ignorance, equally preclude the poor. The wealthy are formed into bodies by their professions, their different degrees of opulence called ranks, their knowledge, and their small number. They necessarily, in all countries, administer government; for they alone have skill and leisure for its functions. Thus circumstanced, nothing can be more evident than their inevitable preponderance in the political scale. The preference of partial to general interests is, however, the greatest of all public evils. It should, therefore, have been the object of its laws to repress this malady; but it has been their perpetual tendency to aggravate it. Not content with the inevitable inequality of fortune, they have superadded to it honorary and political distinctions. Not content with the inevitable tendency of the wealthy to combine, they have embodied them in classes. They have fortified those conspiracies against the general interest, which they ought to have resisted though they could not disarm. Laws, it is said, cannot equalize men. No. But ought they for that reason to aggravate the inequality which they cannot cure? Laws cannot inspire unmixed patriotism; but ought they, for that reason, to foment that corporation spirit which is its most fatal enemy?-Mackintosh.

LVII.

NDOLENCE.-Inconsistent soul that man is !—languishing under wounds that he has power to heal!-his whole life a contradiction to his knowledge!-his reason, that precious gift of God to him—(instead of pouring in oil) serving but to sharpen his sensibilities, to multiply his pains, and render him more melancholy and uneasy under

nations.

Nobility is the Corinthian capital of polished states." The august fabric of society is deformed and encumbered by such Gothic ornaments. The massy Doric that sustains it is labour, and the splendid variety of arts and talents that solace and embellish life, form the decorations of life, form the decorations of its Corinthian and Ionic capitals. -Mackintosh.

R

LIX.

EFORM NEEDS AGITATION.-Power vegetates with more vigour after gentle purgings. A slender

reform amuses and lulls the people-the popular enthusiasm subsides, and the moment of effectual reform is irretrievably lost. No important political improvement was ever obtained in a period of tranquillity. The corrupt interest of the government is so strong, and the cry of the people so feeble, that it were vain to expect it. If the effervescence of the popular mind is suffered to pass away without effect, it would be absurd to expect from languor what enthusiasm has not obtained. If radical reform is not, at such a moment, procured, all partial changes are evaded and defeated in the tranquillity that succeeds. The gradual reform that arises from the presiding principle exhibited in the specious theory of Mr. Burke, is belied by the experience of all ages. Whatever excellence, whatever freedom is discoverable in governments, has been infused into them by the shock of a revolution, and their subsequent progress has been only the accumulation of abuse. It is hence that the most enlightened politicians have recognized the necessity of frequently recalling governments to their first principles.