PERIODICAL WORKS.
[The Edinburgh Review]. No 54.
1. Childe Harold's Pilgrimage, Canto the Third, and The Prisoner of Chillon, and other Poems. By Lord Byron.—In this article the Reviewers do not confine themselves altogether to these two publications, but the Corsair being the last work of Lord Byron of which they had given a particular account, they introduce their examination of the present works by notices of Lara, The Siege of Corinth, and other intermediate pieces. This Third Canto of Childe Harold, the Reviewers are persuaded, will not be pronounced inferior to either of the former; and they think that it will probably be ranked above them by those who have been most delighted with the whole. Of The Prisoner of Chillon they speak in the language of praise; but the rest of the poems are said to be less amiable, and most of them, the Reviewers fear, have a personal and not very charitable application.
2. A Letter to the Roman Catholic Priests of Ireland, on the expediency of reviving the Canonical mode of electing Bishops by Dean and Chapter, &c. By C. O.—There is no further notice of the book or its author. It is a dissertation on the Catholic question, in which the Reviewer endeavours to shew that no securities whatever should be required from the Catholics as the condition of their emancipation.
3. Defence of Usury: showing the impolicy of the present legal restraints on the term of pecuniary bargains, in Letters to a Friend. To which is added, a Letter to Adam Smith, Esq. LL.D. on the discouragements opposed by the above restraints to the progress of inventive industry. The third edition: to which is also added, second edition, a Protest against Law Taxes. By Jeremy Bentham, Esq. of Lincoln's Inn.—In this article the Reviewer begins with examining the reasons that have been urged in defence of the usury laws, and finds that they produce none of the good which they pretend to have in view; and then proceeds to point out the mischiefs which they create in all directions. These laws are considered to be also insufficient, and inconsistent with their avowed purposes, as they allow of transactions substantially usurious. The penalties imposed upon all who assist suitors in courts of justice, with the means of enforcing their rights, stipulating for a certain premium, which the law of England denominates maintenance and champerty, are reprobated as the growth of a barbarous age; and a very strong case is extracted from Mr Bentham's treatise, to show the ruinous consequences of this law to needy suitors. The repeal of the usury laws, however, is held to be imprudent at this particular crisis, as "all persons now owing money would inevitably have their creditors coming upon them for payment." It is to be wished the Reviewer had taken into consideration the effects which this repeal might produce upon the terms of loans to government, and upon the price of the public funds.—The Protest against Law Taxes is highly extolled. The privilege of sueing in forma pauperis is shewn to be of little value. Stamps on law proceedings are censured; and the vulgar argument, that such taxes operate as a check to litigation, is said to be "triumphantly refuted" by Mr Bentham.
4. Wesentliche Betrachtungen oder Geschichte des Krieges Zwischen den Osmanen imd Russen in den Jahren 1768 bis 1774, von Resmi Achmed Efendi, aus dem Türkischen übersetzt und durch Anmerkungen erlärdert von Heinrich Friedrich Von Diez.—This book is a history of the war between Russian and the Ottoman Porte, in the years 1768–1774, originally written in Turkish by Resmi Achmed Efendi, and translated into German by M. Von Diez. The Reviewer has contrived, by the playfulness and pleasantry of his style, to render this short article very amusing. The work itself, he says, is dull enough in all conscience, but it is a literary curiosity.
5. National Difficulties practically explained, and Remedies proposed as certain, speedy, and effectual, for the relief of all our present embarrassments.—The questions proposed for discus-
