OCR Text |
Show (43) Trzflm of the People, and the Guard/am 03' "P that Legiflators ought to do what Lawyers their rights, (for they are no more, andI am which the offended Maya/{v of an injured People " cannot; for they have 720 other rules to bind " them but the great principles of reafon and " equity, and the general {enleof mankind, and although in arbitrary countries this IS true, for there the People being dim/Zed of all power, can bring down on their heads. Parliaments and both the legiflative and executive authority who will fupport the Conflitution, will be {up- rue/Zed [0/619 in the Prince, he may have no ported by the People, and have nothing to fear; other rules than thefe to bind hzm; yet in free but thofe who will fubvert the Conflitution, the Firf't did, who loft his head in fuch an at-f countries the cafe is different. In England, " the legiilative," lays Lord Bolingbroke, "ris" :1 1597mm), and may be callcdh in one fene, tempt; and which, as Lord Chef'terfield tells _ " an ahfo/m‘e, but in none an arhzz‘rmy power. us, " if he had not left, we had certainly " It is limited," fays Mr. Locke, " to the pub-- d " lie mod of the Society." I fay, it is boun one of its Members) {hould ever attempt to deftroy thofe rights, that, as they will well deferve the fate, [0 may they feel all that vengeance let them tremble, as one man, even as Charles " loft our Liberties." ‘ by theorules of the Conflitution, "for the rules Having thus gone over the conftitutional of the Conflitution are to the Parliament, what ground of this country, and taken a comparative View of the foundation upon which its the Law is to the Judges. The People make the Government is fuperfirué‘ted, the inference to and as the Judges are bound to determine ac- be drawn from thence is this; that if the a- cording to the Law of the land, [0 are Parli Government be as Ihave Rated it to be, and to the ments bound to enaét Laws according as Ifhall hold it to be, till the contrary be proved, the right 2‘0 unlimited power contended rules of the Confiitution ; and not according to their own principles of reafon and equrty,.a3d for in Parliament, cannot, in common apprehenfion, there exift. For although Mr. Burke what they call the general fenfe. of mankinh. for thefe may differ with the princ1ples oft e afl'erts (and Intention this, becaufe I with to flate, and not to mifiate his meaning, and if I Conflitution, as we know they have done 3 and therefore arifes the necefiity of aflerting the do, I .trul't he will impute it to the want of controul of the Conflitution over the Law and comprehenfion, and not to any intention in me) the Parliament. " that Conflitution, the Parliaments make the Law; But |