nful than those of other systems of which they have no
knowledge. In the one case, they like their own best, simply because
it is their own best; and they dislike their own worst, because it is
their own worst. We cherish a taste, in the nature of things, without
entering into any comparisons, for when the means of comparison
offer, and we find improvements, it ceases to be a taste at all;
while to complain of any positive grievance, is the nature of man, I
fear!"

"I think a republic odious!"

"_Le republique est une horreur!_"

Grace thought a republic odious, without knowing any thing of any
other state of society, and because it contained odious things; and
Mademoiselle Viefville called a republic _une horreur_, because heads
fell and anarchy prevailed in her own country, during its early
struggles for liberty. Though Eve seldom spoke more sensibly, and
never more temperately, than while delivering the foregoing opinions,
Sir George Templemore doubted whether she had all that exquisite
_finesse_ and delicacy of features, that he had so much admired; and
when Grace burst out in the sudden and senseless exclamation we have
recorded, he turned towards her sweet and animated countenance,
which, for the moment, he fancied the loveliest of the two.

Eve Effingham had yet to learn that she had just entered into the
most intolerant society, meaning purely as society, and in connexion
with what are usually called liberal sentiments, in Christendom. We
do not mean by this, that it would be less safe to utter a generous
opinion in favour of human rights in America than in any other
country, for the laws and the institutions become active in this
respect, but simply, that the resistance of the more refined to the
encroachments of the unrefined, has brought about a state of
feeling--a feeling that is seldom just and never philosophical--which
has created a silent, but almost unanimous bias against the effects
of the institutions, in what is called the world. In Europe, one
rarely utters a sentiment of this nature, under circumstances in
which it is safe to do so at all, without finding a very general
sympathy in the auditors; but in the circle into which Eve had now
fallen, it was almost considered a violation of the proprieties. We
do not wish to be understood as saying more than we mean, however,
for we have no manner of doubt that a large portion of the
dissentients even, are so idly, and without reflection; or for the