place, he is describing a conduct obviously corrupt, he is drawing a picture essentially bloody; his colouring must therefore be suited to the subject, and he who blames Macchiavelli because the virtuous sentiments of The Discourses are not found in The Prince, might reproach Guido Reni for not having painted his ethereal figure of Fortune on the same canvas with his Massacre of the Innocents. Besides that, he himself hints, that it might have been dangerous to express his opinions freely. "A certain Prince," says he, "of these times, whom it is not well to name (il quale non e bene nominare) always preaches," &c. What, however, appears to be the chief source of misapprehension, is, that in the midst of these bad principles are occasionally given the soundest maxims of policy, the enumeration of which seems to confound the good with the profligate. But if Macchiavelli undertook to delineate a bad Prince, the truth of history, the consistency of character, obliged him to write thus. The most profligate Prince that ever wore a crown must often act honestly, or his empire is lost. Such is the homage which vice itself is obliged to pay to honour, that even crime finds safety behind the mask of virtue. A government which should uniformly defy the rules of good faith and honesty, would perish in its own corruption. The virtues adhere to and strengthen each other, but the vices are completely centrifugal, and a faithless government undermines itself while it betrays others. When Plato assumes the easy useless task of describing a fictitious republic, he finds no difficulty in making good characters which exist only in fancy, nor in prescribing rules of government perfectly just and perfectly impracticable. When Aristotle,* a much more acute politician, describes the causes of revolutions, and the means by which different governments support themselves, he states, with a precision which to some appears to detract from the originality of the Florentine, the vices, and the deceptions by which tyrants maintain their power. When Macchiavelli with greater depth and detail pursues the same inquiry, he is forced to show that if tyrants do violate some of the great moral rules of duty, their very existence requires that they must often feel the reality or possess the resemblance of virtue.

But whatever were his views, the merits of his works are to be appreciated by their effect on society. His particular interests, his own purposes, if he had any in the composition, have long since perished with him, and to posterity nothing has survived but the clear exposition, the lucid image of the vices and the artifices of tyrants. Far from teaching the means of oppression, such a development can only serve to alarm society for its safety. It is indeed questionable, whether a despot was ever formed by study, since the power which lifts him beyond control, secures the passions from the approach of abstract specu

Aristotle, Politics, particularly. B. 5.

lation. The advice which might influence would be whispered by obsequious counsellors. But to publish the secret movements of despotism, is to reveal its atrocity; to show how tyrants govern, is to invite mankind to detest, or instruct them to oppose usurpation.

Σ.

SKETCHES OF AMERICAN SCENERY-FOR THE PORT FOLIO.

CASCADE CREEK unites itself with the Susquehanna about a mile to the south of that part of the northern boundary line of Pennsylvania, through which the river passes on its first entrance into this State. The Creek is, in general, rapid, and derives its name from a fine Cascade of about sixty feet in height, of which we have given a sketch. This is about half a mile above the mouth of the Creek, the banks or cliffs of which are so abrupt on both sides, that the inquisitive traveller is obliged to wade a considerable part of the way in the water, before he can reach the Cascade, the beauty of which will amply reward his toil. At this place the rock is composed of horizontal strata of great regularity, over which the water, catching in its descent, falls in a broken sheet of foam. The banks of the Creek, above the Cascade, are skirted with the hemloc spruce, (Pinus-Abies Americana) which, though a tree of little value for its timber, adds greatly, in the painter's eye, to the pictiresque beauty of the scene.

R. H. R.

FOR THE PORT FOLIO.

ANALYSIS OF ANTONY'S SPEECH.-No. I.

THAT "too much familiarity begets contempt," has long been received as a sound maxim in the business of social intercourse; and Goldsmith justly recommends a certain degree of ceremonious respect even among the most intimate friends. The principle of this sentiment extends itself over every thing that is the object of pleasure or pain; of desire or aversion. Whatever we become familiar with loses, by a con

stant and unrestrained use, the stronger features of its character, and ceases to produce either the gratifications or disgusts, the reverence or contempt at first excited by it. Calculating on this principle of our nature, governments, the most tyrannical, and systems of religion, the most odious and absurd, have, in various ages, wrapt themselves in the holiness of mystery, and maintained an empire by distance and concealment, which would have been dissipated by the power of light. It is our misfortune, that not only bad things discover their deformities by a near approach to them, but the good also lose the respect which is due to them, by becoming too cheap and common. How much of the wisdom and sublimity spread over the pages of the Scriptures is disregarded and lost by the abuse of them in schools? How much is the reverence they should always command banished, by daily seeing their leaves strewed over the floor of a school-room, and trampled upon with wanton indifference? The finest combinations of language, the very offspring of inspiration, become irrecoverably degraded in our estimation, when they come first to our knowledge from the lips of stammering children, or the mouthing of a pedagogue, incapable of perceiving, enjoying, or communicating their excellence.

In order to exercise and improve boys in the art of speaking, collections, of celebrated passages, have been made, with great taste too, from the most eminent writers in our language. Shakspeare and Milton, Dryden and Pope have each undergone this torture; and, if they could now take a peep into a grammar school, at morning recitations, they would be exceedingly amused or enraged, as the humour of the moment might be. The tutor, with scrupulous attention, directs his instructions to a careful observance of the stops. Mind, boys-count one at a comma; one, two, at a semicolon, and so on; and this is called the Art of Speaking: but as to the sentiment conveyed, or the genius displayed by the author, as they are to be scanned by no rule of grammar, it comes not within the duty of the teacher to understand or communicate them. A boy thus acquires a habit of reading and repeating the most sublime compositions, with no other object than to fix the words in his memory, and mark the artificial divisions of their parts, without discovering or seeking their beauties, or feeling their power. If he does not say,

"My name is Norval on the Grampion hills,"

it is only because he sees a stop after Norval, and not because it would be absurd to read it so, even if the stop were not there; and thus he is taught. For should he read it as above, his teacher would probably correct him by drawing his attention to the stop, and not by showing him what nonsense he had made of it. The mischief does not end here. However crude and premature the opinion thus formed of a composition must