Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 3.djvu/214

206 and that by the fatal conjunction of many unhappy circumstances, it is very possible for our island to be represented sometimes by those, who have the least pretensions. So little truth or justice there is in what some pretend to advance, that the actions of former senates ought always to be treated with respect by the latter; that those assemblies are all equally venerable, and no one to be preferred before another; by which argument, the parliament that began the rebellion against king Charles I, voted his trial, and appointed his murderers, ought to be remembered with respect.

But to return from this digression; it is very plain, that considering the defectiveness of our laws, the variety of cases, the weakness of the prerogative, the power or cunning of ill-designing men, it is possible that many great abuses may be visibly committed, which cannot be legally punished; especially if we add to this, that some inquiries might probably involve those, whom upon other accounts it is not thought convenient to disturb. Therefore it is very false reasoning, especially in the management of publick affairs, to argue that men are innocent, because the law has not pronounced them guilty.

I am apt to think it was to supply such defects as these, that satire was first introduced into the world; whereby those, whom neither religion, nor natural virtue, nor fear of punishment, were able to keep within the bounds of their duty, might be withheld by the shame of having their crimes exposed to open view in the strongest colours, and themselves rendered odious to mankind. Perhaps all this may be little regarded by such hardened and abandoned natures as I have to deal with; but, next to taming or binding