1818 Sept. 2.

Parl. Reform Bill

Reasons ult o

'.2. Electors Who

Universality

2. Intellectuality comparative

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But in respect of appropriate intellectual aptitude, is there really any sufficient or just ground for the supposition /supposing/ that under a representative democracy with universal suffrage meaning under the English Monarchy with a House of Commons so filled there would on the part of the Electors taken the aggregate in respect of appropriate intellectual aptitude, except any degree of inferiority, {comparison being [...?] with the condition in this respect of the existing set of Electors?} The answer is surely /clearly/ in the negative.

1. The time in question what is it? It is not the time - the real time - in /at/ which these reasons are pending[?] /is[?] pressed[?]/, but the imagined /supposed/ time at which the here proposed scheme of representation has been already been carried into effect. But it is not in the nature of the case that any such scheme shall have been carried into effect, but in [...?] state of the public mind such that on the part of the whole body of the virtually-universal-suffrage men taken in the aggregate, a degree of appropriate intellectual aptitude higher than at present is to be found at present in a correspondent majority of the best and most extensively instructed classes taken together. From the effect in question, by what cause in the very nature of the case can it have been produced? By no other than this, viz. by the combined pressure of the majority of the people concurring in a demand made of this great and salutary /necessary/ change.