re published; I cannot be equally confident in any plan for the
absolute cure of those disorders, or for their certain future
prevention. My aim is to bring this matter into more public discussion.
Let the sagacity of others work upon it. It is not uncommon for medical
writers to describe histories of diseases very accurately, on whose cure
they can say but very little.

The first ideas which generally suggest themselves, for the cure of
Parliamentary disorders, are, to shorten the duration of Parliaments;
and to disqualify all, or a great number of placemen, from a seat in the
House of Commons. Whatever efficacy there may be in those remedies, I am
sure in the present state of things it is impossible to apply them. A
restoration of the right of free election is a preliminary indispensable
to every other reformation. What alterations ought afterwards to be made
in the constitution, is a matter of deep and difficult research.

If I wrote merely to please the popular palate, it would indeed be as
little troublesome to me as to another, to extol these remedies, so
famous in speculation, but to which their greatest admirers have never
attempted seriously to resort in practice. I confess then, that I have
no sort of reliance upon either a triennial Parliament, or a place-bill.
With regard to the former, perhaps it might rather serve to counteract,
than to promote the ends that are proposed by it. To say nothing of the
horrible disorders among the people attending frequent elections, I
should be fearful of committing, every three years, the independent
gentlemen of the country into a contest with the treasury. It is easy to
see which of the contending parties would be ruined first. Whoever has
taken a careful view of public proceedings, so as to endeavor to ground
his speculations on his experience, must have observed how prodigiously
greater the power of ministry is in the first and last session of a
Parliament, than it is in the intermediate period, when members sit a
little firm on their seats. The persons of the greatest Parliamentary
experience, with whom I have conversed, did constantly, in canvassing
the fate of questions, allow something to the court side, upon account
of the elections depending or imminent. The evil complained of, if it
exists in the present state of things, would hardly be removed by a
triennial Parliament: for, unless the influence of government in
elections can be entirely taken away, the more fre