SOME MODERN GROTTNDSWELL. 25 



j&amp;gt;*&amp;lt;5dict a continuance of fine weather, when there is no 

 appearance of a commotion among the elements, near or re 

 mote, the far-reaching effects of a distant storm may catch 

 the unwary coaster in his fancied security, and dash him 

 high on the beach, crippled for life., or a dead and sightless 

 corpse. 



. As the effects of a grounds well are proportionate to the 

 violence of the storm or disturbance which occasioned it, so 

 in the bodies politic and social we observe a similar pro 

 portion in the strength of periodic agitations resulting from 

 nial-administration, or other grievances which have grown 

 up in the lapse of years and become strong and odious. 



SOME MODERN GROUNDSWELLS. 



Modern history records many popular upheavals which 

 may well be termed groundswells, some of them actually 

 marking epochs in the life of the human race upon the 

 earth. 



Such was the convulsion, which, after centuries of mis 

 rule and corruption, shook English society to its center, in 

 the days of the first Charles, and ended only after that mon 

 arch, more sinned against than sinning, had lost his life. 

 Not even then was the struggle between kingly domination 

 and the rights of the people to a voice in the government 

 permanently decided. The &quot; last and worser Charles,&quot; re 

 called to the throne of his ancestors, provoked another storm, 

 which James II. was unwise enough to raise to fury, and 

 this time the Stuart was expelled from England, finally and 

 forever. 



That awful tragedy in modern history, known as the French 

 Revolution, in like manner was the direct consequence of 

 long years of oppression and misery, coupled with ignorance 

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