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These druids called themselves mediators they were villeins, or serfs of the soil; between God and men; they legislated, both their labour and their blood bethey excommunicated, they had the longed to their masters, who were called power of life and death. The bishops "nobles." The greater number of men gradually succeeded to the authority of in Europe were what they still continue the druids, under the Goth and Vandal to be in many parts of the world—the government. The popes put themselves serfs of a lord, a species of cattle bought at their head; and, with briefs, bulls, and and sold together with the land. It remonks, struck terror into the hearts of quired centuries to get justice done to kings, whom they sometimes dethroned humanity; to produce an adequate imand occasionally caused to be assassi-pression of the odious and execrable nanated, and drew to themselves, as nearly ture of the system, according to which the as they were able, all the money of Eu-many sow, and only the few reap; and rope. The imbecile Ina, one of the ty-surely it may even be considered forturants of the English heptarchy, was thenate for France that the powers of these first who, on a pilgrimage to Rome, sub-petty robbers were extinguished there by mitted to pay St. Peter's penny (which the legitimate authority of kings, as it was about a crown of our money) for was in England by that of the king and every house within his territory. The nation united. whole island soon followed this example; England gradually became a province of the pope; and the holy father sent over his legates, from time to time, to_levy upon it his exorbitant imposts. John, called Lackland, at length made a full and formal cession of his kingdom to his holiness, by whom he had been excommunicated; the barons, who did not at all find their account in this proceeding, expelled that contemptible king, and substituted in his room Louis VIII. father of St. Louis, King of France. But they soon became disgusted with the new-comer, and obliged him to recross

the sea.

Happily, in consequence of the convulsions of empires by the contests between sovereigns and nobles, the chains of nations are more or less relaxed. The barons compelled John (Lackland) and Henry III. to grant the famous charter, the great object of which, in reality, was to place the king in dependence on the lords, but in which the rest of the nation was a little favoured, to induce it, when occasion might require, to range itself in the ranks of its pretended protectors. This great charter, which is regarded as the sacred origin of English liberties, itself clearly shows how very little liberty was understood. The very title proves that the king considered himself absolute by right, and that the barons and clergy compelled him to abate his claim to this

While the barons, bishops, and popes, were thus harassing and tearing asunder England, where each of the parties strove eagerly to be the dominant one, the peo-absolute power only by the application of ple, who form the most numerous, useful, and virtuous portion of a community, consisting of those who study the laws and sciences, merchants, artisans, and even peasants, who exercise at once the most important and the most despised of Occupations; the people, I say, were looked down upon equally by all these combatants, as a species of beings inferior to mankind. Far indeed, at that time, were the commons from having the slightest participation in the government:

superior force. These are the words with which Magna Charta begins: "We grant, of our free will, the following privileges to the archbishops, bishops, abbots, priors, and barons, of our kingdom," &c. Throughout the articles of it, not a word is said of the house of commons; a proof that it did not then exist, or that it existed without power. The freemen of England are specified in it, a melancholy demonstration that there were men who were not free. We perceive,

A man is not exempted from paying particular taxes because he is a noble or a clergyman. All imposts are regulated by the house of commons, which, although subordinate in rank, is superior in credit to that of the lords. The peers and bishops may reject a bill sent up to them by the commons, when the object is to raise money, but they can make no alteration it: they must admit it or reject

from the thirty-seventh article, that the pretended freemen owed service to their lord. Liberty of such a description had but too strong a similarity to bondage. By the twenty-first article, the king ordains, that henceforward his officers shall not take away the horses and ploughs of freemen, without paying for them. This regulation was considered by the people as true liberty, because it freed them from a greater tyranny. Henry VII. a suc-it, without restriction. When the bill is cessful warrior and politician, who pre- confirmed by the lords, and assented to tended great attachment to the barons, by the king, then all classes of the nation but who cordially hated and feared them, contribute. Every man pays, not acgranted them permission to alienate their cording to his rank (which would be ablands. In consequence of this, the vil-surd) but according to his revenue. There leins, who by their industry and skill ac- is no arbitrary taille or capitation, but a cumulated property, in the course of real tax on lands. These were all vatime became purchasers of the castles of ́lued in the reign of the celebrated King the illustrious nobles who had ruined themselves by their extravagance, and, gradually, nearly all the landed property of the kingdom changed masters.

William. The tax subsists still unaltered, although the rents of lands have considerably increased; thus no one is oppressed, and no one complains. The feet of the The house of commons now advanced cultivator are not bruised and mutilated in power every day. The families of the by wooden shoes; he eats white bread; old nobility became extinct in the pro- he is well clothed. He is not afraid to gress of time; and, as in England, cor-increase his farming-stock, nor to roof rectly speaking, peers only are nobles, his cottage with tiles, lest the following there would scarcely have been any no-year should, in consequence, bring with bles in the country, if the kings had not, from time to time, created new barons, and kept up the body of peers, whom they had formerly so much dreaded, to counteract that of the commons, now become too formidable. All the new peers, who compose the upper house, receive from the king their title and nothing more, since none of them have the property of the lands of which they bear the The reader well knows that in Spain, names. One is Duke of Dorset, without near the Coast of Malaga, there was dispossessing a single foot of land in Dor-covered, in the reign of Philip II. a setshire; another is an earl under the name of a certain village, yet scarcely knowing where that village is situated. They have power in the parliament, and nowhere else.

You hear no mention, in this country, of the high, middle, and low courts of Justice, nor of the right of chase over the lands of private citizens, who have no right to fire a gun on their own estates.

it an increase of taxation. There are numerous farmers who have an income of about five or six hundred pounds sterling, and still disdain not to cultivate the land which has enriched them, and on which they enjoy the blessing of freedom.

SECTION VIII.

small community, until then unknown, concealed in the recesses of the Alpuxarras mountains. This chain of inaccessible rocks is intersected by luxuriant valleys, and these valleys are still cultivated by the descendants of the Moors, who were forced, for their own happiness, to become Christians, or at least to appear such.

Among these Moors, as I was stating,

there was, in the time of Philip, a small (so wrong in Europe for finding fault with gourds creeping on the ground, would have been right in Mexico. He would have been still more in the right in India, where cocoas are very elevated. This proves that we should never hasten to conclusions. What God has made, be has made well, no doubt; and has placed his gourds on the ground in our climates, lest, in falling from on high, they should break Matthew Garo's nose.

society, inhabiting a valley to which there existed no access but through caverns. This valley is situated between Pitos and Portugos. The inhabitants of this secluded abode were almost unknown to the Moors themselves. They spoke a language that was neither Spanish nor Arabic, and which was thought to be derived from the ancient Carthaginians.

This society had but little increased in numbers: the reason alleged for which was that the Arabs, their neighbours, and before their time the Africans, were in { the practice of coming and taking from them the young women.

The calabash will only be introduced here to show that we should mistrust the idea that all was made for man. There are people who pretend that the turf is only green to refresh the sight. It would These poor and humble, but neverthe-appear, however, that it is rather made less happy people, had never heard any mention of the Christian, or Jewish religion; and knew very little about that of Mahomet, not holding it in any estimation. They offered up, from time immemorial, milk and fruits to a statue of Hercules. This was the amount of their religion. As to other matters, they spent their days in indolence and innocence. They were at length discovered by a familiar of the inquisition. The grand in-der their shades. quisitor had the whole of them burnt. This is the sole event of their history.

for the animals who nibble it, than for man to whom dog-grass and trefoil are useless. If nature has produced the trees in favour of some species, it is difficult to say to which she has given the preference. Leaves, and even bark, nourish a prodigious multitude of insects: birds eat their fruits, and inhabit their branches, in which they build their industriouslyformed nets, while the flocks repose un

The author of the Spectacle de la Nature pretends that the sea has a flux and The hallowed motives of their con- reflux, only to facilitate the going out and demnation were, that they had never coming in of our vessels. It appears payed taxes, although, in fact, none had that even Matthew Garo reasoned better; ever been demanded of them, and they the Mediterranean, on which so many were totally unacquainted with money; vessels sail, and which only has a tide in that they were not possessed of any bi-three or four places, destroys the opinion ble, although they did not understand of this philosopher. Latin; and that no person had been at the pains of baptising them. They were all invested with the San-benito, and broiled to death with becoming ceremony. It is evident that this is a specimen of the true system of government; nothing can so completely contribute to the content, harmony, and happiness of society.

GOURD OR CALABASH. THIS fruit grows in America on the branches of a tree as high as the tallest oaks.

Thus, Matthew Garo, who is thought

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Let us enjoy what we have, without believing ourselves the centre and object of all things.

GRACE.

IN persons and works, grace signifies, not only that which is pleasing, but that which is attractive; so that the ancients imagined that the goddess of beauty ought never to appear without the graces. Beauty never displeases, but it may be deprived of this secret charm, which invites us to regard it, and sentimentally attracts and fills the soul. Grace in

opposite; for if an artist, whatever branch he may cultivate, only expresses frightful things, and softens them not by agreeable contrasts, he will repel.

figure, carriage, action, discourse, depends on its attractive merit. A beautiful woman will have no grace, if her mouth be shut without a smile, and if her eyes display no sweetness. The serious is not always graceful, because un-sists in softness of outline and harmonious attractive, and approaching too near to the severe, which repels.

A well-made man, whose carriage is timid or constrained, gait precipitate or heavy, and gestures awkward, has no gracefulness, because he has nothing gentle or attractive in his exterior The voice of an orator which wants flexibility or softness, is without grace.

It is the same in all the arts. Proportion and beauty may not be graceful. It cannot be said that the pyramids of Egypt are graceful; it cannot be said that the colossus of Rhodes is as much so as the Venus of Gnidos. All that is merely strong and vigorous exhibits not the charm of grace.

It would show but small acquaintance with Michael Angelo and Caravaggio to attribute to them the grace of Albano. The sixth book of the Æneid is sublime; the fourth has more grace. Some of the gallant odes of Horace breathe gracefulness, as some of his epistles cultivate

reason.

It seems, in general, that the little and pretty of all kinds are more susceptible of grace than the large. A funeral oration, a tragedy, or a sermon, are badly praised, if they are only honoured with the epithet of graceful.

It is not good for any kind of work to be opposed to grace, for its opposite is rudeness, barbarity, and dryness. The Hercules of Farnese should not have the gracefulness of the Apollo of Belvidere and of Antinous, but it is neither rude nor clumsy. The burning of Troy, in Virgil, is not described with the graces of an elegy of Tibullus, it pleases by stronger beauties. A work, then, may be deprived of grace, without being in the least disagreeable. The terrible, or horrible, in description, is not to be graceful, neither should it solely affect its

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Grace, in painting and sculpture, con

expression; and painting, next to sculpture, has grace in the unison of parts, and of figures which animate one another, and which become agreeable by their attributes and their expression.

Graces of diction, whether in eloquence or poetry, depend on choice of words and harmony of phrases, and still more upon delicacy of ideas and smiling descriptions. The abuse of grace is affectation, as the abuse of the sublime is absurdity; all perfection is nearly a fault.

To have grace applies equally to persons and things. This dress, this work, or that woman, is graceful. What is called a good grace, applies to manner alone. She presents herself with good grace. He has done that which was expected of him with a good grace. To possess the graces :-This woman has grace in her carriage, in all that she says and does.

To obtain grace is, by metaphor, to obtain pardon, as to grant grace is to grant pardon. We make grace of one thing by taking away all the rest. The commissioners took all his effects and made him a gift (a grace) of his money. To grant graces, to diffuse graces, is the finest privilege of the sovereignty; it is to do good by something more than justice. To have one's good graces, is usually said in relation to a superior: to have a lady's good graces, is to be her favourite lover. To be in grace, is said of a courtier who has been in disgrace: we should not allow our happiness to depend on the one, or our misery on the other. Graces, in Greek, are charities;' a term which signifies amiable.

The graces, divinities of antiquity, are one of the most beautiful allegories of the Greek mythology. As this mythology always varied according either to the ima 'gination of the poets, who were its theo

logians, or to the customs of the people, the number, names, and attributes of the graces often change; but it was at last agreed to fix them to the number of three, Aglaia, Thalia, and Euphrosyne, that is to say, sparkling, blooming, mirthful. They were always near Venus. No veil should cover their charms. They preside over favours, concord, rejoicings, love, and even eloquence; they were the sensible emblem of all that can render life agreeable. They were painted dancing and holding hands; and every one who entered their temples was crowned with flowers. Those who have condemned the fabulous mythology, should at least acknowledge the merit of these lively fictions, which announce truths intimately connected with the felicity of mankind.

GRACE (OF).

SECTION I.

posed at liberty not to eat; or "neces-
sary," that is, unavoidable, being nothing
more than the chain of eternal decrees
and events.
We shall take care not to
enter into the long and appalling details,
subtleties, and sophisms, with which
these questions are embarrassed. The
object of this dictionary is not to be the
vain echo of vain disputes.

St. Thomas calls grace a substantial form, and the Jesuit Bouhours names it a je ne sais quoi; this is perhaps the best definition which has ever been given of it.

If the theologians had wanted a subject on which to ridicule Providence, they need not have taken any other than that which they have chosen. On one side, the Thomists assure us that man, in receiving efficacious grace, is not free in the compound sense, but that he is free in the divided sense; on the other, the Molinists invent the medium doctrine of God and congruity, &c., and imagine exciting, preventing, concomitant, and cooperating grace.

THIS term, which signifies favour or privilege, is employed in this sense by theologians. They call grace a particular operation of God on mankind, to render Let us quit these bad, but seriouslythem just and happy. Some have ad- constructed jokes of the theologians; let mitted universal grace, that which God us leave their books, and each consult his gives to all men, though mankind, accord- common sense; when he will see that all ing to them, with the exception of a very these reasoners have sagaciously deceived small number, will be delivered to eternal themselves, because they have reasoned flames: others admit grace towards upon a principle evidently false. They Christians of their communion only; and have supposed that God acts upon partilastly, others only for the elect of thatcular views; now an eternal God, without general, immutable, and eternal laws, is an imaginary being, a phantom, a god of fable.

communion.

It is evident that a general grace, which leaves the universe in vice, error, and eternal misery, is not a grace, a favour, Why, in all religions, on which men or privilege, but a contradiction in terms. pique themselves on reasoning, have theParticular grace, according to theolo-ologians been forced to admit this grace gians, is either in the first place "sufficing," which if resisted, suffices not resembling a pardon given by a king to a criminal, who is nevertheless delivered over to the punishment; or "efficacious," when it is not resisted, although it may be resisted; in this case, they just resemble famished guests to whom are presented delicious viands, of which they will surely eat, though, in general, they may be sup

which they do not comprehend? It is, that they would have salvation confined to their own sect, and further, they would have this salvation divided among those who are the most submissive to themselves. These particular theologians, or chiefs of parties, divide among themselves. The Mussulman doctors entertain similar opinions and similar disputes, because they have the same interest to actuate

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