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Rh and theoretic few, who saw in universal freedom the only tie between man and his kind—the only rational hope whereon to ground the dissemination of equitable principles among the human race.

At the time of which we are writing, the classics, so lately thrown open for study and delight, were the universal source whence the young student drew his faith and inspiration. The glorious republics of Greece and Rome, seen through the halo which genius has flung round them, seemed the very models of that perfection whose belief ever haunts the mind capable of exertion.

History, it is said, is the past teaching by example. Alas, that example has perpetuated many dazzling errors! How many false principles have been laid down, how much delusion supported, by reference to the glories of Athens and of Rome! It remained for a later time to observe that those so-called republics were but aristocracy in its most oppressive form; and what are now the people were then positive slaves; to say nothing of how utterly unsuitable their form of government would be to our differing creed, climate, and manners. But it was to them that the wisest philosophers of that day turned for examples of legislation, and instances of patriotism; and it may well be excused in one young and ardent as Evelyn, if he