case permitted.  Under this administration the number of schools rose from 140 to 634; a commission was instituted for procuring the publication of appropriate books of instruction in the Polish language; and several similar measures were taken for advancing the best interests of the country.  The constitution of the new kingdom of Poland, in 1815, entered essentially into the same views; and was in every respect favourable to the development of the mental faculties of the nation.  The modern kingdom of Poland embraced, indeed, not much more than the sixth part of the vast territory, which under the Jagellons had constituted the kingdom of that name.  Before the cessions at Andrussov in the year 1667, the ancient kingdom contained sixteen millions of inhabitants; the census of the modern kingdom in 1818, counted only 2,734,000.  But that the population of this exhausted country increased during the Russian administration,—­especially in consequence of the encouragement given to foreign colonists, the establishment of manufactures which furnished means of support for the lower classes, and other similar measures,—­is apparent from the results of the census of 1827; according to which the kingdom then contained 3,705,000 inhabitants.[41]

In the field of science and literature, the nobility had at length found rivals among the free citizens; and the courts of these temples were now, through the erection of village schools, made accessible even to the peasant, who was, in name at least, no longer a degraded slave.[42] If the Russian government in Poland had been exercised in practice, according to the same principles on which it was founded; if Alexander’s first intentions had been practically executed in the same spirit in which the happiness of his Polish subjects had been theoretically planned; perhaps it would have been less difficult to reconcile the minds of the Poles to the loss of their independence as a nation, which they justly consider as an inestimable good.  We have here no concern with politics, except so far as they have a necessary influence on the state of general cultivation; or so far as they give birth to important occasional appearances in the republic of letters.  Considered in the first point of view, it is not to be denied, that the Polish nation, since the foundation of the constitutional Russian kingdom of Poland in 1815, has made more progress towards social improvement, and has advanced more towards a state of equality in a mental and intellectual respect with the countries of middle Europe, viz.  Germany, France and England, than during the whole vast period of their previous existence.