cause of his country, and of the human race. He pursued the noblest ends by the noblest means: the dig nity and happiness of mankind, by fublime genius and heroic courage. The most distinguished characters, in many instances, have been found to have derived the enthufiafm that prompted them to undertake and persevere in the execution of great defigns from an admiration of other illustrious characters, which inspired a defire of imitation. Achilles emulated Bacchus: Alexander, Achilles: Julius Cæfar, Alexander; and Frederick II. of Pruffia, with other heroes, Julius Cæfar. So too, Charles XII. of Sweden had Quintus Curtius, in his earliest youth, always in his hands, and had learned his stories of Alexander by heart. In like manner Guftavus III. the late king of Sweden, was inflamed with a love of glory, by contemplating the actions of both his paternal and maternal ancestors; particularly of Gustavus Vafa and Gustavus Adolphus, and of the renowned Pruffian monarch, who was his uncle. If general Washington was roused to any grandeur of defign, or, in his publie conduct, political and military, had any model of irritation, it feems to have been king William III. prince of Orange, and king of England. The ground on which we hazard this conjecture is, his admiration frequently exprefied of that great prince, both in his letters and in private converfation, compared with the tenor of his own actions. The caufes and circumstances in which they were both engaged were fimilar: their conduct alfo fimilar. The prince maintained the independence of his countrymen, in oppofition to the mighty power of France: the ge neral maintained the independence of his countrymen, in oppofition to that of England: both were remarkable for coolness and caution; but remarkable also for firmness and intrepidity, under every circumstance of danger, and every critical moment of action. They never shunned a decisive engagement from any other motive than that of prudence: nor were they wifer in council than brave in the field; though their final success was more owing to judicious retreat, and renewed preparations for actions, than to daring impetuofity. The character given to the pretender, in 1745, and applied to general Washington in his familiar letters to general Mercer, may, with equal propriety, be applied both to king William and to himself. They were the most cautious men in the world, not to be cowards; and the braveft, not to be rash. It may be added, that their fortitude, in the eye of true moral criticifm, shone forth with greater fplendour, when veiled in the garb of caution, than when confeffed to the eyes of all, and covered with duft and blood in the field of battle. There is an active fortitude, and their is a paffive fortitude: the latter not certainly less, but in fome respects fuperior to the former. In the conflict and agitation of danger, quickly to be over, or quickly to fpend its utmost fury, the mind of the patriot and hero is awakened by an excitement of his spirits, and the attention and fympathy of all around him. In the calms of torpid filence, nay, and under the chilling blafts of reproach, whilft he ftill retains his unfhaken purpose, the eclat of his virtue is less, but the proof of its conftancy greater: greater in the the inverse ratio of the magnitude of the difficulties and dangers to be overcome, to the indifference with which they are regarded. It is the firmness of both the heroes that forms the subject of this brief parallel, after their retreats under in numerable disadvantages and hardships, that, in the whole of their character, is the just object of the greatest admiration. There was allo a striking coincidence, not only between the circumstances and fituation and the public conduct of these great men, political and military, but allo, in lome points, between their natural tempers and difpotitions: particularly in an habitual taciturnity and reserve. A degree of taciturnity is, indeed, infeparable from a mind intent on great and complicated defigns. Minds deeply occupied in the contemplation of great ends, and the means neceffary for their accomplishment, have as little leifure as inclination either to entertain others with their converfation, or to be entertained by them. Most great men, when profoundly engaged in important affairs, are remarkably filent. Buonaparte, though naturally affable, in the midst of those circumftances of unprecedented novelty, complication, and alarm, in which it has been his destiny to be placed, is, on the whole, reserved and filent. Henry IV. of France, though naturally affable, humourous, and facetious, became thoughtful and filent, when he found himfelf involved in projects of great difficulty as well as importance. It is not by a multiplicity of words and common-place compliments that men attain an afcendency over the minds of other men; but by the weight of their character and the foundness of their judgement, which readily difcerns certain common interests and paffions, that tend to unite men in common sympathies and common purfaits. It was a common and striking trait in the characters of both king William L. and general Washington, that they both pofiefled the happy art of reconciling and uniting various difcordant parties in the profecution of common objects. But every parallel is foon terminated, by the wonderful diversity which characterizes every individual of the human race. Washington had no favourites, but was warm in his affections to his own family and near relatives: William was not a little addicted to favouritifm; but cold and indifferent to the fincere attachment and devotion of his queen: a princess, by whose right he was raised to a throne, and a partner worthy any fovereign prince, for every accomplishment of mind and perfon. The calm, deliberate, and folid character of general Washington did not exclude a turn to contrivance and invention. He was judicious, not dull; ingenious, not chimerical. In this respect, his talents and turn, like his virtues, were carried to the line beyond which they would have ceased to be talents and virtues, and no farther. He knew how to diftinguith difficulties from impoffibilities, and what was within the bounds of human power, in given situations, from the extravagancies of a heated and bold imagination. He was neither terrified by danger, nor feduced by repose, from embracing the proper moment for action. He was modest, without diffidence; sensible to the voice of fame, without vanity; independent and dignified, without pride. He was a friend to liberty, not licentiouness: not to the abstractions of philosophers, but to thofe ideas of well-regulated freedom, which the ancestors of the Americans had carried with them from England, and confirmed by the revolution towards the end of the eightéen century. On those principles he fought and conquered; conquered-but not for himself. He was a Hannibal, as well as Fabius; a Cromwell, without his ambition; a Sylla, without his crimes. As the children of men, in youth or the vigour of manhood, are more healthful and vigourous than those in the decline of life, so general Washington defcended and formed, by the fpirit of England, in the purest and most flourishing period of English freedom, poffefled a juster and higher spirit of liberty than what might, probably, have been bred by an emigration in the present times. When we reflect on the conteft between monarchial power, on the one hand, and the fpirit of infubordination, on the other, which, at the present moment, divide Europe, we shall find reason to congratulate mankind, that the example of a happy medium between both has been fet, and is likely to be more and more enforced, by the growing profperity of America. In this view, general Washington appears in the light of another Noah; the pilot, who, failing in the middle, between the dangers of Sylla and Charybdis, guided the ark that faved the human race from ruin. The French agents, Adet, Fauchet, Genèt, and Dupont, had been fent out, to the American states, in the character of envoys; but, in reality, as firebrands of difcord and sedition. The grand object of their miffion was, that the French republic should acquire such an influence and afcendency in North America, as she already possessed in Venice, Genoa, and the Swiss cantons: to divide the North Americans into two great political parties, or rather governments; to play the nothern states, where the French interest preponderated, against the southern; to weaken, and so to obtain an influence and authority over the whole. As the patriotifm, prudence, and firmness of general Washington had contributed fo largely to fnatch his country from the grafp of the British legislature, so now they contributed equally to fave it from a connection and fubordination, ftill more to be dreaded, with the French republic. The magnitude of the danger, from which general Washington, before his refignation of the presidency, faved his country, will fufficiently appear from the mention of one circumstance, that Mr. John Adams, the vice-president of the congrefs, the intimate and confidential friend of general Washington, and, in every respect, worthy of fo great an honour, was chofen his fucceffor, by a majority of only three votes above the number that appeared for Mr. Jefferies, who was at the head of the French party: which passed on the 8th of February, 1797. It may also be observed, to the fame end, that the treaty for an amicable and commercial intercourse between Great Britain and North America, was ratified only by the president's cafting vote. CHRONICLE. 4th. Dublin. [] CHRONICLE: JANUARY. L AST night, the house of Caleb Harman, esq. in the county of Longford, was attacked by a numerous party of Defenders, who demanded a furrender of all the arms in the house; but, on Mr. Harman's refusing to comply with this demand, they determined to carry their purpose by affault, and with fome difficulty forced open the doors. Mr. Har-, man at the head of his domestics, endeavouring to repel the affailants, was fired upon and received the contents of a blunderbuss loaded with flugs in his abdomen, and in consequence of his wounds, died this morning. Several of the domestics were also severely wound-, ed; and the defenders having effectually succeeded in obtaining all the arms in the house, retreated in triumph. Eleven out of the twelve ruffians who assassinated Mr. Harman have been taken, and are in Longford gaol; in the number is the person who was wounded by Mr. Harman's pistol. 6th. Leith. His royal highness the count d'Artois, with his suite, landed here from on board his majefty's frigate Jason, on the frigate's coming to anchor in the roads, his VOL. XXXVIII. royal highness was faluted with 21 guns from Leith battery, and with the like number on his landing at Leith, where he was received from the boat by lord Adam Gordon and a part of his fuite, and conducted in his lordship's carriage to an apartment in his majesty's palace of Holyrood-house, fitted up in hafte for his reception; and, as he entered the palace, his royal highness was faluted with 21 guns from Edinburgh Castle. The Windfor Foretters and Hopetoun Fencibles were in readiness to line the approach to the palace, but, his royal highness chufing to land in a private manner, and with as little ceremony as poffible, that was dispensed with. The noblemen in his royal highness's fuite followed in carriages provided for that purpose, and were conducted from the outer gate of the palace, by the commander in chief, to their apartments. His royal highness and fuite, confifting of a number of French noblemen and gentlemen, dined with lord Adam Gordon. At Carlton house, between 7th nine and ten o'clock in the morning, the princess of Wales was delivered of a princess. The duke of Gloucester, the archbishop of Canterbury, the lord chancellor, the B the lord prefident of his majesty's council, the duke of Leeds, the duke of Devonshire, the earl of Cholmondeley (lord chamberlain), and the earl of Jersey (master of the horse to the prince of Wales), lord Thurlow, and the ladies of her royal highness's bedchamber, were prefent. Her royal highness and the young princess were in perfect health. Between eight and nine 14th. o'clock this day, the pow der mills belonging to Mr. Hill, at Hounflow, owing to the wheels of the mill not being properly fupplied with oil, took fire, and blew up with a dreadful explofion, which not only terrified the inhabitants of the place but alarmed the cities of London and Westminfter, and the houses of the people several miles round the metropolis experienced the effects of its powerful concuffion; three men who were at work in the manufactory, have lost their lives, and the flames from the mill communicating to a punt in the mill river, in which were 30 barrels of gun. powder, fet fire to the whole, and blew up with a terrible explofion; the man who had the care of the veffel being thattered to pieces, and the boat being blown out of the water. Not a veftige of the mill isleft standing, and Hounflow heath is covered with bricks and tiles, and the mangled limbs of the unfortunate fufferers. The houses in Hounslow, Ifleworth, and even Brentford, have fuffered confiderably; the Crown Inn at Hounflow, and the King's Head at Brentford, have not a whole pane of glass in the windows; and the inhabitants were fo terrified near the fpot, that they not only forfook their dwellings, but a number of women, with their children, through fear, appeared half naked in the. streets, expecting every moment that their houses would fall and bury them in the ruins. The scattered limbs of the unfortunate victims, who for the most part have left large families to lament- their loss by this unforefeen event, were, by order of the magiftrates, collected together and depofited in the church-yard. The loss of this valuable manufactory is estimated at near 20,000l. The shock was felt as far north of London as the extremities of Enfield parith, and South beyond Croydon. A fimilar difafter happened to the fame concern about 20 years ago. 16th. Vienna. The princess royal of France, Maria Theresa, arrived here on the 9th, a little after fix o'clock in the evening, amidst the loudest acclamations of crowds of people, who accompanied her carriage as far as the Burg, where his Imperial majefty had caused a refidence to be prepared for her. Count Colloredo, cabinet minister to the emperor, accompanied her to the place of her refidence from Burkeridorff, whither he went to welcome her, in the name of his Imperial majesty, as foon as information of her arrival was received. Prince Stabremberg, the principal lord of the bedchamber, on the roth, went to the refidence of the princess, and prefented to prince Gavre all the future household fervants, &c. def. tined for her use. - The first who received the French princess royal of France in this capital, were the archdukes and archducheffes. The emperor and empress honoured her with a vifit foon after her arrival, and |