I am at least certain, that I have hitherto listened to the arguments that have been offered on either side with an attention void of prejudice; I have repressed no motions of conviction, nor abstracted my mind from any difficulty, to avoid the labour of solving it: I have been solicitous to survey every position in its whole extent, and trace it to its remotest consequences; I have assisted the arguments against the bill by favourable suppositions, and imaginary circumstances, and have endeavoured to divest my own opinion of some appendant and accidental advantages, that I might view it in a state less likely to attract regard; and yet I cannot find any reason by which I could justify myself to my country or my conscience, if I should concur in rejecting this bill, or should not endeavour to promote it. I am not unacquainted, my lords, with the difficulties that obstruct the knowledge of our own hearts, and cannot deny that inclination may be sometimes mistaken for conviction; and men even wise and honest, may imagine themselves to believe what, in reality, they only wish: but this, my lords, can only happen for want of attention, or on sudden emergencies, when it is necessary to determine with little consideration, while the passions have not yet time to subside, and reason is yet struggling with the emotions of desire.

In other circumstances, my lords, I am convinced that no man imposes on himself without conniving at the fraud, without consciousness that he admits an opinion which he has not well examined, and without consulting indolence rather than reason; and, therefore, my lords, I can with confidence affirm, that I now declare my real opinion, and that if I err, I err only for want of abilities to discover the truth; and hope it will appear to your lordships, that I have been misled at least by specious arguments, and deceived by fallacious appearances, which it is no reproach not to have been able to detect.

It will, my lords, be granted, I suppose, without hesitation, that the law is consistent with itself; that it never at the same time commands and prohibits the same action; that it cannot be at once violated and observed. From thence it will inevitably follow, that where the circumstances of any transaction are such, that the principles of that law by which it is cognizable are opposite to each other, some expedients may be found by which these circumstances may be altered. Otherwise a subtle or powerful delinquent will always find shelter in ambiguities, and the law will remain inactive, like a balance loaded equally on each side.

On the present occasion, my lords, I pronounce with the utmost confidence, as a maxim of indubitable certainty, that the publick has a claim to every man's evidence, and that no man can plead exemption from this duty to his country. But those whom false gratitude, or contracted notions of their own interest, or fear of being entangled in the snares of examination, prompt to disappoint the justice of the publick, urge with equal vehemence, and, indeed, with equal truth, that no man is obliged to accuse himself, and that the constitution of Britain allows no man's evidence to be extorted from him to his own destruction.

Thus, my lords, two of the first principles of the British law, though maxims equally important, equally certain, and equally to be preserved from the least appearance of violation, are contradictory to each other, and neither can be obeyed, because neither can be infringed.

How then, my lords, is this contradiction to be reconciled, and the necessity avoided of breaking the law on one side or the other, but by the method now proposed, of setting those whose evidence is required, free from the danger which they may incur by giving it.

The end of the law is the redress of wrong, the protection of right, and the preservation of happiness; and the law is so far imperfect as it fails to produce the end for which it is instituted; and where any imperfection is discovered, it is the province of the legislature to supply it.

By the experience, my lords, of one generation after another, by the continued application of successive ages, was our law brought to its present accuracy. As new combinations of circumstances, or unforeseen artifices of evasion, discovered to our ancestors the insufficiency of former provisions, new expedients were invented; and as wickedness improved its subtilty, the law multiplied its powers and extended its vigilance.

If I should, therefore, allow, what has been urged, that there is no precedent of a bill like this, what can be inferred from it, but that wickedness has found a shelter that was never discovered before, and which must be forced by a new method of attack? And what then are we required to do more than has been always done by our ancestors, on a thousand occasions of far less importance?

I know not, my lords, whether it be possible to imagine an emergence that can more evidently require the interposition of the legislative power, than this which is now proposed to your consideration. The nation has been betrayed in peace, and disgraced in war; the constitution has been openly invaded, the votes of the commons set publickly to sale, the treasures of the publick have been squandered to purchase security to those by whom it was oppressed, the people are exasperated to madness, the commons have begun the inquiry that has been for more than twenty years demanded and eluded, and justice is on a sudden insuperably retarded by the deficiency of the law.

Surely, my lords, this is an occasion that may justify the exertion of unusual powers, and yet nothing either new or unusual is required; for the bill now proposed may be supported both by precedents of occasional laws, and parallel statutes of lasting obligation.

When frauds have been committed by the agents of trading companies, bills of indemnity to those by whom any discoveries should be made, have been proposed and passed without any of those dreadful consequences which some noble lords have foreseen in this. I have never heard that any man was so stupid as to mistake such a bill for a general act of grace, or that the confession of any crimes was procured by it, except of those which it was intended to detect; I have never been informed, that any murderer was blessed with the acuteness of the noble lord, or thought of flying to such an act as to a common shelter for villany. Such suppositions, my lords, can be intended only to prolong a controversy and weary an opponent; nor can such trifling exaggerations contribute to any other end, than of discovering the fertility of imagination, and the exuberance of eloquence.

For my part, my lords, I think passion and negligence equally culpable in a debate like this; and cannot forbear to recommend seriousness and attention, with the same zeal with which moderation and impartiality have already been inculcated. He that entirely disregards the question in debate, who thinks it too trivial for a serious discussion, and speaks upon it with the same superficial gaiety with which he would relate the change of a fashion, or the incidents of a ball, is not very likely, either to discover or propagate the truth; and is less to be pardoned, than he who is betrayed by passion into absurdities, as it is less criminal to injure our country by zeal than by contempt.

That bills, without any essential difference from that which is now before us, have been passed in favour of private companies, is indisputably certain; it is certain that they never produced any other effect, than such as were expected from them by those who promoted them. It is evident, that the welfare of the nation is more worthy of our regard than any separate company; that the whole, of more importance than a part; and therefore, the same measures may be now used with far greater justice, and with equal probability of success.

The necessity of the law now proposed, my lords, cannot more plainly appear, than by reflecting on the absurdity of the pleas made use of for refusing it, which, considered in the whole, contain only this assertion, that the security of one man is to be preferred to justice, to truth, to publick felicity; that a precedent is rather to be established, which will for ever shelter every future minister from the laws of our country; and that all our miseries are rather to be borne in silence, or lamented in impotence, than the man, whom the whole nation agrees to accuse as the author of them, should be exposed to the hazard of a trial, even before those whom every tie of interest and long-continued affection has united to him.

It is, indeed, objected, that by passing this bill, we shall transfer the authority of trying him to the other house; that we shall give up our privileges for ever, erect a new court of judicature, and overturn the constitution.

I have long observed, my lords, how vain it is to argue against those whose resolutions are determined by extrinsick motives, and have been long acquainted with the art of disguising obstinacy, by an appearance of reasons that have no weight, even in the opinion of him by whom they are offered, and of raising clouds of objections, which, by the first reply, will certainly be dissipated, but which, at least, fill the mouth for a time, and preserve the disputant from the reproach of adhering to an opinion, in vindication of which he had nothing to say.

Of this kind is the objection which I am now to remove, though I remove it only to make way for another, for those can never be silenced who can satisfy themselves with arguments like this; however, those that offer it expect it should be answered, and if it should be passed over in the debate, will boast of its irrefragability, and imagine that they have gained the victory by the superiority of their abilities, rather than of their numbers.

That we shall, by passing this bill, give the commons a power which they want at present, is unquestionably evident; but we shall only retrieve that which they were never known to want before, the power of producing evidence; evidence which we, my lords, must hear, and of whose testimonies we shall reserve the judgment to ourselves. The commons will only act as prosecutors, a character in which they were never conceived to encroach upon our right. The man whose conduct is the subject of inquiry, must stand his trial at our bar; nor has the bill any other tendency, than to enable the commons to bring him to it.

What can be alleged against this design I know not; because I can discover no objections which do not imply guilt, and guilt we are not yet at liberty to suppose. I am so far from pressing this bill from any motives of personal malevolence, that I am only doing, in the case of the minister, what I should ardently desire to be done in my own, and what no man would wish to obstruct, who was supported by a consciousness of integrity, and stimulated by that honest sense of reputation which I have always found the concomitant of innocence.

I hope I shall be readily believed by your lordships, when I assert, once more, that I should not only forbear all opposition to a bill intended to produce a scrutiny into my conduct, but that I should promote it with all my interest, and solicit all my friends to expedite and support it; for there was once a time, my lords, in which my behaviour was brought to the test, a time when no expedient was forgotten by which I might be oppressed, nor any method untried to procure accusations against me.

Whether the present case in every circumstance will stand exactly parallel to mine, I am very far from presuming to determine. I had served my country with industry, fidelity, and success, and had received the illustrious testimony of my conduct, the publick thanks of this house. I was conscious of no crime, nor had gratified, in my services, any other passion than my zeal for the publick. I saw myself ignominiously discarded, and attacked by every method of calumny and reproach. Nor was the malice of my enemies satisfied with destroying my reputation without impairing my fortune: for this purpose a prosecution was projected, a wretch was found out who engaged to accuse me, and received his pardon for no other purpose; nor did I make any opposition to it in this house, though I knew the intent with which it was procured, and was informed that part of my estate was allotted him to harden his heart, and strengthen his assertions.

This, my lords, is surely a precedent which I have a right to quote, and which will vindicate me to your lordships from the imputation of partiality and malignity; since it is apparent, that I do only in the case of another, what I willingly submitted to, when an inquiry was making into my conduct.

But, my lords, this is far from being the only precedent which may be pleaded in favour of this bill; a bill which, in reality, concurs with the general and regular practice of the established law, as will appear to every one that compares it with the eighth section of the act for preventing bribery; in which it is established as a perpetual law, that he who, having taken a bribe, shall, within twelve months, inform against him that gave it, shall be received as an evidence, and be indemnified from all the consequences of his discovery.

To these arguments of reason and precedent, I will add one of a more prevalent kind, drawn from motives of interest, which surely would direct our ministers to favour the inquiry, and promote every expedient that might produce a complete discussion of the publick affairs; since they would show, that they are not afraid of the most rigorous scrutiny, and are above any fears that the precedent which they are now establishing may revolve upon themselves.

To elude the ratification of this bill, it was at first urged that there was no proof of any crime; and when it was shown, that there was an apparent misapplication of the publick money, it became necessary to determine upon a more hardy assertion, and to silence malicious reasoners, by showing them how little their arguments would be regarded. It then was denied, with a spirit worthy of the cause in which it was exerted, that the civil list was publick money.

Disputants like these, my lords, are not born to be confuted; it would be to little purpose that any man should ask, whether the money allotted for the civil list was not granted by the publick, and whether publick grants did not produce publick money; it would be without any effect, that the uses for which that grant is made should be enumerated, and the misapplication of it openly proved; a distinction, or at least a negative, would be always at hand, and obstinacy and interest would turn argument aside.

Upon what principles, my lords, we can now call out for a proof of crimes, and proceed in the debate as if no just reason of suspicion had appeared, I am not able to conjecture; here is, in my opinion, if not demonstrative proof, yet the strongest presumption of one of the greatest crimes of which any man can be guilty, the propagation of wickedness, of the most atrocious breach of trust which can be charged upon a British minister, a deliberate traffick for the liberties of his country.

Of these enormous villanies, however difficult it may now seem to disengage him from them, I hope we shall see reason to acquit him at the bar of this house, at which, if he be innocent, he ought to be desirous of appearing; nor do his friends consult his honour, by endeavouring to withhold him from it; if they, indeed, believe him guilty, they may then easily justify their conduct to him, but the world will, perhaps, require a more publick vindication.

These, my lords, are the arguments which have influenced me hitherto to approve the bill now before us, and which will continue their prevalence, till I shall hear them confuted; and, surely, if they are not altogether unanswerable, they are surely of so much importance, that the bill for which they have been produced, must be allowed to deserve, at least, a deliberate examination, and may very justly be referred to a committee, in which ambiguities may be removed, and inadvertencies corrected.

Lord CHOLMONDELEY spoke next, to the following purpose:—My lords, this bill is, in my opinion, so far from deserving approbation, that I am in doubt whether I should retard the determination of the house, by laying before you the reasons which influence me in this debate; nor, indeed, could I prevail upon myself to enter into a formal discussion of a question, on which I should have imagined that all mankind would have been of one opinion, did not my reverence of the abilities of those noble lords who have spoken in defence of the bill, incline me, even against the conviction of my own reason, to suspect that arguments may be offered in its favour, which I have not yet been able to discover; and that those which have been produced, however inconclusive they have seemed, will operate more powerfully when they are more fully displayed, and better understood.

For this reason I shall lay before your lordships the objections which arose in my mind when the bill was first laid before us, and which have rather been strengthened than invalidated by the subsequent debate.