It suggests melancholy reflections, in consequence of the strange course we have long held, that we are now no longer quarrelling about the character, or about the conduct of men, or the tenor of measures, but we are grown out of humor with the English Constitution itself:  this is become the object of the animosity of Englishmen.  This Constitution in former days used to be the admiration and the envy of the world:  it was the pattern for politicians, the theme of the eloquent, the meditation of the philosopher, in every part of the world.  As to Englishmen, it was their pride, their consolation.  By it they lived, for it they were ready to die.  Its defects, if it had any, were partly covered by partiality, and partly borne by prudence.  Now all its excellencies are forgot, its faults are now forcibly dragged into day, exaggerated by every artifice of representation.  It is despised and rejected of men, and every device and invention of ingenuity or idleness set up in opposition or in preference to it.  It is to this humor, and it is to the measures growing out of it, that I set myself (I hope not alone) in the most determined opposition.  Never before did we at any time in this country meet upon the theory of our frame of government, to sit in judgment on the Constitution of our country, to call it as a delinquent before us, and to accuse it of every defect and every vice,—­to see whether it, an object of our veneration, even our adoration, did or did not accord with a preconceived scheme in the minds of certain gentlemen.  Cast your eyes on the journals of Parliament.  It is for fear of losing the inestimable treasure we have that I do not venture to game it out of my hands for the vain hope of improving it.  I look with filial reverence on the Constitution of my country, and never will cut it in pieces, and put it into the kettle of any magician, in order to boil it, with the puddle of their compounds, into youth and vigor.  On the contrary, I will drive away such pretenders; I will nurse its venerable age, and with lenient arts extend a parent’s breath.

SPEECH

ON

A MOTION, MADE BY THE RIGHT HON.  WILLIAM DOWDESWELL,

MARCH 7, 1771,

FOR LEAVE TO BRING IN

A BILL FOR EXPLAINING THE POWERS OF JURIES IN PROSECUTIONS FOR LIBELS.

TOGETHER WITH

A LETTER IN VINDICATION OF THAT MEASURE,

AND

A COPY OF THE PROPOSED BILL.