, thus magically wrought upon, the world has recently witneffed in his fublime flight of fancy, and matchless antithelis, on pig iron and pigs teats! It has, indeed, been wafpifhly objected, by the jealoufy of Mr. C-nn-g," that the idea was pitifully stolen from a pane in a print-fhop window." Surely this pert Etonian need not be told, that the balloon that foars the highest, derives its power from gas extracted from the most grofs materials!-In fhort, the

VOL. X.

1

wit

170 ON THE DEATH OF THE DS. OF DEVONSHIRE. wit of the Right Honourable Orator has blazed forth fo like a liquid deluge of iron ore, that it is but right to caution His Majefty's new Minifters to keep as much as poffible out of the fiery torrent of its courfe!!!

MEM. The old blue and buff breeches, on the Right Honourable Orator's return home, were difcovered by the handmaid who has the fuperintendance of those concerns, not to be fo correctly clofed in one part, as common decorum might require; but as this arofe merely from the accidental fpringing of a button, by energetic action, an additional one has been affixed, to preferve the decent coftume of that quarter in future!

ON THE DEATH OF THE DUCHESS OF

WH

DEVONSHIRE.

[From the Morning Poft.]

WHERE Thames, in whirly dimples flowing,
Steals by Chifwick's bloffom'd grove;

*

On flowers reclin'd, with Bacchus glowing,

I invoke my lyre to love.

But, as I touch the breathing fhell,

A fighing murmur floats around;
Amaz'd, I ftrike a louder fwell,

With louder fighs the chords refound:
The groaning foreft waves;
The hills, and hollow caves,
Their melting griefs proclaim:

While, from his oozy bed,
Old Thames erects his head,

And fighs Georgiana's name.

Then come, fair nymphs, with fragrant flowers,
Come, and deck Georgiana's farine;
Bring bloffoms pluck'd from Paphian bowers;
Rofes dropping tears of wine:

* A favourite feat of the Duchefs.

Pluck

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