A Letter from the Right Honourable 
 Edmund Burke to a Noble Lord
 
 THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 CALIFORNIA 
 LOS ANGELES 
 
 OF
 
 A LETTER 
 
 FROM THE RIGHT HONOURABLE 
 
 EDMUND BURKE 
 
 TO 
 
 A NOBLE LORD, 
 
 ON THE 
 
 i 
 
 ATTACKS MADE UPON HIM AND HIS PENSION, 
 
 IN 
 
 The Houfe of Lords, 
 
 BY 
 
 THE DUKE OF BEDFORD 
 
 ANH THE 
 
 EARL OF LAUDERDALE, 
 
 Early in the prefent Seflions of Parliament. 
 
 Eontton : 
 
 PRINTED FOR J. OWEN, NO. 1 68, PICCADILLY, AND F. AND C. 
 Kl V1NGTON, NO. 62, ST. P AUI/S CHURCH-YARD. 
 
 1796.
 
 MY LORD, 
 
 T COULD hardly flatter myfelf with the hope, 
 that fo very early in the feafon I (houldhave 
 to acknowledge obligations to the Duke of 
 Bedford and to the Earl of Lauderdale. Thefe 
 noble perfons have loft no time in conferring 
 upon me, that fort of honour, which it is alone 
 within their competence, and which it is cer- 
 tainly mod congenial to their nature and their 
 manners to beilow. 
 
 To be ill fpoken of, in whatever language 
 they fpeak, by the zealots of the new fed in 
 philofophy and politicks, of which thefe nobl-e 
 perfons think fo charitably, and of which others 
 think fojuftly, to me, is no matter of uneafmefs 
 or furprife. To have incurred the difpleafure of 
 the Duke of Orleans or the Duke of Bedford, to 
 
 n fall 
 
 868409
 
 fall under the cenfure of Citizen Briffot or of hb 
 friend the Earl of Lauderdale, I ought to confider 
 as proofs, not the Icaft fatisfactory, that I have 
 produced fome part of the effect I propofed by 
 my endeavours. I have laboured hard to earn, 
 what the noble Lords are generous enough to 
 pay. Perfonal offence I have given them none. 
 The part they take againft me is from zeal to 
 the caufe. It is well ! It is perfectly well ! I 
 have to do homage to their juftice. 1 have to 
 thank the Bedfbrds and the Lauderdales for 
 having fo faithfully and fo fully acquitted to- 
 wards me whatever arrear of debt was left un- 
 difcharged by the Prieflleys and the Paines. 
 
 Some, perhaps, may think them executors in 
 their own wrong : I at leaft have nothing to 
 complain of. They have gone beyond the 
 demands of juftice. They have been (a little 
 perhaps beyond their intention) favourable 
 to me. They have been the means of bring- 
 ing out, by their invectives, the handfome 
 things which Lord Grenville has had the 
 goodnefs and condefcenfion to fay in my be- 
 half, Retired as I am from the world, and 
 from all it's affairs and all it's pleafures, I con- 
 fefs it does kindle, in my nearly extinguifhed 
 
 feelings,
 
 ( 3 ) 
 
 feelings, a very vivid fatisfa&ion to be fo at- 
 tacked and fo commended. It is foothing to 
 my wounded mind, to be commended by an 
 able, vigorous, and well informed ftatefman, 
 and at the very moment when he (lands forth 
 with a manlinefs andrefolution, worthy of him- 
 felf and of his caufe, for the prefervation of the 
 perfon and government of our Sovereign, and 
 therein for the fecurity of the laws, the liberties, 
 the morals, and the lives of his people. To be 
 in any fair way connected with fuch things, is 
 indeed a diftinction. No philofophy can make 
 me above it : no melancholy can deprefs me fo 
 low, as to make me wholly infenfible to fuch an 
 honour. 
 
 Why will they not let me remain in obfcu- 
 rity and inaction ? Are they apprehenflve, that 
 if an atom of me remains, the fed has fomething 
 to fear ? Muft I be annihilated, left, like old 
 John Zifca's, my Ikin might be made into 
 a drum, to animate Europe to eternal battle, 
 againfl. a tyranny that threatens to overwhelm 
 all Europe, and all the human race ? 
 
 My Lord, it is a fubjeft of aweful meditation. 
 
 Before this of France, the annals of all time 
 
 B 2 have
 
 ( 4 ) 
 
 have not furniihed an inftance of a cowpleat 
 revolution. That revolution feems to have ex- 
 tended even to the conftitution of the mind of 
 man. It has this of wonderful in it, that it re-i 
 fembles what Lord Verulam fays of the operations 
 of nature : It was perfect, not only in all its ele- 
 ments and principles, but in all it's members and 
 it's organs from the very beginning. The moral 
 fcheme of France furniflies the only pattern ever 
 known, which they who admire will itiftantly 
 refemble. It is indeed an inexhauftible reper- 
 tory of one kind of examples. In my wretched 
 condition, though hardiy to be claiTed with 
 the living, I am not fafe from them. They 
 have tygers to fall upon animated flrength. 
 They have hyenas to prey upon carcafles. The 
 national menagerie is collected by the firft phy- 
 fiologifts of the time ; and it is defective in no. 
 defcription of favage nature. They purfue, even 
 fuch as me, into the obfcureft retreats, and haul 
 them before their revolutionary tribunals. Neir 
 ther fex, nor age not the fanctuary of the tomb 
 is facred to them. They have fo determined a. 
 hatred to all privileged orders, that they deny 
 even to the departed, the fad immunities of the 
 grave. They are not wholly without an ob- 
 ject. Their turpitude purveys to their malice j
 
 ( 5 ) 
 
 and they unplumb the dead for bullets to afTaf- 
 finate the living. If all re volution ids were not 
 proof againft all caution, I fhould recommend it 
 to their consideration, that no perfons were ever 
 known in hiftory, either facred or profane, to 
 vex the fepulchre, and by their forceries, to call 
 up the prophetic dead, with any other event, 
 than the prediction of their own difaflrous fate,* 
 * " Leave me, oh leave me to repofe !" 
 
 In one thing I can excufe the Duke of Bed- 
 ford for his attack upon me and mymortuary 
 penfion. He cannot readily comprehend die 
 tranfaction he condemns. What I have ob- 
 tained was the fruit of no bargain ; the produc- 
 tion of no intrigue j the refult of no compromife ; 
 the effect: of no felicitation. The firft fuggeftion 
 of it never came from me, mediately or imme- 
 diately, to his Majefty or any of his Minifters. 
 It was long known that the inftant my engage- 
 ments would permit it, and before the heavieft 
 of all calamities had for ever condemned me to 
 obfcurity and forrow, I had refolved on a 
 total retreat. I had executed that defign. I 
 was entirely out of the way of ferving or of 
 hurting any ftatefman, or any party, when the 
 fo generoufly and fo nobly carried 
 
 into
 
 ( 6 ) 
 
 into effect the (pontaneous bounty of the Crown. 
 Both defcriptions have acted as became them. 
 When I could no longer ferve them, the Mini- 
 flers have confidered my fituation. When I 
 eould no longer hurt them, the revolutionifts 
 have trampled on my infirmity. My gratitude, 
 I truft, is equal to the manner in which the be- 
 nefit was conferred. It came to me indeed, at 
 a time of life, and in a ftate of mind and body, 
 in which no circumflance of fortune could af- 
 ford me any real pleafure. But this was no 
 fault in the Royal Donor, or in his Minifters, 
 who were pleafed, in acknowledging the merits 
 of an invalid fervant of the publick, to affuage 
 the forrows of a defolate old man. 
 
 It would ill become me to boaft of any thing. 
 It would as ill become me, thus called upon, to 
 depreciate the value of a long life, fpent with 
 unexampled toil in the fervice of my country. 
 Since the total body of my fervices, on ac- 
 count of theinduftry which was fliewn in them, 
 and the fairnefs of my intentidns, have ob- 
 tained the acceptance of my Sovereign, it would 
 be abfurd in me to range myfelf on the fide of 
 the Duke of Bedford and the Correfponding 
 Society, or, as far as in me lies, to permit a dif- 
 pute on the rate at which the authority appointed 
 
 by
 
 ( 7 ) 
 
 fey our Conftitution to eftimate fuch things, has 
 been pleafed to lei ihem. 
 
 Loofe libels ought to be pafled by in filence 
 and contempt. By me they have been fo al- 
 ways. I knew that as long as I remained in 
 publick, I fhould live down the calumnies of 
 malice, and ihe judgments of ignorance. If I 
 happened to be now and then in the wrong, as 
 who is not, like all other men, I mud bear the 
 contequence of my faults and my miftakes. 
 The libels of the prefent day, are juft of the 
 fame fluff as the libels of the paft. But they 
 derive an importance from the rank of the per- 
 fons they come from, and the gravity of the place 
 where they were uttered. In fome way or other 
 I ought to take fome notice of them. To 
 aflert myfrlf thus traduced is not vanity or arro- 
 gance. It is a demand of juftice; it is a demon- 
 ftration of gratitude. If I am unworthy, the 
 Minifters are worfe than prodigal. On that hv- 
 pothefis, 1 perfectly agree with the Duke of Bed- 
 ford. 
 
 For whatever I have been (I am now no more) 
 I put myfelf on my country. I ought to be 
 allowed a reafonable freedom, becaufe I ftand 
 upon my deliverance ; and no culprit ought to 
 
 plead
 
 ( 8 ) 
 
 plead in irons. Even in the utmoft latitude of 
 defenfive liberty, I wifh to preferve all poflible 
 decorum. Whatever it may be in the eyes 
 of thefe noble perfons themfelves, to me, their 
 fit nation calls for the moft profound refpect. If I 
 fhould happen to trefpafs a little, which 1 truft I 
 final 1 not, let it always be fuppofed, that a con- 
 iulion -of characters may produce miftakes; 
 that in the mafquerades of the grand carnival of 
 our age, whimfical adventures happen j odd 
 things are faid and pafs off. If I fhould 
 fail a fingle point in the high refpect 1 owe 
 to thofe illuftrious perfons, I cannot be fup- 
 pofed to mean the Duke of Bedford and the 
 Earl of Lauderdale of the Houfe of Peers, but 
 the Duke of Bedford and the Earl of Lauder- 
 dale of Palace Yard ; The Dukes and Earls of 
 Brentford. There they are on the pavement ; 
 there they feem to come nearer to my humble 
 level ; and, virtually at leaft, to have waved 
 their high privilege. 
 
 Making this proteflation, I refufe all re- 
 volutionary tribunals, where men have been 
 put to death for no other reafon, than that they 
 had obtained favours from the Crown. I claim, 
 not the letter, but the fpirit of the old Englim 
 law, that i. c , to be tried by my peers. I decline 
 
 his
 
 ( 9 ) 
 
 his Grace's jurifdidion as a judge. I challenge 
 the Duke of Bedford as a juror to pafs upon the 
 value of my ftrvices. Whatever his natural parts 
 may be, I cannot recognize in his few and idle 
 years, the competence to judge of my long and 
 laborious life. If I can help it, he (hall not be on 
 the inqueft of my quantum meruit. Poor rich 
 man! He can hardiy know any thing of publick 
 induflry in it's exertions, or can eftimate it's com- 
 penfations when it's work is done. I have no 
 doubt of his Grace's readinefs in all the calcula- 
 tions of vulgar arithaietick ; but I (hrewdly fuf- 
 pect, that he is very little ftudied in the theory 
 of moral proportions ; and has never learned 
 the Rule of Three in the arithmetick of policy 
 and ftate. 
 
 His Grace thinks I have obtained too much. 
 I anfwer, that my exertions, whatever they 
 have been, were fuch as no hopes of pecuniary 
 reward could poffibly excite; and no pecu- 
 niary compenfation can poffibly reward them. 
 Between money and fuch fervices, if done by 
 abler men than I am, there is no common prin- 
 ciple of comparifon : they are quantities incom- 
 menfurable. Money is made for the comfort and 
 convenience of animal life. It cannot be a re- 
 ward for what, mere animal life muft incjeed fuf- 
 c tain>
 
 C 10 ) 
 
 tain, but never can infpire. With fubmifiion 
 to his Grace, I have not had more than fuffi- 
 citnt. As to any noble ufe, I truft I know how 
 to employ, as well as he, a much greater fortune 
 than he pofferTes. In a more confined applica- 
 tion, I certainly ftand in need of every kind of 
 relief and eafement much more than he docs. 
 When I fay 1 have not received more than I de- 
 ferve, is this the language I hold to Majefty ? 
 No! Far, very far, from it! Before that pi efence, 
 I claim no merit at all. Every thing towards me 
 is favour, and bounty. One ftyle to a gracious 
 benefactor; another to a proud and infultmg foe. 
 
 His Grace is pleafed to aggravate my guilt, 
 by charging my acceptance of his Majefty's 
 grant as a departure from my ideas, and the 
 fpirit of my ccnduA with regard to cecono- 
 my. If it be, my ideas of ceconomy were falfe 
 and ill founded. But they are the Duke of 
 Bedford's ideas of ceconomy I have contradicted, 
 and not my own. If he means to allude to cer- 
 tain bills brought in by me on a meflage from 
 the throne in 1782, I tell him, that there is no- 
 thing in my conduct: that can contradict either 
 the letter or the fpirit of thofe acts. Does he 
 mean the pay-office act ? I take it for granted 
 he does not. The act to which he alludes is, 
 
 I fuppofej
 
 ( II ) 
 
 I fuppofe, the eftablimrr em aft. I greatly doubt 
 whether his Grace has ever read the one or the 
 other. The firft of thefe fyftems coft me, with 
 every afliftance which my then fituation gave me, 
 pains incredible. I found an opinion common 
 through all the offices, and general in the pub- 
 lick at large, that it would prove impoffible to 
 reform and methodize the office of Paymafter 
 General. I undertook it, however; and I fuc- 
 ceeded in my undertaking. Whether the mili- 
 tary fervice, or whether the general oeconomy of 
 our finances have profited by' that act, I leave 
 to thole who are acquainted with the army, and 
 with the treafury, to judge. 
 
 An opinion full as general prevailed alfo at the 
 fame time, that nothing could be done for the re- 
 gulation of the civil-lift eftablimment. The very 
 attempt to introduce method into it, and any li- 
 mitations to it's fervices, was held abfurd. I 
 had not feen the man, who fo much as fuggeft- 
 cd one oeconomical principle, or an oeconomkal 
 expedient, upon that fubjeft. Nothing but 
 coarfe amputation, or coarfer taxation, were 
 then talked of, both of them without defign, 
 combination, or the leaft fhadow of principle. 
 Blind and headlong zeal, or factious fury, were 
 the whole contribution brought by the moft 
 
 c 2 noi/y
 
 noify on that occafion, towards the fatisfa&ioji 
 of the publick, or the relief of the Crown. 
 
 Let me tell my youthful Cenfor, that the 
 neceflities of that time required fomething 
 very different: from what others then iug- 
 gefted, or what his Grace now couceives. Let 
 me inform him, that it was. one of the moft cri- 
 tical periods in our annals. 
 
 Aflronomers have fuppofed, that if a certain 
 comet, \\hofe path interfered the ediptick, had 
 met the earth ip fome (1 forget what) li^n, it 
 would have whirled us along wiih it, in it's ex- 
 centrick courle, into God knows what regions of 
 heat and cold. Had the portentous comet of 
 the rights of man, (which " from it's horrid hair 
 " {hakes peftiJence, and war," and " with fear of 
 " change perplexes Monarchs") had that comet 
 croffed upon us in that internal iiate of Eng r 
 land, nothing human could have prevented our 
 bong irrelifijbly hurried, out of the highway 
 of heaven, into all the vices, crimes, horrours 
 and miferies of the French revolution. 
 
 Happily, France was not then jacobinized. 
 Her hoftility was at a good diftance. We had 
 a limb cut off $ but we preferved the body: We 
 
 loft
 
 ( 13 ) 
 
 loft our Colonies; but we kept our Conftitu- 
 tion. There was, indeed, much inteftine heat; 
 there was a dreadful fermentation. Wild and 
 favage inlurredion quitted the woods, and 
 prowled about our (treets in the name of re- 
 form. Such was the diftemper of the publick 
 mind, that there was no madman, in his nv.ddeft 
 ideas, and maddeft projects, who mighjt not 
 count upon numbers to iupport his principles 
 and execute his defigns. 
 
 Many of the changes, by a great mifnomer 
 called parliamentary reforms, werit, not in the 
 intention of all the profeffors and lupporters of 
 them,' undoubtedly, but went in their certain, 
 and, in my opinion, not very remote effect, 
 home to the utter deftruction of the Conltitution 
 of this kingdom. Had they taken place, not 
 France, but England, would have had the honour 
 of leading upthedeath-danceofDemocratick Re- 
 volution. Other projects, exactly coincident ui 
 time with thofe, ftruck at the very exiftence 
 of the kingdom under any constitution. There 
 are who remember the blind fury of fome, and 
 the lamentable htlplefihefs of others ; here, a 
 torpid confuHon, from a panic fear of the danger ; 
 there, the fame inaction from a ftupid infenlibi- 
 lity to it; here, well-withers to the mifchief; 
 
 there,
 
 there, indifferent lookers-on. At the fame 
 time, a fort of National Convention, dubious 
 in its nature, and perilous in its example, nofed 
 Parliament in the very feat of its authority ; fat 
 with a fort of fuperintendance over it; and little 
 lefs than dilated to it, not only laws, but the 
 very form and eflence of Legiflature itfelf. In 
 Ireland things ran in a ftill more eccentrick courfe. 
 Government was unnerved, confounded, and in 
 a manner fufpended. It's equipoife was totally 
 gone. I do not mean to fpeak difrefpectfully of 
 Lord North. He was a man of admirable parts; of 
 general knowledge; of a verfatile underftanding 
 fitted for every fort of bufinefs ; of infinite wit 
 and pleafantry ; of a delightful temper; and with 
 a mind moft perfectly difmterefted. But it would 
 be only to degrade myfelf by a weak adulation, 
 and not to honour the memory of a great man, 
 to deny that he wanted fomething of the vi- 
 gilance, and fpirit of command, that the time 
 required. Indeed, a darknefs, next to the fog 
 of this awful day, loured over the whole region. 
 For a little time the helm appeared abandoned 
 
 Ipfe diem no&emque negat difcernere ccdo 
 Nee meminifle viae medi Palinurus in undi. 
 
 At that time I was connected with men of 
 high place in the community. They loved Li- 
 berty
 
 berty as much as the Duke of Bedford can do; 
 ami they underftood it at lead as well. Perhaps 
 their politicks, as ufual, took a tincture from 
 their character, and they cultivated what they 
 loved. The Liberty they purfued was a 
 Liberty infeparable from order, from virtue, 
 from morals, and from religion, and was neither 
 hypocritically nor fanatically followed. They 
 did not wifh, that Liberty, in itfelf, one of the 
 firft of blefllngs, mould in it's perverfion become 
 the greateft curfe which ox Id fall upon man- 
 kind. To preferve the Conftitution entire, and 
 practically equal to all the great ends of it's for- 
 mation, not in one fingle part, but in all it's 
 parts, was to them the firft object. Popularity 
 and power they regarded alike. Thefe were with 
 them only different means of obtaining that ob- 
 ject ; and had no preference over each other in 
 their minds, but as one or the other might af- 
 ford a furer or a lefs certain profpect of arriving 
 at that end. It is fome confolation to me in 
 the chearlefs gloom, which darkens the evening 
 of my life, that with them I commenced my 
 political career, and never for a moment, in 
 reality, nor in appearance, for any length of 
 time, was fepai ated from their good wimes and 
 good opinion. 
 
 By what accident it matters not, nor upon 
 what defert, but juft then, and in the midft of 
 
 that
 
 that hunt of obloquy, which ever has purfued 
 me with a full cry through life, I had obtained 
 a very confiderable degree of publick confi- 
 dence. 1 know well enough how equivocal a 
 teft this kind of popular opinion forms of the 
 merit that obtained it. I am no ftranger to the 
 infecurity of it's tenure. I do not boaft of it. 
 It is mentioned, to fliew,not how highly 1 prize 
 the thing, but my right to value the ufe I made 
 of it. J endeavoured to turn that (hort-lived 
 advantage romyfelf into a permanent benefit to 
 my Country. Far am I from detracting from 
 the merit of fome Gentlemen, out of office or 
 in it, on that occafion. No ! It is not my way 
 to refufe a full and heaped meafure of juftice 
 to the aids that I receive. I have, through 
 life, been willing to give every thing to others; 
 and to referve nothing for myfelf, but the 
 inward confcience, that I had omitted no pains, 
 to difcover, to animate, to difcipline, to di- 
 rect the abilities of the Country for it's fer- 
 vice, and to place them in the beft light to 
 improve their age, or to adorn it. This con- 
 fcience I have. I have never fupprefled any 
 man j never checked him for a moment in his 
 courfe, by any jeiloufy, or by any policy. I was 
 always ready, to the height of my means (and they 
 were always infinitely below my defires) to for- 
 ward thofe abilities which overpowered my own. 
 
 He
 
 ( I? ) 
 
 He is an ill-furniflied undertaker, who has no 
 machinery but his own hands to work with. 
 Poor in my own faculties, I ever thought myfelf 
 rich in theirs. In that period of difficulty and dan- 
 ger, more efpecially, I confulted, and lincerely 
 co-operated with men of all parties, who feemed 
 difpofed to the fame ends, or to any main part 
 of them. Nothing, to prevent diforder, was 
 omitted : when it appeared, nothing to fubdue 
 it, was left uncounfelled, nor unexecuted, as 
 far as I could prevail. At the time I fpeak 
 of, and having a momentary lead, fo aided and 
 fo encouraged, and as a feeble inftrument in a 
 mighty hand I do not fay, 1 faved my Country; 
 I am fure I did my Country important fervice. 
 There were few, indeed, that did not at that 
 time acknowledge it, and that time was thirteen 
 years ago. It was but one voice, that no man in 
 the kingdom better deferved an honourable pro- 
 vifion mould be made for him. 
 
 So much for my general conduct through the 
 whole of the portentous crifis from 1780 to 
 1782, and the general fenfe then entertained of 
 that conduct by my country. But my charac- 
 ter, as a reformer, in the particular inftances 
 which the Duke of Bedford refers to, is fo con- 
 nected in principle with my opinions on the hi- 
 deous changes, which have fince barbarized 
 D France,
 
 France, and fpreading thence, threaten the po- 
 litical and moral order of the whole world, that 
 it feems to demand Something of a more detail- 
 ed difcuffion. 
 
 My oeconomical reforms were not, as his 
 Grace may think, the fuppreflion of a paltry pen- 
 lk>n or employment, more or lefs. GEconomy in 
 iny plans was, as it ought to be, fecondary, fub- 
 ordinate, infirumental. I acted on ftate prin- 
 ciples. J found a great diftemper in the com- 
 monwealth ; and, according to the nature of the 
 evil and of the object, I treated it. The malady 
 was deep; it was complicated, in the caufes and 
 in the fymptoms. Throughout it was full of con- 
 traindicants. On one hand Government, daily 
 growing more invidious for an apparent increafe 
 of the means of flrength, was eveiy day growing 
 more contemptible by real weaknefs. Nor was 
 this diffblution confined to Government com- 
 monly fo cnlled. It extended to Parliament; 
 which was lofmg not a little in it's dignity 
 and eftimation, by an opinion of it's not 
 acting on worthy motives. On the other 
 hand, the defires of the People, (partly na- 
 tural and partly infufed into them by art) ap- 
 peared i,n fo wild and inconfiderate a man- 
 ner, with regard to die ccconomical object 
 
 (for
 
 C '9 ) 
 
 (for I fet afide for a moment the dreadful tam- 
 pering with the body of the Conilitution itfelf) 
 that if their petitions had literally been complied 
 with, the State would have been convulfed ; and 
 a gate would have been opened, through which 
 all property might be facked and ravaged. 
 Nothing could have faved the Publick from the 
 mifchiefs of the falfe reform but it's abfurdity ; 
 which would foon have brought itfelf, and with 
 it all real reform, into difcredit. This would have 
 left a rankling wound in the hearts of the people 
 \vho would know they had failed in the accom- 
 plimment of their wimes, but who, like the reft of 
 mankind in all ages, would impute the blame to 
 any thing rather than to their own proceedings. 
 But there were then perfons in the world, who 
 nourimed complaint ; and would have been tho- 
 roughly difappointed if the people were ever fa- 
 tisfied. I was not of that humour. I wifhed 
 that they jhould be fatisfied. It was my aim to 
 give to the People the fubftance of what I knew 
 they defired, and what I thought was right 
 whether they defired it or not, before it had been 
 modified for them into fenfelefs petitions. I 
 knew that there is a manifeft marked diftinc- 
 tion, which ill men, with ill defigns, or weak 
 men incapable of any defign, will conftantly be 
 confounding, that is, a marked diftin'fljon be- 
 D 2 ween
 
 ( 20 ) 
 
 tween Change and Reformation. The former 
 alters the fubftance of the objects themfelves ; 
 and gets rid of all their eflential good, as well as 
 of all the accidental evil annexed to them. 
 Change is novelty; and whether it is to operate 
 any one of the effects of reformation at all, or 
 whether it may not contradict the very principle 
 upon which reformation is defired, cannot be cer- 
 tainly known beforehand. Reform is, not a 
 change in the fubftance, or in the primary mo- 
 dification of the object, but a direct application 
 of a remedy to the grievance complained of. 
 So far as that is removed, all is fure. It flops 
 there; and if it fails, the fubftance which un- 
 derwent the operation, at the very word, is but 
 where it was. 
 
 All this, in effect, I think, but am not fure, I 
 have faid elfewhere. It cannot at this time be 
 too often repeated ; line upon line ; precept upon 
 precept ; until it comes into the currency of a 
 proverb> ?o innovate is not to reform. The French 
 revolutionifts complained of every thing ; they 
 refufed to reform any thing; and they left no- 
 thing, no, nothing at all unchanged. The con- 
 fe'quences are before us, not in remote hiftory ; 
 not in future prognostication : they are about 
 tis ; they are upon us. They make the publick 
 p 2 fecurity;
 
 fecurity ; they- menace private enjoyment. They 
 dwarf the growth of the young ; they break the 
 quiet of the old. If we travel, they flop our 
 way. They infeft us in town ; they purfue us 
 to the country. Our bufmcfs is interrupted ; 
 our repofe is troubled ; our pleafures are fad- 
 dened ; our very {Indies are poifoned and per- 
 verted, and knowledge is rendered worfe than 
 ignorance, by the enormous evils of this dread- 
 ful innovation. The revolution harpies of 
 France, fprung from night and hell, or from that 
 chaotick anarchy, which generates equivocally 
 " all monftrous, all prodigious things," cuckoo- 
 like, adulteroufly lay their eggs, and brood 
 over, and hatch them in thentft of every neigh- 
 bouring State. Thefe obfcene harpies, who deck 
 themfelves, in I know not what divine attributes, 
 but who in reality are foul and ravenous birds 
 of prey (both mothers and daughters) flutter 
 over our heads, and foufe down upon our 
 tables, and leave nothing unrent, unrifled, un- 
 ravaged, or unpolluted with the flime of their 
 filthy offal *. 
 
 * Triilius baud illis monftrum, nee faevior ulla 
 Peftis, & ira Deum Stygiis fefe extulit undis. 
 Virginei volucrum vultus ; faediffima ventris 
 Proluvies; uncaeque manus j & pallida Temper 
 Ora fame- 
 Here
 
 If his Grace can contemplate ihe refult of this 
 compleat inoovation, or, as fome friends of his 
 will call it reform, in the whole body of it's 
 fo/lidity and compound mafs, at which, as Ham- 
 let fays, the face of Heaven glows with horrour 
 and indignation, and which, in truth, makes 
 every reflecting mind, and every feeling heart, 
 perfectly thought-lick, without a thorough ab- 
 horrence of every thing they fay, and every 
 thing they do, I am amazed at the morbid 
 ftrength, or the natural infirmity of his mind. 
 
 It was then not my love, but my hatred to 
 innovation, that produced my Plan of Reform. 
 Without troubling myfelf with the exactnefs of 
 the logical diagram, I confidered them as things 
 fubflantially oppofite. It was to prevent that 
 evil, that I propofed the meafures, which his 
 Grace is pleafed, and I am not forry he is pleaf- 
 cd, to recall to my recollection. I had (what 
 
 Here the Poet breaks the line, becaufe he (and that He is 
 Virgil) had not verfe or language to defcribe that monfter 
 even as he had conceived her. Had he lived to our time, he 
 would have been more overpowered with the reality than he 
 was with the imagination. Virgil only knew the horror of 
 the times before him. Had he Jived to fee the Revolutionifts 
 and Conftitutionalifts of France, he would have had more 
 horrid and difgufting features of his harpies to defcribe, and 
 more frequent failures in the attempt to defcribe them. 
 
 I hope
 
 I hope that Noble Duke will remember in all 
 his operations) a State to preferve, as well as a 
 State to reform. I had a People to gratify, but 
 not to inflame, or to miflead. I do not 
 claim half the credit for what I did, as for what 
 I prevented from being done. In that lunation 
 of the publick mind, I did not undertake, as 
 was then propofed, to new model the Houfe of 
 Commons or the Houfe of Lords; or to change 
 the authority under which any officer of the 
 Crown acted, who was fuffered at all to exift. 
 Crown, Lords, Commons, judicial fyftem, 
 fyftem of adminiftration, exifted as they had 
 ex i fled before ; and in the mode and manner in 
 which they had always exifted. My meafures 
 were, what I then truly dated them to the 
 Houfe to be, in their intent, healing and medi- 
 atorial. A complaint was made of too much 
 influence in tire Houfe of Commons; I re- 
 duced it in both Houfes ; and I gave my 
 reafons article by article for every reduction, 
 and fhewed why I thought it fafe for the 
 fervice of the State. I heaved the lead every 
 inch of way 1 made. A difpofition to ex- 
 pence was complained of; to that I op- 
 pofed, not mere retrenchment, but a fyflem of 
 osconomy, which would make a random ex- 
 pence without plan or forefight, in future not 
 
 eafily
 
 r * > 
 
 eafily practicable. I proceeded upon principles 
 of refearch -to put me in pofieflion of my mat- 
 ter; on principles of method to regulate it; and 
 on principles in the human mind and in civil 
 affairs to fecure and perpetuate the operation. 
 I conceived nothing arbitrarily ; nor propofed 
 any thing to be done by the will and pleafure of 
 others, or my own; but by reafon, and by reafon 
 only. 1 have ever abhorred, fince the firft dawn 
 of my underftanding to this it's obfcnre twi- 
 light, all the operations of opinion, fancy, in- 
 clination, and will, in the affairs of Govern- 
 ment, where only a fovereign reafon, paramount 
 to all forms of legiflation and adminiftration, 
 mould dictate. Government is made for the 
 very purpofe of oppofing that reafon to will and 
 to caprice, in the reformers or in the reformed, 
 in the governors or in the governed, in Kings, 
 in Senates, or in People. 
 
 . On a careful review, therefore, and analyfis of 
 all the component parts of the Civil Lift, and 
 on weighing them each againft other, in order to 
 make, as much as poflible, all of them a fub- 
 jecl; of eftimate (the foundation and corner- 
 ftone of all regular provident oeconomy) it ap- 
 peared to me evident, that this was impracti- 
 cable, whilft that part, called the Penfion Lift, 
 
 was
 
 
 
 was totally difcretionary in it's amount. For 
 this reafon, and for this only, I propofed to re- 
 duce it, both in it's grofs quantity, and in it's 
 larger individual proportions, to a certainty : 
 left, if it were left without a. general limit, it might 
 eat up the Civil Lift fervice; if fuffered to be 
 granted in portions too great for the fund,itmighc 
 defeat it's own end j and by unlimited allowances 
 to fome, it might difable the Crown in means of 
 providing for otheis. The Penfion Lift was to 
 be kept as a facred fund ; but it could not be kept 
 as a conftant open fund, fufficient for growing 
 demands, if fome demands could wholly devour 
 it. The tenour of the Act will (hew that it re- 
 garded the Civil Lift only y the reduction of which 
 to fome fort of cftimate was my great object. 
 
 No other of the Crown funds did I meddle 
 with, becaufe they had not the fame rela- 
 tions. This of the four and a half per cents 
 does his Grace imagine had efcaped me, or had 
 efcaped all the men of bufinefs, who acted with, 
 me in thofe regulations ? I knew that fuch a 
 fund t xifted, and that penfions had been always 
 granted on ir, before his Grace was born. This 
 fund was full in my eye. It was full in the eyes 
 of thofe who worked with me. It was left on 
 principle. On principle I did what was then
 
 done ; and on principle what was left undone 
 was omitted. I did not dare to rob the nation 
 of all funds to reward merit. If I prefled this 
 point too clofe, I acted contrary to the avowed 
 principles on which I went. Gentlemen are 
 very fond of quoting me ; but if any one thinks 
 it worth his while to know the rules that guided 
 me in my plan of reform, he will read my printed 
 fpeechon that fubject ; at leaft what is contained 
 from page 230 to page 241 in the fecond Volume 
 of the collection which a friend has given himfelf 
 the trouble to make of my publications. Be this 
 as it may, thefe two Bills (though atchieved with 
 the greateft labour, and management of every 
 fort, both within and without the Houfe) were 
 only a part, and but a fmall part, of a very large 
 fyftem, comprehending all the objects I ftated 
 in opening my proportion, and indeed many 
 more, which I juit hinted at in my Speech to the 
 Electors of Briftol, when I was put out of that 
 reprefentation. All thefe, in fome ftate or other 
 of forwardnefs, I have long had by me. 
 
 1 But do I juftify his Majefty's grace on thefe 
 grounds ? I think them the leaft of my fervicesl 
 The time gave them an occafional value : 
 What I have done in the way of political oeco- 
 nomy was far from confined to this body of 
 
 meafures.
 
 raeafures. I did not come into Parliament to con 
 my lefibn. I had earned my penlion before 
 I fee my foot in St. Stephen's Chapel. I was 
 prepared and difciplined to this political war- 
 fare. The firft feffion I fat in Parliament, I 
 found it necefiary to analyze the whole com- 
 mercial, financial, conftitutional and foreign in- 
 terefts of Great Britain and it's Empire. A 
 great deal was then done; and more, far more 
 would have been done, if more had been per- 
 mitted by events. Then in the vigour of my 
 manhood, my conftituuon funk under my la- 
 bour. Had I then died, (and I feemed to my- 
 felf very near death) I had then earned for thofe 
 who belonged to me, more than the Duke of 
 Bed ford's ideas of fervice are of power ro eftimate. 
 But in truth, thefe fervices I am called to ac- 
 count for, are not thofe on which I value myfelf 
 the moft. If I were to call for a reward (which 
 I have never done) it fliould be for thofe in 
 which for fourteen years, without intermiffion, I 
 mewed the moft induftry, and had the leaft fuc- 
 cefs; I mean in the affairs of India. They 
 are thofe on which I value myfelf the moft ; 
 moft for the importance; moft for the labour; 
 moft for the judgment ; moft for conftancy and 
 perfeverance in the purfuit. Others may value 
 E 2 them
 
 them moft for the intention. In that, furely, 
 they are not miftaken. 
 
 Does his Grace think, that they who ad- 
 vifed the Crown to make my retreat eafy, con- 
 fidered me only as an oeconomift * That, well 
 underftood, however, is a good deal. If I had 
 not deemed it of fome value, I mould not have 
 made political ceconomy an obje<ft of my humble 
 ftudies, from my very early youth to near the 
 end of my fervice in parliament, even before, 
 (at leaft to any knowledge of mine) it had 
 employed the thoughts of fpeculative men in 
 other parts of Europe. At that time, it was 
 ftill in it's infancy in England, where, in 
 the laft century, it had it's origin. Great and 
 learned men thought my ftudies were not wholly 
 thrown away, and deigned to communicate with 
 me now and then on fome particulars of their 
 immortal works. Something of thefe ftudies 
 may appear incidentally in fome of the ear- 
 Heft things I publifhed. The Houfe has been 
 witnefs to their effect, and has profited of 
 them more or Icfs, for above eight and twenty 
 years. 
 
 To their eftimate I leave the matter. I 
 was not, like his Grace of Bedford, fwaddled, 
 
 and
 
 and rocked, and dandled into a Legiflator ; 
 " Niter in adver/itm" is the motto for a man 
 like me. I poflefit-d not one of the qualities, 
 nor cultivated one of the arts, that recommend 
 men to the favour and protection of the great. 
 I was not made for a minion or a tool. As little 
 did I follow the trade of winning the hearts, by 
 impofing on the underftandings, of the people. 
 At every ftep of my progrefs in life (for in every 
 ftep was I traverfed and oppofed), and at every 
 turnpike I met, I was obliged to (hew my pair- 
 port, and again and again to prove my fole title 
 to the honour of being ufeful to my Country, by 
 a proof that I was not wholly unacquainted with 
 it's laws, and the whole fyftem of it's interefts both 
 abroad and at home. Otherwife no rank, no 
 toleration even, for me. I had no arts, but 
 manly arts. On them I have flood, and, pleafe 
 God, in fpiie of the Duke of Bedford and the 
 Earl of Lauderdale, to the laft gafp will I Hand. 
 
 Had his Grace condefcended to enquire 
 concerning the perfon, whom he has not thought 
 it below him to reproach, he might have found, 
 that in the whole courfe of my life, I have ne- 
 ver, on any pretence of ceconomy, or on any 
 other pretence, fo much as in a fingle inftancc, 
 ftood between any man and his reward of 
 
 fervice,
 
 ( 3 ) 
 
 fervice, or his encouragement in ufeful talent 
 and purfuit, from the higheft of thofe fervices 
 and purfuits'to the lowed. On the contrary I 
 nave, on an hundred occafions, exerted myfelf 
 with (ingular zeal to forward every man's even 
 tolerable pretenfions. I have more than once 
 had good-natured reptehenlions from my 
 friends for carrying the matter to fomething 
 bordering on abufe. This line of conduct, 
 whatever it's merits might be, was partly owing 
 to natural difpofition ; but 1 think full as much 
 to reafon and principle. 1 looked on the confi- 
 deration of publick fervice, or publick orna- 
 ment, to be real and very juftice : and I ever 
 held, a fcanty and penurious juftice to partake 
 of the nature of a wrong. I held it to be, in its 
 confequences, the worft osconomy in the world. 
 In faving money, I foon can count up all the 
 good I do ; but when by a cold penury, I blaft 
 the abilities of a nation, and ftunt the growth of 
 it's aclive energies, the ill I may do is beyond 
 all calculation. Whether it be too much or 
 too little, whatever I have done has been ge- 
 neral and fyftematick. I have aever entered 
 into thofe trifling vexations and oppreflive de- 
 tails, that have been falfely, and moft ridicu- 
 loufly laid to my charge. 
 
 Did
 
 ( 3' ) 
 
 Did I blame the penfions given to Mr. Barre 
 and Mr. Dunning between the propofition and 
 execution of my plan ? No ! furely, no ! Thofe 
 penfions were within my principles. I afiert it, 
 thofe gentlemen deferred their penfions, their 
 titles, all they had ; and if more they had, I 
 fhould have been but pleafed the more. They 
 were men of talents ; they were men of fervice., 
 I put the profeffion of the law out of the quef- 
 tion in one of them. It is a fervice that rewards 
 itfelf . But their pub/ick fervice , though, from their 
 abilities unqueftionably of more value than mine, 
 in it's quantity and in it's duration was not to 
 be mentioned with it. But I never could drive 
 a hard bargain in my life, concerning any mat- 
 ter whatever j and leaft of all do I know how 
 to haggle and huckfter with merit. Penfion for 
 myfelf I obtained none; nor did I folicit any. 
 Yet I was loaded with hatred for every thing 
 that was with held, and with obloquy for ever}' 
 thing that was given. I was thus left to fupport 
 the grants of a name ever dear to me, and ever 
 venerable to the world, in favour of thofe, who 
 were no friends of mine or of his, againft the 
 rude attacks of thofe who were at that time 
 friends to the grantees, and their own zealous 
 partizans. I have never heard the Earl of L,au- 
 derdale complain of thefe penfions. He finds 
 
 nothing
 
 nothing wrong till he comes to me. This is 
 impartiality, in the true modern revolutionary 
 ftyle. 
 
 Whatever I did at that time, fo far as it regard- 
 ed order and ceconomy, is flable and eternal ; as 
 all principles muft be. A particular order of 
 things may be altered ; order itfelf cannot lofe 
 its value. As to other particulars, they are va- 
 riable by time and by circumftances. Laws of 
 regulation are not fundamental laws. The pub- 
 lick exigencies are the matters of all fuch laws. 
 They rule the laws, and are not to be ruled by 
 them. They who exercife the legislative power 
 at the time muft judge. 
 
 It may be new to his Grace, but I beg leave 
 to tell him, that mere parfimbny is not cecono- 
 my. It is feparable in theory from it ; and in 
 fad it may, or it may not, be apart of ceconomy, 
 according to circumftanoes. Expence, and great 
 expence, may be an eflential part in true recono- 
 my. If pariimony were to be confidered as one 
 of the kinds of that virtue, there is however ano- 
 ther and an higher oeconomy. QEconomy is a 
 diftributive virtue, and conlifts not in faving* but 
 in feleclion. Parfimony requires no providence, 
 no fagacity, no powers of combination, no com- 
 
 parifon,
 
 ( 33 ) 
 
 parifon, no judgment. Meer inftinct, and that 
 not an inftinct of the nobleft kind, may produce 
 this falfe ceconomy in perfection. The other 
 ceconomy has larger views. It demands a difcri- 
 minating judgment, and a firm fagacious mind. 
 It fhuts one door to impudent importunity, only 
 to open another, and a wider, to unprefuming 
 merit. If none but meritorious fervice or real 
 talent were to be rewarded, this nation has not 
 wanted, and this nation will not want, the 
 means of rewarding all the fervice it ever will 
 receive, and encouraging all the merit it ever 
 will produce. No (late, fince the foundation of 
 fociety, has been impoverished by that fpecies 
 ofprofufion. Had the ceconomy of felection 
 and proportion been at all times obferved, we 
 mould not now have had an overgrown Duke 
 of Bedford, to opprefs the induftry of humble 
 men, and to limit by the ftandard of his own 
 conceptions, thejuftice, the bounty, or, if he 
 pleafes, the charity of the Crown. 
 
 His Grace may think as meanly as he will of 
 my deferts in the far greater part of my conduct 
 in life. It is free for him to do fo. There will 
 always be fome difference of opinion in the value 
 of political fervices. But there is one merit of 
 mine, which he, of all men living, ought to be 
 F the
 
 ( 34 ) 
 
 the lad to call in qneftion. I have fupported 
 with very great zeal, and I am told with fome 
 degree of fuccefs, thofe opinions, or if his Grace 
 likes another expreflion better, thofe old preju- 
 dices which buoy up the ponderous mafs of his 
 nobility, wealth, and titles. I have omitted no 
 exertion to prevent him and them from finking 
 to that level, to which the meretricious French 
 faction, his Grace at leaft coquets with, omit no 
 exertion to reduce both. I have done all I could 
 to difcountc-nance iheir enquiries into the for- 
 tunes of thofe, who hold large portions of wealth 
 without any apparent merit of their own. I have 
 ftrained every nerve to keep the Duke of Bed- 
 ford in that fituation, which alone makes him 
 my fuperior. Your Lordmip has been a wk- 
 r.efs otthe ufe he makes of that pre-eminence. 
 
 But be it, that this is virtue! Be it, that there 
 is virtue in this well fele&ed rigour; yet all vir- 
 tues are not equally becoming to all men and at 
 all times. There are crimes, undoubtedly 
 there are crimes, which in all feafons of our 
 exigence, ought to put a generous antipathy in 
 action ; crimes that provoke an indignant jutlice, 
 and call forth a warm and animated purfuit. 
 But all things, that concern, what I may call, the 
 pveveniue police of morality, all things mere- 
 
 "y
 
 ( 35 ) 
 
 ly rigid, harfli and ccnforial, the antiquated mo- 
 ralifts, at whofe feet I was brought up, would 
 net have thought thefe the fitteft marter to form 
 the favourite virtues of young men of rank. What 
 might have been well enough, and have been re- 
 ceived v, ith a veneration mixed \vith awe and 
 terrour, from an old, fevere, crabbed Cat o, would 
 have wanted fomething of propriety in the young 
 Scipios, the ornament of the Roman Nobility, in 
 the flower of their life. But the times, the mo- 
 rals, the matters, the fcholars have all under- 
 gone a thorough revolution. It is a vile illibe- 
 ral fchool, this new French academy of the fans 
 culottes. There is nothing in it that is fit fof a 
 Gentleman to learn. 
 
 Whatever it's vogue may be, I ftill flatter 
 myfelf, that the parents of the growing ge- 
 neration will be fatisfied with what is to be 
 taught to their children in Weftminfter, in 
 Eaton, or in Winchefter : I ftill indulge ihe 
 hope that no grown Gentleman or Nobleman of 
 our time will think of rimming at Mr. Thelw ill's 
 lecture whatever may have been left incom pleat 
 at the old Univerfities of his country. I would 
 give to Lord Grcnville and Mr. Pitt fora motto, 
 what was faid f a Roman Cenfor or Praetor (or 
 
 F 2 what
 
 ( 36 ) 
 
 what was he), who in virtue of a Senatus con- 
 fultum fhut up certain academies, 
 
 ' Cludere Ludum Impudcntiac juffit," 
 
 Every honeft father of a family in the kingdom 
 will rejoice at the breaking up for the holidays, 
 and will pray that there may be a very long va- 
 cation in all fuch fchools. 
 
 The awful ftate of the time, and not myfelf or 
 my own juftification, is my true object in what I 
 now write; or in what 1 (hall ever write or fay. 
 It little fignifies to the world what becomes of 
 fuch things as me, or even as the Duke of Bed- 
 ford. What I fay about either of us is nothing 
 more than a vehicle, as you, my Lord, will ea- 
 fily perceive, to convey my fentiments on matters 
 far more worthy of your attention. It is when I 
 ftick to my apparent firft fubject that 1 ought 
 to apologize, not when I depart from it. I there- 
 iore muft beg your Lordfhip's pardon for again 
 i'efuming it after this very fliort digrefiionj 
 aflurlng you that I (hall never altogether lofe 
 fight of fuch matter as perfons abler than I am 
 may turn to fome profit. 
 
 The
 
 ( 37 ) 
 
 The Duke of Bedford conceives, that he is 
 obliged to call the attention of the Houte of 
 Peers to his Majefty's granr to me, which he 
 confiders as exceflive and out of all bounds. 
 
 I know not how it has happened, but it really 
 feems, that, whilft his Grace was meditating his 
 well-confidered cenfure upon me, he fell into a 
 fort of fleep. Homer nods ; and the Duke of 
 Bedford may dream ; and as dreams (even his 
 golden dreams) are apt to be ill-pieced and in- 
 con gruoufly put together, his Grace preferved 
 his idea of reproach to me, but took the fubjecl:- 
 matter from the Crown-grants to his own fa- 
 mily. This is " the ftuffof which his dreams 
 are made." In that way of putting things toge- 
 ther his Grace is perfectly in the right. The 
 grants to the Houfe ofRuflel were fo enormous, 
 as not only to outrage ceconomy, but even to 
 ftagger credibility. The Duke of Bedford is the 
 Leviathan among all the creatures of the Crown. 
 He tumbles about his unwieldy bulk ; he plays 
 and frolicks in the ocean of the Royal bounty. 
 Huge as he is, and whilft " he lies floating many 
 a rood," he is flill a creature. His ribs, his fins, 
 his whalebone, his blubber, the very fpiracles 
 through which he fpouts a torrent of brine 
 againft his origin, and covers me all over with 
 
 the
 
 the fpray, every thing of him and about him 
 is from the Throne. Is it for him to queftion 
 the difpenfution of th? Royal favour ? 
 
 I ically am at a lofs to draw any fort of pa- 
 rallel bet ween the publick merits of his Grace, by 
 which he juflifies the grants he holds, and thefe 
 lei vices of mine, on the favourable conftrudlion 
 of which 1 have obtained what his Grace fo 
 much difapproves. In private life, I have not 
 at all the honour of acquaintance with the noble 
 Duke. But I ought to prefume, and it coils 
 me nothing to do fo, that he abundantly de- 
 ferves the efteem and love of all who live with 
 him. But as to publick fervice, why truly it 
 would not be more ridiculous for me to com- 
 pare myfelf in rank, in fortune, in fplendid de- 
 fcent, in youth, ftrength, or figure, with the 
 Duke of Bedford, than to make a parallel 
 between his fervices, and my attempts to be 
 ufeful to my country. It would not be grofs 
 adulation, but uncivil irony, to fay, that he has 
 any publick merit of his own to keep alive the 
 idea of the fervices by which his vaft landed 
 Pentions were obtained. My merits, whatever 
 they are, are original and perfonal j his are de- 
 rivative. It is his anceftor, the original pen- 
 fioner, that has laid up this inexhauitible fund 
 
 f
 
 ( 39 ) 
 
 of merit, which makes his Grace fo very deli- 
 cate and exceptious about the merit of all other 
 grantees of the Crown. Had he permitted me 
 to remain in quiet, I mould have faid 'tis his 
 eftate; that's enough. It is his bylaw; what 
 have I to do with it or it's hiftory ? He would 
 naturally have faid on his fide, 'tis this man's 
 fortune. He is as good now, as my anceftor 
 was two hundred and fifty years ago. I am a 
 young man with very old penfions ; he is an old 
 man with very young penfions, that's all ? 
 
 Why will his Grace, by attacking me, force 
 me relu&antly to compare my little merit with 
 that which obtained from the Crown thofe pro- 
 digies of profufe donation by which he tramples 
 on the mediocrity of humble and laborious indi- 
 viduals? I would willingly leave him to the He- 
 rald's College, which the philofophy of the Sans 
 culottes, (prouder by far than all the Garters, and 
 Norroys and Ciarencieux, and Rouge Dragons 
 that ever pranced in a proceffion of what his 
 friends call ariflocrates and defpots) will abolifh 
 with contumely and fcorn. Thefe hiftorians, re- 
 corders, and blazoners of virtues and arms, differ 
 wholly from that other defcription of hiftorians, 
 who never affign any aft of politicians to a good 
 motive. Thefe gentle hiftorians, on the contrary, 
 
 crip
 
 ( 40 ) 
 
 dip their pens in nothing but the milk of human 
 kindnefs. They feek no further for merit than 
 the preamble of a patent, or the infcnption on 
 a tomb. With them every man created a peer 
 is firft an hero ready made. They judge of every 
 man's capacity for office by the offices he has 
 filled ; and the more offices the more ability. 
 Every General-officer with them is a Marlbo- 
 rough; every Statefman a Burleigh; every Judge 
 a Murray or a Yorke. They, who alive, were 
 laughed at or pitied by all their acquaintance, 
 make as good a figure as the beft of them in 
 the pages of Guillim, Edmonfon, and Collins. 
 
 To thefe recorders, fo full of good nature to 
 the great and profperous, I wou!4 willingly leave 
 the firfl Baron Rufiel, and Earl of Bedford, and 
 the merits of his grants. But the aulnager, the 
 weigher, the meter of grants, will not fuffer us to 
 acquiefce in the judgment of the Prince reign- 
 ing at the time when they were made. They 
 are never good to thofe who earn them. Well 
 then; fince the new grantees have war made on 
 them by the old, and that the word of the So- 
 vereign is not to be taken, let us turn our eyes 
 to hiftory, in which great men have always a 
 pleafure in contemplating the heroic origin of 
 their houfe. 
 
 The
 
 The firft peer of the name, the firft pur- 
 chafer of the grants, was a Mr. Ruflel, a per- 
 fon of an ancient gentleman's family raifed 
 by being a minion of Henry the Eighth. As 
 there generally is fome refemblance of character 
 to create thefe relations, the favourite was in all 
 likelihood much fuch another as his matter. 
 The firft of thofe immoderate grants was not 
 taken from the antient demefne of the Crown, 
 but from the recent confifcation of the ancient 
 nobility of the land. The lion having fucked 
 the blood of his prey, threw the offal carcafe to 
 the jackall in waiting. Having tafted once the 
 food of confifcation, the favourites became fierce 
 and ravenous. This worthy favourite's firft 
 grant was from the lay nobility. The fecond, in- 
 finitely improving on the enormity of the firft, 
 was from the plunder of the church. In truth 
 his Grace is fomewhat excufable for his dif- 
 like to a grant like mine, not only in its quan- 
 tity, but in it's kind fo different from his 
 own. 
 
 Mine was from a mild and benevolent fove- 
 reign ; his from Henry the Eighth. 
 
 G Mine
 
 C 4* ) 
 
 Mine had not it's fund in the murder of any 
 innocent perfon of illuftrious rank*, or in the 
 pillage of any body of unoffending men. His 
 grants were from the aggregate and confolidated 
 funds of judgments iniquitouily legal, and from 
 pofTeffions voluntarily furrendered by the lawful 
 proprietors with the gibbet at their door. 
 
 The merit of the grantee whom he derives 
 from, was that of being a prompt and greedy 
 inftrument of a levelling tyrant, who opprefTed 
 all defcriptions of his people, but who fell with 
 particular fury on every thing that was great and 
 noble. Mine has been, in endeavouring to fcreen 
 -every man, in every clafs, from oppreflion, and 
 particularly in defending the high and eminent, 
 who in the bad times of confifcating Princes, 
 confifcating chief Governors, or confifcating 
 Demagogues, are the moil expo fed to jealoufy, 
 avarice and envy. 
 
 The merit of the original grantee of his Grace's 
 penfions, was in giving his hand to the work, 
 and partaking the fpoil wiih a Prince, who plun- 
 
 * See the hiftory of the melancholy cataftroplie of the 
 Duke of Buckingham. Temp. Hen. 8. 
 
 dered
 
 ( 43 ) 
 
 dered a part of his national church of his time 
 and country. Mine was in defending the whole 
 of the national church of my own time and my 
 own country, and the whole of the national 
 churches of all countries, from the principles 
 and the examples \\bich lead to ecclefiaftical pil- 
 lage, thence to a contempt of all prefcriptive 
 titles, thence to the pillage of all property, and 
 thence to univerfa.1 defolatioh* 
 
 The merit of the origin of his Grace's fortune 
 was in being a favourue and chief advifer to a 
 Piince, who left no liberty to their native coun- 
 try. My endeavour was to obtain liberty for 
 the municipal country in which I was born, and 
 for all deicriptions and denominations in it. 
 Mine was to fupport with unrelaxing vigilance 
 every right, every privilege, every fianchife, in 
 this my adopted, my dearer and more compre- 
 henfive country ; and not only to preferve thofe 
 rights in this chief feat of empire, but in 
 every nation, iu every land, in every climate, 
 language and religion, in the vaft domain 
 that ftill is under the protection, and the 
 larger that was once under the pro:ec~bion, of the 
 Britilh Crown. 
 
 G ^ His
 
 ( 44 ) 
 
 His founder's merits were, by arts in which 
 he ferved his mafter and made his fortune, to 
 bring poverty, wretchednefs and depopulation 
 on his country. Mine were under a benevolent 
 Prince, in promoting the commerce, manufac- 
 tures and agriculture of his kingdom; in which 
 his Majefty (hews an eminent example, who 
 even in hisamufements is a patriot, and in hours 
 of leifure an improver of his native foil. 
 
 His founder's merit, was the merit of a gen- 
 tleman raifed by the arts of a Court, and the 
 protection of a Wolfey, to the eminence of a 
 great and potent Lord. His merit in that 
 eminence was by inftigating a tyrant to in- 
 
 juftice, to provoke a people to rebellion. 
 
 My merit was, to awaken the fober part of the 
 country, that they might put themfelves on their 
 guard againft any one potent Lord, or any greater 
 number of potent Lords, or any combination of 
 great leading men of any fort, if ever they mould 
 attempt to proceed in the fame courfes, but in 
 the reverfe order, that is, by inftigating a cor- 
 rupted populace to rebellion, and, through that 
 rebellion, introducing a tyranny yet worfe than 
 the tyranny which his Grace's anceftor fup- 
 poited, and of which he profited in the manner 
 
 we
 
 ( 45 ) 
 
 we behold in the defpotifm of Henry the 
 Eighth. 
 
 The political merit of the firft penfioner of 
 his Grace's houfe, was that of being concerned 
 as a counfcllor of ftate in advifing, and in his 
 perfon executing the conditions of a diftio- 
 nourable peace with France ; the furrendering 
 thr fortrefs of Boulogne, then our out guard on 
 the Continent. By that furrender, Calais, the 
 key of France, and the bridle in the mouth of 
 that power, was, not many years afterwards, 
 finally loft. My merit has been in refitting the 
 power and pride of France, under any form of 
 it's rule ; but in oppofing it with the greateft 
 zeal and earneftnefs, when that rule appeared in 
 the word form it could affume ; the wonl indeed 
 which theprime caufe and principle of all evil could 
 pofilbly give it. It was rny endeavour by every 
 means to excite a fpirit in the houfe, where I 
 had the honour of a feat, for carrying on with 
 early vigour and decition, the moft clearly juft 
 and necelTary war, that this or any nation ever 
 carried on ; in order to lave my country from 
 the iron yoke of it's power, and from the more 
 dreadful contagion of its principles; to prc- 
 ferve, while they can be piefervcd pure and un- 
 tainted, the ancient, inbred inicgtky, piety, 
 
 good
 
 good nature, and good humour of the people 
 of England, from the dreadful peftilence which 
 beginning in France, threatens to lay wafte the 
 whole moral, and in a great degree the whole 
 phyfical world, having done both in the focus 
 of it's moft intenfe malignity. 
 
 The labours of his Grace's founder merited the 
 eurfes, not loud but deep, of the Commons of 
 England, on whom he and his mafter had effected 
 a compleat Parliamentary Reform Jay making them in 
 their flavery and humiliation, the true and ade- 
 quate reprefentatives of a debafed, degraded, 
 and undone people. My merits were, in hav- 
 ing had an active, though not always an often- 
 tatious (hare, in every one act, without excep- 
 tion, of undifputed conftitutional utility in my 
 time, and in having fupported on all occafions, 
 the authority, the efficiency, and the privileges 
 of the Commons of Great Britain. I ended my 
 fer vices by a recorded and fully reafoned affer- 
 uon on their own journals of their conftitutional 
 tights, and a vindication of their conftitutional 
 conduct. I laboured in all things to merit their 
 inward approbation, and (along with the aflift- 
 ants of the largeft, the greateft, and bed of. my 
 endeavours) 1 received their free, unbiased, 
 publick, and folcmn thanks. 
 
 Thus
 
 ( 47 ) 
 
 Thus ftands the account of the comparative 
 merits of the Crown grants which compofe the 
 Duke of Bedford's fortune as balanced againft 
 mine. In the name of common fenfe, why 
 Ihould the Duke of Bedford think, that none 
 but of the Houfe of Ruflel are entitled to the 
 favour of the Crown ? Why fhould he ima- 
 gine that no King of England has been capable 
 of judging of merit but King Henry the Eighth ? 
 Indeed, he will pardon me ; he is a little mif- 
 taken ; all virtue did not end in the firft Earl of 
 Bedford. All difcernment did not lofe it's vi- 
 lion when his Creator clofed his eyes. Let him 
 remit his rigour on the difproportion between 
 merit and reward in others, and they will make 
 no enquiry into the origin of his fortune. They 
 will regard with much more fatisfaftion, as he 
 will contemplate with infinitely more ad vantage, 
 whatever in his pedigree has been dulcified by 
 anexpofure to the influence of heaven in along 
 flow of generations, from the hard, acidulous, 
 metallick tincture of the fpring. It is Hide to be 
 doubted, that feveral of his forefathers in that 
 long feries, have degenerated into honour and 
 virtue. Let the Duke of Bedford (I am furehc 
 will) reject with fcorn and horror, the counfels 
 of the lecturers, thofe wicked panders to avarice 
 and ambition, who would tempt him in the trou- 
 bles
 
 ( 48 ) 
 
 bles of his country, to feek another enormous 
 fortune from the forfeitures of another nobility, 
 and the plunder of another church. Let him 
 (and I trufl that yet he will) employ all the 
 energy of his youth, and all the refources of his 
 wealth, to crufh rebellious principles which 
 have no foundation in morals, and rebellious 
 movements, that have no provocation in ty- 
 ranny. 
 
 Then will be forgot the rebellions, which, by 
 a doubtful priority in crime, his anceftor had 
 provoked and extinguished. On fuch a conducl 
 in the noble Duke, many of his countrymen 
 might, and with fome excufe might, give way 
 to the enthufiafm of their gratitude, and in the 
 dafhing ftyle of fome of the old-declaimers, cry 
 out, that if the fates had found no other way 
 in which they could give a *Duke of Bedford and 
 his opulence as props to a tottering world, then 
 the butchery of the Duke of Buckingham might 
 be tolerated ; it might be regarded even with 
 complacency., w hi 1ft in the heir of confifcation 
 they faw the fympathizing comforter of the 
 martyrs, who fuffer under the cruel confifcation 
 of this day ; vvhilft they beheld with admiration 
 
 * At fi non aliam venture fata Neroni, &c., 
 
 his
 
 ( 49 ) 
 
 his zealous protection of the virtuous and loyal 
 nobility of France, and his manly fupportof his 
 brethren, the yet {landing nobility and gentry 
 of his native land. Then his Grace's merit would 
 be pure and new, and (harp, as frefti from the 
 mint of honour. As he pleafed he might re- 
 flect honour on his predeceflbrs, or throw it for- 
 ward on thofe who were to fucceed him. He 
 might be the propagator of the (lock of honour, 
 or the root of it, as he thought proper. 
 
 Had it pleafed God to continue to me the 
 hopes of fucceffion, I mould have been, ac- 
 cording to my mediocrity, and the mediocrity 
 of the age I live in, a fort of founder of a family; 
 I mould have left a fon, who, in all the points 
 in which perfonal merit can be viewed, in fci- 
 ence, in erudition, in genius, in tafte, in honour, 
 in generofity, in humanity, in every Hberal fenti- 
 ment, and every liberal accomplimment, would 
 not have fhewn himfelf inferior to the Duke of 
 Bedford, or to any of ihofe whom he traces in his 
 line. His Grace very foon would have wanted all 
 plaufibility in his attack upon that provifion 
 which belonged more to mine than to me. He 
 would foon have fupplied every deficiency, and 
 fymmetrized every difproportion. It would not 
 have been for that fucceflbr to refort to any ftag- 
 
 H nant
 
 ( 5 ) 
 
 nant wafting refervoir of merit in me, or in any 
 anceftry. He had in himfelf a falient, living 
 fpring, of generous and manly action. Every 
 day he lived he would have re-purchafed the 
 bounty of the crown, and ten times more, if 
 ten times more he had received. He was made 
 a publick creature; and had no enjoyment what- 
 ever, but in the performance of fome duty. At 
 this exigent moment, the lofs of a finimed man 
 is not eafily fupplied. 
 
 But a difpofer whofe power we are little able 
 to refift, and whofe wifdom it behoves us not at 
 all to difpute; has ordained it in another manner, 
 and (whatever my querulous weaknefs might fug- 
 geft) a far better. The ftorm has gone over me ; 
 and I lie like one of thofe old oaks which the late 
 hurricane has fcattered about me. I am ftrip- 
 ped of all my honours ; I am torn up by the 
 roots, and lie proftrate on the earth ! There, and 
 proftrate there, I moft unfeignedly recognize 
 the divine juftice, and in fome degree fubmitto 
 it. But whilft I humble myfelf before God, I 
 do not know that it is forbidden to- repel the 
 attacks of unjuft and inconfiderate men. The 
 patience of Job is proverbial. After fome of 
 the convulfive ftruggles of our irritable nature, 
 he fubmitted himfelf, and repented in duft and 
 
 aflies.
 
 afties. But even fo, I do not find him blamed 
 for reprehending, and with a confiderable de- 
 gree of verbal afperity, thofe ill-natured neigh- 
 hours of his, who vifited his dunghill to read 
 moral, political, and ceconomical lectures on 
 his mifery. I am alone. I have none to meet 
 my enemies in the gate. Indeed, my Lord, ] 
 greatly deceive myfelf, if in this hard feafon I 
 would give a peck of refufe wheat for all that is 
 called fame and honour in the world. This is 
 the appetite but of a few. It is a luxury ; it is a 
 privilege ; it is an indulgence for thofe who are 
 at their eafe. But we are all of us made to fhun 
 difgrace, as we are made to ilirink from pain, 
 and poverty, and difeafe. It is an inftinct ; and 
 under the direction of reafon, inftind is always 
 in the right. I live in an inverted order. They 
 -who ought to have fucceeded me are gone be- 
 fore me. They who mould have been to me 
 as pofterity are in the place of anceftors. I owe 
 to the deareft relation (which ever muft fubfift 
 in memory) that ad of piety, which he would 
 have performed to me ; I owe it to him to (hew 
 that he was not defcended, as the Duke of Bed- 
 ford would have it, from an unworthy parent. 
 
 Tbe Crown has confidered me after long fer- 
 
 vice : the Crown has paid the Duke of Bedford by 
 
 H 2 advance.
 
 advance. He has had a long credit for any fervice 
 which hemay perform hereafter. He is fecure, and 
 long may he be fecure, in his advance, whether he 
 performs any fervices or not. But let him 
 take care how he endangers the fafety of that 
 Conftitution which fecures his own utility or 
 his own infignificance ; or how he difcourages 
 thofe, who take up, even puny arms, to defend 
 an order of things, which, like the Sun of Hea- 
 ven, (nines alike on the ufeful and the worth- 
 leis. His grants are engrafted on the public 
 law of Europe, covered with the awful hoar 
 of innumerable ages. They are guarded by 
 the facred rules of prefcription, found in that 
 full treafury of jurifprudence from which the 
 jejunenefs and penury of our municipal law 
 has, by degrees, been enriched and ilrength- 
 ened. This prefcription 1 had my (hare (a very 
 full (hare) in bringing to it's perfection *, 
 The Duke of Bedford will flandas long as pre- 
 fcriptive law endures; as long as the great 
 ftable laws of property, common to us with all 
 civilized nations, are kept in their integrity, 
 and without the fmalleft intermixture of the 
 laws, maxims, principles, or precedents of the 
 Grand Revolution. They are fecure againfj: 
 
 * $ir George Savile's A& ? called the Nullum Tempus A&.
 
 ( S3 ) 
 
 *11 changes but one. The whole revolutionary 
 fyftem, inilitutes, digeft, code, novels, text, 
 glofs, comment, are, not only not the fame, 
 but they are the very reverfe, and the reverfe. 
 fundamentally, of all the laws, on which civil 
 life has hitherto been upheld in all the govern- 
 ments of the world. The learned profeflbrs of 
 the Rights of Man regard prefcription, not as a 
 title to bar all claim, fet up againft old pofleffion 
 but they look on prefcription as itfelf a bar 
 againft the pofleffor and proprietor. They hold 
 an immemorial pofleffion to be no more than a 
 long continued, and therefore an aggravated 
 injuftice. 
 
 Such are their ideas ; fuch their religion, and 
 fuch their law. But as to our country and our 
 race, as long as the well compacted ftructure of 
 our church and ftate, the fanctuary, the holy of 
 holies of that ancient law, defended by reve* 
 rence, defended by power, a fortrefs at once 
 and a temple*, (hall ftand inviolate on the brow 
 of the Britifti Sion as long as the Britim Mo- 
 narchy, not more limited than fenced by the 
 orders of the State, (hall, like the proud Keep 
 
 * Templum in modum arcis. Tacitus of the Temple of 
 Jerufalen} 
 
 of
 
 54 ; 
 
 of Windfor, rifing in the majefty of pro- 
 portion, and girt with the double belt of it's 
 kindred and coeval towers, as long as this awful 
 ftructure (hall overfee and guard the fubje&ed 
 land fo long the mounds and dykes of the 
 low, fat, Bedford level will have nothing to 
 fear from all the pickaxes of all the levellers of 
 France. As long as our Sovereign Lord the 
 King, and his faithful fubjecls, the Lords and 
 Commons of this realm, the triple cord, which 
 no man can break; the folemn, fworn, conftitu- 
 tional frank-pledge of this nation; the firm gua-, 
 rantees of each others being, and each others 
 rights ; the joint and feveral fecurities, each in 
 it's place and order, for every kind and every 
 quality, of property and of dignity As long 
 as thefe endure, fo long the Duke of Bedford 
 is fafe : and we are all fafe together the high 
 from the blights of envy and the fpoliations of 
 rapacity; the low from the iron hand of oppref- 
 fioii and the infolent fpurn of contempt. Amen ! 
 and fo be it : and fo it will be> 
 
 Dum tlomus ALnex Capitoli immobile faxum 
 Accolet ; imperiumque pater Romanus habebit. 
 
 / 
 
 But if the rude inroad of Gallick tumult, with 
 it's fophiftical Rights of Man, to falfify the ac- 
 count,
 
 count, and it's fword as a makeweight to 
 throw into the fcale, (hall be introduced into 
 our city by a mifguided populace, fet on by 
 proud great men, themfelves blinded and in- 
 toxicated by a frantick ambition, we (hall, all 
 of us, perim and be overwhelmed in a com- 
 mon ruin. If a great ftorm blow on our 
 coaft, it will caft the whales on the ftrand as 
 well as the periwinkles. His Grace will no 
 furvive the poor grantee he defpifes, no not for 
 a twelvemonth. If the great look forfafety in 
 the fervices they render to this Gallick caufe, it is 
 to be foolifli, even above the weight of privi- 
 lege allowed to wealth. If his Grace be one of 
 thefe whom they endeavour to profelytize, he 
 ought to be aware of the character of the feet, 
 whofe doctrines he is invited to embrace. With 
 them, infurrection is the moil facred of revolu- 
 tionary duties to the ftate. Ingratitude to bene- 
 fadors is the firfl of revolutionary virtues. 
 Ingratitude is indeed their four cardinal vir- 
 tues compacted and amalgamated into one ; and 
 he will find it in every thing that has hap- 
 pened fince the commencement of the phi- 
 lofophick revolution to this hour. If he pleads 
 the merit of having performed the duty of 
 infurrection againft the order he lives in (God 
 forbid he ever (hould), the merit of others 
 
 will
 
 will be to perform the duty* of infurrec- 
 tion againft him. If he pleads (again God for- 
 bid he ihould, and I do not fufpect he will) his 
 ingratitude to the Crown for it's creation of his 
 family, others will plead their right and duty 
 to pay him in kind. They will laugh, indeed 
 they will laugh, at his parchment and his wax. 
 His deeds will be drawn out with the reft of 
 the lumber of his evidence room, and burnt to 
 the tune of ga ira in the courts of Bedford (then 
 Equality) Houfc. 
 
 Am I to blame, if I attempt to pay his Grace's 
 hoftile reproaches to me with a friendly admoni- 
 tion to himftrlf? Can I be blamed, for pointing out 
 to him in what manner he is like to be affected, 
 if the fed of the cannibal philofophers of 
 France mould profelytize any confiderable part 
 of this people, and, by their joint profelytizing 
 arms, fliould conquer that Government, to 
 which his Grace does not feem to me to give all 
 the fupport his own fecurity demands ? Surely 
 it is proper, that he, and that others like him, 
 fliould know the true genius of this feet ; what 
 their opinions are ; what they have done : and 
 to whom ; and what, (if a prognoftick is to be 
 formed from the difpofitions and actions of 
 men) it is certain they will do hereafter. He
 
 ( 57 ) 
 
 oUght to know, that they have fworn 
 the only engagement they ever will keep, to all 
 in this country, who bear a refemblance td 
 themfelves, and who think as fuch, that The 
 'whole duty of man confifts in deftruftion. They 
 are a mifallied and difparaged branch of the 
 houfe of Nimrod. They are the Duke of Bed- 
 ford's natural hunters ; and he is their n.uural 
 game. Becaufe he is not very profoundly reflat- 
 ing, he ileeps in profound fecurity : they, on 
 the contrary, are always vigilant, aftive, en- 
 terprizing, and though far removed from any 
 knowledge, which makes men eftimable or ufe- 
 ful, in all the inflruments and refources of evilj 
 their leaders are not meanly inftrudted, or in- 
 fufficiently furnimed. In the French Revolu- 
 tion every thing is new; and, from want of pre- 
 paration to meet fo unlooked for an evil, every 
 thing is dangerous. Never, before this time, 
 was a fet of literary men, converted into a gang 
 of robbers and aflaflins. Never before, did A 
 den of bravoes and banditti, afiume the garb 
 and tone of an academy of philofophers; 
 
 Let me tell his Grace, that an union of fuch 
 characters, monftrous as it feems, is not made 
 for producing defpicable enemies. But if they 
 are formidable as f^cs, as friends they arc 
 
 i dreadful
 
 ( 58 ) 
 
 dreadful indeed. The men of property in France 
 confiding in a force, which feemed to be irre- 
 fiftible, becaufe it had never been tried, ne- 
 glected to prepare for a conflid with their 
 enemies at their own weapons. They were 
 found in fuch a fituadon as the Mexicans were, 
 when they were attacked by the dogs, the ca- 
 valry, the iron, and the gunpowder of an hand- 
 ful of bearded men, whom they did not know 
 to e-xifl in nature. This is a comparifon that 
 fome, I think, have made; and it is juft. 
 In France they had their enemies within 
 their honfes. They were even in the bofoms 
 of many of them. But they had not fagacity to< 
 difcern their favage character. They feemed 
 tame, and even careffing. They had nothing 
 but douce humanlte in their mouth. They could 
 not bear the puniihment of the mildeft laws on- 
 the greateil criminals. The flighted feverity of 
 juftice made their flefh creep. The very idea 
 that war exifted in the world difturbed their re- 
 pofe. Military glory was no more,with them, than 
 a fplendid infamy. Hardly would they hear oif 
 felf defence, which they reduced within fuch 
 bounds, as to leave it no defence at all. All this 
 while they meditated the confifcations and mafia - 
 cres we have feen. Had any one told theie un- 
 fortunate Noblemen and Gentlemen, how, and 
 
 by
 
 ( 59 ) 
 
 by whom, the grand fabrick of the French mo- 
 narchy under which they flourished would be 
 fubverted, they would not have pitied him as a 
 vifionary, but would have turned from him as 
 what they cull a mauvais platfant. Yet we have 
 feen what has happened. The perfons who 
 have fuffered from the cannibal philofophy of 
 France, are fo like the Duke of Bedford, 
 that nothing but his Grace's probably not 
 fpeaking quite fo good French, could enable us 
 to find out any difference. A great many of 
 them had as pompous titles as he, and were of 
 full as illuftrious a race : force few of them had 
 fortunes as ample ; feveral of them, without 
 meaning the lealldifparagement to the Duke of 
 Bedford, were as wife, and as virtuous, and as 
 valiant, and as well educated, and as compleat in 
 all the lineaments of men of honour as he is : 
 And to all this they had added the powerful 
 outguard of a military profeffion, which, in it's 
 nature, renders men fomewhat more cautious 
 than thole, who have nothing to attend to 
 but the lazy enjoyment of undifturbed poffef- 
 fions. But fecurity was their ruin. They are 
 darned to pieces in the (lorm, and our mores 
 are covered with the wrecks. If they had 
 been aware that fuch a thing might happen, 
 fuch a thing never could have happened. 
 
 12 I allure
 
 ( 60 ) 
 
 I afTure his Grace, that if I ftatc to him the 
 defigns of his enemies, in a manner which 
 may appear to him ludicrous and impoffible, 
 | tell him nothing that has not exactly hap- 
 pened, point by point ? but twenty-four mile 
 from our own more. I allure him that the 
 Frenchified faction, more encouraged, than 
 others are warned, by what has happened in 
 France, look at him and his landed pofief- 
 iions, as an object at once of curiofity and 
 rapacity. He is made for them in every part 
 of their double character. As robbers, to them 
 he is a noble booty : as fpeculatifts, he is a 
 glorious fubject for their experimental phi- 
 lofophy. He affords matter for an extenfive 
 analyfis, in all the branches of their fcience, 
 geometrical, phyfical, civil and political. Thefe 
 philofophers are fanaticks ; independent of any 
 intereft, which if it operated alone would make 
 them much more tractable, they are carried 
 with fuch an headlong rage towards every def- 
 perate trial, that they would facrifice the whole 
 human race to the flighted of their experi- 
 ments. I am better able to enter into the cha- 
 racter of this defcription of men than the noble 
 Duke can be. I have lived long and varioufly 
 m the World. Without any confiderable pre- 
 tenfions to literature in myfelf, 1 have afpired 
 
 >\. : , , t ~, , ' . . L. . J ' - ' A
 
 ( 6- ) 
 
 to the love of letters. I have lived for a great 
 many years in habitudes with thofe who profef- 
 fed them I can form a tolerable eftimate of 
 what is likely to happen from a character, 
 chiefly dependent for fame and fortune, on 
 knowledge and talent, as well in it's morbid 
 and perverted ftate, as in that which is found 
 and natural. Naturally men fo formed and 
 finimed are the firft gifts of Providence to the 
 World. But when they have once thrown off the 
 fear of God, which was in all ages too often the 
 cafe, and the fear of man, which is now the cafe, 
 and when in that ftate they come to underftand 
 one another, and to ad; in corps, a more dreadful 
 calamity cannot arife out of Hell to fcourge 
 mankind. Nothing can be conceived more 
 hard than the heart of a thorough-bred meta- 
 phyfkian. It comes nearer to the cold malig- 
 nity of a wicked fpirit than to the frailty and 
 paffion of a man. It is like that of the prin- 
 ciple of Evil himfelf, incorporeal, pure, un- 
 mixed, dephlegmated, defecated evil. It is no 
 eafy operation to eradicate humanity from the 
 human bread. What Shakefpeare calls " the 
 compunctious vifitings of nature," will fome- 
 times knock at their hearts, and protefl againft 
 their murderous fpeculations. But they have 
 a means of compounding with theh>nature. 
 
 Their
 
 ( 62 ) 
 
 Their humanity is not diffolved. They only 
 give it a long prorogation. They are ready to 
 declare, that they do not think two thoufand 
 years too long a period for the good that they 
 puriue. It is remarkable, that they never Tee 
 any way to their projected good but by the road 
 of'fome evil. Their imagination is not fatigued, 
 with the contemplation of human flittering thro' 
 the wild wafte of centuries added to centuries, 
 of inifery and defolation. Their humanity is at 
 their horizon and, like the horizon, it always 
 flies before them. The geometricians, and 
 the chy mills bring, the one from the dry 
 bones of their diagrams, and the other from 
 the foot of rheir furnaces, difpofitions that 
 make them worfe than indifferent about thofe 
 feelings and habitudes, which are the fupports 
 of the moral world. Ambition is come upon 
 them fuddenly ; they are intoxicated with it, 
 and it has rendered them fearlefs of the dan- 
 ger, which may from thence arife to others 
 or to themfelves. Thefe philofophers, con- 
 fider men in their experiments, no more than 
 they do mice in an air pump, or in a recipient 
 of mephitick gas. Whatever his Grace may think 
 of himfelf, they look upon him, and every thing 
 that belongs to him, with no more regard than 
 they do upon the whiikers of that little long- 
 
 tailccj
 
 wiled animal, that has been long the game of 
 the grave, demure, infidiour, fpring-nailed, 
 velvet-pawed, green-eyed philofophers, whether 
 going upon two legs, or upon four, 
 
 His Grace's landed pofleffions are irrefiftibly 
 inviting to an agrarian experiment. They are 
 a downright intuit upon the Rights of Man. 
 They are more extenfive than the territory of 
 many of the Grecian republkks; and they are 
 without comparifon more fertile than moil of 
 them. There are now republicks in Italy, in 
 Germany and in Swifierland, which do not pof- 
 fefs any thing like fo fair and ample a domain. 
 There is fcope for Teven philofophers to proceed 
 in their analytical experiments, upon Harington's 
 feven different forms of republicks, in the acres 
 of this one Duke. Hitherto they have been 
 whoby unproductive to fpeculation ; fitted for 
 nothing but to fatten bullocks, and to produce 
 grain for beer, ftill more to ftupify the dull 
 Englifh underftanding. Abbe Sieyes has wh^le 
 nefts of pigeon-holes full of conftitutions 
 ready made, ticketed, fortrd, and numbered ; 
 fuited to every feafon and every fancy ; fome 
 with the top of the pattern at the bottom, and 
 fo-iie with the bottom at the top; fome plain, 
 fome flowered; iome riiiHnguifhed for their 
 
 fimplicuyj
 
 Ihnplicity; others for their complexity; fome 
 of blood colour; fome of boue de Paris-, fome 
 with directories, others without a direction; 
 fome with councils of elders, and councils of 
 youngfters; fome without any council at all. 
 Some where the electors choofe the reprefenta- 
 tives ; others, where the reprefentatives choofe 
 the electors. Some in long coats, and fome in 
 fliort cloaks ; fome with , antaloons ; fome with- 
 out breeches. Some with five (hilling qualifica- 
 tions; fome totally unqualified. So that no con- 
 ftitution-fancier may go unfuited from his (hop, 
 provided he loves a pattern of pillage, oppreffion, 
 arbitrary imprifonment, confifcation, exile, revo- 
 lutionary judgment, and legalifed premeditated 
 murder, in any (hapcs into which the) can be 
 put. What a pity it is, that the progrefs of ex- 
 perimental philofophy (houid be checked by his 
 Grace's monopoly ! Such are their fentiments, 
 I aflure him ; fuch is their language when they 
 dare to fpeak ; and fuch are their proceedings, 
 when they have the means to act. 
 
 Their geographers, and geometricians, have 
 been fome time out of practice. It is fame time 
 fince they have divided their own country into 
 fquares. That figure has ioit the charms of it's 
 
 novelty.
 
 ( 73 ) 
 
 the oldeft and purclt nobility that Europe 
 can boaft, among a people nenowned above 
 all others for love of their native land. Though 
 it was never {hewn in infult to any human be- 
 ing, Lord Kepple was fbmething high. It was 
 a wild ftock of pride, on which the tendereft of 
 all hearts had grafted the milder virtues. He 
 valued ancient nobility; and he was not difin- 
 clined to augment it with new honours. He 
 valued the old nobility and the new, not as an 
 excufe for inglorious floth, but as an incitement 
 to virtuous activity. He confidered it as a fort 
 of cure for felfifhnefs and a narrow mind; con- 
 ceiving that a man born in an elevated place, in 
 himlelf was nothing, but every thing in what 
 went before, and what was to come after him. 
 Without much fpeculation, but by the fure in- 
 ftincl: of ingenuous feelings, and by the dictates 
 of plain unfophifticated natural understanding, 
 he felt, that no great Commonwealth could by 
 ;uiy poilibility long fubfift, without abodyoffome 
 kind or other of nobility, decorated with honour, 
 arid fortified by privilege. This nobility 
 forms the chain that connects the ages of a na- 
 tion, which otherwife (with Mr. Paine) would 
 fbon be taught that no one generation can bind 
 another. He felt that no political fabrick could 
 be well made without fome fuch order of things 
 
 L as
 
 ( 74 ) 
 
 as might, through a feries of time, afford a ra- 
 tional hope of fecuring unity, coherence, con- 
 fiftency, and (lability to the ftate. He felt that 
 nothing elfe can protect it againft the levity of 
 courts, and the greater levity of the multitude. 
 That to talk of hereditary monarchy without any 
 thing elfe of hereditary reverence in the Com- 
 monwealth, was a low-minded abfurdityj fit 
 only for thofe deteftable " fools afpiring to 
 be knaves," who began to forge in 1789, 
 the falfe money of the French Conftitution 
 That it is one fatal objection to all new 
 fancied and new fabricated Republicks, (among 
 a people, who, once poffeffing fuch an 
 advantage, have wickedly and infolently re- 
 jected^ it,) that the prejudice of an old nobility 
 is a thing that cannot be made. It may be 
 improved, it may be corrected, it may be re- 
 plenifhed : men may be taken from it, or aggre- 
 gated to it, but the thing itfelfis matter of inve- 
 terate opinion, and therefore cannot be matter of 
 mere positive inftitmion. He felt, that this no- 
 bility, in fact does not exifl in wrong of other 
 
 orders of the itate, but by them, and for them. 
 I 
 
 I knew the man. I fpeak of; -and, if we can 
 divine the future, out of what we collect from 
 the part, no perfon living would look with more 
 
 fcorn
 
 ( 75 ) 
 
 fcorn and horrour on the impious parricide 
 committed on all their anceftry, and on the 
 defperate attainder pafled on all their pofte- 
 rity, by the Orleans, and the Rochefoucaults, 
 and the Fayettes, and the Vifcomtes de No- 
 ailles, and the falfe Perigords, and the long 
 et cetera of the perfidious Sans Culottes of 
 the court, who like demoniacks, poflefled with a 
 fpirit of fallen pride, and inverted ambition, ab- 
 dicated their dignities, difowned their families, 
 betrayed the mod facred of all trufts, and by 
 breaking to pieces a great link of fociety, and 
 all the cramps and holdings of the (late, brought 
 eternal confvifion and defolation on their coun- 
 try. For the fate of the mifcreant parricides 
 themfelves he would have had no pity. Com- 
 panion for the myriads of men, of whom the 
 world was not worthy, who by their means have 
 perimed in prifons, or on fcaflfolds, or are pin- 
 ing in beggary and exile, would leave no room 
 in his, or in any well-formed mind, for any 
 fuch fenfation. We are not made at once to 
 pity the oppreflbr and the opprefled. 
 
 Looking to hisBatavian defcent, how could he 
 bear to behold his kindred, the defcendants of 
 the brave nobility of Holland, whofe blood pro- 
 digally poured out, had, more than all the ca- 
 
 L 2 nals,
 
 ( 76 ) 
 
 nals, mecrs, and inundations of their country, 
 protected their independence, to behold them 
 bowed in the bafelt fervitude, to the bafeft and 
 vileft of the human race ; in fervitude to thofe 
 who in no rcfpecl, were fuperior in dignity, 
 or could afpire to a better place than that of 
 hangmen to the tyrants, to whofe fccptercd 
 pride they had oppofed an elevation of foul, that 
 furmounted, and overpowered the loftinefs of 
 Caftile, the haughtinefs of Auftria, and the 
 overbearing arrogance of France ? 
 
 Could he with patience bear, that the chil- 
 dren of that nobility, who would have deluged 
 their country and given it to the fea, rather than 
 fubmit to Louis XIV. who was then in his me- 
 ridian* glory, when his arms were conducted by 
 the Turennes, by the Luxembourgs, by the 
 Boufflers; when his councils were directed by 
 the Colberts, and the Louvois; when his tribu- 
 nals were filled by the Lamoignons and the 
 Dagucflaus---that thefe mould be given up to 
 the cruel fport of the Pichegru's, the Jourdans, 
 the Santcrres, under the Hollands, and Briflbts, 
 and Gorfas, and Robefpierres, the Reubcls, the 
 Carnots, and Talliens, and Dantons, and the 
 whole tribe of Regicides, robbers, and revolu- 
 tionary judges, that, from the rotten carcafe of 
 
 their
 
 ( 77 ) 
 
 their own murdered country, have poured out 
 innumerable (warms of the lowed, and at once 
 the mod deftruclive of the clafles of animated 
 nature, which like columns of locufts, have laid 
 waftc the faireft part of the world ? 
 
 Would Kepple have borne to fee the ruin of 
 the virtuous Patricians, that happy union of the 
 noble and the burgher, who with figml prudence 
 and integrity, had long governed the cities of the 
 confederate Republick, the dimming fathers of 
 their country, who, denying commerce to them- 
 felves, made it flourish in a manner unexampled 
 under their protection? Could Kepple have 
 borne that a vile faction fhould totally deftroy 
 this harmonious conftruction, in favour of a 
 robbing Democracy, founded on the (purious 
 rights of man ? 
 
 He was no great clerk, but he was perfectly 
 well verfed in the interefts of Europe, and he 
 could not have heard with patience, that the 
 country of Grotius, the cradle of the Law of 
 Nations, and one of the richeft repofitories of 
 all Law,*fhould be taught a new code by the 
 ignorant flippancy of Thomas Paine, the pre- 
 fumptuous foppery of La Fayette, with his ftolen 
 rights of man in his hand, the wild profligate 
 
 intrigue
 
 intrigue and turbulency of Marat, and the 
 impious fophiflry of Condorcer, in his infolent 
 addretles to the Batavian Republick ? 
 
 Could Keppel, who idolized the houfe of 
 INaiTau, who was himfelf given to England, 
 along with the bleffings of the Britilh and Dutch 
 revolutions; with revolutions of inability; with 
 revolutions which confolidated and married the 
 liberties and the interefts of the two nations for 
 ever, covtld he fee the fountain of Britiih liberty 
 itfeif in fervitude to France? Could he fee with 
 -patience a Prince of Orange expelled as a fort of 
 diminutive defpot, with every kind of contu- 
 mely, from the country, which that family of de- 
 liverers had fo often refcued from ilavery, and 
 obliged to live in exile in another country, which 
 owes it's liberty to his houfe? 
 
 Would Keppel have heard with patience, that 
 the conduct to be held on fuch occafions was to 
 become fhort by the knees to the faction of the 
 homicides, to intreat them quietly to retire ? or 
 if the fortune of war mould drive them from 
 their firft wicked and tinprcvoked invafion, that 
 no fecurky mould be taken, no arrangement 
 made, no barrier formed, no alliance entered 
 into for the fecurity of that, which under a fo- 
 reign
 
 ( 79 ) 
 
 reign name is the mod precious pm of Eng- 
 land? What would he have faid, if it was even 
 propofed that the Auftrian Netherlands (which 
 ought to be a barrier to Holland, and the tie of 
 an alliance, to protect her again ft any fpecies of 
 rule that might be erected, or even be reftored in 
 France) mould be formed into a republick under 
 her influence and dependent upon her power? 
 
 But above all, what would he have faid, if he 
 had heard it made a matter of accufation againft 
 me, by his nephew the Duke of Bedford, that 
 I was the author of the war ? Had I a mind 
 to keep that high diftindion to myielf, as 
 from pride I might, but from juftice 1 dare 
 not, he would have fnatched his mare of it from 
 my hand, and held it with the grafp of a dying 
 convuliion to his end. 
 
 It would be a mod arrogant prefumption in me 
 to aflume to myfelf the glory of what belongs to 
 his Majefty, and to his Minifters, and to his 
 Parliament, and to the far greater majority of 
 his faithful people : But had I flood alone to 
 counfel, and that all were determined to be 
 guided by my advice, and to follow it impli- 
 citly then I {hould have been the fole author 
 of a war. But it fhould have been a war on 
 
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