have done our part, and shall, I trust, continue to do it.-Let them, even now, do theirs, and THE WORLD IS SAVED.' Art. 31. A Measure productive of substantial Benefits, to Government, the Country, the Public Funds, and to Bank Stock, Respectfully submitted to the Governors, Directors, and Proprietors of the Bank of England. By Simeon Pope. 8vo. pp. 46. Is. 6d. Richardson. 1799. The measure proposed by Mr. Pope is as follows: Let the Bank of England (under the sanction of Parliament) advance to Government, this year, the sum of ten millions, at an interest of four per cent. and payable in ten instalments, on the security or credit of the general income tax for the ensuing year 1800then to be optional in the Bank proprietors to extend or not the loan to the year 1801-and so to every succeeding year as long as the tax shall exist.' The most important objection to this plan is the increase of bank paper in circulation which it might cause. Mr. P. supposes that, the sum being advanced by instalments, the notes issued for the first will, in the common course of business, have returned to the bank before the second instalment becomes payable :-but if not, he affirms that, in our present circumstances, an emission of more than double the notes at this time in circulation is justifiable.' If the Bank be restrained from paying in specie, and under no restraint as to the quantity of paper which it may circulate, it may well afford to lend to government any number of millions: but a disproportionate use of such a licence endangers not only public credit, but all property in the kingdom. We believe the legislature to be the only judge competent to determine the quantity of bank notes which should be allowed to circulate. Mr. P. advances several positions to which we cannot accede. He is of opinion, for instance, that taxes which distress the farmer are beneficial, and occasion overflowing markets and low prices :-but, if the farmer carries more to the market than the average produce, he must lessen his stock, and future years will suffer for a present plenty.The style of this pamphlet is too florid for such sober subjects as money and artithmetical calculations. Art. 32. The Speech of Sir John Sinclair, Bart. M. P. &c. on the Bill for imposing a Tax upon Income, in the Debate on that Bill, on Friday the 14th December 1798. 8vo. 6d. Debrett. 1799. Sir John Sinclair regards the funding system as the climax of financial invention, the greatest of all political discoveries, the most valuable mine,' &c. If there be merit in anticipating revenue and in incurring debt, the moderns are not entitled to the honour of the invention; for it is a discovery of very antient date. Funding depends on the ability of the borrower, and on the credit which the opinion of that ability creates. When Governments anticipate, if there be a want of ability in the country, or a deficiency of credit, they become bankrupt. Nothing strengthens so much as the practice of funding, in appearance, the mischievous political paradox that private vices are public benefits. In Sir John's speech, it is apprehended, as a misfortune, that a spirit of economy may be introduced into the establishments of private families. Yet it must invariably be true, and mathematically demonstrable, that the less each individual expends on himself, the more he might afford to contribute to the public support. If (says he) a new plan must be adopted, and if property, instead of expenditure, must be attacked, it becomes a matter of nice discussion, whether the extraordinary contribution should be raised by a tax on capital, or a tax on income, or by blending the two together, which, though the most complicated, yet being unquestionably the justest, ought to be preferred. What I mean is, that every man should pay, instead of 10 per cent. on his income, per cent. on his capital, and 5 per cent. on his income, by which persons who had no capital, would be greatly relieved, and those who were possessed of considerable property, would pay more in proportion to their opulence, than under the system that is proposed. Almost the only objection to this plan is, the difficulty of ascer taining the value of a man's capital.' There appears to us at least one other objection: the present tax on income may prove, in many cases, partial: but would the plan proposed by Sir John Sinclair be less so? Land, he classes as income. Reckoning land, which produces a clear annual rental of one thousand pounds, at 25 years' purchase; then property worth £25,000, if it be in land, will not be required to contribute more than will be demanded from property of £. 10,000 value which shall be deemed capital. Such great tenderness shewn to the landed interest could not be very encouraging to industry, and ill accords with the professed object, that those who were possessed of considerable property should pay in proportion to their opulence. Art. 33. The Substance of a Speech made by Lord Auckland in the House of Peers, 8th January 1799, on the 3d Reading of the Bill for granting certain Duties upon Income. 8vo. Is. Wright. The political opinions of this Noble Loid being so generally known, and the subject of the speech before us having been so fully discussed, many remarks will not now be necessary. The principle of gradual rise in taxation, or of requiring a higher proportion from the higher classes,' his Lordship thinks, is objectionable, as having a levelling tendency; and that it would amount to neither more nor less than the introduction of a plan for equalizing fortunes; and to the implied inference, that, because a man possesses much, therefore more shall be taken from him than is proportionably taken from others.' On the merits of this objection, there will be various opinions. His Lordship has not thought it necessary to add weight to it by ar gument. The noble Lord endeavours to prove that every species of annuity or income is equally valuable. He demands; Will it be contended, that, in point of real value, an unsettled estate, which its owner will leave to his son, is of more worth to him, than if the same estate were for his life only, and already settled on his son and his descendants? Would an estate so settled for life with remainder to his son, be more valuable to him, than it would be, if he had no son, and it were. settled on some distant relation or os a stranger? stranger? And if on a stranger, how is it more valuable to the sessor than any other annuity for life?" pos The cases here supposed do not seem selected on account of their difficulty. All property left by those who have no children must, in course, go to more distant relations, or to strangers: but how will any of the cases mentioned apply to that of a man having children, whose annuity nevertheless expires with him, or is perhaps only for a short term of years, and who must depend on what he can save during the term, for the maintenance of himself and his family after its expiration? The change in political opinions which has of late years taken place in this country, is strikingly exemplified in the following paragraph of this speech; in which, alluding to some expressions in his letters addressed to the Earl of Carlisle, written in 1779, and which were now quoted by the Earl, in debate, Lord A. says, If however the Noble Lord had adverted with his usual accuracy to the context of the passages which he thought proper to cite, he would have found that they related to a voluntary contribution to be dependent on the enthusiasm of the contributors; or if to a forced and general contribution, then to be dependent on a mere voluntary disclosure of income. At the period of which I speak, it never entered into the minds of the most enlightened statesmen (and I appeal to a Noble and Learned Friend who now hears me, and was conversant in the discussions to which I refer) that it could be prac ticable to establish a forced and general contribution on the only just and efficient system of a forced disclosure.' POETRY and DRAMATIC. Art. 34. Sidney. A Monody, occasioned by the Loss of the Viceroy Packet, on her Passage from Liverpool to Dublin, in Dee. 1798. 4to. 28. Rickman. We wish not to repress sensibility, when excited by unaffected sorrow but there is something so singularly mechanical in the afflietion which is said to have produced these lines, by anticipating the death of the two youths whom they were intended to bewail, and transferring them to two others who were not in the author's thoughts when they were written, that we must own their effect on our feelings to have been rather feeble. The effusions of a poetical imagination, even in fictitious sorrow, if illumined by the slightest radiations of genius, and if not extremely wild, we are ever disposed to treat with lenity: but, when the best lines and sentiments of a production called a Monody, or whatever be its title, consist of shreds and patches from the writings of others, it cannot claim,-nor ought it, through tenderness, to receive the praises due to works of real merit. This monody may be very acceptable, perhaps, to the author's friends, and to the particular families which have been bereaved of their children by the calamity described; without being fit for the public eye, which can be repaid for perusal only by real poetical merit. What virtue can there be in the name of Lycidas, or Sidney, to compen *The Lord Chancellor,' sate for defects of composition? The untimely death of dogs, cats and birds, has often been bewailed with wit and ingenuity in the lan guage of sorrow: but the merit of these fugitive pieces did not rest on the name of Cæsar, Pompey, or Selima. Though the author calls on a Muse in the first stanza, he bids her get about her business in the second: Amid the sacred griefs which rend my heart, What sympathizing Muse will bear a part?• Far hence be all the giddy train Of fabled inspiration, light and vain.' The title of SIDNEY, which, like LYCIDAS, seems merely to imply an individual, must perplex and embarrass those English readers who have not had a Sir Hugh Evans to tell them that "there is numbers in nouns," or have never heard of the Greeks writing and speaking in the dual number: for Sidney here implies two brothers sharing the same melancholy fate. The sorrow seems equally fictitious with the name. The author may, however, boast at least one requisite for a poet: for he invents not only the sorrow but the occasion; and indeed he has found so many scraps and allusions to his purpose in Milton, Gray, and other plaintive bards, that his compilation reminds us of what musicians call, not a Monody, but a Medley. Art. 35. Cambro-Britons, an Historical Play, in Three Acts. First performed at the Theatre-Royal, Haymarket, July 21, 1798. With a Preface. Written by James Boaden, Esq. 8vo. 25. Robinsons. 1798. Historical plays very rarely observe the truth of history. Faithfully to exhibit the march and issue of events in real life would not exactly answer the play-wright's purpose. Fiction must be invoked, in order to give a continued interest to the drama; and probability must be outraged, in order to surprise and give stage effect. Ghosts and spectres have lately received some countenance, to the no small satisfaction of the dramatic writer; who is happy, when put to a difficulty, to avail himself of the ready assistance of these preternatural beings. Hence a splendid and amusing scene is exhibited to the galJeries, but good taste is always disgusted. Mr. Boaden, in order to produce a sudden reconciliation between Llewellyn (the hero of the piece) and his brother David, makes the tomb of their mother " ope its ponderous and marble jaws? to vomit forth her ghost; which being accomplished, the apparition magnificently ascends to the upper regions! Thus, by the intervention of this cerulean-coloured ghost, the angry hot blooded Welshmen are prevented from destroying each other; a momentary change from hatred to love is effected; and David, who just before was in rebellion against his brother Llewellyn and anxious to deprive him of his mistress, returns to his allegiance, renounces his passion, and undertakes to conduct Elinor from Chester, where she was in captivity, to Llewellyn's retreat in the fastnesses of Snowdon. It must be confessed that this maternal ghost is not invoked for nothing, for no sprite could do more in less time: but was it necessary to oblige the tombs to give up their dead, in order to bring a rebellious brother to a sense of his duty? The stage cannot produce its proper moral effect by such a conduct. Are The piece in other respects is not ill conducted, and the characters enemy. Art. 36. This poem will probably be read by all parties, as the author calls With respect to the little patronage at present bestowed on genius by the great, we must observe that the time for expecting specific sums for dedications, and remuneration for flattery, is past. Authors are now too numerous, and the great are too poor, for such commerce. If a work has real merit, the PUBLIC does more for it, by enabling the booksellers to give a price for the copy-right, than, in times when a Mecenas could be found, any author could ever expect from individual patronage. Pope, the first poet who ceased to solicit patronage, (except for the subscription to his Homer,) was the first who acquired a considerable fortune by the sale of his writings. Every man can dedicate, but every man cannot produce a great work. It is well known that, in all countries, as civilization approaches, hospitality recedes: so in literature, while the writers and readers are few, patronage is wanting to encourage ingenuity and dili gence to instruct and amuse mankind. The personages assailed in this satire have a sturdy foe to encoun ter. If, unluckily, some of our friends be among them, however we may wish to mount the stage in their defence, our interference might, possibly, have no other effect than to render future flagellation still more violent, We must therefore leave them to fight their own battles-for, though Broughton, the Pugilist and Beaf-eater, when in Germany, having had a quarrel with some soldiers of a Hanoverian regiment, is said to have offered to fight every individual of that corps, provided he might have leave to return home when he had done; we cannot screw our courage to the striking place" tight enough to fight for a whole regiment maltraité by one who might answer, perhaps, if asked his name,-" my name is Legion." We shall therefore, without attempting a defence of the nominal culprits, merely bear our testimony to the abilities of the judge, and present our readers with the exordium to his poem; which will at once manifest the author's design, and serve as a specimen of the polish and force of his numbers: Beat |