how much to ourselves; and how large a portion of what we have to endure has been forced upon us by a foreign Power, over whom we could exercise no controul but by arms.  The course here recommended will keep us, as we are, free and happy—­will preserve us from what, through want of these and like precautions, other Nations have been hurried into—­domestic broils, sanguinary tribunals, civil slaughter in the field, anarchy, and (sad cure and close of all!) tranquillity under the iron grasp of military despotism.  Years before this catastrophe, what would have become of your Elective Franchise, Freeholders of Westmoreland?  The Coadjutors of the obscure Individuals who, from a distance, first excited this movement under a pretence of recovering your Rights, would have played the whirlwind among your Property, and crushed you, less perhaps out of malice, than because, in their frenzy, they could not help it.

A conviction that the subject is ill understood by those who were unprepared for what has just been said, is the excuse to my own mind, Gentlemen, for having made so protracted a demand upon your attention.  The ruinous tendencies of this self-flattering enterprize can only be checked by timely and general foresight.  The contest in which we are engaged has been described by Persons noticing it from a distance, as the work of a Cabal of Electioneering Jobbers, who have contrived to set up the Thanet against the Lowther interests, that both Parties might spend their money for the benefit of those who cared for neither.  The Thanet interest in the County of Westmoreland!—­one might almost as well talk of an interest in the moon!  The Descendant of the Cliffords has not thought it worth while to recommend himself to the Electors, by the course either of his public or his private life; and therefore, though his purse may have weight, and his possessions are considerable, he himself, in reference to the supposed object, is nothing.  If this had been really an attempt made by a numerous body of malcontent Freeholders to carry their wishes for a change into effect, by placing at their head some approved Chief of an ancient Family, possessed of real consequence in the County, the proceeding, considered in the abstract, could not have been objected to.  This County is, and ever was, open to fair and honourable contest, originating in principles sanctioned by general practice; and carried on by means which, if universally adopted, would not be injurious to the State.  But the present measure stands not upon any such grounds; it is an attempt, no matter with what ultimate view, TO EFFECT A TOTAL CHANGE IN THE CHARACTER OF COUNTY ELECTIONS; beginning here with the expectation, as is openly avowed, of being imitated elsewhere.  It reverses the order hitherto pursued.  Instead of aiming to influence the less wealthy and less instructed Freeholders through the medium of those whom they have been accustomed to confide in—­instead of descending by