y, on whose cure they can say but
very little.

The first ideas which generally suggest themselves for the cure of
Parliamentary disorders are, to shorten the duration of Parliaments, and
to disqualify all, or a great number of placemen, from a seat in the
House of Commons. Whatever efficacy there may be in those remedies, I am
sure in the present state of things it is impossible to apply them. A
restoration of the right of free election is a preliminary indispensable
to every other reformation. What alterations ought afterwards to be made
in the constitution is a matter of deep and difficult research.

If I wrote merely to please the popular palate, it would indeed be as
little troublesome to me as to another to extol these remedies, so famous
in speculation, but to which their greatest admirers have never attempted
seriously to resort in practice. I confess them, that I have no sort of
reliance upon either a Triennial Parliament or a Place-bill. With regard
to the former, perhaps, it might rather serve to counteract than to
promote the ends that are proposed by it. To say nothing of the horrible
disorders among the people attending frequent elections, I should be
fearful of committing, every three years, the independent gentlemen of
the country into a contest with the Treasury. It is easy to see which of
the contending parties would be ruined first. Whoever has taken a
careful view of public proceedings, so as to endeavour to ground his
speculations on his experience, must have observed how prodigiously
greater the power of Ministry is in the first and last session of a
Parliament, than it is in the intermediate periods, when Members sit a
little on their seats. The persons of the greatest Parliamentary
experience, with whom I have conversed, did constantly, in canvassing the
fate of questions, allow something to the Court side, upon account of the
elections depending or imminent. The evil complained of, if it exists in
the present state of things, would hardly be removed by a triennial
Parliament: for, unless the influence of Government in elections can be
entirely taken away, the more frequently they return, the more they will
harass private independence; the more generally men will be compelled to
fly to the settled systematic interest of Government, and to the
resources of a boundless Civil List. Certainly something may be done,
and ought to be done, towards lessening that influence in elections; and
t