The bill passed the Commons and went up to the House of Lords. To the credit of the Peers it has to be said that they received it more doubtfully, and were slower to admit the certainty of its blessings than the members of the representative chamber had been. Lord North and Gray condemned it as not only making way for, but {191} actually countenancing and authorizing "the fraudulent and pernicious practice of stock-jobbing." The Duke of Wharton declared that "the artificial and prodigious rise of the South Sea stock was a dangerous bait, which might decoy many unwary people to their ruin, and allure them, by a false prospect of gain, to part with what they had got by their labor and industry to purchase imaginary riches." Lord Cowper said that the bill, "like the Trojan horse, was ushered in and received with great pomp and acclamations of joy, but was contrived for treachery and destruction." Lord Sunderland, however, spoke warmly in favor of the bill, and contended that "they who countenanced the scheme of the South Sea Company had nothing in their view but the easing the nation of part of that heavy load of debt it labored under;" and argued that the scheme would enable the directors of the Company at once to pay off the debt, and to secure large dividends to their share-holders. The Lords decided on admitting the South Sea Company's Trojan horse. Eighty-three votes were in favor of the bill, and only seventeen against it. The bill was read a third time on April 7th, and received the Royal assent on June 11th. The King's speech, delivered that day at the close of the session, declared that "the good foundation you have prepared this session for the payment of the national debts, and the discharge of a great part of them without the least violation of the public faith, will, I hope, strengthen more and more the union I desire to see among all my subjects, and make our friendship yet more valuable to all foreign Powers."