whom comes their promotion. They there- fore contribute to diffuse the spirit of despotism, more than any other profession.

"But" (says the minister) "we cannot do without them. We must have able men in the House of Lords; therefore we must have new men; and they must be selected from a profession accustomed to public bu siness, and which gives those who belong to it opportunities of making an open display of their abilities." This is a sad compliment to the hereditary nobility; as it seems to argue that they are totally unfit to conduct the business that comes before them, without attornies and solicitors from below, who are ennobled merely to save the credit of the peerage. But the truth is, the minister wishes to have some sharp and tractable tools, by which he may do his dirty work, uninterrupted by the interference of those who, possessing a constitutional right to examine it, would perhaps often censure it, if they were not overawed and overborne by those who pretend to be initiated in the misteries of law.

In consequence of this management, a whole profession, with few exceptions, extremely busy both with tongue and pen, is constantly enlisted in the service of a mini

ster.

A great number of attornies and solicitors, besides the gentlemen officially honored with those names, are constantly retain

ed on the side of the court, and consequently lean, for their own sakes, and with a hope of making their families, to the extension of crown influence and prerogative. A set of men, so subtle, so active, so attentive to in. terest, must serve any cause which they choose to espouse; and there is no doubt but that they greatly serve (in the hope of serving themselves) the cause of despotism.

Let any one who is unacquainted with the pains taken by modern ministers to retain the lawyers on the side of prerogative, inspect the court calendar, and remark how great a portion of the modern peers have owed their coronets entirely to their profession as lawyers, to their qualifications as mere men of business in detail, with very scanty knowledge of any thing else, and with small claims to excellence as patriots, philosophers, or philanthropists. Mere men of business commonly fix their eyes on ob. jects of private lucre or temporal elevation alone. They are apt to laugh at the names of patriotism, liberty, and disinterested virtue. They have commonly been too long hackneyed among the lowest of mankind, not perhaps in rank only, but in spirit, knowledge, liberality, to retain any very scrupulous delicacy in their own bosoms, or to believe its existence in others. They consider the good things of the world as a scram. ble, where every man is to get what he can

by address, and bold pretensions, since the law will not allow the use of violence. Certainly there can be no hope of reform, or what the French call a regeneration of human affairs, while men so versed in corruption, so enriched by it, and so well pleased with it, bear sway in senates, and direct the councils of princes.*

SECTION XXXVI.

Poverty, when not extreme, favorable to all Virtue, public and private, and consequently to the Happiness of buman Nature; and enormous Riches, without Virtue, the general Bane.

SUPERFLUITY of riches, like su

perfluity of food, causes sickness and debi

Several of the Crown Lawyers concerned in the profecution of Hardy, &c. in which fo much pains was taken to fhed innocent blood, were put into Parliament by PIERS or grandees, a6 their members or agents, contrary to law and the constitution.

The Marquis of Bath nominates Sir JOHN SCOTT, (the Attor ney General,) to reprefent his Lordship in the House of Com

mons.

Lord Beverley nominates Sir JOHN MITFORD, (the Solicitor General,) to represent him.

Earl Fitzwilliam nominates SERGEANT ADAIR.

The Earl of Lonsdale nominates Mr. ANSTRUTHER.

Mr. Buller nominates Mr. BEARCRAFT.

See Petition prefented to the House of Commons, 6th of

May, 1793.

lity. Poverty, or mediocrity of fortune, is the nurse of many virtues; of modesty, industry, sobriety. But, in this age, the very name of poverty is odious. Poverty is a haggard phantom that appals half the world, and drives them over seas, into torrid zones, to disease and death! Life itself is thought by many a gift fit to be thrown back again into the face of the Almighty Donor, if it is not accompanied with the means of luxury, the means of making a figure beyond others; in a word, the means of indulging the spirit of despotism. Things are so managed, in a state of deep political corruption, that the honors due only to virtue are paid exclusively to MONEY; and those who want not riches for the sake of indulgence in pleasure, or from the love of money itself, grow complete misers, in the hope of obtaining together with opulence, civil honors, seats in the senate-house, and ROYAL FAVOR. They hope to make themselves of consequence enough to be corrupted or rather purchased by the state.

What is the consequence to the people, the laborer, the manufacturer, the retail trader, to poor families with many children, women with small patrimonies, annuitants, dependents, and all the numerous train of persons who are compelled to live, as the common phrase expresses it, from hand to mouth? Their gains or means are fixed,

;

and by no means rise with the rising price of necessaries. But, in consequence of this. rage for riches, the necessaries of life become not only dearer, but worse in quality; less nourishing, less commodious, and less durable. Landlords raise their rents to the utmost possible extent; each determining to make his rent-roll as respectable as some opulent neighbor's favored by a lord lieutenant for his INFLUENCE. They will not let their farms in little portions, to poor industrious tenants; but to some overgrown monopolizer who is in as much haste to grow rich as the landlord himself seeing that as he becomes rich he becomes a man of consequence in the county, and that not only esquires, but even lords, take notice of him at the approach of a general election. He is a wholesale farmer, and will breed but few of the animals of the farmyard, and those only for his own family consumption. His children are too proud to carry the productions of the hen-roost or dairy to the market. He scorns such little gains. He deals only in a great way; and keeps up the price by withholding his stores when the market is low. The neighboring rustics, who used to be respectable, though little farmers, are now his day-laborers, begging to be employed by the great man who has engrossed and consolidated half a dozen farms. The old farm-houses

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