Page:The Danger of Mercenary Parliaments - Toland (1698).djvu/8

 of Valiant made them Cowards, of Eloquent Dumb, and of honest Men Villains: 'tis this can make a whole House of Commons eat their own words, and countervote what they had just before resolv'd on: 'tis this could summon the mercenary Members from all quarters of the Town in an instant to vote their fellow Criminals innocent: 'tis this that can make a Parliament throw away the Peoples Mony with the utmost profusion, without enquiring into the management of it: 'tis this that put a stop to the examination of that scandalous escape of the Thoulon Fleet into Brest: 'tis this that has encourag'd the mismanagements of the Admiralty in relation to the loss of so vast a number of Men of War and Merchant Ships, as well as other Miscarriages which were by all Men judg'd to proceed not from their want of understanding in Sea-Affairs: 'tis this that has hindred the passing a Bill so often brought into the House for incapacitating Members to bear Offices: 'tis this that could not only indemnify, but honour a leading Member for his audacious procuring and accepting a Grant of Lands, which by the Parliament had been set apart for the public Service; a Vote that shall stand recorded in their own Journals to the never-dying Infamy of that mercenary Assembly: 'tis this could make the same Person most confidently affirm, that he was sure the majority of the House would agree to what he was going to propose: 'tis this that could make Men of peaceable Dispositions and considerable Estates vote for a Standing Army: 'tis this that could bring Admirals to confess that our Fleet under their Command was no security to us: 'tis this could make wise Men act against their own apparent Interest: In short, 'tis this that has infatuated our Prudence, stagger'd our Constancy, sullied our Reputation, and introduc'd a total defection from all true English Principles. Bribery is indeed so sure and unavoidable a way to destroy any Nation, that we may all sit down and wonder that so much as the very name of a free Government is yet continued to us. And if by our wary choice of Members we should happen to recover our antient Constitution, we shall with horror and amazement look back, and reflect upon the dreadful Precipice we so narrowly escapt.

7. Fatal Experience has now more than enough convinc'd us, that Courts have been the same in all Ages, and that few Persons have been found of such approv'd Constancy and Resolution as to withstand the powerful Allurements and Temptations which from thence have been continually dispens'd for the corrupting of Mens Minds, and debauching their honest Principles. Such Instances of the frailty of human Nature may be given within these few years past, as might make a Man even asham'd of his own Species, and which (were they not so open and notorious) ought out of pity to Mankind to be buried in perpetual silence. Who can enough lament the wretched Degeneracy of the Age we live in? To see Persons who were formerly noted for the most vigorous Assertors of their Country's Liberty, who from their Infancy had imbib'd no other Notions than what conduc'd to the public Safety, whose Principles were further improv'd and confirm'd by the advantages of a sutable Conversation, and who were so far possest with this spirit of Liberty, that it sometimes transported them beyond the bounds of Moderation, even to unwarrantable Excesses: to see these Men, I say, so infamously fall in with the arbitrary measures of the Court, and appear the most active Instruments for enslaving their Country, and that without any formal steps or degrees, but all in an instant, is so violent and surprizing a transition from one Extreme to another without passing the Mean, as would have confounded the Imaginations of EUCLID or PYRRHO. All the stated Maxims, in relation to the nature of Mankind, which have been long ago settled and establish'd by Philosophers and observing Men, are now baffled and exploded; and we have nothing left us to contemplate, but the wild extravagancies of Romantic Fables, the sudden conveyances of nimble finger'd Jugglers, the inimitable dispatches of transubstantiating Priests, or the now more credible Metamorphoses of Men into Beasts.

8. The necessity we have lain under of