impeachment, and in the Court of Parliament. Your Lordships have already
given judgment against six upon this impeachment, and it is warranted by
the precedents in Parliament; therefore we insist that the articles are
good in substance."

Mr. Cowper.--"They [the counsel] cannot but know that the usages of
Parliaments are part of the laws of the land, although they differ in
many instances from the Common Law, as practised in the inferior courts,
in point of form. My Lords, if the Commons, in preparing articles of
impeachment, should govern themselves by precedents of indictments, in
my humble opinion they would depart from the ancient, nay, the constant,
usage and practice of Parliament. It is well known that the form of an
impeachment has very little resemblance to that of an indictment; and I
believe the Commons will endeavor to preserve the difference, by
adhering to their own precedents."

Sir William Thomson.--"We must refer to the forms and proceedings in the
Court of Parliament, and which must be owned to be part of the law of
the land. It has been mentioned already to your Lordships, that the
precedents in impeachments are not so nice and precise in form as in the
inferior courts; and we presume your Lordships will be governed by the
forms of your own court, (especially forms that are not essential to
justice,) as the courts below are by theirs: which courts differ one
from the other in many respects as to their forms of proceedings, and
the practice of each court is esteemed as the law of that court."

The Attorney-General in reply maintained his first doctrine. "There is
no uncertainty; in it _that can be to the prejudice of the prisoner_: we
insist, it is according to _the forms of Parliament_: he has pleaded to
it, and your Lordships have found him guilty."