National Gazette

A debate took place in the English House of Commons on the 30th of April, relative to a parliamentary reform. Messrs. Grey, Pitt, Fox, and Burke were the principal speakers on this occasion. In the course of the debate Mr. Paine and his pamphlets on the Rights of Man were brought into view. Mr. Fox considered them as not tending to a reform, but to a total alteration of the British government & constitution, and that "Mr. Paine's production was a libel on the government"--Mr. Burke pronounced Paine's pamphlet "a libel of the most infamous kind against the British constitution, and that the clubs and societies who recommended it to be read by the people, were the avowed enemies of the constitution," &c. It is somewhat surprising that both Fox and Burke should be ignorant that Mr. Paine is their countryman, and only a citizen of America. Fox expressly calls him a native of America; and Burke styles him "a stranger (which in one sense is true) who knows just enough of all countries to confuse and distract all, without being of the least use to any.' Mr. Fox calls the Rights of Man a libel; "but it will be remembered that truth itself may be a libel in England."