poison of discontent. Who can say but that a wily and well-practised foreign diplomatist, may be playing the same game, but by different movements, in our own day? The cardinal knew that internal discontent and civil strife were the most effective allies of a foreign enemy. The favourite and proud boast of England, that she held the balance of power in Europe, had been put forth by her accredited agents at foreign courts with so little delicacy, that other powers, as well as France, were not altogether unwilling that the haughty Islanders should suffer the chastisement of internal convulsion, and viewed the calamities with which she was afflicted, with feelings not unallied to pleasure, not considering how infectious such examples are, and how dangerous the explosion of such volcanoes however remote.

Unnaturally repulsed by her brother, but yet undismayed, the highminded Henrietta applied to the Prince of Orange, at whose court she met with a hospitable reception. This prince, who felt like a man and a sovereign, listened to the fair applicant with the delicate and generous sympa thy which her perilous and affecting situation so strongly demanded, and had his ability equalled his inclination, effective aid might have been timely afforded. But the prince was restrained by over-ruling necessity, and it was in a very partial degree, and almost by stealth, that he could give his royal guest any assistance. The all-pervading and baneful influence of France extended itself to this quarter, to which that powerful state was too near a neighbour to be safely disregarded or incensed. The small aid which was in his power, and without making an obvious and decided demonstration, he supplied with that grace which enhances obligation, and it was by means of a vessel which he had granted to the Queen's first importunities, that her royal consort was relieved from the impotent situation he was placed in at York, after the failure of the attempt on Hull, and which enabled him to set his army in motion, and put his cause to that test on Keintown-field, which, if not attended with all the advantages expected from it, furnished proof that the loyal party, though weak in means were strong in courage and faithful devotion. The levies of the preceding

year, which were now concentrated about Oxford and the midland counties, had been wholly provided by the activity and perseverance of the Queen, and with the last recruit which it was possible to obtain or hope for, she was now doubtfully endeavouring to gain access to the Northern army, and by uniting this force with the King's, to aim at striking a blow which might restore tranquillity to them and to their dominions.

But there was an impulse which actuated this heroic Princess, more powerful far than the indignant feelings of insulted royalty, or the consequent desire of vengeance. This impulse was love--tender, faithful love! a love which, in rare exceptions, infuses its warm and animating principles into the cold compacts of royal unions, wherein the happiness of the individuals is sacrificed on the shrine of national policy, and the torch of hymen extinguished by the secret tears of the victims of diplomacy. Henrietta, although a bigot to her religion, was no Jesuit to her love

that, at least, was pure and holy, and not in the selfish or deceptive spirit of cabinets and creeds. It was this love that gale irresistible energy to every thing she attempted-threw the bright halo of hope and enthusiasm around all her actions, and which was now conducting her through stormy seas and imminent perils, to the land which, however convulsed by faction, contained all that was dear to her soul in the idolatry of the heart. Before her departure had been resolved on, it was well known that the English cruizers, which, from the defection of the Lord High Admiral, the Earl of Warwick, were, to a ship, in the interest of the parliament, had, under the command of Batten, the Vice- Admiral, been stationed in small squadrons to watch the different ports in Holland, in order to intercept her passage, should she attempt the succour of her royal consort, and it was on this account that the port of Docklum, having been ascertained to have escaped their vigilance, had been selected for the place of embarkation. Was Henrietta's love thrown away upon a barren and ungrateful soil? O! no-the profligacy of the second Charles was not inherited; his unhappy sire was faithful as he was uxorious, and capable of feeling as of inspiring a pure and lasting passion.

SIR,

At the present period, when reform is progressing with such rapid course, beginning with the high and mighty parts of the social fabric, and proceeding dowwards through all the portions of the domestic systems, from Kings and Parliaments to scavengers and climbing boys; when the schoolmaster, with broom in hand, is verifying the old adage, and sweeping clean all the dust of ages, and together with the cobwebs, demolishing in his zeal many of the ornaments rendered venerable by time, or more truly, knocking down the old pillars of the building because they are old, without preparing to replace them by new, or without their labouring under the imputation of uselessness, it would ill become me, a genuine disciple of the utilitarian school, to allow any longer time to elapse without divulging to the world a new system, which renders easy the system of governing, facilitates education, and in fact may be considered the grand desideratum in this age of renovation.

It may be necessary for me in limine to state to you, that I have, I believe, at last discovered, after years of patient research, the TO KAAON in philosophy and morals, the royal road to learning, and that by my system of instruction the most illiterate may, in an incredibly short period, attain proficiency in at least the groundwork of every sort of knowledge that man can seek for. If Government can be induced to encourage my undertaking, and to transfer the education grant from the present board to me, I shall render the whole nation so rational, such politicians and judges on the most refined questions of finance and political economy, that the Universal Suffrage must become a salutary and efficient measure.

There are to my plan none of the objectionswhich obtain against the generality of systems of education. I do not un

dertake to teach the ploughman to work by trigonometry, nor the tailor to integrate a function, in order to find the expression for a pair of inexpressibles I seek not to teach the cobler the calculus of variations, in order to fit a pair of impaired feet, nor metaphysics, to enable him to prove the mortality of the sole-I ask not to instruct the fishwife in zoology, to enable her to distinguish a mackerel from a whiting, nor the butcher comparative anatomy, in order to cut a fat steak for my dinner

no, sir, I leave such things to the Society for promoting useless knowledge, and pledge myself to you and my country to effect more practical benefit in six months than they will do in sixty years, In order to this, it is my intention, in case Mr. Stanley addresses a letter to me (to be left at Messrs. Curry and Co's, 9, Upper Sackville-street), with an offer of a handsome salary, to proceed through the country, and deliver courses of lectures on the subject of Proverbs, which are the means by which I will bring about the great change which it is my purpose to effect in the social system. At the same time, I will give a hint to Government to be immediate in their application, as in case I get no offer of assistance, I will, like the Sybil, burn my books, and consign to everlasting oblivion what money can never again purchase, and what the Tarquins of our age may uselessly deplore. As it may seem extraordinary to you how such apparently trifling means can conduce to the great ends I have in view, it will be necessary for me to state, as precisely as I may, the grounds of my presumption.

Proverbs-which may be adequately defined as the concentrated essences of the wisdom of our ancestors-have in all ages, and at all periods of the world's history, been considered the "ultimæ rationes" in logic, the arbiters from whose decision no appeal is allowed, or in fact, as the House of Lords

of scholastic disputants. Even Mr. Locke allows them this use, and acknowledges that they may serve to advance science for he says that "general maxims were not the foundations on which discoverers raised their admirable structures, nor the keys that unlockdd and opened their secrets of knowledge. Though afterwards, when schools were established, and sciences had their professors, they often made use of maxims (or proverbs), which being received as unquestionable verities, they on occasion made use of, to convince their scholars of truths in particular instances." So far does Mr. Locke give me his authority for attaching importance to maxims or proverbs; and that there are such things as first principles both of contingent and necessary truths, I do not believe any one will feel disposed to deny, now that Hume's philosophy has been so completely refuted by the labours of Reid, Stewart, and Brown: besides, according to Bishop Berkeley, it is a work well deserving of pains, to make a strict inquiry concerning the principles of knowledge, and to sift them on all sides.

With

such an host of evidence on my sidewith the sanction of so many great names, I may confidentiy claim for proverbs at least the merit of "silencing obstinate wranglers, and bringing contests to soms conclusion, and of being, like an oath for confirmation, the end of all strife." Do not suppose, Sir, that I mean,' like the Aristotelians, to lay down false axioms, and deduce conclusions from these, which serve only to retard and perplex knowledge, or that my design is to imitate their disciples, and propose questions for disputations, to be carried on by appeals to scholastic axioms, such as that of Acquinas-" Whether God loves a possible angel better than an actually existent fly. or, num chimæra bumbinuns in vacuo possit comedere secundas intentiones? No, Sir, my only intention is, by laying my foundation on those well packed morsels of learning, to enable those who furnish the intellectual ammunition of the young ideas, whom it is their "delightful task" to teach "how to shoot," by a more royal road, to arrive at the perception of truths, which by former systems could not be attained without considerable loss of time and labour.

As it would occupy too many of your pages, I cannot, in my present letter, enter as fully as I could wish into my subject. I cannot dilate on consequences which will result from the adoption of my system in its fullest extent, nor enter into a metaphysical controversy on the nature of the understanding, from which I would deduce more fully the advantages of my system. I will, therefore, take up the more popular part of it, and by an inductive argument prove the advantages of proverbs, and also expose a few of the abuses to which they are subject.

Do misfortunes come upon us "like a cloudl"-Do dangers and difficulties, encircle us on every side? or do we lie upon a bed of sickness, suffering all the ills that flesh is heir to, writhing, perhaps, under the agonies of what one of our high civic authorities called tic toorletoo, or cursing that last bin of claret, which has given us an intolerable cholic; or do our dearest friends drop out and bailiffs drop in, for the kind purpose of saving useless expenditure, by giving us gratitous accommodation in one of his Majesty's reception houses. Some kind and warmhearted acquaintance then visits us, and having satisfied his curiosity, and obtained materials for a good story at his next dinner-party, takes his leave, with "Well, my dear fellow, keep up your spirits, it's well it's no worse, and 'twill be all the same in a hundred years."

If some Van Twiller of a friend refuses to assist us when harrassed by tailors, washerwomen, or other adhesive billstickers; or when reduced to the extremity of limiting ourselves to Sunday recreation, and of accounting for our abeence from evening parties by "New Magazine," " Article on Foreign Affairs," "Free Trade Question," "Solicitations of Editor," while he, poor easy man, hardly knows of our existence, and would as soon think of extracting marrow from paving stones as political economy from our brains; and if we are at last compelled to write to some attached friend or very humble servant, for even a half-crown to purchase perchance our hebdomedal repast, he justifies himself in the refusal by the ten times told and worn-out tale of "thoughtless extravagance covering a man with rags," and conjures up the images of departed sovereigns by

"Amici vitia si feras facis tua," vainly supposing that he is acting according to the advice of Plutarch, “ns où TOV ἄνδρα μισῶν, αλλα την πραξιν ἀΰοδοκιμαζων,” while he is making our unfortunate body suffer for crimes of which it was only the instrument, and thereby evincing personal hostility towards us as well as towards our misdemeanours. If some profligate spendthrift have represented to him the folly of bartering his peace of mind and health of body for the pleasures of an hour, and the absurdity of wasting time and opportunities in pursuits as profitless as they are irrational, and as devoid of real pleasure as they are absurd, he replies with an oath that he must "do at Rome as Rome does," and proceeds to the midnight revel, satisfied that there are as great fools in the world as he is, and that a proverb sanctions his imitation of them.

When religion is chosen in any society as the subject of conversation, and its truth demonstrated, or its sanctions discussed; when the advantages attendant on its progress through the world are pointed out, and the consequent importance of national scriptural education is enforced, some objector immediately starts up, and by the use of phrases, if not proverbial, at least disguised under the form of proverbs, and received as such by that very extensive portion of mankind who abhor the labour of thinking, and prefer adopting the cant of a party, at once refutes his antagonist by asserting "that truth and falsehood, in such cases, are merely dependent on the circumstances of time and place;" in fact, that longitude and latitude are their best criterions, opinion varying as these do, their only standard being expediency; he then proceeds with his sapient reasoning by the observation that "many men, many minds," and concludes with a phillippic against enthusiasts and zealots; including the importance of universal benevolence and toleration; the advantage of letting every one follow his own course in morals and religion; and then walks out of the room with the proverb of "the nearer the church the farther from God."

In politics, if consistency be applauded, or political honor advocated, as essential to the well-being of society; if truckling for place and power be reprobated, and held up to public scorn;

if that base and servile spirit which, to retain ministerial rank, prostitutes the executive part of the constitution to the leaders of a priest-driven people, or the mobs of political unions, be condemned; if the successor of Pitt be ridiculed for "licking the dust before a barber's feet," and requesting this dispenser of "promotion and power" to watch his conduct, and not to fail, whenever he saw this sapient chancellor acting wrong, to inform him of his misconduct, and school him in all his acts; if, in fine, that spirit be reprobated which will swear to-day only to forswear to-morrow; which promises retrenchment and practises profusion; preaches non-interference with foreign states, yet, on the first opportunity, violates the pledge without even a shadow of cause; which attempts to restore the constitution, and effects its overthrow; which governs without patronage, yet advances to place and pension only its own creatures; which disclaims nepotism, and promotes only the allied dunces of its own faction; which, in a word, promises anything and performs nothing, unless the latter be likely to prove beneficial to the country; the solution of all these inconsistencics is at once] afforded by the proverb, "Lucri bonus est odor ex re qualibet ;" and the individual actors in the farce satisfy themselves by Sancho's proverb, "that get is a good dog, but hold-fast is a better."

So far have I shown some of the abuses to which proverbs have been subject in the world; I have shown that in general society, in religion, morals, and politics, they are appealed to as sufficient excuses for folly, immorality, and scepticism; and that in politics statesman are not ashamed, if not openly grounding their defence, on an appeal to them, of yet acting in such a manner, that a dependance on these much abused guides is the only mode of explaining their inconsistencies. We are fully assured of their value at contested elections, where the "bird in the hand being worth two in the bush," has decided many a dubious voter, and when the proverbial fragility of promises has satisfied the conscience of many a doubter, who preferred the immediate certainty of advancement to the contingent possibility of his former friend's being restored to place, and who has found more satisfaction in the