by the creation of private boroughs: and for this paradoxical idea of Parliament, and this paradoxical idea of reprefentation, it offers you nothing like extent of erudition, or force of imagination: the art of modern war fays the pamphlet, is to traduce the houfe of Stewart; the art of modern court loyalty, it might have added, is to praise the principle of the Stewart and to plant it in the House of Ha nover. The pamphlet now comes to its own times, and it is to be remarked, that as it dwelt on the paft with all the fury and prejudices of the present time, fo it expatiates on the prefent, with as much error and mistake, as if it were treat ing of the remoteft antiquity. It states the adjustment of 82, to be described by its author as follows: " that it emanated " from the armed convention affembled at Dungannon, was "approved at county meetings of the people, armed and “ unarmed, and was fanctioned and registered by the Irish Parliament:" No fuch thing, nor any thing like it, did its author fay, nor fuggeft, nor hint; and this statement of the pamphlet is not inifrepresentation, nor mifinterpretation, but palpable invention, did not the pamphlet affunie the name of a judicial character, I would fay, downright fabrication; I refpect and admire the meeting at Dungannon, but the fubjects of 82 did not emanate from thence; two years before were they difcuffed in Parliament, they were difcuffed on the 19th of April, 1780, on a motion made by myself, and in the courfe of that feffion and of the next feffion, repeatedly and fully; they were adopted by different counties, and various difcriptions of men, and they finally paffed the Parliament. Such is the history; the pamphlet falfifies the hiftory, to blemish a great transaction, and attributes that falfification to me in order to blemish an individual. We We follow the work where it will be perhaps more fortunate. It objects on the question of the claim of right to the declarations of the Volunteers; their character now, it seems, it profeffes to admire; their conduct however (this was the most leading part of the conduct, of the old Volunteers,) it condemns; the inconfiftency of setting up a character, and putting down a conduct, is glaring, but in a work pregnant with every thing which is exceptionable, hardly deferves notice. But will any man feriously fay, that those bodies fhould not have come forward at that time with refolutions in favour of a claim of right? does any man mean to affirm that we could have established that claim without them? If fo, he is a miftater of the truth. Does any man mean to fay, that the claim did not deferve to be established? if fo, he is a flave; and in neither cafe does he deserve an answer. To have countenanced refolutions effential to the establishment of your conftitution, and to have opposed any further interference, when that conftitution was established, was the duty and the pride of them by whom the business of 82 was conducted. By the first step they procured the conftitution; by the second, they faved the government and in both they deferved well of their country, and are placed far above the reach of the author of this little performance, its little cenfure or its little praife. We thought that at that time, as in the period of magna charta, armed men might make declarations to recover liberty, and having recovered it, we thought they fecured their glory as well as their freedom, by retiring to cultivate the bleffings of peace. The pamphlet has further objections; it condemns the expedition with which the claim of right was established, it calls for difcuffion, and delay-to do what? to debate whether the English Parliament had a right to make laws for Ireland Ireland; whether the privy councils in both countries should alter your bills, or whether the mutiny bill fhould be perpetual? why, for the two preceding years, these subjects had been, and little other than these fubjects had been, debated. The pamphlet has proved to you, however, the necessity of expedition, by its argument for delay; for it explains to you, that we were to delay the question, in order to fell it, that is, in order to diminish, clog, and condition your claim of right: you were to delay, the pamphlet explains, in order to preferve to the Parliament of England, over this country, a fhare of legislative power, and the pamphlet administers additional arguments against its project of delay, by fhewing you, that the viceroy of that time was intriguing against your favourite measures, and it gives you ftill further arguments against delay, by fuggefting that there were certain gentlemen at that time, who would not with their lives have fupported their liberties; it might have added, nor with their votes: perfectly well do we understand the author; and this pamphlet might have added, with peculiar authority, that there were certain young gentlemen at that time, ready to barter honour for office, and liberty for chains. It was therefore, we did not listen to the idea of delay; we did not chufe to fet up the inheritance of the people of Ireland to auction; we were applied to for delay, and we refused it; we thought the 16th of April was the day of the Irish Nation, and we were determined not to fleep, until laying our heads on the pillow, we could fay, this day Ireland has obtained a victory. Seeing then, that the constitution was established without delay, or barter, or auction, the pamphlet does not defpair, it has a cure, viz. corruption; it does not indeed fet forth corruption in words, but it does amply and broadly in idea. The expreffions are thefe: "the only fecurity for national "concurrence is a permanent and commanding influence of "the English executive, or rather English cabinet in the "councils of Ireland." By councils of Ireland it means, and profeffes to mean, nothing lefs than the Parliament, fee page 45. Here is the neceffary fubftitute, it seems, for the British Parliament-here is the half million-here is the dependency of the Irish Parliament avowed as a principle; here breaks out of the taint and fore of that unfortunate system, whoferanknefs the pamphlet feems to have deeply inhaled, and with whofe political incenfe it now deigns to regale our noftrils and its own; here is acknowledged the truth of the complaint of the oppofition, namely, that the British minifter fome years after the fettlement of 1782, wifhed, through his agents here, to filch back our Conftitution of 1782, fo honourably and nobly obtained, and to refume by fraud what had been obtained by treaty. In vain fhall a minister come forth in founding words, such as national concurrence or national connexion, and wrap himself up in the threadbare coat of zeal for empire, to ftab his country to the heart; fuch arguments are not to be answered but punished, and when any man shall avow that he has no idea of governing in this country without rendering her Parliament by the means of influence, perfectly dependent on Great Britain, he avows not his profligacy only, but his incapacity also. Such a minifter could not govern without corruption; he could not govern with it; he might indeed begin by attempts to pack a Parliament, but he will conclude by an attempt to abolish the legislature. To return to the pamphlet. On the subject of the claim of right, the author feems to have three parental ideas; First, That the Volunteers fhould have made no declaration on the fubject Secondly, That the question should have been left left open to delay and Thirdly, That the British cabinet fhould fucceed to the power of the British Parliament. By the first plan the conftitution had been loft, by the fecond fold, and by the third corrupted. We follow the pamphlet ; it states, that the adjustment of 1782 was described by the author of it as follows; then he introduces a defcription which certainly was given by its author, but which was not a defcription of the adjustment of the parliament of 1782, but of a parliament that fat 187 years ago, and which was affembled by James I. in the year of our Lord 1613. Here again is that of which we have fo often reason to complain in this work invention; true it is, that the boroughs created by James I. have had their effect on pofterity, and true it is, that those boroughs continue to fend members to parliament; fo far the parliament of 1782 and of 1613 had a fimilitude; but it is not true that the parliament of 1782 was a packed parliament like that of1613; it is not true that the reprefentatives of the boroughs were either attornies clerks or the fervants of the Caftle as in 1613; nor is it true that the boroughs of 1782 refembled those created by James in 1613; and fo far the two parliaments have no fimilitude. Mr. Burke, speaking to me of some country that had profpered under a conftitution confisting of three eftates, but eftate's defectively formed, obferved, "that it was of the nature of a conftitution fo formed as ours, however clumfy the conftituent parts, when fet together in action, ultimately to act well," fo of that in question. The boroughs, in a course of time, ceafed to be under the influence of the king, and the conftitution took root in the people; the crown became dependant for fupply on the parliament, and the parliament by the octennial bill, became more intimately connected with the country; but however altered, depurated, and naturalized, this borough system |