But one should hear at the end of each piece, the cries o bility and joy of this multitude and its transports, O ben O che gusto! Piacer da morire ! &c. I have seen some unable to control their delight, embraced the horses of t riages in the crowd; and it is well known that Italian hor not so gentle as the English or even as our own. All the this phrenzy, the most of us Frenchmen heard nothing noise, and were far from paying any attention to the music.

We cannot afford space for farther extracts from Mo journal, at this time. On returning to France in 1759, commenced the study of mercantile and political eco which he had begun before his journey to Italy. He wa sented to Madame Geoffrin at this time, whose house the losophers frequented. After their literary dinners, an e lent thing when truly literary, D'Alembert, Raynal, Helv Marmontel, &c. used to resort to the Tuilleries to meet other friends, learn the news, and criticise the govern They took great interest in the various success of their brother Frederic, and were of course disposed to oppos to the French ministry. Madame Geoffrin, a great ministe ist, attempted to divide the forces of the philosophers on march to the place of meeting. When Raynal, D'Alem or Marmontel were about leaving her together, she would tain one of them. This policy of the hostess was defeated by philosophers waiting for each other at the foot of the stairc and she was forced to acknowledge her opposition was v About this time they were violently attacked in a discours the academy by M. de Pompignan. Voltaire replied by s eral satires, and the other light armed troops of ridicule w manœuvred so effectually that de Pompignan was obliged effect an immediate retreat to his own province, accompan by this quotation, made by the dauphin :

'Et l'ami Pompignan pense être quelque chose.'

On the side of the assailants, Palissot wrote the philosophe comedy,' in which they were brought forward to ridicule a hatred, in the style of the old comedy. Morellet procured by a accident an account of the events of the private life of Paliss which he worked up into a satire, that he acknowledges hims passed the bounds of legitimate warfare. Palissot, howeve had friends in power, and Morellet had been imprudent enoug to introduce a lady, who was among the most powerful, in h 'preface to the philosophers' comedy.' This little affair con

cluded therefore by the Abbé's being committed to the bastile for a few weeks, and on his release, being requested to pass the autumn out of Paris. These two months of confinement were passed by Morellet in a round of study, conversation, and exercise, the two last, consisting of singing to himself and dancing round his chamber. Madame de Luxembourg at length obtained his liberation, in consequence of the solicitations of Malesherbes, D'Alembert, and J. J. Rousseau. The latter, in his confessions, complains of Morellet's coldness in his thanks to him on this occasion, and of his having supplanted him in the favor of Madame de Luxembourg. Accordingly, the chapter of these memoirs following the account of the confinement at the bastile, is employed in giving some account of the suspicious disposition of Rousseau. From this portion of the work we can make no extracts. It is incidentally mentioned, however, that the Baron d'Holbach, of whom we shall speak presently, used constantly to employ himself to irritate Rousseau, under the idea that his conversation was more spirited and brilliant, when he was incensed. After this avowal, we cannot see how d'Holbach can complain of Rousseau's illtemper, as he does formally in the same breath, to Morellet. A sensibility less delicate than the Genevan's, might become suspicious when his intimate companions passed their time in endeavoring to excite him with contradiction and raillery, as the bear and bull baiters contrive elastic images to rise again whenever they are thrown over, to irritate the wretched animals, from whose fury and pain the public amusement is derived. It appears that Rousseau had been led to believe that Morellet had written a pastoral instruction,' in which he had been ill treated. The Abbé speaks with very great enthusiasm of Rousseau's eloquence, though with bitterness, of what he calls his deadly principles of equality.'

6

Morellet, though not himself an irreligious man, was greatly delighted with the society of the atheistical philosophers. The following account of their meetings at the house of the baron d'Holbach, may be amusing to some of our readers :

His house at this time collected the most distinguished of the Frenchmen of letters: Diderot, J. J. Rousseau, Helvétius, Barthès, Venelle, Rouelle and his scholars, Rouse and Darcet, Duclos, Saurin, Raynal, Suard, Marmontel, St Lambert, La Condamine, the Chevalier Chasteleux, &c. The baron himself was one of the best educated men of his time, knowing many of the modern lan

we do find in our censuses. Mr Godwin says that more than one half of the whole population are under the age of sixteen; and if he will count the numbers between the ages of sixteen and twenty-five, he will find them equal to any fair calculations which can be made of the number, which has died from the population existing twenty-five years ago. Our census is taken at the end of every ten years. We ought, therefore, to find in each census, the number of inhabitants under the age of ten years exceeding the amount of the whole increase which has taken place during the preceding ten years. It should exceed the amount of the increase, because the places of those of the original stock who have died during the period must be supplied by those who have been born within it, before we can begin to count an increase. And accordingly, we find that in every census which has ever been taken in this country, the inhabitants under the age of ten years do exceed, by a considerable number, the amount of increase which had taken place since the preceding census. If any thing more were wanting in reference to this principal point of all,' Mr G. himself has kindly furnished it. In Sweden, the tables of which Mr G. has furnished us, it seems that the number of persons above the age of fifteen are double those under that age. And yet the population of Sweden, according to Mr G's own statement, is increasing. In the United States, those above the age of sixteen are not quite equal to those under the same age.

We have thus, though not without some trial of our patience, followed Mr Godwin through his statements and arguments which have any relation to this country. In doing this, we have been obliged incidentally to notice some of the principal errors in his general view of the subject of population. Something we had intended to add on his misrepresentations of Mr Malthus' views and arguments; and in consideration of what we should say on this subject, we have hitherto treated the book with more forbearance than it merited. But we have no room left for so endless a topic; and the able reviews of this work from Edinburgh and London, which are already in possession of our readers, render such remarks superfluous. Notwithstanding the disgust we feel at the flimsy, shallow, and uncandid manner in which Mr Godwin has acquitted himself, we are glad that he has written on the subject. After the lapse of more than twenty years, and when the charms of novelty must have ceased, the world has been called upon to recon

sider and revise the judgment it originally pronounced on the truth of Mr Malthus' work. The consequence has been an entire and deliberate affirmance of that judgment; and henceforth, we presume, the subject of population will be considered

as at rest.

ART. XIV.-Memoires de l'abbe Morellet, de l'academie Française, sur le 18e siecle et sur la revolution, &c. Paris, 2 vols. 1821.

LADY MORGAN, in her France, thus commemorates the subject of our present article: 'Morellet, the dear friend of Diderot who had nearly lost his reason in the donjon of Vincennes, of Rousseau banished for the novelty of his paradoxes, of Marmontel who had been thrown into the bastile for reciting a humorous satire, was naturally a friend to the revolution.' In this instance, the fair historian appears to have been more solicitous to establish the most natural theory on the probable conduct of Morellet, than to draw any inferences from the actual facts. He appears to have been throughout, firmly, though peacefully, opposed to the prevailing doctrines of the new philosophy and politics, as far as they affected the state. Indeed the sympathy, with the misfortunes of his friends, which is ascribed to him in the extract just made, would hardly operate sufficiently on his mind to counteract the adverse influence of his own personal losses, by the confiscation of the church property. We have been in fact annoyed by the frequency with which the Abbé, in the memoirs before us, reverts to events which, it cannot be denied, appear to have affected him quite as much from the consequences to himself, as from the dangers to more general interests, which were anticipated or realized in their progress. Thus he speaks in the following way of the suppression of the Société de Sorbonne,' a theological assembly, which he describes as improperly confounded with the theological faculty of the same name, and into which he was admitted.

By the suppression of this establishment, without any indemnity to its members, is not an act of remarkable violence towards private property committed? To procure admission into this society, every one of its members had prolonged his studies, un

dergone examinations, and incurred expense; these efforts and their reward were his personal property.-By what right and with what justice did the assemblies, styled national, deprive me of these advantages, without affording me the slightest indemnity? I had my portion, during life, of the usufructuary property of fifty thousand livres, the income of the association to which I belonged; I had my portion of the building, the use of a public library, cmmon apartments, and provisions, which the house furnished at a low price, and under pretence that it was a public institution, I am deprived of all!"

It is a little surprising, therefore, that the literary veteran, of whose memoirs we propose to give some account at present, should ever have been described by any writer, however inaccurate, as a revolutionary partisan. But Lady Morgan has been abundantly dealt with, and we are all liable to error.

André Morellet died the 12th January 1819, at the great age of 92 years. This long life he passed in a succession of useful literary labors. He has left behind him a long list of translated and original works, and he enjoyed more or less the intercourse of the distinguished public and literary characters who flourished in France and England during his career. The book before us begins with his éloge, delivered before the academy. This is followed by his memoirs, written by himself, up to the year 1800; and the work concludes with extracts from his writings, illustrations of passages in his life, and notices of some of his contemporaries. At the age of fourteen he was sent to a seminary in Paris, from Lyons, his birthplace. After five years at this school, he passed through his concluding examination with some credit. During this period, he describes himself as having become a very acute disputant, and as producing objections in argument with great success. At the close of his stay, by the assistance of a distant relation, who gave him a thousand francs, he obtained the situation in the Société de Sorbonne, already mentioned. Here he passed the ensuing five or six years of his life with great tranquillity, 'never leaving his room or the library but for the lecture room or dining hall,' and having no acquaintance but the inmates of the institution. He was called 'good Morellet,' and in point of theory, was at this time a confirmed optimist. Though very violent in manner and gesture, especially in disputation, he was remarkably good tempered and friendly in disposition. I used to spit blood sometimes,' says he, 'from the violence