plied the country with a band of natural and
independent leaders, trustees of those legal institutions which pervade
the land, and which are the origin of our political constitution. That
great body corporate, styled a nation-a vast assemblage of human beings
knit together by laws and arts and customs, by the necessities of the
present and the memory of the past--offers in this country, through
these its vigorous and enduring members, a more substantial and healthy
framework than falls to the lot of other nations. Our stout-built
constitution throws off with more facility and safety those crude and
dangerous humours which must at times arise in all human communities.
The march of revolution must here at least be orderly. We are preserved
from those reckless and tempestuous sallies that in other countries,
like a whirlwind, topple down in an instant an ancient crown, or sweep
away an illustrious aristocracy. This constitution, which has secured
order, has consequently promoted civilisation; and the almost unbroken
tide of progressive amelioration has made us the freest, the wealthiest,
and the most refined society of modern ages. Our commerce is unrivalled,
our manufacturers supply the world, our agriculture is the most skilful
in Christendom. So national are our institutions, so completely have
they arisen from the temper and adapted themselves to the character of
the people, that when for a season they were apparently annihilated,
the people of England voluntarily returned to them, and established them
with renewed strength and renovated vigour.

The constitution of England is again threatened, and at a moment when
the nation is more prosperous, more free, and more famous than at any
period of its momentous and memorable career. Why is this? What has
occasioned these distempered times, which make the loyal tremble and
the traitor smile? Why has this dark cloud suddenly gathered in a sky so
serene and so splendid? Is there any analogy between this age and that
of the first Charles? Are the same causes at work, or is the apparent
similarity produced only by designing men, who make use of the perverted
past as a passport to present mischief? These are great questions, which
it may be profitable to discuss and wise to study.

Rapin, a foreigner who wrote our history, in the course of his frigid
yet accurate pages, indulged in one philosophical observation. Struck
at the same time by our greatness and by the fury of our fac