nificance for fafety, we should have taken fome pains to have pointed out the numerous errors both in the facts and reasoning of the Rights of Man.' We could not think that such a work would have gained the flightest attention, and to laugh at the author for his folly feemed only neceffary in our account of his crude attempt. It has happened otherwife; and this event has contributed to how that, when malevolence and difappointment join in a defign, no tool is fo mean and despicable but they will condefcend to employ it. We shall therefore be a little more pointed in our examination of this fecond part, though the abfurdity is too glaring to keep us at all times ferious.

The preface might afford us fome fubject of remark, if nonfenfe could be either true or falfe. Paine triumphs in the number of copies fold of the first part, and estimates its merit by the fuppofed inferior fale of an anfwer. If, however, he takes into the account the number circulated at a general expence, for purposes too bafe to mention; thofe, which the acclamations of a party have contributed to fell, and those which have been purchased by furreptitious recommendations, he will find that the merit derived from this fource will fink very low. The introduction contains only a few flowers of this author's peculiar rhetoric, and we particularly learn, that fear makes people afraid.

The first great object is to fhow what may be imputed to government, and what to civilization. In this enquiry, a common author would have ftated what government is; but it is not written in the roll of the book, and therefore, by his own reafoning, in the invaluable first part, there can be no fuch thing, But we have much about government-The old government was an affumption of power for the aggrandifement of itself;" the new 'a delegation of power for the benefit of the whole'Government must be a thing in full maturity; but it is 'fometimes a thorn in the flesh, that produces a fermentation which endeavours to discharge it.' In fhort, it feems every thing, and any thing; and this is exceedingly convenient, for the reafoning about it must be confequently dark and mysterious. It may either have a head or not, as fuits the circumftances; and, when we attempt to feize it, like Ixion, we find that we only grasp a cloud,

Great part of that order which reigns among mankind is not the effect of government. It has its origin in the principles of fociety and the natural conftitution of man. It exifted prior to government, and would exift if the formality of government was abolilied. The mutual dependence and reciprocal interest which man has upon man, and all the parts of a civilized community upon

each

each other, create that great chain of connection which holds it together. The landholder, the farmer, the manufacturer, the merchant, the tradefman, and every occupation, profpers by the aid which each receives from the other, and from the whole.' Common intereft regulates their concerns, and forms their law; and the laws which common ufage ordains, have a greater influence than the laws of government. In fine, fociety performs for itself almost every thing which is ascribed to government.

To understand the nature and quantity of government proper for man, it is neceffary to attend to his character. As nature created him for focial life, fhe fitted him for the station fhe intended. In all cafes fhe made his natural wants greater than his individual powers. No one man is capable, without the aid of fociety, of fupplying his own wants; and thofe wants, acting upon every individual, impel the whole of them into fociety, as naturally as gravitation acts to a center.

But she has gone further. She has not only forced man into fociety, by a diverfity of wants, which the reciprocal aid of each other can fupply, but she has implanted in him a system of social affections, which, though not necessary to his existence, are effential to his happiness. There is no period in life when this love for fociety ceases to act. It begins and ends with our being.

If we examine, with attention, into the compofition and con-ftitution of man, the diverfity of his wants, and the diversity of talents in different men for reciprocally accommodating the wants of each other, his propenfity to fociety, and confequently to preferve the advantages refulting from it, we fhall eafily discover, that a great part of what is called government is mere impofi

tion.

Government is no farther neceffary than to fupply the few cafes to which fociety and civilization are not conveniently competent; and inftances are not wanting to fhew, that every thing which government can ufefully add thereto, has been performed by the common confent of fociety, without government.'

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This is a little fpecimen of the jargon that blazed fo gloriouly in Common Senfe,' and the first part of the Rights of Man.' It is needlefs to examine the reasoning minutely, for it will be obvious that the author confounds the effects of continued focial intercourfe, regulated by government, with the influence of the focial tendency alone. He quotes the example of America; and we need only refer him to the back woodfmen, where the influence of government has not reached: the present state of the other colonies is not an inftance to the purpofe. The principles of focial intercourfe were well underitood by the first colonifts; they had been formed under regu lated governments, and continued, for ages, in the fame train.

When

When he produces fimilar effects from the focial intercourfe of nations that were never regulated by a government, we shall ceafe to think his reasoning abfurd, and his defigns pernicious.

The fubfequent part of the reafoning is of a fimilar kind. Society is confidered, contrary to the experience of every age, as previous to government, merely to prove that the latter is useless. If we obferve, he fays, what the principles are which condenfe men into fociety, and what the motives which regulate their mutual intercourfe afterwards, we fhall find, by the time we arrive at what is called government, that nearly the whole of the business is performed by the natural operation of the parts upon each other. Thus government being found ufelefs, it is afterwards proved to be pernicious; and, at last, it is pronounced to be the generating caufe' of the riots and tumults that, at different times, happened in England. Was govern ment the generating, that is, if words have a meaning, the active caufe of the late riots at Birmingham? Was it the active caufe of the riots in 1780? Did it rouze Jack Cade and the levellers of former ages, the renowned predeceffors of the French levellers and their humble imitators in England? Certainly, in one fense it did fo; for if there was no government there would be no oppofition, and the king in the fame view is the generating caufe of Paine's pamphlet. Such is the reafoning that is to make converts of the whole kingdom!

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The fecond chapter is on the origin of old and new governments. The origin of the old is fhortly difcuffed. While the chief employment of men was that of attending flocks and herds, a banditti of ruffians overrun the country, and the principal robber became the monarch.' We might look back to history, and find every word of this account inconfiftent with its records. But, if almost all were fhepherds, who were the robbers? the reft certainly.-But then, how did the few conquer the greater number? The fhepherds of antiquity were warriors. It is too fevere to call on him for proofs, who is not aware even of the extent of his own principles.

The particular properties and advantages of the old and new governments are next difcuffed; and we find that the new fyftem is, in reality, the oldeft, because most confiftent with the natural rights of man. Allowing the principle, it is as easy to prove that the Georgium Sidus was known to Pythagoras, becaufe it really exifted; in other words, what is right and true must have been discovered in the earliest stage of existence. Hereditary governments, he tells us, are injurious, because they are impofitions, and inadequate to the purposes for which government is neceflary.

With refpect to the first of the fe headIt cannot be proved

by

by what right hereditary government could begin neither does there exist within the compafs of mortal power, a right to efta blish it. Man has no authority over pofterity in matters of perfonal right; and therefore, no man, or body of men, had, or can have, a right to fet up hereditary government. Were even our felves to come again into existence, instead of being fucceeded by pofter rity, we have not now the right of taking from ourselves the rights which would then be ours. On what ground, then, do we pretend to take them from others?

All hereditary government is in its nature tyranny. An he ritable crown, or an heritable throne, or by what other fanciful name fuch things may be called, have no other fignificant explanation than that mankind are heritable property. To inherit a government, is to inherit the people, as if they were flocks and heids.

With refpect to the fecond head, that of being inadequate to the purposes for which government is neceffary, we have only to confider what government effentially is, and compare it with the circumstances to which hereditary fucceffion is fubject.

• Government ought to be a thing always in full maturity. ought to be fo conitructed as to be fuperior to all the accidents to which individual man is fubject; and therefore, hereditary fucceffion, by being fubject to them all, is the most irregular and im perfect of all the fyftems of government.'

We were unwilling to deprive our readers of this precious morfel of reasoning, and fhall leave it to their own reflections. A cool reafoner would have concluded that hereditary monarchies were preferable, on the very principle adduced, that of not being fubject to accidents. Our reformers, however, do nothing in the common way: they are too eager to be cool. The initances are chofen with equal fkill. . Poland, as an elective monarchy, has had fewer foreign wars: but is the nation. more profperous, or the people happier? Paine laughs at he reditary monarchs, and compares them to hereditary authors; but is monarchy a fcience, and are not all men, on his own principle, equal? Thefe are, however, excelled by his fubfequent difcoveries: a republic is no particular form of go vernment: the government of Athens was the wonder of the ancient world; and America is the fame on an extended fcale. -Such is the trash that we are compelled to read and examine; but we must haften on a little more rapidly, for, to notice every abfurdity would fill our whole Number.

In the following chapter on conftitutions, we find Mr. Paine talking more reasonably. They are diftinct, he fays, from governments, and he states, properly, that the affumed powers of fome of the kings of England were repugnant to the confti

8

tution,

tution, while the Bill of Rights, &c. were refumptions which the people claimed and obtained. Government is certainly a fubordinate part of a conftitution; but, when he confiders the origin of the American government as the origin of all go vernments, and refers to it as an example, a copy of the first prototype, he wanders in his ufual abfurdity. The particu lar remarks on conftitutions, and the invectives against the English governments, we fhall pafs over with a smile of contempt: it remains by experience to be feen, whether the fcience of government is in its infancy, or whether the modern reformers are lunatics. By their fruits we must know them; but, if they are wife, Ariftotle, Locke, and Montefquieu have lived in vain. The comparison between the president of the United States of America and the British monarch is particu larly abfurd: the parallel would fcarcely hold between the former and the speaker of the house of commons.

The fifth chapter is entitled,' ways and means of improv ing the condition of Europe'-As our reformer has boafted of his political and fcientific commercial knowledge, we were particularly attentive to these remarks. As ufual, we shall collect a few of the beauties.

The inhabitants of every country, under the civilization of laws, eafily civilize together, but governments being yet in an uncivilized state, and almoft continually at war, they pervert the abundance which civilized life produces to carry on the uncivilized part to a greater extent. By thus engrafting the barbarism of government upon the internal civilization of a country, it draws from the latter, and more especially from the poor, a great portion of those carnings, which fhould be applied to their own fubfiftence and comfort.-Apart from all reflections of morality and philofophy, it is a melancholy fact, that more than one-fourth of the labour of mankind is annually confumed by this barbarous fyftem.

• What has ferved to continue this evil, is the pecuniary advantage, which all the governments of Europe have found in keeping up this ftate of uncivilization. It affords to them pretences for power, and revenue, for which there would be neither occafion nor apology, if the circle of civilization were rendered compleat. Civil government alone, or the government of laws, is not productive of pretences for many taxes; it operates at home, directly under the eye of the country, and precludes the poffibility of much impofition. But when the fcene is laid in the uncivilized contention of governments, the field of pretences is enlarged, and the country, being no longer a judge, is open to every im pofition, which governments please to act.’

A plain reafoner would have afked, what government was. Suppoling