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tem, all the provincial courts enjoyed and were regulated by certain peculiar privileges, which had arisen from a variety of customs, and were established in course of time on a rule of precedents. But each court, under the general spirit of Gallic jurisprudence, was governed by its own rules, and neither made application to, nor was actuated by any of the surrounding courts. This in some measure simplified their proceedings, and stamped on each a character which, although very wide of perfection from the over-ruling prioci. ples of a despotic government, served to give a solidity to their decisions. Under the present order of things, this practice is unrooted, and every tribunal has a right to appeal to any of the precedents of any of the communal decrees, whenever any individual judge thinks proper, and persuades his col· leagues to coincide with him. This which appears to be founded on a just principle of equality, Mons. St. Aubin observed, had been productive of very mischievous consequences; and although the tribunal of Cassation was instituted as a final appeal from all the departmental courts of the republic, yet that the short date of its institution created against it, the want of time to give sanction to its decrees, as precedents for the guidance of other courts. The question of discretion or precedent much divides the philosophical world, and Mons. St. Aubin, perhaps, decides too hastily from what he calls the results. Under the present circumstances, shaken as France has been to her very foundations, and during the earthquake of the Revolution, when all the great property of the realm has been in a continual state of fluctuation, it is more than probable that the wisest possible system of jurisprudence would have been unequal to the weight of litigations. Setting aside this question on discretionary decisions, many solid arguments are to be urged against the French system, and we were not surprised to find an enlightened legislator who had visited England, and studied her jurisprudence with attention, disgusted with the present manner of conducting the judicial affairs of France. To the daily publication of newspapers, and their general currency through the kingdom, he attributed great advantages, as they recorded and propagated the reasons and determinations of the upper courts of law. He said little on their penal code, or the modes of the criminal courts. The non-confronting of witnesses, we remarked, appeared to us highly defective; he offered no argument in its defence. We pointed out one practice which, we couceived, might be adopted with advantage in England. The trials of each day are printed by authority, and posted in the most public parts of the town. A mode which probably operates more powerfully and usefully than chains or gibbets. It serves as a sort of moral daily lesson to the people, and that of the most impressive kind. It contains the name, the native place, the resi dence, the crime, for which the culprit stauds condemned, and the punishment he is sentenced to suffer. From judicial and moral topics, our conversation veered, as it were, naturally to religion, a subject of the highest interest at this period in France and her wide dependencies. He at once declared, that in his opinion the moral doctrines of Christianity had considerably influenced and improved mankind, that previous to its propagation there were authentic documents of a degree of barbarity in a Roman senate, which could not be tolerated in modern times; and that if instances of cruelty had occurred in the history of European kings, governors, or generals, they were not the consequence of a regular system, but flowed rather from the individual tem

per and caprice of those who exercised them. In speaking of the Roman Catholic and other religious establishments, he allowed that they ought to be permitted to remain, rather than shock the feelings or innovate on the habits of a majority of a people. As a member of the tribunate he would have supported the concordat, although he regretted that the government had proposed it, because he thought that the prejudices of the people might have been overcome after so long a suspension, had not the government itself thus have countenanced their revival; he acknowledged the extreme absurdity of an intolerance that damned every dissentient, yet he conceived that the Protestants would have scarcely been less intolerant had they possessed equal power. He believed that if their morality had been less questionable, and their conduct more circumspect, it arose less from internal purity than from the necessity of a cautious inoffensiveness, growing, as Protestantism did, under the briar of persecution. He conceived that the Roman Catholic religion would gain a new footing in France, but not of long duration, since the ministers had been spoiled of their possessions, and the ceremonial rites stripped of their splendor. Mons. St. Aubin studiously avoided any comments on the immediate measures of government. We afterwards learned that although erased from the Tribunate, he had confident expectations of being re-elected. He was originally educated in the law, and ranked with the most conspicuous orators of that assembly. He said it was probable that he should revisit England, and promised us the pleasure of seeing him, if he did, at Maidstone.

In calling with Mr. Goldsmith on Mons. Benjamin Constant, he was unfortunately from home. We were afterwards introduced to him at G.'s apartments, but had little opportunity of conversation: he now leads a retired life, hopeless of being re-elected to the tribunate, or called to any public post, unless a change takes place in public affairs, as he is rated amongst the most zealous advocates of democracy. These were the public characters which Mr. Goldsmith kindly introduced us to; I say kindly, because it was our wish and request, not merely to know the men themselves, but that we might better obtain information on the present floating state of opinions and politics. We should have found no difficulty in forming intimacies with all of them had he wished, but such is the system of espionage, and the vigorous police of Paris, that we avoided too particular an acquaintance with any political characters. There are no agents in the French service more active than calumny and sus picion, and few men of notoriety escape their whispers and aspersions. All these gentlemen, whose interviews with us, I have sketched, are branded with some infamous charges against either their public or private life, or both.

I shall now return to speak of our countryman, Mr. Holcroft. We had considered ourselves flattered by his ready acceptance of an invitation to our apartments through the medium of Mr. Paine. Our conversation turned principally on the existing state of things in France, and we were happy to find that his sentiments corroborated the opinions we had formed and transmitted by letter to our friends in England; but he begged us not to fall on Scylla, in shunning Charybdis, not to suppose that because every thing was not effected, nothing was done; or imagine that in sweeping away the old feudal system, they had not paved the way to great improvements, which he insisted were not to be obtained but by gradual means. Holcroft's person is

that of a man of studious habits, stiff and formal. His manners are cold and repulsive, unless irritated into warmth by opposition to his opinions, which he is, with more facility than seems compatible with the character of a philosophic teacher. He carries on his forehead the print of an uncontrolable spirit, and like Godwin, had rather build solely on the force of truth, than owe any thing to pliancy or persuasion. Goldsmith complained to us of something more than mere incivility from him---of absolute rudeness. Holcroft afterwards explained this to us, and we felt every reason to be complimented by his attention and hospitality. He invited us to spend the following evening with him, at his house near the Quaye de Voltaire. We found him in the very heart of domestic happiness. A wife, fascinating, young, and handsome, with one young child, and a family by a former marriage, one or two of which seemed capable of assisting him in those parts which may be deemed the drudgery of authorship. The father of his present wife is a Mons. Mercier, the author of a celebrated work in the shape of a prophecy, entituled, "Two Thousand Five Hundred," and the "Tableau of Paris." This gentleman, we found with him, but did not know him as the writer of those philosophic speculations, until after his departure. Mr. Holcroft showed us some good pictures, and professed himself an amateur of that elegant art. On taking leave he proposed to adjourn to a billiard table, and we played on very equal terms till midnight. I mention this because he gave frequent occasions, in the course of play, of evincing the impatient violence of his temper. Having assured him that we would take the earliest opportunity of introducing him to Mons. Talma, the Paris Kemble, we waited on him two days afterwards, after having visited Mons. Talma, and found that the acquisition of his acquaintance would be accepted from us as a favor. Lady Mountcashel was making a morning visit to Mr. H. at the time we called, and we supposed that he was reading to her some of his manuscript of the work he had mentioned to us he was about to publish, on "The Manners of Paris, during Six Months in the Year 1801." An author can ill bear to be interrupted in that most pleasing task, but as our intention was to con. fer a kind office, he suffered the mortification with a good grace.

In all cases, an accomplished woman has an apt and inexpressible delicacy in expressing her wishes. The moment we were seated, her ladyship evinced a disposition to indulge that most general, most insinuating, and most excusable female foible, loquacity. We were previously aware of her political sentiments, but little supposed that modern philosophy had so fascinating an advocate. She is a tall elegant woman, with a winning, yet commanding, physiognomy, a graceful mien, and engaging manners. Her conversation is easy, unaffected, and brilliant. Her eye is busy in collecting the admiration of a gazing audience, and active in expressing the pleasure of being pleased. She has a tongue that would silence, if not confute. In short, nature has bestowed on her some of her most valuable kindnesses, which her education and rank have highly contributed to polish and display.

(To be continued.)

Printed and Published by RICHARD CARLILE, 62, Fleet-street, where all Communications, post-paid, or free of expense, are requested to be left.

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The Lion.

No. 20. VOL. 2.] LONDON, Friday, Nov. 14, 1828. [PRICE 6d.

LITERATURE AND THE FINE ARTS.

WHAT is literature? Dr. Johnson calls it learning, or a skill in letters. What is learning? The Doctor tells us that it is literature, with a little verbiage about an acquisition of languages and sciences. So literature is learning, and learning is literature. But in that sort of writing, which, in this and other countries, is commonly and pre-eminently called literature, I can perceive nothing of learning that indicates the possession or the communication of knowledge, no, not even the disposition to possess or communicate. So that which is pre-eminently called literature is not so in reality, not learning, not knowledge, not teaching; but a mischievous occupation of the time of both writer and reader with a perversion of letters. Such I count the novels of Sir Walter Scott, and every piece of fiction that has been presented to mankind. Such things have been called light reading; but it is such light reading as makes light heads, and it is no honour to our species, that the majority have been and are of that class. When I hear light reading spoken of and commended, light, airy pieces of writing, I understand them to mean pieces of writing that do not call for the exercise of thought or reflection, that may be read without improvement, and that fill the head, without disturbing it, with trifles and nonsense, disqualifying it for all the useful purposes and improvements of life. That is what I understand by light reading. It is a sort of mental indolence or truancy, and the cerebral school is either neglected or thrown into disorder; because there is no proper master, or the scholar is idle and refractory. Light reading must produce light minds, by which the business of life is not to be well carried on. Every principle of reform or improvement in human affairs must spring from genius, original thought, perseverance and great in

Printed and Published by R. CARLILE, 62. Fleet Street. No. 20.-Vol. 2. 2 R

dustry in the acquisition and application of knowledge; so that they who furnish mankind with light readings are their enemies, and the qualifiers for all the oppressions, degradations, and deprivations that are found among them. So much for a definition of literature and light reading.

Fiction seems to be a growing passion among our literary men and women, and truth not suiting light minds has no chance of equal reading. I have not examined one of them; but I'll engage, upon a knowledge of current character, that not one of those gaudy little books called annuals, either points a moral or teaches a new truth, perhaps not even an old or long established truth. Such books are not literature, are not learning, are not instructive; may be pastime, but are not food for the mind. I now and then look into a Review; but I never find that I can learn any thing from them beyond historical and geographical points. I find no sound criticism upon the morals, politics, or literature of by-gone people; nor any new developement of physical or moral truths. The writer who does not call upon his reader to think, has not the labour of thought for himself. He plays with other men's thoughts and writings, as a pack of cards is shuffled, or as the twenty-four letters of the alphabet may be used in assimilation to the game of dice-shaken and thrown, leaving the turn-up to chance or fortune. Yet these light-headed and light reading people are the most fortunate in worldly acquisitions; for they sail with the current and offend no one but the philosopher, who is too serious in his purposes of human improvement to enter into petty war with them. He cannot be a philosopher and attend to such triflers.

Fiction may form a novel, but is not a novelty. Now it is almost wholly confined to the representation of probable character and incident. A few centuries ago, it represented wild romance, spiritualities and supernatural incidents, and, in its earliest representations, as they now remain to us, it dealt in cosmogonies, homogonies, and theogonies, such as make up the romance of revealed religion. And as the first evil of fiction has pervaded the whole race of mankind to this day, I deem it a matter of importance, that it should be in every case discountenanced, for the better rooting up of the whole.

Imperfect as is Dr. Johnson's definition of literature, it will sanction the proposition that the highest state of it must exist in the highest state of knowledge, that it is associated with original thought and deep study, rather than with the common scribbler of trifles. It belongs to the severe critic, rather than to the servile eulogist. It depends not so much on the correctness of grammatical expression, which is very desirable, as upon the correctness in delineating physical, political or moral principles; and, hence, I should say, that our Newspapers and Reviews contain nothing associated with the highest order of literature.

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