JB/109/080/001

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Extracts from Earl Greys Speech at the Fox Commemoration dinner at the Lucans head Inn Newcastle 31 December 1817
as printed in the Morning Chronicle 6 Jany 1818.

In this Extract is contained all that relates to the subject
of Reform.

Here I must be allowed to say a few words upon the nature of my own opinions.
Those upon Parliamentary Reform are already well known. To those I still
remain attached under limitations which I made on a former occasion:
I am attached to reform conducted upon moderate principles, I may say,
gradual, and always guided by salutary precaution. To other projects I
may state myself to be a declared enemy; if they were as reducible to practice
as they are plausible in theory, I would say I believe them to be absurd,
visionary, and senseless. Human sagacity is much too limited in its
powers to produce certainty in the effect of any very untried measures; and whoever
has been most attentive to history, will be most inclined to doubt the effect of the
best theories of Government that the wisdom of man can frame. The worst
tyrannies that could be endured have been exercised under the forms
law itself; how many ages classed after our own great charter had been
wrested from the most despicable of Monarchs, before anything like
practical liberty was enjoyed? How feeble, how inefficacious are all
laws or institutions, if that glorious spirit should be suffered to sleep which
can alone render them useful and beneficial? I should say it appears to
me, that there cannot be a more false, a more mistaken, or a
more mischievous belief, than that a Reform in Parliament, however
desirable it may be upon such principles as I have stated, is the one and
only measure by which the salvation of the country can be effected.
That from its adoption every thing will follow, without it every
thing is of so little importance as not to be attended to or attempted,
is a dangerous and mischievous doctrine, that could only have the
effect of perpetuating the System of Government of which we complain.
Our own history is replete with instances of the most perverse
application of the laws.

Identifier: | JB/109/080/001 "JB/" can not be assigned to a declared number type with value 109.
Date_1		Marginal Summary Numbering	01-Mar
Box	109	Main Headings	Parliamentary Reform
Folio number	080	Info in main headings field
Image	001	Titles	Extracts from Earl Grey's Speech on the Fox Commemoration dinner at the Queens head Inn Newcastle 31 December 1817 as printed in the Morning Chronicle 6 Jany 1818
Category	Collectanea	Number of Pages	1
Recto/Verso	recto	Page Numbering
Penner		Watermarks
Marginals		Paper Producer
Corrections		Paper Produced in Year
Notes public		ID Number	35735
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