At a great meeting of delegates, from all parts of the kingdom, and particularly from the North, and from Scotland, held at the Crown and Anchor, to settle the sort of Reform that should be adopted by the people, Major Cartwright and Mr. Cobbett proposed _to limit the suffrage to householders_, for two reasons-- first, upon the plea now exploded, of the _impracticability_ of every man enjoying freedom or universal suffrage; and secondly, for the purpose of joining and still clinging to Sir Francis Burdett, without whose name and co-operation, it was contended that no plan of reform could be carried into effect. I, however, stood boldly up for the great and just principle of universal suffrage, and moved, as an amendment to the motion made by Mr. Cobbett, that instead of _householder suffrage_, universal suffrage should be substituted. After a long and animated debate, my amendment was carried by a vote of sixty; three hands only being held up against it. For this uncompromising, for this determined support of the principles of universal suffrage, in opposition to the _householder_ plan of Sir Francis Burdett, I have ever since been pursued by the vindictive hostility, both openly and covertly, not only of the Baronet's Rump Committee, but of the whole of the Burdett faction, who have, in conjunction with the base and hypocritical Whig faction, been ten times more virulent against me, than even the Tory or Government faction. It may be said, that this is a singular and long digression, and that I am forestalling my history. It is very true; but I deem it necessary to repeat and reiterate the foregoing circumstances, so that a great number of honest and truly excellent Reformers may be able clearly to account for some part of my conduct, which may hitherto have appeared inexplicable. Thousands of very worthy friends of liberty, must have been puzzled and staggered by the violent attacks and calumnies that have been levelled at me, in those public prints that have been generally understood to be the staunch supporters of the principles of freedom; but if they will look back, and narrowly examine into the objects and views of these public prints, they will find that they have been merely the vehicles, by which the Burdettite faction have directed their envenomed shafts against me. Thousands of very sincere and honest friends of liberty have been and are puzzled, to understand how it is, that I have met with such cowardly and unmanly opposition at the _Rump Westminster Dinners_, at the Crown and Anchor; and thousands of equally worthy and honourable men, are disposed to question my pretensions to public favour, upon the ground of the beastly and factious opposition which I have some time experienced from the Whig Waithmanites, at the Common Halls, in the City of London. But as I go along, I will undertake to show the cause of that opposition, and expose the motives of that little city faction, as clear as day-light. Nothing can, indeed, be more plain than this fact, which is, that these factions, one and all, are opposed to the principles of universal Liberty. They have all of them their little, petty, selfish objects to obtain, and in the pursuit of them, they know their greatest obstacle to be, that they cannot any longer make the people their dupes and tools; and they know too, that no man has been so zealously and so perseveringly instrumental as I have been, to keep the people steady in one common pursuit--that of obtaining something for themselves--that of struggling for the interest of the whole community; and they know and feel that nothing could ever warp me from my duty to the public; that I could never be bamboozled nor muzzled, nor silenced, nor bribed, by any one of these factions; and this, this it is that has roused against me their rage and their hostility; and in proportion as I have exposed their sophistry so has their malignity increased. Finding that they could neither answer nor controvert my principles, nor put me down, they have been base enough to resort to slander, and to the most wanton and barefaced falsehoods, which they have trumped up to blacken me. The separation from my wife was a subject that they never failed to urge against me, after having tortured it into a thousand aggravated shapes; not one of which was true. If, however, I would but have joined any one of these factions--would have followed the example of Sir Francis Burdett, and deserted the great mass of the people, by going over to, and joining even the _shopkeeper_ or _householder_ faction, I might have deserted my wife, and left her to starve, with impunity.