violation of liberty and law can be excused only by the most
imperious necessity; nor could it be defended on this occasion by
the plea of impending danger or useful example. The legislature
restrained the persons of the Directors, imposed an exorbitant
security for their appearance, and marked their characters with a
previous note of ignominy: they were compelled to deliver, upon
oath, the strict value of their estates; and were disabled from
making any transfer or alienation of any part of their property.
Against a bill of pains and penalties it is the common right of
every subject to be heard by his counsel at the bar: they prayed to
be heard; their prayer was refused; and their oppressors, who
required no evidence, would listen to no defence. It had been at
first proposed that one-eighth of their respective estates should be
allowed for the future support of the Directors; but it was
speciously urged, that in the various shades of opulence and guilt
such an unequal proportion would be too light for many, and for some
might possibly be too heavy. The character and conduct of each man
were separately weighed; but, instead of the calm solemnity of a
judicial inquiry, the fortune and honour of three and thirty
Englishmen were made the topic of hasty conversation, the sport of a
lawless majority; and the basest member of the committee, by a
malicious word or, a silent vote, might indulge his general spleen
or personal animosity. Injury was aggravated by insult, and insult
was embittered by pleasantry. Allowances of twenty pounds, or one
shilling, were facetiously moved. A vague report that a Director
had formerly been concerned in another project, by which some
unknown persons had lost their money, was admitted as a proof of his
actual guilt. One man was ruined because he had dropped a foolish
speech, that his horses should feed upon gold; another because he
was grown so proud, that, one day at the Treasury, he had refused a