1 62 Present State of Society, [FEB. 



impossible for us to determine ; but we entertain firm hopes that it will 

 be founded on the settled principles of the constitution. The men who 

 are about to undertake it, have outlived most of the wild theories which 

 they once maintained. They have seen the worthlessness of some, and 

 the mischievous nature of others ; and they are now unembittered by the 

 disappointments of a long career of opposition. They have gained, too, 

 a place in the opinion of the world, which nothing but a temperate use 

 of their present power can secure to them; and under these circumstan- 

 ces, we do not despair of seeing the question settled without the aid of 

 any of those destructive principles which are sought to be infused into 

 our legislative system. 



But we would not have our readers to suppose that, by such a mea- 

 sure of reform, the safety of our civil institutions will be at once secured. 

 On the contrary we assert, that it will depend entirely upon the policy 

 of government in other, equally important, questions, whether the 

 present interference with the law of election be the beginning of a period 

 of national renovation, or only the first step towards anarchy and con- 

 fusion ! The circumstances of the country the relative position of its 

 different parties and interests the very organization of its society, have, 

 within the last few years, undergone a serious, a dangerous change ; 

 and nothing but a profound attention to the operation of these circum- 

 stances can restore it to any thing like tranquillity. We entreat the 

 indulgence of our readers for a few moments, whilst we briefly glance at 

 a few of the leading features of these changes, and attempt to shew their 

 influence upon the general question of reform. 



A few months ago a writer would have gained but little credit who 

 had ventured to assert that any serious difficulties were to be appre- 

 hended from the state of society in this country. The members of our 

 legislature looked only to the surface of things; and if matters went on 

 with tolerable smoothness ; if no violent convulsion of our monetary 

 system convulsed the leading interests of the state ; if no shock exposed 

 to common view the decaying prosperity of the country ; if no sacri- 

 legious hand tore aside the frail shroud which concealed the wasted 

 flesh and gaunt limbs of the skeleton, POVERTY, which stalked in dark- 

 ness through the land ; if the cry of disease was faint and stifled, and 

 the victim sunk in hopeless, sullen silence to the grave then who durst 

 assert that England was in distress ? Few were they who dared to 

 brave the sneers of the philosophers, and we thank God that we were 

 amongst that few ! Now, who dare deny the existence of distress in its 

 most appalling extreme ? Who dare deny the danger of such distress, 

 when its bare terror has driven a Whig government (credite posteri!) 

 even to that most unpopular measure, the increase of our standing army ? 

 None dare now deny these things. The Joseph Surfaces of the age, 

 the boasting economists, the prosperity- mongers, and the quacks of 

 every denomination, are "dumb-foundered." They hear the cry of 

 ruin, they see the blaze of conflagration, and then poor, pitiful things ! 

 they creep into their shells, appalled 



"E'en at the sound themselves have made." 



They talk of incendiaries, of men with dark lanterns and ferocious faces, 

 who instigate the wretched peasantry to tumult, of Belgian and French 

 agents stirring them to bloodshed and revolution (do the poor 



