26 the Informer. , '^an. 4. 



ing the money that is nectfsary for tl>€ purposes of 

 good govejyinient, without producing evils that 

 pouteract the design of all good government, 

 Ihould be called a good and necefsary law. 



The end of all good government is to promote 

 the peace, to secure the property, and to protect 

 the person of every subject of the state, from suf- 

 fering unjust annoyance from any one. The laws 

 that promote these objects are good. Those that 

 have an opposite tendency are bad, and ought to 

 be reprobated. 



A law, therefore, which imposes a tax upon the 

 subject, may be a very good law ; but if, under 

 the pretext of levying this tax, it subjects the 

 property of any subject to unjust seizure, and 

 his person to dangers and repeated alarms, it is 

 cruel, unjust and opprefsive : It can no longer be 

 deemed a wise regulation of government, but an 

 effusion of insanity and -ignorance, if not of des- 

 potism and cruelty. 



How it fhould have happened, that in a country 

 whose inhabitants have ever exprefsed a great jea- 

 lousy about their personal freedom, a set of laws 

 fliould have been deliberately enacted, and for a 

 long time patiently submitted to, that are so di-. 

 rectly subversive of every principle of good go- 

 vernment, as the general tenor of the exdise laws 

 in Britain are, it would be difficult to conceive. 

 This difficulty, however, disappears before the 

 man of extensive observation. He knows that 

 habit gradually gets the better of judgement in 

 every case 5 and tliat designing men, relying on 



I 



