lished in the year 1771: but, after such a lapse of time, we are not certain that this is the original edition to which Mr. Young refers. It is not, however, improbable: for he informs us, in his advertisement of the work before us, that, in various parts of the Correspondence inserted in the "Annals of Agriculture" during the last fifteen years, he has been often solicited to give a new edition of his Calendar, and as often formed the resolution of doing it but that the new improvements, which have taken place, made so many and such great alterations necessary, while other and more pressing employments required his attention, that he has hitherto been prevented from executing the task. Having at last completed it, he hopes that the reader will find it, in its present form, worthy of his attention.

As an agricultural remembrancer, such a work, if executed with knowlege and care, must be acceptable to the farmer; and there is no doubt, considering Mr. Young's extensive observation and experience, that he is capable of furnishing useful hints and rules. The subjects noticed in each month are numerous, including a detailed view of the whole business of a farm. The character, however, which Mr. Young endeavours to form, is not that of the merely industrious and plodding farmer; for he advises his Agriculturist, in the months of January and June, to travel to observe the well-cultivated countries, to be present at the sheep-shearings of the Duke of Bedford and of Mr. Coke, and to furnish himself with a laboratory, to occupy his winter evenings. Yet he is aware that this pleasurable mode of gathering knowlege may lead to ideas of expence and dissipation, not compatible with the sober pursuits of his calling; he therefore warns the young farmer of his danger, and observes that if after an excursion, which has carried him into great, and, what is called good company, he returns home not quite so well satisfied with home as he was before, he has contracted a taint that may be worse than the scab among his sheep.'

We copy a part of Mr. Young's admirable advice on Family Arrange ment, which we recommend to the serious attention of every young farmer:

Many accidental circumstances gradually bring into a certain. train the common habits of domestic life; but it would often be more advantageous to lay down a plan to be pursued within doors as well as without such ideas may not always be practicable, but the inere aim will not be without its use. Our young farmer, on entering his farm, must necessarily arrange his plan of life and housekeeping, a subject which should not be wholly omitted, yet admits. but a few cursory hints that may possibly give a turn to his reflections, and, being properly worked on in his mind, may possibly pro

duce a beneficial effect on his conduct. It is not every man that has the power of thinking to any marked utility; but he, whose mind is inquisitive, may think to advantage on every subject. A prudent economy, free from all sordid avarice, will by every one be admitted as right; but it demands some reflection on entering life, or a farm, so to arrange every-day circumstances, that they shall flow from the plan adopted; or at least that such plan shall have no tendency to counteract. In regard to house-keeping, the safest way is to assign a stated weekly sum for it, which should on no account be exceeded. An annual one for his own dress and personal expences; the same for his wife and young children. And he should, in prudence, keep the whole allotted expence so much within his probable income, as to possess an accumulating fund for contingencies, children, &c. &c. And, if he expects the blessing of the Almighty on his industry, he will not forget the poor in such distribution: I do not mean by rates, but by charity and this hint demands one observation: a very material evil attending the support of the poor by rates, is the natural tendency they have essentially to lessen, if not to cut up charity by the root; that they do this in many hearts cannot be doubted; but it is a horrible, and a national evil. Let our young farmer accustom his mind to very different reflections, remembering that what he pays in poorrates he is forced to pay, and that it is a part of his calculation in stocking his farm: if he expects to prosper (but not from that motive only, or he might as well close his purse) let him so accustom himself to kind offices and assistance to his poor neighbours, whoever they may work with, as to gain a habit of reaping pleasure from his free benevolence.

• In such calculations as I have hinted at, he may safely estimate his profit at 10 per cent. on his capital; from 4cool. his income derived from his farm ought to be 400l. a year. He should lay up 50l. and as much more as his better interest may permit. To expend this in extra improvements, may be the most advantageous investment, provided he owns his farm, or has a long lease, not otherwise.

To attend markets and a few fairs, is a necessary part of a far mer's business; but to a young man it is a very dangerous part; it is too apt to give the evil habits of drinking and dissipation: evil company is every where to be found, and many a farmer has been ruined by a want of a careful selection of his acquaintance, and by not avoid. ing the contraction of habits which cannot be indulged with safety. As a safeguard against all evils of this tendency, an habitual attention to the duties of religion will have more efficacy than all the philosophic morality which so much abounds upon the tongues of many: by religion, I mean that of the national church, the most excellent that has been any where established for the instruction of the human species. He can have no true friend that will not advise him to keep the Sabbath piously and strictly himself, and make his family do the same many a judge has traced the origin of crimes that have brought labourers to the gallows, to Sabbath-breaking; and, if the source of failures among farmers were as well explored, they would be traced to the same spring. Serve God on Sunday as you serve yourself on Monday if you are a pagan, a deist, a moral philosopher, you are,

to

to a certain degree, in reason, answerable for the paganism, deism, or moral philosophy of your children and servants; if a christian, you are surely the same for their christianity: you may gain by this, but cannot lose.'

This volume is furnished with an appendix, containing various useful tables, and with a copious index.

ART. XI. The Constitution of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, Civil and Ecclesiastical. By Francis Plowden, Esq., Barrister at Law. 8vo. 108. Boards. Ridgway.

CHANCE has long kept out of our view this well-intentioned

and useful work: but, as its subject is not temporary, we trust that the oversight will not prove to be of any serious detriment. Mr. Plowden, though he will not join us in religious communion, holds as strongly as any of us the soundness of our political constitution; of which he is a warm admirer, a zealous vindicator, and frequently an able expounder. He appears to regard our civil regimen with as much fondness as any other subject, and in truth his being a catholic is no reason why he should not; for its outlines were formed, many of its most admired parts were shaped, and its genius and spirit were acquired, while the religion in which he believes was dominant. That which the public profession of his faith, when it ceased, left imperfect, the dread of its return in other new circumstances afterward achieved; and it was this dread, which at the time was by no means causeless, but which it would be now as ridiculous to harbour as that of magic or witchcraft, that occasioned the complete establishment of our civil rights.

Mr. Plowden is a decided though a temperate whig, a staunch though a cautious adherent to the principles of the glorious revolution, and a dauntless though discreet asserter of the principles then brought into action. We are glad to find that he does not countenance, in any degree, the doctrine so studiously inculcated a few years ago in one of the temples of the law; we refer to those popular lessons in which the notion of an original compact was scouted as an unfounded and pernicious tenet. Treading in the steps of the venerable defenders of British liberties, he cherishes and maintains this doctrine, which rests on principles friendly to popular rights, and hostile to abuses of power:

Suffice it for the present to say, that the real basis of the political and civil power or sovereignty which exists in each state, is the original agreement, compact, or contract of the society or community,

"

which forms that state, to depute and delegate the rights, which were in them individually in the state of nature, to those, whose duty it should become, to rule, protect, and preserve the community. For in this consists the whole duty both of the supreme and subordinate magistracy. It would be nugatory to question the reality of this original contract, because the particular time and place, when and where it was entered into, cannot be named, nor the written charter or document, in which it is expressed, be produced for the satisfaction and benefit of future generations. "The chief question is not, whether there was ever such a contract formally and actually made: but whether mankind had not a right to make it: for if they had, civil government, in the ordinary course of things, could be rightfully founded upon nothing else, but this, or what is equivalent to it, a tacit consent of the governed. And since the latter must be of the same effect with the other, this may be sufficient for our present purpose, unless persons think fit to call also for the original draught of a tacit consent.' The actual assemblage of the multitude forming themselves into a particular society, was the formal ratification of this original contract, though it were done by tacit consent; and by this each individual of our ancestors became bounden to the power of the whole community, or, in other words, to the sovereignty of the state. The free continuance of each of their successors in the community is the bond, by which they become more solemnly and firmly obligated to the contract, by grounding their tacit consent upon the valuable considerations and daily increasing advantages of the experience and improvements of their predecessors. This is a multiplying principle, that acquires vigor from every incident of human life, as each revolving day brings with it fresh reasons and motives, why the living members of the community should ratify and confirm the original contract entered into by their deceased ancestors. The perpetuation therefore of the community, is the unceasing renovation and confirmation of the original contract, in which it was founded.'

Mr. P. quotes from an anonymous author the passage which we subjoin; and which, though quaint and inelegant, inculcates a maxim that can never be too much present to the mind of Britons:

"There is nothing ought to be so dear to the Commons of Great Britain as a free parliament; that is, a House of Commons every way free and independent either of the Lords or ministry, &c. free in their persons; free in their estates; free in their elections; free in their returns ; free in their assembling; free in their speeches, debates, and determinations; free to complain of offenders: free in their prosecutions for offences; and therein free from the fear or influence of others, how great soever; free to guard against the incroachments of arbitrary power; free to preserve the liberties and properties of the subject; and yet free to part with a share of those properties, when necessary for the service of the public; nor can he be justly esteemed a representative of the people of Britain, who does not siucerely endeavour to defend their just rights and liberties against all invasions whatsoever."

The

The author exhibits in a very just light the revolutton of 1688, and very properly exposes some mystic jargon which occurs amid the luminous representations of that event by Mr. Burke. Indeed, Mr.Plowden's observations on this head form the most vaJuable portion of his volume.-He contends that those who were instrumental in effecting that revolution, and their successors, were so far from seeking to throw a veil over the principles on which they acted in that memorable proceeding, that they courted oportunties of proclaiming and ratifying them. Of this na ture he considers the two acts of Queen Anne, which make it treason to deny the competence of parliament to change the succession, the proclamation declaring the church not to be in danger, and the occurrences on the trial of Sacheverel,—as well the preamble prefixed by the Commons to the articles of impeachment, as the judgment of the Peers. He observes that the revolution gave no rights to the community, which the community did not before possess; but, by affording an opportunity of calling these rights into action, like all other practical examples, it threw light upon the principles, from which the rights themselves originated.'

With regard to the principles on which the parties to this event acted, they were, he says, prior to the constitution itself, and fully adequate to every purpose of preserving and improving it, as the exigencies of circumstances, and the wishes of the community might require. The facts which gave rise to the Revolution were such, as in human probability never will again recur in that combination, that shall occasion another such Revolution upon the strength of precedent.'

Mr. P.'s view of the nature of this great measure will ap pear from this passage:

We must never lose sight of the great pervading maxim of our Constitution, that the sovereignty of all power not only originated from the people, but continues unalienably to reside with them. Since the first institution of civil or political government upon earth, there never existed an instance, in which the transcendency of this sovereign right in the people was so clearly demonstrated, as in our Revolution of 1688. For in that temporary dissolution of the government, which was occasioned by the abandoment or dereliction of it by the executive power, the people in reality and practice, carried their rights to an extent far beyond the speculative allowances of the most unconfined theorists. So well satisfied were they of the general tenor of the Constitution and government, that to such parts, as they did not think fit to change and alter, they very wisely endeavoured to add strength, vigor, and authority. But imagination cannot conceive a greater stretch of human power, than to make the King's choice of his own religion (a right which every man possesses independently of the community) the immediate cause of his deprivation of all those benefits and advantages,