UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA AT LOS ANGELES
A N
APPEAL
THE N E W
THE OLD WHIGS,
[ PRICB 3 s. f
0 8 2
A N
APPEAL
FROM
THE NEW
T O
THE OLD WHIGS,
IN GONSEQJJENCE OF SOME LATE
DISCUSSIONS IN PARLIAMENT,
RELATIVE TO THE
Reflexions on the French Revolution.
THE THIRD EDITION.
LONDON:
PRINTED FOR J. DODSLEY, PALL-MALL,
M.DCC.XCI.
fHERE are Jome corrections in this Edition, which tend to render the Jenje lejs objcurs in one or two places. The order cf the two laft members is alfo changed, and I believe for the better. This change was made on the Juggeftion of a very learned perfon> to the partiality of whoje friendship I owe much j to the feverity of whoje judgment I owe more.
2FH
T Mr. Burke's time of life, and in his difpo- fitions, pet ere honeflam dimiffionem was all he had to do with his political aflbciates. This boon - they have not choien to grant him. With many ex- 0 prefllons of good-will, in effeft they tell him he has |j loaded the ftage too long. They conceive it, tho' g an harfh yet a neceffary office, in full parliament to ~ declare to the prefent age, and to as late a pofteri- ty, as fhall take any concern in the proceedings of our day, that by one book he has diigraced the whole tenour of his life. — Thus they difmifs their oo old partner of the war. He is advifed to retire, ^ whilft they continue to ferve the public upon wifer <=° principles, and under better aufpices, ^ . Whether Diogenes the Cynic was a true phi- => lofopher, cannot eafily be determined. He has written nothing. But the fayings of his which are handed down by others, are lively; and may be eafily and aptly applied on many occafions by thofe whofe wit is not fo perfect as their me- & mory. This Diogenes (as every one will recollefl) 5 was citizen of a little bleak town fituated on the ^ coaft of the Euxine, and expofed to all the buffets of that unhofpitable fea. He lived at a great diftance
from
from thofe weather-beaten walls, in eafe and indo- lence, and in the midft of literary leifure, when he was informed that his townfmen had condemned him to be banifhed from Sinope ; he anfwered coolly, "And I condemn them to live in Sinope."
/The gentlemen of the party in which Mr. Burke has always acted, in palling upon him the fentence I of retirement *, have done nothing more than to \ confirm the fentence which he had long before palTed upon himfelf. When that retreat was choice, which the tribunal of his peers inflict as puniih- ment, it is plain he does not think their fentence intolerably fevere. Whether they who are to con- tinue in the Sinope which fliortly he is to leave, will fpend the long years which, I hope, remain to them, in a manner more to their fatisfaction, than he Ihall flide down, in filence and obfcurity, the flope of his declining days, is belt known to him who meafures out years, and days, and for- tunes.
* News-paper intelligence ought always to be received with Come degree of caution. I do not know that the following pa- ragraph is founded on any authority; but it comes with an air of authority. The paper is profefledly in the intereft of the modern Whigs, and under their direction. The para- graph is not difclaimed on their part. It profefles to be the decifion of thofe whom its author calls " The great and firm body of the Whigs of England." Who are the Whigs of a different competition, which the promulgator of the fentence confiders as compj>fed of fleeting ard unfettled particles, I know not, nor whether there be any of that defcription. The definitive fentence of" the great and firm body of the Whigs of England" (as this paper gives it out) is as follows :
" The great and firm body of the Whigs of England, true to their «c principles, have decided on the difpnte between Mr. Fox and Mr. " Burke; and the former is declared to have maintained the pure doc- " trines by which they are bound together, and upon which they have " invariably acted. Ths confequence is, that Mr. Burke retires from « parliament." A/cmng- Chronicle, May it, tygr.
~~* *"""•** The
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The quality of the fentencc does not however decide on the juftice of it. Angry friendfhip is fometimes as bad as calm enmity. For this rea- fon the cold neutrality of abftraft juftice, is, to a good and clear caufe, a more defirable thing than an affection liable to be any way difturbed. When the trial is by friends, if the decifion fhould happen to be favorable, the honor of the acquittal is leflen- edj if adverfe, the condemnation is exceedingly embittered. It is aggravated by coming from lips profeffmg friendfhip, and pronouncing judgment with forrow and reluctance. Taking in the whole view of life, it is more fafe to live under the jurif- diction of fevere but Heady reafon, than under the empire of indulgent, but capricious paffion. It is certainly well for Mr. Burke that there are impartial men in the world. To them I addrefs myfelf, pending the appeal which on his part is made from the living to the dead, from the mo- dern Whigs to the antient.
The gentlemen, who, in the name of the party, have palled fentence on Mr. Burke's book, in the light of literary criticifm are judges above all challenge. He did not indeed flatter himfelf, that as a writer, he could claim the approbation of men whole talents, in his judgment and in the public judgment, approach to prodigies ; if ever fuch perfons fliould be difpofed to eftimate the merit of a compofition upon the ftandard of their own ability.
In their critical cenfure, though Mr. Burke may find himfelf humbled by it as a writer, as a man and as an Englifhman, he finds matter not only of con- folation, but of pride. He propofed to convey to a j foreign people, not his own ideas, but the prevalent opinions and fentiments of a nation, renowned for wifdom, and celebrated in all ages for a well under- B 2 ftood
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ftood and well regulated love of freedom. This was the avowed purpofe of the far greater part of his work. As that work has not been ill received, and as his critics will not only admit but contend, that this reception coulH not be owing to any excellence fn the compofition capable of perverting the public judgment, it is clear that he is not disavowed by the nation whofe fentiments he had undertaken to defcnbe. His reprefcntation is authenticated by the verdict of his country. Had his piece, as a work of fkill, been thought worthy of commenda- tion, fome doubt might have been entertained of the caufe of his fuccefs. But the matter (lands exaftly as he wiflies it. He is more happy to have his fidelity in reprefentation recognized by the body of the people, than if he were to be ranked in point of ability (and higher he could not be ranked) with thofe whofe critical cenlure he has had the misfortune to incur.
It is not from this part of their decifion which the author wiflies an appeal. There are things which touch him more nearly. To abandon them would argue, not diffidence in his abilities, but treachery to his caufe. Had his work been recognized as a pattern for dextrous argument, and powerful eloquence, yet if it tended to eftablifli maxims, or to infpire fentiments, adverfe to the wife and free conftitution of this kingdom, he would only have caufe to lament, that it pofTerTed qualities fitted to perpetuate the memory of his offence. Oblivioa would be the only means of his efcaping the re- proaches of pofterity. But, after receiving the com- mon allowance due to the common weaknefs of man, he wiflies to owe no part of the indulgence of the world to its forgetfulnefs. He is at uTue with the party, before the prefent, and if ever he can reach it, before the coming, generation.
The
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The author, feveral months previous to his pub- lication, well knew, that two gentlemen, both of them pofieffed of the moft diftinguiihed abilities, and of a moft decifive authority in the party, had differed with him in one of the moft material points relative to the French revolution ; that is in their opinion of the behaviour of the French foldiery, and its re- volt from its officers. At the time of their public declaration on this fubject, he did not imagine the opinion of thefe two gentlemen had extended a great way beyond themfelves. He was however well aware of the probability, that perlbns of" their juft credit and influence would at length difpofe the greater number to an agreement with their fentiments; and perhaps might induce the, whole body to a tacit acquieicence in their declara- tions, under a natural, and not always an improper diflike of {hewing a difference with thofe who lead their party. I- will 'not deny, that in general this- conduct in parties is defenfible ; but within what li- mits the practice is to be circumlcribed, and with what exceptions the doctrine which fupports it is to be received, it is not my prefent purpofe to define. The prefent queftion has nothing to do with their motives j it only regards the public expreffion of their fentiments.
The author is compelled, however reluctantly, to receive the fentence pronounced upon him in the Houfe of Commons as that of the party. It pro- ceeded from the mouth of him who muft be regard- ed as its authentic organ. In a difcuffion which con- tinued for two days, no one gentleman of the oppofi- tion interpofed a negative, or even a doubt, in favour of him or of his opinions. If an idea confonant to the doctrine of his book, or favourable to his conduct, lui ks in the minds of any perfons in that defcription, it is to be confidered only as a peculiarity whjcn they B 3 indulge
indulge to their own private liberty of thinking. The author cannot reckon upon it. It has nothing to do with them as members of a party. In their public capacity, in every thing that meets the public ear, or public eye, the body muft be confidered as una- nimous.
They muft have been animated with a very warm zeal againft thofe opinions, becaufe they were under no necejfity of acting as they did, from any juft caufe of apprehenfion that the errors of this writer fhould be taken for theirs. They might difap- prove i it was not neceffary they fhould difaiiow him, as they have done in the whole, and in all the parts of his book ; becaufe neither in the whole nor in any of the parts, were they, directly, or by any implication, involved. The author was known in- deed to have been warmly, ftrenucufly, and affec^ tionately, againft all allurements of ambition, and all pofiibility of alienation from pride, or perfonal picque, or peevilh jealoufy, attached to the Whig party. With one of them he has had a long friend- fliip, which he muft ever remember with a me- lancholy pleafure. To the great, real, and ami- able virtues, and to the unequalled abilities of that gentleman, he lhall always join with his country in paying a juft tribute of applaufe. There are others in that party for whom, without any fhade of forrow, he bears as high a degree of love as can enter into the human heart; and as much veneration as ought to be paid to human creatures ; becaufe he firmly believes, that they are endowed with as many and as great virtues, as the nature of man is capable of producing, joined to great clearnefs of intellect, to a juft judgment, to a wonderful temper, and to true wifdom. His fenti- ments with regard to them can never vary, with- out fubjecting him to the juft indignation of man-
kind,,
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kind, who are bound, and are generally difpofed, to look up with reverence to the beft patterns of their fpecies, and fuch as give a dignity to the na- ture of which we all participate. For the whole of the party he has high refpect. Upon a view indeed of the compofition of all parties, he finds great fatisfaction. It is, that in leaving the fer- vice of his country, he leaves parliament without all comparifon richer in abilities than he found it. Very folid and very brilliant talents diftinguifh the minifterial benches. The oppofite rows are a fort of feminary of genius, and have brought forth fuch and fo great talents as never before (amongft us at leaft) have appeared together. If their owners are difpofed to ferve their country, (he trufts they are) they are in a condition to ren- der it fervices of the higheft importance. If, through miftake or paffion, they are led to contribute to its ruin, we fhail at leaft have a confolation denied to the ruined country that adjoins us — we fhall not be deftroyed by men of mean or fecondary capacities.
All thefe confiderations of party attachment, of perfonal regard, and of perfonal admiration, rendered the author of the Reflections extremely cautious, left the flighteft fufpicion fhould arife of his having undertaken to exprefs the fentiments even of a {ingle man of that description. His words at the outfet of his Reflections are thefe :
" In the firft letter I had the honour to write to <c you, and which at length I fend, I wrote neither "for, nor from any defcription of men ; nor fhall " I in this. My errors, if any, are my own. My
reputation alone is to anfwer for them." In
another place, he fays (p. 126.) <c I have no man's " proxy. I fpeak only from myjelf\ when I difclaim, " as I do, with all poffible earneftnefs, all commu- K nion with the actors in that triumph, or with the B 4 " admirer*
*c admirers of it. When I afiert any thing elfe, as " concerning the people of England, I fpeak from " obfervation, not from authority"
To fay then, that the book did not contain the fenti- ments of their party, is not to contradict the author, or to clear themfelves. If the party had denied his doctrines to be the current opinions of the majo- rity in the nation, they would have put the quef- tion on its true iffue. There, I hope and believe, his cenfurers will find on the trial, that the author is as faithful a reprefentative of the general fentiment of; the people of England, as any perfon amongft them can be of the ideas of his own party.
The French Revolution can have no connexion with the objeds of any parties in England formed before the period of that event, unlefs they choofe to imitate any of its a6b, or to confolidate any princi- ples of that revolution with their own opinions. The French revolution is no part of their original con- fra<?l. The matter, (landing by itfelf, is an open fubjecl: of political difcufiion, like all the other re- volutions (and there are many) which have been attempted or accomplished in our age. But if any confiderable number of Britifh fubje&s, taking a factious intereft in the proceedings of France, begin publicly to incorporate themfelves for the fubverfion of nothing Ihort of the whole conftitution of this kingdom j to incorporate themfelves for the ytter overthrow of the body of its laws, civil and ecclefiaftical, and with them of the whole fyftem of its manners, in favour of the new conftitution, and of the modern ufages of the French nation, I think no party principle could bind the author not to exprefs his fentiments ftrongly againft fuch a faction, On the contrary, he was perhaps bound to mark his dffient, when the leaders of the party were daily go- jpg out of their way to make public declarations in
parliament^
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parliament, which, notwithftanding the purity of their intentions, had a tendency to encourage ill- defigning men in their practices againft our con- flitution.
The members of this faction leave no doubt of the nature and the extent of the miichief they mean to produce. They declare it openly and deci- fively. Their intentions are not left equivocal. They are put out of all difpute by the thanks which, formally and as it were officially, they ifiue, in order to recommend, and to promote the cir- culation of the moft atrocious and treafonable li- bels, againft all the hitherto cheriflied objects of the love and veneration of this people. Is it con- trary to the duty of a good fubject, to reprobate fuch proceedings ? Is it alien to the office of a good member of parliament, when fuch practices en- creafe, and when the audacity of the confpirators grows with their impunity, to point out in his place their evil tendency to the happy conftitution which he is chofen to guard ? Is it wrong in any fenfe, to render the people of England fenfible how much they muft fuffer if unfortunately fuch a wicked fac- tion fhould become porTeffed in this countiy of the fame power which their allies in the very next to us have fo perfidioufly ufurped, and fo outra- geoufly abufed ? Is it inhuman to prevent, if pofli- ble, the fpilling of their blood, or imprudent to guard againft the effufion of our own ? Is it con- trary to any of the honeft principles of party, or re- pugnant to any of the known duties of friend (hip for any fenator, refpectfully, and amicably, to cau- tion his brother members againft countenancing by inconfiderate expreflions a fort of proceeding which it is impofiible they fhould deliberately approve ?
He had undertaken to demonftrate, by arguments which he thought could not be refuted, and by do- cuments, which he was fure could not be denied,
thac
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that no comparifort was to be made between the Bri- tifli government, and the French ufurpation. — That they who endeavoured madly to compare them, were by no means making the companion of one good fyftem with another good fyftem, which va- ried only in local and circumftantial differences ; much lefs, that they were holding out to us a fupe- rior pattern of legal liberty, which we might fub- ftitute in the place of our old, and, as they defcribe it, fuperannuated conftitution. He meant to de- monftpate, that the French fcheme was not a com- parative good, but a pofitive evil. — That the quef- tion did . not at all turn, as it had been ftated, on a parallel between a monarchy and a republic. He denied that the prefent fcheme of things in France, did at all deferve the refpectable name of a republic : he had therefore no comparifon be- tween monarchies and republics to make. — That what was done in France was a wild attempt to methodize anarchy j to perpetuate and fix diforder. That it was a foul, impious, monftrous thing, whol- ly out of the courfe of moral nature. He un- dertook to prove, that it was generated in trea- chery, fraud, falfehood, hypocrify, and unprovoked murder. — He offered to make out, that thofe who have led in that bufinefs, had conducted themfelves with the utmoft perfidy to their colleagues in func- tion, and with the moft flagrant perjury both to- wards their king and their conflituents j to the one of whom the affembly had fworn fealty, and to the other, when under no fort of violence or conftraint, they had fworn a full obedience to inftructions. — That by the terror of affaffination they had driven away a very great number of the members, fo as to produce a faife appearance xof a majority. — That this fictitious majority had fabricated a conftitution, which as now it ftands, is a tyranny far beyond any example that can be found in the civilized 4 European
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European world of our age; that therefore the lovers of it muft be lovers, not of liberty, but, iff they really underftand its nature, of the lowed and bafeft of all fervitude.
He propofed to prove, that the prefent ftate of things in France is not a tranfient evil, productive, as fome have too favourably reprefented it, of a lafting good ; but that the prefent evil is only the j means of producing future, and (if that were poffible) I worfe evils. — That it is not, an undigefted, imper- feel, and crude fcheme of liberty, which may gradu- ally be mellowed and ripened into an orderly and focial freedom ; but that it is ib fundamentally wrong, as to be utterly incapable of correcting itfelf by- any length of time, or of being formed into any mode of polity, of which a member of the houfc of commons could publicly declare his approba- tion,
If it had been permitted to Mr. Burke, he would have fliewn diftinctly, and in detail, that what the afiembly calling itfelf national, had held out as a Jarge and liberal toleration, is in reality a cruel and in- fidious religious perfecution ; infinitely more bitter than any which had been heard of within this cen- tury.— That it had a feature in it worfe than the old perfections. — That the old perfecutors afted, or pretended to aft, from zeal towards fome fyflem of piety and virtue : they gave ftrong preferences to their own ; and if they drove people from one religion, they provided for them ancther, in which men might take refuge, and expect confolation. — That their new perft cution is not againft a variety in confcience, but againft all confcience. That it} profefles contempt towards its objeft j and whilf]:/ it treats all religion with fcorn, is riot fo much aaf neutral about the modes: It unites the oppofite pyils of intolerance an4 pf indifference,
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He could have proved, that it is fo far from re- jeftingtefts (as unaccountably had been aflerted) that the afiembly had impofed tefts of a peculiar hardfhip, arifing from a cruel and premeditated pecuniary fraud : tefts againft old principles, fanftioned by the laws, and binding upon the confcience. — That thefe tefts were not impofed as titles to fome new honour or fome new benefit, but to enable men to hold a poor com- penfation for their legal eftates, of which they had been unjuftly deprived; and, as they had before been reduced from affluence to indigence, fo on refufal to fwear againft their confcience, they are now driven from indigence to famine, and treated -with every pofllble degree of outrage, infult, and inhumanity. — That thefe tefts, which their impofers well knew would not be taken, were intended for the very purpofe of cheating their miferable victims out of the compenfation which the tyrannic im- poftors of the aflembly had previoufly and pur- pofely rendered the public unable to pay. That thus their ultimate violence arofe from their origi- nal fraud.
He would have jfhewn that the univerfal peace and concord amongft nations, which thefe common enemies to mankind had held out with the fame frau- dulent ends and pretences with which they had uni- formly conducted every part of their proceeding, was a coarfe and clumfy deception, unworthy to be propofed as an example, by an informed and fa-. gacious Britifh fenator, to any other country.-— . That far from peace and good-will to men, they meditated war againft all other governments; and propofed fyftematically to excite in them all the very worft kind of feditions, in order to lead to their com- mon deftruction. — That they had diicovered, in the few inftances in which they have hitherto had the power of difcovering it, (as at Avignon, and in
the
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the Comtat, at Cavailhon and at Carpentras) in what a favage manner they mean to conduct the feditions and wars they have planned againft their neighbours for the fake of putting themlelves at the head of a confederation of republics as wild and as mifchievous as their own. He would hav* fhewn in what manner that wicked fcheme was carried on in thofe places, without being dire<5tly either owned or difclaimed, in hopes that the un- done people fhould at length be obliged to fly to their tyrannic protection, as fome fort of refuge from their barbarous and treacherous hoftility. He would have fhewn from thofe examples, that neither this nor any other fociety could be in fafety as ; long as fuch a public enerny was in a condition to j continue directly or indirectly fuch practices againft its peace, — That Great Britain was a principal ob-// ject of their machinations ; and that they had be- gun by eftablifhing correfpondences, communica-/ tions, and a fort of federal union with the factious^ here. — That no practical enjoyment of a thing fo imperfect and precarious, as human happinefs muft be, even under the very beft of governments, could be a feoirity for the exiftence of thefe govern- ments, during the prevalence of the principles of France, propagated from that grand fchool of every difoixler, and every vice.
He was prepared to (hew the madnefs of their declaration of the pretended rights of man •> the childifh futility of fome of their maxims ; the grofs andftupidabfurdity,andthe palpable falfity of others ; and the mifchievous tendency of all fuch declara- tions to the wellbeing of men and of citizens, and to the fafety and profperity of every juft commonwealth. He was prepared to fhew that, in • their conduct, the aflembly had directly violated not only every found principle of government, but every one, without exception, of their own falfe or futile maxims ; and
indeed
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indeed every rule they had pretended to lay down for their own direction.
In a word, he was ready to fhew, that thofe who could, after fuch a full and fair expofure, con- tinue to countenance the French infanity, were not miflaken politicians, but bad men -, but he thought that in this cafe, as in many others, ignorance had been the caufe of admiration.
Thefe are ftrong affertions. They required ftrong proofs. The member who laid down thefe pofitions was and is ready to give, in his place, to each po- fition decifive evidence, correfpondent to the na- ture and quality of the feveral allegations.
In order to judge on the propriety of the interrup- tion given to Mr. Burke, in his fpeech on the com- mittee of the Quebec bill, it is necefiary to enquire, firft, whether, on general principles, he ought to have been fuffered to prove his allegations ? Secondly, whether the time he had chofen was fo very unieafonable as to make his exercife of a par- liamentary right productive of ill effects on his friends or his country ? Thirdly, whether the opi- nions delivered in his book, and which he had begun to expatiate upon that day, were in contra- diction to his former principles, and inconfiftent with the general tenor of his publick conduct ?
They who have made eloquent panegyrics on the French Revolution, and who think a free difcuflion fo very advantageous in every cafe, and under every circumftance, ought not, in my opinion, to have pre- vented their eulogies from being tried ' on the teft of facts. If their panegyric had been anfwered with an invective (bating the difference in point of eloquence) the one would have been as good as the other : that is, they would both of them have been good for nothing. The panegyric and the fatire ought to be fuffered to go to trial j and that
which
which fhrinks from it, muft be contented to (land at bell as a mere declamation.
I do not think Mr. Burke was wrong in the courfe he took. That which feemed to be recom- mended to him by Mr. Pitt, was rather to extol the Englifh conftitution, than to attack the French. I do not determine what would be beft for Mr. Pitt to do in his fituadon. I do not deny that be may have good reafons for his referve. Perhaps they might have been as good for a fimilar referve on the part of Mr. Fox, if his zeal had fuffered him to liften to them. But there were no motives of minifterial prudence, or of that prudence which ought to guide a man perhaps on the eve of being minifter, to reftrain the author of the Reflections. He is in no office under the crown j he is not the organ of any party.
The excellencies of the Britifh conftitution had already exercifed and exhaufted the talents of the beft thinkers, and the moft eloquent writers and fpeakers, that the world ever faw. But in the pr»- fent cafe, a fyftem declared to be far better, and which certainly is much newer (to reftlefs and un- ftable minds no fmall recommendation) was held out to the admiration of the good people of Eng- land. In that cafe, it was furely proper for thofe, who had far other thoughts of the French conftitu- tion, to fcrutinize that plan which has been recom- mended to our imitation by active and zealous fac* tions, at home and abroad. Our complexion is fuch, that we are palled with enjoyment, and ftimu- lated with hope; that we become lefs fenfible to a long-pofferTed benefit, from the very circum- fiance that it is become habitual. Specious, un- tried, ambiguous profpects of new advantage re- commend themfelves to the fpirit of adventure, which more or lefs prevails in every mind. From this temper, men, and factions, and nations too,
have
have facrifked the good, of which they had been in allured poilefilon, in favour of wild and irrational expectations. What fliould hinder Mr. Burke, if he thought this temper likely, at one time or other, to prevail in our country, from expofing to a mul- titude, eager to game, the falfe calculations of this lottery of fraud ?
I allow, as I ought to do, for the effufions which come from a general zeal for liberty. This is to be indulged, and even to be encouraged, as long as the queftion is general. An orator, above all men, ought to be allowed a full and free ufe of the praife of liberty. A common place in favour of ilavery and tyranny delivered to a popular afiembly, would indeed be a bold defiance to all the princi- ples of rhetoric. But in a queftion whether any particular conftitution is or is not a plan of ra- tional liberty, this kind of rhetorical flourifh in favour of freedom in general, is furely a little out of its place. It is virtually a begging of the queftion. It is a fong of triumph, before the battle.
" But Mr. Fox does not make the panegyric of " the new conftitution ; it is the deftruction only of " the ablblute monarchy he commends." When that namelefs thing which has been lately fet up in France was defcribed as " the moft ftupendous and *£ glorious edifice of liberty, which had been erecl- " ed on the foundation of human integrity in " any time or country," it might at firft, have led the hearer into an opinion, that the con- ftruction of the new fabric was an object of ad- miration, as well as the demolition of the old. Mr. Fox, however, has explained himfelf; and it would be too like that captious and cavilling fpirit, which I fo perfectly deteft, if I were to pin down the language of an eloquent and ardent mind, to the punctilious exactnefs of a pleader. Then Mr. Fox did not mean to applaud that monftrous thing,
which,
Which, by the courtefy of France, they call a con- ftkution. I eafily believe it. Far from meriting the praifes of a great genius like Mr. Fox, it can- not be approved by any man of common fenfe, or common information. He cannot admire the change of one piece of barbarifm for another, and a worfe. / He cannot rejoice at the deftruction of a monar- chy, mitigated by manners, refpectful to laws and ufages, and attentive, perhaps but too attentive to public opinion, in favour of the tyranny of a licen- tious, ferocious, and favage multitude, without laws, manners, or morals, and which fo far from refpect- ing the general fenfe of mankind, infolently endea- vours to alter all the principles and opinions, which have hitherto guided and contained the world, and to force them into a conformity to their views and actions. His mind is made to better things.
That a man fhould rejoice and triumph in the deftruction of an abfolute monarchy -, that in fuch an event he fhould overlook the captivity, dif- grace, and degradation of an unfortunate prince, and the continual danger to a life which exifts only to be endangered ; that he fhould overlook the utter ruin of whole orders and clafTes of men, extending it- felf directly, or in its neareft confequences, to at leaft a million of our kind, and to at leaft the temporary •wretchednefs of an whole community, I do not de- ny to be in fome fort natural : Becaufe, when people fee a political object, which they ardently defire, but in one point of view, they are apt extremely to pal- liate, or underrate the evils which may arife in ob- taining it. This is no reflection on the humanity of thofe perfons. Their good-nature I am the laft man in the world to difpute. It only fhews that they are not fufficiently informed, or fufficiently confiderate. When they come to reflect ferioufly on the tranfaction, they will think themfelves bound to examine what the object is that has been ac- quired by all this havock. They will hardly afifert , C that
( 18 )
that the deltr notion of an abfolute monarchy, is a thing good in itfelf, without any fort of reference to •the antecedent ftate of things, or to confequences which refult from the change ; without any confider- ation whether under its ancient rule a country was, to. a confiderable degree, flourifhing and populous,; highly cultivated, and highly commercial ; and whe- ther, under that domination, though perfonal liberty, had been precarious and infecure, property at leaft ' was ever violated. They cannot take the moral fym- pathies of the human mind along with them, in ab- ftractions feparated from the good or evil condition of the {late, from the quality of actions, and the cha- racter of the actors. None of us love abfolute and uncontrolled monarchy ; but we could not rejoice at the fufferings of a Marcus Aurelius, or a Trajan, who were abfolute monarchs, as we do when Nero is condemned by the fenate to be punifhed more •major urn : Nor when that monfter was obliged to fly with his wife Sporus, and to drink puddle, were men affected in the fame manner, as when the ve- nerable Galba, with all his faults and errors, v/as 'murdered by a revolted mercenary foldiery. With fuch things before our eyes our feelings contradict our theories ; and when this is the cafe, the feel- ings are true, and the theory is falfe. What I con- tend for is, that in commending the deilruction of, an abfolute monarchy, all the circumftances ought j not to be wholly overlooked, as confiderations fitj only for fhallow and fuperficial minds.
The fubverfion of a government, to deferve any praife, muft be confidered but as a ftep preparatory to the formation of fomething better, either in the fcheme of the government itfelf, or in the peribns who adminifter in it, or in both. Thefe events can- not in reaion be feparated. For inftance, when we praife our revolution of 1688, though the nation, in that act, was on the defenfive, and was juftified
in
( '9 )
in incurring all the evils of a defenfive war, we do not reft there. We always combine with the fub- verfion of the old government the happy fettlement which followed. When we eftimate that revolt , tion, we mean to comprehend in our calculation f both the value of the thing parted withy and the / value of the thing received in exchange.
The burthen of proof lies heavily on thofe who tear to pieces the whole frame and contexture of their country, that they could find no other way of fettling a government fit to obtain its rational ends, except that which they have purfued by means unfavourable to all the prefent happinefs of millions of people, and to the utter ruin of feveral hundreds of thoufands. In their political arrangements, men have no right to put the well-being of the prefent generation wholly out of the queftion. Perhaps the only moral truft with any certainty in our hands, is the care of our own time. With regard to futurity, we are to treat it like a ward. We art not fo to attempt an improvement of his fortune, as to put the capital of his eftate to any hazard.
It is not worth our while to difcufs, like fophifters, whether, in no cafe, fome evil, for the fake of fome benefit is to be tolerated. Nothing univerfal can be rationally affirmed on any moral, or any politi- cal fubjecl. Pure metaphyfical abftraction doe* not belong to thefe matters. The lines of morality are not like the ideal lines of mathematics. They arc broad and deep as well as long. They admit of ex-» , ceptions ; they demand modifications. Thefe ex- ceptions and modifications are not made by th£ / procefs of logic, but by the rules of prudence. Pru- dence is not only the firft in rank of the virtues poli- tical and moral, but fhe is the director, the regu- lator, the ftandard of them all. Metaphyfics can- not live without definition; but prudence is cau- tious how foe defines. Our courts cannot be more C a fearful
fearful in fuffering fictitious cafes to be brought be- fore them for eliciting their determination on a point of law, than prudent moralifts are in putting ex- treme and hazardous cafes of confcience upon emer- gencies not exifting. Without attempting there- fore to define, what never can be defined, the cafe of a revolution in government, this, I think, may \ be fafely affirmed, that a fore and prefilng evil is to be removed, and that a good, great in its amount, and unequivocal in its nature, mud be probable almoft to certainty, before the ineflimable price of our own morals, and the well-being of a number of our fellow-citizens, is paid for a revolution. If ever we ought to be ceconomifls even to parfimony, it is in the voluntary production of evil. Every \ revolution contains in it fomething of evil. ' It muft always be, to thofe who are the greateft
/amateurs, or even profeffors of revolutions, a matter very hard to prove, that the late French government was fo bad, that nothing worfe, in the infinite devices of men, could come in its place. 'They who have brought France to its prefent con- dition ought to prove allb, by fomething better than prattling about the Baftile, that their fubverted government was as incapable, as the prefent cer- tainly is, of all improvement and correction. How dare they to fay fo who have never made that expe- riment? They are experimenters by their trade. They hare made an hundred others, infinitely more hazardous.
,~- The Englifh admirers of the forty-eight thoufand republics which form the French federation, praife them not for what they are, but for what they are to become. They do not talk as politicians but as prophets. But in whatever character they choofe to found panegyric on prediction, it will be thought a little fmgular to praife any work, not for its own merits, but for the merits of fomething elfe which
may
may fucceed to it. When any political inftitution is praifed, in fpite of great and prominent faults of every kind, and in all its parts, it muft be fuppofed to have fomething excellent in its fundamental prin- ciples. It muft be fhewn that it is right though imperfect; that it is not only by poflibility fufcep- tible of improvement, but that it contains in it a principle tending to its melioration.
Before they attempt to fhew this progreflion of their favourite work, from abfolute pravity to finifhed perfection, they will find themfelves engaged in a civil war with thofe whofe caufe they maintain. What! alter our fublime conftitution, the glory of France, the envy of the world, the pattern for man- kind, the mafter- piece of legiflation, the collected and concentrated glory of this enlightened age ! Have we not produced it ready made and ready armed, ma- ture in its birth, a perfect goddefs of wifdom and of war, hammered by our blackfmith midwives out of the brain of Jupiter himfelf? Have we not fworn our devout, profane, believing, infidel people, to an allegiance to this goddefs, even before Ihe had burft the dura mater, and as yet exifted only in embryo ? Have we not folemnly declared this conftitution unalterable by any future legiflature ? Have we not bound it on pofterity for ever, though our abettors have declared that no one generation is competent to bind another ? Have we not obliged the members of every future aflembly to qualify themfelves for their feats by fwearing to its con- fcrvation ?
Indeed the French conftitution always muft be (if a change is not made in all their principles and fundamental arrangements) a government wholly by popular reprefentation. It muft be this or nothing. The French faction confiders as an ufurpation, as an atrocious violation of the indefeafible rights of man, every other defcription. of government. Take it C 3 or
or leave it ; there is no medium. Let the irrefra- gable doctors fight out their own controverfy in £heir own way, and with their own weapons j and when they are tirecj let them commence a treaty of peace. Let the plenipotentiary Ibphifters of Eng- land fettle with the diplomatic fophifters of France in what manner right is to be corrected by an infu- jfion of wrong, and how truth .may be rendered more true by a due intermixture of falfhood.
Having iuffitiently proved, that nothing could make it generally improper for Mr. Burke to prove what he had alledged concerning the object of this difpute, I pafs to the fecond queihien, that is, whe- ther he was juftified in clioofijig the committee on the Quebec bih as the field for this difcuf- fion ? If it were neceflary, it might be fhewn, that he was not the firft to bring thefe difcufllons into parliament, nor the firft to renew them in this feffion. The fact is notorious. As to the Quebec bill, they were introduced into the debate upon that fubject for two plain reafons ; firft, that as he thought it then not advifeable to make the proceedings of the factious focieties the fubject of a direct motion, he had no other way open to him. Nobody has attempted to fhew, that it was at all admifiible into any other bufmefs before the houfe. Here every thing was favourable. Here \ was a bill to form a new constitution for a French ; province under Englifh dominion. The queftion, 1 naturally arofe, whether we fhould fettle that con-^ ftitution upon Engliih ideas, or upon French.! This furnifhed an opportunity for examining into the value of the French cqnftitudon, either confider- ed as applicable to colonial government, or in its own nature. The bill too was in a committee. By the privilege of fpeaking as often as he pleafed, he hoped in fome meafure to fupply the want of fupport, which he had but too much reafon to apprehend. JTI a committee it was always in his power to bring
the
the queftions from generalities to fafts ; from de- i clamation to difcuffion. Some benefit he actually received from this privilege. Theie are plain, ob- vious, natural reafons for his conduct. I believe they are the true, and the only true ones.
They who juftify the frequent interruptions, which at length wholly difabled him from proceeding, attri- bute their conduct to a very different interpretation of his motives. They fay, that through corruption, or malice, or foliy, he was acting his part in a plot to make his friend Mr. Fox pafs for a republican ; and thereby to prevent the gracious intentions of his fo- vereign from taking effe6t, which at that time. had began to difclofe themielves in his favour *. This
is- f.ariv/ -ji r
* To explain this, it will be neceflary to advert to a para-, graph which appeared in a paper in the minority interefl Tome time before this debate. " A very dark intrigue has lately been " difcovered, the authors of which are well known to us.; brtt " until the glorious day fhall come, when it will not be a " LIBEL to tell the TRUTH, we muft not be fo regardlefs of " our own fafety, as to publifh their names. We will, how- " ever, ftate the fad, leaving it to the ingenuity of our readers' " to diicover what we dare not publifh.
" Since the bufmefs of the armament againft Rufiia has been " under difcufiion, a great perfonage has been heard to fay, " that " he was not fo wedded to Mr. PITT, as not to be very willing " to give his confidence to Mr. Fox, if the latter mould be " able, in a crifis like the prefent, to conduct: the government " of the country with greater advantage to the public."
" This patriotic declaration immediately alarmed the fwarm " of courtly infects that live only in the funfhine of minifterial " favour. It was thought to be the forerunner of the difmif- " fion of Mr. PITT, and every engine was fet at work for the. " purpofe of preventing fuch an event. The principal engine " employed on this occafion was CALUMNY. It was whif- " pered in the ear of a great perfonage, that Mr. Fox was the " laft man in England to be truiled by a KING, becaufe he " was by PRINCIPLE a REPUBLICAN, and consequently an " enerny to riONARCHY.
" In the difcuflion of the Quebec bill which flood for yefter-
" day, it was the intention of fome perfons to conneft with this
" fubjedl the French Revolution, in hopes that Mr. Fox would
" be warmed by a coliifion with Mr. Burke, and induced tode-
C 4. «• fen4
is a pretty ferious charge. This, on Mr. Burke's part, would be fomething more than miftakej fomething worfe than formal irregularity. Any contumely, any outrage is readily paflfed over, by the indulgence which we all owe to fudden paffion. Thefe things are foon forgot upon occafions in which all men are fo apt to forget themfelves. De- liberate injuries, to a degree muft be remembered, becaufe they require deliberate precautions to be fecured againft their return.
I am authorized to fay for Mr. Burke, that he confiders that caufe affigned for the outrage offered to him, as ten times worfe than the outrage itfelf. There is fuch a ftrange confufion of ideas on this fubjecl, that it is far more difficult to underftand the nature of the charge, than to refute it when underftood. Mr. Fox's friends were, it feems, feized with a fudden panic terror left he Ihould
«' fend that revolution in which fo much power was taken " from, and fo little left in, the crown.
" Had Mr. Fox fallen into the fnare, his fpeech on the occa- « fion would have been laid before a great perfonage, as a " proof that a man who could defend fuch a revolution, might " be a very good republican, but could not poffibly be a friend «' to monarchy.
" But thofe who laid the fnare were difappointed ; for Mr. f ' Fox, in the fhort converfation which took place yefterday in " the houfe of commons faid, that he confeffedly had thought te favorably of the French revolution ; but that moft certainly «' he never had, either in parliament or out of parliament, pror " feffed or defended republican principles."
•^Argus, April azd, 1791.
Mr. Burke canr.ot anfwer for the truth, nor prove the falfe- hood of the ftory given by the friends of the party in this paper. He only knows that an opinion of its being well or ill authen- ticated had no influence on his conduft. He meant only, to the beft of his power, to guard the public againft the ill defigns of factions out of doors. What Mr. Burke did in parliament could hardly have been intended to draw Mr. Fox into any declara- tions unfavourable to his principles, fmce (by the account of thofe who are his friends) he had long before effectually prevented the fuccefs of any fuch fcandalous defigns. Mr. Fox's friends have themfelves dene away that imputation on Mr, Burke.
pafs
C *5 )
pafs for a republican, I do not think they had any ground for this apprehenfion. But let us admit they had. What was there in the Quebec bill, ra- ther than in any other, which could fubject him or them to that imputation ? Nothing in a difcuffion of the French conftitution, which might arife on the Quebec bill, could tend to make Mr. Fox pafs for a republican ; except he ihould take oc- cafion to extol that ftate of things in France, which affects to be a republic or a confederacy of re- publics. If fuch an encomium could make any unfavourable impreftlon on the king's mind, furely his voluntary panegyrics on that event, not fo much introduced as intruded into other debates, with which they had little relation, muft have produced that effect: with much more certainty, and much greater force. The Quebec bill, at worft, was only one of thofe opportunities, carefully fought, and in- duftrioufly improved by himfelf. Mr. Sheridan had already brought forth a panegyric on the French fyftem in a ftill higher ftrain, with full as little de- mand from the nature pf the bufmefs before the houfe, in a fpeech too good to be fpeedily forgot- ten. Mr. Fox followed him without any direct call from the fubject matter, and upon the fame ground. To canvafs the merits of the French conftitution on the Quebec bill could not draw forth any opi- nions which were not brought forward before, with no fmall oftentation, and with very little of ne- ceflity, or perhaps of propriety. What mode, or what time of difcuffmg the conduct of the French faction in England would not equally tend to kindle this enthufiafm, and afford thofe occafions for pane- gyric, which, far from fhunning, Mr. Fox has always induftrioufly fought ? He himfelf faid very truly, in the debate, that no artifices were neceffary to draw from him his opinions upon that fubject. But to fall upon Mr, Burke for making an ufe, at worft
not
( 26 )
not more irregular, of the fame liberty, is tan-- tamount to a plain declaration, that the topic of France is tabooed or forbidden ground to Mr. Burke, and to Mr. Burke alone. But furely Mr. Fox is not a republican; and what fhould hinder him, when fuch a difcuflion came on, from clearing him- felf unequivocally (as his friends fay he had done near a fortnight before) of all fuch imputations ? Inftead of being a difadvantage to him, he would have defeated ail his enemies, and Mr. Burke, fmce he has thought proper to reckon him amongft them.
But it feems, fome news-paper or other had im- puted to him republican principles, on occafion of his conduct upon the Quebec bill. Suppofing Mr. Burke to have feen thefe news-papers (which is to fuppofe more than- 1 believe to be true) I would afk, when did the news-papers forbear to charge Mr. Fox, or Mr. Burke himfelf, with republican principles, or any other principles which they thought could render both of them odious, fometimes to one defcription of people, fometimes to another ? Mr. Burke, fmce the publication of his pamphlet, has been a thoufand times charged in the news-papers with holding de- fpotic principles. He could not enjoy one moment of domeftic quiet, he could not perform the leaft particle of public duty, if he did not altogether difregard the language of thofe libels. But how- ever his fenfibility might be affected by fuch abufe, it would in him have been thought a moil ridicu- lous reafon for {hutting up the mouths of Mr. Fox, or Mr. Sheridan, fo as to prevent their delivering their fentiments of the French revolution, — that forfooth, " the news-papers had lately charged Mr. " Burke with being an enemy to liberty."
I allow that thole gentlemen have privileges to
which Mr. Burke has no claim. But their friends
ought to plead thofe privileges -, and not to affign bad
i reafons,
reafons, on the principle of what is fair between man and man, and thereby to put themfelves on a level with thofe who can Ib eafily refute them. Let them fay at once that his reputation is of no value, and that he has no call to aflert it -, but that theirs Js of infinite concern to the party and the public ; and to that ccnfkleration he ought to facrifice all his opinions, and all his feelings.
In that language I fhould hear a ftyle corre- fpondent to the proceeding ; lofty, indeed, but plain and confident. Admit, however, for a moment, and merely for argument, that this gentleman had as good a right to continue as they had to begin thefe difcufiions, in ctndour and equity they muft allow that their voluntary defcant in praife of the French constitution was as much an oblique attack on Mr. Burke, as Mr. Burke's enquiry into the foundation of this encomium could poffibly be conftrued into an imputation upon them. They well knew, that he felt like other men ; and of courfe he would think it mean and unworthy, to decline afferting in his place, and in the front of able adverfaries, the principles of what he had penned in his clofet, and without an opponent before him. They could not but be convinced, thac declamations of this kind would rouze him ; that he muft think, coming from men of their calibre, they were highly mif- chievous ; that they gave countenance to bad men, and bad defigns; and, though he was aware that the handling fuch matters in parliament was delicate, yet he was a man very likely, whenever, much againft his will, they were brought there, to refolve, that there they Ihouid be thoroughly lifted. Mr. Fox, early in the preceding fefTion, had public notice fiom Mr. Burke of the light in which he con- jQdered every attempt to introduce the example j of France into the politics of this country ; and I of his refolution to break with his belt friends^
and
/ and to join with his word enemies to prevent it. He hoped, that no fuch neccffity would ever exiil. But in cafe it fhould, his determination was made. The party knew perfectly that he would at leaft defend himfelf. He never intended to attack Mr. Fox, nor did he attack him directly or indirectly. His fpeech kept to its matter. No perfonality was employed even in the remoteft allufion. He never did impute to that gentleman any republican prin- ciples, or any other bad principles or bad conduct whatfoever. It was far from his words; it was far from his heart. It mufl be remembered, that not- wkhftanding Mr. Fox, in order to fix on Mr. Burke, an unjuftifiable change of opinion, and the foul crime of teaching a fet of maxims to a boy, anq afterwards, when thefe maxims became adult in his! mature age, of abandoning both the difciple anc$ the doctrine, Mr. Burke never attempted, in any one particular, either to criminate or to recrimi- nate. It may be faid, that he had nothing of the kind in his power. This he does not controvert. He certainly had it not in his inclination. That
fentleman had as little ground for the charges which e was fo eafily provoked to make upon him.
The gentlemen of the party (I include Mr. Fox) have been kind enough to confider the difpute brought on by this bufmefs, and the confequent reparation of Mr. Burke from their corps, as a matter of regret and uneafinefs. I cannot be of opinion, that by his exdufion they have had any lofs at all. A man whofe opinions are fo very ad- verfe to theirs, adverfe, as it was expreffed, " as *( pole to pole," fo mifchievoufly as well as fo di- rectly adverfe, that they found themfelves under the / neceffity of folemnly difclaiming them in full parlia-.J ment, fuch a man muft ever be to them a moil im4f feemly and unprofitable incumbrance. A co-opera- tion with him could only ferve to embarrafs them in
ati
all their councils. They have befides publickly re- prefented him as a man capable of abufing the doci- lity and confidence of ingenuous youth ; and, for a / bad reafon, or for no reafon, of difgracing his whole/ public life by a icandalous contradiction of every onef of his own acts, writings, and declarations. If thefc charges be true, their excluiion of fuch a perfon from their body is a circumflance which does equal honour to their juftice and their prudence. If they cxpn is a degree of fenfibility in being obliged to execute this wife and juft fentence, from a conli- deration of fome amiable or fome pleafant quali- ties which in his private life their former friend may happen to poflefs, they add, to the praife of their wifdom and firmnefs, the merit of great tendernefe of heart, and humanity of difpofition. /"On their ideas, the new Whig party have, in my /opinion, acted as became them. The author of | the Reflections, however, on his part, cannot, with- out great fhame to himfelf, and without entailing \ cverlafting difgrace on his pofterity, admit the truth or juftice of the charges which have been made upon him ; or allow that he has in thofe Reflections difcovered any principles to which honeft men are bound to declare, not a fhade or two of difient, but a total fundamental oppofition. He muit believe, if he does not mean wilfully to abandon his caufe and his reputation, that principles fundamentally at variance with thofe of his book, are fundamentally falfe. What thofe principles, the antipodes to his, really are, he can only difcover from that contrariety. ,He is very unwilling to fuppofe, that the doctrines / of fome books lately circulated are the principles I of the party ; though, from the vehement declara- ' tions againtl his opinions, he is at fome lofs how to judge otherwife.
For the prefent, my plan does not render it ne- ctary to fay any thing further concerning the me- rits
( 30 )
rits cither of the one fet of opinions or the other. The author would have difcuffed the merits of both in his place, but he was not permitted to do fo.
I pafs to the next head of charge, Mr. Burke's inconfiftency. It is certainly a great aggravation of his fault in embracing falfe opinions, that in doing fo he is not fuppofed to fill up a void, but that he is guilty of a dereliction of opinions ;•' that are true and laudable. This is the great gift of the charge againft him. It is not fo much that he is wrong in his book (that however is alledged alfo) as that he has therein belyed his whole life. I believe, if he could venture to va- lue himfelf upon any thing, it is on the virtue o confiftency that he would value himfelf the moft. Strip him of this, and you leave him naked indeed.
In the cafe of any man who had written fome- thing, and fpoken a great deal, upon very multifa-
i
rious matter, during upwards of twenty-five years \ public fervice, and in as great a variety of import- ant events as perhaps have ever happened in the fame number of years, it would appear a little hard, in order to charge fuch a man with inconfiftency, to fee collected by his friend, a fort of digeft of his fayings, even to fuch as were merely fportive and jocular. This digeft, however, has been made, with equal pains and partiality, and without \ bringing out thofe paflages of his writings which j might tend to fhew with what reftrictions any ex-/ prefllons, quoted from him, ought to have beeri underftood. From a great ftatefman he did not quite expect this mode of inquifition. If it only appeared in the w >rks of common pamphleteers, Mr. Burke might fafely truft to his reputation. When thus urged, he ought, perhaps, to do a little more. It fhall be as little as poffible, for I hope not much is wanting. To be totally filent on his
charges
charges would not be refpectful to Mr. Fox. Ac- culations fometimes derive a weight from the per- fons who make them, to which they are not en- tided from their matter.
He who thinks, that the Britifh conftitntion ought to confift of the three members, of three very dif- ferent natures, of which it does actually confift, and , thinks it his duty to preferve each of thofe mem- ' bers in its proper place, and with it's proper pro- portion of power, mufl (as each lhall happen to be attacked) vindicate the three feveral parts on the feveral principles peculiarly belonging to them. He cannot uflert the democratic part on the princi- ples on which monarchy is fupported ; nor can he fupport monarchy on the principles of democracy; nor can he maintain ariftocracy on the grounds of the one or of the other, or of both. All thefej he muft fupport on grounds that are totally differ- ent, though practically they may be, and happily! with us they are, brought into one harmonious body./ A man could not be confiftent in defending fuch// various, and, at firft view, difcordant parts of ai/ mixed conftitution, without that fort of inconfift-/] ency with which Mr. Burke (lands charged.
As any one of the great members of this conftitu- tion happens to be endangered, he that is a friend to all of them choofes and prefles the topics necefiary for the fupport of the part attacked, with all the ftrength, the earneftnefs, the vehemence, with all the power of ftating, of argument, and of colouring, which he happens to poflefs, and which the cafe demands. He is not to embarrafs the minds of his hearers, or to encumber, or overlay his fpeech, by bringing into view at once (as if he were reading an aca- demic lecture) all that may and ought, when a juft occafion prefents itfelf, to be faid in favour of the other members. At that time they are out of the «ourt ; there Js no queftion concerning them.
Whilft
Whilft he oppofes his defence on the part where the attack is made, he prefumes, that for his regard to the juft rights of all the reft, he has credit in every candid mind. He ought not to apprehend, that his raifmg fences about popular privileges this day, will infer that he ought, on the next, to concur with thofe who would pull down the throne : becaufe on the next he defends the throne, it ought not to be fup- pofed that he has abandoned the rights of the people.
A man who, among various objects of his equal regard, is fecure of fome, and full of anxiety for the fate of others, is apt to go to much greater lengths in his preference of the objects of his imme- diate folicitude than Mr. Burke has ever done. A man fo circumftanced often feems to undervalue, to vilify, almoft to reprobate and difown, thofe that are out of danger. This is the voice of nature and truth, and not of inconfiftency and falfe pretence. The danger of any thing very dear to us, removes, for the moment, every other affection from the mind. When Priam had his whole thoughts em- ployed on the body of his Hector, he repels with indignation, and drives from him with a thoufand reproaches, his furviving fons, who with an officious piety crouded about him to offer their affiftance. A good critic (there is no better than Mr. Fox) would fay, that this is a mafter-ftroke, and marks a deep understanding of nature in the father of poetry. He would defpife a Zoilus, who would conclude from this paffage that Homer meant to reprefent this man of affliction as hating or being indifferent and cold in his affections to the poor reliques of his houfe, or that he preferred a dead carcafe to his living children.
Mr. Burke does not ftand in need of an allowance of this kind, which, if he did, by candid critics ought to be granted to him. If the principles of a mixed
conftitution
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conftitution be admitted, he wants no more to juftify to confiftency every thing he has faid and done during the courfe of a political life juft touchiag to its clofe. I believe that gentleman has kept him- felf more clear of running into the fafliion of wild vifionary theories, or of feeking popularity through every means, than any man perhaps ever did in the lame fituation,
He was the firft man who, on the huftings, at a\ popular election, rejected the authority 'of inftruc- ) tions . from conftituents j or who, in any place,/ has argued fo fully againft it. Perhaps the dif- credit into which that doctrine of compulfive in- ftructions under our conftitution is fince fallen, may be due, in a great degree, to his oppofing himfelf to it in that manner, and on that occafion.
The reforms in reprefentation, and the bills for} fhortening the duration of parliaments, he uniformly / and fteadily oppofed for many years together, inf contradiction to many of his belt friends. Thefe friendsj however, in his better days, when they had more to hope from his fervice and more to fear from his lofs than now they have, never chofe to find any inconfiftency between his acts and ex- preflions in favour of liberty, and his votes on thofc queftions. But there is a time for all things.
Againft the opinion of many friends, even againft the folicitacion of fome of them, he oppofed thofe of the church clergy, who had petitioned the Houfe of Commons to be difchnrged from the fubfcrip- tion. Although he fupported the diffenters in their petition for the indulgence which he had refufed to the clergy of the eftablifhed church, in this, as he was not guilty of it, fo he was not reproached with inconfiftency. At the fame time he promoted, and againft the wifh of feveral, the claufe that gave the diflenting teachers another fubfcription in the D place
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place of that which was then taken away. Neither at that time was the reproach of inconfiftency brought againft him. People could then diftinguifh between a difference in conduct, under a variation of circumftancesj and an inconfiftency in principle. It was not then thought neceffary to be freed of him as of an incumbrance.
Thefe inftances, a few among many, are pro- duced as an anfwer to the infmuation of his having purfued high popular courfes, which in his late book he has abandoned. Perhaps in his whole life he has never omitted a fair occafion, with whatever rifqne to him of obloquy as an indivi- dual, with whatever detriment to his intereft as a member of oppofition, to affert the very fame doc-^ trines which appear in that book. He told the Houfe, upon an important occafion, and pretty early in his fervice, that " being warned by the ill effect " of a contrary procedure in great examples, he " had taken his ideas of liberty very low ; in order " that they fhould ftick to him, and that he might " ftick to them to the end of his life."
At popular elections the moft rigorous cafuifts will remit a little of their feverity. They will allow to a candidate fome unqualified effufions in favour of freedom, without binding him to adhere to them in their utmoft extent. Bvt Mr. Burke put a more ftrict rule upon himfelf than moft moralifts would put upon others. At his firft offering himfelf to Briftol, where he was almoft fure he Ihould not obtain, on that or any oc- cafion, a fmgle Tory vote, (in fact he did obtain but one) and refted wholly on the Whig intereft, he thought himfelf bound to tell to the electors, both before and after his election, exactly what a repre- fentative they had to expect in him.
" The diftinguijhing part of our conftitution (h/*
" faid)
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e{ faid) is its liberty. To preferve that liberty in- " violate, is the peculiar duty and proper truft of f. member of the houfe of commons. But the li- " berty, the only liberty I mean, is a liberty con- \ <( nedbed with order, and that not only exifts with " order and virtue, but cannot exift at all without " them. It inheres in good and fteady govern- " ment, as in itsfubftance and vital principle."
The liberty to which Mr. Burke declared him- felf attached, is not French liberty. That liberty is nothing but the rein given to vice and confuiion. Mr. Burke was then, as he was at the writing of his Reflections, awfully imprefied with the difficulties arifmg from the complex ftate of our conftitution and our empire, and that it might require, in dif- ferent emergencies different forts of exertions, and the fucceffive call upon all the various principles which uphold andjuftify it. This will appear from what he faid at the clofe of the poll. —
" To be a good member of parliament is, let me <c tell you, no eafy tafkj efpecially at this time, «' when there is fo ftrong a difpofition to run into s< the perilous extremes offer-vile compliance, or f< wild popularity. To unite circumipectbn with •*' vigour, is abfolutely neceffary ; but it is extreme- " ly difficult. We are now members for a rich " commercial city ; this city, however, is but a part <f of a rich commercial nation, the interefts of which " are various, multiform) and intricate. We are " members for that great nation which, however, is " itfelf but part of a great empire, extended by our " virtue and our fortune to the fartheft limits of " the eaft and of the weft. All thefe wide-fpread j " interefts muft be confidered; muft be compared jl *c muft be reconciled, if pofllble. We are members " for a free country ; and furely we all know that " the machine of a free conftitution is no fimple D 2 a thing i
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" thing; but as intricate and as ddicatey as it is " valuable. We are members in a great and an- " tient MONARCHY ; and iv e muft prefen-e religioujly " the true legal rights of the fovereign, which form the tc key-jlcne that binds together the noble and well- f( conftrufted arch of our empire and our conftitittion. " A conftitution made up of balanced powers, muft <c ever be a critical thing. As fuch I mean to touch " that part of it which comes within my reach."
In this manner Mr. Burke fpoke to his condi- ments feventeen years ago. He fpoke, not like a partizan of one particular member of our confti- 1 tution, but as a perfon ftrongly, and on principle, attached to them all. He thought thefe great and \efTential members ought to be preserved, and pre- ferved each in its place ; and that the monarchy ought not only to be fecured in its peculiar ex- iftence, but in its pre-eminence too, as the prefid- ing and connecting principle of the whole. Let it be confidered, whether the language of his book, printed in 1790, differs from his fpeech at Briftol in 1774.
i "With equal juftice his opinions on the American fwar are introduced, as if in his late work he had (belied his conduct and opinions in the debates which arofe upon that great event. On the Ameri- can war he never had any opinions which he has feen occafion to retract, or which he has ever retracted. He indeed differs effentially from Mr. Fox as to the caufe of that war. Mr. Fox has been pleafed to fay, that the Americans rebelled, * becaufe they thought c they had not enjoyed liberty enough.' This caufc of the -war from him I have heard of for the firft time. It is true that thofe who ftimulated the nation to that meafure, did frequently urge this topic. They contended, that the Americans had from the begin- ning aimed at independence j that from the begin-
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ning they meant wholly 'to throw off the authority \ of the crown, and to break their connexion with ' the parent country. This Mr. Burke never believed. / When he moved his fecond conciliatory propofition in the year 1776, he entered into the difcufiion of this point at very great length ; and from nine fe- veral heads of preemption, endeavored to prove the charge upon that people not to be true.
If the principles of all he has faid and wrote on the occafion, be viewed with common tem- per, the gentlemen of the party will perceive, that on a fuppofition that the Americans had re belled merely in order to enlarge their liberty, Mr. Burke would have thought very differently o the American caufe. What might have been in the ffecret thoughts of fome of their leaders it is im- Vpoflible to fay. As far as a man, fo locked up as Dr. Franklin, could be expected to communicate his ideas, I believe he opened them to Mr. Burke. It was, I think, the very day before he fet out for Ame- rica, that a very long converfation pa (Ted between them, and with a greater air of opennefs on the Doc- tor's fide, than Mr. Burke had obferved in him be- fore. In this difcourfe Dr. Franklin lamented with apparent fincerity, the feparation feared was inevitable between Great Britain colonies. He certainly {poke of it as an event which gave him the greateft concern. America, he faid, would never again fee fuch happy days as ihe had pafled under the protection of England. He cbferved, that ours was the only inftance of a great empire, in which the moil diftant parts and members had been as well governed as the metropolis and its vicinage : But that the Americans were going to lole the means which fecured to them this rare and precious advan- tage. The queftion wjth them was not whether they were to remain as they had been before the troubles, for better, he allowed they could not hope to be;
'
i in mm De- mented, and\ >n which he/ •itain and hen
/'but whether they were to give up fo hap^y a fitua- \tion without a ftruggle ? Mr. Burke had feveral other converfations with him about that time, in none of which, foured and exafperated as his mind certainly was, did he difcover any other wilh in favour of America than for a fecurity to its ancient condi-/ tion. Mr. Burke's converfation with other Ameri- cans was large indeed, and his enquiries extenfive and diligent. Trufting to the refult of all thefe means of information, but trufling much more in the pub- lic preemptive indications I have juft referred to, and to the reiterated folemn declarations of their affemblies, he always firmly believed that they were ji purely on the defenfive in that rebellion. He con- fidered the Americans as Handing at that time, and in that controverfy, in the fame relation to Eng- land, as England did to king James the Second, in 1688. He believed, that they had taken up arms from one motive only ; that is our attempting to tax them without their confent; to tax them for the purpofes of maintaining civil and military eftablifhments. If this attempt of ours could have been practically eftablifhed, he thought with them, that their aflemblies would become totally ufelefs ; that under the iyftem of policy which was then
frfued, the Americans could have no fort of fe- rity for their laws or liberties, or for any part of ^m ; and, that the very cireumftance of our free- — m would have augmented the weight of their flavery.
Confidering the Americans on that defenfive foot- ing, he thought Great Britain ought inftantly to have clofed wkh them by the repeal of the taxing act. He was of opinion that our general rights over that country would have been preferved by this timely conceflion*. When, inflead of this,
* See his fpeech on American taxation., the i pth of April, 1 774.
a Bfofton
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a Bofton port bill, a MafTachufet's charter bill, a Filhciy bill, an Intercourfe bill, I know not how many hcftile bills rufhed out like Ib many tempefts from all points of the compafs, and were accompanied firft with great fleets and ar- mies of Englifh, and followed afterwards with great bodies of foreign troops, he thought that their caufe grew daily better, becaufe daily more defen- five ; and that ours, becaufe daily more offenfive, grew daily worfe. He therefore in two motions, in two fucceflive years, propofed in parliament; many concefiions beyond what he had reafon toj think in the beginning of the troubles would everj be ferioufly demanded.
So circumftanced, he certainly never could and never did wifh the colonifts to be fubdued by arms. He was fully perfuaded, that if fuch fhould be the event, they muft be held in that fubdued ftate by a great body of {landing forces, and per- haps of foreign forces. He was ftrongly of opinion, that fuch armies, firft victorious over Englifhmen, in a conflict for Englifh coriftitutional rights and privileges, and afterwards habituated (though in America) to keep an Englifh people in a ftate i of abject fubjection, would prove fatal in the end j to the liberties of England itfelf ; that in the mean ' time this military fyftem would lie as an oppreffive 1 burthen upon the national finances j that it would \ conftantly breed and feed new difcuflions, full of , heat and acrimony, leading poffibly to a new feries of wars ; and that foreign powers, whilft we con- tinued in a ftate at once burthened and diffracted, muft at length obtain a decided fuperiority over us. On what part of his late publication, or on what exprefllon that might have efcaped him in that work, is any man authorized to charge Mr. Burke with a contradiction to the line of his conduct, , and to the current of his doctrines on the American j D 4 war ?
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war ? The pamphlet is in the hands of his accufers, let them point out the paflage if they can.
Indeed, the author has been well fifted and fcru- tinized by his friends. He is even called to an account for every jocular and light expreffion. A ludicrous picture which he made with regard to a pafiage in the fpeech of a * late minifter, has been brought up againft him. That paflage con- tained a lamentation for the lofs of monarchy to the Americans, after they had feparated from Great Britain. He thought it to be unfeafonable, ill judged, and ill forted with the circumftances of all the parties. Mr. Burke, it feems, confidered it ridiculous to lament the lofs of fome monarch or other, to a rebel people, at the moment they had for ever quitted their allegiance to theirs and our fovereign; at the time when they had broken off all connexion with this nation, and had allied them- felves with its enemies. He certainly muft have thought it opeli to ridicule : and, now that it is recalled to his memory, (he had, J believe, whol- ly forgotten the circumftance) he recollects that he did treat it with fome levity. But is it a fair infe- rence from a jeft on this unfeafonable lamentation, that he was then an enemy to monarchy either in this or in any other country ? The contrary per- haps ought to be inferred, if any thing at all can be- argued from pleafantries good or bad. Is it for this reafon, or for any thing he has laid or done re- lative to the American war, that he is to enter into an alliance offenfive and defenfive with every rebellion, in every country, under every circum- ftance, and raifed upon whatever pretence? Is it "becaufe he did not wifli the Americans to be fub- dued by arms, that he muft be inconfiftent v;ith Jiimfelf, if he reprobates the conduft of thofe fo-
* Lord Lanfclown.
tieties
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cietics in England, who alledging no one act of tyT\ ranny or oppreffion, and complaining of no hoftile ] attempt againft our antient laws, rights, and ulages, \ are now endeavouring to work the ckltruction of the j crown of this kingdom, and the whole of its con- ftitution? Is he obliged, from the concefiions he wilhed to be made to the colonies, to keep any terms with thofe clubs and federations, who hold out to us *• as a pattern for imitation, the proceedings inJFrance, in which a king, who had voluntarily and formally di- \ vetted himieif of the right of taxation, and of all |J other fpecies of arbitrary power, has been dethroned ? / — Is it becaufe Mr. Burke wilhed to have America rather conciliated than vanquifhed, that he muft wifh well to the army of republics which are fet up in France; a country wherein not the people, but the monarch was wholly on the defend ve (a poor, indeed, and feeble defenfive) to preferve Jome fragments of the royal authority againft a determined and defpe- rate body of confpirators, whofe object it was, with whatever certainty of crimes, with whatever hazard of war and every other fpecies of calamity, to anni--, hilate the whole of that authority; to level all ranks, > orders, and diftinctions in the flate ; and utterly to ; deftroy property, not more by their acts than in/ their principles ?
Mr. Burke has been alfo reproached with an in- confiflency between his late writings and his former conduct, becaufe he had propofed in parliament feveral ceconomical, leading to feveral conftitutional reforms. Mr. Burke thought, with a majority of the Houfe of Commons, that the influence of the crown at one time was too great ; but after his Ma- jeity had by a gracious mefTage, and feveral fubfe- quent acts of parliament, reduced it to a ftandard which fatisfied Mr. Fox himfelf, and, apparently at leaft, contented whoever wifhed to go fartheft in that reduction, is Mr. Burke to allow that it would be right
for
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for us to proceed to indefinite lengths upon that fub- ject? that it would therefore bejuftifiable in a people owing allegiance to a monarchy, and profefiing to\ maintain it, not to reduce, but wholly to take away all \ prerogative, and «// influence whatfoever ? — Muft his having made, in virtue of a plan of oeconomical re- gulation, a reduction of the influence of the crown, compel him to allow, that it would be right in the French or in us to bring a king to fo abject a ftate, as in function not to be fo relpectable as an under fhcrifF, but in pe-rfon not to differ from the condi- tion of a mere prifoner ? One would think that fuch) a thing as a medium had never been heard of in tlW moral world.
This mode of arguing from your having done any thing in a certain line, to the neceffity of do- ing every thing, has political ccnfequences of other moment than thofe of a logical fallacy. If no man can propofe any diminution or modification of an invidious or dangerous power or influence in go- vernment, without entitling friends turned into adverfaries, to argue him into the deftruction of all prerogative, and to a fpoliation of the whole patronage of royalty, I do not know what can more effectually deter perfons of fober minds from engaging in any reform ; nor how the worft enemies to the liberty of the fubject could contrive any me- thod more fit to bring all correctives on the power of the crown into fuipicion and difrepute.
If, fay his accufers, the dread of too great influence in the crown of Great Britain could juftify the degree of reform which he adopted, the dread of a return under the defpotifm of a monarchy might juftify the people of France in going much further, and reduc- ing monarchy to its prefent nothing. Mr. Burke does pot allow, that a furrlcient argument ad hominem is inferable from thefe premifes. If the horror of the exceffes of an abfolute monarchy furnifhes a reafon for
abolifhing
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abolifKing it, no monarchy once abfolute (all have been fo at one period or other) could ever be limited. It mult be deftroyed ; otherwife no way could be found to quiet the fears of thofe who were formerly fub- jected to that fway. But the principle of Mr. Burked proceeding ought to lead him to a very different conclufion ;-— to this conclufion, — that a monar-X chy is a thing perfectly fufceptible of reform ; per- V fectly fufceptible of a balance of power ; and that, i; when reformed and balanced, for a great country, it / is the belt of all governments. The example of our" country might have led France, as it has led him, to perceive that monarchy is not only reconcila- ble to liberty, but that it may be rendered a great and ftable fecurity to its perpetual enjoyment. No correctives which he propofed to the power of the crown could lead him to approve of a plan of a republic (if fo it may be reputed) which has no correctives, and which he believes to be inca- pable of admitting any. No principle of Mr. Burke's conduct or writings obliged him, from confiftency, to become an advocate for an ex- change of mifchiefs ; no principle of his could . compel him to juftify the fetting up in the place j of a mitigated monarchy, a new and far more/ defpotic power, under which there is no trace of? liberty, except what appears in confufion a*id iri crime.
Mr. Burke does not admit that the faction pre- dominant in France have aboiilhed their monarchy and the orders of their flate, from any dread of arbi- trary power that lay heavy on the minds of the peo- ple. It is not very long lince he has been in that country. Whilft there he converfed with many de- fcriptions of its inhabitants. A few perfons of rank did, he allows, difcover ftrong and manifeft tokens of fuch a fpirit of liberty, as might be expected one day to break all bounds. Such gentlemen have
fincc
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/mce had more reafon to repent of their want of forefight than I hope any of the fame clafs will ever have in this country. But this fpirit was far from general even amongft the gentlemen. As to the lower orders and thofe a little above them, in whofe name the prefent powers domineer, they were far from difcovering any fort of diflatisfaflion with the power and prerogatives of the crown.
SThat vain people were rather proud of them : they rather defpifed the Englifh for not having a mo- narch pofieffed of fuch high and perfect authority. : <?bey had felt nothing from Lettres de Cachet. The \ Baftile could infpire no horrors into them. This was a treat for their betters. It was by art and impulfe i it was by the finifter ufe made of a fea- fon of fcarcity ; it was under an infinitely diverfified fucceffion of wicked pretences, wholly foreign to the queftion of monarchy or ariftocracy, that this light people were infpired with their prefent fpirit of levelling. Their old vanity was led by art to take another turn : It was dazzled and feduced by mi- litary liveries, cockades, and epaulets, until the French populace was led to become the willing, but flill the proud and fhoughtlefs inflrument and victim of another domination. Neither did that people defpife, or hate, or fear their nobility. On the contrary, they valued themfelves on the gene- rous qualities which diftinguifhed the chiefs of then-1 nation.
So far as to the attack on Mr. Burke, in ccnfe- quence of his reforms.
To fhew that he has in his laft publication abandoned thofe principles of liberty which have given energy to his youth, and in fpite of his cenlbrs will afford repofe and confolation to his declining age, thofe who have thought proper in parliament to declare againft his book, ought to have produced fomething in it, which di- rectly
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or indirectly militates with any rational plan of free government. It is fomething extraordinary, that they whofe memories have fo well ferved them with regard to light and ludicrous expreflions which years had configned to oblivion, fhould not have been able to quote a fingle paflage in a piece ib lately publifhed, which contradicts any thing he has formerly ever laid in a flyle either ludicrous or ferious. They quote his former fpeeches, and his ; former votes, but not one fyllable from the book./ It is only by a collation of the one with the other that the alledged inconfiftency can be eftablifhed. But as they are unable to cite any fuch contradictory paflage, fo neither can they fhew any thing in the general tendency and fpirit of the whole work un- favourable to a rational and generous fpirit of li- berty j unlefs a warm oppofition to the fpirit of \ levelling, to the fpirit of impiety, to the fpirit of • profcription, plunder, murder, and cannibalifm, be | adverle to the true principles of freedom.
The author of that book is fuppofed to have pafied from extreme to extreme ; but he has always j kept himfelf in a medium. This charge is not fo wonderful. It is in the nature of things, that they who are in the centre of a circle fhould appear directly oppofed to thofe who view them from any part of the circumference. In that middle point, however, he will flill remain, though he may hear people who themfelves run beyond Aurora and the Ganges, cry out, that he is at the extremity of the weft.
In the fame debate Mr. Burke was reprefented as arguing in a manner which implied that the Bri- tifh conftitution could not be defended, but by abu- fmg all republics antient and modern. He faid no- thing to give the leaft ground for fuch a cenfure. He never abufed all republics. He has never pro- felfed himfelf a friend or an enemy to republics or
to
to monarchies in the abftract. He thought that the circumftances and habits of every country, which it is always perilous and productive of thegreaieft cala- mities to force, are to decide upon the form of its government. There is nothing in his nature, his temper, or his faculties, which fhould make him an enemy to any republic modern or antient. Far from it. He has ftudied the form and fpirit of republic§ very early in life ; he has ftudied them with great attention ; and with a mind undifturbed by affection or prejudice. He is indeed convinced that the fci- ence of government would be poorly cultivated without that ftudy. But the refult in his mind from that inveftigation has been, and is, that neither England nor France, without infinite detriment to them, as well in the event as in the experiment, could be brought into a republican form ; but that \ every thing republican which can be introduced j with fafety into either of them, mufl be built upon 1 a monarchy; built upon a real, not a nominal mo- / narchy, as its ejjential bafis ; that all fuch inftitu- rions, whether ariftocratic or democratic, muft ori- ginate from their crown, and in all their proceed- ings muft refer to it ; that by the energy of that main Ipring alone thofe republican parts muft be fet in ac- tion, and from thence muft derive their whole le- gal .effect, (as amongft us they actually do) or the whole will fall into confufion. Thefe republican members have no other point but the crown in which they can poffibly unite.
This is the opinion expreffed in Mr. Burke'* book. He has never varied in that opinion fince \ he came to years of difcretion. But furely, if at -y any time of his life he had entertained other no- tions, (which however he has never held or profefied to hold) the horrible calamities brought upon a great people, by the wild attempt to force their country into a republick, might be more than fufficient to
undecejve
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undeceive his understanding, and to free it for ever from fuch deftructive fancies. He is certain, that many, even in France, have been made fick of their theories by their very fuccefs in realizing them.
To fortify the imputation of a defertion from his principles, his conftant attempts to reform abufes, have been brought forward. It is true, it has been the bufmefs of his ftrength to reform abufes in government ; and his laft feeble efforts are em- ployed in a ftruggle againft them. Politically he has lived in that element j politically he will die in it. Before he departs, T will admit for him that he deferves to have all his titles of merit brought forth, as they have been, for grounds of con- demnation, if one word, juftifying or fupporting abufes of any fort, is to be found in that book which has kindled fo much indignation in the mind of a great man. On the contrary, it fpares no exifling abufe. Its very purpofe is to make war with abufes; not, indeed, to make war with the dead, but with thofe which live, and flourish, and reign.
The purpofe for which the abufes of govern- ment are brought into view, forms a very ma- terial confederation in the mode of treating them. The complaints of a friend are things very differ- ent from the invectives of an enemy. The charge of abufes on the late monarchy of France, was not intended to lead to its reformation, but to juftify its deftruction. They who have raked into all hiftory for the faults of kings, and who have ag- gravated every fault they have found, have acted confidently ; becaufe they acted as enemies. No man can be a friend to a tempered monarchy who bears a decided hatred to monarchy itfelf. He who, at the prefent time, is favourable, or even fair to that fyftem, muft act towards it as towards a friend with frailties, who is under the profecution § of
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of implacable foes. I think it a duty in that cafe, not to inflame the public mind againft the obnoxi- ous perfon, by any exaggeration of his faults. It is our duty rather to palliate his errors and defects, or to cad them into the lhade, and induftrioufly to bring forward any good qualities that he may hap- pen to poffefs. But when the man is to be amend- ed, and by amendment to be preferred, then the line of duty takes another direction. When his fafety is effectually provided for, it then becomes the office of a friend to urge his faults and vices with all the energy of enlightened affection, to paint them in their moft vivid colours, and to bring the moral patient to a better habit. Thus I think with regard to individuals j thus I think with regard to antient and refpected governments and orders of men. A fpirit of reformation is never more confident with itfelf, than when it refufes to be rendered the means of deftruction.
I fuppofe that enough is faid upon thefe heads of accufation. One more I had nearly forgotten, but I (hall foon difpatch it. The author of the Re- flections, in the opening of the laft parliament, en- tered on the Journals of the Houfe of Commons a motion for a remonftrance to the crown, which is fubftantially a defence of the preceding parlia- | ment, that had been difiblved under difpleafure. It * is a defence of Mr. Fox. It is a defence of the Whigs. By what connection of argument, by what affociation of ideas, this apology for Mr. Fox and his party is, by him and them, brought to cri- minate his and their apologift, I cannot eafily di- vine. It is true, that Mr. Burke received no previous encouragement from Mr. Fox, nor any the leaft countenance or fupport at the time when the motion was made, from him or from any gentleman of the party, one only excepted, from whcfe friendfhip, on that and on other occafions, he derives an honour
to
( 49 )
to which he muft be dull indeed to he infenfible *, If than remonftrance therefore was a falfe or feeble defence of the meafures of the party, they were in no wife affected by it. It Hands on the Journals. This fccures to it a permanence which the author cannot expect to any other work of his. Let it fpeak for itfelf to the prefent age, and to all pofte- ritjr. The party had no concern in it; and it can never be quoted againft them. But in the late debate it was produced, not to clear the party from an im- proper defence in which they had no fhare, but for the kind purpofe of infmuating an inconfiftency be- tween the principles of Mr. Burke's defence of the diflblved parliament, and thofe on which he pro- ceeded in his late Reflections on France.
It requires great ingenuity to make out fuch a parallel between the two cafes, as to found a charge of inconfiftency in the principles ailumed in arguing the one and the other. What relation had Mr. Fox«'s India bill to the conftitution of France ? What relation had that conftitution to the queftion of right, in an houfe of commons, to give or to withhold its confidence from minifters, and to flate that opinion to the crown ? What had this difcuf- fion to do with Mr. Burke's idea in 1784, of the ill confequences which muft in the end arife to the crown from fetting up the commons at large as an oppofite intereft to the commons in parliament? What has this difcufllon to do with a recorded warning to the people, of their rafhly forming a precipitate judgment againft their repreientatives ? "What had Mr. Burke's opinion of the danger of in- troducing new theoretic language unknown to the records of the kingdom, and calculated to excite vexatious queftions, into a parliamentary proceed-
* Mr. Windham.
E ing,
( 5° )
Ing, to do with the French afiembly, which defies all precedent, and places its whole glory in realizing what had been thought the moft vifionary theories ? What had this in common with the abolition of the French monarchy, or with the principles upon which the Englifh revolution was juftified ; a revolution in which parliament, in all its acts and all its decla- rations, religioufly adheres to f the form of found words,' without excluding from private difcuffions, fuch terms of art as mayferve to conduct an inquiry for which none but private perfons are relponfible ? Thefe were the topics of Mr. Burke's propofed re- monftrance; all of which topics fuppofe the exift- ence and mutual relation of our three eftates ; as well as the relation of the Eaft India Company to the crown, to parliament, and to the peculiar laws, rights, and ufages of the people of Hindoftan ? What reference, I fay, had thefe topics to the conftitution of France, in which there is no king, no lords, no commons, no India company to injure or fup- port, no Indian empire to govern or opprefs ? What relation had all or any of thefe, or any queftion which could arife between the prerogatives of the crown and the privileges of parliament, with the cenfure of thofe factious perfons in Great Britain, whom Mr. Burke ftates to be engaged, not in favour of privilege againft prerogative, or of pre- rogative againft privilege, but in an open attempt againft our crown and our parliament; againft our conftitution in church and ftate ; againft all the parts and orders which compofe the one and the other?
No perfons were more fiercely active againft Mr. Fox, and againft the meafures of the houfe of Commons diffolved in 1784, which Mr. Burke de- fends in that remonftrance, than feveral of thofe re- volution-makers, whom Mr. Burke condemns alike
in
itt His remonftrance, and in his book. Thefe revo- lutionifts indeed may be well thought to vary in their condud. He is, however; far from accufmg them, in this variation, of the fmalleft degree of inconfifl- ency. He is perfuaded, that they are totally indif- ferent at which end they begin the demolition of the conftitution. — Some are for commencing their ope- rations with the deftruction of the civil powers, in order the better to pull down the ectiefiaftical j fome wifh to begin with the ecclefiaftical, in order to facilitate the ruin of the civil ; fome would de- llroy the houfe of commons through the crown j fome the crown through the houfe of commons; and fome would overturn both the one and the other through what they call the people. But I believe that this injured writer will think it not at all in- j confident with his prefent duty, or with his former' life, ftrenuoufly to oppoie all the various partizans of deftruclion, let them begin where, or when, or how they will. No man would fet his face more / determinedly againft thofe who fhculd attempt to deprive them, or any defcription of men, of the rights they poflefs. No man would be more fteady in preventing them from abufmg thofe rights to the deftruction of that happy order under which they enjoy them. As to their title to any thing further, it ought to be grounded on the proof they give of the fafcty with which power may be trufled in their hands. When they attempt without difguife, not to win it from our affections, but to force it from our fears, they fhew, in the character of their means of obtaining it, the ufe they would make of their do- minion. That writer is too well read in men, not to know how often the defire and defign of a tyrannic domination lurks in the claim of an extravagant liberty. Perhaps in the beginning it always difplays itfelf in that manner. No man has ever affected E 2 power
( 5' )
power which he did not hope from the favour of die exifting government, in any other mode.
The attacks on the author's confiftency relative to France, are (however grievous they may be to his feelings) in a great degree external to him and to us, and comparatively of little moment to die people of England. The fubilantial charge upon him is concerning his doctrines relative to the Revolution of i6&8. Here it is, that they who fpeak in the name of the party have thought proper to cen- fure him the moft loudly, and with the greateil afpcrity. Here they faftcn ; and, if they are right in their fact, with fufficient judgment in their (elec- tion. If he be guilty in this point he is equally blameable, whether he is confiitent or not. If he endeavours to delude his countrymen by a falfe re- prefentation of the fpirit of that leading event, and of the true nature and tenure of the government formed in confequence of it, he is deeply refpon- fiblej he is an enemy to the free conllitution of the kingdom. But he is not guilty in any fenfe. I maintain that in his Reflections he has ftated the Revolution and the fcttiement upon dieir true prin- ciples of legal reafon and conftitutional policy.
His authorities are the acts and declarations of parliament given in their proper words. So far as thefe go, nothing can be added to what he has quoted. The queftion is, whether he has under- ftood them rightly. I think they fpeak plain enough. But we muft now fee whether he proceeds v/ith other authority than his own conftructions ; and if he does, on what fort of authority he proceeds. In this part, his defence will not be made by argument, but by wager of law. He takes his compurgators, his vouchees, his guarantees, along with him. I know, that he will not be fatisfied with a juftification proceeding on general reafons of policy. He muft
be
( 53 )
• be defended on party grounds too ; or his caufe is not fo tenable as I wifh it to appear. It muft be made out for him, not only, that in his conftrucYion of thefe public a6ts and monuments he conforms him- felf to the rules of fair, legal, and logical interpre- tation; but it muft be proved that his conftruc- tion is in perfect harmony with that of the ancient Whigs, to whom, againft the Sentence of the mo- dern, on his part, I here appeal.
This July, it will be twenty-fix years* fmce he became connected with a man whofe memory will ever be precious to Englishmen of all parties, as long as the ideas of honour and virtue, public and private, are underftood and cherifhed in this nation. That memory will be kept alive with par- ticular veneration by all rational and honourable Whigs. Mr. Burke entered into a connexion with that party, through that man, at an age, far from raw and immature ; at thole years when men are all they are ever likely to become ; when he was in the prime and vigour of his life \ when the powers of his underftanding, according to their ftandard, were at the beft j his memory exercifed ; his judg- ment formed; and his reading, much frefher in the recollection, and much readier in the application, than now it is. He was at that time as likely as moft men to know what were Whig and what were Tory principles. He was in a fituation to difcern what fort of Whig principles they enter- tained, with whom it was his wifh to form an eter- nal connexion. Foolilh he would have been at that time of life (more fbolifh than any man who undertakes a public truft would be thought) to ad- here to a caufe, which he, amongft all thofe who were engaged in it, had the leaft fanguine hopes of, as a road to power.
* July i/th 1765. E 3
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There are who remember, that on the removal of the Whigs in the year 1766, he was as free to choofe another connexion as any man in the king- dom. To put himfelf out of the way of the nego- tiations which were then carrying on very eagerly, and through many channels, with the Earl of Chat- ham, he went toll eland very foon after the change of miniftry, and did not return until the meeting of parliament. He was at that time free from any thing which looked like an engagement. He was further free at the defire of his friends ; for the very day of his return, the Marquis of Rockingham wifhed him to accept an employment under the new fyftem. He believes he might have had fuch a fituation ; but again he cheerfully took his fate with the party.
It would be a ferious imputation upon the pru- dence of my friend, to have made even fuch trivial facrifices as it was in his power to make, for prin- ciples wiiich he did not truly embrace, or did" not perfectly underftand. In either cafe the foily would have been great. The queftion now is, whether, when he firft practically profefled Whig principles, he underftood what principles he profefled j and whether, in his book, he has faithfully expreffed them.
When he entered into the Whig party, he did not conceive that they pretended to any difcoveries. They did not affect to be better Whigs, than thofe were who lived in the days in which principle was put to the teft. Some of the Whigs of thofe days were then living. They were what the Whigs had been at 'the Revolution j what they had been during the reign of queen Anne ; what they had been at the accefllon of the prefent royal family.
What they were at thofe periods is to be feen. It rarely happens to a party to have the opportunity of a
clear,
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clear, authentic, recorded, declaration of their poli- tical tenets upon the fubject of a great conftitutional event like that of the Revolution. The Whigs had that opportunity, or, to fpeak more properly, they made it. The impeachment of Dr. Sacheverel was undertaken by a Whig Miniflry and a Whig Houfe of Commons, and carried on before a preva- lent and fteady majority of Whig Peers. It was carried on for the exprefs purpole of ftating the true grounds and principles of the Revolution -, what the Commons emphatically called their foundation. It was carried on for the purpole of condemning the principles on which the Revolution was firil op- pofed, and afterwards calumniated, in order by a juridical fentence of the higheft authority to con- firm and fix Whig principles, as they had operated both in the refiftance to King James, and in the . Jubfequent fettlement ; and to fix them in the ex- tent and with the limitations with which it was meant they fliould be underftood by pofterity. The minifters and managers for the Commons were per- fons who had, many of them, an active fhare in the Revolution. Mod of them had feen it at an age capable of reflection. The grand event, and all the diicuflions which led to it, and followed it, were then alive in the memory and converfation of all men. The managers for the Commons muft be fuppofed to have fpoken on that fubject the pre- valent ideas of the leading party in the Commons, and of the Whig miniflry. Undoubtedly they fpoke alfo their own private opinions ; and the private opinions of luch men are not without weight. They were not umbratiles dottores> men who had ftudied a free conftitution only in its anatomy, and upon dead fyftems. They knew it alive and in action.
In this proceeding, the Whig principles, as ap- plied to the Revolution and fettlement, are to be E 4 found,
found, or they are -to be found no where. I wifli the Whig readers of this appeal firft to turn to Mr. Burke's Reflections from p. 20 to p. 50 ; and then to attend to the following extracts from the trial of Dr. Sacheverel. After this, they will confider two things; firft, whether the doctrine in Mr. Burke's Reflections be confonant to that of the Whigs of that period j and fecondly, whether they choofe to abandon the principles which belong- ed to the progenitors of fome of them, and to the . predecefTors of them all, and to learn new principles \ of Whiggifm, imported from France, and diiTemi- nated in this country from diflenting pulpits, from federation focieties, and from the pamphlets, which (as containing the political creed of thofe fynods) are in- duftrioufly circulated in all parts of the two king- doms. This is their affair, and they will make their option.
Thefe new Whigs hold, that the fovereignty, whether exercifed by one or many, did not only ori- ginate/re^ the people (a pofition not denied, nor worth denying or afienting to) but that, in the people the fame fovereignty constantly and unalien- ably refides ; that the people may lawfully depofe kings, not only for mifconduct, but without any mif- conduct at all ; that they may fet up any new fafhion of government for themfelves, or continue without any government at their pleafure ; that the people are eflentially their own rule, and their will the meafure of their conduct ; that the tenure of ma- giftracy is not a proper fubject of contract; becaufe magiftrates have duties, but no rights : and that if a contract de faffo is made with them in one age, allowing that it binds at all, it only binds thofe who were immediately concerned in it, but does not pafs to pofterity. Thefe doctrines concerning the people (a term which they are far from accurately defining, but by which, from many circumftances, it is plain
enough
( 57 )
I enough they mean their own faction, if they fhould \grow by early arming, by treachery, or violence, into the prevailing force) tend, in my opinion, to the utter fubverfion, not only of all government, in all modes, and to all ftable fecurities to rational freedom, but to all the rules and principles of morality itfelf.
k I arTert, that the ancient Whigs held doctrines, totally different from thole I have laft mentioned. I aflert, that the foundations laid down by the Com- mons, on the trial of Doctor Sacheverel, for jufti- fying the revolution of 1688, are the very fame laid down in Mr. Burke's Reflections ; that is to fay, —a breach of the original contraft, implied and exprefled in the conftitution of this country, as a fcherne of government fundamentally and invio- lably fixed in King, Lords, and Commons. — That the fundamental fubverfion of this antient conftitu- tion, by one of its parts, having been attempted, and in effect accomplifhed, juftified the Revolu- tion. That it was juftified only upon the neceffity of the cafe; as the only means left for the reco- very of that antient conftitution, formed by the ori- ginal contract of the Britifh ftate ; as well as for the future prefervation of the fame government. Thefe are the points to be proved.
A general opening to the charge againft Dr. Sache- verel was made by the Attorney General, Sir John Montagu; but as there is nothing in that opening fpeech which tends very accurately to fettle the prin- ciple upon which the Whigs proceeded in the pro- fecution (the plan of the ipeech not requiring it) I proceed to that of Mr. Lechmere, the manager who fpoke next after him. The following are ex- tracts, given, not in the exact order in which they ftand in the printed trial, but in that which is thought moft fit to bring the ideas of the Whig Commons diftinctly under our view.
i MR.
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* MR. LECHMERE.
c It becomes an indifpenfable duty upon us, who appear in the name and on the behalf of all the Commons of Great Britain, not onlj to demand your lordfhips juftice on fuch a criminal [Dr. Sa-r cheverel] but dearly and openly to ajfert our foun- dat ions' — — —
< The nature of our conflitution is that of a //- m*te£l monarchy ; wherein the fupreme power is communicated and divided between Queen, Lords, anc* Commons ; though the executive power and adminiftration be wholly in the crown. The terms Of fucfa a conftitution do not only ftippofe, but ex-
r . . 01,
prefs, an original contract between the crown and fac people : by which that fupreme power was
r r » / r r .
(by mutual conient, and not by accident) limited, an^ lodged in more hands than one. And the uniform frefervation of fuch a conftitution for Jo. many a?es* without any fundamental cLatt?e, demon-
/, 71/7-7 • r 7 /•
jtratcs to your Icrajhips the continuance of the Jame contraft.' — — —
' The conlequences of fuch a frame of govern- ment are obvious. That the laws are the rule to
..... r
both ; the common meaiure of the power or the crown, and of the obedience of the fubjecl ; and if the executive part endeavours fac.Jubvcrjion and tota^ deftruttion of the government l, the original con- tract is thereby broke, and the right of allegiance ceafes ; that part of the government, thus funda- mentally injured, hath a right to fave or recover that conftitution, in which it had an original in-
s The necejfary means (which is the phrafe ufed f by the Commons in their firft article) are words
State Trials, vol. v. p. 651.
made
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' made choice of by them with the greatefl caution. c Thofe means are defcribed (in the preamble to
4 their charge) to be, that glorious enterprize, which ? his late majefly undertook, with an armed force, f to deliver this kingdom from popery and arbitrary ' power ; the concurrence of many fubjeclis of the ( realm, who came over with him in that enterprize, c and of many others of all ranks and orders, who ' appeared in arms in many parts of the kingdom
5 in aid of that enterprize.
c Thefe were the means that brought about the c Revolution ; and which the act that pafTed foon s after, declaring the rights and liberties of the fubjeff, c and fettling the JucceJJion of the crown, intends, f when his late majefty is therein called the glorious f inftrument of delivering the kingdom ; and which the f Commons, in the laft part of their firft article,
* exprefs by the word rejiftance.
f But the Commons, who will never be unmind- Regard of c ful of the allegiance of the fubiects to the crown of the Com"
... . • j j • i • i i • i mons to
f this realm, judged it highly incumbent upon their aiie-
* them, out of regard to thefafety of her majefty' s f^"^0,, c perfon and government, and the antient and legal a d to the*
< conftitution of this kingdom, to call that refiftance *"[.£,,_ ' the necejfary means; thereby plainly founding that tion.
* power, right, and refiftance, which was exercifed ' by the people at the time of the happy Revolu- f tion, and which the duties of felf-prefervation and ( religion called them to, upon the NECESSITY ' of the cafe, and at the fame time effectually fe curing
< her majefty' s government, and the due allegiance of aUberfabjeSs.' — — —
* The nature of fuch an original contratt of go«- AH ages vernment proves, that there is not only a power I^e'inte. in the people, who have inherited this freedom, to reft in p«- aflert their own title to it ; but they are bound in £7S?^ duty to tranfmit the fame conftitution to their pof- tiadl> and terity alfo.'
Mr.
Mr. Lechmere made a fecond fpeech. Notwith- ftanding the clear and fatisfactory manner in which he delivered himfelf in his firfl upon this arduous queftion, he thinks himfelf bound again difti nelly to affert the fame foundation j and to juftify the Re- volution on the cafe of ' necejjity only, upon principles perfectly coinciding with thofe laid down in Mr. Burke's Letter on the French affairs.
MR. LECHMERE.
c Your lordfhips were acquainted, in opening the charge, with how great caution, and with what un- feigned regard to her majefly and her govern- ment, and the duty and allegiance of her fub- jects, the commons made ufe of the words ne- ceflary means., to exprefs the refiftance that was made ufe of to bring about the Revolution, and with the condemning of which the Doctor is charged by this article; not doubting but that the honour and juftice of that refiftance, from the ne- cejjity of that cafe, and to which alom we have fir iff ly confined eur/ehes, when duly confidered, would confirm and ftrengthen j-, and be underitocd to be an effectual fecurity for an allegiance of the fubject to the crown of this realm, in every other cafe where there is not the fame necejjity ; and that the right of the people to Jelf-defence, and pre- fer-vation of their liberties, by ref flame, as their loft remedy, is the rejult of a cafe of Juch neceflity only, and by which the original contract between king and people, is broke. I'bis was the •principle laid down and carried through all that was J aid with rejpeft to allegiance ; and on which foundation, in the name and on the behalf of all the commons of
1 Great
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Great Britain, we ajfert and juftify that refiftance by which the late happy revolution was brought about' — — —
f It appears to your lordfhips and the world, that breaking the original contrail between king and people y were the words made choice of by that Houfe of Commons, [the Houfe of Commons which had originated the declaration of right,] with the greateft deliberation and judgment, and approved of by your lordfhips, in that firft and fundamental ftep towards the re-eftablifoment of the government, which had received ib great a fhock from the evil counfels which had been given to that unfortunate prince.'
Sir John Hawles, another of the managers, fol- lows the fteps of his brethren, pofitively affirming the doctrine of non-reliftance to government to be the general, moral, religious, and political rule for the fubject; and juflifying the Revolution on the fame principle with Mr. Burke, that is, as an ex- ception from neceffity. — Indeed he carries the doctrine on the general idea of non-refiftance much further than Mr. Burke has done; and full as far as it can perhaps be fupported by any duty ofperfeft obliga- tion j however noble and heroic it may be, in many cafes, to fuffer death rather than difturb the tran- quillity of our country.
* SIR JOHN HAWLES.
c Certainly it muft be granted, that the doctrine f that commands obedience to the fupreme power, c though in things contrary to nature, even to fuffer * death, which is the higheft injuftice that can be
* P. 676.
* done
' done a man, rather than make an oppofition to the5 ' fupreme power * [is reafonablej] becaufe the c death of one, or fome few private perfons, is a ( lefs evil than difturbing the whole government ; that c law muft needs be underftood to forbid the doing ' or faying any thing to difturb the government ; c the rather becaufe the obeying that law cannot c be pretended to be againft nature : and the Doc- ' tor's refufing to obey that implicit law, is the c reafon for which he is now profecuted; though he c would have it believed, that the reafon he is now c profecuted, was for the doctrine he aflerted of f obedience to the fupreme power > which he ' might have preached as long as he had pleafed, ' and the Commons would have taken no offence c at it, if he had flopped there, and not have taken * upon him, on that pretence or occafion, to have c caft odious colours upon the Revolution.'
General Stanhope was among the managers: He begins his fpeech by a reference to the opinion of his fellow managers, which he hoped had put beyond all doubt the limits and qualifications that the Commons had placed to their doctrines con- cerning the Revolution; yet not fatisfied with this general reference, after condemning the principle of non-refiftance, which is aflerted in the fennon without any exception, and ftating, that under the fpe- cious pretence of preaching a peaceable doctrine, Sacheverel and the Jacobites meant in reality to excite a rebellion in favour of the Pretender, he explicitly limits his ideas of refiftance with the
* The words neceflary to the completion of the fentence are wanted in the printed trial — but the conftru&ion of the Sentence, as well as tl.e foregoing part of the fpeech, juiHfy the infertion of fome fuch fupplemental words as the above.
boundaries
boundaries laid down by his colleagues and by Mr. Burke.
GENERAL STANHOPE.
f The conftitution of England is founded upon c compatt ; and the fubjeils of this kingdom have, R; hts of c in their feveral public and private capacities, as the fubje ' legal a title to what are their rights by law, as a JrownV f prince to the poffefiion of his crown. q»*iiy le-
f Your lordfhips, and mod that hear me, are wit- gal" f nefies, and muft remember the neceffities of thofe f times which brought about the Revolution : that jufticeof f no other remedy was left to preferve our religion Jo£niS c and liberties ; that refiftance was neceffary and con- neceffity. { Jeqttently juft. — —
* Had the Doctor, in the remaining part of his f fermon, preached up peace, quietnefs, and the f like, and fhewn how happy we are under her f maj city's adminiftration, and exhorted obedience c to it, he had never been called to anfwer a f charge at your lordfhips bar. But the tenor of all 4 his fubfequent difcourfe is one continued invective c againft the government.'
Mr. Walpole (afterwards Sir Robert) was one of the managers on this occafion. He was an honourable man and a found Whig. He was not, as the Jacobites and difcontented Whigs of his time have reprefented him, and as ill-informed people flill reprelent him, a prodigal and corrupt miniiter. They charged him in their libels and feditious converfa- tions as having firft reduced corruption to a fyftem. Such was their cant. But he was far from governing by corruption. He governed by party attachments. The charge of fyftematic corruption is lefs appli- cable to him, perhaps, than to any minifler who ever ferved -the crown for fo great a length of
time.
( 64 )
time. He gained over very few from the Oppo- fition. Without being a genius of the firft clafs, he was an intelligent, prudent, and fafe minifteK. He loved peace -, and he helped to commu- nicate the fame difpofition to nations at leaft as warlike and reftlefs as that in which he had the chief direction of affairs. Though he ferved a matter who was fond of martial fame, he kept all the eftablifhments very low. The land tax continued at two fhillings in the pound for the greater part of his adminiftration. The other impofitions were moderate. The profound re- pofe, the equal liberty, the firm protection of juft laws during the long period of his power, were the principal caufes of that profperity which afterwards took fuch rapid ftrides towards per- fection; and which furniihed to this nation abi- lity to acquire the military glory which it has fince obtained, as well as to bear the burthens, the caufe and confequence of that warlike reputation. With many virtues, public and private, he had his faults ; but his faults were fuperficial. A carelefs, coarfe, and over familiar ftyle of difcourfe, without fufficient regard to perfons or occafions, and an almoft total want of political decorum, were the errours by which he was moil hurt in the public opinion: and thofe through which his enemies obtained the greateft advantage over him. But juflice muft be done. The prudence, fteadinefs, and vigilance of that man, joined to the greateft poflible lenity in his character and his politics, preferved the crown to this royai family ; and with it, their laws and li- berties to this country. Walpoie had no other plan of defence for the Revolution, than that of the othtr managers, and of Mr. Burke j and he gives full a* little countenance to any arbitrary at- tempts, , n the pait of reftlefs and factious men, for framing new governments according to their fancies.
MR.
t 65 )
MR. WALPOLE.
? Refiftance is no where enafted to be legal, but Cafe of fubjefted, by all the laws now in being, to the "ufj of"the greateft penalties. It is what is not, cannot, nor iaw;*»d
• 1 t J /- M j «« i • the higlieft
ought ever to be defcnbed, or affirmed, in any oOneL pofitive law, to be excu fable : when> and upon what nevtr-to-bt-expffftd occafions, it may be exercifed, no man can forefeej and it ought never to he thought of, but when an utter fubverfion of the laws of the realm threatens the whole frame of our conftitution, and no redrefs can other-wife be hoped for. It therefore does, and ought for ever, to ftand, in the eye and letter of the law, as the highejl offence. But becaufe any man. or party of men, may not^ out of folly or wantonnefs, commit treafon, or make their own difcontents, ill prin- ciples, or difguifed affections to another intereft, a pretence to refift the fupreme power, will it fol- utmoft low from thence that the utmoft neceffity ought JSSte not to engage a nation, in its own defence, for the prefervation of fly e whole T
Sir Jofeph Jekyl was, as I have always heard and believed, as nearly as any individual could be, the very ftandard of Whig principles in his age. He was a learned, and an able man ; full of honour, integrity, and public fpirit; no lover of innovation; nor difpofed to change his Iblid principles for the giddy fafhion of the hour. Let us hear this Whig.
SIR JOSEPH JEKYL.
* In clearing up and vindicating the juftice of the
* Revolution, which was the fecond thing propofel, it
F < is
( 66 )
Commons < is far from the intent of the Commons to ftate the ?heTm£te c I*m**s and bounds of the fnbject's fubmiflion to the of fubmif- « fovereign. That which the law hath been wifely c filent in, the Commons defire to be filent in too ; c nor will they put any cafe of a juftifiable refiftance, ' but that of the Revolution only; and they perfuade f themjehcs that the doing right to that refiftance will ( be Jo far from promoting popular licence or confufion-, ' that it ivill have a contrary effeft> and be a means of 'fettling men's winds in the love of, and veneration for ' the laws -t to refcue and fecure which, was the c ONLY aim and intention of thofe concerned in re- •'Jijlance.'
lion.
To feciirfe the laws, the only aim of the Revolu- tion.
Dr. Sacheverel's counfel defended him on this principle, namely — that whilft he enforced from the pulpit the general doctrine of non-refiftance, he was not obliged to take notice of the theoretic limits which ought to modify that doctrine. Sir Jofeph Jekyl, in his reply, whilft he controverts its application to the Doctor's defence, fully admits and even enforces the principle itfelf, and fupports the Revolution of 1 68 8, as he and all the managers had done before, exactly upon the fame grounds on which Mr. Burke has built, in his Reflections on the French Revolution.
SIR JOSEPH JEKYL.
c If the Doctor had pretended to have ftated the particular bounds and limits of non-refiftance, and told the people in what cafes they might, or might not refift, be would have been much to blame ; nor was one word faid in the articles, or by the managers, as if that was expected from him: but, on the contrary > we have infifted, that in NO
* tare
i
afe can refinance b? lawful, but in cafe of extreme neceffity, and where the conftitution cannot ether- neceflity. f wife be preferred; and fuch neceffity ought to be c plain and obvious to the fenfe and judgment of ( the whole nation > and this was the cafe at the Re- ' volution.'
The counfel for Doctor Sacheverel, in defend- ing their client, were driven in reality to abandon the fundamental principles of his doctrine, and to confefs, that an exception to the general doctrine of paffive obedience and non-refiftance did exift in the cafe of the Revolution. This the ma- nagers for the Commons confidered as having gained their caufe ; as their having obtained the •whole of what they contended for. They con- gratulated themfelves and the nation on a civil victory, as glorious and as honourable as any that had obtained in arms during that reign of tri- umphs.
Sir Jofeph Jekyl, in his reply to Harcourt, and the other great men who conducted the cauie for the Tory fide, fpoke in the following memorable terms, diftinctly Hating the whole of what the Whig Houfe of Commons contended for, in the name of all their constituents : — *
SIR JOSEPH JEKYJ.
c My lords, the concefiions [the conceffions of Ne Sacheverel's counfel] are thde: — That, neceffity ^""^JJ creates an exception to the general rule of /ubmif- and the/ fion to the prince j — that fuch exception is under- f JJ'JJI ^on ftood or implied in the laws that require fudi nec«r«jr, iubmiffionj— and that the cafe of the Revolution ^e™?' wa: a cafe of ncceflity. th« demand
^^ , TM r
F 2 * Thefe
( 68 )
1 Thefe arc conccfllons Jo ample, and do fo fully anfwer the drift of the Commons in this article, and are to the utmoft extent of their meaning in it, that I can't forbear congratulating them upon this fuccefs of their impeachment ; that in full parliament, this erroneous doctrine of unlimited non-refiftance is given up, and difclaimed. And may it not, in after ages, be an addition to the glories of this bright reign, that fo many of thofe who are honoured with being in her majefty's fervice have been at your lordlhips bar, thus fuc- cefsfully contending for the national rights of her people, and proving they are not precarious or remedilefs ?
* But to return to thefe conceflions j I muft ap- peal to your lordlhips, whether they are not a total departure from the Doctor's anfwer.'
I now proceed to fhew that the Whig managers for the Commons meant to preferve the government on a firm foundation, by aflerting the perpetual vali- dity of the fettlement then made, and its coercive power upon pofterity. I mean to fhew that they gave no fort of countenance to any doctrine tending , to imprefs the people, taken feparately from the legif- lature which includes the crown, with an idea that they had acquired a moral or civil competence to alter (without breach of the original compact on the part of the king) the fuccefiion to the crown, at their pleafure; much lefs that they had acquired any right, in the cafe of fuch an event as caufed the Revolution, to fet up any new form of govern- ment. The author of the Reflections, I believe, thought that no man of common understanding could oppofe to this doctrine, the ordinary fove- reign power* a"s declared in the act of queen Anne. That is j that the kings or queens of the realm,
with
with the confent of parliament, are competent to regulate and to fettle the fuccefiion of the crown. This power is and ever was inherent in the fupreme fovereignty ; and was not, as the political divines vainly talk, acquired by the revolution. It is de- clared in the old ftatute of Queen Elizabeth. Such a power muft refide in the complete fovereignty of every kingdom $ and it is in fact exercifed in all of them. But this right of competence in the legiflature, not in the people, is by the legiflature itfelf to be exer- cifed \v\t\\found difcretion ; that is Ito fay, it is to be exercifed or not, in conformity to the fundamental principles of this government ; to the rules of moral obligation ; and to the faith of pacts, either con- tained in the nature of the tranfaction, or entered into by the body corporate of the kingdom j which body, in juridical construction, never dies; and in fact never loies its members at once by death.
Whether this cfoctnne is reconcileable to the modern philofophy of government, J believe the author neither knows nor cares ; as he has little refpect for any of that fort of philofophy. This may be becaufe his capacity and knowledge do not reach to it. If fuch be the cafe, he cannot be blamed, if he acts on the fenfe of that incapacity ; he cannot be blamed, if in the moil arduous and critical queftions which can poflibly arife, and which affect to the quick the vital parts of our conftitu- tion, he takes the fide which leans moft to fafety and fettlement $ that he is refolved not " to be wife " beyond what is v-ritten" in the legiflative recor4 and practice j that when doubts arife on them, he endeavours to interpret one ftatute by another j and to reconcile them all to eftablifhed recognized morals, and to the general antient known policy of the laws of England. Two things are equally Evident, the firft j$, that the legiflature polMes the F 3 power
( 70 )
power of regulating the fucceflion of the crown; the fecond, that in the exercife of that right it has uniformly acted as if under the reftraints which the author has ftated. That author makes what the antients call mos majorum, not indeed his fole, but certainly his principal rule cf policy, to guide his judgment in whatever regards our laws. Unifor- mity and ?.:;:ilogy can b>" pjcfeived in them by this procefs only. That point bang fixed, and laying fafl. Iv-'.l of a flrong bottom, our fpecula- tions may fwir.gin all directions, without public de- triment; becaufe they will ride with fure anchorage.
In this manner thefe things have been always confidered by our anceftors. There are fome in- deed who have the art cf turning the very acts of parliament which were made for fecuring the here- ditary fucceffbn in the prefent royal family by ren- dering it penal to doubt of the validity of thofe acts of parliament, into an inftrument for defeating all their ends and purpofes : but upon grounds fo very foolifH, that it is not worth while to take further notice of fuch fophiftry.
To prevent any unneceflaiy fubdivifion, I ihall here put together what may be neceflary to fhew the perfect agreement of the Whigs with Mr. Burke, in his affertions, that the Revolution made no " eflential change in the conftitution of the mo- " narchy, or in any of its ancient, found, and " legal principles; that the fucceflion was fettled <f in the Hanover family, upon the idea, and in the " mode of an hereditary fucceflion qualified with " Proteftantifm ; that it was not fettled upon ekftive " principles, in any fenfe of the word efeftive, or " under any modification or defcription of election " whatfoever i but, on the contrary, that the nation, " after the Revolution, renewed by a frefh compact " the fpiiit of 'the original compact of the ftate,
" binding
( 71 )
Cf binding itfelf, both in its exifting members and all Its " pofterity, to adhere to the fettlement of an here- " ditary fucceffion in the Proteftant line, drawn " from James the Firft, as the ftock of inheritance."
SIR JOHN HAWLES.
c If he [Dr. Sacheverel] is of the opinion he pre- Necefiity of f tends, I cannot imagine how it comes to pafs, that Jj ^'ght f he that pays that deference to the fupreme power of the c has preached fo directly contrary to the determina- Jubmuf™ J ' tions of the fupreme power in this governments he to the r«- ' very well knowing that the lawfulnels of the Revo- tlemcnt ' lution, and of the means whereby it was brought c about, has already been determined by the aforefaid
* acts of parliament : and do it in the worft manner he ' could invent. For queftioning the right to the crown c here in England, has procured the Jhedding of more c blood, and caufed more Jlaughter, than all the other ' matters tending to difturbances in the government, put ' together. If, therefore, the doctrine which the e apoftles had laid down, was only to continue the
* peace of the world, as thinking the death of foine
* few particular perfons better to be borne with f than a civil war ; fure it is the higheft breach of 1 that law to queftion the firft principles of this ' government.'
' If the Doctor had been contented with the liberty
* he took of preaching up the duty of paffive obedi- ' ence, in the moft extenfive manner he had thought
* fit, and would have flopped there, your lordfhips ' would not have ha.d the trouble, in relation to ' him, that you now have; but it is plain, that he ' preached up his abfolute and unconditional obe- f djence, not to continue the -peace and tranquillity of ' this nation, but to Jet thejubjefts atjtrifey and to ratfe
* a war in the bowels of this nation \ and it is for this f that he is now profecuted ; though he would fain ' have it believed that the profecution was for
F 4 < preaching
( 7* )
f preaching the peaceable doctrine of abfolute obe- * dience.'
Whole frame of goi-ernmer,t reftoredui - hurt on the Revolution.
SIR JOSEPH JEKYL.
* The whole tenor of the adminiftration, then in being, was agreed by all to be a total departure from tbe conftitution. The nation was at that time united in that opinion, all but the criminal part of it. And as the nation joined in the judgment of their difeafe, fo they did in the remedy, they Jaw there was no remedy left, but the laft ; and when that remedy took place, the whole frame of. the go- vernment ivas reftored entire and unhurt *• This fhewed the excellent temper the nation was in at that time, that, after fuch provocations from an abufe of the regal power, and fuch a convulfion, no one fart of the conftitution was altered, orjuffer- ed the leaft damage \ but, on the contrary ', the whole received new life and 'vigour.'
The Tory council for Dr. Sacheverel having infmuated, that a great and effential alteration in the conftitution had been wrought by the Revolu- tion, Sir Joieph Jekyl is fo ftrong on this point,
* * What we did was, in truth and fubftance and in a conflitu-
* tional light, a revolution, hot made, 'but prevented. We took ' folid fecurities; we fettled doubtful queftions; we correfled ano- « malies in our Jaw. In the liable fundamental parts of our con-
* ftitution we made no revolution ; rio, nor any alteration at all. ' We did not impair the monarchy. Perhaps it might be Ihewn ' that we ftrengthened it very confiderably. The nation kept the ' fame ranks, the fame orders, the fame privileges, the fame fran-
* chifes, the fame rules for property, the fame fubordinations,the « fame order iri the law, in the revenue, and in the magiftracy ; ' the fame lords, the fame commons, the fame corporations, the ' fame electors.' Mr. Burke's fpeech in the Hcttfe of Commons f $tb February 1 790. Jt appears how exa&ly he coincides in every thing with Sir jofeph Jekyl,
that
( 73 )
£hat he takes fire even at the infinuation of his being of fuch an opinion.
SIR JOSEPH JEKYU
* If the Doctor inftructed his counfel to infinu- K ate that there was any innovation in the conftitution J wrought by the Revolution, it is an addition to his crime. The Revolution did not introduce any inno- vation ; it was a reftoration of the antient funda- mental conftitution of the kingdom, and giving it its proper force and energy.'
***##*#•#**
The Solicitor General, Sir Robert Eyre, dif- tinguilhes exprefsly the cafe of the Revolution, and ics principles, from a proceeding at pleafure, on the part of the people, to change their antient confti- tution, and to frame a new government for them- felves. He diftinguifiies it with the fame care from the principles of regicide, and republicanifm, and the forts of refiftance condemned by the doctrines of the church of England, and, which ought to be condemned, by the doctrines of all churches pro- fefling Chriftianity.
MR. SOLICITOR GENERAL^ SIR ROBERT EYRE.
' The refiftance at the Revolution, which was Revolution 5 founded in unavoidable ne-ce/ity, could be no de- J'Xfo'T
* fence to a man that was attacked for ajjerting voluntary 5 that the people might cancel their allegiance at plea- Segiaw* f Jure, or dethrone- and murder their Jovereign by a
f- judiciary Jentence. For it can never be inferred
* from the lawfulness of refiftance, at a time when ' a total fubverficn of the government both in church '. and ft ate was intended, that a people may take '• up arms, and call their Jovereign to account at ' pleafure ; and, therefore, fmce the Revolution could
* le ofnofervice in giving the leaft colour for averting
( any
( 74 )
c any fuch wicked principle, the Doctor could never ' intend to put it into the mouths of thofe new ' preachers, and new politicians, for a defence ; ' unlefs it be his opinion, that the refiftance at the
* R volution can bear any parallel with the execra- c bis m:>.rddr cf the royal martyr, jo iujJly detefledby the
' It is plain that the Doctor is not impeached c for preaching a. general doctrine, and enforcing
* L,e general duty of obedience, but for preaching
* againft an excepted cafe, after he has flat ed the ex- f cepfion. He is not impeached for preaching the
* genera] doctrine of obedience, and the utter ille- f gality of refiftance upon any pretence whatfoever ; c but becaufe, having firft laid down the general ' doctrine as true, without any exception, he flatss ' the excepted cafe, the Revolution, in exprefs terms, ' as an objection ; and then afTuming the confide- ' ration of that excepted cafe, denies there was any c refiftance in the Revolud: n ; and afferts, that to ' impute refiftance to the Revolution, would caft ' black and odious colours upon it. This is not
* preaching the doctrine of non-re fiftance, in the ' general terms ufed by the homilies, and the fa-
* thers of the church where cafes of neceflity may ' be underftcod to be excepted by a tacit implication, as ' the counjel have allowed-, but is preaching directly ' againft the refiftance at the Revolution, which, in
* the courfe of this debate, has been all along ad- c mitted to be neceffary and juft, and can have ' no other meaning than to bring a dishonour
* upon the Revolution, and an odium upon thofe. ( great and illuftrious perfons, thofe friends to the f monarchy and the church, that ajjifled in bringing it ( about. For had the Doclor intended any thing elfe,
* he would have treated the cafe of the Revolution ' in a different manner, and have given it the true ( and fair anfii-er j he would have faid, that the re-
< fiftance
( 7J )
« fiftance at the Revolution was cf abjolute neceffity, Revolution
, , , , r • i a • • on abfolutc
' and the only means left to revive the conjtitution j neceiruy.
' and muft therefore be taken as an executed cafe,
* and could never come within the reach and inten-
* tion of the general doctrine of the church.
' Your lord (hips take notice on what grounds the c Doftor continues to affert the fame pofition in his 4 anfwer. But is it not moft evident, that the ge-.
* neral exhortations to be met with in the homilies ' of the church of England, and fuch like decla- c rations in the ftatutes of the kingdom, are meant
* only as rules for the civil obedience of the fubjeft 4 to the legal adminiftration of the fupreme power in 4 ordinary cafes ? And it is equally abfurd, to con-
* ftrue any words in a pofitive law to authorize the
* deftruftion of the whole, as to expect that king, 4 lords, and commons fhould, in exprefs terms of 4 law, declare fuch an ultimate refort as the right of 4 refinance t at a time when the cafe fuppofes that the f force of all law is ceajed *.
( The Commons muft always refent, with the ut- Commons 4 moil deteftation and abhorrence, every pofition aveMhlSj
* that may fhake the authority of that aft of par- thefubmif- 4 liament, whereby the crown is fettled upon her SritjftotM 4 majefty, and whereby the lords fpiritual and temporal fettiement 4 and commons do, in the name of. all the people of Eng- crolin.
4 land, moft humbly and faithfully Jubmit them/elves, f their heirs and pofteritiss, to her majejiy, which this 4 general principle of abfolute non-refiftance muft f certainly fhake.
c For, if the refiftance at the Revolution was ille- e gal, the Revolution fettled in ufurpation, and this 4 aft can have no greater force and authority than f an aft pafied under an ufurper.
4 And the Commons take leave to obierve, that 4 the authority of the parliamentary fettiement is a
* See Reflexions, p. 42, 43.
' matter
( 76 )
matter of the greateft confequence to maintain,, in a cafe where the hereditary right to the crown is contefted.
' It appears by the feveral inftances mentioned in the act declaring the rights and liberties of the fubject, and fettling the fuccefilon of the crown, that at the time of the Revolution there was A total ' fubverfion of the conftitution of government both in church and ft ale, which is a cafe that the laws cf England could ne^jerfuppoje^ provide for, or have in view.*
Sir Jofeph Jekyl, fo often quoted, confidered the prefervation of the monarchy, and of the rights and prerogatives of the crown, as eiTential objects with all found Whigs ; and that they were bound, not on- ly to maintain them when injured or invaded, but to exert themfelves as much for their re-eftabliftiment, ifthey fhould happen to be overthrown by popular fu- ry, as any of their own more immediate and popu- lar rights and privileges, if the latter fhould be at any time fubverted by the crown. For this reafon he puts the cafes of the Revolution and the Reftora- Kiony exactly upon the fame footing. He plainly marks, that it was the object cf all honeft men, not to facrifice one part of the conftitution to an- other; and much more, not to facrifice any of them to vifionary theories of the rights of man ; but to preferve our whole inheritance in the conftitution, in all its members and all its relations, entire, and unimpaired, from generation to generation. In this Mr. Burke exactly agrees with him.
SIR JOSEPH JEKYL.
iat 3re * Nothing is plainer than that the people have riSht<jof ( a light to the laws and the conftitution. This
' right
( 77 )
right the nation hath afferted, and recovered out of the hands of thofe who had difpoffefTed them of it at feveral times. There are of this two fainous inflames in the knowledge of the prefent age ; I mean that of the Reftauration, and that ^f JJ of the Revolution j in both of thefe great events union. were the regal -power, and the rights of the people ^^ recovered. And it is bard to Jay in 'which the u-refti-i people have the greatefl intereft:, for the commons ^f^ are Jenfible that there is not one legal power be- crown longing to the crown, but they have an intereft in it ; own!'1* and I doubt not but they will always be as careful to fupport the rights of the crown, as their own privileges .'
The other Whig managers regarded (as he did) the overturning, of the monarchy by a republican faclion with the very fame horror and deteftation with which they regarded the deftruftion of the privileges of the people by an arbitrary mo- narch.
MR. LECHMERE,
Speaking of our conftitution, ftates it as c a f conflitution which happily recovered itfelf,.at
* the Reftoration, from the confufions and dif-
* orders which the horrid and del eft able proceed-
* ings of faction and uj'urpation had thrown it into, f and which, after many convulfions and ftruggles,
•was providentially faved at the late happy Revo- 1 lution ; and, by the many good laws parted fince
* that time, ftands now upon a firmer foundation :
* together with the moft comfortable profpect of ' fecurity to all pofterity, by the fettlement of the £ crown in the Proteftant line.'
I mean
( 78 )
I mean now to Ihew that the Whigs, (if Sir Jofeph Jekyl was one) and if he fpoke in conformity to the fenfe of the Whig houfe of commons and the Whig miniftry who employed him, did care- fully guard againft any prefumption that might arife from the repeal of the non-refitlance oath of Charles the fecond, as if, at the Revolution, the an- tient principles of our government were at all chang- ed— or that republican doctrines were countenanced, — or any fanftion given to feditious proceedings upon general undefined ideas of mifconducl: — or for changing the form of government — or for refiftance upon any other ground than the mceffity fo often mentioned for the purpofe of felf-prefervation. It will {hew dill more clearly the equal care of the then Whigs, to prevent either the regal power from being fwallowed up on pretence of popular rights, or the popular rights from being deftroyed on pretence of regal prerogatives.
SIR JOSEPH JEKYL.
c Further, I defire it may be confidered, that thefe legislators [the legiflators who framed the non- refiftance oath of Charles the Second] were guarding againft the confequences of thofe per- nicious and antimonarcbical principles, which had been broached a little before in this nation ; and thofe large declarations in favour of non-rejiftame were made to encounter or obviate the mifchief of thofe principles ; as appears by the preamble to the fulleft of thofe acts, which is the militia aft, in the i jth and i4th of King Charles the Second. The words of that act are thefe : And, during the late ufurped governments, many evil find rebellious principles have been wftilled into the minds of the people of this kingdom, which may break forth, unlejs prevented, to the difturb<yjcc of the peace and quiet
( thereof:
( 79 )
c thereof: Be it therefore enafted, &V. Plere your f lordfhips may fee the reafon that inclined thofc c legiflators to exprefs themfelves in fuch a manner 4 againft refiftance. They had Jem the regal rights c fwallowed z'.p, under the pretence cf popular ones ; and
* it is no imputation on them that they did not then c forefee a quite different cafe, as was that of the Re- ' volution j where, under the pretence of regal au- c thority,a total fubveriion of the rights of the fubjeft ' was advanced, and in a manner effected. And this
* may ferve to fhew, that it was not the defign of c thofe legiflators to condemn refiftance, in a cafe of
* abfohte necej/ity, for preferring the conftitution, when c they were guarding againft principles which had fo c lately deftroyed it.
c As to the truth of the do6lrine in this declara- tion which was repealed, / will admit it to be as true as the Doffor' s counjel ajftrt it; that is, with an exception of cafes of neceffity ; and it was not re- pealed becaufe it was falfe, underftanding it with that reftrittion ; but it was repealed becaufe it might be interpreted in an unconfinedjenje, and ex- clufive of that reftriftion; and being fo underftood, would refle6t on the juftice of the Revolution : and this the legiflature had at heart, and were very jealous of j and by this repeal of that decla- ration, gave a parliamentary or legiflative admo- nition, againft averting this doctrine of non-re- fiftance in an unlimited fenfe.' — — —
c Though the general doftrine of non- refiftance, General the doftrine of the church of England, as ftated in her homilies, or elfewhere delivered, by which
the general duty of fubje&s to die higher powers JjJ is taught, be owned to be, as unqueftionably it bound to* is, a godly and wholefome doclrine-, though this *J general doctrine has been conftantly inculcated by the reverend fathers of the church, dead and living, and preached by them as a prefervative S < againft
againft the popifh doctrine of depofing prince"*; and as the ordinary rule of obedience ; arid though the fame doctrine has been preached, maintained, and avowed by our moft orthoddx and able divines from the time of the Reforma"- tion j and how innocent a man Dr. Sacheverel had been, if, with an bone/} and well-meant zeal, he had preached the fame doctrine in the fame general terms in which he found it delivered try the apoftles of Chrift, as taught by the homilies, and the reverend fathers of our church, and, in imitation of thofe great examples, had only prefied the general duty of obedience, and the il- legality of refiftance, without taking notice 6f any exception.'
SubmilTion :o the fove- ; reign a con- ' Vieniious
uty, except L.n cafes of f^eceflity.
I <
I'
Another of the managers for the houfe of com* mons, Sir John Holland, was not lefs careful in guarding againft a confufion of the principles of the revolution, with any loofe general doctrines of a right in the individual, or even in the people, to under- take for themfelves, on any prevalent tempo- rary opinions of convenience or improvement, any fundamental change in the conftitution, or to fabricate a new government for themfelves, and thereby to difturb the public peace, and to unfettie the antient conftitution of this kingdom.
SIR JOHN HOLLAND.
c The commons would not be underftood, as if they were pleading for a licentious refiftance ; as if JubjeRs were left to their good-will and pleafure, when they are to obey, and when to rejift. No, my lords, they know jhey are obliged by all the ties of Jo rial creatures and Chriftiansy for wrath and
* confcience fake, to fulmit to their fovereign. The ( commons do not abet humourjome factious arms : ' they aver them to be rebellious. But yet they
* maintain, that that refiftance at the Revolution,
* which was fo neceffary, was lawful and juft from < that neceffity.
c Thele general rujes of obedience may, upon a c real neceffity -, admit a lawful exception ; and fuch a
* necejjary exception we aflert the revolution to be,
* 'Tis with th'i3 view of neceffity only, abfolute Right of
* neceffity of preferving our laws, liberties, and
* religion] 'tis with this limitation that we defire to u ' be underftood, when any of us fpeak of refiftance
€ in general. The neceffity of the refiftance at the ( Revolution, was at that time obvious to every ' man/
I fhall conclude thefe extra6b with a reference to the prince of Orange's declaration, in which he gives the nation the fulleft affurance that in his enterprize he was far from the intention of introducing any change whatever in the fundamental law and con- ftitution of the ftate. He confidered the objecl: of his enterprize, not to be a precedent for further revolutions, but that it was the great end of his ex- pedition to make fuch revolutions fo far as hu- man power and wifdom could provide, unnecefla-
Extracts from the Prince of Orange's Declaration.
c All magiftrates, who have been unjuftly turn- ed out, fhall forthwith refume their former em- ployments, as well as all the boroughs of Eng- land fhall return again to their antient frefcrip- tions and charters : and more particularly, that
G *&f
the antlent charter of the great and famous ci- ty of London fhall be again in force. And that the writs for the members of parliament fhall be addrefled to the proper officers, according to law and cuftom. *— — — ' And for the doing of all other things, which the two houfes of parliament fhall find necefTary for the peace, honour, and fafety of the nation, fo that there may be no danger of the nation's falling, at any time hereafter, under arbitrary government'
Extra^ from the Prince of Orange's additional De- claration.
e We are confident that no perfbns can \\xvtfuch hard thoughts of us, as to imagine that we have any other defign in this undertaking, than to pro- cure a fettlementof the religion, and of the liberties and properties oftheJubjecJs, upon Jo fur e a founda- tion, that there may be no danger of the nation's re- lapfmg into the like miferies at any time hereafter. And, as the forces that we have brought along with us are utterly diiproportioned to that wicked de- fign of conquering the nation, if we were capable of intending it ;Jo the great numbers of the principal nobility and gentry, that are men of eminent quality and eft at es, and perfons of known integrity and zeal, both for the religion and government of England, many of them aljo being diftingui/hed by their conflant fidelity to the crown, who do both accompany us in this expedition, and have earneftly folicited us to it, will cover us from all fuch malicious infi- nuations.'
In the fpirit, and upon one occafion in the words *, of this declaration, the ftatutes paffed in that reign made fuch provifions for preventing thefe dangers, that fcarcely any thing fhort of combination
Declaration of Right.
of
of king, lords, and commons for the definition of the liberties of the nation, can in any probability make us liable to fimilar perils. In that dreadful, and, I hope, not to be looked for cafe, any opinion of a right to make revolutions, grounded on this pre- cedent, would be but a poor refource. — Dreadful indeed would be our fituation.
Thefe are the doctrines held by the Wings of the Revolution, delivered with as much folemnity, and as authentically at leaft, as any political dog- jnas were ever promulgated from die beginning of the world. If there be any difference between their tenets and thofe of Mr. Burke it is, that the old Whigs oppofe themfelves ftill more ftrongly than he does againft the doctrines which are now propagated with fo much induftry by thofe who would be thought their fucceffors.
It will be faid perhaps, that the old Whigs, in order to guard themfelves againft popular odium, pretended to affert tenets contrary to thofe which they fecretly held. This, if true, would prove, what Mr. Burke has uniformly afferted, that the extrava- gant doctrines which he meant to expofe, were dif~ agreeable to the body of the people ; who, though they perfectly abhor a defpotic government, cer- tainly approach more nearly to the love of mitigated monarchy, than to any thing which bears the ap- pearance even of the beft republic. But if thefe old Whigs deceived the people, their conduct was unaccountable indeed. They expofed their power, as every one converfant in hiftory knows, to the greateft peril, for the propagation of opinions which, on this hypothecs, they did not hold. It is a new kind of martyrdom. This fuppofition does as little credit to their integrity as their wifdom: It makes them at once hypocrites and fools. I think of thofe great men very differently. I hold them to have been, what the world thought them, G 2 men
of deep imderftanding, open fmcerity, and clear honour. However, be that matter as it may ; what thefe old Whigs pretended to be, Mr. Burke is. This is enough for him.
I do indeed admit, that though Mr. Burke has proved that his opinions were thofe of the old Whig party, folemnly declared by one houfe, in effect and fubftance by both houfes of parliament, this teftimony (landing by itfelf will form no proper defence for his opinions, if he and the old Whigs were both of them in the wrong. But it is his prefent concern, not to vindicate thefe old Whigs, but to fhew his agreement with them. — He appeals to them as judges : he does not vindicate them as culprits. It is current that thefe old politicians knew little of the rights of men ; that they loft their way by groping about in the dark, and fum- bling among rotten parchments and mufty records. Great lights they fay are lately obtained in the world ; and Mr. Burke, inftead of ihrowding himfelf in ex- ploded ignorance, ought to have taken advantage of the blaze of illumination which has been fpread about him. It may be fo. The enthufiafts of this time, it feems, like their predeceffors in another faction of fanaticifm, deal in lights. — Hudibras plea- fantly fays of them, they
" Have lights, where better eyes are blind, u As pigs are faid to fee the wind."
The author of the Reflections has heard a .great deal concerning the modern lights j but he has not yet had the good fortune to fee much of them. He has read more than he can juftify to any thing but the fpirit of curiofity, of the works of thefe illuminators of the world. He has learn- ed nothing from the far greater number of them, than a full certainty of their fhallownefs, levity, pride, petulance, prefumption and ignorance.
Where
Where the old authors whom he has read, and the old men whom he has converfed with, have left him in the dark, he is in the dark ftill. If others, however, have obtained any of this extraor- dinary light, they will ufe it to guide them in their reft- arches and their conduct. I have only to with, that the nation may be as happy and as profperous under the influence of the new light, as it has been in the fober fhade of the old obfcurity. As to the reft, it will be difficult for the author of the Re- flections to conform to the principles of the avowed leaders of the party, until they appear otherwife than negatively. All we can gather from them is this, that their principles are diametrically oppofite to his. This is all that we know from authority. Their negative declaration obliges me to have re- courfe to the books which contain pofitive doc- trines. They are indeed, to thofe Mr. Burke holds, diametrically oppofite ; and if it be true, (as the oracles of the party have faid, I hope haftily) that their opinions differ fo widely, it fhould feem they are the moft likely to form the creed of the modern Whigs.
I have ftated what were the avowed fentiments of the old Whigs, not in the way of argu- ment, but narratively. It is but fair to fet before the reader, in the fame fimple manner, the fenti- ments of the modern, to which they fpare neither pains nor expence to make profelytes. I choofe them from the books upon which moft of that in- duftry and expenditure in circulation have been em- ployed ; I choofe them not from thofe who fpeak with a politic obfcurity ; not from thofe who only controvert the opinions of the old Whigs, without advancing any of their own, but from thofe who fpeak plainly and affirmatively. The Whig reader may make his choice between the two doctrines.
The doctrine then propagated by thefe focieties,
which gentlemen think they ought to be very
G 3 tender
( 86 )
tender in difcouraging, as nearly as poflible iit their own words, is as follows: that in Greac Britain we are not only without a good conftitu- tion, but that we have " no conftitution." That, " tho' it is much talked about, no fuch thing as a " conftitution exifts, or ever did exift ; and confe- " quently that the people have a conftitution yet: to " form-, that fince William the Conqueror, the " country has never yet regenerated irfelf, and is " therefore without a conftitution. That where " it cannot be produced in a vifible form, there is <f none. That a conftitution is a thing antecedent " to government ; and that the conftitution of a <c country is not the aft of its government, but of " a people conftituting a government. That every " thing in the Englifh government is the reverie " of what it ought to be, and what it is faid to be " in England. That the right of war and peace <£ refides in a metaphor {hewn at the Tower, for * fix pence or a fhilling a-piece. — That it fig- " nifies not where the right refides, whether in the " crown or in parliament. War» is the common <c harveft of thofe who participate in the divifion " and expenditure of public money. That the <c portion of liberty enjoyed in England is juft " enough to enflave a country more productively " than by defpotifm."
So far as to the general ftate of the Britifh confti- tution.— As to our houfe of lords, the chief virtual reprefentative of our ariftocracy, the great ground and pillar of fecurity to the landed intereft, and that main link by which it is connected with the law and the crown, thefe worthy focieties are pleaied to tell us, that, " whether we view ariftocracy before, or :f behind, or fide- ways, or any way elfe, domeftically " or publicly, it is (till a monfter. That ariftocracy " in France had one feature lefs in its countenance " than what it has in fome other countries •> it did
" not
" not compofe a body of hereditary legiflators. It: <c was not a corporation of ariftocracy •" — for fuch it feems that profound legiflator Mr. De la Fay- ctte defcribes the houfe of peers. <c That it is " kept up by family tyranny and injuftice — that <c there is an unnatural unfitnefs in ariftocracy to be " legiflators for a nation — that their ideas of dif- " tributive juftice are corrupted at the very fource j " they begin life by trampling on all their younger Cf brothers, and fifters, and relations of every kind, " and are taught and educated fo to do.— That the " idea of an hereditary legiflator is as abfurd as an (t hereditary mathematician. That a body holding " themfelves unaccountable to any body, ought to <c be trufted by no body — that it is continuing the fc uncivilized principles of governments founded in tf conqueft, and the bafe idea of man having apro- <f perty in man, and governing him by a perfonal <f right — that ariftocracy has a tendency to dege- " nerate the human fpecies," &c. &c.
As to our law of primogeniture, which with few and inconfiderable exceptions is the (landing law of all our landed inheritance, and which without quef- tion has a tendency, and I think a moft happy tendency, to preferve a character of confequence, weight, and prevalent influence over others in the whole body of the landed intereft, they call loudly for its deftrutljon. They do this for political rea- fons that are very manifeft. They have the con- fidence to fay, " that it is a law againft every law " of nature, and nature herfelf calls for its deftruc- " tion. Eftablifh family juftice, and ariftocracy " falls. By the ariftocratical law of primogeni- " turelhip, in a family of fix children, five are " expofed. Ariftocracy has never but cm child. " The reft are begotten to be devoured. They " are thrown to the cannibal for prey, and the na- " tural parent prepares the unnatural repaft."
64 As
As to the houfe of commons, they treat it far worfe than the houfe of lords or the crown have been ever treated. Perhaps they thought they had a greater right to take this amicable freedom with thofe of their own family. For many years it has been the perpetual theme of their invectives. — " Mockery, infult, ufurpation," are amongft the beft names they beftow upon it. They damn it in the mafs, by declaring " that it does not arife *f out of the inherent rights of the people, as the " national aflembly does in France, and whofe " name defignates its original."
Of the charters and corporations, to whofe rights, a few years ago, thefe gentlemen were fo trem- blingly alive, they fay, " that when the people of " England come to reflect upon them, they will, c< like France, annihilate thofe badges of oppref- " fion, thofe traces of a conquered nation."
As to our monarchy, they had formerly been more tender of that branch of the conftitution, and for a good realbn. The laws had guarded againfl all feditious attacks upon it, with a greater degree of ftriftnefs and feverity. The tone of thefe gen- tlemen is totally altered fince the French Revolu- tion. They now declaim as vehemently againft the monarchy, as in former occafions they treacher- oufly flattered and foothed it.
" When we furvey the wretched condition of cc man under the monarchical and hereditary fyftems Cf of government, dragged from his home by one " power, or driven by another, and impoverifhed " by taxes more than by enemies, it becomes evi- " dent that thofe fyftems are bad, and that a ge- " neral revolution in the principle and conftruction " of governments is necefTary.
" What is government more than the manage - 5f ment of the affairs of a nation ? It is not, and " from its nature cannot be, the property of any
" particular
" particular man or family, but of the whole com- *e munity, at whole expence it is fupported ; and " though by force or contrivance it has been ufurp- " ed into an inheritance, the ufurpation cannot " alter the right of things. Sovereignly, as a " matter of right, appertains to the nation only, fc and not to any individual j and a nation has at <c all times an inherent indefeafible right to abolifh " any form of government it finds inconvenient, " and eftablifh fuch as accords with its interefl, cc difpofition, and happinefs. The romantic and " barbarous diftinttion of men into kings and fub- 'c jects, though it may fuit the condition of cour- " tiers, cannot that of citizens ; and is exploded fc by the principle upon which governments are -" now founded. Every citizen is a member of " the fovereignty, and, as fuch, can acknowledge " no perfonal fubjection; and his obedience can be f only to the laws."
Warmly recommending to us the example of France, where they have deftroyed monarchy, they fay —
" Monarchical fovereignty, the enemy of man- " kind, and the fource of mifery, is abolifned ; and <c fovereignty itfelf is reftored to its natural and " original place, the nation. Were this the cafe ?' throughout Europe, the caufe of wars would be ?' taken away."
u But, after all, what is this metaphor called a ** crown, or rather what is monarchy ? Is it a thing, " or is it a name, or is it a fraud ? Is it * a con- " trivance of human wifdom,' or of human craft " to obtain money from a nation under fpecious " pretences ? Is it a thing nece0ary to a nation ? ?f If it is, in what does that neceffity confift, what ff fervices does it perform, what is its bufmefs, and
" v/hat
( 9° )
*f what are its merits ? Doth the virtue confift m " the metaphor, or in the man ? Doth the gold- " fmith that makes the crown make the virtue al- '* fo ? Doth it operate like Fortunatus's wifriing- " cap, or Harlequin's wooden fword ? Doth it make " a man a conjuror ? In fine, what is it ? It ap- " pears to be a fomething going much out of " fafhion, falling into ridicule, and rejected in fome " countries both as unneceffary and expenfive. In " America it is confidered as an abfurdity ; and in " France it has fo far declined, that the goodnefs " of the man, and the refpect for his perfonal cha- " rafter, are the only things that preferve the ap- " pearance of its exiftence."
" Mr. Burke talks about what he calls an here- " ditary crown, as if it were fome production of " Nature i or as if, like Time, it had a power to tf operate, not only independently, but in fpite of " man; or as if it were a thing or a fubjecT: uni- " verfally confented to. Alas ! it has none of thole " properties, but is the reverfe of them all. It is a " thing in imagination, the propriety of which is " more than doubted, and the legality of which " in a few years will be denied."
" If I afk the farmer, the manufacturer, the * merchant, the tradefman, and down through all " the occupations of life to the common labourer, " what fervice monarchy is to him ? he can give " me no anfwer. If I alk him what monarchy is, " he believes it is fomething like a fmecure.
" The French conftitution fays, That the right " of war and peace is in the nation. Where elfe " fhould it refide, but in thofe who are to pay the " expence?
a In England, this right is faid to refide in a me- 3 " tapher.
( 9' )
* taphory fhewn at the Tower for fixpence or a
Cc fhilling a-piece : So are the lions ; and it would
tf be a ftep nearer to reafon to fay it refided in
K them, for any inanimate metaphor is no more
" than a hat or a cap. We can all fee the abfurdi-
<c ty of worfhipping Aaron's molten cal£ or Nebu-
" chadnezzar's golden image; but why do men
« continue to praftife themfelves the abfurdities they
ff defpife in others ?"
The Revolution and Hanover fucceffion had been objects of the higheft veneration to the old Whigs. They thought them not only proofs of the ibber and fteady fpirit of liberty which guided their anceftors ; but of their wifdom and provident care of pofterity. — The modern Whigs have quite other notions of thefe events and actions. They do not deny that Mr. Burke has given truly the words of the acts of parliament which fecured the fuc- ceffion, and the juft fenfe of them. They attack not him but the law.
" Mr. Burke (fay they) has done fome fervice, " not to his caufe, but to his country, by bringing <c thofe claufes into public view. They ferve to " demonftrate how neceffary it is at all times to watch " againft the attempted encroachment of power, " and to prevent its running to excefs. Itisfome- " what extraordinary, that the offence for which " James II. was expelled, that of fctting up power " by ajjumption, fhould be re-acted, under another " lhape and form, by the parliament that expelled ec him. It fhews that the rights of man were but <e imperfectly underftood at the Revolution; for, l( certain it is, that the right which that parliament K fet up by cffumption (for by delegation it had it not, " and could not have it, becaufe none could give it) " over the perfons and freedom of pofterity for ever, " was of the fame tyrannical unfounded kind which
" James
*' James attempted to fet up over the parliament
" and the nation, and for which he was expelled.
: The only difference is, (for in principle they dif-
" fer not), that the one was an ufurper over the
: living, and the other over the unborn -, and as
" the one has no better authority to ftand upon
" than the other, both of them muft be equally
" null and void, and of no effect."
" As the eftimation of all things is by comparifon, " the Revolution of 1688, however from circum- cc ftances it may have been exalted beyond its va- " lue, will find its level. It is already on the wane ; " eclipfed by the enlarging orb of reafon, and the " luminous revolutions of America and France. In <c lefs than another century, it will go, as well as " Mr. Burke's labours, * to the family vault of all fc the Capulets.' Mankind will then fcarcely beKevf " that a country calling itfelf free, would fend to <f Holland for a man, and clothe him with power, on " purpoje to put tbemfehes in fear of him, and give " him almoft a million fterlixg a -year for leave to ff Jubmit tbewjehes and their fofterity, like bend-men 11 and bend-women, fcr ever "
" Mr. Burke having faid that the king holds his " crown in contempt of the choice of the Revolu- <c tion fociety, who individually or colleftively have " not," (as moft certainly they have not) u a vote " for a king amongft them, they take occafion from c< thence to infer, that a king who does not hold " his crown by election, defpifes the people."
<f The King of England," fays be, " holds bis <f crown (for it does not belong to the nation, " according to Mr. Burke) in contempt of the choice " of the Revolution Society." &c.
" As to who is King in England or elfe where,
« or
( 93 )
'* or whether there is any King at all, or whether *r the people chufe a Cherokee Chief, or a Heflian " Huffar for a King, it is not a matter that I " trouble myfelf about — be that to themfelves; *< but with refpect to the doctrine, fo far as it re- *f lates to the Rights of Men and Nations, it is " as abominable as any thing ever uttered in the " moft enflaved country under heaven. Whether " it founds worfe to my ear, by not being accuf- " tomed to hear fuch defpotifm, than what it does ls to the ear of another perfon, I am not fo well " a judge of; but of its abominable principle I " am at no lofs to judge."
Thefe focieties of modern Whigs pufh their in- folence as far as it can go. In order to prepare the minds of the people for treafon and rebellion, they reprefent the king as tainted with principles ofdef- potifm, from the circumflance of his having domi nions in Germany. In direct defiance of the moil notorious truth, they defcribe his government there to be a defpotifm i whereas it is a free conftitution, in which the dates of the electorate have their part in the government -, and this privilege has never been infringed by the king, or, that I have heard of, by any of his predeceffors. The confti- tution of the electoral dominions has indeed a dou- ble control, both from the laws of the empire, and from the privileges of the country. Whatever rights the king enjoys a.s elector, have been always pa- rentally exercifed, and the calumnies of theft fcan- dalous focieties have not been authorized by a fingle .complaint of oppreffion.
" When Mr. Burke fays that f his majefty's heirs and fuccefTors, each in their time and order, v/ill come to the crown with the Jame contempt of their choice with which his majefty has fuc- ceeded to that he wears,' it is faying too much even to the humbleft individual in the country ; " part of Avhole daily labour goes towards making
"up
( 94 )
" up the million fterling a year, which the country <f gives the perfon it ftiles a king. Government " with infolence, is defpotifm j but when contempt " is added, it becomes worfe j and to pay for con- " tempt, is the excefs of flavery. This fpecies of " government comes from Germany ; and re- " minds me of what one of the Brunfwick foldiers " told me, who was taken prilbner by the Ameri- " cans in the late war: c Ah !' faid he, * America ' is a fine free countiy, it is worth the people's
* righting for ; I know the difference by knowing
* my own : in my country, if the prince fays> Eat t ftraWy we eat ft raw.' " God help that country, " thought I, be it England or elfe where, whole li- " berties are to be protected by German principles " of government, and princes of Brunfivick ! "
" It is fomewhat curious to obferve, that although <c the people of England have been in the habit of " talking about kings, it is always a Foreign Houfe <f of kings ; hating Foreigners, yet governed by them. " — It is now the Houfe of Brunfwick, one of the " petty tribes of Germany." -----
" If Government be what Mr. Burke defcribes " it, * a contrivance of human wifdom,' I might " afk him, if wifdom was at fuch a low ebb in Eng- " land, that it was become necefTary to import it " from Holland and from Hanover ? But I will do <£ the country the juftice to fay, that was not the " cafe ; and even if it was, it miftook the cargo. " The wifdom of every country, when properly ex- *e erted, is fufficient for all its purpofes j and there <( could exift no more real occafion in England to ** ba-ve Jent for a Dutch Stadtholder, or a Ger- " man Eleftor, than there was in America to have " done a fimilar thing. If a country does not un- " derftand its own affairs, how is a foreigner to un- " derftand them, who knows neither its laws, its
" manners,
( 95 )
" manners, nor its language? If there exifted a man
" fo tranfcendantly wife above all others, that his
" wifdom was neceffary to inftruft a nation, fome
*c reafon might be offered for monarchy ; but when
<c we caft our eyes about a country, and obferve
" how every part underftands its own affairs j and
" when we look around the world, and fee that of all
" men in it, the race of kings are the mofl infigni-
" ficant in capacity, our reafon cannot fail to afk us
« — What are thofe men kept for ?" *
Thefe are the notions which, under the idea of Whig principles, feveral perfons, and among them perfons of no mean mark, have afibciated them- felves to propagate. I will not attempt in the fmalleft degree to refute them. This will probably be done (if fuch writings {hall be thought to deferve any other than the refutation of criminal juftice) by others, who may think with Mr. Burke. He has performed his parr.
I do not wifh to enter very much at large into the difcuflions which diverge and ramify in all ways from this productive fubject. But there is one topic upon which I hope I fhall be excufed in going a little be- yond my defign. The factions, now io bufy amongft us, in order to diveft men of all love for their country, and to remove from their minds all duty with re- gard to the ftate, endeavour to propagate an opini- on, that the people, in forming their commonwealth, have by no means parted with their power over it. This is an impregnable citadel, to which thefe gen- tlemen retreat whenever they are pufhed by the battery of laws, and ufages, and pofitive conven- tions. Indeed it is fuch and of fo great force, that all they have done in defending their out- works is fo much time and labour thrown away. Difcufs any of their fchemes — their anfwer is — It
* Vindication of the Rights of Man, recommended by the feveral focieties.
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Is the act of the people, and that is fufficient. Are w£ to deny to a majority of the people the right of altering even the whole frame of their fociety, if fuch fhould be their pleafure ? They may change it, fay they, from a monarchy to a republic to-day, and to-morrow back again from a republic to a monarchy ; and fo backward and forward as often as they like. They are matters of the common- wealth ; becaufe in fubftance they are themfelves the commonwealth. The French revolution, fay they, was the act of the majority of the people ; and if the majority of any other people, the people of England for inftance, wifh to make the fame change, they have the fame right.
J uft the fame undoubtedly. That is, none at all. Neither the few nor the many have a right to act merely by their will, in any matter connected with duty, truft, engagement, or obligation. The conflitution of a country being once fettled upon fome compact, tacit or exprefled, there is no power exifting of force to alter it, without the breach of the covenant, or the confent of all the parties. Such is the nature of a contract. And the votes of a majority of the people, whatever their infamous flatterers may teach in order to corrupt their minds, cannot alter the moral any more than they can alter the phyfical eflence of things. The people are not to be taught to think lightly of their engagements to their go- vernors; elfe they teach governors to think lightly of their engagements towards them. In that kind of game in the end the people are fure to be lofers. To flatter them into a contempt of faith, truth, and juftice, is to ruin them ; for in thefe virtues confifts their whole fafety. To flatter any man, or any part of mankind, in any defcription, by afferting, that in engagements he or they are free whilft any other hu- man creature is bound, is ultimately to veft the rule of morality in, the pleafure of thofe who ought to be
rigidly
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rigidly fubmitted to it ; to fubje<5t the fovereign rea- fon of the world to the caprices of weak and giddy men.
But, as no one of us men can difpenfe with public or private faith, or with any other tie of moral ob- ligation, fo neither can any number of us. The number engaged in crimes, inftead of turning them into laudable acts, only augments the quantity and the intenfity of the guilt. I am well aware, that men love to hear of their power, but have an ex- treme difrelifh to be told of their duty. This is of courfe ; becaufe every duty is a limitation of feme power. Indeed arbitrary power is fo mi'ch to the depraved tafteof the vulgar, of the vulgar of every deicription, that almoft all the difTenfions which lacerate the commonwealth, are not concerning the manner in which it is to be exercifed, but concerning the hands in which it is to be placed. Somewhere they are refolved to have it. Whether they de- fire it to be veiled in the many or the few, de- pends with moft men upon the chance which they imagine they themfelves may have of partaking in the exercife of that arbitrary fway, in the one mode or in the other.
It is not neceflary to teach men to third after power. But it is very expedient that, by moral inftructioR, they fhould be taught, and by their civil conftitutions they fhould be compelled^ to put many reftrictions upon the immoderate exercife of it, and the inordinate defire. The beft method of obtaining thefe two great points forms the important, but at the fame time the difficult problem to the true itatefman. He thinks of the place in which politi- cal power is to be lodged, with no other attention, than as it may render the more or the lefs practi- cable, its falutary reftraint, and its prudent direc- tion. For this reafon no legiflator, at any period of the world, has willingly placed the feat of active H power
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power in the hands of the multitude : Becaufe there it admits of no control, no regulation, no fteady direction whatfoever. The people are trie natural control on authority ; but to exercife and to control together is contradictory and impoffible.
As the exorbitant exercife of power cannot, un- der popular fway, be effectually reftrained, the other great object of political arrangement, the means of abating an excefiive defire of it, is in fuch a ftate Hill worfe provided for. The democratick com- monwealth is the foodful nurfe of ambition. Un- der the other forms it meets with many reftraints. Whenever, in Hates which have had a democratick bafiSjthelegiflators have endeavoured to put reftraints upon ambition, their methods were as violent, as in the end they were ineffectual; as violent indeed as any the moft jealous defpotifm could invent. The oftracifm could not very long fave itfelfi and much lefs the ftate which it was meant to guard, from the attempts of ambition, one of the natural inbred in- curable diftempers of a powerful democracy.
But to return from this fliort digreflion, which however is not wholly foreign to the queftion of the effect of the will of the majority upon the form or the exiftence of their fociety. I cannot too often recommend it to the ferious confideration of all men, who think civil fociety to be within the pro- vince of moral jurifdiction, that if we owe to it any duty, it is not fubject to our will. Duties are not voluntary. Duty and will are even contradictory terms. Now though fociety might be at firft a voluntary act (which in many cafes it undoubtedly was) it continues under a permanent {landing cove- nant, coexifting with the fociety ; and it attaches upon every individual of that fociety, without any formal act of his own. This is warranted by the general practice, arifing out of the general fenfe of mankind. Men without their choice derive be- nefits
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nefhs from that aflbciation; without their choice they are fubjected to duties in confequence of thefe benefits j and without their choice they enter into a virtual obligation as binding as any that is actual. Look through the whole of life and the whole fyf- tem of duties. Much the ftrongeft moral obliga- tions are fuch as were never the refults of our option. I allow, that if no fupreme ruler exifts, wife to form, and potent to enforce, the moral law, there is no fanction to any contract, virtual or even actual, againft the will of prevalent power. On that hypo- thefis, let any fet of men be ftrong enough to fet their duties at defiance, and they ceafe to be duties any longer. We have but this one appeal againft irrefiftible power—
Si genus humanum et mortalia temmtls arma, At fperate Deos memores fandi atque nefandi.
Taking it for granted that I do not write to the difciples of the Parifian philofophy, I may afliime, that the awful author of our being is the author of our place in the order of exiftence ; and that having dif- pofed and marfhalled us by a divine tactick, not ac- cording to our will, but according to his, he has, in and by that difpofition, virtually Subjected us to act the part which belongs to the place affigned us. We have obligations to mankind at large, which are not in confequence of any fpecial voluntary pact. They arife from the relation of man to man, and the rela- tion of man to God, which relations are not matters of choice. On the contrary, the force of all the pacts which we enter into with any particular perfon amongft them, depends upon thofe prior obligations. In fome cafes the fubordinate relations are voluntary, in others they are neceffary — but the duties are all compulfive- When we marry, the choice is voluntary, but the duties are not matter of choice. They are dictated by the nature of the fituation. Dark and infcrutable are H 2 the
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the ways by which we come into the world. Ther inftincts which give rile to this myfterious pro- ce£> of nature are not of our making. But out: of phyfical caufes, unknown to us, perhaps un- knowable, arife moral duties, which, as we are ab>e perfectly to comprehend, we are bound indif- penfably to perform. ChikLen are not confenting to their relation, but their relation, without their actual confent, binds them to its duties; or rather it implies their confent, becaufe the prefumed confent of every rational creature is in unifon with the predif- po fed order of things. Men come in that manner into a community with the focial ftate of their pa- rents, endowed with all the benefits, loaded with all the duties of their fituation. If the focial ties and ligaments, ipun out of tliofe phyfical relations which are the elements of the commonwealth, in moft cafes begin, and .always continue, independently of our will, fo does that relation called our country, which comprehends (as it has been well faid) " * all the charities of all," bind us to it without any fti- pulation on our part. Nor are we left without powerful inftincts to make this duty as dear and grateful to us, as it is awful and coercive. Our country is not a thing of mere phyfical locality. It confifts, in a great meature, in the antient order into which we are born. We may have the fame geographical fituation, but another country ; as we may have the fame country in another foil. The place that determines our duty to our country is a focial, civil relation.
Thefe are the opinions of the author whofe caufe I defend. I lay them down not to enforce them upon others by difputation, but as an account of his proceedings. On them he acts ; and from them he is convinced that neither he, nor any man,
* Omnes omnium charitates patria una comple&itur. Cic.
or
or number of men, have a right (except what ne~ cefiity, which is out of and above all rule, rather impofes than beftows) to free themfelves from, that primary engagement into which every man born into a community as much contracts by his being born into it, as he contracts an obligation to certain parents by his having been derived from their bodies. The place of every man determines his duty. If you afk, Quern te Deus effejiiffit? You will be anfwered when you refolve this other quef- tion, Humana qua parte locatus es in re* ?
I admit, indeed, that in morals, as in all things elfe, difficulties will fometimes occur. Duties will fometimes crofs one another. Then queftions will arife, which of them is to be placed in fubordina- tion ; which of them may be entirely luperfeded ? Thefe doubts give rife to that part of moral fci- ence called cafuiftry, which, though necefTary to be well ftudied by thofe who would become expert in that learning, who aim at becoming what, I think Cicero fomewhere calls, artifices officiorum -, it re- quires a very folid and difcriminating judgment, great modefty and caution, and much fobriety of mind in the handling ; elfe there is a danger that it may totally fubvert thofe offices which it is its object only to methodize and reconcile. Duties, at their extreme bounds, are drawn very fine, fo as to become almoft evanefcent. In that ftate, fome fhade of doubt will always reft on thefe queftions, when they are purfued with great fubtilty. But the
* A few lines in Perfius contain a good fummary of all the objeds of moral inveftigation, and hint the refult of our en- quiry : There human will has no place.
QuidfuMus ? et quidnam iiiduri gignimur ? ordo Quis datus? et metre qui • moilis rlexue et uncle ? Quis modus argento ? Quidy/n of tare ? Quid afpcr Utile nummus habet ? Patn<s charifque propinquts Quantum elargiri debeat ? — Quern te Deus effe JuJ/tt ?— et humana qua parte iocatus es in re ?
Hj very
very habit of ftating thefe extreme cafes is not very laudable or fafe : becaufe, in general, it is not right to turn our duties into doubts. They are impofed to govern our conduct, not to exercife our ingenuity ; and therefore, our opinions about them ought not to be in a ftate of fluctuation, but fteady, furc, and refolved.
Amongft thefe nice, and therefore dangerous, points of cafuiftry may be reckoned the queftion fo much agitated in the prefent hour — Whether, after the people have difcharged themfelves of their original power by an habitual delegation, n:> occa- fion can pofllbly occur which may juftify their re- fumption of it ? This queftion, in this latitude, is very hard to affirm or deny : but I am fatisfied that no occafion can juftify fuch a refumption, which wculd not equally authorize a difpenfation •with any other moral duty, perhaps with all of them together. However, if in general it be not eafy to determine concerning the lawfulnefs of fuch devious proceedings, which muft be ever on the edge of crimes, it is far from difficult to forefee the perilous confequences of the refufcita- tion of fuch a power in the people. The practical confequences of any political tenet go a great way in deciding upon its value. Political problems do not primarily concern truth or falfehood. They relate to good or evil. What in the refult is likely to produce evil, is politically falfe : that which is productive of good, politically is true.
Believing it therefore a queftion at leaft ar- duous in the theory, and in the practice very critical, it would well become us to afcertain, as well as we can, what form it is that our incantations are about to call up from darknefs and the fleep of ages. When the fupreme authority of the people is in queftion, before we attempt to extend or to confine it, we ought to fix in our minds, with fome degree
of
of diftinftnefs, an idea of what it is we mean when we fay the PEOPLE.
In a (late of rude nature there is no fuch thing as a people. A number of men in themfelves have no colle6tive capacity. The idea of a people is the idea of a corporation. It is wholly artificial ; and made like all other legal fictions by common agreement. What the particular nature of that agreement was, is collected from the form into which the particular fociety has been caft. Any other is not their covenant. When men, there- fore, break up the original compact or agreement which gives its corporate form and capacity to a ftate, they are no longer a people; they have no longer a corporate exiftence ; they have no longer a legal coactive force to bind within, nor a claim to be recognized abroad. They are a number of vague loofe individuals, and nothing more. With them all is to begin again. Alas ! they little know how many a weary flep is to be taken before they can form themfelves into a mafs, which has a true politic perfonality.
We hear much from men, who have not ac- quired their hardinefs of aflertion from the profun- dity of their thinking, about the omnipotence of a majority, in fuch a diflblution of an ancient fociety as hath taken place in France. But amongft men fo difbanded, there can be no fuch thing as majority or minority; or power in anyone perfon to bind another. The power of acting by a majority, which the gentle- men theorifts feem to afTume fo readily, after they have violated the contract out of which it has arifen, (if at all it exifted) muft be grounded on two aflump- tions; firft, that of an incorporation produced by unanimity; and fecondly, an unanimous agreement, that the a<5t of a mere majority (fay of one) ihall pafs with them and with others as the acl: of the whole.
H4 We
We are fo little affected by things which are habi- tual, that we confider this idea of the decifion of a ma- jority as if it were a law of our original nature : But fuch conftruclive whole, refiding in a part only, is one of th.e mofl violent fictions of pofitive law, that ever has been or can be made on the principles of artifi- cial incorporation. Out of civil fociety nature knows nothing of it ; nor are men, even when arranged ac- cording to civil order, otherwife than by very long training, brought at all to fubmit to it. The rrind is brought far more eafily to acquiefce in the pro- ceedings of one man, or a few, who act under a general procuration for the ftate, than in the vote of a victorious majority in councils in which every man has "his fhare in the deliberation. For there the beaten party are exafperated and four- ed by the previous contention, and mortified by the conclufive defeat. This mode of decifion, where wills may be fo nearly equal, where, ac- cording to cjrcumftances, the fmaller number may be the {banger force, and where apparent reafon may be ail upon one fide, and on the other little elfe than impetuous appetite ; all this muft be the refult of a very particular and ipecial convention, confirmed afterwards by long habits of obedience, by a fort of difcipline in fociety, and by a ftrong hand, vefted with ftationary permanent power, to enforce this fort of conftruclive general will. What oigan it is that fliall declare the corporate mind is fo much a matter of pofitive arrangen ent, that feveral dates, for the validity of feveral of their acts, have required a pro- portion of voices much greater than that of a mere majority. 1 hefe proportions are fo entirely governed by convention, that in ibme cafts the minority decides. The laws in many countries to condemn require more than a mere majority ; lefs than an equal number to acquit. In our judicial trials we require unani- mity either to condemn or to abfolve. In fome in- corporations
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corporations one man fpeaks for the whole ; in others, a few. Until the other day, in the confti- tution of Poland, unanimity was required to give validity to any a6t of their great national council or diet. This approaches much more nearly to rude nature than the inftitutions of any other country. Such, indeed, every commonwealth muft be, with- out a pofitive law to recognize in a certain number the will of the entire body.
If men diflblve their antient incorporation, in or- der to regenerate their community, in that ftate of things each man has a right, if he pleafes, to re- main an individual. Any number of individuals, who can agree upon it, have an undoubted right to form themfclves into a ftate apart and wholly inde- pendent. If any of thefe is forced into the fellow- fhip of another, this is conqueft and not compacl:. On every principle, which fuppofes fociety to be in virtue of a free covenant, this compulfiye incorpo- ration muft be null and void.
As a people can have no right to a corporate ca- pacity without univerfal confent, fo neither have they a right to hold exclufivelv any lands in the name and title of a corporation On the fcheme of the pre- fent rulers in our neighbouring country, regenerated as they are, they have no more right to the ter- ritory called France than T have. I have a right to pitch my tent in any unoccupied place I can find for it ; and I may apply to my own maintenance any part of their unoccupied foil. I may purchafe the houfe or vineyard of any individual proprietor who refufes his confent (and moft proprietors have, as far as they dared, refulcd ir) to the new incorpo- ration. I ftand in his independent place. Who are thefe infolent men calling themfelves the French nation, that would monopolize this fair domain of nature ? Is it becaufe they fpeak a certain jargon ? Is it their mode of chattering, to me unintelli- gible,
gible, that forms their title to my land? Who are they who claim by prefcription and defcent from certain gangs of banditti called Franks, and Burgundians, and Vifigoths, of whom I may have never heard, and ninety-nine out of an hundred of themfelves certainly never have heard; whilft at the very time they tell me, that prefcription and long poffeffion form no title to property ? Who are they that prefume to aflert that the land which I purchafed of tke individual, a natural perfon, and not a fiction of flate, belongs to them, who in the very capacity in which they make their claim can exift only as an imaginary being, and in virtue of the very prefcription which they reject and difown r This mode of arguing might be pufhed into all the detail, fo as to leave no fort of doubt, that on their principles, and on the fort of footing on which they have thought proper to place themfelves, the crowd of men on the other fide of the channel, who have the impudence to call themfelves a people, can never be the lawful exclufive pof- fefTors of the foil. By what they call reafoning without prejudice, they leave not one ftone upon another in the fabric of human fociety. They fub- vert all the authority which they hold, as well as all that which they have deftroyed.
As in the abftract, it is perfectly clear, that, out of a ftate of civil fociety, majority and minority are re- lations which can have no exiftence ; and that in civil fociety, its own fpecific conventions in each incor- poration, determine what it is that conftitutes the people, fo as to make their act the fignification of the general will •, to come to particulars, it is equally clear, that neither in France nor in England has the ori- ginal, or any fubfequent compact of the ftate, ex- prefTed or implied, conftituted a majority of men, told by the bead, to be the acting people of their feveral « communities. And I fee as little of policy or uti- * 5 %>
Jity, as there is of right, in laying down a principle that a majority of men told by the head are to be confidered as the people, and that as fuch their will is to be law. What policy can there be found in arrangements made in defiance of every political principle ? To enable men to act with the weight and character of a people, and to anfwer the ends for which they are incorporated into that capacity, we mult fuppofe them (by means immediate or confe- quential) to be in that Hate of habitual focial difci- pline, in which the wifer, the more expert, and the more opulent, conduct, and by conducting enlighten and protect the weaker, the lefs knowing, and the lefs provided with the goods of fortune. When the mul- titude are not under this difcipline, they can fcarcely be faid to be in civil fociety. Give once a certain conftitution of things, which produces a variety of conditions and circumftances in a ftate, and there is in nature and reafon a principle which, for their own (benefit, poftpones, not the intereft but the judgment, of thofe who are niimeroplures,to thofe who are wr- Jufe et honore majores. Numbers in a ftate (fuppofing, which is not the cafe in France, that a ftate does exift) are always of confideration — but they are not the whole confideration. It is in things more ferious than a play, that it may be truly faid,/^//V eft equitem mibi plaitdere.
A true natural ariftocracy is not a feparate intereft in the ftate, or feparable from it. It is an effential integrant part of any large people rightly confti- tuted. It is formed out of a clafs of legitimate preemptions, which, taken as generalities, muft be admitted for actual truths. To be bred in a place of eftimation ; To fee nothing low and fordid from one's infancy ; To be taught to refpect one's felf; To be habituated to the cenforial infpection of the public eye ; To look early to public opinion ; To ftand upon fuch elevated
ground
ground as to be enabled to take a large view of the wide-fpread and infinitely diverfified combinations of men and affairs in a large fociety ; To have lei- fure to read, to reflect, to convert ; To be enabled to draw the court and attention of the wife and learned wherever they are to be found ; — To be ha- bituated in armies to command and to obey ; To be taught to defpife danger in the purfuit of honour and duty ; To be formed to the greateft degree of vigilance, forefight, and circum- fpection, in a ftate of thing, in