and be aided, in any one fyftem of public utility? I remember an old fcholaftic aphorifin, which fays, "that the man who lives wholly detached "from others, must be either an angel or a "devil." When I fee in any of these detached gentlemen of our times the angelic purity, power, and beneficence, I fhall admit them to be angels. In the mean time we are born only to be men. We fhall do enough if we form ourselves to be good ones. It is therefore our bufinefs carefully to cultivate in our minds, to rear to the most perfect vigour and maturity, every fort of generous and honeft feeling that belongs to our nature. To bring the difpofitions that are lovely in private life into the fervice and conduct of the commonwealth; so to be patriots, as not to forget we are gentlemen. To cultivate friendfhips, and to incur enmities. To have both ftrong, but both felected: in the one, to be placable; in the other, immoveable. To model our principles to our duties and our fituation. To be fully perfuaded, that all virtue which is impracticable is fpurious; and rather to run the rifque of falling into faults in a course which leads us to act with effect and energy, than to loiter out our days without blame, and without ufe. Public life is a fituation of power and energy; he trefpaffes against his duty who fleeps upon his watch, as well as he that goes over to the enemy. It There is, however, a time for all things. is not every conjuncture which calls with equal I 2 force force upon the activity of honest men; but critical exigencies now and then arife; and I am mistaken, if this be not one of them. Men will fee the neceffity of honeft combination; but they may fee it when it is too late. They may embody, when it will be ruinous to themselves, and of no advantage to the country; when, for want of fuch a timely union as may enable them to oppofe in favour of the laws, with the laws on their fide, they may, at length, find themselves under the neceffity of confpiring, instead of confulting. The law, for which they ftand, may become a weapon in the hands of its bitterest enemies; and they will be caft, at length, into that miserable alternative, between flavery and civil confufion, which no good man can look upon without horror; an alternative in which it is impoffible he fhould take either part, with a confcience perfectly at repofe. To keep that fituation of guilt and remorfe at the utmost distance, is, therefore, our first obligation. Early activity may prevent late and fruitlefs violence. As yet we work in the light. The scheme of the enemies of public tranquillity has difarranged, it has not destroyed us. If the reader believes that there really exists fuch a Faction as I have defcribed; a Faction ruling by the private inclinations of a Court, against the general fenfe of the people; and that this Faction, whilft it pursues a scheme for undermining all the foundations of our freedom, weakens (for the present at least) all the powers of executory Government, rendering us abroad contemptible, contemptible, and at home distracted; he will believe alfo, that nothing but a firm combination of public men against this body, and that, too, fupported by the hearty concurrence of the people at large, can poffibly get the better of it. The people will fee the neceffity of reftoring public men to an attention to the public opinion, and of restoring the conftitution to its original principles. Above all, they will endeavour to keep the House of Commons from affùming a character which does not belong to it. They will endeavour to keep that House, for its exiftence, for its powers, and its privileges, as independent of every other, and as dependent upon themselves, as poffible. This fervitude is to an House of Commons (like obedience to the Divine law) perfect freedom." For if they once quit this natural, rational, and liberal obedience, having deferted the only proper foundation of their power, they must feek a fupport in an abject and unnatural dependence fomewhere else. When, through the medium of this juft connexion with their conftituents, the genuine dignity of the Houfe of Commons is reftored, it will begin to think of cafting from it, with fcorn, as badges of fervility, all the falfe ornaments of illegal power, with which it has been, for fome time, disgraced. It will begin to think of its old office of CONTROUL. It will not fuffer, that laft of evils, to predominate in the country; men without popular confidence, public opinion, natural connexion, or mutual truft, invefted with all the powers of Govenment. When When they have learned this leffon themselves, they will be willing and able to teach the Court, that it is the true intereft of the Prince to have but one Adminiftration; and that one compofed of those who recommend themselves to their Sovereign through the opinion of their country, and not by their obfequioufness to a favourite. Such men will ferve their Sovereign with affection and fidelity; because his choice of them, upon fuch principles, is a compliment to their virtue. They will be able to ferve him effectually; because they will add the weight of the country to the force of the executory power. They will be able to serve their King with dignity; because they will never abuse his name to the gratification of their private spleen or avarice. This, with allowances for human frailty, may -probably be the general character of a Ministry, which thinks itself accountable to the House of Commons; when the Houfe of Commons thinks itself accountable to its conftituents. If other ideas should prevail, things must remain in their prefent confufion; until they are hurried into all the rage of civil violence; or until they fink into the dead repose of defpotifm. THE EN D. |