Absolute Governments, (though the disgrace of human nature) hatli this advantage with them, that they are simple; if the people suffer, they know the head from which their suffering springs; know likewise the remedy; and are not bewildered by a variety of causes and cures. But the Constitution of England is so exceedingly complex, that the nation may suffer for years together without being able to discover in which part the fault lies; some will say in one and some in another, and every political physician will advise a different medicine.

I know it is difficult to get over local or long standing prejudices, yet if we will suffer ourselves to examine the component parts of the English Constitution, we shall find them to be the base remains of two ancient tyrannies, compounded with some new Republican materials.

First. The remains of Monarchical tyranny, in the per son of the King.

Secondly. The remains of Aristocratical tyranny, in the persons of the Peers.

Thirdly. The new Republican materials, in the persons of the Commons, on whose virtue depends the freedom of England.

The two first by being hereditary are independent of the people; wherefore, in a constitutional sense, they contribute nothing towards the freedom of the State.

To say that the Constitution of England is a union of three powers, reciprocally checking each other, is farcical; either the words have no meaning, or they are flat contradiction.

To say that the Commons is a check upon the King, presupposes two things:

First. That the King is not to be trusted without being looked after; or, in other words, that a thirst for absoluie power is the natural disease of Monarchy.

Secondly. That the Commons, by being appointed for that purpose, are either wiser or more worthy of confidence than the Crown.

But as the same Constitution which gives the Commons a power to check the King by withholding the supplies, gives afterwards the King a power to check the Commons by empowering him to reject their other bills, it again supposes that the King is wiser than those whom it has already supposed to be wiser than him. A mere absurdity !

There is something exceedingly ridiculous in the composition of Monarchy; it first excludes a man from the means of information, yet empowers him to act in cases where the highest judgment is required. The state of a King shuts him from the world, yet the business of a King requires him lo know it thoroughly; wherefore, the different parts, by unnaturally opposing and destroying each other, prove the whole character to be absurd and useless.

Some writers have explained the English Constitution thus: the King, say they, is one, the People, another; the Peers are an House in behalf of the King; the Commons in behalf of the People; but this bath all the distinctions of an House divided against itself; and though the expressions be pleasantly arranged, yet when examined they appear idle and ambiguous; and it will always happen, that the TUcest construction that words are capable of, when applied to the description of something which either cannot exist, or is too incomprehensible to be within the compass of description, will be words of sound only, and though they may amuse the ear, they cannot inform the mind; for this explanation includes a previous question, viz: How came the King by a power which the people are afraid to trust, and always obliged to check? Such a power could not be the gift of a wise people, neither can any power which needs checking be from God; yet the provision which the Constitution makes, supposes such a power to exist.

But the provision is unequal to the task; the means either cannot, or will not accomplish the end, and the whole affair is a felo-de-se: for as the greater weight will always carry up the less, and as all the wheels of a machine are put in motion by one, it only remains to know which power in the Constitution has the most weight, for that will govern; and though the others, or a part of them, may clog, or as the phrase is, check the rapidity of its motion, yet so long as, they cannot stop it, their end eavours will be ineffectual; the first moving power will at last have its way, and what it wants in speed is supplied by time.

That the Crown is this overbearing part in the English Constitution needs not be mentioned, and that it derives its whole consequence merely from being the giver of places and pensions is self-evident; wherefore, though we have been wise enough to shut and lock a door against absolute Monarchy, we, at the same time, have been foolish enough to put the Crown in possession of the key.

The prejudice of Englishmen in favour of their own Government, by King, Lords, and Commons, arises as much, or more, from national pride than reason. Individuals are undoubtedly safer in England than in some other countries; but the will of the King is as much the law of the land in Britain as in France, with this difference, that instead of proceeding directly from his mouth, it is banded to the people under the more formidable shape of an Act of Parliament. For the fate of Charles the First hath only made Kings more subtile—not more just.

Wherefore, laying aside all national pride and prejudice in favour of modes and forms, the plain truth is, that it is wholly owing to the Constitution of the People, and not to the Constitution of the Government, that the Crown is not as oppressive in England as in Turkey.

An inquiry into the constitutional errors in the English form of Government, is at this time highly necessary; for as we are never in a proper condition of doing justice to others, while we continue under the influence of some leading partiality, so neither are we capable of doing it to ourselves while we remain fettered by any obstinate prejudice. And as a man who is attached to a prostitute is unfitted to choose or judge of a wife, so any prepossession in favour of a rotten Constitution of Government will disable us from discerning a good one.

Mankind being originally equals in the order of creation, the equality could only be destroyed by some subsequent circumstance: The distinctions of rich and poor, may in a great measure be accounted for, and that without having recourse to the harsh, ill-sounding names of oppression and avarice. Oppression is often the consequence, but seldom or never the means of riches; and though avarice will preserve a man from being necessitously poor, it generally makes him too timorous to be wealthy.

But there is another and greater distinction, for which no truly natural or religious reason can be assigned, and that is, the distinction of men into Kings and Subjects. Male and female are the distinctions of nature; good and bad the distinctions of Heaven; but how a race of men came into the world so exalted above the rest, and distinguished like some new species, is worth inquiring into, and whether they are the means of happiness or of misery to mankind.

In the early ages of the world, according to the Scripture chronology, there were no Kings; the consequence of which was, there were no wars: it is the pride of Kings which throws mankind into confusion. Holland, without a King, hath enjoyed more peace for this last century than any of the monarchical Governments in Europe. Antiquity favours the same remark; for the quiet and rural lives of the first Patriarchs hath a happy something in them, which vanishes away when we come to the history of Jewish Royalty.

Government, by Kings, was first introduced into the world by the Heathens, from whom the children of Israel copied the custom. It was the most prosperous invention the Devil ever set on foot for the promotion of idolatry. The Heathens paid Divine honours to their deceased Kings, and the Christian world hath improved on the plan by doing the same to their living ones. How impious is the title of sacred Majesty applied to a worm, who, in the midst of his splendour, is crumbling into dust!

As the exalting one man so greatly above the rest cannot be justified on the equal rights of nature, so neither can it be defended on the authority of Scripture; for the will of the Almighty, as declared by Gideon and the Prophet Samuel, expressly disapproves of Government by Kings. All anti-monarchical parts of Scripture have been very smoothly glossed over in monarchical Governments, but they undoubtedly merit the attention of countries which have their Governments yet to form. "Render unto Cesar the things which are Casar's" is the Scripture doctrine of Courts, yet it is no support of monarchical Government,