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The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. II. (of 12) by Edmund Burke

E >> Edmund Burke >> The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. II. (of 12)




These, Gentlemen, were the reasons why we left this good work in the
rude, unfinished state in which good works are commonly left, through
the tame circumspection with which a timid prudence so frequently
enervates beneficence. In doing good, we are generally cold, and
languid, and sluggish, and of all things afraid of being too much in the
right. But the works of malice and injustice are quite in another style.
They are finished with a bold, masterly hand, touched as they are with
the spirit of those vehement passions that call forth all our energies,
whenever we oppress and persecute.

Thus this matter was left for the time, with a full determination in
Parliament not to suffer other and worse statutes to remain for the
purpose of counteracting the benefits proposed by the repeal of one
penal law: for nobody then dreamed of defending what was done as a
benefit, on the ground of its being no benefit at all. We were not then
ripe for so mean a subterfuge.

I do not wish to go over the horrid scene that was afterwards acted.
Would to God it could be expunged forever from the annals of this
country! But since it must subsist for our shame, let it subsist for our
instruction. In the year 1780 there were found in this nation men
deluded enough, (for I give the whole to their delusion,) on pretences
of zeal and piety, without any sort of provocation whatsoever, real or
pretended, to make a desperate attempt, which would have consumed all
the glory and power of this country in the flames of London, and buried
all law, order, and religion under the ruins of the metropolis of the
Protestant world. Whether all this mischief done, or in the direct train
of doing, was in their original scheme, I cannot say; I hope it was not:
but this would have been the unavoidable consequence of their
proceedings, had not the flames they had lighted up in their fury been
extinguished in their blood.

All the time that this horrid scene was acting, or avenging, as well as
for some time before, and ever since, the wicked instigators of this
unhappy multitude, guilty, with every aggravation, of all their crimes,
and screened in a cowardly darkness from their punishment, continued,
without interruption, pity, or remorse, to blow up the blind rage of the
populace with a continued blast of pestilential libels, which infected
and poisoned the very air we breathed in.

The main drift of all the libels and all the riots was, to force
Parliament (to persuade us was hopeless) into an act of national perfidy
which has no example. For, Gentlemen, it is proper you should all know
what infamy we escaped by refusing that repeal, for a refusal of which,
it seems, I, among others, stand somewhere or other accused. When we
took away, on the motives which I had the honor of stating to you, a few
of the innumerable penalties upon an oppressed and injured people, the
relief was not absolute, but given on a stipulation and compact between
them and us: for we bound down the Roman Catholics with the most solemn
oaths to bear true allegiance to this government, to abjure all sort of
temporal power in any other, and to renounce, under the same solemn
obligations, the doctrines of systematic perfidy with which they stood
(I conceive very unjustly) charged. Now our modest petitioners came up
to us, most humbly praying nothing more than that we should break our
faith, without any one cause whatsoever of forfeiture assigned; and when
the subjects of this kingdom had, on their part, fully performed their
engagement, we should refuse, on our part, the benefit we had stipulated
on the performance of those very conditions that were prescribed by our
own authority, and taken on the sanction of our public faith: that is to
say, when we had inveigled them with fair promises within our door, we
were to shut it on them, and, adding mockery to outrage, to tell
them,--"Now we have got you fast: your consciences are bound to a power
resolved on your destruction. We have made you swear that your religion
obliges you to keep your faith: fools as you are! we will now let you
see that our religion enjoins us to keep no faith with you." They who
would advisedly call upon us to do such things must certainly have
thought us not only a convention of treacherous tyrants, but a gang of
the lowest and dirtiest wretches that ever disgraced humanity. Had we
done this, we should have indeed proved that there were _some_ in the
world whom no faith could bind; and we should have _convicted_ ourselves
of that odious principle of which Papists stood _accused_ by those very
savages who wished us, on that accusation, to deliver them over to their
fury.

In this audacious tumult, when our very name and character as gentlemen
was to be cancelled forever, along with the faith and honor of the
nation, I, who had exerted myself very little on the quiet passing of
the bill, thought it necessary then to come forward. I was not alone;
but though some distinguished members on all sides, and particularly on
ours, added much to their high reputation by the part they took on that
day, (a part which will be remembered as long as honor, spirit, and
eloquence have estimation in the world,) I may and will value myself so
far, that, yielding in abilities to many, I yielded in zeal to none.
With warmth and with vigor, and animated with a just and natural
indignation, I called forth every faculty that I possessed, and I
directed it in every way in which I could possibly employ it. I labored
night and day. I labored in Parliament; I labored out of Parliament.
If, therefore, the resolution of the House of Commons, refusing to
commit this act of unmatched turpitude, be a crime, I am guilty among
the foremost. But, indeed, whatever the faults of that House may have
been, no one member was found hardy enough to propose so infamous a
thing; and on full debate we passed the resolution against the petitions
with as much unanimity as we had formerly passed the law of which these
petitions demanded the repeal.

There was a circumstance (justice will not suffer me to pass it over)
which, if anything could enforce the reasons I have given, would fully
justify the act of relief, and render a repeal, or anything like a
repeal, unnatural, impossible. It was the behavior of the persecuted
Roman Catholics under the acts of violence and brutal insolence which
they suffered. I suppose there are not in London less than four or five
thousand of that persuasion from my country, who do a great deal of the
most laborious works in the metropolis; and they chiefly inhabit those
quarters which were the principal theatre of the fury of the bigoted
multitude. They are known to be men of strong arms and quick feelings,
and more remarkable for a determined resolution than clear ideas or much
foresight. But, though provoked by everything that can stir the blood of
men, their houses and chapels in flames, and with the most atrocious
profanations of everything which they hold sacred before their eyes, not
a hand was moved to retaliate, or even to defend. Had a conflict once
begun, the rage of their persecutors would have redoubled. Thus fury
increasing by the reverberation of outrages, house being fired for
house, and church for chapel, I am convinced that no power under heaven
could have prevented a general conflagration, and at this day London
would have been a tale. But I am well informed, and the thing speaks it,
that their clergy exerted their whole influence to keep their people in
such a state of forbearance and quiet, as, when I look back, fills me
with astonishment,--but not with astonishment only. Their merits on that
occasion ought not to be forgotten; nor will they, when Englishmen come
to recollect themselves. I am sure it were far more proper to have
called them forth, and given them the thanks of both Houses of
Parliament, than to have suffered those worthy clergymen and excellent
citizens to be hunted into holes and corners, whilst we are making
low-minded inquisitions into the number of their people; as if a
tolerating principle was never to prevail, unless we were very sure that
only a few could possibly take advantage of it. But, indeed, we are not
yet well recovered of our fright. Our reason, I trust, will return with
our security, and this unfortunate temper will pass over like a cloud.

Gentlemen, I have now laid before you a few of the reasons for taking
away the penalties of the act of 1699, and for refusing to establish
them on the riotous requisition of 1780. Because I would not suffer
anything which may be for your satisfaction to escape, permit me just to
touch on the objections urged against our act and our resolves, and
intended as a justification of the violence offered to both Houses.
"Parliament," they assert, "was too hasty, and they ought, in so
essential and alarming a change, to have proceeded with a far greater
degree of deliberation." The direct contrary. Parliament was too slow.
They took fourscore years to deliberate on the repeal of an act which
ought not to have survived a second session. When at length, after a
procrastination of near a century, the business was taken up, it
proceeded in the most public manner, by the ordinary stages, and as
slowly as a law so evidently right as to be resisted by none would
naturally advance. Had it been read three times in one day, we should
have shown only a becoming readiness to recognize, by protection, the
undoubted dutiful behavior of those whom we had but too long punished
for offences of presumption or conjecture. But for what end was that
bill to linger beyond the usual period of an unopposed measure? Was it
to be delayed until a rabble in Edinburgh should dictate to the Church
of England what measure of persecution was fitting for her safety? Was
it to be adjourned until a fanatical force could be collected in London,
sufficient to frighten us out of all our ideas of policy and justice?
Were we to wait for the profound lectures on the reason of state,
ecclesiastical and political, which the Protestant Association have
since condescended to read to us? Or were we, seven hundred peers and
commoners, the only persons ignorant of the ribald invectives which
occupy the place of argument in those remonstrances, which every man of
common observation had heard a thousand times over, and a thousand times
over had despised? All men had before heard what they dare to say, and
all men at this day know what they dare to do; and I trust all honest
men are equally influenced by the one and by the other.

But they tell us, that those our fellow-citizens whose chains we have a
little relaxed are enemies to liberty and our free Constitution.--Not
enemies, I presume, to their _own_ liberty. And as to the Constitution,
until we give them some share in it, I do not know on what pretence we
can examine into their opinions about a business in which they have no
interest or concern. But, after all, are we equally sure that they are
adverse to our Constitution as that our statutes are hostile and
destructive to them? For my part, I have reason to believe their
opinions and inclinations in that respect are various, exactly like
those of other men; and if they lean more to the crown than I and than
many of you think _we_ ought, we must remember that he who aims at
another's life is not to be surprised, if he flies into any sanctuary
that will receive him. The tenderness of the executive power is the
natural asylum of those upon whom the laws have declared war; and to
complain that men are inclined to favor the means of their own safety is
so absurd, that one forgets the injustice in the ridicule.

I must fairly tell you, that so far as my principles are concerned,
(principles that I hope will only depart with my last breath,) that I
have no idea of a liberty unconnected with honesty and justice. Nor do I
believe that any good constitutions of government, or of freedom, can
find it necessary for their security to doom any part of the people to a
permanent slavery. Such a constitution of freedom, if such can be, is in
effect no more than another name for the tyranny of the strongest
faction; and factions in republics have been, and are, full as capable
as monarchs of the most cruel oppression and injustice. It is but too
true, that the love, and even the very idea, of genuine liberty is
extremely rare. It is but too true that there are many whose whole
scheme of freedom is made up of pride, perverseness, and insolence. They
feel themselves in a state of thraldom, they imagine that their souls
are cooped and cabined in, unless they have some man or some body of men
dependent on their mercy. This desire of having some one below them
descends to those who are the very lowest of all; and a Protestant
cobbler, debased by his poverty, but exalted by his share of the ruling
church, feels a pride in knowing it is by his generosity alone that the
peer whose footman's instep he measures is able to keep his chaplain
from a jail. This disposition is the true source of the passion which
many men in very humble life have taken to the American war. _Our_
subjects in America; _our_ colonies; _our_ dependants. This lust of
party power is the liberty they hunger and thirst for; and this Siren
song of ambition has charmed ears that one would have thought were never
organized to that sort of music.

This way of _proscribing the citizens by denominations and general
descriptions_, dignified by the name of reason of state, and security
for constitutions and commonwealths, is nothing better at bottom than
the miserable invention of an ungenerous ambition which would fain hold
the sacred trust of power, without any of the virtues or any of the
energies that give a title to it,--a receipt of policy, made up of a
detestable compound of malice, cowardice, and sloth. They would govern
men against their will; but in that government they would be discharged
from the exercise of vigilance, providence, and fortitude; and
therefore, that they may sleep on their watch, they consent to take some
one division of the society into partnership of the tyranny over the
rest. But let government, in what form it may be, comprehend the whole
in its justice, and restrain the suspicious by its vigilance,--let it
keep watch and ward,--let it discover by its sagacity, and punish by its
firmness, all delinquency against its power, whenever delinquency exists
in the overt acts,--and then it will be as safe as ever God and Nature
intended it should be. Crimes are the acts of individuals, and not of
denominations: and therefore arbitrarily to class men under general
descriptions, in order to proscribe and punish them in the lump for a
presumed delinquency, of which perhaps but a part, perhaps none at all,
are guilty, is indeed a compendious method, and saves a world of trouble
about proof; but such a method, instead of being law, is an act of
unnatural rebellion against the legal dominion of reason and justice;
and this vice, in any constitution that entertains it, at one time or
other will certainly bring on its ruin.

We are told that this is not a religious persecution; and its abettors
are loud in disclaiming all severities on account of conscience. Very
fine indeed! Then, let it be so: they are not persecutors; they are only
tyrants. With all my heart. I am perfectly indifferent concerning the
pretexts upon which we torment one another,--or whether it be for the
constitution of the Church of England, or for the constitution of the
State of England, that people choose to make their fellow-creatures
wretched. When we were sent into a place of authority, you that sent us
had yourselves but one commission to give. You could give us none to
wrong or oppress, or even to suffer any kind of oppression or wrong, on
any grounds whatsoever: not on political, as in the affairs of America;
not on commercial, as in those of Ireland; not in civil, as in the laws
for debt; not in religious, as in the statutes against Protestant or
Catholic dissenters. The diversified, but connected, fabric of
universal justice is well cramped and bolted together in all its parts;
and depend upon it, I never have employed, and I never shall employ, any
engine of power which may come into my hands to wrench it asunder. All
shall stand, if I can help it, and all shall stand connected. After all,
to complete this work, much remains to be done: much in the East, much
in the West. But, great as the work is, if our will be ready, our powers
are not deficient.

Since you have suffered me to trouble you so much on this subject,
permit me, Gentlemen, to detain you a little longer. I am, indeed, most
solicitous to give you perfect satisfaction. I find there are some of a
better and softer nature than the persons with whom I have supposed
myself in debate, who neither think ill of the act of relief, nor by any
means desire the repeal,--yet who, not accusing, but lamenting, what was
done, on account of the consequences, have frequently expressed their
wish that the late act had never been made. Some of this description,
and persons of worth, I have met with in this city. They conceive that
the prejudices, whatever they might be, of a large part of the people,
ought not to have been shocked,--that their opinions ought to have been
previously taken, and much attended to,--and that thereby the late
horrid scenes might have been prevented.

I confess, my notions are widely different; and I never was less sorry
for any action of my life. I like the bill the better on account of the
events of all kinds that followed it. It relieved the real sufferers; it
strengthened the state; and, by the disorders that ensued, we had clear
evidence that there lurked a temper somewhere which ought not to be
fostered by the laws. No ill consequences whatever could be attributed
to the act itself. We knew beforehand, or we were poorly instructed,
that toleration is odious to the intolerant, freedom to oppressors,
property to robbers, and all kinds and degrees of prosperity to the
envious. We knew that all these kinds of men would gladly gratify their
evil dispositions under the sanction of law and religion, if they could:
if they could not, yet, to make way to their objects, they would do
their utmost to subvert all religion and all law. This we certainly
knew. But, knowing this, is there any reason, because thieves break in
and steal, and thus bring detriment to you, and draw ruin on themselves,
that I am to be sorry that you are in possession of shops, and of
warehouses, and of wholesome laws to protect them? Are you to build no
houses, because desperate men may pull them down upon their own heads?
Or, if a malignant wretch will cut his own throat, because he sees you
give alms to the necessitous and deserving, shall his destruction be
attributed to your charity, and not to his own deplorable madness? If we
repent of our good actions, what, I pray you, is left for our faults and
follies? It is not the beneficence of the laws, it is the unnatural
temper which beneficence can fret and sour, that is to be lamented. It
is this temper which, by all rational means, ought to be sweetened and
corrected. If froward men should refuse this cure, can they vitiate
anything but themselves? Does evil so react upon good, as not only to
retard its motion, but to change its nature? If it can so operate, then
good men will always be in the power of the bad,--and virtue, by a
dreadful reverse of order, must lie under perpetual subjection and
bondage to vice.

As to the opinion of the people, which some think, in such cases, is to
be implicitly obeyed,--near two years' tranquillity, which follows the
act, and its instant imitation in Ireland, proved abundantly that the
late horrible spirit was in a great measure the effect of insidious art,
and perverse industry, and gross misrepresentation. But suppose that the
dislike had been much more deliberate and much more general than I am
persuaded it was,--when we know that the opinions of even the greatest
multitudes are the standard of rectitude, I shall think myself obliged
to make those opinions the masters of my conscience. But if it may be
doubted whether Omnipotence itself is competent to alter the essential
constitution of right and wrong, sure I am that such _things_ as they
and I are possessed of no such power. No man carries further than I do
the policy of making government pleasing to the people. But the widest
range of this politic complaisance is confined within the limits of
justice. I would not only consult the interest of the people, but I
would cheerfully gratify their humors. We are all a sort of children
that must be soothed and managed. I think I am not austere or formal in
my nature. I would bear, I would even play my part in, any innocent
buffooneries, to divert them. But I never will act the tyrant for their
amusement. If they will mix malice in their sports, I shall never
consent to throw them any living, sentient creature whatsoever, no, not
so much as a kitling, to torment.

"But if I profess all this impolitic stubbornness, I may chance never to
be elected into Parliament."--It is certainly not pleasing to be put out
of the public service. But I wish to be a member of Parliament to have
my share of doing good and resisting evil. It would therefore be absurd
to renounce my objects in order to obtain my seat. I deceive myself,
indeed, most grossly, if I had not much rather pass the remainder of my
life hidden in the recesses of the deepest obscurity, feeding my mind
even with the visions and imaginations of such things, than to be placed
on the most splendid throne of the universe, tantalized with a denial of
the practice of all which can make the greatest situation any other than
the greatest curse. Gentlemen, I have had my day. I can never
sufficiently express my gratitude to you for having set me in a place
wherein I could lend the slightest help to great and laudable designs.
If I have had my share in any measure giving quiet to private property
and private conscience,--if by my vote I have aided in securing to
families the best possession, peace,--if I have joined in reconciling
kings to their subjects, and subjects to their prince,--if I have
assisted to loosen the foreign holdings of the citizen, and taught him
to look for his protection to the laws of his country, and for his
comfort to the good-will of his countrymen,--if I have thus taken my
part with the best of men in the best of their actions, I can shut the
book: I might wish to read a page or two more, but this is enough for my
measure. I have not lived in vain.

And now, Gentlemen, on this serious day, when I come, as it were, to
make up my account with you, let me take to myself some degree of honest
pride on the nature of the charges that are against me. I do not here
stand before you accused of venality, or of neglect of duty. It is not
said, that, in the long period of my service, I have, in a single
instance, sacrificed the slightest of your interests to my ambition or
to my fortune. It is not alleged, that, to gratify any anger or revenge
of my own, or of my party, I have had a share in wronging or oppressing
any description of men, or any one man in any description. No! the
charges against me are all of one kind: that I have pushed the
principles of general justice and benevolence too far,--further than a
cautious policy would warrant, and further than the opinions of many
would go along with me. In every accident which may happen through life,
in pain, in sorrow, in depression, and distress, I will call to mind
this accusation, and be comforted.

Gentlemen, I submit the whole to your judgment. Mr. Mayor, I thank you
for the trouble you have taken on this occasion: in your state of health
it is particularly obliging. If this company should think it advisable
for me to withdraw, I shall respectfully retire; if you think otherwise,
I shall go directly to the Council-House and to the 'Change, and without
a moment's delay begin my canvass.

* * * * *


BRISTOL, September 6, 1780.

At a great and respectable meeting of the friends of EDMUND BURKE, Esq.,
held at the Guildhall this day, the Right Worshipful the Mayor in the
chair:--Resolved, That Mr. Burke, as a representative for this city, has
done all possible honor to himself as a senator and a man, and that we
do heartily and honestly approve of his conduct, as the result of an
enlightened loyalty to his sovereign, a warm and zealous love to his
country through its widely extended empire, a jealous and watchful care
of the liberties of his fellow-subjects, an enlarged and liberal
understanding of our commercial interest, a humane attention to the
circumstances of even the lowest ranks of the community, and a truly
wise, politic, and tolerant spirit, in supporting the national church,
with a reasonable indulgence to all who dissent from it; and we wish to
express the most marked abhorrence of the base arts which have been
employed, without regard to truth and reason, to misrepresent his
eminent services to his country.

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