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have charms for the Anti-Chamber, and those valets who will deign to insert in their journals the commands of their masters. They alone will enjoy liberty, since their servility may be relied on, There is an evening paper which enjoys some privileges: the favor has been granted to it, which has been denied to others, of being sent off by post on the day of its appearance. Should any person be desirous of extracting any articles of news from this journal, he cannot do so till he has sent them to the Censors, although we must suppose that those articles have been already under the Censor's eye. But the thing permitted to one, is refused to another : what is perfectly lawful in the Etoile would become illegal in the Journal des Débats or the Quotidienne, in the Constitutionnel or the Courrier. The impudence of these petty tyrannies, however, admits of explanation: power has nothing offensive in it when directed by genius; it may rather be considered as one of its inherent qualities: but when mediocrity is promoted to the higher posts, the power that accompanies it displays all the insolence of an up

start,

Whatever attempts may be made to stifle liberty, it will assuredly slip from the weak hands that shall try to keep it in check; it is in fact already escaping from their grasp. Behold the blanks which are again to be found in the journals: you will see these blanks excite no small degree of wrath: yet the crime of blank pages would be a singular one to bring before the tribunals. The vexations exercised at the post-offices will have no better success. When the public opinion is made up, nothing can stop it. The capital and the provinces will now be inundated with pamphlets. Even silence will be looked upon as an attack, and the Ministry will be accused by the very thing they are not told of. Alas! we had not arrived at such a pass at the opening of the session.

When Buonaparte could in 24 hours cause a public writer to be shot, it may be considered that there existed restraint (répression). Terror also operated as a restraint, But as to the Ministry, who fears them?

And why do those who so fiercely braved public opinion fly before it? Why this censorship, but from the fear of that opinion which they affect to despise?

I have made inquiry as to the articles cut out of the Journal des Débats of Tuesday, Aug. 17. They are as follows: 1st, A second article reviewing the session which terminated the labors of the Chamber of Deputies. (This article is about to appear, printed by Le Normant, together with the first, and those intended to follow it.)-2d. The advertisement of this present Pamphlet.-3d. Some lines on the Duke of Orleans, noticing the sensibility of this Prince on occasion of the distribution of the accessits obtained by the Duke de Chartres.-Such are the first exploits of the Censorship.

I know not if others have been struck as I have; but every thing I see appears to me inexplicable, and nearly to approach to madness. I can understand those acts, however whimsical in themselves, which tend to the same object, and are likely to benefit the authors of them: but I can form no conception of men who desire to save themselves, and who yet do the very thing that must destroy them. What occasion is there, I would ask, for those acts of violence which we have for some months witnessed-that agitation in the midst of repose-that thirsting after ministerial dictatorship, when no one disputes the established power? Why corrupt the journals, and afterwards bind them in chains, when the victories of an heir to the throne and the prosperity of France had destroyed all revolutionary opposition? That which the King announced on opening the session of 1823, had been permitted by Providence, and accomplished by the army. Who is there that did not feel in his paternal soil a firmer footing? who that did not rejoice to see France regain her rank among the Powers of Europe?

But some unknown circumstance arises to snatch away our fairest hopes. We retrograde, on a sudden, at least eight years; we are replacing ourselves just where we were at the commencement of the restoration : we are arming ourselves afresh against the pub. lic liberties: we revert to the Censorship-aggravating the evil by an act without precedent as it regards the tribunals. We imitate the very conduct we had stigmatised: we introduce circular letters at the elections; we feel the need of Peers to secure a majo rity; and yet, whilst we repel the Royalists, we assume that apellation. Every thing was tending towards ministerial power; every thing now is receding from it: it remains insulated, exposed to a thousand enemies, supported only by opinions that it dictates, by journals that it pays, and by flatterers whom it despises.

When looking for a solution of these inexplicable things, one sometimes feels inclined to fall into the opinion of those melancholy persons who think that certain mysterious societies are driving to destruction all established order. But what are we putting in its' place? the arbitrary will of Ministers, and the yoke of their clerks and underlings. And is it thus we would attempt to govern France, and contravene the advancement of society and of the age in which we live !

No, that is impossible: yet, if we would reject these fears, others will still remain, that are created by the faults of which we are at once the witnesses and the victims. By exaggerating every thing, by forcing every thing, by abusing every thing, by trenching on established institutions, and compromising things most sacred, all means of future government are destroyed, the

strongest minds are wearied out, whilst honest men are disgusted; and thus, between despotism on the one hand, and an impracticable liberty on the other, people shrink into that indifference in politics, which brings on the dissolution of society-as indifference in religion leads to annihilation.

Who can have produced these tremendous evils? What ill-fated, but powerful genius has controlled the fortune of our country? It can be no genius. Nothing can be more deplorable than that which has happened to us, in the triumph of an undefinable something, and the success of a few little plotting contrivers. Two or three individuals get themselves fixed in power-and, in order to hold it for a few days, they stake the great destinies of France against their momentary interest.

We must make haste to quit the road we have got into, unless we would fall into a precipice. People may dispose of themselves, or destroy themselves, if they think fit; but ought on no account to compromise their country's welfare: but the Ministry by its system has shaken the legitimate monarchy to its foundations. What signify their intentions? they can never make amends for their deeds.

The remedy indeed is easy, if the disease be taken in time: if it is suffered to make head, it becomes incurable. I cannot develop all my thoughts in this small pamphlet, the rapid work of a few hours, and which I publish in haste on account of the importance of the subject; it is hard for me, that am so far advanced in my career, to re-engage in struggles which have consumed my life; but, a Peer of France, and a Magistrate, I cannot see public liberty perish. I could not see the tribunals attacked without raising my voice-without yielding my support, feeble as it may be, to the institutions that are endangered. That the throne of our wise Monarch may remain unassailable-that France may be free and happy is my prayer ;-and as to my own destiny, God's will be

done!

ON

THE PRESENT DISTURBANCES

IN

THE SOUTHERN DISTRICTS

OF

IRELAND:

BY

A RESIDENT OF THE COUNTY OF CORK.

"Ainsi, lorsqu'un prince veut faire de grands changements dans sa nation, il faut qu'il réforme par les lois ce qui est établi par les lois, et qu'il change par les manières ce qui est établi par les manières; et c'est une très mauvaise politique de changer par les lois ce qui doit être changé par les manières."

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Il y a des moyens pour empêcher les crimes; ce sont les peines: il y en a pour faire changer les manières ; ce sont les exemples.”

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INTRODUCTION.

THE following remarks have been written for some months, and were not at first designed for publication. I do not think that I have either exaggerated or misrepresented; and I lay them before the public with the single wish, that, if in no other way, at least by attracting attention to investigations of this nature, they may chance to be of some little service to my country. The habits of the higher and the lower orders in Ireland, and the relations in which they stand towards each other, have been sketched from time to time by writers of great ability; but never, that I know, strictly with a view to their political bearing, and their connexion with that sort of intermittent fever with which the southern districts have been afflicted for sixty or seventy years. As I proceeded, numerous tracks presented themselves in which I might have been tempted to travel, if other pursuits of a severer kind had left me leisure. Let me hope that others better qualified will undertake an office, which is not less interesting than the subject is deeply important.

It may seem strange that, in an inquiry into the causes of the present disturbances, I have scarcely said a word of Tithes. I thought it better to suppress some few remarks I had prepared, than touch lightly on a topic so large and so momentous.

It was not intended in these pages to write receipts for the cure

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