2801.] 
Ireland, the provincial-government is di- 
recting roads to be made into feme of the 
mountainous and favage diftri&ts of the 
ifland 5 but, as for any performance of pr6- 
mifes to cultivate or civilize by education 
the long-negleéted wafte of the public 
mind—-O! if knowledge be the wing 
wherewith men fly to heaven, with what 
oltrich-wings have the rulers of this country 
been furnifhed ! ' 
They have degraded the character of 
-the prefs by methods unknown in any 
other nation. Inftead of the public prints 
being, as they ought to be, a paleitra for 
the exercife of literary talent, and the 
wreltle of rival minds, they are turned into 
a fickly peftilential pool,which extinguithes 
exery fpark of literature, and the great 
inftrument of freedom is immerfed in the 
very cloacaof thecity. I know not how 
any dignifidd sovernment can give coun- 
y aig 8 e 
tenance and fanétion to fuch papers, ex- 
cept under the fame pretence that the 
Popes are faid to give their licence to bro- 
‘thels, and an Emperor drew a tax from 
ordure. 
As the Maratifin of politics poifoned 
the virtue of the Parifian Revolution; fo it 
is the contagious effinvia of corrupted 
\ 
minds, fuch as penned the Hifory of the 
late Irifh rebellion, which may be called 
the Maratifm of-loyalty, and which pre- 
pares us for the extinétion of the prefs, 
by polluting it with the virus of perfonal 
fcandal.. Habit indeed may, in fome mea- 
fure, fortify us from fuch infection, and 
(after wafhing our hands) we may take up, 
without harm, fome of the journals of the 
day; but, notwithftanding, the fair and 
free character of the Irith prefs is injured, 
juft as the town of Philadelphia fuffers 
from the dirt of the docks, and the filth 
of the common fewers. The ftyle of the 
public papers has its influence upon the 
manners of the. country, and is again in- 
fluenced by thofe manners, They copy 
that tone of converfation too common 
-among men of high ftation,° which mixes 
a coarfe contempt. of decency with the 
blackguardifm of the bar, and banifhies 
from the leffer intercourfes of ‘life that 
gentlemanfhip which is equally the duty 
of democrat. and ariftocrat. I know no 
character fo complete and confiftenc as a 
perfon uniting the principles of republi- 
canifm with the manners of refined arif- 
tocracy. 
I have ever liked the principles better 
than the perfons of democrats, their po- 
litical maxims better than ‘their private 
and perfonal manners ;—and were I to 
judge of the doctrine merely from the dif- 
abe ' 
On the Spirit of Enquiry. 
287 
ciples—-of the mind. from the manners, 
which are nothing elfe than mind at the 
furface, I fhould be led to conclude that 
the extremes of political charaé¥er are 
apt to affimilate, and that democracy is 
for the molt part nothing but ariltocracy 
in a fhabby coat. I fee the fame infat- 
ferable pride and fatal feif-confidence in 
both parties, and I fay with the immortal 
-Montefquieu; ** As diliant as heaven is 
from the earth, fo is the true fpirit of 
equality from that of extreme equality.’* 
O facred names of Liberty, Juftice, our 
Country, Concord, Peace!—If fee them 
written on the ftandard of Democracy ; 
but in the manners of the men that march 
under thefe banners, I find ariftocratic 
felf-fufficiency—ariftoeratic and exclufive 
party-{fpirit—ariftocratic demeanour to 
menials—ariftocratic negleét, not to fay 
contempt, of the houfhold virtues, which, 
if not effential tothe grand public virtues, 
are at leafi their moft amiable accompani- 
ment, and perhaps their beit and furek 
guarantee. 
There is a ferocioufnefs of {pirit among 
the great vulgar as well as the: fmall, 
which equally a&uates the loyalift and 
the revolutionift, which has much more of 
perfonal vengeance in its nature, than 
any public feeling, and which. arifing 
from a partial view of things, both as to 
the caufes and the remedies of national 
evils, is to be mitigated not by the pre-~ 
amble of an Act of Parliament, but by 
an encouragement to the ipirit of inquiry, 
which would infenfibly tame the violence. 
of our pdfiions by enabling us to fee 
things as they really are, We want the 
means of exciting great paffions. We 
have loft our country. It is the afcen- 
dancy of little perfonal paffions svhich 
are the effect of bigotry in the common 
people, of a domincering habit in the up- 
per clafles, and of grofs ignorance in 
both, fofered by a partiality in the leqif- 
lature, and a ftrong averfion in the Ca- 
tholic clergy to yield up to their Jaity the 
free exercife and enlarged cuJtivation of 
their own reafon; it is to thefe caules we 
are to «itribute rebellious difpofitions, 
and the barbarities that were, will be, 
and mult be, confequent upon inveterate 
party and religious animofities. Educa- 
tion is the harp of Orpheus, which gra- 
dually mollifies the furioufnefs of uncivi- 
lized nature, and tames the tigers of the 
human breaft. If the priefts take and 
keep pofleffion of the reafon of mankind, 
I fay they are refponfible for the fatal ef. 
feéts of their paffions,. I will allow thac 
the facerdotal influence in early Mages of 
fociety . 
- 
