We readily acknowledge that we were chargeable with inadvertency in our last Number, in classing the "Dairyman's Daughter" with "Sancho" as a fiction. Our correspondent, (we presume, the Author,) states that the minutest article of 'descriptive scenery' in the former narrative, is as correct as the other circumstances of the story; and he justly pleads for an exception in favour of such details, in discussing the doubtful or injurious tendency of religious fictions.

An Erratum in the Rev. Dr. Johnson's Sketch of the Life of Cowper, has misled us with respect to the village at which Cowper rested in his journey to Norfolk. At page Ixi. of the "Sketch" "the quiet village of St. Neot's, near Eaton,' should be the quiet village of Eaton, near St. Neot's,' St. Neot's being a market town. The church-yard at Eaton, in which the conversation alluded to took place, adjoins the inn on the high north road at which the interesting party slept.

**We do not hesitate to give insertion to the following Letter from the Rev. Mr. Snow, one of the clergymen who have recently seceded from the Episcopal Church. We shall, at least for the present, refrain from making any

comment.

SIR,

I have just now seen the Review of the Bishop of Gloucester's Charge in your Number for this present month; and have read in it your remarks on the subject of a late secession "from the Episcopal Church.” I beg to assure you, Sir, that you altogether misunderstand the principles of those seceders whom you condemn.

The charge which you appear especially to prefer against us, is of exalling a chimerical assurance above the righteousness of Christ, and of ascribing merit to faith? I suppose there never was a more unjust charge, nor one which indicated a more entire ignorance of our opinions. All the seceding ministers to whom you refer, as well as all the other teachers connected with us, would utterly reject such a tenet as that which you attribute to them. The error of supposing faith to be the meritorious cause of a sinner's salvation has been one against which they have in an especial manner contended; whilst all their statements are designed to lead men away from every thing in themselves as a ground of dependence, to the active and passive obedience of the Son of God.

I would further add that the definition of faith which you attribute to us, is to the full as absurd in my eyes as it can be in yours.

I particularly request that you will insert this letter in your next Number, in the first place, as a matter of justice to persons whose opinions you have mis represented; and in the second place, to prevent the supposition that the absurd opinions which you attribute to us have in any respect received our countenance

I am, SIR,

Your obedient Servant,

Cheltenham, 16th Oct. 1816.

THOMAS SNOW.

ECLECTIC REVIEW,

FOR DECEMBER, 1816.

Art. I. The Monarchy according to the Charter. By the Viscount de Chateaubriand, Peer of France, Minister of State, Chevalier of the Royal and Military Order of St. Louis, Member of the Royal Institute of France. 8vo. pp. ix. 252. Price 7s. 6d. Murray, 1816.

WE

E imagine that after all the visits and revisits to Paris of our philosophical and sentimental travellers, after all the Letters from France, and Letters from Paris, and Narratives of Events, and Political Reflections, which have had the good effect of furnishing some employment to the London printers during the last twelvemonths, our readers in common with ourselves find it extremely difficult to come to any definite conclusions respecting the real state of parties in France, or even to understand the political tactics of the contending factions. This perplexity would not however be connected with any very anxious solicitude to gain information on the subject, were it not that this country is unfortunately so deeply implicated in the final result of the measures adopted by the French Government. There can be no doubt that France is indebted, in what light soever she may view the obligation, to the presence of foreign troops for the preservation of her internal tranquillity. The mean precautions, the espionage, the whole of the domestic policy adopted by the present ministry, sufficiently indicate their conscious weakness and insecurity; and it may be presumed that their information as to the real circumstances of the country, is not less accurate than that of our London politicians. No doubt they are aware that ties of individual interest alone, attach any portion of the population to the present dynasty; that the Charter has but few charms in the eyes of a nation which finds itself made free by force, and rendered loyal by the Police. ACharter which, so far from being a treaty between the Prince and the Subject, is bestowed as a gratuity emanating from the paternal heart of the monarch, and which, so far from constituting the assertion of rights on the part of the people, is subVOL. VI. N.S. 2 U

stantially but a collection of edicts adopted as the mere framework of government, is not calculated to conciliate opinion, or to inspire confidence. Deficient in all the requisites of a a compact, it provides no guarantee for the people who, in the very acceptance of that: Constitution, only submit to authority.

The last article in the Constitution,' remarks the venerable M. Grégoire, enacts, that it shall be submitted to the acceptance of the French people, and nevertheless that the 'member of the ancient dynasty called to the throne, shall be proclaimed King of the French as soon as he shall have ( signed it, and sworn to observe and to enforce it. Is it then for the sake of mere form, and in courtesy only, that the people are called in? Had they thought fit to reject your work, as they had a right to do, in what a dilemma would you have been precipitated? I do not mean to raise any doubt as to the wish that the nation may manifest; but we must take our stand upon principles, and can it be denied, that in order to give validity to an act of this nature, the respective ratifi'cations of the contracting parties ought to have preceded the taking of possession ?'*

That which imparts value and efficiency to a Charter, is its being actually a BILL OF RIGHTS; a declaration of the rights and liberties of the subject; having for its basis, not the precarious will of a monarch, but the conscious power of a free people, and guarded by that watchful spirit of liberty from which it emanated. But the French Charter has no such origin or safeguard, for political liberty has no existence in France. The contentions between the Constitutionalists and the Royalists, are not those of a people struggling for their rights, but of parties striving for ascendency. Strange, that the Constitution and the Charter should seem to be the watch-words of the rival factions! But of what use is a Charter, where the Sovereign, disdaining, according to M. Chateaubriand's representation, to be King by the Constitution of the Empire,' assumes the language of absolute prerogative; where an extra-legitimacy is pretended to, neither sauctioned by the Charter, nor recognised by the people; and where the minister violates the very letter of the boasted compact with impunity? And yet it is by the Constitutionalists that this Charter is violated; and the Royalists, the ultra Royalists, are those who are in direct opposition to the King Are we then to imagine, that the one party are with Jaudable intentions attempting to establish the Constitution by arbitrary means, and that the other aim at tyrannizing by means

*"De la Constitution Française de L'An 1814. gore, Ancien Evêque de Blois, Senateur, &c. &c." 8vo. Paris. 1814. p. 22.

Par M. Gré4me. Edition,

of the Charter?-that the one party are culpable in their measures only, while the other are to be suspected for their designs? For in fact, the Constitutionalists, it seems, are afraid of liberty.' The Ultras want to make a bad use of it; and the King himself is afraid of them.

It might throw some light on the mystery, had we any accurate information as to the sort of materials of which the present ministry are composed, and the secret principle which binds them together in their present line of policy. This information cannot be derived from the representations of news-, papers, or the crude opinions which our travelled gentlemen import from the Palais Royal. The charges or admissions of an opponent often however afford us the best clew to the character of a man or of a party. M. De Chateaubriand insinuates pretty broadly, that the Constitutionalists are involved in a conspiracy against the Bourbons; and to give credibility to his charge, he thus proceeds to designate some of the individuals who occupy, as we presume, a prominent station in that party.

One of these persons may I admit, have served the King all his life: but he is ambitious; he has no fortune, he wants places, he observes that a certain party is the path to favour, and he embraces that party

Another was irreproachable until the hundred days; but during that fatal period he was guilty of mean compliances, and since that has become irreconcileable. He punishes us for the fault which he committed, and the more venomously, because this fault shews alike want of judgment and weakness of character: great personal interests are in fact less inimical to the Bourbons, than little personal vanities.

A fourth, during the hundred days, was heroic, but since then his pride has been wounded, and a private pique has induced him to enlist under the banners which he had formerly opposed.

Another is religious, but he has been persuaded that to urge AT PRESENT the interests of the Church, would be highly imprudent, and that too much precipitation might ruin its interests.

Another is attached to legitimate monarchy, but happens to abhor the nobility, and does not much like the priests.

Another loves the Bourbons, has served them, and would serve them again; but he wishes for freedom and the political results of the Revolution, and has strangely taken it into his head that the Royalists are undermining liberty, and wish to undo all that has been

done

• Another would be inclined to think that there were some danger, were he not convinced that we are alarmists who only cry out because we are discontented, and because we have been defeated in our intrigues and private plans of ambition.

Others, in fine, and they for the greater number, are careless, frivolous, or pusillanimous, and wish only for pleasure and ease; they dread the very thoughts of any thing that looks like independence,

and take the line of submission, weakly fancying it to be that of quiet.' pp. 207-209.

This passage certainly appears to warrant one deduction, that the interests of the Church' form a leading object of the party to which our Author is attached, and that it is constituted of those who do like the priests, and of those who are in the interest of the old nobility. Of this we never had any doubt; and it is a circumstance deserving of remark, that the men who discover so ardent a love for the Charter, should be mainly that class of the nation the least interested in the extension of popular freedom,—the partisans of the old aristocracy, and of a bigoted, rapacious priesthood. M. de Chateaubriand has let us into another secret, namely, that there are some of his opponents, who, though they love the Bourbons, wish for freedom, and who think, strange as the opinion is according to his representation, that the Royalists are undermining liberty. Now, the existence of this opinion as entertained, not by a few coffee-house politicians, or remote observers, but by individuals in official situations, active occupants of the scene of political intrigue, is a fact on which we lay far greater stress, than on a hundred political reflections. The existence of such an opinion is indeed no demonstration of its being founded on truth; but one cannot conceive that the character of the Royalists should be altogether mistaken by persons whose integrity M. Chateaubriand himself seems not to question, and whose principles evidently entitle them to respect. And it is no small tribute to that party against whom our Author vents his eloquence, that it should comprise men whose acknowledged moral and religious character, rendered it necessary for him to tax his ingenuity, to shew how they could become the dupes of the ascendant faction. Something more, then, is obviously necessary, than is comprehended in the Viscount's motto, The King, the Charter, and Honest men.' If these honest men are weak men, they may, by his own shewing, fall into the class of conspirators against the liberties of their country. Weak men are to be found on each side of a political question, and it is by them especially that the ruin of a nation is often precipitated. M. de Chateaubriand himself may be an honest man. It is possible that though endued with sensibility, and a romantic imagination, though, moreover, a fine writer and a nobleman, he may nevertheless, in point of judgement, be in some degree a weak man: this Abdiel' of loyalty may not be an "excellent statesman' or a profound philosopher. Indeed, we can scarcely contemplate a man honestly devoted to all the mummeries of the Romish superstition, expatiating on them with rapture as the beauties of Christianity, and exclaiming, as in the Eighty-fourth Chapter of the present work, 'What