impeach the constitution! Might you not have said at once, The parliament may indeed constitutionally tax the colonists, for it taxes millions of Britons who have no vote for parliament men; but the constitution is defective, and we patriots, we friends of the constitution, will avowedly find fault with the constitution till we can find an opportunity of casting it into a new mould? And what this mould is, which, I fear, rash patriots are getting ready as fast as they can, and into which they hope to cast the inflamed minds of the populace, you, sir, help us to guess, where you say, "It is glaringly evident," (to such good friends of the constitution as you are,)" it is glaringly evident, that there is not a man in England, who is able to boil a pot, in ever so despicable a hovel, but may, if he pleases, have a voice in the disposal of his property." That is, in laying on or taking off taxes, or (which comes to the same) in making and repealing laws. Sir, I would no more encourage a tyrannical monarch, and an oppressive parliament, than you: but supposing our mild king were a tyrant, and his parliament consisted of three hundred and ninety-nine little tyrants, would it not be better, upon the whole, to be ruled by four hundred tyrants, than to be at the mercy of four hundred thousand? If you calmly weigh this question, I am persuaded, sir, that your prejudices will subside. In the meantime remember, that if you are right as a patriot, you are wrong not only as a man and a Christian, but also as a controvertist; and that, whether the constitution is defective or not, and whether you can mend it or not, you have granted that unequal representation is constitutional, and of consequence that the taxation of myriads of Britons in England, and sons of Britons in America, who send no representatives to parliament, is perfectly agreeable to the constitution.

You strengthen your cause by quoting a French and an English judge. As Mr. Wesley has taken particular notice of these quotations in the last edition of his Address, I shall only transcribe his answers, You write, "All the inhabitants," &c, says Montesquieu, speaking of the English constitution, "ought to have a right of voting at the election of a representative, except such as are so mean as to be deemed to have no will of their own." Nay, (answers Mr. W.,) "If all have a right to vote that have a will of their own, certainly this right belongs to every man, woman, and child in England. A man has a will of his own, whether he be twenty or thirty years old, and whether he have forty pence or forty shillings a year.'

One quotation more. Judge Blackstone says, "In a free state, every man, who is supposed to be a free agent, ought in some measure to be his own governor; therefore one branch at least of the legislative power should reside in the whole body of the people." Mr. Wesley answers: "But who are the whole body of the people? According to him, every free agent. Then the argument proves too much; for are not women free agents? Yea, and poor as well as rich men? According to this argument, there is no free state under the sun." From these just answers it is evident that your scheme drives at putting the legislative power in every body's hands, that is, at crowning king mob.

To conclude: Upon the force of the preceding arguments, I ask, first, Is not the demand of proportionable moderate taxes, which the sovereign of Great Britain has upon our wealthy fellow subjects settled in the

British dominions on the continent, both rational, Scriptural, and constitutional? Rational, as being founded upon a reasonable, self-evident bright, flowing from the nature and fitness of things, and acknowledged by every civilized nation under heaven? Scriptural, as being supported by the explicit commands of St. Paul, and Christ himself? And constitutional, since the constitution enjoins that millions of Britons at home, who have no voice at elections, or are represented by men whom they voted against; and that myriads of Britons abroad, whether they are freeholders or not, (and some of them are not only freeholders, but members of parliament also,) shall be all taxed without their consent?

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I flatter myself, sir, that this appeal to your conscience, your Bible, and your legal patriotism, will soften your prejudices, and prepare your mind for my next letter. In the meantime I earnestly recommend to your thankful admiration, the excellence of the British government, which equally guards our properties, liberties, and lives, against the tyranny of unjust, arbitrary, or cruel monarchs; and against the ferocity of that Cerberus, that hydra, that Briareus, that many-headed monster, a mob of ungrateful, uneasy, restless men, who despise dominion; speak evil of dignities; give to illiberal behaviour, scurrilous insolence, and disloyalty unmasked, the perverted name of patriotism; commit enormities under pretence of redressing grievances; and set up the ensign of devastation wherever they erect their standard of lawless liberty. Hoping, sir, that a panic fear of a virtuous king, a lawful parliament, and a conscientious minister, whose crime is only that of making a constitutional stand against the boisterous overflowings of civil Antinomianism; hoping, I say, that such an absurd fear will never hurry you into groundless discontent, and unguarded publications; entreating you to take no step which may countenance King Mob, his merciless minister, Rapine, and his riotous parliament summoned from the "most despicable hovels;" requesting you to exalt our Divine Lawgiver, who sums up his law of liberty in these precious statutes, "Render to Cesar the things which are Cesar's, and to God the things which are God's. A new commandment I give unto you, that you love one another, as I have loved you;" wishing you, sir, all Scriptural success in the Gospel, which says, "Submit yourselves to every ordinance of man for the Lord's sake; whether it be to the king, as supreme, or unto governors, as unto them that are sent by him for the punishment of evil doers, and for the praise of them that do well :" ardently praying that when the governors, generals, and forces going to America, shall land there, our disobedient fellow subjects may be found doing well, that is, penitently submitting themselves to their sovereign, that the threatened punishment may be turned into deserved praise: and begging you would take in good part the freedom of this well-meant expostulation, I declare that I am as much in love with liberty as with loyalty; and that I write a heart-felt truth, when I subscribe myself, reverend sir, your affectionate fellow labourer in the Gospel, a republican by birth and education, and a subject of Great Britain by love of liberty and free choice,

MADELEY, Nov. 15, 1775.

J. FLETCHER.

LETTER II.

The doctrine of Americanus is highly unconstitutional, and draws after it a long train of absurd consequences.

REVEREND SIR, I hope I have proved, in my first letter, that Mr. Wesley's doctrine of government is rational, Scriptural, and constitutional; and that a right of taxing subjects, with or without their consent, is an inseparable appendage of supreme government. I shall now attempt to prove that your doctrine of liberty, and taxation only with our own consent, is absurd and unconstitutional; and that, while you try to break the lawful yoke of civil government laid on the colonists, you doctrinally bind the greatest part of the English with chains of the most abject slavery, and fix a ridiculous charge of robbery on the king and parliament, for taxing some millions of Britons, who are no more represented in parliament than the foreigners who sojourn in England, or the English who live abroad.

Permit me to state the question more particularly than I have done in my former letter. Mr. Wesley thinks that the colonists are mistaken when they consider themselves as put on a level with slaves, because they are taxed by a parliament in which they have no representatives of their own choosing: I say, of their own choosing, because I apprehend that, as all the freeholders and voting burgesses in Great Britain virtually represent the commonalty of all the British empire,* and as such freeholders, &c, virtually represent all that commonalty, whether it be made up of voters or non-voters, of poor men or men of property, of men at home, at sea, or on the continent; so the house of commons virtually represents all the freeholders and voting burgesses in Great Britain; whether they voted or not at the last election, or whether they voted for or against the sitting members.

With an eye to this virtual representation, which draws after it a pas sive submission to taxation, Mr. W. asks, "Am I and two millions of Englishmen," who have no right to vote for representatives in parlia ment, "made slaves, because we are taxed without our own consent?" You reply, "Yes, sir, if you are taxed without your own consent, you are a slave." You consider such taxation as "the very quintessence of slavery;" you declare that if the Americans submit to it, "their condi tion differs not from that of the most abject slaves in the universe:" and you insinuate that whoever attempts to tax them otherwise than by their direct representatives, "attempts an injury; whoever does it, commits a robbery; he throws down the distinction between liberty and slavery. Taxation and representation [you mean direct representation] are coeval with, and essential to this constitution." But when you publish such assertions, which justify the armed colonists, and represent the majority in parliament as a gang of robbers, docs not an enthusiastic warmth for lawless liberty carry you beyond the bounds of calm reflection? And

* Mr. Fletcher added in a parenthesis here "except Ireland, which being a kingdom by itself, and no English colony, coins its own money, and has its peculiar parliament." As Ireland is now incorporated with Great Britain in one empire, and sends representatives to the British parliament, that clause is here omitted.

are you aware of the stab which you give the constitution; and of the insult which you offer, not only to your superiors, but also to millions of your worthy countrymen, whom you absurdly stigmatize as some of the "most abject slaves in the universe?"

Probably not one in five of our husbandmen, sailors, soldiers, mechanics, day labourers, and hired servants, are freeholders, or voting burgesses. And must four out of five, in these numerous classes of freeborn Englishmen, wear the badge of the most abject slavery, in com. pliance with your chimerical notions of liberty? We are not allowed to vote so long as we are minors; and must also all our blooming young men, from seventeen years of age to twenty-one, be considered as "most abject slaves?" You may say, indeed, that they are represented by their parents or guardians: but what if these guardians or parents have no vote themselves? Beside, if minors can be thus represented, why should not our colonies be represented in the same manner by the mother country, which has so tenderly nursed, and so carefully protected them from their infancy? To return. If the wives of freeholders are sup. posed to vote by their husbands, what must we say of those who have buried their husbands? Have all widows buried their liberty with the partners of their beds? A freeholder has seven children; he leaves his freehold to his eldest son; and because he cannot leave a freehold to all, will you reproach him as the father of six abject slaves? Another freeholder, to pay his debts, is obliged to sell his freehold, and of consequence his right of taxing himself. Does he sell his liberty with his freehold, and "involve himself in absolute slavery?" The general election comes on: a young gentleman wants a few months of the age which the law requires in a voter; and of consequence he cannot yet choose his own representative; must he continue a slave till the next election? A knight, disapproved by most voters in the county, offers to represent them; they try in vain to get some other gentleman to oppose him; and the candidate whom they tacitly object to, sits in the house chiefly for want of a competitor. Is their liberty at all affected by this kind of involuntary representation, which draws after it a kind of involuntary taxation ?-At the next election, perhaps, the opposition runs high between several candidates; one has (I suppose) two thousand votes; another, one thousand nine hundred; and a third, one thousand seven hundred. The first is elected: two thousand freeholders are taxed by a representative of their own choosing, and three thousand six hundred voters go home disappointed of their choice, and having the mortification of being taxed by a man whom they did not vote into parliament; nay, by a man whom they opposed with all their might. Their choice is perhaps equally frus trated with regard to the other knight of the shire. Now, are these three thousand six hundred voters in any degree reduced to a state of slavery, till they can have an opportunity of being represented according to their minds? Again: a free-born Englishman is possessed of a house, which he lets for thirty-eight shillings a year; for want of two shillings more in his yearly income he is no freeholder: and, like the colonists, he is taxed without his consent; is he "an abject slave" on this account? Wild patriotism answers in the affirmative; but impartial men smile and say, What! is British liberty so mean a blessing as to depend upon a couple of shillings? Could a Jew make it turn on a hinge more conVOL. IV.

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temptible than this? O, sir, what a low price does your system indirectly fix upon a jewel, on which you seem to set so immense a value!

Once more: during the last election, myriads of Englishmen were abroad, some upon their travels for their health, and others upon civil, military, or mercantile business; nor had they any more share in the choice of the members of parliament who now tax them, than the Ame rican colonists; and will you aver, sir, that if all these Englishmen were collected, they might constitutionally reform the constitution, and tax themselves by a congress composed of men who stimulate them to dis. content? Will you assert, that such a congress would do well to make laws in opposition to the statutes of the king and parliament? And would you call the members of such a congress loyal subjects, if they raised an army to drive the king's forces out of his own dominions; yea, out

those very provinces where they hold their land by gracious grants of the crown; where they have acquired their wealth under the protection of the mother country; and where the sovereign's forces, which they now endeavour to cut off, have kindly fought their battles.

To come nearer to the point; some years ago, Lord Clive, member for Shrewsbury, went to the East Indies; and Lord Pigot, member for Bridgenorth, is now gone thither. Their estates are immensely large; yet in consequence of their leaving England, the former lord was, and the latter is, taxed without his consent. And will you stand to your absurd doctrine, sir, and infer, that the burgesses of Shrewsbury were, and that those of Bridgenorth are, reduced to a partial, temporary state of slavery, by the emigration of one of their representatives; and that Lord Clive was, and Lord Pigot now is, an absolute slave; because, in consequence of their emigration, the former was, and the latter is, taxed without his consent? If you say that Lord Clive came back to England, and that Lord Pigot may return and tax himself if he please; I reply, this is exactly the case with the colonists. By emigration they are prevented from sharing in the legislative power of the parliament. But let them come back, if they have set their hearts upon legislative honours. The mother country and the parliament house are as open to them as to any free-born Englishman. They may purchase freeholds, they may be made burgesses of corporate towns, they may be chosen members of the house of commons; and some of them, if I mistake not, sit already there. The colonists are then on a level not only with Britons in gene. ral, but with all members of parliament who are abroad. And therefore to demand superior privileges, is to demand rights which no Britons have, and which the members of parliament who go out of Great Britain never thought of, our British nabobs not excepted.

As mountains rise upon mountains among the Alps, so absurdities rise upon absurdities in your system: take some more instances of it. If we believe you, sir, he is an abject slave who is taxed without his consent. Hence follows another absurdity. The day that a bill for an additional land tax to subdue the colonies passes, the knights of a large shire are absent; the one, I suppose, is kept from the house by illness, and the other is called into the country by business or pleasure: neither votes for the bill. Now, sir, are they and the county they represent made slaves by being taxed without their consent? If you reply, that their not opposing the bill implies that they consent to it; I answer, the