elayed till the
exigencies of the government shall be so great as not to allow time
for raising the supplies by any other method.

By this artifice, gross as it is, the patrons of this wonderful bill
hope to obstruct a plain and open detection of its tendency. They
hope, my lords, that the bill shall operate in the same manner with
the liquor which it is intended to bring into more general use; and
that as those that drink spirits are drunk before they are well aware
that they are drinking, the effects of this law shall be perceived
before we know that we have made it. Their intent is to give us a dram
of policy, which is to be swallowed before it is tasted, and which,
when once it is swallowed, will turn our heads.

But, my lords, I hope we shall be so cautious as to examine the
draught which these state empirics have thought proper to offer us;
and I am confident that a very little examination will convince us of
the pernicious qualities of their new preparation, and show that it
can have no other effect than that of poisoning the publick.

The law before us, my lords, seems to be the effect of that practice,
of which it is intended likewise to be the cause, and to be dictated
by the liquor of which it so effectually promotes the use; for surely
it never before was conceived, by any man intrusted with the
administration of publick affairs, to raise taxes by the destruction
of the people.

Nothing, my lords, but the destruction of all the most laborious and
useful part of the nation can be expected, from the license which is
now proposed to be given not only to drunkenness, but to drunkenness
of the most detestable and dangerous kind, to the abuse not only of
intoxicating, but of poisonous liquors.

Nothing, my lords, is more absurd than to assert, that the use of
spirits will be hindered by the bill now before us, or indeed that it
will not be in a very great degree promoted by it. For what produces
all kind of wickedness, but the prospect of impunity on one part, or
the solicitation of opportunity on the other; either of these has too
frequently been sufficient to overpower the sense of morality, and
even of religion; and what is not to be feared from them, when they
shall unite their force, and operate together; when temptations shall
be increased, and terrour taken away?

It is allowed by those who have hitherto disputed on either side of
this question, that the people appear obstinately enamoured of this
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