12 Character of the late C. J. Fox. which it is capable, and avoid all theh evil, seems best calculated to accomplish the ends of government, provided it be sufficiently restrained from exercising oppression. In the English constitution it is kept in check by a single magistrate on the one hand, and by a popular assembly on the other, and makes up in dignity what it wants in consequence. To the king the whole executive is entrusted, and all subordinate agents are of his appointment. He can do no wrong, and no guilt can be imputed to him; bat no act of his contrary to the good of the people is valid. Judiciary power is in the name of the king, but exercised independently of him; and the checks upon these two branches which form the security of the people, reside in the legislative power of the commons, and their privileges of granting the supplies. For the Bow Monthly Magazine. [Aug. 1, ave set the seal of approbation on his virtues and opinions, all that I can do is to present you with another sketch of the character of your friend, which you may insert in a future edition of your work if it shall be deemed worthy a place in that curious collection. This delineation was drawn up, not long after the demise of Mr. Fox, and formed part of a tract which was intended to exhibit a view of the country at that eventful crisis, but for some reasons which I am not at liberty to mention, the piece, though printed, was not published. The author of the pamphlet after giving some general observations upon political parties, and their efforts in producing the dismemberment of the British empire, proceeds in the following man ner: "America is indebted for her sovereignty neither to her own exertions, though directed by the energy and wisdom of SKETCH of the CHARACTER of the late Washington, nor to the interference of CHARLES JAMES FOX. In a LETTER addressed to PHILOPATRIS VARVICENSIS. Irregular speech hath commonly divers more advantages for it, and fewer checks upon it, than other bad practice hath.- BARROW, SIR, TO admit that the perusal of your motley Volumes purporting to be a monument of friendship and patriotism, commcmorative of the splendid talents and private virtues of Mr. Fox, afforded me some amusement, is no more than what is due to the importance of the subject, and to the abilities displayed in the illustration of the character. But I could not help wishing that the work had been more matured, and that the learned compiler Ind waited some time longer for the purpose of marking, by the sure test of experience, the claim of his hero to the title of a sound politician, and an enlightened statesman. It was generally known, that this great man had hazarded many bald opinions respecting the French Revolution, and that, in fact, he stood at the head of a party radically hostile to the war, on the ground that it was injurious to the cause of liberty, and the rights of mankind. Considering what extraordinary changes have taken place, it were to have been wished, with Submission to Providence, that Mr. Fox had lived to see the counter-revoludon which has been brought about on the contment, and to have told his followers what impressions these wonderful scenes had made on his mind. But as this regret is now unavailing, and as you France, with the auxiliary aids of Spain and Holland. She owes it primarily to the English opposition, headed by a man of mischievously splendid talents, who was more capable of ruining than of regulating the affairs of a kingdom. He could infuse a tone and vigour into the most feeble party, and lead on his warriors in debate, with extraordinary effect. His versatile abilities were always ready to catch at those points which, by his ingenuity, he knew how to turn to his advantage, by fixing upon them the general attention; and with the magic of words at his command, poured forth a stream of cloquence, which solled with such rapidity, that his hearers were at least confounded, if they were not convinced, and this passed with the multitude, as the triumph of truth, when it was nothing more than the influence of art over the passions. Knowing well how to captivate the understanding by. the power of oratory, he cast a broad glare of colour around the objects which he was sensible were most likely to arrest the observation of those whom he wanted to dereive; while, with equal dexterity, he contrived to throw into shade, or made rficulous and contemptible, the facts and principles which in their proper position and a fair light, would have exposed his errors, and destroyed the delusion. More solicitous to distress his adversary than to elicit truth, or to promote utility, he was always devising methods to perplex government, and to distress the public tranquillity. "With little aptitude for business, and too indolent, as well as dissipated, to 1814.]. Character of the late C. J. Fox. make himself master of that information which is essential to qualify a man for an office of high duty in the state, or to criticize justly those who are employed in the discharge of that duty; he had yet sufficient quickness of discernment, and knowledge of mankind, to see where the charge of a fault or weakness could be fastened with the greatest chance of producing an extensive effect. Having an uncommon flow of language, with an equal felicity of invention, he made all subjects by his management, appear forcible and persuasive, though the premises were often absurd, the reasoning vague, and the conclusions dangerous. It was one of his prominent and worst failings, that as he little regarded the solidity of the principles which he advocated, so he was utterly careless of the consequences to which they led, or of the practical application that wicked and designing neu might be disposed to make of them. He seemed, indeed, to have but one object in his public capacity as the director of a party, and that was to wound the feelings of those whom he wished to displace; and this disposition he manifested by constantly opposing all their schemes, and by attempting to defeat every purpose, without either knowing or caring whether the same was good or bad. "Like most men of eccentric genius, whose minds are not under the guidance of moral discipline, and trained to the exercise of serious inquiry, he was an enthusiast upon topics where the imagination had more room for play than the judgment. In other words, he had that thetoric at his command which enabled him to wield the fierce democracies at his will, to electrify popular assemblies by the hardihood of assertion, clothed with the graces of attraction, or armed with the terrors of denunciation, covering the deformity of error by the amplitude of description, and the poverty of sense by variety of illustration. But with all this address and confidence, though supported by a widely extended reputation, he was after all a mere theorist in the importaut branches of political science, where deep research and matured experience are needial to give any value to a man's opinions, or to stamp authority, upon his reasonings. This powerful declaimer could, indeed, diffuse a specious elegance over the most pestilential sophisins; but while he effected to be the champion of the people, he contributed more than any man to injure them, by raising in their minds false hopes, or sinking them into a de 13 spondent state by unreasonable fears. What was said of the anarch of old, too well comported with his lofty pretensions and continual hostility: He seem'd For dignity compos'd, and high exploit, Dropt manna, and could make the worse appear The better reason, to perplex and dash "You may ask, perhaps, how it was 14 Character of the late C. J. For. parties; since however bold and vehement they may appear against public measures and the corruptions of government, no tools of administration can be more under the restraint of prescription and influence than they are under that of caprice and ambition, Themselves not free, but to themselves enthrall'd. "" By the circle of rank and fashion in which this eminent person moved, he was regarded as a luminary of the first magnitude, and as peculiarly fitted to contend with the illustrious statesman then at the head of affairs, and who neither courted the support of the aristocracy, nor stooped to gain the applauses of the multitude. It may at first sight appear very extraordinary, that the same man who affected to be the leader of the democracy, should at the same time stand so closely connected with a domineering oligarchy, as to be entirely dependent upon the party, and to become even a pensioner on them for his support. "But the wonder will cease when we consider that the former character was necessary to the furtherance of the objects entrusted to his management as the prime minister of opposition. Iscruple not to fix this apellation upon him, be cause he uniformly acted as the organ of a combined force, made up of the principal great families, who considered themselves as having an hereditary right to take the lead in the government of the country. To strengthen their interest, the influence of an association, with an old but popular name tacked to it, was called in; and thus the concerns of the country were to be managed by a club; but when the doctrines professed and circulated by this society obtained a dreadful elucidation in the revolution which spread ruin and death over half the civilized world, the institution sunk into contempt. But how the head of the Whig Club deported himself during the progress of that awful portent, which, Like a comet burn'd, That fires the length of Ophiuchus huge needs neither detail nor comment. His [Aug. 1, posed sovereignty of the people. This bastard doctrine, which is subversive of nature in all her relations, was gendered during a bloody and successful rebellion, but when that contest ended, as all such violations of order do, in usurpation and tyranny, the monster sunk in obscurity, where it remained till it was drawn forth to serve the vile purposes of factious ambition. "It was left, to the disgrace of our times, to stamp a sort of character upon what has no analogy in the universe: but which, if suffered to gain a settlement among us, will, and that at no very distant period, destroy all the respect hitherto paid to distinctions and esta blishments, which give lustre to virtue and strength to the laws. "In adopting the revolutionary principle of the origin of government, the leaders. of political associations were actuated by no other motive than that of gaining power by popularity; but they strangely overlooked the direct tendency of the argument, that if the doctrine be true and the people should ever take it into their heads to act on the alleged right, government must inevitably fall beneath the sway of the sovereign mob. The danger of abstract propositions and metaphysical subtleties in politics, was never more apparent than in this very instance: for what the original broachers perhaps considered merely in a philosophical point of view, their disciples, little used to the refinenients of logical explication, take in the plain and gross seuse as a rule for practice and a plea for resistance. "It is painful to dwell so much upon this topic, and the only excuse that can be offered for it is this; that the eminent person whose political career is here sketched, gave a new turn to the spirit of party, by directing its operations in a channel the most dangerous to the foundations of social order and national safety. Securities, the accumulation of ages, and the result of deliberative wisdom, have been wantonly hazarded by appeals to those who may be fitted to destroy the best, but who have neither the virtue to appreciate the value of the best constitution in the world, nor wisdom sufficient to mend the worst. Nothing, indeed, can be more repugnant to common sense, than the supposition that mixed assemblies and associations are competent to judge of the intricacies which unavoidably occur in directing the affairs of every great state. Nothing can be more injurious to the 1814.] On the Art of Healing by Divination. 15 Dieu;" which consists in justifying that practice in themselves which they most severely condemn in others: and in adopting with aggravating circumstances, the very measures against which, when out of place, they most bitterly inveighed, as being founded in wicked motives, and replete with nothing but mischief and ruin to the community." peace and welfare of the men so practised upon ani deluded, than the call which is made upon them by the factious and ambitious, to interfere in the concerns of government. What requires deliberate counsel and patient investigation, an enlarged knowledge of the world, and an intimate acquaintance with human nature in its various rela tions, is most preposterously recom- Such is the picture which this anonymended to the prompt decision of men, mous writer has drawn of the distindrawn together by artifice, misled by guished statesman, for whose memory falsehood, and influenced by noisy ora- you cherish a tender esteem, and to tors to a state of passion. By such cultivate whose merits you have condemeans as these, a new school of politics scended to glean panegyricks from newshas been formed in this country; the papers and magazines, public speeches, founder of which institution was never and funeral sermons. I wish your more in his element, than when he was learning and eloquence had been more engaged in addressing groups of willingworthily employed, and that instead of disciples, whose plaudits he secured by devoting your powers to the praise of a fattering their vanity, and whose in- doubtful character, you had spent the temperance he excited by inisrepresenta fragment of life in the illustration of When these men were wrong the more important cause of religion, and violent, he justified their honest and in the real service of your king and zeal; and proceedings which approach country. I am, &c. ed very near to sedition, found in him PHILANAX ANGLICUS. and his coadjutors ardent apologists, if not downright advocates. tions. "It is very observable, that neither any change of circumstances, uor the fullest refutation of his bold predictions, ever drew from the lips of this singular man an ingenuous retractation of his errors, or a manly submission to the conviction of truth. He seemed to think himself placed in a situation which privileged him above the ordinary forms and reulations of political warfare; and to have thought, that as he had once taken his side as the leader of a party, he taust of course resist administration in every thing. It was this, probably, that induced him to adopt a measure which in other days would have brought down a heavy judgment upon his head. I allude to his sending a confidential agent to a foreign court, for the purpose of thwarting the designs of his own government. It certainly would have been fortunate for the reputation of Mr. Fox, if he had been called off in the full blaze of his popularity; but Providence permitted him, for better purposes, to form another coalition, and to enjoy that seat of power which had been for so many years the object of his ambition. The rest of his remarkable story may be told by those who have learned the art of reconciling political contradic tions; who are, in short, profoundly, conversant in that branch of knowledge, to which a French writer acutely gives the term of "l'art de chieaner avec For the New Monthly Magazine. VISIONARY DIVINATION. OF all human sciences, medicine un. doubtedly ranks among the most ancient. In the early ages of the world, when simplicity was the characteristic of man's cal aids; but when his nature degene earthly career, he had no need of medirated, and vice and luxury corrupted his habits of innocence and temperance, diseases sprung up, which those aids alone could assuage or eradicate. The knowledge of them could not fail at first sick were placed in the highways, that to be empirical and precarious. The passers-by might assist them with their appropriated this office exclusively to counsel; and, at length, the priesthood themselves. It was not merely the sacerdotal dignity which rendered them objects of awe and reverence to the illiterate multitude; they were regarded as and they proved themselves as skil the depositories of learning and science; ful, as they were successful, in cementing their influence by those arts, which # The Editor complies with the request of a respectable correspondent, in giving the above sketch a place in this number, but without offering any opinion of his own on the truth or propriety of the delineation, which is open to the examination and correction of every intelligent and dispassionate person, 16 On the Art of Healing by Divination. were best calculated to inflame the prejudices of the vulgar in their favour. It is the work of ages only to wean men and nations from popular illusions, and the deep-rooted opinions transmitted from sire to son: it cannot, therefore, surprise us, that even when the intellectual energy of Greece was signalizing itself by efforts which have commanded the admiration of after-ages, it should still remain a popular dogma in medicine, "that persons labouring under bodily infirmity, might be thrown into a state of charmed torpor, in which, though destitute of any previous medical knowledge, they would be enabled to ascertain the nature of their malady, as well as well as of the diseases of others, and devise the means of their cure." Upon this dogma was founded the mystery of incubations, or the art of healing by visionary divination. Whether man be capable or not of divination, is a point which, if it were not unnecessary to our present purpose to enlarge upon, it would be at least superfluous to discuss in these days. Such a power was assigned to him, not only by the vulgar, but by most of the philosophical sects of antiquity; and it does appear to savour a little of temerity, that Epicurus and the cynics should have ventured to reject a belief so universally and strenuously maintained, and resting on an infinity of traditions and accounts of prophets, in whom Greece had abounded from her earliest times, and of whose divine gift of prophecy the firmest conviction was currently entertained. Eschylus, Plutarch, Apuleius, and other Greek authors, bear ample testimony to the popularity of this persuasion, and tell us, that by uncommon and irregular motions of the body, intoxicating vapours, or certain holy ejaculations, men might be thrown into an enchanted trance; in which, being in a state between waking and sleeping, they were unsusceptible of external impressions, aud, obtaining a glimpse of futurity, were gifted with the power of prophecy. Here their allusion, however, only concerns the celebrated divinations of the Pythia. We must, therefore, probe somewhat deeper, in order to illustrate that species of divination which was the result of dreams, and a source of information on the nature of diseases and their remedies. This superstition was in no less acceptation than the former among the ancients, whose temples were constantly crowded with the sick, and reverberated with their supplications for divinatory [Aug. 1, dreams, which were regarded as an im mediate gift from the gods. Indeed the celestial origin of dreams was universally admitted by the nations of antiquity, and thence also their efficacy as oracles. Nothing could be more natural than such an idea. From the crude and imperfect notions which long prevailed in respect to the soul, it was scarcely possible for them to ascribe the impressions which their memory retained of the creation of their fancy during their slumbers, to the instrumentality of their own conceits; they could not fail, therefore, to impute them to the interposition of some foreign agent. To whom could they refer them more naturally than to a divinity? When awake they imagined themselves always attended by the gods in person, and ascribed every thought and resolve, every appearance or acci Ident which deviated from the common course of nature, to the immediate action of the gods. It was on this idea that so many nations originally rested their belief in divinatory dreams. The records of antiquity, therefore, abound in instances (for the greater part of an early date) where the actions of men have been the results of a dream, whose conceit was entirely at variance with the real state of their affairs. It was not long before the diversity of dreams awakened their attention; some were connected and simple; others were obscure, and made up of curious fancies, though not incapable of being resolved by the windings and turnings of allegory. It was no unnatural transition from the received belief in dreams, to the idea that they might become the medium of seeking instruction from the gods: hence the institution of oracles, whose responses were given in dreams; and the addition of sleeping chambers to many temples, such as those in Epidaurus and at Oropos. Here it was, that, after pious ceremonies and prayers, men laid themselves down in expectation of dreams; when this expectation was rea lized, though the dream proved ever so confused or intricate, the dreamer always succeeded in reconciling it to his circumstances : his own belief, and priestly wiles, readily effected the solus tion. The conceit of dreams, accordanto the votary's wishes, was so powerfully promoted by the preparatory initiation he had undergone, that it would have been somewhat extraordinary had he been altogether disappointed. He was generally anxious to increase the fame of the divinity by his dream, and possessed |