HECATE-Oh, well done! I commend your pains, By the WITCHES, who joining hands, dance round the CALDON. Bubble, bubble! toil, and trouble! March 14. [Exeunt omnes. IN MORE OF THE DOCTOR. [From the Oracle.] Effugere eft triumphus! N former times, when France provok'd the blow, BROD. THE ANECDOTE. [From the Morning Chronicle.] HE language now held in Parliament reminds us of a story to be found in an early edition of Joe Miller. A Jack Ketch infifted upon leading an innocent man to execution. While the noofe was preparing, the unhappy victim remonftrated with great earneftnefs, and faid there must surely be some mistake, as he had committed no crime, and there was no warrant for his death. "Put in your neck," faid Jack; you can complain againft me if I am wrong. You know my refponfibility." 66 THE IN THE KETTLE AND THE POT; OR, THE [From the Morning Poft.] "Let him change his opinion with decorum." Debate on vir John Wrottefly's Motion. the debate above alluded to, a Right Hon. Gentleman, whom we shall defignate as the Kettle, taunted a brother Privy Counsellor, who will probably not be mistaken, as the Pot, with "inconfiftency and coalition!" As imputations have double force when they come from clean hands, it may poffibly amufe your readers to be reminded of fome ftrokes of character in the Kettle, which will demonftrate at once his peculiar fitnefs for venting fuch a reproach, and the juftice of his title to thofe encomiums which his panegyrifts fo frequently mingle with their vefpers. Mr. Kettle's outfet in public life was in the loftieft flight of Toryifm; and the first object of his worship, Mr. Pitt-difappointed in certain Oriental fpeculations (an early prefage of recent realization), a few months difplayed him upon the directly oppofite extreme a blazing Whig-a flathy Foxite. The only difficulty was to decide, for which of the two fyftems honeft Kettle was moft refolute; that which, trampling upon the Commons of England, and reducing the Imperial Magiftracy of the British Conftitution to the likenefs and the littlenefs of private life, afferted, that the King had as clear a right to appoint or dismiss a Minifter, as any gentleman to hire and turn off his groom; or this which, though never denying the legal prerogatives of the Crown, maintained that all the functions of the English Kingship are public trufts, confided for the benefit of the people, not for the capricious gratification of the reigning Sovereign, always to be exercifed with reference to the feelings of Parliament and the interefts of the Nation (as contradiftinguished diftinguished to the whim and fancy of the Prince), and marking, more than by any other act of authority, the eternal difference between limited monarchy and abfolute defpotifm. Of these contrary principles, the fame year faw the good Kettle as the zealous difciple, equally ardent on both fides. A new and grand epoch furnished a fine opportunity for Kettle's tranfitions; a fcene where many a Kettle flourished and faded-the French Revolution. Before their fhoes were old who trod the Baftille to duft; whilft the Revolution was as yet only reproached with excefs of benevolent philofophy, and aiming at Utopian perfection; even then, when as yet Mr. Burke had fcarcely made one convert-even then, was honest Kettle a profound alarmift! A Court of Law, folemnly deciding upon human life, recognised the moral decorum and legal difcretion of the first public celebration of the French Revolution which took place in this country, namely, on the 14th of July 1790; but though the Chief Juftice and Primate of England could not but vindicate every fentiment that was uttered on that occafion, vet honeft Kettle was the first, and almost the only man in England, to aferibe to fuch a meeting inflammatory views ;-but mark ye, when, by and by, the Revolution affumed a new character, when the butcheries of September, the murder of the King, the Queen, the Princefs, the flaughter of the Deputies; when Robefpierre turned France into a charnel-house; and when thofe friends of freedom in England, "who, only in a general honeft thought, and common good of all the world," wifhed well to the Revolution, hung their heads with forrow and with fhame-then it was that the admirable Kettle came forth in a new guife, quite worthy of himfelf. Tame and torpid, and fenfelefs and lifelefs, was every other advocate of the French Revolution, in comparison with the infpired Kettle. He became the fudden hope of British British Jacobinifm; the ftar by which it was guided, either to spare or fall on. The Whigs!-they were impoftors! Even the fociety of the "Friends of the People" were but cold white mortals after all, whofe moderation chilled the energies of the fudden apostle. In a word, the ftigmatizer of those who rejoiced in the French revolution, whilft the French revolution was yet unftained by crimes, became himself fo totally revolutionized, that his patronymie was absolutely loft, and he was, for years, flattered by being called after the bloodieft ruffian that France ever produced! Well, therefore, and truly did honeft Kettle vaunt, on Wednesday fe'nnight, that his antagonists" would find it no eafy task to fix inconfiftency upon him." After fome years spent in a fyftem of hints against Mr. Fox for languor! indifpofition to popular courses! illicit ariftocracy in hort, for not risking the uproar of univerfal peace-behold the honeft Kettle stand forward in the face of the Whig Club, fpontaneously own his repented error, and proclaim, with the phlegm of a true profeffor, "unalterable adherence" to the object fo fufpected-(his hearers on that day will never forget his words.) He is a candidate at a popular election; the Foxites fuftain him; they canvafs; they fubfcribe; they write for him, in profe and in verfe; they make his caufe their own. Trace him onward, he plays a game most embarraffing to his connexions, and gives a glimpfe of that fpirit which his conduct has fince fo notably verified. Reasoned with, he pleads "duty," and juftifies himfelf by criminating all his friends in a body. Does the motive break through the difguife? he gets defperate; renounces all tie; declaims against party (the common practice of the venal), declares he never belonged to anybels upon a huftings the object of his for * Cicero probably knew as much of these matters as our accom plifhed mer devotion (in fealty for whom the Whig Club can teftify, that he would not fuccumb to even the earliest friends of his life, whom he then fo worshipped) vindicates his right to make the most of himself, and changes his opinion with decorum! In the war, you fee him as in a magnifier. He oppofed the late war with fury, as being frantic and abfurd; in which war the diftrefs of France (who fought fingle-handed), and the alliance of the flates of Europe (who fought with us), rendered any vital blow at our national existence hardly poffible: the prefent war, in which all Europe refuses to co-operate, in which our all is put to hazard for a rock in Africa, confeffedly against the latter; and in which the contraft of poffible refults ftands thus-though the invafion fail, France continues great and mighty; if it fucceeds, we are utterly extinguifhed-fuch a war the wife Kettle fupports as fane and judicious, and, in favour of that, he has no objection to a coalition with Pots, or pipkins. Well and wifely did the Kettle reproach his old friends on Wednesday night, or, in the language of a zealous profelyte to war and Ad-n," courageoufly did he unmask their real defigns," on the fcore of coalition with the late Minifters-furrounded as the Kettle fat with the former fycophants, flaves, and fatraps of thofe decried Minifters. Well and wifely did he interpofe upon an Irith question, and sport the topic of torture, fide by fide, with a noble perfon, in all things full brother to Kettle himfelf; equally veracious and confiftent; ripe and ready; et pares ambo et parati-the grand inflictor and grand negator-one who in doing or denying ftands nearly unmatched, and who can brazen down even the gentle Claudius plifhed Kettle; and his very expreffion is, that he should have deemed it a turpitude to have continued in a scene which Brutus had quitted. Turfe mihi videretur me manere in urbe e qua Brutus cederet. M TOL, VIII. even |