ade in parliament. The Habeas
Corpus Act was suspended in 1794: Horne Tooke and Hardy were both
arrested and tried for high treason in November. An English jury
fortunately showed itself less subservient than the Scottish; the judge
was scrupulously fair: and both Hardy and Horne Tooke were acquitted.
The societies, however, though they were encouraged for a time, were
attacked by severe measures passed by Pitt in 1795. The 'Friends of the
People' ceased to exist The seizure of the committee of the
Corresponding Societies in 1798 put an end to their activity. A report
presented to parliament in 1799[131] declares that the societies had
gone to dangerous lengths: they had communicated with the French
revolutionists and with the 'United Irishmen' (founded 1791); and
societies of 'United Englishmen' and 'United Scotsmen' had had some
concern in the mutinies of the fleet in 1797 and in the Irish rebellion
of 1798. Place says, probably with truth, that the danger was much
exaggerated: but in any case, an act for the suppression of the
Corresponding Societies was passed in 1799, and put an end to the
movement.

This summary is significant of the state of opinion. The genuine
old-fashioned Whig dreaded revolution, and guarded himself carefully
against any appearance of complicity. Jacobinism, on the other hand, was
always an exotic. Such men as the leading Nonconformists Priestley and
Price were familiar with the speculative movement on the continent, and
sympathised with the enlightenment. Young men of genius, like Wordsworth
and Coleridge, imbibed the same doctrines more or less thoroughly, and
took Godwin for their English representative. The same creed was
accepted by the artisans in the growing towns, from whom the
Corresponding Societies drew their recruits. But the revolutionary
sentiment was not so widely spread as its adherents hoped or its enemies
feared. The Birmingham mob of 1791 acted, with a certain unconscious
humour, on the side of church and king. They had perhaps an instinctive
perception that it was an advantage to plunder on the side of the
constable. In fact, however, the general feeling in all classes was
anti-Jacobin. Place, an excellent witness, himself a member of the
Corresponding Societies, declares that the repressive measures were
generally popular even among the workmen.[132] They were certainly not
penetrated with revolutionary fervour. Had it been otherwise, the
repressive measures, severe as t