Government and civil Society are things of infinite complexity, and rash Politicians are the worst enemies of mankind; because it is mainly through them that rational liberty has made so little progress in the world. You have heard of a Profession to which the luxury of modern times has given birth, that of Landscape-Gardeners, or Improvers of Pleasure-grounds. A competent Practitioner in this elegant art begins by considering every object, that he finds in the place where he is called to exercise his skill, as having a right to remain, till the contrary be proved. If it be a deformity he asks whether a slight alteration may not convert it into a beauty; and he destroys nothing till he has convinced himself by reflection that no alteration, no diminution or addition, can make it ornamental. Modern Reformers reverse this judicious maxim. If a thing is before them, so far from deeming that it has on that account a claim to continue and be deliberately dealt with, its existence with them is a sufficient warrant for its destruction. Institutions are to be subverted, Practices radically altered, and Measures to be reversed. All men are to change their places, not because the men are objectionable, or the place is injurious, but because certain Pretenders are eager to be at work, being tired of both. Some are forward, through pruriency of youthful talents—and Greybeards hobble after them, in whom number of years is a cloak for poverty of experience. Some who have much leisure, because every affair of their own has withered under their mismanagement, are eager to redeem their credit, by stirring gratis for the public;—others, having risen a little in the world, take swimmingly to the trade of factious Politics, on their original stock of base manners and vulgar opinions. Some are theorists hot for practice, others hacknied Practitioners who never had a theory; many are vain, and must be busy; and almost as many are needy—and the spirit of justice, deciding upon their own merits, will not suffer them to remain at rest.
The movement made among us, my countrymen of Westmoreland, was preceded, announced, and prepared, by such Agitators, disseminating falsehoods and misrepresentations, equally mischievous, whether they proceeded from wilful malice or presumptuous ignorance. Take warning in time. Be not persuaded to unite with them who, whether they intend you injury or not, cannot but prove your enemies. Let not your's be the first County in England, which, since the days of Wilkes, and after the dreadful example of France, has given countenance to principles congenial to the vice, profligacy, and half-knowledge of Westminster; but which formerly were unheard of among us, or known only to be detested. Places, Pensions, and formidable things, if you like! but far better these, with our King and Constitution, with our quiet fire-sides and flourishing fields, than proscription and confiscation, without them! Long wars, and their unavoidable accompaniment, heavy taxes—both these evils are liable to intemperate exaggeration; but, be they what they may, would there be less of war and lighter taxes, as so many grumblers loudly preach, and too many submissive spirits fondly believe, if the House of Commons were altered into one of more popular frame, with more frequent opportunities given of changing the persons sent thither? A reference to the twenty years which succeeded the Revolution, may suffice to shew the fallacy of such expectations. Parliaments were then triennial, and democratic principles fashionable even among the Servants of the Crown. Yet, during that space of time, wars were almost incessant; and never were burthens imposed so far above the apparent ability of the Nation to support them. Having adverted to the warlike measures of those reigns merely to support my argument, I cannot forbear to applaud the high-spirited Englishmen of that age. Our forefathers were tried, as we have been tried—and their virtue did not sink under the duties which the decrees of Providence imposed upon it. They triumphed, though less signally than we have done;—following their example, let us now cultivate fortitude, encourage hope and chearful industry; and give way to enterprise. So will prosperity return. The stream, which has been checked, will flow with recruited vigour—and, when another century shall have passed away, the ambition of France will be as little formidable to our then-existing Posterity as it is now to us. But the lessons of History must be studied;—they teach us that, under every form of civil polity, war will contrive to lift up its head, and most pertinaciously in those States where the People have most sway. When I recur to these admonitions, it is to entreat that the discontented would exercise their understandings, rather than consult their passions; first separating real from mistaken grievances, and then endeavouring to ascertain (which cannot be done with a glance of the mind) how much is fairly attributable to the Government; how much to ourselves; and how large a portion of what we have to endure has been forced upon us by a foreign Power, over whom we could exercise no controul but by arms. The course here recommended will keep us, as we are, free and happy—will preserve us from what, through want of these and like precautions, other Nations have been hurried into—domestic broils, sanguinary tribunals, civil slaughter in the field, anarchy, and (sad cure and close of all!) tranquillity under the iron grasp of military despotism. Years before this catastrophe, what would have become of your Elective Franchise, Freeholders of Westmoreland? The Coadjutors of the obscure Individuals who, from a distance, first excited this movement under a pretence of recovering your Rights, would have played the whirlwind among your Property, and crushed you, less perhaps out of malice, than because, in their frenzy, they could not help it.
A conviction that the subject is ill understood by those who were unprepared for what has just been said, is the excuse to my own mind, Gentlemen, for having made so protracted a demand upon your attention. The ruinous tendencies of this self-flattering enterprize can only be checked by timely and general foresight. The contest in which we are engaged has been described by Persons noticing it from a distance, as the work of a Cabal of Electioneering Jobbers, who have contrived to set up the Thanet against the Lowther interests, that both Parties might spend their money for the benefit of those who cared for neither. The Thanet interest in the County of Westmoreland!—one might almost as well talk of an interest in the moon! The Descendant of the Cliffords has not thought it worth while to recommend himself to the Electors, by the course either of his public or his private life; and therefore, though his purse may have weight, and his possessions are considerable, he himself, in reference to the supposed object, is nothing. If this had been really an attempt made by a numerous body of malcontent Freeholders to carry their wishes for a change into effect, by placing at their head some approved Chief of an ancient Family, possessed of real consequence in the County, the proceeding, considered in the abstract, could not have been objected to. This County is, and ever was, open to fair and honourable contest, originating in principles sanctioned by general practice; and carried on by means which, if universally adopted, would not be injurious to the State. But the present measure stands not upon any such grounds; it is an attempt, no matter with what ultimate view, TO EFFECT A TOTAL CHANGE IN THE CHARACTER OF COUNTY ELECTIONS; beginning here with the expectation, as is openly avowed, of being imitated elsewhere. It reverses the order hitherto pursued. Instead of aiming to influence the less wealthy and less instructed Freeholders through the medium of those whom they have been accustomed to confide in—instead of descending by legitimate gradations from high to lower, from the well-instructed and widely-experienced to those who have not had equal advantages—it commences at the bottom; far beneath the degree of the poorest Freeholders; and works upwards, with an inflammatory appeal to feelings that owe their birth to previous mistatement of facts. Opulence, rank, station, privilege, distinction, intellectual culture—the notions naturally following upon these in a Country like England are protection, succour, guidance, example, dissemination of knowledge, introduction of improvements, and all the benefits and blessings that among Freemen are diffused, where authority like the parental, from a sense of community of interest and the natural goodness of mankind, is softened into brotherly concern. This is no Utopian picture of the characteristics of elevated rank, wealth, competence, and learned and liberal education in England; for, with the liberty of speech and writing that prevails amongst us, if such rays of light and love did not generally emanate from superiority of station, possessions, and accomplishment, the frame of society, which we behold, could not subsist. Yes—in spite of pride, hardness of heart, grasping avarice, and other selfish passions, the not unfrequent concomitants of affluence and worldly prosperity, the mass of the people are justly dealt with, and tenderly cherished;—accordingly, gratitude without servility; dispositions to prompt return of service, undebased by officiousness; and respectful attachment, that, with small prejudice to the understanding, greatly enriches the heart: such are the sentiments with which Englishmen of the humblest condition have been accustomed to look up towards their Friends and Benefactors. Among the holders of fixed property (whether labourers in the field or artisans); among those who are fortunate enough to have an interest in the soil of their Country; these human sentiments of civil life are strengthened by additional dependencies.—I am aware how much universal habits of rapacious speculation, occasioned by fluctuations in the value of produce during the late war—how much the spread of manufactories and the baleful operation of the Poor Laws, have done to impair these indigenous and salutary affections. I am conscious of the sad deterioration, and no one can lament it more deeply; but sufficient vitality is left in the Stock of ancient virtue to furnish hope that, by careful manuring, and skilful application of the knife to the withered branches, fresh shoots might thrive in their place—were it not for the base artifices of Malignants, who, pretending to invigorate the tree, pour scalding water and corrosive compounds among its roots; so that the fibres are killed in the mould by which they have been nourished.
That for years such artifices have been employed in Westmoreland, and in a neighbouring County, with unremitting activity, must be known to all. Whatever was disliked has been systematically attacked, by the vilifying of persons connected with it. The Magistrates and public Functionaries, up to the Lord Lieutenant himself, have been regularly traduced—as unfaithful to their trust; the Clergy habitually derided—as time-servers and slavish dependants; and the Gentry, if conspicuous for attachment to the Government, stigmatized—as Men without honour or patriotism, and leagued in conspiracy against the Poor. After this manner have the Provincial Newspapers (the chief agents in this local mischief,) concurred with the disaffected London Journals, who were playing the same part towards laws and institutions, and general measures of State, by calumniating the principal Authorities of the Kingdom. Hence, instead of gratitude and love, and confidence and hope, are resentment and envy, mistrust and jealousy, and hatred and rancour, inspired:—and the drift of all is, to impress the Body of the People with a belief that neither justice can be expected, nor benevolence hoped for, unless power be transferred to Persons least resembling those who now hold it; that is—to Demagogues and Incendiaries!
It will be thought that this attempt is too extravagant to be dangerous; inasmuch as every member of society, possessed of weight and authority, must revolt from such a transfer, and abhor the issues to which it points. Possessed of weight and authority—with whom? These Agitators have weight and authority there, where they seek for it, that is with no small portion of what they term the physical strength of the Country. The People have ever been the dupes of extremes. VAST GAINS WITH LITTLE PAINS, is a jingle of words that would be an appropriate inscription for the insurrectionary banner of unthinking humanity. To walk—to wind—towards a thing that is coveted—how unattractive an operation compared with leaping upon it at once!—Certainly no one possessed of legitimate authority can desire such a transfer as we have been forced to contemplate; but he may aid in bringing it about, without desiring it. Numerous are the courses of civil action in which men of pure dispositions and honourable aims, are tempted to take part with those who are utterly destitute of both. Be not startled, if, merely glancing at the causes of this deplorable union, as it is now exhibited in this part of England, I observe, that there is no necessary connection between public spirit and political sagacity. How often does it happen that right intention is averse to inquiry as casting a damp upon its own zeal, and a suspicion upon the intrinsic recommendation of its object! Good men turn instinctively from inferences unfavourable to human nature. But there are facts which are not to be resisted, where the understanding is sound. The self-styled Emancipators have tried their strength; if there were any thing promising to England in their efforts, we should have seen this Country arrayed in opposite Parties resembling each other in quality and composition. Little of that appears. The promoters of the struggle did not hope for such a result; and many of them would not have wished for it, could they have expected to be carried through by that ruinous division of the upper from the lower ranks of society, on which they mainly relied.
But, Freeholders, wicked devices have not done the service that was expected from them. You are upon your guard; the result of this canvass has already shewn that a vast majority of you are proof against assault, and remain of sound mind. Such example of Men abiding by the rules of their Forefathers cannot but encourage others, who yet hesitate, to determine in favour of the good cause. The more signal the victory the greater will be the honour paid to fixed and true principles, and the firmer our security against the recurrence of like innovations. At all events, enough, I trust, has been effected by the friends of our present Representatives to protect those who have been deceived, and may not in time awaken from their delusion. May their eyes be opened, and at no distant day; so that, perceiving the benefits which the laws, as now enacted and administered, ensure to their native Land, they may feel towards you who make the wiser choice the gratitude which you will have deserved.—The beginnings of great troubles are mostly of comparative insignificance;—a little spark can kindle a mighty conflagration, and a small leak will suffice to sink a stately vessel. To that loyal decision of the event now pending, which may be confidently expected, Britain may owe the continuance of her tranquillity and freedom; the maintenance of the justice and equity for which she is pre-eminent among nations; and the preservation of her social comforts, her charitable propensities, her morals and her religion. Of this, as belonging to the future, we cannot speak with certainty; but not a doubt can exist that the practices which led to the destruction of all that was venerable in a neighbouring Country, have upon this occasion been industriously, unscrupulously, eagerly resorted to.—But my last words shall be words of congratulation and thanksgiving—upon a bright prospect that the wishes will be crossed, and the endeavours frustrated, of those amongst us who, without their own knowledge, were ready to relinquish every good which they and we possess, by uniting with overweening Reformers—to compose the VANGUARD OF A FEROCIOUS REVOLUTION!
A FREEHOLDER.
Westmoreland, February 24, 1818.
NOTE.