While he was at Caftlegandolfe, on giving a fplendid repaft to fome grandees of Spain, he laid afide his fovereign authority, and joined them in a friendly manner when feated at table, without fuffering them to rife to falute him.

The public imagined he had loft fight of the grand objects of the Jefuits, whilft, according to the cuftom of the court of Rome, he only aimed at gaining time. He at times fearched the archives of the Propaganda, to confult the Memoirs of Cardinal de Tournon, of M. Maigrot, of La Beaume, and of the Jefuit Miffionaries. At other times he had read to him the accufations of the fociety, and their vindications. Every important work, pro or can, with respect to the jefuits, he attentively examined; whilft equally mistrusting the eulogiums, and the farcafms paffed upon them, he was biaffed neither by their panegyrifts nor their fatyrifts. No man was ever more impartial. Equally abftracting himself from his own inclination, as well as all prejudices, he judged in the fame manner upon the occafion as pofterity neceffarily must.

"Let me (faid he to the fovereigns who preffed him to determine) have leifure to examine the important affair upon which I am to pronounce. I am the common father of the faithful, particularly

thofe of the clergy; and I cannot deitroy a celebrated order, without fufficient reafon to justify me in the eyes of all ages, and above all, before God."

The people, ever idolizing him, ceafed not to blefs his reign; and their perfeverance in doing fo con ftitutes his greateft eulogium. It is well known that the Romans eafily change from enthusiasm to hatred; that they have often calumniated thofe pontiffs whom they had the moft flattered; and that a pope to please them should not reign above three years. Unfortunately, on account of their laziness, they conftantly hope that a change of mafters must be attended with an increafe of happiness; juft as fick men are apt to fancy that they will be much easier when they are placed in another posture.

The glory of Clement would not have been complete, if he had not contributed to the embellishment of Rome, a city fo fufceptible of ornaments, fo fruitful in riches proper to decorate it; but unwilling to purfue the path of Sixtus V. Paul V. or Benedict XIV. he compofed a mufeum, comprizing every thing that could gratify the curiofity of antiquaries and travellers; that is to fay, the fearceft curiofities that had been tranfmitted by the ancients.

It might be faid, on this occafion, that Rome, jealous of honouring this pontificate, was eager to difplay the mafter-pieces which lay concealed within her bowels. Scarce a year paffed without vafes, urns, ftatues of exquifite workmanfhip, being dug up, to enrich the fuperb collection begun under Lambertini. Here with the caft of an eye, we may fee the triumph of the Chriftian religion, by the frag

ments

ments that ferved in the pagan facrifices, and the ruins of all thofe prophane divinities, the ftatues of which are no longer held in estimation, but in proportion to the mafterfhip with which they are executed. When Clement could relax from the variety of bufinefs in which he was engaged, he visited thefe monuments with foreigners of diftinction, and celebrated artists, rather as a fovereign who confiders it as a duty to embellish his capital, than as an amateur, who gratifies his taste. This he faid to the Chevalier Chatelus, a worthy branch of the immortal d' Agueffeau, as well on account of his wit as his extenfive knowledge. After converfing with him upon different fubjects, he concluded, that being born in a village, and brought up in a cloyster, where the love of arts was not infpired, he could not acquire the neceffary judgment to determine as a connoiffeur, upon the monuments he collected; but that, as a fovereign, he thought himself obliged to difplay the finest models to artists and the curious, in order that they might know and imitate them."

If he did not always reward the learned, as they might think they had a right to expect from fo enlightened a pope, circumftances fhould be adverted to. The multiplicity of bufinefs in which he was engaged, joined to the fhortness of his reign, did not afford him leifure to engage in thofe purfuits which would have given him the greatest pleafure. Moreover, a pope cannot always act agreeably to his own inclinations. There are incidents that tie his hands. Nevertheless, he was always found attentive to beftow bishopricks only upon thofe he knew to be men of learning;

and to this reafon may be afcribed his fo frequently promoting priests of his own order.

A pope is generally very circumfpect in the nomination of a bishop. He knows that the proper regulation of a diocefe requires judgment and abilities; for which reafon the Italian bishops are ufually as meek as they are learned, and as charitable as they are zealous. They are conftant refidents, and they live in friendship and cordiality with their curates; for they must not be confounded with thofe monsignori, known in Rome under the titles of prelates, and who frequently, not being in orders, fill fuch pofts as laymen might occupy, and ferve the pope in his various functions.

Clement was not lefs attentive in the nomination of his nuncios: he was defirous that his ambaffadors fhould do him honour, as well by their manners as by their learning, and particularly by their love of peace; and, if he appointed M. Doria his nuncio to the court of France, notwithstanding his youth, it was because he was convinced that his extraordinary virtues had outstripped his years, and that his merit already correfponded with the celebrity of his name. It was not till after the confequence this prelate had gained in Spain (where he was the bearer of the confecrated child - bed linen) that Clement named him nuncio in France. He fent him there as an angel of peace, fit to maintain the harmony between the father and the eldest son of the church.

Religion has often fuffered by an indifcreet zeal; and in order to prevent it for the future, as far as poffible, Clement, whofe prudence ever dictated all his fteps and refolves, obferved a gofpel tolera

tion, as did the divine legiflator with regard to the Sadduceans and the Samaritans. He ufed to fay, *We too often lay afide charity to maintain faith, without reflecting, that, if it is not allowed to tolerate error, it is forbidden to hate and perfecute thofe who have unfortunately embraced it."

To the above rather too general a character, it may not be amifs to add the following particulars. His death was immediately attributed to poifon, as if an old man of feventy, loaded with infirmities and diforders, could not quit the world without violence. His proceedings against the jefuits furnish ed, in the minds of fome people, a plaufible colour for this charge, and the malevolence of their enemies embellished it with circumAtances. It feems even as if the minifters of those powers who had procured their diffolution did not think it beneath them to countenance the report, as if falfehood was neceffary to prevent the revival of a body which had already funk, in its full ftrength, a mighty facrifice to their combined relent

ment.

The charge was the more ridiculous, as the Pontiff had for a long time laboured under a painful diforder, which originally proceeded from a fuppreffion of urine, to which he was fubject; yet the report was propagated with the greatest industry; and, though the French and Spanish minifters were prefent at the opening of his body, the most horrible circumftances were published relative to that operation. Nay, it was confidently affirmed, that the hair dropped off from the hand, the head fell off from the body, and that the stench 6

poifoned and killed the operators. It availed but little that the operators fhewed them felves alive and in good health, and that the furgeons and phyficians proved the falihood of every part of the report.

Striking Picture of Charles V. during bis Retirement in the Monaftery of St. Juft, where he ended his Days. From Travels through Spain, by Richard Twifs, Efq; F.R. S.

A

SI have mentioned Charles V. I fhall add a short quotation from the Abbé de la Porte: he fays, he was in 1755 in the monaftery of St. Juft, which is fituated between the cities of Talavera la Reyna and Placentia: and that one of the monks fhewed him the place where the emperor had lodged. "There, faid he fneeringly, there is the melancholy folitude where that monarch, become imbecile and devout, paffed his days in winding up clocks, in teazing the friars, in giving himself the difcipline, in daubing the walls of his cell with fcraps on predeftination and grace, in stunning himfelf with reflecting on the abandonment of all his crowns, and in repenting. There he performed the farce of his own burial, put himself in a coffin, fung for himself the de profundis, and fhewed all the follies of a diftempered brain. One day when he went in his turn to wake the novices, at the hours of mattins, one of them, whom he shook too violently, becaufe he ftill flept, faid to him, Haft thou not troubled the repofe of the world long enough, without coming to disturb that of peaceable men who have forfaken it ?”

Political

Political Characters, by Mr. Edmund Burke, in his Speech on American Taxation, in the House of Commons, April 19, 1774.

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GEORGE GRENVILLE.

Perfon to whom on other accounts (Mr. Burke excepts his new colony fyftem) this country owes very great obligations. I do believe, that he had a very ferious defire to benefit the public. But, with no fmall ftudy of the detail, he did not feem to have his view, at least equally, carried to the total circuit of our affairs. He generally confidered his objects in lights that were rather too detached. Whether the bufinefs of an American revenue was impofed upon him altogether; whether it was entirely the refult of his own Speculation; or, what is more probable, that his own ideas rather coincided with the inftructions he had received; certain it is, that, with the best intentions in the world, he first brought this fatal scheme into form, and established it by act of parliament.

No man can believe, that at this time of day I mean to lean on the venerable memory of a great man, whofe lofs we deplore in common. Our little party differences have been long ago compofed; and I have acted more with him, and certainly with more pleasure with him, than ever I acted against him. Undoubtedly Mr. Grenville was a first-rate figure in this country. With a masculine understanding, and a flout and refolute heart, he had an application undiffipated and unwearied. He took public bufinefs, not as a duty which he was to fulfil, but as a pleasure he was to

enjoy; and he feemed to have no delight out of this house, except in fuch things as fome way related to the business that was to be done within it. If he was ambitious, I will fay this for him, his ambition was of a noble and generous ftrain. It was to raife himself, not by the low pimping politics of a court, but to win his way to power, thro' the laborious gradations of public fervice; and to fecure to himself a well-earned rank in parliament, by a thorough knowledge of its conflitution, and a perfect practice in all its business.

Sir, if fuch a man fell into errors, it must be from defects not intrinsical; they must be rather fought in the particular habits of his life; which, though they do not alter the ground-work of character, yet tinge it with their own hue. He was bred in a profeffion. He was bred to the law, which is, in my opinion, one of the first and nobleft of human fciences: a fcience which does more to quicken and invigorate the understanding, than all the other kinds of learning put together; but it is not apt, except in perfons very happily born, to open and to liberalize the mind exactly in the fame proportion, Paffing from that study, he did not go very largely into the world; but plunged into bufinefs; I mean into the bufinefs of office; and the limited and fixed methods and forms eftablished there. Much knowledge is to be had undoubtedly in that line; and there is no knowledge which is not valuable. But it may truly be faid, that men too much converfant in office are rarely minds of remarkable enlargement. Their habits of office are apt to give them a turn to think

the

the fubftance of bufinefs not to be much more important than the forms in which it is conducted. Thefe forms are adapted to ordinary occafions; and therefore perfons who are nurtured in office do admirably well, as long as things go on in their common order; but when the high roads are broken up, and the waters out, when a new and troubled fcene is opened, and the file affords no precedent, then it is that a greater knowledge of mankind, and a far more extenfive comprehenfion of things, is requifite than ever office gave, or than office can ever give. Mr. Grenville thought better of the wisdom and power of human legislation than in truth it deferves. He conceived, and many conceived along with him, that the flourishing trade of this country was greatly owing to law and inftitution, and not quite fo much to liberty; for but too many are apt to believe regulation to be commerce, and taxes to be revenue. Among regulations, that which ftood first in reputation was his idol. I mean the act of navigation. He has often profeffed it to be fo. The policy of that act is, I readily admit, in many respects well understood. But I do fay, that, if the act be fuffered to run the full length of its principle, and is not changed and modified according to the change of times and the fluctuation of circumstances, it must do great mifchief, and frequently even defeat its own purpose.

After the war, and in the last year of it, the trade of America had increafed far beyond the fpeculations of the moft fanguine imagination. It fwelled out on every fide. It filled all its proper channels to the brim. It overflowed

with a rich redundance, and, breaking its banks on the right and on the left, it fpread out upon fome places, where it was indeed improper, upon others where it was only irregular. It is the nature of all greatness not to be exact; and great trade will always be attended with confiderable abuses. The contraband will always keep pace in fome measure with the fair trade. It should stand as a fundamental maxim, that no vulgar precaution ought to be employed in the cure of evils, which are closely connected with the caufe of our profperity. Perhaps this great perfon turned his eyes fomewhat lefs than was just towards the incredible increase of the fair trade; and looked with fomething of too exquifite a jealousy towards the contraband. He certainly felt a fingular degree of anxiety on the fubject; and even began to act from that paffion earlier than is commonly imagined. For whil he was firft lord of the admiralty, though not strictly called upon ia his official line, he prefented a very ftrong memorial to the lords of the treasury (my lord Bute was then at the head of the board) heavily complaining of the growth of the illicit commerce in America. Some mifchief happened even at that time from this over-earneft zeal. Much greater happened afterwards when it operated with greater power in the highest department of the finances. The bonds of the act of navigation were ftraitened fo much, that America was on the point of having no trade, either contraband or legitimate. They found, under the conftruction and execution then ufed, the act no longer tying but actually ftrangling them. All this coming with new enumerations