1819 Apr. 19

To Erskine 4 4

| | Whig Fallacies

Oh but (says Your Lordship) Lord Milton has told you expressly and pushin[...?] in what his theory of the Constitution consists, and therefore it is not for you to fish for it /thus to pretend/. What makes him so fond of the Constitution is that it affords so apt a balance of powers, so by which balance it affords a check you are to take for grated an effectual one against the encroachments of the Crown, and on the other hand protects the crown against the [...?] of the people.

Alas my Lord mere theory /vision/ and nothing else. The principle unintelligible: the facts opposite to those stated in support of it

1. Counterpoise, effectual none: effectual /adequate/ check to the encroachments of the Crown, none: were it even ever so adequate as to encroachments still that would be as nothing: for it being without any further encroachments, already a virtual despotism.

2 Against the tumult of the people the Crown i.e. the Monarch not protected. Not protected so effectually as is the Chief Magistrate in the United States

3 Protected the Crown might be that is to say the Monarch - for I leave it to deceivers to use fiction and figures of speech instead of the proper words - protected the Crown /Monarch/ might be against tumults ever so effectually and the people be never the better for it. The by thousands might by the people the rioting of tumults, and in his Lordship regard as here their case not be worth. [...?]ing so that the individual the one Monarch were thus protected /(personal connections particular relations out of the question)/. For my part, my sympathies being governed altogether by the numeration table, setting aside the abuse and danger on the part of the people, if a certain [...?] producing to the patient a certain quantity of pain or uneasiness were to be given /suffered/ I had rather any one King should be the sufferer by it than any two paupers. I mean of course always setting aside in both cases all consequences in respect of alarm and danger considered as capable of being spread /spreading themselves/ around in the body of the people.