system could not be different from what it has turned out. The house of commons, instead of being the representative and depository of the collective sense of this nation, has become a theatre for wrangling disputants to declaim in the scene of noisy impertinence and pedantic folly. An empty shew of reason, a set of words has been substituted for the silent operation of general feeling and good sense; and ministers referring every thing to this flimsy standard have been no longer taken up in planning wise measures, but in studying how to defend their blunders. It has been usual to draw a sort of parallel between the person of whom we are speaking, and the late Mr. Pitt For this perhaps there is little more foundation than the great length of their administrations, and their general ability as leaders of the debates in parliament. If I were disposed to make a comparison of this kind, I should attempt, to describe them by their differences rather than their resemblances They had both perhaps equal plausibility, equal facility and equal presence of mind; but it was of an entirely different kind, and arose from different causes in each of them. Walpole's manner was more natural and less artificial; his resources were more the result of spontaneous vigour and quickness of mind, and less the growth of cultivation and industry. If the late minister was superior to his predecessor in office in logical precision, in the comprehensive arrangement of his subject, and a perfect acquaintance with the topics of common-place declamation, he was certainly at the same time very much his inferior in acuteness of understanding, in original observation, and knowledge of human nature, and in lively, unexpected turns of thought. Pitt's readiness was not owing to the quickness or elasticity of his understanding, but to a perfect self-command, a steadiness and inflexibility of mind, which never lost sight of the knowledge which it had in its possession, nor was ever distracted in the use of it. Nothing ever assumed a new shape in passing through his mind: he recalled his ideas just as they were originally impressed, and they neither received nor ever threw a sparkling light on any subject with which he connected them, either by felicity of combination, or ingenuity of argument. They were of that loose, general, unconnected kind, as just to fill the places they were brought out to occupy in the rank and file of an oration, and then returned mechanically back to their several stations, to be ready to appear again whenever they were called for. Walpole's eloquence, on the other hand, was less an affair of reminiscence, and more owing to present invention. He seems to have spoken constantly on the spur of the occasion: without pretending to exhaust his subject, he often put it in a striking point of view; and the arguments into which he was led in following the doublings and windings of a question, were such as do not appear to have occurred to himself before, nor to have been made

use of by others. When he had to obviate any objection, he did not do it so much by ambiguity or evasion, as by immediately starting some other difficulty on the opposite side of the question, which blunted the edge of the former, and staggered the opinion of his hearers. The style of their speeches is also marked by the same differences as their mode of reasoning. In the one you discover the ease and vivacity of the gentleman, of the man of the world; in the other the studied correctness of the scholar. The one has the variety, simplicity, and smartness of conversation; the other has all the fulness, the pomp, the premeditated involutions and measured periods of a book, but of a book not written in the best style. The one is more agreeable and insinuating; the other more imposing and majestic. Not to spin out this comparison to an unnecessary length, I should think that Walpole was less completely armed for entering the lists with his antagonists, but that his weapons were keener, and more difficult to manage: that Pitt had more art, and Walpole more strength and activity; that the display of controversial dexterity was in Walpole more a trial of wit, and in Pitt more an affair of science; that Walpole had more imagination, and Pitt more understanding; if, indeed, any thing can entitle a man to the praise of understanding, which is neither valuable, nor his own.

Sir,

Sir Robert Walpole's Speech in Reply.

THOUGH the question has been already so fully and so handsomely opposed by my worthy friend under the gallery, by the learned gentleman near me, and by several others, that there is no great occasion to say any thing farther against it; yet as some new matter has been started by some of the gentlemen who have since that time spoke upon the other side of the question, I hope the house will indulge me the liberty of giving some of those reasons which induce me to be against the motion. In general, I must take notice, that the nature of our con. stitution seems to be very much mistaken by the gentlemen who have spoken in favour of this motion. It is

certain that ours is a mixed government, and the perfection of our constitution consists in this, that the monarchical, aristocratical, and democratical forms of goverument, are mixt and interwoven in ours, so as to give us all the advantages of each without subjecting us to the dangers and inconveniences of either. The democratical form of government, which is the only one I have now occasion to take notice of,* is liable to these inconveniences that they are generally too tedious in coming to any resolution, and seldom brisk and expeditious enough in carrying their resolutions into execution; that they are always wavering in their resolutions, and never steady in any of the measures they resolve to pursue, and that they are often involved in factions, seditions, and insurrections, which expose them to be made the tools, if not the prey of their neighbours. Therefore, in all the regulations we make in respect to our constitution, we are to guard against running too much into that form of government which is properly called democratical. This was in my opinion the effect of the triennial law, and will again be the effect, if ever it should be restored.

That triennial elections would make our government too tedious in all their resolves is evident, because in such case, no prudent administration would ever resolve

Sir Robert here, by entirely leaving out the consideration of the other parts of our constitution which are intended to operate as checks and correctives of the democratical part, very ingeniously models the house of commons according to his own wishes, and at the same time in such a manner as to answer the purposes of all the other parts and in fact to render them unnecessary. It has always been pretended that the house of commons was but one branch of the legis lature the representative of the people; and that an antidote to any evils that might arise from this part of the system was wisely provided in the other branches, which were to represent property and power; but care has been taken to make sure of the remedy in the first instance, namely, by inoculating the patient before the disease was caught, and making the house of commons itself never any thing more than the representative of property and power.

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upon any measure of consequence till they had felt not only the pulse of the parliament, but the pulse of the people; and the ministers of state would always labour under this disadvantage, that as secrets of state must not be immediately divulged, their enemies (and enemies they will always have,) would have a handle for exposing their measures, and rendering them disagreeable to the people, and thereby carrying perhaps a new election against them before they could have an opportunity of justifying their measures by divulging those facts and circumstances from whence the justice and the wisdom of their measures would clearly appear.

Then, sir, it is by experience well known, that what is called the populace of every country, are apt to be too much elated with success, and too much dejected with every misfortune; this makes them wavering in their opinions about affairs of state, and never long of the same mind; and as this house is chosen by the free and unbiassed voice of the people in general, if this choice were so often renewed, we might expect that this house would be as wavering and as unsteady as the people usually are; and it being impossible to carry on the public affairs of the nation without the concurrence of this house, the ministers would always be obliged to comply, and consequently would be obliged to change their measures as often as the people changed their minds.

With septennial parliaments, sir, we are not exposed to either of these misfortunes, because if the ministers after having felt the pulse of the parliament, which they can always soon do, resolve upon any measures, they have generally time enough before the new election comes on to give the people a proper information, in order to shew them the justice and the wisdom of the measures they have pursued; and if the people should at any time be too much elated, or too much dejected, or should without a cause change their minds, those at the helm of affairs have time to set them right before a new election comes on.

As to faction and sedition, sir, I will grant that in monarchical and aristocratical governments it generally arises from violence and oppression; but in democratical governments it always arises from the people's having too great a share in the government; for in all countries and in all governments, there always will be many factious and unquiet spirits, who can never be at rest either in power or out of power. When in power, they are never easy unless every man submits entirely to their direction; and when out of power, they are always working and intriguing against those that are in, without any regard to justice or to the interest of their country. In popular governments such men have too much game; they have too many opportunities for working upon and corrupting the minds of the people, in order to give them a bad impression of, and to raise discontents against those that have the management of the public affairs for the time; and these discontents then break out into seditions and insurrections. This, sir, would in my opinion be our misfortune if our parliaments were either annual or triennial. By such frequent elections there would be so much power thrown into the hands of the people as would destroy that equal mixture which is the beauty of our constitution. In short, our government would really become a democratical government, and might from thence very probably diverge into a tyrannical. There. fore in order to preserve our constitution, in order to prevent our falling under tyranny and arbitrary power, we ought to preserve that law which I really think has brought our constitution to a more equal mixture, and consequently greater perfection than it was ever in before that law took place.

As to bribery and corruption, sir, if it were possible to influence by such base means the majority of the elec tors of Great Britain to chuse such men as would probably give up their liberties, if it were possible to influence by such means a majority of the members of this house to consent to the establishment of arbitrary power,