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Bench, for the time being, may chance to be a courtier, of a fa cobite family, and to have arbitrary notions with respect to government. He may hold, befides his judicial office, another during pleafure, that may bring in 4 or 50col. a year; the next judge to him may hold likewise an additional, precarious place, of 200ol. a year, by the recommendation of his chief; the third judge may have lately had given him, through the fame intereft, a place of 300l. a year; and the fourth and laft, may be a modeft young man, juft brought to the bench, from being a private counfel, in a laborious department in the profeffion, wholly and folely by the authority of the fame chief. His lordship being a political man, may be afked by the miniftry of the day, whether he has read fuch a pamphlet, and whether he does not think it a ftrong libel upon them? He may answer yes: upon which Mr. Attorney is directed to profecute the writer. This is done, and he is taken up, and required to find fureties of the peace, and for his behaviour, and not merely for his appearance to try the information.. He muft fubmit to all this, or lie in prison ab initio. It matters not whether he be one of the reprefentatives of the people in parliament or not, for by a late concurrent refolution of both houfes, he is intitled to no privilege in the cafe of a libel, although he is in every other misdemeanor which is not an actual breach of the peace. When the trial comes on, the jury find the defendant not guilty. The judge tells them the evidence was clear of his being the publisher, and defires to know the ground they go upon. They tell his lordship that they do not think the paper a libel, or published with a criminal, but with a good intent. He acquaints them that their verdict then is a nullity: in fhort, it is no verdict. After fome pause and confufion, they fay, at laft, they cannot, to be fure, but find that the defendant published the paper. A verdict of guilty is ordered to be entered up. The counsel move in arrest of judgment, on account of the misdirection of the judge. The only court, where this motion can be heard, is his lordship's own court, fo circumstanced it being the only tribunal where criminal profecutions at the fuit of the king against the fubject can be heard. I need fay no more; but I will fuppofe his lordship directs a special verdict to be taken: it muft, in that way, come again before himfelf and his affeffors. From thence it may, indeed, be carried before the house of lords, by appeal, but if the miniftry have any weight there, I leave it to the reader to guess what a writer against them, appealing from a folemn judgment of the judges of the land, is likely to meet with. The King's Bench may fentence fuch writer to perpetual imprisonment, or to a fine which he cannot pay, which will answer the fame end, or to the pillory; and this may even be the fate of a peer. Who, knowing all this, and seeing fuch an example, would ever think of laying his thoughts before the public, in oppofition to any meature of adminiftration or government? Until now, the common notion of this conftitution was, that no person under it could be found guilty of any crime but by a jury. If law was mixed with fact, the judge always instructed the jury what he apprehended to be the law, and they, after comparing the facts with his expofition of the law, were to judge whether the defendant was guilty of the crime he was charged with, or not, and to find accordingly. No man before ever doubted but the jury in a criminal fuit were the fole judges of the criminality of the defendant. But that is found, at last, not to be fo in libel, and that the jury are merely to find whether the defendant published. It is the

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As the fublime and beautiful conftitute fo effential a part of the polite arts, it may not be amifs to add, by way of contraft, what Mr. Burke, a countryman of our own, has faid of them; and with which the baron (not much to his honour, we are forry to say it) appears to have been utterly unac quainted. Beauty, then, is defined by this ingenious author, to be that quality, or thofe qualities, in bodies, by which they caufe love, or fome paffion fimilar to it. It has been thought, fays he, that the idea of utility, or a part's being well adapted to answer its end, is the cause of beauty, or indeed beauty itfelf. But experience feems to have by no means been fufficiently confulted in framing this theory; for, on that principle, the wedge-like fnout of a swine, with its rough cartilage at the end; the little funk eyes, and the whole make of the head fo well adapted to its offices of digging and rooting, would be extremely beautiful. If the fitnefs of parts was what conftituted the lovelinefs of their form, the actual employment of them would undoubtedly much augment it; but this is far from being always the cafe. A bird on the wing is not fo fo beautiful as when it is perched. There is another notion current, pretty near a-kin to the former, that perfection is the conftituent caufe of beauty. But in fenfible objects, fo far is perfection from being always confidered as fuch, that beauty, where it is higheft, in the female fex, almost always carries with it an idea of weakness and imperfection. It is farther remarkable that beauty always dwells upon little and pleafing objects, whilft the fublime, which is the caufe of admiration, dwells on great objects and terrible. If we compare the beautiful and fublime, there appears a remarkable contrat in the comparifon. Sublime objects are vaft in their dimenfions beautiful ones, comparatively, fmall. An object, to be beautiful, fhould be fmooth and polished; to be great, rugged and negligent. Beauty fhould fhun the right line, yet deviate from it infenfibly; the great, in many cases, loves the right line; and when it deviates, it often makes a strong deviation; beauty fhould not be obfcure; the great ought to be dark and gloomy; beauty should be light and delicate; the great, folid and even maffy. They are indeed ideas of a very different nature, one being founded on pain, the other on pleasure.—This, which is in our opinion the moft juft and philofophical theory concerning the fublime and beautiful, we thought highly proper to precede an account of the polite arts, which are so intimately connected with these ideas.

To return to the baron, we can by no means fubfcribe to the latter part of his obfervation, allowing it to be practicable, that all authors fhould endeavour after the fublime in every

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advance new ones, becomes interefting to every perfon, who is defirous of knowing the hiftory and conftitution of that country. The author of the Candid Inquiry, that is, the editor of this volume, confcious of the imperfection which might attend his own attempt, has corroborated his opinion, "that patronage is every way injurious to the church of Scotland,' by republifhing feveral tracts on this fubject, by writers of unquestionable character and abilities.

The firft is, the Reprefentation of Meff. Carftares, Blackwell, and Bailie, by appointment of the commiffion of the general affembly, to the houfe of peers, against the bill for reftoring patronages, in 1712. This addrefs fets forth the principles and rights of the church of Scotland upon the prefent article.

An Account of Lay-Patronages in Scotland follows next, published at the above conjun&ture, in order to fupport the addrefs; more copiously fhewing, in point of law, the rights of the church, by the Revolution and Union settlements. This piece is fuppofed to have been written by Sir David Dalrymple,

The third article is entitled, Confiderations on Patronages, addreffed to the Gentlemen of Scotland, by Dr. Francis Hutchefon, 1735. This is followed by the Refolution of the affembly in 1736, upon the return of their commiffioners from parliament, with the report of their want of fuccefs, well known to be the draught of the late lord P- -t D-s.

We come now to the only original compofition in this volume, entitled A Candid Inquiry into the conftitution of the Church of Scotland, in relation to the Settlement of Minifters. The author has taken a wider range than any former adventurer in the fame field. He enquires into the origin of patronage, its gradual prevalence in various periods and in different countries, and its effects on religion and the clergy.

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At the Revolution, he fays, it was found, that patronage was inconvenient, and fubject to great abuse; it was therefore laid afde, and in its room a new conftitution, for the fettlement of minifters, was thus formed. Upon a vacancy, the heritors, being Proteftants, and the elders, are to name and propofe the perfon to the whole congregation, to be either approven or difapproven by them; and if they difapprove, the difapprovers to give in their reafons, to the effect the affair may be cognofced by the prefbytery of the bounds, at whofe judgment, and by whofe determination, the calling and entry of a particular minifter is to be ordered and concluded.?

Such, he adds, was the equitable and liberal plan settled by our wife forefathers, as the foundation and rule of government in this most effential point, affecting in turn every individual

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tizen who aspires to be truly useful: but we muft caution the young ftudent, not to take this book but for what it really is, and to use it with circumfpection. It is not a fyftematic work. The limits of the belles lettres are not there exactly marked; all the sciences are there confounded; there are very few definitions, and thofe few are imperfe&t; the axioms, the principles, the fundamental rules that flow from them are not marked with precifion; the terms of art not fufficiently explained; theology, philofophy, morality, and many other fciences that have no relation to the belles lettres, are there mixed with them. From all this arifes a confufion in the mind that is very detrimental to those who devote themselves to study. We ought therefore to regard this fingular work, not so much as a dogmatic treatise on the belles lettres, as an ingenious compilation of the most pleafing examples drawn from the best authors; executed with tafte, and ornamented with the graces of style.'

The baron begins his obfervations upon the Polite Arts by ftrictures upon grammar, which, though we acknowledge it to be the foundation of all the reft, is of fo dry and uninteresting a nature, that we fhall be as concife as possible in our remarks upon it. Our author juftly rejects the received definition of grammar, namely, the art of fpeaking well. which more properly belongs to rhetoric; and in the place of it fubftitutes that of the art of fpeaking and writing a language correctly. With regard to the parts of speech, they vary fo much in different languages, and are fo generally known, that it is not here neceffary to enlarge upon them. We hall, therefore, lay before the reader our author's remarks upon the faults that are committed against the purity of ftile in general, which will properly pave the way to the subsequent chapter on rhetoric, or the art of speaking with propriety. The first of these faults is the ufe of barbarous terms, fuch as are either fo old, fo new, or fo uncommon, as to be intelligible to few perfons only. The fecond is the gallimatia, as the French call it, or that confufion and obscurity, which arifes from a number of phrafes jumbled together, without order or judgment. The third is ambiguity, which proceeds from fuch expreffions as have a double sense; and, of confequence, render a difcourfe obfcure. The fourth is long and frequent parentheses, which interrupt the thread of the difcourfe, and fufpend the fense. The fifth is a bad arrange,

ment of the words; the fixth is long periods, which render a difcourfe obfcure and perplexed, by prefenting too great a number of ideas to the mind at the fame time. The feventh is barbarifms and folecifms, or fuch faults as are contrary to the

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The finds new objects, interefts, and connexions, to exercife her fancy and her powers.'

Dr. Langhorne certainly over rates the merit of his Fables. His advertisement implies, that this fpecies of writing has hitherto been deftitute of imagery, defcription and sentiment. But we will venture to affert that no man who has a taste for poetry will deny that Gay's Fables have thofe embellishment, Gay was a poet much fuperior to Dr. Langhorne; and a poet always animates his thoughts, on whatever object he is employed, with imagery, defcription, and fentiment. Invention, it must be owned, in the fine arts, is a proof of a vigorous and fertile mind; provided it is conducted with judgment, and prefents attractive ideas. Much, however, cannot be faid in favour of the new objects, interefts, and connexions, which Dr. Langhorne has here found for poetry; as they are remote from common life, and will, we shall venture to prophecy, be chiefly regarded by the author. As thofe of our English readers, whom a writer fhould wish to please, are not of an extravagant, oriental turn, they are not obliged to fop, or Gay, for giving reason and speech to the animal creation; and much less to our fabulift for making the Sun-flower complain, and the Ivy vent its invidious reproaches. The more probable a fiction is, the more pleafing it will be, and the stronger influence will its moral have upon the mind. Therefore, if the compiler of fables would lay before us important objects, interefts, and connexions, let him make his own fpecies the ground-work of his poetry; and however fevere our restriction may seem to the luxuriant imagination of Dr. Langhorne, man is fo complicated, and diversified a being, that he will always afford ample matter for inventive genius.

The plan of these Fables is trifling; and it is ill conducted. Flowers are here introduced which are but little known, and are therefore proper fubjects for a minute virtuofo, not for a fentimental poet, who will always take his imagery from those objects with which the generality of mankind are converfant, because it is more his province to affect than to inform.

Pioribus atque poetis

Quidlibet audendi femper fuit æqua poteftas.

It is by this obfervation of Horace that Dr. Langhorne vindicates his attempt; an observation, which, when mifapplied, will never authenticate poetical error and he has no right to avail himself of it, who miakes a prepofterous choice of fuch materials, as none but himself would felect, for original compofition.

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