questionably be for the permanent benefit of the country, and contribute essentially to the due administration of its affairs, if the rest were to be banished from its councils and presence for ever.

As in the physical frame one disease ordinarily leads on to or is the parent of another, so is it also in the body politic, where many of the most dangerous diseases by which it is oppressed are clearly to be traced to the disordered state of its representative system. More especially in the department of administrative government, and in every branch of it, are the effects of this evil exhibited. In the distribution of promotion, what might aptly be termed "the scrambling system" has been established, closely corresponding with the popular election system which is pursued in the choice of a representative. The principle of the scrambling system is that the preference of a candidate for any official post should be decided, not by the merits of the individual, or his fitness for the office, but by the amount of political interest which he possesses, or the power that he has of exciting an agitation on his behalf. Even where the most important offices have to be filled, the personal influence of the applicant, or his connection with the ministry, instead of the consideration of the public benefit, are what too often determine his selection. This system, however, which pervades and corrupts the whole

administrative department of the State, originates entirely in the anomalous condition of the representative system. Thus, a member of Parliament depending for his election upon the will of his constituents, is obliged to conciliate their favour; and in the disposal of the preferment entrusted to him, or which he has the interest to obtain, the influence of the applicant among the constituency, and not his peculiar fitness for the office, is what in most cases really determines his appointment. The same system, originating with the constituent bodies, is carried on through all departments of the State; and as the members of the representative body are pressed by their constituents, so do they in turn press the ministry, and the scrambling system is made applicable alike to the disposal of every office, however important, that may happen to become vacant.

The remedy for this evil can be only effected by commencing at the fountain head. Reform the representative system, and administrative corruption will soon cease.

As regards the qualification required of members of Parliament, this ought to consist in all cases of a certain amount of property, so as to give the representative an actual stake in the country; for though returned by one interest only, he is empowered to legislate respecting them all. It is

QUALIFICATION OF MEMBERS OF PARLIAMENT. 69

also important that this qualification should be a real one, and that no fictitious claim should, as at present, on any account be allowed. But it should be also of a reasonable amount only. An interest to the extent of 1000l. in land for a county member, or of 1000%. in personal property for a city or borough member, appears sufficient for the purpose.

This qualification ought, however, to be of a mixed character, so as to ensure the possession of a certain degree of intelligence and information, and moral endowment, as well as property. Gross immorality ought, equally with insolvency, to disqualify an individual for the office of legislator. A State should no more to be ruled by its profligate members, than a man should be influenced by his bad passions and corrupt inclinations. On the other hand, some of our greatest statesmen have been but poor men. Burke lived mainly on his pension; and Pitt died almost a pauper, and the nation generously and gratefully paid his debts. The main advantages of having wealthy rulers in a State are that by this means they have much at stake; and that not only are they less likely to be influenced by corrupt motives, either as regards their conduct in office, or their efforts to hold it, but they are more exempt from the suspicion of any such weakness.

The House of Lords, though not elected by the nation, is nevertheless at present the real representative of its great and leading interests, especially of its virtue, its intelligence, its loyalty, and its wealth. In this respect its importance to the State and to all classes is immense. That the aristocracy, as a whole, do fairly and efficiently represent the interests of virtue and intelligence, as well as those of property, is not only proved by their character and conduct as a body, but is in nothing more strikingly exemplified than by the severity of the sarcasms which are ever wont to be hurled against those individual members of their community who occasionally deviate from a correct course. If it was not for the rarity of these deviations, and for the strong and marked contrast which they present to the general conduct of the whole body, but little notice would be taken of them, and they would fail to excite any particular comment.

A peerage was conferred not long ago, on the granting of which it was authoritatively announced that the object of Her Majesty in ennobling the individual thus honoured was to afford in the Upper House a representation of a branch of the great manufacturing interest of the country. But if the principle of representation is thus acknowledged to exist in the House of Lords as well as in the Commons, surely the higher interests to which I have alluded, and which have been of late years

so depressed, ought fully to be represented in that assembly which is their peculiar province, while those which have no direct or immediate connection whatever with that assembly are admitted to representation there. And if the commercial interest, which is in certain respects antagonistic to that of intelligence, is to obtain its share of representation in the House of Lords, it is, doubtless, but a due adjustment of interests to extend the interest of intelligence in the House of Commons.

It has, however, been urged of late, that the wealth of certain members of the aristocracy has so declined, that they can no longer be regarded as having that stake in the country which, as hereditary legislators, holding the rank they do, they ought to possess. Indeed, Sir Thomas Smith, in his "Commonwealth of England,"* observes of the nobility, after specifying the amount of property necessary to be possessed by a person on his being raised to any particular rank in the peerage, that "if they decay by excesse, and be not able to maintayne the honour (as Senatores Romani were amoti Senatu), so sometimes they are not admitted the Upper House in the Parliament, although they keepe the name of Lord still." may, therefore, be fairly submitted to that illustrious body, and to the nation generally, which is

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