George Bancroft, History of the United States from the Discovery of the American Continent, Vol. 6, 10th edition.

[320]

The Press, too, came forward with unwonted

Chap. XLII.} 1769. Dec.

boldness, as the interpreter of public opinion and a legitimate power in the state. ‘Can you conceive,’ wrote the anonymous Junius¹ to the King, ‘that the people of this country will long submit to be governed by so flexible a House of Commons? The oppressed people of Ireland give you every day fresh marks of their resentment. The Colonies left their native land for freedom and found it in a desert. Looking forward to independence, they equally detest the pageantry of a King and the supercilious hypocrisy of a bishop.’

The meeting of Parliament in January, 1770,

1770. Jan.

would decide, whether the British Empire was to escape dismemberment. Chatham recommended to the more liberal aristocracy² that junction with the people, which, after sixty years, achieved the Reform of the British Constitution; but in that day it was opposed by the passionate impulses of Burke,³ and the inherent reluctance of the high-born.

The debate on the ninth turned on the capacity and rights of the people, and involved the complaints of America and of Ireland, not less than the discontent of England at the disfranchisement of Wilkes.

‘It is vain and idle to found the authority of this House upon the popular voice,’ said Charles Jenkinson, pleading for the absolute independence of Parliament. ‘The discontents that are held up as spectres,’ said Thomas de Grey, brother of the Attorney General, ‘are the senseless clamors of the thoughtless, ’