Page:Reform or revolution.djvu/2

2 sort of family privilege, the right to govern the many. Lawful Government only existing with the concurrence or possibility of concurrence of the whole of the inhabitants of the country, all other Government is unlawful usurpation and tyranny. These are propositions which the nation regards as too clear for further disputation, and which it will soon seek to enforce; it has talked long enough, and the time for doing something beyond talking has now arrived. My object in this address is to suggest to you the unadvisability of a longer resistance on your part to the popular demand, a demand which has hitherto been expressed with much moderation, and to point out to you, how you—if you refuse to listen to the pleading cry for political life—may be compelled to do immediate justice to the nation. I am not vain enough to expect that any large number of the occupants of your lordships' house will pay much attention to this address, because, knowing as I do—for even the common people have begun to understand the real history of the British aristocracy—that in a large number of cases the origin of your grand titles has been of a most dishonourable and unworthy nature, it is too much to expect the stream to be entirely free from the viciousness inherent in its source—a man who is a peer because his great grandfather was rich enough seventy years ago to buy four boroughs, can hardly be expected to have very exalted notions on the subject of parliamentary representation. An individual whose baron's dignity was called into being, under the corrupt administration of Pitt, in order to vote down all wise and liberal measures, ought not, I admit, to be required to hold any very superior views as to legislative duties. A peer whose marquisate or dukedom had its foundation in a king's lust, and a woman's pretty face and lack of virtue, may be pardoned for not knowing what ought to constitute the true nobility of a nation. An earldom going back to the times when might governed in lieu of law, and force was the substitute for reason, does not necessarily bring to its modern holder the purest ideas of honesty and justice. A peer's estate acquired from an ill-gotten pension, must be a sad dead weight in the race for real honour. And I think all these cases may be found in any full gathering of your Lordships' most noble body.

To the ecclesiastical section of your Lordships' house, I