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REVIEW.
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Untitled Article
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Untitled Article
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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Review.
REVIEW .
Untitled Article
( 167 )
Untitled Article
Art . I . —The Constitutional History of England , from the Accession of Henry VII . to the Death of George II . By Henry Hallam . In 2 Vols . 4 to . London , Murray , 1827 .
It is a singular reproach to our literature , that the crude speculations of De Lolme should so long have been the onl y popular work amongst us on the subject of our constitutional history . Until the appearance of Mr . Hallam ' s valuable publications , the inquirer into the character and history of the English government had been compelled to resort to the most diversified sources of information—to our annalists , to our memoir writers , to the
numerous array of our political controversialists , and especially to that gigantic library of constitutional knowledge , the Journals of Parliament . The "History of the English Government , " by Professor Millar , did indeed furnish some ingenious views and able theories , but it was greatly deficient in one most essential quality—historical research . This prevailing want of
sound information , on the great subject of our constitutional history , was taken advantage of by Hume , who , in a manner the most artful and ingenious , has presented in his History a picture of our government altogether at variance with historical truth , and yet so skilfully drawn as to deceive all who have not made the study of English history their peculiar province . * who have not made the stud y of English history their peculiar province . *
To Mr . Hallam we are indebted for the first attempt to treat this vast subject in a manner suitable to its importance . In his History of the Middle Ages he devoted a chapter to the English Constitution , in which , with great skill and accuracy , he traced its origin , progress , and character , till the reign of Henry VII . In the volumes before us he resumes the task at that period , and in a fuller and still more satisfactory manner , has investigated and illustrated the history of our government to the accession of George III .
In the performance of this task he has displayed equalities , the value of which is in proportion to their rarity—a cool and discriminating judgment—a most even-handed impartiality—and an industry and research seldom equalled . It is , therefore , with singular pleasure that we introduce these volumes to our readers ; convinced , as we are , that they will prove a very faithful guide , not only to the study of our civil constitution , but also , so far as the details extend , to that of our ecclesiastical history . In the present
number we shall examine only the first of the volumes before us ; and after giving some account of the views taken by Mr . Hallam , with regard to the character of our Constitution during the period comprised in it , ( from the accession of Henry VII . to the first sittings of the Long Parliament , ) we shall notice more particularly some passages relating to the affairs of the church , and especially the three important chapters devoted to the History of the Reformation .
In his endeavours to justify the prerogative pretensions of the Stuarts , as not inconsistent with constitutional precedent , Mr . Hume has sketched the character of our government under the Tudors not only as despotic in
prac-* Gibbon , in his Memoirs , speaks of " the impartial philosophy of Hume . " Nay , Hume himself seems to have been deceived into , a belief of bis own strict impartiality .
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), March 2, 1828, page 167, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2558/page/23/
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