fame,-and England is sufficiently large to hold the fame of both.

A view of Mr. Pitt's political life, written by the pen of a friend, and with great ability, may be seen in the critique of "Mr. Gifford's Life of Pitt," inserted in the "Quarterly Review," for the month of August 1810.-While the transactions, in which a great political character has been engaged, are yet recent; this is perhaps the best mode in which a view of his public life can be communicated: the events themselves are generally known; all therefore to be done is to clear up a few doubtful facts, and to lead the reader to form a proper judgment on the merits of the principal performer. This is done in a masterly manner, in the critique to which we have referred. Has Mr. Fox,-has Mr. Burke,no surviving friend, who will do the same justice to his memory?

Those who have perused the excellent critique of Mr. Burke's "Letters on a Regicide Peace," in the Monthly Review, which we have mentioned in a former note, must-wish for a similar discussion of that great man's character and writings from the same pen.

XII. 6.

The Holy Alliance.

WHO now pretends to foresee the consequences likely to result from this extraordinary event?

1. During the Assyrian, Persian, Macedonian and Roman empires, the grand political division of the world was, into the states within their sway, and

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the states beyond it. At the end of the fifth century of the christian era, the greater part of Europe was Roman.

2. After the death of Trajan, the Romans ceased to be conquerors; the barbarians of the north and north-east soon began to invade their territories on every side, and to erect on their ruins a multitude of principalities, independent on each other, but united by the profession of a common religion, by a common regard for its interests, and by a common submission, in religious concerns, to the pope, as their common head*.

3. By degrees, Austria, France, Spain, and England, became the European powers of the first order. The union of the Imperial and Spanish crowns on the head of Charles the fifth, produced confederacies against him. The French monarch was always at their head; and Europe thus became divided into two new parties, the Austrian and the French.

4. In the mean time, the arms of Mahomet and his successors divided a large proportion of the world into the worshippers of Christ, and the believers in the Koran t.

"The perpetual correspondence of the Latin clergy, the "frequent pilgrimages to Rome and Jerusalem, and the grow"ing authority of the popes, cemented the union of the christian "republics, and gradually produced the similar and common "jurisprudence, which has distinguished from the rest of man"kind, the independent and even hostile nations of modern "Europe." Gibb. Hist. of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, ch. xxxvii.

+ Mahometanism has been carried on the north to the point, where the Ouralian and Altai mountains meet: thence, it may

5. The reformation arrived: and then, according to Schiller* "The whole of Europe became di"vided into a catholic and a protestant party. "The interests of the European states, which, till “that time, had been national, ceased to be such; "and the interests of religion formed a bond of union, among subjects of different governments,

be traced over little Bucharia to the southernmost point of Hindustan; and thence, in a south-easternly direction, to Goram, a small island between Ceram and Papua, or New Guinea, in which there are not fewer than eight mosques. It is also spread over every country from the Hellespont to the Indus, and from the Arabian to the Persian Gulph; it is professed on each side of the Nile; and, in the west of Africa, the line between the Mahometans and Pagans, extends, according to Mr. Parke, to St. Joseph or Galam (lat. 14. 20.): thence in a waving direction, it proceeds to and includes Tombuctoo. In the east of Africa, it is professed in part of Madagascar and the opposite shores.

The Mahometans have lost Spain; and, in the north, their progress has been checked by the extension of christianity into Siberia; but, in middle and lower Asia, it has always been gaining ground; so that, speaking generally, from the commencement of the Hegira, to the present time, Mahometanism has always been on the increase. But, extensive as is the aggregate of the territories thus occupied by the followers of Mahomet, it is greatly exceeded by those occupied by the followers of Buddha; they fill Tartary, China, and many of the Malayan islands.

*Histoire de la Guerre de trente ans,-cited by M. de Bonald, in his interesting essay, "De l'Unité Religieuse dans "l'Europe;" inserted in the Ambigu of Peltier, No. cxxv.This journal contains several other essays of Bonald, on subjects of literature and history, which show great learning, an excellent taste, and profound observation. See also Les " véritables Auteurs de la Révolution de France de 1789," 8vo. Neufchatel, 1797

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who, till this time; had been unknown to each "other. A sentiment more powerful in the heart "of man than even the love of his country, rendered "him capable of perceptions and feelings which "reached beyond its limits: the French calvinist "found himself more in contact with a calvinist in England, Germany, Holland, or Geneva, than "with a catholic in his own country." This effected a new political division of Europe: France siding with the separatists from the church of Rome, and introducing to the aid of their common cause, the Ottoman power*, became the real head of one party; Austria was the head of the other. But when, upon the abdication of Charles the fifth, his German were divided from his Spanish states, and the civil wars of France weakened her connections with the protestant powers and the Porte, Elizabeth of England, and Philip the second of Spain, became the conspicuous characters.-Elizabeth, with the United Provinces at her disposal, was the centre of the protestant system; Philip with the aid of Bavaria, was the centre of the catholic; and all the temporal, and, (which was of much greater consequence,) all

* It may be said with truth, that, without the direct or indirect aid, given by France to the protestants and the Ottoman powers, there would not have been a protestant state on the north of the Rhine or the Maine, or a Mahometan settlement on the north of the Danube.

That the views of the protestant party in the reign of queen Mary were considerably furthered by French intrigue, is abundantly shown, by Dr. Lingard, in the part of his excellent history, which relates to the reign of that much calumniated princess.

the spiritual power of Rome, co-operated with the Spaniard, and placed the pope in the van of the catholic array. Then, if Schiller's remarks be just, the protestants in every country subject to the Spanish sway, would be partisans of Elizabeth, and every catholic in the territories subject to her dominion or control, would be favourable to the designs of Philip and the pope.

6. Thus matters remained till the treaty of Westphalia: this considerably lessened the influence of religion on politics, and, from this time, in consequence of the general dissemination of the new philosophy, that influence rapidly declined.

7. The French revolution followed and changed the face of Europe; less, however, by the new demarcations of territory, though these were great, than by the introduction of new principles into them all, and the general exhaustion of Europe, which the war occasioned *. - The new principles thus introduced are considered by the advocates for the ancient order of things as destructive of legitimate government, and on all occasions are, on this account,

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Nations," says Burke, in his celebrated work on the French revolution, "are wandering deeper and deeper into an ocean of boundless debt. Public debts, which, at first, were a security to governments, are likely, in their excess, "to become the means of their subversion. If governments "provide for these debts by heavy impositions, they perish "by becoming odious to the people. If they do not provide "for them, they will be undone by the efforts of the most "dangerous of all parties. I mean an extensive discontented "monied interest, injured and not destroyed."-An alarming' dilemma !