Defenderifm where it was triumphant; would it be very much for the happiness of the country if these outrages were to be univerfal, if they were to rife above the check of magisterial power, and if the exifting Government, faulty as fome men may efteem it, were to be fet afide to make room for a provifional Directory of Defenders?

When malice is indulged to its extent, every object is overlooked, except what tends to gratify the predominant paffion. An ambition as frantic as it is profligate, has impelled a few incendiaries to aim at the deftruction of the prefent ruling powers, and they account no expedient too defperate, if it only tends to accomplish their purpose. But, fuppofing them to have gained their point, are they fure that even they themfelves would not foon have reafon to repent of their rashness? If general infurrection were now the order of the day, would the restless multitude continue to bow before the fpeculative geniufes who had called them into action? Or can we imagine that a committee of Switcher Donellies would long be fwayed by the metapho

*The Nom de Guerre of a noted leader of Defenders and United Irifhmen juft then taken into cuftody at Maghera in the county of Londonderry,

ric

ric energy of an Helot's * eloquence? It had been all-powerful to excite; but would it be equally effectual to reftrain? It was well fitted to draw the peasant from his industry, and to engage him in midnight murder, and noon-day depredation. But when the multitude had once tried the ftrength of their own brawny arms, can we think that tropes and figures of speech would still keep them in subjection to a few physicians; lawyers, and haberdashers, whose " profeffional prudence" had induced them to conceal themfelves until they hoped there was no hazard in the exposure of their persons ?

But in putting thefe queftions I feel difcouraged. They to whom they apply are as "the "deaf adder which ftoppeth her ears." Once more, then, I turn to the friends of order and human happiness. I call upon them to weigh what I have said, and to judge whether any madnefs is to be compared with the attempts which we have seen, and still fee, to excite the ignorant impaffioned populace to discontent, to violence, to rebellion? And whether they who perfevere in

*Alluding to a well known publication, called the Helot's Letters, which appeared about the year 1784, and was the firft effufion of that inflammatory rhetoric which has fince been used by the United Irishmen with a fuccefs fo fatal to the quiet and fafety of the country.

this diabolical pursuit, after the deplorable refults which have already arifen from it, and in the view of those infinitely greater mischiefs which would neceffarily accrue from the completion of their schemes, do not deferve to be hurled from fociety as the enemies of God and Man ?

ESSAY IX.

June 23, 1796.

THE exertions of Government to suppress that spirit of combination and infurgency by which this country has been harraffed, are deferving of the higheft praife. They have been as judicious as they were vigorous, and the benefit arifing from them has, perhaps, been as great as on any fair grounds could have been expected. But I hefitate not to say that, in order to a radical cure, there is a neceffity for remedies which no government of any extenfive country can of itself apply. Government may repel actual infurrection by oppofing to it a fuperior force: it may give energy to the endea vours of active Magiftrates by a prompt attention to their applications: it may keep good order in the metropolis and its immediate environs, but it cannot detect the embryo plots that

are

are hatching from time to time in remote provinces. It cannot follow the midnight fteps of the foul fiend, while he fows the tares of fedition in the foil of village fimplicity. It may lop off the ftem, what appears above ground and ftrikes the eye at a diftance; but it is impoffible. it should be able to pursue and trace out the entangled roots of the mifchief which extend themfelves beneath the furface.

Thefe are duties which they whose interest is at ftake muft perform for themselves. The men of understanding, of property, of principle, in the different parts of the country, muft exert themselves to preferve the country, with an affiduity proportionate to that which other men have ufed, and are ftill ufing, to destroy it, or a thorough extirpation of the evil cannot poffibly be expected,

That the actual agitators are few in number, and that amongst those who have any pretenfions to refpectability the well-difpofed would outreckon the malcontents by hundreds to one, I cannot entertain a doubt. But the mifchief is, that the many are indolent, while the few are indefatigable. Good, eafy, undefigning men, fit quietly at their fire-fides, while the guileful anarchifts are diffufing the principles, and matur

ing the schemes, of infurrection and revolution.

To an indolence of precisely a fimilar nature, much more than to the number or the ftrength of their adversaries, the gentry of France have owed their ruin. Had they, at the beginning, exerted themselves in their respective provinces to prevent combinations, to detect mifreprefentations, and to prevent their adherents and their neighbours from being debauched by the maddening principles of the Jacobins, they would, in all probability, never have been driven from that country, of which, in fpite of all that can be advanced by prejudice or by petulance, they were the grace and the ornament.

But if ever it should happen that the gentlemen of this country should, in confequence of a fimilar negligence, experience a fimilar ruin, their blame would be aggravated beyond all comparison; because they have advantages, as well as motives, which French gentlemen were not bleffed with. Here we know what we have to fupport, a Conftitution under which we and our fathers have enjoyed the moft fubftantial bleffings; and the permanence of which is our only tenure for public and private fafety, for property, liberty, and life. A French gentleman