proprietors of boroughs. Is
it not notorious that those who represent it as in the highest degree
pernicious and degrading that a public man should be called to account
by a great city which has intrusted its dearest interests to his care,
do nevertheless think that he is bound by the most sacred ties of
honour to vote according to the wishes of his patron or to apply for the
Chiltern Hundreds? It is a bad thing, I fully admit, that a Member of
Parliament should be a mere delegate. But it is not worse that he should
be the delegate of a hundred thousand people than of one too powerful
individual. What a perverse, what an inconsistent spirit is this; too
proud to bend to the wishes of a nation, yet ready to lick the dust at
the feet of a patron! And how is it proved that a member for Lambeth
or Finsbury will be under a more servile awe of his constituents than
a member for Leicester, or a member for Leicestershire, or a member
for the University of Oxford? Is it not perfectly notorious that many
members voted, year after year, against Catholic Emancipation, simply
because they knew that, if they voted otherwise, they would lose their
seats? No doubt this is an evil. But it is an evil which will exist in
some form or other as long as human nature is the same, as long as
there are men so low-minded as to prefer the gratification of a vulgar
ambition to the approbation of their conscience and the welfare of their
country. Construct your representative system as you will, these men
will always be sycophants. If you give power to Marylebone, they will
fawn on the householders of Marylebone. If you leave power to Gatton,
they will fawn on the proprietor of Gatton. I can see no reason for
believing that their baseness will be more mischievous in the former
case than in the latter.

But, it is said, the power of this huge capital is even now dangerously
great; and will you increase that power? Now, Sir, I am far from denying
that the power of London is, in some sense, dangerously great; but I
altogether deny that the danger will be increased by this bill. It has
always been found that a hundred thousand people congregated close to
the seat of government exercise a greater influence on public affairs
than five hundred thousand dispersed over a remote province. But this
influence is not proportioned to the number of representatives chosen by
the capital. This influence is felt at present, though the greater part
of the capital is