Volume 1

Microcosm of London / [Anon].

Date:
[1808-1811]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Microcosm of London / [Anon]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    191/248 page 179
    artfully collected and carefully hoarded, were dissipated in ridiculous pageants, criminal pleasures, or expeditions foolishly employed: money must therefore be raised, and to this end the people were again consulted, and for some time cajoled. Wolsey, the crafty minister, first obtained a considerable sum under the title of a benevolence, which, to the circumstance of its being an extortion, superadded the mortification of being considered as a free gift. But this re- source being exhausted, the king was obliged again to address himself to the representatives of the people, who only granted half the supplies demanded; they even went so far as to refuse to permit Wolsey to be heard in the house upon the subject, having resolved. That none could be permitted to sit or argue there, but such as had been elected members. Even when the spirit of freedom has been extinguished, the tamest subjects have been found to resist an unusual attack upon their property, particularly when insult has accompanied injury; and thus a feeling of national honour, and a regard for public liberty, have sometimes arisen out of the less honourable sense of private interest. But whatever may have been the causes that produced it, we cannot but admire the constancy with which the commons, even during this reign, vindicated their right to refuse subsidies; a right which was destined to prove the instrument of their own preservation, and also of the liberties of the people. In this respect they seem to have departed from the servile obedience to the will of the crown, which in other respects governed their proceedings; particularly in that “ amazing heap of wild and new-fangled treasons,” which during his reign disgraced the statute books of this kingdom; laws, respecting which the most extraordinary A a 2
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