1822.] 
[ 425 ] 
STEPHENSIANA. 
No. XIV. 
The late ALEXANDER STEPHENS, Esq. of Park House, Chelsea, devoted an active and 
well-spent life in the collection of Anecdotes of his contemporaries, and generally entered in a 
book the collections of the passing day ;—these collections we have purchased, and propose to 
present a selection from them to our readers. As Editor of the Annual Obituary, and many 
other biographical works, the Author may probably have incorporated many of these scraps ; 
but the greater part are unpublished, and all stand alone as cabinet pictures of men and 
manners, worthy of a place in a literary miscellany. 
—_——— 
COLONEL WARDLE. 
HIS zealous M.P. retired from 
public life in disgust, owing to 
the jealousy which his popularity 
created in Burdett and others. ‘The 
enjoyment of popularity may be liken- 
ed to one standing on the top of a 
pee. where there is room only for 
imself, while several are aiming at the 
same station. Candidates for popu- 
larity are, therefore, always endea- 
vouring to break each other’s necks. 
Wardle found himself as much under- 
mined by the envy of one party as by 
the enmity of. the other, and therefore 
wisely sought a private station in 
Kent, after fighting some hard cam- 
paigns in Parliament. 
SACRED METAMORPHOSIS. 
Holy Chrysostom studied <Aristo- 
phanes, and had the art (says Milton) 
“to change a scurrilous vehemence 
into the style of a rousing sermon.” 
CENSORSHIP OF BOOKS. 
In the primitive chureh, ere the 
sound principles of religion became 
‘corrupted, the bishops and councils 
‘were wont to declare what books were 
not commendable, proceeding no fur- 
ther, but leaving it to each one’s con- 
‘science to read or lay by. This was 
founded on the principle, that in reli- 
gious matters every man must govern 
himself, his judgment furnishing a 
plain and certain rule for his conduct. 
This usage prevailed till after the year 
800, as we learn from Padre Paolo, 
that great unmasker of the ‘l'rentine 
Council. After which time, the Ro- 
man pontifis, engrossing into their own 
hands all authority in spiritual mat- 
ters, were for burning and prohilbit- 
ing to read whatever opposed their 
interests. Yet, for a while, they were 
sparing in their censures, and_ not 
many books were so dealt with, till 
Pope Martin V. proceeded to excom- 
municate the readers of heretical 
books,—the Hussites and Wickliffites 
growing numerous about that time. 
Leo X. and his successors followed 
Montnty Mac. No, 375, 
his example, till the Council of Trent 
brought forth their Expurgatory Index. 
To complete the measure of encroach- 
ment, their last invention was to ordain . 
that no book should be printed, unless 
it had been licensed under the names of 
two or three friars. The popes intro- 
duced this custom into England; and, 
though a great and crying abuse, it 
Was sanctioned by the English Pres- 
bytery during the Long Parliament.. 
In our own age we have seen a 
society erected, which has impudently 
taken on itself the odious powers of 
censorship, under the canting pretence 
of suppressing vice, and similar cant- 
ing has always been the hypocritical 
means of keeping up this vassalage of 
the human mind. It is good policy 
in a government to put forward its 
tools in apparently independent asso- 
ciations, whenever it desires to effect 
any odious purpose. 
BURDETT. 
On asking this baronet why, as he 
was able to eflect so little in Parlia- 
ment, he considered it worth his while 
to hold a seat, he replied that it was a 
protection, and that without it a public 
man was not independent of power.— 
I once advised him to give dinners to 
his friends, like other men of his consi- 
deration. He complied, and I was of 
his party: but I found it had been 
served from.a tavern, and, even in 
that way, he said he found it so in- 
compatible with his convenience, that 
he would never give another. His 
habits are too unsettled for the forms 
of society: he rises at all hours,~goes 
to bed at all hours,—eats at any hour, 
and in any way,—and is in all things, 
from hour to hour, the creature of his 
personal feelings. From this cause 
he never answers letters,—often does 
not open them; and, in his private 
connexions, is the most uncertain man 
alive. He is steady only in his devo- 
tion to the principles of liberty; but 
unsteady even in his measures regard- 
ing them. ‘The best of men, yet, from 
31 bad 
