No. 8. EDINBURGH, SATURDAY, APRIL 19, 1845. THE LOVE OF LIFE-ITS USES THE love of life may be justly reckoned one of the PRICE 13d. horror with which, instinctively, they recoil at the deed of the assassin, would regard the invasion of life as a crime of comparatively small moment; and thus society would be deprived of one of its most important safeguards. In a similar ratio, and from a like cause, war, even at present a dire evil, would increase-that 'game which,' to employ the words of the gentle Cowper, 'were their subjects wise, kings would not play at,' would become the universal pastime. We can, in truth, conceive few calamities more dismal than the extinction, could it be effected, of the dread with which death is contemplated by the mind of man. The arrangement is beautiful and wise, that death should be the 'king of terrors.' The love of life, too, has its religious uses. It furnishes a strong presumption of our immortality. It proclaims the horror with which we recoil from the idea of annihilation. It whispers to us that some part of us is far too good to be consigned to the dust. It is, in fact, the voice of the soul announcing its own grandeur and indestructibleness. Life is dear to us for a thousand reasons. We cling with intense fondness to the familiar objects around us; they become, in truth, a part of ourselves, and it costs the heart a violent wrench to be torn from them. The fair blue heavens-the royal sun-night, with its twinkling stars-the landscape, with its charms-ocean, sleeping in beauty or lashed by tempest-the scenes of childhood and youth-the faces around our hearth-it is not poetry, reader, it is nature that bids us prize the boon of being : It is, perhaps, not sufficiently considered how much we owe to this strong constitutional sentiment. The love of life! It is the arm that guards the temple of our being. It is the wall of fire that surrounds our earthly existence. It is the sentinel, ever wakeful, ever at its post, giving notice of the first approach of danger, and summoning all the sister powers to aid and action. But for the strength of this instinct, can we doubt that the number would be anything but small of those who, not influenced by higher and more sacred considerations, would seek a shelter from the calamities of the present scene in the grave of the suicide? Besides, the anxiety we feel for the continued health and protracted existence of those whom Providence has consigned to our care would be extirpated; for what we felt of little consequence to ourselves we would cease to wish for in the case of others. The absence of this ardent attachment to life, or even its existence in a feeble state, would thus tend inevitably to impair all our kindly and generous sympathies, make affection a meaningless word, and leave the weak and the helpless of every class without friends and without guar-All that a man hath will he give for his life.' 'Your dians. Did we, moreover, cease to prize our being as a boon of peerless price, one great motive to industrious exertion would be destroyed; the sweat of our brows we would regard as too dear a price to pay for our daily bread; many of our noblest enterprises would never be undertaken; and the arts and sciences, the main object of which is to exalt and embellish life, would cease to be cultivated, or at least they would be cultivated with little care. And then what a scene of crime and consequent wretchedness would our world be, if composed chiefly, or rather exclusively, of idlers! The restraints of law, too, would be stripped of more than half their power. The minds of men, losing the For who, to dull forgetfulness a prey, master,' said the brave Carmathian to those who waited on him, 'is at the head of thirty thousand soldiers: three such men as these are wanting in his host;' while, at the same time, accosting three of his champions, he commanded the first to plunge a dagger into his breast, the second to leap into the Tigris, and the third to cast himself headlong down a precipice. His orders were instantly and without a murmur obeyed. In this and kindred incidents we see the love of life giving way to another, we wont say a more exalted sentiment. But there are other and far higher displays of this mastery. We see it conquered often by the thirst for knowledge, especially when that is associated with the thirst for distinction. There is a numerous and in many respects a noble class, who enrich their understandings at the expense, may we not say, the sacrifice of their existence. There are intellectual martyrs, even as Galileo was, when sickening in his dungeon for maintaining that our globe was not the centre of the planetary system. There are men whose devotion to study is maintained at the peril of life. They realize the words applied to Henry Kirke White by a brother poet : 'He nursed the pinion which impell'd the steel.' They are sad comments on the wise man's statement'Much study is a weariness of the flesh.' Is it too much to say that these have conquered their love of life, or at any rate got it subordinated to other ends? By no means. We are told of Achilles that he had two alternatives set before him—to die covered with glory won on the plains of Troy, or to pass a long life without renown in the place of his nativity. We can conceive of such an alternative having been submitted, at the commencement of their intellectual career, to some as illustrious for genius as the hero of the Iliad was for feats of arms. We can conceive the question proposed to many whose names are now identified with the most brilliant intellectual achievements of our kind, whether they would go to an early grave, or lose those delights and those honours which scientific research, the labours of art, or the flights of imagination, would be sure to win for them. And we plead that the former alternative would have been preferred. Would Milton have sacrificed, for a paltry addition of twenty years to his tack of life, the superb visions that crowded thickly on his soul while he meditated his great epic, and gave it to the world in the proud consciousness, as he said, that posterity would not willingly let it die? Would Newton have changed ages with Methuselah, if his nine hundred and ninety-nine years had cost him the glory of the discoverer of gravitation ? Would Byron, though sceptical of another world, have 'ripened hoar with time,' and for this have been contented to go down to the dust, leaving no name that 'made an epitaph ?' Would Franklin have sacrificed his fame as the man who 'sketched the constitution of a continent with one hand, while with the other he drew the lightning from the clouds,' for ages of inglorious ease? The tenacity with which we cling to existence is indeed strong; but we do not hesitate to say, that, in minds of the higher order, the love of knowledge, when especially it is associated with the thirst for renown, is still stronger. Then the love of life is frequently mastered and displaced by the affections; we allude to the benevolent and patriotic emotions, but more especially to our domestic sympathies. We allow, indeed, that, in cases such as those we are about to mention, there may be a mixture and conflict of motives-a portion of alloy mixed with the pure gold. But what of it ? Our admiration of mankind will be limited indeed, if we accord it to none of their actions save those that flow from motives quite unadulterated. This apart then, we find that the love of life often yields to purer and more exalted affections. The gallant seaman braving the lash of the tempest or the scorchings of the fire alone, that he may rescue the tenants of his bark from a grave in the deep-the devoted soldier interposing his own person and receiving the stroke that would have killed his leader-the patriot facing the dangers of the field that he may protect the honour and independence of his country-the Christian missionary toiling and dying in the sublime cause of the world's evangelization-these, and such as these, attest that the love of life, however strong, may be conquered So that, while the names of Leonidas, of Wallace, and of Tell, adorn the page of history-while those of Howard and Clarkson live in the memory of mankind-while the 'Martyr of Erromango' is not forgotten, we shall not want proof of this. Then there are what we have called our domestic sym pathies. One page of Roman story tells us of two friends, strong that either of them could have died for the other: Damon and Pythias, whose attachment was so heroically here the love of life was subdued by the ardour of friendship. The case of the citizens of Calais will also suggest itself to the mind of the reader. And, to speak more directly in reference to our domestic sympathies, where is the mother who would not brave death to snatch the infant of her bosom from impending destruction? where the father who would not peril his own life to save that ef his son? or the brother who could endure an existence purchased by pusillanimous exemption from a danger which proved fatal to a sister? Exceptions there may be; still, we plead, the rule is on that side most honourable to our nature. Attachment to principle, too, will dethrone the love of life. We need not name the thousands who have not ' reckoned their lives dear to them' for the testimay they held-the noble army of martyrs who 'Lived unknown Till persecution dragged them into fame, They braved the lion, they dared the stake, they quaffed the boiling lead, rather than prove recreant to the cause of sacred truth. Their scorn, shall we call it, of life was noble when, to have preserved it, they must have parted with what was far dearer to them-a good conscience. It is beautifully and wisely arranged that our attachment to life should be ardent; but it would be dishonouring to us to suppose that it cannot be surmounted. We have, in these remarks, endeavoured to indicate both the uses of this great law of nature, and also its limits. BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. ROBERT NICOLL. ROBERT NICOLL was born on the 7th of January, 1814, in a farm-house at Little Tullibeltane, in Perthshire. He was the second son in a family of nine children. His father, at the time of his birth, was in comfortable circumstances, and tenant of a small farm in Auchtergaven his mother was a daughter of the venerable Elder John, so affectionately mentioned by Nicoll in his poems. The ancestors of both had been settled in the same parish for many generations, and were highly esteemed. When Robert was five years of age, his father, in consequence of the bankruptcy of a relative for whom he had become security, became embarrassed in his circumstances, and giving up his whole property to his creditors, engaged himself as a day-labourer on the fields he had so latel farmed, and thus early did Nicoll begin that course of hardships with which he had to contend during the remainder of his life. When Nicoll had attained his sixth year, he was sent to the parish school, where he continued for several successive winters, being, during the summer season, employed in assisting in farming operations. It was at this early period of his life that his fondness for reading began to show itself. In going to, or returning from school, or when herding upon his own Ordé braes,' he was never without a book. From this early propensity for reading, from the calmness of his temper, and from the mildness of his disposition, he was, by his friends, nicknamed 'the minister.' of some money; and also endeavoured to improve his circumstances by starting a local periodical-an attempt which utterly failed; soon after which he retired from the business, making it over entirely to his partner. While in Dundee he formed an attachment to an amiable young lady, Miss Alice Souter, who afterwards became his wife; which made it necessary that he should establish himself in some suitable and permanent situation. Miss Souter naturally shared his anxiety, and by her advice he resolved to look for employment once more in Edinburgh, or, failing there, in London. He fixed on the latter as the place where he was most likely to succeed; and early in the next year he wrote to his friends in Edinburgh for such letters of recommendation as they could give him. This scheme, however, seemed to them to be attended with too much risk to be immediately put in execution; and Mr Tait kindly offered him temporary employment till something better should be found. Not long after, through the exertions of that gentleman, he was appointed editor of the Leeds Times; and after making a short visit to his mother and to his It was at this period, while yet no more than thirteen, betrothed, he repaired to Leeds, and entered upon the that he first began to write; he also, at the same time, discharge of his duties. Very soon after he began to conbecame a correspondent of one of the Perth newspapers; duct this newspaper, its circulation increased immensely and continued to scribble and compose till he was six-for some time at the rate of two hundred a-week. teen, when, despairing of ever writing the English lan- About the end of this year he was married to Miss Souter, guage correctly, as he himself says, 'I made a bonfire he having gone to Dundee for that purpose. of my papers, and wrote no more till I was two years At twelve years of age, Robert was sent to work in the garden of a gentleman who lived in his father's neighbourhood. This circumstance was productive of no change in the habits of our poet. He was now, however, much harder worked than formerly, and had, consequently, less time for reading. He still continued to attend the parish school during the winter months. A reading club having at this time been established in the village, Nicoll became a member, and falling on the books with great avidity, he soon devoured their whole contents. older.' The next important step in our poet's life was his binding himself an apprentice to a grocer in Perth. On settling there, he bought Cobbett's English Grammar, and soon made himself completely master of it. He shortly after this became acquainted with Mr and Mrs Johnstone, and through them with Mr Tait, the publisher of Tait's Magazine;' all of whom continued, through his short life, to be his friends. Nicoll's industry at this time was untiring. He rose every morning at four o'clock, and read and composed till seven; he was then engaged in business till nine in the evening; and no sooner were his daily labours over, than he gave himself up to study. He was also a member of a debating society, the necessary preparation for which must have still farther curtailed his leisure time. It was about this period that his first production of any length appeared; it was entitled 'Il Zingaro,' and was published in Johnstone's Magazine.' When this tale was written, Nicoll was but nineteen; and his letters and manuscript compositions show that he had improved, during the previous year, both in his powers of thought and expression. At the close of his apprenticeship, his health having suffered from too intense application, he went home to breathe the air of his native mountains. He likewise, about this time, made his first visit to Edinburgh; his principal object being to obtain a situation in which he might enjoy facilities for cultivating his literary tastes. In this, however, he was disappointed. Nicoll returned home much vexed at the unsuccessful result of his visit. But a mind like his could not remain idle; and, shortly after, he went to Dundee, and opened a circulating library, where he soon became acquainted with most of the intelligent young men of the town, who were in the habit of frequenting his shop. He was now quite a literary man-writing articles for the newspapers, making speeches at public meetings, delivering political lectures, writing poems, while, by diligent reading, he greatly added to his stock of knowledge. This year (1835) he published a small volume of poems and lyrics, which was largely subscribed for by his friends in his own rank of life. The work was also well received by his Edinburgh acquaintance, and favourably noticed by the press. Nicoll, however, subsequently regretted the publication, as having been premature, and made a resolution to publish no more for many years. Finding that nothing could be done in his business without capital, he received into partnership a young tradesman, who was possessed During the whole of 1837, Nicoll continued to attend unremittingly to his duties-condensing news, reporting, and maintaining a wide correspondence. Nor, in the midst of these multifarious employments, was poetry forgotten; he continued to add, at intervals, to the original edition of his lyrics, many poems of great beauty; and a newspaper having been at this time got up in Sheffield, he undertook, from a wish to better his condition, to write leaders for it. This severe labour, there can be no doubt, hastened on his untimely end. We have little more to tell of Nicoll's brief career. At the conclusion of a general election, when Leeds was contested by Sir W. Molesworth and Sir J. Beckett, Nicoll, who had devoted his whole energies to the interest of the former, was seized with an illness which terminated in a rapid consumption. He removed from Sheffield to Trinity, near Edinburgh, to the house of his friends the Johnstones, which had been kindly placed at his service, where he was assiduously attended by Dr Combe and some other medical gentlemen; but all their efforts to save him were unavailing-the hand of death was upon him. His parents, who had been informed of his condition, left their home on a dark winter evening, and, by walking all night, arrived in time to see their gifted son breathe his last. Thus lived, and thus, at the early age of twenty-four, died Robert Nicoll, who has, by Ebenezer Elliot, been styled 'Scotland's second Burns. His was a life upon which it is pleasing to look back-a life in which there is so much to admire and so little to condemn. Few there are among the scanty sons of genius so uncontaminated by the pride of intellect, so diffident of personal merit, as was the subject of our brief memoir. He was buried in North Leith churchyard. Not a stone marks the spot where rests the dust of Robert Nicoll. Most of Nicoll's poems are written in his own beautiful Doric, the Lowland Scotch. We, however, like his poems that are written in the English language as much as we do the others. A complete edition of his poems and lyrics, with a beautifully written and touching memoir of his life, was published by Mr Tait in 1842. This volume contains upwards of one hundred and forty pieces of various lengths. Nicoll's descriptions of scenery are very beautiful and true. Soft, sweet, and tender even to sadness, are many of the pieces of this early lost bard of Scotland; and many a faithful and touchingly pictured incident has he left behind, in his poetry, to soften and delight the heart of his reader. Listen to the last low murmurings of the Dying Maiden,' and say if its simple pathos does not, in some parts, partake of the sublime. We regret that the length of the poem pre- it are unquestionably the most ancient literary composi cludes our giving it entire : The winds are soughin' o'er the hills, The burns come gushin' doun The kelpie in the drumlie weil Is singing his eerie croon ! Sae sharp an' cauld the nippin' sleet An' Death, frae out the darksome grave, O! this is a bright an' glorious earth, I ha'e lo'ed to sleep on my mither's breast, An I ha'e lo'ed thee, sister fair, Wi mair than a sister's love; An' I ha'e dream'd o' comin' years, When we should bear ac heart, ae hope, My soul is wearin' now; Kiss ance again this burnin' brow; The lip, the cheek, the hazel eye, My mither! ope the casement wide Where gowans grow! The gates of light Are open now to me! With a master-hand very seldom equalled, he mingles tenderness with beauty, and picturesque description with pathetic sentiment. He could not, like Burns, combine many opposite qualities in his poetry. Among the most beautiful pieces he has written may be particularized, I am blind,' Thoughts of Heaven,' and 'The Village Church.' The poems of a humorous kind by Nicoll are nearly as good in their own way as those of a serious description. We would particularly notice The Dominie,' 'Fiddler Johnny,' The Auld Beggar-man,' 'Janet M'Bean,' and 'Minister Tam' (a record of the sturdy uphill progress of many a respectable divine and learned professor). In judging of Nicoll's poems and lyrics, and in forming an estimate of their quality, we must ever bear in mind the extreme youth of their author: his death took place at a period of life before which most poets have not written their first sonnet. Ebenezer Elliot has said of Nicoll, that the only fault in his poems was a too great diffuseness-a fault said to be one of great promise in a young author, and which, had he lived, he soon would have amended. It is very pleasing to think that all of them are written in a beautifully religious tone; indeed every line bears upon it the impress of that love of nature and of nature's God which our poet himself so deeply felt. THE WORTH OF THE BIBLE. In addition to the intrinsic excellencies of the Bible, which give it powerful claims to the attention of mankind, there are various circumstances of an adventitious nature, which render it peculiarly interesting to a reflecting mind. Among these circumstances we may, perhaps, not improperly mention its great antiquity. Whatever may be said of its inspiration, some of the books which compose tions extant, and perhaps the most ancient that ever were written; nor is it very improbable that letters were first employed in recording some parts of them, and that they were written in the language first spoken by man. It is not only the most ancient book, but the most ancient monument of human exertion, the eldest offspring ef human intellect, now in existence. Unlike the other works of man, it inherits not his frailty. All the cotemporaries of its infancy have long since perished and are forgotten. Yet this wonderful volume still survives. Like the fabled pillars of Seth, which are said to have bid defiance to the Deluge, it has stood for ages unmoved in the midst of that flood, which sweeps away men, with their labours, into oblivion. That these circumstances render it an interesting object of contemplation, it is needless to remark. Were there now in existence a tree which was planted, an edifice which was erected, or any monument of human ingenuity which was formed, at that early period in which some parts of the Bible were written, would it not be contemplated with the keenest interest, carefully preserved as a precious relic, and considered as something little less than sacred? With what emotions, then, will a thoughtful mind often open the Bible; and what a train of interesting reflections is it, in this view, calculated to excite! While we contemplate its antiquity, exceeding that of every object around us except the works of God, and view it, in anticipation, as continuing to exist unaltered until the end of time, must we not feel almost irresistibly impelled to venerate it, as proceeding originally from Him, who is yesterday, to-day, and for ever the same, and whose works, like his years, fail not ? We The interest which this volume excites by its antiquity, will be greatly increased, if we consider the violent and persevering opposition it has encountered, and the almost innumerable enemies it has resisted and overcome. contemplate with no ordinary degree of interest a rock which has braved for centuries the ocean's rage, practically saying, 'hitherto shalt thou come, but no farther; and here shall thy proud waves be stayed.' With still greater interest, though of a somewhat different kind, should we contemplate a fortress, which, during thousands of years, had been constantly assaulted by successive generations of enemies-around whose walls millions had perished-and to overthrow which the utmost efforts of human force and ingenuity had been exerted in vain. Such a rock, such a fortress, we contemplate in the Bible. For thousands of years this volume has withstood, not only the iron tooth of time, which devours men and their works together, but all the physical and intellectual strength of man. Pretended friends have endeavoured to corrupt and betray it; kings and princes have perseveringly sought to banish it from the world; the civil and military powers of the greatest empires have been leagued for its destruction; the fires of persecution have often been lighted to consume it and its friends together; and, at many seasons, death, in some horrid form, has been the almost certain consequence of affording it an asylum from the fury of its enemies. It has also been almost incessantly assailed by weapons of a different kind, which, to any other book, would be far more dangerous than fire or sword. In these assaults, wit and ridicule have wasted all their shafts; misguided reason has been compelled, though reluctantly, to lend her aid, and, after repeated defeats, has again been dragged to the field; the arsenals of learning have been emptied to arm her for the contest; and, in search of means to prosecute it with success, recourse has been had, not only to remote ages and distant lands, but even to the bowels of the earth, and the region of the stars. Yet still the object of all these attacks remains uninjured; while one army of its assailants after another has melted away. Though it has been ridiculed more bitterly, misrepresented more grossly, opposed more rancorously, and burned more frequently, than any other book, and per haps than all other books united, it is so far from sink ing under the efforts of its enemies, that the probability of its surviving until the final consummation of all things is now evidently much greater than ever. The rain has descended; the floods have come; the storm has arisen, and beat upon it; but it falls not, for it is founded upon a rock. Like the burning bush, it has ever been in the flames, yet it is still unconsumed; a sufficient proof, were there no other, that He who dwelt in the bush preserves the Bible. If the opposition which this volume has successfully encountered, renders it an interesting object of contemplation; the veneration which has been paid to it, the use which has been made of it, and the benefits which have been derived from it by the wise and good, in all ages, make it still more so. Who would not esteem it a most delightful privilege, to see and converse with a man who had lived through as many centuries as the Bible has existed; who had conversed with all the successive generations of men, and been intimately acquainted with their motives, characters, and conduct; who had been the chosen friend and companion of the wise and good, in every age-the venerated monitor, to whose example and instructions the wise had ascribed their wisdom, and the virtuous their virtues? What could be more interesting than the sight, what more pleasing and instructive than the society of such a man? Yet such society we may in effect enjoy, whenever we choose to open the Bible. In this volume we see the chosen companion, the most intimate friend of the prophets, the apostles, the martyrs, and their pious cotemporaries; the guide, whose directions they implicitly followed; the monitor, to whose faithful warnings and instructions they ascribed their wisdom, their virtues, and their happiness. In this volume we see the book in which the deliverer, the king, the sweet psalmist of Israel delighted to meditate day and night; whose counsels made him wiser than all his teachers; and which he describes as sweeter than honey and more precious than gold. This too is the book for the sake of which our pious ancestors forsook their native land and came to this then desolate wilderness; bringing it with them as their most valuable treasure, and, at death, bequeathing it to us, as the richest bequest in their power to make. From this source, they, and millions more now in heaven, derived the strongest and purest consolation; and scarcely can we fix our attention on a single passage in this wonderful book, which has not afforded comfort or instruction to thousands, and been wet with tears of penitential sorrow or grateful joy, drawn from eyes that will weep no more. There is, probably, not an individual some of whose ancestors did not while on earth prize this volume more than life, and breathe many fervent prayers to heaven that all their descendants, to the latest generation, might be induced to prize it in a similar manner. Thousands, too, have sealed their belief of its truth with their blood; rejoicing to shed it in defence of a book, which, while it led them to the stake, enabled them to triumph over its tortures. Nor have its effects been confined to individuals. Nations have participated largely in its benefits. Armed with this volume, which is at once sword and shield, the first heralds of Christianity went forth conquering and to conquer. And wherever its influence is felt, temperance, industry, and contentment prevail; natural and moral evils are banished, or mitigated; and churches, hospitals, and asylums for almost every species of wretchedness, arise to adorn the landscape and cheer the eye of benevolence. Such are the temporal benefits, which even infidelity itself, if it would for once be candid, must acknowledge that the Bible has bestowed on man. Almost coeval with the sun, its fittest emblem, it has, like that luminary, from the commencement of its existence, shed an unceasing flood of light on a benighted and wretched world. Who then can doubt, that He who formed the sun, gave the Bible to be a light unto our feet, and a lamp to our path P Who, that contemplates this fountain, still full and overflowing, notwithstanding the millions who have drank of its waters, can doubt, that it has a real though invisible connexion with that river of life, which flows for ever at the right hand of God ?-Dr E. Payson. THE FRENCH REVOLUTION. THE STATE OF FRANCE. THE French Revolution has so profoundly agitated mankind, that a notice of it may well be expected to form an early feature in the pages of a popular miscellany. Into the political considerations which it involves we do not intend to enter. In the following article, and a few similar papers, we shall confine ourselves exclusively to the narration of facts, leaving our readers to form their own conclusions; our object being to present an epitome of the most important period in modern history, and of events with which every intelligent person desires to be acquainted. The present article will be devoted to a brief description of the state of France before the Revolution, and of the causes which gave rise to that event. On future occasions we purpose describing its more important phases or brilliant passages, in a series of articles, each of which we shall endeavour to render complete and interesting in itself. Long before the advent of the Revolution, the condition of the country had, to discriminating observers, indicated the approach of the impending storm. The monarchy was worn out, the nobility corrupt, and the clergy degenerate. A thousand years had almost elapsed since the establishment of the former under Clovis, and the system was thus hastening to that state of decay which seems inseparable from all human institutions. The vices of one king, and the virtues of another, had alike contributed to produce this result. The long and expensive wars of Louis XIV. and the profligacy of Louis XV. had exhausted the resources of the kingdom, and alienated the affections of the inhabitants; and the quiet, unobtrusive, undecided character of Louis XVI. was calculated rather to encourage than to suppress the rising flame. This unhappy monarch, if endowed with few qualities which attract our admiration, was possessed of many which engage our esteem; and had he lived in an earlier era, he would have been considered the beau ideal of that patriarchal system on which the government was supposed to be founded; but on the stormy era when he ascended the throne, his virtues tended only to excite the political tempest which swept him and his family from the earth. The number, the frivolity, and the viciousness of the nobles had increased to a surprising degree; and it was mainly these that gave rise to the Revolution. According to Madame de Staël, there were nearly one hundred thousand of them; as not only was the head of a family noble, but likewise all his descendants; and titles of nobility were besides obtained from numberless offices, or were openly purchased by money. The nobles possessed many privileges-they contributed nothing to the support of the state, and they enjoyed a monopoly of all its higher offices. They alone could hold commissions in the army or navy, and fill the more important and lucrative posts of civil government; and to such an extent had their influence attained, that, in the very year before the Revolution broke out, they had caused the feeble king to pass a decree that none but those noble for four generations should hold a military commission; while they, at the same time, declared themselves exempt from contributing in any way to the expenses of the state and yet, at the moment when they assumed such privileges, they were themselves the very slaves of the court. A post, a pension, or some frivolous honour, was at any time sufficient to gain the best of them. A few, indeed, stood aloof, and were apparently exempt from this universal degeneracy; but it was either because, like the Duke of Orleans, they had been disappointed at court; or, as in the instance of the smaller noblesse in La Vendée, because their private fortunes were unfit to cope with the costly dissipation of the metropolis. And yet these alone stood |