the firft fervant of a court, in which prayers are morality, and kneeling is religion. Truft not too far to appearnces, by which your predeceffors have been deceived, though they have not been injured. Even the best of princes may at last difcover that this is a contention in which every thing may be loft but nothing can be gained; and as you became minifter by accident, were adopted without choice, trufted without confidence, and continued without favour, be affured that, whenever an occafion preffes, you will be discarded without even the forms of regret. You will then have reafon to be thankful, if you are permitted to retire to that feat of learning, which, in contemplation of the fyftem of your life, the comparative purity of your manners with thofe of their high fteward, and a thousand other recommending circumftances, has chofen you to encourage the growing virtue of their youth, and to prefide over their education. Whenever the fpirit of diftributing prebends and bifhopricks fhall have departed from you, you will find that learned feminary prefectly recovered from the delirium of an installation, and what in truth it ought to be, once more a peaceful scene of flumber and meditation. The venerable tutors of the university will no longer diftrefs your modefty, by proposing you for a pattern to their pupils. The learned dulness

of

of declamation will be filent; and even the venal mufe, though happiest in fiction, will forget your virtues. Yet, for the benefit of the fucceeding age, I could wish that your retreat might be deferred until your morals fhall happily be ripened to that maturity of corruption, at which philofophers tell us, the worst examples cease to be contagious. JUNIUS.

LETTER XV,

TO THE PRINTER OF THE PUBLIC ADVERTISER.

A

SIR,

Great deal of useless argument might have been faved, in the political conteft, which has arifen from the expulfion of Mr. Wilkes, and the fabfequent appointment of Mr. Luttrell, if the question had been once ftated with precifion, to the fatisfaction of each party, and clearly understood by them both. But in this, as in almost every other difpute, it ufually happens that much time is loft in referring to a multitude of cafes and precedents, which prove nothing to the purpose, or in maintaining propofitions, which are either not difputed, or, whether they be admitted or denied, are entirely indifferent as to the matter in debate; VOL. I.

G

until

until at last the mind, perplexed and confounded with the endless fubtleties of controverfy, lofes fight of the main queftion, and never arrives at truth. Both parties in the dispute are apt enough to practise thefe difhoneft artifices. The man who is confcious to the weakness of his caufe, is interested in concealing it: and on the other fide it is not uncommon to fee a good cause mangled by advocates who do not know the real strength of it.

I should be glad to know, for inftance, to what purpose in the prefent cafe fo many precedents. have been produced to prove, that the house of commons have a right to expell one of their own members; that it belongs to them to judge of the validity of elections; or that the law of parliament is part of the law of the land? After all these propofitions are admitted, Mr. Luttrell's right to his feat will continue to be just as disputable as it was before. Not one of them is at prefent in agitation. Let it be admitted that the house of commons were authorised to expel Mr. Wilkes; that thay are the proper court to judge of elections, and that the law of parliament is binding upon the people; ftill it remains to be enquired whether the house, by their refolution in favour of Mr. Luttrell, have or have not truly declared that law. To facilitate this enquiry, I would have the queftion cleared of all foreign or

indif

indifferent matter.

The following ftate of it will probably be thought a fair one by both parties; and then I imagine there is no gentleman in this country who will not be capable of forming a judicious and true opinion upon it. I take the queftion to be strictly this: Whether or no it be the known established law of parliament, that the expulfion of a member of the house of commons of itself creates in him fuch an incapacity to be re-elected, that, at a fubfequent election, any votes given to him are null and void, and that any other candidate, who, except the perfon expeled, has the greatest number of votes, ought to be the fitting member?

To prove that the affirmative is the law of parliament, I apprehended it is not fufficient for the prefent house of commons to declare it to be fo. We may shut our eyes indeed to the dangerous confequences of suffering one branch of the legitlature to declare new laws, without argument or example, and it may perhaps be prudent enough to submit to authority; but a mere affertion will never convince, much lefs will it be thought reafonable to prove the right by the fact itself. The miniftry have not yet pretended to fuch a tyranny over our minds. To fupport the affirmative fairly, it will either be neceffary to produce fome ftatute in which that pofitive provifion shall have been

made, that specific disability clearly created, and the confequences of it declared; or, if there be no fuch statute, the custom of parliament must then be referred to and some case or cafes, ftrictly in point, must be produced, with the decifion of the court upon them; for I readily admit that the custom of parliament, once clearly proved, is equally binding with the common and statute law. The confideration of what may be reasonable or unreasonable makes no part of this question. are enquiring what the law is not what it ought to be. Reafon may be applied to fhew the improperiety or expedience of a law, but we must have either statute or precedent to prove the exiftence of it. At the fame time I do not mean to admit that the late refolution of the house of commons is defenfible on general principles of reafon, any more than in law. This is not the hinge on which the debate turns.

We

Suppofing therefore that I have laid down an accurate state of the question, I will venture to affirm, ift. That there is no ftatute exifting by which that specific difablity, which we speak of, is created. If there be, let it be produced. The argument will then be at an end.

2dly: That there is no precedent in all the proceedings of the house of commons which comes entirely home to the prefent cafe, viz, where an ' expelled