JB_128_062.xml

Title: [9 Oct r 1809 + §.3 Parl y Reform]

Description: 9 Oct r 1809 + §.3

Parl y Reform

2 o

B. I. Necessity

Ch. Occasional inadequate

§.3. Burke advocates occasional

1

§.3. Occasional, to the exclusion of constant, interposition pleased for

/advocated/ by Burke

Occasional interposition—(it must be confessed)—‘ interposition’ indeed, but that not more nor other than occasional—was what was

desired and pleaded for, on the part of the people by Edmund Burke.

‘Indeed’ (says he +) ‘in the situation in which we stand, with an

immense revenue, an enormous debt, mighty establishments, Government itself a great

banker and a great merchant, I see no other way for the preservation of a decent

attention to public interest in the Representatives, but the

interposition of the body of the people itself’ (the words italicized here

are italicized in the original) ‘of the body of the people itself—Yes—but when?

{Periodically and regularly and} at {stated and} pre-appointed and foreknown

times?—No: but on some very particular occasion or occasions, when the purpose of a

very particular and meritorious connection of Noble Lords and Gentlemen may be

answered by it, things being at that pitch that for giving the country the benefit of

their services, nothing less, nothing else will serve—‘whenever’ (continues he) ‘it

shall appear, by some flagrant and notorious act, by some capital

innovation, that these Representatives are going to over-leap

the fences of the law, and to introduce an arbitrary power’;—a state /juncture/ of

things the arrival and continued existence of which the ninety-nine preceding pages

had been employed to prove.

+ Thoughts on the causes of the present discontents. p. 100.

JB_128_052.xml

Title: [8 Oct r 1809 Parl y Reform]

Description: 8 Oct r 1809

Parl y Reform

1 Necessity

Ch. Occasional inadequate

§.1. Changes how produced

2

2

Intervention better than nothing at all. Blackst. IV. C.11. p.147

Interventions[?] were constantly recurring[?]: then[?] not.

The sort of faculty which in this respect they possess is certainly better than none

at all: since on the part of the body any the least facility for giving expression to

the sentiments of the people is better than none at all. But that, in the character

of a security /preservative/ against misrule or so much as in the character of a

security against arbitrary power, this faculty of occasional interposition is far

from being /approaching to the nature of/ an equivalent to a regularly-recurring

interposition on the part of the same authority, will /is a proposition /are truths/

that will I trust/ be the more clearly perceptible the more closely the subject is

considered.

It is nothing like a sufficient /altogether insufficient and inefficient in the

character of a/ security against habitual misrule /it will be seen to be altogether

insufficient and even inefficient/: and being so, it would not be enough, though it

were sufficient in the character of a security against a /the/ compleat overthrow of

the constitution by arbitrary power: which it will also be seen not to be.

Three or four times in a century this /such/ interposition or the apprehension of it

may have the effect of producing a change in administration: which change may be for

the better or the worse.

But for the sake of clear conceptions let us admitt /it be admitted/ that a change

of this sort will by this cause be produced ten times in the course of a century:

upon an average once in every ten years: and that upon each occasion an

administration which though, as proved by its continuance in office, acceptable to

the King, will have been justly odious /odious, and justly so/ to the people, will

have given place to another administration either popular or less unpopular.

JB_128_066.xml

Title: [8 Oct r 1809 + §.3 Parl y Reform]

Description: 8 Oct r 1809 + §.3

Parl y Reform

1 o

B. I. Necessity

Ch. Occasional inadequate

§. Burke

1

 To be inserted either in P t I. Necessity, or in P t III. Plan?

Ch. 17. Occasional interposition on the part of the people inadequate

§.3. Burke—Occasional interposition alone advocated by him

Meantimes this occasional interposition, in how small a degree soever it answers the

purpose of the people answers in the best possible degree the purpose of party men of

that set of Court dependents whose interest in the good things /loaves and fishes/

for the time happens to be in the state not of possession but expectancy.

When the voice of the people has reached to a certain pitch of loudness, the strings

of administration will they know be crushed and a new set of performers /themselves/

be summoned upon the stage.

But when once mounted upon the stage and fairly seated, is it their interest—can it

be any desire of theirs to hear any thing more of the voice of the people? /So long

as they continue there/ That voice can never more make itself heard but to their

prejudice.

Such as is /hath been/ their interest, such of course hath /has/ been their

language. A grumbling, a disturbance, a riot, a tumult—a sedition—any thing of this

sort—any thing /expression of popular affection/ which in its nature can not but be

occasional they have no objection to: on the contrary it is what they wish for—and

which in so far as it can be promoted in a whole show[?]—by words which whether

spoken or written will be sufficiently guarded they use their endeavours /are used/

to promote.

Propose to them the only useful mode of interposition, constant, constantly

efficacious and therefore as constantly quiet—in that they behold unsurmountable

difficulties. Then comes a cloud /torrent/ of words, the object of which is to make

plain things seem mysterious, and easy things impracticable.