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yet. I believe in the new law you have revealed to the house of commons. I hope this doctrine has no existence but in your own heart. After all, Sir, if you had confulted that fober difcretion, which you feem to oppofe with triumph to the honeft jollity of a tavern, it might have occurred to you that, although you could have fucceeded in fixing a charge of inconfiftence upon Mr. Grenville, it would not have tended in any shape to exculpate yourself.

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• Your next infinuation, that Sir William Meredith had haftily adopted the falfe gloffes of his new ally, is of the fame fort with the first. It conveys a fneer as little worthy of the gravity of character, as it is ufelefs to your defence. It is of little moment to the public to enquire by whom the charge was conceived, or by whom it was adopted. The only question we ask is, whether or not it be true. The remainder of The remainder of your reflections, upon Mr. Grenville's conduct deftroy themselves. He could not poffibly come prepared to traduce your integrity to the houfe. He could not forefee that you would, even speak upon the question,, much less could he forefee that you would maintain a direct contradiction of that doctrine, which, you had folemnly, difinterestedly, and upon fober-> eft reflection delivered to the public. He came armed indeed with what he thought a refpectable

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authority, to fupport what he was convinced was the cause of truth, and I doubt not he intended to give you, in the courfe of the debate, an honourable and public teftimony of his esteem. Thinking highly of his abilities, I cannot however allow him the gift of divination. As to what you are pleased to call a plan cooly formed to impofe upon the house of commons, and his producing it without provocation at midnight, I confider it as the language of pique and invective, therefore unworthy of regard. But, Sir, I am fenfible I have followed your example too long, and wandered from the point.

The-qotation from your commentaries is matter of record. It can neither be altered by your friends, nor misreprefented by your enemies, and I am willing to take your own word for what you have faid in the houfe of commons. If there be a real. difference between what you have written and what you have spoken, you confess that your book ought to be the ftandard. Now, Sir, if words mean any thing, I apprehend that when a long enumeration of difqualifications (whether by statute or the cuftom of parliament) concludes with thefe general comprehensive words, but subject to these re• ftrictions and difqualifications, every subject of the realm is eligible of common right,' a reader of a plain understanding muft of course reft fatif.

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hed that no fpecies of difqualifications whatsoever had been omitted. The known character of the author, and the apparent accuracy with which the whole work is compiled, would confirm him in his opinion; nor could he poffibly form any other judgment, without looking upon your Comentaries in the fame light in which you confider thofe penal laws, which though not repealed are fallen into difufe, and are now in effect A SNARE TO THE UNWARY.

You tell us indeed that it was not part of your plan to specify any temporary incapacity, and that you could not, without a fpirit of prophecy, have fpecified the disability of a private individual, fubfequent to the period at which you wrote. What your plan was I know not; but what it fhould have been, in order to complete the work you have given us, is by no means difficult to determine. The incapacity, which you call temporary, may continue feven years; and though you might not have forefeen the particular cafe of Mr. Wilkes, you might and fhould have forefeen the poffibility of fuch a cafe, and told us how far the house of commons were authorized to proceed in it by the law and cuftom of parliament. The freeholders of Middlefex would then have known what they had to truft to, and would never have returned Mr. Wilkes when colonel Luttrell was a candidate

candidate against him. They would have chofe fome indifferent perfon rather than submit to be reprefented by the object of their contempt and detestation.

Your attempt to diftinguish between difabilities, which affect whole claffes of men, and those which affect individuals only, is really unworthy of your understanding. Your Commentaries had taught me that, although the inftance, in which a penal law is exerted, be particular, the laws themfelves are general. They are made for the benefit and inftruction of the public, though the penalty falls only upon an individual. You cannot but know, Sir, that what was Mr. Wilkes's case yesterday may be your's or mine to-morrow, and that confe quently the common right of every fubject of the realm is invaded by it. Profeffing therefore to treat of the conftitution of the house of commons, and of the laws and cuftoms relative to that conftitution, you certainly were guilty of a moft unpardonable omiffion, in taking no notice of a right and privilege of the house, more extraordinary and more arbitrary than all the others they poffefs put together. If the expulfion of a member, not under any legal difability, of itself creates in him an incapacity to be re-elected, I fee a ready way marked out, by which the majority may at any time remove the honefteft and ableft men who

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happen to be in oppofition to them. To say that they will not make this extravagant use of their power, would be a language unfit for a man fo learned in the laws as you are. By your doctrine, Sir, they have the power, and laws you know are intended to guard against what men may do, not to truft to what they will do.

Upon the whole, Sir, the charge against you is of a plain, fimple nature: It appears even upon the face of your own pamphlet. On the contrary, your justification of yourself is full of fubtlety and refinement, and in fome places not very intelligible. If I were perfonally your enemy, I should dwell, with a malignant pleasure, upon thofe great and useful qualifications, which you certainly posfefs, and by which you once acquired, though they could not preferve to you the refpect and esteem of your country, I fhould enumerate the honours you have loft, and the virtues you have difgraced but having no private refentments to gratify, I think it fufficient to have given my opinion of your public conduct, leaving the punifnment it deferves to your closet and to yourself.

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