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The town talk, the fishpool, the plebian, the old Whig, the spinster, etc
The town talk the fishpool the plebian the old Whig the spinster etc Author:Joseph Addison Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: t Sir RICHARD STEELE'S SPEECH on the Septennial Bill, April 24, ' A FT ER the very material quotation, which $ that gentleman in the gallery has produced,... more » h is evident that new chofen Annual Parlia- 8 Ments were never the cuftom or right of this f Kingdom, It remains therefore only to con- ' fider (that now thare is a law, which makes Parliaments meet, as of courfe, at fuch a ftated Time) whether the period of Three Years anfwers the purpbfes intended by it? The J Preamble to the 'Triennial Act expreffes, that '. it was introduced 1nto the Conftitution for the ' better U nion and Agreement of the King and his People ; but it has had a quite contrary ' effeft; and experience has verified, what a ['t wife man faid of ft, when it was enadled, that ' it had made a Triennial King, a Triennial Mi- ? hiftry, a Triennial Alliance. We feel this in all occurrences of State; and they who look upon us from abroad behold th.e tfruggle in f which we are ne'ceffarily engaged from time ' to time under this law. Ever fince it has been f enacted, the nation has been in a feries 6'f c'on- tention. The jfirjl Year of a Tr1ennial Parlia- f merit has been fpent in vindictive decifions and f Mr. Cragjs, Junior. animofidea' animoGties about the late eleftions. The fecond ' SefEon has entered into bufinefs, but rather ' with a fpirit of contradiction to what the pre- ' vailing fet of men in former Parliaments had ' brought to pafs, than of adifinterefted zeal for ' the common good. The third Seffion lan- ' guifhed in the purfuit of what little was in- ' tended to be done in the fecond ; and the ap- ' proach of an enfuing EleRion terrified the ' members into a fervile management, according ' as their refpedive principals were difpofed to- ' wards the queftion b...« less