Art. V. 1. Mirabeau's Letters, during his Residence in England; with Anecdotes, Maxims, &c. Now first translated from the Original Manuscripts. To which is prefixed, an Introductory Notice on the Life, Writings, Conduct, and Character of the Author. 2 Vols. pp. lxxxiii. 928. Price 21s. London, 1832. 2. Semi-Serious Observations of an Italian Exile, during his Residence in England. By Count Pecchio. 12mo. pp. xvi. 525. Price 10s. 6d. London, 1833.

THE history of this portion of Mirabeau's Correspondence, now first published, is thus stated.

6

In the year 1806, the Translator was residing at Brussels. At that period, the fashion of collecting autographs was extremely prevalent, especially among ladies. A particular friend of the Translator's, Madame de Bathe, requested Mde. Guilleminot, the sister-in-law of the present General Guilleminot, to assist her in her collection. Her husband, in consequence, applied to one of the sisters of Napoleon Buonaparte. That princess mentioned the application to Cambaceres, the Chancellor of the empire; and under his direction, the Keeper of the Archives was instructed to forward as many autograph letters as might be at his disposal to Brussels. Between two and three thousand letters, written by celebrated men of the Revolution, were accordingly despatched. The Translator was present on their arrival. Mde. de Bathe requested him to select those which might appear the most interesting. Having done so, he was allowed to transcribe such as he chose, and also to submit the originals to the inspection of several of his friends..... Most of Mirabeau's letters, here given, were in his own hand-writing; but some of them had been copied by Adam, his secretary, who succeeded Hardy. It is not known to whom they had been written; for, having been collected either by Mirabeau or by Adam, and partially arranged, with a view to their publication, the envelopes had been destroyed.'

For corroborating testimony to the genuineness of these Letters, the Translator refers to Prince d'Aremberg, an intimate friend of Mirabeau's, and several other highly respectable personages. The date of the letters is 1784, 5.

The notice of the Life and Character of Mirabeau, prefixed to the Letters, is spirited and, upon the whole, impartial and just. It is a melancholy and disgusting disclosure. A prodigy of talent, talent of gigantic energy, he exhibited at the same time the most frightful specimen of mind without heart. Immoral does not describe his character: he had no sense of morality, no conscience either in morals, politics, or religion. He was entirely unprincipled. He looked not merely first, but exclusively, to his personal interest in public affairs; and, as Mde. de Stael observes, his foresight was bounded by his selfishness. The tri'bune by policy, and the aristocrat by taste,' at once a Tory and a destructionist, he despised the mob as much as he hated his

VOL. IX.-N.S.

I

own order; and yet, he courted the applause and enjoyed the incense of the rabble, while his vanity never suffered him to forget his pretensions to nobility. He was to be bought by any party; but no gold would have satisfied his cupidity, supported his oriental extravagance, or purchased his fidelity. He is described as ugly almost to hideousness, the face of a tiger marked with the small-pox'; but of his very ugliness, as of the moral hideousness of which it was a type, he was vain. With all his deformity of countenance, he was a personal favourite with the ladies. To a Herculean frame, he united a voice of thunder, full, flexible, and sonorous. This was the chief instrument of his power; and by this he impressed, seduced, inflamed, and ruled. His vanity, the efflorescence of his pure selfishness, was seen in every thing.

He was vain of his person,-his learning,-his oratory, -his acting, his fencing,-his authorship,-his mode of correcting proofs for the press ;-vain of every thing. Yet, as a littérateur, he was one of the most notorious and unblushing plagiarists that ever existed. As a writer, or as a speaker, he never scrupled to avail himself, to whatever extent occasion might require, of the labours of others. A proud man would not have thus acted. "His work on the Bank of St. Charles,' his 'Denunciation of Stockjobbing,' his Considerations on the order of Cincinnatus,' and his Lettres de Cachet,' were his titles to fame. But if all who had contributed to these works had each claimed his share, nothing would have remained as Mirabeau's own, but a certain art of arrangement, some bold expressions, and biting epigrams, and numerous bursts of manly eloquence, certainly not the growth of the French Academy. He obtained from Clavière and Panchaud the materials for his writings on finance. Clavière supplied him with the subject matter of his Letter to the King of Prussia.' De Bourges was the author of his address to the Batavians." It has been already seen, that Dumont and Duroverai wrote many of his speeches. Mirabeau was not profound; but he possessed the art of seizing upon grand points, and making the most of them. His facility in appropriating the ideas, thoughts, and expressions of others, was truly wonderful; with a Promethean touch he made them his own. In fact, Dumont,-all the parties enumerated above, and many others, were neither more nor less than his journeymen-his tools. Mirabeau was not,

he was a man of splendid genius; but his genius was not subservient to his reason; he was deplorably wanting in self-respect; he was impetuous, violent and indiscreet;-he possessed not the discretion of a child ten years of age. His shrewdness, his perspicacity, were pro

* Rivarol, a court writer, once remarked, Je suis vendu, mais non payé. Mirabeau's reply was, 'Je suis payé, mais non vendu.'

-ever

digious. He was profoundly skilled in the art of flattery ;-persuasive-capable of cajoling;-yet open to flattery himself,liable to be cajoled, and converted to the purposes of others, even by men immeasurably his inferiors in knowledge and in intellect.

Temperate in drinking, he was the reverse in every other gratification of sense, His perceptions were nice; his conduct was gross. Ardent as a lover, he was inconstant as he was ardent; sensualheartless-profligate.

· Had Mirabeau been virtuous, he would have been great: as he was vicious, he was only wonderful.'-Vol. I. pp. lxxxi-lxxxiii.

This is well put, and far more just than the remark of M. Mignet, that he wanted nothing but the opportunity, to be 'great.' La Harpe was accustomed to say of the Plebeian Aristocrat,' that he was nominally and essentially a despot; and that, had he enjoyed the government of an empire, he would have surpassed Richelieu in pride, and Mazarin in policy.' This might have been, had not his vanity been so much greater than his pride, and had not his policy been always over-ruled by his profligacy.

The most instructive view, perhaps, to be taken of his character, is in reference to the state of society which produced it. Mirabeau was not simply a Frenchman, but he was the quintessence of the national character; of that character which Voltaire described as a hybrid between the ape and the tiger. He was the personification, the avatar of those evil qualities which have ever been most prominent in the French character. He might have been a Catiline in Rome; we know not what he might have been in England,-perhaps a mere Childe Harold, or a Chatham without his patriotism and virtue; but he could have been Mirabeau, only in France. His character was the illegitimate offspring of the old regime and the revolution; deriving its energy from the latter, its utter viciousness from the former. He sprang from that old noblesse whose crimes and profligacy, fostered by a corrupt priesthood, had loosened all the bonds of morality and law, and left nothing for the Revolution to destroy, but the forms and trappings of government. His vanity and ferocity were French; his utter destitution of religious principle, his atheism, and his profligacy, were the effect of that condition of society upon which he was thrown, and out of the mould of which he rose; a condition produced by the twin evils, popery and despotism, the joint corrupters and enslavers of mind and body; in other words, by the court of the Bourbons and the priesthood of Rome.

But our present object is neither to write an essay on the character of Mirabeau, nor to discuss the causes which produced this Genius of disorganization. It is necessary that the reader should be apprised of the character of the Writer of these observations upon England. In these Letters, however, Mirabeau's appear

ance is advantageous. They evince no laxity of principle or of conduct; and from their perusal, the Editor remarks, no one would suppose him to be otherwise than a man of honour and rectitude; and yet, while living in London, he was the sensualist, the volup tuary, the profligate Mirabeau.' His talents, however, procured him the acquaintance of several of the leading men of the day. Of many points of the English character, and of many of the public institutions of England, he was a professed and ardent 'admirer.' Chatham's speeches more especially excited his admiration; and howsoever the copy might differ from the ori'ginal,' he avowedly made that great orator his model. We shall now, without further preface, lay before our readers, a few specimens of the Letters. Perhaps the best criticism upon them, is that which the Writer has himself supplied.

In that case I shall return to Paris; and one of the first books I intend to publish will be, "A Year's Residence in England." I have written to my different correspondents, requesting them not to destroy my letters dated from hence. They are merely rough sketches, thrown off in the greatest haste, filled perhaps with contradictory notions respecting this country and its inhabitants; but, whatever they may be, they bear the impress of the moment; and I, like many other worthy individuals, am guided in my opinions by the state of my mind, the health of my body, or, perhaps, to be more precise, by the fullness or emptiness of my purse. "I find it difficult," said La B. "to persuade a minister who is in the act of digesting a delicious meal, that the people of an entire province are in a state of actual starvation." This is certain; I feel more pleased with myself and with those around me, thanks to the fifty louis a month I receive from my publisher.' Vol. I. p. 130.

Contradictory and sometimes absurd, certainly, the notions thrown out at random in these effusions of the moment, must be pronounced. For example:

To children, the religious exercises of the English afford nothing capable of softening and humanizing their disposition. These exercises do not strike the senses; they are confined to prayers, which never end, and are interspersed with metaphysical or dogmatical instructions, that have no effect upon the mind. On the other hand, the service of the Church of Rome, the pictures and statues which adorn the temples, with the variety of ceremonies, processions, salutations, &c., are better adapted to the capacity of young people: as they have a natural turn for imitation, they are seen to crowd together in Catholic countries, to dress shrines, to sing at high mass, and to walk in processions. These exercises nourish that simplicity which becomes their tender years, and gives the mind a pliant turn that preserves the gentleness of their temper, and their disposition to gayety.

If, in England, we observe the influence of religion on grown persons, we shall see a new source of melancholy. Let us confine ourselves to the country towns and villages-to that part of the nation which has most religion-and we shall find that the Jewish rigour

with which they are obliged to keep the Sabbath, the only holiday they have, is an absolute specific to nourish the gloom of their temper. This rigid observance of the Sabbath is founded upon the laws which the Puritans extorted from Queen Elizabeth; laws which James the First, and Charles the First, in vain endeavoured to meliorate by ordinances which allowed all sorts of lawful pleasures and amusements after divine service.'-Vol. I. pp. 238-240.

The English, accustomed to view religion in this gloomy light, are ready to fall into every sort of excess which they may think capable of leading them to perfection, by any path whatever. There is no sort of extravagance of this kind that an English head is not capable of. Religion, notwithstanding, is calculated to make men happy; and I fully concur with the writer who says-" He will be cheerful, if he has a cheerful religion; he will be sad, if his religion is of a sad and gloomy kind; he makes his happiness subordinate to it, and refers himself to it in all things that interest him most." Thus, the ministers of religion are responsible to God, not only for the future, but the present happiness of the people whose confidence they possess. It is an offence against the human species, to disturb the repose which they should enjoy upon earth.

The theatrical exhibitions of the English contribute equally to feed, or rather to increase, the national melancholy. The tragedies which the people are most fond of, consist of a number of bloody scenes, shocking to humanity; and these scenes are upon the stage as warm and affecting as the justest action can render them ;-an action as lively, pathetic, and glowing, as that of their preachers is cold, languid, and uniform.'-Vol. I. pp. 243, 244.

To the national melancholy of the English, thus nourished by the pulpit and the stage, this clever, superficial, volatile Frenchman paradoxically ascribes the aptitude of the English for the sciences,' and 'the great sale of the newspapers', which the generality of the English, he says, spend a considerable time in reading. Hence those revolutions which have so often changed 'the government of England.' It is a pity that it did not occur to him to ascertain the date of the first newspaper. In the pre'sent state of England,' he continues, public affairs have become the concern of every Englishman: each citizen is a politician. The case was quite different in the reigns of Henry VIII. and 'Queen Elizabeth.' In the next page, he proceeds to speak of the political divisions and contests that agitated England in those reigns, when newspapers had assuredly little to do with creating disturbances. The theme is thus pursued in Letter xlvi.

The impetuosity and the perseverance with which melancholy dwells upon such objects as interest and engage it, are the principles that induce the English to concern themselves so much about public affairs. Each citizen, identifying himself with the government, must of necessity extend to himself the high idea he has of the nation: he triumphs in its victories; he is afflicted by its calamities; he exhausts