ceive, then, no longer the mighty of our world in this strange union with misery and degradation, but the presiding spirit of one of these orbs; or multiply his power, and make him the deputed governor, the vicegerent angel, of a million of those orbs that are spread, in their myriads, through infinity. Think what it would be to be permitted to hold high converse with such a delegate of heaven as this; to find this lord of a million worlds the actual inhabitant of our own; to see him, and yet live; to learn the secrets of his immense administration; and hear of forms of being, of which men can now have no more conception than the insect living on a leaf has of the forest that surrounds him. Still more, to find, in this being, an interest, a real interest, in the affairs of our little corner of the universe; of that earthly cell, which is absolutely invisible from the nearest fixed star that sparkles in the heavens above us. Nay, to find him willing to throw aside his glorious toils of empire, in order to meditate our welfare, and dwell among us for a time. This surely would be wondrous, appalling, and yet transporting; such as that, when it had passed away, life would seem to have nothing more it could offer, compared to the being blessed with such an intercourse!

And now mark,-behind all the visible scenery of nature; beyond all the systems of all the stars; around this whole universe, and through the infinity of infinite space itself; from all eternity and to all eternity; there lives a Being, compared to whom that mighty Spirit just described, with his empire of a million suns, is infinitely less, than to you is the minutest mote that floats in the sunbeam. There is a Being, in whose breath lives the whole immense of worlds; who with the faintest wish could blot them all from existence; and who, after they had all vanished away like a dream, would remain, filling the whole tremendous solitude they left, as unimpaired in all the fulness of His might, as when He first scattered them around Him to be the flaming beacons of His glory. With Him, coinfinite with immensity, coeval with eternity, the universe is a span, its duration a moment. Hear His voice attesting His own eternal sovereignty: "Heaven and earth shall pass away, but My words shall not pass away."-But who is He that thus builds the throne of His glory upon the ruins of earth and heaven? who is He that thus triumphs over a perishing universe, Himself alone eternal and impassible? The child of a Jewish woman;-He who was laid in a manger, because there was no room for Him in the inn at Bethlehem!

READINGS

IN

SENATORIAL AND JUDICIAL ELOQUENCE.

I.—MR. PITT (LORD CHATHAM) IN REPLY TO MR. HORACE WALPOLE. SIR-The atrocious crime of being a young man, which the honourable gentleman has, with such spirit and decency, charged upon me, I shall neither attempt to palliate nor deny; but content myself with wishing, that I may be one of those whose follies may cease with their youth, and not of those who continue ignorant in spite of age and experience.

Whether youth can be attributed to any man as a reproach, I will not, Sir, assume the province of determining; but surely, age may justly become contemptible, if the opportunities which it brings have passed away without improvement; and vice appear to prevail when the passions have subsided. The wretch who, after having seen the consequences of a thousand errors, continues still to blunder, and in whom age has only added obstinacy to stupidity, is surely the object either of abhorrence or contempt; and deserves not that his gray head should secure him from insults. Much more, Sir, is he to be abhorred, who, as he has advanced in age, has receded from virtue, and become more wicked with less temptation; who prostitutes himself for money which he cannot enjoy, and spends the remains of his life in the ruin of his country.

But youth, Sir, is not my only crime: I have been accused of acting a theatrical part.-A theatrical part may either imply some peculiarities of gesture, or a dissimulation of my real sentiments, and the adoption of the opinions and language of another man.

In the first sense, Sir, the charge is too trifling to be confuted, and deserves to be mentioned, only that it may be despised. I am at liberty, like every other man, to use my own language; and though I may, perhaps, have some ambition to please this gentleman, I shall not lay myself under any

restraint, nor very solicitously copy his diction or his mien, however matured by age or modeled by experience.

But if any man shall, by charging me with theatrical behaviour, imply that I utter any sentiments but my own, I shall treat him as a calumniator and a villain; nor shall any protection shelter him from the treatment which he deserves. I shall, on such an occasion, without scruple, trample upon all those forms with which wealth and dignity entrench themselves, nor shall anything, but age, restrain my resentment; age, which always brings with it one privilege,-that of being insolent and supercilious, without punishment!

But with regard, Sir, to those whom I have offended, I am of opinion that, if I had acted a borrowed part, I should have avoided their censure: the heat which offended them is the ardour of conviction, and that zeal for the service of my country which neither hope nor fear shall influence me to suppress. 1 will not sit unconcerned while my liberty is invaded, nor look in silence upon public robbery.-I will exert my endeavours, at whatever hazard, to repel the aggressor, and drag the thief to justice, whoever may protect him in his villainy, and whoever may partake of his plunder.

II —LORD CHATHAM (MR. PITT) ON THE AMERICAN WAR. I CANNOT, my Lords, I will not, join in congratulation or misfortune and disgrace. This, my Lords, is a perilous and tremendous moment. It is not a time for adulation: the smoothness of flattery cannot save us in this rugged and awful crisis. It is now necessary to instruct the throne in the language of truth. We must, if possible, dispel the delusion and darkness which envelop it; and display, in its full danger and genuine colours, the ruin which is brought to our doors. Can ministers still presume to expect support in their infatuation? Can parliament be so dead to its dignity and duty, as to give its support to measures thus obtruded and forced it? Measures, my Lords, which have reduced this late flourishing empire to scorn and contempt! "But yesterday, and Britain might have stood against the world: now, none so poor as do her reverence!"-The people, whom we at first despised as rebels, but whom we now acknowledge as enemies, are abetted against us, supplied with every military store, have their interests consulted, and their ambassadors entertained, by our inveterate enemy; and ministers do not-and dare not-interpose with dignity or effect. The desperate

upon

state of our army abroad is in part known. No man more highly esteems and honours the British troops than I do; I know their virtues and their valour; I know they can achieve anything but impossibilities; and I know that the conquest of British America is an impossibility. You cannot, my Lords, you can not conquer America. What is your present situation there? We do not know the worst; but we know that, in three campaigns, we have done nothing, and suffered much. You may swell every expense, accumulate every assistance, and extend your traffic to the shambles of every German despot: your attempts will be for ever vain and impotent— doubly so, indeed, from this mercenary aid on which you rely; for it irritates, to an incurable resentment, the minds of your adversaries, to over-run them with the mercenary sons of rapine and plunder, devoting them and their possessions to the rapacity of hireling cruelty. If I were an American, as I am an Englishman, while a foreign troop was landed in my country, I never would lay down my arms;-never, never, never!

But, my Lords, who is the man, that, in addition to the disgraces and mischiefs of the war, has dared to authorise and associate, to our arms, the tomahawk and scalping-knife of the savage?-to call, into civilised alliance, the wild and inhuman inhabitant of the woods?-to delegate, to the merciless Indian, the defence of disputed rights, and to wage the horrors of his barbarous war against our brethren? My Lords, these enormities cry aloud for redress and punishment. But, my Lords, this barbarous measure has been defended, not only on the principles of policy and necessity, but also on those of morality; "for it is perfectly allowable," says Lord Suffolk, "to use all the means, which God and nature have put into our hands." I am astonished, I am shocked, to hear such principles confessed; to hear them avowed in this house, or in this country. My Lords, I did not intend to encroach so much on your attention, but I cannot repress my indignation-I feel myself impelled to speak. My Lords, we are called upon-as members of this house, as men, as Christians-to protest against such horrible barbarity!- "That God and nature have put into

our hands!" What ideas of God and nature that noble lord may entertain, I know not; but I know, that such detestable principles are equally abhorrent to religion and humanity. What! to attribute the sacred sanction of God and nature to the massacres of the Indian scalping-knife!-to the cannibal savage, torturing, murdering, devouring, drinking the blood

of his mangled victims! Such notions shock every precept of morality, every feeling of humanity, every sentiment of honour. These abominable principles, and this more abominable avowal of them, demand the most decisive indignation.

I call upon that Right Reverend, and this most Learned Bench, to vindicate the religion of their God-to support the justice of their country. I call upon the Bishops, to interpose the unsullied sanctity of their lawn ;-upon the Judges, to interpose the purity of their ermine, to save us from this pollution. I call upon the honour of your Lordships to reverence the dignity of your ancestors, and to maintain your own. I call upon the spirit and humanity of my country, to vindicate the national character. I invoke the Genius of the Constitution! From the tapestry that adorns these walls, the immortal ancestor of this noble Lord frowns with indignation at the disgrace of his country. To send forth the merciless cannibal, thirsting for blood! Against whom?-your brethren! -to lay waste their country, to desolate their dwellings, and extirpate their race and name, by the aid and instrumentality of these horrible hounds of war! Spain can no longer boast pre-eminence in barbarity. She armed herself with bloodhounds to extirpate the wretched natives of Mexico; we, more ruthless, loose these dogs of war against our countrymen in America, endeared to us by every tie that can sanctify humanity. I solemnly call upon your Lordships, and upon every order of men in the state, to stamp, upon this infamous procedure, the indelible stigma of the Public Abhorrence. More particularly, I call upon the holy prelates of our religion to do away this iniquity; let them perform a lustration, to purify the country from this deep and deadly sin.

III.-LORD MANSFIELD, ON PRIVILEGE OF PARLIAMENT.

MY LORDS,-When I consider the importance of this bill to your Lordships, I am not surprised it has taken up so much of your consideration. It is a bill, indeed, of no common magnitude; it is no less than to take away, from two-thirds of the legislative body of this great kingdom, certain privileges and immunities, of which they have been long possessed. Perhaps there is no situation in which the human mind can be placed, that is so difficult and trying, as when it is made a judge in its own cause. There is something in the breast of man, so attached to self, so tenacious of privileges once obtained; that, in such a situation, either to discuss with