been forced to conclude a humiliating peace with the republic in 1373. It is said that he was so much awed by the majesty of the assembly, that on the first day on which he appeared before it, he was unable to deliver his address. The next day he recovered his spirits, or more probably his strength, and his speech in behalf of Carrara was loudly applauded. He returned to his retirement in a failing state of health, and his complaints were aggravated by imprudence, and disregard of medical advice. July 18, 1374, he was found dead in his library, his head resting on an open book. A stroke of apoplexy had thus suddenly terminated his life. All Padua assisted at his obsequies, and Francesco of Carrara led the funeral pomp. A marble tomb, which still exists, was raised to him before the door of the church of Arquà.

Such was the death and such the life of Francesco Petrarca, than whom few men have exerted more influence over their own times; have contributed more to form and polish the language of their native land; or have given a more decided tone to the literature of succeeding generations. This is not the place to enter into a minute analysis of his merits as a poet. If he did not create the kind of poetry in which he excelled, at least he carried it to perfection: if he could not save his style from being disfigured by feeble imitators, at least he left it in itself a noble work: if he did not avoid the false conceits and strained illustrations, which at the rise of a new literature are almost always found to possess irresistible attractions, he redeemed and even ennobled them by strains of simple passion, imagination, and melody, which will live as long as the language in which they are composed. His Latin writings, on which he wished his reputation to rest, are now much neglected. They are not indeed calculated for general reading; but they are highly valuable as records of the time and of the man. His letters form the most interesting, because the most personal, portion of them. Few men have laid bare their hearts so completely as Petrarch. His vanity, his dependence on the sympathy of others, led him to commit to writing every incident of his life, every turn in the troubled course of his feelings. But he gains rather than loses by this voluntary exposure. His Christian faith and Christian principles of philosophy, however swayed by occasional currents of passion, stand out beautifully amidst the corruptions of that age. It is as impossible to rise from a perusal of Petrarch's poetry, and even more perhaps of his prose, without a feeling of love for the man, as of admiration for the author.

In early life he was distinguished for beauty, of which he was himself not insensible; for he left, in his Letter to Posterity,' a description of his own person, which we quote from Ugo Foscolo's translation. "Without being uncommonly handsome, my person had something

agreeable in it in my youth. My complexion was a clear and lively brown; my eyes were animated; my hair had grown grey before twenty-five, and I consoled myself for a defect which I shared in common with many of the great men of antiquity (for Cæsar and Virgil were grey-headed in youth), and I had a venerable air, which I was by no means very proud of." He was then miserable, Foscolo continues, if a lock of his hair was out of order; he was studious of ornamenting his person with the nicest clothes; and to give a graceful form to his feet, he pinched them in shoes that put his nerves and sinews to the rack. These traits are taken from his own familiar letters.

The life and writings of Petrarch have been repeatedly illustrated at great length. The Petrarcha Redivivus' of Tomasini; the voluminous Mémoires sur Petrarque' of the Abbé de Sade, who has taken up the subject as a matter of family history; and the works of Tiraboschi and Baldelli, are among the best authorities for our author's history. To the English, and indeed to every reader, we must recommend the Essays on Petrarch,' by Ugo Foscolo; at the end of which there are some exquisite translations by Lady Dacre. The most

complete edition of Petrarch's works is the folio published at Bâsle in 1581. Among the numerous editions of his Italian poems, we may particularize that of Biagioli, 1822, as containing the notes of Alfieri; and that of Marsard, printed at Padua, as distinguished alike for its correctness and beauty of execution.

THE six and thirty years which have elapsed since the death of Edmund Burke are not sufficient to secure a right and impartial sentence on his character. We are still within the heated temperature of the same political agitations in which he lived and struggled. We are not, perhaps our children will not be, qualified to judge him and his contemporaries, with that calmness with which men weigh the merits of things and persons who have exerted no perceptible influence over their own times. It is fortunate, therefore, that the limits of this brief memoir prescribe rather a succinct statement of unquestioned facts, than a disputable adjudication between opposite opinions.

Edmund Burke, son of Richard Burke, an attorney in extensive practice in Dublin, was born in that city, January 1, 1730. Of his early life little is known with certainty. He appears to have distinguished himself at Trinity College, Dublin, by his acquirements and talents, especially by a decided taste and ability for the discussion of subjects relating to English history and politics. His first literary effort of any importance was made before he quitted that university, in some letters directed against a factious writer called Lucas, at that time the popular idol. These are not preserved. In 1750 he came to London, and was entered a student of the Middle Temple. It is singular that the idle rumour, expressly contradicted by himself, of his having completed his education at St. Omer's, should be still in some degree accredited by the author of the article 'Burke,' in the Biographie Universelle. Whether, in 1752 or 1753, he became a candidate for the chair of Logic at Glasgow, is a more doubtful question: the opinions of Dugald Stewart and Adam Smith, who took some pains to ascertain the truth, were in the negative. It is certain, however, that the extraordinary talents of Burke soon began

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to attract attention: he wrote in many political and literary miscellanies, and formed an acquaintance with some distinguished characters of the time. Among these should be mentioned Lord Charlemont, Gerard Hamilton, Soame Jenyns, and somewhat later, Goldsmith, Reynolds, Dr. Johnson, and Hume. His first avowed work, the Vindication of Natural Society,' was published in 1756, and excited very general admiration. The imitation of Bolingbroke's style in this essay was so perfect, that some admirers of the deceased philosopher are said to have overlooked the evident signs of irony, and to have believed it to be a genuine posthumous work. This may appear strange; but it is surely more strange, that forty years afterwards this 'Vindication' should have been republished by the French party, with a view of serving democratic interests. Before the close of 1756, appeared the Philosophical Inquiry into the Origin of our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful,' which added largely to Burke's reputation, and procured him the valuable friendship of Sir Joshua Reynolds. Shortly afterwards, the public attention being at that time much directed to the American colonies, was published An Account of the European Settlements in America,' of which Burke was probably not the sole, but the principal author. It was much read, as well on the Continent as in England; and indeed no inconsiderable portion of it has been incorporated into the celebrated work of the Abbé Raynal. About this time Burke married the daughter of Dr. Nugent, an intelligent physician, who had invited him to his house while suffering under an illness, the result of laborious application. This union was a source of uninterrupted comfort to him through life. "Every care vanishes," he was in the habit of saying, when I enter my own home." A confined income, however, rendered literary exertion still more indispensable to him than before: and in 1759 The Annual Register,' that most useful work, for many years entirely composed by Burke, or under his immediate superintendence, was undertaken by him in conjunction with Dodsley. At length, in 1765, with the first Rockingham administration, he entered on a more extensive sphere of action: being appointed private secretary to the Marquis of Rockingham, through the recommendation of his friend Mr. Fitzherbert.

Coming now into Parliament as member for Wendover in Buckinghamshire, Burke became an eminent supporter of the Whig party. The situation of affairs was critical. Mr. Grenville's stamp act, a fatal departure from the policy on which the colonies had been previously governed, had excited much discontent in America. A strong party, supported by the evident favour of the court and the general

feeling of the country, urged the necessity of perseverance in this coercive policy. Lord Chatham and his adherents no less strenuously denied the right of the Imperial Legislature to impose taxes on America without her own consent. The Rockingham Whigs adopted a middle course between these extremes. They repealed the stamp act, declaring at the same time that the right of taxation resided inalienably in Parliament. Their administration was short-lived. Lord Chatham succeeded them in power, at the head of that “dovetailed" cabinet which Burke has so admirably satirised in his Speech on American Taxation.' His influence was little more than nominal, and in spite of it, schemes for raising a revenue in America were soon revived. From these measures, the public attention was for a short time diverted by the domestic agitation caused by the proceedings against Wilkes, the disputed election in Middlesex, and the mysterious letters of Junius. The shadow of that name was at the time believed by many to rest on Burke: a supposition long since rejected, and supported by scarce any evidence; though his power as a writer, and his known facility in disguising his style, gave some degree of plausibility to the supposition. In his own name, and without any disguise, he came forward to attack the ministry of the Duke of Grafton, in a political treatise, entitled, Thoughts on the Present Discontents.' This has been termed the Whig Manual, and certainly contains the ablest exposition ever given of the principles held by that party for a long series of years. Shaken by this and other attacks, the Duke retired, and left the state under the guidance of a minister, whose merits have been overshadowed by the disastrous circumstances in which he was involved. From this time commenced that long and brilliant opposition, which, from a very low condition of numbers and influence, gradually worked its way through the most momentous parliamentary struggles; and by a continued display of powers the most accomplished, and union the most effective, gained an ultimate victory, first over popular prepossessions, and then over royal obstinacy. The court party were so inferior in eloquence and genius, that their arguments are little remembered, while the speeches of the Whigs are in every body's hands. They felt the importance of the contest deeply, or they would not have been animated to their extraordinary exertions. But the wisest of them could not foresee the prodigious extent of those consequences, which, within the duration of their own lives, resulted from their endeavours. It was much for them to look forward to the independence of America. What would it have been to contemplate the spread of popular principles in Europe, and that