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Untitled Article
minal courts , by which the trial is instituted for one offence , and the sentence influenced by another . It might have been worth while for those who have assumed the office of public moralists on this occasion , to have inquired how far the irregularities of the Individual were attributable to institutions for the existence and
influence of which he cannot be held responsible . Whatever may be the benefits of Royalty , we certainly cannot rank amongst them its moral influences upon the characters of those by whom its honours are to be inherited . Is it favourable to sincerity or constancy in private friendships to be surrounded with flatterers , and to commence life by detecting the hollowness and selfishness of the strongest professions of devotedness ? Or to purity of manners to be the early object of female blandishments ; to be prompted ,
and have every facility , to the almost unrestrained indulgence of the passions ; and to be at the same time cut off , by the absurd and wicked restrictions of the Royal Marriage Bill , from that natural and honourable course which would be most likely to promote a becoming demeanour and to secure domestic happiness ? Or can public principle be reasonably expected , or fairly demanded of one , whose favour we make the prize for which parties are tempted to compromise their principles , and statesmen to stoop to the
basenesses of intrigue ? And as to religion , we should be at a loss to name , or to invent an office , less propitious to the reception of right impressions , than that of an hereditary bishop-maker . We ought not at once strenuously to uphold this state of things , and yet to sit in stern judgment upon those who are , to a certain extent , its victims . If the interests of the community require that a family should be exposed to such corrupting influences * we should
< c Be to their faults a little blind , And to their virtues very kind . " If it be intended merely to inquire into the working of our institutions and the practicability of their amelioration , the exhibition of Royal failings would certainly be in point ; but the effect of the argument would not be enhanced-by ascribing so much to the demerits of the Individual .
The late King was peculiarly unfortunate in the circumstances of his early life . The " discipline of his noble governors and reverend tutors" is said to have been " strict beyond all precedent and all propriety ,. '' This rigidity is ascribed to the interposition of his Royal father . Every observer of life must be familiar with the common and natural consequences of subjecting youth of great expectations to a training of inordinate severity . Experience has amply shewn its tendency to produce , the moment its bonds are unloosed , a career of the wildest profligacy .
The Life of George IV . divides itself into three portions ; from his birth ( 12 th Au g * 1702 ) to his entering on the Regency in Feb . 1811 ; from that to his accession to the crown by the demise of George III ., on the 29 th Jan . 1820 ; and thence to his decease on the 26 th June last . Our remarks will relate chiefly to the third of these periods ,
It-would-be painful , disgusting , and * so far as we perceive , useless , to dwell upon , the records of . His Majesty's , conduct while Heir Apparent . Intrigues and Jockeyship ; Dissipation and Extravagance ; a private marriage publicly denied , and a public espousal of convenience , the unhappy history of which is sufficiently known , are topics from which we gladly turn away . Yet the Prince was papular . He was the associate , and believed to hold
Untitled Article
506 On the Reign of George the Fourth .
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Aug. 2, 1830, page 506, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2587/page/2/
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