Page:Thoughts on civil liberty, on licentiousness and faction.djvu/130



HE Patrons of Faction would be self-contradictory and inconsistent, not only on different, but on parallel Occasions."

Thus, if the Exercise of a Privilege should be quietly allowed to one Officer of State, and by the same Persons should be clamoured against in his Successor: The Persons thus acquiescing and clamouring by Turns, would stand convicted of a self-contradictory and inconsistent Conduct: And without deciding on the Propriety or Impropriety of the Privilege in Question, would carry upon them a clear Mark of Licentiousness and Faction.

Again, if a certain Mode of political Influence on Dependents was generally exercised among all the Ranks of a free Country:—If the same Persons already