of the Exchequer) in the course of the session, that was inconsistent with the perfect operation of the sinking fund act, and of the clause that bore the name of the individual by whom it was proposed. At the same time Ministers did not mean to assert that the provisions of that act, at all times, and under all circumstances, could be literally executed; and here the right honourable gentleman had introduced what every stockholder knew as well as himself, that if it were to go to the extremity of accumulation, far from being to the interest of the public creditor, it would be destructive of his property, and of the other property of the country in general. The first question which the country ought to look at in a fearless and a manly way was, whether it ought to be satisfied with its financial situation in time of peace; or whether some effort ought not to be made to enable it to meet the burdens of a new war, should such calamity unfortunately visit it? This was a subject of immense magnitude-a subject independent of all parties, and of all party interests; and "I conjure you (said his Lordship) not to suffer any feeling of respect for the Government, if such exist, to divert you from the strict discharge of your duty. If you do not in your conscience believe that the existing Government can be trusted-if you think them incompetent in talent, or in prudence, or in honesty, you owe it to your own character, to the best interests of the State, to the great nation whose representatives you are, not to hesitate a moment in carrying that opinion to the foot of the throne, and to call for the dismissal of those individuals you hold unworthy of their stations. I should hold that the Government was indeed degraded; that it was indeed un

worthy of the confidence of the Prince who has so long trusted it, of the people who have so long relied upon it, if, after the expression of such an opinion, it were base enough for a moment to continue in office : if the House refused Ministers its support, if it denied them the means of conducting the affairs of the kingdom, they ought instantly to retire to make way for others, in whose favour the wishes and hopes of the country were united. I conjure gentlemen not to trifle or tamper with this mighty question; let them put Government wholly out of their view, and let them decide upon the broad and substantial merits, not upon any consideration of who may or who may not be in power; the question is not between Ministers and their antagonists, it is between Parliament and the country-between the representatives and their constituents; and it would be disgraceful to the House if at such a time as this it could at all contemplate party interests and political motives. I say, and I say it with all humility, that as servants of the Crown we should be unworthy of our stations, if while Parliament withheld the means, we still persisted in retaining the reins of Government: we claim to be armed with weapons to meet the difficulties and dangers of the State, and if we are not to be intrusted with them, we are willing to resign to more favoured, perhaps more able, but not more zealous champions.' His Lordship went on to contend, that a saving of L. 2,000,000 annually was not sufficient to enable the country to meet with firmness the shock of a future war. The right honourable gentleman had taunted him with opinions he (Lord Castlereagh) had expressed early in the session. His Lordship would not retract one iota of what he had

then advanced, not because he was ashamed to do so if truth would warrant him, but because all he had asserted had been borne out by subsequent inquiry. He had asserted from L. 2,000,000 to L. 2,500,000 to be the surplus of the revenue, and the Report of the Finance Committee corroborated the statement. He had maintained that the country was in a state of prosperity, and he was willing to rest the confirmation solely upon the evidence of the honourable member for Lancaster. He had also contended that there was a fair prospect of further improvement; and who had ventured to contradict him? His Lordship was not at all disposed to deny that retrenchments could be made in quarters not yet examined; but taking it on the right honourable gentleman's own showing, that a million could be gained, it was still clear that the measures now proposed were necessary for future safety. His Lordship insisted that the country ought not to be satisfied with its financial situation: it was a clear proposition of state policy, that no country could be considered safe which did not in time of peace make such a progressive reduction of its debt as would enable it to meet the hazard of a future war: the burdens of one war ought not to be allowed to accumulate on those of another, until the vessel of the state became, as it were, water-logged, without a chance of reaching port, and dreading destruction from every approaching wave. The proposition of the Chancellor of the Exchequer was not intended merely to favour the stockholder; it was to benefit the nation at large, which could not be secure until the debt had been reduced. This process ought to be begun with not less than L.5,000,000, progressively ascending to L. 8,000,000; leaving it to the

wisdom of Parliament to decide, whether it was fit that the accumulation should continue further, or whether the still growing surplus should operate a remission of taxation in favour of the people. After such a war, and such enormous financial exertions, some limits ought unquestionably to be put to the burdens of the people; but if the argument of the right honourable gentleman meant any thing, it meant that the effort now recommended was too insignificant. Did he mean to countenance the notion, which no man who had one clear idea on the subject of finance would support, that L. 15,000,000 instead of L. 5,000,000 should be annually operating the reduction of the debt? If it did amount to that, unquestionably the first Act of Parliament ought to be to diminish that sinking fund, which would be in truth most injurious to the whole property of the kingdom. If the dispute were as to time and amount, and not as to tax or no tax, then came the question, whether L. 5,000,000 were the proper sum to be named; and examining the details, it might be found that there was a peculiar claim upon the house to impose taxes at the present moment. Looking at the charges upon, and the sums payable out of it, the consolidated fund never stood in a situation like the present: and when the right honourable gentleman spoke of breaches of faith, he might properly and fairly have argued, that Parliament would have been guilty of a breach of faith to the public creditor, if it had not taken some steps upon the subject; for at present there were not assignable ways and means to pay the public creditor, and to provide for the sinking fund out of it. In this view, if the Chancellor of the Exchequer had called upon

the house for less than L. 3,000,000, he would not have done his duty with a view to rendering the consolidated fund equal to the burdens it had to sustain. If, then, it were true, according to the right honourable gentleman, that L. 5,000,000 were too little, and that L. 8,000,000 were scarcely enough; and if it were true that L. 1,000,000 might be spared in other ways; and, according to another honourable gentleman, great savings effected on drawbacks and bounties, what did it prove, but that the relief which the plan contemplated would be much sooner attained? Then came the serious question, when the reduction of the national debt should cease, how far the anxiety of the people to be relieved from taxes onght to be attended to; and how far the forebodings, perhaps justifiable, of an approaching war ought to be allow ed to operate a still further diminution until the threatening cloud should have blown over? His Lordship should consider the nation in a proud situation in point of finance, with a sinking fund of L. 8,000,000, and an almost inexhaustible reserve of L. 15,000,000 in the shape of a property-tax, should the threats of a daring enemy and the dangers of the kingdom render it necessary for Ministers to call upon Parliament for a renewal of that mighty source of revenue. It had already consented to the sacrifice on the return of Buonaparte from Elba; and he did not doubt that, should a new and expensive war visit the country, the Government would again be armed with this massive and impregnable shield. Starting then at L. 5,000,000, some assurance might be felt, that at no distant period the produce of the sinking fund might be applied to the diminution of the taxes; and what were called the dead expences

of the country, in pensions, &c. to the army and navy, would probably be annually reduced to the amount of L. 150,000. What might be the growth of the revenue, it would be idle to speculate; but not to entertain sanguine hopes would be to belie the result of all experience. It was of course liable to fluctuations; but it had always upon the whole gradually and sometimes rapidly ascended, and it was undeniable that its natural tendency was to augment. Upon this and other points his Lordship was by no means gloomy in his expectations; and he agreed with the right honourable gentleman that it would be highly satisfactory if by the influence of a large sum upon the market, and other favourable circumstances, the funds were so raised that the five per cents. or four per cents. could be paid off. His Lordship saw the less reason to despair of witnessing this epoch in our history, from a recurrence to the year 1792, when the three per cents. were nearly at par; and now with a sinking fund of L. 5,000,000 in the first instance, gradually increasing, there seemed little room for melancholy reflection. It was not to be forgotten, that before the end of the war the people had borne L. 18,000,000 of taxes, which they had since not been called upon to sustain; they had borne them, not without some degree of suffering, but, unquestionably, without any diminution of the general prosperity: therefore, when government now proposed only to revive L. 3,000,000 of these taxes, it placed a firm reliance on the courage as well as on the wisdom of the nation. Ministers had always professed to look forward to a period when it might be necessary for them to make a new effort of taxation: and as to the time for this call, his Lordship fairly avowed, that except

for particular circumstances, it might have been made with more advantage at the beginning of the next session than at the present moment. But the right honourable gentleman had stated, that he could have no confidence in a government that introduced this question at this time; on the contrary, his Lordship thought that even the right honourable gentleman would be a safer minister than one who would allow the country to go through a feverish summer in fretful deliberations upon the point whether new taxes would or would not be proposed in the ensuing session. His Lordship thought that he had now occupied quite as much time as was necessary upon a matter so plain to all that were disposed to see the question merely resolved itself into this point, Ought the country to be satisfied with its financial situation? But the right honourable gentleman seemed to hold out a prospect that he would have made a much greater effort: that instead of L. 3,000,000 of taxes, if he had been Minister, he would have proposed L. 10,000,000: his advice upon this and some other subjects might be very good, but his Lordship doubted whether the country would be willing to pay the additional L. 7,000,000 to obtain it. His whole speech went to show, that Ministers ought to be turned out of their places, because they did not propose L. 10,000,000. The present Government thought L. 3,000,000 sufficient, and they had also thought it right to submit it to Parliament rather than to the provinces. The next point was, Was the present the fit time for making an exertion? Upon that his Lordship wished to join issue, and he was as little apprehensive for the result as he had been on a former night, when the voluntary confidence of the house

had exceeded even his most sanguine expectations.

Mr Brougham was quite ready to meet the Noble Lord on the ground where he had planted himself: he had undoubtedly put this most important of all questions to a fair and intelligible issue; and it was simply thisWhether at this particular moment it was fit that the House of Commons should give its assent to a motion for raising L.3,000,000 of taxes from the pockets of the people to be placed at the disposal of the existing Government. It was certainly possible to contemplate a period at which Parliament might be justified in entertaining such a proposition; but he entreated every gentleman calmly and dispassionately to reflect, whether he could make up his mind to vote that that period had arrived, or whether, on the contrary, recent measures had not put a bar to the consideration. He would first endeavour to set right his right honourable friend in the eyes of those who had been present only while the Noble Lord was speaking, and who contrived with some ingenuity, but with very little regard to correctness, to misrepresent the address of the right hon. gentleman who had preceded him : there was nothing in the spirit, purport, or analogy of the speech of the right hon. gentleman, (Mr Tierney,) which could warrant for a moment the gross perversions to which it had been subjected. The first mistatement was as to the time when new taxation might be necessary. He (Mr Tierney) had not said that the time had arrived, but that it might arrive; but he went so far even as to assert, that he did not think it would arrive; yet the Noble Lord had not scrupled to assume that he (Mr Tierney) had admitted the whole question, by allowing the immediate necessity of increased taxation. An imputation had

been thrown out against his right hon. friend, of raising a clamour against all taxes whatever; but his right hon. friend had said, "Don't let it be supposed that I mean to make these objections against taxes gene rally; that I mean to contend, that at no time, and under no circumstances, may additional taxation be imposed upon the country; but this is not the time." The time might arrive when, refreshed by a long interval of peace, and by habits of indus try, that an accumulation of capital might take place which might put the country in a more advantageous situation. A time might arrive when the people should have enjoyed that repose, which they had so nobly earned, which they were so richly entitled to, by their sufferings, their blood, and their toil; by their patience under those sufferings, by their constant and devoted attachment to the interests of their country, and still more by their firm resistance to all those attempts which had been made to seduce them from their duty: - the time might arrive when, thus situated, they would stand in a different relation to such a proposition; but now to interrupt their short-breathing time, in their present exhausted state, was not only most indecent, but, to use a still stronger term, was a most atrocious attempt to increase the oppressive burdens of a people thus suffering, patient, and deserving. If any one had only heard the Noble Lord's statement on the present occasion, he must have supposed that his right hon. friend had been contending that these L.3,000,000 were not sufficient, and that instead of them he wanted not less than L. 10,000,000. It had puzzled him to account for the Noble Lord's former misunderstanding; but just now he caught, as it were, a glimmering of the reason why the Noble Lord had here so mistaken, or, to

express himself in a parliamentary sense, mistated the reasoning of his right hon. friend; but he protested against any mode of reasoning which could give the Noble Lord a right to assume that the right hon. member had said that L. 3,000,000 were too little, and had only objected, because the sum was not rather L.10,000,000. There was another thing which, in justice to himself and his right hon. friend, he must take notice of. It was said that nothing could be more unfair than for him (Mr Tierney) to oppose a plan which was, in fact, a leaf taken out of their (the Opposition's) book. His right hon. friend did not accord with this plan, inasmuch as it took a large part of the sinking fund away, so as to leave a sum which it was proposed to increase to L.5,000,000; a new sinking fund, of that magical amount and number which had been so often repeated, and which, it would seem, was not to be exceeded. Now, the whole gist of his right hon. friend's argument was this that in consequence of the present pressure, and of the direful and insuperable necessity which resulted from it, they would be compelled to break faith with the stockholders, inasmuch as a new sinking fund was to be given them; whereas they had lent their money on the notion, at the time, that there existed a sinking fund of L. 15,000,000, and which, but for the operation of the year 1813, would have been now L.21,000,000. There was another question which the Noble Lord did not like, because it was quite impossible for him to lose himselt in those loose and vague surmises in which he so much delighted. In the year 1786 a sinking fund was created of L. 1,000,000, to which L. 200,000 were afterwards added, making altogether L.1,200,000. In 1792 the appropriation of so much of every loan to this fund was determin.