Another head is the saving on the army and ordnance extraordinaries,

particularly in the American branch. What or how much reduction may be

made, none of us, I believe, can with any fairness pretend to say; very

little, I am convinced. The state of America is extremely unsettled;

more troops have been sent thither; new dispositions have been made; and

this augmentation of number, and change of disposition, has rarely, I

believe, the effect of lessening the bill for extraordinaries, which, if

not this year, yet in the next we must certainly feel. Care has not been

wanting to introduce economy into that part of the service. The author's

great friend has made, I admit, some regulations: his immediate

successors have made more and better. This part will be handled more

ably and more minutely at another time: but no one can cut down this

bill of extraordinaries at his pleasure. The author has given us

nothing, but his word, for any certain or considerable reduction; and

this we ought to be the more cautious in taking, as he has promised

great savings in his "Considerations," which he has not chosen to abide

by in his "State of the Nation."

On this head also of the American extraordinaries, he can take credit

for nothing. As to his next, the lessening of the deficiency of the land

and malt-tax, particularly of the malt-tax, any person the least

conversant in that subject cannot avoid a smile. This deficiency arises

from charge of collection, from anticipation, and from defective

produce. What has the author said on the reduction of any head of this

deficiency upon the land-tax? On these points he is absolutely silent.

As to the deficiency on the malt-tax, which is chiefly owing to a

defective produce, he has and can have nothing to propose. If this

deficiency should he lessened by the increase of malting in any years

more than in others, (as it is a greatly fluctuating object,) how much

of this obligation shall we owe to this author's ministry? will it not

be the case under any administration? must it not go to the general

service of the year, in some way or other, let the finances be in whose

hands they will? But why take credit for so extremely reduced a

deficiency at all? I can tell him he has no rational ground for it in

the produce of the year 1767; and I suspect will have full as little

reason from the produce of the year 1768. That produce may indeed become

greater, and the deficiency of course will be less. It may too be far

otherwise. A fair and judicious financier will not, as this writer has

done, for the sake of making out a specious account, select a favorable

year or two, at remote periods, and ground his calculations on those. In

1768 he will not take the deficiencies of 1753 and 1754 for his

standard. Sober men have hitherto (and must continue this course, to

preserve this character,) taken indifferently the mediums of the years

immediately preceding. But a person who has a scheme from which he

promises much to the public ought to be still more cautious; he should

ground his speculation rather on the lowest mediums because all new

schemes are known to be subject to some defect or failure not foreseen;

and which therefore every prudent proposer will be ready to allow for,

in order to lay his foundation as low and as solid as possible. Quite

contrary is the practice of some politicians. They first propose

savings, which they well know cannot be made, in order to get a

reputation for economy. In due time they assume another, but a different

method, by providing for the service they had before cut off or

straitened, and which they can then very easily prove to be necessary.

In the same spirit they raise magnificent ideas of revenue on funds

which they know to be insufficient. Afterwards, who can blame them, if

they do not satisfy the public desires? They are great artificers but

they cannot work without materials.

These are some of the little arts of great statesmen. To such we leave

them, and follow where the author leads us, to his next resource, the

Foundling Hospital. Whatever particular virtue there is in the mode of

this saving, there seems to be nothing at all new, and indeed nothing

wonderfully important in it. The sum annually voted for the support of

the Foundling Hospital has been in a former Parliament limited to the

establishment of the children then in the hospital. When they are

apprenticed, this provision will cease. It will therefore fall in more

or less at different times; and will at length cease entirely. But,

until it does, we cannot reckon upon it as the saving on the

establishment of any given year: nor can any one conceive how the author

comes to mention this, any more than some other articles, as a part of a

_new_ plan of economy which is to retrieve our affairs. This charge will

indeed cease in its own time. But will no other succeed to it? Has he

ever known the public free from some contingent charge, either for the

just support of royal dignity or for national magnificence, or for

public charity, or for public service? does he choose to flatter his

readers that no such will ever return? or does he in good earnest

declare, that let the reason, or necessity, be what they will, he is

resolved not to provide for such services?

Another resource of economy yet remains, for he gleans the field very

closely,--1800_l._ for the American surveys. Why, what signifies a

dispute about trifles? he shall have it. But while he is carrying it

off, I shall just whisper in his ear, that neither the saving that is

allowed, nor that which is doubted of, can at all belong to that future

proposed administration, whose touch is to cure all our evils. Both the

one and the other belong equally (as indeed all the rest do) to the

present administration, to any administration; because they are the gift

of time, and not the bounty of the exchequer.

I have now done with all the minor, preparatory parts of the author's

scheme, the several articles of saving which he proposes. At length

comes the capital operation, his new resources. Three hundred thousand

pounds a year from America and Ireland.--Alas! alas! if that too should

fail us, what will become of this poor undone nation? The author, in a

tone of great humility, _hopes_ they may be induced to pay it. Well, if

that be all, we may hope so too: and for any light he is pleased to give

us into the ground of this hope, and the ways and means of this

inducement, here is a speedy end both of the question and the revenue.

It is the constant custom of this author, in all his writings, to take

it for granted, that he has given you a revenue, whenever he can point

out to you where you may have money, if you can contrive how to get at

it; and this seems to be the masterpiece of his financial ability. I

think, however, in his way of proceeding, he has behaved rather like a

harsh step-dame, than a kind nursing-mother to his country. Why stop at

300,000_l._ If his state of things be at all founded, America and

Ireland are much better able to pay 600,000_l._ than we are to satisfy

ourselves with half that sum. However, let us forgive him this one

instance of tenderness towards Ireland and the colonies.

He spends a vast deal of time[82] in an endeavor to prove that Ireland

is able to bear greater impositions. He is of opinion, that the poverty

of the lower class of people there is, in a great measure, owing to _a

want_ of judicious taxes; that a land-tax will enrich her tenants; that

taxes are paid in England which are not paid there; that the colony

trade is increased above 100,000_l._ since the peace; that she _ought_

to have further indulgence in that trade; and ought to have further

privileges in the woollen manufacture. From these premises, of what she

has, what she has not, and what she ought to have, he infers that

Ireland will contribute 100,000_l._ towards the extraordinaries of the

American establishment.

I shall make no objections whatsoever, logical or financial, to this

reasoning: many occur; but they would lead me from my purpose, from

which I do not intend to be diverted, because it seems to me of no small

importance. It will be just enough to hint, what I dare say many readers

have before observed, that when any man proposes new taxes in a country

with which he is not personally conversant by residence or office, he

ought to lay open its situation much more minutely and critically than

this author has done, or than perhaps he is able to do. He ought not to

content himself with saying that a single article of her trade is

increased 100,000_l._ a year; he ought, if he argues from the increase

of trade to the increase of taxes, to state the whole trade, and not one

branch of trade only; he ought to enter fully into the state of its

remittances, and the course of its exchange; he ought likewise to

examine whether all its establishments are increased or diminished; and

whether it incurs or discharges debts annually. But I pass over all

this; and am content to ask a few plain questions.

Does the author then seriously mean to propose in Parliament a land-tax,

or any tax for 100,000_l._ a year upon Ireland? If he does, and if

fatally, by his temerity and our weakness, he should succeed; then I say

he will throw the whole empire from one end of it to the other into

mortal convulsions. What is it that can satisfy the furious and

perturbed mind of this man? is it not enough for him that such projects

have alienated our colonies from the mother-country, and not to propose

violently to tear our sister kingdom also from our side, and to convince

every dependent part of the empire, that, when a little money is to be

raised, we have no sort of regard to their ancient customs, their

opinions, their circumstances, or their affections? He has however a

_douceur_ for Ireland in his pocket; benefits in trade, by opening the

woollen manufacture to that nation. A very right idea in my opinion; but

not more strong in reason, than likely to be opposed by the most

powerful and most violent of all local prejudices and popular passions.

First, a fire is already kindled by his schemes of taxation in America;

he then proposes one which will set all Ireland in a blaze; and his way

of quenching both is by a plan which may kindle perhaps ten times a

greater flame in Britain.

Will the author pledge himself, previously to his proposal of such a

tax, to carry this enlargement of the Irish trade? If he does not, then

the tax will be certain; the benefit will be less than problematical. In

this view, his compensation to Ireland vanishes into smoke; the tax, to

their prejudices, will appear stark naked in the light of an act of

arbitrary power and oppression. But, if he should propose the benefit

and tax together, then the people of Ireland, a very high and spirited

people, would think it the worst bargain in the world. They would look

upon the one as wholly vitiated and poisoned by the other; and, if they

could not be separated, would infallibly resist them both together. Here

would be taxes, indeed, amounting to a handsome sum; 100,000_l._ very

effectually voted, and passed through the best and most authentic forms;

but how to be collected?--This is his perpetual manner. One of his

projects depends for success upon another project, and this upon a

third, all of them equally visionary. His finance is like the Indian

philosophy; his earth is poised on the horns of a bull, his bull stands

upon an elephant, his elephant is supported by a tortoise; and so on

forever.

As to his American 200,000_l._ a year, he is satisfied to repeat

gravely, as he has done an hundred times before, that the Americans are

able to pay it. Well, and what then? does he lay open any part of his

plan how they may be compelled to pay it, without plunging ourselves

into calamities that outweigh tenfold the proposed benefit? or does he

show how they may be induced to submit to it quietly? or does he give

any satisfaction concerning the mode of levying it; in commercial

colonies, one of the most important and difficult of all considerations?

Nothing like it. To the Stamp Act, whatever its excellences may be, I

think he will not in reality recur, or even choose to assert that he

means to do so, in case his minister should come again into power. If he

does, I will predict that some of the fastest friends of that minister

will desert him upon this point. As to port duties he has damned them

all in the lump, by declaring them[83] "contrary to the first principles

of colonization, and not less prejudicial to the interests of Great

Britain than to those of the colonies." Surely this single observation

of his ought to have taught him a little caution; he ought to have begun

to doubt, whether there is not something in the nature of commercial

colonies, which renders them an unfit object of taxation; when port

duties, so large a fund of revenue in all countries, are by himself

found, in this case, not only improper, but destructive. However, he has

here pretty well narrowed the field of taxation. Stamp Act, hardly to be

resumed. Port duties, mischievous. Excises, I believe, he will scarcely

think worth the collection (if any revenue should be so) in America.

Land-tax (notwithstanding his opinion of its immense use to agriculture)

he will not directly propose, before he has thought again and again on

the subject. Indeed he very readily recommends it for Ireland, and

seems to think it not improper for America; because, he observes, they

already raise most of their taxes internally, including this tax. A most

curious reason, truly! because their lands are already heavily burdened,

he thinks it right to burden them still further. But he will recollect,

for surely he cannot be ignorant of it, that the lands of America are

not, as in England, let at a rent certain in money, and therefore

cannot, as here, be taxed at a certain pound rate. They value them in

gross among themselves; and none but themselves in their several

districts can value them. Without their hearty concurrence and

co-operation, it is evident, we cannot advance a step in the assessing

or collecting any land-tax. As to the taxes which in some places the

Americans pay by the acre, they are merely duties of regulation; they

are small; and to increase them, notwithstanding the secret virtues of a

land-tax, would be the most effectual means of preventing that

cultivation they are intended to promote. Besides, the whole country is

heavily in arrear already for land-taxes and quit-rents. They have

different methods of taxation in the different provinces, agreeable to

their several local circumstances. In New England by far the greatest

part of their revenue is raised by _faculty-taxes_ and _capitations_.

Such is the method in many others. It is obvious that Parliament,

unassisted by the colonies themselves, cannot take so much as a single

step in this mode of taxation. Then what tax is it he will impose? Why,

after all the boasting speeches and writings of his faction for these

four years, after all the vain expectations which they have held out to

a deluded public, this their great advocate, after twisting the subject

every way, after writhing himself in every posture, after knocking at

every door, is obliged fairly to abandon every mode of taxation

whatsoever in America.[84] He thinks it the best method for Parliament

to impose the sum, and reserve the account to itself, leaving the mode

of taxation to the colonies. But how and in what proportion? what does

the author say? O, not a single syllable on this the most material part

of the whole question! Will he, in Parliament, undertake to settle the

proportions of such payments from Nova Scotia to Nevis, in no fewer than

six-and-twenty different countries, varying in almost every possible

circumstance one from another? If he does, I tell him, he adjourns his

revenue to a very long day. If he leaves it to themselves to settle

these proportions, he adjourns it to doomsday.

Then what does he get by this method on the side of acquiescence? will

the people of America relish this course, of giving and granting and

applying their money, the better because their assemblies are made

commissioners of the taxes? This is far worse than all his former

projects; for here, if the assemblies shall refuse, or delay, or be

negligent, or fraudulent, in this new-imposed duty, we are wholly

without remedy; and neither our custom-house officers, nor our troops,

nor our armed ships can be of the least use in the collection. No idea

can be more contemptible (I will not call it an oppressive one, the

harshness is lost in the folly) than that of proposing to get any

revenue from the Americans but by their freest and most cheerful

consent. Most moneyed men know their own interest right well; and are as

able as any financier, in the valuation of risks. Yet I think this

financier will scarcely find that adventurer hardy enough, at any

premium, to advance a shilling upon a vote of such taxes. Let him name

the man, or set of men, that would do it. This is the only proof of the

value of revenues; what would an interested man rate them at? His

subscription would be at ninety-nine per cent discount the very first

day of its opening. Here is our only national security from ruin; a

security upon which no man in his senses would venture a shilling of his

fortune. Yet he puts down those articles as gravely in his supply for

the peace establishment, as if the money had been all fairly lodged in

the exchequer.

American revenue £200,000

Ireland 100,000

Very handsome indeed! But if supply is to be got in such a manner,

farewell the lucrative mystery of finance! If you are to be credited for

savings, without showing how, why, or with what safety, they are to be

made; and for revenues, without specifying on what articles, or by what

means, or at what expense, they are to be collected; there is not a

clerk in a public office who may not outbid this author, or his friend,

for the department of chancellor of the exchequer; not an apprentice in

the city, that will not strike out, with the same advantages, the same,

or a much larger plan of supply.

Here is the whole of what belongs to the author's scheme for saving us

from impending destruction. Take it even in its most favorable point of

view, as a thing within possibility; and imagine what must be the wisdom

of this gentleman, or his opinion of ours, who could first think of

representing this nation in such a state, as no friend can look upon but

with horror, and scarcely an enemy without compassion, and afterwards

of diverting himself with such inadequate, impracticable, puerile

methods for our relief! If these had been the dreams of some unknown,

unnamed, and nameless writer, they would excite no alarm; their weakness

had been an antidote to their malignity. But as they are universally

believed to be written by the hand, or, what amounts to the same thing,

under the immediate direction, of a person who has been in the

management of the highest affairs, and may soon be in the same

situation, I think it is not to be reckoned amongst our greatest

consolations, that the yet remaining power of this kingdom is to be

employed in an attempt to realize notions that are at once so frivolous,

and so full of danger. That consideration will justify me in dwelling a

little longer on the difficulties of the nation, and the solutions of

our author.

I am then persuaded that he cannot be in the least alarmed about our

situation, let his outcry be what he pleases. I will give him a reason

for my opinion, which, I think, he cannot dispute. All that he bestows

upon the nation, which it does not possess without him, and supposing it

all sure money, amounts to no more than a sum of 300,000_l._ a year.

This, he thinks, will do the business completely, and render us

flourishing at home, and respectable abroad. If the option between glory

and shame, if our salvation or destruction, depended on this sum, it is

impossible that he should have been active, and made a merit of that

activity, in taking off a shilling in the pound of the land-tax, which

came up to his grand desideratum, and upwards of 100,000_l._ more. By

this manoeuvre, he left our trade, navigation, and manufactures, on the

verge of destruction, our finances in ruin, our credit expiring, Ireland

on the point of being ceded to France, the colonies of being torn to

pieces, the succession of the crown at the mercy of our great rival, and

the kingdom itself on the very point of becoming tributary to that

haughty power. All this for want of 300,000_l._; for I defy the reader

to point out any other revenue, or any other precise and defined scheme

of politics, which he assigns for our redemption.

I know that two things may be said in his defence, as bad reasons are

always at hand in an indifferent cause; that he was not sure the money

would be applied as he thinks it ought to be, by the present ministers.

I think as ill of them as he does to the full. They have done very near

as much mischief as they can do, to a constitution so robust as this is.

Nothing can make them more dangerous, but that, as they are already in

general composed of his disciples and instruments, they may add to the

public calamity of their own measures, the adoption of his projects. But

be the ministers what they may, the author knows that they could not

avoid applying this 450,000_l._ to the service of the establishment, as

faithfully as he, or any other minister, could do. I say they could not

avoid it, and have no merit at all for the application. But supposing

that they should greatly mismanage this revenue. Here is a good deal of

room for mistake and prodigality before you come to the edge of ruin.

The difference between the amount of that real and his imaginary revenue

is, 150,000_l._ a year at least; a tolerable sum for them to play with:

this might compensate the difference between the author's economy and

their profusion; and still, notwithstanding their vices and ignorance,

the nation might he saved. The author ought also to recollect, that a

good man would hardly deny, even to the worst of ministers, the means of

doing their duty; especially in a crisis when our being depended on

supplying them with some means or other. In such a case their penury of

mind, in discovering resources, would make it rather the more necessary,

not to strip such poor providers of the little stock they had in hand.

Besides, here is another subject of distress, and a very serious one,

which puts us again to a stand. The author may possibly not come into

power (I only state the possibility): he may not always continue in it:

and if the contrary to all this should fortunately for us happen, what

insurance on his life can be made for a sum adequate to his loss? Then

we are thus unluckily situated, that the _chance_ of an American and

Irish revenue of 300,000_l._ to be managed by him, is to save us from

ruin two or three years hence at best, to make us happy at home and

glorious abroad; and the actual possession of 400,000_l._ English taxes

cannot so much as protract our ruin without him. So we are staked on

four chances; his power, its permanence, the success of his projects,

and the duration of his life. Any one of these failing, we are gone.

_Propria hæc si dona fuissent!_ This is no unfair representation;

ultimately all hangs on his life, because, in his account of every set

of men that have held or supported administration, he finds neither

virtue nor ability in any but himself. Indeed he pays (through their

measures) some compliments to Lord Bute and Lord Despenser. But to the

latter, this is, I suppose, but a civility to old acquaintance: to the

former, a little stroke of politics. We may therefore fairly say, that

our only hope is his life; and he has, to make it the more so, taken

care to cut off any resource which we possessed independently of him.

In the next place it may be said, to excuse any appearance of

inconsistency between the author's actions and his declarations, that he

thought it right to relieve the landed interest, and lay the burden

where it ought to lie, on the colonies. What! to take off a revenue so

necessary to our being, before anything whatsoever was acquired in the

place of it? In prudence, he ought to have waited at least for the first

quarter's receipt of the new anonymous American revenue, and Irish

land-tax. Is there something so specific for our disorders in American,

and something so poisonous in English money, that one is to heal, the

other to destroy us? To say that the landed interest _could_ not

continue to pay it for a year or two longer, is more than the author

will attempt to prove. To say that they _would_ pay it no longer, is to

treat the landed interest, in my opinion, very scurvily. To suppose that

the gentry, clergy, and freeholders of England do not rate the commerce,

the credit, the religion, the liberty, the independency of their

country, and the succession of their crown, at a shilling in the pound

land-tax! They never gave him reason to think so meanly of them. And, if

I am rightly informed, when that measure was debated in Parliament, a

very different reason was assigned by the author's great friend, as well

as by others, for that reduction: one very different from the critical

and almost desperate state of our finances. Some people then endeavored

to prove, that the reduction might be made without detriment to the

national credit, or the due support of a proper peace establishment;

otherwise it is obvious that the reduction could not be defended in

argument. So that this author cannot despair so much of the

commonwealth, without this American and Irish revenue, as he pretends to

do. If he does, the reader sees how handsomely he has provided for us,

by voting away one revenue, and by giving us a pamphlet on the other.

I do not mean to blame the relief which was then given by Parliament to

the land. It was grounded on very weighty reasons. The administration

contended only for its continuance for a year, in order to have the

merit of taking off the shilling in the pound immediately before the

elections; and thus to bribe the freeholders of England with their own

money.

It is true, the author, in his estimate of ways and means, takes credit

for 400,000_l._ a year, _Indian Revenue_. But he will not very

positively insist, that we should put this revenue to the account of his

plans or his power; and for a very plain reason: we are already near two

years in possession of it. By what means we came to that possession, is

a pretty long story; however, I shall give nothing more than a short

abstract of the proceeding, in order to see whether the author will take

to himself any part in that measure.

The fact is this; the East India Company had for a good while solicited

the ministry for a negotiation, by which they proposed to pay largely

for some advantages in their trade, and for the renewal of their

charter. This had been the former method of transacting with that body.

Government having only leased the monopoly for short terms, the Company

has been obliged to resort to it frequently for renewals. These two

parties had always negotiated (on the true principle of credit) not as

government and subject, but as equal dealers, on the footing of mutual

advantage. The public had derived great benefit from such dealing. But

at that time new ideas prevailed. The ministry, instead of listening to

the proposals of that Company, chose to set up a claim of the crown to

their possessions. The original plan seems to have been, to get the

House of Commons to compliment the crown with a sort of juridical

declaration of a title to the Company's acquisitions in India; which the

crown on its part, with the best air in the world, was to bestow upon

the public. Then it would come to the turn of the House of Commons again

to be liberal and grateful to the crown. The civil list debts were to be

paid off; with perhaps a pretty augmentation of income. All this was to

be done on the most public-spirited principles, and with a politeness

and mutual interchange of good offices, that could not but have charmed.

But what was best of all, these civilities were to be without a farthing

of charge to either of the kind and obliging parties. The East India

Company was to be covered with infamy and disgrace, and at the same time

was to pay the whole bill.

In consequence of this scheme, the terrors of a parliamentary inquiry

were hung over them. A judicature was asserted in Parliament to try this

question. But lest this judicial character should chance to inspire

certain stubborn ideas of law and right, it was argued, that the

judicature was arbitrary, and ought not to determine by the rules of

law, but by their opinion of policy and expediency. Nothing exceeded the

violence of some of the managers, except their impotence. They were

bewildered by their passions, and by their want of knowledge or want of

consideration of the subject. The more they advanced, the further they

found themselves from their object.--All things ran into confusion. The

ministers quarrelled among themselves. They disclaimed one another. They

suspended violence, and shrunk from treaty. The inquiry was almost at

its last gasp; when some active persons of the Company were given to

understand that this hostile proceeding was only set up _in terrorem_;

that government was far from an intention of seizing upon the

possessions of the Company. Administration, they said, was sensible,

that the idea was in every light full of absurdity; and that such a

seizure was not more out of their power, than remote from their wishes;

and therefore, if the Company would come in a liberal manner to the

House, they certainly could not fail of putting a speedy end to this

disagreeable business, and of opening a way to an advantageous treaty.

On this hint the Company acted: they came at once to a resolution of

getting rid of the difficulties which arose from the complication of

their trade with their revenue; a step which despoiled them of their

best defensive armor, and put them at once into the power of

administration. They threw their whole stock of every kind, the revenue,

the trade, and even their debt from government, into one fund, which

they computed on the surest grounds would amount to 800,000_l._, with a

large probable surplus for the payment of debt. Then they agreed to

divide this sum in equal portions between themselves and the public,

400,000_l._ to each. This gave to the proprietors of that fund an annual

augmentation of no more than 80,000_l._ dividend. They ought to receive

from government 120,000_l._ for the loan of their capital. So that, in

fact, the whole, which on this plan they reserved to themselves, from

their vast revenues, from their extensive trade, and in consideration of

the great risks and mighty expenses which purchased these advantages,

amounted to no more than 280,000_l._, whilst government was to receive,

as I said, 400,000_l._

This proposal was thought by themselves liberal indeed; and they

expected the highest applauses for it. However, their reception was very

different from their expectations. When they brought up their plan to

the House of Commons, the offer, as it was natural, of 400,000_l._ was

very well relished. But nothing could be more disgustful than the

80,000_l._ which the Company had divided amongst themselves. A violent

tempest of public indignation and fury rose against them. The heads of

people turned. The Company was held well able to pay 400,000_l._ a year

to government; but bankrupts, if they attempted to divide the fifth part

of it among themselves. An _ex post facto_ law was brought in with great

precipitation, for annulling this dividend. In the bill was inserted a

clause, which suspended for about a year the right, which, under the

public faith, the Company enjoyed, of making their own dividends. Such

was the disposition and temper of the House, that although the plain

face of facts, reason, arithmetic, all the authority, parts, and

eloquence in the kingdom, were against this bill; though all the

Chancellors of the Exchequer, who had held that office from the

beginning of this reign, opposed it; yet a few placemen of the

subordinate departments sprung out of their ranks, took the lead, and,

by an opinion _of some sort of secret support_, carried the bill with a

high hand, leaving the then Secretary of State and the Chancellor of the

Exchequer in a very moderate minority. In this distracted situation, the

managers of the bill, notwithstanding their triumph, did not venture to

propose the payment of the civil list debt. The Chancellor of the

Exchequer was not in good humor enough, after his late defeat by his own

troops, to co-operate in such a design; so they made an act, to lock up

the money in the exchequer until they should have time to look about

them, and settle among themselves what they were to do with it.

Thus ended this unparalleled transaction. The author, I believe, will

not claim any part of the glory of it: he will leave it whole and entire

to the authors of the measure. The money was the voluntary, free gift of

the Company; the rescinding bill was the act of legislature, to which

they and we owe submission: the author has nothing to do with the one or

with the other. However, he cannot avoid rubbing himself against this

subject merely for the pleasure of stirring controversies, and

gratifying a certain pruriency of taxation that seems to infect his

blood. It is merely to indulge himself in speculations of taxing, that

he chooses to harangue on this subject. For he takes credit for no

greater sum than the public is already in possession of. He does not

hint that the Company means, or has ever shown any disposition, if

managed with common prudence, to pay less in future; and he cannot doubt

that the present ministry are as well inclined to drive them by their

mock inquiries, and real rescinding bills, as he can possibly be with

his taxes. Besides, it is obvious, that as great a sum might have been

drawn from that Company, without affecting property, or shaking the

constitution, or endangering the principle of public credit, or running

into his golden dreams of cockets on the Ganges, or visions of

stamp-duties on _Perwannas_, _Dusticks_, _Kistbundees_, and

_Husbulhookums_. For once, I will disappoint him in this part of the

dispute; and only in a very few words recommend to his consideration,

how he is to get off the dangerous idea of taxing a public fund, if he

levies those duties in England; and if he is to levy them in India, what

provision he has made for a revenue establishment there; supposing that

he undertakes this new scheme of finance independently of the Company,

and against its inclinations.

So much for these revenues; which are nothing but his visions, or

already the national possessions without any act of his. It is easy to

parade with a high talk of Parliamentary rights, of the universality of

legislative powers, and of uniform taxation. Men of sense, when new

projects come before them, always think a discourse proving the mere

right or mere power of acting in the manner proposed, to be no more than

a very unpleasant way of misspending time. They must see the object to

be of proper magnitude to engage them; they must see the means of

compassing it to be next to certain; the mischiefs not to counterbalance

the profit; they will examine how a proposed imposition or regulation

agrees with the opinion of those who are likely to be affected by it;

they will not despise the consideration even of their habitudes and

prejudices. They wish to know how it accords or disagrees with the true

spirit of prior establishments, whether of government or of finance;

because they well know, that in the complicated economy of great

kingdoms, and immense revenues, which in a length of time, and by a

variety of accidents have coalesced into a sort of body, an attempt

towards a compulsory equality in all circumstances, and an exact

practical definition of the supreme rights in every case, is the most

dangerous and chimerical of all enterprises. The old building stands

well enough, though part Gothic, part Grecian, and part Chinese, until

an attempt is made to square it into uniformity. Then it may come down

upon our heads altogether, in much uniformity of ruin; and great will be

the fall thereof. Some people, instead of inclining to debate the

matter, only feel a sort of nausea, when they are told, that "protection

calls for supply," and that "all the parts ought to contribute to the

support of the whole." Strange argument for great and grave

deliberation! As if the same end may not, and must not, be compassed,

according to its circumstances, by a great diversity of ways. Thus, in

Great Britain, some of our establishments are apt for the support of

credit. They stand therefore upon a principle of their own, distinct

from, and in some respects contrary to, the relation between prince and

subject. It is a new species of contract superinduced upon the old

contract of the state. The idea of power must as much as possible be

banished from it; for power and credit are things adverse, incompatible;

_Non bene conveniunt, nec in una sede morantur_. Such establishments are

our great _moneyed_ companies. To tax them would be critical and

dangerous, and contradictory to the very purpose of their institution;

which is credit, and cannot therefore be taxation. But the nation, when

it gave up that power, did not give up the advantage; but supposed, and

with reason, that government was overpaid in credit, for what it seemed

to lose in authority. In such a case to talk of the rights of

sovereignty is quite idle. Other establishments supply other modes of

public contribution. Our _trading_ companies, as well as individual

importers, are a fit subject of revenue by customs. Some establishments

pay us by a _monopoly_ of their consumption and their produce. This,

nominally no tax, in reality comprehends all taxes. Such establishments

are our colonies. To tax them would be as erroneous in policy, as

rigorous in equity. Ireland supplies us by furnishing troops in war; and

by bearing part of our foreign establishment in peace. She aids us at

all times by the money that her absentees spend amongst us; which is no

small part of the rental of that kingdom. Thus Ireland contributes her

part. Some objects bear port-duties. Some are fitter for an inland

excise. The mode varies, the object is the same. To strain these from

their old and inveterate leanings, might impair the old benefit, and not

answer the end of the new project. Among all the great men of antiquity,

_Procrustes_ shall never be my hero of legislation; with his iron bed,

the allegory of his government, and the type of some modern policy, by

which the long limb was to be cut short, and the short tortured into

length. Such was the state-bed of uniformity! He would, I conceive, be a

very indifferent farmer, who complained that his sheep did not plough,

or his horses yield him wool, though it would be an idea full of

equality. They may think this right in rustic economy, who think it

available in the politic:

Qui Bavium non odit, amet tua carimna, Mævi!

Atque idem jungat vulpes, et mulgeat hircos.

As the author has stated this Indian taxation for no visible purpose

relative to his plan of supply, so he has stated many other projects

with as little, if any distinct end; unless perhaps to show you how full

he is of projects for the public good; and what vast expectations may be

formed of him or his friends, if they should be translated into

administration. It is also from some opinion that these speculations may

one day become our public measures, that I think it worth while to

trouble the reader at all about them.

Two of them stand out in high relievo beyond the rest. The first is a

change in the internal representation of this country, by enlarging our

number of constituents. The second is an addition to our

representatives, by new American members of Parliament. I pass over here

all considerations how far such a system will be an improvement of our

constitution according to any sound theory. Not that I mean to condemn

such speculative inquiries concerning this great object of the national

attention. They may tend to clear doubtful points, and possibly may

lead, as they have often done, to real improvements. What I object to,

is their introduction into a discourse relating to the immediate state

of our affairs, and recommending plans of practical government. In this

view, I see nothing in them but what is usual with the author; an

attempt to raise discontent in the people of England, to balance those

discontents which the measures of his friends had already raised in

America. What other reason can he have for suggesting, that we are not

happy enough to enjoy a sufficient number of voters in England? I

believe that most sober thinkers on this subject are rather of opinion,

that our fault is on the other side; and that it would be more in the

spirit of our constitution, and more agreeable to the pattern of our

best laws, by lessening the number, to add to the weight and

independency of our voters. And truly, considering the immense and

dangerous charge of elections; the prostitute and daring venality, the

corruption of manners, the idleness and profligacy of the lower sort of

voters, no prudent man would propose to increase such an evil, if it be,

as I fear it is, out of our power to administer to it any remedy. The

author proposes nothing further. If he has any improvements that may

balance or may lessen this inconvenience, he has thought proper to keep

them as usual in his own breast. Since he has been so reserved, I should

have wished he had been as cautious with regard to the project itself.

First, because he observes justly, that his scheme, however it might

improve the platform, can add nothing to the authority of the

legislature; much I fear, it will have a contrary operation; for,

authority depending on opinion at least as much as on duty, an idea

circulated among the people that our constitution is not so perfect as

it ought to be, before you are sure of mending it, is a certain method

of lessening it in the public opinion. Of this irreverent opinion of

Parliament, the author himself complains in one part of his book; and he

endeavors to increase it in the other.

Has he well considered what an immense operation any change in our

constitution is? how many discussions, parties, and passions, it will

necessarily excite; and when you open it to inquiry in one part, where

the inquiry will stop? Experience shows us, that no time can be fit for

such changes but a time of general confusion; when good men, finding

everything already broken up, think it right to take advantage of the

opportunity of such derangement in favor of an useful alteration.

Perhaps a time of the greatest security and tranquillity both at home

and abroad may likewise be fit; but will the author affirm this to be

just such a time? Transferring an idea of military to civil prudence, he

ought to know how dangerous it is to make an alteration of your

disposition in the face of an enemy.

Now comes his American representation. Here too, as usual, he takes no

notice of any difficulty, nor says anything to obviate those objections

that must naturally arise in the minds of his readers. He throws you his

politics as he does his revenue; do you make something of them if you

can. Is not the reader a little astonished at the proposal of an

American representation from that quarter? It is proposed merely as a

project[85] of speculative improvement; not from the necessity in the

case, not to add anything to the authority of Parliament, but that we

may afford a greater attention to the concerns of the Americans, and

give them a better opportunity of stating their grievances, and of

obtaining redress. I am glad to find the author has at length discovered

that we have not given a sufficient attention to their concerns, or a

proper redress to their grievances. His great friend would once have

been exceedingly displeased with any person, who should tell him, that

he did not attend sufficiently to those concerns. He thought he did so,

when he regulated the colonies over and over again: he thought he did so

when he formed two general systems of revenue; one of port-duties, and

the other of internal taxation. These systems supposed, or ought to

suppose, the greatest attention to and the most detailed information

of, all their affairs. However, by contending for the American

representation, he seems at last driven virtually to admit, that great

caution ought to be used in the exercise of _all_ our legislative rights

over an object so remote from our eye, and so little connected with our

immediate feelings; that in prudence we ought not to be quite so ready

with our taxes, until we can secure the desired representation in

Parliament. Perhaps it may be some time before this hopeful scheme can

be brought to perfect maturity, although the author seems to be in no

wise aware of any obstructions that lie in the way of it. He talks of

his union, just as he does of his taxes and his savings, with as much

_sang froid_ and ease as if his wish and the enjoyment were exactly the

same thing. He appears not to have troubled his head with the infinite

difficulty of settling that representation on a fair balance of wealth

and numbers throughout the several provinces of America and the West

Indies, under such an infinite variety of circumstances. It costs him

nothing to fight with nature, and to conquer the order of Providence,

which manifestly opposes itself to the possibility of such a

Parliamentary union.

But let us, to indulge his passion for projects and power, suppose the

happy time arrived, when the author comes into the ministry, and is to

realize his speculations. The writs are issued for electing members for

America and the West Indies. Some provinces receive them in six weeks,

some in ten, some in twenty. A vessel may be lost, and then some

provinces may not receive them at all. But let it be, that they all

receive them at once, and in the shortest time. A proper space must be

given for proclamation and for the election; some weeks at least. But

the members are chosen; and if ships are ready to sail, in about six

more they arrive in London. In the mean time the Parliament has sat and

business far advanced without American representatives. Nay, by this

time, it may happen that the Parliament is dissolved; and then the

members ship themselves again, to be again elected. The writs may arrive

in America, before the poor members of a Parliament in which they never

sat, can arrive at their several provinces. A new interest is formed,

and they find other members are chosen whilst they are on the high seas.

But, if the writs and members arrive together, here is at best a new

trial of skill amongst the candidates, after one set of them have well

aired themselves with their two voyages of 6000 miles.

However, in order to facilitate everything to the author, we will

suppose them all once more elected, and steering again to Old England,

with a good heart, and a fair westerly wind in their stern. On their

arrival, they find all in a hurry and bustle; in and out; condolence and

congratulation; the crown is demised. Another Parliament is to be

called. Away back to America again on a fourth voyage, and to a third

election. Does the author mean to make our kings as immortal in their

personal as in their politic character? or whilst he bountifully adds to

their life, will he take from them their prerogative of dissolving

Parliaments, in favor of the American union? or are the American

representatives to be perpetual, and to feel neither demises of the

crown, nor dissolutions of Parliament?

But these things may be granted to him, without bringing him much nearer

to his point. What does he think of re-election? is the American member

the only one who is not to take a place, or the only one to be exempted

from the ceremony of re-election? How will this great politician

preserve the rights of electors, the fairness of returns, and the

privilege of the House of Commons, as the sole judge of such contests?

It would undoubtedly be a glorious sight to have eight or ten petitions,

or double returns, from Boston and Barbadoes, from Philadelphia and

Jamaica, the members returned, and the petitioners, with all their train

of attorneys, solicitors, mayors, selectmen, provost-marshals, and above

five hundred or a thousand witnesses, come to the bar of the House of

Commons. Possibly we might be interrupted in the enjoyment of this

pleasing spectacle, if a war should break out, and our constitutional

fleet, loaded with members of Parliament, returning-officers, petitions,

and witnesses, the electors and elected, should become a prize to the

French or Spaniards, and be conveyed to Carthagena, or to La Vera Cruz,

and from thence perhaps to Mexico or Lima, there to remain until a

cartel for members of Parliament can be settled, or until the war is

ended.

In truth the author has little studied this business; or he might have

known, that some of the most considerable provinces of America, such,

for instance, as Connecticut and Massachusetts Bay, have not in each of

them two men who can afford, at a distance from their estates, to spend

a thousand pounds a year. How can these provinces be represented at

Westminster? If their province pays them, they are American agents, with

salaries, and not independent members of Parliament. It is true, that

formerly in England members had salaries from their constituents; but

they all had salaries, and were all, in this way, upon a par. If these

American representatives have no salaries, then they must add to the

list of our pensioners and dependents at court, or they must starve.

There is no alternative.

Enough of this visionary union; in which much extravagance appears

without any fancy, and the judgment is shocked without anything to

refresh the imagination. It looks as if the author had dropped down from

the moon, without any knowledge of the general nature of this globe, of

the general nature of its inhabitants, without the least acquaintance

with the affairs of this country. Governor Pownall has handled the same

subject. To do him justice, he treats it upon far more rational

principles of speculation; and much more like a man of business. He

thinks (erroneously, I conceive; but he does think) that our legislative

rights are incomplete without such a representation. It is no wonder,

therefore, that he endeavors by every means to obtain it. Not like our

author, who is always on velvet, he is aware of some difficulties; and

he proposes some solutions. But nature is too hard for both these

authors; and America is, and ever will be, without actual representation

in the House of Commons; nor will any minister be wild enough even to

propose such a representation in Parliament; however he may choose to

throw out that project, together with others equally far from his real

opinions, and remote from his designs, merely to fall in with the

different views, and captivate the affections, of different sorts of

men.

Whether these projects arise from the author's real political

principles, or are only brought out in subservience to his political

views, they compose the whole of anything that is like precise and

definite, which the author has given us to expect from that

administration which is so much the subject of his praises and prayers.

As to his general propositions, that "there is a deal of difference

between impossibilities and great difficulties"; that "a great scheme

cannot be carried unless made the business of successive

administrations"; that "virtuous and able men are the fittest to serve

their country"; all this I look on as no more than so much rubble to

fill up the spaces between the regular masonry. Pretty much in the same

light I cannot forbear considering his detached observations on

commerce; such as, that "the system for colony regulations would be very

simple, and mutually beneficial to Great Britain and her colonies, if

the old navigation laws were adhered to."[86] That "the transportation

should be in all cases in ships belonging to British subjects." That

"even British ships should not be _generally_ received into the colonies

from any part of Europe, except the dominions of Great Britain." That

"it is unreasonable that corn and such like products should be

restrained to come first to a British port." What do all these fine

observations signify? Some of them condemn, as ill practices, things

that were never practised at all. Some recommend to be done, things that

always have been done. Others indeed convey, though obliquely and

loosely, some insinuations highly dangerous to our commerce. If I could

prevail on myself to think the author meant to ground any practice upon

these general propositions, I should think it very necessary to ask a

few questions about some of them. For instance, what does he mean by

talking of an adherence to the old navigation laws? Does he mean, that

the particular law, 12 Car. II. c. 19, commonly called "The Act of

Navigation," is to be adhered to, and that the several subsequent

additions, amendments, and exceptions, ought to be all repealed? If so,

he will make a strange havoc in the whole system of our trade laws,

which have been universally acknowledged to be full as well founded in

the alterations and exceptions, as the act of Charles the Second in the

original provisions; and to pursue full as wisely the great end of that

very politic law, the increase of the British navigation. I fancy the

writer could hardly propose anything more alarming to those immediately

interested in that navigation than such a repeal. If he does not mean

this, he has got no farther than a nugatory proposition, which nobody

can contradict, and for which no man is the wiser.

That "the regulations for the colony trade would be few and simple if

the old navigation laws were adhered to," I utterly deny as a fact. That

they ought to be so, sounds well enough; but this proposition is of the

same nugatory nature with some of the former. The regulations for the

colony trade ought not to be more nor fewer, nor more nor less complex,

than the occasion requires. And, as that trade is in a great measure a

system of art and restriction, they can neither be few nor simple. It is

true, that the very principle may be destroyed, by multiplying to excess

the means of securing it. Never did a minister depart more from the

author's ideas of simplicity, or more embarrass the trade of America

with the multiplicity and intricacy of regulations and ordinances, than

his boasted minister of 1764. That minister seemed to be possessed with

something, hardly short of a rage, for regulation and restriction. He

had so multiplied bonds, certificates, affidavits, warrants,

sufferances, and cockets; had supported them with such severe penalties,

and extended them without the least consideration of circumstances to so

many objects, that, had they all continued in their original force,

commerce must speedily have expired under them. Some of them, the

ministry which gave them birth was obliged to destroy: with their own

hand they signed the condemnation of their own regulations; confessing

in so many words, in the preamble of their act of the 5th Geo. III.,

that some of these regulations had laid _an unnecessary restraint on the

trade and correspondence of his Majesty's American subjects_. This, in

that ministry, was a candid confession of a mistake; but every

alteration made in those regulations by their successors is to be the

effect of envy, and American misrepresentation. So much for the author's

simplicity in regulation.

I have now gone through all which I think immediately essential in the

author's idea of war, of peace, of the comparative states of England and

France, of our actual situation; in his projects of economy, of finance,

of commerce, and of constitutional improvement. There remains nothing

now to be considered, except his heavy censures upon the administration

which was formed in 1765; which is commonly known by the name of the

Marquis of Rockingham's administration, as the administration which

preceded it is by that of Mr. Grenville. These censures relate chiefly

to three heads:--1. To the repeal of the American Stamp Act. 2. To the

commercial regulations then made. 3. To the course of foreign

negotiations during that short period.

A person who knew nothing of public affairs but from the writings of

this author, would be led to conclude, that, at the time of the change

in June, 1765, some well-digested system of administration, founded in

national strength, and in the affections of the people, proceeding in

all points with the most reverential and tender regard to the laws, and

pursuing with equal wisdom and success everything which could tend to

the internal prosperity, and to the external honor and dignity of this

country, had been all at once subverted, by an irruption of a sort of

wild, licentious, unprincipled invaders, who wantonly, and with a

barbarous rage, had defaced a thousand fair monuments of the

constitutional and political skill of their predecessors. It is natural

indeed that this author should have some dislike to the administration

which was formed in 1765. Its views, in most things, were different from

those of his friends; in some, altogether opposite to them. It is

impossible that both of these administrations should be the objects of

public esteem. Their different principles compose some of the strongest

political lines which discriminate the parties even now subsisting

amongst us. The ministers of 1764 are not indeed followed by very many

in their opposition; yet a large part of the people now in office

entertain, or pretend to entertain, sentiments entirely conformable to

theirs; whilst some of the former colleagues of the ministry which was

formed in 1765, however they may have abandoned the connection, and

contradicted by their conduct the principles of their former friends,

pretend, on their parts, still to adhere to the same maxims. All the

lesser divisions, which are indeed rather names of personal attachment

than of party distinction, fall in with the one or the other of these

leading parties.

I intend to state, as shortly as I am able, the general condition of

public affairs, and the disposition of the minds of men, at the time of

the remarkable change of system in 1765. The reader will have thereby a

more distinct view of the comparative merits of these several plans, and

will receive more satisfaction concerning the ground and reason of the

measures which were then pursued, than, I believe, can be derived from

the perusal of those partial representations contained in the "State of

the Nation," and the other writings of those who have continued, for now

nearly three years, in the undisturbed possession of the press. This

will, I hope, be some apology for my dwelling a little on this part of

the subject.

On the resignation of the Earl of Bute, in 1763, our affairs had been

delivered into the hands of three ministers of his recommendation: Mr.

Grenville, the Earl of Egremont, and the Earl of Halifax. This

arrangement, notwithstanding the retirement of Lord Bute, announced to

the public a continuance of the same measures; nor was there more reason

to expect a change from the death of the Earl of Egremont. The Earl of

Sandwich supplied his place. The Duke of Bedford, and the gentlemen who

act in that connection, and whose general character and politics were

sufficiently understood, added to the strength of the ministry, without

making any alteration in their plan of conduct. Such was the

constitution of the ministry which was changed in 1765.

As to their politics, the principles of the peace of Paris governed in

foreign affairs. In domestic, the same scheme prevailed, of

contradicting the opinions, and disgracing most of the persons, who had

been countenanced and employed in the late reign. The inclinations of

the people were little attended to; and a disposition to the use of

forcible methods ran through the whole tenor of administration. The

nation in general was uneasy and dissatisfied. Sober men saw causes for

it, in the constitution of the ministry and the conduct of the

ministers. The ministers, who have usually a short method on such

occasions, attributed their unpopularity wholly to the efforts of

faction. However this might be, the licentiousness and tumults of the

common people, and the contempt of government, of which our author so

often and so bitterly complains, as owing to the mismanagement of the

subsequent administrations, had at no time risen to a greater or more

dangerous height. The measures taken to suppress that spirit were as

violent and licentious as the spirit itself; injudicious, precipitate,

and some of them illegal. Instead of allaying, they tended infinitely to

inflame the distemper; and whoever will be at the least pains to

examine, will find those measures not only the causes of the tumults

which then prevailed, but the real sources of almost all the disorders

which have arisen since that time. More intent on making a victim to

party than an example of justice, they blundered in the method of

pursuing their vengeance. By this means a discovery was made of many

practices, common indeed in the office of Secretary of State, but wholly

repugnant to our laws, and to the genius of the English constitution.

One of the worst of these was, the wanton and indiscriminate seizure of

papers, even in cases where the safety of the state was not pretended in

justification of so harsh a proceeding. The temper of the ministry had

excited a jealousy, which made the people more than commonly vigilant

concerning every power which was exercised by government. The abuse,

however sanctioned by custom, was evident; but the ministry, instead of

resting in a prudent inactivity, or (what would have been still more

prudent) taking the lead, in quieting the minds of the people, and

ascertaining the law upon those delicate points, made use of the whole

influence of government to prevent a Parliamentary resolution against

these practices of office. And lest the colorable reasons, offered in

argument against this Parliamentary procedure, should be mistaken for

the real motives of their conduct, all the advantage of privilege, all

the arts and finesses of pleading, and great sums of public money were

lavished, to prevent any decision upon those practices in the courts of

justice. In the mean time, in order to weaken, since they could not

immediately destroy, the liberty of the press, the privilege of

Parliament was voted away in all accusations for a seditious libel. The

freedom of debate in Parliament itself was no less menaced. Officers of

the army, of long and meritorious service, and of small fortunes, were

chosen as victims for a single vote, by an exertion of ministerial

power, which had been very rarely used, and which is extremely unjust,

as depriving men not only of a place, but a profession, and is indeed of

the most pernicious example both in a civil and a military light.

Whilst all things were managed at home with such a spirit of disorderly

despotism, abroad there was a proportionable abatement of all spirit.

Some of our most just and valuable claims were in a manner abandoned.

This indeed seemed not very inconsistent conduct in the ministers who

had made the treaty of Paris. With regard to our domestic affairs, there

was no want of industry; but there was a great deficiency of temper and

judgment, and manly comprehension of the public interest. The nation

certainly wanted relief, and government attempted to administer it. Two

ways were principally chosen for this great purpose. The first by

regulations; the second by new funds of revenue. Agreeably to this plan,

a new naval establishment was formed at a good deal of expense, and to

little effect, to aid in the collection of the customs. Regulation was

added to regulation; and the strictest and most unreserved orders were

given, for a prevention of all contraband trade here, and in every part

of America. A teasing custom-house, and a multiplicity of perplexing

regulations, ever have, and ever will appear, the masterpiece of finance

to people of narrow views; as a paper against smuggling, and the

importation of French finery, never fails of furnishing a very popular

column in a newspaper.

The greatest part of these regulations were made for America; and they

fell so indiscriminately on all sorts of contraband, or supposed

contraband, that some of the most valuable branches of trade were driven

violently from our ports; which caused an universal consternation

throughout the colonies. Every part of the trade was infinitely

distressed by them. Men-of-war now for the first time, armed with

regular commissions of custom-house officers, invested the coasts, and

gave to the collection of revenue the air of hostile contribution. About

the same time that these regulations seemed to threaten the destruction

of the only trade from whence the plantations derived any specie, an act

was made, putting a stop to the future emission of paper currency, which

used to supply its place among them. Hand in hand with this went

another act, for obliging the colonies to provide quarters for soldiers.

Instantly followed another law, for levying throughout all America new

port duties, upon a vast variety of commodities of their consumption,

and some of which lay heavy upon objects necessary for their trade and

fishery. Immediately upon the heels of these, and amidst the uneasiness

and confusion produced by a crowd of new impositions and regulations,

some good, some evil, some doubtful, all crude and ill-considered, came

another act, for imposing an universal stamp-duty on the colonies; and

this was declared to be little more than an experiment, and a foundation

of future revenue. To render these proceedings the more irritating to

the colonies, the principal argument used in favor of their ability to

pay such duties was the liberality of the grants of their assemblies

during the late war. Never could any argument be more insulting and

mortifying to a people habituated to the granting of their own money.

Taxes for the purpose of raising revenue had hitherto been sparingly

attempted in America. Without ever doubting the extent of its lawful

power, Parliament always doubted the propriety of such impositions. And

the Americans on their part never thought of contesting a right by which

they were so little affected. Their assemblies in the main answered all

the purposes necessary to the internal economy of a free people, and

provided for all the exigencies of government which arose amongst

themselves. In the midst of that happy enjoyment, they never thought of

critically settling the exact limits of a power, which was necessary to

their union, their safety, their equality, and even their liberty. Thus

the two very difficult points, superiority in the presiding state, and

freedom in the subordinate, were on the whole sufficiently, that is,

practically, reconciled; without agitating those vexatious questions,

which in truth rather belong to metaphysics than politics, and which can

never be moved without shaking the foundations of the best governments

that have ever been constituted by human wisdom. By this measure was let

loose that dangerous spirit of disquisition, not in the coolness of

philosophical inquiry, but inflamed with all the passions of a haughty,

resentful people, who thought themselves deeply injured, and that they

were contending for everything that was valuable in the world.

In England, our ministers went on without the least attention to these

alarming dispositions; just as if they were doing the most common things

in the most usual way, and among a people not only passive, but pleased.

They took no one step to divert the dangerous spirit which began even

then to appear in the colonies, to compromise with it, to mollify it, or

to subdue it. No new arrangements were made in civil government; no new

powers or instructions were given to governors; no augmentation was

made, or new disposition, of forces. Never was so critical a measure

pursued with so little provision against its necessary consequences. As

if all common prudence had abandoned the ministers, and as if they meant

to plunge themselves and us headlong into that gulf which stood gaping

before them; by giving a year's notice of the project of their Stamp

Act, they allowed time for all the discontents of that country to fester

and come to a head, and for all the arrangements which factious men

could make towards an opposition to the law. At the same time they

carefully concealed from the eye of Parliament those remonstrances which

they had actually received; and which in the strongest manner indicated

the discontent of some of the colonies, and the consequences which might

be expected; they concealed them even in defiance of an order of

council, that they should be laid before Parliament. Thus, by concealing

the true state of the case, they rendered the wisdom of the nation as

improvident as their own temerity, either in preventing or guarding

against the mischief. It has indeed, from the beginning to this hour,

been the uniform policy of this set of men, in order at any hazard to

obtain a present credit, to propose whatever might be pleasing, as

attended with no difficulty; and afterwards to throw all the

disappointment of the wild expectations they had raised, upon those who

have the hard task of freeing the public from the consequences of their

pernicious projects.

Whilst the commerce and tranquillity of the whole empire were shaken in

this manner, our affairs grew still more distracted by the internal

dissensions of our ministers. Treachery and ingratitude were charged

from one side; despotism and tyranny from the other; the vertigo of the

regency bill; the awkward reception of the silk bill in the House of

Commons, and the inconsiderate and abrupt rejection of it in the House

of Lords; the strange and violent tumults which arose in consequence,

and which were rendered more serious by being charged by the ministers

upon one another; the report of a gross and brutal treatment of the

----, by a minister at the same time odious to the people; all conspired

to leave the public, at the close of the session of 1765, in as

critical and perilous a situation, as ever the nation was, or could be,

in a time when she was not immediately threatened by her neighbors.

It was at this time, and in these circumstances, that a new

administration was formed. Professing even industriously, in this public

matter, to avoid anecdotes; I say nothing of those famous

reconciliations and quarrels, which weakened the body that should have

been the natural support of this administration. I run no risk in

affirming, that, surrounded as they were with difficulties of every

species, nothing but the strongest and most uncorrupt sense of their

duty to the public could have prevailed upon some of the persons who

composed it to undertake the king's business at such a time. Their

preceding character, their measures while in power, and the subsequent

conduct of many of them, I think, leave no room to charge this assertion

to flattery. Having undertaken the commonwealth, what remained for them

to do? to piece their conduct upon the broken chain of former measures?

If they had been so inclined, the ruinous nature of those measures,

which began instantly to appear, would not have permitted it. Scarcely

had they entered into office, when letters arrived from all parts of

America, making loud complaints, backed by strong reasons, against

several of the principal regulations of the late ministry, as

threatening destruction to many valuable branches of commerce. These

were attended with representations from many merchants and capital

manufacturers at home, who had all their interests involved in the

support of lawful trade, and in the suppression of every sort of

contraband. Whilst these things were under consideration, that

conflagration blazed out at once in North America; an universal

disobedience, and open resistance to the Stamp Act; and, in consequence,

an universal stop to the course of justice, and to trade and navigation,

throughout that great important country; an interval during which the

trading interest of England lay under the most dreadful anxiety which it

ever felt.

The repeal of that act was proposed. It was much too serious a measure,

and attended with too many difficulties upon every side, for the then

ministry to have undertaken it, as some paltry writers have asserted,

from envy and dislike to their predecessors in office. As little could

it be owing to personal cowardice, and dread of consequences to

themselves. Ministers, timorous from their attachment to place and

power, will fear more from the consequences of one court intrigue, than

from a thousand difficulties to the commerce and credit of their country

by disturbances at three thousand miles distance. From which of these

the ministers had most to apprehend at that time, is known, I presume,

universally. Nor did they take that resolution from a want of the

fullest sense of the inconveniences which must necessarily attend a

measure of concession from the sovereign to the subject. That it must

increase the insolence of the mutinous spirits in America, was but too

obvious. No great measure indeed, at a very difficult crisis, can be

pursued, which is not attended with some mischief; none but conceited

pretenders in public business will hold any other language: and none but

weak and unexperienced men will believe them, if they should. If we were

found in such a crisis, let those, whose bold designs, and whose

defective arrangements, brought us into it, answer for the consequences.

The business of the then ministry evidently was, to take such steps, not

as the wishes of our author, or as their own wishes dictated, but as the

bad situation in which their predecessors had left them, absolutely

required.

The disobedience to this act was universal throughout America; nothing,

it was evident, but the sending a very strong military, backed by a very

strong naval force, would reduce the seditious to obedience. To send it

to one town, would not be sufficient; every province of America must be

traversed, and must be subdued. I do not entertain the least doubt but

this could be done. We might, I think, without much difficulty, have

destroyed our colonies. This destruction might be effected, probably in

a year, or in two at the utmost. If the question was upon a foreign

nation, where every successful stroke adds to your own power, and takes

from that of a rival, a just war with such a certain superiority would

be undoubtedly an advisable measure. But _four million_ of debt due to

our merchants, the total cessation of a trade annually worth _four

million_more, a large foreign traffic, much home manufacture, a very

capital immediate revenue arising from colony imports, indeed the

produce of every one of our revenues greatly depending on this trade,

all these were very weighty accumulated considerations, at least well to

be weighed, before that sword was drawn, which even by its victories

must produce all the evil effects of the greatest national defeat. How

public credit must have suffered, I need not say. If the condition of

the nation, at the close of our foreign war, was what this author

represents it, such a civil war would have been a bad couch, on which

to repose our wearied virtue. Far from being able to have entered into

new plans of economy, we must have launched into a new sea, I fear a

boundless sea, of expense. Such an addition of debt, with such a

diminution of revenue and trade, would have left us in no want of a

"State of the Nation" to aggravate the picture of our distresses.

Our trade felt this to its vitals; and our then ministers were not

ashamed to say, that they sympathized with the feelings of our

merchants. The universal alarm of the whole trading body of England,

will never be laughed at by them as an ill-grounded or a pretended

panic. The universal desire of that body will always have great weight

with them in every consideration connected with commerce: neither ought

the opinion of that body to be slighted (notwithstanding the

contemptuous and indecent language of this author and his associates) in

any consideration whatsoever of revenue. Nothing amongst us is more

quickly or deeply affected by taxes of any kind than trade; and if an

American tax was a real relief to England, no part of the community

would be sooner or more materially relieved by it than our merchants.

But they well know that the trade of England must be more burdened by

one penny raised in America, than by three in England; and if that penny

be raised with the uneasiness, the discontent, and the confusion of

America, more than by ten.

If the opinion and wish of the landed interest is a motive, and it is a

fair and just one, for taking away a real and large revenue, the desire

of the trading interest of England ought to be a just ground for taking

away a tax of little better than speculation, which was to be collected

by a war, which was to be kept up with the perpetual discontent of those

who were to be affected by it, and the value of whose produce even after

the _ordinary_ charges of collection, was very uncertain;[87] after the

_extraordinary_, the dearest purchased revenue that ever was made by any

nation.

These were some of the motives drawn from principles of convenience for

that repeal. When the object came to be more narrowly inspected, every

motive concurred. These colonies were evidently founded in subservience

to the commerce of Great Britain. From this principle, the whole system

of our laws concerning them became a system of restriction. A double

monopoly was established on the part of the parent country; 1. A

monopoly of their whole import, which is to be altogether from Great

Britain; 2. A monopoly of all their export, which is to be nowhere but

to Great Britain, as far as it can serve any purpose here. On the same

idea it was contrived that they should send all their products to us

raw, and in their first state; and that they should take everything from

us in the last stage of manufacture.

Were ever a people under such circumstances, that is, a people who were

to export raw, and to receive manufactured, and this, not a few

luxurious articles, but all articles, even to those of the grossest,

most vulgar, and necessary consumption, a people who were in the hands

of a general monopolist, were ever such a people suspected of a

possibility of becoming a just object of revenue? All the ends of their

foundation must be supposed utterly contradicted before they could

become such an object. Every trade law we have made must have been

eluded, and become useless, before they could be in such a condition.

The partisans of the new system, who, on most occasions, take credit for

full as much knowledge as they possess, think proper on this occasion to

counterfeit an extraordinary degree of ignorance, and in consequence of

it to assert, "that the balance (between the colonies and Great Britain)

is unknown, and that no important conclusion can be drawn from premises

so very uncertain."[88] Now to what can this ignorance be owing? were

the navigation laws made, that this balance should be unknown? is it

from the course of exchange that it is unknown, which all the world

knows to be greatly and perpetually against the colonies? is it from the

doubtful nature of the trade we carry on with the colonies? are not

these schemists well apprised that the colonists, particularly those of

the northern provinces, import more from Great Britain, ten times more,

than they send in return to us? that a great part of their foreign

balance is and must be remitted to London? I shall be ready to admit

that the colonies ought to be taxed to the revenues of this country,

when I know that they are out of debt to its commerce. This author will

furnish some ground to his theories, and communicate a discovery to the

public, if he can show this by any medium. But he tells us that "their

seas are covered with ships, and their rivers floating with

commerce."[89] This is true. But it is with _our_ ships that these seas

are covered; and their rivers float with British commerce. The American

merchants are our factors; all in reality, most even in name. The

Americans trade, navigate, cultivate, with English capitals; to their

own advantage, to be sure; for without these capitals their ploughs

would be stopped, and their ships wind-bound. But he who furnishes the

capital must, on the whole, be the person principally benefited; the

person who works upon it profits on his part too; but he profits in a

subordinate way, as our colonies do; that is, as the servant of a wise

and indulgent master, and no otherwise. We have all, except the

_peculium_; without which even slaves will not labor.

If the author's principles, which are the common notions, be right, that

the price of our manufactures is so greatly enhanced by our taxes; then

the Americans already pay in that way a share of our impositions. He is

not ashamed to assert, that "France and China may be said, on the same

principle, to bear a part of our charges, for they consume our

commodities."[90] Was ever such a method of reasoning heard of? Do not

the laws absolutely confine the colonies to buy from us, whether foreign

nations sell cheaper or not? On what other idea are all our

prohibitions, regulations, guards, penalties, and forfeitures, framed?

To secure to us, not a commercial preference, which stands in need of no

penalties to enforce it; it finds its own way; but to secure to us a

trade, which is a creature of law and institution. What has this to do

with the principles of a foreign trade, which is under no monopoly, and

in which we cannot raise the price of our goods, without hazarding the

demand for them? None but the authors of such measures could ever think

of making use of such arguments.

Whoever goes about to reason on any part of the policy of this country

with regard to America, upon the mere abstract principles of government,

or even upon those of our own ancient constitution, will be often

misled. Those who resort for arguments to the most respectable

authorities, ancient or modern, or rest upon the clearest maxims, drawn

from the experience of other states and empires, will be liable to the

greatest errors imaginable. The object is wholly new in the world. It is

singular; it is grown up to this magnitude and importance within the

memory of man; nothing in history is parallel to it. All the reasonings

about it, that are likely to be at all solid, must be drawn from its

actual circumstances. In this new system a principle of commerce, of

artificial commerce, must predominate. This commerce must be secured by

a multitude of restraints very alien from the spirit of liberty; and a

powerful authority must reside in the principal state, in order to

enforce them. But the people who are to be the subjects of these

restraints are descendants of Englishmen; and of a high and free spirit.

To hold over them a government made up of nothing but restraints and

penalties, and taxes in the granting of which they can have no share,

will neither be wise nor long practicable. People must be governed in a

manner agreeable to their temper and disposition; and men of free

character and spirit must be ruled with, at least, some condescension to

this spirit and this character. The British, colonist must see something

which will distinguish him from the colonists of other nations.

Those seasonings, which infer from the many restraints under which we

have already laid America, to our right to lay it under still more, and

indeed under all manner of restraints, are conclusive; conclusive as to

right; but the very reverse as to policy and practice. We ought rather

to infer from our having laid the colonies under many restraints, that

it is reasonable to compensate them by every indulgence that can by any

means be reconciled to our interest. We have a great empire to rule,

composed of a vast mass of heterogeneous governments, all more or less

free and popular in their forms, all to be kept in peace, and kept out

of conspiracy, with one another, all to be held in subordination to this

country; while the spirit of an extensive and intricate and trading

interest pervades the whole, always qualifying, and often controlling,

every general idea of constitution and government. It is a great and

difficult object; and I wish we may possess wisdom and temper enough to

manage it as we ought. Its importance is infinite. I believe the reader

will be struck, as I have been, with one singular fact. In the year

1704, but sixty-five years ago, the whole trade with our plantations was

but a few thousand pounds more in the export article, and a third less

in the import, than that which we now carry on with the single island of

Jamaica:--

Exports. Imports.

Total English plantations in 1704 £488,265 £814,491

Jamaica, 1767 467,681 1,243,742

From the same information I find that our dealing with most of the

European nations is but little increased: these nations have been pretty

much at a stand since that time, and we have rivals in their trade. This

colony intercourse is a new world of commerce in a manner created; it

stands upon principles of its own; principles hardly worth endangering

for any little consideration of extorted revenue.

The reader sees, that I do not enter so fully into this matter as

obviously I might. I have already been led into greater lengths than I

intended. It is enough to say, that before the ministers of 1765 had

determined to propose the repeal of the Stamp Act in Parliament, they

had the whole of the American constitution and commerce very fully

before them. They considered maturely; they decided with wisdom: let me

add, with firmness. For they resolved, as a preliminary to that repeal,

to assert in the fullest and least equivocal terms the unlimited

legislative right of this country over its colonies; and, having done

this, to propose the repeal, on principles, not of constitutional right,

but on those of expediency, of equity, of lenity, and of the true

interests present and future of that great object for which alone the

colonies were founded, navigation and commerce. This plan I say,

required an uncommon degree of firmness, when we consider that some of

those persons who might be of the greatest use in promoting the repeal,

violently withstood the declaratory act; and they who agreed with

administration in the principles of that law, equally made, as well the

reasons on which the declaratory act itself stood, as those on which it

was opposed, grounds for an opposition to the repeal.

If the then ministry resolved first to declare the right, it was not

from any opinion they entertained of its future use in regular

taxation. Their opinions were full and declared against the ordinary use

of such a power. But it was plain, that the general reasonings which

were employed against that power went directly to our whole legislative

right; and one part of it could not be yielded to such arguments,

without a virtual surrender of all the rest. Besides, if that very

specific power of levying money in the colonies were not retained as a

sacred trust in the hands of Great Britain (to be used, not in the first

instance for supply, but in the last exigence for control), it is

obvious, that the presiding authority of Great Britain, as the head, the

arbiter, and director of the whole empire, would vanish into an empty

name, without operation or energy. With the habitual exercise of such a

power in the ordinary course of supply, no trace of freedom could remain

to America.[91] If Great Britain were stripped of this right, every

principle of unity and subordination in the empire was gone forever.

Whether all this can be reconciled in legal speculation, is a matter of

no consequence. It is reconciled in policy: and politics ought to be

adjusted, not to human reasonings, but to human nature; of which the

reason is but a part, and by no means the greatest part.

Founding the repeal on this basis, it was judged proper to lay before

Parliament the whole detail of the American affairs, as fully as it had

been laid before the ministry themselves. Ignorance of those affairs had

misled Parliament. Knowledge alone could bring it into the right road.

Every paper of office was laid upon the table of the two Houses; every

denomination of men, either of America, or connected with it by office,

by residence, by commerce, by interest, even by injury; men of civil and

military capacity, officers of the revenue, merchants, manufacturers of

every species, and from every town in England, attended at the bar. Such

evidence never was laid before Parliament. If an emulation arose among

the ministers and members of Parliament, as the author rightly

observes,[92] for the repeal of this act, as well as for the other

regulations, it was not on the confident assertions, the airy

speculations, or the vain promises of ministers, that it arose. It was

the sense of Parliament on the evidence before them. No one so much as

suspects that ministerial allurements or terrors had any share in it.

Our author is very much displeased, that so much credit was given to the

testimony of merchants. He has a habit of railing at them: and he may,

if he pleases, indulge himself in it. It will not do great mischief to

that respectable set of men. The substance of their testimony was, that

their debts in America were very great: that the Americans declined to

pay them, or to renew their orders, whilst this act continued: that,

under these circumstances, they despaired of the recovery of their

debts, or the renewal of their trade in that country: that they

apprehended a general failure of mercantile credit. The manufacturers

deposed to the same general purpose, with this addition, that many of

them had discharged several of their artificers; and, if the law and the

resistance to it should continue, must dismiss them all.

This testimony is treated with great contempt by our author. It must be,

I suppose, because it was contradicted by the plain nature of things.

Suppose then that the merchants had, to gratify this author, given a

contrary evidence; and had deposed, that while America remained in a

state of resistance, whilst four million of debt remained unpaid, whilst

the course of justice was suspended for want of stamped paper, so that

no debt could be recovered, whilst there was a total stop to trade,

because every ship was subject to seizure for want of stamped

clearances, and while the colonies were to be declared in rebellion, and

subdued by armed force, that in these circumstances they would still

continue to trade cheerfully and fearlessly as before: would not such

witnesses provoke universal indignation for their folly or their

wickedness, and be deservedly hooted from the bar:[93] would any human

faith have given credit to such assertions? The testimony of the

merchants was necessary for the detail, and to bring the matter home to

the feeling of the House; as to the general reasons, they spoke

abundantly for themselves.

Upon these principles was the act repealed, and it produced all the good

effect which was expected from it: quiet was restored; trade generally

returned to its ancient channels; time and means were furnished for the

better strengthening of government there, as well as for recovering, by

judicious measures, the affections of the people, had that ministry

continued, or had a ministry succeeded with dispositions to improve that

opportunity.

Such an administration did not succeed. Instead of profiting of that

season of tranquillity, in the very next year they chose to return to

measures of the very same nature with those which had been so solemnly

condemned; though upon a smaller scale. The effects have been

correspondent, America is again in disorder; not indeed in the same

degree as formerly, nor anything like it. Such good effects have

attended the repeal of the Stamp Act, that the colonies have actually

paid the taxes; and they have sought their redress (upon however

improper principles) not in their own violence, as formerly;[94] but in

the experienced benignity of Parliament. They are not easy indeed, nor

ever will be so, under this author's schemes of taxation; but we see no

longer the same general fury and confusion, which attended their

resistance to the Stamp Act. The author may rail at the repeal, and

those who proposed it, as he pleases. Those honest men suffer all his

obloquy with pleasure, in the midst of the quiet which they have been

the means of giving to their country; and would think his praises for

their perseverance in a pernicious scheme, a very bad compensation for

the disturbance of our peace, and the ruin of our commerce. Whether the

return to the system of 1764, for raising a revenue in America, the

discontents which have ensued in consequence of it, the general

suspension of the assemblies in consequence of these discontents, the

use of the military power, and the new and dangerous commissions which

now hang over them, will produce equally good effects, is greatly to be

doubted. Never, I fear, will this nation and the colonies fall back upon

their true centre of gravity, and natural point of repose, until the

ideas of 1766 are resumed, and steadily pursued.

As to the regulations, a great subject of the author's accusation, they

are of two sorts; one of a mixed nature, of revenue and trade; the other

simply relative to trade. With regard to the former I shall observe,

that, in all deliberations concerning America, the ideas of that

administration were principally these; to take trade as the primary end,

and revenue but as a very subordinate consideration. Where trade was

likely to suffer, they did not hesitate for an instant to prefer it to

taxes, whose produce at best was contemptible, in comparison of the

object which they might endanger. The other of their principles was, to

suit the revenue to the object. Where the difficulty of collection, from

the nature of the country, and of the revenue establishment, is so very

notorious, it was their policy to hold out as few temptations to

smuggling as possible, by keeping the duties as nearly as they could on

a balance with the risk. On these principles they made many alterations

in the port-duties of 1764, both in the mode and in the quantity. The

author has not attempted to prove them erroneous. He complains enough to

show that he is in an ill-humor, not that his adversaries have done

amiss.

As to the regulations which were merely relative to commerce, many were

then made; and they were all made upon this principle, that many of the

colonies, and those some of the most abounding in people, were so

situated as to have very few means of traffic with this country. It

became therefore our interest to let them into as much foreign trade as

could be given them without interfering with our own; and to secure by

every method the returns to the mother country. Without some such scheme

of enlargement, it was obvious that any benefit we could expect from

these colonies must be extremely limited. Accordingly many facilities

were given to their trade with the foreign plantations, and with the

southern parts of Europe. As to the confining the returns to this

country, administration saw the mischief and folly of a plan of

indiscriminate restraint. They applied their remedy to that part where

the disease existed, and to that only: on this idea they established

regulations, far more likely to check the dangerous, clandestine trade

with Hamburg and Holland, than this author's friends, or any of their

predecessors had ever done.

The friends of the author have a method surely a little whimsical in all

this sort of discussions. They have made an innumerable multitude of

commercial regulations, at which the trade of England exclaimed with one

voice, and many of which have been altered on the unanimous opinion of

that trade. Still they go on, just as before, in a sort of droning

panegyric on themselves, talking of these regulations as prodigies of

wisdom; and, instead of appealing to those who are most affected and the

best judges, they turn round in a perpetual circle of their own

reasonings and pretences; they hand you over from one of their own

pamphlets to another: "See," say they, "this demonstrated in the

'Regulations of the Colonies.'" "See this satisfactorily proved in 'The

Considerations.'" By and by we shall have another: "See for this 'The

State of the Nation.'" I wish to take another method in vindicating the

opposite system. I refer to the petitions of merchants for these

regulations; to their thanks when they were obtained; and to the strong

and grateful sense they have ever since expressed of the benefits

received under that administration.

All administrations have in their commercial regulations been generally

aided by the opinion of some merchants; too frequently by that of a few,

and those a sort of favorites: they have been directed by the opinion of

one or two merchants, who were to merit in flatteries, and to be paid in

contracts; who frequently advised, not for the general good of trade,

but for their private advantage. During the administration of which this

author complains, the meetings of merchants upon the business of trade

were numerous and public; sometimes at the house of the Marquis of

Rockingham; sometimes at Mr. Dowdeswell's; sometimes at Sir George

Savile's, a house always open to every deliberation favorable to the

liberty or the commerce of his country. Nor were these meetings confined

to the merchants of London. Merchants and manufacturers were invited

from all the considerable towns in England. They conferred with the

ministers and active members of Parliament. No private views, no local

interests prevailed. Never were points in trade settled upon a larger

scale of information. They who attended these meetings well know what

ministers they were who heard the most patiently, who comprehended the

most clearly, and who provided the most wisely. Let then this author and

his friends still continue in possession of the practice of exalting

their own abilities, in their pamphlets and in the newspapers. They

never will persuade the public, that the merchants of England were in a

general confederacy to sacrifice their own interests to those of North

America, and to destroy the vent of their own goods in favor of the

manufactures of France and Holland.

Had the friends of this author taken these means of information, his

extreme terrors of contraband in the West India islands would have been

greatly quieted, and his objections to the opening of the ports would

have ceased. He would have learned, from the most satisfactory analysis

of the West India trade, that we have the advantage in every essential

article of it; and that almost every restriction on our communication

with our neighbors there, is a restriction unfavorable to ourselves.

Such were the principles that guided, and the authority that sanctioned,

these regulations. No man ever said, that, in the multiplicity of

regulations made in the administration of their predecessors, none were

useful; some certainly were so; and I defy the author to show a

commercial regulation of that period, which he can prove, from any

authority except his own, to have a tendency beneficial to commerce,

that has been repealed. So far were that ministry from being guided by a

spirit of contradiction or of innovation.

The author's attack on that administration, for their neglect of our

claims on foreign powers, is by much the most astonishing instance he

has given, or that, I believe, any man ever did give, of an intrepid

effrontery. It relates to the Manilla ransom; to the Canada bills; and

to the Russian treaty. Could one imagine, that these very things, which

he thus chooses to object to others, have been the principal subject of

charge against his favorite ministry? Instead of clearing them of these

charges, he appears not so much as to have heard of them; but throws

them directly upon the administration which succeeded to that of his

friends.

It is not always very pleasant to be obliged to produce the detail of

this kind of transactions to the public view. I will content myself

therefore with giving a short state of facts, which, when the author

chooses to contradict, he shall see proved, more, perhaps, to his

conviction, than to his liking. The first fact then is, that the demand

for the Manilla ransom had been in the author's favorite administration

so neglected as to appear to have been little less than tacitly

abandoned. At home, no countenance was given to the claimants; and when

it was mentioned in Parliament, the then leader did not seem, at least,

_a very sanguine advocate in favor of the claim_. These things made it a

matter of no small difficulty to resume and press that negotiation with

Spain. However, so clear was our right, that the then ministers resolved

to revive it; and so little time was lost, that though that

administration was not completed until the 9th of July, 1765, on the

20th of the following August, General Conway transmitted a strong and

full remonstrance on that subject to the Earl of Rochfort. The argument,

on which the court of Madrid most relied, was the dereliction of that

claim by the preceding ministers. However, it was still pushed with so

much vigor, that the Spaniards, from a positive denial to pay, offered

to refer the demand to arbitration. That proposition was rejected; and

the demand being still pressed, there was all the reason in the world to

expect its being brought to a favorable issue; when it was thought

proper to change the administration. Whether under their circumstances,

and in the time they continued in power, more could be done, the reader

will judge; who will hear with astonishment a charge of remissness from

those very men, whose inactivity, to call it by no worse a name, laid

the chief difficulties in the way of the revived negotiation.

As to the Canada bills, this author thinks proper to assert, "that the

proprietors found themselves under a necessity of compounding their

demands upon the French court, and accepting terms which they had often

rejected, and which the Earl of Halifax had declared he would sooner

forfeit his hand than sign."[95] When I know that the Earl of Halifax

says so, the Earl of Halifax shall have an answer; but I persuade myself

that his Lordship has given no authority for this ridiculous rant. In

the mean time, I shall only speak of it as a common concern of that

ministry.

In the first place, then, I observe, that a convention, for the

liquidation of the Canada bills, was concluded under the administration

of 1766; when nothing was concluded under that of the favorites of this

author.

2. This transaction was, in every step of it, carried on in concert with

the persons interested, and was terminated to their entire satisfaction.

They would have acquiesced perhaps in terms somewhat lower than those

which were obtained. The author is indeed too kind to them. He will,

however, let them speak for themselves, and show what their own opinion

was of the measures pursued in their favor.[96] In what manner the

execution of the convention has been since provided for, it is not my

present business to examine.

3. The proprietors had absolutely despaired of being paid, at any time,

any proportion, of their demand, until the change of that ministry. The

merchants were checked and discountenanced; they had often been told, by

some in authority, of the cheap rate at which these Canada bills had

been procured; yet the author can talk of the composition of them as a

necessity induced by the change in administration. They found themselves

indeed, before that change, under a necessity of hinting somewhat of

bringing the matter into Parliament; but they were soon silenced, and

put in mind of the fate which the Newfoundland business had there met

with. Nothing struck them more than the strong contrast between the

spirit, and method of proceeding, of the two administrations.

4. The Earl of Halifax never did, nor could, refuse to sign this

convention; because this convention, as it stands, never was before

him.[97]

The author's last charge on that ministry, with regard to foreign

affairs, is the Russian treaty of commerce, which the author thinks fit

to assert, was concluded "on terms the Earl of Buckinghamshire had

refused to accept of, and which had been deemed by former ministers

disadvantageous to the nation, and by the merchants unsafe and

unprofitable."[98]

Both the assertions in this paragraph are equally groundless. The treaty

then concluded by Sir George Macartney was not on the terms which the

Earl of Buckinghamshire had refused. The Earl of Buckinghamshire never

did refuse terms, because the business never came to the point of

refusal, or acceptance; all that he did was, to receive the Russian

project for a treaty of commerce, and to transmit it to England. This

was in November, 1764; and he left Petersburg the January following,

before he could even receive an answer from his own court. The

conclusion of the treaty fell to his successor. Whoever will be at the

trouble to compare it with the treaty of 1734, will, I believe, confess,

that, if the former ministers could have obtained such terms, they were

criminal in not accepting them.

But the merchants "deemed them unsafe and unprofitable." What merchants?

As no treaty ever was more maturely considered, so the opinion of the

Russia merchants in London was all along taken; and all the instructions

sent over were in exact conformity to that opinion. Our minister there

made no step without having previously consulted our merchants resident

in Petersburg, who, before the signing of the treaty, gave the most full

and unanimous testimony in its favor. In their address to our minister

at that court, among other things they say, "It may afford some

additional satisfaction to your Excellency, to receive a public

acknowledgment of _the entire and unreserved approbation of every

article_ in this treaty, from us who are so immediately and so nearly

concerned in its consequences." This was signed by the consul-general,

and every British merchant in Petersburg.

The approbation of those immediately concerned in the consequences is

nothing to this author. He and his friends have so much tenderness for

people's interests, and understand them so much better than they do

themselves, that, whilst these politicians are contending for the best

of possible terms, the claimants are obliged to go without any terms at

all.

One of the first and justest complaints against the administration of

the author's friends, was the want of rigor in their foreign

negotiations. Their immediate successors endeavored to correct that

error, along with others; and there was scarcely a foreign court, in

which the new spirit that had arisen was not sensibly felt,

acknowledged, and sometimes complained of. On their coming into

administration, they found the demolition of Dunkirk entirely at a

stand: instead of demolition, they found construction; for the French

were then at work on the repair of the jettees. On the remonstrances of

General Conway, some parts of these jettees were immediately destroyed.

The Duke of Richmond personally surveyed the place, and obtained a

fuller knowledge of its true state and condition than any of our

ministers had done; and, in consequence, had larger offers from the Duke

of Choiseul than had ever been received. But, as these were short of our

just expectations under the treaty, he rejected them. Our then

ministers, knowing that, in their administration, the people's minds

were set at ease upon all the essential points of public and private

liberty, and that no project of theirs could endanger the concord of the

empire, were under no restraint from pursuing every just demand upon

foreign nations.

The author, towards the end of this work, falls into reflections upon

the state of public morals in this country: he draws use from this

doctrine, by recommending his friend to the king and the public, as

another Duke of Sully; and he concludes the whole performance with a

very devout prayer.

The prayers of politicians may sometimes be sincere; and as this prayer

is in substance, that the author, or his friends, may be soon brought

into power, I have great reason to believe it is very much from the

heart. It must be owned too that after he has drawn such a picture, such

a shocking picture, of the state of this country, he has great faith in

thinking the means he prays for sufficient to relieve us: after the

character he has given of its inhabitants of all ranks and classes, he

has great charity in caring much about them; and indeed no less hope, in

being of opinion, that such a detestable nation can ever become the care

of Providence. He has not even found five good men in our devoted city.

He talks indeed of men of virtue and ability. But where are his _men_ of

virtue and ability to be found? Are they in the present administration?

Never were a set of people more blackened by this author. Are they among

the party of those (no small body) who adhere to the system of 1766?

These it is the great purpose of this book to calumniate. Are they the

persons who acted with his great friend, since the change in 1762, to

his removal in 1765? Scarcely any of these are now out of employment;

and we are in possession of his desideratum. Yet I think he hardly means

to select, even some of the highest of them, as examples fit for the

reformation of a corrupt world.

He observes, that the virtue of the most exemplary prince that ever

swayed a sceptre "can never warm or illuminate the body of his people,

if foul mirrors are placed so near him as to refract and dissipate the

rays at their first emanation."[99] Without observing upon the

propriety of this metaphor, or asking how mirrors come to have lost

their old quality of reflecting, and to have acquired that of

refracting, and dissipating rays, and how far their foulness will

account for this change; the remark itself is common and true: no less

true, and equally surprising from him, is that which immediately

precedes it: "It is in vain to endeavor to check the progress of

irreligion and licentiousness, by punishing such crimes in _one

individual_, if others equally culpable are rewarded with the honors and

emoluments of the state."[100] I am not in the secret of the author's

manner of writing; but it appears to me, that he must intend these

reflections as a satire upon the administration of his happy years. Were

over the honors and emoluments of the state more lavishly squandered

upon persons scandalous in their lives than during that period? In these

scandalous lives, was there anything more scandalous than the mode of

punishing _one culpable individual_? In that individual, is anything

more culpable than his having been seduced by the example of some of

those very persons by whom he was thus persecuted?

The author is so eager to attack others, that he provides but

indifferently for his own defence. I believe, without going beyond the

page I have now before me, he is very sensible, that I have sufficient

matter of further, and, if possible, of heavier charge against his

friends, upon his own principle. But it is because the advantage is too

great, that I decline making use of it. I wish the author had not

thought that all methods are lawful in party. Above all he ought to have

taken care not to wound his enemies through the sides of his country.

This he has done, by making that monstrous and overcharged picture of

the distresses of our situation. No wonder that he, who finds this

country in the same condition with that of France at the time of Henry

the Fourth, could also find a resemblance between his political friend

and the Duke of Sully. As to those personal resemblances, people will

often judge of them from their affections: they may imagine in these

clouds whatsoever figures they please; but what is the conformation of

that eye which can discover a resemblance of this country and these

times to those with which the author compares them? France, a country

just recovered out of twenty-five years of the most cruel and desolating

civil war that perhaps was ever known. The kingdom, under the veil of

momentary quiet, full of the most atrocious political, operating upon

the most furious fanatical factions. Some pretenders even to the crown;

and those who did not pretend to the whole, aimed at the partition of

the monarchy. There were almost as many competitors as provinces; and

all abetted by the greatest, the most ambitious, and most enterprising

power in Europe. No place safe from treason; no, not the bosoms on which

the most amiable prince that ever lived reposed his head; not his

mistresses; not even his queen. As to the finances, they had scarce an

existence, but as a matter of plunder to the managers, and of grants to

insatiable and ungrateful courtiers.

How can our author have the heart to describe this as any sort of

parallel to our situation? To be sure, an April shower has some

resemblance to a waterspout; for they are both wet: and there is some

likeness between a summer evening's breeze and a hurricane; they are

both wind: but who can compare our disturbances, our situation, or our

finances, to those of France in the time of Henry? Great Britain is

indeed at this time wearied, but not broken, with the efforts of a

victorious foreign war; not sufficiently relieved by an inadequate

peace, but somewhat benefited by that peace, and infinitely by the

consequences of that war. The powers of Europe awed by our victories,

and lying in ruins upon every side of us. Burdened indeed we are with

debt, but abounding with resources. We have a trade, not perhaps equal

to our wishes, but more than ever we possessed. In effect, no pretender

to the crown; nor nutriment for such desperate and destructive factions

as have formerly shaken this kingdom.

As to our finances, the author trifles with us. When Sully came to those

of France, in what order was any part of the financial system? or what

system was there at all? There is no man in office who must not be

sensible that ours is, without the act of any parading minister, the

most regular and orderly system perhaps that was ever known; the best

secured against all frauds in the collection, and all misapplication in

the expenditure of public money.

I admit that, in this flourishing state of things, there are appearances

enough to excite uneasiness and apprehension. I admit there is a

cankerworm in the rose:

Medio de fonte leporum

Surgit amari aliquid, quod in ipsis floribus angat.

This is nothing else than a spirit of disconnection, of distrust, and of

treachery among public men. It is no accidental evil, nor has its effect

been trusted to the usual frailty of nature; the distemper has been

inoculated. The author is sensible of it, and we lament it together.

This distemper is alone sufficient to take away considerably from the

benefits of our constitution and situation, and perhaps to render their

continuance precarious. If these evil dispositions should spread much

farther, they must end in our destruction; for nothing can save a people

destitute of public and private faith. However, the author, for the

present state of things, has extended the charge by much too widely; as

men are but too apt to take the measure of all mankind from their own

particular acquaintance. Barren as this age may be in the growth of

honor and virtue, the country does not want, at this moment, as strong,

and those not a few examples, as were ever known, of an unshaken

adherence to principle, and attachment to connection, against every

allurement of interest. Those examples are not furnished by the great

alone; nor by those, whose activity in public affairs may render it

suspected that they make such a character one of the rounds in their

ladder of ambition; but by men more quiet, and more in the shade, on

whom an unmixed sense of honor alone could operate. Such examples indeed

are not furnished in great abundance amongst those who are the subjects

of the author's panegyric. He must look for them in another camp. He who

complains of the ill effects of a divided and heterogeneous

administration, is not justifiable in laboring to render odious in the

eyes of the public those men, whose principles, whose maxims of policy,

and whose personal character, can alone administer a remedy to this

capital evil of the age: neither is he consistent with himself, in

constantly extolling those whom he knows to be the authors of the very

mischief of which he complains, and which the whole nation feels so

deeply.