his reasons with much eloquence, yet he found himself com pelled to yield to the general predeliction in favour of hereditary monarchy. In all his contests with the great, he evinced the truth of his own obfervation, that grandeur and power are no match, in a fair conteft with wit, talents, and knowlege.

Whatever may have been the faults of his private life, the grand blemish of his public character was his unbounded love of popularity. M. PITHOU confeffes that he was ' avaricious of public favour, to the exclufion of every other. He was particularly ambitious of renown in the service of administration ; that fublime science which governs the univerfe; and Necker was at this period the idol of France. To this caufe of hatred, others were added. The contempt manifefted by the minifter, on fome delicate occafions, completely ulcered the proud heart of Mirabeau, who, from that moment, criticized all his conduct, without refpecting truth or decency. It was through his means principally, that Necker began to lofe his popularity, and was finally difgraced.'

M. PITHOU prefents us with feveral pleafing specimens of M. De Mirabeau's eloquence; which was rapid, forcible, frequently convincing, and which always filenced, where it did not convince. Some of thefe fpecimens have been inferted in our public papers, at the periods in which they were spoken. We fhall, however, felect his opinion concerning religious eftablishments; the rather as it is not diftinguished by impofing impetuofity of ftyle, fo much as by force of argument; and as it perfectly coincides with the fentiments of almost every one, whofe perfonal intereft, or whole prejudices of education, do not prevent his perceiving and embracing the moft inconteftible truths.

M. PITHOU informs us that, after the ecclefiaftics had in vain employed every method to preferve their wealth, jurifdiction, and ftations in the church, they laid a fare for their powerful antagonist, by propofing that the national decree fhould announce that the Roman catholic religion fhould be the only religion received, in order that the confciences of its profeffors might not be disturbed by the great changes which were making in the Constitution:'

M. De Mirabeau answered,

Religion can no more be a national establishment, than confcience. A man is not truly religious, becaufe he is a conformist to an eftablishment, but when he practifes the duties incumbent on humanity. Therefore, to term religion national, is to give it either an infignificant or a ridiculous appellation. Is it as judges of its truth, or as judges of its aptitude to form good citizens, that the Legiflature would render religion conftitutional? In the firft place, though fome truths be merely national, moral truths are uni

verfal :

verfal: fecondly, is it poffible that the public welfare fhould be promoted, by binding the confciences with the fetters of legal regulations Laws can only unite men in points where there is a common contact; they can therefore properly act only on what may be termed the furface of their exiftence. By private opinion, and by confcience, they ftill remain isolated: no affociations can deprive them of these monitors. As nothing can nor ought to be national in an empire, but inftitutions eftablished to produce political effeas; and religion being no other than a correfpondence of the mind with the univerfal fpirit; it is impoffible that this correfpondence can admit of any civil or legal form.

The Chriftian religion is more particularly, by its very effence, exempt from every fyftem of local legiflation. God never created this luminary to lend forms and tints to the focial organization of the French but he has placed it in the centre of the universe, to be the point of union by the exercise of universal benevolence. Why do you not demand a decree that the fun fhall enlighten our nation to the exclufion of every other? Our reprefentatives have replaced Christianity on its ancient bafis; they have foreseen and difconcerted every measure that might endanger the edifice; and yet you oppose, to the utmost of your power, all their endeavours to give religion a respectable and immutable existence. That wall of brafs which they have erected around her, you are undermining by the very weapons which you ought to have employed in her defence. Prelates and refractory priests are breathing a fpirit of revolt and madness, becaufe the law wills them to be citizens and preachers of the gofpel!-Behold their perfidious proteftations, in which the torments of the damned are denounced against those who unite liberty with the gospel! See how they are agitating weak and timerous confciences, accustomed to believe without examination! See how they treat thofe who refufe to petition for the flavery from which they have miraculously efcaped! See how they bafely and treacherously affect to calumniate the reprefentatives of the empire, with the character belonging to the perfecutors of the primitive church; as if they themselves refembled the primitive martyrs for, truth! when they are become, by their accumulated vices, Priests of Satan, and forfakers of Chrift and of his gofpel. Peace, patience, humanity, are the precepts of that divine book, which you deem it a punishment to read and meditate.'

Thefe fpecimens render us defirous of a more complete publication on the fubject.

ART. XIX. Abrégé d'Hiftoire Naturelle, &c. i. e. An Abridgment of the Natural Hiftory of Viviparous Quadrupeds, and of Birds: By M. HOLANDRE, M. D. &c. 4 Vols. 8vo. With 4 Vols. of coloured Plates. Deux-Ponts. 1790. Imported by De Boffe, Gerard-freet. Price rol.

T

HE author of these volumes obferves, that he imagines he is doing an acceptable fervice, as well to thofe who are alAPP, REV. Vol. VI.

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ready inftructed, as to others who need to be informed, by prefenting them with thefe reprefentations of quadrupeds and birds. His work confifts of upward of fen hundred coloured figures, the greater part drawn after nature, or after the best plates. As thefe were firft drawn, and the defcriptions afterward affixed to them, the order obferved in the text depends on that in the drawings. This order, however, is fimilar to that of M. De Buffon; to the correfponding articles in whofe work the reader is directed by references placed at the head of each description: each plate is likewife diftinguished by a mark, pointing out the plate in Buffon with which it agrees; fo that, although the author ftyles his publication a compilement, and an appendix to the natural hiftory of Buffon, it may rather be confidered as an abridgment of that celebrated work.

In fuch a great variety of figures, all cannot poffefs equal degrees of excellence: in general, the drawings appear to be faithful, and the colouring is beautiful. The defcriptions are fhort, but plain and intelligible. On the whole, thefe elegant volumes are well calculated for those who wish to obtain a general knowlege of the subject; such as defire an intimate acquaintance with natural hiftory, must look farther, and search deeper.

ART. XX. Traité pratique du Gréement: i. e. A Practical Treatife on the Rigging of Ships, and other Sailing Veffels publithed by Order of the King, for the Instruction of those who are intended for the Sea-fervice; by M. LESCALLIER, Commissarygeneral of the Colonies, &c. With Plates. 2 Vols. 4to. Paris.

1791.

CONNECTED as this country is with the fea, and depending

to much on its shipping for its ftrength and riches, every publication, which tends to increafe the nautical fcience, becomes to us of importance. The induftry, alfo, of our neigh.bours on the continent, fhould give activity to our own exertions; and while other European nations are friving which fhall excel, it behoves us not to remain idle fpectators of a conteft, where we have fo much at stake.

The treatife before us is merely practical: it enters on no fpeculative points; and no theory nor mathematical calculation is employed. The author apologizes for any imperfections which it may poffefs, and obferves, that it was a task, not of his choice, but impofed on him; and that it was written in a diftant country, among the fatigues of the government of a colony in the torrid zone, and where he had no opportu

nity of examining the structure of the parts which he was defcribing. It requires, however, little apology: it seems both full and accurate and the engravings, by which it is illuftrated, are elegant, and apparently exact.

The fubject is treated in three books; and though we have ftyled the work a treatise on the rigging (gréement) of fhips, it contains an account of all that is neceffary to furnish a fhip for the purpofe of navigation.

The first book gives fome general obfervations and prelimi nary explanations: it enumerates the different pullies, and describes their ufes it teaches the art of fplicing, and of making various kinds of knots, &c.—In the fecond, the names, fituations, ufes, &c. of the ropes, are fhewn: they are confidered under different heads, as belonging to the mafts, to the yards, to the fails, rudder, anchor, &c. This completes the defcription of the rigging proper for fhips of the line.

The third book contains an account of the different modes of rigging veffels intended for peculiar fervice: it delineates alfo the various kinds of veffels in use among other nations, both at a diftance from us, and in our neighbourhood.

This appears to be an ufeful elementary book, and will doubtless be acceptable to thofe for whom it is intended by the author.

ART. XXI. Le Tocfin des Politiques: i. e. The Alarm Bell of Politics. By the Abbé SABATTIER DE CASTRES. Small 12mo. Pp. 104. 1791. No Place Specified.

WHE

THEN an alarm is given, nothing can be more natural than for every one, within its found, to feel a folicitude, left the cause of it fhould, in fome way or another, affect himself. If he cannot fatisfy his anxious curiofity in any other manner, he will be induced to apply to the very place whence the alarm was given; and to inquire on what account the public tranquillity was thus disturbed. On being informed that, notwithftanding all the noife which was made, the evil is at a confiderable diftance; and that, instead of his own or his neighbour's dwelling being in immediate danger, fome remote village is in flames; he will anfwer, "I am extremely forry for the difafter but why should the alarm be fo univerfal?" When this little pettifhnefs, however, has fubfided, which was at the moment excited by the difappointment at finding things better than he expected, his curiofity, united with fympathy for the diftreffed, will prompt him to know the extent of the evil, how it began, and how it is likely to terminate.

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With feelings and difpofitions fomething like thefe, we procured and perufed the little treatise before us. As it has neither preface, nor index, nor chapters of contents, nor titlepage, to give us the leaft idea of what could cause this alarm, there was no other way of fatisfying our curiofity, nor of appeafing our inquietude, than by reading the whole: which, we can affure our readers, was not fo fhort a task as might have been expected from its diminutive fize. Had the author chofen the usual mode of publication, the thoughts contained in these few pages would have been expanded into a comely octavo. He feems to difdain the common and trite methods of foliciting public attention, and to prefer one of his own.

However this may be, we are happy to inform our countrymen, that the danger is not at our own door; nor does it relate to our neighbours the French; although, from the subject, and the name of the author, we were apprehensive that this might be the cafe. It contains a warning given to the Emperor Leopold, and to the States of the Auftrian Netherlands; pointing out their imminent danger from the perverse measures adopted and pursued by each. It endeavours to prove, that due feverity, exercised against the leaders of their disturbances, in place of the Emperor's unbounded clemency, would have more effectually fecured his own authority, by animating and encouraging the ftrenuous adherents to the houfe of Auftria, and by extirpating the feeds of faction. The author affures the States, that they are confiderable lofers by the recovery of their privileges: that their ancient form of government, not being planned on the principles of reafon, nor founded on the common rights of man, is replete with numberless pernicious errors that their laws were made according to the whims and caprices of petty fovereigns, whofe jarring interefts, formed, or rather jumbled, them into an heterogeneous and unformed mafs; and that the privileges granted to one state are in oppotion to the claims of the others, and are the fources of all thofe jealoufies that have ever fubfifted between the Brabanters and the inhabitants of Flanders. He would convince them, that an attachmment to thefe privileges is the cause of the Auftrian Netherlands remaining in a fituation much inferior to what might have been expected from their local advantages; and that, if they continue to cherish them, all Europe will leave them far behind in every valuable improvement. He vindicates the conduct of the late Emperor in the changes introduced; and he feverely cenfures the accommodating spirit of his prefent Majefty, whofe love of peace, and abhorrence of vigorous measures, are repaid with a contempt that forebodes

I

future