-which are the only sure preservatives from Parliamentary servility, or the encroachments of a monarch or a ministry. Very possibly, their designs were not less factious, nor their motives more pure or patriotic than those which prevail now but they knew the art of statesmanship, whatever they intended to practise, and would have scorned to assail the Whig Government of that day by little feats of dexterity, and the mere tactics of Parliamentary discipline. The task of the Jacobite opposition of the last century, was to unfurl before the nation, and plant in public view the standard of Constitutional and Political integrity, and to them we owe some of the noblest and purest elucidations of those principles on which our nation in former days grew great. To the Conservative opposition of our time the country is indebted for the deepest blow they have received. If our age could boast of those nervous writers who adorned the early period of the last, we could imagine how, in a second "Vision of Camilick," the nation might be shewn the portrait of a minister, at whose entrance into a Reformed House of Commons, the representatives of the people should rise with one accord, and with all deference and humility pray of him to continue to misgovern them, and for his reward should lay down their principles, their easy consciences, and their broken pledges at his feet.

Whatever our political predilections may be, it is not in the spirit of party that we say all this. Our desire is that our public men should breathe a pure atmosphere. There are evils, but there are at the same time advantages of no little importance, in the fact of the two great parties in the state being arrayed against each other. Without party, to a greater or less degree, no body of men can act with usefulness or effect; and while faction is to be denounced, party politics—that is, the development of general principles of government by men who hold them in common, while they differ in details-is among the sureties and safeguards of liberty. But unless there is truth and sincerity in a party, it necessarily becomes a curse. Sir Robert Peel had only two courses which, as an honest politician, he was entitled to follow. He might either have held by the old Tory creed, and met manfully the pressure of the onward tide of popular opinion, or he might fairly have avowed the real sentiments he holds, and given the country not only the benefit of the measures to which they naturally lead, but also enabled those who concur with him in principle, to unite with him against his real antagonists. In the one case he would have remained excluded with untarnished reputation-in the other, he might have ruled with great renown. In the paltry path he has selected-his hand pointing one way, and his footsteps turned the other-despising the faith of his followers,

and afraid to tell his own-with his balanced periods, and equalizing orations-playing off the liberality of one debate against the ultra-monopolism of the next-his stage whispers, and muttered asides, always qualifying his open address-he has reaped nothing but the contempt and dislike of all parties, and will remain in our history as an instructive example of a man who missed a golden chance becoming great, because he had not the courage to prefer manliness and honesty to specious manoeuvering. But although his reputation as a statesman is conclusively fixed, his influence is still powerful, and his example most pernicious; and therefore we are truly glad to see a spirit of disgust arising in his own ranks. We hail Mr. D'Israeli's work, not as the production of a statesman, or a wise man, but as an indication that the bow has been too tightly stretched, and that the rebound is at hand.

Mr. D'Israeli's remedies for the evils he describes, are characteristic enough. He wants to abolish Parliaments; to restore feudalism; to make the Crown supreme, but paternal; the Church independent and infallible; and the people loyal and free;-by restoring, in short, the regime of the most unenlightened and tyrannical ages, he hopes for the prosperity and liberty of our own. This extravagance might be worth notice, if Young England were about to become our rulers; but as at present all the benefit we expect from them, is to inspire into the ranks of the dominant party something of the honesty and generosity of boyhood, we may reasonably trust, that as Young England grows older, it may also grow more rational.

These political visions have led us away from Mr. D'Israeli's literary merits; and we hardly think that his present work possesses sufficient excellence to recall us to a more particular examination of it. In fact, independently of the excitement which is produced by its reference to real persons and events, it is a rather dull performance. We had marked, for extract and observation, a singular theory of the author's, which has more foundation in his personal pride in his Hebrew descent, than in any historical or physiological truth. Mr. D'Israeli thinks that the Hebrew mind governs the world :-that every great man or woman is in nine cases out of ten a Jew-and he details a variety of eminent personages, in war, science, and singing, all of whom were of Jewish extraction. We have not space to enter into this fantastic speculation; we shall only observe, that there is one announcement which struck us, and probably will strike most of his readers with great surprise. In speaking of the Spanish Jews, he not only recounts as an historical fact, but descants with enthusiastic praise, on the circumstance that these professors of the ancient faith, while they outwardly conformed to Christianity, still re

tained their own creed, so that the highest situations of the Church were filled by parties who in reality were Jews in disguise. It irresistibly occurs to us to ask, if this is, in any other land than Spain, one of the characteristics of that Hebrew mind which we are told governs the world-or one of the secrets of that government?

But we must conclude. We close the book thinking much more of the author's subject, than of himself-revolving bitter fancies of the fate of this great people—and wondering to what destiny, in the hand of an all-wise Providence, the bewildering complication of impulses which spring up on every side, are bearing us on our dark and unpiloted voyage.

INDEX.

INDEX

TO THE

FIRST VOLUME OF THE NORTH BRITISH REVIEW.