The National Register. — London, England, 1812-03-29 00:00:00

IP II THE NATIONAL REGISTER. I F ~. . ._ .. ...• - - Our 'Ring*, Conattution, anD 31,,a1D5. PRINTED AND PUBLISILED AT ':CO. 5 ) PICK ETT.-STREET, STRAND, NEAR TEMPLE DAL SrNDAY, MARCH , 29,. Igl2. N. 2.21. - .POI,ITICAL DISQUISITION. -, ' No. 208. • CIVIC PATRIOTISM. The polittcal world has seldom.presented a more aw fully interesting spectacle than at this moment.-;-‘ It is not oneiof peace and security, but of agitation and danger. Late events have burst the bonds of human passions, and they now rage in all their hideousness and their futy. Disappointed ambition has torn from her own face the mask that veiled her features. Pretended friend ship has unblushingly renounced -her smiles and turned into bitter enmity, public spirit, which formed the motto of party, is openly abandoned as unprofitable ncl vain, and we hear from almost every side, the loud clamours of disappointment, the jeer of malignity, and the ridiculous lamentations of sel fishness and baffled interest. Like the ocean after a rough equinoctial blast, the whole country presents a ruffled surface. What would be the duty of real pa triots4—To exert themselves to restore the tranquillity of the land. But what is the conduct of our pretended pa triots ? Do they endeavour to quell the agitation of the public minds ? Do they shed balm on the wounds which they represent the Body Politic to have received ? Let the declaimers of the Common Hall answer these ques tions ; but let them look at home, before they yield a reply, It was natural to expect, that the grand efforts lately made by the most elevated class of the opposition, to frighten the PRINCE REGENT into a change of rnea- Lures and men, would be followed, after their failure, by a puny and desultory warfare on the part of their adher- Nits in the lower walks of life. We saw, therefore, with. out any excessive surprise, the exertions made throughout the country to excite popular discontent, and to give it a voice which might reach the Throne with the accent of menace and the language of insult. We heard, but we can scarcely believe it, for we cannot conceive the exist ence of such a degree of iniquity possible, that the riots that destroyed the peace and prosperity of several ccun ties, Were fed by the secrect contributions of the friends of Reform, After receiving such information, and learn. ing that it had been communicated as authentic to an higher authority after thus seeing rebellion organized in our land, the proceedings of the Livery of London on Thursday last, and their Resolutions, must'appear com paratively mild and harmless. The traveller, who has been terrified by th e di s t an t roar o f the lion, perceives no fearful sound in the loud braying of an ass. The linen-draper of patriotic spirit, who, while re;kon. CCXX PRICE 9(1. ing behind his counter the rich -krofits of hisstrade, • pon ders on national bankruptcy aWd ruin, has once more brought to light the fruit of his shop meditations. Like the articles which he exposes for sale, and this is perhaps one of them, it is of a motley nature. Its general cha racter is abuse, but its is lavished on so many subjects that it partakes of their variety. Wild and disgraceful pro jects, frauds and peculatious, useless places, pensions, sine cures, reversions, and expensive establishments, form the out-works against which Mr. WAITHMAN directs the fire of his artillery. He next discharges his wrath on the weight of taxation, and the " inquisitorial and arbitrary mode of its exaction," and then, with all the Quixotic spirit that once so successfully fought with windmills, he bravely assails our paper currency, and only leaves this powerful antagonist to return to his old stores of abuse against the traffic of seats in Parliament, the Walcheren expedition, and the re-appointment of the Duke of YORK, The Orders in f Cnuncil are then represented, in imitation of BUONAPAnTE'S reports, as having rendered the threats, of our enemy efficient, and produced ,‘ the almost general ruin of our merchants, and the starving and wretched condition of the population of the manufacturing districts, who, driven to despair, claim relief in a change of system, instead of an extension of our penal codes"—Here Mr. WA MINIAN has displayed mere decency than we expected from a patriot of his natu e se and condition, Although he has used in the foregoing passage which we have extraeted from his resolutions, the very ideas contained iv. the French report, he has altered a few words here and there, so as to conceal their identity from the e-ys of a careless and easily deluded public. To address the Purees: REGENT ja the very words of Neroeuosr would have been so gross an insulr, that it might have dissipated the blindness of the common herd of reforwers, the deceived not the deceivers, and increased the pretty general defection from their party which has already taken place. It was therefore not only decent, but prudent, in Mr. WAITHMAN to act as he had done : and we do him the justics to believe, that .he would never have sacrificed so -nWth to decency in this case, had not that more serious consideration been at, tached to it. It would he fatiguing to our readers, as much as the hear. ers of Mr. WAITHYAN'S speech, to enter at length into an examination of its sentiments. They were the same, he told tits himself, which he used twenty years asp, and which had been eepressed by almost every man out place ever since states have existed, in which a field has lain open to the ambition of the lowest subject. A tide of repetitions flowed from his lips, and, notwithstandieg all his exertions, lie had the mortification of not being once originally abusive. The rest of the resolutions which this unfortunate speech introduced, arc of a piece with those we have als ready described, The one asserts again, what had been officially declared in Parliament to be a falsehood, that ioreigners have been placed he; in command over E 1