Claudius, defeated Caractacus and his brother in three fucceffive battles. Oforius Scapula struck a decifive blow against Carac tacus, whom he took and fent prifoner to Rome, with his wife and family. Suetonius Paulus totally defeated the Britons under Boadicea; and Agricola finished the conqueft of South Britain in the year of Chrift 78, one hundred and thirty-three years after the landing of Julius Cæfar. The Monitor, speaking of the Saxons, fays, he hopes never to fee the time when Britain fhall again truft to an army defcended from that perfidious race. Here Mr. Monitor's averfion to fubfidy-treaties feems to have fwallowed up his recollection; otherwife he would have remembered that we ourselves are the defcendants of that very perfidious race: that we owe not only our natural existence, but alfo our conftitution to that perfidious race; and that the best and most glorious of our monarchs are the offspring of those perfidious invaders. Mr. Monitor gives us to understand that William the Norman was affured of many friends in England; that he fought against a ufurper, who fell in the battle, and left him without a competitor. Now all the hiftories which we have perused, declare that he had not one friend in the kingdom of any confequence; that Harold was greatly beloved by his fubjects; and that he was furvived by Edgar Atheling, the real heir of blood, and the darling of the English people-He mentions the deftruction of the Spanish Armada, as the effect of English valour; whereas it was owing to ftorms and other unforeseen accidents. He fays twenty thousand men were thought a fufficient strength to dispute with the enemy on the shore, if any should escape the fleet: but, in fact, Queen Elizabeth had raised three armies confifting of more than three times that number, befides the militia along the coast, which was armed for the occafion. We now come to confider the poetry and wit of the Monitor, in which he shall speak for himself. At the end of the 47th number we find the following advertisement : "O yes! O yes! O yes! • Whereas two ADMIRABLES with a ftrong fquadron of men of war, belonging to a certain European potentate, have lately difappeared, and to the great furprize of all the good people of this nation, have not yet been heard of; • Whoever "Whoever can give any fatisfactory intelligence concerning them, and will apply to the fign of the anchor and hope near • Charing-crofs, fhall be rewarded with the brains of a Sea Lion, ¡a joul of Newcastle Salmon, and a Fox's brush.' His poetical talents will be feen in this morceau. The TIMELY ADVICE. Speak out, fpeak loud, for now's the time or never. A fhort while hence may be no time to fpeak, The number is clinched with another piece of humour. ADVERTISEMENT. zz. Whereas the warehoufe of Mr. John Bull, merchant, fituated between the Straits of Gibraltar and the Gulf of Lions, has been lately robbed of a very large quantity of naval ftores and other effects, by a parcel of baboons, owing, as he apprehends, to the treachery or neglect of either Tom, Jack, George, Philip, Harry, or fome other of his fervants: "Whoever can give any certain intelligence of the fervant who left the warehoufe-door open, and will apply to the Cock in the Pit near Whitehall, or to John Ketch'em, Efq; at the fign of the Ax and Block near Great Tower-Hill, fhall be rewarded with a piece of the beft fuperfine broad cloath, an article poor Mr. Bull fears he fhall not much longer be per-mitted to deal in." If the Monitor is not monitoribus afper, we would advise him to renounce for the future all connection with wit, humour, and poetry: thefe are flowers that do not thrive in a political foil. He will do well to confider quid valeant humeri, and to fix in his memory this couplet of Horace Protinus ut moneam, (fi quid monitoris eges tu) Quid de quoque Viro, et cui dicas, fæpe videto. ART. VIII. Morality and Religion effential to Society. A Sermon preached at the Affizes held at Leicefter, on Thursday, August 12, 1756. By Ralph Heathcote, A. M. Request of the Sheriff and Grand Jury. Payne. Published at the 8vo. Price 6 d. HIS fermon is, in our opinion, one of the best we have THI is written in a plain, eafy, and perfpicuous ftile, without pedantry or affectation: Every fentiment arifes naturally from the fubject, and is clofely connected with the words of the text: Method is obferved without tedious divifion and subdivifion, and the whole fo conducted as at once to convince, and to perfuade. But let the reader judge for himself by the following imperfect fketch of it. ...The text is taken from the vith chapter of Micah, ver. 8. What doth the Lord require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God? Which words Mr. Heathcote obferves, will be found to exhibit an exact and regular plan, and to contain a fummary of religious and civil duty. To do justly, is the bafis of all focial virtue, the cornerftone of fociety, which cannot poffibly exift where a favage violation of juice is predominant; but although to do juftine is neceffary to the being, yet will it not of itself fuffice to the well-being of Society. The Prophet therefore hath wifely directed to love mercy. Mr. Heathcote, after illuftrating and explaining the nature of those two important duties justice and mercy, proceeds to obferve, that the neceffity of thefe virtues is à truth which may eafily determine our understandings, but it will not fo eafily determine our wills: It may fubdue and conquer our reafon, but it will not, of itself, fubdue and con quer quer our appetites and paffions. Hence the want of fome ftronger principle, founded in the authority of a fuperior, to control and reftrain their violence; fome fanction, to enforce the practice of juftice and mercy.-Now this principle or fanction being nothing but the power of religion; the Prophet therefore exhorts, in the laft place, to walk humbly with God : and this comprehends our religious duty. He then shews the neceflity of religion, for the enforcement of civil duty. Because were religion excluded, the only ties which would remain to preferve juftice and mercy are, first, the written laws of men; and fecondly, the unwritten laws of reafon and confcience-both which he proves by very good arguments as totally infufficient; and thence very justly concludes, that the laws of God alone can remove every difficulty, as they cenfure not only our actions but even our wills, not only our fouleft misdemeanors, but the very thoughts which give them birth. 6 Thus (fays he) the plan, laid down by the prophet in my text, becomes intire and complete. To do justly and to love • mercy, includes our civil du'y: to walk humbly with God, includes our religious. Morality and religion, then, appear to be the great foundation and fafeguard of fociety: and they are equally neceflary to fupport and protect it, becaufe ' equally neceflary to fupport and protect each other.' Mr. Heathcote further remarks, that as morality cannot fubfift without religion, fo neither can religion without morality. What this fenfible author fays concerning the feparation of thefe, we fhall give our readers in his own words. The folly (fays he) of feparating morality and religion,› • and the inconveniencies, which attend fo unnatural a pro-› cedure, may in fome measure be exemplified, by what is • now paffing in our own age and nation. For it happens unluckily, that we have at this time two confiderable parties, • amongst us, who are fhamefully guilty of the feparation. complained of: who efpoufe morality to a contempt of re-, ligion, and who espouse religion to a contempt of morality.; Under the former, may be comprehended the greater part of those who disbelieve the truth of revealed religion: un • der der the latter, enthufiafts and fanatics of every denomina<tion. Now the mischiefs, done to society by both these tribes, are alike fatal and deftructive of its being. They, who defpife religion, however they may in words extol morality, <do, as we have seen, in deed fubvert it. For, by depriving it of that, which is its only fecurity, they render it often ‹ ineffectual, but always precarious. No lefs injurious to the body focial are enthufiafts and fanatics, who degrade morality to do honour to religion. The religionist is ufually fo fixed upon the things above, that he is apt to overlook the things below; and fo taken up with his duty towards God, as fometimes to forget his duty towards ⚫ his neighbour. • Experience has ever fhewn, that, the moment a man quits reason, he becomes a prey to fanaticifm. Then every conceit, which a wild and difordered imagination can fuggeft, • is the fruits of the Holy Spirit; is, infallibly, pure religion; and pure religion, being the cause of God, must be maintained and propagated at all adventures. For this-the religionist will (as he has ever done) grow noify, turbulent, ⚫ and feditious: will not fcruple, when it is in his power, to ❝ overturn government, and lay whole kingdoms wafte: will break through all the bonds of justice, remain inexorable to the cries of mercy, and, under the delufion of ferving God, ❝ count it glory to destroy his creatures. Here fociety, we see, • will be demolished to its foundations; and men as effectually 'forced into a state of nature by religion without morality, 'as they were, in the former cafe, by morality without re· ligion.' We have the more readily taken this opportunity of quoting Mr. Heathcote's fentiments on this fubject, as they intirely correfpond with our own, and may poffibly be of fervice in promoting the extirpation of the many frantic vifionaries and idle enthufiafts lately fprung up amongst us, who are taking fo much pains to pull down the statues of learning and science, and raise up Gothic altars to ignorance and barbarifin. ART. |