this occasion to have put forth all their powers.  Conspicuous among them was Charles Montague, who was rapidly attaining a foremost rank among the orators of that age.  To him the lead seems on this occasion to have been left; and to his pen we owe an account of the discussion, which gives a very high notion of his talents for debate.  “We have framed”—­such was in substance his reasoning,—­“we have framed a law which has in it nothing exclusive, a law which will be a blessing to every class, from the highest to the lowest.  The new securities, which we propose to give to innocence oppressed by power, are common between the premier peer and the humblest day labourer.  The clause which establishes a time of limitation for prosecutions protects us all alike.  To every Englishman accused of the highest crime against the state, whatever be his rank, we give the privilege of seeing his indictment, the privilege of being defended by counsel, the privilege of having his witnesses summoned by writ of subpoena and sworn on the Holy Gospels.  Such is the bill which we sent up to your Lordships; and you return it to us with a clause of which the effect is to give certain advantages to your noble order at the expense of the ancient prerogatives of the Crown.  Surely before we consent to take away from the King any power which his predecessors have possessed for ages, and to give it to your Lordships, we ought to be satisfied that you are more likely to use it well than he.  Something we must risk; somebody we must trust; and; since we are forced, much against our will, to institute what is necessarily an invidious comparison, we must own ourselves unable to discover any reason for believing that a prince is less to be trusted than an aristocracy.

“Is it reasonable, you ask, that you should be tried for your lives before a few members of your House, selected by the Crown?  Is it reasonable, we ask in our turn, that you should have the privilege of being tried by all the members of your House, that is to say, by your brothers, your uncles, your first cousins, your second cousins, your fathers in law, your brothers in law, your most intimate friends?  You marry so much into each other’s families, you live so much in each other’s society, that there is scarcely a nobleman who is not connected by consanguinity or affinity with several others, and who is not on terms of friendship with several more.  There have been great men whose death put a third or fourth part of the baronage of England into mourning.  Nor is there much danger that even those peers who may be unconnected with an accused lord will be disposed to send him to the block if they can with decency say ’Not Guilty, upon my honour.’  For the ignominious death of a single member of a small aristocratical body necessarily leaves a stain on the reputation of his fellows.  If, indeed, your Lordships proposed that every one of your body should be compelled to attend and vote, the Crown might have some chance