need not name. For there,
instead of being requested to withdraw the proposition, it
would have been met by a direct negative or by 'the previous
question,' in support of which, no doubt, a majority of that
assembly, miscalled the representatives of the people, would
have voted. Yet the manner in which this, a meeting of the
people, would have decided, was pretty obvious; and hence it
might be inferred how far the people concurred in sentiment
and feeling with the House of Commons. That the proposed, or
any charitable subscription, must be inadequate to relieve the
actual distress of the country was a proposition which could
not be disputed, but yet he did not intend to oppose that
subscription; on the contrary, he should give it every
possible support in his power; and it was, he felt, a
consolation to them that there were still some persons in this
country who could afford something to relieve the poor; but
he was afraid that neither the landowner nor the mercantile
interest had the means of
doing so; for the former could obtain no rent, and the latter
no trade--the only persons, in fact, who were able to assist
the poor under present circumstances were the placemen, the
sinecurists, and the fund-holders, who must give up at least
half of their ill-gotten gains in order to effect the object.
With this impression fixed upon his mind, he felt it his duty
to propose an additional resolution, that the ministers of
the crown, that the Government of the country, who wielded
the power of Parliament, were alone competent to remove and
to alleviate the national distress. This, indeed, was evident
from the statement of our financial situation which he
had already made. He had called upon the Chancellor of the
Exchequer, who was present, to contradict that statement if
he could; but the right honourable gentleman had felt it
expedient not to utter one word, as the meeting had witnessed.
Yet from that statement it must be obvious, as he had already
observed, that the military and naval situation of the country
must be abandoned, or at least half the national debt must be
extinguished, for the resources of the empire could not endure
such burthens. The noble lord concluded with expressing his
intention when the present resolutions were got over, to move
another, stating the r