CHAPTER IV.

TREASON AND SEDITION BILLS.

IN the session of 1743, the house of commons, apprised of some recent machinations of the court of St. Germain's, sent up to the Lords a bill making it High Treason to correspond with the sons of the Pretender. On the commitment of this bill, the Lord Chancellor HARDWICKE moved that the committee be instructed to receive a clause for continuing the penalties and forfeitures legally incurred by the descendants of traitors, to the death of the sons of the Pretender; and which, by the operation of an act passed in the reign of Queen ANNE, expired with the Pretender himself. The clause was thus opposed with equal eloquence and public spirit by the Duke of Bedford.

"MY LORDS,

"Though I hope that I have never given reason for suspicion, that I am less zealous than any other lord for the security of our present constitution, or the defence of the family now upon the throne; though I desire to be considered as equally zealous for liberty, and equally tenacious of those laws which secure property with every other man; though I am convinced that a Prince forced upon us by the armies and fleets of France will become. only the Vice-Roy of the monarch to whom he owes his exaltation, and that we should thenceforth be considered by the French as their tributaries and their vassals, yet I cannot approve the motion which the noble lord has made.

"Your lordships cannot be surprised that I am alarmed at the proposal of a law like this, I, whose family has suffered so lately the deprivation of its rank and its fortune by the tyranny of a court; I, whose grandfather was cut off by an unjust prosecution, and whose father was condemned for many years to see himself deprived of the rights of his birth, which were at length restored to him by more equitable judges. It is surely reasonable, my lords, that I should oppose the execution of penalties to the descendants of offenders, who have scarcely myself escaped the blast of an attainder. I am very far from denying, my lords, what has been asserted, that the French have long been aspiring to universal monarchy; that they consider their projects as liable to be defeated only by the English; and that they have therefore for many years labored, to give a King to England; but, my lords, the ill success of all their past attempts convinces me, that they have nothing to hope from any future efforts of the same kind, and that therefore we need not have recourse to new degrees of severity, or enact penal laws of an extraordinary kind to prevent that which experience has shewn impossible to be accomplished.

"What could not be accomplished by the power or the policy of the great French monarch, may, very justly, be considered by his successor as an hopeless project; for the French counsels do not now appear to be guided by the wisdom which at that time was discovered in all their treaties and negotiations, nor have their arms yet acquired that reputation which filled half the nations of the world with terror. They are not able now to influence kingdoms by their manifestos, or to revive a dejected party by the promise of their assistance: they are now indeed wealthy and powerful, but they are not wealthy to such a degree as to hire the nation to destroy itself, nor so powerful as to sink it to despair.

Besides, not only the force which is to be employed against the fabric of our constitution is diminished; but the edifice is grown stronger by time, the basis is sunk deeper, the superstructure is become more solid, and all the parts have by degrees conformed to each other, so that there is no chasm or weakness to be found. Many circumstances, by which the French were formerly induced to hope for success have now vanished for ever. The nation was then divided into two parties, of which that which publicly avowed the desire of restoring the exiled family to the throne, was generally computed to be more numerous. This infatuation, my lords, is now at an end: the numbers of the Jacobites are reduced to a small set below consideration, and seem now more desirous to enjoy their opinions in peace and privacy, than to make proselytes; and to be tolerated by the lenity of the government, than to endanger themselves by new provocations.

The English people, my lords, are now consolidated into one body, and more uniformly together; they have at last discovered that nominal distinctions are only idle sound, by which they have been long amused by more parties than one, while they were plundered, and oppressed. And whosoever shall review the conduct of the people for about twenty years backward, shall find that they have every year appeared better informed of the true nature of our government, and that they have sacrificed all nar row views and petty considerations to the great scheme of general felicity; that they have acted steadily, resolutely, and wisely; and that in their regard for one man, or their opposition to another, they have considered truly how far the public good was promoted or obstructed by their counsels.

On the present occasion, my lords, they have given the fullest proof of their loyalty which they are able to exhibit, by innumerable addresses sent from all parts, and

drawn up in terms which express the firmest fidelity and warmest affections,-professions, my lords, which surely deserve some other return than the severity of a penal law, a law by which one person is condemned to suffer for the crime of another. As it is necessary, my lords, that subjects should obey their governors, so it is likewise reasonable, that governors should trust their subjects; at least that they should not studiously disgust them by groundless suspicions; for when the people see that no degree of obedience can recommend them to regard, they will naturally lose their affection for their superiors; and when their affection is once extinguished, if they do not violate their duty, they will at least neglect it. To be suspected my lords, is always offensive, and as a suspicious man is perpetually harassing himself with superfluous vigilance, disturbing his quiet with dreams of danger, and wearying himself by providing securities against violence or fraud which never was designed, so a suspicious government always defeats its own endeavours, and by destroying that popularity to which it must always trust for its defence in time of real danger, weakens itself. The multiplication of penal laws, the establishment of armies, and the distribution of pensions, the usual methods by which weak governments endeavour to strengthen their basis, are all transitory and uncertain supports, which the first blast of general discontent may drive before it, and which have a tendency to produce that rage which they cannot furnish the means of resisting. I think it therefore necessary, my lords, to oppose this motion, because I think it my duty to preserve the government from the greatest of all evils, the loss of popularity; and am of opinion that ten thousand penal laws cannot so much contribute to the perpetual establishment of the royal family, as one act of confidence, condescension, or bounty, by which the affections of the people may be conciliated.

But this, my lords, is not the only argument against it, by which I am inclined to deny my concurrence. It ought to be always remembered, and by me shall not be easily forgotten, that we are here assembled to deliberate, not for any particular purposes or narrow plans, but for the great end of society, the general happiness; that, as we are not to gratify the caprices of the people by vilifying the dignity or restraining the power of the throne, so we are not to appease the suspicions of the throne by sacrificing the safety or honor of the people: we are to support our sovereign, indeed, but not by such means as destroy the ends by which sovereignty was established, the public welfare, and common security. The motion is therefore, in my opinion, wholly indefensible, because, though it should be granted that it may add some security to the throne, it must in proportion impair the happiness of the people, as it must fill the nation in this time of general commotion with anxiety, and oblige almost every man to the unnatural and unavailing care of watching the conduct of another, and at last must involve thousands in undeserved misery, by punishing them for crimes which they did not commit, and which they could not prevent, and inflicting penalties, therefore, which can have no other effect than that of enriching, by forfeitures, the minions of the court. These reasons, my lords, are surely sufficiently powerful to justify me in opposing the motion; and yet there remains another, which perhaps may, when it is fully examined, appear equally weighty. Notwithstanding the happiness of our present state, the protection of our rights, and the security of our property; notwithstanding the confidence which may be reposed in the equity, the moderation, and the wisdom of his Majesty, and the hopes which we may reasonably have of being governed to all succeeding ages by his illustrious descendants with the same justice, magnanimity, and prudence, yet I am not confident that these hopes may not be disappointed. I know