as a beneficial mean for improvement, resembles the rose of Florida, the bird of Paradise, or the cypress of Greece. The first, the most beautiful of flowers, emitting no fragrance ;the second, the most beautiful of birds, yielding no song ;the third, the finest of trees, yielding no fruit. It has, not inaptly, been called a species of "adultery." It characterizes a weak and superficial mind, ill qualifies it for honourable exertion, and peculiarly unfits its possessor for selecting brilliant subjects to exercise his fancy; or furnishing correct and sound materials to form and elevate the understanding.

To a judicious love of novelty, on the other hand, may we refer some of the pleasures we derive from contrast; the various changes of climate and seasons; the observance of manners and customs of nations; the charms of science; and the delights of poetry. Since, by directing the attention to a diversity of objects, the mind roves, as it were, in an enchanted theatre; imbibing rich and comprehensive ideas, that administer, in a manner the most vivid and impressive, to the organs of perception and taste. Directed to its proper end, the enlargement of the understanding, by the acquirement of knowledge,-it conduces to the improvement of every art, and contributes to the perfection of every science.

DIFFERENCE BETWEEN LOVE AND ADMIRATION.

As the passion of legitimate love is engendered and confirmed by intimacy of connexion, so, on the other hand, the passion of admiration is awakened by distance, and kept alive by continual novelty. For these two passions,-so often confounded with each other,—are not more different in their origin, than in their results. What we love becomes more endeared to us by repetition; what we admire ceases to please us, when it ceases to be new. Thus is it with scenery. The vine in our garden, the oak that shades our cottage, the woods that shelter us from the north, are not more high, more shady, more neat, or more fruitful, than other oaks, vines, cottages,

and woods; but, from long familiarity, they acquire a title to our preference, by the interesting associations with which they are connected; and having acquired that title, we should be unwilling to exchange them for the most beautiful vale of the South, or the proudest mountain of the North. On the other hand, let us climb the triple Cader-Idris, Ben Lomond, or Ben Nevis; and, after viewing with admiration their several wonders, let us inquire of our own feelings, if we do not look around for other objects to gratify our desires. Novelty once satisfied, admiration ceases; and when we cease to admire, we become weary.

Such is the difference between love and admiration in scenery. The one, begetting tranquillity and content, requires no aliment; the other, continually searching for food, engenders restlessness. Hence the poet, wandering among the rocks of Pelion, and the vales of Olympus, hails with pleasure the plains of Larissa, decked with all the riches of a fertile soil. The traveller, who has long been indulging in the more elevated scenery of the Grisons, feels himself relieved, when he enters the green valleys of Piedmont, and the extended vales of Tuscany; and the white summits of St. Bernard, the glaciers of the Rhetian, and the wonders of the Pennine Alps, are exchanged, with satisfaction, for the calm and fertile meads of Novorese and Aosta.

Distance gives mysterious beauty to landscape, as it does to human greatness: and when we have quitted scenes, hallowed to our feelings by the moral treasures they possess, the greater the distance, the greater the pleasure we derive from a remembrance of them.

Admiration requiring something ever new to gratify its appetite, those objects, which excite the wonder and admiration of strangers, are viewed with indifference, bordering on frigidity, by the natives of the country, in which they are situated. Humboldt relates, that at Schauffhausen he knew VOL. II.

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many persons, who had never seen the fall of the Rhine; and while at Santa Cruz, he could find only one person, who had ascended the Peak of Teneriffe.

Totally unconscious, and sometimes utterly unworthy of the beautiful country, in which they live, men of this kind require some one to point out to them the lovely scenes, by which they are surrounded; in the same manner, as many a nobleman of England, Germany, and Italy, know the value of their paintings and sculptures, only by the applause, bestowed on them by learned and enlightened strangers. They are the bodies of insects, buried in amber! Thus was it when Petrarch visited Rome, in the fourteenth century. While viewing the fragments of temples, the remnants of statues, the falling porticoes, the baths, the aqueducts, the tesselated pavements, and, above all, the gigantic ruins of the Coliseum, he was indignant to find, that the tribune Rienzi, and his friend Colonna, were alone conversant in the history of, and appeared alone to sympathize with, those noble and magnificent ruins. "No one," said he, 66 were more ignorant of Rome, than the Romans themselves."

MYSTERY IN LANDSCAPE.

SOME scenes there are, which acquire an increased interest, from being only partially revealed to us. Landscape has its secrets, as well as women. We must not see every thing at once; nor must we see every thing, there is to be seen. The rose, in full display of beauty, is not so captivating, as, when opening her paradise of leaves, she speaks to the fancy, rather than the sight. Thus the imagination, which so frequently borrows from Nature, repays her obligations, by giving additional grace and splendour to her beauties. In poetry, the light touches of Anacreon fire the fancy, in a much higher degree, than the minute descriptions of Ovid; the nervous brevity of Lucretius defines more clearly to the mental eye, than all the profuse delineations of Cow

ley and the obscure image of death, in Milton, is even more horrific than the Ugolino of Dante.

The observation holds good in reference to landscape; and hence arises the cause, why straight lines are so peculiarly offensive; why landscape admits of no symmetry; and why Alpine views are not so agreeable for any length of time, as those, that are observed from the sides, or at the feet of high and woody mountains. Lakes must wind, and trees must hide, or the beauties of the finest scene will pall upon the sight. Had we the Venus de Medicis always unveiled before us, we should soon cease to be moved by the whiteness of her bosom, or the symmetry of her contour.

EFFECTS OF CONTRAST.

FROM novelty springs the pleasure, which is ever attendant on judicious contrast. The earth, and "all that it inhabits," animals, birds, fishes, and insects; flowers, plants, trees, and rivers; the air, the clouds, the stars, nay, the whole universal region of infinity, are all one vast, one interminable tissue of decided contrast. So also are the feelings, the opinions, and passions of man; the form of his external frame, as well as the organic principles of his mind. In music and in painting; in architecture and mechanics; indeed, throughout the whole circle of the sciences and the arts, are the laws of contrast also acknowledged and confirmed. Hence is it, that, as in the formation of beauty, the most opposite colours are frequently employed, so in the architecture of governments, those constitutions, which present the most nicely opposed contrasts or balances, have universally been found to be the best in theory, and the most reducible to practice :-even the contrasts of contending interests, in a state, contribute to the proper administration of a government.

It is not a little remarkable, that Ferdinand, king of Cas

tile, should have have been sensible, in some measure, of the truth of this remark; as we may learn from his answer to those Castilians, who solicited him to deprive the states of Arragon of their independence. This he refused to do; alleging as his reason, "that the equilibrium of power, enjoyed by the king and people, contributed to public safety; and that whenever the one preponderated over the other, ruin was the consequence to one, if not to both." And yet the benefits of these balances were neither observable to Tacitus nor Bonaparte. Tacitus was of opinion, that a constitution, consisting of three estates, could have no long duration; and when La Fayette returned thanks to Bonaparte, for his liberation from the dungeon of Olmutz, the First Consul presumed to assert, that Mons. La Fayette had endeavoured to establish a 'solecism, in appointing a monarch, at the head of a republic".

* Annal. iv. c. 33.—Cicero, however, speaks of the three estates with approbation. De Republica, lib. ii.

b This is very well for a man who began his career in the midst of anarchy, and finished by establishing a despotism. But the British constitution might have taught him better grace, and a wiser argument. This constitution, founded, in the first instance, upon a passage of only five lines *, it is our duty, not by words artfully adapted to the purpose of undermining its best principles, to protect:-each man in his sphere, and every man to the best of his ability: And, should necessity require, each man, peer as well as peasant, and peasant as well as peer, is bound to fight for it. The cheapest and most effective method of preservation, however, is to elect discreet and enlightened men to represent the country in parliament, and to pay them for their services. "I always thought any of the simple, unbalanced governments bad," said Mr. Fox, in his speech on the army estimates, Feb. 9, 1790. Simple monarchy, simple aristocracy, simple democracy ;—I hold them all imperfect or vicious; all are bad by themselves. The composition alone is good. These have been my sentiments always; in which I have agreed with my friend, Mr. Burke."

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It is difficult to say too much in praise of these lines; and as language is scarcely able to express the admiration and the reverence with which they ought to be regarded, it would be well if they were inscribed in large capitals on every church, chapel, and house throughout the empire. "Nullus liber homo capiatur, vel imprisonetur, aut disseisiatur de libero tenemento suo, vel libertatibus vel liberis consuetudinis suis, aut utlagetur, aut exulet, aut aliquo modo destruatur, nec super eum ibimus, nec super eum mittemus, nisi per legale