Imatges de pàgina
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LONDON, Printed by NICHOLS and SON,
at Cicero's Head, Red Lion Paffage, Fleet-Street;

where LETTERS are particularly requested to be fent, PosT PAID.
And fold by ELIZABETH NEWBERY,

the Corner of St. Paul's Church Yard, Ludgate-Street. 1800

ON THE COMPLETION OF HIS SEVENTIETH VOLUME.

W

HATEVER Poets Laureate fay,
Fearful to lose their wine and pay,
The Century now is past;
URBAN, let us redeem the time,
In loyal profe or useful rhyme,

While a few more years laft.
Yes, Urban, yes, the Century's past;
Nor all the laureate heads that live,
From Skelton to the very last,

To it a different term can give.
Fled is the Century to the dark abyfs

Wherein fo many former have been loft; Few have been maik'd with more events than this;

Then, famous period, what haft thou to
boaft?

What Century has not, in its middle time,
To tell of Revolution's horrid deeds!
Of innovation, fickleness, and crime,
Rebellion's progrefs, or Rebelion's feeds?
Yet of improvements may fome Centuries
boaft;
[light;
Of true Religion, and true Learning's
Of virtuous fchifm from Error's bigot hoft:
Of fuch an age the annals must shine
bright.

The CENTURY 'S PAST, and we have
liv'd

At leak its half; but who believ'd
Such doings to have seen?
Deeds done in our advancing age,
That blot the fair hiftoric page,

We fcarce know what they mean.
Scarce had we enter'd on our teens,
When Britain witness'd dangerous scenes,
Rebellion thook our land;
But, ere our half of life was spent,
We witnefs'd much more dire event

Extend from ftrand to strand.
Phrenzy and faction have o'erthrown
Alike the altar and the throne,

What have they left instead?
Wild anarchy and mifcall'd reafon's (way,
Murder and plunder day by day;

A mob without a head.

OLD

What of the age, that just expiring lies,
Shall partial Hiftory fay or more or less;
While GALLIA's guilt 's proclaim'd without
difguife,
[fefs.

Our BRITAIN'S happiness we must con-
Let Blenheim tell, and let tell Ramilies,
And let the marth of Efthambruges tell,
When under Marlborough's fword and his
allies,
[fell;

Th' unnumber'd hofts of Frenchmen daily And let a ten years' war aloud proclaim

Our deathless glories on the Continent; Tho' fhort-liv'd peace difgrac'd our Anna's reign;

Her realms and councils into faction rent. And hall we now,. when injur'dEurope calls Aloud for aid, our friendly aid refuse? Though foes prevail, and injur'd Europe falls,

Britain alone infpires th' Hiftoric Mufe. Th' enraptur'd Mufe her feats of arms shall fing [train ; Learning and Commerce in expanded Patron of Arts her most religious King,

She prays may live, nor yet has pray'd

in vain.

The trueft freedom ftill is Albion's boaft;
Diffus'd in UNION o'er her every thore
IERNE feels, in her united coaft,

What SeoTIA tafted ninety years before,
Let Union then, well understood,
Join heart and hand for every good.
Tho' Albion ftand alone,

Her new confolidated realm
No hoftile foe thall e'er o'erwhelm;
Her empire's all her own.
To the Almighty's throne afcend
Each fervent prayer our lips can fend,
Follow'd by heartfelt zeal;
That Heaven our Sovereign's life extend,
His grateful fubjects to defend,

And fav the public weal. R. G. *Battle at Oudenarde, alluding to Spenfer's Fairy Queen, II. 10. 24.

THE UNION. JAN. 1, 1801.

LD England's Rofe and Scotland's
Thistle join'd
Henceforth with Ireland's Shamrock is
[combin'd.
HONI SOIT QUI MAL Y PENSE*
Was Albion's motto long ago;
To which, with true prophetic fenfe,
Join'd TRIA JUNCTA IN UNOT.

So oft her knights 'gainst Scotia's fought,
That Union only could reprefs it;

* Motto of the Garter. Motto of St. Patrick.

The pungent motto Scotland brought
Was, NEMO ME IMPUNE LACESSIT,
But, when Hibernia join'd her hand,
QUIS SEPARABITS? hold the cried;
So let us bail the happy band,

For TRIA JUNCTA's verified.
Thus long may they flourish, and long may

unite

Their fupporters ftill refting on GOD AND
MY RIGHT.
B. S.

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PREFACE.

Jan 1, 1801. HE Conductor of a miscellaneous work like the GENTLEMAN'S

TM Constanno accompany his readers into the opening Century

without leading their recollectious, as well as his own, to a fummary furvey of the many and fingular events which have diftinguished the Century which has just clofed upon them, and in the larger half of which his life has been pent. Though the undertaking began before he came into being, and only the continuation of it for one quarter of the Century devolved on him, he cannot but feel a fecret fatisfaction that he has been made the happy inftrument of recording alike events, of which he has only heard, and thofe of which himself was conscious; Quæque ipfe vidit, & quorum pars magna fuit ;

as well as of preferving the deductions and improvements made on thefe events by his many valuable Correfpondents.

The occurrences through the greater part of the laft Century may be deemed only a fucceffion of events that are common to every fimilar period. Men of eminence in every department have clofed their career in the Eighteenth, as in all preceding Centuries; battles have been fought; fieges carried or raifed; empires won and loft; territories transferred to new and unexpected owners; ftorms and earthquakes, plague, peftilence, and famine, have ravaged and deftroyed; comets have blazed; exhalations have glided meteorous; the greater luminaries have been eclipfed; new difcoveries have been made in Arts, Sciences, and Commerce; new fects and notions have fprung up in Religion; in fhort, events great and fmall proceeded in their general courfe of fucceffion for ninety years out of the hundred, which we have as firm a perfuafion go to the conftitution of a Century ftrictly fo called, as 20s. to a pound, or 218. to a guinea.

The Century opened with a confirmation of the bleffings which this Country gained by the Revolution, and which it was intended Europe fhould have participated, by the train of victories gained by that hero of our own, Marlborough, during a ten years war; till the religious fcruples of a fovereign and the turbulent bigotry of an unworthy fon of the church difturbed the public tranquillity, and hafiened a peace,which only the death of the ambitious Louis maintained. The war was changed into domeftic rebellion, fuppreffed, indeed, in a few weeks from its firft appearance. The tranquillity of Spain fuffered a longer interruption. A more exalted member of the Church of England fell a victim to his own rettlefs ambition; and George I. did not live to fee negotiation reftoring peace to Europe for a fhort period, and interrupted by a series of battles and another rebellion, after his immediate fucceffor had been near twenty years in poffeffion of his throne. The government of Holland was vefted in a Stadtholder, and other alterations and partitions made in other ftates of Europe. The differences in the calculation of time were obviated by the introduction of a new ftyle among us. The defence of our territories in both the Indies demanded our utmost exertions; and our acquifitions in both were confirmed by the peace of Paris, 1763. VOL. LXX.

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