LONDON, Printed by NICHOLS and SON, where LETTERS are particularly requefted to be fent, PoST PAID. ON THE COMPLETION OF HIS SEVENTIETH VOLUME. W pay, HATEVER Poets Laureate fay, While a few more years lait. To it a different term can give. Wherein fo many former have been loft; Few have been mark’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 boast; [light; Of true Religion, and true Learning's Of virtuous fchifm from Error's bigot hoft: of fuch an age the annals muft fhine bright. The CENTURY 'S PAST, and we have liv'd At leak its half; but who believ'd We scarce know what they mean. Extend from ftrand to ftrand. Phrenzy and faction have o'erthrown Alike the altar and the throne, What have they left instead? Wild anarchy and mifcall'd reason's sway, Murder and plunder day by day; A mob without a head. THE What of the age, that juft 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 conLet 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 inspires th' Hiftoric Mofe. Th' enraptur'd Muse her feats of arms fhall 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 Seo TIA tafted ninety years before. Her new confolidated realm To the Almighty's throne afcend And fav the public weal. R. G. *Battle at Oudenarde, alluding to Spenfer's Fairy Queen, II. 10. 24. UNION. LD England's Rofe and Scotland's [combin❜d. OL Thistle join'd Henceforth with Ireland's Shamrock is HONI SOIT QUI MAL Y PENSE* Was Albion's motto long ago; To which, with true prophetic sense, *Motto of the Garter. Motto of St. Patrick. JAN. 1, 1801 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 hail the happy band, For TRIA JUNCTA's verified. Thus long may they flourish, and long may unite Their fupporters ftill refting on GOD AND TH PREFACE. Jan 1, 1801. THE Conductor of a mifcellaneous work like the GENTLEMAN'S MAGAZINE cannot accompany his readers into the opening Century without leading their recollections, as well as his own, to a fummary furvey of the many and fingular events which have diftinguifhed the Century which has juft clofed upon them, and in the larger half of which his life has been ipent. 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 thote of which himself was confcious; 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 fucceflion 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; forms 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 21s. 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 haftened 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 rettless ambition; and George I. did not live to fee negotiation reftoring peace to Europe for a fhort period, and interrupted by a feries 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 utmoft exertions; and our acquifitions in both were confirmed by the peace of Paris, 1763. VOL. LXX. Here |
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