mentary cognizance, what all the world knows but too well, that is, in what manner he chooses to dispose of the public revenues to the creatures of his politics,

The debate has been long, and as much so on my part, at least, as on the part of those who have spoken before me. But long as it is, the more material half of the subject has hardly been touched on; that is, the corrupt and destructive system to which this debt has been rendered subservient, and which seems to be pursued with at least as much vigour and regularity as ever. If I considered your ease or my own, rather than the weight and importance of this question, I ought to make some apology to you, perhaps some apology to myself, for having detained your attention so long. I know on what ground I tread. This subject, at one time taken up with so much fervour and zeal, is no longer a favourite in this House. The House itself has undergone a great and signal revolution. To some the subject is strange and uncouth; to several harsh and distasteful; to the relics of the last parliament it is a matter of fear and apprehension. It is natural for those who have seen their friends sink in the tornado which raged during the late shift of the monsoon, and have hardly escaped on the planks of the general wreck, it is but too natural for them, as soon as they make the rocks and quicksands of their former disasters, to put about their new-built barks, and as much as possible to keep aloof from this perilous lee shore.

But let us do what we please to put India from our thoughts, we can do nothing to separate it from our public interest and our national reputation. Our attempts to banish this importunate duty, will only make it return upon us again and again, and every time in a shape more unpleasant than the former. A government has been fabricated for that great province; the right honourable gentleman says, that therefore you ought not to examine into its conduct. Heavens! what an argument is this! We are not to examine into the conduct of the direction, because it is an old government: we are not to examine into

Then we

this board of controul, because it is a new one. are only to examine into the conduct of those who have no conduct to account for. Unfortunately the basis of this new government has been laid on old condemned delinquents, and its superstructure is raised out of prosecutors turned into protectors. The event has been such as might be expected. But if it had been otherwise constituted; had it been constituted even as I wished, and as the mover of this question had planned, the better part of the proposed establishment was in the publicity of its proceedings; in its perpetual responsibility to parliament. Without this check, what is our government at home, even awed, as every European government is, by an audience formed of the other states of Europe, by the applause or condemnation of the discerning and critical company before which it acts? But if the scene on the other side of the globe, which tempts, invites, almost compels to tyranny and rapine, be not inspected with the eye of a severe and unremit ting vigilance, shame and destruction must ensue. one, the worst event of this day, though it may deject, shall not break or subdue me. The call upon us is authoritative. Let who will shrink back, I shall be found at my post. Baffled, discountenanced, subdued, discredited, as the cause of justice and humanity is, it will be only the dearer to me. Whoever therefore shall at any time bring before you any thing towards the relief of our distressed fellow-citizens in India, and towards a subversion of the present most corrupt and oppressive system for its government, in me shall find a weak, I am afraid, but a steady, earnest, and faithful assistant.

For

When Mr. Burke sat down, several members rose to speak, but it being one o'clock, and the question being loudly called for, the House divided: Yeas 69: Noes 164. So it passed in the negative.

MR. PITT'S Bill for reforming the PUBLIC OFFICES.

IN

March 8.

addition to the different bills which had passed for the purpose of regulating the public offices of the kingdom, Mr. Pitt brought one in this session "for appointing commissioners to inquire into the fees, gratuities, perquisites, and emoluments, which are or lately have been received in the several public offices to be therein mentioned; to examine into any abuses which may exist in the same; and to report such observations as shall occur to them, for the better conducting and managing the business transacted in the said offices." The opposition this measure encountered was considerable. After the motion for reading the bill a third time had been opposed by Mr. Sheridan, and supported by Mr. Pitt and the attorney-general,

Mr. BURKE rose and desired that Magna Charta might be referred to, and that part read which states that "“nullus liber homo capiatur vel imprisonetur," &c. While it was reading, there was a laugh on the treasury-bench side of the House. Mr. Burke thereupon observed, that what he had desired to be read was, he believed, at this day regarded just in the same light as Chevy Chace, or any other old ballad — as fit only to be laughed at. It was, however, to him of serious importance, and he would shew that the present bill was a direct and violent contradiction to Magna Charta and the common law of the land. He proceeded to point out the clauses empowering the commissioners to call for persons and papers, as clauses that went an extraordinary length indeed; so far even as to force persons to criminate themselves. He enlarged upon this as an infringement of the liberty of the subject, which that House, as the guardian of the constitution, ought never to countenance. He took notice of Mr. Pitt's expression, that the aim of the bill was to inquire after and correct possible

abuses; a better phrase, he had never heard, nor one more truly applicable to the subject. Thus, he said, it was avowed that there was not any known existing necessity for the bill, but that it was produced with a view to hunt after one. He appealed to the feelings of the House, whether such unconstitutional powers as the bill would authorize the commissioners to exercise, ought to be trusted in any hands but upon the most pressing necessity. He animadverted also on that part of Mr. Pitt's speech, in which he had insinuated that former boards of treasury had been too proud and too lazy to do their duty. He declared he deemed pride and laziness two of the worst vices human nature could fall into. Pride made us arrogant and disdainful to all who differed from us in opinion, and laziness made us neglect our own duty, and push it off to be discharged by our deputies. The one led to high honours and large emoluments; the other made us disdain to merit either the one or the other, but induced us to revive the ancient practice of the Flagellants, not indeed to lay the lash upon our own backs, but upon the backs of those under us.

In the present bill there was, he said, an obvious tinge of the school in which the right honourable author had been bred. Most schools had their characteristics; thus the school of Venice was known by its colouring; the school of Raphael by its design; but the school he alluded to, was the school of large promise and little performance; the school where smiles and professions were dealt out liberally in the outset, but the issue was always a tyrannous exercise over menials and dependents, under pretence of great economy and great attention, but where the utmost probable produce from such oppressive stretches of power could be but inconsiderable. He called the bill a slander upon the whole official establishments of the kingdom, and said, it presumed the general prevalence of the grossest corruption and fraud, in every one of them. The public offices of Great Britain, he believed, were the best conducted, and the most free from affording real ground of

censure, of any in Europe. They made a part of the na tional reputation; and that House ought not to suffer them to be so foully slandered, as they were in that bill, which was clearly not a bill of use, but a bill of idle parade and ridiculous ostentation. It was a sample of doing nothing at all, when it was pretended that a great deal was done. He took notice of the vermin-abuses mentioned by Mr. Sheridan, and said, it was but too true, the right honourable gentleman opposite to him loved to hunt in holes and

"Mice and rats, and such small deer

Had been Tom's food for seven long year."

But though the bill was a reptile crawling in the dirt, it would be found to bite hard, where the constitution ought not to be lacerated. He lamented that the invidious task of investigating the characters and qualifications of the three com missioners had fallen upon him; but he should do his duty, though he meant not to provoke any man's resentment. He then entered into a discussion of the separate characters of Sir John Dick, Mr. Molleson, and Mr. Baring, paid each of them the highest personal compliments, but gave his reasons for declaring all the three totally unqualified to execute the duties imposed on them by the bill. Mr. Burke returned to the point from whence he set out, and said, the bill was a direct violation of Magna Charta, the common law of the land, and the constitution.

The bill was read a third time and passed.