第44章 Letter XI(4)

Should a King obtain,for many years at once,the supplies and powers which used to be granted annually to him;this would be deemed,I presume,even in the present age,an unjustifiable measure and an intolerable grievance,for this plain reason:because it would alter our constitution in the fundamental article,that requires frequent assemblies of the whole legislature,in order to assist,and control too,the executive power which is entrusted with one part of it.Now I ask,is not the article which requires frequent elections of the representative,by the collective body of the people,in order to secure the latter against the ill consequences of the possible weakness or corruption of the former,as fundamental an article,and as essential to the preservation of our liberties as the other?No man dares say that it is not;at least,no man who deserves our attention.The people of Britain have as good a right,and a right as necessary to be asserted,to keep their representatives true to the trust reposed in them,and to the preservation of the constitution,by the control of frequent elections,as they have to keep their kings true to the trust reposed in them,and to the preservation of the constitution,by the control of frequent sittings of Parliament.How comes it then to pass,that we may observe so great a difference in the sentiments of mankind,about these two cases?Propose the first,there is no servile friend of government,who will not affect all that horror at the proposition,which every friend of the constitution will really feel.Propose the keeping up septennial,nay,the making decennial Parliaments,the same friends of government will contend strenuously for one,and by consequence for both;since there can be no reason alleged for the first,which is not stronger for the last,and would not be still stronger for a longer term.These reasons,drawn from two or three commonplace topics of pretended conveniency and expediency,or of supposed tranquillity at home,and strength abroad,I need not mention.

They have been mentioned by others,and sufficiently refuted.But that which may very justly appear marvellous,is this:that some men,I think not many,who are true friends of the constitution,have been staggered in their opinions,and almost seduced by the false reasonings of these friends of government;though nothing can be more easy than to show,from reason and experience,that convenience,expediency,and domestic tranquillity may be,and in fact have been as well,nay,better secured under triennial,nay,annual Parliaments,than under Parliaments of a longer continuance;and as for strength abroad,that is,national credit and influence,it will depend on the opinion foreign nations have of our national dispositions,and the unanimity of our sentiments.

It must be chiefly determined therefore by their knowledge of the real sense of the nation.Now that can appear no way so much as in the natural state of our constitution,by frequent elections;and when it does appear so,it must have another kind of effect than the bare resolutions of a stale,ministerial Parliament,especially if it happens,as it may happen in some future time,that the sense of the nation should appear to be different from the sense of such a Parliament,and that the resolutions of such a Parliament should be avowedly dictated by men,odious and hated,contemptible and contemned both at home and abroad.

But in the supposition that some inconveniencies may arise by frequent elections,which is only allowed for argument's sake,are such inconveniencies,and the trifling consequences of them,to be set in the balance against the danger of weakening any one barrier of our liberty?Every form of government hath advantages and dis advantages peculiar to it.Thus absolute monarchies seem most formed for sudden and vigorous efforts of power,either in attracting or in defending,whilst,in free constitutions,the forms of government must be necessarily more complicated and slow;so that in these,the same secrecy cannot be always kept,nor the same dispatch always made,nor the same steadiness of measures always pursued.Must all these forms,instituted to preserve the checks and controls of the several parts of the constitution on one another,and necessary by consequence to preserve the liberty of the whole,be abandoned therefore,and a free constitution be destroyed,for the sake of some little conveniency or expediency the more in the administration of public affairs?