expressed their disapprobation, and the man being ordered to
withdraw, the following debate ensued upon the propriety of the
question.]

Mr. SANDYS spoke first, in substance as follows:--Sir, those who are
intrusted by their country with the authority of making laws, ought,
undoubtedly, to observe them with the utmost circumspection, lest they
should defeat their own endeavours, and invalidate, by their example,
their own decrees.

There is no part, sir, of our civil constitution more sacred, none that
has been more revered by those that have trampled upon other forms of
justice, and wantoned in oppression without restraint, than that
privilege by which every Briton is exempted from the necessity of
accusing himself, and by which he is entitled to refuse an answer to any
question which may be asked, with a view to draw from him a confession
of an offence which cannot be proved.

Whether this great privilege, sir, is not violated; whether the
unalienable right of a free subject is not infringed, by the question
put to the person at our bar, the house must decide. The punishment to
which intruders are subject by the orders of this house, proves that his
presence in the house is considered as a crime, of which, as we have no
proof of it, a confession ought not to be extorted by an artful and
insidious question, of which he may not discover the intention or the
consequence. Such treatment, sir, is rather to be expected by slaves in
the inquisition of Spain, than a Briton at the bar of this house; a
house instituted to preserve liberty, and to restrain injustice and
oppression.

Mr. CAMPBELL spoke next, to this effect:--Sir, I cannot but concur with
the opinion of the honourable gentleman, that, in requiring an answer to
this question, we shall expose a man to a punishment against whom we
have no evidence, but what is extorted from himself; and, consequently,
no knowledge of his crime upon which we can proceed to inflict censures
or penalties, without the manifest infraction of our constitution.

It cannot be imagined, sir, that he intends to confess himself guilty of
a crime of which no proof has been brought, or that he will voluntarily
subject himself to punishments. It must, therefore, follow, that he is
entrapped in his examination, by an artifice, which, I hope, will never
find any countenance in this house.

Mr. WINNINGTON answered to the following purpose:--Sir, it is not
impossible that the honourable gentle