the injury it may
receive from the part I bear in it. I think the proposition is so
evident, that it wants no enforcement; it comes to you from the voice of
the nation, which, thank God, has at last found admittance within these
walls.

Innocence is of so delicate a nature, that it cannot bear suspicion, and
therefore will desire inquiry; because it will always be justified by
it. Guilt, from its own consciousness, will use subterfuges, and fly to
concealment; and the more righteous and authoritative the inquiry, the
more it will be avoided; because the greater will be the dread of
punishment.

In private life, I am contented with men's virtues only, without seeking
for opportunities of blame. In a publick character, when national
grievances cry aloud for inquiry and justice, it is our duty to pursue
all the footsteps of guilt; and the loud, the pathetick appeal of my
constituents, is more forcibly persuasive than any motive of private
tenderness. This appeal is not the clamour of faction, artfully raised
to disturb the operation of government, violent for a while, and soon to
be appeased. It is the complaint of long and patient sufferings, a
complaint not to be silenced; and which all endeavours to suppress it,
would only make more importunate and clamorous. It is the solemn appeal
of the whole people, of the united body of our constituents, in this
time of national calamity, earnestly beseeching you, in a legal
parliamentary way, to redress their grievances, to revive your ancient
right of inquiry, to explore the most remote and hidden sources of
iniquity, to detect the bold authors of their distress, that they may be
made examples of national justice.

It is to you they appeal, the true, the genuine representatives of the
people. Not like former parliaments, an instrument of state, the
property of a minister, purchased by the missionaries of corruption, who
have been dispersed through the kingdom, and furnished with the publick
money to invade all natural interest, by poisoning the morals of the
people. Upon this rotten foundation has been erected a towering fabrick
of corruption: a most dangerous conspiracy has been carried on against
the very essence of our constitution, a formidable system of ministerial
power has been formed, fallaciously assuming, under constitutional
appearances, the name of legal government.

In this system we have seen the several offices of administration meanly
resolving themselves un