e to imagine an emergence
that can more evidently require the interposition of the legislative
power, than this which is now proposed to your consideration. The nation
has been betrayed in peace, and disgraced in war; the constitution has
been openly invaded, the votes of the commons set publickly to sale, the
treasures of the publick have been squandered to purchase security to
those by whom it was oppressed, the people are exasperated to madness,
the commons have begun the inquiry that has been for more than twenty
years demanded and eluded, and justice is on a sudden insuperably
retarded by the deficiency of the law.

Surely, my lords, this is an occasion that may justify the exertion of
unusual powers, and yet nothing either new or unusual is required; for
the bill now proposed may be supported both by precedents of occasional
laws, and parallel statutes of lasting obligation.

When frauds have been committed by the agents of trading companies,
bills of indemnity to those by whom any discoveries should be made, have
been proposed and passed without any of those dreadful consequences
which some noble lords have foreseen in this. I have never heard that
any man was so stupid as to mistake such a bill for a general act of
grace, or that the confession of any crimes was procured by it, except
of those which it was intended to detect; I have never been informed,
that any murderer was blessed with the acuteness of the noble lord, or
thought of flying to such an act as to a common shelter for villany.
Such suppositions, my lords, can be intended only to prolong a
controversy and weary an opponent; nor can such trifling exaggerations
contribute to any other end, than of discovering the fertility of
imagination, and the exuberance of eloquence.

For my part, my lords, I think passion and negligence equally culpable
in a debate like this; and cannot forbear to recommend seriousness and
attention, with the same zeal with which moderation and impartiality
have already been inculcated. He that entirely disregards the question
in debate, who thinks it too trivial for a serious discussion, and
speaks upon it with the same superficial gaiety with which he would
relate the change of a fashion, or the incidents of a ball, is not very
likely, either to discover or propagate the truth; and is less to be
pardoned, than he who is betrayed by passion into absurdities, as it is
less criminal to injure our country by zeal than by contempt