lefs crimination. The article with regard to contracts, in particular, muft ftrike every perfon who has not entirely renounced the principles of his reafon, and the dictates of his experience. Is there any perfon fo ignorant of the principles of political fociety, or who has confidered the contracts given in the late German war, in the American war; or who reflects on the manner in which lottery-tickets are disposed of under the present administration; who can conftrue into a crime the conduct of the late governor-general of Bengal in difpofing of laborious and lucrative offices in fuch a manner as would at once benefit the India Company, and attach individuals to its fervice? The conduct of all administrations, in all nations and ages of the world, would be a fatire on the fuppofition.

In the difcuffion of general queftions, that involve a variety of feparate particulars and circumftances not fully elucidated, there are fome principles of common fenfe and ordinary penetration that come home to the mind of every impartial man. When Mr. Haftings was appointed governor of India he was invefted with a difcretionary power to promote the interests of the India Company and of the British empire; he discharged the truft, and preserved the empire committed to him, in the fame way, and with greater fplendour and fuccefs, than any of his predeceffors in office; his departure from India was marked with the lamentations of the natives, and the tears of his countrymen; on his return to England he received the thanks and congratulations of his employers. Thefe facts are fo ftrong and ftriking that no falfe reafoning or falfe rhetoric will ever obliterate their impreffion.

It was a favourite idea of Bishop Butler, that nations, like individuals, are fubject to fits of infanity. Of this, with regard to England, the rife, the progrefs, and the termination of the American war, was a ftrong demonstration. Will that tempeft never spend itfelf, that fury affuage? It will give confolation, however, and even triumph, to the celebrated perfonage who now attracts the attention of Europe, to think that his merit is recognised in every corner of the globe-except in the English House of Commons.

BUDGET.

This is the first year, fince the year 1774, that has been exempted from taxes and a loan to government. A deficiency has been found in the customs which may be eafily accounted for. During the dependence of the Commercial Treaty with France it was not to be expected that the merchants would continue to import, at the old duties, commodities which were foon to be reduced in their price, and stock their warehouses

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to

to their obvious difadvantage. This obfervation particularly applies to the valuable imports of wine and fpirits. Although the finances of the country appear to be in a more flourishing ftate than in any year fince the peace, every means fhould be taken to render the taxes efficient and productive. Formerly, deficiencies in one tax were compensated by impofing another, and the people faw no end to their burdens. The present miniftry have adopted a wifer plan, by inquiring into the causes that occafion deficiencies, and endeavouring to remove them. Smuggling, and an improper mode of collecting the taxes, seem to be the great obftacles to the increase of the national revenue. The former has been greatly checked, though it cannot be altogether fuppreffed; the latter (the business of collecting taxes) ought to centre in as few hands as poffible.

But although the nation has no cause to despair from the afpect of their affairs, the miniftry have little reafon to triumph. When we confider that our annual expenditure amounts to upwards of fixteen millions, and that the annual revenue comes fhort of it by at least half a million, public economy, in all the branches of government, and a patriotic and unremitting attention to explore all the fources of industry in the kingdom, are indifpenfably neceffary in a minister of GreatBritain. In this view the Commercial Treaty opens the profpect of manifold advantages to both kingdoms. From the fpeech of M. de Calonne to the Affembly of the Notables the French finances appear to have been as much embarraffed as our own. The difmiffion and difgrace of their late ministry, by whom the Commercial Treaty was framed, threatens nothing hoftile to that transaction. A change of ministers in France does not imply a change of meafures, as generally happens in England.

SHOP-TAX.

This vexatious, odious, and unproductive tax, has been again complained of, and again confirmed. Obftinacy is not the worst quality which a minifter can poffefs; but it ought never to be exerted but in a good caufe. Mr. Pitt pledged himself to repeal this tax when it should be proved that it was partial or oppreffive. This has been done to the conviction of all men; but our young minifter affects to be unconvinced.

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Communications for THE ENGLISH REVIEW are requested to be fent to Mr. MURRAY, No. 32, Fleet-ftreet, London; where Subfcribers for this Monthly Performance are refpectfully defired to give in their Names,

THE

ENGLISH REVIEW,

For MAY, 1787.

ART. I. An Hiftorical View of the English Government, from the Settlement of the Saxons in Britain to the Acceffion of the Houfe of Stewart. By John Millar, Efq. Profeffor of Law in the University of Glasgow. 4to. 18s. boards. Čadell. London, 1787.

THE

HE rife of the English government, and its progress towards perfection, prefent one of the most curious' and useful fubjects of inquiry which philosophy can investigate, or hiftory record. From rude beginnings, and barbarous inftitutions, a conftitution arofe, by degrees, which diftinguishes England from other nations. The wild and undefined liberty which characterised the Gothic ancestors of all the European nations foon gave place in England to the outlines of political freedom; ancient ufages, when vio lated by tyrants, were not only restored, but received a legal fanction; and, from an original compact between the king and the people, we trace the flow but gradual progrefs of a conftitution, which, in its full establishment, involves a fyftem of government and law the most favourable to liberty and the rights of mankind that has ever been known in the world.

The British government is, indeed, the only one to be found in the annals of history which has political freedom for its object; which aims at the diffusion of liberty through all the members of the ftate; and in which the conftitution is at the fame time afcertained in all its boundaries, and alive ENG. REV. Vol. IX. May 1787.

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alive in all its parts. The republics of the ancient world contained little more, in their original form, than the police of fingle cities; fovereignty, indeed, refided in the free citizens; but the greater proportion of the people, so far from being admitted to a fhare in the government, were, by the inftitution of domestic flavery, excluded from the common rights of men. The republics of modern Europe are inconfiderable in their extent, and confer very unequal privileges on the individuals which compose them. The English nation alone have adopted a form of government which afcertains the rights, and fecures the liberty, of all its members; and in which all orders of men are represented in the great council of the nation, and participate the powers of the ftate.

The progrefs of fuch a fingular conftitution is interesting to other nations as well as to Britain. If Athens was the native feat from which refinement and the arts flowed to the ancient world, England has been the parent of liberty to the modern. The free ftates of Europe have been fupported by her policy, and protected by her arms; the contagious vicinity of freedom has mitigated the rigour of the defpotic governments around her; and her defcendants, in another, hemifphere, animated with the fpirit of their ancestors, have opened a new scene in the hiftory of mankind. To trace the causes by which fuch an extenfive and liberat plan of civil freedom has been established in this ifland; to mark the concurrence of wife inftitutions and fortunate events, by which our Saxon ancestors have been enabled to conceive more comprehenfive ideas of liberty than other nations; and to form the rudiments of thofe political inftitutions which have been productive of fuch profperity and happiness to a great and populous empire; is the object of Mr. Millar in his Hiftorical and Philofophical View of the English Government.

He divides the series of events in the hiftory of England into three parts; the firft extending from the settlement of the Saxons in Britain to the Norman conqueft; the fecond from the reign of William the Conqueror to the acceffion of the house of Stewart; the third from the reign of James the Firft to the present time..

The first period contains the conqueft of England by the northern barbarians; the divifion of the country under the different chiefs by whom that people were conducted; the fubfequent union of those principalities under one fovereign; and the courfe of public tranfactions> under the Saxon and Danish monarchs.

The reign of William the Conqueror, while it put an end to the ancient line of kings, introduced into England a multitude of foreigners,

who

who obtained extenfive landed poffeffions, and fpread with great rapidity the manners and customs of a nation more civilized and improved than the English. The inhabitants were thus excited to a quicker advancement in the common arts of life, at the fame time that the nation, by acquiring continental connections, was involved in more extenfive military operations.

By the union of the crowns of England and Scotland, upon the acceffion of the house of Stewart, the animofities and diffenfions, with all their troublesome confequences, which had fo long fubfifted between the two countries, were effectually fuppreffed. By the improvement of manufactures, and the introduction of a confiderable foreign trade, England began, in a fhort time, to eftablish her maritime power, and to affume a higher rank in the scale of Europe.

The fame periods are also distinguished by remarkable variations in the form of government.

Upon the fettlement of the Saxons in Britain, we behold a number of rude families, or tribes, feebly united together, and little accuftomed either to fubordination among themselves, or to the authority of a monarch. During the reigns of the Anglo-Saxon princes we discover the effects produced by the gradual acquifition of property; in confequence of which, fome individuals were advanced to the poffeffion of great estates, and others, who had been lefs fortunate, were obliged to shelter themselves under the protection of their more opulent neighbours. Political power, the ufual attendant of property, was thus gradually accumulated in the hands of a few great leaders, or nobles; and the government became more and more aristocratical.

• When the advances of the country in improvement had opened a wider intercourse, and produced a more intimate union, between the different parts of the kingdom, the accumulated property in the hands of the king became the fource of greater influence than the divided property poffeffed by the nobles. The prerogatives of the former, in a courfe of time, were therefore gradually augmented; and the privileges of the latter fuffered a proportionable diminution. From the reign of William the Conqueror in England we may date the firft exaltation of the crown, which, under his fucceffors of the Plantagenet and Tudor families, continued to rife in splendour and authority,

About the commencement of the reign of James the First, great alterations began to appear in the political ftate of the nation. Commerce and manufactures, by diffufing a fpirit of liberty among the great body of the people, by changing the system of national defence, and by increafing the neceffary expences of government, gave rife to thofe difputes, which, after various turns of fortune, were at last happily terminated by the establishment of a popular government.

With reference to that diftribution of property, in the early part of our hiftory, which goes under the name of the feudal fyftem, the conftitution established in the first of these periods may be called the feudal ariftocracy; that in the fecond, the feudal monarchy; and that which took place in the third may be called the commercial govern. ment,'

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