ley, Efq; to the Committee on the state of Public affairs, the perufal of which papers is recommended to me by Sir James Norcliffe, at the defire of the Committee of Affociation in the county of York.

In whatever particulars I may differ from the fentiments and plans contained in these papers, I think it my duty refpectfully to acknowledge the receipt of them, and through your means to acquaint the gentlemen of the Committee, that I have carefully and impartially perused them. It is now eighteen years fince I have arrived at that age when the laws of this country entitle a man to take an active part in its political interefts, and to judge for himself with respect to political affairs. A great part of thofe important years have been by me employed either in the ftudy or in the promotion of what I thought effential to the welfare of my country, and although my public fervices have been uniformly rejected or neglected, by the King's Minifters, my application to the important study has been unabated, and my zeal for the public fervice unfhaken.

It is a maxim of mine, which I hope I fhall retain while I exist, that our duties towards the common-wealth are not to be relinquifhed on account of the faults or errors of those whom the Executive Power has thought fit to inveft with his active powers in that common-wealth. Were it not from the influence of this maxim,

I might plead exemption from political energy, fince I belong to an order of men who ftand diftinguished from the reft of the community at large, by having long fince furrendered their political liberty, and confented to permit the Minifter, for the time being, to nominate their Reprefentatives.

Against this furrender I have in vain ftruggled ever fince I came among them, and if I were to yield to the modern fpirit of refentment against Ministers, on my account, I might abundantly difplay my indignation against a fucceffion of Minifters who have excluded me from the employments for which birth, my turn of mind, and my unremitted train of study have fitted me.

But, Sir, my love towards my fellow citizens is of too high a form to yield to such personal confiderations. I confider myfelf, tho' ftripped by the meanness and venality of my brethren of the only privilege belonging to my order, as ftill belonging to the Public and to the State which protects me.

I am fenfible, however, of the importance of that civil liberty which ought to belong to me as a degraded, though not difhonoured, native of Great Britain, and accordingly I fhall, in as few words as poffible, give you my fentiments on the mafs of matter contained in the communications which the York Committee and Mr. Hartley have thought proper to make to the public and to me.

After

After the moft mature confideration of the fubject at large, I venture to give you my opinion that the difcafes of the British Conftitution are interwoven with, and arife from the very nature of that much admired, but, as I think, very imperfect Constitution.

The Conftitution of Great-Britain, originating from the gradual introduction of popular weight by the effects of literature and commerce, has been continually in a ftate of fluctuation. Before the reign of Henry VII. our Constitution was a concentrated ariftocracy only, in fome degree invaded by the gradual effects of the Corporations from the reign of that Prince to the Revolution in the year 1688. The Conftitution was continually purging itself of its antient forms, and tending more and more towards a commonwealth of the people, when the Prince of Orange was made King; he was stripped by the Statute of the pretended powers of his predeceffors, but the form of Government remained the fame.

A continual bounty was to be offered to the Prince for his intelligent management of the revenues of the State, for the purpose of making up the deficiencies of the old prerogative, and the Candidates, for places in the Senate, were to have a continual bounty for the corruption of the voters, to place them where they were to treat with the Prince for the price of the liberty of the people.

By the nature of election, a continual fcene of intemperance,

intemperance, corruption of manners, and bribery, was to be kept up among the people; and this baneful engine was to extend its influence to the remotest part of the country, and to contaminate the cottage, as fully as the palace of the Prince, or the pandarous feats of lubricity in the fireets of the metropolis.

In other states, the odious manners of an overgrown and luxurious capital, reach only the limits of a corrupted atmosphere which furrounds it; in this, it taints every thing we fee, hear, feel, or can difcern, by the powers of our understanding.

I am convinced, therefore, that the cause of all our misfortunes, and the perpetual deterioration of our country which we muft fubmit to behold, is to be fought for, and fought for alone, in the nature of the Conftitution itself.

Quo femel imbutá, quodcunque infundis, acefcit.

Let us not imagine that triennial or annual Parliaments, melting the boroughs into the counties, and far lefs adding one hundred Members to the Senate, will cure the disease in question.

The new modelling of the Conftitution would coft a civil war, and after all, things be no better than they were before.

*The lines in Horace, here alluded to, but altered by Lord Buchan, ftand thus:

no femel eft imbuta recens, fervabit odorem Tefla diu."

"Sincerum eft nifi vas, quodcunque infundis acefcit."

The people whofe manners are already corrupted, would ftill fell themselves to the best bidders, or the most artful rogues, and the elected would continue to fell themselves to the Prince or his Minifters, for offices, penfions, contracts, and ribbons, or titles. In fhort, the aphorifm of Hippocrates, the father of Greek Physicians, would still apply to this as to the disease of the body, "Errors in the first concoction are never, or at least feldom, cured by a fecond." Upon the whole, therefore, however I may approve of the concern expreffed by the Committee and Mr. Hartley, on account of the growing evils of the ftate, I am convinced that the Plan propofed would not be effectual towards their removal, nor any other be fuccefsful fhort of a rotatory fyftem of election, founded upon independent qualifications, which I fear would be impracticable, except in a ftate where great concuffions opened a door to new models; and as things are, virtuous combinations formed for the reftoration of public and private manners, feem to me to be the only means of faving this finking ftate and nation.

I am, Sir,

Your humble fervant,

BUCHAN.

Paper VII.