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vern. But I never heard that any publick meafure, or political system, much less that the merits of the constitution of any foreign nation, had been the fubject of a formal proceeding at their festivals; until, to my inexpressible surprise, I found them in a fort of publick capacity, by a congratulatory address, giving an authoritative sanction to the proceedings of the national affembly in France.

In the ancient principles and conduct of the club, fo far at least as they were declared, I see nothing to which I could take exception. I think it very probable, that for fome purpose, new members may have entered among them; and that some truly christian politicians, who love to difpenfe benefits, but are careful to conceal the hand which distributes the dole, may have made them the instruments of their pious designs. Whatever I may have reason to suspect concerning private management, I shall speak of nothing as of a certainty but what is publick.

For one, I should be forry to be thought, directly or indirectly, concerned in their proceedings. I certainly take my full share, along with the rest of the world, in my individual and private capacity, in speculating on what has been done, or is doing, on the publick stage; in any place ancient or modern; in the republick of Rome, or the republick of Paris; but having no general

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general apoftolical mission, being a citizen of a particular state, and being bound up in a confideable degree, by its publick will, I should think it at least improper and irregular for me to open a formal publick correfpondence with the actual government of a foreign nation, without the exprefs authority of the government under which I live.

I should be still more unwilling to enter into that correfpondence, under any thing like an equivocal defcription, which to many, unacquainted with our usages, might make the address, in which I joined, appear as the act of persons in fome fort of corporate capacity, acknowledged by the laws of this kingdom, and authorized to speak the sense of fome part of it. On account of the ambiguity and uncertainty of unauthorized general descriptions, and of the deceit which may be practised under them, and not from mere formality, the house of commons would reject the most sneaking petition for the most trifling object, under that mode of fignature to which you have thrown open the folding-doors of your prefence chamber, and have ushered into your national afsembly with as much ceremony and parade, and with as great a bustle of applaufe, as if you had been vifited by the whole reprefentative majesty of the whole English nation. If what this society has thought proper to fend forth had been a piece of argument, it would have signified little whofe argument argument it was. It would be neither the more nor the less convincing on account of the party it came from. But this is only a vote and resolution. It stands folely on authority; and in this case it is the mere authority of individuals, few of whom appear. Their signatures ought, in my opinion, to have been annexed to their instrument. The world would then have the means of knowing how many they are; who they are; and of what value their opinions may be, from their personal abilities, from their knowledge, their experience, or their lead and authority in this state. To me, who am but a plain man, the proceeding looks a little too refined, and too ingenious; it has too much the air of a political stratagem, adopted for the fake of giving, under a high-founding name, an importance to the publick declarations of this club, which, when the matter came to be closely inspected, they did not altogether fo well deserve. It is a policy that has very much the complexion of a fraud.

I flatter myself that I love a manly, moral, regulated liberty as well as any gentleman of that society, be he who he will; and perhaps I have given as good proofs of my attachment to that cause, in the whole course of my publick conduct. I think I envy liberty as little as they do, to any other nation. But I cannot fstand forward, and give praise or blame to any thing which relates to human

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human actions, and human concerns, on a simple view of the object, as it stands stripped of every relation, in all the nakedness and folitude of metaphyfical abstraction. Circumstances (which with fome gentlemen pass for nothing) give in reality to every political principle its diftinguishing colour, and discriminating effect. The circumstances are what render every civil and political scheme beneficial or noxious to mankind. Abstractedly speaking, government, as well as liberty, is good; yet could I, in common fenfe, ten years ago, have felicitated France on her enjoyment of a government (for she then had a government) without inquiry what the nature of that government was, or how it was administered? Can I now congratulate the fame nation upon its freedom? Is it because liberty in the abstract may be claffed amongst the blessings of mankind, that I am ferioufly to felicitate a mad-man, who has efcaped from the protecting restraint and wholesome darkness of his cell, on his restoration to the enjoyment of light and liberty? Am I to congratulate a highwayman and murderer, who has broke prifon, upon the recovery of his natural rights? This would be to act over again the scene of the criminals condemned to the gallies, and their heroick deliverer, the metaphyfick knight of the for. rowful countenance.

When I fee the spirit of liberty in, action, I fee a strong strong principle at work; and this, for a while, is all I can poffibly know of it. The wild gas, the fixed air is plainly broke loofe: but we ought to suspend our judgment until the first effervescence is a little subsided, till the liquor is cleared, and until we fee something deeper than the agitation of a troubled and frothy furface. I must be tolerably fure, before I venture publickly to congratulate men upon a blessing, that they have really received one. Flattery corrupts both the receiver and the giver; and adulation is not of more fervice to the people than to kings. I should therefore fufpend my congratulations on the new liberty of France, until I was informed how it had been combined with government; with publick force; with the discipline and obedience of armies; with the collection of an effective and welldistributed revenue; with morality and religion; with folidity and property; with peace and order; with civil and social manners. All these (in their way) are good things too; and, without them, liberty is not a benefit whilst it lasts, and is not likely to continue long. The effect of liberty to individuals is, that they may do what they please: we ought to fee what it will please them to do, before we risk congratulations, which may be foon turned into complaints. Prudence would dictate this in the case of feparate infulated private men; but liberty, when men act in bodies, iş power.

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