were awakened. England never presented a firmer countenance, or a more vigorous arm, to all her enemies, and to all her rivals. Europe under her respired and revived. Every where she appeared as the protector, assertor, or avenger of liberty. A war was made and supported against fortune itself. The treaty of Ryswick, which first limited the power of France, was soon after made: the grand alliance very shortly followed, which shook to the foundations the dreadful power which menaced the independence of mankind. The states of Europe lay happy under the shade of a great and free monarchy, which knew how to be great, without endangering its own peace at home, or the internal or external peace of any of its neighbours.

Mr. Burke said he should have felt very unpleasantly if he had not delivered these sentiments. He was near the end of his natural, probably still nearer to the end of his political career; that he was weak and weary; and wished for rest. That he was little disposed to controversies, or what is called a detailed opposition. That at his time of life, if he could not do something by some sort of weight of opinion, natural or acquired, it was useless and indecorous to attempt any thing by mere struggle. Turpe senex miles. That he had for that reason little attended the army business, or that of the revenue, or almost any other matter of detail for some years past. That he had, however, his task. He was far from condemning such opposition; on the contrary, he most highly applauded it, where a just occasion existed for it, and gentlemen had vigour and capacity to pursue it. Where a great occasion occurred, he was, and while he continued in parliament would be, amongst the most active and the most earnest, as he hoped he had shewn on a late event. With respect to the constitution itself, he wished few alterations in it; happy, if he left it not the worse for any share he had taken in its service. As soon as Mr. Burke had concluded,

Mr. Fox got up and declared, that he rose with a concern of mind which it was almost impossible to describe, at perceiving himself driven to the hard necessity of making at least a short answer to the latter part of a speech, to which he had listened with the greatest attention, and which, some observations and arguments excepted, he admired as one of the wisest and most brilliant flights of oratory ever delivered in that House. There were parts of it, however, which he wished had either been omitted, or deferred to some other and more fit occasion. His right honourable friend, in alluding to him, had mixed his remarks with so much personal kindness towards him, that he felt himself under a difficulty in making any return, lest the House should doubt his sincerity, and consider what he might say as a mere discharge of a debt of compliments. He must, however, declare, that such was his sense of the judgment of his right honourable friend, such his knowledge of his principles, such the value

which he set upon them, and such the estimation in which he held his friendship, that if he were to put all the political information which he had learnt from books, all which he had gained from science, and all which any knowledge of the world and its affairs had taught him, into one scale, and the improvement which he had derived from his right honourable friend's instruction and conversation were placed in the other, he should be at a loss to decide to which to give the preference. He had learnt more from his right honourable friend than from all the men with whom he had ever conversed.

His right honourable friend had grounded all which he had said on that part of a speech made by him on a former day, when he wished that his right honourable friend had been present, in which he had stated, that if ever he could look at a standing army with less constitutional jealousy than before, it was now; since, during the late transactions in France, the army had manifested, that on becoming soldiers they did not cease to continue citizens, and would not act as the mere instruments of a despot. That opinion he still maintained. But, did such a declaration warrant the idea, that he was a friend to democracy? He declared himself equally the enemy of all absolute forms of government, whether an absolute monarchy, an absolute aristocracy, or an absolute democracy. He was adverse to all extremes, and a friend only to a mixed government, like our own, in which, if the aristocracy, or indeed either of the three branches of the constitution, were destroyed, the good effect of the whole, and the happiness derived under it, would, in his mind, be at an end. When he described himself as exulting over the success of some of the late attempts in France, he certainly meant to pay a just tribute of applause to those who, feelingly alive to a sense of the oppressions under which their countrymen had groaned, disobeyed the despotic commands of their leaders, and gallantly espoused the cause of their fellow citizens, in a struggle for the acquisition of that liberty, the sweets of which we all enjoyed.

He begged, however, not to be misunderstood in his ideas of liberty. True liberty could only exist amidst the union and co-operation of the different powers which composed the legislative and the executive government. Never should he lend himself to support any cabal or scheme, formed in order to introduce any dangerous innovation into our excellent constitution; he would not, however, run the length of declaring, that he was an enemy to every species of innovation. That constitution, which we all revered, owed its perfection to innovation; for, however admirable the theory,

experience was the true test of its order and beauty. His right honourable friend might rest assured, that they could never differ in principles, however they might differ in their application. In the application of their principles, they more than once had experienced the misfortune of differing, particularly in regard to the representation of the people in parliament, and they might occasionally continue to differ in regard to other points, which depended rather on the application of their principles, than on their principles themselves. The scenes of bloodshed and cruelty which had : been acted in France no man could have heard of without lamenting; but still, when the severe tyranny under which the people had so long groaned was considered, the excesses which they committed, in their endeavour to shake off the yoke of despotism, might, he thought, be spoken of with some degree of compassion; and he was persuaded that, unsettled as their present state appeared, it was preferable to their former condition, and that ultimately it would be for the advantage of this country that France had regained her freedom.

What had given him the greatest uneasiness, in hearing the latter part of his right honourable friend's speech, was, lest, from its being well known that he had long considered it as the boast and happiness of his life to have lived on terms of the most perfect confidence and intimacy with his right honourable friend, an impression might be left on the mind of that House, or on the minds of the public, that there had existed some grounds for suspicion that he could so far forget himself, upon the score either of principles or of duty, as at any moment to countenance, or rather not vehemently to reprobate, all doctrines and all measures inimical to the constitution. Again, therefore, must he repeat, under the most solemn assurances, to his right honourable friend, that he never would lend himself to any cabal, nor, on any occasion, act in a manner incompatible with the principles which he had so repeatedly professed, and which he held in common with his right honourable friend. He differed, however, from his right honourable friend, in his opinion of the Revolution in 1688. From that period we had, undoubtedly, to date the definition and confirmation of our liberties; and the case was certainly more parallel to the revolution in France than his right honourable friend seemed willing to allow. The reason why France had been so long settling her constitution, and why we had so soon adjusted ours in 1688, was owing to there being so much despotism to destroy in France, and so little which called for destruction when the revolution in our government took place; a fact which

of itself was sufficient to convince his right honourable friend that there was no ground whatever for the apprehensions which he had that day stated. He imputed this warmth of his right honourable, friend, and the extent to which he had pushed this argument, to a laudable but extreme anxiety, lest any man should be rash enough to hazard an attempt to render what had passed in France an object of imitation in this country.

In conclusion, Mr. Fox observed, that he should embrace a future opportunity of entering more amply into a discussion respecting the affairs of France, as far as they might ultimately operate either in favour of or against this country, should the House consider it necessary to fix upon such a topic for their investigation,

Mr. Burke answered, that he could, without the least flattery or exaggeration, assure his right honourable friend, that the separation of a limb from his body could scarcely give him more pain, than the circumstance of differing from him, violently and publicly, in opinion. It was not even in his idea to insinuate that his right honourable friend would lend his aid to any plan concerted for the support of dangerous and unconstitutional procedures. He knew the contrary. His motive for the remarks which he had made was to warn those who did not possess the brilliant talents and illuminated penetration of his right honourable friend, whose moderation was one of the leading features of his political character, from entertaining sentiments which he conceived to be adverse to good government. He was exceedingly glad, however, that he had delivered himself so plainly in his former speech, since what he had said had drawn from his right honourable friend an explanation not more satisfactory to his mind, than he was persuaded it was to the House, and all who had heard it.

Mr. Sheridan said, that the very reasons which Mr. Burke had given for expressing the sentiment which he had that day uttered, namely an apprehension of being supposed to acquiesce in the opinions of those for whom he entertained the highest regard, and with whom he had uniformly acted, operated also on his mind, and made him feel it a duty to declare, that he differed decidedly from that right honourable gentleman in almost every word that he had uttered respecting the French revolution. Mr. Sheridan added some warm compliments to Mr. Burke's general principles; but said that he could not conceive how it was possible for a person of such principles, or for any man who valued our own constitu tion, and revered the revolution that obtained it for us, to unite with such feelings an indignant and unqualified abhorrence of all the proceedings of the patriotic party in France. He conceived theirs to be as just a revolution as ours, proceeding upon as sound a principle and a greater provocation, and vehemently defended the general views and conduct of the national assembly. He joined with Mr. Burke in abhorring the cruelties that had been commit

ted; but what, he said, was the awful lesson that was to be gathered from the outrages of the populace? What, but an abhorrence of that accursed system of despotic government, which sets an example of depravity to the slaves it rules over; and if a day of power comes to the wretched populace, is it to be wondered at, however it is to be regretted, that they act without any of those feelings of justice or humanity which the principles and practice of the governors had stripped them of? Mr. Sheridan went into several other topics respecting the French revolution, and charged Mr. Burke with being an advocate for despotism, and with having spoken of the national assembly with an unwarrantable freedom of speech. Mr. Burke answered, that he most sincerely lamented over the inevitable necessity of now publicly declaring, that henceforth his honourable friend and he were separated in politics; yet, even in the very moment of separation, he expected that his honourable friend for so he had been in the habit of calling him—would have treated him with some degree of kindness; or at least, if he had not, for the sake of a long and amicable connection, heard him with some partiality, have done him the justice of representing his arguments fairly. On the contrary, he had, as cruelly as unexpectedly, misrepresented the nature of his remarks. The honourable gentleman had thought proper to charge him with being the advocate of despotism, though, in the beginning of his former speech, he had expressly reprobated every measure which carried with it even the slightest appearance of despotism. All who knew him could not avoid, with the most unmerited violation of natural justice, acknowledging, that he was the professed enemy of despotism in every shape, whether, as he had before observed, it appeared as the splendid tyranny of Lewis the XIV. or the outrageous democracy of the present government of France, which levelled all distinctions in society.

MR. FOX'S MOTION FOR THE REPEAL OF THE TEST AND CORPORATION ACTS.

March 2.

HE very small majority by which Mr. Beaufoy's motion for the relief of protestant dissenters had been rejected last year*, justified the perseverance of that body in renewing their application to parliament, and could not fail of giving them sanguine hopes of success. Another application was immediately determined upon, to be made in the present session, and the interval was employed, with indefatigable industry, in making every possible exertion to fortify their cause, both by general appeals to the

* See p.1. of the present volume.