they have
not, at least, taken advantage of the errours that have been
committed. It must be owned, that they have either reformed the
nation, or at least pointed out the way by which the reformation that
has been so long desired, may be effected.

That this tax will in some degree hinder drunkenness, it is reasonable
to expect, because it can only be hindered by taxing the liquors which
are used in excess; but there yet remain, concerning the weight of the
tax that ought to be laid upon them, doubts which nothing but
experience can, I believe, remove.

By experience, my lords, we have been already taught, that taxes may
be so heavy as to be without effect; that restraint may be so violent
as to produce impatience; and, therefore, it is proper in the next
essay to proceed by slow degrees and gentle methods, and produce that
effect imperceptibly which we find ourselves unable to accomplish at
once.

I cannot therefore think, that the duty of three shillings a gallon
can be imposed without defeating our own design, and compelling the
people to find out some method of eluding the law like that which was
practised after the act, by which in the second year of his present
majesty, five shillings were imposed upon every gallon of compound
waters; after which it is well known, that the distillers sold a
simple spirit under the contemptuous title of _senatorial brandy_, and
the law being universally evaded, was soon after repealed as useless.

Such, my lords, or worse, will be the consequence of the tax which the
noble lord has proposed; for if it cannot be evaded, spirits will be
brought from nations that have been wiser than to burden their own
commodities with such insupportable impost, and the empire will soon
be impoverished by the exportation of its money.

Lord HERVEY answered, in substance as follows:--My lords, I am very
far from thinking the arguments of the noble lord such as can
influence men desirous to promote the real and durable happiness of
their country; for he is solicitous only about the prosperity of the
British manufactures, and the preservation of the British trade, but
has shown very little regard to British virtue.

That part of his argument is, therefore, not necessary to be answered,
if the suggestion upon which it is founded were true, since it will be
sufficient to compare the advantage of the two schemes. And with
regard to his insinuation, that senatorial brandy may be revived by a
high du