ence on the accumulated pile of our political prejudices, to extend and strengthen it, by undermining all our moral sentiments and national habits? Yet we are told, that there is no imputation on the moral character of Oliver! We wonder Mr. Wilberforce did not suggest that his religious character also remained unimpeached, except, indeed, that he had been guilty of subornation of treason on the Sabbath-day. According to our present catechism of legitimacy, to be a cat's-paw is to be virtuous—is to be moral—is to be pious—is to be loyal—is to be a patriot—is to be what Castles is, and Castlereagh approves!—This subject naturally leads us into low company and low allusions. As, after Fielding's Hero had finished his speech on honour, his friend the Count pronounced him a Great Prig, so, after Lord Castlereagh's speech of Monday evening, we can no longer refuse to consider him a Great Man, in the sense of the philosophical historian; that is to say, a man who has a very great regard for himself, and a very great contempt for the prejudices and feelings of the rest of mankind.
July 15, 1817.
The debate in the House of Commons on Mr. Brougham's motion took a very spirited, and rather personal turn. We do not think Lord Castlereagh was quite successful in rebutting the principal charges brought against his foreign and domestic policy. With respect to Genoa, for instance, and the late arbitrary contributions levied on British merchants there, his Lordship seemed to say that he had but one object, and that in this respect his conduct had been uniformly consistent while abroad, namely, to protect legitimacy, and that the rights and property of British subjects were accordingly left to shift for themselves, as things beneath his notice. This answer will hardly satisfy most of our readers. He considered it an illiberal and injurious policy to
