private benevolence, expanding itself into patriotism, renders his whole being the estate of the public, in which he has not reserved a peculium for himself of profit, diversion, or relaxation.  During the session the first in and the last out of the House of Commons, he passes from the senate to the camp; and seldom seeing the seat of his ancestors, he is always in Parliament to serve his country or in the field to defend it.  But in all well-wrought compositions some particulars stand out more eminently than the rest; and the things which will carry his name to posterity are his two bills:  I mean that for a limitation of the claims of the crown upon landed estates, and this for the relief of the Roman Catholics.  By the former he has emancipated property; by the latter he has quieted conscience; and by both he has taught that grand lesson to government and subject,—­no longer to regard each other as adverse parties.

Such was the mover of the act that is complained of by men who are not quite so good as he is,—­an act most assuredly not brought in by him from any partiality to that sect which is the object of it.  For among his faults I really cannot help reckoning a greater degree of prejudice against that people than becomes so wise a man.  I know that he inclines to a sort of disgust, mixed with a considerable degree of asperity, to the system; and he has few, or rather no habits with any of its professors.  What he has done was on quite other motives.  The motives were these, which he declared in his excellent speech on his motion for the bill:  namely, his extreme zeal to the Protestant religion, which he thought utterly disgraced by the act of 1699; and his rooted hatred to all kind of oppression, under any color, or upon any pretence whatsoever.

The seconder was worthy of the mover and the motion.  I was not the seconder; it was Mr. Dunning, recorder of this city.  I shall say the less of him because his near relation to you makes you more particularly acquainted with his merits.  But I should appear little acquainted with them, or little sensible of them, if I could utter his name on this occasion without expressing my esteem for his character.  I am not afraid of offending a most learned body, and most jealous of its reputation for that learning, when I say he is the first of his profession.  It is a point settled by those who settle everything else; and I must add (what I am enabled to say from my own long and close observation) that there is not a man, of any profession, or in any situation, of a more erect and independent spirit, of a more proud honor, a more manly mind, a more firm and determined integrity.  Assure yourselves, that the names of two such men will bear a great load of prejudice in the other scale before they can be entirely outweighed.