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Memoirs of Henry Hunt, Esq. — Volume 3 by Henry Hunt
page 50 of 472 (10%)
do, any more than he has with ours. We are to look to his conduct as a
public man, and, if he serve us in that capacity, he is entitled to our
gratitude. Suppose, for instance, the plague were in Bristol, and the
only physician, who had skill and courage to put a stop to its ravages,
was separated from his wife and living with the wife of another man;
would you refuse his assistance? Would you fling his prescriptions
into the kennel? Would the canting Messrs. Mills and Elton and Walker
exclaim, "no! we will have none of your aid; we will die rather than be
saved by you, who have broken your marriage vows!" Would they say this?
No; but would crawl to him, would supplicate him, with tears in their
eyes. And yet, suffer me to say, Gentlemen, that such a physician in a
plague would not be more necessary in Bristol than such a man as Mr.
Hunt now is; and that the family affairs of a Member of Parliament is
no more a matter of concern with his constituents than are the family
affairs of a physician a matter of concern with his patients. When an
important service had been received from either, it would be pleasanter
for the benefited party to reflect that the party conferring the benefit
was happy in his family; but, if the case were otherwise, to suppose
the benefit less real, or the party conferring it entitled to less
gratitude, is something too monstrously absurd to be entertained by any
man of common sense.

The remainder of my subject I must reserve for another Letter, and in
the mean while, I am, Gentlemen, your sincere friend, Wm. COBBETT.
_Botley, July 27, 1812._

By the insertion of these letters, which were published at the time,
I shall give the reader a pretty clear insight into the whole of my
exertions at that period. My doing this will show that I entertained and
avowed exactly the same principles of politics at that moment which I do
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