The Philosophy of Cotemjjorary Criticism. 



1821. 1 



wliich, together with the decrease upon 

 the four items before mentioned, would 

 amount to a sum not much short of 

 thirteen thousand pounds ! ! As to tlie 

 employment of the poor, tlietotal amount 

 of work done in the three last years, is 

 f 357. 14s. Id. and the amount paid in 

 (be same perio'l, for flax and machinery 

 is £4.");$. Is. 2d. thereby clearly demons- 

 trating, that Lord Castlereagh's theo- 

 retical proposition of employing the 

 poor in digging holes one day and fill- 

 ing them up the next, is less senseless 

 than the practical specimen afforded 

 by the Guardian Board of Clcrkenwell, 

 in tlie emjiloyment of the poor of that 

 ])arish. The best account 1 have seen 

 of the employment of the poor, is that 

 presented by Mr. Lidd(dl, Master of 

 ilie House of Correction at Preston, in 

 F>ancashire, to tlie county magistrates, 

 from Easter, 1818, to Easter, 1819, be- 

 ing 55 weeks. 



Average number of Prisoners 254. 

 Gross earnings . ... £1684 2 

 Proportion paid to 'i 



Prisoners . . 345 17 5 [- 514 5 8 

 Do. to Inspectors . 168 8 3) 



Net earnings of 254 prisoners 



in 55 weeks 1169 16 4 



The cost of food for the same j)eriod 

 is JE1846. 8s. 3d. from which the nelt 

 amount of earnings, being deducted, 

 leaves a charge of £646. lis, lid. for 

 the keep of 254 prisoners, for 55 weeks, 

 on an average of less than one shilling 

 a week for each prisoner, besides al- 

 lowing rather more than twenty-seven 

 shillings for tlie private use of each 

 prisoner. The result is the more cre- 

 ditable to the management of the go- 

 vernor, inasmuch, as it has taken place 

 dtiring a period when wages for the 

 kind of work (weaving) in which the 

 prisoners are generally employed, have 

 been unusually low. J. F. J. 



May 23d, 1 821.^ 



For the Monthly Magazine. 



THE PHILOSOPHY OF COTEM- 



PORARY CRITICISM. 



No. XIII. 



Edinburgh Heview, No. 69. 



THE/>-*< article bears the imposing 

 title of " History of the English 

 Lcgisliiture ;" but i.s, in fact, a fault- 

 finding disijuisitioii concerning a " I'e- 

 port from the Lords' Committees, ap- 

 pointed to search the .Journals of the 

 Hous(;, Rolls of Parliament, and other 

 records and documents, for all matt(!rs 

 touching the dignity of a Piier of the 

 Healm." This elaborate compilation, 

 of great extent uuU curiosity, although 



529 



satisfactory in many respects, is cer- 

 tainly, also, in others defective; but 

 nevertheless, it is one of the very best 

 things of the kind that has ever issued 

 from any of the committees of Parlia- 

 ment. Antiquarian and historical re- 

 searches are not easily executed by 

 committees. They require the ardour 

 and constancy of an individual mind; 

 whereas eonuuitlees, when not sitting, 

 may be said to have no intellectual ex- 

 istence. With regard to the review, 

 we have two strong objections to the 

 article. In the first place, the Lords' 

 report is not publislied, and the public 

 have no means of ascertaining whether 

 the observations of the critic are well 

 or ill-founded, nor, even were it pub- 

 lished, is the work itself of any gene- 

 ral interest. Future political histori- 

 ans may refer to it judiciously, but the 

 materials of which it consists, in its 

 present form, possess nothing attrac- 

 tive, nor could they, in that shape, 

 have been made so. The critic mo- 

 destly tells us that he has undertaken 

 the task expressly, " before it be too 

 late." being in great concern lest the 

 report should "go down to posterity, 

 in its present state, as the deliberate 

 judgment of one branch of the legisla- 

 ture, on the ancient constitution of 

 their country." To say nothing of 

 the bad grammar of this prefatory 

 blustering, we would ask what is 

 meant by a report of a committee being 

 " the deliberate judgment of one branch 

 of the legislature ?" That branch has 

 nothing to do with it — it is but a^twig, 

 or more truly a bud of a twig : in- 

 deed, unless we are much misinformed, 

 the whole has been got up by an 

 individual, and we suspect the reviewer 

 knows as nmch ; for he insinuates that 

 " the author of the report is a young 

 adventurer in the paths of constitu- 

 tional antiquities," and stigmatizes 

 him as " dazzled witli the novelty of 

 the scenery " — " while his judgment 

 is warped and perverted by the false 

 and ))rejudiced accounts he has perused 

 of former travelU^rs, on whom he ob- 

 stinately fixes his faith, in opposition 

 to the evidences of his own senses." 

 liut if there was a lack of judgment 

 in taking uj) tin; crude topic of a first 

 parliamentary report, tiiere is still a 

 great<',r deficiency in the manner in 

 whicli it has been handled. For ex- 

 ainj)lc, (and the same species of false 

 reasoning may be traced throtighout the 

 article,) the critic, observes tliat the 

 <'()mniiltee JKrgiu with llieNorman con- 

 quest. " They own," says he, " that 



the 



