* "But Thou, thy suppliant Sons afar "Who vexest with injurious war, "Unnatural mother, hear thy doom! "Devoted BRITAIN, mark thy ills to come! "Enfeebled by corruption's sway, "The ruin of a mighty state, "Unhonour'd shalt thou sink to swift decay; "Each art, each virtue, fled that made thee great. "Torn from its base thy column lies, "Forgotten all thy victories; "In the throng'd port thy Cross is seen no more; "Lost are thy boasted laws, o'erthrown thy balanc'd pow'r. II. 2. "To peaceful realms the sword "In evil hour the proud IBERIAN bore; And Wealth uncounted swell'd his fatal store. "We ask but for peace, liberty and safety." Address of the Congress to the People of England. + The massacre of the innocent Peruvians, at the famous inter view of their emperor with Pizarro and his Spaniards, in the valley near Cusco, was quickly followed and revenged by the cruelties attending the civil wars in that country among the conquerors. Pizarro, after sacrificing Almagro to his ambition, who had been his friend, and his original partner in the conquest of Peru, was himself assassinated, at noon, in his palace, by the nephew and partisans of his rival. That sordid and cruel avarice which first "To mutual slaughter rush the frantic band: "Spirits of heroes old "Who erst your country's rights affail'd "Challeng'd in Arms; and now heav'n's guardian shield O'er ftruggling Freedom hold; "Rescuing her unpolluted shrine "In other climes her sons ye join. "Heaven her blazing portal spreads; "Shafts of glory pierce the night; "Lo! the bright van the Royal Patriot leads, "Founder of laws, and arbiter of right; "Pensive his brow, as when opprest By Danish pride his realm he view'd: "Girt with his peers + FITZWALTER lifts his crest, "With Him, who ill star'd HENRY'S arms with"stood; carried the sword thither, turned it against every one by whose death the ruffians could hope for plunder; and history affords scarce any thing more inhuman and perfidious than what the Spaniards suffered from each other, except the miseries they had before inflicted on the mild and helpless Indians. Alfred was the first who compiled a body of laws for the whole kingdom. Blackstone's Introduction. The leader of the barons who compelled King John to sign Magna Charta. Simon de Montfort, Earl of Leicester, headed the opponents of Henry III. "See SPENCER's foe, fierce LANCASTER appear, "And † KENT too early slain, and TRESSEL's brow "Frowning from CHALGRAVE's sanguine field, "In timely death his virtue seal'd, "The right he bled for, to maintain; "HAMPDEN in sun-bright mail augments the Train. "Victims of STUART'S bigot pride; "Nor are Ye absent, generous pair, In many a year of adverse fortune tried, "LEICESTER'S firm sou, and BEDFORD'S gentle heir. *The Earl of Lancaster was principal of the league against the Spencers, favourites of Edward II. who ruined that unfortunate prince, by alienating the affections of his people. + Edmund, Earl of Kent,' was a young man of an amiable character and of the blood royal. He joined in the opposition to the Spencers, but was afterward put to death by the intrigues of the queen mother of Edward III. for endeavouring to remove her and Mortimer from the station they had usurped and filled so ill. William Tressel, Chief Justice of England, was named procurator of the people, to resign back to Edward II. their fealty at his deposition, and to renounce their allegiance to him. § He was killed in a skirmish in the beginning of the civil wars, while the parliament's cause was yet that of liberty and the people. There seems a great similarity in the cases of Hampden refufing the payment of ship-money, and the American denial of parliamen tary taxation. The British parliament seems to stand nearly in the same relation to America, as the King to the people of England; each possesses a constitutional supremacy, which invests it with the most important powers; but each is bound to ab stain from invading a right which our constitution expressly reserves to the people; the only sure defence against the despotism of a King at home, or a nation at a distance. Whoever has seen the letters of Algernon Sidney, will easily estimate the worth of that truly great character, A modern reader "Join'd in Love, in Fate ye fell! "Still the just Muse your fame shall tell "Where Freedom holds on earth her hallow'd seat; "And nations yet unborn the pious strains repeat. III. 2. "Ye too, they cry, be bold! "Uncheck'd by secret guile, or force abhorr❜d, "And dauntless brave the mercenary sword. "And when are past the appointed years, "Smites with a giant's force, and quells her pow'r, III. 3. "Fast by the sapphire throne "Its adamant beam the balance sways, "That set the suffering nations free, "Cherish deeds by heaven approv'd "And virtues equal to thy doom "Thrice happy land! See on thy plains belov'd "The sacred Muse her promis'd seat assume. will be much struck with the following passage from one of his father, the Earl of Leicester. "It was not God's will that the King "should follow the advice I gave him, to accommodate his diffe"rences with the Scots, and not to make war, where nothing was to "be gained and much might be lost." However convulsions like those in America may retard the progress of the arts during their continuance, they make abundant re "As o'er the main thy Towers arise, 66 Spreading their salutary light; "And bless with hope the weary'd seaman's eyes, "Worn with th' Atlantic storm, and wrapt in night, "Thy genial breast shall still th' Unhappy greet, Refuge of injur'd Worth, and Freedom's last retreat." EPITAPH ON SOPHOCLES. FROM THE GREEK OF SIMMIAS THE THEBAN. AROUND my Sophocles's grave REV. R. BLAND. compence, by forcing the minds of men to uncommon exertions. The strength thus acquired cannot fail of producing the noblest fruits, when the return of peace and establishment of freedom permits them to be occupied with those objects. |