whole, to admit the truth of this statement. It is, what we have always thought it our duty, to point out to the notice of those who can see no guilt but in the envied possessors of dignity and power; and forms, indeed, the very basis of the answer we have repeatedly attempted to give to those Utopian or factious reformers, whose intemperance has done more injury to the cause of reform, than all the sophistry and all the corruption of their opponents. But, though we admit the premises of Mr Windham's argument, we must utterly deny his conclusions. Though we admit, that a part of the people is venal and corrupt, as well as its rulers, we really cannot see that we have admitted any thing in defence of venality and corruption;-nor can we imagine, how that melancholy and most humiliating fact, can help in the least to make out, that corruption is not an immoral and pernicious practice; not a malum in se, as Mr Windham has been pleased to assert; nor even a practice which it would be just and expedient, if it were practicable, to repress and abolish. The only just inference from the fact is, that ministers and members of Parliament are not the only guilty persons in the traffic;-and that all remedies are likely to be inefficient, which are not capable of being applied through the whole range of the malady. It may be a very good retort from the gentlemen within deors to the gentlemen without-and when they are reproached with not having clean hands, it may be very natural for them to ask a sight of those of their accusers. But is this any answer at all to those, who insist upon the infamy and the dangers of corruption in both quarters? Or, is the evil really supposed to be less formidable, because it appears to be very widely extended, and to be the fair subject, not only of reproach, but of recrimination? The seat of the malady, and its extent, may indeed vary our opinion as to the nature of the remedy which ought to be administered; but the knowledge, that it has pervaded more vital parts than one, certainly should not lead us to think that no remedy whatever is needed, or to consider the symptoms as too slight to require any particular attention.

But, though we differ thus radically from Mr Windham in our estimate of the nature and magnitude of this evil, we have already said, that we are disposed to concur with him in disapproving of the measure which was lately proposed for their correction. The bill of Mr Curwen, and all bills that aim only at repressing the ultimate trafic for scats, by pains and penalties to be imposed

providing for themselves, their relations or dependants. I am as little disposed as any one to defend them in this conduct. Let it be reprobated in terms as harsh as any one pleases, and much more s than it commonly is.' Speech, p. 28.

on those immediately concerned in the transaction, appears to us to begin at the wrong end,-and to aim at repressing a result which may be regarded as necessary, so long as the causes which led to it are allowed to subsist in undiminished vigour. It is like trying to save a valley from being flooded, by building a paltry dam across the gathered torrents that flow into it. The only effect is, that they will make their way, by a more destructive channel, to worse devastation. The true policy would have been, to drain the feeding rills at their fountains, or to provide another vent for the stream, before it had reached the declivity by which the flat is commanded. While the spirit of corruption is unchecked, and even fostered in the bosom of the country, the interdiction of the common market will only throw the trade into the hands of the more profligate and daring,--or give a monopoly to the privileged and protected dealings of administration; and the evil will in both ways be aggravated, instead of being relieved. To make our own system of cure intelligible, it is necessary for us to explain, in a very general way, in what we conceive the evils of this corruption chiefly to consist.

It would be easy to enumerate many, of a pretty formidable description; but, for our present purpose, they may be summed up under two main divisions. In the first place, the weakening and depravation of that public principle, and general concern for right and liberty, upon which all political freedom must ultimately depend; and, 2dly, the vast increase of the power of the crown, by the means which this organized system of corruption affords, for bringing the whole weight of its enormous patronage to bear upon the body of the legislature.

The first of these is the grand, radical, and parent evil; from which the second, and a thousand others of less note, are legitimately descended :-but the second is the most formidable of all its existing progeny, and may be regarded as the worst and most dangerous of the fruits which it has yet brought to maturity. The vast and alarming extent of this influence, and its actual effects upon the legislature, and indeed upon all the higher classes of society, we have endeavoured, on a former occasion, to explain; and earnestly entreat all who do not bear the state of the fact very clearly in their remembrance, to look back to the detail by which we have there supported our opinion, as to the enormous increase of that influence, and of the dangers to which it gives birth. An influence it is, we are firmly persuaded, that has increased sevenfold during the present reign, in the actual amount of the patronage, and other means of seduction, in the disposal of which it consists,

Vol. XVI. p. 197, &c.

and

and seventy-and-seven fold in the art of applying those means, and in the power which they have obtained from the circumstances and habits of a great part of the community;--an influence, which is not only undermining the foundations of our constitutional liberty, but rendering the government itself, and the characters of public men contemptible in the eyes of all who are either above or below the sphere of its operations; and thus preparing the materials of a dreadful explosion, and paving the way for that ominous union of improvidence, corruption, timidity and actual establishment, on the one hand, and of talents, turbulence, honest enthusiasm and physical strength, on the other, which have so recently covered the face of Europe with the ruins of its antient governments.

Every plan of reform, therefore, which is calculated to meet the evils from which we actually suffer, should have for its objects, as it appears to us; first, to diminish and restrain the influence of the Crown; and then to foster and encourage the spirit and the love of liberty among the great body of the people. It should be calculated, like the prescription of a wise physician, in the first place, to relieve the most urgent and alarming of the symptoms by which the patient is oppressed or endangered; and then to eradicate and counteract the general morbid tendency or habit, from which it may appear that those and all other indications of disease had taken their origin. The influence of the Crown, is the distressing symptom of our present malady; and its operation on the legislature, its most alarming and characteristic peculiarity. This, therefore, we must endeavour in the first place to obviate and relieve; and apply ourselves afterwards to remove the unhealthy diathesis which will otherwise threaten the return of this, or of some other analogous syr.ptom.

We have indicated, on a former occafion, the first and most important steps which we think fhould be taken to remove a part of the preffure of this influence from the legislative affembly, by a refolute and peremptory exclufion of a great variety of fubordinate placemen, and minor officers of the government, who are now allowed to fit in that body. The bartering of fuch offices for regular attendance and unfailing fupport, is one of the most direct and dangerous of the corruptions that are carried on by the immediate fervants of the fovereign; and, at the fame time, is of fuch a kind, as hardly to be reached by any penal or prohibitory enactment; and, in fact, would only be encouraged by fuch a bill as that which is introduced by Mr Curwen. The obvious and effectual remedy, therefore, is to make the holders of fuch offices incapable of fitting or voting; and thus either cutting off entirely this whole branch of unlawful traffic, or at leaft curtailing its profits

profits to an incredible degree, by forcing it into a far more unfafe and circuitous channel.

The next step is, to endeavour to reduce the actual amount of the influence itself, by abolishing all finecure and unneceffary places and offices-introducing and enforcing a fyftem of rigid and jealous economy-and throwing a part, at least, of the patronage, which is now vetted in the crown, into detached and inconfiderable bodics of electors.

After that, it may perhaps be found practicable really to render corruption more difficult-by multiplying the numbers, and raifing the qualifications of voters--by taking away the right of election from decayed, inconfiderable, and rotten boroughs, and bestowing it on great towns, poffeffing various and divided wealth. But, though the increafed number of voters will make it more difficult to bribe them, and their greater opulence render them lefs liable to be bribed; fill, we confcfs that the chief benefit which we expect from any provifions of this for, is the fecurity which we think they will afford for the improvement, maintenance, and propagation of a free fpicit among the people-a feeling of political right, and of individual intereft, among fo great a number of perfons, as will make it not only difcreditable, but unsafe, to invade their liberties, or trefpafs upon their privileges. It is never to be forgotten, that the great and ultimate barrier against corruption, oppreflion, and arbitrary power, muft always be raifed on public opinion-and on opinion to valued and fo aficrted, as to point refolutely to resistance, if it be once infulted, or fet at defiance. In order to have this public opinion, however, either fufficiently frong, or fufficiently enlightened, to afford fuch a fecurity, it is quite neceffary that a very large body of the people be taught to fet a value upon the rights which it is qualified to protect,-that their reafon, their moral principles, their pride, and habitual feelings, fhould all be engaged on the fide of their political independence, that their attention fhould be frequently directed to their rights and their duties, as citizens of a free flate,-and their eyes, ears, hearts and affections, familiarized with the fpectacles, and themes, and occafions, that remind them of thofe rights and duties. In a commercial country like England, the purfuit of wealth, or of personal comfort, is apt to engross the whole care of the body of the people; and, if property be tolerably fecured by law, and a vigilant police reprofs actual outrage and diforder, they are likely enough to fall into a general forgetfulness of their political rights, and even to regard as burdenfome thofe political functions, without the due exercife of which the whole frame of our liberties would foon diffolve, and fall to pieces. It is of infinite and incalculable importance, therefore, to fpread, as widely as poffible, among the

people,

people, the feelings and the love of their political bleflings-to exercife them unceasingly in the evolutions of a free conftitutionand to train them to thofe fentiments of pride, and jealoufy, and felf-esteem, which arife naturally from their experience of their own value and importance in the great order of fociety, and upon which alone the fabric of a free government can ever be fafely erected.

We indicate all these things very briefly; both because we cannot now afford room for a more full expofition of them, and becaufe it is not our intention to exhauft this great fubject on the prefent occafion, but rather to place before our readers a few of the leading principles upon which we shall think it our duty to expatiate at other opportunities. We cannot, however, bring even thefe preliminary and mifcellaneous obfervations to a clofe, without taking fome notice of a to ic which feems peculiarly in favour with the reafoning enemies ei reform; and to which we cannot reply, without developing, in a more friking manner than we have yet done, the nature of our appreherlions from the influence of the crown, and of our expectations of good from the increased fpirit and intelligence of the people.

The argument to which we allude, proceeds upon the conceffion, that the influence of the crown has increafed very greatly within the last fifty years; and confiits almost entirely in the affertion, that this increafe, great as it undoubtedly is, yet has not kept pace with the general increafe which has taken place, in the fame period, in the wealth, weight and influence, of the people; fo that, in point of fact, the power of the crown, although absolutely greater, is proportionally less than it was at the commencement of the prefent reign; and ought to be augmented, rather than diminished, if our object be to preferve the antient balance of the conftitution. We mult do Mr Windham the juftice to fay, that he does not make use of this argument; but it forms the grand referve of Mr Rofe's battle; and, we think, is more frequently and triumphantly brought forward than any other, by thofe who affect to juflify abufes by argumentation.

The first aufwer we make to it, confifts in denying the fact upon which it proceeds, at leaft in the fenfe in which it must be alerted, in order to afford any fhadow of colour to the conclufion. There is, undoubtedly, far more wealth in the country than there was fifty years ago; but there is not more independence ;-there are not more men whofe incomes exceed what they conceive to be their neceffary expenditure;-not nearly fo many who confider themfelves as nearly rich enough, and who would therefore look on themselves as without apology for doing any thing against their duty or their opinions, for the fake of profit to themfelves: On

the