oice so disagreeable, I should
more willingly suffer by such a bill passed in my own case, than consent
to pass it in that of another.

The duke of ARGYLE replied to the following effect:--My lords, I am not
yet able to discover that the bill now before us is either illegal or
absurd, that its interpretation is doubtful, or its probable
consequences dangerous.

The indisputable maxim, that _the publick has a right to every man's
evidence,_ has been explained away with much labour, and with more art
than a good cause can often require. We have been told of publick
contracts, of the rights of society with regard to individuals, and the
privileges of individuals with respect to society; we have had one term
opposed to another, only to amuse our attention; and law, reason, and
sophistry have been mingled, till common sense was lost in the
confusion.

But, my lords, it is easy to disentangle all this perplexity of ideas,
and to set truth free from the shackles of sophistry, by observing that
it is, in all civilized nations of the world, one of the first
principles of the constitution, that the publick has a right, always
reserved, of having recourse to extraordinary methods of proceeding,
when the happiness of the community appears not sufficiently secured by
the known laws.

Laws may, by those who have made the study and explanation of them the
employment of their lives, be esteemed as the great standard of right;
they may be habitually reverenced, and considered as sacred in their own
nature, without regard to the end which they are designed to produce.

But others, my lords, whose minds operate without any impediment from
education, will easily discover, that laws are to be regarded only for
their use; that the power which made them only for the publick advantage
ought to alter or annul them, when they are no longer serviceable, or
when they obstruct those effects which they were intended to promote.

I will, therefore, my lords, still assert, that _the publick has a right
to every man's evidence;_ and that to reject any bill which can have no
other consequence than that of enabling the nation to assert its claim,
to reconcile one principle of law with another, and to deprive villany
of an evasion which may always be used, is to deny justice to an
oppressed people, and to concur in the ruin of our country.

And farther, my lords, I confidently affirm it has not been proved, that
this bill can endanger any but the