438 Mr. Sadler's Speech. ^Oct^ 



ment and society, in language worthy of their rank ; and while with 

 the most powerful hand of our day he strips off the disguises of philoso- 

 phical arrogance and public corruption, pointing out the upward secure 

 path to national honour and glory. 



Gentlemen : — In addressing you upon 

 this occasion, you will expect that I should 

 advert to the terms in which your public 

 invitation was expressed. In doing this, 

 however, I must waive any remarks upon 

 the too flattering manner in which you 

 have been kind enough to allude to my 

 character and talents; further than just tosay, 

 that my character, I hope, will ever be marked 

 by consistency ; and as to my talents, what- 

 ever they may be, (and I regret to say they 

 are humble and limited,) I have freely de- 

 voted them, under the direction of my con- 

 science, to the service of the country ; — a 

 line of conduct which I foresaw would bring 

 upon me the ridicule and abuse of a certain 

 class of speakers and writers, v.ho reserve all 

 their approbation for mercenary and unprin- 

 cipled tergiversation, and all their hatred 

 for the honest and opposite course. I am, 

 however, well content to endure this, cer- 

 tain as I am that such attempts v/iU only 

 tend to bring into more gcneial discussion 

 those principles of policy of which I am an 

 humble advocate, and v.hich must prevail, 

 being, I am -fully satisfied, those of pa- 

 triotism, humanity, and truth. To this 

 policy you have adverted in your invita- 

 tion to me, and especially to that part of it 

 more immediately affecting the interests 

 of this ancient and most respectable town. 

 I shall, therefore, on this occasion, confine 

 myself to shortly discussing some of the 

 most prominent and important topics it in- 

 volves. 



Gentlemen, the ancient and genuine 

 policy of this great country, hke its con- 

 stitution, was not, if I may so express my- 

 self, struck out at a heat. Dictated by 

 necessity, and confirmed by experience, it 

 was the work of successive generations — 

 generations of incomparably greater intel- 

 lect, and, it is to be feared, of far more real 

 patriotism than the present. It was not 

 dictated, perhaps, by hireling critics, or 

 patronised by political pamj hleteers, but it 

 had in the deliberate sanction and suflfrar^es 

 of such names as Bacon, as Locke, as Ad- 

 dison, the signature of immortality — men 

 . who brought to the consideration of the 

 subject not only the broadest lights of 

 reason, but the utmost warmth of bene- 

 volence, and who left nothing to be dis- 

 covered in the fundamental principles of 

 •human policy to the witlings of the day, 

 but the secret of their own conceited igno- 

 rance. That policy, founded upon tl;e cer- 

 tainty of the rich abundance of all things 

 necessary to human existence within oiu: 

 own shores, and of the consequent duty and 

 advantage of developing them, sought from 

 foreign countries those commodities (hap- 

 pily for us, few and comparatively unim- 

 portant) which nature had denied to this. 



at the same time strictly protecting those 

 branches of British industry which could 

 not otherwise have been introduced amongst 

 us, or preserved when established. Now 

 it were most easy to shew that whatever 

 reasons there might have been for the in- 

 troduction of such a system (and they were 

 Buch as will continue to operate in all 

 countries where common sense prevails), 

 such reaK«ns were rendered infinitely more 

 imperative by that course of events v/hich 

 has caused this country to be more heavily 

 taxed than any other, and (thanks to the 

 ■ support of internal industry) long enabled 

 it to dispense the most liberal reward to 

 human labour of any nation upon earth. 

 To allow British labour to be competed 

 with by foreigners in our own market, then 

 is, in reference to the first fact, our taxa- 

 tion, the most dishonest, and in regard to- 

 the second, our comforts, the most cruel 

 policy that ever was ventured upon by any 

 government in the world, to say nothing of 

 its folly. In behalf of the foniier sj'stem I 

 have mentioned names ; I will now make a 

 still more important appeal, namely to facts. 

 Reasonings, by whomsoever urged, may 

 fail ; Experience, never ! Under that sys- 

 tem of policy, and in spite of obstacles the 

 most formidable, the nation increased its 

 wealth, promoted its prosperity, consoUdated 

 its power, and extended its dominion. De- 

 pressions there certainly did occur in the 

 country, but these, which towards the last 

 were plainly traceable to the introduction 

 of parts of the absurd policy nov/ adopted, 

 were, comparatively speaking, slight and 

 temporary, and, above all, partial ; if one 

 Interest suffered, the rest were in a condition 

 to sustain it. The vibrations of the na- 

 tional balance soon subsided into the equir 

 poise of settled and general prosperity. The 

 history of tlie world exhibits not the nation 

 whose advancement was so rapid, and whose 

 prosperity seemed to promise such per- 

 petuit}'. That such was its condition, I 

 appeal to your individual experience. I cite 

 still higher authority. Prosperity was pro- 

 nounced in glowing language from the 

 throne — prosperity was echoed in still more 

 exaggerated terms, and attended with bound- 

 less prouiises of its perpetuity and increase 

 by the minister of the crown. Tliese de- 

 clarations were believed and acted upon by 

 the people, and their faitli has been since 

 imputed to them as their folly and their 

 crime, by some of those even, who put 

 them forth. But they were true, andwoidd 

 have remained so, but for the perverse al- 

 teration, at that moment, of tlie principles 

 of our national poUcy. All innovation. 

 Lord Bacon says, is with injury ; and he 

 must be blind, indeed, that does not see 

 the injury this has occasioned. But by a 



