date

1 Oct 1809 Parl y Reform B
1 Oct 1809

Parl y Reform

B. I. Necessity

Ch. 18 Idol-Worship Mischief

§.1.

2

2

Decimius[?] ortuperandi[?]

1. Habit of laudation

2. Habit of referring measures to the personal accommodation of the King

Proceeding on this supposition, supposing accordingly that the class composed of

those by whom the interest of the ten, the sixteen or the sixty millions is preferred

to that of one man {or one family} is a class not purely ideal, not compleatly

destitute of individuals, I will /propose/ in the course of this chapter to venture

so far as to endeavour to represent to any fellow-subjects /fellow-countrymen/, such

of them as are not steeled against reason /argument/ either by sinister interest or

interest-begotten prejudice, the mischief they do to themselves and their fellow

subjects by giving encouragement and circulation to discourses and modes of speaking

which without directly asserting that the preference /interest of the one/ is due to

the interest of the one, ground themselves on the indirect assumption /would be

altogether without ground, but for this trust/ of this most preposterous and

pernicious of all principles.
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  • Title: [1 Sept 1809 Parl y Reform B]
    Description: 1 Sept 1809

    Parl y Reform

    B. I. Necessity

    Ch. 18 Idol-Worship Mischief

    §.1. Inconsistency with end of government

    §.1

    1

    1

    […?] idols-worship

    King the Baal of the constitution.

    Worship of King is d o of […?]. Vox populi, vox dei

    1. Personal character of King should not be talked of

    2. Laudation[?] mischief

    3. Laudation ground of. i.e. without […?] Grounds

    4. Mode of […?] is to keep character if worth while

    Ch. Mischief and unreasonableness of idol-worship in the person of the King

    §.1. Inconsistency of King-worship with the acknowledged end of government

    Notwithstanding the Revolution, a point that seems never as yet to have been

    settled, is – what is the proper and preferable end in view and object of pursuit in

    government: whether the aggregate /universal/ interest of the whole community of

    which the Monarch is a member, or the particular interest of that one individual.

    That in case of competition (and the case of competition is a case that occurs but

    too frequently) that in case of competition it is the interest of the whole community

    that ought to give way is a proposition which I do not remember to have any where

    observed to be directly maintained or asserted: but as to /of/ its being tacitly

    assumed and openly acted upon, and even argued from /grounded upon in point of

    argument/ in so far as a proposition which is not directly asserted can be said to be

    argued from /grounded upon/, so copious are the instances that the difficulty is

    rather /what there is of difficulty consists/ in finding any principle /proposition/

    of the opposite {complexion} than are /such as are/ of this cast

    Nay but it may be said /says some one/ those who write or speak this are but the

    tools of the Court: men who perceiving their own sinister interest to be dependent

    upon those of the King, take this as they do every other occasion to promote his,

    because promoting his is promoting their own.

    That to a most desperate extent, such as above must on this occasion have been the

    cause of what goes by the name of loyalty, does not admitt of doubt. But tools of the

    Court are not the less members of the community: and if on this occasion it be by one

    man’s[?] instance an interest of the self-regarding class that pens and tongues have

    in a great multitude of instances been set to work, yet what seems scarcely more

    exposed to doubt /less indubitable/ is, that no inconsiderable extent the effect may

    have had principles of a less ungenerous nature, such as social sympathy, and the

    contagious influence of example, for its cause.
  • Title: [18 Sep. 1809 + Parl y Reform]
    Description: 18 Sep. 1809 +

    Parl y Reform

    B. I. Necessity

    Ch.18. Mischief of Idol-worship

    Ch. Elogiums mischievous

    *6

    19

    2

    And is it then true that the whole people of an enlightened country are at once so

    weak {and so unjust} as to love each one of them a man and the same man and one of

    whom so much better than himself, and so unjust as to love him better than all their

    fellow countrymen to the amount of so many millions put together? all this without

    any one rational cause, without any one justifying fact the truth of which if it be

    true, can have made its way to his knowledge?

    True? Not it indeed – what is true is neither more nor less than this – viz that a

    tribe of meritless not to say worthless men seeing /beholding each of them/ in this

    man either the creater or the preserver of their superfluous ill-deserved prosperity,

    present or future, vested or contingent, love[?] /worship/ in his person /the person

    of this their living idol/ or rather in his name; each of them himself, careless of

    the whole people /millions/ at whose expence this prosperity is /is or is to be/

    expected or deserved.
  • Title: [2 Sept 1809 Parl y Reform B]
    Description: 2 Sept 1809

    Parl y Reform

    B. I. Necessity

    Ch.18. Mischief of Idol-worship

    §.3. King’s interest. 2. power[?]

    Elogiums mischievous

    Elogiums &c

    7

    9

    7

    7

    7

    If you consent to be thus governed by a good King, prepare yourself to be thus

    governed by a bad one: for a bad one, and the bad ministers which such bad one will

    be sure to find will still less bear contradictions than this good one.