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hiftory. Where could any man, confcious of his own inability to act alone, and willing to act as he ought to do, have arranged himself better? If any one thinks this kind of fociety to be taken up as. the best method of gratifying low perfonal pride, or ambitious intereft, he is mistaken; and knows nothing of the world.

Preferring this connection; I do not mean to detract in the flighteft degree from others. There are fome of thofe, whom I admire at fomething of. a greater diftance, with whom I have had the happinefs alfo perfectly to agree, in almost all the particulars, in which I have differed with fome fucceffive administrations; and they are such, as it never can be reputable to any government to reckon among its enemies. I hope there are none of you, corrupted with the doctrine taught by wicked men for the worst purposes, and received by the malignant credulity of envy and ignorance, which is, that the men who act upon the publick ftage are all alike; all equally corrupt; all influenced by no other views than the fordid lure of salary and penfion. The thing, I know by experience to be falfe. Never expecting to find perfection in men, and not looking for divine attributes in created beings, in my commerce with my cotemporaries, I have found much human virtue. I have feen not a little publick fpirit; a real fubordination of intereft to duty; and a decent and regulated

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gulated fenfibility to honeft fame and reputation. The age unquestionably produces, (whether in a greater or lefs number than former times, I know not) daring profligates, and infidious hypocrites. What then? Am I not to avail myself of whatever good is to be found in the world, because of the mixture of evil that will always be in it? The fmallness of the quantity in currency only heightens the value. They, who raife fufpicions on the good on account of the behaviour of ill men, are of the party of the latter. The common cant is no juftification for taking this party. I have been deceived, fay they, by Titius and Mævius; I have been the dupe of this pretender or of that mountebank; and I can trust appearances no longer. But my credulity and want of difcernment cannot, as I conceive, amount to a fair presumption against any man's integrity. A confcientious perfon would rather doubt his own judgment, than condemn his fpecies. He would fay, I have observed without attention, or judged upon erroneous maxims; I trusted to profeffion, when I ought to have attended to conduct. Such a man will grow wife, not malignant, by his acquaintance with the world. But he that accufes all mankind of corruption ought to remember that he is fure to convict only one. In truth I fhould much rather admit thofe whom at any time I have difrelifhed the most, to be patterns of perfection, than feek a confolation

to my own unworthinefs, in a general communion of depravity with all about me.

That this ill-natured doctrine fhould be preached by the miffionaries of a court I do not wonder. It anfwers their purpose. But that it fhould be heard among those who pretend to be ftrong affertors of liberty, is not only furprising, but hardly natural. This moral levelling is a fervile principle. It leads to practical paffive obedience far better, than all the doctrines, which the pliant accommodation of theology to power has ever produced. It cuts up by the roots, not only all idea of forcible refiftance, but even of civil oppofition. It difpofes men to an abject fubmiflion, not by opinion, which may be fhaken by argument or altered by paffion, but by the ftrong ties of publick and private intereft. For if all men who act in a publick fituation are equally felfish, corrupt, and venal, what reason can be given for defiring any fort of change, which befides the evils which muft attend all changes, can be productive of no poffible advantage? The active men in the ftate are true famples of the mafs. If they are univerfally depraved, the commonwealth itself is not found. We may amuse ourfelves with talking as much as we please of the virtue of middle or humble life; that is, we may place our confidence in the virtue of those who have never been tried. But if the perfons who are continually emerging out of that sphere, be no

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better than those whom birth has placed above it, what hopes are there in the remainder of the body, which is to furnish the perpetual fucceffion of the ftate? All who have ever written on government, are unanimous, that among a people generally corrupt, liberty cannot long exist. And indeed how is it poffible? when those who are to make the laws, to guard, to enforce, or to obey them, are by a tacit confederacy of manners, indifpofed to the spirit of all generous and noble inftitutions.

I am aware that the age is not what we all wifh. But I am fure, that the only means of checking its precipitate degeneracy, is heartily to concur with whatever is the best in our time; and to have fome more correct ftandard of judging what that beft is, than the tranfient and uncertain favour of a court. If once we are able to find, and can prevail on ourselves to strengthen an union of such men, whatever accidentally becomes indifpofed to ill-exercifed power, even by the ordinary operation of human paffions, must join with that society, and cannot long be joined, without in fome degree affimilating to it. Virtue will catch as well as vice by contact; and the publick stock of honeft manly principle will daily accumulate. We are not too nicely to fcrutinize motives as long as action is irreproachable. It is enough, (and for a worthy man perhaps too much) to deal out its infamy to convicted guilt and declared apoftacy.

This, gentlemen, has been from the beginning' the rule of my conduct; and I mean to continue it, as long as fuch a body as I have described, can by any poffibility be kept together; for I fhould think it the moft dreadful of all offences, not only towards the present generation but to all the future, if I were to do any thing which could make the minutest breach in this great confervatory of free principles. Those who perhaps have the fame intentions, but are separated by fome little political animofities, will I hope difcern at laft, how little conducive it is to any rational purpose, to lower its reputation. For my part, gentlemen, from much experience, from no little thinking, and from comparing a great variety of things, I am thoroughly perfuaded, that the laft hopes of preferving the spirit of the English constitution, or of re-uniting the diffipated members of the English race upon a common plan of tranquillity and liberty, does entirely depend on their firm and lafting union; and above all on their keeping themfelves from that defpair, which is fo very apt to fall on thofe, whom a violence of character and a mixture of ambitious views, do not fupport through a long, painful, and unfuccefsful ftruggle.

There never, gentlemen, was a period in which the ftedfaftness of fome men has been put to fo fore a trial. It is not very difficult for well-formed minds to abandon their intereft; but the fepa

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