Some benefit he actually received from this privilege. These
are plain, obvious, natural reasons for his conduct. I believe they are
the true, and the only true ones.
They who justify the frequent interruptions, which at length wholly
disabled him from proceeding, attribute their conduct to a very
different interpretation of his motives. They say, that, through
corruption, or malice, or folly, he was acting his part in a plot to
make his friend Mr. Fox pass for a republican, and thereby to prevent
the gracious intentions of his sovereign from taking effect, which at
that time had begun to disclose themselves in his favor.[8] This is a
pretty serious charge. This, on Mr. Burke's part, would be something
more than mistake, something worse than formal irregularity. Any
contumely, any outrage, is readily passed over, by the indulgence which
we all owe to sudden passion. These things are soon forgot upon
occasions in which all men are so apt to forget themselves. Deliberate
injuries, to a degree, must be remembered, because they require
deliberate precautions to be secured against their return.
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