On the 27th Wilkes was once more chosen Alderman of Farringdon Ward, without opposition. The same day he was carried before the House of Commons, attended by a great concourse of people, who, however, by his order soon dispersed, or behaved with singular decency. His committees too, who had regimented the mobs of London and Westminster, conducted them with composure and regularity. Lord Barrington moved that Wilkes might be confined to speak only to the two allegations of his complaint,—the alteration of the writ, and the subornation of witnesses. The Opposition objected to the restrictions, and combated them till ten at night. Serjeant Glynn pleaded for Wilkes, and spoke with a clearness, argument, decency, and propriety, that was applauded by both sides; and though attacked by Norton and the Attorney-General, who called him Wilkes’s representative,[183] he defended himself with a modesty that conciliated much favour. The debate turned chiefly on general warrants and libels: George Grenville defended the former, and himself, and the Lords Egremont and Halifax:—on the latter, to pay his court, he said that libels against Ministers were not to be regarded, but against the King were serious. Dyson, as usual, was shrewd, and, as usual, ill-treated by the Opposition; Colonel Barré, the day before, having baptized him by the name of Mungo, a black slave in a new farce called “The Padlock,” who is described as employed by everybody in all jobs and servile offices. Burke ridiculed the Ministers as he had done the day before with greater applause; and Barré, repeating his attacks, was called to order by Rigby, whom he had described as a jolly, eating, drinking fellow, who finding himself now in a comfortable situation, seldom spoke. Being provoked at the interruption, Barré rejoined surlily, “The gentleman denies being a Minister, and calls me to order; but I have not done with him yet. Whether Minister or not, he lies in a bed[184] to himself; I do not envy him, nor would I have his principles to lie in his bed.” This unpleasant attack thunderstruck Rigby, who coloured, and not choosing to have the last sentence explained, made no reply. The House then divided, and the restrictions were carried by 278 to 131, Grenville and his friends being in the majority, as were Lord Granby, Sir Edward Hawke, and Conway.[185]
Wilkes was then called in, seemed abashed, and behaved with great respect to the House. He demanded to be admitted and to take the oaths as a member, which after some debate was refused on his being a prisoner. His counsel were then called in, and were informed that they must confine themselves to the two points of his allegation; but it being then near midnight, the House adjourned to the 31st. The next day Conway told me, he and Lord Granby had agreed to stay away on the expulsion: having declared against violent measures, they would not concur in it; and disapproving Wilkes’s attacks on the Government, they would not defend him.
Wilkes appeared again before the House on the 31st. He complained that his character had been aspersed in the printed votes, which accused him of blasphemy, though he had not been convicted of it; and demanded reparation. The case was this:—some time before, when the House, at the motion of Lord Clare, had sent for the roll of his conviction on the North Briton and “Essay on Woman,” it appeared that the clerk had forgotten to endorse them; on which he had been ordered to endorse them as they ought to have been; on which he wrote there the titles of seditious libel and blasphemy. Dyson, who adjusted the votes for the Speaker, had (probably by design) inserted these titles in the votes. When Martin the banker had lately moved to admit Wilkes, and the House had refused on account of his condemnation for those libels, they were going to renew those words; but Beckford objecting to the word blasphemy, the House had acquiesced, and intituled the piece a profane and impious libel. Norton now endeavoured to prove that he had been convicted of blasphemy, because it being in the charge, and he being brought in guilty of the premises, Norton inferred that he was convicted of it; but Serjeant Glynn showed that in all indictments charges are ridiculously exaggerated, and though a man may be brought in guilty of a crime, half the articles of a charge are never attempted to be proved. Sir George Saville and Sir Joseph Mawbey stiffly maintained the same argument. Lord North, Dyson, and the Ministerial party as obstinately supported the contrary ground, till General Conway showed the injustice of the tenet, and that it was at most constructive blasphemy; on which Sir George Saville joining him, and the House applauding, Dyson was forced to insert other palliating words—a great point gained to Wilkes, to have gotten rid of the actual condemnation for blasphemy. He then proceeded on his defence, and brought Curry, a printer, to prove the manner in which the “Essay on Woman” had been stolen from Wilkes by the means of Carteret Webbe, who had sent Curry to Carrington the messenger to be paid for the theft. Curry showed and owned himself an infamous rogue; and having first sold Wilkes, was now in his pay. Men were shocked at the treachery used towards Wilkes, and thence he again gained ground. The two Earls were then brought before the House. Wilkes only asked Lord Sandwich (the projector of the plot) if he knew of Curry being bribed by the Ministry, and being promised a place? The Earl answered, that he had promised him all proper protection, but had nothing to do with the disposition of public money. Lord March said, Kidgell had shown him the fragment of the Essay on Woman, and he had advised him to complain of it; but had never seen Carteret Webbe till within the last four days. Webbe, now blind, sat there at the bar, and was grievously abused by Davenport, Wilkes’s counsel. At two in the morning the House adjourned the farther consideration till the next day.[186]
Amongst these notorious personages, notice must be taken of Sir Fletcher Norton. He had been purchased for this business (for even his attachment to Lord Mansfield and the Court were not sufficient to secure his zeal, though the cause was so bad) by the place of Chief Justice in eyre and a pension of 3000l. a-year. It was stipulated that Norton should quit the law, and be chief manager in the House of Commons: but no sooner was the bargain struck and the pension secured, than Norton, not caring to give up 7000l. a-year, which he got by his profession, pleaded that he could not in honour abandon his clients. His next point of honour was trying to prove by construction that Wilkes had been condemned of more than he had been condemned. Another acquisition to the Court was Sir Laurence Dundas, the rich commissary, a friend of Grenville, and now seduced from him by Rigby, another late friend of Grenville. Dundas commanded the votes of nine members. He demanded a peerage for himself, having acquired above eight hundred thousand pounds in less than four years of the late war—so far fairly that he had executed the commission on cheaper terms than anyone else had offered. He was, besides, nobly generous; yet it would have been gross indeed to have raised him to the peerage on no other foundation than the money he had gained from the public. It was known too, that Prince Ferdinand had been on the point of hanging him on part of his contract not being furnished so soon as he had engaged it should be.[187]
Carteret Webbe’s counsel was then heard in his defence, and to move compassion, pleaded before his face that he was decayed both in eyesight and understanding. Wilkes’s counsel replied. Dr. Blackstone[188] then moved a long, obscure question, setting forth that Wilkes’s complaint against Lord Mansfield was frivolous and trifling; and as the Courts below had pronounced that alteration of writs was not unusual, the charge was scandalous, as tending to calumniate the Chief Justice, and lessen the respect of the people for the law and the judges. He was seconded by a young Mr. Payne,[189] who spoke for the first time with much applause, though his language was wonderfully verbose. He was connected with Lord Mansfield, and as his speech was interlarded with law anecdotes, the person in whose behalf it was uttered was supposed to have assisted in the composition. Payne was a good figure and possessed himself well, having been accustomed to act plays in a private set; but his usual dialect being as turgid as Othello’s when he recounts his conquest of Desdemona, he became the jest of his companions and the surfeit of the House of Commons. Serjeant Glynn showed the injustice of the motion, for as it was clear and allowed that the writ had been altered, had not the prisoner a right to plead that alteration in his own defence? Norton and the Crown lawyers were warm on the other side; on which Barré called them the heavy artillery of the Court; or rather, said he, they resemble the elephants in Eastern armies, which fall back upon and put their own troops in confusion. The Ministers maintained their point till very late at night, though the House gave many signs of disgust at the violence of their proceedings. At last George Grenville, with attention to Lord Mansfield, and yet disapproving the question, wished some middle and temperate method could be hit upon. The House loudly agreed with him, but Lord North and Norton stuck firm, and the latter declared he would divide the House, though he should be alone. The Ministerial party then cried out as loudly on that side; till Conway rose, and taking notice that a minute before everybody had roared for moderation, and now were again for violence, proposed that, instead of harsh words, they should correct the motion, and say, that the alteration of writs not being unprecedented, the charge against Lord Mansfield should be declared groundless. Grenville approved this, and even Norton, and that amendment was accepted without a division. Thurlow then, at past one in the morning, moved that Wilkes had not made out his charge against Webbe, (though a letter had been produced from him to Curry and three other printers, bidding them take care to be uniform in their evidence, and though Curry had been subsisted at the expense of the Government,) and that the charge was frivolous and groundless. If these last words, he said, were disputed, the debate must be adjourned to another day. The Opposition, weakly or fatigued, objected only to the latter words, and offered to acquiesce in the former part of the vote, if the censure was promised to be omitted; with which Thurlow complied, and then carried the rest of his motion.[190]
On the 2nd, Wilkes was again heard; owned his preface to Lord Weymouth’s letter, said he gloried in it, and only wished he had made it stronger. The Attorney-General moved to vote that preface a scandalous and seditious libel, tending to subvert all order and government. Sir George Saville moved the previous question. Grenville, and even Dr. Blackstone, opposed the Attorney’s motion, as Wilkes ought to be tried for a libel at common law, and not by the Houses of Lords and Commons. Dyson reminded Grenville that he himself had brought a message from the King against Wilkes’s North Briton; was it a greater violation of the privileges of the House of Commons to receive a message from the House of Lords than from the Crown? Grey Cooper[191] spoke well against mobs; Burke warmly against the Lords extorting evidence, and usurping powers. He called Lord Weymouth’s letter a bloody scroll, and dwelt much on the word effectual in the orders to the soldiers. Rigby asked if it would have been wise to order the soldiers to do their duty ineffectually? At past two in the morning the House divided; the courtiers were 239, the minority 135, Grenville and his friends, who were not above ten, being in the latter number. The House then agreed with the Lords and passed the censure.[192]
Soon after the division happened a singular event. Some hours before, Humphrey Cotes[193] sent for Sir William Meredith out of the House, and told him Mr. Allen wanted to speak with him. Sir William said he did not know him, and went back. This Allen, who had been in the army, had been deservedly abused in the House by Sir William for persecuting the condemned chairmen, one of whom had saved his life. Sir William afterwards going to the House, had been met by Allen, who demanded satisfaction. Sir William said he did not know him; if he had injured him he would give him satisfaction next morning, but would not occasion a disturbance then. Captain Walsingham Boyle (who had been concerned with Sir William in saving the chairmen) hearing of this altercation, complained to the House of the violation of their privileges by Allen’s taking notice of what had passed in the House. This occasioned a heat and debate, which lasted till half an hour after four in the morning, when Allen was ordered into custody, and to be brought to the bar the next day with Humphrey Cotes.
Allen absconded for some hours, but surrendered himself in the morning. He was a handsome young fellow, and had stolen a marriage with an idiot sister of the Spanish Charles Townshend; but he had such a savage thirst of blood, that he had been broken by a court-martial at Belleisle, for having forged and sent challenges to six officers in the names of others. Cotes was not called upon by the House, but Allen was carried to their bar, where he denied the charge,—both he and Cotes having been so cautious as not to tell Meredith that the occasion of the challenge was words spoken in the House: yet Sir William and Captain Walsingham had heard, for three days, that Allen was lurking about, and intended to challenge one of them. The House being satisfied of the charge, and with the behaviour of the two members, committed Allen to Newgate.
The same evening, Lord Barrington moved for the expulsion of Wilkes, for the three libels—of the North Briton, the Essay on Woman, and the Preface to Lord Weymouth’s Letter. The House sat again till three in the morning, when the expulsion was voted by 219 to 137. Grenville spoke against it as an accumulative charge, not one of the crimes alone being sufficient to deserve that punishment. Burke spoke admirably on the same side. Lord Granby and Sir Edward Hawke, who had declared so strongly against it, both voted for the expulsion. Conway kept away. Serjeant Glynn gained great fame by the candour of his conduct on the whole proceeding; owning, that as counsel for Wilkes, he had maintained points which he would not assert in the House. Wilkes himself made a very indifferent figure, showing neither parts nor quickness in his speeches or examination of the witnesses.[194] The same day, Earl Cornwallis[195] kissed hands as Vice-Treasurer of Ireland, to make room for Norton to be Justice in Eyre. This worthless man, though disposed to the Court, as I have said, and originally employed in the prosecution of Wilkes, would not support his own principles—at least, his own inclinations—without this immoderate bribe. The Crown, though possessed of so much power by the disposition of honours, offices, and pensions, was sunk to the lowest contempt, and reduced to purchase every man whose vote or service it wanted, and thus was surrounded by none almost but those who had insulted and forced it to buy them. If, on the contrary, the King had tried by good and popular measures to secure the affections of the people, he might have maintained the balance against the parliamentary chiefs: but, having lost the hearts of the nation, his sole resource was the prostitution of honours and money to those who were most obnoxious to himself and the people.
Wilkes was no sooner expelled, than he again presented himself as candidate for the county of Middlesex, and in the North Briton, published a very bold address to the freeholders, in which, under the title of the Administration, he severely lashed the House of Commons. There was at this time an avowed, though very small republican party, the chiefs of which were Mrs. Macaulay, the historian, her brother Sawbridge, his brother-in-law, Stephenson, a rich merchant,[196] and Thomas Hollis, a gentleman of strict honour and good fortune, a virtuoso, and so bigoted to his principles, that, though a humane and good man, he would scarce converse with any man who did not entirely agree with his opinions. He had no parts, but spent large sums in publishing prints and editions of all the heroes and works on his own side of the question: but he was formed to adorn a pure republic, not to shine in a depraved monarchy.[197]