crime of treafon," they perplex the public with ftrange incongruities by punishing a highwayman as they would do a pickpocket, they abol:fh all profeffional pre-eminence, and deftroy all degrees of diftinction in " mistaken virtue." How infinitely more amiable and delicate is Mr. Burke's mode of thinking and feeling on these occafions!

"Though piracy may be, in the eye of the law, a lefs offence than treafon; yet as both are, in effect, punished with the fame death, the fame forfeiture, and the fame corruption of blood, I never would take from any fellow-creature whatever, any fort of advantage, which he may derive to his fafety the pity of mankind, or to his reputation froin from their general feelings, by degrading his offence, when I cannot foften his punishment. The general fenfe of mankind tells me, that thofe offences, which may poffibly arife from mistaken virtue, are not in the clafs of infamous actions. Lord Coke, the oracle of the English law, conforms to that general fenfe, where he fays, that "thole things which are of the highest criminality may be of the leaft difgrace."

With due deference, however, to the judgement of this celebrated fenator, and we hope without injury to his finer feelings, we muft beg leave to remark, that Lord Coke is here fpeaking of a circumitance, that really obtained, or sometimes took place, in the law, not that which ought generally fo to do; of a circumftance which, tho' actually legal, was rather fo de facto, than de jure; it being inconfiftent with the very nature of crimes and intention of punishment, that the greatest crine fhould be, however it might be, the leaft, of all others, difgraceful.

Again, the want of dignity and confiftency in the British Legillature and Government is expofed in the lenity, with which the prefent unjuft, oppreffive, cruel, and deftructive war is carried on against the American Rebels!

"Whenever," fays the letter-writer," a rebellion really and truly exifts, (which is as cafily known in tact, as it is difficult to define in words) government has not entered into fuch military conventions; but has ever declined all intermediate treaty, which fhould put rebels in poffeffion of the law of nations with regard to war, Commanders would receive no benefits at their hands, because they could make no return for them. Who has ever heard of capitulation, and parole of honour, and exchange of prifoners, in the late rebellions in this kingdom? The answer to all demands of that fort was, "we can engage for nothing; you are at the king's pleafure." We ought to rememher, thet if our prefent enemies be, in reality and truth, rebels, the king's generals have no right to release them upon any conditions whatfoever; and they are themselves anfwerable to the law, and as much in want of a pardon for doing fo, as the rebels whom they release."

To be fure, there does appear a little inconfiftence in treating avowed rebels on the fame footing as foreign enemies; and

7

certair

certain it is we did not treat the Scotch rebels in the fame manner; but furely, circumftances may juftify the measure on Our author's own plea, "that nobody can have fuch a fanatical zeal for the criminal juftice of Henry the eighth, that he will contend for executions that must be retaliated tenfold on his own friends."-Mr. Burke will not dare to say in direct terms that the Americans are not in open rebellion; and yet he muft admit it would be downright madnefs, while they are as powerful as they are at prefent, not to admit of a cartel or exchange of prifoners.

General principles both of law and juftice are frequently obliged to give way to particular fituations and circumftances; and, if they did not, they would as frequently counteract the univerfal principles of equity and found policy.-There needed no ghoft to come to tell us that, "indeed, our affairs are in a bad condition," and even a politician of lefs authority night have fufficed. But really, tho' we no more rejoice at it than does Mr. Burke, we cannot think it fo great a misfortune that the refractory Americans, to whofe names we have been fo long familiar, have fallen under the fwords of trangers, whofe names we cannot pronounce, rather than by thofe of true-born Englishmen. On the contrary, that the punishment, due to their temerity, has been immediately inflicted on them by foreigners, is a confideration that may probably prevent fome of that heart-burning and hatred against real Englifhmen, which may remain after the conteft is decided.His objection to the hard names, or as he calls them "barbarous appellations" of the ftrangers, is contemptible affectation. The North Americans were no ftrangers to German names, or German antipathies, before the Heffians were employed to fubdue then. By the natural regards to repeatedly expreffed by this writer for the American rebels, one would imagine Mr. Burke was himself a true-born Englishman, and the Americans, to a man, defcended from native Britons, inftead of being in a great degree an heterogeneous mixture of emigrants from moft Countries in Europe. And yet this writer fays,

"I think I know America. If I do not, my ignorance is incurable, for I have fpared no pains to understand it; and I do moit folemniy affure thofe of my Conttituents who put any fort of confidence in my industry and integrity, that every thing that has been done there has arifen from a total mifconception of the object."

How! Every thing, that has been done, arifen from a total misconception of the object!- l'his is much! Horridly out of luck, indeed, must have been the advifers, as well as the executors, of our American projects to have failed in every thing. If we are not mistaken, the beft advisers are called in those D dd 2 who,

who, having long refided and been employed on the spot, must be fuppofed to have known fomething of the obje; and that all thefe fhould totally mifconceive it, and that every thing that has been done, fhould be done in confequence of fuch mitconception, is what we can hardly conceive: Unless, indeed, one over-ruling caufe might effect the whole; and of this, our letter-writer gives a fhrewd hint in the following ftriking defeription of a character, under which we would have the reader, helping out a bad painter, fubfcribe the name.

"It is no excu'e for prefumptuous ignorance, that it is directed by infolent paffion. The poorest being that crawls on earth, contending to fave itfelf from injustice and oppreffion, is an object respectable in the eyes of God and man. But I cannot conceive any existence under heaven, (which, in the depths of its wifdom tolerates all forts of things) that is more truly odicus and difgufting, than an impotent helpless crea ture, without civil widom or military kill, without a conicioufnefs of any other qualification for power but his fervility to it, bloated with pride and arrogance, calling for battles which he is not to fight, contending for a violent dominion which he can never exercise, and satis, fied to be himself mean and miferable, in order to render others contemptible and wretched.”

We do not prefume to know whom the author here affects to defcribe; but, in our own opinion, he affects to know other perfons and things much better than he knows himself. And yet, unfortunately for him, he takes fome pains to thew that he does know himfelf. Hear him-

"I am charged with being an American. If warm affection, towards thofe over whom I claim any fhare of authority, be a crime, I am guilty of this charge. But I do affure you (and they, who know me publickly and privately will bear witrels to me) that if ever one man lived more zealous than another, for the supremacy of parlia ment, and the rights of this imperial Crown it was my felf. Many others indeed might be more knowing in the extent, or in the founda tion of thete rights. I do not pretend to be an antiquary, or a lawyer, or qualified for the chair of Profeffor in Metaphyfics. I never ventured to put your folid interefts upon fpeculative grounds. My having conflantly declined to du fo, has been a tributed to my incapacity for fuch difquifitions; and I am inclined to believe it is partly the caufe. I never shall be afiained to coniefs, that where I am ignorant I am diffident.

We fhould be glad to know what here, and what kind of authority, Mr. Burke claims over the Americans. Not furely, as their agent, for in that refpect, he can only at in authority under them. If as a member of the British Legidature; he ought to know, that as an individual commoner, he is the tervant, not the mailer of 1 is conftituents; and tho' the Legislative acts may bind in all cafes whatever, it is the minifter or magiftrate only, who is vefted with authority over thote whom they bind, and not the indi viduals of the Legiflature,

Afhamed

4

Afhamed to confefs! No furely! It would be honourable to confefs. But how to bring a vain man to confefs he is ignorant, is the difficulty. Few know the extent of their own knowledge, and how far Mr. Burke is poffeffed of that most. effential kind of knowledge, the knowledge of one's felf, will appear from the inftances he gives of his diffidence.

A man's fetting up for a prophet is one egregious proof of his diffidence. In cafe the fword," fays he, "fhould do all the sword can da, the fuccefs of their [our] arms, and the defeat of their our] policy, will be one and the fame thing.You will never fee any revenue from America. Some increate of the means of corruption, without any cafe of the public burthens, is the very beft that can happen !"-Hold, Sir, your ill-omened croaking! There is yet nothing tremulous or diffident in the tone. Hoarfe, however, as your last note is, it may be a true foreboding; the former we will venture to contradict, tho' we are well apprized that any revenues arifing from America will be chiefly applied to foment the growing diforder of corruption in the mother country; but for a very different reason than is fuggefted by this letter-writer.-But to return to the inftances of his diffidence. "The whole," fays he, peremptorily, "of thofe maxims, upon which we have made and continued this war, muft be abandoned. Nothing indeed (for I would not deceive you) can place us in our former fituation. That hope must be laid afide. But there is a difference between bad, and the worst of all. Terms relative to the cause of the war, ought to be offered by the authority of Parliament. An arrangement at home, promifing fome security for them, ought to be made.”—Again, "Our means of originally holding America, our means of reconciling with it after quarrel, of recovering it after feparation, after victory, did depend, and muft depend, in their feveral stages and periods, upon a total renunciation of that unconditional fubiniffion, which had taken fuch poffeffion of the minds of vio lent men *.'

Again, a few pages after, he fays,

"Be fully affared, that, of all the phantoms that ever deluded the fond hopes of a credulous world, a parliamentary revenue in the Colonies is the most perfectly chimerical. Your breaking them to any fub

Muft the act then be repealed, which paffed in the Rockingham adminiftration, declaratory of the fupremacy of the British parliament over the Colonies, in all cafes whatever? And was Mr. Burke one of those vialent men, who infifted on fuch unconstitutional fubmiflion? He was, but his note is now changed. A different ftate of things requires a different conduct." This is a plea for Mr. Burke's change of opinion, but not for a change in ministerial measures ! Rev.

jection

jection, far from relieving your burthens, (the pretext for this war,) will never pay that military force which will be kept up to the deftruction of their liberties and yours. I rifque nothing in this prophecy."

Not at all the man who fets up for a prophet, especially a political one, may fafely ftand the chance of the die. At the fame time, however, it must be owned, a pretenfion to prophecy is not a mark of that diffidence, of which our author affects to make his boaft.-But, tho' we cannot give proof of his selfknowledge from inftances of his diffidence, we can give one from his confidence. He affirms, and that truly enough, that he is not qualified for the chair of profeffor of metaphyfics; I have never, fays he, ventured to put your folid interefts upon fpeculative grounds, My having conftantly declined to do fo, has been attributed to my incapacity for fuch difquifitions; and I am inclined to believe it is partly the caufe." Here our author feems to poffefs fome degree of felf-knowledge. For obferve what he fays of political Liberty.

Civil freedom, gentlemen, is not, as many have endeavoured to perfuade you, a thing that lies hid in the depths of abitrufe fcience, It is a bleffing and a benefit, not an abftract fpeculation; and all the uft reafoning that can be upon it, is of fo coarfe a texture, as perfectly to fuit the ordinary capacities of thofe who are to enjoy, and of thofe who are to defend it. Far from any refemblance to thofe propofitions in Geometry and Metaphyfics, which admit no medium, but must be true or falfe in all their latitude, focial and civil freedom, like all other things in common life, are variously mixed and modified, enjoyed in very different degrees, and fhaped into an infinite diverfity of forms, according to the temper and circumstances of every community,"

That is, if we can make any meaning out of this strange paffage, civil freedom is fomething which we can neither defcribe nor define; it is not a fpeculative paint, but a practical object; fo unlike a propofition either in Geometry or Metaphyfics that it may be partly true, and partly falfe, or, like other bleffed catholic nonfenfe, it may be neither falle nor true. Did ever any man take civil freedom, for a scientific propofition? And yet, the means of its investigation, its at tainment and prefervation, certainly depend on fuch propofitions; whole truth is cffential to those who would either attain or preserve it. What the writer means by propofitions in Geometry

The reafoning on which the most practical knowledge is founded, (and in spite of the new Scotch Common-fenfe, no knowledge is otherwife to be obtained) is, and must be, speculative: all reafoning is fo; as all reafoning is in fact metaphyfical, as the cant is. The premifes on which it is employed, however, are, if juft and true, deducible only from phyfical experience, the foundation of all human' knowledge.-It, yet, does not thence follow that every man's feelings are equally just and proper grounds for argument.

Our