portant object, will be promoted by blending the occupations of industry with a confiderable proportion of fuch fuperftitious ceremonies as awaken the future hopes, without lulling the prefent benevolence, of the multitude; but nobody can doubt, that in countries where, from whatever caufe, induftry does not prevail, proceffions, and other rites of the fame nature, will tend to restrain the populace from the vices, and of confequence prevent fome of the miseries of idlenefs,

The peafantry of this country are unqueftionably in a more comfortless ftate than a benevolent mind could with them. But, England and Switzerland excepted, is not this the cafe all over Europe? In all the countries I have feen, or had an account of, the hufbandmen, probably the most virtuous, but certainly the most ufeful part of the community, whofe labour and industry maintain all the rest, and in whom the real ftrength of the state

refides,

refides, are, by a most unjust dispensation, generally the poorest and most oppreffed. But although the Italian peafantry are by no means in the affluent, independent fituation of the peafantry of Switzerland, and the tenantry of England, yet they are not fubjected to the fame oppreffions with those of Germany, nor are they fo poor as those of France.

Great part of the lands in Italy belong to convents; and I have obferved, and have been affured by those who have the best opportunities of knowing, that the tenants of these communities are happier, and live more at their eafe, than those of a great part of the nobility. The revenues of convents are ufually well managed, and never allowed to be fquandered away by the folly or extravagance of any of its members; confequently the community is not driven, by craving and threatening creditors, as individuals frequently are, to squeeze out of their vaffals

the

the means of fupplying the waste occafioned by their own vanity and expence. A convent can have no incitement to fevere and oppreffive exactions from the peasants, except sheer avarice; a paffion which never rifes to fuch a height in a fociety where the revenue is in common, as in the breast of an individual, who is folely to reap the fruits of his own oppreffion.

The ftories which circulate in Proteftant countries, concerning the fcandalous debauchery of monks, and the luxurious manner in which they live in their convents, whatever truth there may have been in them formerly, are certainly now in a great measure without foundation. I remember when I was at the Grande Chartreufe, near Grenoble, which has a confiderable diftrict of land belonging to it, I was informed, and this information was confirmed by what I faw, that thofe monks were gentle and generous mafters, and that their tenants were envied by all the peafantry

fantry around, on account of the treatment they received, and the comparatively eafy terms on which they held their farms. From the enquiries I have made in France, Germany, and Italy, I am convinced that this is ufually the cafe with those peasants who belong to convent lands: and very often, I have been informed, befides having easy rents, they alfo find affectionate friends and protectors in their masters, who vifit them in fickness, comfort them in all diftreffes, and are of service to their families in various fhapes.

I have been speaking hitherto of the peafantry belonging to convents; but I believe I might extend the remark to the tenants of ecclefiaftics in general, though they are often reprefented as more proud and oppreffive mafters than any clafs of men whatever; an afperfion which may have gained credit the more eafily on this account, that inftances of cruelty and oppreffion in

eccle

ecclefiaftics ftrike more, and raise a greater indignation, than the fame degree of wickedness in other men; they raise a greater indignation, because they are more unbecoming of clergymen, and they strike more when they do happen, because they happen feldomer. The ambition of Popes fome centuries ago, when the Court of Rome was in its zenith, the unlimited influence and power which particular Churchmen acquired in England and France, had thofe effects upon their actions and characters, which ambition and power usually have on the characters of men; it rendered them infolent, unfeeling, and perfecuting: yet, for every cruel and tyrannical Pope that history has recorded, it will be easy to name two or three Roman Emperors who have furpaffed them in every species of wickedness; and England and France have had Prime Minifters with all the vices, without the abilities, of Wolfey and Richelieu.

Thofe