numberless mischiefs arifing from it, as to deter them from coming forward as Candidates, and almost to inspire them with disgust against Elections and Parliaments. In all these different ways, as well as by its immediate effects on the House of Commons, it preys on the welfare and endangers the ftability of the Empire.

Maladies which from their nature appear on the point of exhaufting and wearing out themselves, may be permitted to take their course. But this malady threatens to increase with the increasing wealth of the State. The extension of trade, foreign and domestic, prepares à continual influx of monied Candidates; and the thirft of bribes, rendered infa tiable by customary and periodical indulgence, will ftimulate the Electors more and more. Foftered thus by natural caufes, the growing evil can be checked only by the strong arm of law. And the Member of Parliament who shall devife and carry into execution a plan by which it may be speedily and generally checked, may congratulate himself on having rendered a more effential service to his country,

than

than the General who by his victories should add new provinces to her dominion.

It remains to fubjoin, according to the order already propofed, a few remarks on those peculiarities in the fituation of a Member of the House of Commons, to which the obfervations already made on the parliamentary duties of Peers are not immediately ap plicable.

The Member of the Lower House, having an identity of intereft with the mass of private Citizens from which he has been recently taken, and into which, generally speaking, he is shortly to return, is exempt from many of the prejudices which envelop hereditary and permanent Nobility. But while he feels, in common with the Peer, the enfnaring allurements of promotion, of emolument, and of party; he is also exposed to prepoffeffions and tempta tions of his own. He is liable to be influenced in his conduct by undue motives refulting from his past and present situation. He is in danger of being led to commit himself as a fupporter and partifan of Government,

J

by

by asking favours for the friends who have promoted his intereft, or may be likely to promote it, at elections. He is apt to regard himself, not as the difinterested Representative of all his Conftituents, but as the partial delegate of those who voted in his favour; to be guided in supporting or opposing political measures, rather by views of re-election than by the dictates of conscience; and, when the private advantage of the Borough or of the County by which he is deputed, jars and clafhes with the public good, to forget that he is a Representative of all the People of Great Britain.

It occafionally happens that a young man of little fortune, but of promising talents, is introduced into the House of Commons by fome political chieftain on a fort of mutual fpeculation. The former trufts that he fhall obtain credit and influence; the latter, that the credit and influence which the elève may acquire, will redound to the honour and contribute to

the advantage of the patron. A A young Member thus fituated enjoys for a time the complaifance usually manifefted by the House to

wards

wards young Members; but when that has fubfided, as of course it foon muft, he commonly finds a very strong prejudice subsisting against him, and shewing itself in those ways which are well known to perfons accustomed to witness the debates. This prejudice is generally so powerful as not to be overcome but by extraordinary abilities. As far as it originates in envy, and thence it often arifes in part, it is highly blamable. But as far as the disapprobation is founded on reason, it ought by no means to be fmothered. For the trade in queftion is in a moral light fo objectionable, that it is very defirable that few perfons should conceive themselves to have capital fufficient for undertaking it.

Except under very particular circumstances a Member of Parliament ought not to pair off, as the term is, without having an intimate knowledge of the whole of the subject at iffue; left new facts should be brought to light, and new reafonings advanced, which, had he been present, might have altered his opinion. When previously folicited, as he frequently will be, to take a specified part re

feeling

specting fome private business depending, never let him promife more than that he will attend the progrefs of the Bill, and vote according to what he shall deem its real merits. The folicitations urged on fuch occasions are often fo importunate and fo unreasonable, as to have fome chance of impelling the person to whom they are addreffed into an unmerited partiality for the other fide of the question. It is to be feared, however, that it is by no means uncommon for individuals in the Upper as well as in the Lower Houfe to be governed by motives very different from those of public duty in voting on what is called private businefs. He who obferves the confciences of his neighbours flumbering in torpor and fu pineness ought to be on his guard to preserve his own from the contagion.

Feigned excufes and exaggerated statements of fickness, framed for the purpose of escaping the trouble of attending on Calls of the House, or on Committees, will be fcrupulously avoided by a confcientious Member of Parliament. And as attendance on Committees, whether relating to elections or to other fubjects, free

quently