We have heard the necessity of reforming the nation by degrees urged as an argument for imposing first a lighter duty, and afterwards a heavier; this complaisance for wickedness, my lords, is not so defensible as that it should be battered by arguments in form, and therefore I shall only relate a reply made by Webb, the noted walker, upon a parallel occasion.
This man, who must be remembered by many of your lordships, was remarkable for vigour, both of mind and body, and lived wholly upon water for his drink, and chiefly upon vegetables for his other sustenance: he was one day recommending his regimen to one of his friends who loved wine, and who, perhaps, might somewhat contribute to the prosperity of this spirituous manufacture, and urged him, with great earnestness, to quit a course of luxury by which his health and his intellects would equally be destroyed. The gentleman appeared convinced, and told him, that he would conform to his counsel, and thought he could not change his course of life at once, but would leave off strong liquors by degrees. By degrees, says the other, with indignation! if you should unhappily fall into the fire, would you caution your servants not to pull you out but by degrees?
This answer, my lords, is applicable in the present case; the nation is sunk into the lowest state of corruption, the people are not only vitious, but insolent beyond example; they not only break the laws, but defy them; and yet some of your lordships are for reforming them by degrees.
I am not easily persuaded, my lords, that our ministers really intend to supply the defects that may hereafter be discovered in this bill; it will doubtless produce money, perhaps much more than they appear to expect from it; I doubt not but the licensed retailers will be more than fifty thousand, and the quantity retailed must increase with the number of retailers. As the bill will, therefore, answer all the ends intended by it, I do not expect to see it altered, for I have never observed ministers desirous of amending their own errours, unless they are such as produce a deficiency in the revenue.
Besides, my lords, it is not certain, that when this fund is mortgaged to the publick creditors, they can prevail upon the commons to change the security; they may continue the bill in force for the reasons, whatever they are, for which they have passed it, and the good intentions of our ministers, however sincere, may be defeated, and drunkenness, legal drunkenness, established in the nation.
This, my lords, is very reasonable; and therefore we ought to exert ourselves for the safety of the nation, while the power is yet in our own hands, and without regard to the opinion or proceedings of the other house, show that we are yet the chief guardians of the people, and the most vigilant adversaries of wickedness.
The ready compliance of the commons with the measures proposed in this bill, has been mentioned here with a view, I suppose, of influencing us, but surely by those who had forgotten our independence, or resigned their own. It is not only the right, but the duty of either house, to deliberate without regard to the determinations of the other; for how would the nation receive any benefit from the distinct powers that compose the legislature, unless their determinations are without influence upon each other? If either the example or authority of the commons can divert us from following our own convictions, we are no longer part of the legislature; we have given up our honours and our privileges, and what then is our concurrence but slavery, or our suffrage but an echo?
The only argument, therefore, that now remains, is the expediency of gratifying those by whose ready subscription the exigencies which the counsels of our new statesmen have brought upon us, and of continuing the security by which they have been encouraged to such liberal contributions.
Publick credit, my lords, is, indeed, of very great importance, but publick credit can never be long supported without publick virtue; nor indeed if the government could mortgage the morals and health of the people, would it be just or rational to confirm the bargain. If the ministry can raise money only by the destruction of their fellow-subjects, they ought to abandon those schemes for which the money is necessary: for what calamity can be equal to unbounded wickedness?
But, my lords, there is no necessity for a choice which may cost us or our ministers so much regret; for the same subscriptions may be procured by an offer of the same advantages to a fund of any other kind, and the sinking fund will easily supply any deficiency that might be suspected in another scheme.