nature, and in its minutest, as well as its grandest movements, in its most energetic, as well as its most ordinary affections, invariably subject to those laws.

When philosophers assure us we cannot understand causes, that we perceive only effects,-philosophically speaking, they say the truth: but all our actions,—this is no less true,-are wheels within wheels, a train of causes and effects. Though of primary causes we know nothing, yet what are but effects with respect to phenomena that preceded, become causes with respect to those that follow. And what is our guide in all the regular, useful pursuits of human life, but correct observations of those causes, and a right application of our knowledge for purposes of just reasoning, and daily experience?

Thus when the body is diseased, we refer, as to the cause, to the taking of too much or too little food, of too much or too little exercise, to inordinate passions, or to other casualties and influences incident to our nature: on beholding a building in ruins, we consider the materials of which it was composed, and the purposes for which it was raised, more than the time it has lasted, or the power by which it was destroyed. So with respect to those tumults, and wars, and violent deaths in civil communities, it is not so much a question of what now is, as of what has been: Whence come wars and rumors of wars?"

The opinions, professions, and conduct of men, are as necessarily influenced by causes, as the events which take place in civil society; and we must estimate the writings of men in the same manner. Thus in the writings of Bacon and Hobbes, judging from the principles laid down, or the occasional concessions introduced in the writings of those philosophers, I infer, that some of their opinions took an impulse from their relative situations, from the circumstances of the times, more than from the genuine impulse of their own great minds, or from following the order of their own systems. And this is the most candid account that can be given of the matter, in cases where the principles of civil liberty and of arbitrary power are intermingled, like contradictory masses amalgamated in one body, in the same system.

:

Burke was a striking example of this vacillating state of mind. Whether, as another person spake of himself, he could not afford to keep a conscience, and should always yield to expediency, I do not inquire but he was certainly a political engineer, full of manoeuvring powers; taking his stand often in opposite points, moving in opposite directious, and pursuing his operations by such contradictory designs, that he hardly seemed the same man; at one time laying down natural laws and fundamental principles, pleading for liberty against power and the usurpations of political esta

blishments, for reforms against public abuses and unconstitutional influence. Then again he rallies :-behold him pleading for power against liberty, for the usurpations of establishments against the laws of nature; for the continuance of corruptions in defiance of his own high demands for the independence of parliaments; and for the support of an influence, which he had before denounced as having increased beyond all due bounds, and as being unconstitutional! Such was the political progress of Mr. Burke's mind, from the American War, to that epoch in the French Revolution which he lived to witness.

Highly probable, too, it is, that the recent commotions and changes which have taken place on the continent,-changes which were preceded by violent flashes of light, and often followed by sensible darkness,-have occasioned, I will not say tergiversation, but rather confusion, perplexity, contradiction, unmanageable points in the opinions of many in England at this time; that some, from unexpected events, have receded from opinions which were thought violent, because they were earnest, and from demands which were deemed clamorous, because they 'were popular. But examples occur, where men are rather confounded than converted; where they may be said rather to yield to circumstances, than to abandon their principles; and they become like musical instruments, which, though not shattered and broken, are miserably out of tune, or played on by unskilful hands. Because they do not understand the world, they think they do not understand themselves: and, perhaps, in both cases they think truly. For if man has been justly called a microcosm, or little world, for the variety of his individual nature; society, from its combination of different inclinations, pursuits, interests, powers, passions, and conditions, may be called the megacosm, or great world; a machine of vast compass, intricate contrivances, inexplicable movements, and deep recesses: and in contemplating it very honest men may be mistaken, when they think themselves right; and they may have been right where they think themselves to have been mistaken. And should any of us have trembled, as it were, for a while on that narrow neck of land, FEAR, which Hobbes makes the origin of society, I hope we shall never plunge into that ocean of arbitrary power, which for all the valuable purposes of life, would be its destruction.

Nor is it improbable, that some have gone, from the same cause, the contrary way; that, as some have been moved backward, to Fear, others may have been led forward, to Hope; that thinking circumstances of public calamity and alarm should lead nations, no less than individuals, to serious thoughts, and permanent reformations, they have eyed more narrowly public abuses, and perceived their consequences; that, thinking corruption tends to division,

dissolution, and death; and that mutual sympathies, mutual confidence, and mutual protection, the great ends of civil society, can bring the dispersed interests of individuals to a resting place, and by exciting the most pleasing, the most salutary feeling of co-operation, can unite and consolidate them for purposes of public utility; they have renounced claims, which they once advocated, and advocate claims which they once opposed; and that after vacillating backwards and forwards like a pendulum, for a long time, they may at length, perhaps, imagine they are now come to their proper point of rest; believing there is much truth in the declaration, that when "the divine judgments are abroad in the earth, the nations should learn righteousness."

This Essay then does not, any more than the preceding, profess to meddle with the difficult question of Reform, except, as it may happen, by cursory allusions; and this, in order more effectually to consider some advantages which all possess in common, and to awaken those sympathies which all members of a civil community should feel with the public interest.

And yet I yield only apparently. I rather step aside, than take the opposite course. For to perceive defects, and to be indifferent about remedies, implies no great liberality; to admit, and defend them, requires some ability. Ever since I tried to think, our Par

Such readers as choose to see the particular deviations from parliamentary representation defended, are referred to Dr. Paley's Principles of Moral and Political Philosophy, Book II. ch. vi. This book is referred to for the purpose of pointing out a publication, where Dr. Paley's arguments are exposed and confuted with much acuteness, See Letters to William Paley, M.A. on his objections to a reform in the representation of the Commons. Printed for Johnson, 1796. It falls in with my plan to copy from the Appendix to those Letters the following passage, ("as being declaratory of the Common Law," and as saying all I would wish to say,) from Sir Thomas Smith's tract "on the Manuer of Governement or Policie of the Realme of Englande." "Everie Englishman is entended to bee there in Parliament present, either in person, or by procuration and attornies, of what preheminence, state, dignitie, or qualities soever he be, from the prince, (be he king or queen,) to the lowest person of Englande: and the consent of the Parliament is supposed to be everie man's consent."—De Republica Anglorum, 1583, p. 35. Sir Thomas Smith was the person so well known in the History of Greek Literature at Cambridge, and who was afterwards secretary to Edward and Elizabeth.

Dr. Paley's Defence of our present Parliamentary Representation is evidently a system of accommodation, founded on his doctrine of expedience. In 1774, he published "A Defence of Bishop Law's Considerations, in reply to Dr. Randolph on the Propriety of requiring Subscription to the 39 Articles." There he says, "It is obvious that subscription to the 39 Articles might be altered, or withdrawn, upon general principles of justice and expedience;" and in his chapter on Religious Establishments, in his Principles of Moral and Political Philosophy, Book VI. Ch. 10, the same writer defends, or at least apologises for, subscription, by the doctrine of expedience. To such

liament has, I thought, wanted reforming, and my convictions have been every day increasing. But the subject is too large for my present limits, and involving, as it must, the minutiae of particular deviations, does not so properly belong to this place. So, as I have already said, I have rather glanced at reform, than looked it full in the face.

With this view were stated in former essays definitions and opi❤ nions of different writers, churchmen, dissenters, lawyers, and political writers, on the British Constitution, with such reserve for private sentiment which occurred at the time, with due approbation of what seemed good in the English Constitution, but with some discriminations between what was fundamental and accidental principles; between what was, and what is, and, from considering the changeableness of all human institutions, what may be; recollecting what has been so well illustrated and enforced by Algernon Sidney, "that good governments admit of changes in the superstructure, whilst the foundations remain unchangeable."

Blackstone expresses somewhere the changeableness of our constitution in this lax, loose way: "What our constitution now is." Lax it is, and loose, yet truly expressed. What our constitution is, we may know; it is before our eyes: what it may become is unknown; it depends, like our lives, on contingencies; it is buried, like our hopes and our fears, in the dark womb of futurity. Philosophers and politicians have speculated on the pleasing, awful subject; some concluding, that the democratical part of our Constitution will bring on a republic; others, that the monarchical will bring on despotism. So thought Hume. Montesquieu, who seems to have been of the same opinion, says, "it will perish when the legislative shall be more corrupt than the executive."

In speaking on the principles of civil government, it is usual to appeal (as in the present case) to philosophers and politicians. But it is not necessary to play the politician or philosopher. Those principles, which ought to govern societies of men, are deducible only from our wants, and appeal to that divine light, that lighteth every one that cometh into the world, the primitive reason of man: they are not difficult to ascertain, nor difficult to be understood. Our base interests and passions, our prejudices and superstitions, may throw a mist before us; and the impostures of governments may involve us in mysteries and darkness: but let us feel our proper wants, and, in the exercise of reason, we shall not mistake our way.

reasonable lengths may this doctrine be stretched. In another place, he calls the influence of the Crown the more successful expedient. It is clear this able writer knew what was right on the above subjects.

' Discourses concerning Government, Ch. II. Sect. xvii.

clergy have, many of them, caught a tone from Locke. And what friend to constitutional liberty, who has perused the works of Burnet, Hoadley, Sykes, and Blackburne, has not derived pleasure and instruction from them? Bishop Hurd's Dialogues on the very subject of these essays-the English Constitution, we have had occasion to refer to before; and it is an excellent work, founded on true constitutional principles; and many others, as excellent, might be pointed out. What religious doctrines, and rites, sacraments, and discipline, the established clergy may think it their duty to support, as teachers in a religious community, is totally unconnected with the present subject: what concerns religion becomes an affair of conscience, which only religion addresses; but what is of a nature merely civil (as what we are now treating of, is) addresses other feelings, and the duty arises from other obligations: and so to proceed.

In the exact

The same influence which the established clergy have over their flock, dissenting ministers have over theirs; and they are not merely to be justified in using it to promote the fundamental principles of English liberty-they seem, by the most weighty considerations, bound to do so. To these fundamental maxims they owe much, and to them they should look for more. proportion as their complaints against corporation and test laws are just, should be their zeal in promoting the fundamental principles of the English constitution: for those principles are favorable to their plea; and the just operation of them would remove the grievance.

I cannot forbear remarking here, that by whatever religious tests the clergy may think proper, (agreeably to what was just now hinted) to bind themselves, yet that, in cases purely civil, it is not congenial to the spirit of our constitution, properly understood, to introduce doctrines of theological import: they make no part of Magna Charta-no part in the Act of Settlement. For the introduction of doctrinal matters, as tests for the members of our universities, we are indebted to the authority of James 1.2 who made so free with our constitutional liberties; and the Corporation and Test Oaths were not originally aimed against the Protestant dissenters, though afterwards applied to them.3

1 Fortescue, in his admirable book de Laudibus Ll. Angl. says nothing about doctrinal points.

2 Stat. Academiæ Cantab. Literæ Regiæ.

3 See Bishop Hoadley's Refutation of Bishop Sherlock's Arguments against a Repeal of the Corporation and Test Laws; and the Right of Protestant Dissenters to a complete Toleration, Ch. 1, 2; where is given a History of the Corporation and Test Acts, and it is shown, that opposition to popery was the primary end of both.