now live in the hearts of the people they instructed and protected, while their calumniators are forgotten, or remembered only to be execrated.

"Irishmen of the present day," says our admired orator-"may go to the graves of these honorable dead men-they may raise up their tomb-stones, as their calumniators threw them down-they will feel it more instructive to converse with the ashes of the one, than with the compositions of the other."

On the 6th March, 1786, Mr. Forbes moved the House to resolve, "That the present application and amount of Pensions on the Civil Es. tablishment, are a grievance to the nation, and demand redress."

On the discussion of this motion it appeared, that in the year 1757, the annual charge of Pensions was only 45,000l. per annum; and that in that year a resolution passed the House, to the following effect, "That paying so great a sum in Pensions, was an imprudent disposition of the public revenue, and a grievance which ought to be redressed.

In 1785, the the Pension List amounted to 95,000l. which exceeded the whole amount of the Civil Establishment.

From 1757 to 1785, every Establishment,

Civil and Military, greatly increased-the patronage of the Crown was extended, and the National Debt amounted to more than two millions. The Pension List of Ireland exceeded that of England.-The commerce-the revenue, and the resources of the former, bore no competition with those of the latter." It was idle, therefore," said Mr. Forbes, "to talk of the Independence of the Irish Parliament, whose Members received wages from the Crown." On this debate, Mr. Grattan made the memorable declaration, which seemed to have given such pain to the delicate feelings of Ministers: "Should I affirm," said Mr. Grattan, "that the Pension List is not a grievance, I should affirm, in the face of my country-an impudent, insolent, and a public lie!"-This motion, so essential to the purity and independence of Parliament, was lost.-On this occasion Mr. Grattan occupied the attention of the House but for a short time.

On the 13th March, Mr. Forbes presented his Bill to limit the amount of Pensions, which was received, and read a first time; and on a motion being made, that the bill be read a second time, on the succeeding night, Mr. Curran, (now Master of the Rolls) distinguished himself in an eminent degree, by a display of that sar

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castic wit, and a happy exertion of that fancy, which fascinated every hearer, captivated the attention, and excited the admiration of every party on either side of the House. The speech he delivered on this occasion, appearing to the Editors to be faithfully and correctly reported, they would feel it an act of great injustice to that celebrated orator, and inflexible Irishman, to deny to the readers of this volume, the pleasure which they have experienced in the pe rusal of one of the happiest efforts of that caustic humour, which consumed while it enlightened, and planted a thorn in the bosom of the Administration, which could not refuse their admiration of its powers.

On this very interesting question, Mr. CURRAN thus addressed the Chair:

"Sir, I object to adjourning this Bill to the first of August, because I perceive, in the present disposition of the House, that a proper decision will be made upon it this night. We have set out upon our inquiry in a manner so honorable, and so consistent, that we have reason to expect

the happiest success, which I would not wish to see baffled by delay,

"We began with giving the full affirmative of this House, that no grievance exists at all; we considered a simple matter of fact, and adjourned our opinion, or rather we gave sentence on the conclusion, after having adjourned the premises. But I do begin to see a great deal of argument in what the learned Baronet has said, and I beg gentlemen will acquit me of apostacy if I offer some reasons why the Bill should not be admitted to a second reading..

"I am surprised that gentlemen have taken up such a foolish opinion, as that our constitution is maintained by its different component parts, mutually checking and controlling each other: they seem to think with Hobbes, that a state of nature is a state of warfare; and that, like Mahomet's coffin, the constitution is suspended between the attraction of different powers. My friends seem to think that the Crown should be restrained from doing wrong by a physical necessity; forgetting, that if you take away from a man all power to do wrong, you at the same time take away from him all merit of doing right, and by making it impossible for men to run into slavery, you enslave them most effectually. But if instead of the three different parts of our con

stitution drawing forcibly in right lines, at opposite directions, they were to unite their power, and draw all one way, in one right line, how great would be the effect of their force, how happy the direction of this union! The present system is not only contrary to mathematical rectitude, but to public harmony; but if instead of privilege setting up his back to oppose prerogative, he was to saddle his back, and invite prerogative to ride, how comfortably might they both jog along; and therefore it delights me to hear the advocates for the Royal bounty flowing freely, and spontaneously, and abundantly, as Holywell in Wales. If the Crown grants double the amount of the revenue in pensions, they approve of their Royal Master, for he is the breath of their nostrils.

"But we will find that this complaisance, this gentleness between the Crown and its true servauts, is not confined at home; it extends its influence to foreign powers. Our merchants have been insulted in Portugal, our commerce interdicted; what did the British Lion do? Did he whet his tusks? Did he bristle up and shake his mane? Did he roar? No; no such thing-the gentle creature wagged his tail for six years at the court of Lisbon, and now we hear from the Delphic oracle on the Treasury bench, that he is