not. But surely that purpose ought to be a wonderfully good one, to
warrant the methods he has taken to compass it. If the facts and
reasonings in this piece are admitted, it is all over with us. The
continuance of our tranquillity depends upon the compassion of our
rivals. Unable to secure to ourselves the advantages of peace, we are at
the same time utterly unfit for war. It is impossible, if this state of
things be credited abroad, that we can have any alliance; all nations
will fly from so dangerous a connection, lest, instead of being
partakers of our strength, they should only become sharers in our ruin.
If it is believed at home, all that firmness of mind, and dignified
national courage, which used to be the great support of this isle
against the powers of the world, must melt away, and fail within us.
In such a state of things can it be amiss if I aim at holding out some
comfort to the nation; another sort of comfort, indeed, than that which
this writer provides for it; a comfort not from its physician, but from
its constitution: if I attempt to show that all the arguments upon which
he founds the decay of that constitution, and the necessity of that
physician, are vain and frivolous? I will follow the author closely in
his own long career, through the war, the peace, the finances, our
trade, and our foreign politics: not for the sake of the particular
measures which he discusses; that can be of no use; they are all
decided; their good is all enjoyed, or their evil incurred: but for the
sake of the principles of war, peace, trade, and finances. These
principles are of infinite moment. They must come again and again under
consideration; and it imports the public, of all things, that those of
its ministers be enlarged, and just, and well confirmed, upon all these
subjects. What notions this author entertains we shall see presently;
notions in my opinion very irrational, and extremely dangerous; and
which, if they should crawl from pamphlets into counsels, and be
realized from private speculation into national measures, cannot fail of
hastening and completing our ruin.
This author, after having paid his compliment to the showy appearances
of the late war in our favor, is in the utmost haste to tell you that
these appearances were _fallacious_, that they were no more than an
_imposition_.--I fear I must trouble the reader with a pretty long
quotation, in order to set before him the more clearly this author's
peculiar way of conceiving and reasoning:
"Happily (the K.) was then advised by ministers, who did not suffer
themselves to be dazzled by the glare of brilliant appearances; but,
knowing them to be _fallacious_, they wisely resolved to profit of their
splendor before our enemies should also _discover the imposition_.--The
increase in the exports was found to have been occasioned chiefly by the
demands of _our own fleets and armies_, and, instead of bringing wealth
to the nation, was to be paid for by oppressive taxes upon the people of
England. While the British seamen were consuming on board our men of war
and privateers, foreign ships and foreign seamen were employed in the
transportation of our merchandise; and the carrying trade, so great a
source of wealth and marine, _was entirely engrossed by the neutral
nations_. The number of British ships annually arriving in our ports was
reduced 1756 sail, containing 92,559 tons, on a medium of the six years'
war, compared with the six years of peace preceding it.--The conquest of
the Havannah had, indeed, stopped the remittance of specie from Mexico
to Spain; but it had not enabled England to seize it: on the contrary,
our merchants suffered by the detention of the galleons, as their
_correspondents in Spain were disabled from paying them for their goods
sent to America. The loss of the trade to Old Spain was a further bar to
an influx of specie_; and the attempt upon Portugal had not only
deprived us of an import of bullion from thence, but the payment of our
troops employed in its defence was a fresh drain opened for the
diminution of our circulating specie.--The high premiums given for new
loans had sunk the price of the old stock near a third of its original
value; so that the purchasers had an obligation from the state to repay
them with an addition of 33 per cent to their capital. Every new loan
required new taxes to be imposed; new taxes must add to the price of our
manufactures, _and lessen their consumption among foreigners_. The decay
of our trade must necessarily _occasion a decrease of the public
revenue_; and a deficiency of our funds must either be made up by fresh
taxes, which would only add to the calamity, or our national credit must
be destroyed, by showing the public creditors the inability of the
nation to repay them their principal money.--Bounties had already been
given for recruits which exceeded the year's wages of the ploughman and
reaper; and as these were exhausted, and _husbandry stood still for want
of hands_, the manufacturers were next to be tempted to quit the anvil
and the loom by higher offers.--_France, bankrupt France, had no such
calamities impending over her; her distresses were great, but they were
immediate and temporary; her want of credit preserved her from a great
increase of debt, and the loss of her ultramarine dominions lessened her
expenses. Her colonies had, indeed, put themselves into the hands of the
English; but the property of her subjects had been preserved by
capitulations, and a way opened for making her those remittances which
the war had before suspended, with as much security as in time of
peace_.--Her armies in Germany had been hitherto prevented from seizing
upon Hanover; but they continued to encamp on the same ground on which
the first battle was fought; and, as it must ever happen from the policy
of that government, _the last troops she sent into the field were
always found to be the best, and her frequent losses only served to fill
her regiments with better soldiers. The conquest of Hanover became
therefore every campaign more probable_.--It is to be noted, that the
French troops received subsistence only, for the last three years of the
war; and that, although large arrears were due to them at its
conclusion, the charge was the less during its continuance."[39]
If any one be willing to see to how much greater lengths the author
carries these ideas, he will recur to the book. This is sufficient for a
specimen of his manner of thinking. I believe one reflection uniformly
obtrudes itself upon every reader of these paragraphs. For what purpose,
in any cause, shall we hereafter contend with France? Can we ever
flatter ourselves that we shall wage a more successful war? If, on our
part, in a war the most prosperous we ever carried on, by sea and by
land, and in every part of the globe, attended with the unparalleled
circumstance of an immense increase of trade and augmentation of
revenue; if a continued series of disappointments, disgraces, and
defeats, followed by public bankruptcy, on the part of France; if all
these still leave her a gainer on the whole balance, will it not be
downright frenzy in us ever to look her in the face again, or to contend
with her any, even the most essential points, since victory and defeat,
though by different ways, equally conduct us to our ruin? Subjection to
France without a struggle will indeed be less for our honor, but on
every principle of our author it must be more for our advantage.
According to his representation of things, the question is only
concerning the most easy fall. France had not discovered, our statesman
tells us, at the end of that war, the triumphs of defeat, and the
resources which are derived from bankruptcy. For my poor part, I do not
wonder at their blindness. But the English ministers saw further. Our
author has at length let foreigners also into the secret, and made them
altogether as wise as ourselves. It is their own fault if (_vulgato
imperii arcano_) they are imposed upon any longer. They now are apprised
of the sentiments which the great candidate for the government of this
great empire entertains; and they will act accordingly. They are taught
our weakness and their own advantages.
He tells the world,[40] that if France carries on the war against us in
Germany, every loss she sustains contributes to the achievement of her
conquest. If her armies are three years unpaid, she is the less
exhausted by expense. If her credit is destroyed, she is the less
oppressed with debt. If her troops are cut to pieces, they will by her
policy (and a wonderful policy it is) be improved, and will be supplied
with much better men. If the war is carried on in the colonies, he tells
them[41] that the loss of her ultramarine dominions lessens her
expenses, and insures her remittances:--
Per damna, per cædes, ab ipso
Ducit opes animumque ferro.
If so, what is it we can do to hurt her?--it will be all an
_imposition_, all _fallacious_. Why, the result must be,--
Occidit, occidit
Spes omnis, et fortuna nostri
Nominis.
The only way which the author's principles leave for our escape, is to
reverse our condition into that of France, and to take her losing cards
into our hands. But though his principles drive him to it, his politics
will not suffer him to walk on this ground. Talking at our ease and of
other countries, we may bear to be diverted with such speculations; but
in England we shall never be taught to look upon the annihilation of our
trade, the ruin of our credit, the defeat of our armies, and the loss of
our ultramarine dominions (whatever the author may think of them), to be
the high road to prosperity and greatness.
The reader does not, I hope, imagine that I mean seriously to set about
the refutation of these uningenious paradoxes and reveries without
imagination. I state them only that we may discern a little in the
questions of war and peace, the most weighty of all questions, what is
the wisdom of those men who are held out to us as the only hope of an
expiring nation. The present ministry is indeed of a strange character:
at once indolent and distracted. But if a ministerial system should be
formed, actuated by such maxims as are avowed in this piece, the vices
of the present ministry would become their virtues; their indolence
would be the greatest of all public benefits, and a distraction that
entirely defeated every one of their schemes would be our only security
from destruction.
To have stated these reasonings is enough, I presume, to do their
business. But they are accompanied with facts and records, which may
seem of a little more weight. I trust, however, that the facts of this
author will be as far from bearing the touchstone, as his arguments. On
a little inquiry, they will be found as great an imposition as the
successes they are meant to depreciate; for they are all either false
or fallaciously applied; or not in the least to the purpose for which
they are produced.
First the author, in order to support his favorite paradox, that our
possession of the French colonies was of no detriment to France, has
thought proper to inform us, that[42] "they put themselves into the
hands of the English." He uses the same assertion, in nearly the same
words, in another place;[43] "her colonies had put themselves into our
hands." Now, in justice, not only to fact and common sense, but to the
incomparable valor and perseverance of our military and naval forces
thus unhandsomely traduced, I must tell this author, that the French
colonies did not "put themselves into the hands of the English." They
were compelled to submit; they were subdued by dint of English valor.
Will the five years' war carried on in Canada, in which fell one of the
principal hopes of this nation, and all the battles lost and gained
during that anxious period, convince this author of his mistake? Let him
inquire of Sir Jeffery Amherst, under whose conduct that war was carried
on; of Sir Charles Saunders, whose steadiness and presence of mind saved
our fleet, and were so eminently serviceable in the whole course of the
siege of Quebec; of General Monckton, who was shot through the body
there, whether France "put her colonies into the hands of the English."
Though he has made no exception, yet I would be liberal to him; perhaps
he means to confine himself to her colonies in the West Indies. But
surely it will fare as ill with him there as in North America, whilst we
remember that in our first attempt at Martinico we were actually
defeated; that it was three months before we reduced Guadaloupe; and
that the conquest of the Havannah was achieved by the highest conduct,
aided by circumstances of the greatest good fortune. He knows the
expense both of men and treasure at which we bought that place. However,
if it had so pleased the peacemakers, it was no dear purchase; for it
was decisive of the fortune of the war and the terms of the treaty: the
Duke of Nivernois thought so; France, England, Europe, considered it in
that light; all the world, except the then friends of the then ministry,
who wept for our victories, and were in haste to get rid of the burden
of our conquests. This author knows that France did not put those
colonies into the hands of England; but he well knows who did put the
most valuable of them into the hands of France.
In the next place, our author[44] is pleased to consider the conquest of
those colonies in no other light than as a convenience for the
remittances to France, which he asserts that the war had before
suspended, but for which a way was opened (by our conquest) as secure as
in time of peace. I charitably hope he knows nothing of the subject. I
referred him lately to our commanders, for the resistance of the French
colonies; I now wish he would apply to our custom-house entries, and our
merchants, for the advantages which we derived from them.
In 1761, there was no entry of goods from any of the conquered places
but Guadaloupe; in that year it stood thus:--
Imports from Guadaloupe, value, £482,179
--------
In 1762, when we had not yet delivered up our conquests, the account
was,
Guadaloupe £513,244
Martinico 288,425
--------
Total imports in 1762, value, £801,669
--------
In 1763, after we had delivered up the sovereignty of these islands, but
kept open a communication with them, the imports were,
Guadaloupe £412,303
Martinico 344,161
Havannah 249,386
----------
Total imports in 1763, value, £1,005,850
----------
Besides, I find, in the account of bullion imported and brought to the
Bank, that, during that period in which the intercourse with the
Havannah was open, we received at that one shop, in treasure, from that
one place, 559,810_l._; in the year 1763, 389,450_l._; so that the
import from these places in that year amounted to 1,395,300_l._
On this state the reader will observe, that I take the imports from, and
not the exports to, these conquests, as the measure of the advantages
which we derived from them. I do so for reasons which will be somewhat
worthy the attention of such readers as are fond of this species of
inquiry. I say therefore I choose the import article, as the best, and
indeed the only standard we can have, of the value of the West India
trade. Our export entry does not comprehend the greatest trade we carry
on with any of the West India islands, the sale of negroes: nor does it
give any idea of two other advantages we draw from them; the
remittances for money spent here, and the payment of part of the balance
of the North American trade. It is therefore quite ridiculous, to strike
a balance merely on the face of an excess of imports and exports, in
that commerce; though, in most foreign branches, it is, on the whole,
the best method. If we should take that standard, it would appear, that
the balance with our own islands is, annually, several hundred thousand
pounds against this country.[45] Such is its aspect on the custom-house
entries; but we know the direct contrary to be the fact. We know that
the West-Indians are always indebted to our merchants, and that the
value of every shilling of West India produce is English property. So
that our import from them, and not our export, ought always to be
considered as their true value; and this corrective ought to be applied
to all general balances of our trade, which are formed on the ordinary
principles.
If possible, this was more emphatically true of the French West India
islands, whilst they continued in our hands. That none or only a very
contemptible part, of the value of this produce could be remitted to
France, the author will see, perhaps with unwillingness, but with the
clearest conviction, if he considers, that in the year 1763, _after we
had ceased to export_ to the isles of Guadaloupe and Martinico, and to
the Havannah, and after the colonies were free to send all their
produce to Old France and Spain, if they had any remittance to make; he
will see, that we imported from those places, in that year, to the
amount of 1,395,300_l._ So far was the whole annual produce of these
islands from being adequate to the payments of their annual call upon
us, that this mighty additional importation was necessary, though not
quite sufficient, to discharge the debts contracted in the few years we
held them. The property, therefore, of their whole produce was ours; not
only during the war, but even for more than a year after the peace. The
author, I hope, will not again venture upon so rash and discouraging a
proposition concerning the nature and effect of those conquests, as to
call them a convenience to the remittances of France; he sees, by this
account, that what he asserts is not only without foundation, but even
impossible to be true.
As to our trade at that time, he labors with all his might to represent
it as absolutely ruined, or on the very edge of ruin. Indeed, as usual
with him, he is often as equivocal in his expression as he is clear in
his design. Sometimes he more than insinuates a decay of our commerce in
that war; sometimes he admits an increase of exports; but it is in order
to depreciate the advantages we might appear to derive from that
increase, whenever it should come to be proved against him. He tells
you,[46] "that it was chiefly occasioned by the demands of our own
fleets and armies, and, instead or bringing wealth to the nation, was to
be paid for by oppressive taxes upon the people of England." Never was
anything more destitute of foundation. It might be proved, with the
greatest ease, from the nature and quality of the goods exported, as
well as from the situation of the places to which our merchandise was
sent, and which the war could no wise affect, that the supply of our
fleets and armies could not have been the cause of this wonderful
increase of trade: its cause was evident to the whole world; the ruin of
the trade of France, and our possession of her colonies. What wonderful
effects this cause produced the reader will see below;[47] and he will
form on that account some judgment of the author's candor or
information.
Admit however that a great part of our export, though nothing is more
remote from fact, was owing to the supply of our fleets and armies; was
it not something?--was it not peculiarly fortunate for a nation, that
she was able from her own bosom to contribute largely to the supply of
her armies militating in so many distant countries? The author allows
that France did not enjoy the same advantages. But it is remarkable,
throughout his whole book, that those circumstances which have ever been
considered as great benefits, and decisive proofs of national
superiority, are, when in our hands, taken either in diminution of some
other apparent advantage, or even sometimes as positive misfortunes. The
optics of that politician must be of a strange conformation, who beholds
everything in this distorted shape.
So far as to our trade. With regard to our navigation, he is still more
uneasy at our situation, and still more fallacious in his state of it.
In his text, he affirms it "to have been _entirely_ engrossed by the
neutral nations."[48] This he asserts roundly and boldly, and without
the least concern; although it cost no more than a single glance of the
eye upon his own margin to see the full refutation of this assertion.
His own account proves against him, that, in the year 1761, the British
shipping amounted to 527,557 tons,--the foreign to no more than 180,102.
The medium of his six years British, 2,449,555 tons,--foreign only
906,690. This state (his own) demonstrates that the neutral nations did
not _entirely engross our navigation_.
I am willing from a strain of candor to admit that this author speaks at
random; that he is only slovenly and inaccurate, and not fallacious. In
matters of account, however, this want of care is not excusable; and the
difference between neutral nations entirely engrossing our navigation,
and being only subsidiary to a vastly augmented trade, makes a most
material difference to his argument. From that principle of fairness,
though the author speaks otherwise, I am willing to suppose he means no
more than that our navigation had so declined as to alarm us with the
probable loss of this valuable object. I shall however show, that his
whole proposition, whatever modifications he may please to give it, is
without foundation; that our navigation had not decreased; that, on the
contrary, it had greatly increased in the war; that it had increased by
the war; and that it was probable the same cause would continue to
augment it to a still greater height; to what an height it is hard to
say, had our success continued.
But first I must observe, I am much less solicitous whether his fact be
true or no, than whether his principle is well established. Cases are
dead things, principles are living and productive. I affirm then, that,
if in time of war our trade had the good fortune to increase, and at the
same time a large, nay the largest, proportion of carriage had been
engrossed by neutral nations, it ought not in itself to have been
considered as a circumstance of distress. War is a time of inconvenience
to trade; in general it must be straitened, and must find its way as it
can. It is often happy for nations that they are able to call in neutral
navigation. They all aim at it. France endeavored at it, but could not
compass it. Will this author say, that, in a war with Spain, such an
assistance would not be of absolute necessity? that it would not be the
most gross of all follies to refuse it?
In the next place, his method of stating a medium of six years of war,
and six years of peace, to decide this question, is altogether unfair.
To say, in derogation of the advantages of a war, that navigation is not
equal to what it was in time of peace, is what hitherto has never been
heard of. No war ever bore that test but the war which he so bitterly
laments. One may lay it down as a maxim, that an average estimate of an
object in a steady course of rising or of falling, must in its nature be
an unfair one; more particularly if the cause of the rise or fall be
visible, and its continuance in any degree probable. Average estimates
are never just but when the object fluctuates, and no reason can be
assigned why it should not continue still to fluctuate. The author
chooses to allow nothing at all for this: he has taken an average of six
years of the war. He knew, for everybody knows, that the first three
years were on the whole rather unsuccessful; and that, in consequence of
this ill success, trade sunk, and navigation declined with it; but _that
grand delusion_ of the three last years turned the scale in our favor.
At the beginning of that war (as in the commencement of every war),
traders were struck with a sort of panic. Many went out of the
freighting business. But by degrees, as the war continued, the terror
wore off; the danger came to be better appreciated, and better provided
against; our trade was carried on in large fleets, under regular
convoys, and with great safety. The freighting business revived. The
ships were fewer, but much larger; and though the number decreased, the
tonnage was vastly augmented: insomuch that in 1761 the _British_
shipping had risen by the author's own account to 527,557 tons.--In the
last year he has given us of the peace, it amounted to no more than
494,772; that is, in the last year of the war it was 32,785 tons more
than in the correspondent year of his peace average. No year of the
peace exceeded it except one, and that but little.
The fair account of the matter is this. Our trade had, as we have just
seen, increased to so astonishing a degree in 1761, as to employ British
and foreign ships to the amount of 707,659 tons, which is 149,500 more
than we employed in the last year of the peace.--Thus our trade
increased more than a fifth; our British navigation had increased
likewise with this astonishing increase of trade, but was not able to
keep pace with it; and we added about 120,000 tons of foreign shipping
to the 60,000, which had been employed in the last year of the peace.
Whatever happened to our shipping in the former years of the war, this
would be no true state of the case at the time of the treaty. If we had
lost something in the beginning, we had then recovered, and more than
recovered, all our losses. Such is the ground of the doleful complaints
of the author, that _the carrying trade was wholly engrossed by the
neutral nations_.
I have done fairly, and even very moderately, in taking this year, and
not his average, as the standard of what might be expected in future,
had the war continued. The author will be compelled to allow it, unless
he undertakes to show; first, that the possession of Canada, Martinico,
Guadaloupe, Grenada, the Havannah, the Philippines, the whole African
trade, the whole East India trade, and the whole Newfoundland fishery,
had no certain inevitable tendency to increase the British shipping;
unless, in the second place, he can prove that those trades were, or
might be, by law or indulgence, carried on in foreign vessels; and
unless, thirdly, he can demonstrate that the premium of insurance on
British ships was rising as the war continued. He can prove not one of
these points. I will show him a fact more that is mortal to his
assertions. It is the state of our shipping in 1762. The author had his
reasons for stopping short at the preceding year. It would have
appeared, had he proceeded farther, that our tonnage was in a course of
uniform augmentation, owing to the freight derived from our foreign
conquests, and to the perfect security of our navigation from our clear
and decided superiority at sea. This, I say, would have appeared from
the state of the two years:--
1761. British 527,557 tons.
1762. Ditto 559,537 tons.
1761. Foreign 180,102 tons.
1762. Ditto 129,502 tons.
The two last years of the peace were in no degree equal to these. Much
of the navigation of 1763 was also owing to the war; this is manifest
from the large part of it employed in the carriage from the ceded
islands, with which the communication still continued open. No such
circumstances of glory and advantage ever attended upon a war. Too happy
will be our lot, if we should again be forced into a war, to behold
anything that shall resemble them; and if we were not then the better
for them, it is net in the ordinary course of God's providence to mend
our condition.
In vain does the author declaim on the high premiums given for the loans
during the war. His long note swelled with calculations on that subject
(even supposing the most inaccurate of all calculations to be just)
would be entirety thrown away, did it not serve to raise a wonderful
opinion of his financial skill in those who are not less surprised than
edified, when, with a solemn face and mysterious air, they are told that
two and two make four. For what else do we learn from this note? That
the more expense is incurred by a nation, the more money will be
required to defray it; that in proportion to the continuance of that
expense, will be the continuance of borrowing; that the increase of
borrowing and the increase of debt will go hand in hand; and lastly,
that the more money you want, the harder it will be to get it; and that
the scarcity of the commodity will enhance the price. Who ever doubted
the truth, or the insignificance, of these propositions? what do they
prove? that war is expensive, and peace desirable. They contain nothing
more than a commonplace against war; the easiest of all topics. To bring
them home to his purpose, he ought to have shown that our enemies had
money upon better terms; which he has not shown, neither can he. I shall
speak more fully to this point in another place. He ought to have shown
that the money they raised, upon whatever terms, had procured them a
more lucrative return. He knows that our expenditure purchased commerce
and conquest: theirs acquired nothing but defeat and bankruptcy.
Thus the author has laid down his ideas on the subject of war. Next
follow those he entertains on that of peace. The treaty of Paris upon
the whole has his approbation. Indeed, if his account of the war be
just, he might have spared himself all further trouble. The rest is
drawn on as an inevitable conclusion.[49] If the House of Bourbon had
the advantage, she must give the law; and the peace, though it were much
worse than it is, had still been a good one. But as the world is yet
_deluded_ on the state of that war, other arguments are necessary; and
the author has in my opinion very ill supplied them. He tells of many
things we have got, and of which he has made out a kind of bill. This
matter may be brought within a very narrow compass, if we come to
consider the requisites of a good peace under some plain distinct heads.
I apprehend they may be reduced to these: 1. Stability; 2.
Indemnification; 3. Alliance.
As to the first, the author more than obscurely hints in several places,
that he thinks the peace not likely to last. However, he does furnish a
security; a security, in any light, I fear, but insufficient; on his
hypothesis, surely a very odd one. "By stipulating for the entire
possession of the Continent (says he) the restored French islands are
become in some measure dependent on the British empire; and the good
faith of France in observing the treaty guaranteed by the value at which
she estimates their possession."[50] This author soon grows weary of his
principles. They seldom last him for two pages together. When the
advantages of the war were to be depreciated, then the loss of the
ultramarine colonies lightened the expenses of France, facilitated her
remittances, and therefore _her colonists put them into our hands_.
According to this author's system, the actual possession of those
colonies ought to give us little or no advantage in the negotiation for
peace; and yet the chance of possessing them on a future occasion gives
a perfect security for the preservation of that peace.[51] The conquest
of the Havannah, if it did not serve Spain, rather distressed England,
says our author.[52] But the molestation which her galleons may suffer
from our station in Pensacola gives us advantages, for which we were not
allowed to credit the nation for the Havannah itself; a place surely
full as well situated for every external purpose as Pensacola, and of
more internal benefit than ten thousand Pensacolas.
The author sets very little by conquests;[53] I suppose it is because he
makes them so very lightly. On this subject he speaks with the greatest
certainty imaginable. We have, according to him, nothing to do, but to
go and take possession, whenever we think proper, of the French and
Spanish settlements. It were better that he had examined a little what
advantage the peace gave us towards the invasion of these colonies,
which we did not possess before the peace. It would not have been amiss
if he had consulted the public experience, and our commanders,
concerning the absolute certainty of those conquests on which he is
pleased to found our security. And if, after all, he should have
discovered them to be so very sure, and so very easy, he might at least,
to preserve consistency, have looked a few pages back, and (no
unpleasing thing to him) listened to himself, where he says, "that the
most successful enterprise could not compensate to the nation for the
waste of its people, by carrying on war in unhealthy climates."[54] A
position which he repeats again, p. 9. So that, according to himself,
his security is not worth the suit; according to fact, he has only a
chance, God knows what a chance, of getting at it; and therefore,
according to reason, the giving up the most valuable of all possessions,
in hopes to conquer them back, under any advantage of situation, is the
most ridiculous security that ever was imagined for the peace of a
nation. It is true his friends did not give up Canada; they could not
give up everything; let us make the most of it. We have Canada, we know
its value. We have not the French any longer to fight in North America;
and from this circumstance we derive considerable advantages. But here
let me rest a little. The author touches upon a string which sounds
under his fingers but a tremulous and melancholy note. North America was
once indeed a great strength to this nation, in opportunity of ports, in
ships, in provisions, in men. We found her a sound, an active, a
vigorous member of the empire. I hope, by wise management, she will
again become so. But one of our capital present misfortunes is her
discontent and disobedience. To which of the author's favorites this
discontent is owing, we all know but too sufficiently. It would be a
dismal event, if this foundation of his security, and indeed of all our
public strength, should, in reality, become our weakness; and if all the
powers of this empire, which ought to fall with a compacted weight upon
the head of our enemies, should be dissipated and distracted by a
jealous vigilance, or by hostile attempts upon one another. Ten Canadas
cannot restore that security for the peace, and for everything valuable
to this country, which we have lost along with the affection and the
obedience of our colonies. He is the wise minister, he is the true
friend to Britain, who shall be able to restore it.
To return to the security for the peace. The author tells us, that the
original great purposes of the war were more than accomplished by the
treaty. Surely he has experience and reading enough to know, that, in
the course of a war, events may happen, that render its original very
far from being its principal purpose. This original may dwindle by
circumstances, so as to become not a purpose of the second or even the
third magnitude. I trust this is so obvious that it will not be
necessary to put cases for its illustration. In that war, as soon as
Spain entered into the quarrel, the security of North America was no
longer the sole nor the foremost object. The _Family Compact_ had been I
know not how long before in agitation. But then it was that we saw
produced into daylight and action the most odious and most formidable of
all the conspiracies against the liberties of Europe that ever has been
framed. The war with Spain was the first fruits of that league; and a
security against that league ought to have been the fundamental point of
a pacification with the powers who compose it. We had materials in our
hands to have constructed that security in such a manner as never to be
shaken. But how did the virtuous and able men of our author labor for
this great end? They took no one step towards it. On the contrary they
countenanced, and, indeed, as far as it depended on them, recognized it
in all its parts; for our plenipotentiary treated with those who acted
for the two crowns, as if they had been different ministers of the same
monarch. The Spanish minister received his instructions, not from
Madrid, but from Versailles.
This was not hid from our ministers at home; and the discovery ought to
have alarmed them, if the good of their country had been the object of
their anxiety. They could not but have seen that the whole Spanish
monarchy was melted down into the cabinet of Versailles. But they
thought this circumstance an advantage; as it enabled them to go through
with their work the more expeditiously. Expedition was everything to
them; because France might happen during a protracted negotiation to
discover the great imposition of our victories.
In the same spirit they negotiated the terms of the peace. If it were
thought advisable not to take any positive security from Spain, the most
obvious principles of policy dictated that the burden of the cessions
ought to fall upon France; and that everything which was of grace and
favor should be given to Spain. Spain could not, on her part, have
executed a capital article in the family compact, which obliged her to
compensate the losses of France. At least she could not do it in
America; for she was expressly precluded by the treaty of Utrecht from
ceding any territory or giving any advantage in trade to that power.
What did our ministers? They took from Spain the territory of Florida,
an object of no value except to show our dispositions to be quite equal
at least towards both powers; and they enabled France to compensate
Spain by the gift of Louisiana: loading us with all the harshness,
leaving the act of kindness with France, and opening thereby a door to
the fulfilling of this the most consolidating article of the family
compact. Accordingly that dangerous league, thus abetted and authorized
by the English ministry without an attempt to invalidate it in any way,
or in any of its parts, exists to this hour; and has grown stronger and
stronger every hour of its existence.
As to the second component of a good peace, _compensation_, I have but
little trouble; the author has said nothing upon that head. He has
nothing to say. After a war of such expense, this ought to have been a
capital consideration. But on what he has been so prudently silent, I
think it is right to speak plainly. All our new acquisitions together,
at this time, scarce afford matter of revenue, either at home or abroad,
sufficient to defray the expense of their establishments; not one
shilling towards the reduction of our debt. Guadaloupe or Martinico
alone would have given us material aid; much in the way of duties, much
in the way of trade and navigation. A good ministry would have
considered how a renewal of the _Assiento_ might have been obtained. We
had as much right to ask it at the treaty of Paris as at the treaty of
Utrecht. We had incomparably more in our hands to purchase it. Floods of
treasure would have poured into this kingdom from such a source; and,
under proper management, no small part of it would have taken a public
direction, and have fructified an exhausted exchequer.
If this gentleman's hero of finance, instead of flying from a treaty,
which, though he now defends, he could not approve, and would not
oppose; if he, instead of shifting into an office, which removed him
from the manufacture of the treaty, had, by his credit with the then
great director, acquired for us these, or any of these, objects, the
possession of Guadaloupe or Martinico, or the renewal of the _Assiento_,
he might have held his head high in his country; because he would have
performed real service; ten thousand times more real service, than all
the economy of which this writer is perpetually talking, or all the
little tricks of finance which the expertest juggler of the treasury can
practise, could amount to in a thousand years. But the occasion is lost;
the time is gone, perhaps forever.
As to the third requisite, _alliance_, there too the author is silent.
What strength of that kind did they acquire? They got no one new ally;
they stript the enemy of not a single old one. They disgusted (how
justly, or unjustly, matters not) every ally we had; and from that time
to this we stand friendless in Europe. But of this naked condition of
their country I know some people are not ashamed. They have their system
of politics; our ancestors grew great by another. In this manner these
virtuous men concluded the peace; and their practice is only consonant
to their theory.
Many things more might be observed on this curious head of our author's
speculations. But, taking leave of what the writer says in his serious
part, if he be serious in any part, I shall only just point out a piece
of his pleasantry. No man, I believe, ever denied that the time for
making peace is that in which the best terms maybe obtained. But what
that time is, together with the use that has been made of it, we are to
judge by seeing whether terms adequate to our advantages, and to our
necessities, have been actually obtained. Here is the pinch of the
question, to which the author ought to have set his shoulders in
earnest. Instead of doing this, he slips out of the harness by a jest;
and sneeringly tells us, that, to determine this point, we must know the
secrets of the French and Spanish cabinets[55], and that Parliament was
pleased to approve the treaty of peace without calling for the
correspondence concerning it. How just this sarcasm on that Parliament
may be, I say not; but how becoming in the author, I leave it to his
friends to determine.
Having thus gone through the questions of war and peace, the author
proceeds to state our debt, and the interest which it carried, at the
time of the treaty, with the unfairness and inaccuracy, however, which
distinguish all his assertions, and all his calculations. To detect
every fallacy, and rectify every mistake, would be endless. It will be
enough to point out a few of them, in order to show how unsafe it is to
place anything like an implicit trust in such a writer.
The interest of debt contracted during the war is stated by the author
at 2,614,892_l._ The particulars appear in pp. 14 and 15. Among them is
stated the unfunded debt, 9,975,017_l._, supposed to carry interest on a
medium at 3 per cent, which amounts to 299,250_l._ We are referred to
the "Considerations on the Trade and Finances of the Kingdom," p. 22,
for the particulars of that unfunded debt. Turn to the work, and to the
place referred to by the author himself, if you have a mind to see a
clear detection of a capital fallacy of this article in his account. You
will there see that this unfunded debt consists of the nine following
articles: the remaining subsidy to the Duke of Brunswick; the remaining
_dédommagement_ to the Landgrave of Hesse; the German demands; the army
and ordnance extraordinaries; the deficiencies of grants and funds; Mr.
Touchet's claim; the debts due to Nova Scotia and Barbadoes; exchequer
bills; and navy debt. The extreme fallacy of this state cannot escape
any reader who will be at the pains to compare the interest money, with
which he affirms us to have been loaded, in his "State of the Nation,"
with the items of the principal debt to which he refers in his
"Considerations." The reader must observe, that of this long list of
nine articles, only two, the exchequer bills, and part of the navy debt,
carried any interest at all. The first amounted to 1,800,000_l._; and
this undoubtedly carried interest. The whole navy debt indeed amounted
to 4,576,915_l._; but of this only a _part_ carried interest. The author
of the "Considerations," &c. labors to prove this very point in p. 18;
and Mr. G. has always defended himself upon the same ground, for the
insufficient provision he made for the discharge of that debt. The
reader may see their own authority for it.[56]
Mr. G. did in fact provide no more than 2,150,000_l._ for the discharge
of these bills in two years. It is much to be wished that these
gentlemen would lay their heads together, that they would consider well
this matter, and agree upon something. For when the scanty provision
made for the unfunded debt is to be vindicated, then we are told it is a
very _small part_ of that debt which carries interest. But when the
public is to be represented in a miserable condition, and the
consequences of the late war to be laid before us in dreadful colors,
then we are to be told that the unfunded debt is within a trifle of ten
millions, and so large a portion of it carries interest that we must not
compute less than 3 per cent upon the _whole_.
In the year 1764, Parliament voted 650,000_l._ towards the discharge of
the navy debt. This sum could not be applied solely to the discharge of
bills carrying interest; because part of the debt due on seamen's wages
must have been paid, and some bills carried no interest at all.
Notwithstanding this, we find by an account in the journals of the House
of Commons, in the following session, that the navy debt carrying
interest was, on the 31st of December, 1764, no more than 1,687,442_l._
I am sure therefore that I admit too much when I admit the navy debt
carrying interest, after the creation of the navy annuities in the year
1763, to have been 2,200,000_l._ Add the exchequer bills; and the whole
unfunded debt carrying interest will be four millions instead of ten;
and the annual interest paid for it at 4 per cent will be 160,000_l._
instead of 299,250_l._ An error of no small magnitude, and which could
not have been owing to inadvertency.
The misrepresentation of the increase of the peace establishment is
still more extraordinary than that of the interest of the unfunded debt.
The increase is great, undoubtedly. However, the author finds no fault
with it, and urges it only as a matter of argument to support the
strange chimerical proposals he is to make us in the close of his work
for the increase of revenue. The greater he made that establishment, the
stronger he expected to stand in argument: but, whatever he expected or
proposed, he should have stated the matter fairly. He tells us that this
establishment is nearly 1,500,000_l._ more than it was in 1752, 1753,
and other years of peace. This he has done in his usual manner, by
assertion, without troubling himself either with proof or probability.
For he has not given us any state of the peace establishment in the
years 1753 and 1754, the time which he means to compare with the
present. As I am obliged to force him to that precision, from which he
always flies as from his most dangerous enemy, I have been at the
trouble to search the journals in the period between the two last wars:
and I find that the peace establishment, consisting of the navy, the
ordnance, and the several incidental expenses, amounted to 2,346,594_l._
Now is this writer wild enough to imagine, that the peace establishment
of 1764 and the subsequent years, made up from the same articles, is
3,800,000_l._ and upwards? His assertion however goes to this. But I
must take the liberty of correcting him in this gross mistake, and from
an authority he cannot refuse, from his favorite work, and standing
authority, the "Considerations." We find there, p. 43[57], the peace
establishment of 1764 and 1765 stated at 3,609,700_l._ This is near two
hundred thousand pounds less than that given in "The State of the
Nation." But even from this, in order to render the articles which
compose the peace establishment in the two periods correspondent (for
otherwise they cannot be compared), we must deduct first, his articles
of the deficiency of land and malt, which amount to 300,000_l._ They
certainly are no part of the establishment; nor are they included in
that sum, which I have stated above for the establishment in the time of
the former peace. If they were proper to be stated at all, they ought to
be stated in both accounts. We must also deduct the deficiencies of
funds, 202,400_l._ These deficiencies are the difference between the
interest charged on the public for moneys borrowed, and the produce of
the taxes laid for the discharge of that interest. Annual provision is
indeed to be made for them by Parliament: but in the inquiry before us,
which is only what charge is brought on the public by interest paid or
to be paid for money borrowed, the utmost that the author should do, is
to bring into the account the full interest for all that money. This he
has done in p. 15; and he repeats it in p. 18, the very page I am now
examining, 2,614,892_l._ To comprehend afterwards in the peace
establishment the deficiency of the fund created for payment of that
interest, would be laying twice to the account of the war part of the
same sum. Suppose ten millions borrowed at 4 per cent, and the fund for
payment of the interest to produce no more than 200,000_l._ The whole
annual charge on the public is 400,000_l._ It can be no more. But to
charge the interest in one part of the account, and then the deficiency
in the other, would be charging 600,000_l._ The deficiency of funds must
therefore be also deducted from the peace establishment in the
"Considerations"; and then the peace establishment in that author will
be reduced to the same articles with those included in the sum I have
already mentioned for the peace establishment before the last war, in
the year 1753, and 1754.
Peace establishment in the "Considerations" £3,609,700
Deduct deficiency of land and malt £300,000
Ditto of funds 202,400
-------- 502,400
---------
3,107,300
Peace establishment before the late war, in
which no deficiencies of land and malt, or
funds are included 2,346,594
---------
Difference £760,706
Being about half the sum which our author has been pleased to suppose
it.
Let us put the whole together. The author states,--
Difference of peace establishment before and
since the war £1,500,000
Interest of Debt contracted by the war 2,614,892
---------
4,114,892
The _real_ difference in the peace
establishment is £760,706
The actual interest of the
funded debt, including
that charged on the
sinking fund £2,315,642
The actual interest of
unfunded debt at most 160,000
---------
Total interest of debt
contracted by the war 2,475,642
---------
Increase of peace establishment, and interest of
new debt 3,236,348
---------
Error of the author £878,544
It is true, the extraordinaries of the army have been found considerably
greater than the author of the "Considerations" was pleased to foretell
they would be. The author of "The Present State" avails himself of that
increase, and, finding it suit his purpose, sets the whole down in the
peace establishment of the present times. If this is allowed him, his
error perhaps may be reduced to 700,000_l._ But I doubt the author of
the "Considerations" will not thank him for admitting 200,000_l._ and
upwards, as the peace establishment for extraordinaries, when that
author has so much labored to confine them within 35,000_l._
These are some of the capital fallacies of the author. To break the
thread of my discourse as little as possible, I have thrown into the
margin many instances, though God knows far from the whole of his
inaccuracies, inconsistencies, and want of common care. I think myself
obliged to take some notice of them, in order to take off from any
authority this writer may have; and to put an end to the deference which
careless men are apt to pay to one who boldly arrays his accounts, and
marshals his figures, in perfect confidence that their correctness will
never be examined.[58]
However, for argument, I am content to take his state of it. The debt
was and is enormous. The war was expensive. The best economy had not
perhaps been used. But I must observe, that war and economy are things
not easily reconciled; and that the attempt of leaning towards parsimony
in such a state may be the worst management, and in the end the worst
economy in the world, hazarding the total loss of all the charge
incurred, and of everything along with it.
But _cui bono_ all this detail of our debt? Has the author given a
single light towards any material reduction of it? Not a glimmering. We
shall see in its place what sort of thing he proposes. But before he
commences his operations, in order to scare the public imagination, he
raises by art magic a thick mist before our eyes, through which glare
the most ghastly and horrible phantoms:
Hunc igitur terrorem animi tenebrasque necesse est.
Non radii solis, neque lucida tela diei
Discutiant, sed naturæ species ratioque.
Let us therefore calmly, if we can for the fright into which he has put
us, appreciate those dreadful and deformed gorgons and hydras, which
inhabit the joyless regions of an imagination fruitful in nothing but
the production of monsters.
His whole representation, is founded on the supposed operation of our
debt, upon our manufactures, and our trade. To this cause he attributes
a certain supposed dearness of the necessaries of life, which must
compel our manufacturers to emigrate to cheaper countries, particularly
to France, and with them the manufacture. Thence consumption declining,
and with it revenue. He will not permit the real balance of our trade to
be estimated so high as 2,500,000_l._; and the interest of the debt to
foreigners carries off 1,500,000_l._ of that balance. France is not in
the same condition. Then follow his wailings and lamentings, which he
renews over and over, according to his custom--a declining trade, and
decreasing specie--on the point of becoming tributary to France--of
losing Ireland--of having the colonies torn away from us.
The first thing upon which I shall observe is,[60] what he takes for
granted as the clearest of all propositions, the emigration of our
manufacturers to France. I undertake to say that this assertion is
totally groundless, and I challenge the author to bring any sort of
proof of it. If living is cheaper in France, that is, to be had for less
specie, wages are proportionably lower. No manufacturer, let the living
be what it will, was ever known to fly for refuge to low wages. Money is
the first thing which attracts him. Accordingly our wages attract
artificers from all parts of the world. From two shillings to one
shilling, is a fall in all men's imaginations, which no calculation upon
a difference in the price of the necessaries of life can compensate. But
it will be hard to prove that a French artificer is better fed, clothed,
lodged, and warmed, than one in England; for that is the sense, and the
only sense, of living cheaper. If, in truth and fact, our artificer
fares as well in all these respects as one in the same state in
France,--how stands the matter in point of opinion and prejudice, the
springs by which people in that class of life are chiefly actuated? The
idea of our common people concerning French living is dreadful;
altogether as dreadful as our author's can possibly be of the state of
his own country; a way of thinking that will hardly ever prevail on them
to desert to France.[61]
But, leaving the author's speculations, the fact is, that they have not
deserted; and of course the manufacture cannot be departed, or
departing, with them. I am not indeed able to get at all the details of
our manufactures; though, I think, I have taken full as much pains for
that purpose as our author. Some I have by me; and they do not hitherto,
thank God, support the author's complaint, unless a vast increase of the
quantity of goods manufactured be a proof of losing the manufacture. On
a view of the registers in the West Riding of Yorkshire, for three years
before the war, and for the three last, it appears, that the quantities
of cloths entered were as follows:
Pieces broad. Pieces narrow.
1752 60,724 72,442
1753 55,358 71,618
1754 56,070 72,394
------- -------
172,152 216,454
Pieces broad. Pieces narrow.
1765 54,660 77,419
1766 72,575 78,893
1767 102,428 78,819
------- -------
3 years, ending 1767 229,663 235,131
3 years, ending 1754 172,152 216,464
------- -------
Increase 57,511 18,677
In this manner this capital branch of manufacture has increased, under
the increase of taxes; and this not from a declining, but from a greatly
flourishing period of commerce. I may say the same on the best authority
of the fabric of thin goods at Halifax; of the bays at Rochdale; and of
that infinite variety of admirable manufactures that grow and extend
every year among the spirited, inventive, and enterprising traders of
Manchester.
A trade sometimes seems to perish when it only assumes a different form.
Thus the coarsest woollens were formerly exported in great quantities to
Russia. The Russians now supply themselves with these goods. But the
export thither of finer cloths has increased in proportion as the other
has declined. Possibly some parts of the kingdom may have felt something
like a languor in business. Objects like trade and manufacture, which
the very attempt to confine would certainly destroy, frequently change
their place; and thereby, far from being lost, are often highly
improved. Thus some manufactures have decayed in the west and south,
which have made new and more vigorous shoots when transplanted into the
north. And here it is impossible to pass by, though the author has said
nothing upon it, the vast addition to the mass of British trade, which
has been made by the improvement of Scotland. What does he think of the
commerce of the city of Glasgow, and of the manufactures of Paisley and
all the adjacent country? Has this anything like the deadly aspect and
_facies Hippocratica_ which the false diagnostic of our state physician
has given to our trade in general? Has he not heard of the iron-works of
such magnitude even in their cradle which are set up on the Carron, and
which at the same time have drawn nothing from Sheffield, Birmingham, or
Wolverhampton?
This might perhaps be enough to show the entire falsity of the complaint
concerning the decline of our manufactures. But every step we advance,
this matter clears up more; and the false terrors of the author are
dissipated, and fade away as the light appears. "The trade and
manufactures of this country (says he) going to ruin, and a diminution
of our _revenue from consumption_ must attend the loss of so many seamen
and artificers." Nothing more true than the general observation: nothing
more false than its application to our circumstances. Let the revenue on
consumption speak for itself:--
Average of net excise, since the new duties,
three years ending 1767 £4,590,734
Ditto before the new duties, three years
ending 1759 3,261,694
---------
Average increase £1,329,040
Here is no diminution. Here is, on the contrary, an immense increase.
This is owing, I shall be told, to the new duties, which may increase
the total bulk, but at the same time may make some diminution of the
produce of the old. Were this the fact, it would be far from supporting
the author's complaint. It might have proved that the burden lay rather
too heavy; but it would never prove that the _revenue from, consumption_
was impaired, which it was his business to do. But what is the real
fact? Let us take, as the best instance for the purpose, the produce of
the old hereditary and temporary excise granted in the reign of Charles
the Second, whose object is that of most of the new impositions, from
two averages, each of eight years.
Average, first period, eight years, ending 1754 £525,317
Ditto, second period, eight years, ending 1767 538,542
-------
Increase £613,225
I have taken these averages as including in each a war and a peace
period; the first before the imposition of the new duties, the other
since those impositions; and such is the state of the oldest branch of
the revenue from consumption. Besides the acquisition of so much new,
this article, to speak of no other, has rather increased under the
pressure of all those additional taxes to which the author is pleased to
attribute its destruction. But as the author has made his grand effort
against those moderate, judicious, and necessary levies, which support
all the dignity, the credit, and the power of his country, the reader
will excuse a little further detail on this subject; that we may see how
little oppressive those taxes are on the shoulders of the public, with
which he labors so earnestly to load its imagination. For this purpose
we take the state of that specific article upon which the two capital
burdens of the war leaned the most immediately, by the additional
duties on malt, and upon beer.
Barrels.
Average of strong beer, brewed in eight years
before the additional malt and beer duties 3,895,059
Average of strong beer, eight years since
the duties 4,060,726
---------
Increase in the last period 165,667
Here is the effect of two such daring taxes as 3_d._ by the bushel
additional on malt, and 3_s._ by the barrel additional on beer. Two
impositions laid without remission one upon the neck of the other; and
laid upon an object which before had been immensely loaded. They did not
in the least impair the consumption: it has grown under them. It appears
that, upon the whole, the people did not feel so much inconvenience from
the new duties as to oblige them to take refuge in the private brewery.
Quite the contrary happened in both these respects in the reign of King
William; and it happened from much slighter impositions.[62] No people
can long consume a commodity for which they are not well able to pay. An
enlightened reader laughs at the inconsistent chimera of our author, of
a people universally luxurious, and at the same time oppressed with
taxes and declining in trade. For my part, I cannot look on these duties
as the author does. He sees nothing but the burden. I can perceive the
burden as well as he; but I cannot avoid contemplating also the strength
that supports it. From thence I draw the most comfortable assurances of
the future vigor, and the ample resources, of this great, misrepresented
country; and can never prevail on myself to make complaints which have
no cause, in order to raise hopes which have no foundation.
When a representation is built on truth and nature, one member supports
the other, and mutual lights are given and received from every part.
Thus, as our manufacturers have not deserted, nor the manufacture left
us, nor the consumption declined, nor the revenue sunk; so neither has
trade, which is at once the result, measure, and cause of the whole, in
the least decayed, as our author has thought proper sometimes to affirm,
constantly to suppose, as if it were the most indisputable of all
propositions. The reader will see below the comparative state of our
trade[63] in three of the best years before our increase of debt and
taxes, and with it the three last years since the author's date of our
ruin.
In the last three years the whole of our exports was between 44 and 45
millions. In the three years preceding the war, it was no more than from
35 to 36 millions. The average balance of the former period was
3,706,000_l._; of the latter, something above four millions. It is true,
that whilst the impressions of the author's destructive war continued,
our trade was greater than it is at present. One of the necessary
consequences of the peace was, that France must gradually recover a part
of those markets of which she had been originally in possession.
However, after all these deductions, still the gross trade in the worst
year of the present is better than in the best year of any former period
of peace. A very great part of our taxes, if not the greatest, has been
imposed since the beginning of the century. On the author's principles,
this continual increase of taxes must have ruined our trade, or at least
entirely checked its growth. But I have a manuscript of Davenant, which
contains an abstract of our trade for the years 1703 and 1704; by which
it appears that the whole export from England did not then exceed
6,552,019_l._ It is now considerably more than double that amount. Yet
England was then a rich and flourishing nation.
The author endeavors to derogate from the balance in our favor as it
stands on the entries, and reduces it from four millions, as it there
appears, to no more than 2,500,000_l._ His observation on the looseness
and inaccuracy of the export entries is just; and that the error is
always an error of excess, I readily admit. But because, as usual, he
has wholly omitted some very material facts, his conclusion is as
erroneous as the entries he complains of.
On this point of the custom-house entries I shall make a few
observations. 1st. The inaccuracy of these entries can extend only to
FREE GOODS, that is, to such British products and manufactures, as are
exported without drawback and without bounty; which do not in general
amount to more than two thirds at the very utmost of the whole export
even of _our home products_. The valuable articles of corn, malt,
leather, hops, beer, and many others, do not come under this objection
of inaccuracy. The article of CERTIFICATE GOODS re-exported, a vast
branch of our commerce, admits of no error, (except some smaller frauds
which cannot be estimated,) as they have all a drawback of duty, and the
exporter must therefore correctly specify their quantity and kind. The
author therefore is not warranted from the known error in some of the
entries, to make a general defalcation from the whole balance in our
favor. This error cannot affect more than half, if so much, of the
export article. 2dly. In the account made up at the Inspector-General's
office, they estimate only the original cost of British products as they
are here purchased; and on foreign goods, only the prices in the country
from whence they are sent. This was the method established by Mr.
Davenant; and as far as it goes, it certainly is a good one. But the
profits of the merchant at home, and of our factories abroad, are not
taken into the account; which profit on such an immense quantity of
goods exported and re-exported cannot fail of being very great: five per
cent, upon the whole, I should think, a very moderate allowance. 3dly.
It does not comprehend the advantage arising from the employment of
600,000 tons of shipping, which must be paid by the foreign consumer,
and which, in many bulky articles of commerce, is equal to the value of
the commodity. This can scarcely be rated at less than a million
annually. 4thly. The whole import from Ireland and America, and from the
West Indies, is set against us in the ordinary way of striking a balance
of imports and exports; whereas the import and export are both our own.
This is just as ridiculous, as to put against the general balance of the
nation, how much more goods Cheshire receives from London than London
from Cheshire. The whole revolves and circulates through this kingdom,
and is, so far as regards our profit, in the nature of home trade, as
much as if the several countries of America and Ireland were all pieced
to Cornwall. The course of exchange with all these places is fully
sufficient to demonstrate that this kingdom has the whole advantage of
their commerce. When the final profit upon a whole system of trade rests
and centres in a certain place, a balance struck in that place merely on
the mutual sale of commodities is quite fallacious. 5thly. The
custom-house entries furnish a most defective, and, indeed, ridiculous
idea of the most valuable branch of trade we have in the world,--that
with Newfoundland. Observe what you export thither; a little spirits,
provision, fishing-lines, and fishing-hooks. Is this _export_ the true
idea of the Newfoundland trade in the light of a beneficial branch of
commerce? Nothing less. Examine our imports from thence; it seems upon
this vulgar idea of exports and imports, to turn the balance against
you. But your exports to Newfoundland are your own goods. Your import is
your own food; as much your own, as that you raise with your ploughs out
of your own soil; and not your loss, but your gain; your riches, not
your poverty. But so fallacious is this way of judging, that neither the
export nor import, nor both together, supply any idea approaching to
adequate of that branch of business. The vessels in that trade go
straight from Newfoundland to the foreign market; and the sale there,
not the import here, is the measure of its value. That trade, which is
one of your greatest and best, is hardly so much as seen in the
custom-house entries; and it is not of less annual value to this nation
than 400,000_l._ 6thly. The quality of your imports must be considered
as well as the quantity. To state the whole of the foreign import _as
loss_, is exceedingly absurd. All the iron, hemp, flax, cotton, Spanish
wool, raw silk, woollen and linen-yarn, which we import, are by no means
to be considered as the matter of a merely luxurious consumption; which
is the idea too generally and loosely annexed to our import article.
These above mentioned are materials of industry, not of luxury, which
are wrought up here, in many instances, to ten times, and more, of their
original value. Even where they are not subservient to our exports, they
still add to our internal wealth, which consists in the stock of useful
commodities, as much as in gold and silver. In looking over the specific
articles of our export and import, I have often been astonished to see
for how small a part of the supply of our consumption, either luxurious
or convenient, we are indebted to nations properly foreign to us.
These considerations are entirely passed over by the author; they have
been but too much neglected by most who have speculated on this subject.
But they ought never to be omitted by those who mean to come to anything
like the true state of the British trade. They compensate, and they more
than compensate, everything which the author can cut off with any
appearance of reason for the over-entry of British goods; and they
restore to us that balance of four millions, which the author has
thought proper on such a very poor and limited comprehension of the
object to reduce to 2,500,000_l._
In general this author is so circumstanced, that to support his theory
he is obliged to assume his facts: and then, if you allow his facts,
they will not support his conclusions. What if all he says of the state
of this balance were true? did not the same objections always lie to
custom-house entries? do they defalcate more from the entries of 1766
than from those of 1754? If they prove us ruined, we were always ruined.
Some ravens have always indeed croaked out this kind of song. They have
a malignant delight in presaging mischief, when they are not employed in
doing it: they are miserable and disappointed at every instance of the
public prosperity. They overlook us like the malevolent being of the
poet:--
Tritonida conspicit arcem
Ingeniis, opibusque, et festa pace virentem;
Vixque tenet lacrymas quia nil lacrymabile cernit.
It is in this spirit that some have looked upon those accidents that
cast an occasional damp upon trade. Their imaginations entail these
accidents upon us in perpetuity. We have had some bad harvests. This
must very disadvantageously affect the balance of trade, and the
navigation of a people, so large a part of whose commerce is in grain.
But, in knowing the cause, we are morally certain, that, according to
the course of events, it cannot long subsist. In the three last years,
we have exported scarcely any grain; in good years, that export hath
been worth twelve hundred thousand pounds and more; in the two last
years, far from exporting, we have been obliged to import to the amount
perhaps of our former exportation. So that in this article the balance
must be 2,000,000_l._ against us; that is, one million in the ceasing of
gain, the other in the increase of expenditure. But none of the author's
promises or projects could have prevented this misfortune; and, thank
God, we do not want him or them to relieve us from it; although, if his
friends should now come into power, I doubt not but they will be ready
to take credit for any increase of trade or excise, that may arise from
the happy circumstance of a good harvest.
This connects with his loud laments and melancholy prognostications
concerning the high price of the necessaries of life and the products of
labor. With all his others, I deny this fact; and I again call upon him
to prove it. Take average and not accident, the grand and first
necessary of life is cheap in this country; and that too as weighed, not
against labor, which is its true counterpoise, but against money. Does
he call the price of wheat at this day, between 32 and 40 shillings per
quarter in London dear?[64] He must know that fuel (an object of the
highest order in the necessaries of life, and of the first necessity in
almost every kind of manufacture) is in many of our provinces cheaper
than in any part of the globe. Meat is on the whole not excessively
dear, whatever its price may be at particular times and from particular
accidents. If it has had anything like an uniform rise, this enhancement
may easily be proved not to be owing to the increase of taxes, but to
uniform increase of consumption and of money. Diminish the latter, and
meat in your markets will be sufficiently cheap in account, but much
dearer in effect: because fewer will be in a condition to buy. Thus your
apparent plenty will be real indigence. At present, even under temporary
disadvantages, the use of flesh is greater here than anywhere else; it
is continued without any interruption of Lents or meagre days; it is
sustained and growing even with the increase of our taxes. But some have
the art of converting even the signs of national prosperity into
symptoms of decay and ruin. And our author, who so loudly disclaims
popularity, never fails to lay hold of the most vulgar popular
prejudices and humors, in hopes to captivate the crowd. Even those
peevish dispositions which grow out of some transitory suffering, those
passing clouds which float in our changeable atmosphere, are by him
industriously figured into frightful shapes, in order first to terrify,
and then to govern the populace.
It was not enough for the author's purpose to give this false and
discouraging picture of the state of his own country. It did not fully
answer his end, to exaggerate her burdens, to depreciate her successes,
and to vilify her character. Nothing had been done, unless the
situation of France were exalted in proportion as that of England had
been abased. The reader will excuse the citation I make at length from
his book; he outdoes himself upon this occasion. His confidence is
indeed unparalleled, and altogether of the heroic cast:--
"If our rival nations were in the same circumstances with ourselves, the
_augmentation of our taxes would produce no ill consequences_: if we
were obliged to raise our prices, they must, from the same causes, do
the like, and could take no advantage by underselling and under-working
us. But the alarming consideration to Great Britain is, _that France is
not in the same condition_. Her distresses, during the war, were great,
but they were immediate; her want of credit, as has been said, compelled
her to impoverish her people, by raising the greatest part of her
supplies within the year; _but the burdens she imposed on them were, in
a great measure, temporary, and must be greatly diminished by a few
years of peace_. She could procure no considerable loans, therefore she
has mortgaged no _such oppressive taxes as those Great Britain has
imposed in perpetuity for payment of interest_. Peace must, therefore,
soon re-establish her commerce and manufactures, especially as the
comparative _lightness of taxes_, and the cheapness of living, in that
country, must make France an asylum for British manufacturers and
artificers." On this the author rests the merit of his whole system. And
on this point I will join issue with him. If France is not at least in
the _same condition_, even in that very condition which the author
falsely represents to be ours,--if the very reverse of his proposition
be not true, then I will admit his state of the nation to be just; and
all his inferences from that state to be logical and conclusive. It is
not surprising, that the author should hazard our opinion of his
veracity. That is a virtue on which great statesmen do not perhaps pique
themselves so much; but it is somewhat extraordinary, that he should
stake on a very poor calculation of chances, all credit for care, for
accuracy, and for knowledge of the subject of which he treats. He is
rash and inaccurate, because he thinks he writes to a public ignorant
and inattentive. But he may find himself in that respect, as in many
others, greatly mistaken. In order to contrast the light and vigorous
condition of France with that of England, weak, and sinking under her
burdens, he states, in his tenth page, that France had raised
50,314,378_l._ sterling _by taxes within the several years_ from the
year 1756 to 1762 both inclusive. All Englishman must stand aghast at
such a representation: To find France able to _raise within the year_
sums little inferior to all that we were able even to _borrow_ on
interest with all the resources of the greatest and most established
credit in the world! Europe was filled with astonishment when they saw
England _borrow_ in one year twelve millions. It was thought, and very
justly, no small proof of national strength and financial skill, to find
a fund for the payment of the interest upon this sum. The interest of
this, computed with the one per cent annuities, amounted only to
600,000_l._ a year. This, I say, was thought a surprising effort even of
credit. But this author talks, as of a thing not worth proving, and but
just worth observing, that France in one year raised sixteen times that
sum without borrowing, and continued to raise sums not far from equal to
it for several years together. Suppose some Jacob Henriques had
proposed, in the year 1762, to prevent a perpetual charge on the nation
by raising ten millions within the year: he would have been considered,
not as a harsh financier, who laid a heavy hand on the public; but as a
poor visionary, who had run mad on supplies and taxes. They who know
that the whole land-tax of England, at 4_s._ in the pound, raises but
two millions, will not easily apprehend that any such sums as the author
has conjured up can be raised even in the most opulent nations. France
owed a large debt, and was encumbered with heavy establishments, before
that war. The author does not formally deny that she borrowed something
in every year of its continuance; let him produce the funds for this
astonishing annual addition to all her vast preceding taxes; an
addition, equal to the whole excise, customs, land and malt-taxes of
England taken together.
But what must be the reader's astonishment, perhaps his indignation, if
he should find that this great financier has fallen into the most
unaccountable of all errors, no less an error than that of mistaking the
_identical sums borrowed by France upon interest, for supplies raised
within the year_! Can it be conceived that any man, only entered into
the first rudiments of finance, should make so egregious a blunder;
should write it, should print it; should carry it to a second edition;
should take it not collaterally and incidentally, but lay it down as the
corner-stone of his whole system, in such an important point as the
comparative states of France and England? But it will be said, that it
was his misfortune to be ill-informed. Not at all. A man of any loose
general knowledge, and of the most ordinary sagacity, never could have
been misinformed in so gross a manner; because he would have immediately
rejected so wild and extravagant an account.
The fact is this: the credit of France, bad as it might have been, did
enable her (not to raise within the year) but to _borrow_ the very sums
the author mentions; that is to say, 1,106,916,261 livres, making, in
the author's computation, 50,314,378_l._ The credit of France was low;
but it was not annihilated. She did not derive, as our author chooses to
assert, any advantages from the debility of her credit. Its consequence
was the natural one: she borrowed; but she borrowed upon bad terms,
indeed on the most exorbitant usury.
In speaking of a foreign revenue, the very pretence to accuracy would be
the most inaccurate thing in the world. Neither the author nor I can
with certainty authenticate the information we communicate to the
public, nor in an affair of eternal fluctuation arrive at perfect
exactness. All we can do, and this we may be expected to do, is to avoid
gross errors and blunders of a capital nature. We cannot order the
proper officer to lay the accounts before the House. But the reader must
judge on the probability of the accounts we lay before him. The author
speaks of France as raising her supplies for war by taxes within the
year; and of her debt, as a thing scarcely worthy of notice. I affirm
that she borrowed large sums in every year; and has thereby accumulated
an immense debt. This debt continued after the war infinitely to
embarrass her affairs; and to find some means for its reduction was then
and has ever since been the first object of her policy. But she has so
little succeeded in all her efforts, that the _perpetual_ debt of
France is at this hour little short of 100,000,000_l._ sterling; and she
stands charged with at least 40,000,000 of English pounds on life-rents
and tontines. The annuities paid at this day at the Hôtel de Ville of
Paris, which are by no means her sole payments of that nature, amount to
139,000,000 of livres, that is to 6,318,000_l._; besides _billets au
porteur_, and various detached and unfunded debts, to a great amount,
and which bear an interest.
At the end of the war, the interest payable on her debt amounted to
upwards of seven millions sterling. M. de la Verdy, the last hope of the
French finances, was called in, to aid in the reduction of an interest,
so light to our author, so intolerably heavy upon those who are to pay
it. After many unsuccessful efforts towards reconciling arbitrary
reduction with public credit, he was obliged to go the plain high road
of power, and to impose a tax of 10 per cent upon a very great part of
the capital debt of that kingdom; and this measure of present ease, to
the destruction of future credit, produced about 500,000_l._ a year,
which was carried to their _Caisse d'amortissement_ or sinking fund. But
so unfaithfully and unsteadily has this and all the other articles which
compose that fund been applied to their purposes, that they have given
the state but very little even of present relief, since it is known to
the whole world that she is behindhand on every one of her
establishments. Since the year 1763, there has been no operation of any
consequence on the French finances; and in this enviable condition is
France at present with regard to her debt.
Everybody knows that the principal of the debt is but a name; the
interest is the only thing which can distress a nation. Take this idea,
which will not be disputed, and compare the interest paid by England
with that paid by France:
Interest paid by France, funded and
unfunded, for perpetuity or on lives,
after the tax of 10 per cent £6,500,000
Interest paid by England, as stated by
the author, p. 27 4,600,000
----------
Interest paid by France exceeds that
paid by England £1,900,000
The author cannot complain, that I state the interest paid by England as
too low. He takes it himself as the extremest term. Nobody who knows
anything of the French finances will affirm that I state the interest
paid by that kingdom too high. It might be easily proved to amount to a
great deal more: even this is near two millions above what is paid by
England.
There are three standards to judge of the good condition of a nation
with regard to its finances. 1st, The relief of the people. 2nd, The
equality of supplies to establishments. 3rd, The state of public credit.
Try France on all these standards.
Although our author very liberally administers relief to the people of
France, its government has not been altogether so gracious. Since the
peace, she has taken off but a single _vingtième_, or shilling in the
pound, and some small matter in the capitation. But, if the government
has relieved them in one point, it has only burdened them the more
heavily in another. The _Taille_,[65] that grievous and destructive
imposition, which all their financiers lament, without being able to
remove or to replace, has been augmented no less than six millions of
livres, or 270,000 pounds English. A further augmentation of this or
other duties is now talked of; and it is certainly necessary to their
affairs: so exceedingly remote from either truth or verisimilitude is
the author's amazing assertion, _that the burdens of France in the war
were in a great measure temporary, and must be greatly diminished by a
few years of peace_.
In the next place, if the people of France are not lightened of taxes,
so neither is the state disburdened of charges. I speak from very good
information, that the annual income of that state is at this day thirty
millions of livres, or 1,350,000_l._ sterling, short of a provision for
their ordinary peace establishment; so far are they from the attempt or
even hope to discharge any part of the capital of their enormous debt.
Indeed, under such extreme straitness and distraction labors the whole
body of their finances, so far does their charge outrun their supply in
every particular, that no man, I believe, who has considered their
affairs with any degree of attention or information, but must hourly
look for some extraordinary convulsion in that whole system: the effect
of which on France, and even on all Europe, it is difficult to
conjecture.
In the third point of view, their credit. Let the reader cast his eye on
a table of the price of French funds, as they stood a few weeks ago,
compared with the state of some of our English stocks, even in their
present low condition:--
French. British.
5 per cents 63 Bank stock, 5-1/2 159
4 per cent (not taxed) 57 4 per cent cons. 100
3 per cent " " 49 3 per cent cons. 88
This state of the funds of France and England is sufficient to convince
even prejudice and obstinacy, that if France and England are not in the
same condition (as the author affirms they are not) the difference is
infinitely to the disadvantage of France. This depreciation of their
funds has not much the air of a nation lightening burdens and
discharging debts.
Such is the true comparative state of the two kingdoms in those capital
points of view. Now as to the nature of the taxes which provide for this
debt, as well as for their ordinary establishments, the author has
thought proper to affirm that "they are comparatively light"; that "she
has mortgaged no such oppressive taxes as ours"; his effrontery on this
head is intolerable. Does the author recollect a single tax in England
to which something parallel in nature, and as heavy in burden, does not
exist in France; does he not know that the lands of the noblesse are
still under the load of the greater part of the old feudal charges, from
which the gentry of England have been relieved for upwards of a hundred
years, and which were in kind, as well as burden, much worse than our
modern land-tax? Besides that all the gentry of France serve in the army
on very slender pay, and to the utter ruin of their fortunes, all those
who are not noble have their lands heavily taxed. Does he not know that
wine, brandy, soap, candles, leather, saltpetre, gunpowder, are taxed in
France? Has he not heard that government in France has made a monopoly
of that great article of _salt?_ that they compel the people to take a
certain quantity of it, and at a certain rate, both rate and quantity
fixed at the arbitrary pleasure of the imposer?[66] that they pay in
France the _Taille_, an arbitrary imposition on presumed property? that
a tax is laid in fact and name, on the same arbitrary standard, upon the
acquisitions of their _industry_? and that in France a heavy
_capitation-tax_ is also paid, from the highest to the very poorest sort
of people? Have we taxes of such weight, or anything at all of the
compulsion, in the article of _salt_? do we pay any _taillage_, any
_faculty-tax_, any _industry-tax?_ do we pay any _capitation-tax_
whatsoever? I believe the people of London would fall into an agony to
hear of such taxes proposed upon them as are paid at Paris. There is not
a single article of provision for man or beast which enters that great
city, and is not excised; corn, hay, meal, butcher's-meat, fish, fowls,
everything. I do not here mean to censure the policy of taxes laid on
the consumption of great luxurious cities. I only state the fact. We
should be with difficulty brought to hear of a tax of 50_s._ upon every
ox sold in Smithfield. Yet this tax is paid in Paris. Wine, the lower
sort of wine, little better than English small beer, pays 2_d._ a
bottle.
We, indeed, tax our beer; but the imposition on small beer is very far
from heavy. In no part of England are eatables of any kind the object of
taxation. In almost every other country in Europe they are excised, more
or less. I have by me the state of the revenues of many of the principal
nations on the Continent; and, on comparing them with ours, I think I am
fairly warranted to assert, that England is the most lightly taxed of
any of the great states of Europe. They, whose unnatural and sullen joy
arises from a contemplation of the distresses of their country, will
revolt at this position. But if I am called upon, I will prove it beyond
all possibility of dispute; even though this proof should deprive these
gentlemen of the singular satisfaction of considering their country as
undone; and though the best civil government, the best constituted, and
the best managed revenue that ever the world beheld, should be
thoroughly vindicated from their perpetual clamors and complaints. As to
our neighbor and rival France, in addition to what I have here
suggested, I say, and when the author chooses formally to deny, I shall
formally prove it, that her subjects pay more than England, on a
computation of the wealth of both countries; that her taxes are more
injudiciously and more oppressively imposed; more vexatiously collected;
come in a smaller proportion to the royal coffers, and are less applied
by far to the public service. I am not one of those who choose to take
the author's word for this happy and flourishing condition of the French
finances, rather than attend to the changes, the violent pushes and the
despair of all her own financiers. Does he choose to be referred for the
easy and happy condition of the subject in France to the remonstrances
of their own parliaments, written with such an eloquence, feeling, and
energy, as I have not seen exceeded in any other writings? The author
may say, their complaints are exaggerated, and the effects of faction. I
answer, that they are the representations of numerous, grave, and most
respectable bodies of men, upon the affairs of their own country. But,
allowing that discontent and faction may pervert the judgment of such
venerable bodies in France, we have as good a right to suppose that the
same causes may full as probably have produced from a private, however
respectable person, that frightful, and, I trust I have shown,
groundless representation of our own affairs in England.
The author is so conscious of the dangerous effects of that
representation, that he thinks it necessary, and very necessary it is,
to guard against them. He assures us, "that he has not made that display
of the difficulties of his country, to expose her counsels to the
ridicule of other states, or to provoke a vanquished enemy to insult
her; nor to excite the people's rage against their governors, or sink
them into a despondency of the public welfare." I readily admit this
apology for his intentions. God forbid I should think any man capable of
entertaining so execrable and senseless a design. The true cause of his
drawing so shocking a picture is no more than this; and it ought rather
to claim our pity than excite our indignation; he finds himself out of
power; and this condition is intolerable to him. The same sun which
gilds all nature, and exhilarates the whole creation, does not shine
upon disappointed ambition. It is something that rays out of darkness,
and inspires nothing but gloom and melancholy. Men in this deplorable
state of mind find a comfort in spreading the contagion of their spleen.
They find an advantage too; for it is a general, popular error, to
imagine the loudest complainers for the public to be the most anxious
for its welfare. If such persons can answer the ends of relief and
profit to themselves, they are apt to be careless enough about either
the means or the consequences.
Whatever this complainant's motives may be, the effects can by no
possibility be other than those which he so strongly, and I hope truly,
disclaims all intention of producing. To verify this, the reader has
only to consider how dreadful a picture he has drawn in his 32nd page,
of the state of this kingdom; such a picture as, I believe, has hardly
been applicable, without some exaggeration, to the most degenerate and
undone commonwealth that ever existed. Let this view of things be
compared with the prospect of a remedy which he proposes in the page
directly opposite, and the subsequent. I believe no man living could
have imagined it possible, except for the sake of burlesquing a subject,
to propose remedies so ridiculously disproportionate to the evil, so
full of uncertainty in their operation, and depending for their success
in every step upon the happy event of so many new, dangerous, and
visionary projects. It is not amiss, that he has thought proper to give
the public some little notice of what they may expect from his friends,
when our affairs shall be committed to their management. Let us see how
the accounts of disease and remedy are balanced in his "State of the
Nation." In the first place, on the side of evils, he states, "an
impoverished and heavily-burdened public. A declining trade and
decreasing specie. The power of the crown never so much extended over
the great; but the great without influence over the lower sort.
Parliament losing its reverence with the people. The voice of the
multitude set up against the sense of the legislature; a people
luxurious and licentious, impatient of rule, and despising all
authority. Government relaxed in every sinew, and a corrupt selfish
spirit pervading the whole. An opinion of many, that the form of
government is not worth contending for. No attachment in the bulk of
the people towards the constitution. No reverence for the customs of our
ancestors. No attachment but to private interest, nor any zeal but for
selfish gratifications. Trade and manufactures going to ruin. Great
Britain in danger of becoming tributary to France, and the descent of
the crown dependent on her pleasure. Ireland, in case of a war, to
become a prey to France; and Great Britain, unable to recover Ireland,
cede it by treaty," (the author never can think of a treaty without
making cessions,) "in order to purchase peace for herself. The colonies
left exposed to the ravages of a domestic, or the conquest of a foreign
enemy."--Gloomy enough, God knows. The author well observes,[67] _that a
mind not totally devoid of feeling cannot look upon such a prospect
without horror; and an heart capable of humanity must be unable to hear
its description_. He ought to have added, that no man of common
discretion ought to have exhibited it to the public, if it were true; or
of common honesty, if it were false.
But now for the comfort; the day-star which is to arise in our hearts;
the author's grand scheme for totally reversing this dismal state of
things, and making us[68] "happy at home and respected abroad,
formidable in war and flourishing in peace."
In this great work he proceeds with a facility equally astonishing and
pleasing. Never was financier less embarrassed by the burden of
establishments, or with the difficulty of finding ways and means. If an
establishment is troublesome to him, he lops off at a stroke just as
much of it as he chooses. He mows down, without giving quarter, or
assigning reason, army, navy, ordnance, ordinary, extraordinaries;
nothing can stand before him. Then, when he comes to provide, Amalthea's
horn is in his hands; and he pours out with an inexhaustible bounty,
taxes, duties, loans, and revenues, without uneasiness to himself, or
burden to the public. Insomuch that, when we consider the abundance of
his resources, we cannot avoid being surprised at his extraordinary
attention to savings. But it is all the exuberance of his goodness.
This book has so much of a certain tone of power, that one would be
almost tempted to think it written by some person who had been high in
office. A man is generally rendered somewhat a worse reasoner for having
been a minister. In private, the assent of listening and obsequious
friends; in public, the venal cry and prepared vote of a passive senate,
confirm him in habits of begging the question with impunity, and
asserting without thinking himself obliged to prove. Had it not been for
some such habits, the author could never have expected that we should
take his estimate for a peace establishment solely on his word.
This estimate which he gives,[69] is the great groundwork of his plan
for the national redemption; and it ought to be well and firmly laid, or
what must become of the superstructure? One would have thought the
natural method in a plan of reformation would be, to take the present
existing estimates as they stand; and then to show what may be
practicably and safely defalcated from them. This would, I say, be the
natural course; and what would be expected from a man of business. But
this author takes a very different method. For the ground of his
speculation of a present peace establishment, he resorts to a former
speculation of the same kind, which was in the mind of the minister of
the year 1764. Indeed it never existed anywhere else. "The plan,"[70]
says he, with his usual ease, "has been already formed, and the outline
drawn, by the administration of 1764. I shall attempt to fill up the
void and obliterated parts, and trace its operation. The standing
expense of the present (his projected) peace establishment, _improved by
the experience of the two last years, may be thus estimated_"; and he
estimates it at 3,468,161_l._
Here too it would be natural to expect some reasons for condemning the
subsequent actual establishments, which have so much transgressed the
limits of his plan of 1764, as well as some arguments in favor of his
new project; which has in some articles exceeded, in others fallen
short, but on the whole is much below his old one. Hardly a word on any
of these points, the only points however that are in the least
essential; for unless you assign reasons for the increase or diminution
of the several articles of public charge, the playing at establishments
and estimates is an amusement of no higher order, and of much less
ingenuity, than _Questions and commands_, or _What is my thought like_?
To bring more distinctly under the reader's view this author's strange
method of proceeding, I will lay before him the three schemes; viz. the
idea of the ministers in 1764, the actual estimates of the two last
years as given by the author himself, and lastly the new project of his
political millennium:--
Plan of establishment for 1764, as by
"Considerations," p. 43 [71] £3,609,700
Medium of 1767 and 1768, as by
"State of the Nation," p. 29 and 30 3,919,375
Present peace establishment, as by the
project in "State of the Nation," p. 33 3,468,161
It is not from anything our author has anywhere said, that you are
enabled to find the ground, much less the justification, of the immense
difference between these several systems; you must compare them
yourself, article by article; no very pleasing employment, by the way,
to compare the agreement or disagreement of two chimeras. I now only
speak of the comparison of his own two projects. As to the latter of
them, it differs from the former, by having some of the articles
diminished, and others increased.[72] I find the chief article of
reduction arises from the smaller deficiency of land and malt, and of
the annuity funds, which he brings down to 295,561_l._ in his new
estimate, from 502,400_l._ which he had allowed for those articles in
the "Considerations." With this _reduction_, owing, as it must be,
merely to a smaller deficiency of funds, he has nothing at all to do. It
can be no work and no merit of his. But with regard to the _increase_,
the matter is very different. It is all his own; the public is loaded
(for anything we can see to the contrary) entirely _gratis_. The chief
articles of the increase are on the navy,[73] and on the army and
ordnance extraordinaries; the navy being estimated in his "State of the
Nation" 50,000_l._ a year more, and the army and ordnance
extraordinaries 40,000_l._ more, than he had thought proper to allow for
them in that estimate in his "Considerations," which he makes the
foundation of his present project. He has given no sort of reason,
stated no sort of necessity, for this additional allowance, either in
the one article or the other. What is still stronger, he admits that his
allowance for the army and ordnance extras is too great, and expressly
refers you to the "Considerations";[74] where, far from giving
75,000_l._ a year to that service, as the "State of the Nation" has
done, the author apprehends his own scanty provision of 35,000_l._ to be
by far too considerable, and thinks it may well admit of further
reductions.[75] Thus, according to his own principles, this great
economist falls into a vicious prodigality; and is as far in his
estimate from a consistency with his own principles as with the real
nature of the services.
Still, however, his present establishment differs from its archetype of
1764, by being, though raised in particular parts, upon the whole, about
141,000_l._ smaller. It is improved, he tells us, by the experience of
the two last years. One would have concluded that the peace
establishment of these two years had been less than that of 1764, in
order to suggest to the author his improvements, which enabled him to
reduce it. But how does that turn out?
Peace establishment[76] 1767 and 1768, medium £3,919,375
Ditto, estimate in the "Considerations," for 1764 3,609,700
---------
Difference £309,675
A vast increase instead of diminution. The experience then of the two
last years ought naturally to have given the idea of a heavier
establishment; but this writer is able to diminish by increasing, and to
draw the effects of subtraction from the operations of addition. By
means of these new powers, he may certainly do whatever he pleases. He
is indeed moderate enough in the use of them, and condescends to settle
his establishments at 3,468,161_l._ a year.
However, he has not yet done with it; he has further ideas of saving,
and new resources of revenue. These additional savings are principally
two: 1st, _It is to be hoped_,[77] says he, that the sum of 250,000_l._
(which in the estimate he allows for the deficiency of land and malt)
will be less by 37,924_l._[78]
2nd, That the sum of 20,000_l._ allowed for the Foundling Hospital, and
1800_l._ for American Surveys, will soon cease to be necessary, as the
services will be completed.
What follows, with regard to the resources,[79] is very well worthy the
reader's attention. "Of this estimate," says he, "upwards of 300,000_l._
will be for the plantation service; and that sum, _I hope_, the people
of Ireland and the colonies _might be induced_ to take off Great
Britain, and defray between them, in the proportion of 200,000_l._ by
the colonies, and 100,000_l._ by Ireland."
Such is the whole of this mighty scheme. Take his reduced estimate, and
his further reductions, and his resources all together, and the result
will be,--he will _certainly_ lower the provision made for the navy. He
will cut off largely (God knows what or how) from the army and ordnance
extraordinaries. He may be _expected_ to cut off more. He _hopes_ that
the deficiencies on land and malt will be less than usual; and he
_hopes_ that America and Ireland might be _induced_ to take off
300,000_l._ of our annual charges.
If any of these Hopes, Mights, Insinuations, Expectations, and
Inducements, should fail him, there will be a formidable gaping breach
in his whole project. If all of them should fail, he has left the nation
without a glimmering of hope in this thick night of terrors which he has
thought fit to spread about us. If every one of them, which, attended
with success, would signify anything to our revenue, can have no effect
but to add to our distractions and dangers, we shall be if possible in a
still worse condition from his projects of cure, than he represents us
from our original disorders.
Before we examine into the consequences of these schemes, and the
probability of these savings, let us suppose them all real and all safe,
and then see what it is they amount to, and how he reasons on them:--
Deficiency on land and malt, less by £37,000
Foundling Hospital 20,000
American Surveys 1,800
-------
£58,800
This is the amount of the only articles of saving he specifies: and yet
he chooses to assert,[81] "that we may venture on the credit of them to
reduce the standing expenses of the estimate (from 3,468,161_l._) to
3,300,000_l._"; that is, for a saving of 58,000_l._ he is not ashamed
to take credit for a defalcation from his own ideal establishment in a
sum of no less than 168,161_l._! Suppose even that we were to take up
the estimate of the "Considerations" (which is however abandoned in the
"State of the Nation"), and reduce his 75,000_l._ extraordinaries to the
original 35,000_l._, still all these savings joined together give us but
98,800_l._; that is, near 70,000_l._ short of the credit he calls for,
and for which he has neither given any reason, nor furnished any data
whatsoever for others to reason upon.
Such are his savings, as operating on his own project of a peace
establishment. Let us now consider them as they affect the existing
establishment and our actual services. He tells us, the sum allowed in
his estimate for the navy is "69,321_l._ less than the grant for that
service in 1767; but in that grant 30,000_l._ was included for the
purchase of hemp, and a saving of about 25,000_l._ was made in that
year." The author has got some secret in arithmetic. These two sums put
together amount, in the ordinary way of computing, to 55,000_l._, and
not to 69,321_l._ On what principle has he chosen to take credit for
14,321_l._ more? To what this strange inaccuracy is owing, I cannot
possibly comprehend; nor is it very material, where the logic is so bad,
and the policy so erroneous, whether the arithmetic be just or
otherwise. But in a scheme for making this nation "happy at home and
respected abroad, formidable in war and flourishing in peace," it is
surely a little unfortunate for us, that he has picked out the _Navy_,
as the very first object of his economical experiments. Of all the
public services, that of the navy is the one in which tampering may be
of the greatest danger, which can worst be supplied upon an emergency,
and of which any failure draws after it the longest and heaviest train
of consequences. I am far from saying, that this or any service ought
not to be conducted with economy. But I will never suffer the sacred
name of economy to be bestowed upon arbitrary defalcation of charge. The
author tells us himself, "that to suffer the navy to rot in harbor for
want of repairs and marines, would be to invite destruction." It would
be so. When the author talks therefore of savings on the navy estimate,
it is incumbent on him to let us know, not what sums he will cut off,
but what branch of that service he deems superfluous. Instead of putting
us off with unmeaning generalities, he ought to have stated what naval
force, what naval works, and what naval stores, with the lowest
estimated expense, are necessary to keep our marine in a condition
commensurate to its great ends. And this too not for the contracted and
deceitful space of a single year, but for some reasonable term.
Everybody knows that many charges cannot be in their nature regular or
annual. In the year 1767 a stock of hemp, &c., was to be laid in; that
charge intermits, but it does not end. Other charges of other kinds take
their place. Great works are now carrying on at Portsmouth, but not of
greater magnitude than utility; and they must be provided for. A year's
estimate is therefore no just idea at all of a permanent peace
establishment. Had the author opened this matter upon these plain
principles, a judgment might have been formed, how far he had contrived
to reconcile national defence with public economy. Till he has done it,
those who had rather depend on any man's reason than the greatest man's
authority, will not give him credit on this head, for the saving of a
single shilling. As to those savings which are already made, or in
course of being made, whether right or wrong, he has nothing at all to
do with them; they can be no part of his project, considered as a plan
of reformation. I greatly fear that the error has not lately been on the
side of profusion.