parliamentary reform, that the popular voice may yet be heard, and it is also acknowledged by many who call themselves tories, that the representation is not so fair as it might, and as it should be: but with the latter there is a fear, and I acknowledge it not altogether unfounded, that the democratic ascendency may become too great. The people, using the term in its best sense, want more advocates in the senate; they need men whose principles are sound in policy, and whose persons are not under ministerial influence. Every such man is an acquisition-an important addition to the real strength of the nation. You, my Lord, are most excellently adapted to fill your place in the House of Lords upon this groundyou are independent of ministers, you have a name which needs not the embellishment of a higher title-your pleasures, as far as I know or have heard, are not expensive, and as you have not disdained to employ your pen on the ordinary condition of plebeian writers, you have in that a mine of honorable wealth. You have nothing about you that should make you a demagogue you have more of Coriolanus than of Gracchus in your constitution-you might interpose between the court and the mob-you might control the one, and could oppose the other. Of course you would be subject to have your name branded in "John Bull;" but you can despise a court poet, and you would be above noticing the idle calumnies of a Sunday newspaper. Pursuing an independent line of conduct, you might perhaps please no party-so much the better; you would benefit all. You might be treated by the tories as a radical, and reproached by the radicals as an advocate of half measures, as a false friend, and a trimmer between the court and the public; but you have shown yourself in early youth, unmoved by the severity of impertinent criticism, and surely you might learn in your maturer years, to despise the clamors of a mob, and to be above the contempt of court sycophants. You have shown yourself too powerful for your literary critics, and you could as easily vanquish your political critics. You could always have something to say for yourself. You might ensure attention in the House, you could command it out of doors. And as you have compelled those who despised your first poetical attempts, to give unqualified praise to your after exertions, so in like manner you could bring to your side those who might at first oppose your political endeavours. What a field for glorious exertion lies before you !—what laurels might you not reap in this new field, this untried region for your talents! Would it not also be an advantage to you, that you should yourself be on the spot where the calumnies that are raised against you have their birth? Your power might then strangle them in their infancy; the public mind would not have time to digest them before they were refuted. You are now at so great a dis

tance that you cannot reply to an accusation before it has circulated over the kingdom; your vindication is tardy, and loses its power by length of time. At home your character might be understood, your fame might be vindicated. Surely you could tolerate our cloudy sky and foggy atmosphere; the bright soul is its own sunshine, the mind is its own place.

Among other grounds of anticipating a revolution, are our financial embarrassments. To these you are now in a measure contributing. It must be to an ingenuous mind a painful thought to contribute in the slightest degree to the evils of a revolution; and, to say nothing of your own part in it, may not your example have some little weight? Return to your country, and give a specimen of what the conduct of a patriotic nobleman should be. Let your fellow peers see that true dignity is not measured by an idle retinue, or by expensive pleasures; let public business be your pleasure, and you will find imitators. Let the people see that true respectability is in the due discharge of duty. What will be the value of your property, whether in the public funds, or from landed property, in case of a revolution arising from public necessities? Your fine genius will not exempt you from confiscation— your splendid poetry will not save you from the general ruin, and the more extensive your property, the more tempting to the hand of rapine.

In short, what motive can keep you abroad that does not more powerfully urge your return? You are not indifferent to England; your works proclaim your interest in it, and your very expressions of contempt contradict themselves by their own bitterness; you could never write so eloquently upon a subject for which you had no concern. There are no pleasures abroad which you might not enjoy here. Society in its highest rank of station or talent you could have here. Reputation and literary fame you might more quickly gather and more keenly relish in this country: and to all your other pleasures you might add that supreme and commanding one-the satisfaction that you were acting an honorable and useful part to your fellow citizens.

It has been stated in the public journals, that your Lordship is about to receive from this country two coadjutors, with whose assistance you are about to commence a periodical publication. Is it possible!-it cannot be. There are men enough for works of this nature, and your talents would be wasted upon such an idle speculation. The world must be at a loss to find you employment, if it attributes such a design to you. Your duties, as a member of the House of Lords, would not be half so irksome, and your reward for the due discharge of those duties would be a tenfold addition to your reputation. Do not let posterity have to say VOL. XIX. NO. XXXVIII. *Z

Pam.

of you, that while your country was struggling at home amidst political difficulties, you were wasting your precious time and your powerful talents in literary speculations abroad. You have done enough to make your name stand high among wits-do something to make it look glorious among lords, and reputable among patriots. You have done enough for booksellers, do something for history. Your name has been sufficiently hackneyed by critics, let it now be a theme for those who in after times shall talk of the great spirits to whom Britain is indebted for the preservation of its liberties.

Your Lordship's

most obedient, &c.

CHRISTIANITY

INTERESTED IN

THE DISMISSAL OF MINISTERS.

A

VINDICATION OF THE PEOPLE

FROM THE

CHARGE OF BLASPHEMY,

AND A

DEFENCE OF THE FREEDOM OF THE PRESS.

IN SIX LETTERS, ADDRESSED TO

W. WILBERFORCE, ESQ., M. P.,

AND THE RELIGIOUS PUBLIC.

BY CHRISTOPHILUS.

[Continued from No. XXXVII. p. 199.]

"Methinks I see in my mind a noble and puissant nation rousing herself like a strong man after sleep, and shaking her invincible locks: methinks I see in her an eagle muing her mighty youth, and kindling her undazzled eyes at the full mid-day beam; purging and unskaling ter long abused sight at the fountain itself of heavenly radiance; while the whole noise of timorous and flocking birds, with those also that love the twilight, flutter about amazed at what she means, and in their envious gabble would prognosticate a year of sects and schisms."

MILTON'S Speech for the Liberty of the Press.

SECOND EDITION.

[Altered and corrected exclusively for the Pamphleteer.]

VOL. XIX.

LONDON:-1821.

Pam. NO. XXXVIII.

2 A

THIS

Humble Aindication

OF THE

PEOPLE AND THE PRESS,

IS INSCRIBED ΤΟ ΤΗΣ

LORDS AND "COMMONS"

OF THE

UNITED KINGDOM,

BY

ONE OF THE PEOPLE.

LETTER IV.

AS TO THE REAL QUANTITY AND QUALITY OF THE "BLASPHEMY" WHICH ACTUALLY HAS GONE FORTH TO THE PEOPLE THROUGH THE MEDIUM OF THE PRESS; WHAT MEANS HAVE BEEN USED BY THESE MINISTERS FOR ITS DISCOVERY AND SUPPRESSION; AND A BRIEF CONTRAST OF ITS AMOUNT WITH THE AMAZING MASS OF RELIGIOUS PUBLICATION IN THE SAME PERIOD.

"Some generals of old have endeavoured to take towns by treachery, by corrupting some of the garrison; and they have done it several ways. Some have sent of their own men as fugitives into the town, thereby to put them into credit and authority with the enemy, and give them opportunity to betray them. Some by this means have discovered the strength of the garrison, and by that discovery have taken the town."-Nicholas Machiavel's Art of War, chap. vii. To corrupt a garrison, and take it by treachery.

SIR,

I HAVE before admitted the existence of irreligious publications to a certain extent; and I had almost said that I did not regret their existence, for the sake of the striking contrast they afford to the cotemporaneous zeal for the support of Christianity. The comparative insignificancy also of the numbers and effect of these publications, proves the distaste of the public mind for infidelity more incontestably than could have been effected in any other way. There are, however, very peculiar circumstances attending what I should term their forced circulation; for certain I am, that no appearances warranted even a suspicion that they were welcome in any corner of the kingdom.