Society for the Reformation of Manners Society would pay others to bring prosecutions, or bring prosecutions on its own account. A prominent supporter of the Society was John Gonson, Justice of the Peace and Chairman of the Quarter Sessions for the City of Westminster for 50 years in the early 18th century. He was noted for his enthusiasm for raiding brothels and for passing harsh sentences, and was depicted twice in William Hogarth's "A Harlot's Progress" series of paintings and engravings. In around 1770, the Society denounced Covent Garden as: The Society sought and gained the patronage of both Church and Crown: John Tillotson, the Archbishop
A Harlot's Progress of six prints to subscribers for a Guinea. Pirate copies of the engravings were soon in circulation, and Hogarth procured a 1735 Act of Parliament (8 Geo. II. cap. 13) to prohibit the practice. Soon after, Hogarth published his second series of satirical and moralistic images, "A Rake's Progress", followed ten years later by "Marriage à-la-mode". The original paintings were destroyed in a fire at Fonthill House in 1755, the country house of William Beckford (1709–1770), a politician and father of William Thomas Beckford (1 October 1760 – 2 May 1844) builder of Fonthill Abbey in Wiltshire. The original plates