for the very value of the moral influence exercised by the people thus assembled over their Government, Legislative or Executive, is according to the strict adherence to those rules which, from time immemorial, have guarded the practice of this inestimable right.

Surely, it was not wise on the part of the Opposition to build a bridge to carry O'Connell over that flood of mutiny, let loose by the priesthood and himself into Ireland, because he acted within-what lawyers call"The letter of the law!"

What is the form, what is the order, which causes the opinions of the people to be respected by Parliament, and by the thinking part of the community, when they assemble, in public, to discuss their grievances? It is when such assemblies are duly invoked by local authorities, exercising their power of jurisdiction; when these meetings are attended by the magistracy, gentry, persons of substance and character, who belong to the places or the vicinity where the petitioners reside. Nothing of this sort takes place, in calling together the multitudes who attend Mr. O'Connell.

Soon after the close of the French war, Mr. Henry Hunt's assemblies, in setting forth their grievances to Parliament, proceeded much in the same way as Mr. O'Connell's. Mr. Hunt's party presented to the House of Commons a monster petition of such a size that it was laid with difficulty upon the floor of the House. The principal feeling excited by this petition was curiosity to examine the signatures affixed to it, and to discover how often different names were subscribed in the same handwriting; some said they had discovered this repetition several hundred fold.

Mr. Hunt's cause shortly afterwards fell; his peti

tions had no effect, but his meetings produced this feeling throughout England; they were considered as an infraction of a sacred right which might cause anarchy, but could lead to no public good; thus they soon ceased with the agitation that called them forth.

However, about the same time, for the purpose of obtaining the abolition of the Property-tax, there were held in England, according to the spirit of the law and the constitution, public meetings, duly and properly convened, adequately attended, and controlled by the legal local authorities.

There was no monster address, but sundry petitions were presented, and received the utmost attention of Parliament and the public, because they were undoubtedly genuine; the names were, bona fide, what their signatures set them forth to be, as they were by the side of those of men of wisdom and probity, whose characters would have been compromised, had they allowed their names to appear, and to give, thereby, the stamp of currency and respectability to signatures that were fictitious or assumed.*

The Government of that day (a most powerful one) opposed the prayer of these petitions. The leader in the House of Commons, Lord Castlereagh, designated

* If ever Mr. O'Connell should approach the British Parliament, by petition, what guarantee will the great Agitator give, that the signatures to such document are genuine, or that they represent the names of persons capable of understanding the purport and prayer of such petitions?

There was a very great difference between the two men: Mr. Hunt, though a demagogue, was honest; and though he did not possess the legal craft of Mr. O'Connell, he had, in our judgment, a much better understanding. Mistaken in his purposes, Hunt was, however, sincere, straightforward, and honest in the mode he adopted to carry them into effect.

it as "an ignorant impatience of taxation," which had roused the people to address Parliament for the repeal of this measure. However, the Minister gave way, and the tax ceased. The Government did not give way to the monster petition of Mr. Hunt; but this popular orator found himself immured in gaol, to pay the penalty for the sedition of the people, and his own indiscretion.

If the United Parliament allows itself to become the arena for such arguments as those held by the noble Lords to whom we have alluded, the demagogues of England will soon follow in the wake of Mr. O'Connell; and the spirit of law, now respected in England, will be scoffed at, as it is in Ireland. Such a practice will first beget contempt, and then cause to fall into desuetude the most valuable and peculiar right that ever was conferred upon a nation, for the purpose of securing wholesome liberty.

Looking to what old Whig maxims were, during the career of the great Whig leaders to whom we have alluded, it behoves every one that calls himself Whig, and not Radical or Repealer, to consider what must be, in the end, the consequences of the abuse, by Mr. O'Connell's legions, of the sacred right of the people to petition Parliament.

If the mode by which the Irish are now exercising this privilege spreads itself into England, what old Sergeant Maynard said to King William, the Whigs will have to say of themselves,-"That they had lived long enough to outlive the Constitution itself,"-having chosen, whilst in factious opposition, to deny those great principles of constitutional doctrine, once held so sacred, especially by Whig lawyers, statesmen, and philosophers.

CHAPTER III.

Contrast between the late Opposition of Conservatives and that of their present Opponents.-Doubts raised by the Opinions of the two Ex-Chancellors.-Error of the Lawyers.-Difference between social Order in England and in Ireland.

If the Opposition had advanced in either House to a position so high as to enable them to attempt to assume the reins of power, even then they would have hardly been justified in dealing as they did with the public affairs of Ireland.

But there being not the slightest probability of their removing their political antagonists from the helm of affairs, their tactics were an irresponsible mode of encumbering with difficulties the ordinary march of affairs. A course directly adverse to that responsible patriotic opposition, given by the Conservatives, to measures of which they conscientiously disapproved.

It is obvious to those who have inquired into the parliamentary history of Great Britain, for the last century, that the best order of parliamentary control over State government, is when the two parties are powerful, and when the opponents and supporters of the ministry are not unequally balanced; because, under such an order of control, each party is obliged to develope the broad principles which ought to direct State affairs.

But no principle whatever directed the Opposition in its policy last session, with regard to Irish affairs.

If the Opposition disapproved of the dismissal of the Irish magistracy, it was not necessary to sanction the act by silence, that appeared consent: the leaders of the Opposition might have admonished the Government to exhaust all the means of civil control within its power, before it sought, by any other measure, to arrest the gatherings of Repeal.

They might have said that, since 1688, Judges (and consequently Magistrates) were appointed no longer by the Crown "quamdiu si bene placitur;" but now, "se bene gesserint," that the removal of such Magistrates from the Commission of the Peace was a strong exercise of the Queen's prerogative, that could only be justified by a full exposure of the events with which the Executive Government had been called upon to deal in its official capacity.

This vantage ground was not occupied; the Opposition wandered into a labyrinth of legal special pleading, the essence of their oratory being comprised in the dangerous doctrine, that not the spirit, "but the quirks and quillets of the law," should control the exercise of constitutional power. They arrested thus the putting down of what tended to the dismemberment of the empire—a fatal measure, opposed by the wise and good of every party, and only thus fraudulently supported and advanced.

In the first onset against the Government, it was agreed (as we have already stated), that the conduct of the Magistrates, in attending Repeal meetings, was within the letter of the law. Now, any one, who has had experience in what equity lawyers call the letter