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is not immediate from the crown, or natural in the kingdom. Never were minifters better supported in parliament. Parliamentary support comes and goes with office, totally regardless of the man, or the merit. Is government strengthened? It grows weaker and weaker. The popular torrent gains upon it every hour. Let us learn from our experience. It is not fupport that is wanting to government, but reformation. When ministry refts upon publick opinion, it is not indeed built upon a rock of adamant; it has, however, fome stability. But when it ftands upon private humour, its structure is of ftubble, and its foundation is on quickfand. I repeat it again-He that fupports every adminiftration, fubverts all government. The reafon is this: The whole bufinefs in which a court ufually takes an intereft goes on at prefent equally well, in whatever hands, whether high or low, wife or foolish, fcandalous or reputable; there is nothing therefore to hold it firm to any one body of men, or to any one confiftent scheme of politicks. Nothing interpofes, to prevent the full operation of all the caprices and all the paffions of a court upon the fervants of the publick, The system of administration is open to continual fhocks and changes, upon the principles of the meaneft cabal, and the most contemptible intrigue. Nothing can be folid and permanent. All good men at length fly with horrour from fuch a fervice. Men of rank and abi

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lity, with the fpirit which ought to animate fuch men in a free state, while they decline the jurifdiction of dark cabal on their actions and their fortunes, will, for both, chearfully put themselves upon their country. They will truft an inquifitive and diftinguishing parliament; because it does enquire, and does diftinguifh. If they act well, they know, that in fuch a parliament, they will be fupported against any intrigue; if they act ill, they know that no intrigue can protect them. This fituation, however awful, is honourable. one hour, and in the self fame affembly, without any affigned or affignable caufe, to be precipitated from the higheft authority to the moft marked neglect, poffibly into the greateft peril of life and reputation, is a fituation full of danger, and deftitute of honour. It will be fhunned equally by every man of prudence, and every man of spirit.

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Such are the confequences of the divifion of court from the adminiftration; and of the divifion of publick men among themfelves. By the former of thefe, lawful government is undone; by the latter, all oppofition to lawless power is rendered impotent. Government may in a great measure be restored, if any confiderable bodies of men have honefty and refolution enough never to accept administration, unless this garrifon of king's men, which is ftationed, as in a citadel, to controul and enflave it, be entirely broken and difbanded,

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banded, and every work they have thrown up be levelled with the ground. The difpofition of publick men to keep this corps together, and to act under it, or to co-operate with it, is a touch-ftone by which every adminiftration ought in future to be tried. There has not been one which has not fufficiently experienced the utter incompatibility of that faction with the publick peace, and with all the ends of good government: fince, if they oppofed it, they foon loft every power of ferving the crown; if they fubmitted to it, they loft all the efteem of their country. Until minifters give to the publick a full proof of their entire alienation from that fyftem, however plaufible their pretences, we may be fure they are more intent on the emoluments than the duties of office. If they refuse to give this proof, we know of what stuff they are made. In this particular, it ought to be the electors bufinefs to look to their reprefentatives. The electors ought to esteem it no lefs culpable in their member to give a fingle vote in parliament to fuch an administration, than to take an office under it; to endure it, than to act in it. The notorious infidelity and versatility of members of parliament, in their opinions of men and things, ought in a particular manner to be confidered by the electors in the enquiry which is recommended to them, This is one of the principal holdings of that deftructive fyftem, which has endeavoured to un

hinge all the virtuous, honourable, and ufeful connexions in the kingdom.

This cabal has, with great fuccefs, propagated a doctrine which ferves for a colour to thofe acts of treachery; and whilst it receives any degree of countenance, it will be utterly fenfelefs to look for a vigorous oppofition to the court party. The doctrine is this: That all political connexions are in their nature factious, and as fuch ought to be diffipated and deftroyed; and that the rule for forming administrations is mere personal ability, rated by the judgment of this cabal upon it, and taken by draughts from every divifion and denomination of publick men. This decree was folemnly promulgated by the head of the court corps, the Earl of Bute himself, in a speech which he made, in the year 1766, against the then admi-niftration, the only adminiftration which he has ever been known directly and publickly to oppofe.

It is indeed in no way wonderful, that fuch perfons fhould make fuch declarations. That connexion and faction are equivalent terms, is an opinion which has been carefully inculcated at all times by unconftitutional statefimen. The reafon is evident. Whilft men are linked together, they eafily and fpeedily communicate the alarm of any evil defign. They are enabled to fathom it with common counsel, and to oppose it with united strength. Whereas, when they lie difperfed, without concert,

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order, or discipline, communication is uncertain, counfel difficult, and refiftance impracticable. Where men are not acquainted with each other's principles nor experienced in each other's talents, nor at all practifed in their mutual habitudes and difpofitions by joint efforts in business; no perfonal confidence, no friendship, no common intereft, fubfifting among them; it is evidently impoffible that they can act a publick part with uniformity, perfeverance or efficacy. In a connexion, the most inconfiderable man, by adding to the weight of the whole, has his value, and his ufe; out of it, the greatest talents are wholly unserviceable to the publick. No man, who is not inflamed by vainglory into enthufiafm, can flatter himself that his fingle, unfupported, defultory, unsystematick endeavours are of power to defeat the subtle designs and united cabals of ambitious citizens. When bad men combine, the good must affociate; elfe they will fall, one by one, an unpitied facrifice in a contemptible struggle.

It is not enough in a fituation of truft in the commonwealth, that a man means well to his country; it is not enough that in his fingle perfon he never did an evil act, but always voted according to his confcience, and even harangued against every defign which he apprehended to be prejudicial to the interefts of his country. This innoxious and ineffectual character, that seems formed

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