h are unpunished
are not the less vicious, though none but God, the conscience, and the
opinions of mankind take cognizance of them.

It is not merely so in this or that government, but in all countries.
The king in this country is undoubtedly unaccountable for his actions.
The House of Lords, if it should ever exercise, (God forbid I should
suspect it would ever do what it has never done!)--but if it should ever
abuse its judicial power, and give such a judgment as it ought not to
give, whether from fear of popular clamor on the one hand, or
predilection to the prisoner on the other,--if they abuse their
judgments, there is no calling them to an account for it. And so, if the
Commons should abuse their power, nay, if they should have been so
greatly delinquent as not to have prosecuted this offender, they could
not be accountable for it; there is no punishing them for their acts,
because we exercise a part of the supreme power. But are they less
criminal, less rebellious against the Divine Majesty? are they less
hateful to man, whose opinions they ought to cultivate as far as they
are just? No: till society fall into a state of dissolution, they cannot
be accountable for their acts. But it is from confounding the
unaccountable character inherent in the supreme power with arbitrary
power, that all this confusion of ideas has arisen.

Even upon a supposition that arbitrary power can exist anywhere, which
we deny totally, and which your Lordships will be the first and proudest
to deny, still, absolute supreme dominion was never conferred or
delegated by you,--much less, arbitrary power, which never did in any
case, nor ever will in any case, time, or country, produce any one of
the ends of just government.

It is true that the supreme power in every constitution of government
must be absolute, and this may be corrupted into the arbitrary. But all
good constitutions have established certain fixed rules for the exercise
of their functions, which they rarely or ever depart from, and which
rules form the security against that worst of evils, the government of
will and force instead of wisdom and justice.

But though the supreme power is in a situation resembling arbitrary, yet
never was there heard of in the history of the world, that is, in that
mixed chaos of human wisdom and folly, such a thing as an _intermediate_
arbitrary power,--that is, of an officer of government who is to exert
authority over the people without