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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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scrip tion of men that revolted against the p rinciples of justice and humanity . 1 & House of Brunswick . ( Dec . 16 , 1788 . ) To the House of Brunswick this country stood , in an eminent degree indebted ; and , indeed , few princes
ever deserved the love of their subjects more than the princes of that house * Since their accession to the throne , their government had been such as to render it highly improbable , that there should ever be ground for art act of exclusion to pass , to set aside one of their heirs from the
succession , or that such a circumstance should ever become a necessary subject of contemplation . If the princes of the House of Brunswick had , at any time , differed with their subjects , it had been only on collateral points , which had been easily adjusted in
parliament . No one of the princes of that house had ever made any attempt against the constitution of the country ; although , had such a mischievous design been meditated , a party could have been found in existence , and ready to abet them in any scheme , the blackest and most fatal that ever
tyrant devised against the liberties or the happiness of his subjects . The love , therefore , of the people was due to the illustrious family on the throne , in -so peculiar and eminent a degree , that every circumstance which looked as if it- could at any time endanger the hereditary right of the House of Brunswick to the
succession , ought to be guarded against with peculiar jealousy . 17 . Influence of the Crown . ( Regency Debate , Dec . 16 , 1788 . ) Upon this occasion , Mr . Fox remarked , that his own resistance
against the latter ( encroachment of prero gative ) , when it had been thought increas ing unconstitutionally , was well known . The influence of the crown had been more than once checked in * hat House , and he really believed ' to the advantage of the people . Wheney the executive authority was urged beyond its reasonable extent , it o « ght to be resisted , and he carried Jjis ideas on that head so far , that he had not scrupled to declare that the Applies ought to be stopped if the
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royal assent were refused to a constitutional curtailment of any obnoxious and dangerous prerogative . Moderate men , he was aware , thought this a
violent doctrine j but he had uniformly maintained it ; and the public had derived advantage from its having been carried into effect . He desired
to ask , however , if this was an occasion for exercising the constitutional power of resisting the prerogative or the influence of the crown in that House ? He had ever made it hig pride to combat with the crown in the plenitude of its power and the
fulness of its authority ; he wished not to trample on its rights wjien it lay extended at their feet , deprived of its functions and incapable of resistance . Let the right honourable gentleman pride himself on a victory obtained against a defenceless foe I
Let him boast of a triumph where no battle had been fought , and , consequently , where no glory could be obtained i Let him take advantage of the calamities of human nature ; let him , like an unfeeling lord of the manor , riot in the riches to be acquired by plundering shipwrecks , by
rigorously asserting a right to the waifs , estrays , deodands , and all the accumulated produce of the various accidents which misfortune could throw into his power I Let it not be my boast , said Mr . Fox , to have gained such victories , obtained such triumphs , or availed myself of wealth so acquired .
18 * Parliamentary Majorities . ( Dec , 16 , 1788 . ) In majorities , Mr . Fox declared h 6 had no great trust ; he had for many years had the mortification to find himself in a minority in that house j and yet , upon a change of situation ,
he had generally found , that the majority , who had before divided against him , divided with him . For more than eighteen years of his political life had he been obliged to stem the torrent of power , and sometimes he ,
had enjoyed the satisfaction of finding himself in a majority of the same parliament , of which , in the prosecution of the same principles and the declaration of the same designs , he had before been only supported by ^ minority .
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Charles James Fox * 537
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Sept. 2, 1815, page 537, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1764/page/5/
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