ferred from it. But, in the cafe of a king, people are apt to think the reasoning lefs abfurd. The fplendour of Majefty dazzles their imaginations, and overpowers their understanding." However, as this effect of conqueft will probably never be agitated (it being precluded by the modern practice of capitulations), it is unneceffary to purfue this part of the subject any further.

The remaining arguments advanced by our Author, in oppofition to Lord Mansfield's opinion, fhall be confidered in a fubfequent Review.

ART. III. The History of Modern Europe: With an Account of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, and a View of the Progrefs of Society from the Fifth to the Eighteenth Century. In a Series of Letters from a Nobleman to his Son. 8vo. 2 Vols. 12 S. Boards. Robinson, &c. 1779.

MODERN hiftory has been thought by many to poffefs

advantages over the Ancient, in point of utility, as it traces the rife and progrefs of those communities which at prefent fubfift, and lays open the origin of the feveral excellencies and defects in the prefent forms of civil government. That this object of study is of great importance, cannot be doubted. To furnish young perfons with a connected view of the progress of fociety in modern times, which fhall give them fomething more than a chronological feries of names and facts, and lead them to make juft and useful reflections on the events which have occurred in the world, muft therefore be acknowledged to be a laudable defign.

With this view the Hiftory of Modern Europe, now before us, is profeffedly written; and, in our opinion, the defign is executed in a manner which does credit to the writer's abilities and judgment, and will render the work highly acceptable to the public. The Writer has very fuccefsfully endeavoured to ftrike a medium between the dry chronological method of Puffendorf, and the defultory, but captivating manner of Voltaire. He has related facts with great perfpicuity, and at the fame time, with no inconfiderable fhare of elegance of style. He interweaves with the general narrative many interefting anecdotes, and judicious reflections; and through the whole, he difcovers a liberality of fentiment, refpecting both religion and civil policy, which will render his work particularly estimable in the judgment of thofe who have not learned to defpife the idea, and ridicule the name, of LIBERTY.

The following remarks on the progrefs of fociety, from the fettlement of the modern nations to the middle of the eleventh century, may ferve as a fpecimen of this work.

I have already given you an account of the Syftem of Policy and Legislation established by the Barbarians, or modern nations, on their first fettlement in the provinces of the Roman empire; and I have endeavoured, in the course of my narration, to trace the progrefs of fociety, as it regards religion, laws, government, manners, and literature: but as the hiftory of the human mind is of infinitely more importance than the detail of events, this letter fhall be entirely devoted to fuch circumftances as tend more particularly to throw light upon that fubject. I fhall alfo purfue the fame method, at different intervals, during the fubfequent part of your historical ftudies.

'Though the northern invaders wanted taste to value the Roman arts, laws, or literature, they generally embraced the religion of the conquered: and the mild and benevolent fpirit of Christianity would doubtlefs have foftened their favage manners, had not their minds been already infected by a barbarous fuperftition; which mingling itfelf with the Chriftian principles and ceremonies, produced that abfurd mixture of violence, devotion, and folly, which has fo long difgraced the Romish church, and which formed the character of the middle ages. The clergy were gainers, but Christianity was a lofer, by the converfion of the Barbarians. They rather changed the object, than the fpirit of their religion.

The Druids among the Gauls, and the Priests among the ancient Germans, and all the nations of Scandinavia, poffeffed an abfolute dominion over the minds of men. Thefe people, after embracing Christianity, retained their veneration for the priesthood; and unhappily the clergy of thofe times had neither virtue enough to preferve them from abufing, nor knowledge fufficient to enable them to make a proper ufe of their power. They favoured the fuperftitious homage; and fuch of the Barbarians as entered into orders, carried their ignorance and their original prejudices along with them.

The Chriftian emperors had enriched the church; they had lavished on it privileges and immunities: and these feducing advantages had but too much contributed to a relaxation of discipline, and the introduction of disorders, more or lefs hurtful, which had altered the fpirit of the gofpel. Under the dominion of the Barbarians, the degeneracy increased, till the pure principles of Chriftianity were loft in a grofs fuperftition, which, instead of aspiring to fanctity and virtue, the only facrifice that can render a rational being acceptable to the great Author of order and of excellence, endeavoured to conciliate the favour of God by the fame means that fatisfied the juftice of men, or by thofe employed to appease their fabulous deities.

'As all civil crimes were bought off by money among the northern conquerors, they attempted, in like manner, to bribe heaven, by benefactions to the church; and the more they gave themselves up to their brutal paffions, to rapine and to violence, the more profufe they were in this fpecies of good works. They seem to have believed, fays the Abbe de Mably, that avarice was the first attribute of the Divinity, and that the faints made a traffic of their influence and protection. Hence the bon mot of Clovis: St. Martin ferves

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his friends very well; but he makes them pay foundly for his trouble."

"Our treasury is poor," faid Chilperic, the grand fon of Clovis; "our riches are gone to the church: the bishops are the kings!"

And indeed the fuperior clergy, who by the acquifition of lands added the power of fortune to the influence of religion, were often the arbiters of kingdoms, and difpofed of the crown while they regulated the affairs of the flate. There was a neceffity of confulting them, because they poffeffed all the knowledge that then remained in Europe: they only knew any thing. The acts of their councils were confidered as infallible decrees, and they fpoke ufually in the name of God; but alas! they were only men.

As the intereft of the clergy clashed with that of the laity, op pofition and jealoufy produced new diforders. The priests made afe of artifice against their powerful adverfaries; they invented fables to awe them into fubmiffion; they employed the spiritual arms in defence of their temporal goods; they changed the mild language of charity into frightful anathemas: the religion of Jefus breathed nothing but terror. To the thunder of the church, the intrument of fo many wars and revolutions, they joined the affiftance of the fword. Warlike prelates, clad in armour, combated for their poffeffions, or to ufurp thofe of others; and, like the heathen priefts, whofe pernicious influence was founded on the ignorance of the people, the Chriftian clergy fought to extend their authority by confining all knowledge to their own order. They made a mystery of the mok neceffary fciences: truth was not permitted to fee the light, and reafon was fettered in the cell of fuperftition. Many of the clergy themselves cout fearce read, and writing was principally confined to the cloilters; where a blind and interested devotion, equally willing to deceive and to believe, held the quill; and where lying chronicles and fabulous legends were compofed, which contaminated history, religion, and the principles and the laws of fociety.

Without arts, íciences, commerce, policy, principles, almost all the European nations were as barbarous and wretched as they could ponbly be, unless a miracle had been wrought for the difgrace of humanity. Charlemagne indeed in France, and Alfred the Great in England, endeavoured to difpel this darkness, and tame their fubjects to the restraints of law; and they were so fortunate as to fucceed: light and order diftinguished their reigns. But the ignorance and barbarifm of the age were too powerful for their liberal inflitutions: the darkness returned, after their time, more thick and heavy than formerly, and fettled over Europe, and fociety again tumbled into chaos.

The ignorance of the Weft was fo profound, during the ninth and tenth centuries, that the clergy, who alone poffeffed the important fecrets of reading and writing, became neceffarily the arbiters and the judges of almost all fecular affairs. They compre. hended, in their jurisdiction, marriages, contracts, wills; which they took care to involve in mystery, and by which they opened to themselves new fources of wealth and power. Every thing wore the colour of religion: temporal and fpiritual concerns were confounded;

and

and from this unnatural mixture fprung a thousand abuses. The history of thofe ages forms a fatire on the human foul; and on religion, if we should impute to it the faults of its minifters.

Redeem your fouls from deftruction," fays St. Egidius, bifhop of Noyon," while you have the means in your power; offer prefents and tythes to churchmen; come more frequently to church; humbly implore the patronage of the faints: for if you obferve these things, you may come with fecurity in the day of the tribunal of the eternal Judge, and fay, Give us, O Lord, for we have given unto thee!"

In feveral churches of France they celebrated a festival in commemoration of the Virgin Mary's flight into Egypt. It was called the Feast of the Afs. A young girl richly drefled, with a child in her arms, was fet upon an afs fuperbly caparifoned. The afs was led to the altar in folemn proceffion. High mafs was faid with great pomp. The afs was taught to kneel at proper places: an hymn, not lefs childish than impious, was fung in his praife: and when the ceremony was ended, the priest, instead of the ufual words with which he difmiffed the people, brayed three times like an afs; and the people, inftead of the ufual refponfe, brayed three times in

return.

Letters began to revive in the eleventh century; but what letters? A fcientifical jargon, a falfe logic, employed about words, without conveying any idea of things, compofed the learning of those times. It confounded every thing, in endeavouring to analyse every thing. As the new fcholars were principally divines, theological matters chiefly engaged their attention: and as they neither knew hiftory, philofophy, nor criticifm, their labours were as futile as their inquiries, which were equally difgraceful to reafon and religion. The conception of the bleffed Virgin, and the digeftion of the eacharift, were two of the principal objects of their fpeculation: and out of the laft a third arofe; which was, to know whether it was voided again!

The diforders of government and manners kept pace, as they always will, with thofe of religion and letters. They seem to have attained their utmoft height towards the clofe of the tenth century, Then the feudal policy, whofe defects I have elsewhere noticed, was become univerfal. The dukes or governors of provinces, the marquifes employed to guard the marches, and even the counts intrafted with the administration of justice, all originally officers of the crown, had made themselves matters of their duchies, marquifates, and counties. The King indeed, as fuperior lord, fill received homage from them for thofe lands which they held of the crown, and which, in default of heirs, returned to the royal domain: he had a right of calling them out to war; of judging them in his court by their affembled peers, and of confifcating their estates in cafe of rebellion; but in all other refpects, they themselves enjoyed the rights of royalty. They had their fub-vaffals, or fubjects; they made laws, held courts, coined money in their own name, and levied war against their private enemies.

The most frightful diforders arofe from this ftate of feudal anarchy. Force decided all things. Europe was one great field of

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battle; where the weak struggled for freedom, and the frong for dominion. The king was without power, and the nobles without principle; they were tyrants at home, and robbers abroad: nothing remained to be a check upon ferocity and violence. The Scythians in their deferts could not be lefs indebted to the laws of fociety, than the Europeans during the period under review. The people, the most numerous as well as the most useful class in the community, were either actual flaves, or exposed to so many miferies, arising from pillage and oppreffion, to one or other of which they were a con. tinual prey, and often to both, that many of them made a voluntary furrender of their liberty for bread and protection. What must have been the state of that government, where flavery was an eligible condition!

But conformable to the obfervation of the philofophic Hume, there is a point of depreffion, as well as of exaltation, beyond which human affairs feldom país, and from which they naturally return in a contrary progrefs. This utmoft point of decline fociety feems to have attained in Europe, as I have alread faid, about the beginning of the eleventh century; when the diforders of the feudal government, together with the corruption of taste and manners confequent upon thefe, were arrived at their greateft excefs: and accordingly from that era, we can trace a fucceffion of caufes and events, which, with different degrees of influence, contributed to abolish anarchy and barbarifm, and introduce order and politeness.

Among the first of thefe caufes we muft rank Chivalry; which, as the elegant and inquifitive Dr. Robertfon remarks, though commonly confidered as a wild institution, the refult of caprice and the fource of extravagance, arofe naturally from the fta:e of fociety in thofe times, and had a very ferious effect in refining the manners of the European nations.

• The feudal state, as has been obferved, was a state of perpetual war, rapine, and anarchy. The weak and unarmed were expofed every moment to infults or injuries. The power of the fovereign was too limited to prevent thefe wrongs, and the legislative authority too feeble to redrefs them: there was scarce any shelter from violence and oppreffion, except what the valour and generofity of private perfons afforded; and the arm of the brave was the only tribunal to which the helpless could appeal for justice. The trader could no longer travel in fafety, or bring to market his commodities, without which there was no fubfifting: every poffeffor of a caftle pillaged them, or laid them under contribution; and many not only plundered the merchants, but carried off all the women that fell in their way. Slight inconveniencies may be overlooked or endured; but when abufes grow to a certain height, the fociety must reform, or go to ruin; it becomes the bufinefs of all to discover, and to apply fuch remedies as will moft effectually remove them. Humanity fprung from the bofom of violence, and relief from the hand of rapacity. Thofe licentious and tyrannic nobles, who had been guilty of every fpecies of outrage, and every mode of oppreffion; who, equally unjust, unfeeling, and fuperftitious, had made pilgrimages, and had pillaged; who had massacred, and done penance: touched at laft by a fenfe of natural equity, and fwayed by the con

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