ition, except from Mr. Thornton,
member for the city of York, who inveighed against it with great
fervour, as a measure that savoured of French policy, to which the
English nation ever had the utmost aversion. He affirmed, that the
method in which it was proposed this register should be kept, would
furnish the enemies of Great Britain with continual opportunities of
knowing the strength or weakness of the nation; that it would empower
an ill-designing minister to execute any scheme subversive of public
liberty, invest parish and petty officers of the peace with exorbitant
powers, and cost the nation about fifty thousand pounds a-year to carry
the scheme into execution. These arguments, which, we apprehend,
are extremely frivolous and inconclusive, had great weight with a
considerable number who joined in the opposition, while the ministry
stood neutral. Nevertheless, after having undergone some amendments, it
was conveyed to the lords, by whom it was, at the second reading, thrown
out as a scheme of very dangerous tendency. The legislature of Great
Britain have, on some occasions, been more startled at the distant
shadow of a bare possibility, than at the real approach of the most
dangerous innovation.

SIR HANS SLOANE'S MUSEUM PURCHASED BY PARLIAMENT.

From the usual deliberations on civil and commercial concerns, the
attention of the parliament, which had seldom or never turned upon
literary avocations, was called off by an extraordinary subject of this
nature. Sir Hans Sloane, the celebrated physician and naturalist,
well known through all the civilized countries of Europe for his ample
collection of rarities, culled from the animal, vegetable, and mineral
kingdoms, as well as of antiquities and curiosities of art, had
directed, in his last will, that this valuable museum, together with his
numerous library, should be offered to the parliament, for the use
of the public, in consideration of their paying a certain sum in
compensation to his heirs. His terms were embraced by the commons, who
agreed to pay twenty thousand pounds for the whole, supposed to be worth
four times that sum; and a bill was prepared for purchasing this museum,
together with the Harleian collection of manuscripts, so denominated
from its founder, Robert Harley, earl of Oxford, lord-high-treasurer of
England, and now offered to the public by his daughter, the duchess of
Portland. It was proposed, that these purchases should be joined to th