10. _The Press._—The freedom with which this powerful engine is wielded in the different states of Germany, varies very much. Between Vienna and Leipzig-liberty of the press, there is nearly as much difference as between Negro freedom in Virginia and London. But the censorship exists everywhere. The manuscript of volume, magazine, or newspaper must first undergo the revisal of the phlegmatic and inexorable CENSOR, who strikes out or alters every passage or paragraph which has any tendency to exercise the imagination, excite the feelings, or appeal to the passions. This at least, is the policy of Austria. Now it would require but little ingenuity to prove—or at least, persuade, that this is the very _ne plus ultra_ of good government. What engines are so potent in the origination and propagation of evil as imagination, feeling, passion? How praiseworthy is it in the Austrian Emperor to stifle and suppress all combustible materials of this kind!—How beneficial would the Censorship prove in England! Take, for instance, the subject of LIBEL—so well calculated to introduce all kinds of hatred and ill-will amongst Britons. The AGE or the SATIRIST might, without the possibility of _prevention_, assert that “the QUEEN was—anything but a gentlewoman:”—and that “the Chancellor of the Exchequer was lately _detected in picking the pocket_ of one of his neighbours on the treasury bench!!” Now if such paragraphs came before an Austrian Censor, that redoubtable OFFICIAL would either erase them entirely and cite the audacious editor before one of the tribunals, or substitute something like the following:—“From all parts of the country congratulatory addresses are pouring in upon her MAJESTY, in consequence of the recent happy event.” And in respect to the alleged PICK-POCKET, it would probably run thus:—“The recent financial measure of the Chancellor of the Exchequer (the imposition of a tax on rent-gatherers), has given universal satisfaction to all classes of the community—with the exception, perhaps, of Daniel O’Connel, M.P., who opposed the measure so stoutly in parliament.” But the _prevention_ of all sources of excitement and irritation amongst the community, so much preferable to the _punishment_ of them afterwards, would not be the only advantage of a shackled, that is, a censored PRESS. The great majority of writers, who, being defective in imagination, feeling, and passion—in other words, of GENIUS—are now consigned to oblivion, would, under the paternal Austrian system, spring up in myriads, and greatly tend to render the Plumbean rule of authority a veritable wand of Mercury, soothing the great mass of society into soporific torpor, and silencing effectually those turbulent spirits of the age, who stir up men’s minds to mischief! Away then with those hot-headed enthusiasts who prefer a “LIBERTAS PERICULOSA” to the Austro-patriarchal system of “SERVITUDO QUIETA,” where the fiat of the sovereign is the fate of the subject!!