was but 700,000 pounds
annually; if it ever produced so much clear. The prodigious and
dangerous disaffection to the very being of the establishment, and the
cause of a Pretender then powerfully abetted from abroad, produced many
demands of an extraordinary nature both abroad and at home. Much
management and great expenses were necessary. But the throne of no
Prince has stood upon more unshaken foundations than that of his present
Majesty.

To have exceeded the sum given for the Civil List, and to have incurred a
debt without special authority of Parliament, was, _prima facie_, a
criminal act: as such Ministers ought naturally rather to have withdrawn
it from the inspection, than to have exposed it to the scrutiny, of
Parliament. Certainly they ought, of themselves, officially to have come
armed with every sort of argument, which, by explaining, could excuse a
matter in itself of presumptive guilt. But the terrors of the House of
Commons are no longer for Ministers.

On the other hand, the peculiar character of the House of Commons, as
trustee of the public purse, would have led them to call with a
punctilious solicitude for every public account, and to have examined
into them with the most rigorous accuracy.

The capital use of an account is, that the reality of the charge, the
reason of incurring it, and the justice and necessity of discharging it,
should all appear antecedent to the payment. No man ever pays first, and
calls for his account afterwards; because he would thereby let out of his
hands the principal, and indeed only effectual, means of compelling a
full and fair one. But, in national business, there is an additional
reason for a previous production of every account. It is a cheek,
perhaps the only one, upon a corrupt and prodigal use of public money. An
account after payment is to no rational purpose an account. However, the
House of Commons thought all these to be antiquated principles; they were
of opinion that the most Parliamentary way of proceeding was, to pay
first what the Court thought proper to demand, and to take its chance for
an examination into accounts at some time of greater leisure.

The nation had settled 800,000 pounds a year on the Crown, as sufficient
for the purpose of its dignity, upon the estimate of its own Ministers.
When Ministers came to Parliament, and said that this allowance had not
been sufficient for the purpose, and that they had incurred a debt of
500,000 p