\ 
1800,] State of the Manners, Se. 
For the Monthly Magazine. 
PRESENT STATE Of the MANNERS, SOCI- 
ETY, Go. &c. of the METROPOLIS of 
ENGLAND. » — 
_ (Continued from page 222.) 
HE architeéture of this country has 
been gradually improving during the 
laft fixty years. The heavy fabrics of brick 
work, the uniform fquare mafs of building, 
which were admired in the days of WIL- 
LIAM AND Mary, and which had fuc- 
ceeded the uncouth @ru€tures that braved 
both time and proportion finee the reign 
of Elizabeth, now yield to the more light 
and finifhed elegance of Italian models. 
The introdu@ion of Portland fione has 
tended very confiderably to improve the 
beauty of Englifh a:chitecture; while the 
balcony wiudow, the Venetian gallery, by 
admitting a larger hody of air into the 
apartinents, greatly contribute to the 
health of thofe who inhabit the metropo- 
lis. Dre(s has alfo been confiderably im- 
proved by our intercourfe with foreign 
nations: he women of this country now 
adopt a fpecies of decoration at once eafy 
and graceful. Nature feems to refume her 
empire, while art is hourly declining. The 
deformities of itiffened fays, high heels, 
powder, whalebone petticoats, and un- 
meaning flounces of many coloured frip- 
pery, now yield to the fimple elegance of 
cambric and muflin drapery: thus health 
is preferved by an unconftrained motion of 
the bedy; and beavty is afcertained by 
_ the unequivocal teftimonies of fymmetry 
and nature. : 
The females of England are confidera- 
bly indebted to our moft celebrated a&tref- 
fes for the revolution in drefs. Accuftom- 
ed of late years to behold the coffume of 
various nations gracefully difplayed at 
our theatres, women of rank, who lead 
the capricious idol Fasuion, through all 
the mazes of polite fociety, fpeedily 
adopted what they eonfidered as advanta- 
geous to beauty. The Turkith robe, the 
Giecian drapery, the fimplicity of the 
French peafant, and the natural graces of 
Engiifh fymmetry, {peedily united in pre- 
fenting the moft attraftive models of dig- 
nity and tafte.., To the elegant attitudes 
of Lady Hamilton the female world is 
~alfo tonfiderably indebted, The form of 
this lady is not peculiarly gifted with love- 
line(s, though fhe is ‘unqueftionably a 
charming woman} but fhe has made the 
motion of the human frame her ftudy ; and 
from her example the women of the prefent 
day in Italy and France, as well as in 
England, ‘have been obferved to acquire 
an ealy elegance of manner, which was fo 
_Monrary Mac, No, 65. — ) 
_ ation. 
‘ 
of the Metropolis of England, 305. 
finely imagined in the portraits of Sir 
‘Peter Lely, and our modern Apelles, Sir 
Jofhua Reynclds. | 
Of our public ,/pectacles I have already 
taken a retrofpeét. But the Oratorio has 
not yet been the fubjeét of animadvertion. 
This haymenic meeting, at a feafon when 
it is calculated to infpire a kind of religi- 
ous enthufiafm, fhould not be intermingled 
with compofitions of a lefs ferious nature. 
The performance of DRYDEN’s ODE has 
ever been a violation of propriety.’ The 
triumphs of LOVE and WINE; the pra:fe 
of Baccuus, the feats of THals, are ren- 
dered ludicrous, when introduced among 
the moit facred fubjeéts. However exqui- 
fite this ede may be in, the opinion of lire- 
rary judges, it has unqueftionably no claim 
to religicus veneration. Why,then is it 
permitted to form apart of facsed harmo.g . 
ny?, An oraterio is calculated to focthe 
the imagination ; to infpire, to awaken an 
holy zeal, a fervour of devotion, Hew 
then muft reafon turn difgufted from thole 
paflaces in the Ode tc St. Cecilia, which 
are fcarcely decent; and unqueitionably 
tending to the abfurd fuperfiition of the 
Heathea mythology. 
There never were fo many monthly and 
diurnal publications as at the prefent pe- 
riod; and to the perpetual novelty which 
iffves from the prefs may in a great mea- 
fure be attributed the expanfion of mind, 
which daily evinces itfelf among all clafles 
of the people. “The monthly mifcellanies 
are read by the middling orders of fociety, 
by the Zterati, and fometimes by the lof- 
tieft_ of our nobility.. The daily prints 
fall into the hands of all claffes: they 
difplay the temper of the times ; the intri- 
cacies of political manceuvre; the opinians 
of ‘the learned, the enlightened, and the 
patriotic.. But<for the medium of a di- 
urnal paper, the letters of Junius had 
been unknown, or perhaps never written. 
Political controverly and literary difcuf- 
fions are only rendered of utility to mai- 
kind, by the fpirit-oF emulative conten- 
tion. “Ihe prefs is the mirror-where foliy 
may fee its own likeseis, and vice ccn- 
template the magnitude of its deformity. 
It alfo prefepts*a- tablet of manners; a 
tran{cript of the temper cf mankind; a 
check on the gigantic ttrides of innovations, * 
and a bulwark which REASON has ravfed, 
and, it is to.be hoped, rime will confe- 
crate, round the altar of immortal Li- 
BERTY ! 
There is nothing of mere importance 
to the rifing generation than the method 
of inculcating the early rudiments of edu- 
Public fchools' have been found 
Re of 

ar 
a 
