"On the occasion of the removal of the subsidy to the excise tax on transport fuels"

 

"EXCI'SE. n.s. [accijs, Dutch; excisum, Latin.] A hateful tax levied upon commodities, and adjudged not by the common judges of property, but wretches hired by those to whom excise is paid."

~ from Samuel Johnson's 1755 Dictionary of the English Language