whose bad propensities are stimulated and augmented by the original error that has been committed.

And then, in the second place, it is to be considered, that from the nature of human institutions, men commonly adhere to what they have been accustomed to, long after it has lost its suitableness to their actual position, or become encumbered with errors which have altogether perverted it from its original design;-so that, when the movement for improvement is at last forced on them by the recent operation of the evils that had been fostered— that movement takes the character, rather of a violent attempt to throw off an afflictive and inveterate disease, than of a hearty endeavour to give stability and new vigour to improved institutions and modes of life-and that there is thus, on the surface of society, this constant operation of two antagonist forces going forward-the one tending to keep things in their existing condition, after they should have been gradually and wisely subjected to cautious change-and the other addressing itself to the correction of existing evils, not as to things which should be gently removed, but which rather demand an entire destruction of the system with whose vital energies they have become incorporated-and from which, therefore, it is thought

they can only be removed by a violent undoing of every thing connected with them.

In the words of Lord Bacon, when treating of what he has called the peccant humours of society -"the first of these," says he, "is the extreme affecting of two extremities; the one antiquity, the other novelty, wherein it seemeth the children of time do take after the nature and malice of the father. For, as he devoureth his children, so one of them seeketh to devour and suppress the other, while antiquity envieth there should be new additions, and novelty cannot be content to add, but it must deface; surely," continues he, "the advice of the prophet is the true direction in this matter, • State super vias antiquus, et videte quænam sit via recta, et bona, et ambulate in ea ;' antiquity deserveth that reverence, that men should make a stand thereon, and discover what is the best way; but, when the discovery is well taken, then to make progression; and, to speak truly, ‘Antiquitus seculi juventus mundi; these times are the ancient when the world is ancient, and not those which we account ancient ordine retrogrado, by a computation backward from ourselves." From this contest, however, of two principles, the one envying that there should be new additions, and the other not content to add, but seeking to de

stroy, it is plain that the strife must be one of great violence when it comes to its crisis, and that the quiet order and progressive amendment of human affairs are likely to be great sufferers by the contention.

Then, in the third place, it is to be considered, that the plan hitherto adopted by men, when setting about the improvement of their condition, has commonly, or almost in all cases, been rather by seeking for new forms of government, than for any amendment simply in their maxims of administration, or in their modes of conducting the institutions that already exist. Their first effort has always thus been, to remove or destroy the existing frame-work of social life—or, at least, to give a new form to some of its most prominent portions. They thus assume the attitude of those persons who commence their operations for the bettering of their trade, by the breaking of the machinery, by means of which it has previously been conducted; and when this process of destruction has once been commenced, it has seldom stopped at the first intended movement, but has proceeded with the same rash hand to the entire mechanism of life -and has thus involved society, and all its existing institutions, in one accumulation of ruin.

For it is still farther to be considered, in the.

fourth place, that when excitement has been generated to a certain extent in society-and doubt been entertained as to the value or truth of any one principle or institution, the tendency always has been, that that excitement and doubt have propagated themselves with daily augmenting speed over every principle and institution that had previously been venerated-even those which had once been esteemed the most essential to the welfare of life, and the least liable to any attacks of doubt. Thus when men have once been led to lose their reverence for what seemed only the frame-work of social life-and have ventured to put forth a destructive hand towards it, they have seldom stopped short, till their religious belieftheir moral principles-their respect for all authority and precept, have been subjected to the same treatment—and thus a change which, in its commencement, seemed directed towards but a small or acknowledged disorder, ultimately affects the whole intellectual, and moral, and religious order of life;-and infidelity-and atheism—and immorality-and a disregard of all authority-and a general violation of all the rules of purity and decency, become the eventual characteristics of all seasons of great and general excitement.

In the fifth place, party-spirit never fails to have

its share in the production of the evils of such times-men doing things, not because they would have freely chosen them, but because they are apprehended to be necessary to counteract the opposite faction against whose endeavours to obtain power every exertion must be made-and the maxim of the ancient poet is thus often acted on to an extent which is productive of the most unprincipled and ruinous measures" fas aut nefas, quis in hoste requirit." Sympathy too, in such times, communicates the evil impression to vast bodies of men, whose united agency adds incalculably to the pressure and endurance of the mischief that is produced; and still more, as in such a state of things, each individual is willing to shift the responsibility from himself, and to consider himself as merely obeying the general impulse, measures are adopted which no mind presumes to defend as proper or beneficial-but which, on the contrary, are universally admitted to be unjustifiable,— though they continue to be submitted to and pushed forward, simply because no individual feels himself responsible for the event, and because the measure in question is clamorously demanded, and cannot, from some cause or other, be resisted.

In the last place, the causes already noticed,