doctrine with every consideration of equity and compensation, to satisfy the interests of the parties concerned, while it applied to the common interests and common salvation of India and Great Britain.

Need I urge any farther excitements? The fate of a great portion of the globe-the fate of great states, in which your own existence is involved-the distresses of fifteen millions of people-the rights of humanityare involved in this question. Good God! what a call! The native of Indostan, born a slave, his neck bent from the very cradle to the yoke, by birth, by education, by climate, by religion, a patient, submissive, willing subject to eastern despotism, first begins to feel, first shakes his chains, for the first time complains under the pre-eminence of British tyranny!

It only remains for me to state the sort of committee for which I wish. A committee of the whole house, with the business of the session which remains unfinished, could sit but seldom, and at this late season would be ineffectual. A select committee, I confess, has generally been the committee of the minister. Lists of names conveyed from the treasury have often had the fortune to be adopted by the majority.

Sir, I have not proposed this idea without thinking of that objection; but I do not believe it is intended to check this inquiry by such means. I have a further confidence. I do not believe they would succeed if they were tried. I shall therefore, sir, propose a committee of thirty-one, with a proportionable quorum to sit in the holidays; and should means be found to continue their operations during the summer, I do not be lieve there is a member who could be called to that committee, who would not forego all private avocations or conveniences for prosecuting that great essential public duty. I therefore move, that a committee be appointed to enquire into the nature, state, and condition of the East India Company, and of the British affairs in India. That the committee do consist of thirty one members, to be chosen by ballot, &c. &c.

MR. JENKINSON.

(The present Earl of Liverpool.)

"Servetur ad imum

"Qualis ab incœptu processerit, & sibi constel."

In Reply to Sir William Meredith's Motion on Articles of Subscription.

Α CURSORY view of the times would convince any man of the hon. gentleman's mistake who spoke last, accusing Laud as the principal promoter of that farrago, as the gentleman was pleased to term it. (Here he re

ferred to an act passed in the reign of Edward VI. and also quoted several particulars relative to professor Cheke, queen Elizabeth, and James I.) From the passages, sir, here alluded to, it is manifest, that what the honourable gentleman hath attributed to Laud, is the work of other hands. But granting it, sir, to be as the gentleman says; yet candour must allow, that Laud, with all his faults, was a very great man. With respect, sir, to the matter of subscription, I profess myself an advocate for the measure, a convert to its utility. I know, sir, with men of lively parts, and a brilliancy of genius, there is nothing so easy as to place an object in such a light, as that the bye-standers cannot refrain from beholding it with ridicule: I know, sir, that the hackneyed term superstition may be called in with great dexterity, as a bugbear to alarm weak minds, by suggesting groundless terrors; but surely, sir, this cannot be called a superstitious age-it is rather an age of scepticism; under the notion of religious liberty, the solemn truths of religion itself are treated with contempt, and sceptical infidelity abounds. Some men, sir, are for

laying our youth under no restraint: others go farther; they argue for the natural excellence of the passions, and urge, that they should be left to indulge them at will. But, sir, if the passions are early felt, sad experience

proves that reason is a guest that takes not up her residence in our breasts, till a late, a very late period of life. One man, who calls himself a philosopher, hath contended, that man, as he comes into the world, should be left entirely to himself; at random to receive each impression from without, at random to follow each suggestion from within. I do confess, sir, I should have a great curiosity to try the experiment; but certain I am, a person trained in such a manner, would be a man quite unfit to live in society. This, sir, is the mode of education contended for by Rousseau, whom I always looked upon as an ingenious madman. With respect therefore, sir, to an exemption from human ties, in matters of religion, I am against it. So much depends upon the right education of youth, that every innovation on an established mode, which for ages had been found to answer the end, should be avoided. That the present mode adopted at our universities, has answered the end, the past and present experience may determine.

Whence the man, who explored the unfrequented paths of science, unlocked the secret stores of knowledge, and laid open the hidden treasures of learning and of wisdom? Whence, sir, Bacon ?-From an university. Whence, sir, he, who by the surest geometric proofs, sought out the laws of matter and motion? Whence Newton ?-Froin an university. On the other hand, whence all that scepticism, that froth of words, that puerile stuff, so much the taste of the present times? I will answer you, sir-not from an university; but from your Humes, your Bolingbrokes, your Rousseaus and others of this despicable tribe.*

Since then, sir, the custom of our universities, for ages, hath answered every end the state could require in the education of its youth, I am not for substituting another mode; I am not for making an innovation upon their establishment.

Mr. Jenkinson here forgets his university trammels and runs out of the course. He transposes the question, and then produces a list of obnoxious names, some of which were from an university.

Nor is it, sir, an establishment peculiar to English universities; all foreign ones have their tests. At the university of Paris I know a test is established, and the members are required to testify their strict adherence to such doctrines as characterise the religion of the coun. try. By the edict of Nantz, also, provision is made, that protestants, the dissenters of that country, shall nevertheless declare their assent to a certain prescribed form. What, therefore, hath been so universally adopted, I should suppose adopted because found to be of national utility; and I shall not, sir, give my vote for England to be exempt from what hath been found by foreigners necessary for the maintenance of the religion of the country: by consequence, I strenuously oppose the motion, and your quitting the chair.

LORD NORTH,

On the Petition presented against the Bill to remove the Board of Customs from the Town of Boston,

SAID, however great his obligations were to the candour and public spirit of the honourable gentleman who made the motion, (Mr. Fuller,) yet he differed much from him in the amendment proposed. His lordship observed, that though the honourable gentleman had said it was the first offence, yet upon recollection he was very sure he would not be of that opinion, as the people at Boston had begun many years ago to endeavour to throw off all obedience to this country that indeed this was the first time that parliament had proceeded to punish them. He said, I am by no means an enemy to lenient measures, but I find that resolutions of censure and warning will avail nothing; we must therefore proceed to some immediate remedy: now is our time to stand out, to defy them, to proceed with firmness, and without fear; that they would never reform until we

take a measure of this kind. Let this bill produce a conviction to all America that we are now in earnest, and that we will proceed with firmness and vigour ; that conviction would be lost if they see us hesitating and doubting. That it would be enough to shew that Great Britain is in earnest. The merchandize now will be landed at Marble-head, in the port of Salem, which is putting Boston about seventeen miles from the sea with respect to foreign trade. This restriction will be continued as long as they persist in their proceedings; it will operate severely or mildly against them, according to their behaviour; if they are obstinate, the measure will be severe; if not, mild. He believed that Boston would not immediately submit to a fine, nor to the intention of the present bill, unless it came attended with a mark of resolution and firmness that we mean to punish them, and assert our right. It is impossible to suppose but some of our own people may in some de gree suffer a little; but we must compare those temporary inconveniences with the loss of that country, and its due obedience to us: they bear no comparison; and the preference must certainly be given to the latter, and attended to. The honourable gentleman, he said, tells us, that the Americans will not pay their debts due to this country, unless we comply with their disposition. I believe, says his lordship, things will remain much in the same state as they did upon a like occasion. They threatened us with the same thing if we did not repeal the stamp act; we repealed that act, and they did not pay their debts. If this threat is yielded to, we may as well take no remedy at all. Their threats will hold equally good to the fine proposed by the honourable gentleman, as to the operation of this bill. I hope, adds his lordship, that we every one feel, that it is the common cause of us all; and such an unanimity will go half way to their obedience to this bill. The honourable gentleman tells us, that the act will be a waste piece of paper, and that an army will be required to put it in VOL. II.

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