ject was purely British; and in the same page he accuses Ministers of mak; ing no attempt upon Boulogne. Does he then mean, that to have attacked Boulogne would not have been an object purely British? And would it have been an evidence of disinterested policy, after arming the Continent against France, to have confined our exertions exclusively to our own security?

"To counsel an expedition against Boulogne, to dissuade the speedy conquest of Bavaria, to recommend the landing of bodies of British troops necessarily detached and unsupported, in Holland, in the north of France, and in Lombardy, are propositions so radically erroneous, as to prove a total ignorance of tactics in those who have composed this Inquiry. To a literary man, it is no, reproach to have omitted to study a subject foreign to his usual pursuits; but why does Mr. Fox lend his sanction to a work replete with such fallacious views? The conclusion must be, that this far-famed statesman is unacquainted with the causes which decide the fate of battles and the issue of campaigns. When he relies on a defence so frail as an armed peasantry; when he countenances the recommendation of detached operations in the heart of the country of an enemy so fatally active as the French; and above all, when he makes light of the danger of invasion, without explaining the grounds of his security, except in vague and general terms, we are but too well justified to conclude, that he has neglected to give these most important subjects the grave consideration they demand, and that he has seen Europe shaken to her centre without investigating the causes of the awful convulsion.”

The author next gives some wholesome advice to his antagonist, which, we venture to predict, he will not be disposed to follow.

"To the author, or rather assistant author of this Inquiry, I will recommend a better task. By adopting the distorted views of party, he narrows the wide field which is the legitimate province of the philosophic mind. While he obtains the patronage of the Minister of the day, he relinquishes a fair claim to general and permanent approbation. Instead of being the apologist of a party, let him constitute himself the advocate of Britain against France, the vindicator of the cause of Europe against the arrogant tyrant who threatens to enslave her. If we can indulge the hope of a secure peace, let him exercise his talents in an inquiry into those conditions and that system which alone can insure permanent tranquillity. If this prospect be denied us, if Buonaparte refuse to acknowledge claims indispensable to our safety, and belie, as usual, his professions, it will then become an adequate object for the talents of this writer to excite merited indignation against such insatiable ambition, to point out the nature and extent of our danger, and unfold those resources by which it may be successfully opposed.

"Had the publication under review been even less directly sanctioned by Mr. Fox, its internal evidence would have bespoke its parentage. It is replete with those extremes, both in thought and language, which characterize his speeches. Like them, the Inquiry presents us with an accumulation of arguments in support of whatever idea is uppermost at the moment, without considering that the best means of refutation may be frequently found in this hasty assemblage. And, like his own career in public life, this work is an instructive exemplification of those inconsist

encies

encies which infallibly proceed from an ardent mind, untestrained by caution and undisciplined by moderation."

This is certainly no exaggerated character of the work, the object of which is, in our judgment, much more reprehensible than even the means by which the author attempts to attain it. Mr. Pitt's conduct is thus vindicated from the foolish aspersions of the Inquirer.

"In whatever way we examine the conduct of these important measures on the part of Mr. Pitt, we shall find the most solid grounds of approbation. The alliance was formidable in magnitude beyond example, the cordiality of its members has been evinced by their constancy under disaster, and the whole scheme was concealed from the enemy until the Russians were approaching Germany. England, therefore, amply ful. filled her part in the Coalition, and its failure was occasioned by causes beyond her controul.

ment.

"The career of the illustrious Statesman we have lost, has been upi. form; it was no less great in its close, than promising in its commence. The historian of his life will be under no necessity to call in to his panegyric the aid of eloquent or impassioned language: let him endeavour to elevate his mind to the conception of Mr. Pitt's views, to investigate his measures by their own merits, to weigh his motives and conduct in silent meditation, without attending to the reports either of friends or enemies, and he will pourtray a character equally admirable in all that enlightens the mind, and dignifies the heart."

The last part of this pamphlet contains "Strictures on the Conduct of the present Ministry," in which the author inquires, in his turn, how far they have justified the high character which their panegyrist has bestowed on them? For this purpose he takes a brief review of their leading measures, beginning with the appointment of Lord Ellenborough to a seat in the Cabinet, his comments on which unprecedented measure are alike judicious and temperate.

"Lord Ellenborough's appointment to a seat in the Cabinet. In an Administration composed of men who, on all occasions, had professed so great a jealousy of the Executive Power, and so firm an adherence to the rights of the people, above all to the impartial administration of public justice, the introduction of the Lord Chief Justice into the Cabinet was a step equally unexpected and inconsistent. To unite in one person functions so opposite as the judicial and executive, is repugnant equally to the provisions of our excellent Constitution, and to the first principles of justice. The impropriety of the measure was compensated by no countervailing advantage, it was required by no imperious necessity. Already fully occupied by most laborious duties, his Lordship can devote no ade quate portion of his time to political avocations. Advanced to the summit of his profession, and enjoying its highest honours, his dignity does not require this adventitious distinction."

"This extraordinary measure of giving the Chief Justice a voice in the Cabinet, might suit the arrangement of parties, but it does not suit the country. It might gratify his Lordship, but it gives him no real exal.

tation.

tation. It renders more prominent that part of his character which is least admired. We reverence inflexible integrity and eminent talents in the Judge-in the Senator we recognize the common passions and prejudices of men."

We are bold to say, that never was a measure adopted by any Ministry which gave more general, and, we will add, more just dissatisfaction than this appointment. It has really shaken the confidence of men, in that which constituted the exclusive boast of Britons. The more we consider it, and we have considered the subject deeply, and without prejudice or partiality, the more strongly are we impressed with the conviction, that it is at direct variance with that grand principle of our Constitution, which marks the boundary between the judicial and executive functions; and that it has an immediate tendency to pollute the fair current of justice, which should be preserved pure and inviolate as the spotless virgin's fame. The next subject of animadversion to our author is the accession of Lord Sidmouth to a Cabinet, of which Mr. Fox and Lord Grenville were the leading members; and here too, his remarks are most pertinent and just. Having shewn that the objections to an union between Mr. Pitt and Mr. Addington stood on a totally different ground, from the conduct of the former during the feeble administration of the latter, he observes:

"How differently had they been treated by Lord Grenville and Mr. Fox! His Lordship had combated and ridiculed every measure they had brought forward; and Mr. Fox, not contented with opposing particular propositions, declared them the weakest Administration who had ever governed the Country. Despised, however, and vilified as he has been, Lord Sidmouth, instead of honourably disdaining the connexion, is induced to sit in the Cabinet with those whom he never can forgive. After laying claim to the confidence of his Sovereign and the Country by a uni. form appearance of candour and disinterestedness, he is tempted to a connexion with men of the most opposite principles, by an office, nominal in every respect but income. Indebted to Mr. Pitt for his introduction into public life, by the appointment to the high rank of Speaker, and professing throughout the greatest veneration for his talents and principles, his Lord. ship feels now no hesitation to act with the man who had been through life the opponent of his benefactor. Lord Grenville and Mr. Fox, who I had formerly differed in every thing, excepting the ridicule of Addington, now agree, with wonderful harmony, in recommending him as one of the confidential servants of the Crown *."

Addington's

"The publication by the French of the intercepted letters in the Admiral Aplin, undeceived the public in regard to a most important political transaction. On the unexpected appointment of Mr. Addington to the head of the New Administration in 1801, it was generally believed, from his intimate connexion with Mr. Pitt, from his apparent unfitness

for

4

Addington's present situation is like that of the Turkish Empire, which, utterly without the means of self-support, is only prevented from falling into decay by the opposite interests of contending Powers. There is not, we will venture to say, in his Majesty's dominions at this moment, an object of more general respect than the personage in question. It is notorious that Mr. Addington's overtures to Mr. Pitt, in the summer of 1803, for the return of that statesman to power, failed entirely from his own objections to admit Lord Grenville into the Cabinet, or even to allow Mr. Pitt to propose his Lordship to his Majesty as one of his Ministers; and it is equally well known that, on his resignation in 1805, he declared, that he had no alternative but to resign, or to join Mr. Fox, which he never would consent to do. Lord Sidmouth is perfectly acquainted with his Sovereign's sentiments of his conduct; and his mind must be singolarly constructed if he find in his peerage, his house in Richmond Park, and his present insignificant office, an adequate compensation for the sacrifice of his public character, for the loss of the Royal Confidence, and the mistrust of all parties, without the respect of any. Whenever Parliament shall be dissolved, those adventitious circumstances to which he has been indebted for a temporary consequence, not justified by any personal qualities, natural or acquired, will have lost their effect, and

for the situation, and from Mr. Pitt's reputed love of power, that Mr. Addington was only a glove for the hand that still continued to guide the reins of Government. This opinion was openly declared by the Opposition. Mr. Fox, with his usual discretion, harangued the Whig Club about a King who threatened to send his Jack-boot to direct his Senate, and that we might now see the Jack-boot's Jack-boot. This sagacious insinuation, however, is disproved by Lord Grenville's Letter to Marquis Wellesley, of the 12th of July 1803 (intercepted and published), in which his Lordship, in speaking of the Ministry, says Mr. Pitt did not recommend Addington; and who that knew him would have done it?' Again, Mr. Henry Wellesley, in a letter to his brother by the same conveyance, dated 28th of July 1803, after mentioning that Mr. Pitt and Mr. Addington were no longer on speaking terms, uses these remarkable expresssions: Mr. Pitt opposes daily the Defence Bill in the House, but he opposes it as a Counsellor; and by his very objections he has rendered it fit for its intended purposes, which would otherwise never have been the case.'

"Those who justly appreciated Mr. Pitt's manly and disinterested eharacter, knew him to be incapable either of Court intrigue for the ap. pointment of a Minister, or of an insidious support in Parliament for his continuance in office. But the aspersions were plausible, and the Opposition urged them with an assurance calculated to impose on all those who adopted the current report of Mr. Pitt's ambitious disposition. Of these and similar cafumnies that great man disdained to take the smallest notice; and this specious assertion might have continued to mislead the Public, had not the accidental publication of Lord Grenville's Letter given it an explicit denial."

he

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he will be left to sink into that obscurity for which Nature seems to have designed him, and in which he would ever have remained but for the fostering protection of that illustrious patron, whose kindness has been repaid with the basest ingratitude. His Lordship has the peculiar consolation, however, derived from the conviction that his peaceful slumbers will never be disturbed, either by the anxious solicitude of his friends, or by the censorious animadversions of his enemies; and it will be said of his political character, with more truth, perhaps, than of any other subject now living, that it has ceased to exist. We must here be understood to limit our observations to the public character alone of this weak politician. His private character comes not within our jurisdiction; yet it is but just to add, that we believe him to be a religious and moral man; and even his public errors may be fairly imputable to the effects of ambition operating on a feeble mind, unexpectedly placed in a new and extraordinary situ

ation.

The proceedings on the Additional Force Act are next animadverted upon by our author with great severity; he considers them as holdmg out a temptation in future to disobey the acts of the legislature, when it may be found inconvenient to obey them: and he is led to this conclusion by the reward of the disobedient, and the punishment of the obedient in the present instance. He is so far right in his con◄ jectures, that certainly the prospect of a repeal of the Act prevented We ourselves heard a Noblea compliance with it in many cases. man, high in the confidence of an illustrious personage, and now a candidate for the office of Lord Lieutenant of a County, pronounce that Act, in a company of Magistrates and others, a swindling transaction; and, though he was told that it was the duty of the company to enforce, and not to criticise the law, he continued, with an equal contempt of decency and of duty, to throw every possible obstacle in the way of its execution. The succeeding topic of animadversion we shall transcribe.

"Complaints of the exclusion of merit from the high offices of State, have been sounded in our ears these twenty years. The failures of our expeditions, and the errors in the administration of important departments at home, have been uniformly ascribed to the employment of incompetent persons, and to the exclusion of the tried servants of the State. Party. favour, in short, has been the theme of the bitterest reproaches from the late Opposition. Pledged as they were to the preference of merit, and possessing ample choice of able men by the union of parties, what a selection have they made for the Treasurership of the Ordnance! They have intrusted the controul over millions of the public money to a man, by profession a Contractor and a Banker, that line which, of all others, offers the greatest facility for a lucrative use of the public treasure.— They have promoted to a station of high rank, a private trader unknown to the public service of his country and they have associated with themselves a man convicted, by an impartial tribunal, of bribery and corruption.