Lisbon Papers.
The Times, 1824-04-22T00:00:00

ne 4eaizte..of this d.ste.contamns tihe new uonsttution m1 zroz, to wbich thefollowink observations are subjoined:- "o After this.exposition of the principal features of this new project of a Constitution, we will say two wordslabout it-that the Iotizsm eircumdauatim' to form it was wanting-tbat it is not modelled ac- cording to the customs and manners of the nation-that it was not graRted to the people by the legitimate authority-that it contains within itself the germ of its own destruction-that it is evidently an amalgamation of democracy-that it does not give the Crown a suf- ficient guarantee, in the intermediate powers, to oppose the revolu- tionary torrent which threatens it-tlat this work bears the stamp of the disorganizing and oppressive faction which dictated it to the Prince Royal of the Lusitanian Empire forcing him to deviate from his most sacred duties, and to renounce hs most valuable rights as a man and a Prince, merely to reign, and that insecurely and with dis- grace, over ap art of the empire, when he might one day reign over the whole. This Constitution, threatened at itsvery birth by the dis- sent of part of the people, and by the defects which it contains, and which presage to it the common fate of all works executed with pre- cpitation, a fate which has been proved in eur Continent and in Brazil itself, is the doubip liberml work, by which it is pretended to destroy the union of the Portuguese family. This is the labyrinth in which a population is going to entangle itself, divided as it is within itself by tbe jarring elements of which it is formed. When will the people find the clue of Ariadne to get out of this maze? Do they recollect what blood, what vicissitudes, the Constitutiou which is underToing a continual reform cost England? How dearly have Spain and Portugal paid for the efflervescence which this system of innovation introducedinto thosekingdoms. Have theyforgotten the first allurements of theFrench revolution in l789,and thehorrors which succeeded ? If this took place in a nation which had attaiiied the highest degree of civilization, what can Brazil hope in the state of in- fancy in which it is, with respect to a sm4ll part of its population, and in the most dlecided state of barbar4sm with respect to the African race, of which the nost numerous portion is composed? It is time, rather than mankind themselves, that gently orders their habits and their laws: the sudden introduction of a universal re- form, however good it may appear at first siFht, never produced any thing but confusion and discontent. Xxpenence demonstrates this. It is not merely to pv;ll down an ancient edifice to build a new one; it is to pull to pieces an edifice, connected with others, which must go to ruin with it, and the ruins of which may impede the progress of the proiected work. These men, who have involved themselves in an undertaking equally rash and hazardous, will in the course of time become sensible of their folly; and the fruit they will ga. ther from their iniprudence will be, Lo find themselves at the end in the desperate situation wliic4 the poet describes in the following verses :_ " Audit iter, numeratque dies, spatioque viarum " dietitur vitam. Torquetur pace futura, Nec recepit somnos et sape cubilibus amens "Fre.utittr nivnamiue luit fornidine Dmena." LIZSAONI VPAPPSF. V.T-QRnN. APRIL 5.