the houfe to determine on Tome future occafion, after that 
night, if the lottery fhouid ever again form part of the ways 
and means of the year. It fhouid not, however, be taken 
for granted, becaufe the guards againft improper practices 
in the lottery had once failed, that they muft always fail. 
He was fatisfied, it was not to the lotteries, but to the 
infurance , that the objection lay. Ke did not fay, that 
fora revenue of 300,000!. a-year, the houfe ought to give 
their fandtion to any thing immoral, or productive of evil; 
but, at the fame time, he was not for abandoning a finan¬ 
cial refource of this kind, without trying whether fome 
meafure might not be devifed for remedying the evils re- 
fulting from it. 
Mr. Wilberforce faid, that infurance was not the only 
evil of lotteries. By dividing tickets into /mail flares, a 
fpirit of gambling was difieminated, which was attended 
with the molt ferious evils to the lower dalles. As to the 
produdlivenefsof the lottery, it had dwindled from 6oo,oool. 
to 300,0001. and he thought that the fum which appeared 
to be facrificed to morality would be far more than re¬ 
paid otherwife. By fupprefiing lotteries, many would 
remain to enrich the country with their labours, whom 
the lottery would reduce into habits of idlenefs and ex¬ 
travagance. 
Sir Samuel Romilly was extremely forry to hear the 
Chancellor of the Exchequer treating the cafe of the lot¬ 
tery as a matter falling of courfe to form part of the 
fervice of the year. He (fir S. R.) had formerly attempted 
an improvement on the criminal law of the country. If 
the houfe could pafs a law to do away temptations to com¬ 
mit crimes, that would be the moll: effectual mode of im¬ 
proving the criminal code. But what were they now' 
about to do? To pafs a law to allow and encourage 
crimes, by encouraging the temptation to commit them. 
The molt aCtive agents were employed to feduce perlons 
to the commifiion of the crimes to which lotteries gave 
birth ; and the mod ingenious paragraphs in newfpapers 
were invented for the furtherance of this purpofe. He 
could point out paragraphs holding out lures to appren¬ 
tice-boys to embark in this trade, and to begin with their 
Chriftmas-boxes, under the aflurance, that by perfeverance 
they would foon ride in their coaches. Thefe practices 
were now fpread from the' capital to every village in the 
kingdom. 
The refolutions were agreed to, and ordered to be re¬ 
ported. Of courfe, the queftion was again agitated, when 
Mr. Wharton brought up the report, on the 18th of May. 
It would be fuperfluous, even did our limits admit, to 
enter much farther into the arguments againft lotteries, 
which are reducible to tw'o ; namely, that they tended to 
encourage vice, with its pernicious confequences both to 
the individual and the ftate ; and that the profits arifing 
from them to the public had dwindled to the 1 mail fum 
of 300,0001. We cannot refrain, however, from extract¬ 
ing a Ihort paragraph from Mr. Whitbread’s fpeech againft 
lotteries, as it contains a very curious faCt : “There is 
a fociety exifting for the Supprefiion of Vice; one of the 
rules of which is, that no man fhall be admitted unlefs a 
member of the e/lablifed church. This regulation will cer¬ 
tainly be highly relifned by the 110-popery gentlemen. 
But, if they let their faces againft minor offences, and yet 
countenance the lottery, it will be like calling out feven 
devils from a man, when a legion of other devils were 
immediately to enter.” He believed that there was not a 
fin pointed at in the decalogue, which was not encou¬ 
raged by the lottery. 
In defence of the lottery, it was obferved by fir Thomas 
Turton, that the fum accruing to government from the 
annual lottery, was not, as had been ftated, 300,000k only, 
but, together with damps, 700,000k—The Chancellor of 
the Exchequer faid, that it had been argued by Mr. Whit¬ 
bread, that, if this fpecies of gambling were put an end 
to, it would ftop all kinds of vice. This was draining 
the argument too far. The circumftances of mifery that 
Jiad been alluded to, arofe not out of lotteries, but 
from infurances ; and could never be the effeCt even of in- 
lurance, if the lottery was elratcn in one day —a period to 
which he propofed to confine it in future. 
On adivifion of the houfe, there appeared—for lotteries 
go, againft them 36. After this, the refolution of the 
houfe in favour of a lottery was paffed through the re¬ 
maining ftages into a law.—The limiting the drawing of 
each lottery to one or two days, which has been the prac¬ 
tice fince this time, has certainly ieflened the evil of them ; 
but ftill it will be urged, that the love of money, the hope 
of riling into a better fituation by the benefit of chance, 
and the lures held out by thole whofe interelt it is to fell 
the tickets, are incentives too powerful not to be dan¬ 
gerous in a large community. Gambling is a vice ter 
which fo many of all dalles are blindly propenfe, that the 
entire extermination of that hydra would have been a day 
of triumph for many who mourn the folly of their rela¬ 
tions and friends labouring under the difeafe, and even 
for thofe, who, although they are affedted by the mania, 
yet, in their lucid moments, deteft the very paffion which 
drives them on to try their fortune, and deprecate the pangs 
of difappointment they feel after the irretrievable lofs of 
their too-eafily ventured property. 
The principal fubjedt of attention and debate that oc¬ 
cupied the houfe of commons for the remainder of this 
feflion, was the great queftion of parliamentary reform. 
It is a curious fadt, that, whenever a moment of reft feems 
to approach, after long and laborious difculfions, reform is 
taken up as an everlaiting order of the day ; and appears 
as if brought on purpofe to fill up a chafm in the records 
of the houle, and to keep the minifters conftantly on the 
alert. 
A plan was firft propofed by Mr. Madocks; but, al¬ 
though amended and re-amended, fell to the ground with 
its appendages, chiefly becaufe it included a charge of 
parliamentary corruption againft lord Caftiereagh and Mr. 
Perceval.—Then a plan and a motion from Mr. Curwen, 
long debated upon, modified lo as fubfiantially to reverfe 
its original tendency and objedt, in one word, neutra¬ 
lized, and palled at laft. 
The indefatigable champion, fir Francis Burdett, brought 
forward his plan for parliamentary reform ; but even his 
model! and condefcending motion, “that his plan fhouid 
be taken into future conlideration,” was negatived. This 
plan, which coincided very nearly with that propofed thirty 
years ago in the houfe of lords by the late duke of Rich¬ 
mond, was briefly as follows: 1. That freeholders and. 
others, fubjedt to diredt taxation in fupport of the poor, 
the church, and the Hate, be required to eledt members to 
ferve in parliament. 2. That each county be fubdivided 
according to its taxed male population, and each fubdi- 
vifion required to eiedt one reprefentative. 3. That the 
votes be taken in each parilli by the parilh-officers ; and 
that all the cletlions fiould be finifud in one and the fame day . 
4. That the parilh-officers make the return to the Iheriff’s 
court, to be held for that purpofe at ftated periods. 5. That 
parliaments he brought back to a conftitutional duration. 
Thefe few and limple regulations appear to us to form 
a very good ground-work for reform: its effect would be 
to unite property with political right, and abolifh rotten 
boroughs.—Sir James Hall, however, thought that the 
plan amounted to complete and radical revolution. “ It would 
be the ruin of a (hip if you take away her ballad : the bal¬ 
lad of the Britilh Itate-veffd might be fometimes too 
heavy ; but on the whole file proceeded very well in her’ 
courle ; and even the rotten boroughs might ultimately do-a 
great deal of good.'" The minifters and the holders of 
rotten boroughs of courfe agreed in this profound ob- 
fervation; and, on the divifion of the houfe, the num¬ 
bers were, for fir Francis Burdett’s motion 15, againft it 74, 
On the 8th of June, Mr. Whitbread, after a fuitable 
preface, moved a refolution to the following effedt .- “ That 
this houfe will, early in the next feflion of parliament., 
take into its mod ferious confideration, how far it may be 
expedient to provide ioma farther liiaiutioa to the nusi- 
hes? 
