d how far they are
prepared to go the whole lengths of the reason of those remarkable laws.
Mr. Dowdeswell and his friends are of opinion that the circumstances are
not the same, and that therefore the bill ought not to be the same.

It has been always disagreeable to the persons who compose that
connection to engage wantonly in a paper war, especially with gentlemen
for whom they have an esteem, and who seem to agree with them in the
great grounds of their public conduct; but they can never consent to
purchase any assistance from any persons by the forfeiture of their own
reputation. They respect public opinion; and therefore, whenever they
shall be called upon, they are ready to meet their adversaries, as soon
as they please, before the tribunal of the public, and there to justify
the constitutional nature and tendency, the propriety, the prudence, and
the policy of their bill. They are equally ready to explain and to
justify all their proceedings in the conduct of it,--equally ready to
defend their resolution to make it one object (if ever they should have
the power) in a plan of public reformation.

Your correspondent ought to have been satisfied with the assistance
which his friends have lent to administration in defeating that bill. He
ought not to make a feeble endeavor (I dare say, much to the displeasure
of those friends) to disgrace the gentleman who brought it in. A measure
proposed by Mr. Dowdeswell, seconded by Sir George Savile, and supported
by their friends, will stand fair with the public, even though it should
have been opposed by that list of names (respectable names, I admit)
which have been printed with so much parade and ostentation in your
papers.

It is not true that Mr. Burke spoke in praise of Lord Mansfield. If he
had found anything in Lord Mansfield praiseworthy, I fancy he is not
disposed to make an apology to anybody for doing justice. Your
correspondent's reason for asserting it is visible enough; and it is
altogether in the strain of other misrepresentations. That gentlemen
spoke decently of the judges, and he did no more; most of the gentlemen
who debated, on both sides, held the same language; and nobody will
think their zeal the less warm, or the less effectual, because it is not
attended with scurrility and virulence.

FOOTNOTES:

[2] The manuscript from which this Letter is taken is in Mr. Burke's own
handwriting, but it does not appear to whom it was addressed, nor is
there an