to Mr Cobbett's fundamental measure of reform, and the reasons for which we must resist any attempt to remove all placemen or other dependants of the Executive from Parliament, or to exclude altogether the interference of great families in elections. We think, a certain infusion of these elements in that assembly essential to the existence of our mixed government; and should consider the accomplishment of such a reform as Mr Cobbett contends for, as the signal for its instant destruction.

With regard to the interference of peers in elections, it is evidently impossible to prevent it by any statutory or authoritative regulation and as, in fact, it is not very different from the interference of wealthy commoners, it is needless to say any thing more on the subject. With regard to placemen, however, we may be indulged with a few words more. Although excluded from Parliament, this suspicious order of persons would still exist; and, as, they would still possess the highest rank, dignity and emolument in the nation, their situation would still be the great object both of generous and of sordid ambition. To say that Parliament would have no concern with them, and that the King might change or appoint them, without producing any sensation in the Legislature, is mere raving or drivelling, and is scarcely entitled to an answer. Parliament, from a sense of duty, would be bound to take a concern in all such nominations; and would be still more sure to take such a concern, from motives of interest, party, or attachment. It would be bound upon some occasions, and entitled upon all, to vote thanks to the retiring ministers, and to declare that they were enemies to the country who had advised his Majesty to displace them; nay, they might petition against any one appointment, and might withhold the supplies till their petition was granted. They would have the means of interfering, therefore, in every such appointment, and in every act of the government, just as effectually as at present; and it cannot require many words to show, that they would have exactly the same inducements. Though placemen could not be members of Parliament on this new system, members of Parliament, it is presumed, might be still transmuted into placemen; and if Parliament had the same power to embarrass and controul the Executive as now, it is easy to see that there would be just the same scramble and competition for such appointments among the members of Parliament, which exists at the present moment. The only difference would be, that the scramble would be conducted in a good degree by underlings and deputies, whom each set of ministers would leave successively to fight their battles, when they themselves took flight to the higher regions of office. Ambitious men would then fight for their places by hirelings of an inferior description; and the ambition which now brings the lof

tiest talents of the country into open competition in that public assembly, would confine them, in a good degree, to the more dangerous and uncontroulable intrigues of the Cabinet, and leavethe Legislature to a secondary and more ignoble breed of combatants, who would struggle for their respective chieftains in that degraded arena. It is needless, after this, to enlarge upon the absurdity of denying a place in the great legislative assembly to the official advisers of the Sovereign, or upon any of the other inconveniences which would evidently result from such an arrangement. Mr Cobbett and his associates only call for the exclusion of placemen from Parliament, as the means of preventing its members from scrambling for office or emolument; but it is evident, that such an exclusion would have no tendency to produce this effect. It would degrade the Legislature, without pu rifying it in the smallest degree. It is needless, therefore, to enlarge on the dangers of the remedy; for no one, surely, will insist upon taking it, if it be proved to be quite inefficacious.

But, though we think the actual balance of the constitution requires the exercise of royal and aristocratical influence in the House of Commons, we do by no means intend to assert, that there may not be too much of that influence. Though we wish always to see placemen, and expectant placemen, as well as the members and clients of noble families, in that House, we are perfectly aware, that there may be too many of that description. We wish to see them there to preserve the balance of the constitution, but it may be destroyed by their excess, as well as by their exclusion; and we have no objection to concede to Mr Cobbett, or to any one else, that there is at present great reason for apprehension, and for caution as to this particular.

We are not much afraid of the influence of noble families. It is not, in general, a debasing or ungenerous influence; and, in this country, there is so little of the oppressive, tyrannical spirit of some aristocracies, that we have really no apprehension at all from the prevalence of such a temper in our Government. An English peer has scarcely any other influence than an English gentleman of equal fortune; and scarcely any other interest to maintain it. The whole landed interest, including the Peerage, is scarcely a match for, the monied interest, either in Parliament or in society; and, as it is the basis of a more steady and permag nent, as well as a more liberal and exalted dependency, we wish rather to see peers concerned in elections, than stockjobbers or nabobs. The evil and the danger is from the multitude of places and of placemen; not so much from their having places in Parliament, as from their actual existence, and the enormous amount of the patronage which is necessarily vested in some of those functionaries, over which Parliament has an unlimited controul,

We

traffic, to the indignation of Mr Cobbett, without any qualification. But we are by no means certain that its consequences are fo extremely injurious to the conftitution as he appears to imagine. A venal borough is a borough which Government has not bought; and which may therefore be bought by Mr Cobbett, or any other independent man. When a feat in Parliament is advertized for fale, a pretty fair competition, we think, is opened to politicians of all defcriptions. The independent and well affected part of the nation is far richer than the government, or the peerage; and if all feats in parliament could be honeftly and openly fold for ready money, we have no fort of doubt that a very great majority would be purchafed by perfons unconnected with the Treasury, or the House of Lords. Wealth is one of the democratical elements in this trading and opulent country; and an arrangement which gave it more immediate political efficacy, probably would not be at all unfavourable to that part of our conftitution.

The great objection, on the other hand, is, that no honourable man will purchase a seat, and that those who do pay money for one, may be presumed to intend to make money by it, and to sell themselves the first good opportunity. The first observation sounds plausible; and yet every body knows it not to be true. There certainly are many men whose private honour is unimpeachable, who sit for venal boroughs. How this is managed we do not exactly know. Whether the end is thought to sanctify the means, or whether the frequency of the transaction has legalized it in the ideas of the world, like the orchard.thefts of schoolboys, and the plunder of Border chieftains of old ;—or whether the seat is bought for the young patriot, as the living is bought for the young priest, while they themselves are kept pure from the stain of bribery or simonywe really do not pretend to understand. With regard to the other conclusion, that when the seat is bought, the sitter must mean to be sold, it is as certainly at variance with fact, and has a smaller share of probability. The most moderate contest will generally cost more than the dearest borough in the market; and as, in trying times, contests will be very frequent, it must be the most economical and prudent way for a patriotic party to provide for as many as they can by purchase, before they try the more costly and honourable road of open competition. On the whole, however, we have no great affection for rotten boroughs; but chiefly, because we think that the practice of purchasing them tends to abate the love of liberty, and the pride of independence among the people; and that it is to their feelings, and not to the composition of the Legislature, that we must always look for the fountain and vital spring of our freedom.

Upon

Upon the whole, we hope we have said something to justify our love of our actual constitution our aversion to Mr. Cobbett's schemes of reform-and our indignation at his attempts to weaken the respect and attachment of the people to forms and establishments, without which, we are persuaded, there would be no security for their freedom. To some among the higher classes of our readers, an apology may appear to be requisite for the time and attention we have bestowed on a writer of this description. The higher orders of society, however, we are afraid, are but little aware, either of the great influence which such a writer possesses, or of the extent to which many of his sentiments prevail among the middling classes of the community. In his contempt for the Legislature, and his despair of public virtue or energy, Mr Cobbett, we believe, has rather followed than fashioned the impressions of those for whom his publications are intended. There is a very general spirit of discontent, distrust, and contempt for public characters, among the more intelligent and resolute portion of the inferior ranks of society. We can see, as well as Mr Cobbett, the seeds of a revolution in the present aspect and temper of the nation; and though we look forward to it, we trust, with other feelings and other dispositions, we are not the less sensible of the hazard in which we are placed. We anticipate little from such an event, but general degradation and misery; we have stepped beyond the limits of our duty, to express our horror at the suggestion; and have contributed our feeble aid to rouse or to undeceive those who may have been misled by different anticipations. At the same time, we cannot be blind to the tendency of public opinion; and are afraid that, in the event of any great emergency or disaster, no reasonings, and no motives of prudence, will be sufficient to uphold the established forms of the constitution, unless some effort be made on the part of public men to wipe off the imputations which are now thrown upon their characters, to show that, in a great crisis, they can forget party, and prejudice, and self-interest, and that they have either talents to form plans adequate to the emergency, and resolution to carry them into execution, or magnanimity to retire from a situation, to the duties of which they are unequal, and to give place to those, upon whose firmness and prudence and talents the nation can rely with assurance. We do not think that this would be done, by making Sir Francis Burdett first Lord of the Treasury, and Mr Horne Tooke secretary for the Home Department. But much must be done, and more desisted from,-before they and their advocates are disarmed of their most effectual means of delusion.

ART.

ART. X. Qüestiones Criticas sobre varios Puntos de Historia Economica, Politica y Militar. Su autor D. Antonio de Capmany. 8vo. pp. 305, Madrid. 1807.

N° o opinion has been more universally received by political writers, than that Spain was once a rich, populous, and commercial kingdom; and many ingenious and plausible theories have been proposed, to account for its decline. The expulsion of the Jews and Moriscoes ;-the discovery and conquest of America; the foreign and domestic wars, in which for more than two centuries the Spanish monarchy was continually engaged ;the religious bigotry and intolerance of its government;-the excessive number and pernicious influence of its clergy;--the abject and debasing superstition of its subjects;-the oppressive and ruinous system of taxation established in the greater part of its provinces ;-the monopolies and other restraints on commerce, which narrow views of interest and mistaken calculations of profit have dictated to its rulers ;-its vexatious and intermeddling, though weak and inefficient, police, which harasses and torments, without protecting or defending the people ;-and, lastly, the want of security for the liberty and property of the subject, in a country where individuals are liable to exile and imprisonment, without even the form of a trial;-where the course of justice, always slow and uncertain, is sometimes openly infringed by interpositions of royal authority, and still oftener secretly perverted by private intrigues and solicitations ;-and where the necessities of a prodigal, unprincipled court, lead to arbitrary exactions and irregular means of supply, which are happily unknown in the rest of Europe, the dominions of Turkey only excepted :Such are the causes to which the decline of Spain has been attributed And it must be confessed, that, in a country where grievances like these exist, arts and civilization cannot advance, nor the state keep pace with the progress of other nations which possess a better form of government, or enjoy, at least, a more wise and equitable administration of affairs.

:

The spectacle of a great, powerful and opulent nation, reduced to weakness, poverty and contempt, by the vices of its government, presents a curious and instructive, though melancholy object of contemplation. But, to judge fairly and without exaggeration, of so lamentable a reverse of fortune, we must not rest satisfied with ascertaining the existence, but must inquire into the extent of the calamity. What was the state of Spain, it may be asked, before the evils of a bad government were felt in the conduct of its affairs? What evidence have we that there has

been