I thought I could be of any service to the publick, I would come forward. When the assessed tax bill was brought before your lordships, I did come forward, and endeavoured to point out what I conceived were likely to be its pernicious effects, but without success. When the expedients to which the minister is driven for raising money prove that we are near the end of our resources, surely you cannot be so improvident as to commit their application to the same hands by which they have hitherto been so uselessly squandered.

There is another subject to which my attention is naturally drawn, in touching upon the present topick. After the severe punishment which has to night been inflicted upon the proprietor and printer of a newspaper, it may not be unfair to complain of the foul calumnies which are heaped by the underlings, or, I know not what to call them, of government, upon every man who opposes the measures of administration. The basest aspersions and the most scandalous insinuations, are lavished upon all who venture to dissent from the measures or opinion of ministers. Such indeed is the quantity of this abuse, that it seems as if those who employ it considered themselves too scantily paid by their superiours, and endeavoured to make up for it by currying favour with their readers by the grossness of their falsehoods and scurrilities. We have been charged with inflaming the people by our speeches against the government, and with being hostile to the true principles of the constitution. It may be said that we ought not to regard these calumnies, and ought to persevere in doing our duty. It becomes a question, however, what is our duty. Such despicable calumnies certainly ought to be treated with contempt. If, however, instead of resisting the encroachments of the minister, our attendance has no other effect but to sanction his abuses, and teach the people to believe that they have no alternative but to choose between the present ministers and those

* The Morning Chronicle.

with whom I act, I should consider that attendance as not only nugatory but mischievous. If such, however, be the alternative which ministers choose to hold out, it becomes our duty to prove that the calumny is ill founded. By withdrawing the attention of the country from us, and fixing it upon ministers, we are desirous that they should reflect that no evil can be greater than the continuance of the present ministers in office. Then they will find men able to conduct their affairs, men fitted to conciliate Ireland, to obtain peace, men in whom the French will have no title to think concession is weakness. When we hold a reform in parliament to be necessary, we know that this measure is unfavourably received by the majority. We are convinced, however, that without this the country can never be placed upon a good footing. We stand pledged to take no share in any administration, in which this is not a leading object. In saying this, I am ready to confess that there are some measures which appear to me to be more immediately necessary than parliamentary reform-a peace with France, the conciliation of Ireland, with the question of catholick emancipation, and parliamentary reform in that country. While I admit this, however, I hold a parliamentary reform is a leading object. This I say merely in answer to the charge of being a candidate for office, for I should be ashamed to talk of myself as fit for any office in any other view. Upon this subject I likewise declare that the specifick plan proposed last year in another place has my concurrence. I will say further, that without a peace with France, without conciliation with Ireland, parliamen. tary reform can be of no advantage to the country; while the latter is necessary to secure and to improve the benefits of the former. There may be men of talents and integrity perfectly well qualified for the first offices of the state who would not consider parliamentary reform as a necessary ingredient in their system. Such men I should congratulate upon their boldness in undertaking the conduct of publick affairs upon such terms. So long, however, as they acted for

the publick advantage, they should have my support, though I should reserve to myself the right of bringing forward the question of parliamentary reform whenever the proper moment arrived.

But the calumniators to which I have alluded, not satisfied with these charges, have also dared to insinuate, that I am not averse to the success of the French in their designs against this country. Much as I despise the authors of these attacks I think it necessary to repel calumnies so gross. I cannot help considering it as a disadvantage to this country to hold out to the enemy that on landing here they would find supporters. Yet such are the falsehoods which these calumniators assert, such are the means by which they encourage the French to make the attempt. After they have by their own lies induced the enemy to judge unfavourably of the temper of many people here, they turn round and impute the blame of encouragement to those against whom they forge the original calumny, and ascribe to us those impressions of the enemy which they have occasioned. But in case of invasion, who would be the men from whom the directory might flatter themselves with assistance ! Would it not be from those mean sycophants of power who follow every change, who have alternately been the creatures of every one in authority, and whose loyalty

Is the blind instinct that crouches to the rod,
And licks the foot that treads it in the dust!

Every man in the country must know that if the French were to succeed we should be the most degraded and absolute slaves that ever existed. No man can believe that those who oppose administration could for a moment abet the designs of an invading enemy. What then can we think of ministers, when we see them encouraging these base calumnies? What shall we think, when we see them holding out a person whom no man could suspect of disloyalty to his sovereign, or treachery to his country, as unfit to be trusted with arms for their defence. Of this subject, however, it would be irregular to say more on the

present occasion, as it would more naturally form a separate consideration. Yet such calumnies as this did the creatures of ministers industriously propagate, and I mention them only to show that no man can take any share in opposition to the measures of administration, without being in this manner stigmatized. For my own part, though I never shall contribute to preserve his majesty's present ministers in office, I will exert every effort in repelling invasion from our coasts. I shall wait only my sovereign's command to take arms to defend my country, anxious to mingle in the hottest of the battle. Though I conceive there can be no more decided enemy to his king and country than the present minister, I should suspend all difference of opinion till the hostile attack was repelled. Then, however, I should return with the same abhorrence of his principles and detestation of his conduct, and vow eternal enmity to his system. I vow eternal hatred to the system on which they act. Were I ever to join them, may the just indignation of my country pursue me to the grave, may I be execrated by all mankind, and may the Great Creator of all things shower down his curses on my apostate head!

MR. M'INTOSH'S SPEECH,

IN DEFENCE OF MONSIEUR PELTIER, IN a TRIAL FOR A LIBEL AGAINST BUONAPARTE, FIRST CONSUL OF THE FRENCH REPUBLICK, AT THE COURT OF KING'S BENCH, ON THE 21ST OF FEBRUARY, 1803.

DURING the late temporary suspension of hostilities in which a weak, and irresolute ministry permitted the British nation to be unwarily seduced by the stratagems of an artful and perfidious enemy, there arose out of the pacifick relations thus established, one of the most memorable and interesting trials which was ever agitated in Westminster Hall.

The parties in this case were on the one side the Chief Magistrate of the French Republick, and on the other a stanch and virtuous Royalist, who was exiled and proscribed.

At an early stage of the dreadful revolution which scourged and desolated France, M. Peltier, the defendant, discerning in its principles and tendencies every thing that was abhorrent to his dearest attachments, and most sacred duties, sought an asylum in a foreign land.

To England, whither he fled, he brought all that remained to him of his wrecked fortune, an unsullied honour, the splendid endowments of intellect, and an honest, faithful, and ardent devotion to a righteous

cause.

While the eventful contest continued, he with unwearied perseverance appropriated his admirable lite