Abstract liberty, like other mere abstractions, is not to be
found. Liberty inheres in some sensible object; and every nation has
formed to itself some favorite point, which by way of eminence becomes the
criterion of their happiness. It happened, you know, Sir, that the great
contests for freedom in this country were from the earliest times chiefly
upon the question of taxing. Most of the contests in the ancient
commonwealths turned primarily on the right of election of magistrates; or
on the balance among the several orders of the state. The question of
money was not with them so immediate. But in England it was otherwise. On
this point of taxes the ablest pens, and most eloquent tongues, have been
exercised; the greatest spirits have acted and suffered. In order to give
the fullest satisfaction concerning the importance of this point, it was
not only necessary for those who in argument defended the excellence of
the English Constitution to insist on this privilege of granting money as
a dry point of fact, and to prove that the right had been acknowledged in
ancient parchments and blind usages to reside in a certain body called a
House of Commons. They went much farther; they attempted to prove, and
they succeeded, that in theory it ought to be so, from the particular
nature of a House of Commons as an immediate representative of the people,
whether the old records had delivered this oracle or not.
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