eans a change from worse to better, a re-establishment or revival of former neglected discipline, or a correction of abuses therein. The term is much used in a monastic sense for the reducing an order or congregation of religious to the ancient severity of the rule from which it had gradually swerved, or even for improving on the ancient rule or institution itself, and voluntarily making it more severe. In this sense the order of St Bernard is said to be only a reform of that of St Benedict. In this country it is applied both to politics and religion, and may innocently be applied to Reform. to any endeavours to change an establishment from worse to better. But it appears at present to have been chiefly made a pretence for designs which could not fairly or safely be avowed.

A reform in religion and in parliament (see Parliament), has, we know, been most loudly called for by men whose religious notions are immensely different from what has been generally reckoned christianity, and whose designs, as has been legally proved, went to the overthrow of all civil order. For infamous purposes like these, the word reform is a good cloak, especially if any thing can be fixed upon, either in the religion or government of the state, which, with the help of exaggeration and distortion, can be represented to the weak and unthinking as extremely defective and erroneous.

The general error of these men seems to be, that having picked up a set of speculative notions which flatter their own pride and the pride of those who listen to them, they will allow nothing to the arguments of their opponents or the experience of mankind. They think so often and so much upon their ideal reforms, that while they imagine their notions are liberal and extensive, they become contracted beyond imagination; while their judgments, of course, are warped with the most inveterate prejudices (see Prejudice). They see, or think they see, the propriety of their schemes; but they seldom, perhaps never, reflect, that that may be true in speculation or in theory which cannot possibly be reduced to practice. They will not take the world as it is, and allow it to profit by the wisdom and experience of ages; but they will reform it according to those ideas of right which they have learned from their own speculations and airy theories; seldom considering what may be done, they are determined to do what they think ought to be done. Liberty of conscience, and liberty of action, have been claimed by them as the unalienable rights of man; and so we ourselves are disposed to think them: nor have we heard that in this country they have been denied to any man, or set of men, so far as has been thought consistent with the safety of the state, and that of the other individuals who compose it. At the same time, the very same men hesitate not to blame, with acrimony the most violent, and to the utmost of their power to restrain, the actions and opinions of those who, with equal conviction, often on better grounds, and generally with more modesty, differ from them.

Amidst that excessive ardour, too, with which they propagate their opinions, they forget the extreme danger of withdrawing the attention of that part of the community, who must earn their bread by the sweat of their brow, from their proper occupations, to the tempestuous sea of political debate, for which their education and mode of life cannot possibly have qualified them. It requires but very little penetration, however, to be able to see, that it can be of no real service either to the individuals themselves, or to the community at large, in whatever light we look upon it. Indeed, to make those the judges of the law, and the reformers of the legislature, who have all their lives been employed in manual labour, is the extreme of folly; and yet it is what some men of considerable abilities, and from whom we had reason to expect better things, have more than once attempted. The effect of such a mode of seduction, (and it deserves no better name), when it shall become general, instead of serving the purposes of a real reform, must be to annihilate all civil order. Dissatisfaction is the most powerful check to honest industry; and dissatisfaction and idleness must be the effect of the wanderings of such men in the labyrinths of politics; which, for uncultivated minds especially, paves the way for every species of vice, and gradually ripens them for any wickedness, however atrocious. For the truth of these remarks, we appeal to the history of mankind from the creation to the present time: and we would seriously request the sober friends of reform, and many such, we doubt not, there are, to reflect, that in the present day we have more to fear from licentiousness than from despotism; from reform carried to an extreme than from the pretended attempts either of kings or ministers to annihilate our real liberty.

It may also be worth their while to consider, that times of public danger are not generally the best adapted to attempt changes of government; because what might satisfy one party would probably be thought too little by another, and divisions at such a period are most dangerous. When, therefore, attempts are made for reform which appear to be inconsistent with the safety of the state, restrictions must be used, which may by speculative men be thought severe and unnecessary, but of which they themselves are the causes. These restrictions too will be patiently submitted to by the wiser part of the community, when in more peaceable times they would neither have been thought of nor allowed.

Speculative reasoners may speak as much as they will of enlightening the minds of men, and of reforming government by the dictates of a refined and dispassionate philosophy; but when they come to apply their notions to practice, they will either find their representations little better than empty fountains, and therefore ineffective; or, as is more generally found to be the case, these schemes which in theory appeared to be perfect, will in practice, when combined with the malignant and ambitious passions of men, lead to ruin and disorder. The first institution of government, except among the Jews, was unquestionably the effect of passion and interest combined; and this passion and this interest, restrained within due bounds, is productive of much happiness. That government, we believe, too, will be best supported, and most productive of happiness, in which the mutual passions and interests of the individuals who compose it are so equally poised as to support one another, and to promote each the ends and success of the other; and this by the ablest reasoners and the best men has been thought to be the case with the British constitution. If the modern favourers of reform should think this an unstable support, if they will consider the world as it ever has been, and as it is, they will find it the only one we have, except religion; and they will thence be inclined to make the best of it. If after all, however, they should be disposed to doubt the position, we have only further to request them, with the sincerity of men and of Christians, to consult their own breasts, and seriously to consider the probable motives of those who act with them. They will then perhaps see, and they surely ought to acknowledge, that few few men have acted more according to the impulse of passion, interest, and ambition, than those who have for some time past founded the toczin of reform.