as I do with all possible earnestness, all communion with the actors in
that triumph, or with the admirers of it. When I assert anything else,
as concerning the people of England, I speak from observation, _not from
authority_."

To say, then, that the book did not contain the sentiments of their
party is not to contradict the author or to clear themselves. If the
party had denied his doctrines to be the current opinions of the
majority in the nation, they would have put the question on its true
issue. There, I hope and believe, his censurers will find, on the trial,
that the author is as faithful a representative of the general sentiment
of the people of England, as any person amongst them can be of the ideas
of his own party.

The French Revolution can have no connection with the objects of any
parties in England formed before the period of that event, unless they
choose to imitate any of its acts, or to consolidate any principles of
that Revolution with their own opinions. The French Revolution is no
part of their original contract. The matter, standing by itself, is an
open subject of political discussion, like all the other revolutions
(and there are many) which have been attempted or accomplished in our
age. But if any considerable number of British subjects, taking a
factious interest in the proceedings of France, begin publicly to
incorporate themselves for the subversion of nothing short of the
_whole_ Constitution of this kingdom,--to incorporate themselves for the
utter overthrow of the body of its laws, civil and ecclesiastical, and
with them of the whole system of its manners, in favor of the new
Constitution and of the modern usages of the French nation,--I think no
party principle could bind the author not to express his sentiments
strongly against such a faction. On the contrary, he was perhaps bound