ABSTRACT
It is the Remark of an ingenious Foreigner, after an attentive Consideration of our Government and Constitution, that the People of England are Free once in Seven Years.1 It is plain that, in this Observation, he confines his View merely to that Time when the public Trust, committed to the Care of our Representatives, is annihilated; and that he is of Opinion, as soon as it becomes again vested, the Constituents have transferred to the elected, so long as they continue their Delegates, all that share of Liberty, which, however they may flatter themselves, as Englishmen, with the Idea of Possessing, is, from that Moment, yielded up, without Possibility of recal, to those Persons in whom they think / proper to confide. If this political Opinion be well-founded, as I have little Doubt that in Theory it is, how much does it behove every Member of the Community to look well to these his dearest Interests, which must be consigned to the Disposal of such Persons as he shall depute his political Executors and Administrators: For, however the Doctrine of Tests and Instructions may lead Men to imagine that the constitutional Existence of the People should be prolonged during the whole Continuance of a Parliament, yet the most zealous Advocates of these popular Tenets must confess, that it is equally impracticable and inconsistent with the Idea of a well-governed Common-wealth to engage the Majority of its Members in public Disquisitions, which require the full Vigour of a well-informed Mind, unincumbered with the Cares of those innumerable Occupations that engross the Heads and employ the Hands of the Bulk of its Inhabitants.
