The noble duke has endeavoured to reduce us to difficulties, by urging, that since the corruption of the people cannot be greater, we ought willingly to agree to any law, of which the title declares that it is intended to produce a reformation, because the worst that can be feared is, that it may be without effect.

But, my lords, such is the enormous absurdity of this bill, that no plea can be offered for it with the least appearance of reason; and the greatest abilities, when they are exerted in its defence, are able only to show, by fruitless efforts, that it cannot be vindicated.  If the state of the nation be really such as has been supposed, if the most detestable and odious vice has overspread the kingdom to its utmost limits, if the people are universally abandoned to drunkenness, sloth, and villany, what can be more absurd than to trifle with doubtful experiments, and to make laws which must be suspected of inefficacy?  In the diseases of the state, as in those of the body, the force of the remedy ought to be proportioned to the strength and danger of the disease; and surely no political malady can be more formidable than the prevalence of wickedness, nor can any time require more firmness, vigilance, and activity, in the legislative power.

That the law, therefore, may be without effect, is, in the present state of corruption, if it has been truly represented, a sufficient reason for rejecting it, without allowing it to be committed; because there is now no time for indulgence, or for delays; a nation universally corrupt, must be speedily reformed, or speedily ruined.  Those habits which have been confessed to be already too powerful for the laws now in being, may in a short time be absolutely irresistible; and that licentiousness which intimidates the officers of justice, may in another year insult the legislature.

But, my lords, I am yet willing to hope that the noble duke’s account of the wickedness of the people, was rather a rhetorical exaggeration, uttered in the ardour of dispute, than a strict assertion of facts; and am of opinion that, though vice has, indeed, of late spread its contagion with great rapidity, there are yet great numbers uninfected, and cannot believe that our condition is such as that nothing can make it more miserable.

In many parts of the country, my lords, these liquors have not yet been much used, nor is it likely that those who have never sold them, when the law allowed them, will begin an unnecessary trade, when it will expose them to penalties.  But a new law in favour of spirits will produce a general inclination, and a kind of emulation will incite every one to take a license for the retail of this new liquor; and so every part of the kingdom will be equally debauched, and no place will be without a vender of statutable poison.  The luxury of the vulgar, for luxury, in my opinion, it may very properly be called, will still increase, and vices and diseases will increase with it.