Chapter XVI: Appendix: THE ANARCHISTS.—An Ode (1)

[A Parody on Collins’s Ode to the Passions.]

—Numero plures, virtute et honore minores,
Indocti stolidique et depugnare parati.—_Hor._

When Anarchy, sworn foe to Kings,
O’er Gallia wav’d her crimson wings,
Ere yet she spoil’d with iron hand
Fair Europe’s desolated land;
Her offspring here, a spurious brood,
In faction nurs’d, inur’d to blood,
Elate with Hope, perplex’d with Fear,
Would often raise the listening ear;
And all their mother’s wonders tell,
And throng around her secret cell,
Ranting, bribing, whispering, trembling,
Urging, boasting, and dissembling.
By turns they felt the Gallic mind
Enlarg’d, unprejudic’d, refin’d;
Till once, by all the goddess fir’d,
Beyond Discretion rapt, inspir’d;
Seditious, false, and prone to ill,
They eager snatch’d the grey-goose quill.
And as they oft had heard apart
The wonders of Sedition’s art,
Each, for Madness rul’d the hour,
Would prove his own subversive power.

First PAINE his _Rights of Man_ display’d,
But could no more—for falsely cross’d
Ev’n by the friends himself had made,
Enraged he fled to Gallia’s coast.
Next PRIESTLEY tried, to whom ’twas given
Mankind’s free-agency to tell;
Ordain’d to point the road to heaven,
In pure free will he points—to hell!
With meagre visage THELWALL came,
In lectures told his sufferings sore;
Till purple tyrants blush’d with shame
And crowds the suffering saint adore.
But thou, O GODWIN! meek and mild;
Speak thy metaphysic page:
Now it cheer’d a laggard age,
And bade new scenes of joy at distance hail;
When tyrant Kings shall be no more,
When human wants and wars shall fail,
And sleep and death shall quit the hallow’d shore.
’Twas thus he strove to sap the throne.
With borrow’d arts and weapons not his own,
While Gallia clapp’d her hands, and hail’d her favourite child.

And longer had he sung—but, strange to say,
WAKEFIELD, the dragon-fly, rush’d on;
Eager he sought the bold rebellious fray,
And burst with anger and disdain
The web of sophistry in twain
Which GODWIN, patient sage! had spread
To catch the fluttering insects of the land.
Treason upreared her arm to strike,
Rebellion grasped the murd’rous pike,
And though, sometimes, each maddening pause between,
Soft Discretion, joined with Fear,
Whisper’d her councils in his ear,
Still Anarchy upheld the busy scene,
And raised her shield of brass to guard her vot’ry’s head.

Next HOLCROFT vowed in doleful tone
No more to fire a thankless age,
Oblivion marked his labours for her own,
Neglected from the press and damn’d upon the stage.
See! faithful to their mighty dam,
COLERIDGE, SOUTHEY, LLOYD, and LAMB,
In splay-foot madrigals of love.
Soft moaning like the widowed dove,
Pour side by side their sympathetic notes.
Of equal rights and civic feasts
And tyrant Kings and knavish Priests
Swift through the land the tuneful mischief floats.
And now to softer strains they struck the lyre,
They sung the beetle, or the mole,
The dying kid, or ass’s foal,
By cruel man permitted to expire.
But O, how altered was the sprightlier hour!
When FOX, the Parthian hero, rose to view;
He o’er the rest high-towering like a steeple
Leagued with a “Corresponding” crew,
Pledged in large floods of wine “their Majesties—the People”.

The royal tribe accept the proffered power.
Kings from the forge, dictators from the plough,
Peeping from forth their allies low,
Before the fallen arch-seceder bow;
LEPAUX bade Gallia hail his name,
But old St. Stephen bowed his head for shame.

See NORFOLK last, with BEDFORD roll,
He of Bacchus’ favours proud,
The sovereign mob most eloquent addressed;
But soon he spied the mirth-inspiring bowl,
Whose ruby treasures charmed his soul the best;
They would have thought who heard him speak,
’Twas Falstaff, with his minions at his back,
High primed with valour, turbulence, and sack,
Aping the monarch to a wondr’ing crowd.
While BEDFORD proud his lesson to rehearse,
With studious labours urged the bold reply:
Shouts of applause ran rattling through the sky:
And he, the hero of the day,
Right glad their servile suffrage to repay,
Shook golden bounty from his swelling purse.

O, England! heav’n-defended land!
With power to “threaten and command,”
Say, is thy former spirit broke,
To crouch beneath a foreign yoke,
And listen to the idiot strains
Of slaves thy better sense disdains,
As erst, in many an ardent hour,
You awed an adverse haughty power.
Thy lofty mind, to Freedom true,
May well retain what then it knew.
Where is thy former patriot soul,
Above deceit, above controul?
Arise! as in that happier time
United, fearless, bold, sublime.
’Tis said, and I believe the tale,
Thy efforts then could more avail,
Could more true happiness dispense,
With Order, Morals, virtue, Sense,
Than all that fires with party rage
This boastful philosophic age.
Arise! with manly zeal advance,
To curb the lawless power of France;
O, bid her mad endeavours cease,
And give the willing nations PEACE!
—_Fabricius._

THE PASSIONS.

_An Ode for Music._

WILLIAM COLLINS.

When Music, heavenly maid, was young,
While yet in early Greece she sung,
The Passions oft, to hear her shell,
Throng’d around her magic cell,
Exulting, trembling, raging, fainting,
Possess’d beyond the Muse’s painting;
By turns they felt the glowing mind,
Disturb’d, delighted, rais’d, refin’d,
Till once, ’tis said, when all were fir’d,
Fill’d with fury, rapt, inspir’d,
From the supporting myrtles round
They snatch’d her instruments of sound,
And, as they oft had heard apart
Sweet lessons of her forceful art,
Each, for Madness ruled the hour,
Would prove his own expressive power.

First Fear, his hand, its skill to try,
Amid the chords bewilder’d laid,
And back recoil’d, he knew not why,
Even at the sound himself had made.

Next Anger rush’d his eyes on fire,
In lightnings own’d his secret stings,
In one rude clash he struck the lyre,
And swept with hurried hand the strings.

With woful measures wan Despair
Low sullen sounds his grief beguil’d,
A sullen, strange, and mingled air,
’Twas sad by fits, by starts ’twas wild.

But thou, O HOPE! with eyes so fair,
What was thy delighted measure?
Still it whisper’d promis’d pleasure,
And bade the lovely scenes at distance hail!
Still would her touch the strain prolong,
And from the rocks, the woods, the vale,
She call’d on ECHO still through all the song;
And where her sweetest theme she chose,
A soft responsive voice was heard at every close,
And Hope enchanted smil’d, and wav’d her golden hair.

And longer had she sung,—but, with a frown,
REVENGE impatient rose,
He threw his blood-stained sword in thunder down,
And, with a withering look,
The war-denouncing trumpet took,
And blew a blast so loud and dread,
Were ne’er prophetic sounds so full of woe.
And ever and anon he beat
The doubling drum with furious heat;
And though sometimes, each dreary pause between,
Dejected PITY at his side
Her soul-subduing voice applied;
Yet still he kept his wild unalter’d mien,
While each strain’d ball of sight seem’d bursting from his head,

Thy numbers, JEALOUSY, to nought were fix’d,
Sad proof of thy distressful state!
Of differing themes the veering song was mix’d,
And now it courted LOVE, now raving call’d on HATE.
With eyes upraised, as one inspir’d,
Pale MELANCHOLY sat retir’d,
And from her wild sequester’d seat,
In notes by distance made more sweet,
Pour’d through the mellow horn her pensive soul:
And dashing soft from rocks around,
Bubbling runnels join’d the sound;
Through glades and glooms the mingled measure stole,
Or o’er some haunted streams with fond delay,
Round a holy calm diffusing,
Love of peace and lonely musing,
In hollow murmurs died away.

But oh! how alter’d was its sprightlier tone!
When CHEERFULNESS, a nymph of healthiest hue,
Her bow across her shoulders flung,
Her buskins gemm’d with morning dew,
Blew an inspiring air that dale and thicket rung,
The hunter’s call to Faun and Dryad known;
The oak-crown’d Sisters, and their chaste-eyed Queen,
Satyrs and Sylvan boys were seen,
Peeping from forth their alleys green;
Brown EXERCISE rejoic’d to hear,
And SPORT leapt up, and seized his beechen spear.

Last came JOY’S ecstatic trial;
He with viny crown advancing,
First to the lively pipe his hand address’d;
But soon he saw the brisk awakening viol,
Whose sweet entrancing voice he lov’d the best.
They would have thought who heard the strain,
They saw in Tempe’s vale her native maids,
Amidst the festal sounding shades,
To some unwearied minstrel dancing:
While, as his flying fingers kiss’d the strings,
LOVE framed with MIRTH a gay fantastic round,
Loose were her tresses seen, her zone unbound:
And he, amidst his frolic play.
As if he would the charming air repay,
Shook thousand odours from his dewy wings.

O MUSIC! sphere-descended maid,
Friend of PLEASURE, WISDOM’S aid,
Why, goddess, why to us denied,
Lay’st thou thy ancient lyre aside?
As in that lov’d Athenian bower,
You learn’d an all-commanding power,
Thy mimic soul, O nymph endear’d,
Can well recall what then it heard.
Where is thy native simple heart,
Devote to virtue, fancy, art?
Arise, as in that elder time,
Warm, energetic, chaste, sublime!
Thy wonders, in that god-like age,
Fill thy recording Sister’s page.
’Tis said, and I believe the tale,
Thy humblest reed could more prevail,
Had more of strength, diviner rage,
Than all which charms this laggard age,
E’en all at once together found
Cecilia’s mingled world of sound.
O bid our vain endeavours cease,
Revive the just designs of Greece;
Return in all thy simple state!
Confirm the tales her sons relate.

THE ANTI-JACOBIN REVIEW AND MAGAZINE

FOR JULY, 1798.

MAGNA EST VERITAS ET PRÆVALEBIT.

_Art. 1. The Republican Judge, or the American Liberty of the Press,
as exhibited, explained, and exposed, in the base and partial
Prosecution of William Cobbett, for a pretended Libel against the
King of Spain and his Embassador, before the Supreme Court of
Pennsylvania. With an Address to the People of England._

_By Peter Porcupine. 8vo., pp. 96. Price 2s. Wright, London._

The past writings of Mr. William Cobbett, who has assumed the
appellation of Peter Porcupine, are too well known in England to
require any explanation from us, either of _their_ tendency, or of
the author’s principles. Were any doubt entertained on the subject,
nothing more would be requisite to dispel it than a mere reference
to the comments of all the Jacobin Reviewers; who have, without
exception, in defiance alike of decency and of truth, lavished on
them the most indiscriminate censure and the most scurrilous abuse.
Strange as it may appear, it is indisputably true that the
individual exertions of Mr. Cobbett have more essentially
contributed to give a proper tone to the public spirit in America
than all the efforts of the well-disposed part of the native
Americans: for a considerable length of time he combated alone a
host of foes, “himself a host”; stemmed the impetuous tide of
democracy; and checked the irruptions of French anarchy and atheism,
which threatened to overwhelm the American States, and, with the
ruins of their confliction, to crush everything for which the
Americans, at the period of their revolution, professed to fight,
and which they have ever since professed to cherish. The adoption of
such a line of conduct was alone sufficient to draw down upon our
author the vengeance of all whose treasonable designs his manly
efforts were intended to defeat. Accordingly, nothing was spared by
the infuriated advocates of anarchy to injure him in the public
mind, and, by blasting his reputation, to deprive him of that credit
which was indispensably necessary to secure the success of his
works. No imputation however base, no lie however atrocious, none of
those black and diabolical arts, in short, which, issuing from the
bubbling cauldron of democracy, were so skilfully employed to
blacken the first and fairest character in France, as a necessary
prelude to the establishment of the _virtuous_ republic of the Great
Nation, were neglected in the _glorious_ attempt to achieve the ruin
of this worthy individual. When these were found to fail of
producing the desired effect, recourse was had to personal
threats—the coward’s weapon—with the hope of inducing him, by the
means of intimidation, to quit a country in which his enemies
endeavoured to convince him that his life was daily exposed to most
imminent danger. But neither the dread of calumny, nor the fear of
assassination, could lead the object of their persecution to forego
his laudable design. He manfully persevered, and has at length,
though not without infinite difficulty, succeeded in opening the
eyes of the Americans to their own interest, and in the infamous
machinations of France, and of American traitors in the pay of
France—for England is not the ONLY country in which foreign gold is
employed as a stimulus to domestic treason.[330] In the course of
his exertions to produce this desirable end, honest Peter had
occasion to comment on the pusillanimous conduct of the Spanish
monarch, in bending the knee to, and forming an alliance with, the
base plunderers and assassins of his family, and on the insidious
and criminal efforts of the Spanish ambassador to strengthen the
hands of the French faction in America. These comments, it seems,
excited the indignation of Don Carlos Martinez de Trojo, who
determined to bring the author to condign punishment; and it was the
very unwarrantable conduct which the latter experienced on the
occasion that gave rise to the publication before us.

PETER begins his tract by stating the dangers to which he knew
himself exposed, on account of his political principles, when he
established his residence in the state of Pennsylvania, “where the
government, generally speaking, was in the hands of those who had
(and sometimes with great indecency) manifested an uniform
partiality for the sans-culotte French, and as uniform an opposition
to the ministers and measures of the federal government”. That men
should ever be placed in situations of trust and importance, whose
principles are avowedly adverse to the constitution whence they
derive their subsistence, and which it is their bounden duty to
protect, is a circumstance that would excite universal astonishment
if it did not, unhappily, so often occur. Still the frequency of its
occurrence does not alter its nature, nor should it be allowed to
diminish that ample portion of censure which must ever attach to the
authors of such appointments. It is such conduct as this that
justifies one of the wisest observations that ever fell from the pen
of Voltaire—“A GOVERNMENT CAN ONLY PERISH BY SUICIDE”—an observation
confirmed by the fate of every country that has been recently
reduced beneath the iron yoke of republican France.

Aware of his danger, our author thought the best means of averting
it was, by seeking for some standard, as a safe rule for his conduct
in respect to the liberty of this press. “The English press was said
to be _enslaved_; but, when I came to consult the practice of this
enslaved press, I found it still to be far too free for me to
attempt to follow its example. Finally, it appeared to me to be the
safest way, to form to myself some rule founded on the liberty
exercised by the _American press_. I concluded that I might without
danger go as great lengths in attacking the enemies of the country
as others went in attacking its friends: that as much zeal might be
shown in defending the general government and administration as in
accusing and traducing them: and that as great warmth would be
admissible in the cause of virtue, order, and religion, as had been
tolerated in the wicked cause of villainy, insurrection, and
blasphemy” (p. 21). Alas! Peter, at this time, knew but little of
the “spirit and temper,” as MR. BARRISTER ERSKINE would express it,
of democracy and Jacobinism. He knew not that the men who profess
those principles are for the most part vindictive, malignant,
oppressive, and intolerant; and that under the mask of liberty they
exercise the most insupportable tyranny over their families and
dependents, and that in their general conduct to their
inferiors—unless when impelled by interest or urged by ambition,
they irritate their passions with toasts and flattery, from a
tavern-chair, or influence their minds by seditious discourses and
treasonable insinuations, from a tribune or a scaffold—they are
supercilious, arrogant, insolent, and overbearing. He knew not, it
would seem, that those whose whole duty is to defend the laws often
_sleep on their posts_, while their enemies are ever vigilant,
active, and alert; that when the former are attacked, a tardiness of
zeal, amounting nearly to torpor, secures, with few exceptions,
impunity to the assailant; whereas any exposure of the latter draws
forth a malignity of revenge which is the certain fore-runner of
persecution. Indeed, the inveteracy of the discontented, of that
class which includes all those who aspire to the possession of place
and power, and are little scrupulous about the means of attaining
them; and all the determined revolutionists or subverters of
established institutions, may be traced to a natural source. Unable
to support by reason a cause which reason disavows, unable to
strengthen by arguments positions which set all argument at
defiance, it becomes their business to inflame by passion and to
dazzle with sophistry. Hence arises an extreme facility of exposing
their weakness and detecting their infamy, and not having the means
of resisting such exposure, being wholly destitute of the sentiments
which are necessary for a successful reply, they are reduced to the
degrading alternative of abandoning the field to a triumphant
adversary, or of seeking, by the adoption of violent measures, to
punish the opponent whom they did not dare to encounter. This it is
that renders revenge an active principle in _their_ minds.

The first step taken by the Spanish ambassador was an application to
the federal government to prosecute our author “for certain matters
published in his Gazette against himself and that poor, unfortunate,
and humbled mortal, Charles IV., King of Spain”. The government
consented, and Peter was accordingly bound over to appear in the
federal district court before _Judge Peters_. Don Carlos, however,
soon found that his prosecution would be more likely to succeed, if
brought in a district where the defendant had more personal enemies,
and where the people were more generally disposed to the adoption of
revolutionary principles. A memorial was, accordingly, “delivered in
to the federal government, requesting that the trial might come on
before the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, of which Court _McKean is
Chief Justice_”. Of this _republican_ Judge our author gives such an
account as must convey to English minds a strange idea of the
administration of _republican_ Justice. It is to be found in P.
22—When Britons contemplate the character here delineated, and
contrast it with the characters of their own Judges to which even
the licentious tongue of faction has not dared to impute the
smallest stain, their bosoms must glow with satisfaction of the most
exalted kind; they must exult in the superior excellence of that
form of government and of those laws which effectually secure them
from the evils of a vicious, corrupt, or partial distribution of
justice. After giving an historical detail of the proceedings
against him, accompanied by copies of the warrant to apprehend him,
the imputed libels, the bill of indictment, and the Judge’s charge,
Peter exclaims—“This, when it comes to be served up in Britain, will
be a dish for a king. The royalists will lick their lips, and the
republicans will cry, God bless us! The emigrations _for liberty’s
sake_ will cease, and we shall have nothing but the pure
unadulterated dregs of Newgate and the Fleet, the candidates for
Tyburn and Botany Bay—Blessed cargo! All _patriots_ to the backbone:
true philanthropists and universal citizens: fit for any place but
England in this world and heaven in the next!”

But, notwithstanding the Judge’s charge, the most partial and
scandalous charge, we conceive, that ever was delivered _out of
France_, the Grand Jury refused to find the bill, and the
prosecution of course ceased. The Judge, not less disappointed than
the prosecutor, on this occasion, took an early opportunity—to his
infamy be it recorded!—of declaring from the Bench that the Grand
Jury would not _do their duty_. What would the disaffected in this
country say were any British Judge to use such language? The gross
imputations cast upon the character of our author by this
_impartial_ Judge, have extorted from Peter a tribute of justice to
himself which the occasion most amply justifies. As the account here
given perfectly accords with all the information we have received
from persons of undoubted veracity who know him well, and as it
fully corroborates the opinion we ourselves have formed of him, from
an attentive perusal of his publications, we shall extract it for
the satisfaction of our readers:—“It hardly ever becomes a man to
say much of his private character or concerns; but on this occasion
I trust I shall be indulged for a moment. I will say, and I will
make that saying good, whosoever shall oppose it, that I never
attacked any one, whose private character is not, in every light in
which it can possibly be viewed as far beneath mine as infamy is
beneath honour. Nay, I defy the city of Philadelphia, populous as it
is, and respectable as are many of its inhabitants, to produce me a
single man who is more sober, industrious, or honest; who is a
kinder husband, a tenderer father, a better master, a fonder friend,
or (though last not least) a more zealous and faithful subject.

“Most certainly it is unseemly in any one to say this much of
himself unless compelled to it by some public outrage on his
character; but when the accusation is made notorious so ought the
defence; and I do again and again repeat, that I fear not a
comparison between my character and that of any man in this city:
no, not even with that of the very Judge, who held me as the worst
of miscreants. His Honour is welcome, if he please, to carry this
comparison into _all_ the actions of our lives, public and
_domestic_, and to extend it beyond ourselves to _every branch of
our families_.

“As to my writing, I never did slander any one, if the promulgation
of useful truths be not slander. Innocence and virtue I have often
endeavoured to defend, but I never defamed either. I have, indeed,
stripped the close-drawn veil of hypocrisy; I have ridiculed the
follies, and lashed the vices of thousands, and have done it
sometimes perhaps with a rude and violent hand. But these are not
the days for gentleness and mercy. Such as is the temper of the foe,
such must be that of his opponent. Seeing myself published as a
rogue, _and my wife a whore_; being persecuted with such infamous,
such base and hellish calumny in the _philanthropic_ city of
Philadelphia, merely for asserting _the truth_ respecting others,
was not calculated, I assure you, to sweeten my temper, and turn my
ink into honey-dew.

“My attachment to order and good government, nothing but the
impudence of Jacobinism can deny. The object not only of my own
publications, but also of all those which I have introduced or
encouraged, from the first moment that I appeared on the public
scene to the present day, has been to lend some aid in stemming the
torrent of anarchy and confusion. To undeceive the misguided, by
tearing the mask from the artful and ferocious villains who owing to
the infatuation of the poor, and the supineness of the rich, have
made such fearful progress in the destruction of all that is amiable
and good and sacred among men. To the government of this country in
particular it has been my constant study to yield all the support in
my power. When that government, or the worthy men who administer it
have been traduced and vilified, I have stood forward in their
defence, and that too, in times when its friends were some of them
locked up in silence, and others giving way to the audacious
violence of its foes. Not that I am so foolishly vain as to
attribute to my illiterate voter a thousandth part of the merit my
friends are inclined to allow it. As I wrote the other day to a
gentleman who had paid me some compliments on this score, ‘I should
never look on my family with a dry eye if I did not hope to outlive
my works’. They are mere transitory beings to which the
revolutionary storm has given life, and which with that storm will
expire. But, what I contend for and what nobody can deny, I have
done all that laid in my power, all that I was able by any means to
accomplish in order to counteract the nefarious effects of the
enemies of the American government and nation.

“With respect to religion, altho’ Mr. M’Kean was pleased to number
it among the things that were in danger from the licentiousness of
the press, and of course from poor _me_, I think it would puzzle the
devil himself to produce from my writings, a single passage, which
could, by all the powers of perversion be twisted into an attack
upon it. But it would on the contrary be extremely easy to prove,
that I have at all times, when an opportunity offered, repelled the
attacks of its enemies, the abominable battalions of Deists and
Atheists, with all my heart, with all my mind, with all my soul, and
with all my strength. The bitterest drop in my pen has ever been
bestowed upon them; because, of all the foes of the human race, I
look upon them, after the devil, as being the greatest and most
dreadful. Not a sacrilegious plunderer from Henry VIII. to
Condorcet, and from Condorcet to the impious Sans-culottes of
France, has escaped my censure. All those, who have attempted to
degrade religion whether by open insults and cruelties to the
clergy, by blasphemous publications or by the more dangerous poison
of the malignant modern philosophy, I have ranked amongst the most
infamous of mankind, and have treated them accordingly.”

In the concluding part of his tract the author clearly convicts the
Judge of the most decided and most flagrant partiality. He quotes a
number of infamous libels, on religious and political subjects,
which had never roused the indignation, nor even excited the
censure, of those whose duty it is to preserve the public peace and
to enforce a due observance of the laws. If, indeed, we were to
judge, from this specimen, of the mode of administring justice in
America, in matters of libel, we should conclude, that every degree
of licentiousness is allowed to those who seek to debauch the minds
of the people, to seduce them from their allegiance, and to dissolve
every tie which religion and morality have formed for the happiness
of men in a social state, while the upright supporters of virtue,
whose labours are directed to the prevention of anarchy and
rebellion, by detecting the views and exposing the machinations of
their abettors, are the sole objects not merely of _pro_secution but
of _per_secution.

The abuse bestowed on the mild and beneficent sovereigns of these
realms by the Democratic factions in the American Congress, is
almost equal in severity to the censures lavished by some members of
opposition during the _last_ parliament in the British Senate, on
the Kings of Prussia and Hungary, _before_ those monarchs had become
allies of _France_.

The following extracts will, at once, afford a criterion of the
political principles of public men, in the State of Pennsylvania,
and a curious specimen of republican _morality_.

“The _Governor_ (Mifflin) attended at a civic festival, when the
following toasts were drunk, which were published in most of the
newspapers.[331]

“‘Those _illustrious citizens_ sent to Botany Bay. May they be
_speedily recalled_ by their country in _the day of her
regeneration_.’

“‘May the spirit of parliamentary reform in Britain and Ireland
_burst the bonds of corruption, and overwhelm the foes of liberty_.’

“‘The _sans-culottes_ of France. May the robes of _all_ the
_Emperors_, _Kings_, _Princes_, and _Potentates_ [not excepting the
_King of Spain_] now employed in suppressing the flame of liberty,
be cut up to make breeches.’

“This is pretty ‘_decent_’ in a _Governor_; but without stopping to
remark on the peculiar _decency_ of his toasting a gang of
_convicts_, let us come to another instance of his conduct, full as
‘_decent_’ as this.

“At the civic festival, held in this city in 1794, to celebrate the
dethronement of ‘our great and good ally, Louis XVI.’ there were
‘assembled,’ according to the ‘_procès verbal_’ which was sent to
the Paris convention, ‘the CHIEFS, _civil and military_’. This
_procès verbal_ contains a letter to the convention, in which the
following honourable mention is made of the governor. ‘The Governor
of Pennsylvania, that _ardent friend of the French republic_, was
present, and partook of _all our enthusiasm_ and _all our
sentiments_.’[332]

“I believe they spoke truth; for the cannons of the State were
fired, and military companies, with drums beating and colours
flying, attended the execrable fête, one of the ceremonies of which
was _burning the English flag_; and as to the sentiments contained
in the _oaths_ and _speeches_ (for there were both) they abounded in
insults towards almost all the princes of the earth, but
particularly the King of Great Britain.

“A Judge of Pennsylvania, REDMAN, was, in November, 1795, caught
thieving in the shop of MR. FOLWELL, the dry-goods merchant in Front
Street. MR. FOLWELL detected him, took the money ($300) from him,
and kicked him into the street. His _friends_, among the most
intimate of whom was His Excellency the Governor, advised him to
_retire_; and he is still living at his ease about 20 miles from the
city. No justice was ever done to him; he was never censured, not
even in the newspapers! Such is the cowardly, base, and worthless
press of America. Such are _republican judges_, and such is
republican morality! But this is not the worst. I know a Judge who
_committed murder_! wilful murder, and that, too, previous to his
appointment by this our republican Governor!

“I only give a sort of hint here. One day or other if it pleases God
to spare my life, I will publish such a collection of facts as will
shock the universe.

“A Pennsylvania _Judge’s wife_ had, a little while ago, a child, by
a man who kept a livery stable. The _lady_ says, the stableman is
the best of the two and so has married him, though _his Honour_ is
still living. I need not name the parties, for though the cowardly
newspapers have never noticed the affair it is notorious enough.

“There are more bastards born annually in the single state of
Pennsylvania, than in all the British dominions: and as to
cuckoldom, I will only say that every paper teems with
_advertisements of wives eloped_ from the bed and board of their
husbands. I do not hence insinuate that there are _no good people_
here. There are many. As many as in most countries; but then people
will, and do allow, that the morals of the country are approaching
fast to that state, which has never yet failed to prove the ruin of
every thing held in esteem amongst men.”

In proving the falsehood of the assertion so frequently repeated, as
well on this as on the other side of the Atlantic, that “in
_America_ the press is _free_ and truth is _not_ a libel,” our
author adverts to a letter of DR. PRIESTLEY’S on that subject which
he promises hereafter to expose more fully (a promise which we trust
he will not forget); and then introduces the following curious
anecdote, which we extract for the benefit of the Doctor’s political
friends and admirers in Europe. “But since the Doctor wrote that
letter it seems experience has changed his opinion. He has suffered
the just punishment of his malignancy against his country; he has
been cheated, neglected, and scorned. He is now in an obscurity
hardly penetrable; he is reduced to poverty and bursting with
vexation” (may a restless spirit of innovation, springing from, and
nourished by, a bigotted vanity and a turbulent pride ever
experience a similar fate)! All this has had an effect; and I will
state as a fact, which I call upon him to deny if he can, that he
has lately declared “that _Republican governments are the most
arbitrary in the world_”! This MACHIAVEL had said before, and this
all unprejudiced men of reading and observation had long since
admitted; but, we confess we little expected to hear DOCTOR
PRIESTLEY subscribe to the creed of the one, or to the
acknowledgments of the other. Adversity, however, is an able
advocate in the cause of TRUTH.

The Address to the People of England, which is prefixed to the
publication, is short, but pointed and expressive. It breathes the
true spirit of a Briton. Of the literary merit of the work, after
the ample analysis which we have given of its contents, and the
extracts which we have made, little remains to be said. We agree
with the publisher, who in the Advertisement says: “The author has
been more anxious to strengthen his arguments than to polish his
style, to convince the judgment than to flatter the taste,” but
those critics must be more “_delicate_” or fastidious who can reject
substantial advantages for fanciful defects. Though Peter aim not at
embellishments, he possesses great strength and energy of language,
and generally writes with more accuracy than most of the American
authors, who, be it observed, have a phraseology peculiar to
themselves. This tract contains much important information, and we
strenuously recommend it to the serious perusal of our countrymen;
particularly to such of them as are disposed to question the
superior advantages which they enjoy, over ALL republican states
under our own well-poised and limited MONARCHY. The following
admonitions with which the author concludes, will, we trust, have a
due effect on the minds of those to whom they are addressed. “Such,
_Britons_, is the fruit of republican government _here_; not among
the apish and wolfish French, but among a people descended from the
same ancestors as yourselves. When your monarchial government bears
such fruits, let it, I say, be hewn down and cast into the fire; but
till that disgraceful and dreadful day comes, watch over it with
care and defend it to the last drop of your blood, preserve it as
you would a golden casket, the apple of your eye, or the last dear
gift of your dying parents. With this I conclude, praying the God of
our fathers to lead you in the practice of all their virtues, to
give wisdom to your minds and strength to your arms, to keep you
firm and united, honest and generous, loyal, brave, and free; but
above all, to preserve you from the desolating and degrading curse
of revolutionary madness and modern _republicanism_.”

PETER PORCUPINE’S WILL.

[By WILLIAM COBBETT. Published in _The Anti-Jacobin Review and
Magazine_; or Monthly Political and Literary Censor: from July to
December, 1798. Vol. i., pp. 725–8.—ED.]

In the name of Fun, Amen. I PETER PORCUPINE, Pamphleteer and Newsmonger, being (as yet) sound both in body and in mind, do, this fifteenth day of _April_, in the Year of our Lord, one thousand seven hundred and ninety-seven, make, declare, and publish, this my LAST WILL AND TESTAMENT, in manner, form, and substance following; to wit:

IN PRIMIS,

I leave my body to Doctor Michael Lieb, a member of the Legislature of Pennsylvania, to be by him dissected (if he knows how to do it) in presence of the Rump of the Democratic Society. In it they will find a heart that held them in abhorrence, that never palpitated at their threats, and that, to its last beat, bade them defiance. But my chief motive for making this bequest is, that my spirit may look down with contempt on their cannibal-like triumph over a breathless corpse.

_Item._ As I make no doubt that the above said Doctor Lieb (and some other Doctors that I could mention) would like very well to skin me, I request that they, or one of them may do it, and that the said Lieb’s father may tan my skin; after which I desire my Executors to have seven copies of my Works complete, bound in it, one copy to be presented to the Five Sultans of France, one to each of their Divans, one to the Governor of Pennsylvania, to Citizens Maddison, Giles, and Gallatin one each, and the remaining one to the Democratic Society of Philadelphia, to be carefully preserved among their archives.

_Item._ To the Mayor, Aldermen, and Councils of the City of Philadelphia, I bequeath all the sturdy young hucksters, who infest the market, and who to maintain their bastards, tax the honest inhabitants many thousand pounds annually. I request them to take them into their worshipful keeping; to chasten their bodies for the good of their souls; and moreover to keep a sharp look-out after their gallants; and remind the latter of the old proverb: _Touch pot, touch penny_.

_Item._ To T—— J——son, Philosopher, I leave a curious Norway Spider, with a hundred legs and nine pair of eyes; likewise the first black cut-throat general he can catch hold of, to be flead alive, in order to determine with more certainty the real cause of the dark colour of his skin; and should the said T—— J——son survive Banneker the Almanack Maker; I request he will get the brains of said Philomath carefully dissected, to satisfy the world in what respects they differ from those of a white man.

_Item._ To the Philosophical Society of Philadelphia, I will and bequeath a correct copy of Thornton’s plan for abolishing the use of the English language, and for introducing in its stead a republican one, the representative characters of which bear a strong resemblance to pot-hooks and hangers; and for the discovery of which plan, the said society did, in the year 1793, grant to the said language maker 500 dollars premium. It is my earnest desire, that the copy of this valuable performance, which I hereby present, may be shown to all the travelling literati, as a proof of the ingenuity of the author and of the wisdom of the society.

_Item._ To Doctor Benjamin Rush, I will and bequeath a copy of _The Censor_ for January, 1797; but, upon the express condition, that he does not in anywise or guise, either at the time of my death, or _Six months after_, pretend to speak, write, or publish an eulogium on me, my calling or character, either literary, military, civil, or political.

_Item._ To my dear fellow labourer Noah Webster, “gentleman-citizen,” Esq. and News-man, I will and bequeath a prognosticating barometer of curious construction and great utility, by which, at a single glance, the said Noah will be able to discern the exact state that the public mind will be in in the ensuing year, and will thereby be enabled to _trim by degrees_ and not expose himself to detection, as he now does by his sudden lee-shore tacks. I likewise bequeath to the said “gentleman-citizen,” six Spanish milled dollars, to be expended on a new plate of his portrait at the head of his spelling book, that which graces it at present being so ugly that it scares the children from their lessons; but this legacy is to be paid him only upon condition that he leave out the title of _’Squire_, at the bottom of said picture, which is extremely odious in an American school-book, and must inevitably tend to corrupt the political principles of the republican babies that behold it. And I do most earnestly desire, exhort and conjure the said ’Squire news-man, to change the title of his paper, _The Minerva_, for that of _The Political Centaur_.

_Item._ To F. A. Mughlenburg, Esq., Speaker of a late house of Representatives of the United States, I leave a most superbly finished statue of Janus.

_Item._ To Tom the Tinker, I leave a liberty-cap, a tricoloured cockade, a wheel-barrow full of oysters, and a hogshead of grog: I also leave him three blank checks on the bank of Pennsylvania, leaving to him the task of _filling them up_; requesting him, however, to be rather more merciful than he has shown himself heretofore.

_Item._ To the Governor of Pennsylvania, and to the late President and Cashier of the Bank of the said State, as to joint Legatees, I will and bequeath that good old proverb: _Honesty is the best policy_. And this legacy I have chosen for these worthy gentlemen, as the only thing about which I am sure they will never disagree.

_Item._ To T—— Coxe, of Philadelphia, citizen, I will and bequeath a crown of hemlock, as a recompense for his attempt to throw an odium on the administration of General Washington; and I most positively enjoin my Executors, to see that the said crown be shaped exactly like that which this spindle-shanked legatee wore before Gen. Howe, when he made his triumphal entry into Philadelphia.

_Item._ To Thomas Lord Bradford (otherwise called Goosy Tom), Bookseller, Printer, News-man, and member of the Philosophical Society of Philadelphia, I will and bequeath a copy of the peerage of Great Britain, in order that the said Lord Thomas may the more exactly ascertain what probability there is of his succeeding to the seat, which his noble relation now fills in the House of Lords.

_Item._ To all and singular the authors in the United States, whether they write verse or prose, I will and bequeath a copy of my Life and Adventures; and I advise the said authors to study with particular care the 40th and 41st pages thereof; more especially and above all things, I exhort and conjure them never to _publish it together_, though the bookseller should be a saint.

_Item._ To Edmund Randolph, Esq., late Secretary of State, to Mr. J. A. Dallas, Secretary of the State of Pennsylvania, and to His Excellency, Thomas Miffin, Governor of the said unfortunate State, I will and bequeath, to each of them, a copy of the sixteenth paragraph of Fauchet’s _intercepted letter_.

_Item._ To Citizen John Swanwick, member of Congress, by the will and consent of the sovereign people, I leave bills of Exchange on London to an enormous amount; they are _all protested_, indeed, but if properly managed, may be turned to good account. I likewise bequeath to the said John a small treatise by an Italian author, wherein the secret of pleasing the ladies is developed, and reduced to a mere mechanical operation, without the least dependence on the precarious aid of the passions. Hoping that these instances of my liberality will produce, in the mind of the little legislature, effects quite different from those produced therein by the King of Great Britain’s pension to his parents.

_Item._ To the Editors of the _Boston Chronicle_, the _New York Argus_, and the _Philadelphia Merchants’ Advertiser_, I will and bequeath one ounce of modesty and love of truth, to be equally divided between them.

I should have been more liberal in this bequest, were I not well assured, that one ounce is more than they will ever make use of.

_Item._ To Franklin Bache, Editor of the _Aurora of Philadelphia_, I will and bequeath a small bundle of French assignats, which I brought with me from the country of equality. If these should be too light in value for his pressing exigencies, I desire my executors, or any one of them, to bestow on him a second part to what he has lately received in Southwark: and as a further proof of my good will and affection, I request him to accept of a gag and a brand new pair of fetters, which, if he should refuse, I will and bequeath him in lieu thereof—my malediction.

_Item._ To my beloved countrymen, the people of Old England, I will and bequeath a copy of Doctor Priestley’s _Charity Sermon for the benefit of poor Emigrants_; and to the said preaching philosopher himself, I bequeath a heart full of disappointment, grief, and despair.

_Item._ To the good people of France, who remain attached to their sovereign, particularly to those among whom I was hospitably received, I bequeath each a good strong dagger: hoping most sincerely that they may yet find courage enough to carry them to the hearts of their abominable tyrants.

_Item._ To Citizen M——oe, I will and bequeath my chamber looking-glass. It is a plain but exceeding true mirror; in it he will see the exact likeness of a traitor, who has bartered the honour and interest of his country to a perfidious and savage enemy.

_Item._ To the Republican Britons, who have fled from the hands of justice in their own country, and who are a scandal, a nuisance, and a disgrace to this, I bequeath hunger and nakedness, scorn and reproach; and I do hereby positively enjoin on my executors to contribute five hundred dollars towards the erection of gallowses and gibbets, for the accommodation of the said imported patriots, when the legislators of this unhappy state shall have the wisdom to countenance such useful establishments.

_Item._ My friend, J. T. Callender, the runaway from Scotland, is, of course, a partaker in the last mentioned legacy; but as a particular mark of my attention, I will and bequeath him twenty feet of pine plank, which I request my executors to see made into a pillory, to be kept for his particular use, till a gibbet can be prepared.

_Item._ To Tom Paine, the author of _Common Sense_, _Rights of Man_, _Age of Reason_, and a _Letter to General Washington_, I bequeath a strong hempen collar, as the only legacy I can think of that is worthy of him as well as best adapted to render his death in some measure as infamous as his life: and I do hereby direct and order my Executors to send it to him by the first safe conveyance with my compliments, and request that he would make use of it without delay, that the national razor may not be disgraced by the head of such a monster.

_Item._ To the gaunt outlandish orator, vulgarly called the Political Sinner, who in the just order of things follows next after the last mentioned legatee, I bequeath the honour of partaking in his catastrophe; that in their deaths, as well as in their lives, all the world may exclaim: “_See how rogues hang together_”.

_Item._ To all and singular the good people of these States, I leave peace, union, abundance, happiness, untarnished honour, and an unconquerable everlasting hatred to the French Revolutionists and their destructive abominable principles.

_Item._ To each of my Subscribers I leave a _quill_, hoping that in their hands it may become a sword against every thing that is hostile to the government and independence of their country.

_Lastly._ To my three brothers, Paul, Simon, and Dick, I leave my whole estate, as well real as personal (first paying the foregoing legacies) to be equally divided between them, share and share alike. And I do hereby make and constitute my said three brothers the Executors of this my LAST WILL; to see the same performed, according to its true intent and meaning, as far as in their power lies.

PETER PORCUPINE.

Witnesses present,

Philo Fun, }
Jack Jockus. }

THE VISION OF LIBERTY.

_Written in the manner of Spenser._

[As the virulent style of political writing prevalent ninety years ago is now but little known, the present edition of _The Poetry of the Anti-Jacobin_ seemed a convenient medium for giving some specimens of it which appeared in _The Anti-Jacobin Review and Magazine_, a work conducted on the same principles, but by different writers, and with the cognizance of the government. Two of them were by W. COBBETT, who, had he been less arrogant and contentious, and more consistent, would have been, in the words of Lord Dalling, “a very great man in the world; as it was he made a great noise in it”. (See pp. 311–319.)

_The Vision of Liberty_ is by C. KIRKPATRICK SHARPE, an author and artist much esteemed by Scottish antiquarians, of which specimens only need be given. Of _The Anarchists_, the author is not known.]

I.

O wretched man, how long wilt thou refuse
Thy Maker’s favour, and His mercy great?
How long thy worldly happiness abuse,
And growl and grumble at thy present state?
Seeking accursed change both soon and late,
And newest modes allured still to try—
England, beware God’s wrath to aggravate,
For foreign magic blinds thy charmed eye,
And Liberty, sweet Liberty, is now the constant cry.

II.

As on my couch in slumber’s arms I lay,
A vision did my senses entertain;
Of late, me thought in France I miss’d my way,
Amid a columnless deserted plain;
No man or beast upon it did remain,
Swept off by Discord’s wide destroying strife:
Ne planted fence, ne field of waving grain,
Marking the toiling farmer’s busy life,
But ruined huts and castles, brent, were wondrous rife.

III.

Yet on this plain, most goodly to behold,
Saw I a temple tow’ring to the sky,
The dome where of was made of basest gold,
Most false, but yet most lovely to the eye;
And rotting pillars reareth it on high,
Of ghastly human heads, and clotted gore,
With dust, y’mixt the mortar doth supply,
While foulest birds still round this temple soar,
And filthy serpents hiss, and giant hyenas roar.

IV.

Among the heads that did the mass compose,
Three royal skulls were there—one of a king—
Meek saint, who never once revil’d his foes,
His bloody foes that him to scaffold bring;
One of a maid; O heaven! that I could sing
With Spenser’s tongue, her spotless purity,
Her holy zeal, in courts so rare a thing,
By lawless fiends condemn’d she was to die,
And sent, untimely sent, to seek her native sky.

V.

The third I marked with melancholy eyes,
A female head, that once a crown did wear,
Cut off in life’s full bloom, now low she lies,
The loose loves weeping o’er her early bier,
Nor Virtue’s self denies a tender tear;
So young a creature, wonder not she fell,
And left the paths of chastity severe,
Debauched by a court where lust did dwell
Like treach’rous Circe, skill’d in many a witching spell.

VI.

Ah! where are now her gorgeous robes of state,
The glitt’ring gems that did her fairness deck?
The cringing nobles that on her did wait,
The high-born dames that kneeled at her beck?
Alas! a ghastly face, a bloody neck,
A simple winding-sheet is now her share;
Look here, ye proud ones, on this mighty wreck,
And learn what perishable stuff ye are,
From her poor mangled carcase, once so sweet and fair.

VII.

And on the ground there lay a murder’d child,
A piteous sight it was, and full of woe,
Who, when alive, by every art defil’d,
With poison, they at last did overthrow,
Wretches, who never ruth or conscience know;
O lovely flowret cropt by villain hands,
How will thy butchers dread th’ almighty brow,
Arm’d with frowns, when each at judgment stands,
And God the meed of murder from His throne commands.

VIII.

Then o’er the portal was this motto plac’d,
“The house of liberty,” in gold y’writ,
And, vent’ring in, I stood like one amaz’d
Such sights of horror on my heart-strings smit.
There Infidelity, in moody fit,
Hugg’d Suicide—there Rage, and deadly Fears,
There Lechery, with goatish leer did sit,
And Murder, quaffing up his victim’s tears,
With thousand other crimes, too foul for human ears.

IX.

In ’mid the house an image stood in state,
Like to VOLTAIRE in visage and in shape,
Wither’d his heart with fellest rage and hate
Shrivell’d and lean his carcase like an ape
And numerous crowds upon the same did gape,
As he all-naked stood to every eye;
Above an altar covered with crape,
And formed of his books one might descry,
Profane and lewd it was, and cramm’d with many a lie.

X.

And still from ’neath the altar roared he,
As from a bull lowing in cavern deep,
“Come worship me, _O men_, come worship me;
Spit on the cross, of Jesus take no keep,
I promise you an everlasting sleep;
The soul and body both shall turn to clay;
Ye penitents, why do ye sigh and weep?
Let not damnation’s terrors you affray,
Come learn my lore that drives all foolish fears away”.

· · · · ·

XIV.

Next came that cursed felon THOMAS PAINE,
Mounted upon a tiger fierce and fell;
And still a shower of blood on him doth rain,
With tears that from the eyes of widows well;
Loud in his ears the cries of orphans yell;
The axe impending o’er his head alway
While devils wait to catch his soul to hell,
The knave is fill’d with anguish and dismay—
And anxious round he looks, even straws do him affray.

XV.

Then saw I mounted on a braying ass
WILLIAM and MARY, sooth, a couple jolly;
Who married, note ye how it came to pass,
Although each held that marriage was but folly.

· · · · ·

XVIII.

Then came MARIA HELEN WILLIAMS STONE,
Sitting upon a goat with bearded chin;
And she hath written volumes many a one;
Better the idle jade had learned to spin.

· · · · ·

XIX.