Then flourished the _Weekly Discoverer_, and _The Weekly
Discoverer Stripped Naked_. But these were only bare and partial
statements, which excited rancor without conveying intelligence. "Had
there been better vehicles for the expression of public opinion," says the
author of the Student's history of England, "the Stuarts might have been
saved from some of those schemes which proved so fatal to themselves."
In the session of Parliament held in 1695, there occurred a revolution of
great moment. There had been an act, enforced for a limited time, to
restrain unlicensed printing, and under it censors had been appointed;
but, in this year, the Parliament refused to re-enact or continue it, and
thus the press found itself comparatively free.
We have already referred to the powerful influence of the essayists in
_The Tatler_, _Spectator_, _Guardian_, and _Rambler_, which may be called
the real origin of the present English press.
LATER DIVISIONS.--Coming down to the close of the eighteenth century, we
find the following division of English periodical literature:
_Quarterlies_, usually called _Reviews_; _Monthlies_, generally entitled
_Magazines_; _Weeklies_, containing digests of news; and _Dailies_, in
which are found the intelligence and facts of the present moment; and in
this order, too, were the intellectual strength and learning of the time
at first employed.
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