The British Press; or, Morning Literary Advertiser.
London, England, 1825-01-19 00:00:00

THE BRITISH PRESS.

of South American independence. M. DE VILLELE will
gladly avail himself of the representative forms of the
Government to get lid of the awkward and embarrassing
ties by which be is bound to Spain, and the Great Powers of
the Continent. The question then may be considered as
settled. Mr.CAxmi so has triumphed, apparently with-
out an effort, and the Holy Alliance is virtually dissolved.
Advice, were yesterday received from Bombay by the
Lonach to the Sib of September, and from Bengal by the
Atlas to the 17th of August. These vessels have brought
papers to those dates, but the intelligence for the most part
has already reached us. The principal event of import-
ance is the evacuation of Ramoo by the Burmese. This
was the post in which they bad stockaded themselves a
little within our territory on the side of Chittagong. The
abandonment of this station is ascribed to the alarm ex-
cited at the Court of Ave by the capture of Rangoon, and
our continued successes in every encounter with the enemy.
An impression seems to have been made upon them
haughty barbarians, which we hope may render the war
less sanguinary and expensive than it was sometime ago
considered likely to be. Our military renown has evidently
not in the least declined. The British arms arc as drca:-
ful to those against whom they are turned as at any period
in the history of our Indian empire.
In the Bengal papers we have only some fresh versions
of the capture of the island of Cheduba, which we have
known in Europe now more than two months.
'We have given in a separate article an intercstingac-
count of the late dreadful earthquake in Persia.

The case of Cox e. Keav, which filled the journals or
yesterday, is of a somewhat curious description. OVID
has taught us the Art 'f T.ore, but our tragedy hero has
clearly never studied it in the classic school, since he
manifestly sets all the rules of the science at nought. In
the modern process of making love, with out sex at least,
it lasts as long as it is making, and no longer. Amidst the
heroics of the tender passion, a fair share of absurdity is
pardonable,—pardonable, at least, is that unreflective season
of youth, in which the errors of humanity have a claim to
be considered with lenity. But even riper years and more
mellowed experience go for nothing apparently, in the
regions of Crim. COIL CUPID'S gsrland is made up
seemingly of all sorts of flowers: the fresh and the faded
all link lovingly together in the same wreath. It is very
extraordinary, but, however we may account for it, it
really appears as if Love has ceased to inspire its votaries as
formerly, and suffers their insane stupidity to take its full
swing, in revenge, as it were, for the silliness or the
sensuality of their amours. A man of sense, under the in-
fluence of a sincere and honourable attachment to an in-
dividual of the opposite sex, writes to her with the full
possession of all that reason, and of thore moral feelings
which govern him in the other concerns of life : but no
sooner does he yield to the inflaenee of a vicious and
irregular amour, than all his lure letters seem pained by
an idiot; however grave he may be naturally, the tender
passion seems to produce in him all sorts of antics, as
quicksilver makes dumplins dance, that would otherwise
have boiled on in the regular way. Epistles, exhibiting more
maudlin, contemptible, slip-slop, than those of Mr. KEAN,
we never before read ; never were the couplet more truly
verified, that
An eagle's wings were fored for flight,
A goose's furnish quills—to write.
They are not made up of nonsense running in an easy vein ;
they bear the stamp, every one of them, of a vulgar mind
and a cold heart. There is no mark about them even of
guilty sincerity. Nothing can he more execrable than the
following jargon, which mixes up the language of a dotard
with the reasoning of an infidel:—

" Friday, Aug. 2. (Post-mark Bth Aug. 1822.)
" My Heart Strings—That you are mistress of my heart and
fate, every moment of my life confirms. The world without you
appears one vast and gloomy dungeon, and your letters are as sun-
beams through the grating of the prison house. I dwell on them
with admiration. I fancy lam free, and for a moment lam bask.
ing in the full meridian of niy wishes--the delirium subsides—l
see the barriers that encompass me—my sun withdrawn (yourself)
—and all again is left to shade and desolation. Oh GOD ! Charlotte,
how I love you. If such a feeling is a crime, why are we given it ?
I did not seek it--the POWER that will condemn has placed you
in my war—the same inspiring hand that framed my better quali.
ties pointed to you as the object of my love—my everlasting love.
I must not doubt the justice of the great BEING, and hare little
or no faith in the general tempter—whatever it be—

• You are my fate--my Heaven or my Bell.'

ON THE RECOGNITION OF THE INDEPEN-
D.KNCE OF SOUTH AmEntee.

[From the Jewrnal des Delta's of Sunday last.]
-- -

I'All3S, JAN.I6.

A great cry of alum has been raised in consequence of the
recognition of the Spanish American States. It is pretended that we
may perceive in this mearure a triumph of 'evolutionary principles;
that it is a signal for disclaiming the principle of legitimacy, and
that it gives encouragement to all Colonies to revolt. However the
question of the independence of the new States of America has
been often and so fully treated upon in this journal, that, in order
to bring it back to its real point of view, we need only recapitulate
our previous arguments on the subject. It is the interest of civili-
zation and true lii)erty to support everywhere the legitimate autho-
rity against all usurpations effected by •iolence and disorder. So-
ciety will never be able to advance towards a state of peace and
solidity, while the people are misled by the idea that revolt is the
only road to liberty. But the legitimate power ought to fulfil the
purposes for which it is designed without delay ; that is a con-
dition annexed to all authority ; so that if the religion, the insti-
tutions, the security of the territory, the preservation of the exist-
ence of the country as a nation, can no longer be reconciled with
the extreme weakness, or the remote distance of the seat of the le-
gitimate authority, then these revolutions seem to come u the will
of Heaven—." gide vent forstre celeste." Then the sceptre is trans-
ferred from the house of Saul to the house of l)svid ; for society
must subsist ; that alone is clothed in the character of absolu'e le-
gitimacy ; that alone is necessary to the world, and which ema-
nates from God alone.

In applying these principles to Spanish America, it is not ne-
cessary for us at present to inquire whether Spain have governed it
well or ill, a question obscured first by the calumnies of a false
philosophy, but certainly an idle question, since the Americans
were contented with their situation ; they had not revolted for ages,
and their actual separation from their mother country was not the
effect of an insurrection directed against the legitimate King. it
was the destruction of the throne of the Bourbons of Spain—it
was the prolonged captivity of the legitimate Monarch—it was the
total dissolution of the Spanish monarchy, which in 1810 com-
pelled all the men of influence among the Spaniards of America
to embrace a society separated from its legitimate Chief. It was
even in the name of Ferdinand VII., and conformably to his order
addressed to the Council of Castile, that the first American Juntas
proclaimed their independence of every Government residing in
Europe. at the same time that they invoked with their most ardent
wishes the presence either of Ferdinand or of one of his
brothers. The separation of the Americas was directed not
against legitimacy, but against the usurpation of Joseph ;
years passed over, public opinion became divided, the commercial
interest in some of the cities was anxious for an organization aims.
lay to that of the Hanseatic towns ; the proprietors of the soil and
the Catholic Clergy rejected all republican ideas, and the princi-
pal States, even whilst adopting the external forms of a republic,
preserved their old civil and religious institutions, which, as well
as the manners and facial existence of these people, are incom-
patible with the ideas of political equality and religious in-
difference. But Ferdinand was restored to the throne of his
ancestors. Why did not the Americans throw themselves im.
mediately at the feet of their legitimate King? They have
done so, at least a great portion of them, but they have done
it se free, as enlightened nations, who understand the principle of
legitimacy in its true sense, as a principle of society, not as the mys-
terious expression of an absolute hereditary power. They have
said to King Ferdinand, " We are, we wish to remain, Spaniards ;
we attach ourselves once more to your throne, distant as it is, but
we require that you guarantee to us the improvements of our insti-
tutions, of which we have tasted the beneficial results. We
ask for local representation and a certain liberty of commerce.
These conditions, just, wise, and, in all respects calculated to
support the true interests of legitimacy, were repelled with all the
arrogance of incapacity. The avaricious Camarilla grasped at ab-
solute power ; that it might partake of the plunder of the Americas,
it transported to the new Continent armies adequate to conquer, but
who could not retain their conquests. America, ravaged, exas-
perated, became more and more alienated from the mother country.
There were, moreover, some loyal and generous propositions which
failed to effect a reconciliation between the countries. There was
proposed in the second Session of the Cortes at Madrid a plan of
union, which had for its foundation a representative system, local
as well as general, under the supreme authority of the King, who
was to take the title of Emperor of the confederation of the Spains
and the Americas, having for Viceroys the Princes of the Blood.
At a later period, Mexico, the moot important portion of Spanish
America, declared itself ready to acknowledge either the King him.
self or one of his brothers, Frovided he established his resi-
dence in the country. The most considerable persons at
Buenos Ayres, at Guatiniala, at Lima, repeatedly expressed
their anxiety to see a Bourbon at their head. All these loyal
propositions—all these views cf sound policy, were sacri-
ficed to the chimera of nn absolute legitimacy, as if there could
be any thing absolute upon the earth as if there was any
right which was not subject to conditions--as if reason could ever
approve of a principle being acted on which was in direct opposi-
tion to all moral and physical possibility.
Such has been the cotulact of Spain to the Americas. Now
what has been the policy of France and England, the only two
great posers who, having a considerable navy, could have inter-
fered in an efficient manner—let us consider what have been the
duties and the interests of these two Powers? The Treaty of
Chaumont, which was the basis of the alliance of the five great
Powers, imposes upon England the duty of repressing every attempt
of renewing those troubles, springing from the anarchical prin-
ciples of the French Revolution. We have seen that the indepen-
dence of Spanish America is not founded upon revolutionary spirit,
but, upon the contrary, it was first provoked by a legitimate resist-
ance to usurpation, and afterwards continued by the Woad of the
ancient authority to give any guarantee to those people, whom
an event, independent of their inclinations, had placed under new
institutions. England represented to the Cabinet of Madrid the
necessity and the utility of treating with nations not actually in a
state of rebellion. Spain refused this wise counseL England then
declared herself neutral; site denied to both the belligerent pantie
the power of recruiting or making hostile preparations upon British
sM. This was an injurious denial to the Americans ; she renewed
her offers of mediation ; they are once more refused. She an.
nounces that she will wait sonic months, to give Spain time to
arrange her affairs. She has waited a year ; her duties to Europe
are fulfilled ; but England has also duties to perform towards the
Americas, which, with the consent of the Royalist Regency of
Spain, she supported in 11110 against the efforts of the partisans of
Joseph. She has also duties towards her own subjects, to whom at
the period above mentioned she gave encouragement to furnish arms
and ammunition to ail the subjects risen against the Usurper. The
consequence of these connexions has been the employment of great
English capital in American commerce. England has fulfilled this
double duty in regulating, by commercial treaties, her existing re-
lations
with America, and she cannot conclude a treaty with a
State without acknowledging the fact of its independent existence.
The interest of England, as a free, industrious, and commercial
nation, is comprised in these words, liberty, civil, religious, and
commercial, throughout the entire world. Let us now con.
skier what have been the duties and interests of France
As a Member of two great European Alliances, it owed all its cf.
forts and all its course!, to the re-establishment and consolidation
of general order. As a Constitutional Monarchy it ought in justice
to itself to have assisted in effecting a state of peace between the
rights of thrones and the rights of the people. It owed to the glory
of its ancient and national dynasty the maintaining the Bourbons
upon the greatest possible number of thrones; it owed, in short, to
the prosperity of the French nation the increase of our channels
for exporting the products of our manufactures, and the extension
of our commercial activity. In enumerating its duties, we have
enumerated its interests. Nothing was more easy than to have per-
formed the one, and to have secured the other.

France, too wise not to have judged it impossible to regain America
by arms, ought to have essentially applied to the preserving of that
which could have been so easily preserved in the American
colonies—the monarchical government and the dynasty of the
Bourbons. We epealija of the Catholic Church, which in that
country defends itself, aid governs, even now, all the other moral
powers. It was by instantly enlightening the Cabinet at Madrid,
and in case of failing to do that, by supporting the plans of the
American landed Aristocracy, and of the Catholic Clergy. for
creating at 3lexico, lams, and Buenos .1s res, three new tliwes,
upon which there should be placed as many branches of the
!louse at Bourbon. There It on Id then hare resulted a system