the common weakness of our
nature; nor ought any gentleman to affix to a negligent expression a
more offensive sense than is necessarily implied by it.

To search deep, sir, for calumnies and reproaches is no laudable nor
beneficial curiosity; it must always be troublesome to ourselves by
alarming us with imaginary injuries, and may often be unjust to others
by charging them with invectives which they never intended. General
candour and mutual tenderness will best preserve our own quiet, and
support that dignity which has always been accounted essential to
national debates, and seldom infringed without dangerous consequences.

Mr. LYTTLETON spoke as follows:--Sir, no man can be more zealous for
decency than myself, or more convinced of the necessity of a methodical
prosecution of the question before us. I am well convinced how near
indecency and faction are to one another, and how inevitably confusion
produces obscurity; but I hope it will always be remembered, that he who
first infringes decency, or deviates from method, is to answer for all
the consequences that may arise from the neglect of senatorial customs:
for it is not to be expected that any man will bear reproaches without
reply, or that he who wanders from the question will not be followed in
his digressions, and hunted through his labyrinths.

It cannot, sir, be denied, that some insinuations were uttered injurious
to those whose zeal may sometimes happen to prompt them to warm
declarations, or incite them to passionate emotions. Whether I am of
importance enough to be included in the censure, I despise it too much
to inquire or consider, but cannot forbear to observe, that zeal for the
right can never become reproachful, and that no man can fall into
contempt but those who deserve it.

[The clause was amended, and agreed to.]

HOUSE OF COMMONS, MARCH 13, 1740-1.

The seventieth day of the session being appointed for the report from
the committee on the bill for the increase and encouragement of sailors,
sir John BARNARD presented a petition from the merchants of London, and
spoke as follows:--

Sir, this petition I am directed to lay before this house by many of the
principal merchants of that great city which I have the honour to
represent; men too wise to be terrified with imaginary dangers, and too
honest to endeavour the obstruction of any measures that may probably
advance the publick good, merely because they do not concur with their
privat