vice and virtue, or in other words, of folly and wisdom, of perniciousness and utility; and at best, we can regard a man who is commonly called wicked but as a noxious animal, who may be hunted down and destroyed, though merit and demerit be altogether out of the question. Those who look upon Bonaparte as a mere soldier of genius, with such philosophy and love of improvement, as original strength of mind and the unbigoted nature of his profession would leave him, appear to have the truest idea of his character. If as he went forward, he grew heated by his successful violence into a notion that he was playing the part of a kind of inferior Providence, his downfall has only added another warning name to the long list of Salmoneuses, who, without the vision and foresight of Gods, have

undertaken to dispense with the very first principles that regulate the comforts of men. This is the truest comment on the words of the Latin poet:

Cœlum ipsum petimus stultitiâ; neque

Per nostrum patimur scelus

Iracunda Jovem ponere fulmina..

HORACE.

Or as the English poet has still finelier turned it;

We reach at Jove's imperial crown,

And pull the unwilling thunder down.

DRYDEN.

Whether the Allied Monarchs will act up to the promises which they held out, and upon the strength of which, as well as

of feelings more immediately national, Popular Opinion enabled them to conquer, ie a speculation which the author willingly confines to less fanciful publications. One of them, at least, has given some personal proofs of an exemption from the usual vices of conquerors; and circumstances, both past and present, render on all hands the invitations to continue their good policy so numerous, and the shame of contradicting it so ready to start forward, that even weaknesses of a particular kind may come in aid of their better spirit; and monarchs be found to resemble ordinary men in other respects, besides those to which their enemies would confine them. At all events, to say nothing of the successive punishments inflicted on all parties who have offended the common sense of mankind, it appears cer

tain that the age, however retrograde in some respects, has taken sufficient steps in improvement to warrant it's being met with congratulations. Experience, the progress of Education, the extension of the general feeling respecting the Slave Trade, the evident futility of Superstition's endeavours to recover herself, the unquestionable addition of freedom obtained by the French, as far as they have approximated to the political privileges of this country,-in short, the encreasing strength of opinion, the universal advance of people towards their governments, and the better knowledge of each other which has followed the shaking together of the whole civilized community, and which must inevitably prevent the return of certain delusions, even in countries like

Spain, all conspire to secure to the world that improvement in it's social atmosphere, which has generally been preceded by storms and convulsions. And as to the rest, if Poetry is still inclined to colour a little overmuch, and to sit smiling out upon forms and visions of happiness which other eyes cannot discern, let us recollect that glorious definition of her office and privileges, which was struck off under her own inspiration by a writer, in whom knowledge appears to have been almost intuitive:

"The use of this feigned history (Poetry) hath been to give some shadow of satisfaction to the mind of man, in those points, wherein the nature of things doth deny it, the world being, in proportion, inferior to