we are determined to affert and to fecure that proud pofition which we hold, and which, I truft, we fhall long continue to hold among nations. I thall now avail myfelf of your Lordships' indulgence, to take a fhort notice of the principal objections to which this bill has been thought liable. It has been faid by the noble Baron, and has been fuggested to me by others, for whofe opinions alfo I feel a fincere refpect, that the bill having exempted all incomes below 60l. and having impofed the payment in a progreffive feale, from 60l. to 200l. the principle of gradual rife is admitted, and ought to have been purfued through all the higher claffes of income. I contend, with all due deference, that fuch a rife would be contrary to all the fafety and rights of property; that it is worthy only of the French Council of Five Hundred, and confequently would be difgraceful to a British Parliament; and that it would amount to neither more nor less than the introduction of a plan for equalizing fortunes; and to the implied inference, that because a man poffeffes much, therefore more fhall be taken from him than is proportionably taken from others. Nor, when the matter is fairly confidered, is there any inconfiftency in the exemption given to incomes below 601. That exemption is only a liberal conftruction and exercife of the principle, that in levying a tax upon income, we ought not to extend it to incomes which may be neceffary to actual fubfiftence; and having cftablished that point at 60l. a year, there must be fome gradations beyond it, in order to arrive at the one-tenth--otherwife, it would happen, that the man of 651. a year would, by the payment of 61. 10s. become poorer than the man of 6ol. a year, and fo in proportion in advancing higher. Perhaps it might have been more ftrictly conformable to the propofed fyftem, to have confined the feale within 100!. a year. But I give no opinion contrary to the more liberal fentiment which has been exercifed by the framers of the Bill. I att only folicitous to cftablith the confiftency of the principle, by which the inequalities of income remain as they were found; and by which the privations of the year bear, within the year, in an equal proportion upon all. The notion of requiring a higher proportion from the higher claffes, exclufive of its levelling tendency, would imply, that in all taxes upon confumption alfo, every individual thould be rated in proportion to his income; and that when a man of 400l. a year pays a duty of five fhillings for a bufhel of falt, or or for any given quantity of tea or wine the poffeffor of 40001. a year ought to pay fifty fhillings. It is no answer to this, that the ufe of fuch articles is in fome degree voluntary. Happily, fuch a fyftem, which certainly would be unjust and moft mifchievous, is as certainly impracticable. There is another objection, which is equally unfound, though more plaufible. We are told that one fpecies.of in.come is more valuable than another; and therefore, as a fair price for its protection, that it ought to pay in proportion to its value: for example; that an annuity for life being worth only ten years purchase, and an income refulting from an estate in fee being worth thirty years purchase, the latter ought to pay three times as much as the former. I confess that, for a moment, and when this notion first occurred in the debates of the laft feffion, I conceived it to have fome folidity; but a little reflection will fhew, that the whole difficulty arifes from a confufion in terms, and from blending together the ideas of income and capital. Income, as income, cannot be distinguished, and brought into a fcale of taxation, whatever may be the nature and value of the fund from which it is derived. The moment that income is rated by its value in the market, it ceafes to have the properties of incomes, and becomes capital. And then a new queftion prefents itself:will you impofe your contribution upon capital? I conceive that a tax on capital would be unattainable. How would it be poffible to value the different eftates of the owners and occupiers of land, and all the different modifications, conditions, fettlements, remainders, and reverfions, to which real property is liable Still more, at how many years purchafe, and by what rules, will you value the varying incomes of artifts, ma nufacturers, and mercantile and profeffional men? They are in the nature of incomes, for life or for years, and generally with the advantage of being in a courfe of increafe and improvement. It is true, that they are fubject to innumerable accidents and changes; but they cannot be diftinguished in their average from other annuities, no more than those annuifies can be diftinguifhed from incomes which are nominally for ever. Will it be contended, that, in point of real value, an unfettled eftate, which its owner will leave to his children, is of more worth to him, than if the fame eftate were for his life only, and already fettled on his fon and his defcendants? Would an eftate fo fettled for life with remainder to his heirs male be more valuable to him, than it would be, if he had no fon, and it were fettled on fome diftant relation or on a franger? And if on on a stranger, how is it more valuable to the poffeffor than any other annuity for life? The income arifing from commerce or a profeffion, becomes, on the retreat or demife of its present owner, the property of another, just as much as the income arifing from an cftate or from an annuity for life or years. In fhort, we cannot look to income, as liable to a different valuation in every specific cafe; nor as a property fairly to be deemed an object of taxation, with a longer intereft than the life of its poffeffor: Tanquam Sit proprium cui-quam, puncto quod mobilis bore And therefore it is, that by this Bill, in all cafes indifcriminately (and if it were not indifcriminately it would be unjuitly) the accruing income of the year is made liable, for the year, to a deduction in a rated proportion which equally affects all. Such then, my Lords, is the plan before us; eftablishing a fyftem of fupply effentially important in the prefent ftruggle, effentially beneficial on the eventual return of peace, and fuch as will hereafter induce all nations to paufe, before they bring upon us the neceffity of engaging in war with them. I muft once more repeat, my Lords, that this meafure has been accomplished by the union of opinions refpecting the nature of the French hoftility; by the affectionate and grateful attachment which is felt by All for a Sovereign who is juftly confidered as the father of his people; and by the confidence which is repofed in the councils of that Sovereign, and in the wifdom of Parliament; or, in other words, by the general convicton of men's minds, under which (as a noble Marquis pointedly expreffed himself on the first day of the Seffion) "all oppofition is dead and buried."-I may add without any want of candour, that the public opinion is unequivocally marked, when public men, in a period of unexampled anxiety, can retire into obfcurity without exciting, in a great and enlightened Empire, even a whifper of public regret. My Lords, I have repeatedly flood in this place, during the laft five years, a foreboder of increafing difficulties and dangers; nor fhall I ever be difpofed to flatter either your Lordships or myfelf, or the Country at large. But I now look forwards and with good hopes to the cheering approach of better profpects. And at this hour, if we could confider ourselves merely as a maritime ftate, fingly opposed to France and to the Naval Powers who are fo unfortunate as to be compelled to act with France, and to fubmit to be called her allies, the conteft would be be at an end. For what object of conteft could there be between naval antagonists; the one of which has loft to the other, all its commerce, all its colonies, all its external poffeffions, all its feas, and nearly all its fleets; a lofs, including, when the Spanifh and Dutch prizes are added to the lift, above three score fhips of the line, and more than double that number of frigates? I cannot hesitate to say that a naval power, fo circumstanced, and fo blocked up in all its coafts and ports, is defeated and beaten. Her inhabitants may collect in crowds upon the fhore, and call hard names, and ufe opprobious language; but they are beaten, and have ceafed to be a maritime people for a long period of time. So far as our infular interefts are in question, the war is brought to a predicament, in which a man may place his maps before him, and rack his information and ingenuity to find new objects of conqueft and acquifition. But in ftating this, let me not be understood to give, or to convey any opinion relative, either to the weakness or stability of the monstrous government which has established itself in France. It would be prefumption to fay what may be the permanence of a power, which feizes and appropriates, without fcruple or remorfe, the refources of other nations. No man can foretel how long a lawless horde of robbers and murderers may fubfift by pillage and by crimes, before they are overtaken by human or divine juftice. But one truth at least is obvious and certain. So long as the French leaders fhall appear to have no means of existence, but in prolonging the miferies and calamities which they have caufed; and whilft they retain the appetite and power of mifchief and deftruction; it would be madness and folly, on our part, to fuppofe that we can revert in fafety to the bleffings of peace. We ought not to hope for peace fo long as the revolutionizing fyftem maintains its activity. That activity is ftill exerting itself, with all the agonies of fatigued but infatiated malignity, and amidst fcenes of depopulation, bankruptcy, difcontent and revolt. So far as the mere fafety of thefe iflands is in queftion, we are fafe in our own courage and refources. But in looking towards the wifhed for period of pacification, we must never forget, that the fecurity of Europe is effential to the fecurity of the British Empire. We cannot feparate them. Permit me, my Lords, before I fit down, to advert to a circumftance, which, if left unexplained, might fubject me to the imputation of fpeaking with an illiberal warmth and prejudice. On the prefent and on other occafions, I have ufed harth language refpecting the French as a nation :-And furely they have been, during nine years, the moft deteitable people WOODFALL'S PARLIAMENTARY REPORTS. people that ever difgraced the globe on which we live, and [LORDS, breathe, and have our being. They have been, and ftilf continue to be, the fcourge and peft of afflicted humanity. But I wish, once for all, to be understood not to speak of the French fuch as I faw and knew them twelve years ago; nor of the French fuch as I hope, one day, again to fee them. I fpeak of them as them as they are, a credulous, fubjugated, irreligious, immoral, and cruel people; blind inftruments of the corruptions, caprices, and crimes of a few defperate regicides. I fpeak of them as they are, and will continue to fpeak of them on every occafion that may prefent itself; because I feel and know, that we cannot be too often and too ftrongly impreffed with a true opinion of our enemy, and with a true fenfe of our danger. But, God forbid that I fhould apply fuch expreffions to the nation which I faw, compofed of a brave and generous nobility and a good tempered and ingenious people; even then however following falfe lights, and tending towards the precipice down which they have fince fallen. It is among the bitter misfore tunes of that nobility, and of the other refpectable claffes, forced into exile and laden with diftreffes of many kinds, to feel afhamed of the country which gave them birth, and to carry about with them the fentiment, that the very name of a Frenchman will, for ages to come, found gratingly to the ears of mankind-The contraft, my Lords, is obvious and offers itfelf to our attention. I fee it with complacency and with pride. It is a pardonable pride, and of a good and moral tendency. Englishmen derive from their confcioufnefs of being Englishnien, an elevation of mind, which, both to the prefent race and to pofterity, will operate as an inceffant encouragement to national virtue and to right exertious. Vera gloria radices agit, atque etiam propagatur. Lord Darnley apologized for troubling the House after the very able speech which had been delivered in fupport of the bill by the noble Lord who spoke laft, but fo fully convinced of its propriety, that he could not lofe the prefent opportu nity of joining his voice in favour of the meafure to that of both Houfes of parliament, and of the country at large. Though his noble friend went into a great variety of topics fuggefted by the confideration of the propofed tax, two or three points had escaped his notice, to which he felt himself called upon to fpeak. Among the objections made by a noble Lord (Lord Holland) to the bill, was one in particular, that it went to a difclofure of the circumftances of the parties. Had the noble Lord carefully perused the whole of the bill, he |