may be excused for not foreseeing that Toleration, which had been introduced by Cromwell and was now abrogated by Clarendon, would speedily establish itself in England, either by law or by revolution; but they ought to have been aware that the Nonconformists of Scotland were actuated by a fiercer spirit, that they formed a much larger proportion of the people, and that the ruin of Charles I. had arisen from his attempts to subdue that attachment to the Calvinistic worship and discipline which had prevailed among them since the Reformation. The mere letter of the law was far from the most important circumstance attending it. The great evil of such laws is, that they give an incentive and a sanction to the cruelty with which a favoured faction carries them into execution. When the Presbyterians forsook the churches in great multitudes, and as in such circumstances might be expected, with frequent tumult, the soldiery were employed to enforce the laws. The atrocities of the army produced a revolt, which was quelled at Pentland Hills in 1666. The oppression which these people had suffered, the delusions under which they laboured, and their in"offensive behaviour during the insurrection, made them the • objects of compassion. Yet were the King's ministers, particularly Archbishop Sharpe, resolute to take severe venge ance. After this, a scheme of moderation was, for a short time, tried without effect. There was in the political body a 'disease very dangerous and inveterate; and the Government had tried every remedy but the true one to allay and correct ⚫ it. An unlimited toleration, after sects have diffused themselves and are strongly rooted, is the only expedient which can allay their fervour, and make the civil union acquire a superiority over religious distinctions. But, as the operations of this regimen are commonly very gradual, and at first imperceptible, vulgar politicians are apt, for that reason, to have recourse to more hasty and more dangerous remedies.' ‡ 6 6 Agreeably to the wretched policy thus described by the philosophical historian, the Parliament of Scotland, in 1669, 1670, and 1672, passed new and more rigorous laws against the unhappy Presbyterians; couched, indeed, in moderate language, and seemingly excused by the late disorders, but calculated to prolong and aggravate them, by inflaming the passions, as well as enlarging the powers, of the ruling faction. It is more important to observe their general spirit and tendency, than even those monstrous provisions on which historians have already animadverted with deserved severity. These laws, aided by still more tyrannical regulations of the Privy Council, and executed Id. Chap. iv. + Hume, Hist. Charles II. Chap. with unsparing rigour by an army kept up only against the people, and by the employment of the Highlanders, the most loyal, but the most lawless part of the nation, against the discontented Presbyterians, drove them once more into open insurrection. After the suppression of that revolt, some of them more ardent, more enthusiastic, and more indignant than the rest, were provoked into extravagant opinions and furious language, insulting to authority, repugnant to morality, and subversive of society. Assassination was practised and defended. These excesses, instead of being treated as the fatal fruits of a sanguinary administration, were greedily seized by tyrannical ministers as a pretext for multiplying and increasing those very severities which had caused the evil. The violence of Cargill and Cameron, who had excommunicated the King, and renounced all allegiance to the Government, the assassination of Sharpe, and the obstinate fanaticism of those who would not condemn it, were imputed to the whole body of the devoted Presbyterians. They were much insisted on,' says Mr Hume,' as an apology for the rigours of the Administration; but, if duly considered, they ⚫ will rather afford reason for a contrary inference. Such un• happy delusion is an object rather of commiseration than of anger; and it is almost impossible that men could have been ⚫ carried into such a degree of madness, unless provoked by a long train of violence and oppression. Such was, in short, the result of a deviation from the principles of toleration, of the just impatience of an oppressed people, of the resentment and fury of the Government, of the consequent inflammation of all the popular passions, and of the mad attempt to suppress them by new severities, that, in the course of eighteen years, without any settled plan of oppression, or perhaps any original purpose to oppress, the Presbyterians, who formed the most numerous, industrious, intelligent, and moral part of the Scottish nation, had reached that state in which, according to the calm judgment of an historian, very favourable to the House of Stuart, when speaking of their intention to emigrate, any condition seemed preferable to the living in their native country, which, by the prevalence of persecution and violence, was become • as insecure to them as a DEN OF ROBBERS.' + The instruction afforded by this part of history is not confined to religious fanaticism, nor to the reign of Charles II. It is applicable to the prevailing opinions and predominant passions of a people, whatever their source or their nature may be. * Hume, ul supra. Chap. vii. + Id. ibid. These quotations are from the second volume of the quarto edition of Mr Hume's History of the Stuarts, London, 1757. It illustrates the inevitable consequence of the first departure from liberal policy, and the ultimate result of measures which are designed to extinguish opinions by force and fear. The opinions and the enthusiasm of the nineteenth century are different from those of the seventeenth. But opinions, whatever they may be, cannot be altered by violence; and no species of enthusiasm can be subdued by cruelty. It should never be forgotten, that the misgovernment of Charles II., which had these dreadful results in Scotland, was such, that men not wanting in virtue might have been led into it by intolerant principles; that timidity, and the influence of connexion, with no more than the ordinary proportion of selfishness, might have kept some long engaged in it; and that a few, despairing of retreat, supported by the pride of consistency, incensed by new provocations from their opponents, and grown obstinately wedded to that power for which they had made shipwreck of conscience, might persist so long as to become at length real and execrable tyrants. It is certainly very unfortunate that the manuscript now published should end at the very time when the author's means of information became more ample. It would be in the highest degree desirable to possess the sequel of the Memoirs. The trial of the Earl of Argyll; the administration of the Duke of York in Scotland, which deeply affects the personal character of that prince; the real or supposed correspondence of the English patriots with the Scotch Presbyterians; the factions which divided the Scotch Government under James II.; the nature and motives of the opposition in Parliament to the repeal of the penal laws; the landing, defeat, and death of Argyll; the dismissal of Mackenzie from office, and his return, after too short an interval, and too little change of circumstances, to justify us in ascribing his conduct to consistent principles; are all curious, and some of them are not well understood parts of Scottish history. We have reason to be certain, that Mackenzie would not have been successful in justifying his own measures. His attempts, both in this volume and in his Vindication,' to justify the proceedings against Mitchell and the Earl of Argyll, sufficiently show the impossibility of the undertaking. In the first case, he does not even venture to deny, although he affects insensibility to the shameful but certain truth, that Mitchell had confessed his crime to the Privy Council on a promise of life; that when the confession was afterwards given in evidence against him, he urged the promise in his defence; that the Primate, the Chancellor, and two other Cabinet Ministers, then denied that promise on oath; that he offered to prove it by the books of Privy Council, which con 6 tained the promise; that they were refused; and that he was executed. The Earl of Argyll was convicted of high treason for an explanation of a test-oath taken by him, in which he used the following words, I declare that I do not mean to bind up myself, in my station, and in a lawful way, to wish and endeavour any alteration I think to the advantage of Church or State, not repugnant to the Protestant religion, or to my loyalty.' In a supplementary explanation he adds, after way, these almost unnecessary words, Disclaiming all unlawful endeavours; and he declares that, by my loyalty, I understand no other thing than the words plainly bear, to wit, the duty and allegiance of all loyal subjects. Will it be believed that Sir G. Mackenzie, ten years after the trial, attempts to cover the guilt of himself and his accomplices, by leaving out the essential words above printed in italics, and argues upon the explanation thus mutilated, that it was meant as a reservation of a right to enter into future rebellions! * A history of the revolution in Scotland, and an account of the character of the Jacobite hero Dundee, from the hand of a man of so great talent as Mackenzie, would probably be the most interesting part of the hitherto undiscovered manuscript. His genius, which, as we see in the case of Mitchell, is subdued by the recollection of his own misdeeds, might recover its energy in relating his courage in adversity, and his fidelity to an unfortunate Sovereign. Virtue and misfortune might have restored dignity to his mind. He was not by nature cruel, though ambition and subserviency made him the instrument of a cruel tyranny. In the very worst times we find some traces of moderation, and even kindness, in his conduct. Had we seen his account of the last stage of his life, when he acted as the brave and faithful adherent of a fallen party, we might close our acquaintance with more of those feelings which we should wish to entertain for a man whose name is the most brilliant, except that of Arbuthnot, + in the long and dark period of the literary history of Scotland, which extends from the age of Buchanan to the age of Hume. Howell's State Trials, VIII. 886-891. + Perhaps it is a needless caution to name Arbuthnot. The particulars of his life are little known; a circumstance which does more honour to his own modesty than to the feelings of his relations or to the gratitude of his country. But to his long residence in England he must have been indebted for that command over familiar language without which there can be no pleasantry. In this respect he is an English writer. ART. II. Abstract of the Information laid on the Table of the House of Commons, on the Subject of the Slave Trade, being a Report made by a Committee specially appointed for the purpose, to the Directors of the African Institution, on the 8th May 1821, and by them ordered to be printed, as a Supplement to the Annual Report of the present year. 8vo. pp. 180. London, Ellerton. 1821. THE THE French ship Le Rodeur, of two hundred tons burden, sailed from the port of Havre for the river Calabar on the coast of Africa, where she arrived after a prosperous voyage, and anchored at Bonny on the fourteenth of March. Her crew, of twenty-two men, had enjoyed perfect health; and this continued during her stay of three weeks, while she received on board one hundred and sixty negroes, with whom she set sail for Guadaloupe on the sixth of April. No traces of any epidemy had been perceived among the natives; the cargo (as it is called), no more than the crew, exhibited any symptoms of discase; and the first fortnight of the voyage to the West Indies promised a continuance of all the success which had seemed to attend the earlier stages of the expedition. The vessel had now approached the line, when a frightful malady broke out. At first the symptoms were slight, little more than a redness of the eyes; and this being confined to the negroes, was ascribed to the want of air in the hold, and the narrow space between the decks, into which so large a number of those unhappy beings were crowded; something, too, was imagined to arise from the scarcity of water, which had thus early begun to be felt, and pressed chiefly upon the slaves; for they were allowed only eight ounces, which was soon reduced to half a wine glass per day. By the surgeon's advice, therefore, they were suffered, for the first time, to breathe the purer air upon the deck, where they were brought in succession; but many of these poor creatures being affected with that mighty desire of returning to their native country, which is so strong as to form a disease, termed Nostalgia by the physicians, no sooner found they were at liberty, than they threw themselves into the sea, locked in each other's arms, in the vain hope, known to prevail among them, of thus being swiftly transported again to their homes. With the view of counteracting this propensity, the Captain ordered several who were stopt in the attempt, to be shot or hanged in the sight of their companions; but this terrible example was unavailing to deter them; and it became necessary, once more, to confine them entirely to the hold. |