nation, as to lead it to tolerate a feeble and lukewarm effort for attaining this object, or to agree that a general peace shall be concluded, which shall consign the inhabitants of Africa to the unchecked ravages of our Spanish and Portuguese, our Dutch and French Allies. The crisis is important, requiring the vigilance and activity of the friends of human nature.

This country being eminently distinguished by taking the lead in a design the most truly Christian, how desirable it is, that the object in view should be promoted by a correspondent tone and temper influencing the rulers of the nation, to carry into their councils and measures, the spirit of the gospel, for the govern ment of the empire, and in relation to other powers!

In the Sicilian dominions, we behold the spirit of British freedom superseding both political and ecclesiastical tyranny. We see the nobility of the land unanimously resolving that the Feudal system shall be abolished, and all ranks admitted to an equal participation in the privileges of the laws.

At the interposition of the British government, the Prince Regent of Portugal has engaged that the inquisition shall not hereafter be established in his South American dominions.

What nation can, with so much propriety as Britain, advocate the cause, both of civil and religious liberty! May she prosecute so illustrious a course, by making use of her great power for the suppression of the turpitude and those enormous cruelties and crimes, which disfigure various parts of her eastern possessions*. May she so visibly and incontestibly promote the happiness of mankind, that the language may be applicable to our favoured isle: Destroy it not, for a blessing is in it. Isaiah lxv. 8.

In compiling the Epitome, the Writer has not had any object more at heart, than to convert history into a school of morals, and to make science subservient to public utility, as well as to private virtue. Britain, by a se

x Among the Hindoos, children are hung upon trees in baskets, and devoured by birds of prey; and female infants among the Rajpoot Indians, are destroyed by starving. BUCHANAN'S MEM. in INDIA. The same author in his "Memoir on the expediency of an Ecclesiastic Establishment in India," states, that death is inflicted in various ways in the sacred rites of the Hindoos; children are sacrificed by their parents to Gunga. Men and women drown themselves in the Ganges, in the places reputed holy; they devote themselves to death by falling under the wheels of the machines which carry their idols ; and it is caleulated that the women that are burned or buried alive with their deceased husbands, in the northern provinces of Hindos tan, are not less than 10,000 annually.

ries of events almost unparalleled in the history of nations, is invested with power and control over millions of human beings, inhabiting distant regions of the globe; but these thousands of thousands with whom she has opened an intercourse, have been long sitting in darknes, and as. in the region and shadow of death. What nation like Britain, is prepared to raise up others from the most deplorable and abject condition!

When we reflect that in our own country, the influence of royalty, throughout all its branches, has been displayed in promoting a system of education which shall comprehend the lowest orders of the community; that the best energies of the wise, the philanthropic, and the good, in all parts of the nation, have been directed to advancing the moral and religious instruction of this description of our fellow subjects, we cannot but perceive, that they will be prepared to render to society many essential services, which heretofore have been derivable only from the middle or superior classes of population.

Those of the middle and superior classes are now loudly called upon to take an advanced rank in literary and intellectual acquirements; and more especially such as may be likely to engage

in foreign and commercial enterprize*. The successful prosecution of Oriental studies, at the College of Fort William, in Bengal, has smoothed the way for the acquisition of the languages of the East. The progress made by W. Carey, J. Marsbman, and others of our countrymen, in the acquisition of Oriental languages, is equally gratifying and extraordinary.

The Scriptures largely exhibit the rise and fall, the aggrandisement and ruin of states and kingdoms; and it is obvious concerning those who have most occasioned the destruction of mankind, and the depopulation of the earth, that some are entirely blotted out of the list of nations; others have been reduced to a state of wretchedness, degradation, and pusillanimity, so that all mankind may contemplate the consequences of unbounded ambition, and be convinced of the folly of the lust of universal domination.

But to what purpose is it to make reflec

× Sanscrit, Hindoostanee, Arabic, and Persian Grammars, Vocabularies, and Dictionaries, are published or imported by Black, Parry, and Kingsbury, Leadenhall Street; and various publications respecting the commercial, moral, and political state of Hindostan, and the means and probability of its future advancement, may be had of Cadel and Davies, in the Strand, London; from which our countrymen going out to India, may derive much information.

tions like these, unless some practical result be deduced from the observation, which shall be beneficial either to the political, the religious, or civil interests of the human race?

The nations of Europe have had ample opportunity of ascertaining, that judicial arrangements have been effectual to preserve internal order, peace, and tranquillity, in their respective dominions. The principles of justice and equity being immutable in their nature, are of universal application. No change in the circumstances or opinions of men, can alter the nature of that which is intrinsically true. What is just upon a small scale cannot be less so upon a large one. And of what mighty consequence is it, that the animosities of rulers of nations, which involve the interests of millions of rational beings, should be referred to some decision calculated to produce impartiality and justice? After the wide wasting destruction which has overspread Europe, no experiment is necessary to convince us, that an appeal to the sword appreciates not the merits of any cause.

How important is the responsibility, which attaches to Europeans! Should the most distinguished Potentates of Europe meet on English ground for the purpose of drawing together more closely the bond of their union, and of more firm