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Second carried to the inquisition, his own fon, when the only heir

where it was taken into confideration, whether it should not be condemned to the flames."

Such is the character our authors give of Charles the Fifth: what they fay of Philip the Second is as follows:

"This prince was of a middling ftature, but well proportioned: he had a large forehead, blue eyes, a fteady look, and a grave and ferious air. His character was fevere and haughty; his zeal for the fupport of the faith and the Catholic religion implacable: fo that with the utmoft coolness and compofure he would have exterminated every heretic in his dominions. Never was there a prince who applied to bufinefs with greater af fiduity; he entered into the minuteft detail in every branch of his administration; in his own chamber he fet all the fprings of the moft cruel policy in motion, and wanted to act alone in every thing. He was impenetrable and diftruftful, full of revenge and diffimulation; ftuck at nothing to execute his fchemes, was never difcouraged by any obstruction in the course of his enterprises; feemed fupe. rior to events; and received the news of good and bad fortune with the fame phlegmatic compofure. He was a cold fanatic; and never defired to infpire any other fentiment but that of terror. His orders were like the decrees of fate, which were to be executed independently of all human efforts. He made the blood of his fubjects flow in torrents; carried the horrors and devastation of war into all the neighbouring ftates; and was ever armed against his own people or his enemies. Even

of his dominions, could not move his inflexible foul. Whenever an offence was committed, punishment was unavoidable. He never tafted the pleasure of forgiving; and, during a reign of fortytwo years, never enjoyed one day's peace. His minifters, his generals, his favourites, trembled when they approached him, and never spoke to him but upon their knees, and with the moft fearful circumfpection. The duke of Alba, who had laid him under fo many obligations, entering his chamber one day without any previous notice, Philip looked at him with a threatening air, and faid, What daring prefumption is this! it deferves the

axe.

He was defirous that his fubjects, like himfelf, fhould have an air of seriousness. The horrid tribunal of the inquifition, was ever watch ful to banish from his dominions that genuine joy which is the charm of liberty. This monarch was poffeffed of all thofe qualities which enter into the character of a great politician; he had a lively genius, an amazing memory, and indefatigable activity; he was an excellent judge of men, and knew how to employ them according to their feveral talents. He was juft, generous, and fplendid in his court: of an enterprifing genius, and of unfhaken firmnefs in the execution of his defigns; but he forced the Low Countries into rebellion by his untractable feverity; weakened his dominions by the expulfion of the Moors, and by his obstinacy in pursuing the male-contents; he employed his revenues and the treafures of the new world in gratifyand ing his hatred and revenge;

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HE failings of thefe people (the American French) are Counterbalanced by many excellent good qualities; and their failings very often arife from the fame principles from whence their virtues take their fource. They are brave, intrepid, generous, and firmly attached to their fovereign.

The views of nature and found policy, which require that no man fhould be ufelefs to the ftate, are accomplished in thefe islands. Every American has a profeffion.

which their parents in general exprefs towards them, the licence which the manners of the country tolerate; all thefe caufes, combined with a vigorous flow of fpirits in the heat of youth, may account for the impatience, impetuofity, and obftinacy of their difpofitions.

The fupplenefs of their bodies renders them fit for any kind of exercife, as the vivacity of their imagination qualifies them for the attainment of any kind of knowledge. But the fame caufe from whence they derive thefe advan tages, checks them in their progrefs towards perfection. The imagination, that faculty of the foul which bears no reftraint, which always increases the ardour of the paffions, renders the Americans fickle and inconftant in their tafte. It hurries them away to the purfuit of pleafure, and that purfuit ingroffes them totally.

Those who have been fent to receive their education in France, have given the moft promifing hopes of their future, progrefs. But they are no fooner advanced to the dawn of manhood, when the paffions begin to rage, than they give up the fciences, and renounce the belles lettres, for which nature has afforded them fuch fhining talents,

The American women blend an

In thefe countries they still warmly practife that kind and generous hofpitality towards all ftrangers in general, of which history only furnishes fome ancient traditions in the firft ages of mankind: yet their benevolence and goodness of heart does not, in general, extend to their negroes: They are, for the most part, too fevere and unfeeling with regard to them. The Americans are accufed of too hafty, impatient, obftiwhich the heat of the climate has refpect to perfonal valour, bate, and wilful. But the influence over them, the habit of command- woman would think herfelf dif ing flaves from their infancy, and graced, if her husband's courage of being obeyed; the fondnefs was called in question.

being

VOL. IX,

uncommon degree of vivacity and impatience, with an extreme indolence. They are haughty, refolute, and, like the men, obsti- / nately bent on their own will. They are, likewife, equally jealous of the point of honour, with

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It is difficult to reconcile the generofity and fenfibility of their characters, with the extraordinary feverity they ufe towards their flaves; a feverity in which they ezceed the men.

Their hearts are formed for love, and readily enter into attachments; they are very tender in their affections, and never employ any of the arts of feduction; I believe they think that the trouble of practifing them would be too great a tax on their indolence, or that they confider the refinements of coquetry as rather adapted to alienate than embellish love,

They are inflexibly conftant to their attachments: but when their hufband is no more, his lofs prefently makes way for the happinefs of another. There is hardly a woman, who, notwithstanding her affection for her children, does not quickly engage in a fecond marriage, and efface the name and memory of the man with whom the feemed defperately enamoured.

The Caribbees, not being fufceptible of any pleafures beyond thofe of the brute creation, appear likewife to have no fenfe of any other pains than fuch as brutes experience. Living in a flate of fimplicity, they have not, like us, multiplied the objects of defire, and confequently increafed the difficulty of attaining them. Their views are confined to the neceffaries of life, and they are ftrangers to its fuperfluities. Among them, one is not debafed to exalt another. They are unacquainted with the diftinctions of the great and the common people. They all confider themfelves as children of the fame parent: they all claim equal

merit from their country, as they all equally concur in defence of the common caufe.

The ftupidity of their eye prefents a mirrour, which reflects the true difpofition of their fouls. Their indolence is incredible; and they never give themselves a moment's uneafinefs about the future hour.

They pafs their lives, one while fitting with fupine inertnefs, and at another, stretched out in a hammock, where they fleep and fmoak. Hunger fometimes obliges them to go in fearch of food, either by hunting or fishing. They carry their provifion home, and their wives dress it.

Among them the women bear all the drudgery: they never eat with their husbands, who would think it a difhonour to them. But the manners of the Europeans have rendered them lefs fcrupulous on this head,

Love, among them, is an appe. tite which does not differ from hunger or thirft. They never fhew the leaft attention, or express the leaft marks of tenderness or friendfhip for the fair fex, who are fo much courted by polifhed nations, and fo much flighted among thofe who live in a state of nature.

Yet they have no reason to complain of the infidelity of their wives. Coquetry, or vanity, do not prefent them with any flattering hopes of pleafure in inconfancy they find that they are born to obey, and they submit to their lot. Wherever they might transfer their affection, they would only get a new mafter by changing their lover. Add to this, that their inconftancy and infidelity

would

would be punished with fpeedy

death.

The negroes are, or appear to be, naturally timid and daftardly; but, when fupported by the prefence of their mafters, they brave every kind of danger, and will fight till they expire by their fides.

All the negroes, from whatever part of Guinea they come, are extremely addicted to fuperftition, and believe in magic and forcery. They imagine that fuch fupernatural power can deprive them of their miftreffes affection. This apprehenfion is, to them, of all others, molt tormenting, and alarms them) as much as the confideration of their own perfonal fecurity.

Love, that child of nature, whom no chains or impediments can reftrain, who breaks through every obftacle, gives life to every action and fentiment of a negro. Love alone alleviates the weight of their flavery,

They are neither daunted by perils, nor deterred by chaftifement., A negro will leave his mafter in the night, traverfe an extenfive wood, expofed to the attacks of noxious animals, and, without any fear of being apprehended as fugitive, will visit his miftrefs: his abode is, often, fo diftant from her's, that the journey alone, confumes the whole time which fhould be deftined to fleep and refreshment.

proof against the addreffes of a white man.

The taste of the Europeans for women of this colour may feem aftonishing. It is, nevertheless, very general; and it is difficult to fay, whether they have been led to it by opportunity and eafinefs of accefs, by idlenefs, by the influence of the climate, by habit, by example, by indolence, by the haughtiness of the white women, and the little pains they take to make themfelves agreeable; or, perhaps, in the infant ftate of our colonies, by a motive of curiosity, and a fcarcity of women.

Nevertheless, depraved as this inclination may appear, it is certain that our colonies derive fome advantages from this corruption of manners. The negro-women who cohabit with the white men, are, generally, more than ordinary attentive to their duty; and they contract a peculiarity of fentiment which diftinguishes them from the reft.

They preferve their mafters and their lovers from the confpiracies of the flaves; and the government owes to them the detection of a general confpiracy formed by the negroes of Martinico."

Animadverfions on the principal fol lies of the ENGLISH. From the French of M. G. Dourx.

The negro-women have as ftrong Ngland, at prefent fo jealous

paffions as the men. Nevertheless, they are, in general, mutually conftant in their attachments, Va nity is the rock on which the fidelity of the women generally fplits it is feldom that they are

of its liberty of thinking and acting, was once the flave of priests and tyrants. William the Conqueror carried his power fo far, as to oblige the people to put out the fires and go to bed at fix o'clock. The English, for a long time,

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paid a tax of a crown a head to the Pope. There was a time when the priests, who meddle with every thing, had rendered this people fo exceedingly fuperftitious as to make them believe, not only that the health of their fouls, but of their bodies alfo, depended on a regular attendance on public worship. We read in Jurieu, and others, that one of their kings, on viewing the carcafe of a flag which he had juft killed, cried out," By heavens he was in good health, though he never heard mafs nor vefpers."

The English are much changed fince that time; but the change coft them many a bloody war. The generality of them being naturally exceffive in every thing, they paffed in a fhort time from flavery to licentioufnefs; from extreme devotion to the most determined impiety. Every individual having divefted him felf of his troublefome prejudices, gave himself up to his own humour and opinions. Royalty was overturned in the perfon of the unfortunate Charles I. who fuffered death without caufe, and without pity. This prince faying to thofe who conducted him to prifon, "That he thought himfelf accountable for his actions to God alone;" their captain had the infolence to anfwer, " Very true, and therefore we intend fhortly to fend you to God for that purpofe."

During the reign of Charles II. their manners underwent great revolutions. A tafte for literature and gallantry fucceeded to fanaticifm and piety; but they ftill continue to preferve that bafis of ferocity which is productive of

ftrong reafoning in one, and in an other brutality. Perhaps we ourfelves are deceived in this matter, by our refined politenefs, which, according to the English, renders us unnatural. us unnatural. In general, fays M. de Muralt, they perform a good action boldly, and they dare follow their reafon in oppofition to cuftom; but their good fenfe is mixed with whims and extravagance. Their refolutions are generally fudden. It is common in England for a girl to vow that the will marry the first man fhe meets; and accordingly they are married. Wine hath fometimes, among this people, been productive of great cruelty. Some of them have made a vow to murder the first perfon they meet after leaving the tavern; and they have kept their word. Their nobleffe often box or play at bowls with the lowest among the people.

Some of our nation confider the English ftage, which affords that people fo much delight, as a proof of their barbarity. Their trage dies, it is true, though interesting and replete with beauties, are nevertheless dramatic monfters, half butchery and half farce. Grotefque character, and extravagant pleafantry, conftitute the chief part of their comedies; in one of thefe the devil enters fneezing, and fomebody fays to the devil, God bless you. They are not however all of this ftamp: they have even fome in a very good tafte; but there are hardly any which give us an advantageous idea of the English nation; though it is from the theatre that a stranger forms his opinion of the manners of a people. The English comic

poets

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