tion of flax, and flax seed, into this kingdom, or Ireland, in any hip or veffel belonging to any kingdom or state in amity with his majefty, navigated with foreign mariners, during the prefent hof tilities. An Act to permit goods, the product or manufacture of certain places within the Levant, or Mediterranean feas to be imported into Great Britain, or Ireland, in British or foreign veffels, from any place whatsoever, and for laying a duty on cotton, and cotton wool, imported into this kingdom, in foreign fhips or veffels, during the prefent hoftilities. An Act to permit, during the prefent hoftilities, the importation of goods, the produce of the plantations of the crown of Portugal, into Great Britain and Ireland, in Portuguefe vefels, and the importation of certain other goods therein mentioned, in any neutral fhips and veffels. An Act for preventing certain abufes and profanations on the Lord's day, called Sunday. An Act for continuing and amending an A, made in the laft feflion of parliament, intituled, "An Act for appointing and enabling commiffioners to examine, take, and state the public accounts of the kingdom; and to report what balances are in the hands of accountants which may be applied to the public fervice, and what defects there are in the prefent mode of receiving, collecting, if fuing, and accounting for public money, and in what more expeditious an effectual, and lefs expenfive manner, the faid fervice can, in future, be regulated and carried on for the benefit of the public." An Act to direct the payment into the exchequer, of the refpective balances remaining in the hands of the feveral perfons therein named, for the ufe and benefit of the public, and for indemnifying the faid respective perfons and their reprefentatives, in refpect of fuch payments, and againft all future claims relating thereto, and for other purposes therein mentioned. An Act to render valid, certain marriages folemnized in certain churches and public chapels, in which banns had not ufually been published before. or at the time of paffing an Act, made in the 26th year of King George the Second intituled, " An Act, for the better preventing all clandeftine marriages." An Act for establishing an a greement with the united company of merchants trading to the Eaft-Indies, for the payment of the fum of four hundred thoufand pounds, for the use of the public, in full difcharge and fatisfaction of all claims and demands of the public, &c. and for granting to the faid company, for a farther term, the fole and exclufive trade to and from the East Indies; and for establishing certain regulations for the better management of the affairs of the faid company, as well in India as in Europe, and the recruiting the military forces of the faid company. An Act to explain and amend fo much of an Act, made in the 13th year of the reign of his prefent majefty, intituled, " An Act for establishing certain regulations for the the better management of the affairs of the Eaft-India company, as well in India as in Europe, as .relates to the administration of juftice in Bengal; and for the relief of certain perfons imprisoned at Calcutta, in Bengal, under a judicature; and alfo for indemnifying the governor general and council of Bengal, and all officers who have acted under their orders or authority, in the refistance made to the process of the fupreme court." CHARAC CHARACTERS. Character of the Emperor Conftantine; from Gibbon's Hiftory of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. TH [A. D. 324.] HE character of the prince who removed the feat of empire, and introduced fuch im portant changes into the civil and religious conftitution of his country, has fixed the attention, and divided the opinions, of mankind. By the grateful zeal of the Chriftians, the deliverer of the church has been decorated with every attribute of a hero, and even of a faint; while the difcontent of the vanquished party has compared Conftantine to the moft abhorred of thofe tyrants, who, by their vice and weaknefs, difhonoured the Imperial purple. The fame paffions have in fome degree been perpetuated to fucceeding generations, and the character of Conftantine is confidered, even in the prefent age, as an object either of fatire or of panegyric. By the impartial union of thofe defects which are confeffed by his warmeft admirers, and of thofe virtues which are acknowledged by his moft implacable enemies, we might hope to delineate a juft portrait of that VOL. XXIV. extraordinary man, which the truth and candour of history should adopt without a blufh. But it would foon appear, that the vain attempt to blend fuch difcordant colours, and to reconcile such inconfiftent qualities, muft produce a figure monftrous rather than human, unless it is viewed in its proper and diftinct lights by a careful feparation of the different periods of the reign of Constantine. The perfon, as well as the mind of Conftantine, had been enriched by nature with her choiceft endowments. His ftature was lofty, his countenance majestic, his deportment graceful; his strength and activity were displayed in every manly exercife, and from his earliest youth, to a very advanced feafon of life, he preferved the vigour of his conftitution by a ftrict adherence to the domeftic virtues of chastity and temperance. He delighted in the focial intercourse of familiar converfation; and though he might fometimes indulge his difpofition to raillery with lefs referve than was required by the fevere dignity of his ftation, the courtesy and liberality of his manners gained the hearts of all who approached him. The fincerity of his friendfhip has been fufpected; yet he B fhewed, fhewed, on fome occafions, that he was not incapable of a warm and lafting attachment. The difadvantage of an illiterate education had not prevented him from forming a juft eftimate of the value of learning; and the arts and fciences derived fome encouragement from the munificent protection of Conftantine. In the difpatch of bufinefs, his diligence was indefatigable; and the active powers of his mind were almoft continually exercifed in reading, writing, or meditating, in giving audience to anbaffadors, and in examining the complaints of his fubjects. Even those who cenfured the propriety of his measures were compelled to acknowledge, that he poffeffed magnanimity to conceive, and patience to execute, the most arduous defigns, without being checked either by the prejudices of education, or by the clamours of the multitude. In the field, he infufed his own intrepid fpirit into the troops, whom he conducted with the talents of a confummate general; and to his abilities, rather than to his fortune, we may afcribe the fignal victories which he obtained over the foreign and domeftic foes of the republic. He loved glory, as the reward, perhaps as the motive, of his labours. The boundless ambition, which, from the moment of his accepting the purple at York, appeared as the ruling paffion of his foul, may be juftified by the dangers of his own fituation, by the character of his rivals, by the confcioufnefs of fuperior merit, and by the profpect that his fuccefs would enable -him to restore peace and order to the diftracted empire. In his ci vil wars againft Maxentius and Licinius, he had engaged on his fide the inclinations of the people, who compared the undiffembled vices of thofe tyrants, with the fpirit of wisdom and justice which feemed to direct the general tenor of the administration of Conftantine. Had Conftantine fallen on the banks of the Tyber, or even in the plains of Hadrianople, fuch is the character which, with a few exceptions, he might have tranfmitted to pofterity. But the conclufion of his reign (according to the moderate and indeed tender fentence of a writer of the fame age) degraded him from the rank which he had acquired among the most deferving of the Roman princes. In the life of Auguftus, we behold the tyrant of the republic, converted almost by imperceptible degrees, into the fa ther of his country and of human kind. In that of Conftantine, we may contemplate a hero, who had fo long infpired his subjects with love, and his enemies with terror, degenerating into a cruel and diffolute monarch, corrupted by his fortune, or raised by conqueft above the neceffity of diffimulation. The general peace which he maintained during the laft fourteen years of his reign, was a pe riod of apparent fplendor rather than of real profperity; and the old age of Conftantine was difgraced by the oppofite yet reconcileable vices of rapacioufnefs and prodigality. The accumulated treafures found in the palaces of Maxentius and Licinius, were lavifhly confumed; the various innovations introduced by the conqueror, were attended with an increasing |