the part which produced the neceffary deviation; and even then it is to be effected without a decompofition of the whole civil and political mafs, for the purpofe of originating a new civil order out of the first elements of fociety.

"A ftate without the means of fome change is without the means of its confervation! Without fuch means it might even rifque the lofs of that part of the conftitution which it wished the moft religiously to preferve. The two principles of confervation and correction operated ftrongly at the two critical periods of the Reftoration and Revolution, when England found itself without a king. At both thofe periods the nation had loft the bond of union in their antient edifice; they did not, however, diffolve the whole fabric. On the contrary, in both cafes they regenerated the deficient part of the old conftitution through the parts which were not impaired. They kept thefe old parts exactly as they were,that the part recoveredmight be fuited to them. They acted by the ancient organized fates in the shape of their old organization, and not by the organic molecule of a difbanded people. At no time, perhaps, did the fovereign legislature manifelt a more tender regard to that fundamental principle of British conftitutional policy, than at the time of the Revolution, when it deviated from the direct line of hereditary fucceffion. The crown was carried fomewhat out of the line in which it had before moved; but the new line was derived from the fame ftock. It was ftill a line of hereditary defcent; ftill an hereditary defcent in the fame blood, though an hereditary defcent qualified with proteftantifm. When the legislature altered the direction, but kept the principle, they fhewed that they held it inviolable.

On this principle, the law of inheritance had admitted fome amendment in the old time, and long before the era of the Revolution. Some time after the conquest great questions arose upon the legal principles of hereditary defcent. It became a matter of doubt, whether the heir per capita or the heir per firpes was to fucceed; but whether the heir per capita gave way when the heirdom per firpes took place, or the Catholic heir when the Proteftant was

preferred, the inheritable principle furvived with a fort of immortality through all tranfmigrations-multofque per annos fat fortuna domus et avi numerantur avorum. This is the fpirit of our conftitution, not only in its fettled course, but in all its revolutions. Whoever came in, or however he came in, whether he obtained the crown by law, or by force, the hereditary fucceffion was either continued or adopted.

"The gentlemen of the Society for Revolutions fee nothing in that of 1688 but the deviation from the conftitution; and they take the deviation from the principle for the principle. They have little regard to the obvious confequences of their doctrine, though they muft fee, that it leaves pofitive authority in very few of the pofitive inftitutions of this country. When fuch an unwarrantable maxim is once eftablished, that no throne is lawful but the elective, no one act of the princes who preceded their æra of fictitious election can be valid. Do these theorists mean to imitate fome of their predeceffors, who dragged the bodies of our antient fovereigns out of the quiet of their tombs ? Do they mean to attaint and difable backwards all the kings that have reigned before the Revolution, and confequently to ftain the throne of England with the blot of a continual ufurpation? Do they mean to invalidate, annul, or to call into question, together with the titles of the whole line of our kings, that great body of our ftatute law which paffed under those whom they treat as ufurpers? to annul laws of inestimable value to our liberties-of as great value at least as any which have passed at or fince the period of the Revolution? If kings, who did not owe their crown to the choice of their people, had no title to make laws, what will become of the ftatute de tallagio non concedendo? of the petition of right ?-of the act of babeas corpus? Do thefe new doctors of the rights of men prefume to affert, that king James the Second, who came to the crown as next of blood, according to the rules of a then unqualified fueceffion, was not to all intents and purpofes a lawful king of England, before he had done any of thofe acts which, were juftly conftrued into an abdication of his crown? If he was not, much

trouble

trouble in parliament might have been faved at the period thefe gentlemen commemorate. But king James was a bad king with a good title, and not an ufurper. The princes who fucceeded according to the act of parliament which fettled the crown on the electress Sophia, and on her defcendants, being Proteftants, came in as much by a title of inheritance as king James did. He came in according to the law, as it stood at his acceffion to the crown; and the princes of the Houfe of Brunswick came to the inheritance of the crown, not by election, but by the law, as it ftood at their feveral acceffions of Proteltant defcent and inheritance, as I hope I have fhewn fufficiently.

The law by which this royal family is fpecifically deftined to the fucceffion, is the act of the 12th and 13th of king William. The terms of this act bind ♦ us and our heirs, and our pofterity, to them, their heirs, and their pofterity,' being Proteftants, to the end of time, in the fame words as the declaration of right had bound us to the heirs of king William and queen Mary. It therefore fecures both an hereditary crown and an hereditary allegiance. On what ground, except the conftitutional policy of forming an establishment to fecure that kind of fucceffion which is to preclude a choice of the people for ever, could the legislature have faftidioufly rejected the fair and abundant choice which our own country prefented to them, and fearched in ftrange lands for a foreign princefs, from whole womb the line of our future rulers were to derive their title to govern millions of men through a series of ages?

"The princefs Sophia was named in the act of fettlement of the 12th and 13th of king William, for a flock and root of inheritance to our kings, and not for her merits as a temporary adminiftratrix of a power, which the might not, and in fact did not, herfelf ever exercife. She was adopted for one reafon, and for one only, becaufe, fays the act, the most excellent princefs Sophia, electrefs and duchefs do.vager of Hanover, is daughter of the most excellent princefs Elizabeth, late queen of Bohemia, daughter of our late fovereign lord king James the Firft, of happy memory,

and is hereby declared to be the next in fucceffion in the Proteftant line,' &c. &c.;

and the crown fhall continue to the beirs of her body, being Proteftants." This limitation was made by parliament, that through the princef's Sophia an inheritable line, not only was to be continued in future, but (what they thought very material) that through her it was to be connected with the old stock of inheritance in king James the First; in order that the monarchy might preferve an unbroken unity through all ages, and might be preferved (with fafety to our religion) in the old approved mode by defcent, in which, if our liberties had been once endangered, they had often, through all forms and

ruggles of prerogative and privilege, been preferved. They did well. No experience has taught us, that in any other courfe or method than that of an hereditary crown, our liberties can be regularly perpetuated and preferved facred as our hereditary right. An ire regular, convulfive movement may be neceffary to throw off an irregular, convulfive difeafe. But the courfe of fucceffion is the healthy habit of the British conftitution. Was it that the legislature wanted, at the act for the li mitation of the crown in the Hanoverian line, drawn through the female defcend❤ ants of James the First, a due fenfe of the inconveniencies of having two or three, or poffibly more, foreigners in fucceffion to the British throne? No!they had a due fenfe of the evils which might happen from fuch foreign rule, and more than a due fenfe of them. But a more decifive proof cannot be given of the full conviction of the British nation, that the principles of the Revolution did not authorize them to elect kings at their pleafure, and without any attention to the antient fundamental principles of our government, than their continuing to adopt a plan of hereditary Proteftant fucceffion in the old line, with all the dangers and all the inconveniencies of its being a foreign line full before their eyes, and operating with the utmost force upon their minds.

"A few years ago I fhould be afhamed to overload a matter, fo capable of fupporting itself, by the then unneceflary fupport of any argument;

but

but this feditious unconftitutional doctrine is now publicly taught, avowed, and printed. The diflike I feel to revolutions, the fignals for which have fo often been given from pulpits; the fpirit of change that is gone abroad; the total contempt which prevails with you, and may come to prevail with us, of all antient inftitutions, when fet in oppofition to a prefent fenfe of convenience, or to the bent of a prefent inclination: all thefe confiderations make it not unadvifeable, in my opinion, to call back our attention to the true principles of our own domestic laws; that you, my French friend, should begin to know, and that we should continue to cherish them. We ought not, on either fide of the water, to fuffer ourfelves to be impofed upon by the counterfeit wares which fome perfons, by a double fraud, export to you in illicit bottoms, as raw commodities of British growth, though wholly alien to our foil, in order afterwards to fmuggle them back again into this country, manufactured after the newest Paris fashion of an improved liberty.

a

"The people of England will not ape the fashions they have never tried; nor go back to thofe which they have found mifchievous on trial. They look upon the legal hereditary fucceffion of their crown as among their rights, not as among their wrongs; as a benefit, not as a grievance; as a fecurity for their liberty, not as badge of fervitude. They look on the frame of their commonwealth, fuch as it ftands, to be of inestimable value; and they conceive the undisturbed fucceffion of the crown to be a pledge of the stability and perpetuity of all the other members of our conftitution. "I fhall beg leave before I go any further, to take notice of fome paltry artifices, which the abettors of election as the only lawful title to the crown, are ready to employ, in order to render the fupport of the just principles of our conftitution a task fomewhat invidious. Thefe fophifters fubftitute

"That king James the Second, having endeavoured to Jubvert the conflitution of the kingdom, by breaking the original contract between king and people, and by the advice of jefuits, and other wicked

a fictious caufe, and feigned perfo nages, in whofe favour they fuppofe you engaged, whenever you defend the inheritable nature of the crown. It is common with them to difpute as if they were in a conflict with fome of of thofe exploded fanatics of flavery, who formerly maintained, what I believe no creature now maintains, that the crown is held by divine, hereditary, and indefeasible right.'-Thefe old fanatics of fingle arbitrary power dog. matized as if hereditary royalty was the only lawful government in the world, just as our new fanatics of popular arbitrary power, maintain that a popular election is the fole lawful fource of authority. The old prerogative enthufiafts, it is true, 'did speculate foolishly, and perhaps impioufiy too, as if monarchy had more of a divine fanction than any other mode of government; and as if a right to govern by inheritance were in strictness indefeasible in every person, and under every circumftance, which no civil or political right can be. But an abfurd opinion concerning the king's heredi tary right to the crown does not prejudice one that is rational, and bot tomed upon folid principles of law and policy. If all the abfurd theories of lawyers and divines were to vitiate the objects in which they are converfant, we fhould have no law, and no religion, left in the world. But an abfurd theory on one fide of a 'queftion forms no juftification for alledging a falfe fact, or promulgating mischievous maxims on the other.

"The fecond claim of the Revolution Society is a right of cashiering their governors on misconduct.' Perhaps the apprehenfions our ancestors enter. tained of forming fuch a precedent as that of cashiering for misconduct, was the cause that the declaration of the act which implied the abdication of king James, was, if it had any fault, rather too guarded, and too circumftantial. But all this guard, and all this accumulation of circumftances, ferves to fhew the fpirit of perfons, having violated the fundamental laws, and having withdrawn himself out of the kingdom, hath abdicated the government, and the throne is thereby vacant.”

caution

Caution which predominated in the national councils, in a fituation in which imen irritated by oppreffion, and elevated by a triumph over it, are apt to abandon themfelves to violent and extreme courses: it fhews the anxiety of the great men who influenced the conduct of affairs at that great event, to make the revolution a parent of fettlement, and not a nursery of future revolutions.

"No government could ftand a moment, if it could be blown down with any thing fo loofe and indefinite as an opinion of misconduct. They who led at the revolution, grounded the virtual abdication of King James upon no fuch light and uncertain a principle. They charged him with nothing lefs than a defign, confirmed by a multitude of illegal overt acts, to fubvert the Proteftant church and flate, and their fundamental, unquestionable laws and liberties: they charged him with having broken the original contract between king and people. This was more than misconduct. A grave and over ruling neceffity obliged them to take the ftep they took, and took with infinite reluctance, as under that most rigorous of all laws. Their trust for the future prefervation of the conftitution was not in future revolutions. The grand policy of all their regulations was to render it almoft impracticable for any future fovereign to compel the ftates of the kingdom to have again recourfe to thofe violent remedies. They left the crown what, in the eye and eftimation of law, it had ever been, perfectly irrefponfible. In order to lighten the crown ftill further, they aggravated refponfibility on minifters of Itate. By the ftatute of the ft of king William, feff. 2d, called the act for declaring the rights and liberties of the fubject, and for fettling the fucceffion of the crown, they enacted, that the minifters fhould ferve the crown on the terms of that declaration. They fecured foon after the frequent meetings of parliament, by which the whole government would be under the conftant infpection and active controul of the popular reprefentative and of the magnates of the kingdom. In the next great conftitutional act, that of the 12th and 13th -VOL. II,

of king William, for the further li mitation of the crown, and better fecuring the right and liberties of the fubject, they provided, that no pardon under the great feal of England fhould be pleadable to an impeachment by the commons in parliament, The rule laid down for government in the Declaration of Right, the constant infufpection of parliament, the practical claim of impeachment, they thought infinitely a better fecurity not only for their conftitutional liberty, but against the vices of adminißration, than the refervation of a right fo difficult in the practice, fo uncertain in the issue, and often fo mitchievous in the confequences, as that of cashiering their governors.'

"Dr. Price, in this fermon, condemns very properly the practice of grofs, adulatory ad effes to kings. Inftead of this fulfome ftyle, he propofes that his majefty fhould be told, on occafions of congratulation, that

he is to confider himself as more properly the fervant than the fovereign of his people.' For a compliment, this new form of address does not feem to be very foothing. Thofe who are fervants, in name, as well as in effect, do not like to be told of their fituation, their duty, and their obligations. The flave, in the old play, tells his matter, Hæc commemoratio eft quafi exprobratio.' It is not pleasant as compliment; it is not wholefome as inftruction. After all, if the king were to bring hinfelf to echo this new kind of addrefs, to adopt it in terms, and even to take the appellation of Servant of the People as his royal ftyle, how either he or we thould be much mended by it, I cannot imagine. I have feen very affuming letters, figned, Your most obedient, humble fervant. The proudest domination that ever was endured on earth, took a tile of fill greater humility than that which is now proposed for sovereigns by the Apostle of Liberty. Kings and nations were trampled upon by the foot of one calling himself the Servant of Servants;' and mandates for depofing sovereigns were fealed with the fignet of the Fisherman."

"I fhould have confidered all this as no more than a sortof flippant vain dif3 H courfe,

courfe, in which, as in an unfavoury fume, feveral perfons fuffer the fpirit of Jiberty to evaporate, if it were not plainly in fupport of the idea, and a part of the fcheme of cashiering kings for mifconduct In that light it is worth fome observation.

"" Kings, in one fenfe, are undoubtedly the fervants of the people, becaufe their power has no other rational end than that of the general advantage; but it is not true that they are, in the ordinary fenfe (by our conftitution, at leaft) any thing like fervants; the effence of whofe fituation is to obey the commands of fome other, and to be removeable at pleasure. But the king of Great Britain obeys no other perfon; all other perfons are individually, and collectively too, under him, and owe to him a legal obedience. The law, which knows neither to flatter nor to infult, calls this high magistrate, not our fervant, as this humble divine calls him, but our fovereign lord the king; and we, on our parts, have learned to speak only the primitive language of the law, and not the confufed jargon of their Babylonian pulpits.

"As he is not to obey us, but as we are to obey the law in him, our conftitution has made no fort of provifion towards rendering him, as a fervant, in any degree relponible. Our conftitution knows nothing of a magiftrate like the Fufticia of Aragon; nor of any court legally appointed, nor of any procefs legally fettled for fubmitting the king to the refponfibility belonging to all fervants. In this he is not diftinguished from the commons and the lords; who, in their feveral public capacities, can never be called to an account for their conduct; although the Revolution Society chooses to affert, in direct oppofition to one of the wifeft and most beautiful parts of our conftitution, that a king is no more than the first fervant of the public, created by it, and refponfible to it.'

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Ill would our ancestors at the Re volution have deferved their fame for wisdom, if they had found no fecurity for their freedom, but in rendering their government feeble in its operations, and precarious in its tenure; if they had been able to contrive no better remedy against arbitrary power than civil con

fufion. Let thefe gentlemen state whe that reprefentative public is to whom they will affirm the king, as a fervant, to be refponfible. It will be then time enough for me to produce to them the pofitive ftatute law which affirms that he is not.

"The ceremony of cashiering kings, of which thefe gentlemen talk fo much at their eafe, can rarely, if ever, be performed without force. It then becomes a cafe of war, and not of conftitution. Laws are commanded to hold. their tongues amongst arms; and tribunals fall to the ground with the peace they are no longer able to uphold. The Revolution of 1688 was obtained by a juft war, in the only cafe in which any war, and much more a civil war, can be juft. Jufta bella quibus neceffaria.' The queftion of dethroning, or, if these gentlemen like the phr fe better, cashiering kings, will always be, as it has always been, an extraordinary question of ftate, and wholly out of the law; a queftion (like all other queftions of ftate) of difpofitions, and of means, and of probable consequences, rather than of positive rights. As it was not made for common abuses, fo it is not to be agitated by common minds. The fuperlative line of demarcation, where obedience ought to end, and refiftance must begin, is faint, obfcure, and not easily definable. It is not a fingle act, or a fingle event, which determines it. Governments must be abufed and deranged indeed, before it can be thought of; and the profpect of the future must be as bad as the experience of the past. When things are in that lamentable condition, the nature of the difeafe is to indicate the remedy to thofe whom nature has qualified to adminifter in extremities this critical, ambiguous, bitter portion to s diftempered flate. Times and occa fions, and provocations, will teach their own leffons. The wife will determine from the gravity of the cafe; the irritable from fenfibility to oppreffion; the high-minded from difdain and indig, nation at abufive power in unworthy hands; the brave and bold from the love of honourable danger in a generous caufe: but, with or without right, a revolution will be the very laft refource of the thinking and the good.