of committing, every three years, the independent gentlemen of the country into a contest with the treasury.  It is easy to see which of the contending parties would be ruined first.  Whoever has taken a careful view of public proceedings, so as to endeavor to ground his speculations on his experience, must have observed how prodigiously greater the power of ministry is in the first and last session of a Parliament, than it is in the intermediate period, when members sit a little firm on their seats.  The persons of the greatest Parliamentary experience, with whom I have conversed, did constantly, in canvassing the fate of questions, allow something to the court side, upon account of the elections depending or imminent.  The evil complained of, if it exists in the present state of things, would hardly be removed by a triennial Parliament:  for, unless the influence of government in elections can be entirely taken away, the more frequently they return, the more they will harass private independence; the more generally men will be compelled to fly to the settled systematic interest of government, and to the resources of a boundless civil list.  Certainly something may be done, and ought to be done, towards lessening that influence in elections; and this will be necessary upon a plan either of longer or shorter duration of Parliament.  But nothing can so perfectly remove the evil, as not to render such contentions, too frequently repeated, utterly ruinous, first to independence of fortune, and then to independence of spirit.  As I am only giving an opinion on this point, and not at all debating it in an adverse line, I hope I may be excused in another observation.  With great truth I may aver, that I never remember to have talked on this subject with any man much conversant with public business, who considered short Parliaments as a real improvement of the constitution.  Gentlemen, warm in a popular cause, are ready enough to attribute all the declarations of such persons to corrupt motives.  But the habit of affairs, if, on one hand, it tends to corrupt the mind, furnishes it, on the other, with the means of better information.  The authority of such persons will always have some weight.  It may stand upon a par with the speculations of those who are less practised in business; and who, with perhaps purer intentions, have not so effectual means of judging.  It is besides an effect of vulgar and puerile malignity to imagine, that every statesman is of course corrupt; and that his opinion, upon every constitutional point, is solely formed upon some sinister interest.

The next favorite remedy is a place-bill.  The same principle guides in both; I mean, the opinion which is entertained by many, of the infallibility of laws and regulations, in the cure of public distempers.  Without being as unreasonably doubtful as many are unwisely confident, I will only say, that this also is a matter very well worthy of serious and mature reflection.  It is not easy to foresee, what the