sympathies and care for her suffering people. Her heart is now known to beat with a noble desire for popular and liberal measures. The prime minister himself has stood forth as the worthy servant of such a monarch-as the apostle of Free Trade! These are glorious triumphs for the popular cause. Never did public circumstances so auspiciously show themselves in England since the great revolution of 1688. Let the nation take care, this time, to secure the full fruits of them. Let the example of the League show that public opinion, if it please, is omnipotent. Let it not stop short with the abolition of the Corn Laws and the reduction of certain duties. Let it remember that with the abolition of the Corn Laws only one of a thousand aristocratic evils is eradicated. Time will show that cheap bread alone will not enable us to remedy all the mischiefs which remain. Our debt is eight hundred millions; our annual taxation fifty millions; and these will lie as an incubus on our manufacturing exertions, and on the cheapness of everything in England. Let the people remember that aristocratic corruption and the sources of its corruption still remain in the state; that the root of the mischief is still there; that the franchise is still restricted to a few; that Providence will not every year interfere with the seasons to remedy what we should remedy ourselves. Public opinion, under the auspices of a liberal and enlightened monarch, having now shown its power, should maintain its ascendancy till every aristocratic evil is obliterated; till the aristocracy are thrust back to their own house; till the dukes and lords cease to meddle in the election of the Commons; in a word, till our constitution and prosperity are actually restored.

February, 1846.

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CONTENTS.

CHAPTER I.

SIGNIFICANT anecdote of the Kentuckian and Indian.-Origin and

causes of the present false position of governments and people.-

The great modern business and distress of politics are a constant and

fruitless effort to remedy and reverse this position.-Anecdote of

the old man and his chest.-The business of nations, in truth the

same as the business of individuals, and requires only managers and

not delegated masters.-Aristocracy one section of the triple manifes-

tations of Craft-Kingcraft, Aristocraft, and Priestcraft. The spirit

of Caste, of eastern and slavish origin.-Aristocracies have ruined all

nations where they have prevailed.-The aristocracy of England the

possessors of everything in England.-Queen, Lords, and Commons

all in their power.

CHAPTER II.

History of the English aristocracy.-Dates from the Norman Con-

quest. The real facts of this origin, and false pretences of the

present aristocracy.-The Normans only Frenchified Danes.-Wil-

liam the Conqueror, the head of this order, himself a bastard of low

birth.-The Norman aristocracy, enriched by the plunder of Eng-

land, returned to Normandy.-Other and base adventurers brought

together by William's proclamations, took their place.-Savage

cruelty of those people from whom our aristocracy feign to date

their descent. Causes under the succeeding monarchs which rooted

out the whole race of Norman nobles.-The vile and low rabble

from whom any of our aristocracy who are of any real antiquity

actually descend.

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CHAPTER III.

Analysis of what is called TRUE BLOOD.-A wise child that knows
its own father.-Unenviable position of those who do.-The awful
revelations of a long ancestry.-Pure blood self-created by noble
deeds.-Exposition of the vile frauds of the heralds and genealogists.

-Historic review of the dreadful history of the highest blood in

England, the royal.-The Conqueror's family styled the family of

Atreus.-Crimes of Rufus, of the Plantaganets, and above all of

King John.-Rapid glance at succeeding monarchs to our own time;

one scene of murders and revolting crimes.-The same facts

conspicuous in other nations.-Where the true British blood is to

be looked for.

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CHAPTER. IV.

The history of English aristocracy divides itself into three great epochs.

-Magna Charta attributed to the barons, but really the work of

the people. The barons, defeated by John, called in Louis of

France. The barons and their French prince defeated and driven

out by the bowmen of England. The barons merely the tools of

Archbishop Langton.-John pursued to the death by the people,

and a new and better Charta exacted, not by the barons, but the

whole parliament of England, from Henry III.-Confirmed by

Edward I. in compliance with the popular demand.

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CHAPTER V.

General review of the three grand epochs of English aristocracy.-

THE FIRST PERIOD, that of pure feudalism, under which the

aristocracy grew great by the gifts and favours of the crown.-

During this period the people were serfs.-As the aristocracy grew

powerful, their wranglings with each other, and with the Crown,

their benefactor.-Attempts on the Crown itself. These punished

by the Tudors, and humiliation of the noblesse.-THE SECOND

EPOCH; that in which the people strove for their rights with the

crown. In this, the aristocracy siding with the crown against the

people, were, with the crown, pulled down and destroyed by the

people, namely, in the Commonwealth.-THE THIRD AND LAST

EPOCH, extending from the revolution of 1688 to our time,

that of cunning and humbug.-The wonderful success and fruits of

this period of aristocratic power.

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CHAPTER VI.

HISTORIC RISE OF THE ARISTOCRACY OF THE MIDDLE AGES.-Advan-

tages taken by the nobles of the usurpations and troubles of the

reigns of Henry I., Stephen, Henry II., Richard I., John,

Henry III., the Edwards, Richard II.-The members of the York

and Lancaster lines.-Horrors suffered by the people under the

aristocracy of these reigns.

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CHAPTER VII.

View of the full-blown greatness to which aristocracy had arrived in

the time of Edward IV.-The great family of the Nevilles.-The

enormous power, wealth, and body of retainers of Warwick, the

king-maker.—Hume's description of him and the Neville family.—

Thirty thousand persons maintained daily at Warwick's different

castles. Plans to fix his family securely on the throne.-The fall

of Warwick and the other great heads of this family; its total

ruin.-Unprincipled character of the nobility of that time.

CHAPTER VIII.

Henry VII. terminates the first or feudal epoch of the aristocracy,

by lopping off the great heads.-Resumes the grants of estates

made by former monarchs.-Noblemen that he put to death, Lord

Lovel, the Earl of Lincoln, Lord Audley, Lord Fitzwalter, Earl of

Warwick, &c., &c.-Henry VIII. continues the same lopping

system. Beheads the Dukes of Suffolk and Buckingham, Lords

Cromwell and Hungerford, Rochford, Darcy, Hussey, Montacute,

and Marquis of Exeter: the Countess of Salisbury, Lady Rochford;

Lord Surrey; besides great numbers of knights and gentry.—

Dreadful condition of the kingdom.

CHAPTER IX.

Attempts of the nobility again in Edward VI.'s time to usurp the

Crown.-Rise, arrogance, and fall of the upstart Seymours.-The

true character of an aristocracy nakedly displayed in this reign.—A

new race spring out of the plunder of the church.-Browns,

Bromleys, Petres, Parrs, Russells, &c., &c.-Origin of the Bedford

family.-Dreadful evils brought by the aristocracy on the nation.

CHAPTER X.

True character of Queen Elizabeth, as revealed by the State Papers.

-Systematic murders carried on by the commissioner of murder,

Sir Ralph Sadler, and others.-Murders of Cardinal Beaton,

Rizzio, Darnley, Queen of Scots.-Light thrown on these by the

State Papers.-The Scotch nobility held in pay by Elizabeth.-

Horrors of Elizabeth's reign.-Walsingham the forger, and Burleigh

the spider.-Elizabeth's proposal to Sir Amias Paulet, to murder

the Queen of Scots, indignantly rejected.-Ruin of Davison.-

Growth and demonstration of the popular power in this reign.—

Farce of the Queen's Speech at Tilbury Fort.-Elizabeth's

butcheries. She outlives the public's affection.-Horrid state of

the kingdom.

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CHAPTER XI.

Aristocracy during the reign of James I.-The unpopular character

and despotism of the Stuarts peculiarly provocative of popular mani-

festations of power.―James's vaunts of absolutism and divine right.

-His boundless lavishment of titles.-The profligacy of king and

nobility in striking contrast to the simple dignity of the people.-

James knights two hundred people on his journey into England.—

Invents baronets as a money speculation. The price 10007. each.—

Knighthood varied from 300l. to 607.-All government offices set to

sale.-Opens a market for the sale of honours.-Peerages sold for

large sums. The present families who purchased their titles at

this time. James's disgusting favouritism, and the dreadful deeds

of the aristocrats of this reign.-The profligate Buckingham, the

murderer and adulterer Carr, made Earl of Somerset.-Murder of

Sir Thomas Overbury.-The infamous Countess of Essex.-The

rising patriotism of parliament.

CHAPTER XII.

The reign and downfall of Charles.-The popular power stands up

against the oppressions of kings and aristocrats, and punishes in

the monarch high treason against the people.-England enacts the

great drama of avenging patriotism. It arraigns, condemns, and

executes a monarch; the first example to the nations of the

assumption of a people's awful authority.-Examples of the

desperate policy of Charles, which justified the popular act.—Laud

and Strafford, the actors of " the Thorough."-The glorious patriots

of the Parliament.-The base, unpatriotic conduct of the peers.-

They fall into contempt.-Imbecility of the class.

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CHAPTER XIII.

A republic the most perfect form of government, but maintainable

only by a virtuous and high-minded people.-The commonwealth

premature. It lived and died with the glorious few, the Pyms,

Marvels, Hampdens, and Miltons.-Tory assertions that the people

were tired of a republic and therefore recalled the monarch, dis-

proved by statistical facts.-Respect for and prosperity of Eng-

land during the Commonwealth.-Its subsequent effects.-Real

causes of the Restoration.-INFAMOUS BARGAIN OF THE ARIS-

TOCRACY WITH CHARLES II. FOR HIS RESTORATION; BY WHICH

THE ARISTOCRACY RELIEVED THEMSELVES FROM ALL THEIR FEUDAL

SERVICES, AND THREW THE WEIGHT OF TAXATION ON THE PEOPLE.

-The traitor Monk rewarded for his services in this matter with

a dukedom.

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