To God, as the Reality of the Conscience and the Source of all Obligation; to Free Will, as the power of the human being to maintain the Obedience, which God through the Conscience has commanded, agaisnt all the might of Nature; and to the immortality of the Soul, as a State in which the weal and woe of man shall be proportioned to his moral Worth.

of Instinct, of which it would be no inapt Definition that it is a more or less limited Understanding without Self-conciousness, and without comprehension that is, without the power of concluding. the particular from the universal. The few Readers, for whom this note is intended, will observe, that the word, understanding, may be used in two meanings, a wider and a narrower. In the first, it means the active power of the Soul, THOUGHT, as opposed to its passive or merely recipient, property, the SENSE: (N. B. not the Senses, but that quality of the Soul which receive impressions from the Senses, even as the Senses receive impressions from objects out of us,) so defined, it includes the Reason. In its' narrower meaning, the Understanding is used for the faculty, by which we form distinct notions of Things and immediate, positive judgements (ex. gr. Gold is a Body) in distinction from Reason or the faculty by which we form necessary conclusions, or mediate Judgements (ex. gr. Gold being a material Substance must be extended.) If the Reader will put up with scholastic Latinity, he may thus word the component faculties of the animal triplex; Vis sensitiva percipit, Vis regulatrix concipit, vis rationalis comprehendit : prima imprimitur per sensus; secunda impressiones multifarias in notiones individuas coadunat, pas autem notiones regulis secundum analogiam subnectit, i. e. experientiam format; tertia et notiones individuas, et regulas experimentales, Principiis absolutis, seu Legibus necessariis subjungit et subjugat, et inde de rebus, quas reales esse experientia jam monstratum est, ipsa ultro demonstrans, quomodo sint possibiles, scientiam facit. Ratio, seu vis scientifica, est possibilitatis, vel éssentia rerum, per leges earum constitutivas, Intellectio. In its' narrower sense, I assert, that the Understanding, or experiential faculty thus distinguished from the Reason, or sciential power, has no appropriate Object, but the material World in Relation to our worldly Interests. The far-sighted Prudence of Man, and the more narrow, but at the same time far more certain and effectual, Cunning of the Fox, are both no other than a nobler Substitute for Salt, in order that the Hog may not putrify before its destined hour.)

PENRITH: PRINTED AND PUBLISHED BY J. BROWN; AND SOLD BY
MESERS. LONGMAN AND CO. PATERNOSTER ROW, AND
CLEMENT, 201, STRAND, LONDON.

No. 6, THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 21, 1809.

With this Faith all Nature,

Of Eye and Ear

-all the mighty World

presents itself to us, now as the aggregated Material of Duty, and now as a Vision of the Most High revealing to us the mode, and time, and particular instance of applying and realizing that universal Rule, pre-established in the Heart of our Reason! If this be regarded as the dream of an Enthusiast, by such as

deem themselves most free,

When they within this gross and visible sphere
Chain down the winged soul, scoffing ascent,

Proud in their meanness,

by such as pronounce every man out of his Senses who has not lost his Reason; even these may find some weight in the historical Fact that form persons, who had previously strengthened their Intellects and Feelings by the contemplation of those Principles of Duty the actions correspondent to which involve one half of their Consequences, and have Omnipotence, as the Pledge for the remainder-that chiefly from those have been derived the surest and most general Maxims of Prudence, and with these that hardihood which completes the undertaking, ere the contemptuous Calculator (who has left nothing omitted in his scheme of

I earnestly entreat the Reader not to be dissatisfied either with himself or with the Author, if he should not at once understand the preceding paragraph; but rather to consider it as a mere annunciation of a magnificent Theme, the different parts of which are to be demonstrated and developed, explained, illustrated, and exemplified in the progress of the Work. 1 likewise entreat him to peruse with attention and with candour, the weighty Extract from the judicious HOOKER, prefixed as the Motto to the ninth Number of the Friend. In works of Reasoning, as distinguished from narration of Events or statements of Facts; but more particularly in Works, the object of which is to make us better acquainted with our own nature, a Writer, whose meaning is every where comprehended as quickly as his sentences can be read, may indeed have produced an amusing Composition, nay, by awakening and reenlivening our recollections, a useful one; but most assuredly he will not have added either to the stock of our Knowledge, or to the vigour of our Intellect. For how can we gather strength, but by exercise? How can a truth, new to us, be made our own without examination and self-questioning-any new truth, I mean, that relates to the properties of the mind, and its' various faculties and affections! But whatever demands effort, requires time. Ignorance seldom raults into knowledge, but passes into it through an intermediate state of obscurity, even as Night into Day through Twilight.

probabilities, except the might of the human mind) has finished his pretended proof of its impossibility. Though I have in this and the preceding Numbers quoted more frequently and copiously than I shall permit myself to do in future (yet I trust, such passages as will be original to a great majority of my Readers, either from the scarceness of the works, or from the Language in which they are written) I cannot deny myself the gratification of supporting this connection of practical Heroism with previous Habits of philosophic Thought, by a singularly appropriate passage from an Author whose Works can be called rare only from their being, I fear, rarely read, however commonly talked of. It is the instance of Xenophon as stated by Lord Bacon, who would himself furnish an equal instance, if there could be found an equal Commentator.

"It is of Xenophon the Philosopher, who went from Socrates's School into Asia, in the Expedition of Cyrus the younger, against King Artaxerxes. This Xenophon, at that time, was very young, and never had seen the wars before; neither had any command in the army, but only followed the war as a Volunteer, for the Love and Conversation of Proxenus, his Friend. He was present when Falinus came in message from the great King to the Grecians, after that Cyrus was slain in the Field, and they, a handful of men, left to themselves in the midst of the King's territories, cut off from their Country by many navigable Rivers, and many hundred miles. The Message imported, that they should deliver up their arms and submit themselves to the King's mercy. To which message, before answer was made, divers of the Army conferred familiarly with Falinus, and amongst the rest Xenophon happened to say: Why, Falinus! we have now but these two things left, our Arms and our Virtue; and if we yield up our arms, how shall we make use of our Virtue ? Whereto Falinus, smiling on him, said, If I be not deceived, Young Gentleman, you are an Athenian, and I believe, you study philosophy, and it is pretty that you say; but you are much abused, if you think your Virtue can withstand the King's Power.' Here was the Scorn: the Wonder followed-which was, that this young Scholar or Philosopher, after all the Captains were murthered in parly, by treason, conducted those ten thousand foot, through the heart of all the King's high Countries from Babylon to Grecia, in safety, in despight of all the King's Forces, to the Astonishment of the World, and the encouragement of the Grecians, in times succeeding, to make invasion upon the Kings of Persia; as was after purposed by

Jason the Thessalian, attempted by Agesilaus the Spartan, and atchieved by Alexander the Macedonian, all upon the ground of the act of that young Scholar"

Often have I reflected with awe on the great and dis proportionate power, which an individual of no extraor dinary talents or attainments may exert, by merely throwing off all restraint of Conscience. What then must not be the power, where an Individual, of consummate wickedness, can organize into the unity and rapidity of an indi vidual will, all the natural and artificial forces of a populous and wicked nation? And could we bring within the field of imagination, the devastation effected in the moral world, by the violent removal of old customs, familiar sympathies, willing reverences, and habits of subordination almost naturalized into instinct; of the mild influences of reputa tion, and the other ordinary props and aidances of our infirm Virtue, or at least if Virtue be too high a name, of our well-doing; and above all, if we could give form and body to all the effects produced on the Principles and Dispositions of Nations by the infectious feelings of Insecurity, and the soul-sickening sense of Unsteadiness in the whole Edifice of civil Society; the horrors of Battle, though the miseries of a whole War were brought together before our eyes in one disastrous Field, would present but a tame Tragedy in comparison. Nay, it would even present a sight of comfort and of elevation, if this Field of Carnage were the sign and result of a national Resolve, of a general Will, so to die, that neither Deluge nor Fire should take away the name of COUNTRY from their Graves, rather than to tread the same clods of Earth, no longer a Coun try, and themselves alive in nature, but dead in infamy. What is Greece at this present moment? It is the CouxTRY of the Heroes from Codrus to Philopamen; and so it would be, though all the Sands of Africa should cover it's Corn Fields and Olive Gardens, and not a Flower were left on Hybla for a Bee to murmur in.

If then the power with which Wickedness can invest the human being be thus tremendous, greatly does it behove us to enquire into its Source and Causes. So doing we shall quickly discover that it is not Vice, as Vice, which is thus mighty; but systematic Vice! Vice self-consistent and entire; Crime corresponding to Crime; Villainy entrenched and barricadoed by Villainy; this is the condition and main consistuent of it's power. The abandonment of all Principle of Right enables the Soul to chuse and act upon a Principle of Wrong, and to subordinate to this one Principle all the various Vices of Human naturé,

For it is a mournful Truth, that as Devastation is incom-7 parably an easier work than Production, so all it's means and instruments may be more easily arranged into a Scheme and System. Even as in a Siege every Building and Garden, which the faithful Governor must destroy, as impeding the defensive means of the Garrison, or furnishing means of Offence to the Besieger, occasions a Wound in feelings which Virtue herself has fostered: and Virtue, because it is Virtue, loses per force part of her energy in the reluctance, with which she proceeds to a business so repugnant to her wishes, as a choice of Evils. But He, who has once said with his whole heart, Evil be thou my Good! has removed a world of Obstacles by the very cision, that he will have no Obstacles but those of force and brute matter. The road of Justice

"Curves round the corn-field and the hill of vines "Honouring the holy bounds of property!"

de

But the path of the Lightening is straight" and straight the fearful Path

"Of the cannon-ball. Direct it flies and rapid,

"Shatt'ring that it may reach, aud shatt'ring what it reaches." Happily for Mankind, however, the obstacles which a consistent evil mind no longer finds in itself, it finds in its own unsuitableness to Human nature. A limit is fixed to its power: but within that limit, both as to the extent and duration of its influence, there is little hope of checking it's career, if giant and united Vices are opposed only by mixed and scattered Virtues: and those too, probably, from the want of some combining Principle, which assigns to each it's due Place and Rank, at civil War with themselves, or at best perplexing and counteracting each other. Even in the present Ilour of Peril, do we not too often hear even good men declaiming on the horrors and crimes. of War, and softening or staggering the minds of their Brethren by details of individual wretchedness? thus under. pretence of avoiding Blood, withdrawing the will from the defence of the very source of those blessings without which the blood would flow idly in our veins! thus lest a few should fall on the Bulwarks in glory, preparing us to give up the whole State to baseness, and the children of free Ancestors to become Slaves, and the Fathers of Slaves!

Machiavelli has well observed, "Sono di tre generazione Cervelli: l'uno intende per se; l'altro intende quanto da altri gli e mostro; il terzo non intende né per se stesso ne per demostrazione d' altri." "There are Brains of three The one understands of itself; the other under

races.