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* * * * *
SKETCHES
REFORMS AND REFORMERS,
OF
GREAT BRITAIN AND IRELAND.
BY HENRY B. STANTON.
NEW YORK:
PUBLISHED BY BAKER AND SCRIBNER,
145 NASSAU ST. AND 36 PARK ROW,
1850.
Entered according to act of Congress, in the year 1849, by
HENRY B. STANTON,
in the Clerk's office of the District Court of the United States,
for the Southern District of New York.
S. W. BENEDICT,
Stereo. and Print., 16 Spruce St.
PREFACE.
This Book aims to give a summary view of the most important general
Reforms, which have been effected or attempted in Great Britain and
Ireland, from the period of the French revolution down to the present
time. Neither history nor biography has been attempted, but the work
aspires to be only what its title indicates--_Sketches_. Large parts of
it have recently appeared, from time to time, in the _National Era_, of
Washington; no expectation being then entertained that it would assume
any other form of publication. The present occasion has been embraced to
revise and reaerrange the whole, and by condensation and pruning off
repetitions, to make room for considerable additions to the list of
subjects discussed, and individuals noticed. It is even now incomplete,
many men and things, which deserve a place here, being left out--some
because I may underrate their relative importance--others because the
limits of this work will allow only of selections. Still, it is believed
that no important subject has been wholly omitted; though, on account of
the vast number of those worthy to be called Reformers, it has been
found impossible to make special mention of many able and excellent
individuals. Though it may contain errors of fact and opinion, yet, as
it is confined to those phases of events, and incidents in the lives of
persons, which history too seldom dwells upon, it may be found not
wholly valueless to those who would examine the most interesting and
instructive period in the recent annals of England.
The chronological plan of the work is, generally, to notice prominent
popular movements in their order of time, and, in connection with each,
to give sketches, more or less full, of persons who bore a leading part
in it. But such slight regard has been paid to chronological
arrangement, that each subject stands by itself, having only a general
connection with what precedes or follows it.
As to my statistics, I have occasionally been compelled to reach
conclusions much in the same manner as juries agree upon
verdicts--consult a dozen authorities, each one differing with all the
others--get the sum total of the whole, divide it by twelve, and adopt
the result.
This Book is submitted to the reader as an humble attempt to make some
of the Reformers of America better acquainted with some of the Reformers
of the Old World--to show that the Anglo-Saxon love of liberty, which
inspires so many hearts on both sides of the Atlantic, flows from the
same kindred fountain--to prove that, though when measured by her own
vaunted standards, Great Britain is one of the most oppressive and
despicable Governments on earth, her radical reformers constitute as
noble a band of democratic philanthropists as the world has ever
seen--to induce candid Americans to make just discriminations in their
estimate of "England and the English," and to draw distinctions between
the privileged orders of that country and a small, but increasing, and
even now powerful body of its people, who admire the free institutions
of the United States, and are laboring with heroic constancy, and a zeal
tempered with discretion, to secure for themselves and their
fellow-subjects the rights and privileges enjoyed by trans-Atlantic
republicans,--and, finally, to record my admiration of those rare and
true men, who, during the past half century, and while struggling
against difficulties and enduring persecutions, of which we have but the
faintest conceptions, have achieved so much for the cause of Humanity
and Freedom.
H. B. S.
SENECA FALLS, N. Y., October, 1849.
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER I.
Introductory--The "Condition of England" Question 13
CHAPTER II.
British Cabinets from 1770 to 1830--Summary of the Efforts of
the Reformers, from the War of 1793 to the Formation of the
Grey Ministry in 1830 20
CHAPTER III.
Treason Trials of 1794--Societies for Reform--Constructive
Treason--Horne
Tooke--Mr. Erskine 31
CHAPTER IV.
Constructive Treason--The Law of Libel and Sedition--The Dean
of St. Asaph--The Rights of Juries--Erskine--Fox--Pitt 41
CHAPTER V.
The French Revolution--The Continental Policy of Mr. Pitt--The
Policy of Mr. Fox and his Followers--The Continental
Wars--Mr. Sheridan--Mr. Burke--Mr. Perceval 51
CHAPTER VI.
Pitt's Continental Policy--Mr. Tierney--Mr. Whitbread--Lord
Castlereagh--Lord Liverpool--Mr. Canning 62
CHAPTER VII.
Abolition of the African Slave Trade--Granville
Sharpe--Wilberforce--Pitt--Stephen--Macaulay--Brougham 76
CHAPTER VIII.
Law Reform--Jeremy Bentham--His Opinion of the Common Law--His
"Felicity" Principle--His Universal Code--His Works--The
Fruits of his Labors--His Talents and Character 87
CHAPTER IX.
Law Reform--The Penal Code of England--Its Barbarity--The
Death-Penalty--Sir Samuel Romilly--His Efforts to Abolish
Capital Punishment--His Talents and Character 98
CHAPTER X.
Law Reform--The Penal Code--Restriction of the Penalty of
Death in 1823-4--Appointment of Commissioners to Reform the
Civil Law in 1828-9--Sir James Mackintosh--Brougham--Robert
Hall 107
CHAPTER XI.
Religious Toleration--Eminent Nonconformists--The Puritans--Oliver
Cromwell--The Pilgrims--The Corporation and Test
Acts--Their Origin--Their Effects upon Dissenters and others--Their
Virtual Abandonment and Final Repeal--The first Triumph
of the Reformers 117
CHAPTER XII.
Ireland--The Causes of its Debasement--Dublin--Mementoes of
the Captivity of the Country--Movements toward Catholic
Emancipation--Its Early Champions--Mr. Grattan--Mr.
Plunkett--Reverend
Sydney Smith 125
CHAPTER XIII.
Catholic Emancipation--Antiquity and Power of the Papal
Church--Treaty
of Limerick--Catholic Penal Code of Ireland--Opinions
of Penn, Montesquieu, Burke, and Blackstone, concerning
it--Its Amelioration--Catholic Association of 1823--The
Hour and the Man--Daniel O'Connell elected for Clare--Alarm
in Downing Street--Duke of Wellington's Decision--Passage
of the Emancipation Bill--Services of O'Connell and
Shiel--The latter as an Orator 134
CHAPTER XIV.
Movements toward Parliamentary Reform--John Cartwright--The
Father of Parliamentary Reform--His Account of the
Trials of Hardy and Tooke--Lord Byron's Eulogium of him--His
Opinions of the Slave Trade--The First English Advocate
of the Ballot--His Conviction for Conspiracy--His Labors for
Grecian and Mexican Independence--William Cobbett--His
Character, Opinions, and Services--His Style of Writing--His
Great Influence with the Middling and Lower Orders of England--Sir
Francis Burdett--His Labors for Reform--His Recantation 147
CHAPTER XV.
Parliamentary Reform--Old House of Commons--Rotten Boroughs--Old
Sarum--French Revolution of 1830--Rally for
Reform--Wellington Resigns--Grey in Power--Ministerial
Bill Defeated--New Parliament Summoned--Commons Pass
the Bill--Brougham's Speech in Lords--Peers Throw out the
Bill--Mrs. Partington--Riots--Again Bill Passed by Commons
and again Defeated by Peers--Ministers Resign--Are Recalled--The
Bill becomes a Law 164
CHAPTER XVI.
Henry Lord Brougham--His Life, Services and Character 176
CHAPTER XVII.
Charles, Earl Grey--Advocates Abolition of the Slave Trade--His
Rise to Power--His Aid in Carrying the Reform Bill--Sydney
Smith's Eulogy--His Two Great Measures, Parliamentary
Reform and Abolition of Slavery--The Old and New
Whigs--The "Coming Man" 193
CHAPTER XVIII.
Abolition of Negro Slavery--Canning's Resolutions of
1823--Insurrection
in Demerara--"Missionary Smith's Case"--Immediate
Abolition--Elizabeth Heyrick--O'Connell--Brougham's
Celebrated Speech of 1830--Insurrection and Anarchy in Jamaica,
in 1832--William Knibb--Parliamentary Inquiry--Buxton--The
Apprenticeship Adopted, August, 1833--Result
of Complete Emancipation in Antigua--The Apprenticeship
Doomed--The Colonies themselves Terminate it, August 1,
1838 199
CHAPTER XIX.
Notices of some Prominent Abolitionists--T. Fowell Buxton--Zachary
Macaulay--Joseph Sturge--William Allen--James
Cropper--Joseph and Samuel Gurney--George William Alexander--Thomas
Pringle--Charles Stuart--John Scoble--George
Thompson--Rev. Dr. Thomson--Rev. Dr. Wardlaw--Rev.
Dr. Ritchie--Rev. Mr. James--Rev. Messrs. Hinton,
Brock, Bevan, and Burnet 213
CHAPTER XX
British India--Clive and Hastings--East India Company--Its
Oppressions and Extortions--Land Tax--Monopolies--Forced
Labor and Purveyance--Taxes on Idolatry--Amount of Revenue
Extorted--Slavery in India--Famine and Pestilence--The
Courts--Rajah of Sattara--Abolition of Indian Slavery--British
India Society--General Briggs--William Howitt--George
Thompson as an Orator--Lord Brougham's Opinion--Mr.
Thompson's Anti-Slavery Career--His Visit to India--His
Defense of the Rajah--Advocates Corn-Law Repeal--Is
Elected to Parliament 227
CHAPTER XXI.
Cheap Postage--Rowland Hill--His Plan Proposed in 1837--Comparison
of the Old and New Systems--Joshua Leavitt--Money-Orders,
Stamps, and Envelopes--The Free Delivery--London
District Post--Mr. Hume--Unjust Treatment of Mr. Hill
by the Government--The National Testimonial 246
CHAPTER XXII.
Disruption of the State Church of Scotland--Its Causes--The
Veto Act of the Assembly of 1834--Mr. Young Presented to
the Church of Auchterarder--Is Vetoed by the Communicants
and Rejected by the Presbytery--Resort to the Civil Courts--The
Decision--Intrusionists and Non-Intrusionists--The Final
Secession of 1843--The Free Church--Dr. Chalmers--Dr.
Hill 254
CHAPTER XXIII.
The Established Church of England--Its Revenues--Its Ecclesiastical
Abuses--Its Sway over Political Parties--Rev. Dr. Phillpotts--Rev.
Dr. Pusey--Rev. Mr. Noel--Anti-State Church
Movement 264
CHAPTER XXIV.
The Corn Laws--Their Character and Policy--Origin of the
Anti-Corn-Law Movement--Adam Smith--Mr. Cobden--"Anti-Corn-Law
Parliament"--Mr. Villier's Motion in the House
of Commons in 1839--Formation of the League--Power of the
Landlords--Lord John Russell's Motion in 1841--General
Election of that Year--Mr. Cobden Returned to Parliament--Peel
in Power--His Modification of the Corn Laws--Great
Activity and Steady Progress of the League during the Years
1842, '3, '4, and '5--Session of 1846--Sir Robert Peel and the
Duke of Wellington--Repeal of the Corn Laws 271
CHAPTER XXV.
Notice of Corn-Law Repealers--Mr. Cobden--Mr. Bright--Colonel
Thompson--Mr. Villiers--Dr. Bowring--William J.
Fox--Ebenezer Elliott--James Montgomery--Mr. Paulton--George
Wilson--The Last Meeting of the League 281
CHAPTER XXVI.
National Debt of Great Britain--Lavish Expenditures of the
Government--Its Enormous Taxes--Will the Debt be Repudiated?--Will
it Occasion a Revolution?--Plan of Mr. Ricardo to Pay the Debt--
Mr. Hume's Efforts at Retrenchment 290
CHAPTER XXVII.
Defects of the Reform Bill--Origin of Chartism--The "People's
Charter" Promulgated in 1838--The Riots of 1839 and 1842--The
Vengeance of the Government falls on O'Connor, Lovett,
Collins, Vincent, J. B. O'Brien and Cooper--The Nonconformist
Newspaper Established by Mr. Miall--Mr. Sturge--Organization
of the Complete Suffrage Union--Character of the
Chartists 302
CHAPTER XXVIII.
Chartists and Complete Suffragists--Feargus O'Connor--William
Lovett--John Collins--Henry Vincent--Thomas Cooper--Edward
Miall--Reverend Thomas Spencer 311
CHAPTER XXIX.
Ireland, her Condition and Prospects--The Causes of her
Misery--The Remedies for the Evils which Afflict her 322
CHAPTER XXX.
Life, Services, and Character of Daniel O'Connell 333
CHAPTER XXXI.
The Temperance Reformation--Father Mathew 343
CHAPTER XXXII.
International Peace--European Military Establishments--British
Establishment--Mr. Cobden--Peace Party in England--Peace
Congress in Paris--Elihu Burritt--Charles Sumner 346
CHAPTER XXXIII.
Mrs. Elizabeth Fry--Mrs. Amelia Opie--Lady Noel Byron--Miss
Harriet Martineau--Mrs. Mary Howitt 348
CHAPTER XXXIV.
The Literature of Freedom--The Liberal Literature of
England--Periodicals--Edinburgh
Review--Its Founders--Its Contributors--Its
Standard and Style of Criticism--Its Influence--London
Quarterly Review Started--Political Services of the
Edinburgh--Its Ecclesiastical Tone--Sydney Smith--Decline
of the Political Influence of the Edinburgh--Blackwood's
Magazine--Tait's
Magazine--Westminster Review--The Eclectic--The
New Monthly--The Weekly Press--Cobbett's Register--Hunt's
Examiner--Mr. Fonblanque--Mr. Landor--The
Spectator--Douglas Jerrold--Punch--People's and Howitt's
Journals--Mr. Howitt--Chambers' Journal--Penny Magazine
and Cyclopedia 359
CHAPTER XXXV.
The Liberal Literature of England--Poetry--Southey--Coleridge--
Wordsworth--Burns--Rogers--Montgomery--Moore--Campbell--Herbert--
Byron--Shelley--Keats--Hunt--Pringle--Nicoll--Peter--Barton--
Hood--Procter--Tennyson--Milnes--Elliott--Horne--Mary
Howitt--Eliza Cook--Mackay--Novels--Godwin--Holcroft--The
Drama--Bage--Scott--Miss
Edgeworth--Mrs. Opie--Miss Mitford--Mrs. Hall--Miss
Martineau--Banim--Lever--Lover--Bulwer--Dickens--Essays--Jeffrey--
Smith--Brougham--Mackintosh--Macaulay--Lamb--Hazlitt--Carlyle--
Talfourd--Pamphlets--Holland
House--French Literature and Louis Philippe 374
CHAPTER XXXVI.
Conclusion 392
REFORMS AND REFORMERS.
CHAPTER I.
Introductory--The "Condition of England" Question.
The People of the United States must ever be interested in the history
of Great Britain. We have a common origin, and an identity of language;
we hold similar religious opinions, and draw the leading principles of
our civil institutions from the same sources. Reading the same historic
pages, and while recounting the words and deeds of orators and statesmen
who have dignified human nature, or the achievements of warriors who
have filled the world with their fame, we say, "these were _our_
forefathers." The sages and scholars of both nations teach the youth to
cherish the wisdom of Alfred, the deductions of Bacon, the discoveries
of Newton, the philosophy of Locke, the drama of Shakspeare, and the
song of Milton, as the heir-looms of the whole Anglo-Saxon family. The
ties of blood and lineage are strengthened by those of monetary interest
and reciprocal trade; while the channels of social intercourse are kept
open by the tides of emigration which flow unceasingly between us. And
such are the resources of each in arts, in arms, in literature, in
commerce, in manufactures, in the productions of the soil, and such
their advanced position in the science of government, and such the
ability and genius of their great men, that they must, for an indefinite
period, exert a controlling influence on the destiny of mankind.
Nor when viewed in less attractive aspects, can America be indifferent
to the condition and policy of her trans-Atlantic rival. She is
enterprising, ambitious, intriguing. Whitening the ocean with the sails
of her commerce, she sends her tradesmen wherever the marts of men teem
with traffic. Belting the earth with her colonies, dotting its surface
with her forts, anchoring her navies in all its harbors, she rules one
hundred and sixty millions of men, giving law, not only to cultivated
and refined States, but to dwarfed and hardy clans that shrivel and
freeze among the ices of the polar regions, and to swarthy and languid
myriads that repose in the orange groves or pant on the shrubless sands
of the tropics. With retained spies in half the courts and cabinets of
Christendom, she has for a century and a half caused or participated in
nearly all the wars of Europe, Asia, and Africa, while by her arrogance,
diplomacy, or gold, she has shaped the policy of the combatants to the
promotion of her own ends. Ancient Rome, whose name is the synonym of
resistless power and boundless conquest, could not, in the palmy days of
her Caesars, vie with Great Britain in the extent of her possessions and
the strength of her resources. Half a century ago, her great statesman,
sketching the resources of her territory, said, "The King of England, on
whose dominions the sun never sets." An American orator, of kindred
genius, unfolded the same idea in language which sparkles with the very
effervescence of poetic beauty, when he spoke of her as "that Power,
whose morning drum-beat, following the sun, and keeping company with the
hours, encircles the earth daily with one continuous and unbroken strain
of the martial airs of England." In a word, she embodies, in her history
and policy, in large measure, all the virtues and vices of that
alternate blessing and scourge of mankind, THE ANGLO-SAXON RACE.
Britain, once a land of savage pagans, was, long after the Norman
Conquest, the abode of ignorance, superstition, and despotism. And
though for centuries past she has witnessed a steady advance in
knowledge, and civil and religious liberty--though her men of letters
have sent down to their posterity works that shall live till science,
philosophy and poetry are known no more--though her lawyers have
gradually worn off the rugged features of the feudal system, till the
common law of England has been adopted as the basis of our republican
code--though her spiritual Bastile, the State Church, long since yielded
to the attacks of non-conformity, and opened its gates to a qualified
toleration--though all that was vital and dangerous in the maxim, "the
King can do no wrong," fell with the head of Charles I, in 1649--yet it
is only within the last fifty years that she has discovered at work on
her institutions a class of innovators, designated as "REFORMERS."
Humanity will find ample materials for despair, when contemplating the
condition of the depressed classes in Great Britain and Ireland. But
philanthropy will find abundant sources of hope in studying the
character and deeds of their radical reformers. The past half century
has seen an uprising, not of "the middle class" only, but of the very
substratum of society, in a peaceful struggle for inherent rights. No
force has been employed, except the force of circumstances; and the
result has been eminently successful. This "middle class" (and the term
has great significance in England) discovered its strength during the
revolution under Hampden and Cromwell, and received an impulse then
which it has never lost. The nobility and gentry have too often silenced
the popular clamor by admitting its leaders to the rank and privileges
of "the higher orders." Still, concessions were made to the mass of
middle men, which stimulated them to demand, and strengthened them to
obtain more. But a truth, destined to be all-potent in the nineteenth
century, remained to be discovered, viz: the identity in interest of the
middle and lower classes. The lines which custom and prejudice had drawn
between them grew fainter and fainter as the day approached for the full
discovery of this truth. The earthquake shock of the French Revolution
overthrew a throne rooted to the soil by the growth of a thousand years.
Britain felt the crash. Scales fell from all eyes, and the people of the
realm discovered that subjects were clothed with Divine rights as well
as kings. Englishmen said so, in public addresses and resolutions, not
always expressed in courtly phrase, nor rounded off in the style of
rhetorical adulation so grateful to regal ears. The king, not having
duly profited by the lesson the American rebels had taught him, indicted
Hardy, Thelwall, Tooke, and their compatriots, for sedition and treason.
These men were the representatives of both the middle and lower classes.
Their constituents--THE PEOPLE OF ENGLAND--combined for their mutual
safety against the common oppressor. The wall of partition was partially
broken down, and, from that hour to this, the struggle between Right and
Privilege, between the Subject and the Crown, has gone on, distinguished
by alternate defeat and victory, by heroic constancy and dastardly
treachery--noble martyrs dying, valiant combatants living to continue
the good fight.
_"The Condition of England" question_ (as the Parliamentary phrase runs)
was, a century ago, a matter of indifference to the masses. Lord
Castlereagh but uttered the adage of a hundred years when he said, "the
people have nothing to do with the laws, except to obey them."
Parliament was opened with a dull King's speech, to be followed by the
opening of the annual budget of the Chancellor of the Exchequer,
proposing to raise a loan for foreign wars, or a fund to sink the
interest of the public debt. An oracular response was given by the
Minister now and then to some query touching the relations of the
kingdom to continental Powers, or the resources of some newly-acquired
colony. An occasional bill was introduced to pamper the landlord
aristocracy, or to increase the resources of the clergy, and enforce the
collection of tithes in the manufacturing districts. Untitled manhood
was held "dog cheap;" and all legislation (excepting the throwing of a
bone now and then to the Cerberus of "vulgar clamor") looked to the
conservation of the privileged classes, the dignity of the nobility, the
wealth of the church, and the prerogatives of the Crown. How different
now! The representatives of THE PEOPLE have broken into the sacred
inclosure of "the Government," and new men, with new opinions, have
usurped the places of an ancient aristocracy, and its antiquated
principles. Now, "the Condition of England" question takes cognizance of
the rights and the wrongs of all, and involves searching examinations,
and hot and irreverent discussions, in and out of Parliament, of poor
laws, pension laws, game laws, corn laws, free trade, universal
education, unrestricted religious toleration, standing armies, floating
navies, Irish repeal, East and West India emancipation, colonial
independence, complete suffrage, the ballot, annual Parliaments, law
reform, land reform, entails, primogeniture, the life-tenure of judges,
an hereditary peerage, the House of Lords, the Bench of Bishops, the
Monarchy itself, with other matters of like import, about which the
trader and the farmer of Queen Anne's time knew but little, and never
dared to question above his breath, but which, in the days of Victoria,
are the common talk of the artisan and yeoman. Ay, more than this:
reforms not dreamed of in 1805, by Fox, the liberal, are proposed and
carried in 1845 by Peel, the conservative. "Oh, for the golden days of
good Queen Bess," when the common people paid their tithes and ate what
bread they could get, and left law-making to the Knights of the Shire
and the Peers of the Realm!
But he must superficially read history who supposes that the fruitful
Reforms, which now strike their roots so deep into British soil, and
throw their branches so high and wide over the land, were planted by
this century. Their seeds were sown long since, and watered with the
tears and fertilized by the blood of men as pure and brave as God ever
sent to bless and elevate our race. From the conquest of William the
Norman, down to the coronation of Victoria the Saxon, one fact stands
prominently on the page of English history, viz: that there has been a
gradual circumscribing of the powers of the nobles and the prerogatives
of the Crown, accompanied with a corresponding enlargement of the
liberties of the people. Omitting many, I will glance at some of the
more conspicuous landmarks in this highway of reform.
The mitigation of the rigors of the feudal system by William Rufus, the
son of the Conqueror, who established it.--The general institution of
trial by jury, in the succeeding reign of Henry II, and the granting of
freedom to the towns of the realm by royal charters.--Old King John, at
Runnymede, affixing his sign manual to MAGNA CHARTA, with trembling
hand, at the dictation of his haughty barons and their retainers. The
establishment of the House of Commons, about the middle of the
thirteenth century, thus giving the commercial men of the middle class a
voice in the Government.--Edward I, "the English Justinian," encouraging
the courts in those decisions which tended to restrain the feudal lords
and protect their vassals; and approving a statute which declared that
no tax or impost should be laid without the consent of the Lords and
Commons.--The introduction into England, in the latter part of the
fifteenth century, of the art of printing, and the consequent cheapness
of the price of books, and the diffusion of that knowledge which is
power.--The discovery of America, giving an impulse to British commerce,
and increasing the importance of the trading classes, by placing in
their hands those sinews of war which kings must have, or cease to make
conquests. The Reformation, introduced into England in 1534, unfettering
the conscience, and giving to the laity the Heaven-descended charter of
human rights--the Bible.--The Petition of Right--the British Declaration
of Independence--signed by Charles I, in 1628, by command of his
Parliament, which materially curbed the royal prerogative.--His headless
trunk on the scaffold at Whitehall, in 1649, when the aspiring blood of
a Stuart sank into the ground, to appease the republican wrath of
Deacon Praise-God Barebones and Captain Smite-them-hip-and-thigh Clapp,
and their brother Roundheads--teaching anointed tyrants that, though
kings can do no wrong, they can die like common felons.--The succeeding
Commonwealth, when a Huntingdonshire farmer swayed with more than regal
majesty the scepter which had so often dropped from the feebler hands of
the Plantagenets and Tudors. The passage of the _Habeas Corpus_ act, in
1678, in the reign of Charles II, who saved his head by surrendering his
veto. The Revolution of 1688, which deposed one line of kings and chose
another, prescribing to the elected monarch his coronation oath, and
exacting his ratification of the new Declaration of Rights.--The
American Revolution, with its Declaration of Independence, teaching the
House of Hanover the salutary truth, not only that "resistance to
tyrants is obedience to God," but it can be successful. These, and
cognate epochs in English history, which preceded those Modern Reforms
of which I am more particularly to speak, are links in that long chain
of events which gradually circumscribed the power of the princes and
nobles. Each was a concession to that old Anglo-Saxon spirit of liberty,
which demanded independence for the American Colonies, and is now
working out the freedom of the subjects of the Queen of Great Britain
and Ireland.
The object of the following chapters will be, to briefly sketch some of
these MODERN REFORMS, interspersed with notices of some of the prominent
actors in each.