successive as the waves that break upon your shore, you will not have the voice of Omnipotence, that can say, "so far shalt thou come, and no further." It is not at the time of a storm at least, that you can venture on such an experiment: at no season could you attempt it without great hazard.

But the prevailing argument, which is to silence every tongue, and convince every understanding on this subject, is, "that the voice of the people calls for a parliamentary reform;" an argument of much weight indeed, if it were well founded! But notwithstanding all I have heard to that purpose, I do not believe the fact to be so. The people of Ireland are many; the agitators, the writers for the publick prints, the heroes, and the historians of newspapers, are few; though they speak, as it were, with many tongues. The discontented are clamorous, the contented are silent; the songs of industry are only heard at home, whilst the trumpet of discord is audible from shore

to shore.

I know there are several respectable persons, who think favourably of a parliamentary reform. Several very respectable members of this house have indulged themselves in something like enthusiasm on the subject. They have woven garlands to decorate the offering, and prepared crowns of laurel for those who should administer the sacrifice. And yet, when they have disclosed the particular object of their idolatry; when they have stated the different plans, with which they have favoured us during the course of this session, they have discovered a sufficient diversity of opinion indeed. Therefore, I can never be persuaded, that the people of Ireland are unanimous in calling for a measure, when scarcely any two of them are agreed in their sense of the measure itself. Reform is a word to which every reformer annexes his own idea. It is a picture, that every man draws from his own imagination, and sometimes colours to his own interest. Therefore, if you say the people are unanimous in calling for a parliamentary reform, you describe a whimsical unanimity indeed, a unanimity of discordance; something like that ridiculous concert you have

heard of, in which every man sings a different tune; but as they all make a noise together, they call it a con

eert.

The fact is, that in times like the present, when the most mischievous industry has been employed to propagate new notions of government, and new models of constitution, mere popular clamour is ever ready at the call of those who invite it; and there are many to be found who take up the word reform, or any other parole of discontent, because they know it means innovation, and may be commotion. For there are in all countries, however free and however happy, many to be found too restless for peace, and too turbulent for government; men out of the habits of tranquillity; men whom commerce cannot enrich, or freedom satisfy. There are to be found in all countries many who have neither property, nor industry, nor occupation; who must embrace every thing like a change, and aspire at commotion, because they know victory may be acquisition, and defeat can take nothing from them. "Nam semper in civitate quibus opes nullæ sunt, bonis invident, malos extollent, vetera odere, nova exoptant; odio suarum rerum mutari omnia student." Such men are ever ready to raise a popular clamour, which is too often mistaken for the voice of the people; whilst successful industry and conscious happiness remain silent, looking for stability, not innovation; for enjoyment, not experiment.

The only plan of reform that comes home to the wishes or understanding of the people, is that which comprehends the whole of the people: and that you know very well would not be the British constitution, but a pure democracy; it would be the sovereign power in the hands of those who had no property; the first exercise of which power would be to take the property from those who had it. Yet this is the reform which, when any thing has been specifically referred to, the people have demanded. And I have in my hand a printed plan, formed on that very principle, which has been industriously circulated, and which embraces to all

intents and purposes the purity and perfection of the French republick.

I know very well the honourable member who has brought forward this bill, and those who cooperate with him, reprobate such notions as strongly as we do. Yet I must say, if you loosen the habits of men from accustomed government and experienced happiness, you will not be able to recall them to tranquillity by your temperate plans of reform; plans that cannot reach the majority of the people and do you imagine this great majority of the people (which are and must be left out of your plans) whilst by your concessions you are flattering their exertions, will be satisfied with their own exclusion?-No, sir! they would grow more confident from their apparent victory, and more extravagant from being disappointed in their share of the plunder. And this is the misfortune (and it is a great one) of turning the publick mind from the contemplation of its happiness to the vanity of speculation, or the rashness of experi

ment.

Well regulated society ascertains to every man his sphere of action, proportioned to his condition and capacity; every violation of that order is publick confusion. If your taylor were to employ himself in mending your form of government, he would not mend your cloaths; if he were to spend his time in studying the rights of man, he would soon want the food of man; like poor Quidnunc the upholsterer, in devouring the papers for intelligence, he would learn the intelligence of his own bankruptcy. The fact is, sir, when the people at large take up the trade of politicks, they will not follow any other trade ; when artisans become constitution-makers, they will scarcely make any thing else; they will not make hats, they will not make shoes, they will not make linen cloth. They may indeed make a noise, which they may call the voice of the nation; they may make a riot, which they may call the energy of the people. Bu in the mean time the progress of the nation is stopped, Manufactures will not grow out of idleness,

prosperity out of politicks, or order out of alehouses; commerce will not draw bills of exchange on debating clubs, and publick credit will retire from the terrours of armed associations. You see the progress and the mischiefs of what is called popular discussion; that is, the people talking instead of working; talking of what they do not understand, instead of applying themselves to their own · business; debating instead of weaving, and making as many parliaments in the country as there are porter houses. You see, sir, the inevitable conse quences of yielding to the principle of innovation; and tell me if your experience of the state of this country for these last six months confirms or confutes my representations on this subject.

It becomes every wise state, in regulating its policy, to look to the progress of great events in other countries; and we must be negligent to a degree of insensibility, if we do not look to every circumstance that led to the calamitous revolution of France. In the first revolutionary reform of France, in the year 1789, the elective franchise was confined to active citizens, ascertained by maturity of years, and some degree of property. But it soon was discovered, that of twenty-six millions of people there were not three millions of active citizens; and that the immediate electors were not in the proportion of one to a hundred of the people. The consequence was, that the great majority of the people thus excluded, corrupted by the false maxim of their new government, "that personal representation was necessary to freedom; and transported by their successes with that phrenzy of, I will not say liberty, but licentious domination, which has since overturned every principle of human virtue and human happiness, complained, "that they were slaves-that they were unrepresented -that they were bound by laws to which they had not agreed, and that the National Convention did not speak the national will." They therefore, by a bold effort, by the interposition of clubs, and associations, and armed citizens, completed their reform, an equal

representation of all the people; and accomplished, in my opinion, the perfection of tyranny, the democracy of France.

In Ireland the number of electors does not amount to 100,000; they are not near so many. The present bill does not, in my opinion, go to increase the number; nor will you ever propose a plan (for I know you will never propose a democracy) which would in any very considerable degree increase them. But I will suppose that you were-that they were to be augmented to the number of 200,000; yet still you would find, that of 4,000,000 of people, 3,800,000 would remain deprived of the elective franchise; nineteen in twenty of the people. Now, sir, if by yielding to the current of innovation you disengage this great majority of the people from their habits of veneration for the old constitution; if you amuse them with notions of equal or personal representation, which do not belong to our form of government (and are therefore notions, not of reform, but of revolu tion) is it not natural to suppose that you will have them, like their neighbours, calling out for a new constitution; an equal representation of all the people?-You will have them at once animated and disappointed by your concession, complaining that they are slaves-that they are not represented that they are bound by laws to which they have not agreed; with all that cant which belongs to French equality, not to British liberty.

You see, sir, if you yield in any degree to the principle of equal representation, you set the publick mind loose into the mazes of speculation, and you can never satisfy it. You will never conform your practice to that principle, because you know that principle is not to be found in our constitution; but by going as far as your speeches profess, and your bill now proposes, you will give the energy of success to the extravagance of enterprise, and inspire the people with the vain notions, "that tranquillity is supineness, and that turbulence will be triumph." And as to the notion of satisfying moderate men by a temperate reform,