THE

CHRISTIAN EXAMINER,

AND

Church of Ireland Magazine.

RETROSPECTIVE GLANCES.

We have arrived at the commencement of a new period. The hopes of some, the fears of others, the convictions of all, seem to recognise the dawn of a new era-to announce the origin of a novus ordo rerum. A new reign, a new ministry, a renovation promised or threatened of old forms and ordiDances-all this ushered in with a shaking of thrones, a falling of dynasties, an heaving and tossing of the popular mind that forebodes general and radical revolution; these are things that should make even the worldling pause in his career of business and of pleasure-should cause many an unquiet glance to fall upon the uncertain possessions of a world that so frequently change their masters, and should send the Christian to his knees to pray for others and for himself. It is not for us to say of what events the present agitations of Europe are the precursors, or what may be the birth of its present agonies and throes; but sure we are, that a part of the Redeemer's admonition to his Apostles cannot be amiss in its application, whether these are to be the harbingers of millenarian judgments, or to leave the world a longer period of sin and suffering; and the duty of vigilance and prayer seems to be more especially impressed on us, when we witness those convulsions from which alone the Almighty arm can rescue, or look to the coming storms he alone can avert. It is difficult, when we look abroad on Europe, not to fancy that its revolutions have been the retributive scourges of a vindictive justice. The whirlwind of war that scattered the legions of Prussia, and Austria, and Russia, was laden with the groans of partitioned and enslaved Poland; the grandsons of Lewis XIV. have paid and are paying for the persecutions of the truth, which so deeply dyed with gore the white flag of France; and America, and India, and the victims of priestly tyranny in Spain have called down the vengeance of God on the kingdoms of the Peninsula. Belgium, the scene and sharer in the abominations of Alva, is writhing under the effects of religious bigotry and revolutionary violence; while England, that had protested against some, and contended against others, and contentedly witnessed the remainder of these evils, has indeed withstood the fury of the storm, but not without feeling, to its very foundations, the political tempest. "Just and righteous art thou, O Lord of Hosts! and when thy judgments are abroad among the nations, man should learn wisdom;"--but man in his congregated capacity, seems to be unteachable. Ages roll on, bearing with them the collected experience of generations, and these are read, and examined, and wondered at, and forgotten, and man runs the same career of folly and of crime, of tyranny and of ambition, unterrified by the examples, unreclaimed by the lessons they contain.

VOL. XI.

A few retrospective glances at the period through which we have passed, may not be unsuitable to the station to which we have attained; and if there ever were a combination of incidents to render a conjuncture important, it is assuredly at the present. We are at that most awakening period which, notwithstanding all its familiarity, never loses its effect-the opening of a new year; we are at the commencement of a reign contrasted already with the foregoing, by being based on popularity, and giving a promise of more popular concessions, than any period in our history; and if we can judge by the circumstances that surround us, we are on the eve of a general revolution, which may either be accomplished with violence, uprooting every institution that has been consecrated by time and association, or made to assume the milder features of reform and renovation. We feel that such circumstances call upon us to reflect, and that however little we may be enabled to influence others, or to change the course of events, or to enforce attention upon nations, we have, at least, a duty to perform to ourselves; and, if we cannot read the future in the past, we may at least see there his arm, who moves both the past and the coming events, and may deduce thence instruction, lessons of dependence upon his strength who alone is strong, and devotedness to his service who alone is holy.

It is now nearly twenty years since our late sovereign succeeded to the sway of the British empire, at first as regent for his revered sovereign and parent, and after a few years as his successor. If we look externally at his reign, all seems fair and flourishing. The nation, when he came to govern its destinies, was involved in that contest for the liberties of Europe and the world which she had carried on so long. utterly alone, or with weak or treacherous allies. This contest he successfully terminated; his armies, from occupying a strip of sea-coast, hemmed in by the enemy and the ocean, advanced in a few years to the gates of his mighty enemy's metropolis, crossed the sacred frontier, and beat the foe on his own soil; shared in the triumphs of successful warfare, and when his foe rose again with renovated strength and never-dying animosity, smote him single-handed to the earth. He, too, since the termination of hostilities, was influential in maintaining that peace which for fifteen years has now been enjoyed by Europe; and under his sway, the arts and sciences, manufactures and commerce, have been extending and confirming their power. Ingenuity, has been taxed, and invention stimulated to devise new modes of exciting human cupidity, and gratifying languid luxury, while in the prosecution of more useful plans for promoting mutual intercourse, and adding to the comforts and conveniencies of life, England has maintained her proud pre-eminence. At the period of our late sovereign's death, she possessed in dominion a proportion of civilized human beings as large perhaps as ever fell to the lot of any nation, and by her power, her commerce, and her institutions, influenced the actions, and controlled the sentiments of, we might almost say, the civilized globe. Victory on her banners, commerce swelling her sails, wealth filling her exchequer, and the arts lending their assistance to adorn the firm structure, on whose front seemed to be engraven national prosperity. Such was the impression made by the situation and resources of our country during a large proportion of the reign of our late sovereign; but there was a higher source of exultation that beat high at every Briton's heart;if Europe was free, for freedom she was indebted to England; it was British wealth that supported, British means that encouraged, British feelings that invigorated for the contest. In the unconquerable spirit of their country, Englishmen traced with joy the arm that prostrated the mighty foe, the child, and champion, and victim of revolution: they even compromised for the hatred experienced from ungrateful allies, by receiv

!

ing it as a tribute paid though reluctantly to the acknowledged obligation.
Such is the aspect of the British empire, when viewed in one direction;
but it would seem, to consider it as we ought to do, other circumstances are
to be taken into account, and the very causes of this national and indi-
vidual exultation, the very sources of that proud pre-eminence, will be dis-
covered to partake of the deleterious property of all sublunary things, to be
converted into whips to scourge our follies and our vices. The war so just
and so necessary, which has been made the cause of national triumph and
internal pride, has left us victory and distress-victory that has diminished
little from human suffering, and advanced but little of human good, and
distress which the very habits of profusion and prodigality nurtured by the
war, render us less capable of bearing our commerce and our manufac-
tures which excite the jealousy, the rivalry, and the hostility of other
nations, less skilled in that knowledge of the general interests of man, by
which reciprocity insures prosperity, have induced that artificial system of
society, by which all the ills of congregated man are exaggerated, and the
real advantages of this world sacrificed to the doubtful superiority of wealth;
by which the interest of a nation is discussed as a merchant's account, and
nothing estimated but at its money value; by which national credit is
made dependant on the mercenary honesty of the commercial speculators,
and individuals are collected together and taught to know their strength, in
order that by alternate plenty and privation, they may this day revel in reck-
less profusion, and to-morrow offer violence to their masters, because that
profession is checked or diminished. We know the value of commercial
power, and that very much of the daring, adventurous, and unquenchable
spirit of England is owing to its influence: that it supplies the means and
the ability to use; that it prompts invention and stimulates to labour; that it
lends wings to intercourse, and supplies by the skill and enterprise of man
the wise frugality with which nature has bestowed her gifts; all this we
know, and that had it not been for her assistance, the limited resources,
and extent, and population of Britain, must have always kept her back
from the high and elevated situation of power and usefulness she has now
attained: but we cannot close our eyes to the evils connected with commerce,
and more especially when these evils have been aggravated, as in our case,
by circumstances and by time; fostered along with the system they gene-
rate, by the necessities of the country and the plans of its governors,
these evils pass from the system to its patrons, and displacing other and
more genial parts of the character, invest the whole national aspect with
the impression of gain. Such,
Such, to an observer of England, is the effect pro-
duced there, by its almost exclusive character: it is wealth that is the object
of exertion, and it is by wealth that the value of all existence is estimated;
and the whole nation seems to the attentive observer to be employed in ac-
quisition, to be worshippers of Mammon, while scarcely here and there a
single exhortation is heard, or a single sentiment uttered, having another
and better object. The natural results of this exclusive yet universal spirit
follow; that the very class most likely to be influenced by such a spirit,
and from which it should be especially the object of their rulers to preserve
them, have felt its influence and become its victims; that the acquisitions of
labour are now employed, not for the support of the family, but for the in-
dulgence either of solitary or domestic luxury, in extravagance and sensu-
ality, aping in profusion what they cannot imitate in expense, and leaving the
morrow to provide for itself. This spirit, too, is essentially a gambling spirit,
and therefore hostile to every thing like well-regulated industry and well-di-
rected exertion. The sudden acquisition of great gain, the great variation
of wages, the uncertainty of success, acting as a moral stimulant upon the

until

mind, keeps it in a constant state of anxious vibration, or sunk in the carelessness and indifference of indolence; hence the destruction of independent and manly feeling-hence the reliance upon the employer or the parish-hence the loss of much that was valuable in the national character of England, and the substitution of the profligate and improvident radical in place of the steady and substantial yeomen, and hence the constant dread of riot and insurrection in the manufacturing districts, and the lightest cloud that passes across our commercial horizon seems big with the distresses, and the complainings, and the ill conduct of our misguided populace. Such would seem to be some of the evils connected with the manufacturing spirit and its extension, which nurtured and supported by the difficulties of the country through the revolutionary war, is now too deeply impressed on the character of England to be got rid of, and must advance; so that steam engine is added to steam engine, and factory rises beside factory, and new collections of untaught or ill-taught men, and women, and children are formed, as so many nurseries of radicalism, infidelity, and beggary, to increase the anxiety of the rulers, to add to the weight of the pressure on the poor laws, and to accumulate a population useless, burthensome, and dissatisfied. Nor has the moral effect of our long and pertinacious war terminated here; the higher classes have all felt it, from the ennobled land proprietor to the scanty annuitant. The natural result of the war system was to raise the rents of the one, and the income of the other, while the high prices necessarily elevated the agricultural and manufacturing portions of the community, each above his rank and situation—the labourer became a farmer, the farmer a gentleman, the annuitant aped his superiors, and one system of ambitious rivalry extended itself over the empire. But when the exciting causes ceased, things returned to their original and natural channels; the demand diminished, or was partially supplied elsewhere; the sources of artificial opulence were dried up, while, unfortunately, the habits of expenditure and profusion were not easily relinquished, and the tastes and inclinations, acquired during twenty years, remained without remedy or supply. The land proprietors under their influence demanded war rents, which the land-holder could not pay, and hence the bond of cordiality and affection between the higher and lower classes was severed; the mechanic and operative required wages as high to support him, when a limited demand circumscribed his employer's power, as when England was the factory and the toyshop for the world, and repaid a refusal that should have been expected and provided against, by dissatisfaction and rioting. Public retrenchment, rendered necessary by the burthen of the state and its contracted means of meeting it, fell on multitudes unaccustomed and disinclined to frugality, and the outery against a taxation that was essential, because the result of a war, just, and successful, and popular beyond measure, proved the reluctance with which the people part with habits of expenditure, and how unteachable nations are with regard to the objects they pursue. Providence, as if to teach us the condition of mortality, has annexed the penalty of evil, either in its nature or its consequence, to every pursuit of man, and the heedless multitude that cheers the conqueror on his road of triumph, though deaf to the widows' and orphans' groan, will soon have the lesson of retribution brought home to their own business and bosoms, to the part in which they are most sensible, and on which they can least bear a pressure. We have not considered this subject in a political or a commercial, but a merely moral way; and we can not but think that the present state of insubordination and disturbance, of anxiety and turbulence, that have extended their ravages through the sister island, is to be traced to the operation of these causes-moral causes are al

ways slow in their results, and therefore are invisible to many, and overlooked by most, but as the influence is connected with the nature of things, they are unerring in their effects, and sooner or later the result is, that "those who sow the wind will reap the whirlwind."

We have been speaking of the evil consequences of war, but we could also allude to those of peace, and its consequences disastrous, in truth, in a moral point of view. The war was indeed a sad and awful infliction, sweeping away millions of human beings, and saddening many a social circle. England seemed at one time, and that of no short duration, to be, as it were, placed on another planet, having intercourse with the inhabitants of this but by the mutual power of doing mischief, and her watery boundary seemed to separate ber from communion or sympathy with others: but the same waters were a barrier against irreligion; and the war, a war of principle, was used by Providence to keep out the infection of continental manners and continental opinions. We were indeed prevented visiting the statues, and examining the pictures, of France and Italy, but we were preserved pure from their tastes and their habits; and the English character of our Sovereign, and the high tone of morals maintained at his court, while it commanded the respect and affection of the people, contributed not a little to extend the influence of that standard. Peace came; and the barriers that separated us from the continent were removed, and all England seemed to pour itself upon the continent, and the residence there, whether forced or voluntary, gave admission to those opinions, and habits, and practices, of which, it is not too much to say, that they were un-English in their character, and deteriorating to the moral atmosphere of the country. Infidelity and irreligion, or no religion, a continental disregard of the obligation of the Sabbath, and an indifference to the relative duties of life, were necessarily imported, and the English character, unsuited to the exotic levities that might be comparatively harmless abroad, deviated at home from levity to sin. It cannot be denied that, since the peace, the peculiarities of the national character bave been removed or diminished, and that the higher orders of society have assumed a more daring aspect of immorality and levity; it cannot be denied that practical infidelity has obtained a more extensive domain, and speculation has been more openly avowed, and that every species of dissipation and profligacy marks more decidedly the public manners, than at any former period, while the character of the late sovereign, abounding, though it did, in noble and generous traits, was calculated rather to increase than to diminish the evil, by the unfortunate circumstances connected with his early career, the habits that he had contracted from his early associates, and an appearance of carelessness and indifference about the expenditure of personal or public wealth, that gave encouragement to extravagance, and alienated still more the feelings of the people from the aristocracy.

Such and so gloomy do we think the moral prospects of the country; at home, dissatisfaction, distress, alienation, while infidelity is spreading its baneful influence among the lower and higher classes of society, and change in all its forms is brooding over the country-abroad, the most difficult of problems to be solved, the mode of treating revolutions, and preventing the antisocial principle from making way and domesticating in Britain, surrounded by anarchy and change, to pursue the steady course of duty, and to keep our land free from the corrupting evil, without war and its sanguinary honours. If the great experiment that probably awaits us should not succeed; if the inert but overwhelming power of the mob should accelerate too rapidly the vehicle of reform, then revolution may be forced of the most awful kind; but if the blessing of God upon our rulers enables