406 DEFENCE OF QUEEN CAROLINE. [1820. 



But we never could be certain of this proving decisive 

 with both Houses ; and it assuredly never would have 

 been sufficient to make the King give up the bill. He 

 knew that all the facts of his conduct with Lady Jer- 

 sey and others were universally known in society, and 

 he cared little for their being proved at the bar of the 

 Lords. When I said that it might be my painful 

 duty to bring forward what would involve the country 

 in confusion, I was astonished that everybody should 

 have conceived recrimination to be all I intended. 

 Possibly their attention was confined to this from 

 nothing but recrimination having ever been hinted at, 

 either by us or our supporters in either House, or by 



duty of even uttering one whisper, whether by way of attack or by way 

 of insinuation, against the conduct of her illustrious husband but that it 

 rather prescribes to me, for the present, silence upon this great and pain- 

 ful head of the case, I solemnly assure your Lordships, that but for this 

 conviction, my lips on that branch would NOT be closed ; for, in discre- 

 tionally abandoning the exercise of the power which I feel I have, in 

 postponing for the present the statement of that case of which I am 

 possessed, I feel confident that I am waiving a right which I possess, and 

 abstaining from the use of materials which are mine. And let it not be 

 thought, my Lords, that if either now I did conceive, or if hereafter I 

 should so far be disappointed in my expectation that the case against me 

 will fail, as to feel it necessary to exercise that right, let no man 

 vainly suppose, that not only I, but that any the youngest member of 

 the profession would hesitate one moment in the fearless discharge of 

 his paramount duty. I once before took leave to remind your Lordships 

 which was unnecessary, but there are many whom it may be needful to 

 remind that an advocate, by the sacred duty which he owes his client, 

 knows, in the discharge of that oflice, but one person in the world, THAT 

 CLIENT AND NONE OTHER. To save that client by all expedient means 

 to protect*that client at all hazards and costs to all others, and among 

 others to himself is the highest and most unquestioned of his duties ; 

 and he must not regard the alarm, the suffering, the torment, the 

 destruction, which he may bring upon any other. Nay, separating 

 even the duties of a patriot from those of an advocate, and casting them, 

 if need be, to the wind, he must go on reckless of the consequences, if 

 his fate it should unhappily be, to involve his country in confusion for 

 his client's protection !" 



