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the anniversary returns, commemorative of past deeds of glory, nor the history of former national greatness, will be sufficient to retain that genuine patriotic feeling and puissant spirit, which is possessed by a free and enlightened people, under the conscious mental dignity of accumulated physical strength and moral energy, produced by successive ages of honourable renown and useful learning, unless, in their habits of opinion and action, they are taught to cherish and retain an unbroken link of connexion with the chain of past events, and a becoming veneration for the source from whence they were derived. The lines of Horace * are beautifully illustrative of the correctness of these positions; and although written two thousand years ago, are singularly applicable to the circumstances of the times in which we live. The following poetic interpretation may not be deemed inadmissable

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POPULAR SOVEREIGNTY, OR GOVERNMENT, AND THE THEORY OF THE BRITISH CONSTITUTION.

"Every sovereignty is subject to a higher sovereignty."-SENECA.

THE assumption of the abstract maxim, that "all power originates with the people," has of late contributed more to unhinge the whole framework of existing society, in states and kingdoms, than any one principle which has been promulgated, either in ancient or modern times. Although the body politic, which is more expressively denominated “ the people," in every state, constitutes the physical power by which the moral ends of all government are to be sustained in a prima facie sense; yet the moral agency of man, as a being strictly accountable to a higher source for the exercise of all the duties of social life, renders it incompatible with reason, that he should possess the distinct faculty or privilege of originating, independently, any code or system of restriction for the control of his fellow-man, of equal pretensions with himself in a state of nature. Man, therefore, cannot equitably govern his fellow-man in the absence of an authority, which authority must be ample, free, and comprehensive, and independent of all other control, without which there would be no foundation for impartial civil justice, in punishing the bad or sustaining the good. A moment's reflection must satisfy

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any man, who does not presume to dispute the existence of Omnipotence, that this necessary authority can only emanate from God himself, who formed man, not for the purposes of rebellion, but obedience! Thus the doctrine of supreme power arising spontaneously from the people, can only be viewed abstractedly. The early writings of Locke, who, although a great logician, was, in matters of civil government, (as his utopian scheme for Carolina, which proved a complete failure, abundantly establishes,) a mere theorist, at first, favoured the propagation of this hypothetical position. When Locke had, from experience, an opportunity for coming to a rational conclusion on the impracticability of establishing with any safety a system for human regulation, on this view of popular power, unless abstractedly considered, he was sufficiently convinced of his error, and that every theory for human legislation, not based on the "authority of the Holy Scriptures of Truth," was inapplicable to the purposes of social security. Then it was that he wrote that memorable preface to his "Common-place Book," in itself a splendid apology for his previous erroneous impressions, and a masterpiece of refined reasoning, wherein he asserts and defends that " inexhaustible treasure, which the divine wisdom and bounty has adapted to all the purposes of a holy life, directing us to a cure for every disease of the soul, considered both in a moral and theological sense;" but he had committed himself; and the attractive and evil tendency of his preconceived notions was not to be entirely obviated; he could not recall them. Paley, in his "Moral Philosophy," followed nearly in the wake of Locke, with extended sails, although in some parts of his premises he controverts or endeavours to overturn the original opinions or theory of the latter, presenting therein. a fair illustration of the incomprehensible quality of the human mind, even on subjects where an identity of object and

purpose existed between them! So much for regulating the feelings and controling the passions of mankind, en masse, without the constraining power of a superior principle. "The souls of men," says the learned Doctor Parr, "with which the statesman has to deal, are living spirits; he who moves them inconsiderately, raises a momentum which he cannot wield; for it is no easy task to control the awakened desires, nor restrain the inflamed propensities of millions of human beings, let loose from the bonds of responsibility." Had Locke limited himself, under the influence of his latter prin ciples, to the illustration of language and its powers, as the grand auxiliary of the human understanding, which was his forte, and theology his favourite theme, he would have shone pre-eminent indeed amongst the brighter literary stars of his favoured country; but his first premised views of civil rule, by the partial neglect or perversion of first causes, in favour of doctrines purely popular in their spirit, if not rigidly so in their letter, do not entitle his genius on this head to claim the palm of happiness, so emphatically described by Virgil. Paley was a liberal moralist, but by no means a deep reasoner; and as a logician, his writings cannot be fairly placed in the balance with those of his more fortunate rival. The error of Paley is decisive. His theory of the British Constitution is adapted to court the passions, rather than restrain the reason—to please the growing spirit of the times in which he lived and wrote. This is the proximate cause why his views cannot be received by rational men, who do not admit the British Constitution to be built upon expediency, but, in contradistinction, that it was the result of necessity,-to put an end to idolatry in the first place, and despotism in the second; and as a system capable of affording due protection to the governing and the governed; not being the result of accident, but having its precedent in that divine law which is the authority and foundation of all

government: being also duly sustained in moral reasoning by a comparison with ancient heathen systems, the defects of which are provided for, under a combination of powers, each acting as a counterpoise to the other, when duly regulated: by the monarchical power in the state being based on a sacred covenant, which holds the King as Chief Trustee, responsible to God, as well as to the State, for his actions; which covenant not only secures to the people their religious rites and solemn ceremonies inviolate, but their civil liberties, under a security of guarantee not to be obtained in any other system of purely human construction. Thus the cause of Paley's failure is manifest. Writing of him, in the spirit of Christian charity, he was a well-intentioned man, and in his endeavours to sail between the two extremes, shipwrecked his object, as did the hero of antiquity his life, in the dangerous strait of the Hellespont! This comes of human wisdom, when arrayed against the attributes of the Most High-" that great First Cause least understood." Hence, as Doctor Silver1 has judiciously maintained, "his book on the origin of society and of the British Constitution is full of historical errors ;" and, it is to be hoped, contrary to his intentions, "has proved itself highly injurious to the cause of society, to the interests of the established Protestant Church, to the British Constitution, and in some degree to Christianity itself," and which may fairly be inferred, from the abstract conclusions which many unreflecting persons have drawn from its perusal, and who have not possessed the opportunity or the inclination to read deeply, and thus, by sound analogical reasoning, test the stability of his doctrine. The same learned author, in his notes and observations on Paley's theory of the Constitution, has further remarked-" Paley talks of the republican part of the Constitution as living in the

'Late Anglo-Saxon Professor in the University of Oxford.

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