boards and reducing the number of commissioners; and further, to make the new taxes as cheap as possible in the collection, to prevent their being the cause of new salaries, we agree that the stamp tax which we propose shall be collected by the commissioners of the board of accounts, without any new salary. The reduced commissioners must get a compensation, but that will only be a temporary charge".

Such was the public statement, and such the compact. The minister now retains the tax, and withdraws the consideration. He revives the obnoxious measure in part, and he lays the foundation of a revival in toto. The boards will be hereafter completely divided because there are so many commissioners, and then the minister will order three more commissioners because the boards are divided.

There is another circumstance which has taken place since the resolutions to which I refer, which is decisive against the measure. By your money bill, all customs inwards are liable to five per cent., which is collected by the laws of excise; it follows, that all the officers of the custom department who collect these duties must have commissions empowering them to search for exciseable goods; it follows, that they must have commissions both from the commissioners of customs and excise; it follows, that the power of the commissioners of excise and customs is now rendered indivisible by your own laws, otherwise there must be two distinct boards with equal jurisdiction, presiding over one and the same set of officers; but when the excise laws are to be extended, then it seems the business is rendered inseparable; when undue influence is to be extended, then the business is made separate.

These arguments are strong against this measure, but the strongest argument of all is, the Lord-lieutenant's letter recommending it. In stating this letter, if I seem to depart from the gravity of the subject, let it not be imputed to my levity, but to the letter's absurdity. It states delay and trouble, and it offers a remedy; it states that the patent has appointed nine commissioners, four commissioners of customs only, two commissioners of excise only, and three commissioners of both; it orders that these nine commissioners shall remain in one room, but divide themselves, and sit at different tables, with their respective secretaries, an do the business of excise and customs at one and the same moment, in one and the same apartment.

The commissioners of customs only are to sit at their table for the conduct of the port business; the commissioners of excise only are to sit at their table for the conduct of the inland business, pro

eering at the same time and in the same room, and the commissioners of excise and customs may apply themselves to either as they shall think proper. That is, they are placed in a situation in which they must interrupt one another, and are under a physical impossibility of doing business. Two courts are placed in a situation in which it is impossible to attend to themselves, and some of the judges are left free to attend to either or both. Suppose the Court of Exchequer was to divide itself into two courts, sitting in the same chamber, and proceeding, one on the business of equity, the other of law, at one and the same moment, with a floating privilege to one or more barons to attend to either. This letter of the Marquess having thus disposed of the port and inland business, by putting it in a state of interruption and confusion, proceeds to regulate trials, and orders that trials may go on in another chamber, under the cognizance of a sufficient number of commissioners of excise, while at the same moment the other commissioners shall go on, at their separate tables, with the business of the port and inland. So that in the words of the letter, in future, instead of only one business being carried on at a time by this new arrangement, the port and inland business, and trial, may go on all at once, without interfering or interrupting one another. Can we possibly imagine that the public, of whose satisfaction this etter speaks, can be satisfied in a species of institution, which superintends near £1,500,000, under a physical impossibility of doing public justice? Can you persuade the public, of whose satisfaction this letter speaks, to be satisfied in a regulation which draws off part of the commissioners of excise from the trial of their property, under laws that require and puzzle the whole force of all the understanding of all those who compose that most absolute board? Can you imagine, I say, that the public will receive satisfaction from a regulation, the virtues of which rest on that paradoxical perfection, that superna tural domination, supposed to be possessed by the commissioners, o shutting their ears to one subject which is discussed before them, and confining the whole force of their understanding to another? But there is not only a physical ignorance in the letter of instructions, there is also an official confusion. The officers of the ports, perhaps not less than 1500, have commissions, both from the commissioners of excise and customs, and are, it follows, controllable by both. Here, then, are two tables of equal and coördinate jurisdiction presiding over one and the same set of officers. Suppose the commissioners of customs think proper to dismiss an officer-they now have a right; suppose the commissioners of excise think proper to

continue the same officer-they now have a right; suppose the table of excise, to stop smuggling, order a cruiser to Cork; suppose the table of customs order him at the same time instantly to Derry. But there is another mischief in this letter of instruction. The com missioners of excise are responsible for the whole excise, and they are, in cases of improper and illegal seizure, liable to damages; all import excise is collected by port officers, and all their correspondence is in the department of the secretary of the other table-the board of customs. Thus, by the new regulation, the commissioners of the table of excise are responsible for a revenue collected by officers whose correspondence is deposited with another board, and only comes before the board of excise by accident, or good nature, or personal civility. Would there not be a confusion of responsibility, if the board of customs, to whom all such papers come, were to order a vessel to be seized, when the board of excise, in that case, would be responsible for perhaps £10,000, incurred by damages. As the regulation now stands, the commissioners of excise are to collect a great revenue by officers whose conduct they have little opportunity to know, and on whose conduct they cannot exclusively deciac.

I have dwelt enough on this particular measure. I have shown it to be a defiance of the advice of this House, without the pretence even of expediency, and that nothing since that advice was given has taken place in the laws to justify the minister in disregarding it; on the contrary, that it is now necessary, in order to conform to the law, to disregard the instruction of the minister. I say, I have shown this measure to be a disregard to the sense of this House, for the purpose of extending influence; this leads me from the particular subject to the general policy-the nature of this policy I have described the ultimate consequences I shall not now detail, but I will mention one which seems to include all. I know you say—Union; no; it is not the extinction of the Irish Parliament, but its disgraceful continuation. Parliament, under the success of such a project, will live, but live to no one useful purpose. The minister will defeat her attempts by corruption, and deter the repetition of her attempts by threatening the repetition of the expenses of corruption. Having been long the bawd, corruption will become the sage and honest admonitress of the nation. She will advise her no more to provoke the minister to rob the subject-she will advise her to serve in order to save; to be a slave on the principles of good housewifery. Then will parliament, instead of controlling the count, administer to its licentiousness, provide

villas and furniture for the servants of the Castle, afford a place army to obnoxious members, accommodate with cruel and contradictory clauses the commissioners of the revenue, or feed on public rapine the viceroy's clanship! Parliament, that giant that purged these islands of the race of tyrants, whose breed it was the misfortune of England to preserve, and of Ireland to adopt―parliament, whose head has for ages commerced with the wisdom of the gods, and whose foot has spoken thunder and deposition to the oppressor, will, like the sacred giant, stand a public spectacle shorn of his strength, or rather, like that giant, he will retain his strength for the amusement of his enemies, and do feats of ignominious power to gratify an idle and hostile court. And these walls, where ouce the public weal contended, and the patriot strove, will resemble the ruin of some Italian temple, and abound, not with senators, but with animals of prey in the guise of senators, chattering their pert debates, and disgracing those seats which once belonged to the people.

Here you will stop to consider, and demand, why all this? why this attack on Ireland? The minister will tell you what caused, but I will tell what contributed; it was impunity! impunity! You have no adequate responsibility in Ireland, and politicians laugh at the sword of justice which falls short of their heads, and only precipitates on their reputation. Sir, this country has never yet exercised herself in the way of vindictive justice; in the case of Strafford, she was but an humble assistant; and yet in this country we have had victims-the aristocracy at different times has been a victim; the whole people of Ireland, for almost an entire century, were a victim. But ministers, in all the criminal successions ******* here is a chasm, a blank in your history. Sir, you have in Ireland no axetherefore no good minister.

Sir, it is the misfortune of this country, that the principles of her constitution have not yet become entirely the maxims of all those who take a lead in her government. They have no public mindtheir maxims are provincial: and this misconception of our situation is not a little assisted by a prudent sense of their own interest. They know that Ireland does not punish, and they see that the British court rewards. This will explain why the Irish court prefers a strong corrupt government, to a good sound constitution; why peculations of the most scandalous nature, if the English court do not appear to be affected thereby, are represented as trifles; and why corruptions of a most flagitious nature, if the British court can, by any misinterpretation, be represented as benefited thereby, are dvanced as pretensions. This will explain why, under the same

British minister, on the same subject, the powers of the two Houses of the British Parliament shall be asserted, and those of the Irish denied why the extraordinary powers of the two Houses of the Parliament of Britain shall be advanced, and the ordinary powers of the three estates of Ireland denied.

This will explain the phenomena of the times. A Prince of Wales, laden in England with unconstitutional restrictions-a British subject gratified in Ireland with unlimited corruption. This will explain the meanness of our court, as well as its mysteries-when your viceroys, under the present system, for the purpose of reducing the expenses or redressing the evils of the state, are puppets, and the men who serve under them are mere machines moved by wires, held by these puppets; themselves active agents, indeed, for the purpose of incumbrance, and their magic castle the reign of men imp'd with inferior privileges in these descending times of meanness and of mischief.

remonstrate.

This will elucidate the present policy;-a policy against which we Let us suppose the various descriptions of society to approach the Irish minister, and deprecate his project. And, first, the moderate man. He will tell him:

"Sir, give up this system. We were quiet. Why innovate? Why commence an attack? Why make us first the dupes of profession, and afterwards the victims of corruption? why a system in which we cannot perceive or principle, or prudence, or temper?" Let the financier approach him: "Sir, give up this system. You have exceeded the old duties, and you have exceeded the new, and you have exceeded the estimate of expense, as well as the produce of the revenue, and you have been obliged to draft £70,000 from the public creditor, and you have been obliged to bolster up the state by lottery subscriptions; and nothing remains but to attempt new loans, or to proceed to new taxes, or to fall on the bounty". Let the modest virtues of private life approach him: "Sir, give up this system; we do not enter into political discussion, but may we De permitted to fear, lest the very great degree of public corruption at this time, for reasons best known to yourself adopted, and the ribaldry cast by your government on public virtue, may at last extend their poison to the purity of private life". Or let us bring forth the institution of parliament itself to expostulate with the Irish minister! Or, if there is yet her spirit resident in this dome, let that spirit rebuke him! I cannot hear its voice, but I think I feel its dictates. I obey, and I move you:

"That the resolutions of this House against increasing the number