by thread; neither will any get to heaven, unless the cart-rope of his righteoufnefs be untwifted and diffolved piece-meal; for otherwife his cart-rope will be fit for nothing, but cafting anchor on the fandy bank of the law, where his veffel will be broken to pieces, and his foul will fink into the fea of God's wrath.' In this allegorical mode of expreffion, our author is only to be equalled by thofe ingenious orators, who, in a fimilar stile, captivate a croud of admirers, at the Tabernacle, the Foundery in Moorfields, and other feminaries of enthusiasm. We fhall conclude our account of Mr. Erfkine's works with a fpecimen of his poetry. And that we may not be accused of partiality, as we have given fome extracts from his firft discourse, we shall present our readers with the first and second stanza of a gospel fonnet on the fame text: • Of light and life, of grace and glore, In Chrift thou art partaker. Rejoice in him for evermore, Thy Hufband is thy Maker. He made thee; yea, made thee his bride, To what he made he'll ftill abide, Thy hulband made the match.' There may, perhaps, in the compafs of 1600 pages in folio, be fomething which is really valuable; but let the fubfcribers, or those who have more patience than we have, turn over a dunghill for the fake of a gem. VII. Moral Tales. By M. Marmontel. W Becket. E have always made it a rule, to fuffer every work to ftand or fall by its own merits, and therefore we shall apply nothing of what we have faid of the two preceding volumes of this work to the prefent. (See vol. xvii. p. 43.) We have no great objection to the author's light, airy manner, because it is the prevailing täfte of his countrymen; but the characters he has introduced into this volume, are fuch as never exifted in life; and therefore his incidents and catastrophes are equally abfurd, as they are improbable, and, in many respects, impoffible. The Sylph Hufband ftands at the head of this collection: it is the hiftory of Eliza, a lady married to one Volange, who had refined her corporeal fenfations of love into a paffion for thofe aërial beings termed Sylphs. She had an indifference, or rather an averfion, for all grofs fenfations of the marriage-beds but but her husband, by an artful conduct, procured himself to be Introduced into her apartment in the character of a fylph; her enchanting, dreams are diffolved, and he reconciles her to the natural part of her duty. It is now (faid fhe, throwing herfelf into the arms of her husband) it is now that I am enchanted, and I hope that nothing but death alone will break the charm.' The fecond tale in this volume is entitled, Lauretta,' the daughter of a French villager; a man who, it seems, had fentiments of honour far above his station. Lauretta was virtuous, fimple, and fenfible, and fo exquisitely beautiful, that a French count, de Luzy, finds means to carry her to Paris, where he debauches her, and maintains her in high keeping. Lauretta is ignorant, and therefore unconscious of her crime; but the has the most affectionate feelings for her indulgent parent, who one day difcovers her in her coach, as fhe was driving through the streets of Paris. He finds means to whisper her, and perfuades her to give him admittance at night, her keeper being in the country. She fends her fervants abroad, under different pretexts her father enters her apartment at the appointed hour, makes her fenfible of her infamy, and, unknown to any one, carries her back with him to the village, in the fame plain drefs the wore when the left it. Luzy, on his return, is distracted when he finds that he is eloped; but, difcovering where the is, he follows, marries her, and provides for the old man. Though this story has not even the merit of novelty to recommend it, yet, there is fomething touching in the artful fimplicity of Lauretta, and her father's warm fenfe of honour and affection for her as a daughter. The next, which is called, A Wife of Ten Thousand, we think equally unmeaning and unentertaining. A booby hufband, one Melidor, had the young and lively Acelia for his wife; whom the author deferibes as living in a state of careless diffipation, without regard to any thing but luxury; which they both pursue with to much extravagance, that Melidor, by his expences, and the treachery of a friend whom he took to be a philofopher, must have rotted in a jail, had not his wife, who had a large independent fortune, exerted herself, repaired the waftes of his extravagance, and faved him from ruin. We really cannot fee in this flory any thing fo very extraordinary, as to entitle this fame Acelia to the character of being a wife of Ten Thousand; especially as the relieved her husband with out doing any injury to her own eftate. What must have become both of him and her, if he had not been in poffeffion of a feparate fortune? But we have heard of many English ladies, who, by their own perfonal economy, industry, and unVOL. XX. December, 1765. Gg derftanding, derstanding, without poffeffing a fhilling of what they could call their own, have retrieved their hufbands eftates, when reduced to as defperate a condition as that of Melidor. The author's excellence feems to lie in expreffing the fentiments of a young beauty fufceptible of paffion, but in a ge-nuine ftate of nature. This is exemplified in his fourth tale in this volume, which he calls Friendship put to the Teft,' but has nothing befides, either in the ftory or the characters, to recommend it. One Blanford, an English captain in the EastIndies faves the life and honour of Coraly, daughter to a bramin, who is killed when the English facked the village where he lived. Blanford carries Coraly home to England, and conceives fuch a paffion for her, that, being obliged to go again. to fea, he recommends her to his intimate friend, one Nelfon, whofe fifter is to fuperintend her education, till Blanford fhall return home and marry her. During Blanford's absence, Nelfon, though he has the most exquifite fentiments of honour and friendship, involuntarily falls in love with his fair charge, as fhe does with him. The manner of expreffion by which the difclofes her paffion, without attempting to difguife it, is touching, and has in it fomething original, or rather what we may call Oriental. Blanford returns; and perceiving that Nelfon's life depended upon his enjoying Coraly, who was equally affected, generously beftows her in marriage upon his friend, together with a fortune; and the tale ends with Blanford's refrection, That these are trials, to which virtue herself would do well not to expose herself.' 6 The fifth and last tale in this volume is entitled, The Mifanthrope Corrected; but it partakes more of dialogue and didactic, than of narrative and entertainment. The character of a misanthrope is contrafted with that of a French nobleman, who is the reverse, and whofe fole employment is to make his tenants, and all about him, chearful and happy : his conversation, example, and reasoning, by degrees foftens the misanthrope; and at laft he falls in love with, and marries, the nobleman's daughter, a young lady of the highest beauty and virtue. The fituations we difcover in this volume are not very interefting, because they refult from characters that are carried out of the road of common life, and therefore little affect the reader, who feldom takes any concern in the caprices of an author. VIII. The Oeconomical Table, an attempt towards afcertaining and exhibiting the fource, progrefs, and employment of Riches, with explanations, by the Friend of Mankind, the celebrated Marquis de Mirabeau. Tranflated from the French. Pr. 4s. bound. Owen. IN order to give either an abftract or an analysis of this work, fo as to convey to the reader a juft idea of its contents, we muft reprint the whole. Two authors are supposed to be concerned in it, the conftructor of the tables (fix of which are here exhibited in the letter-prefs;) and the illuftrator of them, the marquis de Mirabeau, whofe labours form the body of the work. Its profeffed defign is to recommend agriculture, and to fhew that its reproductions, as our authors chufe to call the profits arifing by it, are the only true fources of riches and population to a ftate. The tranflator has given us a moft ju dicious preface to the fame purpose, with feveral excellent remarks upon this performance as applicable to Great Britain, and her particular fituations and interefts. He obferves, that Colbert's project to enrich France by commerce and manufac tures, at the expence of agriculture, was wild and impractica-, ble; and in this we heartily concur with him. Let any man compare the prodigious fleets and armies raifed and paid by Lewis XIV. in the beginning of his reign, the magnificent works he carried on, the fplendor of his court, and the excefs of his liberality, both in public and private; we fay, let him compare thofe particulars with the prefent ftate of France, and he will be fenfible of the truth of this tranflator's obfervation. We have therefore been often furprised at the vaft encomiums beftowed by the French writers in general, on Colbert, and the benefits which his administration brought to France. We fhall beg leave to add, that the genius of the French is by no means turned towards colonization. The foil of France itfelf is practicable, and its culture both eafy and beneficent; but turn its farmers to the wilds of Canada, where pinching, perfevering labour, must earn every morfel of bread they put into their mouths, what an incredible difference prefents itself in the two fituations! Every page almost of the history which Charlevoix has given us of New France, are fhocking confirmations of this remark; and we are apt to believe that the French colonies in America, fo far from having contributed to the intereffs of the mother country, have been the chief means of the debility, which the difcovered during the late war. There is another, and perhaps a ftronger rea-. fon for the fevere blows which the commerce of France has received, and which arifes from the inability he is under to protect her commerce, be it ever fo extended, in a dispute with Great-Britain. This inferiority does not arise so much from the incapacity the French are under to raise a inarine, in every refpect equal to that of Great Britain, and in fome refpects fuperior, but from the different genius of the two people. Almost every news paper, during the two lare wars, afforded us ftriking proofs of the fuperiority of the British above the French failors. It is not courage alone, that can either acquire or maintain a fuperiority by fea: there is, what may be properly enough called, a bottom in the English failors, which, when they are well commanded, will always render them fuperior to every other people on that element, fo far as we know the hiftory of this globe. The tranflator acknowledges, that fome objections lie to the rules of the Marquis, especially (fays he) from those who love the fine arts, as every man muft, to be allowed any pretenfions to thought and feeling. He infifts, that agriculture cannot poffibly flourish in any country, like France, unless the bulk of the inhabitants prefer the luxurics of fubfiftence to thofe of decoration, commonly deemed the only fupport of these arts. As, therefore, fome readers may not be more tender in judging of his meaning, than he has been guarded in expreffing it, 1 muft beg leave to remark, that he is by no means for having the rich to spend all their money in the purchase of the luxuries of fubfiftence, as at first fight one might be apt to conclude, instead of beftowing part of it on the poor for the luxuries of decoration; fince, the poor having mouths as well as the rich, the demand in both cafes muft the fame on the farmer. He does not require that the confumption of the first products fhould be confined to any particular fet of men; all he requires is, that they should be confumed. But confumed, he apprehends, they never would, were a fuperior tafte for the luxuries of decoration univerfally to prevail, even in towns and cities, fince by fuch numbers of people, in that cafe, confining themfelves to the purchase of manufactures, it would be impofiible for the farmer to fell the produce of his labours, and of courfe to pay his rent, the confequence of which must naturally be an almoft total ceflation of agriculture, the deftruction of the landed intercft; and, to go a step farther than my authors perhaps intended, an end of every fublunary enjoyment worthy the wish of a rational being.' This preface is followed by the author's introduction, which is neither void of merit nor of self-applaufe. His fundamental axioms are as follow: The earth is the mother of all our goods, •Of |