And he
argued, farther, that, as many of the actions specified in these bills
as seditious or treasonable were by many lawyers considered capable of
being reached by statutes already existing, though not universally
understood, it was "humane, not cruel, to remove doubts, and to prevent
men from being ensnared by the ambiguity of old laws."
And in May, 1794, he brought in another bill, founded on the report of a
secret committee which, in compliance with a royal message, the House of
Commons had appointed to investigate the proceedings and objects of
certain societies which were known to exist in different parts of the
kingdom. In obedience to a Secretary of State's warrant, founded on
sworn informations, their books and papers had been seized, and, having
been sealed up, were now laid before the House, with the report of the
committee that they proved that several of the societies which they
named had, ever since the end of the year 1791, been uniformly pursuing
a settled design for the subversion of the constitution; one society, in
particular, having approved a plan for assembling a Convention, in
imitation of the French Assembly sitting under that title, in order to
overturn the established government, and to wrest from the Parliament
the power which the constitution placed in its hands.
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