ne
advantage,--that the whole passed, as far as it is gone, with complete
unanimity, and so quickly that there was no time left to excite any
opposition to it out of doors. In the West India business, reasoning on
what had lately passed in the Parliament of Ireland, and on the mode in
which it was opened here, I thought I saw much matter of perplexity.
But I have now better reason than ever to be pleased with my silence. If
I had spoken, one of the most honest and able men[16] in the Irish
Parliament would probably have thought my observation an endeavor to sow
dissension, which he was resolved to prevent,--and one of the most,
ingenious and one of the most amiable men[17] that ever graced yours or
any House of Parliament might have looked on it as a chimera. In the
silence I observed, I was strongly countenanced (to say no more of it)
by every gentleman of Ireland that I had the honor of conversing with in
London. The only word, for that reason, which I spoke, was to restrain a
worthy county member,[18] who had received some communication from a
great trading place in the county he represents, which, if it had been
opened to the House, would have led to a perplexing discussion of one of
the most troublesome matters that could arise in this business. I got up
to put a stop to it; and I believe, if you knew what the topic was, you
would commend my discretion.

That it should be a matter of public discretion in me to be silent on
the affairs of Ireland is what on all accounts I bitterly lament. I
stated to the House what I felt; and I felt, as strongly as human
sensibility can feel, the extinction of my Parliamentary capacity, where
I wished to use it most. When I came into this Parliament, just fourteen
years ago,--into this Parliament, then, in vulgar opinion at least, the
presiding council of the greatest empire existing, (and perhaps, all
things considered, that ever did exist,) obscure and a stranger as I
was, I considered myself as raised to the highest dignity to which a
creature of our species could aspire. In that opinion, one of the chief
pleasures in my situation, what was first and-uppermost in my thoughts,
was the hope, without injury to this country, to be somewhat useful to
the place of my birth and education, which in many respects, internal
and external, I thought ill and impolitically governed. But when I found
that the House, surrendering itself to the guidance of an authority, not
grown out of an exper