his back, as he was certain they would never venture to meet him face to face.

The author's work, "Vox Populi, Vox Dei," is the most elaborate of his writings on the abstract principles of government. It goes to prove that all kings, governors, and forms of government, proceed from the people, which is the nature of the English constitution ; that the resistance of authority, when tyrannically exercised, is conformable to scripture and reason; that divine revelation and the history of the church confirm this right; and that passive obedience is a treasonable doctrine, contradictory to the attributes of God, and encouraging to rebellion, usurpation, and tyranny.

De Foe may be justly considered as a bold, an able, and incorruptible politician. It is true that, in 1705, we find him applying, by letter, to Lord Halifax, to be engaged as a political writer; and that his lordship sent him a handsome acknowledgment for his services*. But we detect nothing crouching, base, or unprincipled in this application. De Foe always stood manfully by the constitution, and the great principles of the Reformation of 1688. The freedom of Englishmen, and the real prosperity and power of England, were the grand objects he ever had in view.

The seeds of political economy were sown in the period of history we are now considering; but they had not, as yet, produced much fruit. We shall barely notice the subject by way of form, leaving its further and fuller consideration to a more appropriate period of time.

Hobbes has been claimed by modern economists as one of the very first English writers who had arrived * Letters by the Camden Society, 1843.

"The

at correct conclusions as to the real sources of national wealth. In the "Leviathan," 1651, he says, nutrition of a commonwealth consisteth in the plenty and distribution of materials conducing to life. As to the plenty of matter, it is a thing limited by nature to those commodities, which, from two breasts of our common mother the land and sea, God usually either freely giveth, or for labour selleth to mankind. For the matter of this nutriment consisteth in animals, vegetables, minerals; God hath freely laid them before us, in or near to the face of the earth, so as there needeth no more but the labour and industry of receiving them, inasmuch that plenty dependeth (next to God's favour) on the labour and industry of man."

In addition to these remarks by Hobbes, we have several pages of Locke's "Essay on Government," devoted to what, in his opinion, constituted the real wealth of a country. He maintains that "It is labour which puts the greatest part of the value upon land, without which it would scarcely be worth anything.

The other publications which appeared in England, previous to the year 1700, on Economical Science, are chiefly of that class which relate to trade and commerce. The names of these are the following:-"The Merchants' Mappe of Commerce," London, 1638. "The Treasure of Trafficke; or, a Discourse of Forraigne Trade," 1641. "England's Treasure by For"England's Interest and Improvement," 1663. There are four works by Mr. Roger Coke, namely, "A Treatise wherein is Demonstrated that the Church and State of England are in Equal Danger with the Trade of it," 1671. 2nd,"Reasons of the Increase of the Dutch Trade," 1671.

raigne Trade," 1644.

3rd," England's Improvement," 1675. 4th,-"How the Navigation of England may be Increased," 1675. "England's Greatest Happiness," 1677. "Britannia Languens; or, a Discourse on Trade," 1680. “A New Discourse on Trade," 1668. "Discourses upon Trade," 1691. "An Essay on the Probable Methods of Making the People Gainers in the Balance of Trade*."

SECTION IV.

On Public Records-Satirical Productions and Ballads of a Political character-The Drama-Newspapers, &c., &c.

BESIDES the regular treatises, written expressly on political subjects, that we have ventured to scan over in this chapter, and which, form the staple commodity of British speculation on the abstract nature and functions of government, there are other classes of works, which have aided, in some measure, the cause of truth and knowledge on the science of politics. On some of these publications, we shall make a remark or two.

In the first place, we may mention the Public Records of the kingdom. An immense body of interesting and useful information is to be derived from this source. They abound with matters of fact, which enable a general reasoner to verify and establish his abstract propositions and principles. The records of the proceedings of parliament, and the state trials up to the revolution of 1688, abound in valuable mate

*Sec note A, at the end of the volume.

rials to the politician. State Proclamations, from 1558 to 1624, may be occasionally met with in private hands, and even in some few public libraries. There is a valuable collection of this kind, which forms a continuation to the above, embracing the royal proclamations from 1625 to 1717, now in the possession of the Cheetham Library, Manchester. The Harleian Miscellany, in ten, and Lord Somer's Tracts, in twelve volumes, quarto, contain an immense body of curious political writing. In addition to these, there are the King's Tracts, in the British Museum, filling more than a score of volumes, and abounding with the rarest and most notable tracts published during the civil wars.

The "Harleian Miscellany," in ten volumes, contains an immense storehouse of curious and interesting political writing, on almost all theoretical and practical matters of general polity. There are likewise to be found here, several satirical poems on some of the more striking political events of the times; such, for example, as "Roy's Satire against Cardinal Wolsey," 1526, containing full eighty quarto pages. In this interesting and voluminous collection most all the political papers or essays are, however, very brief, many of them only amounting to a few pages, or even a single leaf or two. On this account the Harleian papers, taken as a whole, will not afford much aid to philosophical politicians who aim at obtaining an enlarged and profound view of all the abstract principles of the science of their favourite study. The assistance they will chiefly obtain will be that of recognising the state of public excitement at any given period, and the hold that particular political questions and measures seemed to have on the popular understanding.

The collections of political tracts, squibs, pamphlets, &c., at the Royal Institution, Albemarle-street, London, are valuable. Collection A, 23 vols. fol.; Collection B, 29 vols. fol.; Miscellaneous D, 10 vols.; Political E, 65 vols.; Duten's collection F, 87 vols.; Historical G, 5 vols.; Miscellaneous H, 8 cases; Miscellaneous I, 2 cases; Miscellaneous K, 63 vols.; Miscellaneous L, 7 vols.; state tracts M, 3 vols.; and Rushworth's collection, 8 fol. vols.

In the Free Library, Manchester, there is a collection of political tracts, embracing matters both of theory and speculation, on trade, commerce, finance, revenue, &c., of nearly seven thousand volumes. This is, we believe, the largest and best assortment of the kind in Great Britain. Writers who wish to enter fully into any of the leading divisions of political science, will find in this collection, a great and diversified mass of interesting and useful information.

In the writings of the historians, from the Reformation in England, to the accession of the Prince of Orange, many important political opinions and sentiments will be found. The same remark is applicable to the general mass of theological works; particularly sermons, which underwent a marked change, with the fluctuations of public opinion, on matters of state necessity or expediency.

The popular songs of a nation constitute one of the most palpable manifestations of its political feelings and sympathies; and this is more strikingly the case, if other legitimate channels for the expression of public sentiment be choked or dried up by the repressive hand of power. The song writer is an ubiquitous and privileged character. He pursues his avocation in the