152

HISTORY OP ENGLAND.

cri.U'.

xxiv.

J6!)S.

advanced than that of the great majority of the electors ofthe kingdom. A burgess in a country town, or a fortyshilling freeholder in an agricultural district, then knewlittle about public affairs except what he could learn fromreading the Postman at the alehouse, and from hearing,on the 30th of January, the 29th of May or the 5th ofNovember, a sermon in which questions of state were dis-cussed with more zeal than sense. But the citizen of West-minster passed his days in the vicinity of the palace, of thepublic offices, of the houses of parliament, of the courts oflaw. He was familiar with the faces and voices of ministers,senators and judges. In anxious times he walked in thegreat Hall to pick up news. When there was an importanttrial, he looked into the Court of King’s Bench, and heardCowper and Harcourt contending, and Holt moderatingbetween them. When there ivas an interesting debate inthe House of Commons, he could at least squeeze himselfinto the lobby or the Court of Bequests, and hear who hadspoken, and how and what were the numbers on the divi-sion. He lived in a region of coffeehouses, of booksellers’shops, of clubs, of pamphlets, of newspapers, of theatreswhere poignant allusions to the most exciting questions ofthe day perpetually called forth applause and hisses, ofpulpits, where the doctrines of the High Churchman, of theLow Churchman, of the Nonjuror, of the Nonconformist,were explained and defended every Sunday by the mosteloquent and learned divines of every persuasion. At thattime, therefore, the metropolitan electors were, as a class