and domestic disorder attending a great deal of obscure hospitality, and a never ceasing management of men and things. And after all when the crisis comes, you are liable to be outbid by any nabob or adventurer, and you must expect all that you have done to go for nothing, and the most you can look for is a preference. What can you say to a blacksmith, who has seven children, or to a common labouring man who is offered 700l. for his vote; or to two misers who are offered 2000l., which are all instances distinctly upon record at Wycombe since Mr. Dashwood's election?
"So far for arithmetical considerations, but this is not all.
"As nothing in the world is or can be in the nature of things fixed, all political institutions are perpetually though insensibly changing; and it is the business of sagacity to foresee and act upon every approaching change. The House of Commons under its present institution has had its day, and Parliament itself is no longer considered as Omnipotent as Lord Mansfield used to call it. As knowledge has spread and the representatives have become corrupted, it has ceased to impose, and has no longer the same confidence with the people. It may still do a little good or prevent a little harm of itself, but it is the public opinion which decides, which the House of Commons must obey, as every part of Government must in this and every country of Europe where it shows itself. The extinction of the old parties of Whig and Tory, the depression of the landed interest from the excess of taxes, the increase of trade, the wealth arising from it, as well as from the East and West Indies, leave individuals more at liberty to consider a seat in Parliament as a means of advancement; but these very circumstances give rise to and foment public opinion, which keeps the House of Commons in a greater state of dependence as a body than has ever been the case heretofore. The Crown, too, being now settled in the House of Hanover, without any apprehension from a Pretender, interferes in a very different manner from what it used to do, and naturally
