put statesmen and magistrates into an habit of playing fast
and loose with the laws, straining or relaxing them as may best suit
their political purposes,--and in that light tend to corrupt the
executive power through all its offices.

3rd. If they are taken up on popular actions, their operation in that
light also is exceedingly evil. They become the instruments of private
malice, private avarice, and not of public regulation; they nourish the
worst of men to the prejudice of the best, punishing tender consciences,
and rewarding informers.

Shall we, as the honorable gentleman tells us we may with perfect
security, trust to the manners of the age? I am well pleased with the
general manners of the times; but the desultory execution of penal laws,
the thing I condemn, does not depend on the manners of the times. I
would, however, have the laws tuned in unison with the manners. Very
dissonant are a gentle country and cruel laws; very dissonant, that your
reason is furious, but your passions moderate, and that you are always
equitable except in your courts of justice.

I will beg leave to state to the House one argument which has been much
relied upon: that the Dissenters are not unanimous upon this business;
that many persons are alarmed; that it will create a disunion among the
Dissenters.

When any Dissenters, or any body of people, come here with a petition,
it is not the number of people, but the reasonableness of the request,
that should weigh with the House. A body of Dissenters come to this
House, and say, "Tolerate us: we desire neither the parochial advantage
of tithes, nor dignities, nor the stalls of your cathedrals: no! let the
venerable orders of the hierarchy exist with all their advantages." And
shall I tell them, "I reject your just and reasonable petition, not
because it shakes the Church, but because there are others, while you
lie grovelling upon the earth, that will kick and bite you"? Judge which
of these descriptions of men comes with a fair request: that which says,
"Sir, I desire liberty for my own, because I trespass on no man's
conscience,"--or the other, which says, "I desire that these men should
not be suffered to act according to their consciences, though I am
tolerated to act according to mine. But I sign a body of Articles, which
is my title to toleration; I sign no more, because more are against my
conscience. But I desire that you will not tolerate these men, because
they will not go