Cities are included in their respective counties. You see Middlesex, which paid 80 parts of the tax, and 185 of the subsidy, sent only 8 members to Parliament; and Cornwall, which paid only 8 parts of the tax, and 5 of the subsidy sent 44. Is this proportional ?

G. No, surely.

P. There is a worse article than this in the present management. Canvassing, carousing, intoxication, bribery, perjury, and all the usual attendants on a modern election, disgrace candidates and destroy all confidence in them, and at the same time deprave and debauch the morals of the whole community. In the democratical part of our constitution, there is an exercise of sovereignty by suffrage; but never was the majesty of democracy so debased as it is in some elections. Candidates lose all reverence for the people, their constituents, and the people lose all that respect and reverence for representatives, which men in such high trust should always retain.

G. The means being thus ineffectual, the end of representation is not answered. Is that your meaning, Sir?

P. Yes, verily. Why is democracy interwoven in our constitution with aristocracy and monarchy? Is it not for the sake of its political virtue? And if it ceases to be virtuous, will it not yield to the frictions of wisdom and power essential to the other two parts? In such a case is not the very existence of our constitution in danger, and ought not all possible remedies to be applied? It would be as absurd to deprive the crown of power, and the nobles of consultation, as it would be to defraud the people of virtue. I mean all along political virtue; the peoples' thorough knowledge, just estimation, and actual disposal by unbiassed suffrage of their lives, liberties and properties, and all their natural rights. --I forgot you are a scholar, George, take a crust of Ovid with you

Magna fuit censuque virisque

Perque decem potuit tantum dare sanguinis annos,
Nunc humilis veteres tantummodo troja ruinas

Et

pro divitiis tumulos ostendit avorum.

FRIDA Y.

TAXATION.

P. I THINK we agree that every man has a natural right to his property, be it little or much.

G. We allow further, that his passing out of a natural state of solitude, into a civil state of society, does not alienate this right.

P. Individuals uniting together in society, have a joint interest in securing to each other the enjoyment of this right, and it is one principal excellence of our constitution, that though the giving up a part in trust to one of the community to be employed for the protection and benefit of the whole, be absolutely necessary to the private enjoyment of the rest, yet not the least atom is to be given without their free consent.

G. A great excellence it is, but no more than a right.

P. True. Taxation strikes me in eight points of light. A sort of arrangement may serve for a clue to guide us. The first is the origin of taxes, G. Do you mean to enter on a history of taxation, Sir?

P. No, no. A history of oppression would not

convince you, that you ought to be oppressed. I mean what makes taxes necessary?

G. The expences of government, I presume?

P. Yes; and the expences of government include a great many articles, as the expences of a family do. Some are necessary for safety and defence, some for convenience, some for pleasure, some for justice, some for generosity, all for the publick good; but none for vicious or needless purposes.

G. Of all this I have understood, it is the ancient indisputable right of the house of commons in the first instance to judge.

P. They have the sole right of raising and modelling the supply.

G. Whence have the representatives this right but from their constituents?

P. They derive it from their principals, the people; and in this instance, in spite of Voltaire, the MAJESTY of the people is avowed by our constitution, for the Commons tax the Peers as well as themselves; but they never suffer the Peers to tax them, nor even to amend or alter their money bills; a rejection is all the power they allow them, as jealous in this article of the upper house as of the

crown.

G. Taxes, then, ought not be raised without just and necessary causes, of which the people by their representatives are sole and competent judges. P. Certainly. The next article that strikes me is the quantity of taxation.

G. How would you rate this?
P. As I do my own expences.