It has, indeed, been asserted, that the tax now to be laid upon these liquors will have such wonderful effects, that those who are at present drunk twice a-day, will not be henceforward able to commit the same crime twice a-week; an assertion which I could not hear without wondering at the new discoveries which ministerial sagacity can sometimes make.  In deliberations on a subject of such importance, my lords, no man ought to content himself with conjecture, where certainty may, at whatsoever expense of labour, be attained; nor ought any man to neglect a careful and attentive examination of his notions, before he offers them in publick consultations; for if they were erroneous, and no man can he certain that he is in the right, who has never brought his own opinions to the test of inquiry, he exposes himself to be detected in ignorance or temerity, and to that contempt which such detection naturally and justly produces; or if his audience submit their reason to his authority, and neglect to examine his assertions, in confidence that he has sufficiently examined them himself, he may suffer what to an honest mind must be far more painful than any personal ignominy, he may languish under the consciousness of having influenced the publick counsels by false declarations, and having by his negligence betrayed his country to calamities which a closer attention might have enabled him to have foreseen.

Whether the noble lord, who alleged the certainty of reformation which this bill will produce, ever examined his own opinion, I know not; but think it necessary at least to consider it more particularly, to supply that proof of it which, if it be true, he neglected to produce, or to show, if it be found false, how little confident assertions are to be regarded.

Between twice a-day and twice a-week, the noble lord will not deny the proportion to be as seven to one; and, therefore, to prevent drunkenness in the degree which he persuades us to expect, the price of the liquor must be raised in the same proportion; but the duty laid upon the gallon will not increase the price a fifth part, even though it should not be eluded by distilling liquors of an extraordinary strength; one fifth part of the price is, therefore, in his lordship’s estimate, equal to the whole price seven times multiplied.  Such are the arguments which have been produced in favour of this bill; and such is the diligence with which the publick happiness is promoted by those who have hopes of being enriched by publick calamities.

As the tax will not make a fifth part of the price, and even that may be in some measure evaded, the duty paid for licenses scarcely deserves consideration; for it is not intended to hinder retailers, but to make them useful in some degree to the ministry, by paying a yearly tax for the license of poisoning.

It is, therefore, apparent, upon the noble lord’s supposition, that the price of the liquor will be raised in consequence of this tax, that no man can be hindered from more than a fifth part of his usual debauchery, which, however, would be some advantage to the publick; but even this small advantage cannot be expected from the bill, because one part will obstruct the benefits that might be hoped from another.