On him declining days more grateful close,
Since thousands calmly fink in foft repose.
His foul, a ray of the eternal mind,
To human organs, human pow'rs confin'd,
Beams, as emitted genuine blifs to show,
And forms a little round of heav'n below:
Each thought, each act, felf-love and facial blends,
And but with life the generous purpose ends.
Should men, ungrateful, ev'ry kindness flight,
Defraud, opprefs, thro' avarice, or thro' fpite,
Pitying he fees the low-born meteor fwell,
Secure in acting right, and wishing well:
Or fhou'd good heav'n, for ends all-wife, remove
The fund of bounty from this fon of love;
Refign'd, no harsh reluctance fwells his breaft,
Joy'd to reflect, whatever is, is beft;
That wisdom infinite, muft ftill difplay
Goodness unbounded in its brighteft ray,
And, as the blefsful fount perennial springs,
Alike to him whatever channel brings;
Happily confcious, while thro' him it flow'd,
No private aim obftructed publick good.

Thus bleft Aurelius fed the heav'n-born flame, The Man of Rofs thus foar'd, unknown, to fame. The good man's portrait this,-where-e'r he Full on a throne, contracted in the mines, [fhines, Born where unpolish'd Nature afks no more, Than kindness foon prefents from Nature's flore, Or (nurs'd by Art) where wants innumerous rife, And ceafelefs cares await the kind supplies.

And fhall the fiery zealot, blind as vain,
Prefumptuous, damn to never-ending pain,
The man, who bless'd and bleffing ftill below,
Ne'er own'd a thought fo cruel and fo low?
Because, from him impervious darkness wail'd,
Love's brightest plan, by men, by angels bail'd:
Or, known that truth, by education fway'd,
In faith he differ'd, tho' in life abey'd?
Detefted thought! fure nobler to refign
The truly bounteous to their Sire divine,
And join with me, the growling wretch explode,
(If fuch he is not) negatively good,

Who, fear'd from viler acts by fear or shame,
Dreams on thro' life, juft fcap'd the million's blame,
With changeless face furveying harsh distress,
Stranger alike to pity and redress;
Yet boldly claims in future worlds a bliss,
His narrow foul ne'er knew to grant in this :
Or left this clod, too proud to smart or mend,
And fully curft in miffing life's true end;
Addrefs the gay, by foft perfuafion turn
Profufion's freams thro' bounty's facred urn;
And joy ev'n thus reflected shall atteft
The good are gen'rous, and the gen'rous bleft.

To Sir JOHN TURNER, Bar. Member of the house of Commons.

An ODE. In imitation of, Equam memento, &c. HOR.

By W. BROWNE, Doctor of Phyfick

of both univerfities, and fellow of the Royal college of phyficians.

IR John, preferve an equal mind,
Unmov'd; if he be cross or kind,
Scorn to be Fortune's creature ;
Nor own that he has made you great
With title, lands, and fenate-feat:
To be yourself is greater.

Since you muft die, your purfe will bear
Inftead of port, indulge with claret; [it,
Nor die without good living :
Were you in life's dull path to trudge,
As grave and fober as a judge,

From death there's no reprieving.
Chufe out fome hofpitable shade,
By the old Knight's plantations made,

Trees clofe with trees uniting; Where the fine water's peaceful wave Glides flowly, as if loth to leave A landfkip fo delighting. There let the place be spread with rofes, Whofe fhort lives warn to tope our noses,

And feize each prefent minute; That we may boaft, as well as they, The life we lead is fweet and gay:

And more there's nothing in it. As Lynn and Warham you must quit, Your charming lake and fhady feat,

Let them fill merry find you;
Nor plague your thoughts to raise a fum,
For if you cou'd fcrape up a plumb,
You must leave all behind you.

It differs nothing, if you are
A clown's, or rich Sir Charles's heir,
As to the point of dying;
For death makes no more beds than onêş
And tho' a friend may add a fione,

That alters not your lying.

Here we must all, or foon or late,
Pig in together, fmall and great,

As each receives his fummons; Which life's great wheel decides by lot, While Charon, in his fcurvy boat,

Plies for King, Lords and Commons.

JOUR

took the cafe into their confideration, and appointed the rate for hay for a horse to be 8d. per diem. As this was 2d. per diem above what was allowed by act of parliament, the dragoons fcrupled paying it, and the officers fent a letter to me upon the fubject. This letter I laid before the Attorney-General; and, after he had confidered the cafe, his opinion was, that the Juftices of Peace had exceeded the powers given them by act of parliament; that they were to appoint the rates of neceffary provifions for the foldiers and their horfes, but not fo as to exceed the allowance given by the government, and exprefsly limited by the very act itself; and that the owners of inns, and other houses where foldiers are appointed by law to be quartered, were obliged to furnish them with neceffary provifions for themselves and horfes at a lower rate than what was allowed by law, if the Juftices fhould appoint it to be fo; but that neither they could require, nor the Juftices appoint any higher rates to be paid. And I muft fay it is most reasonable it fhould be fo; for a foldier has at all times one certain uniform pay from the government; his wages do not rife and fall, as other people's do, according to the price of provifions, or the demand for workmen; his pay is always the fame, and the allowance appointed by law is the highest that pay will admit of: he must be supported, and therefore, in times of fcarcity, you must either augment the pay of your foldiers, or you must oblige those where they are quartered, to furnish them with neceffary provifions at thofe rates which their pay will admit of. But I muft take notice, Sir, that before this difpute happened, there had been one of much the fame nature at Ledbury. There the owners of inns, alehouses and the like, even refused the foldiers the use of their fires or utenfils to dress their victuals: they would allow them no small beer to drink, nor so much as falt to their pottage. A foldier upon a march cannot carry a kit chen, a fack of coals, and a cag of fmall beer, upon his back; they must be allowed fuch things at the places where they are quartered; they thought they had a right to infift upon having them; and this had like to have bred a tumult betwixt the foldiers and townfmen, This cafe

was laid before the then Attorney-General, now Lord Chief Juftice Wills; and his opinion was, that the owners of the houfes where the foldiers were quartered, were obliged to allow them diet and small beer at the government's allowance, or even at a cheaper rate, if the Justices of Peace fhould order it to be fo.

I do not myself, Sir, pretend to any great knowledge of the law, or to the art of putting the proper meaning upon the words of an act of parliament; but, upon these two opinions, I think I cannot be accused of paffing a rafh judgment, if I fay that foldiers have, by the laws of this kingdom, a right to infift upon diet and small beer for themselves, and hay and ftraw for their horses, from the owners of the inns or houfes where they are quartered; and indeed to me the sense of the acts of parliament made for this purpose, seems as clear as words can make it. However, there are many lawyers, it seems, efpecially in the country, who think otherwife; and the people, depending upon their opinion, have now in many places begun to refufe diet and small beer to the foldiers quartered in their houses. I do not know but they may foon begin to refuse a foldier a bed. They have, I think, as good a right to refuse the one as the other; for the law fays only, they shall receive the foldiers quartered upon them: it does not fay, they fhall furnish them with beds, no more than it fays, they shall furnifh them with diet and fmall beer. Till now it has always been fuppofed, that by receiving was meant, to furnish the foldier with fuch a bed as he could lie on, and with neceffary provifions at fuch a price as he could pay. But a different interpretation is now put upon this word; and as the doctors of the law thus differ among themselves, the Juftices of the Peace do not know how to behave. If you do not put an end to the difpute, by adding a few explanatory words to the law, which you are now to revive, a law-fuit muft, and is to be begun by information, for terminating this difpute.

This, Sir, will be attended with a great expence to the publick, as well as to the perfons that are to be fued ; which I think you ought to prevent, now you have so fair

an

an opportunity. But what is much worse than the expence attending a law-fuit, if, upon the event of a law-fuit, it fhould be found, that the owners of houfes where foldiers are quartered, are not by law obliged to furnish them with diet and small beer at the government's allowance, or with any thing else befides house-room, the country people, who naturally do not much like foldiers, will take all the advantage they can of what is declared to be law, and this may occafion a general mutiny in your army: for, on the other hand, the foldiers, men who have got arms in their hands, and who have been taught how to use them, won't like to give up a right they think they have a juft title to, and a right which they have enjoyed for at least threescore years without interruption. For preventing these dangers, Sir, I have drawn up a claufe, as I thought I was, by the duty of my office, obliged to do, which I fhall beg leave to lay before you. What I propofe is, That, inftead of the ufual claufe for obliging innkeepers and others to receive the foldiers billeted upon them, you should infert a clause as follows: "Provided nevertheless, and it is hereby enacted, That the officers and foldiers fo quartered and billeted as aforefaid, fhall be received, and furnished with diet and fmall beer, by the owners of the inns, livery ftables, alehoufes, victuallinghouses, and other houses in which they are allowed to be quartered and billeted by this act; paying and allowing for the fame the feveral rates herein after mentioned, to be payable out of the fubfiftence-money, for diet and fmall beer."

The speech of L. Junius Brutus.
Mr Prefident,

T is an unfortunate state we are fallen into, that every feffion of parliament must be attended with new laws, or new claufes in old laws, for oppreffing the induftrious fubject, and endangering the liberties of the country. It is impoffible to levy high duties upon the neceffaries or conveniencies of life, it is impoffible to keep up numerous ftanding armies, without fuch laws, or fuch claufes; and yet we have, for twenty years, been contriving how to continue and increase

both. The high duties we grone under, were introduced for fupporting a heavy and expenfive, but neceffary war; but how the keeping up of a numerous standing army in time of peace, was introduced, I can no other way account for, than by fuppofing, that it was neceffary for fupporting unpopular, deftructive meafures, and a hated minifter. I am furpri fed to hear the forcible quartering of fol diers, upon publick or private houses, infifted on, as if it were a neceffary means for the fupport of our government. Sir, if we were to attend ftrictly to our conftitution, even as it stands at prefent, we ought, in no mutiny-bill, to admit of the quartering of foldiers, even on publick houses, except for a few nights, in their march from one garrifon to another, or for the first night after they arrive at the place defigned for their refidence. Tho we now keep up, tho' we have long kept up a great number of ftanding forces in time of peace; yet, properly fpeaking, they are no more than is fuppofed to be neceffary for guards and garrifons: and accordingly, the refolution annually agreed to in this houfe is, That the number of effective men to be provided for guards and garrifons in G. Britain, for the enfuing year, shall be fuch a number as is then thought necessary. Before the revolution, we had guards and garrifons,even in time of peace; but before the revolution, nor for fome years after, we had no quartering of foldiers, either upon publick or private hou fes, in time of peace, without the confent of the owner. On the contrary, by an exprefs law, the latter end of K. Charles II.'s reign, it was enacted, That no officer, military or civil, or other perfon, shall quar ter or billet any foldier upon any inhabitant of this realm, without his confent; which law ftood in force till near the end of the 1692, when the first law was made for quartering foldiers in publick houses.

Before that year, Sir, our guards and garrifons, by which I mean all the foldiers we had on foot, even in their marching from one place to another, were obliged to quarter themselves, as other travellers do, in houfes that were willing to receive them; and when they came to any garrifon, or place where they were to

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