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GLEANINGS THROUGH HOLLAND

AND WESTPHALIA.

LETTER LVI.

I HAVE, hitherto, purposely put off one important but difaftrous fubject, to the laft moment; although I have now, for the space of fome years, in my different traverfings of the continent, been placed, as it were, in the very eye and ear of it. You feel that I mean the dreadful public, and yet more fatal private, wars of this and many other countries, on this unhappy fide of the English Channel.

What, my loved friend, is the matter with them all!

"Sure 'tis the very error of the moon,

"She comes more near the earth than fhe was wont,

"And makes men mad."

Does it proceed from the facred flame of liberty, which exalts the human almoft to the divine nature?or are the nations filled with clamours

VOL. III.

B

clamours" for that which no man felt the want "of, and with care for freedom, which has never "been in danger?" Springs it from a due fenfe of that proud principle within us, which points at the right which every honeft individual has to rank with the loftieft of the fpecies, when measured by the ftandard of nature?-or from that factious and discontented fpirit, which prompts the worst of mankind to trouble the repofe, and plunder the poffeffions of the best? Comes it from true patriotifm, or from that party rage, which "robs it of its good name ?" It proceeds from all these. But with respect to Equality, on the literal idea, as the mob are encouraged, for reafons they cannot penetrate, to conceive it, was there ever fuch a day-dream? To make the abfurdity more egregious, yet more palateable, it is called natural equality! Prepofterous as falfe! What, dear friend, in nature is equal? Survey her productions: from the first to the laft, from the most gigantic to the moft minute, as well in animals as man, what is there which fhe has not created UNEQUAL, even by express order of the Creator? And by that very inequality intending to promote the wisdom, force, and felicity of the whole? Amongst the fifhes of the fea, and the fowls of the air, and the beafts of the field, the grand line of fubordination, drawn by nature, goes

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on. Would you give to the linnet the wing of the eagle, or to the turnfpit the speed of the greyhound? To what end? Would not nature, by that exchange, be violated in her general laws, and would the beings themselves be the better for it? Am I told, that all these creatures were put under the fubjection of man, and that he, as the lord of all below, can have naturally no fuperior but the God that gave him life? The argument refts then, it seems, on the natural equality of human creatures. Fallacious again. For of all the beings in the fcale of the universe, man,—if we except his origin, concerning the equality of which he has no

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right to be proud, than the worm that devours his 'carcafe, is the most subject to the laws of natural in-equality. The point which places him at the top of the creation is certainly his foul; for his body, whether a masterpiece of beauty, or a mafs of deformity, is alike corruptible, and rather an object of humiliation than of triumph. But, were you disposed to felect, from the diverfified works of nature, any fpecimen of her wonderful variety and irregularity, could you fix on any thing fo proper to display that irregularity, that variety, as the human mind? So far from there being herein an univerfal equality, there is nothing fo unequal amongst all the performances of Creation.

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The ftrength of the lion is not more remote from the feebleness of the gnat, nor the swiftness of the rein-deer from the tardiness of the fnail, than the distance between the power and weaknefs, velocity and flowness, of men's fouls and understandings. Nature, by uncontrollable laws, has established, that to one man fhould be given an head to plan, govern, and command; to another, hands to toil and obey. Innumerable are the gradations, from thofe who guide the helm of the state, to those who regulate the fteerage of a fimple fkiff; from the noblest architect to the most ordinary artificer. The harmonies of civil fociety are carried on by the joint affistance of all these in their proper places; take them out of which, and tranfpofe them, put one into the station of another, and, in fhort, jumble them together, on the plea of natural equality, according to the new fyftem, and what refults from all this? What becomes of civil fociety, and of the world? Doth not fuch a farce upon the decent fubordinations and arrangements of nature, of nature, fill it with difcords, diforders, and death? Look into the page of ancient annals, and into the more fanguinary history of modern times-what do they exhibit but a tiffue of abfurdity, horror, and blood?

Can it be fuppofed, were thefe at length to fubfide, by the establishment of Republicanifm

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