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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/15702-8.txt b/15702-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..2cddc6e --- /dev/null +++ b/15702-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11704 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund +Burke, Vol. VI. (of 12), by Edmund Burke + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. VI. (of 12) + +Author: Edmund Burke + +Release Date: April 24, 2005 [EBook #15702] +[Date last updated: May 5, 2006] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK BURKE VOL 6 *** + + + + +Produced by Paul Murray, Susan Skinner and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team from images generously made +available by the Bibliothèque nationale de France +(BnF/Gallica) at http://gallica.bnf.fr + + + + + + + + +THE WORKS + +OF + +THE RIGHT HONOURABLE + +EDMUND BURKE + + +IN TWELVE VOLUMES + +VOLUME THE SIXTH + + +[Illustration: Burke Coat of Arms.] + + +LONDON +JOHN C. NIMMO +14, KING WILLIAM STREET, STRAND, W.C. +MDCCCLXXXVII + + + + +CONTENTS OF VOL. VI. + + +PREFACE TO THE SECOND POSTHUMOUS VOLUME, IN A LETTER TO THE RIGHT + HON. WILLIAM ELLIOT v + +FOURTH LETTER ON THE PROPOSALS FOR PEACE WITH THE REGICIDE DIRECTORY + OF FRANCE; WITH THE PRELIMINARY CORRESPONDENCE 1 + +LETTER TO THE EMPRESS OF RUSSIA, November 1, 1791 113 + +LETTER TO SIR CHARLES BINGHAM, BART., ON THE IRISH ABSENTEE TAX, + October 30, 1773 121 + +LETTER TO THE HON. CHARLES JAMES FOX, ON THE AMERICAN WAR, + October 8, 1777 135 + +LETTER TO THE MARQUIS OF ROCKINGHAM, WITH ADDRESSES TO THE KING, + AND THE BRITISH COLONISTS IN NORTH AMERICA, IN RELATION TO THE + MEASURES OF GOVERNMENT IN THE AMERICAN CONTEST, AND A PROPOSED + SECESSION OF THE OPPOSITION FROM PARLIAMENT, January, 1777 149 + +LETTER TO THE RIGHT HON. EDMUND S. PERRY, IN RELATION TO A BILL + FOR THE RELIEF OF THE ROMAN CATHOLICS OF IRELAND, July 18, 1778 197 + +TWO LETTERS TO THOMAS BURGH, ESQ., AND JOHN MERLOTT, ESQ., IN + VINDICATION OF HIS PARLIAMENTARY CONDUCT RELATIVE TO THE AFFAIRS + OF IRELAND, 1780 207 + +LETTERS AND REFLECTIONS ON THE EXECUTIONS OF THE RIOTERS IN 1780 239 + +LETTER TO THE RIGHT HON. HENRY DUNDAS: WITH THE SKETCH OF A NEGRO + CODE, 1792 255 + +LETTER TO THE CHAIRMAN OF THE BUCKINGHAMSHIRE MEETING, HELD AT + AYLESBURY, APRIL 13, 1780, ON THE SUBJECT OF PARLIAMENTARY + REFORM 291 + +FRAGMENTS OF A TRACT RELATIVE TO THE LAWS AGAINST POPERY IN IRELAND 299 + +LETTER TO WILLIAM SMITH, ESQ., ON THE SUBJECT OF CATHOLIC + EMANCIPATION, January 29, 1795 361 + +SECOND LETTER TO SIR HERCULES LANGRISHE, ON THE CATHOLIC QUESTION, + May 26, 1795 375 + +LETTER TO RICHARD BURKE, ESQ., ON PROTESTANT ASCENDENCY IN IRELAND, + 1793 385 + +LETTER ON THE AFFAIRS OF IRELAND, 1797 413 + + + + +PREFACE + +TO THE SECOND POSTHUMOUS VOLUME,[1] + +IN A LETTER TO + +THE RIGHT HON. WILLIAM ELLIOT + + +My dear sir,--As some prefatory account of the materials which compose +this second posthumous volume of the Works of Mr. Burke, and of the +causes which have prevented its earlier appearance, will be expected +from me, I hope I may be indulged in the inclination I feel to run over +these matters in a letter to you, rather than in a formal address to the +public. + +Of the delay that has intervened since the publication of the former +volume I shall first say a few words. Having undertaken, in conjunction +with the late Dr. Laurence, to examine the manuscript papers of Mr. +Burke, and to select and prepare for the press such of them as should be +thought proper for publication, the difficulties attending our +coöperation were soon experienced by us. The remoteness of our places +of residence in summer, and our professional and other avocations in +winter, opposed perpetual obstacles to the progress of our undertaking. + +Soon after the publication of the fourth volume, I was rendered +incapable of attending to any business by a severe and tedious illness. +And it was not long after my recovery before the health of our +invaluable friend began gradually to decline, and soon became unequal to +the increasing labors of his profession and the discharge of his +Parliamentary duties. At length we lost a man, of whom, as I shall have +occasion to speak more particularly in another part of this undertaking, +I will now content myself with saying, that in my humble opinion he +merited, and certainly obtained with those best acquainted with his +extensive learning and information, a considerable rank amongst the +eminent persons who have adorned the age in which we have lived, and of +whose services the public have been deprived by a premature death. + +From these causes little progress had been made in our work when I was +deprived of my coadjutor. But from that time you can testify of me that +I have not been idle. You can bear witness to the confused state in +which the materials that compose the present volume came into my hands. +The difficulty of reading many of the manuscripts, obscured by +innumerable erasures, corrections, interlineations, and marginal +insertions, would perhaps have been insuperable to any person less +conversant in the manuscripts of Mr. Burke than myself. To this +difficulty succeeded that of selecting from several detached papers, +written upon the same subject and the same topics, such as appeared to +contain the author's last thoughts and emendations. When these +difficulties were overcome, there still remained, in many instances, +that of assigning its proper place to many detached members of the same +piece, where no direct note of connection had been made. These +circumstances, whilst they will lead the reader not to expect, in the +cases to which they apply, the finished productions of Mr. Burke, +imposed upon me a task of great delicacy and difficulty,--namely, that +of deciding upon the publication of any, and which, of these unfinished +pieces. I must here beg permission of you, and Lord Fitzwilliam, to +inform the public, that in the execution of this part of my duty I +requested and obtained your assistance. + +Our first care was to ascertain, from such evidence, internal and +external, as the manuscripts themselves afforded, what pieces appeared +to have been at any time intended by the author for publication. Our +next was to select such as, though not originally intended for +publication, yet appeared to contain matter that might contribute to the +gratification and instruction of the public. Our last object was to +determine what degree of imperfection and incorrectness in papers of +either of these classes ought or ought not to exclude them from a place +in the present volume. This was, doubtless, the most nice and arduous +part of our undertaking. The difficulty, however, was, in our minds, +greatly diminished by our conviction that the reputation of our author +stood far beyond the reach of injury from any injudicious conduct of +ours in making this selection. On the other hand, we were desirous that +nothing should be withheld, from which the public might derive any +possible benefit. + +Nothing more is now necessary than that I should give a short account of +the writings which compose the present volume. + + +I. Fourth Letter on a Regicide Peace. + +Some account has already been given of this Letter in the Advertisement +to the fourth quarto volume.[2] That part of it which is contained +between the first and the middle of the page 67[3] is taken from a +manuscript which, nearly to the conclusion, had received the author's +last corrections: the subsequent part, to the middle of the page 71,[4] +is taken from some loose manuscripts, that were dictated by the author, +but do not appear to have been revised by him; and though they, as well +as what follows to the conclusion, were evidently designed to make a +part of this Letter, the editor alone is responsible for the order in +which they are here placed. The last part, from the middle of the page +71, had been printed as a part of the Letter which was originally +intended to be the third on Regicide Peace, as in the preface to the +fourth volume has already been noticed. + +It was thought proper to communicate this Letter before its publication +to Lord Auckland, the author of the pamphlet so frequently alluded to in +it. His Lordship, in consequence of this communication, was pleased to +put into my hands a letter with which he had sent his pamphlet to Mr. +Burke at the time of its publication, and Mr. Burke's answer to that +letter. These pieces, together with the note with which his Lordship +transmitted them to me, are prefixed to the Letter on Regicide Peace. + +II. Letter to the Empress of Russia. +III. Letter to Sir Charles Bingham. +IV. Letter to the Honorable Charles James Fox. + +Of these Letters it will be sufficient to remark, that they come under +the second of those classes into which, as I before observed, we divided +the papers that presented themselves to our consideration. + +V. Letter to the Marquis of Rockingham. +VI. An Address to the King. +VII. An Address to the British Colonists in North America. + +These pieces relate to a most important period in the present reign; +and I hope no apology will be necessary for giving them to the public. + +VIII. Letter to the Right Honorable Edmund [Sexton] Pery. +IX. Letter to Thomas Burgh, Esq. +X. Letter to John Merlott, Esq. + +The reader will find, in a note annexed to each of these Letters, an +account of the occasions on which they were written. The Letter to T. +Burgh, Esq., had found its way into some of the periodical prints of the +time in Dublin. + +XI. Reflections on the Approaching Executions. + +It may not, perhaps, now be generally known that Mr. Burke was a marked +object of the rioters in this disgraceful commotion, from whose fury he +narrowly escaped. The Reflections will be found to contain maxims of the +soundest judicial policy, and do equal honor to the head and heart of +their illustrious writer. + +XII. Letter to the Right Honorable Henry Dundas; with the Sketch of a +Negro Code. + +Mr. Burke, in the Letter to Mr. Dundas, has entered fully into his own +views of the Slave Trade, and has thereby rendered any further +explanation on that subject at present unnecessary. With respect to the +Code itself, an unsuccessful attempt was made to procure the copy of it +transmitted to Mr. Dundas. It was not to be found amongst his papers. +The Editor has therefore been obliged to have recourse to a rough draft +of it in Mr. Burke's own handwriting; from which he hopes he has +succeeded in making a pretty correct transcript of it, as well as in the +attempt he has made to supply the marginal references alluded to in Mr. +Burke's Letter to Mr. Dundas. + +XIII. Letter to the Chairman of the Buckinghamshire Meeting. + +Of the occasion of this Letter an account is given in the note subjoined +[prefixed] to it. + +XIV. Tracts and Letters relative to the Laws against Popery in Ireland. + +These pieces consist of,-- + +1. An unfinished Tract on the Popery Laws. Of this Tract the reader will +find an account in the note prefixed to it. + +2. A Letter to William Smith, Esq. Several copies of this letter having +got abroad, it was printed and published in Dublin without the +permission of Mr. Burke, or of the gentleman to whom it was addressed. + +3. Second Letter to Sir Hercules Langrishe. This may be considered as +supplementary to the first letter, addressed to the same person in +January, 1792, which was published in the third volume.[5] + +4. Letter to Richard Burke, Esq. Of this letter it will be necessary to +observe, that the first part of it appears to have been originally +addressed by Mr. Burke to his son in the manner in which it is now +printed, but to have been left unfinished; after whose death he probably +designed to have given the substance of it, with additional +observations, to the public in some other form, but never found leisure +or inclination to finish it. + +5. A Letter on the Affairs of Ireland, written in the year 1797. The +name of the person to whom this letter was addressed does not appear on +the manuscript; nor has the letter been found to which it was written as +an answer. And as the gentleman whom he employed as an amanuensis is not +now living, no discovery of it can be made, unless this publication of +the letter should produce some information respecting it, that may +enable us in a future volume to gratify, on this point, the curiosity of +the reader. The letter was dictated, as he himself tells us, from his +couch at Bath; to which place he had gone, by the advice of his +physicians, in March, 1797. His health was now rapidly declining; the +vigor of his mind remained unimpaired. This, my dear friend, was, I +believe, the last letter dictated by him on public affairs:--here ended +his political labors. + +XV. Fragments and Notes of Speeches in Parliament. + +1. Speech on the Acts of Uniformity. + +2. Speech on a Bill for the Relief of Protestant Dissenters. + +3. Speech on the Petition of the Unitarians. + +4. Speech on the Middlesex Election. + +5. Speech on a Bill for shortening the Duration of Parliaments. + +6. Speech on the Reform of the Representation in Parliament. + +7. Speech on a Bill for explaining the Powers of Juries in Prosecutions +for Libels. + +*7. Letter relative to the same subject. + +8. Speech on a Bill for repealing the Marriage Act. + +9. Speech on a Bill to quiet the Possessions of the Subject against +Dormant Claims of the Church. + +With respect to these fragments, I have already stated the reasons by +which we were influenced in our determination to publish them. An +account of the state in which these manuscripts were found is given in +the note prefixed to this article. + +XVI. Hints for an Essay on the Drama. + +This fragment was perused in manuscript by a learned and judicious +critic, our late lamented friend, Mr. Malone; and under the protection +of his opinion we can feel no hesitation in submitting it to the +judgment of the public. + +XVII. We are now come to the concluding article of this volume,--the +Essay on the History of England. + +At what time of the author's life it was written cannot now be exactly +ascertained; but it was certainly begun before he had attained the age +of twenty-seven years, as it appears from an entry in the books of the +late Mr. Dodsley, that eight sheets of it, which contain the first +seventy-four pages of the present edition,[6] were printed in the year +1757. This is the only part that has received the finishing stroke of +the author. In those who are acquainted with the manner in which Mr. +Burke usually composed his graver literary works, and of which some +account is given in the Advertisement prefixed to the fourth volume, +this circumstance will excite a deep regret; and whilst the public +partakes with us in this feeling, it will doubtless be led to judge with +candor and indulgence of a work left in this imperfect and unfinished +state by its author. + +Before I conclude, it may not be improper to take this opportunity of +acquainting the public with the progress that has been made towards the +completion of this undertaking. The sixth and seventh volumes, which +will consist entirely of papers that have a relation to the affairs of +the East India Company, and to the impeachment of Mr. Hastings, are now +in the press. The suspension of the consideration of the affairs of the +East India Company in Parliament till its nest session has made me very +desirous to get the sixth volume out as early as possible in the next +winter. The Ninth and Eleventh Reports of the Select Committee, +appointed to take into consideration certain affairs of the East India +Company in the year 1783, were written by Mr. Burke, and will be given +in that volume. They contain a full and comprehensive view of the +commerce, revenues, civil establishment, and general policy of the +Company, and will therefore be peculiarly interesting at this time to +the public. + +The eighth and last volume will contain a narrative of the life of Mr. +Burke, which will be accompanied with such parts of his familiar +correspondence, and other occasional productions, as shall be thought +fit for publication.[7] The materials relating to the early years of his +life, alluded to in the Advertisement to the fourth volume, have been +lately recovered; and the communication of such as may still remain in +the possession of any private individuals is again most earnestly +requested. + +Unequal as I feel myself to the task, I shall, my dear friend, lose no +time, nor spare any pains, in discharging the arduous duty that has +devolved upon me. You know the peculiar difficulties I labor under from +the failure of my eyesight; and you may congratulate me upon the +assistance which I have now procured from my neighbor, the worthy +chaplain[8] of Bromley College, who to the useful qualification of a +most patient amanuensis adds that of a good scholar and intelligent +critic. + +And now, adieu, my dear friend, + +And believe me ever affectionately yours, + +WR. ROFFEN. + +BROMLEY HOUSE, August 1, 1812. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[1] Works, Vol. V., quarto edition, (London, F., C., & J. Rivington, +1812,)--Vol. IV. of that edition (London, F. & C. Rivington, 1802) being +the first posthumous volume,--and Vols. I., II., and III. (London, J. +Dodsley, 1792) comprising the collection published during the lifetime +of Mr. Burke. + +[2] Prefixed to the first volume, in the other editions. For the account +referred to, see, in the present edition, Vol. I., pp. xiii., xiv. + +[3] Page 86 of the present edition. + +[4] In this edition, p. 91, near the top. + +[5] In the fourth volume of the present edition. + +[6] The quarto edition,--extending as far as Book II. ch. 2, near the +middle of the paragraph commencing, "The same regard to the welfare of +the people," &c. + +[7] This design the editor did not live to execute. + +[8] The Rev. J.J. Talman. + + + + +FOURTH LETTER + +ON THE + +PROPOSALS FOR PEACE WITH THE REGICIDE DIRECTORY OF FRANCE. + +ADDRESSED TO + +THE EARL FITZWILLIAM. +1795-7. + + +PRELIMINARY CORRESPONDENCE. + +_Letter from the Right Honorable the Lord Auckland to the Lord Bishop of +Rochester_. + +EDEN FARM, KENT, July 18th, 1812. + +My dear Lord,--Mr. Burke's fourth letter to Lord Fitzwilliam is +personally interesting to me: I have perused it with a respectful +attention. + +When I communicated to Mr. Burke, in 1795, the printed work which he +arraigns and discusses, I was aware that he would differ from me. + +Some light is thrown on the transaction by my note which gave rise to +it, and by his answer, which exhibits the admirable powers of his great +and good mind, deeply suffering at the time under a domestic calamity. + +I have selected these two papers from my manuscript collection, and now +transmit them to your Lordship with a wish that they may be annexed to +the publication in question. + +I have the honor to be, my dear Lord, + +Yours most sincerely, + +AUCKLAND. + +TO THE RIGHT REV. THE LORD BISHOP OF ROCHESTER. + + * * * * * + +_Letter from Lord Auckland to the Right Honorable Edmund Burke_. + + +EDEN FARM, KENT, October 28th, 1795. + +My dear Sir,-- + +Though in the stormy ocean of the last twenty-three years we have seldom +sailed on the same tack, there has been nothing hostile in our signals +or manoeuvres, and, on my part at least, there has been a cordial +disposition towards friendly and respectful sentiments. Under that +influence, I now send to you a small work which exhibits my fair and +full opinions on the arduous circumstances of the moment, "as far as the +cautions necessary to be observed will permit me to go beyond general +ideas." + +Three or four of those friends with whom I am most connected in public +and private life are pleased to think that the statement in question +(which at first made part of a confidential paper) may do good, and +accordingly a very large impression will be published to-day. I neither +seek to avow the publication nor do I wish to disavow it. I have no +anxiety in that respect, but to contribute my mite to do service, at a +moment when service is much wanted. + +I am, my dear Sir, + +Most sincerely yours, + +AUCKLAND. + +RIGHT HON. EDMUND BURKE. + + * * * * * + +_Letter from the Right Honorable Edmund Burke to Lord Auckland_. + +My dear Lord,-- + +I am perfectly sensible of the very flattering honor you have done me in +turning any part of your attention towards a dejected old man, buried +in the anticipated grave of a feeble old age, forgetting and forgotten +in an obscure and melancholy retreat. + +In this retreat I have nothing relative to this world to do, but to +study all the tranquillity that in the state of my mind I am capable of. +To that end I find it but too necessary to call to my aid an oblivion of +most of the circumstances, pleasant and unpleasant, of my life,--to +think as little and indeed to know as little as I can of everything that +is doing about me,--and, above all, to divert my mind from all +presagings and prognostications of what I must (if I let my speculations +loose) consider as of absolute necessity to happen after my death, and +possibly even before it. Your address to the public, which you have been +so good as to send to me, obliges me to break in upon that plan, and to +look a little on what is behind, and very much on what is before me. It +creates in my mind a variety of thoughts, and all of them unpleasant. + +It is true, my Lord, what you say, that, through our public life, we +have generally sailed on somewhat different tacks. We have so, +undoubtedly; and we should do so still, if I had continued longer to +keep the sea. In that difference, you rightly observe that I have always +done justice to your skill and ability as a navigator, and to your good +intentions towards the safety of the cargo and of the ship's company. I +cannot say now that we are on different tacks. There would be no +propriety in the metaphor. I can sail no longer. My vessel cannot be +said to be even in port. She is wholly condemned and broken up. To have +an idea of that vessel, you must call to mind what you have often seen +on the Kentish road. Those planks of tough and hardy oak, that used for +years to brave the buffets of the Bay of Biscay, are now turned, with +their warped grain and empty trunnion-holes, into very wretched pales +for the inclosure of a wretched farm-yard. + +The style of your pamphlet, and the eloquence and power of composition +you display in it, are such as do great honor to your talents, and in +conveying any other sentiments would give me very great pleasure. +Perhaps I do not very perfectly comprehend your purpose, and the drift +of your arguments. If I do not, pray do not attribute my mistake to want +of candor, but to want of sagacity. I confess, your address to the +public, together with other accompanying circumstances, has filled me +with a degree of grief and dismay which I cannot find words to express. +If the plan of politics there recommended--pray excuse my +freedom--should be adopted by the king's councils, and by the good +people of this kingdom, (as, so recommended, undoubtedly it will,) +nothing can be the consequence but utter and irretrievable ruin to the +ministry, to the crown, to the succession,--to the importance, to the +independence, to the very existence, of this country. This is my feeble, +perhaps, but clear, positive, decided, long and maturely reflected and +frequently declared opinion, from which all the events which have lately +come to pass, so far from turning me, have tended to confirm beyond the +power of alteration, even by your eloquence and authority. I find, my +dear Lord, that you think some persons, who are not satisfied with the +securities of a Jacobin peace, to be persons of intemperate minds. I may +be, and I fear I am, with you in that description; but pray, my Lord, +recollect that very few of the causes which make men intemperate can +operate upon me. Sanguine hopes, vehement desires, inordinate ambition, +implacable animosity, party attachments, or party interests,--all these +with me have no existence. For myself, or for a family, (alas! I have +none,) I have nothing to hope or to fear in this world. I am attached, +by principle, inclination, and gratitude, to the king, and to the +present ministry. + +Perhaps you may think that my animosity to opposition is the cause of my +dissent, on seeing the politics of Mr. Fox (which, while I was in the +world, I combated by every instrument which God had put into my hands, +and in every situation in which I had taken part) so completely, if I at +all understand you, adopted in your Lordship's book: but it was with +pain I broke with that great man forever in that cause; and I assure +you, it is not without pain that I differ with your Lordship on the same +principles. But it is of no concern. I am far below the region of those +great and tempestuous passions. I feel nothing of the intemperance of +mind. It is rather sorrow and dejection than anger. + +Once more my best thanks for your very polite attention; and do me the +favor to believe me, with the most perfect sentiments of respect and +regard, + +My dear Lord, + +Your Lordship's most obedient and humble servant, + +EDMUND BURKE. + +BEACONSFIELD, Oct. 30th, 1795. + +Friday Evening. + + + + +LETTER IV. + +TO THE EARL FITZWILLIAM. + + +My dear Lord,--I am not sure that the best way of discussing any +subject, except those that concern the abstracted sciences, is not +somewhat in the way of dialogue. To this mode, however, there are two +objections: the first, that it happens, as in the puppet-show, one man +speaks for all the personages. An unnatural uniformity of tone is in a +manner unavoidable. The other and more serious objection is, that, as +the author (if not an absolute skeptic) must have some opinion of his +own to enforce, he will be continually tempted to enervate the arguments +he puts into the mouth of his adversary, or to place them in a point of +view most commodious for their refutation. There is, however, a sort of +dialogue not quite so liable to these objections, because it approaches +more nearly to truth and Nature: it is called CONTROVERSY. Here the +parties speak for themselves. If the writer who attacks another's +notions does not deal fairly with his adversary, the diligent reader has +it always in his power, by resorting to the work examined, to do justice +to the original author and to himself. For this reason you will not +blame me, if, in my discussion of the merits of a Regicide Peace, I do +not choose to trust to my own statements, but to bring forward along +with them the arguments of the advocates for that measure. If I choose +puny adversaries, writers of no estimation or authority, then you will +justly blame me. I might as well bring in at once a fictitious speaker, +and thus fall into all the inconveniences of an imaginary dialogue. This +I shall avoid; and I shall take no notice of any author who my friends +in town do not tell me is in estimation with those whose opinions he +supports. + +A piece has been sent to me, called "Some Remarks on the Apparent +Circumstances of the War in the Fourth Week of October, 1795," with a +French motto: "_Que faire encore une fois dans une telle nuit? Attendre +le jour_." The very title seemed to me striking and peculiar, and to +announce something uncommon. In the time I have lived to, I always seem +to walk on enchanted ground. Everything is new, and, according to the +fashionable phrase, revolutionary. In former days authors valued +themselves upon the maturity and fulness of their deliberations. +Accordingly, they predicted (perhaps with more arrogance than reason) an +eternal duration to their works. The quite contrary is our present +fashion. Writers value themselves now on the instability of their +opinions and the transitory life of their productions. On this kind of +credit the modern institutors open their schools. They write for youth, +and it is sufficient, if the instruction "lasts as long as a present +love, or as the painted silks and cottons of the season." + +The doctrines in this work are applied, for their standard, with great +exactness, to the shortest possible periods both of conception and +duration. The title is "Some Remarks on the _Apparent_ Circumstances of +the War _in the Fourth Week of October_, 1795." The time is critically +chosen. A month or so earlier would have made it the anniversary of a +bloody Parisian September, when the French massacre one another. A day +or two later would have carried it into a London November, the gloomy +month in which it is said by a pleasant author that Englishmen hang and +drown themselves. In truth, this work has a tendency to alarm us with +symptoms of public suicide. However, there is one comfort to be taken +even from the gloomy time of year. It is a rotting season. If what is +brought to market is not good, it is not likely to keep long. Even +buildings run up in haste with untempered mortar in that humid weather, +if they are ill-contrived tenements, do not threaten long to incumber +the earth. The author tells us (and I believe he is the very first +author that ever told such a thing to his readers) "that the _entire +fabric_ of his speculations might be overset by unforeseen +vicissitudes," and what is far more extraordinary, "that even the +_whole_ consideration might be _varied whilst he was writing those +pages."_ Truly, in my poor judgment, this circumstance formed a very +substantial motive for his not publishing those ill-considered +considerations at all. He ought to have followed the good advice of his +motto: "_Que faire encore dans une telle nuit? Attendre le jour_." He +ought to have waited till he had got a little more daylight on this +subject. Night itself is hardly darker than the fogs of that time. + +Finding the _last week in October_ so particularly referred to, and not +perceiving any particular event, relative to the war, which happened on +any of the days in that week, I thought it possible that they were +marked by some astrological superstition, to which the greatest +politicians have been subject. I therefore had recourse to my Rider's +Almanack. There I found, indeed, something that characterized the work, +and that gave directions concerning the sudden political and natural +variations, and for eschewing the maladies that are most prevalent in +that aguish intermittent season, "the last week of October." On that +week the sagacious astrologer, Rider, in his note on the third column of +the calendar side, teaches us to expect "_variable and cold weather";_ +but instead of encouraging us to trust ourselves to the haze and mist +and doubtful lights of that changeable week, on the answerable part of +the opposite page he gives us a salutary caution (indeed, it is very +nearly in the words of the author's motto): "_Avoid_," says he, "_being +out late at night and in foggy weather, for a cold now caught may last +the whole winter_."[9] This ingenious author, who disdained the prudence +of the Almanack, walked out in the very fog he complains of, and has led +us to a very unseasonable airing at that time. Whilst this noble writer, +by the vigor of an excellent constitution, formed for the violent +changes he prognosticates, may shake off the importunate rheum and +malignant influenza of this disagreeable week, a whole Parliament may go +on spitting and snivelling, and wheezing and coughing, during a whole +session. All this from listening to variable, hebdomadal politicians, +who run away from their opinions without giving us a month's +warning,--and for not listening to the wise and friendly admonitions of +Dr. Cardanus Rider, who never apprehends he may change his opinions +before his pen is out of his hand, but always enables us to lay in at +least a year's stock of useful information. + +At first I took comfort. I said to myself, that, if I should, as I fear +I must, oppose the doctrines of _the last week of October_, it is +probable that by this time they are no longer those of the eminent +writer to whom they are attributed. He gives us hopes that long before +this he may have embraced the direct contrary sentiments. If I am found +in a conflict with those of the last week of October, I may be in full +agreement with those of the last week in December, or the first week in +January, 1796. But a second edition, and a French translation, (for the +benefit, I must suppose, of the new Regicide Directory,) have let down a +little of these flattering hopes. We and the Directory know that the +author, whatever changes his works seemed made to indicate, like a +weathercock grown rusty, remains just where he was in the last week of +last October. It is true, that his protest against binding him to his +opinions, and his reservation of a right to whatever opinions he +pleases, remain in their full force. This variability is pleasant, and +shows a fertility of fancy:-- + + Qualis in æthereo felix Vertumnus Olympo + Mille habet ornatus, mille decenter habet. + +Yet, doing all justice to the sportive variability of these weekly, +daily, or hourly speculators, shall I be pardoned, if I attempt a word +on the part of us simple country folk? It is not good for _us_, however +it may be so for great statesmen, that we should be treated with +variable politics. I consider different relations as prescribing a +different conduct. I allow, that, in transactions with an enemy, a +minister may, and often must, vary his demands with the day, possibly +with the hour. With an enemy, a fixed plan, variable arrangements. This +is the rule the nature of the transaction prescribes. But all this +belongs to treaty. All these shiftings and changes are a sort of secret +amongst the parties, till a definite settlement is brought about. Such +is the spirit of the proceedings in the doubtful and transitory state of +things between enmity and friendship. In this change the subjects of the +transformation are by nature carefully wrapt up in their cocoons. The +gay ornament of summer is not seemly in his aurelia state. This +mutability is allowed to a foreign negotiator; but when a great +politician condescends publicly to instruct his own countrymen on a +matter which may fix their fate forever, his opinions ought not to be +diurnal, or even weekly. These ephemerides of politics are not made for +our slow and coarse understandings. Our appetite demands a _piece of +resistance_. We require some food that will stick to the ribs. We call +for sentiments to which we can attach ourselves,--sentiments in which we +can take an interest,--sentiments on which we can warm, on which we can +ground some confidence in ourselves or in others. We do not want a +largess of inconstancy. Poor souls, we have enough of that sort of +poverty at home. There is a difference, too, between deliberation and +doctrine: a man ought to be decided in his opinions before he attempts +to teach. His fugitive lights may serve himself in some unknown region, +but they cannot free us from the effects of the error into which we have +been betrayed. His active Will-o'-the-wisp may be gone nobody can guess +where, whilst he leaves us bemired and benighted in the bog. + +Having premised these few reflections upon this new mode of teaching a +lesson, which whilst the scholar is getting by heart the master forgets, +I come to the lesson itself. On the fullest consideration of it, I am +utterly incapable of saying with any great certainty what it is, in the +detail, that the author means to affirm or deny, to dissuade or +recommend. His march is mostly oblique, and his doctrine rather in the +way of insinuation than of dogmatic assertion. It is not only fugitive +in its duration, but is slippery in the extreme whilst it lasts. +Examining it part by part, it seems almost everywhere to contradict +itself; and the author, who claims the privilege of varying his +opinions, has exercised this privilege in every section of his remarks. +For this reason, amongst others, I follow the advice which the able +writer gives in his last page, which is, "to consider the _impression_ +of what he has urged, taken from the _whole_, and not from detached +paragraphs." That caution was not absolutely necessary. I should think +it unfair to the author and to myself to have proceeded otherwise. This +author's _whole_, however, like every other whole, cannot be so well +comprehended without some reference to the parts; but they shall be +again referred to the whole. Without this latter attention, several of +the passages would certainly remain covered with an impenetrable and +truly oracular obscurity. + +The great, general, pervading purpose, of the whole pamphlet is to +reconcile us to peace with the present usurpation in France. In this +general drift of the author I can hardly be mistaken. The other +purposes, less general, and subservient to the preceding scheme, are to +show, first, that the time of the Remarks was the favorable time for +making that peace upon our side; secondly, that on the enemy's side +their disposition towards the acceptance of such terms as he is pleased +to offer was rationally to be expected; the third purpose was, to make +some sort of disclosure of the terms which, if the Regicides are pleased +to grant them, this nation ought to be contented to accept: these form +the basis of the negotiation which the author, whoever he is, proposes +to open. + +Before I consider these Remarks along with the other reasonings which I +hear on the same subject, I beg leave to recall to your mind the +observation I made early in our correspondence, and which ought to +attend us quite through the discussion of this proposed peace, amity, or +fraternity, or whatever you may call it,--that is, the real quality and +character of the party you have to deal with. This I find, as a thing of +no importance, has everywhere escaped the author of the October Remarks. +That hostile power, to the period of the fourth week in that month, has +been ever called and considered as an usurpation. In that week, for the +first time, it changed its name of an usurped power, and took the simple +name of _France_. The word France is slipped in just as if the +government stood exactly as before that Revolution which has astonished, +terrified, and almost overpowered Europe. "France," says the author, +"will do this,"--"it is the interest of France,"--"the returning honor +and generosity of France," &c., &c.--always merely France: just as if +we were in a common political war with an old recognized member of the +commonwealth of Christian Europe,--and as if our dispute had turned upon +a mere matter of territorial or commercial controversy, which a peace +might settle by the imposition or the taking off a duty, with the gain +or the loss of a remote island or a frontier town or two, on the one +side or the other. This shifting of persons could not be done without +the hocus-pocus of _abstraction_. We have been in a grievous error: we +thought that we had been at war with _rebels_ against the lawful +government, but that we were friends and allies of what is properly +France, friends and allies to the legal body politic of France. But by +sleight of hand the Jacobins are clean vanished, and it is France we +have got under our cup. "Blessings on his soul that first invented +sleep!" said Don Sancho Panza the Wise. All those blessings, and ten +thousand times more, on him who found out abstraction, personification, +and impersonals! In certain cases they are the first of all soporifics. +Terribly alarmed we should be, if things were proposed to us in the +_concrete_, and if fraternity was held out to us with the individuals +who compose this France by their proper names and descriptions,--if we +were told that it was very proper to enter into the closest bonds of +amity and good correspondence with the devout, pacific, and +tender-hearted Sieyès, with the all-accomplished Reubell, with the +humane guillotinists of Bordeaux, Tallien and Isabeau, with the meek +butcher, Legendre, and with "the returned humanity and generosity" (that +had been only on a visit abroad) of the virtuous regicide brewer, +Santerre. This would seem at the outset a very strange scheme of amity +and concord,--nay, though we had held out to us, as an additional +_douceur_, an assurance of the cordial fraternal embrace of our pious +and patriotic countryman, Thomas Paine. But plain truth would here be +shocking and absurd; therefore comes in _abstraction_ and +personification. "Make your peace with France." That word _France_ +sounds quite as well as any other; and it conveys no idea but that of a +very pleasant country and very hospitable inhabitants. Nothing absurd +and shocking in amity and good correspondence with _France_. Permit me +to say, that I am not yet well acquainted with this new-coined France, +and without a careful assay I am not willing to receive it in currency +in place of the old Louis-d'or. + +Having, therefore, slipped the persons with whom we are to treat out of +view, we are next to be satisfied that the French Revolution, which this +peace is to fix and consolidate, ought to give us no just cause of +apprehension. Though the author labors this point, yet he confesses a +fact (indeed, he could not conceal it) which renders all his labors +utterly fruitless. He confesses that the Regicide means to _dictate_ a +pacification, and that this pacification, according to their decree +passed but a very few days before his publication appeared, is to "unite +to their empire, either in possession or dependence, new barriers, many +frontier places of strength, a large sea-coast, and many sea-ports." He +ought to have stated it, that they would annex to their territory a +country about a third as large as France, and much more than half as +rich, and in a situation the most important for command that it would be +possible for her anywhere to possess. + +To remove this terror, (even if the Regicides should carry their +point,) and to give us perfect repose with regard to their empire, +whatever they may acquire, or whomsoever they might destroy, he raises a +doubt "whether France will not be ruined by _retaining_ these conquests, +and whether she will not wholly lose that preponderance which she has +held in the scale of European powers, and will not eventually be +destroyed by the effect of her present successes, or, at least, whether, +so far as the _political interests of England are concerned_, she +[France] will remain an object of as _much jealousy and alarm as she was +under the reign of a monarch_." Here, indeed, is a paragraph full of +meaning! It gives matter for meditation almost in every word of it. The +secret of the pacific politicians is out. This republic, at all hazards, +is to be maintained. It is to be confined within some bounds, if we can; +if not, with every possible acquisition of power, it is still to be +cherished and supported. It is the return of the monarchy we are to +dread, and therefore we ought to pray for the permanence of the Regicide +authority. _Esto perpetua_ is the devout ejaculation of our Frà Paolo +for the Republic one and indivisible. It was the monarchy that rendered +France dangerous: Regicide neutralizes all the acrimony of that power, +and renders it safe and social. The October speculator is of opinion +that monarchy is of so poisonous a quality that a moderate territorial +power is far more dangerous to its neighbors under that abominable +regimen than the greatest empire in the hands of a republic. This is +Jacobinism sublimed and exalted into most pure and perfect essence. It +is a doctrine, I admit, made to allure and captivate, if anything in the +world can, the Jacobin Directory, to mollify the ferocity of Regicide, +and to persuade those patriotic hangmen, after their reiterated oaths +for our extirpation, to admit this well-humbled nation to the fraternal +embrace. I do not wonder that this tub of October has been racked off +into a French cask. It must make its fortune at Paris. That translation +seems the language the most suited to these sentiments. Our author tells +the French Jacobins, that the political interests of Great Britain are +in perfect unison with the principles of their government,--that they +may take and keep the keys of the civilized world, for they are safe in +their unambitious and faithful custody. We say to them, "We may, indeed, +wish you to be a little less murderous, wicked, and atheistical, for the +sake of morals; we may think it were better you were less new-fangled in +your speech, for the sake of grammar; but, as _politicians_, provided +you keep clear of monarchy, all our fears, alarms, and jealousies are at +an end: at least, they sink into nothing in comparison of our dread of +your detestable royalty." A flatterer of Cardinal Mazarin said, when +that minister had just settled the match between the young Louis the +Fourteenth and a daughter of Spain, that this alliance had the effect of +faith and had removed mountains,--that the Pyrenees were levelled by +that marriage. You may now compliment Reubell in the same spirit on the +miracles of regicide, and tell him that the guillotine of Louis the +Sixteenth had consummated a marriage between Great Britain and France, +which dried up the Channel, and restored the two countries to the unity +which it is said they had before the unnatural rage of seas and +earthquakes had broke off their happy junction. It will be a fine +subject for the poets who are to prophesy the blessings of this peace. + +I am now convinced that the Remarks of the last week of October cannot +come from the author to whom they are given, they are such a direct +contradiction to the style of manly indignation with which he spoke of +those miscreants and murderers in his excellent memorial to the States +of Holland,--to that very state which the author who presumes to +personate him does not find it contrary to the political interests of +England to leave in the hands of these very miscreants, against whom on +the part of England he took so much pains to animate their republic. +This cannot be; and if this argument wanted anything to give it new +force, it is strengthened by an additional reason, that is irresistible. +Knowing that noble person, as well as myself, to be under very great +obligations to the crown, I am confident he would not so very directly +contradict, even in the paroxysm of his zeal against monarchy, the +declarations made in the name and with the fullest approbation of our +sovereign, his master, and our common benefactor. In those declarations +you will see that the king, instead of being sensible of greater alarm +and jealousy from a neighboring crowned head than from, these regicides, +attributes all the dangers of Europe to the latter. Let this writer hear +the description given in the royal declaration of the scheme of power of +these miscreants, as "_a system destructive of all public order, +maintained by proscriptions, exiles, and confiscations without number, +by arbitrary imprisonments, by massacres which cannot be remembered +without horror, and at length by the execrable murder of a just and +beneficent sovereign, and of the illustrious princess, who with an +unshaken firmness has shared all the misfortunes of her royal consort, +his protracted sufferings, his cruel captivity, his ignominious +death_." After thus describing, with an eloquence and energy equalled +only by its truth, the means by which this usurped power had been +acquired and maintained, that government is characterized with equal +force. His Majesty, far from thinking monarchy in France to be a greater +object of jealousy than the Regicide usurpation, calls upon the French +to reestablish "_a monarchical government_" for the purpose of shaking +off "_the yoke of a sanguinary anarchy_,--_of that anarchy which has +broken all the most sacred bonds of society, dissolved all the relations +of civil life, violated every right, confounded every duty_,--_which +uses the name of liberty to exercise the most cruel tyranny, to +annihilate all property, to seize on all possessions_,--_which founds +its power on the pretended consent of the people, and itself carries +fire and sword through extensive provinces, for having demanded their +laws, their religion, and their lawful sovereign_." + +"That strain I heard was of a higher mood." That declaration of our +sovereign was worthy of his throne. It is in a style which neither the +pen of the writer of October nor such a poor crow-quill as mine can ever +hope to equal. I am happy to enrich my letter with this fragment of +nervous and manly eloquence, which, if it had not emanated from the +awful authority of a throne, if it were not recorded amongst the most +valuable monuments of history, and consecrated in the archives of +states, would be worthy, as a private composition, to live forever in +the memory of men. + +In those admirable pieces does his Majesty discover this new opinion of +his political security, in having the chair of the scorner, that is, the +discipline of atheism, and the block of regicide, set up by his side, +elevated on the same platform, and shouldering, with the vile image of +their grim and bloody idol, the inviolable majesty of his throne? The +sentiments of these declarations are the very reverse: they could not be +other. Speaking of the spirit of that usurpation, the royal manifesto +describes, with perfect truth, its internal tyranny to have been +established as the very means of shaking the security of all other +states,--as "_disposing arbitrarily of the property and blood of the +inhabitants of France, in order to disturb the tranquillity of other +nations, and to render all Europe the theatre of the same crimes and of +the same misfortunes_." It was but a natural inference from this fact, +that the royal manifesto does not at all rest the justification of this +war on common principles: that it was "_not only to defend his own +rights, and those of his allies_," but "_that all the dearest interests +of his people imposed upon him a duty still more important_,--_that of +exerting his efforts for the preservation of civil society itself, as +happily established among the nations of Europe_." On that ground, the +protection offered is to "those who, by declaring for a _monarchical +government_, shall shake off the yoke of a sanguinary anarchy." It is +for that purpose the declaration calls on them "to join the standard of +an _hereditary monarchy_,"--declaring that the _peace and safety_ of +this kingdom and the other powers of Europe "_materially depend on the +reëstablishment of order in France_." His Majesty does not hesitate to +declare that "_the reëstablishment of monarchy, in the person of Louis +the Seventeenth, and the lawful heirs of the crown, appears to him_ [his +Majesty] _the best mode of accomplishing these just and salutary +views_." + +This is what his Majesty does not hesitate to declare relative to the +political safety and peace of his kingdom and of Europe, and with regard +to France under her ancient hereditary monarchy in the course and order +of legal succession. But in comes a gentleman, in the fag end of +October, dripping with the fogs of that humid and uncertain season, and +does not hesitate in diameter to contradict this wise and just royal +declaration, and stoutly, on his part, to make a counter +declaration,--that France, so far as the political interests of England +are concerned, will not remain, under the despotism of Regicide, and +with the better part of Europe in her hands, so much an object of +jealousy and alarm as she was under the reign of a monarch. When I hear +the master and reason on one side, and the servant and his single and +unsupported assertion on the other, my part is taken. + +This is what the Octobrist says of the political interests of England, +which it looks as if he completely disconnected with those of all other +nations. But not quite so: he just allows it possible (with an "at +least") that the other powers may not find it quite their interest that +their territories should be conquered and their subjects tyrannized over +by the Regicides. No fewer than ten sovereign princes had, some the +whole, all a very considerable part of their dominions under the yoke of +that dreadful faction. Amongst these was to be reckoned the first +republic in the world, and the closest ally of this kingdom, which, +under the insulting name of an independency, is under her iron yoke, +and, as long as a faction averse to the old government is suffered there +to domineer, cannot be otherwise. I say nothing of the Austrian +Netherlands, countries of a vast extent, and amongst the most fertile +and populous of Europe, and, with regard to us, most critically +situated. The rest will readily occur to you. + +But if there are yet existing any people, like me, old-fashioned enough +to consider that we have an important part of our very existence beyond +our limits, and who therefore stretch their thoughts beyond the +_pomoerium_ of England, for them, too, he has a comfort which will +remove all their jealousies and alarms about the extent of the empire of +Regicide. "_These conquests eventually will be the cause of her +destruction_." So that they who hate the cause of usurpation, and dread +the power of France under any form, are to wish her to be a conqueror, +in order to accelerate her ruin. A little more conquest would be still +better. Will he tell us what dose of dominion is to be the _quantum +sufficit_ for her destruction?--for she seems very voracious of the food +of her distemper. To be sure, she is ready to perish with repletion; she +has a _boulimia_, and hardly has bolted down one state than she calls +for two or three more. There is a good deal of wit in all this; but it +seems to me (with all respect to the author) to be carrying the joke a +great deal too far. I cannot yet think that the armies of the Allies +were of this way of thinking, and that, when they evacuated all these +countries, it was a stratagem of war to decoy France into ruin,--or +that, if in a treaty we should surrender them forever into the hands of +the usurpation, (the lease the author supposes,) it is a master-stroke +of policy to effect the destruction of a formidable rival, and to render +her no longer an object of jealousy and alarm. This, I assure the +author, will infinitely facilitate the treaty. The usurpers will catch +at this bait, without minding the hook which this crafty angler for the +Jacobin gudgeons of the new Directory has so dexterously placed under +it. + +Every symptom of the exacerbation of the public malady is, with him, (as +with the Doctor in Molière,) a happy prognostic of recovery.--Flanders +gone. _Tant mieux_.--Holland subdued. Charming!--Spain beaten, and all +the hither Germany conquered. Bravo! Better and better still!--But they +will retain all their conquests on a treaty. Best of all!--What a +delightful thing it is to have a gay physician, who sees all things, as +the French express it, _couleur de rose!_ What an escape we have had, +that we and our allies were not the conquerors! By these conquests, +previous to her utter destruction, she is "wholly to lose that +preponderance which she held in the scale of the European powers." Bless +me! this new system of France, after changing all other laws, reverses +the law of gravitation. By throwing in weight after weight, her scale +rises, and will by-and-by kick the beam. Certainly there is one sense in +which she loses her preponderance: that is, she is no longer +preponderant against the countries she has conquered. They are part of +herself. But I beg the author to keep his eyes fixed on the scales for a +moment longer, and then to tell me, in downright earnest, whether he +sees hitherto any signs of her losing preponderance by an augmentation +of weight and power. Has she lost her preponderance over Spain by her +influence in Spain? Are there any signs that the conquest of Savoy and +Nice begins to lessen her preponderance over Switzerland and the Italian +States,--or that the Canton of Berne, Genoa, and Tuscany, for example, +have taken arms against her,--or that Sardinia is more adverse than +ever to a treacherous pacification? Was it in the last week of October +that the German States showed that Jacobin. France was losing her +preponderance? Did the King of Prussia, when he delivered into her safe +custody his territories on this side of the Rhine, manifest any tokens +of his opinion of her loss of preponderance? Look on Sweden and on +Denmark: is her preponderance less visible there? + +It is true, that, in a course of ages, empires have fallen, and, in the +opinion of some, not in mine, by their own weight. Sometimes they have +been unquestionably embarrassed in their movements by the dissociated +situation of their dominions. Such was the case of the empire of Charles +the Fifth and of his successor. It might be so of others. But so compact +a body of empire, so fitted in all the parts for mutual support, with a +frontier by Nature and Art so impenetrable, with such facility of +breaking out with irresistible force from every quarter, was never seen +in such an extent of territory, from the beginning of time, as in that +empire which the Jacobins possessed in October, 1795, and which Boissy +d'Anglas, in his report, settled as the law for Europe, and the dominion +assigned by Nature for the Republic of Regicide. But this empire is to +be her ruin, and to take away all alarm and jealousy on the part of +England, and to destroy her preponderance over the miserable remains of +Europe. + +These are choice speculations with which the author amuses himself, and +tries to divert us, in the blackest hours of the dismay, defeat, and +calamity of all civilized nations. They have but one fault,--that they +are directly contrary to the common sense and common feeling of +mankind. If I had but one hour to live, I would employ it in decrying +this wretched system, and die with my pen in my hand to mark out the +dreadful consequences of receiving an arrangement of empire dictated by +the despotism of Regicide to my own country, and to the lawful +sovereigns of the Christian world. + +I trust I shall hardly be told, in palliation of this shameful system of +politics, that the author expresses his sentiments only as doubts. In +such things, it may be truly said, that "once to doubt is once to be +resolved." It would be a strange reason for wasting the treasures and +shedding the blood of our country, to prevent arrangements on the part +of another power, of which we were doubtful whether they might not be +even to our advantage, and render our neighbor less than before the +object of our jealousy and alarm. In this doubt there is much decision. +No nation would consent to carry on a war of skepticism. But the fact +is, this expression of doubt is only a mode of putting an opinion, when +it is not the drift of the author to overturn the doubt. Otherwise, the +doubt is never stated as the author's own, nor left, as here it is, +unanswered. Indeed, the mode of stating the most decided opinions in the +form of questions is so little uncommon, particularly since the +excellent queries of the excellent Berkeley, that it became for a good +while a fashionable mode of composition. + +Here, then, the author of the Fourth Week of October is ready for the +worst, and would strike the bargain of peace on these conditions. I must +leave it to you and to every considerate man to reflect upon the effect +of this on any Continental alliances, present or future, and whether it +would be possible (if this book was thought of the least authority) +that its maxims with regard to our political interest must not naturally +push them to be beforehand with us in the fraternity with Regicide, and +thus not only strip us of any steady alliance at present, but leave us +without any of that communion of interest which could produce alliances +in future. Indeed, with these maxims, we should be well divided from the +world. + +Notwithstanding this new kind of barrier and security that is found +against her ambition in her conquests, yet in the very same paragraph he +admits, that, "for the _present_, at least, it is subversive of the +balance of power." This, I confess, is not a direct contradiction, +because the benefits which he promises himself from it, according to his +hypothesis, are future and more remote. + +So disposed is this author to peace, that, having laid a comfortable +foundation for our security in the greatness of her empire, he has +another in reserve, if that should fail, upon quite a contrary ground: +that is, a speculation of her crumbling to pieces, and being thrown into +a number of little separate republics. After paying the tribute of +humanity to those who will be ruined by all these changes, on the whole +he is of opinion that "the change might be compatible with general +tranquillity, and with the establishment of a peaceful and prosperous +commerce among nations." Whether France be great or small, firm and +entire or dissipated and divided, all is well, provided we can have +peace with her. + +But without entering into speculations about her dismemberment, whilst +she is adding great nations to her empire, is it, then, quite so certain +that the dissipation of France into such a cluster of petty republics +would be so very favorable to the true balance of power in Europe as +this author imagines it would be, and to the commerce of nations? I +greatly differ from him. I perhaps shall prove in a future letter, with +the political map of Europe before my eye, that the general liberty and +independence of the great Christian commonwealth could not exist with +such a dismemberment, unless it were followed (as probably enough it +would) by the dismemberment of every other considerable country in +Europe: and what convulsions would arise in the constitution of every +state in Europe it is not easy to conjecture in the mode, impossible not +to foresee in the mass. Speculate on, good my Lord! provided you ground +no part of your politics on such unsteady speculations. But as to any +practice to ensue, are we not yet cured of the malady of speculating on +the circumstances of things totally different from those in which we +live and move? Five years has this monster continued whole and entire in +all its members. Far from falling into a division within itself, it is +augmented by tremendous additions. We cannot bear to look that frightful +form in the face, as it is, and in its own actual shape. We dare not be +wise; we have not the fortitude of rational fear; we will not provide +for our future safety; but we endeavor to hush the cries of present +timidity by guesses at what may be hereafter,-- + + "To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow." + +Is this our style of talk, when + + "all our yesterdays have lighted fools + The way to dusty death"? + +Talk not to me of what swarm of republics may come from this carcass! It +is no carcass. Now, now, whilst we are talking, it is full of life and +action. What say you to the Regicide empire of to-day? Tell me, my +friend, do its terrors appall you into an abject submission, or rouse +you to a vigorous defence? But do--I no longer prevent it--do go +on,--look into futurity. Has this empire nothing to alarm you when all +struggle against it is over, when mankind shall be silent before it, +when all nations shall be disarmed, disheartened, and _truly divided_ by +a treacherous peace? Its malignity towards humankind will subsist with +undiminished heat, whilst the means of giving it effect must proceed, +and every means of resisting it must inevitably and rapidly decline. + +Against alarm on their politic and military empire these are the +writer's sedative remedies. But he leaves us sadly in the dark with +regard to the moral consequences, which he states have threatened to +demolish a system of civilization under which his country enjoys a +prosperity unparalleled in the history of man. We had emerged from our +first terrors, but here we sink into them again,--however, only to shake +them off upon the credit of his being a man of very sanguine hopes. + +Against the moral terrors of this successful empire of barbarism, though +he has given us no consolation here, in another place he has formed +other securities,--securities, indeed, which will make even the enormity +of the crimes and atrocities of France a benefit to the world. We are to +be cured by her diseases. We are to grow proud of our Constitution upon, +the distempers of theirs. Governments throughout all Europe are to +become much stronger by this event. This, too, comes in the favorite +mode of _doubt_ and _perhaps_. "To those," he says, "who meditate on +the workings of the human mind, a doubt may perhaps arise, whether the +effects which I have described," (namely, the change he supposes to be +wrought on the public mind with regard to the French doctrines,) "though +_at present_ a salutary check to the dangerous spirit of innovation, may +not prove favorable to abuses of power, by creating a timidity in the +just cause of liberty." Here the current of our apprehensions takes a +contrary course. Instead of trembling for the existence of our +government from the spirit of licentiousness and anarchy, the author +would make us believe we are to tremble for our liberties from the great +accession of power which is to accrue to government. + +I believe I have read in some author who criticized the productions of +the famous Jurieu, that it is not very wise in people who dash away in +prophecy, to fix the time of accomplishment at too short a period. Mr. +Brothers may meditate upon this at his leisure. He was a melancholy +prognosticator, and has had the fate of melancholy men. But they who +prophesy pleasant things get great present applause; and in days of +calamity people have something else to think of: they lose, in their +feeling of their distress, all memory of those who flattered them in +their prosperity. But merely for the credit of the prediction, nothing +could have happened more unluckily for the noble lord's sanguine +expectations of the amendment of the public mind, and the consequent +greater security to government, from the examples in France, than what +happened in the week after the publication of his hebdomadal system. I +am not sure it was not in the very week one of the most violent and +dangerous seditions broke out that we have seen in several years. This +sedition, menacing to the public security, endangering the sacred person +of the king, and violating in the most audacious manner the authority of +Parliament, surrounded our sovereign with a murderous yell and war-whoop +for that peace which the noble lord considers as a cure for all domestic +disturbances and dissatisfactions. + +So far as to this general cure for popular disorders. As for government, +the two Houses of Parliament, instead of being guided by the +speculations of the Fourth Week in October, and throwing up new barriers +against the dangerous power of the crown, which the noble lord +considered as no unplausible subject of apprehension, the two Houses of +Parliament thought fit to pass two acts for the further strengthening of +that very government against a most dangerous and wide-spread faction. + +Unluckily, too, for this kind of sanguine speculation, on the very first +day of the ever-famed "last week of October," a large, daring, and +seditious meeting was publicly held, from which meeting this atrocious +attempt against the sovereign publicly originated. + +No wonder that the author should tell us that the whole consideration +might be varied _whilst he was writing those pages_. In one, and that +the most material instance, his speculations not only might be, but were +at that very time, entirely overset. Their war-cry for peace with France +was the same with that of this gentle author, but in a different note. +His is the _gemitus columbæ_, cooing and wooing fraternity; theirs the +funereal screams of birds of night calling for their ill-omened +paramours. But they are both songs of courtship. These Regicides +considered a Regicide peace as a cure for all their evils; and so far +as I can find, they showed nothing at all of the timidity which the +noble lord apprehends in what they call the just cause of liberty. + +However, it seems, that, notwithstanding these awkward appearances with +regard to the strength of government, he has still his fears and doubts +about our liberties. To a free people this would be a matter of alarm; +but this physician of October has in his shop all sorts of salves for +all sorts of sores. It is curious that they all come from the +inexhaustible drug-shop of the Regicide dispensary. It costs him nothing +to excite terror, because he lays it at his pleasure. He finds a +security for this danger to liberty from the wonderful wisdom to be +taught to kings, to nobility, and even, to the lowest of the people, by +the late transactions. + +I confess I was always blind enough to regard the French Revolution, in +the act, and much more in the example, as one of the greatest calamities +that had ever fallen upon mankind. I now find that in its effects it is +to be the greatest of all blessings. If so, we owe _amende honorable_ to +the Jacobins. They, it seems, were right; and if they were right a +little earlier than we are, it only shows that they exceeded us in +sagacity. If they brought out their right ideas somewhat in a disorderly +manner, it must be remembered that great zeal produces some +irregularity; but when greatly in the right, it must be pardoned by +those who are very regularly and temperately in the wrong. The master +Jacobins had told me this a thousand times. I never believed the +masters; nor do I now find myself disposed to give credit to the +disciple. I will not much dispute with our author, which party has the +best of this Revolution,--that which is from thence to learn wisdom, or +that which from the same event has obtained power. The dispute on the +preference of strength to wisdom may perhaps be decided as Horace has +decided the controversy between Art and Nature. I do not like to leave +all the power to my adversary, and to secure nothing to myself but the +untimely wisdom that is taught by the consequences of folly. I do not +like my share in the partition: because to his strength my adversary may +possibly add a good deal of cunning, whereas my wisdom may totally fail +in producing to me the same degree of strength. But to descend from the +author's generalities a little nearer to meaning, the security given to +liberty is this,--"that governments will have learned not to precipitate +themselves into embarrassments by speculative wars. Sovereigns and +princes will not forget that steadiness, moderation, and economy are the +best supports of the eminence on which they stand." There seems to me a +good deal of oblique reflection in this lesson. As to the lesson itself, +it is at all times a good one. One would think, however, by this formal +introduction of it as a recommendation of the arrangements proposed by +the author, it had never been taught before, either by precept or by +experience,--and that these maxims are discoveries reserved for a +Regicide peace. But is it permitted to ask what security it affords to +the liberty of the subject, that the prince is pacific or frugal? The +very contrary has happened in our history. Our best securities for +freedom have been obtained from princes who were either warlike, or +prodigal, or both. + +Although the amendment of princes in these points can +have no effect in quieting our apprehensions for liberty on account of +the strength to be acquired to government by a Regicide peace, I allow +that the avoiding of speculative wars may possibly be an advantage, +provided I well understand what the author means by a speculative war. I +suppose he means a war grounded on speculative advantages, and not wars +founded on a just speculation of danger. Does he mean to include this +war, which we are now carrying on, amongst those speculative wars which +this Jacobin peace is to teach sovereigns to avoid hereafter? If so, it +is doing the party an important service. Does he mean that we are to +avoid such wars as that of the Grand Alliance, made on a speculation of +danger to the independence of Europe? I suspect he has a sort of +retrospective view to the American war, as a speculative war, carried on +by England upon one side and by Louis the Sixteenth on the other. As to +our share of that war, let reverence to the dead and respect to the +living prevent us from reading lessons of this kind at their expense. I +don't know how far the author may find himself at liberty to wanton on +that subject; but, for my part, I entered into a coalition which, when I +had no longer a duty relative to that business, made me think myself +bound in honor not to call it up without necessity. But if he puts +England out of the question, and reflects only on Louis the Sixteenth, I +have only to say, "Dearly has he answered it!" I will not defend him. +But all those who pushed on the Revolution by which he was deposed were +much more in fault than he was. They have murdered him, and have divided +his kingdom as a spoil; but they who are the guilty are not they who +furnish the example. They who reign through his fault are not among +those sovereigns who are likely to be taught to avoid speculative wars +by the murder of their master. I think the author will not be hardy +enough to assert that they have shown less disposition to meddle in the +concerns of that very America than he did, and in a way not less likely +to kindle the flame of speculative war. Here is one sovereign not yet +reclaimed by these healing examples. Will he point out the other +sovereigns who are to be reformed by this peace? Their wars may not be +speculative. But the world will not be much mended by turning wars from +unprofitable and speculative to practical and lucrative, whether the +liberty or the repose of mankind is regarded. If the author's new +sovereign in France is not reformed by the example of his own +Revolution, that Revolution has not added much to the security and +repose of Poland, for instance, or taught the three great partitioning +powers more moderation in their second than they had shown in their +first division of that devoted country. The first division, which +preceded these destructive examples, was moderation itself, in +comparison of what has been, done since the period of the author's +amendment. + +This paragraph is written with something of a studied obscurity. If it +means anything, it seems to hint as if sovereigns were to learn +moderation, and an attention to the liberties of their people, from _the +fate of the sovereigns who have suffered in this war_, and eminently of +Louis the Sixteenth. + +Will he say whether the King of Sardinia's horrible tyranny was the +cause of the loss of Savoy and of Nice? What lesson of moderation does +it teach the Pope? I desire to know whether his Holiness is to learn not +to massacre his subjects, nor to waste and destroy such beautiful +countries as that of Avignon, lest he should call to their assistance +that great deliverer of nations, _Jourdan Coupe-tête_? What lesson does +it give of moderation to the Emperor, whose predecessor never put one +man to death after a general rebellion of the Low Countries, that the +Regicides never spared man, woman, or child, whom they but suspected of +dislike to their usurpations? What, then, are all these lessons about +the _softening_ the character of sovereigns by this Regicide peace? On +reading this section, one would imagine that the poor tame sovereigns of +Europe had been a sort of furious wild beasts, that stood in need of +some uncommonly rough discipline to subdue the ferocity of their savage +nature. + +As to the example to be learnt from the murder of Louis the Sixteenth, +if a lesson to kings is not derived from his fate, I do not know whence +it can come. The author, however, ought not to have left us in the dark +upon that subject, to break our shins over his hints and insinuations. +Is it, then, true, that this unfortunate monarch drew his punishment +upon himself by his want of moderation, and his oppressing the liberties +of which he had found his people in possession? Is not the direct +contrary the fact? And is not the example of this Revolution the very +reverse of anything which can lead to that _softening_ of character in +princes which the author supposes as a security to the people, and has +brought forward as a recommendation to fraternity with those who have +administered that happy emollient in the murder of their king and the +slavery and desolation of their country? + +But the author does not confine the benefit of the Regicide lesson to +kings alone. He has a diffusive bounty. Nobles, and men of property, +will likewise be greatly reformed. They, too, will be led to a review of +their social situation and duties,--"and will reflect, that their large +allotment of worldly advantages is for the aid and benefit of the +whole." Is it, then, from the fate of Juigné, Archbishop of Paris, or of +the Cardinal de Rochefoucault, and of so many others, who gave their +fortunes, and, I may say, their very beings, to the poor, that the rich +are to learn, that their "fortunes are for the aid and benefit of the +whole"? I say nothing of the liberal persons of great rank and property, +lay and ecclesiastic, men and women, to whom we have had the honor and +happiness of affording an asylum: I pass by these, lest I should never +have done, or lest I should omit some as deserving as any I might +mention. Why will the author, then, suppose that the nobles and men of +property in France have been banished, confiscated, and murdered, on +account of the savageness and ferocity of their character, and their +being tainted with vices beyond those of the same order and description +in other countries? No judge of a revolutionary tribunal, with his hands +dipped in their blood and his maw gorged with their property, has yet +dared to assert what this author has been pleased, by way of a moral +lesson, to insinuate. + +Their nobility, and their men of property, in a mass, had the very same +virtues, and the very same vices, and in the very same proportions, with +the same description of men in this and in other nations. I must do +justice to suffering honor, generosity, and integrity. I do not know +that any time or any country has furnished more splendid examples of +every virtue, domestic and public. I do not enter into the councils of +Providence; but, humanly speaking, many of these nobles and men of +property, from whose disastrous fate we are, it seems, to learn a +general softening of character, and a revision of our social situations +and duties, appear to me full as little deserving of that fate as the +author, whoever he is, can be. Many of them, I am sure, were such as I +should be proud indeed to be able to compare myself with, in knowledge, +in integrity, and in every other virtue. My feeble nature might shrink, +though theirs did not, from the proof; but my reason and my ambition +tell me that it would be a good bargain to purchase their merits with +their fate. + +For which of his vices did that great magistrate, D'Espréménil, lose his +fortune and his head? What were the abominations of Malesherbes, that +other excellent magistrate, whose sixty years of uniform virtue was +acknowledged, in the very act of his murder, by the judicial butchers +who condemned him? On account of what misdemeanors was he robbed of his +property, and slaughtered with two generations of his offspring,--and +the remains of the third race, with a refinement of cruelty, and lest +they should appear to reclaim the property forfeited by the virtues of +their ancestor, confounded in an hospital with the thousands of those +unhappy foundling infants who are abandoned, without relation and +without name, by the wretchedness or by the profligacy of their parents? + +Is the fate of the Queen of France to produce this softening of +character? Was she a person so very ferocious and cruel, as, by the +example of her death, to frighten us into common humanity? Is there no +way to teach the Emperor a _softening_ of character, and a review of +his social situation and duty, but his consent, by an infamous accord +with Regicide, to drive a second coach with the Austrian arms through +the streets of Paris, along which, after a series of preparatory horrors +exceeding the atrocities of the bloody execution itself, the glory of +the Imperial race had been carried to an ignominious death? Is this a +lesson of _moderation_ to a descendant of Maria Theresa, drawn from the +fate of the daughter of that incomparable woman and sovereign? If he +learns this lesson from such an object, and from such teachers, the man +may remain, but the king is deposed. If he does not carry quite another +memory of that transaction in the inmost recesses of his heart, he is +unworthy to reign, he is unworthy to live. In the chronicle of disgrace +he will have but this short tale told of him: "He was the first emperor +of his house that embraced a regicide; he was the last that wore the +imperial purple." Far am I from thinking so ill of this august +sovereign, who is at the head of the monarchies of Europe, and who is +the trustee of their dignities and his own. + +What ferocity of character drew on the fate of Elizabeth, the sister of +King Louis the Sixteenth? For which of the vices of that pattern of +benevolence, of piety, and of all the virtues, did they put her to +death? For which of her vices did they put to death the mildest of all +human creatures, the Duchess of Biron? What were the crimes of those +crowds of matrons and virgins of condition, whom they mas sacred, with +their juries of blood, in prisons and on scaffolds? What were the +enormities of the infant king, whom they caused, by lingering tortures, +to perish in their dungeon, and whom if at last they dispatched by +poison, it was in that detestable crime the only act of mercy they have +ever shown? + +What softening of character is to be had, what review of their social +situations and duties is to be taught by these examples to kings, to +nobles, to men of property, to women, and to infants? The royal family +perished because it was royal. The nobles perished because they were +noble. The men, women, and children, who had property, because they had +property to be robbed of. The priests were punished, after they had been +robbed of their all, not for their vices, but for their virtues and +their piety, which made them an honor to their sacred profession, and to +that nature of which we ought to be proud, since they belong to it. My +Lord, nothing can be learned from such examples, except the danger of +being kings, queens, nobles, priests, and children, to be butchered on +account of their inheritance. These are things at which not vice, not +crime, not folly, but wisdom, goodness, learning, justice, probity, +beneficence, stand aghast. By these examples our reason and our moral +sense are not enlightened, but confounded; and there is no refuge for +astonished and affrighted virtue, but being annihilated in humility and +submission, sinking into a silent adoration of the inscrutable +dispensations of Providence, and flying with trembling wings from this +world of daring crimes, and feeble, pusillanimous, half-bred, bastard +justice, to the asylum of another order of things, in an unknown form, +but in a better life. + +Whatever the politician or preacher of September or of October may think +of the matter, it is a most comfortless, disheartening, desolating +example. Dreadful is the example of ruined innocence and virtue, and +the completest triumph of the completest villany that ever vexed and +disgraced mankind! The example is ruinous in every point of view, +religious, moral, civil, political. It establishes that dreadful maxim +of Machiavel, that in great affairs men are not to be wicked by halves. +This maxim is not made for a middle sort of beings, who, because they +cannot be angels, ought to thwart their ambition, and not endeavor to +become infernal spirits. It is too well exemplified in the present time, +where the faults and errors of humanity, checked by the imperfect, +timorous virtues, have been overpowered by those who have stopped at no +crime. It is a dreadful part of the example, that infernal malevolence +has had pious apologists, who read their lectures on frailties in favor +of crimes,--who abandon the weak, and court the friendship of the +wicked. To root out these maxims, and the examples that support them, is +a wise object of years of war. This is that war. This is that moral war. +It was said by old Trivulzio, that the Battle of Marignano was the +Battle of the Giants,--that all the rest of the many he had seen were +those of the Cranes and Pygmies. This is true of the objects, at least, +of the contest: for the greater part of those which we have hitherto +contended for, in comparison, were the toys of children. + +The October politician is so full of charity and good-nature, that he +supposes that these very robbers and murderers themselves are in a +course of melioration: on what ground I cannot conceive, except on the +long practice of every crime, and by its complete success. He is an +Origenist, and believes in the conversion of the Devil. All that runs in +the place of blood in his veins is nothing but the milk of human +kindness. He is as soft as a curd,--though, as a politician, he might be +supposed to be made of sterner stuff. He supposes (to use his own +expression) "that the salutary truths which he inculcates are making +their way into their bosoms." Their bosom is a rock of granite, on which +Falsehood has long since built her stronghold. Poor Truth has had a hard +work of it, with her little pickaxe. Nothing but gunpowder will do. + +As a proof, however, of the progress of this sap of Truth, he gives us a +confession they had made not long before he wrote. "'Their fraternity' +(as was lately stated by themselves in a solemn report) 'has been the +brotherhood of Cain and Abel,' and 'they have organized nothing but +bankruptcy and famine.'" A very honest confession, truly,--and much in +the spirit of their oracle, Rousseau. Yet, what is still more marvellous +than the confession, this is the very fraternity to which our author +gives us such an obliging invitation to accede. There is, indeed, a +vacancy in the fraternal corps: a brother and a partner is wanted. If we +please, we may fill up the place of the butchered Abel; and whilst we +wait the destiny of the departed brother, we may enjoy the advantages of +the partnership, by entering without delay into a shop of ready-made +bankruptcy and famine. These are the _douceurs_ by which we are invited +to Regicide fraternity and friendship. But still our author considers +the confession as a proof that "truth is making its way into their +bosoms." No! It is not making its way into their bosoms. It has forced +its way into their mouths! The evil spirit by which they are possessed, +though essentially a liar, is forced by the tortures of conscience to +confess the truth,--to confess enough for their condemnation, but not +for their amendment. Shakspeare very aptly expresses this kind of +confession, devoid of repentance, from the mouth of an usurper, a +murderer, and a regicide:-- + + "We are ourselves compelled, + Even to the teeth and forehead of our faults, + To give in evidence." + +Whence is their amendment? Why, the author writes, that, on their +murderous insurrectionary system, their own lives are not sure for an +hour; nor has their power a greater stability. True. They are convinced +of it; and accordingly the wretches have done all they can to preserve +their lives, and to secure their power; but not one step have they taken +to amend the one or to make a more just use of the other. Their wicked +policy has obliged them to make a pause in the only massacres in which +their treachery and cruelty had operated as a kind of savage +justice,--that is, the massacre of the accomplices of their crimes: they +have ceased to shed the inhuman blood of their fellow-murderers; but +when they take any of those persons who contend for their lawful +government, their property, and their religion, notwithstanding the +truth which this author says is making its way into their bosoms, it has +not taught them the least tincture of mercy. This we plainly see by +their massacre at Quiberon, where they put to death, with every species +of contumely, and without any exception, every prisoner of war who did +not escape out of their hands. To have had property, to have been robbed +of it, and to endeavor to regain it,--these are crimes irremissible, to +which every man who regards his property or his life, in every country, +ought well to look in all connection with those with whom to have had +property was an offence, to endeavor to keep it a second offence, to +attempt to regain it a crime that puts the offender out of all the laws +of peace or war. You cannot see one of those wretches without an alarm +for your life as well as your goods. They are like the worst of the +French and Italian banditti, who, whenever they robbed, were sure to +murder. + +Are they not the very same ruffians, thieves, assassins, and regicides +that they were from the beginning? Have they diversified the scene by +the least variety, or produced the face of a single new villany? _Tædet +harum quotidianarum formarum_. Oh! but I shall be answered, "It is now +quite another thing;--they are all changed. You have not seen them in +their state dresses;--this makes an amazing difference. The new habit of +the Directory is so charmingly fancied, that it is impossible not to +fall in love with so well-dressed a Constitution;--the costume of the +_sans-culotte_ Constitution of 1793 was absolutely insufferable. The +Committee for Foreign Affairs were such slovens, and stunk so +abominably, that no _muscadin_ ambassador of the smallest degree of +delicacy of nerves could come within ten yards of them; but now they are +so powdered, and perfumed, and ribanded, and sashed, and plumed, that, +though they are grown infinitely more insolent in their fine clothes +even than they were in their rags, (and that was enough,) as they now +appear, there is something in it more grand and noble, something more +suitable to an awful Roman Senate receiving the homage of dependent +tetrarchs. Like that Senate, (their perpetual model for conduct towards +other nations,) they permit their vassals (during their good pleasure) +to assume the name of kings, in order to bestow more dignity on the +suite and retinue of the sovereign Republic by the nominal rank of their +slaves: _Ut habeant instrumenta servitutis et reges_." All this is very +fine, undoubtedly; and ambassadors whose hands are almost out for want +of employment may long to have their part in this august ceremony of the +Republic one and indivisible. But, with great deference to the new +diplomatic taste, we old people must retain some square-toed +predilection, for the fashions of our youth. + +I am afraid you will find me, my Lord, again falling into my usual +vanity, in valuing myself on the eminent men whose society I once +enjoyed. I remember, in a conversation I once had with my ever dear +friend Garrick, who was the first of actors, because he was the most +acute observer of Nature I ever knew, I asked him how it happened, that, +whenever a senate appeared on the stage, the audience seemed always +disposed to laughter. He said, the reason was plain: the audience was +well acquainted with the faces of most of the senators. They knew that +they were no other than candle-snuffers, revolutionary scene-shifters, +second and third mob, prompters, clerks, executioners, who stand with +their axe on their shoulders by the wheel, grinners in the pantomime, +murderers in tragedies, who make ugly faces under black wigs,--in short, +the very scum and refuse of the theatre; and it was of course that the +contrast of the vileness of the actors with the pomp of their habits +naturally excited ideas of contempt and ridicule. + +So it was at Paris on the inaugural day of the Constitution for the +present year. The foreign ministers were ordered to attend at this +investiture of the Directory;--for so they call the managers of their +burlesque government. The diplomacy, who were a sort of strangers, were +quite awe-struck with the "pride, pomp, and circumstance" of this +majestic senate; whilst the _sans-culotte_ gallery instantly recognized +their old insurrectionary acquaintance, burst out into a horse-laugh at +their absurd finery, and held them in infinitely greater contempt than +whilst they prowled about the streets in the pantaloons of the last +year's Constitution, when their legislators appeared honestly, with +their daggers in their belts, and their pistols peeping out of their +side-pocket-holes, like a bold, brave banditti, as they are. The +Parisians (and I am much of their mind) think that a thief with a crape +on his visage is much worse than a barefaced knave, and that such +robbers richly deserve all the penalties of all the black acts. In this +their thin disguise, their comrades of the late abdicated sovereign +_canaille_ hooted and hissed them, and from that day have no other name +for them than what is not quite so easy to render into English, +impossible to make it very civil English: it belongs, indeed, to the +language of the _halles_: but, without being instructed in that dialect, +it was the opinion of the polite Lord Chesterfield that no man could be +a complete master of French. Their Parisian brethren called them _gueux +plumés_, which, though not elegant, is expressive and characteristic: +_feathered scoundrels_, I think, comes the nearest to it in that kind of +English. But we are now to understand that these _gueux_, for no other +reason, that I can divine, except their red and white clothes, form at +last a state with which we may cultivate amity, and have a prospect of +the blessings of a secure and permanent peace. In effect, then, it was +not with the men, or their principles, or their polities, that we +quarrelled: our sole dislike was to the cut of their clothes. + +But to pass over _their_ dresses,--good God! in what habits did the +representatives of the crowned heads of Europe appear, when they came to +swell the pomp of their humiliation, and attended in solemn function +this inauguration of Regicide? That would be the curiosity. Under what +robes did they cover the disgrace and degradation of the whole college +of kings? What warehouses of masks and dominoes furnished a cover to the +nakedness of their shame? The shop ought to be known; it will soon have +a good trade. Were the dresses of the ministers of those lately called +potentates, who attended on that occasion, taken from the wardrobe of +that property-man at the opera, from whence my old acquaintance, +Anacharsis Clootz, some years ago equipped a body of ambassadors, whom +he conducted, as from all the nations of the world, to the bar of what +was called the Constituent Assembly? Among those mock ministers, one of +the most conspicuous figures was the representative of the British +nation, who unluckily was wanting at the late ceremony. In the face of +all the real ambassadors of the sovereigns of Europe was this ludicrous +representation of their several subjects, under the name of _oppressed +sovereigns_,[10] exhibited to the Assembly. That Assembly received an +harangue, in the name of those sovereigns, against their kings, +delivered by this Clootz, actually a subject of Prussia, under the name +of Ambassador of the Human Race. At that time there was only a feeble +reclamation from one of the ambassadors of these tyrants and oppressors. +A most gracious answer was given to the ministers of the oppressed +sovereigns; and they went so far on that occasion as to assign them, in +that assumed character, a box at one of their festivals. + +I was willing to indulge myself in an hope that this second appearance +of ambassadors was only an insolent mummery of the same kind; but, alas! +Anacharsis himself, all fanatic as he was, could not have imagined that +his opera procession should have been the prototype of the real +appearance of the representatives of all the sovereigns of Europe +themselves, to make the same prostration that was made by those who +dared to represent their people in a complaint against them. But in this +the French Republic has followed, as they always affect to do, and have +hitherto done with success, the example of the ancient Romans, who shook +all governments by listening to the complaints of their subjects, and +soon after brought the kings themselves to answer at their bar. At this +last ceremony the ambassadors had not Clootz for their Cotterel. Pity +that Clootz had not had a reprieve from the guillotine till he had +completed his work! But that engine fell before the curtain had fallen +upon all the dignity of the earth. + +On this their gaudy day the new Regicide Directory sent for that +diplomatic rabble, as bad as themselves in principle, but infinitely +worse in degradation. They called them out by a sort of roll of their +nations, one after another, much in the manner in which they called +wretches out of their prison to the guillotine. When these ambassadors +of infamy appeared before them, the chief Director, in the name of the +rest, treated each of them with a short, affected, pedantic, insolent, +theatric laconium,--a sort of epigram of contempt. When they had thus +insulted them in a style and language which never before was heard, and +which no sovereign would for a moment endure from another, supposing any +of them frantic enough to use it, to finish their outrage, they drummed +and trumpeted the wretches out of their hall of audience. + +Among the objects of this insolent buffoonery was a person supposed to +represent the King of Prussia. To this worthy representative they did +not so much as condescend to mention his master; they did not seem to +know that he had one; they addressed themselves solely to Prussia in the +abstract, notwithstanding the infinite obligation they owed to their +early protector for their first recognition and alliance, and for the +part of his territory he gave into their hands for the first-fruits of +his homage. None but dead monarchs are so much as mentioned by them, and +those only to insult the living by an invidious comparison. They told +the Prussians they ought to learn, after the example of Frederick the +Great, a love for France. What a pity it is, that he, who loved France +so well as to chastise it, was not now alive, by an unsparing use of the +rod (which, indeed, he would have spared little) to give them another +instance of his paternal affection! But the Directory were mistaken. +These are not days in which monarchs value themselves upon the title of +_great_: they are grown _philosophic_: they are satisfied to be good. + +Your Lordship will pardon me for this no very long reflection on the +short, but excellent speech of the plumed Director to the ambassador of +Cappadocia. The Imperial ambassador was not in waiting, but they found +for Austria a good Judean representation. With great judgment, his +Highness, the Grand Duke, had sent the most atheistic coxcomb to be +found in Florence, to represent at the bar of impiety the House of +Apostolic Majesty, and the descendants of the pious, though high-minded, +Maria Theresa. He was sent to humble the whole race of Austria before +those grim assassins, reeking with the blood of the daughter of Maria +Theresa, whom they sent half dead, in a dung-cart, to a cruel execution; +and this true-born son of apostasy and infidelity, this renegado from +the faith and from all honor and all humanity, drove an Austrian coach +over the stones which were yet wet with her blood,--with that blood +which dropped every step through her tumbrel, all the way she was drawn +from the horrid prison, in which they had finished all the cruelty and +horrors not executed in the face of the sun. The Hungarian subjects of +Maria Theresa, when they drew their swords to defend her rights against +France, called her, with correctness of truth, though not with the same +correctness, perhaps, of grammar, a king: "_Moriamur pro rege nostro, +Maria Theresa._" SHE lived and died a king; and others will have +subjects ready to make the same vow, when, in either sex, they show +themselves real kings. + +When the Directory came to this miserable fop, they bestowed a +compliment on his matriculation into _their_ philosophy; but as to his +master, they made to him, as was reasonable, a reprimand, not without a +pardon, and an oblique hint at the whole family. What indignities have +been offered through this wretch to his master, and how well borne, it +is not necessary that I should dwell on at present. I hope that those +who yet wear royal, imperial, and ducal crowns will learn to feel as +men and as kings: if not, I predict to them, they will not long exist as +kings or as men. + +Great Britain was not there. Almost in despair, I hope she will never, +in any rags and _coversluts_ of infamy, be seen at such an exhibition. +The hour of her final degradation is not yet come; she did not herself +appear in the Regicide presence, to be the sport and mockery of those +bloody buffoons, who, in the merriment of their pride, were insulting +with every species of contumely the fallen dignity of the rest of +Europe. But Britain, though not personally appearing to bear her part in +this monstrous tragi-comedy, was very far from being forgotten. The +new-robed regicides found a representative for her. And who was this +representative? Without a previous knowledge, any one would have given a +thousand guesses before he could arrive at a tolerable divination of +their rancorous insolence. They chose to address what they had to say +concerning this nation to the ambassador of America. They did not apply +to this ambassador for a mediation: that, indeed, would have indicated a +want of every kind of decency; but it would have indicated nothing more. +But in this their American apostrophe, your Lordship will observe, they +did not so much as pretend to hold out to us directly, or through any +mediator, though in the most humiliating manner, any idea whatsoever of +peace, or the smallest desire of reconciliation. To the States of +America themselves they paid no compliment. They paid their compliment +to Washington solely: and on what ground? This most respectable +commander and magistrate might deserve commendation on very many of +those qualities which they who most disapprove some part of his +proceedings, not more justly than freely, attribute to him; but they +found nothing to commend in him "_but the hatred he bore to Great +Britain_." I verily believe, that, in the whole history of our European +wars, there never was such a compliment paid from the sovereign of one +state to a great chief of another. Not one ambassador from any one of +those powers who pretend to live in amity with this kingdom took the +least notice of that unheard-of declaration; nor will Great Britain, +till she is known with certainty to be true to her own dignity, find any +one disposed to feel for the indignities that are offered to her. To say +the truth, those miserable creatures were all silent under the insults +that were offered to themselves. They pocketed their epigrams, as +ambassadors formerly took the gold boxes and miniature pictures set in +diamonds presented them by sovereigns at whose courts they had resided. +It is to be presumed that by the next post they faithfully and promptly +transmitted to their masters the honors they had received. I can easily +conceive the epigram which will be presented to Lord Auckland, or to the +Duke of Bedford, as hereafter, according to circumstances, they may +happen to represent this kingdom. Few can have so little imagination as +not readily to conceive the nature of the boxes of epigrammatic lozenges +that will be presented to them. + +But _hæ nugæ seria ducunt in mala_. The conduct of the Regicide faction +is perfectly systematic in every particular, and it appears absurd only +as it is strange and uncouth, not as it has an application to the ends +and objects of their policy. When by insult after insult they have +rendered the character of sovereigns vile in the eyes of their +subjects, they know there is but one step more to their utter +destruction. All authority, in a great degree, exists in opinion: royal +authority most of all. The supreme majesty of a monarch cannot be allied +with contempt. Men would reason, not unplausibly, that it would be +better to get rid of the monarchy at once than to suffer that which was +instituted, and well instituted, to support the glory of the nation, to +become the instrument of its degradation and disgrace. + +A good many reflections will arise in your Lordship's mind upon the time +and circumstances of that most insulting and atrocious declaration of +hostility against this kingdom. The declaration was made subsequent to +the noble lord's encomium on the new Regicide Constitution,--after the +pamphlet had made something more than advances towards a reconciliation +with that ungracious race, and had directly disowned all those who +adhered to the original declaration in favor of monarchy. It was even +subsequent to the unfortunate declaration in the speech from the throne +(which this pamphlet but too truly announced) of the readiness of our +government to enter into connections of friendship with that faction. +Here was the answer from the throne of Regicide to the speech from the +throne of Great Britain. They go out of their way to compliment General +Washington on the supposed rancor of his heart towards this country. It +is very remarkable, that they make this compliment of malice to the +chief of the United States, who had first signed a treaty of peace, +amity, and commerce with this kingdom. This radical hatred, according to +their way of thinking, the most recent, solemn compacts of friendship +cannot or ought not to remove. In this malice to England, as in the one +great comprehensive virtue, all other merits of this illustrious person +are entirely merged. For my part, I do not believe the fact to be so as +they represent it. Certainly it is not for Mr. Washington's honor as a +gentleman, a Christian, or a President of the United States, after the +treaty he has signed, to entertain such sentiments. I have a moral +assurance that the representation of the Regicide Directory is +absolutely false and groundless. If it be, it is a stronger mark of +their audacity and insolence, and still a stronger proof of the support +they mean to give to the mischievous faction they are known to nourish +there, to the ruin of those States, and to the end that no British +affections should ever arise in that important part of the world, which +would naturally lead to a cordial, hearty British alliance, upon the +bottom of mutual interest and ancient affection. It shows in what part +it is, and with what a weapon, they mean a deadly blow at the heart of +Great Britain. One really would have expected, from this new +Constitution of theirs, which had been announced as a great reform, and +which was to be, more than any of their former experimental schemes, +alliable with other nations, that they would, in their very first public +act, and their declaration to the collected representation of Europe and +America, have affected some degree of moderation, or, at least, have +observed a guarded silence with regard to their temper and their views. +No such thing: they were in haste to declare the principles which are +spun into the primitive staple of their frame. They were afraid that a +moment's doubt should exist about them. In their very infancy they were +in haste to put their hand on their infernal altar, and to swear the +same immortal hatred to England which was sworn in the succession of all +the short-lived constitutions that preceded it. With them everything +else perishes almost as soon as it is formed; this hatred alone is +immortal. This is their impure Vestal fire that never is extinguished: +and never will it be extinguished, whilst the system of Regicide exists +in France. What! are we not to believe them? Men are too apt to be +deceitful enough in their professions of friendship, and this makes a +wise man walk with some caution through life. Such professions, in some +cases, may be even a ground of further distrust. But when a man declares +himself your unalterable enemy! No man ever declared to another a rancor +towards him which he did not feel. _Falsos in amore odia, non fingere_, +said an author who points his observations so as to make them +remembered. + +Observe, my Lord, that, from their invasion of Flanders and Holland to +this hour, they have never made the smallest signification of a desire +of peace with this kingdom, with Austria, or, indeed, with any other +power that I know of. As superiors, they expect others to begin. We have +complied, as you may see. The hostile insolence with which they gave +such a rebuff to our first overture, in the speech from the throne, did +not hinder us from making, from the same throne, a second advance. The +two Houses a second time coincided in the same sentiments, with a degree +of apparent unanimity, (for there was no dissentient voice but yours,) +with which, when they reflect on it, they will be as much ashamed as I +am. To this our new humiliating overture (such, at whatever hazard, I +must call it) what did the Regicide Directory answer? Not one public +word of a readiness to treat. No,--they feel their proud situation too +well. They never declared whether they would grant peace to you or not. +They only signified to you their pleasure as to the terms on which alone +they would in any case admit you to it. You showed your general +disposition to peace, and, to forward it, you left everything open to +negotiations. As to any terms you can possibly obtain, they shut out all +negotiation at the very commencement. They declared that they never +would make a peace by which anything that ever belonged to France should +be ceded. We would not treat with the monarchy, weakened as it must +obviously be in any circumstance of restoration, without a reservation +of something for indemnity and security,--and that, too, in words of the +largest comprehension. You treat with the Regicides without any +reservation at all. On their part, they assure you formally and +publicly, that they will give you nothing in the name of indemnity or +security, or for any other purpose. + +It is impossible not to pause here for a moment, and to consider the +manner in which such declarations would have been taken by your +ancestors from a monarch distinguished for his arrogance,--an arrogance +which, even more than his ambition, incensed and combined all Europe +against him. Whatever his inward intentions may have been, did Louis the +Fourteenth ever make a declaration that the true bounds of France were +the ocean, the Mediterranean, and the Rhine? In any overtures for peace, +did he ever declare that he would make no sacrifices to promote it? His +declarations were always directly to the contrary; and at the Peace of +Ryswick his actions were to the contrary. At the close of the war, +almost in every instance victorious, all Europe was astonished, even +those who received them were astonished, at his concessions. Let those +who have a mind to see how little, in comparison, the most powerful and +ambitious of all monarchs is to be dreaded consult the very judicious +critical observations on the politics of that reign, inserted in the +military treatise of the Marquis de Montalembert. Let those who wish to +know what is to be dreaded from an ambitious republic consult no author, +no military critic, no historical critic. Let them open their own eyes, +which degeneracy and pusillanimity have shut from the light that pains +them, and let them not vainly seek their security in a voluntary +ignorance of their danger. + +To dispose us towards this peace,--an attempt in which our author has, I +do not know whether to call it the good or ill fortune to agree with +whatever is most seditious, factious, and treasonable in this +country,--we are told by many dealers in speculation, but not so +distinctly by the author himself, (too great distinctness of affirmation +not being his fault,)--but we are told, that the French have lately +obtained a very pretty sort of Constitution, and that it resembles the +British Constitution as if they had been twinned together in the +womb,--_mire sagaces fallere hospites discrimen obscurum_. It may be so: +but I confess I am not yet made to it: nor is the noble author. He finds +the "elements" excellent, but the disposition very inartificial indeed. +Contrary to what we might expect at Paris, the meat is good, the cookery +abominable. I agree with him fully in the last; and if I were forced to +allow the first, I should still think, with our old coarse by-word, +that the same power which furnished all their former _restaurateurs_ +sent also their present cooks. I have a great opinion of Thomas Paine, +and of all his productions: I remember his having been one of the +committee for forming one of their annual Constitutions, I mean the +admirable Constitution of 1793, after having been a chamber council to +the no less admirable Constitution of 1791. This pious patriot has his +eyes still directed to his dear native country, notwithstanding her in +gratitude to so kind a benefactor. This outlaw of England, and lawgiver +to France, is now, in secret probably, trying his hand again, and +inviting us to him by making his Constitution such as may give his +disciples in England some plausible pretext for going into the house +that he has opened. We have discovered, it seems, that all which the +boasted wisdom of our ancestors has labored to bring to perfection for +six or seven centuries is nearly, or altogether, matched in six or seven +days, at the leisure hours and sober intervals of Citizen Thomas Paine. + + "But though the treacherous tapster, Thomas, + Hangs a new Angel two doors from us, + As fine as dauber's hands can make it, + In hopes that strangers may mistake it, + We think it both a shame and sin + To quit the good old Angel Inn," + +Indeed, in this good old house, where everything at least is well aired, +I shall be content to put up my fatigued horses, and here take a bed for +the long night that begins to darken upon me. Had I, however, the honor +(I must now call it so) of being a member of any of the constitutional +clubs, I should think I had carried my point most completely. It is +clear, by the applauses bestowed on what the author calls this new +Constitution, a mixed oligarchy, that the difference between the +clubbists and the old adherents to the monarchy of this country is +hardly worth a scuffle. Let it depart in peace, and light lie the earth +on the British Constitution! By this easy manner of treating the most +difficult of all subjects, the constitution for a great kingdom, and by +letting loose an opinion that they may be made by any adventurers in +speculation in a small given time, and for any country, all the ties, +which, whether of reason or prejudice, attach mankind to their old, +habitual, domestic governments, are not a little loosened; all +communion, which the similarity of the basis has produced between all +the governments that compose what we call the Christian world and the +republic of Europe, would be dissolved. By these hazarded speculations +France is more approximated to us in constitution than in situation; and +in proportion as we recede from the ancient system of Europe, we +approach to that connection which alone can remain to us, a close +alliance with the new-discovered moral and political world in France. + +These theories would be of little importance, if we did not only know, +but sorely feel, that there is a strong Jacobin faction in this country, +which has long employed itself in speculating upon constitutions, and to +whom the circumstance of their government being home-bred and +prescriptive seems no sort of recommendation. What seemed to us to be +the best system of liberty that a nation ever enjoyed to them seems the +yoke of an intolerable slavery. This speculative faction had long been +at work. The French Revolution did not cause it: it only discovered it, +increased it, and gave fresh vigor to its operations. I have reason to +be persuaded that it was in this country, and from English writers and +English caballers, that France herself was instituted in this +revolutionary fury. The communion of these two factions upon any +pretended basis of similarity is a matter of very serious consideration. +They are always considering the formal distributions of power in a +constitution: the moral basis they consider as nothing. Very different +is my opinion: I consider the moral basis as everything,--the formal +arrangements, further than as they promote the moral principles of +government, and the keeping desperately wicked persons as the subjects +of laws and not the makers of them, to be of little importance. What +signifies the cutting and shuffling of cards, while the pack still +remains the same? As a basis for such a connection as has subsisted +between the powers of Europe, we had nothing to fear, but from the +lapses and frailties of men,--and that was enough; but this new +pretended republic has given us more to apprehend from what they call +their virtues than we had to dread from the vices of other men. Avowedly +and systematically, they have given the upperhand to all the vicious and +degenerate part of human nature. It is from their lapses and deviations +from their principle that alone we have anything to hope. + +I hear another inducement to fraternity with the present rulers. They +have murdered one Robespierre. This Robespierre, they tell us, was a +cruel tyrant, and now that he is put out of the way, all will go well in +France. Astræa will again return to that earth from which she has been +an emigrant, and all nations will resort to her golden scales. It is +very extraordinary, that, the very instant the mode of Paris is known +here, it becomes all the fashion in London. This is their jargon. It is +the old _bon-ton_ of robbers, who cast their common crimes on the +wickedness of their departed associates. I care little about the memory +of this same Robespierre. I am sure he was an execrable villain. I +rejoiced at his punishment neither more nor less than I should at the +execution of the present Directory, or any of its members. But who gave +Robespierre the power of being a tyrant? and who were the instruments of +his tyranny? The present virtuous constitution-mongers. He was a tyrant; +they were his satellites and his hangmen. Their sole merit is in the +murder of their colleague. They have expiated their other murders by a +new murder. It has always been the case among this banditti. They have +always had the knife at each other's throats, after they had almost +blunted it at the throats of every honest man. These people thought, +that, in the commerce of murder, he was like to have the better of the +bargain, if any time was lost; they therefore took one of their short +revolutionary methods, and massacred him in a manner so perfidious and +cruel as would shock all humanity, if the stroke was not struck by the +present rulers on one of their own associates. But this last act of +infidelity and murder is to expiate all the rest, and to qualify them +for the amity of an humane and virtuous sovereign and civilized people. +I have heard that a Tartar believes, when he has killed a man, that all +his estimable qualities pass with his clothes and arms to the murderer; +but I have never heard that it was the opinion of any savage Scythian, +that, if he kills a brother villain, he is, _ipso facto_, absolved of +all his own offences. The Tartarian doctrine is the most tenable +opinion. The murderers of Robespierre, besides what they are entitled to +by being engaged in the same tontine of infamy, are his representatives, +have inherited all his murderous qualities, in addition to their own +private stock. But it seems we are always to be of a party with the last +and victorious assassins. I confess I am of a different mind, and am +rather inclined, of the two, to think and speak less hardly of a dead +ruffian than to associate with the living. I could better bear the +stench of the gibbeted murderer than the society of the bloody felons +who yet annoy the world. Whilst they wait the recompense due to their +ancient crimes, they merit new punishment by the new offences they +commit. There is a period to the offences of Robespierre. They survive +in his assassins. "Better a living dog," says the old proverb, "than a +dead lion." Not so here. Murderers and hogs never look well till they +are hanged. From villany no good can arise, but in the example of its +fate. So I leave them their dead Robespierre, either to gibbet his +memory, or to deify him in their Pantheon with their Marat and their +Mirabeau. + +It is asserted that this government promises stability. God of his mercy +forbid! If it should, nothing upon earth besides itself can be stable. +We declare this stability to be the ground of our making peace with +them. Assuming it, therefore, that the men and the system are what I +have described, and that they have a determined hostility against this +country,--an hostility not only of policy, but of predilection,--then I +think that every rational being would go along with me in considering +its permanence as the greatest of all possible evils. If, therefore, we +are to look for peace with such a thing in any of its monstrous shapes, +which I deprecate, it must be in that state of disorder, confusion, +discord, anarchy, and insurrection, such as might oblige the momentary +rulers to forbear their attempts on neighboring states, or to render +these attempts less operative, if they should kindle new wars. When was +it heard before, that the internal repose of a determined and wicked +enemy, and the strength of his government, became the wish of his +neighbor, and a security, against either his malice or his ambition? The +direct contrary has always been inferred from that state of things: +accordingly, it has ever been the policy of those who would preserve +themselves against the enterprises of such a malignant and mischievous +power to cut out so much work for him in his own states as might keep +his dangerous activity employed at home. + +It is said, in vindication of this system, which demands the stability +of the Regicide power as a ground for peace with them, that, when they +have obtained, as now it is said (though not by this noble author) they +have, a permanent government, they will be _able_ to preserve amity with +this kingdom, and with others who have the misfortune to be in their +neighborhood. Granted. They will be _able_ to do so, without question; +but are they willing to do so? Produce the act; produce the declaration. +Have they made any single step towards it? Have they ever once proposed +to treat? + +The assurance of a stable peace, grounded on the stability of their +system, proceeds on this hypothesis,--that their hostility to other +nations has proceeded from their anarchy at home, and from the +prevalence of a populace which their government had not strength enough +to master. This I utterly deny. I insist upon it as a fact, that, in the +daring commencement of all their hostilities, and their astonishing +perseverance in them, so as never once, in any fortune, high or low, to +propose a treaty of peace to any power in Europe, they have never been +actuated by the people: on the contrary, the people, I will not say have +been moved, but impelled by them, and have generally acted under a +compulsion, of which most of us are as yet, thank God, unable to form an +adequate idea. The war against Austria was formally declared by the +unhappy Louis the Sixteenth; but who has ever considered Louis the +Sixteenth, since the Revolution, to have been the government? The second +Regicide Assembly, then the only government, was the author of that war; +and neither the nominal king nor the nominal people had anything to do +with it, further than in a reluctant obedience. It is to delude +ourselves, to consider the state of France, since their Revolution, as a +state of anarchy: it is something far worse. Anarchy it is, undoubtedly, +if compared with government pursuing the peace, order, morals, and +prosperity of the people; but regarding only the power that has really +guided from the day of the Revolution to this time, it has been of all +governments the most absolute, despotic, and effective that has hitherto +appeared on earth. Never were the views and politics of any government +pursued with half the regularity, system, and method that a diligent +observer must have contemplated with amazement and terror in theirs. +Their state is not an anarchy, but a series of short-lived tyrannies. We +do not call a republic with annual magistrates an anarchy: theirs is +that kind of republic; but the succession is not effected by the +expiration of the term of the magistrate's service, but by his murder. +Every new magistracy, succeeding by homicide, is auspicated by accusing +its predecessors in the office of tyranny, and it continues by the +exercise of what they charged upon others. + +This strong hand is the law, and the sole law, in their state. I defy +any person to show any other law,--or if any such should be found on +paper, that it is in the smallest degree, or in any one instance, +regarded or practised. In all their successions, not one magistrate, or +one form of magistracy, has expired by a mere occasional popular tumult; +everything has been the effect of the studied machinations of the one +revolutionary cabal, operating within itself upon itself. That cabal is +all in all. France has no public; it is the only nation I ever heard of, +where the people are absolutely slaves, in the fullest sense, in all +affairs, public and private, great and small, even down to the minutest +and most recondite parts of their household concerns. The helots of +Laconia, the regardants to the manor in Russia and in Poland, even the +negroes in the West Indies, know nothing of so searching, so +penetrating, so heart-breaking a slavery. Much would these servile +wretches call for our pity under that unheard-of yoke, if for their +perfidious and unnatural rebellion, and for their murder of the mildest +of all monarchs, they did not richly deserve a punishment not greater +than their crime. + +On the whole, therefore, I take it to be a great mistake to think that +the want of power in the government furnished a natural cause of war; +whereas the greatness of its power, joined to its use of that power, the +nature of its system, and the persons who acted in it, did naturally +call for a strong military resistance to oppose them, and rendered it +not only just, but necessary. But at present I say no more on the genius +and character of the power set up in France. I may probably trouble you +with it more at large hereafter: this subject calls for a very full +exposure: at present it is enough for me, if I point it out as a matter +well worthy of consideration, whether the true ground of hostility was +not rightly conceived very early in this war, and whether anything has +happened to change that system, except our ill success in a war which in +no principal instance had its true destination as the object of its +operations. That the war has succeeded ill in many cases is undoubted; +but then let us speak the truth, and say we are defeated, exhausted, +dispirited, and must submit. This would be intelligible. The world would +be inclined to pardon the abject conduct of an undone nation. But let us +not conceal from _ourselves_ our real situation, whilst, by every +species of humiliation, we are but too strongly displaying our sense of +it to the enemy. + +The writer of the Remarks in the Last Week of October appears to think +that the present government in France contains many of the elements +which, when properly arranged, are known to form the best practical +governments,--and that the system, whatever may become its particular +form, is no longer likely to be an obstacle to negotiation. If its form +now be no obstacle to such negotiation, I do not know why it was ever +so. Suppose that this government promised greater permanency than any of +the former, (a point on which I can form no judgment,) still a link is +wanting to couple the permanence of the government with the permanence +of the peace. On this not one word is said: nor can there be, in my +opinion. This deficiency is made up by strengthening the first ringlet +of the chain, that ought to be, but that is not, stretched to connect +the two propositions. All seems to be done, if we can make out that the +last French edition of Regicide is like to prove stable. + +As a prognostic of this stability, it is said to be accepted by the +people. Here again I join issue with the fraternizers, and positively +deny the fact. Some submission or other has been obtained, by some means +or other, to every government that hitherto has been set up. And the +same submission would, by the same means, be obtained for any other +project that the wit or folly of man could possibly devise. The +Constitution of 1790 was universally received. The Constitution which +followed it, under the name of a Convention, was universally submitted +to. The Constitution of 1793 was universally accepted. Unluckily, this +year's Constitution, which was formed, and its genethliacon sung by the +noble author while it was yet in embryo, or was but just come bloody +from the womb, is the only one which in its very formation has been +generally resisted by a very great and powerful party in many parts of +the kingdom, and particularly in the capital. It never had a popular +choice even in show: those who arbitrarily erected the new building out +of the old materials of their own Convention were obliged to send for an +army to support their work: like brave gladiators, they fought it out +in the streets of Paris, and even massacred each other in their house of +assembly, in the most edifying manner, and for the entertainment and +instruction of their Excellencies the foreign ambassadors, who had a box +in this constitutional amphitheatre of a free people. + +At length, after a terrible struggle, the troops prevailed over the +citizens. The citizen soldiers, the ever-famed national guards, who had +deposed and murdered their sovereign, were disarmed by the inferior +trumpeters of that rebellion. Twenty thousand regular troops garrison +Paris. Thus a complete military government is formed. It has the +strength, and it may count on the stability, of that kind of power. This +power is to last as long as the Parisians think proper. Every other +ground of stability, but from military force and terror, is clean out of +the question. To secure them further, they have a strong corps of +irregulars, ready-armed. Thousands of those hell-hounds called +Terrorists, whom they had shut up in prison, on their last Revolution, +as the satellites of tyranny, are let loose on the people. The whole of +their government, in its origination, in its continuance, in all its +actions, and in all its resources, is force, and nothing but force: a +forced constitution, a forced election, a forced subsistence, a forced +requisition of soldiers, a forced loan of money. + +They differ nothing from all the preceding usurpations, but that to the +same odium a good deal more of contempt is added. In this situation, +notwithstanding all their military force, strengthened with the +undisciplined power of the Terrorists, and the nearly general disarming +of Paris, there would almost certainly have been before this an +insurrection against them, but for one cause. The people of France +languish for peace. They all despaired of obtaining it from the +coalesced powers, whilst they had a gang of professed regicides at their +head; and several of the least desperate republicans would have joined +with better men to shake them wholly off, and to produce something more +ostensible, if they had not been reiteratedly told that their sole hope +of peace was the very contrary to what they naturally imagined: that +they must leave off their cabals and insurrections, which could serve no +purpose but to bring in that royalty which was wholly rejected by the +coalesced kings; that, to satisfy them, they must tranquilly, if they +could not cordially, submit themselves to the tyranny and the tyrants +they despised and abhorred. Peace was held out by the allied monarchies +to the people of France, as a bounty for supporting the Republic of +Regicides. In fact, a coalition, begun for the avowed purpose of +destroying that den of robbers, now exists only for their support. If +evil happens to the princes of Europe from the success and stability of +this infernal business, it is their own absolute crime. + +We are to understand, however, (for sometimes so the author hints,) that +something stable in the Constitution of Regicide was required for our +amity with it; but the noble Remarker is no more solicitous about this +point than he is for the permanence of the whole body of his October +speculations. "If," says he, speaking of the Regicide, "they can obtain +a practicable constitution, even for a limited period of time, they will +be in a condition to reestablish the accustomed relations of peace and +amity." Pray let us leave this bush-fighting. What is meant by a +_limited period of time_? Does it mean the direct contrary to the +terms, _an unlimited period_? If it is a limited period, what limitation +does he fix as a ground for his opinion? Otherwise, his limitation is +unlimited. If he only requires a constitution that will last while the +treaty goes on, ten days' existence will satisfy his demands. He knows +that France never did want a practicable constitution, nor a government, +which endured for a limited period of time. Her constitutions were but +too practicable; and short as was their duration, it was but too long. +They endured time enough for treaties which benefited themselves and +have done infinite mischief to our cause. But, granting him his strange +thesis, that hitherto the mere form or the mere term of their +constitutions, and not their indisposition, but their instability, has +been the cause of their not preserving the relations of amity,--how +could a constitution which might not last half an hour after the noble +lord's signature of the treaty, in the company in which he must sign it, +insure its observance? If you trouble yourself at all with their +constitutions, you are certainly more concerned with them after the +treaty than before it, as the observance of conventions is of infinitely +more consequence than the making them. Can anything be more palpably +absurd and senseless than to object to a treaty of peace for want of +durability in constitutions which had an actual duration, and to trust a +constitution that at the time of the writing had not so much as a +practical existence? There is no way of accounting for such discourse in +the mouths of men of sense, but by supposing that they secretly +entertain a hope that the very act of having made a peace with the +Regicides will give a stability to the Regicide system. This will not +clear the discourse from the absurdity, but it will account for the +conduct, which such reasoning so ill defends. What a roundabout way is +this to peace,--to make war for the destruction of regicides, and then +to give them peace in order to insure a stability that will enable them +to observe it! I say nothing of the honor displayed in such a system. It +is plain it militates with itself almost in all the parts of it. In one +part, it supposes stability in their Constitution, as a ground of a +stable peace; in another part, we are to hope for peace in a different +way,--that is, by splitting this brilliant orb into little stars, and +this would make the face of heaven so fine! No, there is no system upon +which the peace which in humility we are to supplicate can possibly +stand. + +I believe, before this time, that the more form of a constitution, in +any country, never was fixed as the sole ground of objecting to a treaty +with it. With other circumstances it may be of great moment. What is +incumbent on the assertors of the Fourth Week of October system to prove +is not whether their then expected Constitution was likely to be stable +or transitory, but whether it promised to this country and its allies, +and to the peace and settlement of all Europe, more good-will or more +good faith than any of the experiments which have gone before it. On +these points I would willingly join issue. + +Observe first the manner in which the Remarker describes (very truly, as +I conceive) the people of France under that auspicious government, and +then observe the conduct of that government to other nations. "The +people without _any_ established constitution; distracted by popular +convulsions; in a state of inevitable bankruptcy; without any commerce; +with their principal ports blockaded; and without a fleet that could +venture to face one of our _detached squadrons_." Admitting, as fully as +he has stated it, this condition of France, I would fain know how he +reconciles this condition with his ideas of _any kind of a practicable +constitution_, or _duration for a limited period_, which are his _sine +qua non_ of peace. But passing by contradictions, as no fair objections +to reasoning, this state of things would naturally, at other times, and +in other governments, have produced a disposition to peace, almost on +any terms. But, in that state of their country, did the Regicide +government solicit peace or amity with other nations, or even lay any +specious grounds for it, in propositions of affected moderation, or in +the most loose and general conciliatory language? The direct contrary. +It was but a very few days before the noble writer had commenced his +Remarks, as if it were to refute him by anticipation, that his France +thought fit to lay out a new territorial map of dominion, and to declare +to us and to all Europe what territories she was willing to allot to her +own empire, and what she is content (during her good pleasure) to leave +to others. + +This their law of empire was promulgated without any requisition on that +subject, and proclaimed in a style and upon principles which never had +been heard of in the annals of arrogance and ambition. She prescribed +the limits to her empire, not upon principles of treaty, convention, +possession, usage, habitude, the distinction of tribes, nations, or +languages, but by physical aptitudes. Having fixed herself as the +arbiter of physical dominion, she construed the limits of Nature by her +convenience. That was Nature which most extended and best secured the +empire of France. + +I need say no more on the insult offered not only to all equity and +justice, but to the common sense of mankind, in deciding legal property +by physical principles, and establishing the convenience of a party as a +rule of public law. The noble advocate for peace has, indeed, perfectly +well exploded this daring and outrageous system of pride and tyranny. I +am most happy in commending him, when he writes like himself. But hear +still further and in the same good strain the great patron and advocate +of amity with this accommodating, mild, and unassuming power, when he +reports to you the law they give, and its immediate effects:--"They +amount," says he, "to the sacrifice of powers that have been the most +nearly connected with us,--the direct or indirect annexation to France +of all the ports of the Continent from Dunkirk to Hamburg,--an immense +accession of territory,--and, in one word, THE ABANDONMENT OF THE +INDEPENDENCE OF EUROPE!" This is the LAW (the author and I use no +different terms) which this new government, almost as soon as it could +cry in the cradle, and as one of the very first acts by which it +auspicated its entrance into function, the pledge it gives of the +firmness of its policy,--such is the law that this proud power +prescribes to abject nations. What is the comment upon this law by the +great jurist who recommends us to the tribunal which issued the decree? +"An obedience to it would be" (says he) "dishonorable to us, and exhibit +us to the present age and to posterity as submitting to the law +prescribed to us by our enemy." + +Here I recognize the voice of a British plenipotentiary: I begin to feel +proud of my country. But, alas! the short date of human elevation! The +accents of dignity died upon his tongue. This author will not assure us +of his sentiments for the whole of a pamphlet; but, in the sole +energetic part of it, he does not continue the same through an whole +sentence, if it happens to be of any sweep or compass. In the very womb +of this last sentence, pregnant, as it should seem, with a Hercules, +there is formed a little bantling of the mortal race, a degenerate, puny +parenthesis, that totally frustrates our most sanguine views and +expectations, and disgraces the whole gestation. Here is this +destructive parenthesis: "Unless some adequate compensation be secured +_to us_." _To us!_ The Christian world may shift for itself, Europe may +groan in slavery, we may be dishonored by receiving law from an +enemy,--but all is well, provided the compensation _to us_ be adequate. +To what are we reserved? An _adequate_ compensation "for the sacrifice +of powers the most nearly connected with us";--an _adequate_ +compensation "for the direct or indirect annexation to France of all the +ports of the Continent from Dunkirk to Hamburg";--an _adequate_ +compensation "for the abandonment of the independence of Europe"! Would +that, when all our manly sentiments are thus changed, our manly language +were changed along with them, and that the English tongue were not +employed to utter what our ancestors never dreamed could enter into an +English heart! + +But let us consider this matter of adequate compensation. Who is to +furnish it? From what funds is it to be drawn? Is it by another treaty +of commerce? I have no objections to treaties of commerce upon +principles of commerce. Traffic for traffic,--all is fair. But commerce +in exchange for empire, for safety, for glory! We set out in our dealing +with a miserable cheat upon ourselves. I know it may be said, that we +may prevail on this proud, philosophical, military Republic, which looks +down with contempt on trade, to declare it unfit for the sovereign of +nations to be _eundem negotiatorem et dominum_: that, in virtue of this +maxim of her state, the English in France may be permitted, as the Jews +are in Poland and in Turkey, to execute all the little inglorious +occupations,--to be the sellers of new and the buyers of old clothes, to +be their brokers and factors, and to be employed in casting up their +debits and credits, whilst the master Republic cultivates the arts of +empire, prescribes the forms of peace to nations, and dictates laws to a +subjected world. But are we quite sure, that, when we have surrendered +half Europe to them in hope of this compensation, the Republic will +confer upon us those privileges of dishonor? Are we quite certain that +she will permit us to farm the guillotine,--to contract for the +provision of her twenty thousand Bastiles,--to furnish transports for +the myriads of her exiles to Guiana,--to become commissioners for her +naval stores,--or to engage for the clothing of those armies which are +to subdue the poor relics of Christian Europe? No! She is bespoke by the +Jew subjects of her own Amsterdam for all these services. + +But if these, or matters similar, are not the compensations the Remarker +demands, and that on consideration he finds them neither adequate nor +certain, who else is to be the chapman, and to furnish the +purchase-money, at this market, of all the grand principles of empire, +of law, of civilization, of morals, and of religion, where British faith +and honor are to be sold by inch of candle? Who is to be the _dedecorum +pretiosus emptor_? Is it the _navis Hispanæ magister_? Is it to be +furnished by the Prince of Peace? Unquestionably. Spain as yet possesses +mines of gold and silver, and may give us in _pesos duros_ an adequate +compensation for our honor and our virtue. When these things are at all +to be sold, they are the vilest commodities at market. + +It is full as singular as any of the other singularities in this work, +that the Remarker, talking so much as he does of cessions and +compensations, passes by Spain in his general settlement, as if there +were no such country on the globe,--as if there were no Spain in Europe, +no Spain in America. But this great matter of political deliberation +cannot be put out of our thoughts by his silence. She _has_ furnished +compensations,--not to you, but to France. The Regicide Republic and the +still nominally subsisting monarchy of Spain are united,--and are united +upon a principle of jealousy, if not of bitter enmity, to Great Britain. +The noble writer has here another matter for meditation. It is not from +Dunkirk to Hamburg that the ports are in the hands of France: they are +in the hands of France from Hamburg to Gibraltar. How long the new +dominion will last I cannot tell; but France the Republic has conquered +Spain, and the ruling party in that court acts by her orders and exists +by her power. + +The noble writer, in his views into futurity, has forgotten to look back +to the past. If he chooses it, he may recollect, that, on the prospect +of the death of Philip the Fourth, and still more on the event, all +Europe was moved to its foundations. In the treaties of partition that +first were entered into, and in the war that afterwards blazed out to +prevent those crowns from being actually or virtually united in the +House of Bourbon, the predominance of France in Spain, and above all, in +the Spanish Indies, was the great object of all these movements in the +cabinet and in the field. The Grand Alliance was formed upon that +apprehension. On that apprehension the mighty war was continued during +such a number of years as the degenerate and pusillanimous impatience of +our dwindled race can hardly bear to have reckoned: a war equal, within +a few years, in duration, and not, perhaps, inferior in bloodshed, to +any of those great contests for empire which in history make the most +awful matter of recorded memory. + + Ad confligendum venientibus undique Poenis, + Omnia cum belli trepido concussa tumultu + Horrida contremuere sub altis ætheris auris, + In dubioque fuit sub utrorum regna cadendum + Omnibus humanis esset terrâque marique.-- + +When this war was ended, (I cannot stay now to examine how,) the object +of the war was the object of the treaty. When it was found +impracticable, or less desirable than before, wholly to exclude a branch +of the Bourbon race from that immense succession, the point of Utrecht +was to prevent the mischiefs to arise from the influence of the greater +upon the lesser branch. His Lordship is a great member of the diplomatic +body; he has, of course, all the fundamental treaties which make the +public statute law of Europe by heart: and, indeed, no active member of +Parliament ought to be ignorant of their general tenor and leading +provisions. In the treaty which closed that war, and of which it is a +fundamental part, because relating to the whole policy of the compact, +it was agreed that Spain should not give anything from her territory in +the West Indies to France. This article, apparently onerous to Spain, +was in truth highly beneficial. But, oh, the blindness of the greatest +statesman to the infinite and unlooked-for combinations of things which +lie hid in the dark prolific womb of futurity! The great trunk of +Bourbon is cut down; the withered branch is worked up into the +construction of a French Regicide Republic. Here we have formed a new, +unlooked-for, monstrous, heterogeneous alliance,--a double-natured +monster, republic above and monarchy below. There is no centaur of +fiction, no poetic satyr of the woods, nothing short of the hieroglyphic +monsters of Egypt, dog in head and man in body, that can give an idea of +it. None of these things can subsist in Nature (so, at least, it is +thought); but the moral world admits monsters which the physical +rejects. + +In this metamorphosis, the first thing done by Spain, in the honey-moon +of her new servitude, was, with all the hardihood of pusillanimity, +utterly to defy the most solemn treaties with Great Britain and the +guaranty of Europe. She has yielded the largest and fairest part of one +of the largest and fairest islands in the West Indies, perhaps on the +globe, to the usurped powers of France. She completes the title of those +powers to the whole of that important central island of Hispaniola. She +has solemnly surrendered to the regicides and butchers of the Bourbon +family what that court never ventured, perhaps never wished, to bestow +on the patriarchal stock of her own august house. + +The noble negotiator takes no notice of this portentous junction and +this audacious surrender. The effect is no less than the total +subversion of the balance of power in the West Indies, and indeed +everywhere else. This arrangement, considered in itself, but much more +as it indicates a complete union of France with Spain, is truly +alarming. Does he feel nothing of the change this makes in that part of +his description of the state of France where he supposes her not able to +face one of our detached squadrons? Does he feel nothing for the +condition of Portugal under this new coalition? Is it for this state of +things he recommends our junction in that common alliance as a remedy? +It is surely already monstrous enough. We see every standing principle +of policy, every old governing opinion of nations, completely gone, and +with it the foundation of all their establishments. Can Spain keep +herself internally where she is, with this connection? Does he dream +that Spain, unchristian, or even uncatholic, can exist as a monarchy? +This author indulges himself in speculations of the division of the +French Republic. I only say, that with much greater reason he might +speculate on the republicanism and the subdivision of Spain. + +It is not peace with France which secures that feeble government; it is +that peace which, if it shall continue, decisively ruins Spain. Such a +peace is not the peace which the remnant of Christianity celebrates at +this holy season. In it there is no glory to God on high, and not the +least tincture of good-will to man. What things we have lived to see! +The King of Spain in a group of Moors, Jews, and Renegadoes; and the +clergy taxed to pay for his conversion! The Catholic King in the strict +embraces of the most Unchristian Republic! I hope we shall never see his +Apostolic Majesty, his Faithful Majesty, and the King, Defender of the +Faith, added to that unhallowed and impious fraternity. + +The noble author has glimpses of the consequences of peace, as well as +I. He feels for the colonies of Great Britain, one of the principal +resources of our commerce and our naval power, if piratical France shall +be established, as he knows she must be, in the West Indies, if we sue +for peace on such terms as they may condescend to grant us. He feels +that their very colonial system for the interior is not compatible with +the existence of our colonies. I tell him, and doubt not I shall be able +to demonstrate, that, being what she is, if she possesses a rock there, +we cannot be safe. Has this author had in his view the transactions +between the Regicide Republic and the yet nominally subsisting monarchy +of Spain? + +I bring this matter under your Lordship's consideration, that you may +have a more complete view than this author chooses to give of the _true +France_ you have to deal with, as to its nature, and to its force and +its disposition. Mark it, my Lord, France, in giving her law to Spain, +stipulated for none of her indemnities in Europe, no enlargement +whatever of her frontier. Whilst we are looking for indemnities from +France, betraying our own safety in a sacrifice of the independence of +Europe, France secures hers by the most important acquisition of +territory ever made in the West Indies since their first settlement. She +appears (it is only in appearance) to give up the frontier of Spain; and +she is compensated, not in appearance, but in reality, by a territory +that makes a dreadful frontier to the colonies of Great Britain. + +It is sufficiently alarming that she is to have the possession of this +great island. But all the Spanish colonies, virtually, are hers. Is +there so puny a whipster in the _petty form_ of the school of politics +who can be at a loss for the fate of the British colonies, when he +combines the French and Spanish consolidation with the known critical +and dubious dispositions of the United States of America, as they are at +present, but which, when a peace is made, when the basis of a Regicide +ascendency in Spain is laid, will no longer be so good as dubious and +critical? But I go a great deal further; and on much consideration of +the condition and circumstances of the West Indies, and of the genius of +this new republic, as it has operated and is likely to operate on them, +I say, that, if a single rock in the West Indies is in the hands of this +_transatlantic Morocco_, we have not an hour's safety there. + +The Remarker, though he slips aside from the main consideration, seems +aware that this arrangement, standing as it does, in the West Indies, +leaves us at the mercy of the new coalition, or rather at the mercy of +the sole guiding part of it. He does not, indeed, adopt a supposition +such as I make, who am confident that anything which can give them a +single good port and opportune piratical station there would lead to our +ruin: the author proceeds upon an idea that the Regicides may be an +existing and considerable territorial power in the West Indies, and, of +course, her piratical system more dangerous and as real. However, for +that desperate case he has an easy remedy; but, surely, in his whole +shop there is nothing so extraordinary. It is, that we three, France, +Spain, and England, (there are no other of any moment,) should adopt +some "_analogy_ in the interior systems of government in the several +islands which we may respectively retain after the closing of the war." +This plainly can be done only by a convention between the parties; and I +believe it would be the first war ever made to terminate in an analogy +of the interior government of any country, or any parts of such +countries. Such a partnership in domestic government is, I think, +carrying fraternity as far as it will go. + +It will be an affront to your sagacity to pursue this matter into all +its details: suffice it to say, that, if this convention for analogous +domestic government is made, it immediately gives a right for the +residence of a consul (in all likelihood some negro or man of color) in +every one of your islands; a Regicide ambassador in London will be at +all your meetings of West India merchants and planters, and, in effect, +in all our colonial councils. Not one order of Council can hereafter be +made, or any one act of Parliament relative to the West India colonies +even be agitated, which will not always afford reasons for protests and +perpetual interference; the Regicide Republic will become an integral +part of the colonial legislature, and, so far as the colonies are +concerned, of the British too. But it will be still worse: as all our +domestic affairs are interlaced more or less intimately with our +external, this intermeddling must everywhere insinuate itself into all +other interior transactions, and produce a copartnership in our domestic +concerns of every description. + +Such are the plain, inevitable consequences of this arrangement of a +system, of analogous interior government. On the other hand, without it, +the author assures us, and in this I heartily agree with him, "that the +correspondence and communications between the neighboring colonies will +be great, that the disagreements will be incessant, and that causes even +of national quarrels will arise _from day to day_." Most true. But, for +the reasons I have given, the case, if possible, will be worse by the +proposed remedy, by the triple fraternal interior analogy,--an analogy +itself most fruitful, and more foodful than the old Ephesian statue with +the three tier of breasts. Your Lordship must also observe how +infinitely this business must be complicated by our interference in the +slow-paced Saturnian movements of Spain and the rapid parabolic flights +of France. But such is the disease,--such is the cure,--such is, and +must be, the effect of Regicide vicinity. + +But what astonishes me is, that the negotiator, who has certainly an +exercised understanding, did not see that every person habituated to +such meditations must necessarily pursue the train of thought further +than he has carried it, and must ask himself whether what he states so +truly of the necessity of our arranging an analogous interior +government, in consequence of the vicinity of our possessions, in the +West Indies, does not as extensively apply, and much more forcibly, to +the circumstance of our much nearer vicinity with the parent and author +of this mischief. I defy even his acuteness and ingenuity to show me any +one point in which the cases differ, except that it is plainly more +necessary in Europe than in America. Indeed, the further we trace the +details of the proposed peace, the more your Lordship will be satisfied +that I have not been guilty of any abuse of terms, when I use +indiscriminately (as I always do, in speaking of arrangements with +Regicide) the words peace and fraternity. An analogy between our +interior governments must be the consequence. The noble negotiator sees +it as well as I do. I deprecate this Jacobin interior analogy. But +hereafter, perhaps, I may say a good deal more upon this part of the +subject. + +The noble lord insists on very little more than on the excellence of +their Constitution, the hope of their dwindling into little republics, +and this close copartnership in government. I hear of others, indeed, +that offer by other arguments to reconcile us to this peace and +fraternity. The Regicides, they say, have renounced the creed of the +Rights of Man, and declared equality a chimera. This is still more +strange than all the rest. They have apostatized from their apostasy. +They are renegadoes from that impious faith for which they subverted the +ancient government, murdered their king, and imprisoned, butchered, +confiscated, and banished their fellow-subjects, and to which they +forced every man to swear at the peril of his life. And now, to +reconcile themselves to the world, they declare this creed, bought by so +much blood, to be an imposture and a chimera. I have no doubt that they +always thought it to be so, when they were destroying everything at home +and abroad for its establishment. It is no strange thing, to those who +look into the nature of corrupted man, to find a violent persecutor a +perfect unbeliever of his own creed. But this is the very first time +that any man or set of men were hardy enough to attempt to lay the +ground of confidence in them by an acknowledgment of their own +falsehood, fraud, hypocrisy, treachery, heterodox doctrine, +persecution, and cruelty. Everything we hear from them is new, and, to +use a phrase of their own, _revolutionary_; everything supposes a total +revolution in all the principles of reason, prudence, and moral feeling. +If possible, this their recantation of the chief parts in the canon of +the Rights of Man is more infamous and causes greater horror than their +originally promulgating and forcing down the throats of mankind that +symbol of all evil. It is raking too much into the dirt and ordure of +human nature to say more of it. + +I hear it said, too, that they have lately declared in favor of +property. This is exactly of the same sort with the former. What need +had they to make this declaration, if they did not know that by their +doctrines and practices they had totally subverted all property? What +government of Europe, either in its origin or its continuance, has +thought it necessary to declare itself in favor of property? The more +recent ones were formed for its protection against former violations; +the old consider the inviolability of property and their own existence +as one and the same thing, and that a proclamation for its safety would +be sounding an alarm on its danger. But the Regicide banditti knew that +this was not the first time they have been obliged to give such +assurances, and had as often falsified them. They knew, that, after +butchering hundreds of men, women, and children, for no other cause than +to lay hold on their property, such a declaration might have a chance of +encouraging other nations to run the risk of establishing a commercial +house amongst them. It is notorious, that these very Jacobins, upon an +alarm of the shopkeeper of Paris, made this declaration in favor of +property. These brave fellows received the apprehensions expressed on +that head with indignation, and said that property could be in no +danger, because all the world knew it was under the protection of the +_sans-culottes_. At what period did they not give this assurance? Did +they not give it; when they fabricated their first Constitution? Did +they not then solemnly declare it one of the rights of a citizen (a +right, of course, only declared, and not then fabricated) to depart from +his country, and choose another _domicilium_, without detriment to his +property? Did they not declare that no property should be confiscated +from the children for the crime of the parent? Can they now declare more +fully their respect for property than they did at that time? And yet was +there ever known such horrid violences and confiscations as instantly +followed under the very persons now in power, many of them leading +members of that Assembly, and all of them violators of that engagement +which was the very basis of their republic,--confiscations in which +hundreds of men, women, and children, not guilty of one act of duty in +resisting their usurpation, were involved? This keeping of their old is, +then, to give us a confidence in their new engagements. But examine the +matter, and you will see that the prevaricating sons of violence give no +relief at all, where at all it can be wanted. They renew their old +fraudulent declaration against confiscations, and then they expressly +exclude all adherents to their ancient lawful government from any +benefit of it: that is to say, they promise that they will secure all +their brother plunderers in their share of the common plunder. The fear +of being robbed by every new succession of robbers, who do not keep even +the faith of that kind of society, absolutely required that they should +give security to the dividends of spoil, else they could not exist a +moment. But it was necessary, in giving security to robbers, that honest +men should be deprived of all hope of restitution; and thus their +interests were made utterly and eternally incompatible. So that it +appears that this boasted security of property is nothing more than a +seal put upon its destruction; this ceasing of confiscation is to secure +the confiscators against the innocent proprietors. That very thing which +is held out to you as your cure is that which makes your malady, and +renders it, if once it happens, utterly incurable. You, my Lord, who +possess a considerable, though not an invidious estate, may be well +assured, that, if, by being engaged, as you assuredly would be, in the +defence of your religion, your king, your order, your laws, and +liberties, that estate should be put under confiscation, the property +would be secured, but in the same manner, at your expense. + +But, after all, for what purpose are we told of this reformation in +their principles, and what is the policy of all this softening in ours, +which is to be produced by their example? It is not to soften us to +suffering innocence and virtue, but to mollify us to the crimes and to +the society of robbers and ruffians. But I trust that our countrymen +will not be softened to that kind of crimes and criminals; for, if we +should, our hearts will be hardened to everything which has a claim on +our benevolence. A kind Providence has placed in our breasts a hatred of +the unjust and cruel, in order that we may preserve ourselves from +cruelty and injustice. They who bear cruelty are accomplices in it. The +pretended gentleness which excludes that charitable rancor produces an +indifference which is half an approbation. They never will love where +they ought to love, who do not hate where they ought to hate. + +There is another piece of policy, not more laudable than this, in +reading these moral lectures, which lessens our hatred to criminals and +our pity to sufferers by insinuating that it has been owing to their +fault or folly that the latter have become the prey of the former. By +flattering us that we are not subject to the same vices and follies, it +induces a confidence that we shall not suffer the same evils by a +contact with the infamous gang of robbers who have thus robbed and +butchered our neighbors before our faces. We must not be flattered to +our ruin. Our vices are the same as theirs, neither more nor less. If +any faults we had, which wanted this French example to call us to a +"_softening_ of character, and a review of our social relations and +duties," there is yet no sign that we have commenced our reformation. We +seem, by the best accounts I have from the world, to go on just as +formerly, "some to undo, and some to be undone." There is no change at +all: and if we are not bettered by the sufferings of war, this peace, +which, for reasons to himself best known, the author fixes as the period +of our reformation, must have something very extraordinary in it; +because hitherto ease, opulence, and their concomitant pleasure have +never greatly disposed mankind to that serious reflection and review +which the author supposes to be the result of the approaching peace with +vice and crime. I believe he forms a right estimate of the nature of +this peace, and that it will want many of those circumstances which +formerly characterizes that state of things. + +If I am right in my ideas of this new republic, the different states of +peace and war will make no difference in her pursuits. It is not an +enemy of accident that we have to deal with. Enmity to us, and to all +civilized nations, is wrought into the very stamina of its Constitution. +It was made to pursue the purposes of that fundamental enmity. The +design will go on regularly in every position and in every relation. +Their hostility is to break us to their dominion; their amity is to +debauch us to their principles. In the former, we are to contend with +their force; in the latter, with their intrigues. But we stand in a very +different posture of defence in the two situations. In war, so long as +government is supported, we fight with the whole united force of the +kingdom. When under the name of peace the war of intrigue begins, we do +not contend against our enemies with the whole force of the kingdom. +No,--we shall have to fight, (if it should be a fight at all, and not an +ignominious surrender of everything which has made our country venerable +in our eyes and dear to our hearts,) we shall have to light with but a +portion of our strength against the whole of theirs. Gentlemen who not +long since thought with us, but who now recommend a Jacobin peace, were +at that time sufficiently aware of the existence of a dangerous Jacobin +faction within this kingdom. Awhile ago they seemed to be tremblingly +alive to the number of those who composed it, to their dark subtlety, to +their fierce audacity, to their admiration of everything that passes in +France, to their eager desire of a close communication with the mother +faction there. At this moment, when the question is upon the opening of +that communication, not a word of our English Jacobins. That faction is +put out of sight and out of thought. "It vanished at the crowing of the +cock." Scarcely had the Gallic harbinger of peace and light begun to +utter his lively notes, than all the cackling of us poor Tory geese to +alarm the garrison of the Capitol was forgot.[11] There was enough of +indemnity before. Now a complete act of oblivion is passed about the +Jacobins of England, though one would naturally imagine it would make a +principal object in all fair deliberation upon the merits of a project +of amity with the Jacobins of France. But however others may choose to +forget the faction, the faction does not choose to forget itself, nor, +however gentlemen may choose to flatter themselves, it does not forget +them. + +Never, in any civil contest, has a part been taken with more of the +warmth, or carried on with more of the arts of a party. The Jacobins are +worse than lost to their country. Their hearts are abroad. Their +sympathy with the Regicides of France is complete. Just as in a civil +contest, they exult in all their victories, they are dejected and +mortified in all their defeats. Nothing that the Regicides can do (and +they have labored hard for the purpose) can alienate them from their +cause. You and I, my dear Lord, have often observed on the spirit of +their conduct. When the Jacobins of France, by their studied, +deliberated, catalogued files of murders with the poniard, the sabre, +and the tribunal, have shocked whatever remained of human sensibility +in our breasts, then it was they distinguished the resources of party +policy. They did not venture directly to confront the public sentiment; +for a very short time they seemed to partake of it. They began with a +reluctant and sorrowful confession; they deplored the stains which +tarnished the lustre of a good cause. After keeping a decent time of +retirement, in a few days crept out an apology for the excesses of men +cruelly irritated by the attacks of unjust power. Grown bolder, as the +first feeling of mankind decayed and the color of these horrors began to +fade upon the imagination, they proceeded from apology to defence. They +urged, but still deplored, the absolute necessity of such a proceeding. +Then they made a bolder stride, and marched from defence to +recrimination. They attempted to assassinate the memory of those whose +bodies their friends had massacred, and to consider their murder as a +less formal act of justice. They endeavored even to debauch our pity, +and to suborn it in favor of cruelty. They wept over the lot of those +who were driven by the crimes of aristocrats to republican vengeance. +Every pause of their cruelty they considered as a return of their +natural sentiments of benignity and justice. Then they had recourse to +history, and found out all the recorded cruelties that deform the annals +of the world, in order that the massacres of the Regicides might pass +for a common event, and even that the most merciful of princes, who +suffered by their hands, should bear the iniquity of all the tyrants who +have at any time infested the earth. In order to reconcile us the better +to this republican tyranny, they confounded the bloodshed of war with +the murders of peace; and they computed how much greater prodigality of +blood was exhibited in battles and in the storm of cities than in the +frugal, well-ordered massacres of the revolutionary tribunals of France. + +As to foreign powers, so long as they were conjoined with Great Britain +in this contest, so long they were treated as the most abandoned +tyrants, and, indeed, the basest of the human race. The moment any of +them quits the cause of this government, and of all governments, he is +rehabilitated, his honor is restored, all attainders are purged. The +friends of Jacobins are no longer despots; the betrayers of the common +cause are no longer traitors. + +That you may not doubt that they look on this war as a civil war, and +the Jacobins of France as of their party, and that they look upon us, +though locally their countrymen, in reality as enemies, they have never +failed to run a parallel between our late civil war and this war with +the Jacobins of France. They justify their partiality to those Jacobins +by the partiality which was shown by several here to the Colonies, and +they sanction their cry for peace with the Regicides of France by some +of our propositions for peace with the English in America. + +This I do not mention as entering into the controversy how far they are +right or wrong in this parallel, but to show that they do make it, and +that they do consider themselves as of a party with the Jacobins of +France. You cannot forget their constant correspondence with the +Jacobins, whilst it was in their power to carry it on. When the +communication is again opened, the interrupted correspondence will +commence. We cannot be blind to the advantage which such a party affords +to Regicide France in all her views,--and, on the other hand, what an +advantage Regicide France holds out to the views of the republican party +in England. Slightly as they have considered their subject, I think this +can hardly have escaped the writers of political ephemerides for any +month or year. They have told us much of the amendment of the Regicides +of France, and of their returning honor and generosity. Have they told +anything of the reformation and of the returning loyalty of the Jacobins +of England? Have they told us of _their_ gradual softening towards +royalty? Have they told us what measures _they_ are taking for "putting +the crown in commission," and what approximations of any kind _they_ are +making towards the old Constitution of their country? Nothing of this. +The silence of these writers is dreadfully expressive. They dare not +touch the subject. But it is not annihilated by their silence, nor by +our indifference. It is but too plain that our Constitution cannot exist +with such a communication. Our humanity, our manners, our morals, our +religion, cannot stand with such a communication. The Constitution is +made by those things, and for those things: without them it cannot +exist; and without them it is no matter whether it exists or not. + +It was an ingenious Parliamentary Christmas play, by which, in both +Houses, you anticipated the holidays; it was a relaxation from your +graver employment; it was a pleasant discussion you had, which part of +the family of the Constitution was the elder branch,--whether one part +did not exist prior to the others, and whether it might exist and +flourish, if "the others were cast into the fire."[12] In order to make +this Saturnalian amusement general in the family, you sent it down +stairs, that judges and juries might partake of the entertainment. The +unfortunate antiquary and augur who is the butt of all this sport may +suffer in the roistering horse-play and practical jokes of the servants' +hall. But whatever may become of him, the discussion itself, and the +timing it, put me in mind of what I have read, (where I do not +recollect,) that the subtle nation of the Greeks were busily employed, +in the Church of Santa Sophia, in a dispute of mixed natural philosophy, +metaphysics, and theology, whether the light on Mount Tabor was created +or uncreated, and were ready to massacre the holders of the +unfashionable opinion, at the very moment when the ferocious enemy of +all philosophy and religion, Mahomet the Second, entered through a +breach into the capital of the Christian world. I may possibly suffer +much more than Mr. Reeves (I shall certainly give much more general +offence) for breaking in upon this constitutional amusement concerning +the created or uncreated nature of the two Houses of Parliament, and by +calling their attention to a problem which may entertain them less, but +which concerns them a great deal more,--that is, whether, with this +Gallic Jacobin fraternity, which they are desired by some writers to +court, all the parts of the government, about whose combustible or +incombustible qualities they are contending, may "not be cast into the +fire" together. He is a strange visionary (but he is nothing worse) who +fancies that any one part of our Constitution, whatever right of +primogeniture it may claim, or whatever astrologers may divine from its +horoscope, can possibly survive the others. As they have lived, so they +will die, together. I must do justice to the impartiality of the +Jacobins. I have not observed amongst _them_ the least predilection for +any of those parts. If there has been any difference in their malice, I +think they have shown a worse disposition to the House of Commons than +to the crown. As to the House of Lords, they do not speculate at all +about it, and for reasons that are too obvious to detail. + +The question will be concerning the effect of this French fraternity on +the whole mass. Have we anything to apprehend from Jacobin +communication, or have we not? If we have not, is it by our experience +before the war that we are to presume that after the war no dangerous +communion can exist between those who are well affected to the new +Constitution of France and ill affected to the old Constitution here? + +In conversation I have not yet found nor heard of any persons, except +those who undertake to instruct the public, so unconscious of the actual +state of things, or so little prescient of the future, who do not +shudder all over and feel a secret horror at the approach of this +communication. I do not except from this observation those who are +willing, more than I find myself disposed, to submit to this fraternity. +Never has it been mentioned in my hearing, or from what I can learn in +my inquiry, without the suggestion of an Alien Bill, or some other +measures of the same nature, as a defence against its manifest mischief. +Who does not see the utter insufficiency of such a remedy, if such a +remedy could be at all adopted? We expel suspected foreigners from +hence; and we suffer every Englishman to pass over into France to be +initiated in all the infernal discipline of the place, to cabal and to +be corrupted by every means of cabal and of corruption, and then to +return to England, charged with their worst dispositions and designs. In +France he is out of the reach of your police; and when he returns to +England, one such English emissary is worse than a legion of French, who +are either tongue-tied, or whose speech betrays them. But the worst +aliens are the ambassador and his train. These you cannot expel without +a proof (always difficult) of direct practice against the state. A +French ambassador, at the head of a French party, is an evil which we +have never experienced. The mischief is by far more visible than the +remedy. But, after all, every such measure as an Alien Bill is a measure +of hostility, a preparation for it, or a cause of dispute that shall +bring it on. In effect, it is fundamentally contrary to a relation of +amity, whose essence is a perfectly free communication. Everything done +to prevent it will provoke a foreign war. Everything, when we let it +proceed, will produce domestic distraction. We shall be in a perpetual +dilemma. But it is easy to see which side of the dilemma will be taken. +The same temper which brings us to solicit a Jacobin peace will induce +us to temporize with all the evils of it. By degrees our minds will be +made to our circumstances. The novelty of such things, which produces +half the horror and all the disgust, will be worn off. Our ruin will be +disguised in profit, and the sale of a few wretched baubles will bribe a +degenerate people to barter away the most precious jewel of their souls. +Our Constitution is not made for this kind of warfare. It provides +greatly for our happiness, it furnishes few means for our defence. It +is formed, in a great measure, upon the principle of jealousy of the +crown,--and as things stood, when it took that turn, with very great +reason. I go farther: it must keep alive some part of that fire of +jealousy eternally and chastely burning, or it cannot be the British +Constitution. At various periods we have had tyranny in this country, +more than enough. We have had rebellions with more or less +justification. Some of our kings have made adulterous connections +abroad, and trucked away for foreign gold the interests and glory of +their crown. But, before this time, our liberty has never been +corrupted. I mean to say, that it has never been debauched from its +domestic relations. To this time it has been English liberty, and +English liberty only. Our love of liberty and our love of our country +were not distinct things. Liberty is now, it seems, put upon a larger +and more liberal bottom. We are men,--and as men, undoubtedly, nothing +human is foreign to us. We cannot be too liberal in our general wishes +for the happiness of our kind. But in all questions on the mode of +procuring it for any particular community, we ought to be fearful of +admitting those who have no interest in it, or who have, perhaps, an +interest against it, into the consultation. Above all, we cannot be too +cautious in our communication with those who seek their happiness by +other roads than those of humanity, morals, and religion, and whose +liberty consists, and consists alone, in being free from those +restraints which are imposed by the virtues upon the passions. + +When we invite danger from a confidence in defensive measures, we ought, +first of all, to be sure that it is a species of danger against which +any defensive measures that can be adopted will be sufficient. Next, we +ought to know that the spirit of our laws, or that our own dispositions, +which are stronger than laws, are susceptible of all those defensive +measures which the occasion may require. A third consideration is, +whether these measures will not bring more odium than strength to +government; and the last, whether the authority that makes them, in a +general corruption of manners and principles, can insure their +execution. Let no one argue, from the state of things, as he sees them +at present, concerning what will be the means and capacities of +government, when the time arrives which shall call for remedies +commensurate to enormous evils. + +It is an obvious truth, that no constitution can defend itself: it must +be defended by the wisdom and fortitude of men. These are what no +constitution can give: they are the gifts of God; and He alone knows +whether we shall possess such gifts at the time we stand in need of +them. Constitutions furnish the civil means of getting at the natural: +it is all that in this case they can do. But our Constitution has more +impediments than helps. Its excellencies, when they come to be put to +this sort of proof, may be found among its defects. + +Nothing looks more awful and imposing than an ancient fortification. Its +lofty, embattled walls, its bold, projecting, rounded towers, that +pierce the sky, strike the imagination and promise inexpugnable +strength. But they are the very things that make its weakness. You may +as well think of opposing one of these old fortresses to the mass of +artillery brought by a French irruption into the field as to think of +resisting by your old laws and your old forms the new destruction which +the corps of Jacobin engineers of to-day prepare for all such forms and +all such laws. Besides the debility and false principle of their +construction to resist the present modes of attack, the fortress itself +is in ruinous repair, and there is a practicable breach in every part of +it. + +Such is the work. But miserable works have been defended by the +constancy of the garrison. Weather-beaten ships have been brought safe +to port by the spirit and alertness of the crew. But it is here that we +shall eminently fail. The day that, by their consent, the seat of +Regicide has its place among the thrones of Europe, there is no longer a +motive for zeal in their favor; it will at best be cold, unimpassioned, +dejected, melancholy duty. The glory will seem all on the other side. +The friends of the crown will appear, not as champions, but as victims; +discountenanced, mortified, lowered, defeated, they will fall into +listlessness and indifference. They will leave things to take their +course, enjoy the present hour, and submit to the common fate. + +Is it only an oppressive nightmare with which we have been loaded? Is +it, then, all a frightful dream, and are there no regicides in the +world? Have we not heard of that prodigy of a ruffian who would not +suffer his benignant sovereign, with his hands tied behind him, and +stripped for execution, to say one parting word to his deluded +people,--of Santerre, who commanded the drums and trumpets to strike up +to stifle his voice, and dragged him backward to the machine of murder! +This nefarious villain (for a few days I may call him so) stands high in +France, as in a republic of robbers and murderers he ought. What +hinders this monster from being sent as ambassador to convey to his +Majesty the first compliments of his brethren, the Regicide Directory? +They have none that can represent them more properly. I anticipate the +day of his arrival. He will make his public entry into London on one of +the pale horses of his brewery. As he knows that we are pleased with the +Paris taste for the orders of knighthood,[13] he will fling a bloody +sash across his shoulders, with the order of the holy guillotine +surmounting the crown appendant to the riband. Thus adorned, he will +proceed from Whitechapel to the further end of Pall Mall, all the music +of London playing the Marseillaise Hymn before him, and escorted by a +chosen detachment of the _Légion de l'Échafaud_. It were only to be +wished that no ill-fated loyalist, for the imprudence of his zeal, may +stand in the pillory at Charing Cross, under the statue of King Charles +the First, at the time of this grand procession, lest some of the rotten +eggs which the Constitutional Society shall let fly at his indiscreet +head may hit the virtuous murderer of his king. They might soil the +state dress which the ministers of so many crowned heads have admired, +and in which Sir Clement Cotterel is to introduce him at St. James's. + +If Santerre cannot be spared from the constitutional butcheries at home, +Tallien may supply his place, and, in point of figure, with advantage. +He has been habituated to commissions; and he is as well qualified as +Santerre for this. Nero wished the Roman people had but one neck. The +wish of the more exalted Tallien, when he sat in judgment, was, that his +sovereign had eighty-three heads, that he might send one to every one of +the Departments. Tallien will make an excellent figure at Guildhall at +the next Sheriff's feast. He may open the ball with my Lady Mayoress. +But this will be after he has retired from the public table, and gone +into the private room for the enjoyment of more social and unreserved +conversation with the ministers of state and the judges of the bench. +There these ministers and magistrates will hear him entertain the worthy +aldermen with an instructing and pleasing narrative of the manner in +which he made the rich citizens of Bordeaux squeak, and gently led them +by the public credit of the guillotine to disgorge their +anti-revolutionary pelf. + +All this will be the display, and the town-talk, when our regicide is on +a visit of ceremony. At home nothing will equal the pomp and splendor of +the _Hôtel de la République_. There another scene of gaudy grandeur will +be opened. When his Citizen Excellency keeps the festival, which every +citizen is ordered to observe, for the glorious execution of Louis the +Sixteenth, and renews his oath of detestation of kings, a grand ball of +course will be given on the occasion. Then what a hurly-burly! what a +crowding! what a glare of a thousand flambeaux in the square! what a +clamor of footmen contending at the door! what a rattling of a thousand +coaches of duchesses, countesses, and Lady Marys, choking the way, and +overturning each other, in a struggle who should be first to pay her +court to the _Citoyenne_, the spouse of the twenty-first husband, he +the husband of the thirty-first wife, and to hail her in the rank of +honorable matrons before the four days' duration of marriage is +expired!--Morals, as they were, decorum, the great outguard of the sex, +and the proud sentiment of honor, which makes virtue more respectable, +where it is, and conceals human frailty, where virtue may not be, will +be banished from this land of propriety, modesty, and reserve. + +We had before an ambassador from the most Christian King. We shall have +then one, perhaps two, as lately, from the most Anti-Christian Republic. +His chapel will be great and splendid, formed on the model of the Temple +of Reason at Paris; while the famous ode of the infamous Chénier will be +sung, and a prostitute of the street adored as a goddess. We shall then +have a French ambassador without a suspicion of Popery. One good it will +have: it will go some way in quieting the minds of that synod of zealous +Protestant lay elders who govern Ireland on the pacific principles of +polemic theology, and who now, from dread of the Pope, cannot take a +cool bottle of claret, or enjoy an innocent Parliamentary job, with any +tolerable quiet. + +So far as to the French communication here:--what will be the effect of +our communication there? We know that our new brethren, whilst they +everywhere shut up the churches, increased in Paris, at one time at +least fourfold, the opera-houses, the playhouses, the public shows of +all kinds; and even in their state of indigence and distress, no expense +was spared for their equipment and decoration. They were made an affair +of state. There is no invention of seduction, never wholly wanting in +that place, that has not been increased,--brothels, gaming-houses, +everything. And there is no doubt, but, when they are settled in a +triumphant peace, they will carry all these arts to their utmost +perfection, and cover them with every species of imposing magnificence. +They have all along avowed them as a part of their policy; and whilst +they corrupt young minds through pleasure, they form them to crimes. +Every idea of corporal gratification is carried to the highest excess, +and wooed with all the elegance that belongs to the senses. All elegance +of mind and manners is banished. A theatrical, bombastic, windy +phraseology of heroic virtue, blended and mingled up with a worse +dissoluteness, and joined to a murderous and savage ferocity, forms the +tone and idiom of their language and their manners. Any one, who attends +to all their own descriptions, narratives, and dissertations, will find +in that whole place more of the air of a body of assassins, banditti, +housebreakers, and outlawed smugglers, joined to that of a gang of +strolling players expelled from and exploded orderly theatres, with +their prostitutes in a brothel, at their debauches and bacchanals, than +anything of the refined and perfected virtues, or the polished, +mitigated vices of a great capital. + +Is it for this benefit we open "the usual relations of peace and amity"? +Is it for this our youth of both sexes are to form themselves by travel? +Is it for this that with expense and pains we form their lisping infant +accents to the language of France? I shall be told that this abominable +medley is made rather to revolt young and ingenuous minds. So it is in +the description. So perhaps it may in reality to a chosen few. So it may +be, when the magistrate, the law, and the church frown on such manners, +and the wretches to whom they belong,--when they are chased from the +eye of day, and the society of civil life, into night-cellars and caves +and woods. But when these men themselves are the magistrates,--when all +the consequence, weight, and authority of a great nation adopt +them,--when we see them conjoined with victory, glory, power, and +dominion, and homage paid to them by every government,--it is not +possible that the downhill should not be slid into, recommended by +everything which has opposed it. Let it be remembered that no young man +can go to any part of Europe without taking this place of pestilential +contagion in his way; and whilst the less active part of the community +will be debauched by this travel, whilst children are poisoned at these +schools, our trade will put the finishing hand to our ruin. No factory +will be settled in France, that will not become a club of complete +French Jacobins. The minds of young men of that description will receive +a taint in their religion, their morals, and their politics, which they +will in a short time communicate to the whole kingdom. + +Whilst everything prepares the body to debauch and the mind to crime, a +regular church of avowed atheism, established by law, with a direct and +sanguinary persecution of Christianity, is formed to prevent all +amendment and remorse. Conscience is formally deposed from its dominion +over the mind. What fills the measure of horror is, that schools of +atheism are set up at the public charge in every part of the country. +That some English parents will be wicked enough to send their children +to such schools there is no doubt. Better this island should be sunk to +the bottom of the sea than that (so far as human infirmity admits) it +should not be a country of religion and morals! + +With all these causes of corruption, we may well judge what the general +fashion of mind will be through both sexes and all conditions. Such +spectacles and such examples will overbear all the laws that ever +blackened the cumbrous volumes of our statutes. When royalty shall have +disavowed itself,--when it shall have relaxed all the principles of its +own support,--when it has rendered the system of Regicide fashionable, +and received it as triumphant, in the very persons who have consolidated +that system by the perpetration, of every crime, who have not only +massacred the prince, but the very laws and magistrates which were the +support of royalty, and slaughtered with an indiscriminate proscription, +without regard to either sex or age, every person that was suspected of +an inclination to king, law, or magistracy,--I say, will any one dare to +be loyal? Will any one presume, against both authority and opinion, to +hold up this unfashionable, antiquated, exploded Constitution? + +The Jacobin faction in England must grow in strength and audacity; it +will be supported by other intrigues and supplied by other resources +than yet we have seen in action. Confounded at its growth, the +government may fly to Parliament for its support. But who will answer +for the temper of a House of Commons elected under these circumstances? +Who will answer for the courage of a House of Commons to arm the crown +with the extraordinary powers that it may demand? But the ministers will +not venture to ask half of what they know they want. They will lose half +of that half in the contest; and when they have obtained their nothing, +they will be driven by the cries of faction either to demolish the +feeble works they have thrown up in a hurry, or, in effect, to abandon +them. As to the House of Lords, it is not worth mentioning. The peers +ought naturally to be the pillars of the crown; but when their titles +are rendered contemptible, and their property invidious, and a part of +their weakness, and not of their strength, they will be found so many +degraded and trembling individuals, who will seek by evasion to put off +the evil day of their ruin. Both Houses will be in perpetual oscillation +between abortive attempts at energy and still more unsuccessful attempts +at compromise. You will be impatient of your disease, and abhorrent of +your remedy. A spirit of subterfuge and a tone of apology will enter +into all your proceedings, whether of law or legislation. Your judges, +who now sustain so masculine an authority, will appear more on their +trial than the culprits they have before them. The awful frown of +criminal justice will be smoothed into the silly smile of seduction. +Judges will think to insinuate and soothe the accused into conviction +and condemnation, and to wheedle to the gallows the most artful of all +delinquents. But they will not be so wheedled. They will not submit even +to the appearance of persons on their trial. Their claim to this +exemption will be admitted. The place in which some of the greatest +names which ever distinguished the history of this country have stood +will appear beneath their dignity. The criminal will climb from the dock +to the side-bar, and take his place and his tea with the counsel. From +the bar of the counsel, by a natural progress, he will ascend to the +bench, which long before had been virtually abandoned. They who escape +from justice will not suffer a question upon reputation. They will take +the crown of the causeway; they will be revered as martyrs; they will +triumph as conquerors. Nobody will dare to censure that popular part of +the tribunal whose only restraint on misjudgment is the censure of the +public. They who find fault with the decision will be represented as +enemies to the institution. Juries that convict for the crown will be +loaded with obloquy. The juries who acquit will be held up as models of +justice. If Parliament orders a prosecution, and fails, (as fail it +will,) it will be treated to its face as guilty of a conspiracy +maliciously to prosecute. Its care in discovering a conspiracy against +the state will be treated as a forged plot to destroy the liberty of the +subject: every such discovery, instead of strengthening government, will +weaken its reputation. + +In this state things will be suffered to proceed, lest measures of vigor +should precipitate a crisis. The timid will act thus from character, the +wise from necessity. Our laws had done all that the old condition of +things dictated to render our judges erect and independent; but they +will naturally fail on the side upon which they had taken no +precautions. The judicial magistrates will find themselves safe as +against the crown, whose will is not their tenure; the power of +executing their office will be held at the pleasure of those who deal +out fame or abuse as they think fit. They will begin rather to consult +their own repose and their own popularity than the critical and perilous +trust that is in their hands. They will speculate on consequences, when +they see at court an ambassador whose robes are lined with a scarlet +dyed in the blood of judges. It is no wonder, nor are they to blame, +when they are to consider how they shall answer for their conduct to the +criminal of to-day turned into the magistrate of to-morrow. + +The press------ + +The army------ + +When thus the helm of justice is abandoned, an universal abandonment of +all other posts will succeed. Government will be for a while the sport +of contending factions, who, whilst they fight with one another, will +all strike at her. She will be buffeted and beat forward and backward by +the conflict of those billows, until at length, tumbling from the Gallic +coast, the victorious tenth wave shall ride, like the bore, over all the +rest, and poop the shattered, weather-beaten, leaky, water-logged +vessel, and sink her to the bottom of the abyss. + +Among other miserable remedies that have been found in the _materia +medica_, of the old college, a change of ministry will be proposed, and +probably will take place. They who go out can never long with zeal and +good-will support government in the hands of those they hate. In a +situation of fatal dependence on popularity, and without one aid from +the little remaining power of the crown, it is not to be expected that +they will take on them that odium which more or less attaches upon every +exertion of strong power. The ministers of popularity will lose all +their credit at a stroke, if they pursue any of those means necessary to +give life, vigor, and consistence to government. They will be considered +as venal wretches, apostates, recreant to all their own principles, +acts, and declarations. They cannot preserve their credit, but by +betraying that authority of which they are the guardians. + +To be sure, no prognosticating symptoms of these things have as yet +appeared,--nothing even resembling their beginnings. May they never +appear! May these prognostications of the author be justly laughed at +and speedily forgotten! If nothing as yet to cause them has discovered +itself, let us consider, in the author's excuse, that we have not yet +seen a Jacobin legation in England. The natural, declared, sworn ally of +sedition has not yet fixed its head-quarters in London. + +There never was a political contest, upon better or worse grounds, that +by the heat of party-spirit may not ripen into civil confusion. If ever +a party adverse to the crown should be in a condition here publicly to +declare itself, and to divide, however unequally, the natural force of +the kingdom, they are sure of an aid of fifty thousand men, at ten days' +warning, from the opposite coast of France. But against this infusion of +a foreign force the crown has its guaranties, old and new. But I should +be glad to hear something said of the assistance which loyal subjects in +France have received from other powers in support of that lawful +government which secured their lawful property. I should be glad to +know, if they are so disposed to a neighborly, provident, and +sympathetic attention to their public engagements, by what means they +are to come at us. Is it from the powerful states of Holland we are to +reclaim our guaranty? Is it from the King of Prussia, and his steady +good affections, and his powerful navy, that we are to look for the +guaranty of our security? Is it from the Netherlands, which the French +may cover with the swarms of their citizen-soldiers in twenty-four +hours, that we are to look for this assistance? This is to suppose, too, +that all these powers have no views offensive or necessities defensive +of their own. They will cut out work for one another, and France will +cut out work for them all. + +That the Christian religion cannot exist in this country with such a +fraternity will not, I think, be disputed with me. On that religion, +according to our mode, all our laws and institutions stand, as upon +their base. That scheme is supposed in every transaction of life; and if +that were done away, everything else, as in France, must be changed +along with it. Thus, religion perishing, and with it this Constitution, +it is a matter of endless meditation what order of things would follow +it. But what disorder would fill the space between the present and that +which is to come, in the gross, is no matter of doubtful conjecture. It +is a great evil, that of a civil war. But, in that state of things, a +civil war, which would give to good men and a good cause some means of +struggle, is a blessing of comparison that England will not enjoy. The +moment the struggle begins, it ends. They talk of Mr. Hume's euthanasia +of the British Constitution gently expiring, without a groan, in the +paternal arms of a mere monarchy. In a monarchy!--fine trifling +indeed!--there is no such euthanasia for the British Constitution. + + * * * * * + +The manuscript copy of this Letter ends here. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[9] Here I have fallen into an unintentional mistake. Rider's Almanack +for 1794 lay before me; and, in troth, I then had no other. For variety, +that sage astrologer has made some small changes on the weather side of +1795; but the caution is the same on the opposite page of instruction. + +[10] _Souverains opprimés_.--See the whole proceeding in the +_Procès-Verbal_ of the National Assembly. + +[11] + + Hic auratis volitans argenteus anser + Porticibus GALLOS in limine adesse canebat. + + + +[12] See debates in Parliament upon motions made in both Houses for +prosecuting Mr. Reeves for a libel upon the Constitution, Dec., 1795. + +[13] "In the costume assumed by the members of the legislative body we +almost behold the revival of the extinguished insignia of knighthood," +&c., &c.--See _A View of the Relative State of Great Britain and France +at the Commencement of the Year_ 1796. + + + + +A + +LETTER + +TO + +THE EMPRESS OF RUSSIA. + +NOVEMBER 1, 1791. + + +Madam,--The Comte de Woronzow, your Imperial Majesty's minister, and Mr. +Fawkener, have informed me of the very gracious manner in which your +Imperial Majesty, and, after your example, the Archduke and Archduchess, +have condescended to accept my humble endeavors in the service of that +cause which connects the rights and duties of sovereigns with the true +interest and happiness of their people. + +If, confiding in titles derived from your own goodness, I venture to +address directly to your Imperial Majesty the expressions of my +gratitude for so distinguished an honor, I hope it will not be thought a +presumptuous intrusion. I hope, too, that the willing homage I pay to +the high and ruling virtues which distinguish your Imperial Majesty, and +which form the felicity of so large a part of the world, will not be +looked upon as the language of adulation to power and greatness. In my +humble situation, I can behold majesty in its splendor without being +dazzled, and I am capable of respecting it in its fall. + +It is, Madam, from my strong sense of what is due to dignity in +undeserved misfortune, that I am led to felicitate your Imperial Majesty +on the use you have lately made of your power. The princes and nobility +of France, who from honor and duty, from blood and from principle, are +attached to that unhappy crown, have experienced your favor and +countenance; and there is no doubt that they will finally enjoy the full +benefit of your protection. The generosity of your Imperial Majesty has +induced you to take an interest in their cause; and your sagacity has +made you perceive that in the case of the sovereign of France the cause +of all sovereigns is tried,--that in the case of its church, the cause +of all churches,--and that in the case of its nobility is tried the +cause of all the respectable orders of all society, and even of society +itself. + +Your Imperial Majesty has sent your minister to reside where the crown +of France, in this disastrous eclipse of royalty, can alone truly and +freely be represented, that is, in its royal blood,--where alone the +nation can be represented, that is, in its natural and inherent dignity. +A throne cannot be represented by a prison. The honor of a nation cannot +be represented by an assembly which disgraces and degrades it: at +Coblentz only the king and the nation of France are to be found. + +Your Imperial Majesty, who reigns and lives for glory, has nobly and +wisely disdained to associate your crown with a faction which has for +its object the subversion of all thrones. + +You have not recognized this universal public enemy as a part of the +system of Europe. You have refused to sully the lustre of your empire by +any communion with a body of fanatical usurpers and tyrants, drawn out +of the dregs of society, and exalted to their evil eminence by the +enormity of their crimes,--an assemblage of tyrants, wholly destitute of +any distinguished qualification in a single person amongst them, that +can command reverence from our reason, or seduce it from our +prejudices. These enemies of sovereigns, if at all acknowledged, must be +acknowledged on account of that enmity alone: they have nothing else to +recommend them. + +Madam, it is dangerous to praise any human virtue before the +accomplishment of the tasks which it imposes on itself. But in +expressing my part of what I hope is, or will become, the general voice, +in admiration of what you have done, I run no risk at all. With your +Imperial Majesty, declaration and execution, beginning and conclusion, +are, at their different seasons, one and the same thing. + +On the faith and declaration of some of the first potentates of Europe, +several thousands of persons, comprehending the best men and the best +gentlemen in France, have given up their country, their houses, their +fortunes, their professional situation, their all, and are now in +foreign lands, struggling under the most grievous distresses. Whatever +appearances may menace, nobody fears that they can be finally abandoned. +Such a dereliction could not be without a strong imputation on the +public and private honor of sovereignty itself, nor without an +irreparable injury to its interests. It would give occasion to represent +monarchs as natural enemies to each other, and that they never support +or countenance any subjects of a brother prince, except when they rebel +against him. We individuals, mere spectators of the scene, but who sock +our liberties under the shade of legal authority, and of course +sympathize with the sufferers in that cause, never can permit ourselves +to believe that such an event can disgrace the history of our time. The +only thing to be feared is delay, in winch are included many mischiefs. +The constancy of the oppressed will be broken; the power of tyrants +will be confirmed. Already the multitude of French officers, drawn from +their several corps by hopes inspired by the freely declared disposition +of sovereigns, have left all the posts in which they might one day have +effectually served the good cause abandoned to the enemy. + +Tour Imperial Majesty's just influence, which is still greater than your +extensive power, will animate and expedite the efforts of other +sovereigns. From your wisdom other states will learn that they who wait +until all the powers of Europe are at once in motion can never move at +all. It would add to the unexampled calamities of our time, if the +uncommon union of sentiment in so many powers should prove the very +cause of defeating the benefit which ought to flow from their general +good disposition. No sovereign can run any risk from the designs of +other powers, whilst engaged in tins glorious and necessary work. If any +attempt could be feared, your Imperial Majesty's power and justice would +secure your allies against all danger. Madam, your glory will be +complete, if, after having given peace to Europe by your moderation, you +shall bestow stability on all its governments by your vigor and +decision. The debt which your Imperial Majesty's august predecessors +have contracted to the ancient manners of Europe, by means of which they +civilized a vast empire, will be nobly repaid by preserving those +manners from the hideous change with which they are now menaced. By the +intervention of Russia the world will be preserved from barbarism and +ruin. + +A private individual, of a remote country, in himself wholly without +importance, unauthorized and unconnected, not as an English subject, +but as a citizen of the world, presumes to submit his thoughts to one of +the greatest and wisest sovereigns that Europe has seen. He does it +without fear, because he does not involve in his weakness (if such it +is) his king, his country, or his friends. He is not' afraid that he +shall offend your Imperial Majesty,--because, secure in itself, true +greatness is always accessible, and because respectfully to speak what +we conceive to be truth is the best homage which can be paid to true +dignity. + +I am, Madam, with the utmost possible respect and veneration, + +Your Imperial Majesty's + +Most obedient and most humble servant, + +EDM. BURKE. + +BEACONSFIELD, November 1st, 1791. + + + + +A + +LETTER + +TO + +SIR CHARLES BINGHAM, BART., + +ON THE + +IRISH ABSENTEE TAX. + +OCTOBER 30, 1773. + + +NOTE. + + + From authentic documents found with the copy of this Letter + among Mr. Burke's papers, it appears that in the year 1773 a + project of imposing a tax upon all proprietors of landed + estates in Ireland, whose ordinary residence should be in + Great Britain, had been adopted and avowed by his Majesty's + ministers at that time. A remonstrance against this measure, + as highly unjust and impolitic, was presented to the + ministers by several of the principal Irish absentees, and + the project was subsequently abandoned. + + +LETTER. + +Dear Sir,--I am much flattered by your very obliging letter, and the +rather because it promises an opening to our future correspondence. This +may be my only indemnification for very great losses. One of the most +odious parts of the proposed Absentee Tax is its tendency to separate +friends, and to make as ugly breaches in private society as it must make +in the unity of the great political body. I am sure that much of the +satisfaction of some circles in London will be lost by it. Do you think +that our friend Mrs. Vesey will suffer her husband to vote for a tax +that is to destroy the evenings at Bolton Row? I trust we shall have +other supporters of the same sex, equally powerful, and equally +deserving to be so, who will not abandon the common cause of their own +liberties and our satisfactions. We shall be barbarized on both sides of +the water, if we do not see one another now and then. _We_ shall sink +into surly, brutish Johns, and _you_ will degenerate into wild Irish. It +is impossible that we should be the wiser or the more agreeable, +certainly we shall not love one another the better, for this forced +separation, which our ministers, who have already done so much for the +dissolution of every other sort of good connection, are now meditating +for the further improvement of this too well united empire. Their next +step will be to encourage all the colonies, about thirty separate +governments, to keep their people from all intercourse with each other +and with the mother country. A gentleman of New York or Barbadoes will +be as much gazed at as a strange animal from Nova Zembla or Otaheite; +and those rogues, the travellers, will tell us what stories they please +about poor old Ireland. + +In all seriousness, (though I am a great deal more than half serious in +what I have been saying,) I look upon this projected tax in a very evil +light; I think it is not advisable; I am sure it is not necessary; and +as it is not a mere matter of finance, but involves a political question +of much, importance, I consider the principle and precedent as far worse +than the thing itself. You are too kind in imagining I can suggest +anything new upon the subject. The objections to it are very glaring, +and must strike the eyes of all those who have not their reasons for +shutting them against evident truth. I have no feelings or opinions on +this subject which I do not partake with all the sensible and informed +people that I meet with. At first I could scarcely meet with any one who +could believe that this scheme originated from the English government. +They considered it not only as absurd, but as something monstrous and +unnatural. In the first instance, it strikes at the power of this +country; in the end, at the union of the whole empire. I do not mean to +express, most certainly I do not entertain in my mind, anything +invidious concerning the superintending authority of Great Britain. But +if it be true that the several bodies which make up this complicated +mass are to be preserved as one empire, an authority sufficient to +preserve that unity, and by its equal weight and pressure to +consolidate the various parts that compose it, must reside somewhere: +that somewhere can only be in England. Possibly any one member, +distinctly taken, might decide in favor of that residence within itself; +but certainly no member would give its voice for any other except this. +So that I look upon the residence of the supreme power to be settled +here: not by force, or tyranny, or even by mere long usage, but by the +very nature of things, and the joint consent of the whole body. + +If all this be admitted, then without question this country must have +the sole right to the imperial legislation: by which I mean that law +which regulates the polity and economy of the several parts, as they +relate to one another and to the whole. But if any of the parts, which +(not for oppression, but for order) are placed in a subordinate +situation, will assume to themselves the power of hindering or checking +the resort of their municipal subjects to the centre, or even to any +other part of the empire, they arrogate to themselves the imperial +rights, which do not, which cannot, belong to them, and, so far as in +them lies, destroy the happy arrangement of the entire empire. + +A free communication by _discretionary residence_ is necessary to all +the other purposes of communication. For what purpose are the Irish and +Plantation laws sent hither, but as means of preserving this sovereign +constitution? Whether such a constitution was originally right or wrong +this is not the time of day to dispute. If any evils arise from it, let +us not strip it of what may be useful in it. By taking the English Privy +Council into your legislature, you obtain a new, a further, and possibly +a more liberal consideration of all your acts. If a local legislature +shall by oblique means tend to deprive any of the people of this +benefit, and shall make it penal to them to follow into England the laws +which may affect them, then the English Privy Council will have to +decide upon your acts without those lights that may enable them to judge +upon what grounds you made them, or how far they ought to be modified, +received, or rejected. + +To what end is the ultimate appeal in judicature lodged in this kingdom, +if men may be disabled from following their suits here, and may be taxed +into an absolute _denied of justice_? You observe, my dear Sir, that I +do not assert that in all cases two shillings will necessarily cut off +this means of correcting legislative and judicial mistakes, and thus +amount to a denial of justice. I might, indeed, state cases in which +this very quantum of tax would be fully sufficient to defeat this right. +But I argue not on the case, but on the principle, and I am sure the +principle implies it. They who may restrain may prohibit; they who may +impose two shillings may impose ten shillings in the pound; and those +who may condition the tax to six months' annual absence may carry that +condition to six weeks, or even to six days, and thereby totally defeat +the wise means which have been provided for extensive and impartial +justice, and for orderly, well-poised, and well-connected government. + +What is taxing the resort to and residence in any place, but declaring +that your connection with that place is a grievance? Is not such an +Irish tax as is now proposed a virtual declaration that England is a +foreign country, and a renunciation on your part of the principle of +_common naturalization_, which runs through this whole empire? + +Do you, or does any Irish gentleman, think it a mean privilege, that, +the moment he sets his foot upon this ground, he is to all intents and +purposes an Englishman? You will not be pleased with a law which by its +operation tends to disqualify you from a seat in this Parliament; and if +your own virtue or fortune, or if that of your children, should carry +you or them to it, should you like to be excluded from the possibility +of a peerage in this kingdom? If in Ireland we lay it down as a maxim, +that a residence in Great Britain is a political evil, and to be +discouraged by penal taxes, you must necessarily reject all the +privileges and benefits which are connected with such a residence. + +I can easily conceive that a citizen of Dublin, who looks no further +than his counter, may think that Ireland will be repaid for such a loss +by any small diminution of taxes, or any increase in the circulation of +money that may be laid out in the purchase of claret or groceries in his +corporation. In such a man an error of that kind, as it would be +natural, would be excusable. But I cannot think that any educated man, +any man who looks with an enlightened eye on the interest of Ireland, +can believe that it is not highly for the advantage of Ireland, that +this Parliament, which, whether right or wrong, whether we will or not, +will make some laws to bind Ireland, should always have in it some +persons who by connection, by property, or by early prepossessions and +affections, are attached to the welfare of that country. I am so clear +upon this point, not only from the clear reason of the thing, but from +the constant course of my observation, by now having sat eight sessions +in Parliament, that I declare it to you as my sincere opinion, that (if +you must do either the one or the other) it would be wiser by far, and +far better for Ireland, that some new privileges should attend the +estates of Irishmen, members of the two Houses here, than that their +characters should be stained by penal impositions, and their properties +loaded by unequal and unheard-of modes of taxation. I do really trust, +that, when the matter comes a little to be considered, a majority of our +gentlemen will never consent to establish such a principle of +disqualification against themselves and their posterity, and, for the +sake of gratifying the schemes of a transitory administration of the +cockpit or the castle, or in compliance with the lightest part of the +most vulgar and transient popularity, fix so irreparable an injury on +the permanent interest of their country. + +This law seems, therefore, to me to go directly against the fundamental +points of the legislative and judicial constitution of these kingdoms, +and against the happy communion of their privileges. But there is +another matter in the tax proposed, that contradicts as essentially a +very great principle necessary for preserving the union of the various +parts of a state; because it does, in effect, discountenance mutual +intermarriage and inheritance, things that bind countries more closely +together than any laws or constitutions whatsoever. Is it right that a +woman who marries into Ireland, and perhaps well purchases her jointure +or her dower there, should not after her husband's death have it in her +choice to return to her country and her friends without being taxed for +it? If an Irish heiress should marry into an English family, and that +great property in both countries should thereby come to be united in +this common issue, shall the descendant of that marriage abandon his +natural connection, his family interests, his public and his private +duties, and be compelled to take up his residence in Ireland? Is there +any sense or any justice in it, unless you affirm that there should be +no such intermarriage and no such mutual inheritance between the +natives? Is there a shadow of reason, that, because a Lord Rockingham, a +Duke of Devonshire, a Sir George Savile, possess property in Ireland, +which has descended to them without any act of theirs, they should +abandon their duty in Parliament, and spend the winters in Dublin? or, +having spent the session in Westminster, must they abandon their seats +and all their family interests in Yorkshire and Derbyshire, and pass the +rest of the year in Wicklow, in Cork, or Tyrone? + +See what the consequence must be from a municipal legislature +considering itself as an unconnected body, and attempting to enforce a +partial residence. A man may have property in more parts than two of +this empire. He may have property in Jamaica and in North America, as +well as in England and Ireland. I know some that have property in all of +them. What shall we say to this case? After the poor distracted citizen +of the whole empire has, in compliance with your partial law, removed +his family, bid adieu to his connections, and settled himself quietly +and snug in a pretty box by the Liffey, he hears that the Parliament of +Great Britain is of opinion that all English estates ought to be spent +in England, and that they will tax him double, if he does not return. +Suppose him then (if the nature of the two laws will permit it) +providing a flying camp, and dividing his year as well as he can +between England and Ireland, and at the charge of two town houses and +two country-houses in both kingdoms; in this situation he receives an +account, that a law is transmitted from Jamaica, and another from +Pennsylvania, to tax absentees from these provinces, which are +impoverished by the European residence of the possessors of their lands. +How is he to escape this _ricochet_ cross-firing of so many opposite +batteries of police and regulation? If he attempts to comply, he is +likely to be more a citizen of the Atlantic Ocean and the Irish Sea than +of any of these countries. The matter is absurd and ridiculous, and, +while ever the idea of mutual marriages, inheritances, purchases, and +privileges subsist, can never be carried into execution with common +sense or common justice. + +I do not know how gentlemen of Ireland reconcile such an idea to their +own liberties, or to the natural use and enjoyment of their estates. If +any of their children should be left in a minority, and a guardian +should think, as many do, (it matters not whether properly or no,) that +his ward had better he educated in a school or university here than in +Ireland, is he sure that he can justify the bringing a tax of ten per +cent, perhaps twenty, on his pupil's estate, by giving what in his +opinion is the best education in general, or the best for that pupil's +particular character and circumstances? Can he justify his sending him +to travel, a necessary part of the higher style of education, and, +notwithstanding what some narrow writers have said, of great benefit to +all countries, but very particularly so to Ireland? Suppose a guardian, +under the authority or pretence of such a tax of police, had prevented +our dear friend, Lord Charlemont, from going abroad, would he have lost +no satisfaction? would his friends have lost nothing in the companion? +would his country have lost nothing in the cultivated taste with which +he has adorned it in so many ways? His natural elegance of mind would +undoubtedly do a great deal; but I will venture to assert, without the +danger of being contradicted, that he adorns his present residence in +Ireland much the more for having resided a long time out of it. Will Mr. +Flood himself think he ought to have been driven by taxes into Ireland, +whilst he prepared himself by an English education to understand and to +defend the rights of the subject in Ireland, or to support the dignity +of government there, according as his opinions, or the situation of +things, may lead him to take either part, upon respectable principles? I +hope it is not forgot that an Irish act of Parliament sends its youth to +England for the study of the law, and compels a residence in the inns of +court hero for some years. Will you send out with one breath and recall +with another? This act plainly provides for that intercourse which +supposes the strictest union in laws and policy, in both which the +intended tax supposes an entire separation. + +It would be endless to go into all the inconveniences this tax will lead +to, in the conduct of private life, and the use of property. How many +infirm people are obliged to change their climate, whose life depends +upon that change! How many families straitened in their circumstances +are there, who, from the shame, sometimes from the utter impossibility +otherwise of retrenching, are obliged to remove from their country, in +order to preserve their estates in their families! You begin, then, to +burden these people precisely at the time when their circumstances of +health and fortune render them rather objects of relief and +commiseration. + +I know very well that a great proportion of the money of every +subordinate country will flow towards the metropolis. This is +unavoidable. Other inconveniences, too, will result to particular parts: +and why? Why, because they are particular parts,--each a member of a +greater, and not an whole within itself. But those members are to +consider whether these inconveniences are not fully balanced, perhaps +more than balanced, by the united strength of a great and compact body. +I am sensible, too, of a difficulty that will be started against the +application of some of the principles which I reason upon to the case of +Ireland. It will be said, that Ireland, in many particulars, is not +bound to consider itself as a part of the British body; because this +country, in many instances, is mistaken enough to treat you as +foreigners, and draws away your money by absentees, without suffering +you to enjoy your natural advantages in trade and commerce. No man +living loves restrictive regulations of any kind less than myself; at +best, nine times in ten, they are little better than laborious and +vexatious follies. Often, as in your case, they are great oppressions, +as well as great absurdities. But still an injury is not always a reason +for retaliation; nor is the folly of others with regard to us a reason +for imitating it with regard to them. Before we attempt to retort, we +ought to consider whether we may not injure ourselves even more than our +adversary; since, in the contest who shall go the greatest length in +absurdity, the victor is generally the greatest sufferer. Besides, when +there is an unfortunate emulation in restraints and oppressions, the +question of _strength_ is of the highest importance. It little becomes +the feeble to be unjust. Justice is the shield of the weak; and when +they choose to lay this down, and fight naked in the contest of mere +power, the event will be what must be expected from such imprudence. + +I ought to beg your pardon for running into this length. You want no +arguments to convince you on this subject, and you want no resources of +matter to convince others. I ought, too, to ask pardon for having +delayed my answer so long; but I received your letter on Tuesday, in +town, and I was obliged to come to the country on business. From the +country I write at present; but this day I shall go to town again. I +shall see Lord Rockingham, who has spared neither time nor trouble in +making a vigorous opposition to this inconsiderate measure. I hope to be +able to send you the papers which will give you information of the steps +he has taken. He has pursued this business with the foresight, +diligence, and good sense with which he generally resists +unconstitutional attempts of government. A life of disinterestedness, +generosity, and public spirit are his titles to have it believed that +the effect which the tax may have upon his private property is not the +sole nor the principal motive to his exertions. I know he is of opinion +that the opposition in Ireland ought to be carried on with that spirit +as if no aid was expected from this country, and here as if nothing +would be done in Ireland: many things have been lost by not acting in +this manner. + +I am told that you are not likely to be alone in the generous stand you +are to make against this unnatural monster of court popularity. It is +said, Mr. Hussey, who is so very considerable at present, and who is +everything in expectation, will give you his assistance. I rejoice to +see (that very rare spectacle) a good mind, a great genius, and public +activity united together, and united so early in life. By not running +into every popular humor, he may depend upon it, the popularity of his +character will wear the better. + + Non ponebat enim rumores ante salutem; + Ergo postque magisque viri nunc gloria claret. + +Adieu, my dear Sir. Give my best respects to Lady Bingham; and believe +me, with great truth and esteem, + +Your most obedient and most humble servant, + +EDM. BURKE. + +BEACONSFIELD, 30th October, 1773. + +TO SIR CHARLES BINGHAM. + + + + +A + +LETTER + +TO + +THE HON. CHARLES JAMES FOX, + +ON THE AMERICAN WAR. + +OCTOBER 8, 1777. + + +My Dear Charles,--I am, on many accounts, exceedingly pleased with your +journey to Ireland. I do not think it was possible to dispose better of +the interval between this and the meeting of Parliament. I told you as +much, in the same general terms, by the post. My opinion of the +infidelity of that conveyance hindered me from being particular. I now +sit down with malice prepense to kill you with a very long letter, and +must take my chance for some safe method of conveying the dose. Before I +say anything to you of the place you are in, or the business of it, on +which, by the way, a great deal might be said, I will turn myself to the +concluding part of your letter from Chatsworth. + +You are sensible that I do not differ from you in many things; and most +certainly I do not dissent from the main of your doctrine concerning the +heresy of depending upon contingencies. You must recollect how uniform +my sentiments have been on that subject. I have ever wished a settled +plan of our own, founded in the very essence of the American business, +wholly unconnected with the events of the war, and framed in such a +manner as to keep up our credit and maintain our system at home, in +spite of anything which may happen abroad. I am now convinced, by a long +and somewhat vexatious experience, that such a plan is absolutely +impracticable. I think with you, that some faults in the constitution +of those whom we must love and trust are among the causes of this +impracticability; they are faults, too, that one can hardly wish them +perfectly cured of, as I am afraid they are intimately connected with +honest, disinterested intentions, plentiful fortunes, assured rank, and +quiet homes. A great deal of activity and enterprise can scarcely ever +be expected from such men, unless some horrible calamity is just over +their heads, or unless they suffer some gross personal insults from +power, the resentment of which may be as unquiet and stimulating a +principle in their minds as ambition is in those of a different +complexion. To say the truth, I cannot greatly blame them. We live at a +time when men are not repaid in fame for what they sacrifice in interest +or repose. + +On the whole, when I consider of what discordant, and particularly of +what fleeting materials the opposition has been all along composed, and +at the same time review what Lord Rockingham has done, with that and +with his own shattered constitution, for these last twelve years, I +confess I am rather surprised that he has done so much and persevered so +long, than that he has felt now and then some cold fits, and that he +grows somewhat languid and desponding at last. I know that he, and those +who are much prevalent with him, though they are not thought so much +devoted to popularity as others, do very much look to the people, and +more than I think is wise in them, who do so little to guide and direct +the public opinion. Without this they act, indeed; but they act as it +were from compulsion, and because it is impossible, in their situation, +to avoid taking some part. All this it is impossible to change, and to +no purpose to complain of. + +As to that popular humor which is the medium we float in, if I can +discern anything at all of its present state, it is far worse than I +have ever known or could ever imagine it. The faults of the people are +not popular vices; at least, they are not such as grow out of what we +used to take to be the English temper and character. The greatest number +have a sort of an heavy, lumpish acquiescence in government, without +much respect or esteem for those that compose it. I really cannot avoid +making some very unpleasant prognostics from this disposition of the +people. I think that many of the symptoms must have struck you: I will +mention one or two that are to me very remarkable. You must know that at +Bristol we grow, as an election interest, and even as a party interest, +rather stronger than we were when I was chosen. We have just now a +majority in the corporation. In this state of matters, what, think you, +have they done? They have voted their freedom to Lord Sandwich and Lord +Suffolk!--to the first, at the very moment when the American privateers +were domineering in the Irish Sea, and taking the Bristol traders in the +Bristol Channel;--to the latter, when his remonstrances on the subject +of captures were the jest of Paris and of Europe. This fine step was +taken, it seems, in honor of the zeal of these two profound statesmen in +the prosecution of John the Painter: so totally negligent are they of +everything essential, and so long and so deeply affected with trash the +most low and contemptible; just as if they thought the merit of Sir John +Fielding was the most shining point in the character of great +ministers, in the most critical of all times, and, of all others, the +most deeply interesting to the commercial world! My best friends in the +corporation had no other doubts on the occasion than whether it did not +belong to me, by right of my representative capacity, to be the bearer +of this auspicious compliment. In addition to this, if it could receive +any addition, they now employ me to solicit, as a favor of no small +magnitude, that, after the example of Newcastle, they may be suffered to +arm vessels for their own defence in the Channel. Their memorial, under +the seal of Merchants' Hall, is now lying on the table before me. Not a +soul has the least sensibility, on finding themselves, now for the first +time, obliged to act as if the community were dissolved, and, after +enormous payments towards the common protection, each part was to defend +itself, as if it were a separate state. + +I don't mention Bristol as if that were the part furthest gone in this +mortification. Far from it: I know that there is, rather, a little more +life in us than in any other place. In Liverpool they are literally +almost ruined by this American war; but they love it as they suffer from +it. In short, from whatever I see, and from whatever quarter I hear, I +am convinced that everything that is not absolute stagnation is +evidently a party-spirit very adverse to our politics, and to the +principles from whence they arise. There are manifest marks of the +resurrection of the Tory party. They no longer criticize, as all +disengaged people in the world will, on the acts of government; but they +are silent under every evil, and hide and cover up every ministerial +blander and misfortune, with the officious zeal of men who think they +have a party of their own to support in power. The Tories do +universally think their power and consequence involved in the success of +this American business. The clergy are astonishingly warm in it; and +what the Tories are, when embodied and united with their natural head, +the crown, and animated by their clergy, no man knows better than +yourself. As to the Whigs, I think them far from extinct. They are, what +they always were, (except by the able use of opportunities,) by far the +weakest party in this country. They have not yet learned the application +of their principles to the present state of things; and as to the +Dissenters, the main effective part of the Whig strength, they are, to +use a favorite expression of our American campaign style, "not all in +force." They will do very little, and, as far as I can discern, are +rather intimidated than provoked at the denunciations of the court in +the Archbishop of York's sermon. I thought that sermon rather imprudent, +when I first saw it; but it seems to have done its business. + +In this temper of the people, I do not wholly wonder that our Northern +friends look a little towards events. In war, particularly, I am afraid +it must be so. There is something so weighty and decisive in the events +of war, something that so completely overpowers the imagination of the +vulgar, that all counsels must in a great degree be subordinate to and +attendant on them. I am sure it was so in the last war, very eminently. +So that, on the whole, what with the temper of the people, the temper of +our own friends, and the domineering necessities of war, we must quietly +give up all ideas of any settled, preconcerted plan. We shall be lucky +enough, if, keeping ourselves attentive and alert, we can contrive to +profit of the occasions as they arise: though I am sensible that those +who are best provided with a general scheme are fittest to take +advantage of all contingencies. However, to act with any people with the +least degree of comfort, I believe we must contrive a little to +assimilate to their character. We must gravitate towards them, if we +would keep in the same system, or expect that they should approach +towards us. They are, indeed, worthy of much concession and management. +I am quite convinced that they are the honestest public men that ever +appeared in this country, and I am sure that they are the wisest, by +far, of those who appear in it at present. None of those who are +continually complaining of them, but are themselves just as chargeable +with all their faults, and have a decent stock of their own into the +bargain. They (our friends) are, I admit, as you very truly represent +them, but indifferently qualified for storming a citadel. After all, God +knows whether this citadel is to be stormed by them, or by anybody else, +by the means they use, or by any means. I know that as they are, +abstractedly speaking, to blame, so there are those who cry out against +them for it, not with a friendly complaint, as we do, but with the +bitterness of enemies. But I know, too, that those who blame them for +want of enterprise have shown no activity at all against the common +enemy: all their skill and all their spirit have been shown only in +weakening, dividing, and indeed destroying their allies. What they are +and what we are is now pretty evidently experienced; and it is certain, +that, partly by our common faults, but much more by the difficulties of +our situation, and some circumstances of unavoidable misfortune, we are +in little better than a sort of _cul-de-sac_. For my part, I do all I +can to give ease to my mind in this strange position. I remember, some +years ago, when I was pressing some points with great eagerness and +anxiety, and complaining with great vexation to the Duke of Richmond of +the little progress I make, he told me kindly, and I believe very truly, +that, though he was far from thinking so himself, other people could not +be persuaded I had not some latent private interest in pushing these +matters, which I urged with an earnestness so extreme, and so much +approaching to passion. He was certainly in the right. I am thoroughly +resolved to give, both to myself and to my friends, less vexation on +these subjects than hitherto I have done,--much less, indeed. + +If _you_ should grow too earnest, you will be still more inexcusable +than I was. Your having entered into affairs so much younger ought to +make them too familiar to you to be the cause of much agitation, and you +have much more before you for your work. Do not be in haste. Lay your +foundations deep in public opinion. Though (as you are sensible) I have +never given you the least hint of advice about joining yourself in a +declared connection with our party, nor do I now, yet, as I love that +party very well, and am clear that you are better able to serve them +than any man I know, I wish that things should be so kept as to leave +you mutually very open to one another in all changes and contingencies; +and I wish this the rather, because, in order to be very great, as I am +anxious that you should be, (always presuming that you are disposed to +make a good use of power,) you will certainly want some better support +than merely that of the crown. For I much doubt, whether, with all your +parts, you are the man formed for acquiring real interior favor in this +court, or in any; I therefore wish you a firm ground in the country; and +I do not know so firm and so sound a bottom to build on as our +party.--Well, I have done with this matter; and you think I ought to +have finished it long ago. Now I turn to Ireland. + +Observe, that I have not heard a word of any news relative to it, from +thence or from London; so that I am only going to state to you my +conjectures as to facts, and to speculate again on these conjectures. I +have a strong notion that the lateness of our meeting is owing to the +previous arrangements intended in Ireland. I suspect they mean that +Ireland should take a sort of lead, and act an efficient part in this +war, both with men and money. It will sound well, when we meet, to tell +us of the active zeal and loyalty of the people of Ireland, and contrast +it with the rebellious spirit of America. It will be a popular +topic,--the perfect confidence of Ireland in the power of the British +Parliament. From thence they will argue the little danger which any +dependency of the crown has to apprehend from the enforcement of that +authority. It will be, too, somewhat flattering to the country +gentlemen, who might otherwise begin to be sullen, to hold out that the +burden is not wholly to rest upon them; and it will pique our pride to +be told that Ireland has cheerfully stepped forward: and when a +dependant of this kingdom has already engaged itself in another year's +war, merely for our dignity, how can we, who are principals in the +quarrel, hold off? This scheme of policy seems to me so very obvious, +and is likely to be of so much service to the present system, that I +cannot conceive it possible they should neglect it, or something like +it. They have already put the people of Ireland to the proof. Have they +not borne the Earl of Buckinghamshire, the person who was employed to +move the fiery committee in the House of Lords in order to stimulate the +ministry to this war, who was in the chair, and who moved the +resolutions? + +It is within a few days of eleven years since I was in Ireland, and then +after an absence of two. Those who have been absent from any scene for +even a much shorter time generally lose the true practical notion of the +country, and of what may or may not be done in it. When I knew Ireland, +it was very different from the state of England, where government is a +vast deal, the public something, but individuals comparatively very +little. But if Ireland bears any resemblance to what it was some years +ago, neither government nor public opinion can do a great deal; almost +the whole is in the hands of a few leading people. The populace of +Dublin, and some parts in the North, are in some sort an exception. But +the Primate, Lord Hillsborough, and Lord Hertford have great sway in the +latter; and the former may be considerable or not, pretty much as the +Duke of Leinster pleases. On the whole, the success of government +usually depended on the bargain made with a very few men. The resident +lieutenancy may have made some change, and given a strength to +government, which formerly, I know, it had not; still, however, I am of +opinion, the former state, though in other hands perhaps, and in another +manner, still continues. The house you are connected with is grown into +a much greater degree of power than it had, though it was very +considerable, at the period I speak of. If the D. of L. takes a popular +part, he is sure of the city of Dublin, and he has a young man attached +to him who stands very forward in Parliament and in profession, and, by +what I hear, with more good-will and less envy than usually attends so +rapid a progress. The movement of one or two principal men, if they +manage the little popular strength which is to be found in Dublin and +Ulster, may do a great deal, especially when money is to be saved and +taxes to be kept off. I confess I should despair of your succeeding with +any of them, if they cannot be satisfied that every job which they can +look for on account of carrying this measure would be just as sure to +them for their ordinary support of government. They are essential to +government, which at this time must not be disturbed, and their +neutrality will be purchased at as high a price as their alliance +offensive and defensive. Now, as by supporting they may get as much as +by betraying their country, it must be a great leaning to turpitude that +can make them take a part in this war. I am satisfied, that, if the Duke +of Leinster and Lord Shannon would act together, this business could not +go on; or if either of them took part with Ponsonby, it would have no +better success. Hutchinson's situation is much altered since I saw you. +To please Tisdall, he had been in a manner laid aside at the Castle. It +is now to be seen whether he prefers the gratification of his resentment +and his appetite for popularity, both of which are strong enough in him, +to the advantages which his independence gives him, of making a new +bargain, and accumulating new offices on his heap. Pray do not be asleep +in this scene of action,--at this time, if I am right, the principal. +The Protestants of Ireland will be, I think, in general, backward: they +form infinitely the greatest part of the landed and the moneyed +interests; and they will not like to pay. The Papists are reduced to +beasts of burden: they will give all they have, their shoulders, readily +enough, if they are flattered. Surely the state of Ireland ought forever +to teach parties moderation in their victories. People crushed by law +have no hopes but from power. If laws are their enemies, they will be +enemies to laws; and those who have much to hope and nothing to lose +will always be dangerous, more or less. But this is not our present +business. If all this should prove a dream, however, let it not hinder +you from writing to me and tolling me so. You will easily refute, in +your conversation, the little topics which they will set afloat: such +as, that Ireland is a boat, and must go with the ship; that, if the +Americans contended only for their liberties, it would be +different,--but since they have declared independence, and so forth-- + +You are happy in enjoying Townshend's company. Remember me to him. How +does he like his private situation in a country where he was the son of +the sovereign?--Mrs. Burke and the two Richards salute you cordially. + +E.B. + +BEACONSFIELD, October 8th, 1777. + + + + +A + +LETTER + +TO + +THE MARQUIS OF ROCKINGHAM, + +WITH + +ADDRESSES TO THE KING, + +AND + +THE BRITISH COLONISTS IN NORTH AMERICA, + +IN RELATION TO + +THE MEASURES OF GOVERNMENT IN THE AMERICAN CONTEST, AND A PROPOSED +SECESSION OF THE OPPOSITION FROM PARLIAMENT. + +JANUARY, 1777. + + +NOTE. + + + This Letter, with the two Addresses which follow it, was + written upon occasion of a proposed secession from Parliament + of the members in both Houses who had opposed the measures of + government, in the contest between this country and the + colonies in North America, from the time of the repeal of the + Stamp Act. It appears, from an indorsement written by Mr. + Burke on the manuscript, that he warmly recommended the + measure, but (for what reasons is not stated) it was not + adopted. + + +LETTER + +TO THE MARQUIS OF ROCKINGHAM. + +My Dear Lord,--I am afraid that I ought rather to beg your pardon for +troubling you at all in this season of repose, than to apologize for +having been so long silent on the approaching business. It comes upon +us, not indeed in the most agreeable manner, but it does come-upon us; +and I believe your friends in general are in expectation of finding your +Lordship resolved in what way you are to meet it. The deliberation is +full of difficulties; but the determination is necessary. + +The affairs of America seem to be drawing towards a crisis. The Howes +are at this time in possession of, or are able to awe, the whole middle +coast of America, from Delaware to the western boundary of Massachusetts +Bay; the naval barrier on the side of Canada is broken; a great tract of +country is open for the supply of the troops; the river Hudson opens a +way into the heart of the provinces; and nothing can, in all +probability, prevent an early and offensive campaign. What the Americans +_have_ done is, in their circumstances, truly astonishing; it is, +indeed, infinitely more than I expected from them. But having done so +much, for some short time I began to entertain an opinion that they +might do more. It is now, however, evident that they cannot look +standing armies in the face. They are inferior in everything, even in +numbers,--I mean, in the number of those whom they keep in constant duty +and in regular pay. There seem, by the best accounts, not to be above +ten or twelve thousand men, at most, in their grand army. The rest are +militia, and not wonderfully well composed or disciplined. They decline +a general engagement,--prudently enough, if their object had been to +make the war attend upon a treaty of good terms of subjection; but when +they look further, this will not do. An army that is obliged at all +times and in all situations to decline an engagement may delay their +ruin, but can never defend their country. Foreign assistance they have +little or none, nor are likely soon to have more. France, in effect, has +no king, nor any minister accredited enough either with the court or +nation to undertake a design of great magnitude. + +In this state of things, I persuade myself Franklin is come to Paris to +draw from that court a definitive and satisfactory answer concerning the +support of the colonies. If he cannot get such an answer, (and I am of +opinion that at present he cannot,) then it is to be presumed he is +authorized to negotiate with Lord Stormont on the basis of dependence on +the crown. This I take to be his errand: for I never can believe that he +is come thither as a fugitive from his cause in the hour of its +distress, or that he is going to conclude a long life, which has +brightened every hour it has continued, with so foul and dishonorable a +flight. On this supposition, I thought it not wholly impossible that the +Whig party might be made a sort of mediators of the peace. It is +unnatural to suppose, that, in making an accommodation, the Americans +should not choose rather to give credit to those who all along have +opposed the measure of ministers, than to throw themselves wholly on the +mercy of their bitter, uniform, and systematic enemies. It is, indeed, +the victorious enemy that has the terms to offer; the vanquished party +and their friends are, both of them, reduced in their power; and it is +certain that those who are utterly broken and subdued have no option. +But, as this is hardly yet the case of the Americans, in this middle +state of their affairs, (much impaired, but not perfectly ruined,) one +would think it must be their interest to provide, if possible, some +further security for the terms which they may obtain from their enemies. +If the Congress could be brought to declare in favor of those terms for +which one hundred members of the House of Commons voted last year, with +some civility to the party which held out those terms, it would +undoubtedly have an effect to revive the cause of our liberties in +England, and to give the colonies some sort of mooring and anchorage in +this country. It seemed to me that Franklin might be made to feel the +propriety of such a step; and as I have an acquaintance with him, I had +a strong desire of taking a turn to Paris. Everything else failing, one +might obtain a better knowledge of the general aspect of affairs abroad +than, I believe, any of us possess at present. The Duke of Portland +approved the idea. But when I had conversed with the very few of your +Lordship's friends who were in town, and considered a little more +maturely the constant temper and standing maxims of the party, I laid +aside the design,--not being desirous of risking the displeasure of +those for whose sake alone I wished to take that fatiguing journey at +this severe season of the year. + +The Duke of Portland has taken with him some heads of deliberation, +which were the result of a discourse with his Grace and Mr. Montagu at +Burlington House. It seems essential to the cause that your Lordship +should meet your friends with some settled plan either of action or +inaction. Your friends will certainly require such a plan; and I am sure +the state of affairs requires it, whether they call for it or not. As to +the measure of a secession with reasons, after rolling the matter in my +head a good deal, and turning it an hundred ways, I confess I still +think it the most advisable, notwithstanding the serious objections that +lie against it, and indeed the extreme uncertainty of all political +measures, especially at this time. It provides for your honor. I know of +nothing else that can so well do this. It is something, perhaps all, +that can be done in our present situation. Some precaution, in this +respect, is not without its motives. That very estimation for which you +have sacrificed everything else is in some danger of suffering in the +general wreck; and perhaps it is likely to suffer the more, because you +have hitherto confided more than was quite prudent in the clearness of +your intentions, and in the solidity of the popular judgment upon them. +The former, indeed, is out of the power of events; the latter is full of +levity, and the very creature of fortune. However, such as it is, (and +for one I do not think I am inclined to overvalue it,) both our interest +and our duty make it necessary for us to attend to it very carefully, so +long as we act a part in public. The measure you take for this purpose +may produce no immediate effect; but with regard to the party, and the +principles for whose sake the party exists, all hope of their +preservation or recovery depends upon your preserving your reputation. + +By the conversation of some friends, it seemed as if they were willing +to fall in with this design, because it promised to emancipate them from +the servitude of irksome business, and to afford them an opportunity of +retiring to ease and tranquillity. If that be their object in the +secession and addresses proposed, there surely never were means worse +chosen to gain their end; and if this be any part of the project, it +were a thousand times better it were never undertaken. The measure is +not only unusual, and as such critical, but it is in its own nature +strong and vehement in a high degree. The propriety, therefore, of +adopting it depends entirely upon the spirit with which it is supported +and followed. To pursue violent measures with languor and irresolution +is not very consistent in speculation, and not more reputable or safe in +practice. If your Lordship's friends do not go to this business with +their whole hearts, if they do not feel themselves uneasy without it, if +they do not undertake it with a certain degree of zeal, and even with +warmth and indignation, it had better be removed wholly out of our +thoughts. A measure of less strength, and more in the beaten circle of +affairs, if supported with spirit and industry, would be on all accounts +infinitely more eligible. We have to consider what it is that in this +undertaking we have against us. We have the weight of King, Lords, and +Commons in the other scale; we have against us, within a trifle, the +whole body of the law; we oppose the more considerable part of the +landed and mercantile interests; we contend, in a manner, against the +whole Church; we set our faces against great armies flushed with +victory, and navies who have tasted of civil spoil, and have a strong +appetite for more; our strength, whatever it is, must depend, for a good +part of its effect, upon events not very probable. In such a situation, +such a step requires not only great magnanimity, but unwearied activity +and perseverance, with a good deal, too, of dexterity and management, to +improve every accident in our favor. + +The delivery of this paper may have very important consequences. It is +true that the court may pass it over in silence, with a real or affected +contempt. But this I do not think so likely. If they do take notice of +it, the mildest course will be such an address from Parliament as the +House of Commons made to the king on the London Remonstrance in the year +1769. This address will be followed by addresses of a similar tendency, +from all parts of the kingdom, in order to overpower you with what they +will endeavor to pass as the united voice and sense of the nation. But +if they intend to proceed further, and to take steps of a more decisive +nature, you are then to consider, not what they may legally and justly +do, but what a Parliament omnipotent in power, influenced with party +rage and personal resentment, operating under the implicit military +obedience of court discipline, is capable of. Though they have made some +successful experiments on juries, they will hardly trust enough to them +to order a prosecution for a supposed libel. They may proceed in two +ways: either by an _impeachment_, in which the Tories may retort on the +Whigs (but with better success, though in a worse cause) the +proceedings in the case of Sacheverell, or they may, without this form, +proceed, as against the Bishop of Rochester, by a bill of pains and +penalties more or less grievous. The similarity of the cases, or the +justice, is (as I said) out of the question. The mode of proceeding has +several very ancient and very recent precedents. None of these methods +is impossible. The court may select three or four of the most +distinguished among you for the victims; and therefore nothing is more +remote from the tendency of the proposed act than any idea of retirement +or repose. On the contrary, you have, all of you, as principals or +auxiliaries, a much better [hotter?] and more desperate conflict, in all +probability, to undergo, than any you have been yet engaged in. The only +question is, whether the risk ought to be run for the chance (and it is +no more) of recalling the people of England to their ancient principles, +and to that personal interest which formerly they took in all public +affairs. At any rate, I am sure it is right, if we take this step, to +take it with a full view of the consequences, and with minds and +measures in a state of preparation to meet them. It is not becoming that +your boldness should arise from a want of foresight. It is more +reputable, and certainly it is more safe too, that it should be grounded +on the evident necessity of encountering the dangers which you foresee. + +Your Lordship will have the goodness to excuse me, if I state in strong +terms the difficulties attending a measure which on the whole I heartily +concur in. But as, from my want of importance, I can be personally +little subject to the most trying part of the consequences, it is as +little my desire to urge others to dangers in which I am myself to have +no inconsiderable a share. + +If this measure should be thought too great for our strength or the +dispositions of the times, then the point will be to consider what is to +be done in Parliament. A weak, irregular, desultory, peevish opposition +there will be as much too little as the other may be too big. Our scheme +ought to be such as to have in it a succession of measures: else it is +impossible to secure anything like a regular attendance; opposition will +otherwise always carry a disreputable air; neither will it be possible, +without that attendance, to persuade the people that we are in earnest. +Above all, a motion should be well digested for the first day. There is +one thing in particular I wish to recommend to your Lordship's +consideration: that is, the opening of the doors of the House of +Commons. Without this, I am clearly convinced, it will be in the power +of ministry to make our opposition appear without doors just in what +light they please. To obtain a gallery is the easiest thing in the +world, if we are satisfied to cultivate the esteem of our adversaries by +the resolution and energy with which we act against them: but if their +satisfaction and good-humor be any part of our object, the attempt, I +admit, is idle. + +I had some conversation, before I left town, with the D. of M. He is of +opinion, that, if you adhere to your resolution of seceding, you ought +not to appear on the first day of the meeting. He thinks it can have no +effect, except to break the continuity of your conduct, and thereby to +weaken and fritter away the impression of it. It certainly will seem +odd to give solemn reasons for a discontinuance of your attendance in +Parliament, after having two or three times returned to it, and +immediately after a vigorous act of opposition. As to trials of the +temper of the House, there have been of that sort so many already that I +see no reason for making another that would not hold equally good for +another after that,--particularly as nothing has happened in the least +calculated to alter the disposition of the House. If the secession were +to be general, such an attendance, followed by such an act, would have +force; but being in its nature incomplete and broken, to break it +further by retreats and returns to the chase must entirely destroy its +effect. I confess I am quite of the D. of M.'s opinion in this point. + +I send your Lordship a corrected copy of the paper: your Lordship will +be so good to communicate it, if you should approve of the alterations, +to Lord J.C. and Sir G.S. I showed it to the D. of P. before his Grace +left town; and at his, the D. of P.'s, desire, I have sent it to the D. +of R. The principal alteration is in the pages last but one. It is made +to remove a difficulty which had been suggested to Sir G.S., and which +he thought had a good deal in it. I think it much the better for that +alteration. Indeed, it may want still more corrections, in order to +adapt it to the present or probable future state of things. + +What shall I say in excuse for this long letter, which frightens me when +I look back upon it? Your Lordship will take it, and all in it, with +your usual incomparable temper, which carries you through so much both +from enemies and friends. My most humble respects to Lady R., and +believe me, with the highest regard, ever, &o. + +E.B. + +I hear that Dr. Franklin has had a most extraordinary reception at Paris +from all ranks of people. + +BEACONSFIELD, Monday night, Jan. 6, 1777. + + + + +ADDRESS TO THE KING. + + +We, your Majesty's most dutiful and loyal subjects, several of the peers +of the realm, and several members of the House of Commons chosen by the +people to represent them in Parliament, do in our individual capacity, +but with hearts filled with a warm affection to your Majesty, with a +strong attachment to your royal house, and with the most unfeigned +devotion to your true interest, beg leave, at this crisis of your +affairs, in all humility to approach your royal presence. + +Whilst we lament the measures adopted by the public councils of the +kingdom, we do not mean to question the legal validity of their +proceedings. We do not desire to appeal from them to any person +whatsoever. We do not dispute the conclusive authority of the bodies in +which we have a place over all their members. We know that it is our +ordinary duty to submit ourselves to the determinations of the majority +in everything, except what regards the just defence of our honor and +reputation. But the situation into which the British empire has been +brought, and the conduct to which we are reluctantly driven in that +situation, we hold ourselves bound by the relation in which we stand +both to the crown and the people clearly to explain to your Majesty and +our country. + +We have been called upon in the speech from the throne at the opening of +this session of Parliament, in a manner peculiarly marked, singularly +emphatical, and from a place from whence anything implying censure falls +with no common weight, to concur in unanimous approbation of those +measures which have produced our present distresses and threaten us in +future with others far more grievous. We trust, therefore, that we shall +stand justified in offering to our sovereign and the public our reasons +for persevering inflexibly in our uniform dissent from every part of +those measures. We lament them from an experience of their mischief, as +we originally opposed them from a sure foresight of their unhappy and +inevitable tendency. + +We see nothing in the present events in the least degree sufficient to +warrant an alteration in our opinion. We were always steadily averse to +this civil war,--not because we thought it impossible that it should be +attended with victory, but because we were fully persuaded that in such +a contest victory would only vary the mode of our ruin, and by making it +less immediately sensible would render it the more lasting and the more +irretrievable. Experience had but too fully instructed us in the +possibility of the reduction of a free people to slavery by foreign +mercenary armies. But we had an horror of becoming the instruments in a +design, of which, in our turn, we might become the victims. Knowing the +inestimable value of peace, and the contemptible value of what was +sought by war, we wished to compose the distractions of our country, not +by the use of foreign arms, but by prudent regulations in our own +domestic policy. We deplored, as your Majesty has done in your speech +from the throne, the disorders which prevail in your empire; but we are +convinced that the disorders of the people, in the present time and in +the present place, are owing to the usual and natural cause of such +disorders at all times and in all places, where such have +prevailed,--the misconduct of government;--that they are owing to plans +laid in error, pursued with obstinacy, and conducted without wisdom. + +We cannot attribute so much to the power of faction, at the expense of +human nature, as to suppose, that, in any part of the world, a +combination of men, few in number, not considerable in rank, of no +natural hereditary dependencies, should be able, by the efforts of their +policy alone, or the mere exertion of any talents, to bring the people +of your American dominions into the disposition which has produced the +present troubles. We cannot conceive, that, without some powerful +concurring cause, any management should prevail on some millions of +people, dispersed over an whole continent, in thirteen provinces, not +only unconnected, but, in many particulars of religion, manners, +government, and local interest, totally different and adverse, +voluntarily to submit themselves to a suspension of all the profits of +industry and all the comforts of civil life, added to all the evils of +an unequal war, carried on with circumstances of the greatest asperity +and rigor. This, Sir, we conceive, could never have happened, but from a +general sense of some grievance so radical in its nature and so +spreading in its effects as to poison all the ordinary satisfactions of +life, to discompose the frame of society, and to convert into fear and +hatred that habitual reverence ever paid by mankind to an ancient and +venerable government. + +That grievance is as simple in its nature, and as level to the most +ordinary understanding, as it is powerful in affecting the most languid +passions: it is-- + +"AN ATTEMPT MADE TO DISPOSE OF THE PROPERTY OF A WHOLE PEOPLE WITHOUT +THEIR CONSENT." + +Your Majesty's English subjects in the colonies, possessing the ordinary +faculties of mankind, know that to live under such a plan of government +is not to live in a state of freedom. Your English subjects in the +colonies, still impressed with the ancient feelings of the people from +whom they are derived, cannot live under a government which does not +establish freedom as its basis. + +This scheme, being, therefore, set up in direct opposition to the rooted +and confirmed sentiments and habits of thinking of an whole people, has +produced the effects which ever must result from such a collision of +power and opinion. For we beg leave, with all duty and humility, to +represent to your Majesty, (what we fear has been industriously +concealed from you,) that it is not merely the opinion of a very great +number, or even of the majority, but the universal sense of the whole +body of the people in those provinces, that the practice of taxing, in +the mode and on the principles which have been lately contended for and +enforced, is subversive of all their rights. + +This sense has been declared, as we understand on good information, by +the unanimous voice of all their Assemblies: each Assembly also, on this +point, is perfectly unanimous within itself. It has been declared as +fully by the actual voice of the people without these Assemblies as by +the constructive voice within them, as well by those in that country who +addressed as by those who remonstrated; and it is as much the avowed +opinion of those who have hazarded their all, rather than take up arms +against your Majesty's forces, as of those who have run the same risk to +oppose them. The difference among them is not on the grievance, but on +the mode of redress; and we are sorry to say, that they who have +conceived hopes from the placability of the ministers who influence the +public councils of this kingdom disappear in the multitude of those who +conceive that passive compliance only confirms and emboldens oppression. + +The sense of a whole people, most gracious sovereign, never ought to be +contemned by wise and beneficent rulers,--whatever may be the abstract +claims, or even rights, of _the supreme power_. We have been too early +instructed, and too long habituated to believe, that the only firm seat +of all authority is in the minds, affections, and interests of the +people, to change our opinions on the theoretic reasonings of +speculative men, or for the convenience of a mere temporary arrangement +of state. It is not consistent with equity or wisdom to set at defiance +the general feelings of great communities, and of all the orders which +compose them. Much power is tolerated, and passes unquestioned, where +much is yielded to opinion. All is disputed, where everything is +enforced. + +Such are our sentiments on the duty and policy of conforming to the +prejudices of a whole people, even where the foundation of such +prejudices may be false or disputable. But permit us to lay at your +Majesty's feet our deliberate judgment on the real merits of that +principle, the violation of which is the known ground and origin of +these troubles. We assure your Majesty, that, on our parts, we should +think ourselves unjustifiable, as good citizens, and not influenced by +the true spirit of Englishmen, if, with any effectual means of +prevention in our hands, we were to submit to taxes to which we did not +consent, either directly, or by a representation of the people securing +to us the substantial benefit of an absolutely free disposition of our +own property in that important case. And we add, Sir, that, if fortune, +instead of blessing us with a situation where we may have daily access +to the propitious presence of a gracious prince, had fixed us in +settlements on the remotest part of the globe, we must carry these +sentiments with us, as part of our being,--persuaded that the distance +of situation would render this privilege in the disposal of property but +the more necessary. If no provision had been made for it, such provision +ought to be made or permitted. Abuses of subordinate authority increase, +and all means of redress lessen, as the distance of the subject removes +him from the seat of the supreme power. What, in those circumstances, +can save him from the last extremes of indignity and oppression, but +something left in his own hands which may enable him to conciliate the +favor and control the excesses of government? When no means of power to +awe or to oblige are possessed, the strongest ties which connect mankind +in every relation, social and civil, and which teach them mutually to +respect each other, are broken. Independency, from that moment, +virtually exists. Its formal declaration will quickly follow. Such must +be our feelings for ourselves: we are not in possession of another rule +for our brethren. + +When the late attempt practically to annihilate that inestimable +privilege was made, great disorders and tumults, very unhappily and very +naturally, arose from it. In this state of things, we were of opinion +that satisfaction ought instantly to be given, or that, at least, the +punishment of the disorder ought to be attended with the redress of the +grievance. We were of opinion, that, if our dependencies had so outgrown +the positive institutions made for the preservation of liberty in this +kingdom, that the operation of their powers was become rather a pressure +than a relief to the subjects in the colonies, wisdom dictated that the +spirit of the Constitution should rather be applied to their +circumstances, than its authority enforced with violence in those very +parts where its reason became wholly inapplicable. + +Other methods were then recommended and followed, as infallible means of +restoring peace and order. We looked upon them to be, what they have +since proved to be, the cause of inflaming discontent into disobedience, +and resistance into revolt. The subversion of solemn, fundamental +charters, on a suggestion of abuse, without citation, evidence, or +hearing,--the total suspension of the commerce of a great maritime city, +the capital of a great maritime province, during the pleasure of the +crown,--the establishment of a military force, not accountable to the +ordinary tribunals of the country in which it was kept up,--these and +other proceedings at that time, if no previous cause of dissension had +subsisted, were sufficient to produce great troubles: unjust at all +times, they were then irrational. + +We could not conceive, when disorders had arisen from the complaint of +one violated right, that to violate every other was the proper means of +quieting an exasperated people. It seemed to us absurd and preposterous +to hold out, as the means of calming a people in a state of extreme +inflammation, and ready to take up arms, the austere law which a rigid +conqueror would impose as the sequel of the most decisive victories. + +Recourse, indeed, was at the same time had to force; and we saw a force +sent out, enough to menace liberty, but not to awe opposition,--tending +to bring odium on the civil power, and contempt on the military,--at +once to provoke and encourage resistance. Force was sent out not +sufficient to hold one town; laws were passed to inflame thirteen +provinces. + +This mode of proceeding, by harsh laws and feeble armies, could not be +defended on the principle of mercy and forbearance. For mercy, as we +conceive, consists, not in the weakness of the means, but in the +benignity of the ends. We apprehend that mild measures may be powerfully +enforced, and that acts of extreme rigor and injustice may be attended +with as much feebleness in the execution as severity in the formation. + +In consequence of these terrors, which, falling upon some, threatened +all, the colonies made a common cause with the sufferers, and proceeded, +on their part, to acts of resistance. In that alarming situation, we +besought your Majesty's ministers to entertain some distrust of the +operation of coercive measures, and to profit of their experience. +Experience had no effect. The modes of legislative rigor were construed, +not to have been erroneous in their policy, but too limited in their +extent. New severities were adopted. The fisheries of your people in +America followed their charters; and their mutual combination to defend +what they thought their common rights brought on a total prohibition of +their mutual commercial intercourse. No distinction of persons or merits +was observed: the peaceable and the mutinous, friends and foes, were +alike involved, as if the rigor of the laws had a certain tendency to +recommend the authority of the legislator. + +Whilst the penal laws increased in rigor, and extended in application +over all the colonies, the direct force was applied but to one part. Had +the great fleet and foreign army since employed been at that time called +for, the greatness of the preparation would have declared the magnitude +of the danger. The nation would have been alarmed, and taught the +necessity of some means of reconciliation with our countrymen in +America, who, whenever they are provoked to resistance, demand a force +to reduce them to obedience full as destructive to us as to them. But +Parliament and the people, by a premeditated concealment of their real +situation, were drawn into perplexities which furnished excuses for +further armaments, and whilst they were taught to believe themselves +called to suppress a riot, they found themselves involved in a mighty +war. + +At length British blood was spilled by British hands: a fatal era, which +we must ever deplore, because your empire will forever feel it. Your +Majesty was touched with a sense of so great a disaster. Your paternal +breast was affected with the sufferings of your English subjects in +America. In your speech from the throne, in the beginning of the session +of 1775, you were graciously pleased to declare yourself inclined to +relieve their distresses and to pardon their errors. You felt their +sufferings under the late penal acts of Parliament. But your ministry +felt differently. Not discouraged by the pernicious effects of all they +had hitherto advised, and notwithstanding the gracious declaration of +your Majesty, they obtained another act of Parliament, in which the +rigors of all the former were consolidated, and embittered by +circumstances of additional severity and outrage. The whole trading +property of America (even unoffending shipping in port) was +indiscriminately and irrecoverably given, as the plunder of foreign +enemies, to the sailors of your navy. This property was put out of the +reach of your mercy. Your people were despoiled; and your navy, by a +new, dangerous, and prolific example, corrupted with the plunder of +their countrymen. Your people in that part of your dominions were put, +in their general and political, as well as their personal capacity, +wholly out of the protection of your government. + +Though unwilling to dwell on all the improper modes of carrying on this +unnatural and ruinous war, and which have led directly to the present +unhappy separation of Great Britain and its colonies, we must beg leave +to represent two particulars, which we are sure must have been entirely +contrary to your Majesty's order or approbation. Every course of action +in hostility, however that hostility may be just or merited, is not +justifiable or excusable. It is the duty of those who claim to rule over +others not to provoke them beyond the necessity of the case, nor to +leave stings in their minds which must long rankle even when the +appearance of tranquillity is restored. We therefore assure your Majesty +that it is with shame and sorrow we have seen several acts of hostility +which could have no other tendency than incurably to alienate the minds +of your American subjects. To excite, by a proclamation issued by your +Majesty's governor, an universal insurrection of negro slaves in any of +the colonies is a measure full of complicated horrors, absolutely +illegal, suitable neither to the practice of war nor to the laws of +peace. Of the same quality we look upon all attempts to bring down on +your subjects an irruption of those fierce and cruel tribes of savages +and cannibals in whom the vestiges of human nature are nearly effaced by +ignorance and barbarity. They are not fit allies for your Majesty in a +war with your people. They are not fit instruments of an English +government. These and many other acts we disclaim as having advised, or +approved when done; and we clear ourselves to your Majesty, and to all +civilized nations, from any participation whatever, before or after the +fact, in such unjustifiable and horrid proceedings. + +But there is one weighty circumstance which we lament equally with the +causes of the war, and with the modes of carrying it on,--that no +disposition whatsoever towards peace or reconciliation has ever been +shown by those who have directed the public councils of this kingdom, +either before the breaking out of these hostilities or during the +unhappy continuance of them. Every proposition made in your Parliament +to remove the original cause of these troubles, by taking off taxes +obnoxious for their principle or their design, has been +overruled,--every bill brought in for quiet rejected, even on the first +proposition. The petitions of the colonies have not been admitted even +to an hearing. The very possibility of public agency, by which such +petitions could authentically arrive at Parliament, has been evaded and +chicaned away. All the public declarations which indicate anything +resembling a disposition to reconciliation seem to us loose, general, +equivocal, capable of various meanings, or of none; and they are +accordingly construed differently, at different times, by those on whose +recommendation they have been made: being wholly unlike the precision +and stability of public faith, and bearing no mark of that ingenuous +simplicity and native candor and integrity which formerly characterized +the English nation. + +Instead of any relaxation of the claim of taxing at the discretion of +Parliament, your ministers have devised a new mode of enforcing that +claim, much more effectual for the oppression of the colonies, though +not for your Majesty's service, both as to the quantity and application, +than any of the former methods; and their mode has been expressly held +out by ministers as a plan not to be departed from by the House of +Commons, and as the very condition on which the legislature is to accept +the dependence of the colonies. + +At length, when, after repeated refusals to hear or to conciliate, an +act dissolving your government, by putting your people in America out of +your protection, was passed, your ministers suffered several months to +elapse without affording to them, or to any community or any individual +amongst them, the means of entering into that protection, even on +unconditional submission, contrary to your Majesty's gracious +declaration from the throne, and in direct violation of the public +faith. + +We cannot, therefore, agree to unite in new severities against the +brethren of our blood for their asserting an independency, to which we +know, in our conscience, they have been necessitated by the conduct of +those very persons who now make use of that argument to provoke us to a +continuance and repetition of the acts which in a regular series have +led to this great misfortune. + +The reasons, dread Sir, which have been used to justify this +perseverance in a refusal to hear or conciliate have been reduced into a +sort of Parliamentary maxims which we do not approve. The first of these +maxims is, "that the two Houses ought not to receive (as they have +hitherto refused to receive) petitions containing matter derogatory to +any part of the authority they claim." We conceive this maxim and the +consequent practice to be unjustifiable by reason or the practice of +other sovereign powers, and that it must be productive, if adhered to, +of a total separation between this kingdom and its dependencies. The +supreme power, being in ordinary cases the ultimate judge, can, as we +conceive, suffer nothing in having any part of his rights excepted to, +or even discussed before himself. We know that sovereigns in other +countries, where the assertion of absolute regal power is as high as the +assertion of absolute power in any politic body can possibly be here, +have received many petitions in direct opposition to many of their +claims of prerogative,--have listened to them,--condescended to discuss, +and to give answers to them. This refusal to admit even the discussion +of any part of an undefined prerogative will naturally tend to +annihilate any privilege that can be claimed by every inferior dependent +community, and every subordinate order in the state. + +The next maxim which has been put as a bar to any plan of accommodation +is, "that no offer of terms of peace ought to be made, before Parliament +is assured that these terms will be accepted." On this we beg leave to +represent to your Majesty, that, if, in all events, the policy of this +kingdom is to govern the people in your colonies as a free people, no +mischief can possibly happen from a declaration to them, and to the +world, of the manner and form in which Parliament proposes that they +shall enjoy the freedom it protects. It is an encouragement to the +innocent and meritorious, that they at least shall enjoy those +advantages which they patiently expected rather from the benignity of +Parliament than their own efforts. Persons more contumacious may also +see that they are resisting terms of perhaps greater freedom and +happiness than they are now in arms to obtain. The glory and propriety +of offered mercy is neither tarnished nor weakened by the folly of those +who refuse to take advantage of it. + +We cannot think that the declaration of independency makes any natural +difference in the reason and policy of the offer. No prince out of the +possession of his dominions, and become a sovereign _de jure_ only, ever +thought it derogatory to his rights or his interests to hold out to his +former subjects a distinct prospect of the advantages to be derived from +his readmission, and a security for some of the most fundamental of +those popular privileges in vindication of which he had been deposed. On +the contrary, such offers have been almost uniformly made under similar +circumstances. Besides, as your Majesty has been graciously pleased, in +your speech from the throne, to declare your intention of restoring +your people in the colonies to a state of law and liberty, no objection +can possibly lie against defining what that law and liberty are; because +those who offer and those who are to receive terms frequently differ +most widely and most materially in the signification of these words, and +in the objects to which they apply. + +To say that we do not know, at this day, what the grievances of the +colonies are (be they real or pretended) would be unworthy of us. But +whilst we are thus waiting to be informed of what we perfectly know, we +weaken the powers of the commissioners,--we delay, perhaps we lose, the +happy hour of peace,--we are wasting the substance of both +countries,--we are continuing the effusion of human, of Christian, of +English blood. + +We are sure that we must have your Majesty's heart along with us, when +we declare in favor of mixing something conciliatory with our force. +Sir, we abhor the idea of making a conquest of our countrymen. We wish +that they may yield to well-ascertained, well-authenticated, and +well-secured terms of reconciliation,--not that your Majesty should owe +the recovery of your dominions to their total waste and destruction. +Humanity will not permit us to entertain such a desire; nor will the +reverence we bear to the civil rights of mankind make us even wish that +questions of great difficulty, of the last importance, and lying deep in +the vital principles of the British Constitution, should be solved by +the arms of foreign mercenary soldiers. + +It is not, Sir, from a want of the most inviolable duty to your Majesty, +not from a want of a partial and passionate regard to that part of your +empire in which we reside, and which we wish to be supreme, that we +have hitherto withstood all attempts to render the supremacy of one part +of your dominions inconsistent with the liberty and safety of all the +rest. The motives of our opposition are found in those very sentiments +which we are supposed to violate. For we are convinced beyond a doubt, +that a system of dependence which leaves no security to the people for +any part of their freedom in their own hands cannot be established in +any inferior member of the British empire, without consequentially +destroying the freedom of that very body in favor of whose boundless +pretensions such a scheme is adopted. We know and feel that arbitrary +power over distant regions is not within the competence, nor to be +exercised agreeably to the forms or consistently with the spirit, of +great popular assemblies. If such assemblies are called to a nominal +share in the exercise of such power, in order to screen, under general +participation, the guilt of desperate measures, it tends only the more +deeply to corrupt the deliberative character of those assemblies, in +training them to blind obedience, in habituating them to proceed upon +grounds of fact with which they can rarely be sufficiently acquainted, +and in rendering them executive instruments of designs the bottom of +which they cannot possibly fathom. + +To leave any real freedom to Parliament, freedom must be left to the +colonies. A military government is the only substitute for civil +liberty. That the establishment of such a power in America will utterly +ruin our finances (though its certain effect) is the smallest part of +our concern. It will become an apt, powerful, and certain engine for the +destruction of our freedom here. Great bodies of armed men, trained to +a contempt of popular assemblies representative of an English +people,--kept up for the purpose of exacting impositions without their +consent, and maintained by that exaction,--instruments in subverting, +without any process of law, great ancient establishments and respected +forms of governments,--set free from, and therefore above, the ordinary +English tribunals of the country where they serve,--these men cannot so +transform themselves, merely by crossing the sea, as to behold with love +and reverence, and submit with profound obedience to, the very same +things in Great Britain which in America they had been taught to +despise, and had been accustomed to awe and humble. All your Majesty's +troops, in the rotation of service, will pass through this discipline +and contract these habits. If we could flatter ourselves that this would +not happen, we must be the weakest of men; we must be the worst, if we +were indifferent whether it happened or not. What, gracious sovereign, +is the empire of America to us, or the empire of the world, if we lose +our own liberties? We deprecate this last of evils. We deprecate the +effect of the doctrines which must support and countenance the +government over conquered Englishmen. + +As it will be impossible long to resist the powerful and equitable +arguments in favor of the freedom of these unhappy people that are to be +drawn from the principle of our own liberty, attempts will be made, +attempts have been made, to ridicule and to argue away this principle, +and to inculcate into the minds of your people other maxims of +government and other grounds of obedience than those which have +prevailed at and since the glorious Revolution. By degrees, these +doctrines, by being convenient, may grow prevalent. The consequence is +not certain; but a general change of principles rarely happens among a +people without leading to a change of government. + +Sir, your throne cannot stand secure upon the principles of +unconditional submission and passive obedience,--on powers exercised +without the concurrence of the people to be governed,--on acts made in +defiance of their prejudices and habits,--on acquiescence procured by +foreign mercenary troops, and secured by standing armies. These may +possibly be the foundation of other thrones: they must be the subversion +of yours. It was not to passive principles in our ancestors that we owe +the honor of appearing before a sovereign who cannot feel that he is a +prince without knowing that we ought to be free. The Revolution is a +departure from the ancient course of the descent of this monarchy. The +people at that time reentered into their original rights; and it was not +because a positive law authorized what was then done, but because the +freedom and safety of the subject, the origin and cause of all laws, +required a proceeding paramount and superior to them. At that ever +memorable and instructive period, the letter of the law was superseded +in favor of the substance of liberty. To the free choice, therefore, of +the people, without either King or Parliament, we owe that happy +establishment out of which both King and Parliament were regenerated. +From that great principle of liberty have originated the statutes +confirming and ratifying the establishment from which your Majesty +derives your right to rule over us. Those statutes have not given us +our liberties: our liberties have produced them. Every hour of your +Majesty's reign, your title stands upon the very same foundation on +which it was at first laid; and we do not know a better on which it can +possibly be placed. + +Convinced, Sir, that you cannot have different rights and a different +security in different parts of your dominions, we wish to lay an even +platform for your throne, and to give it an unmovable stability, by +laying it on the general freedom of your people, and by securing to your +Majesty that confidence and affection in all parts of your dominions +which makes your best security and dearest title in this the chief seat +of your empire. + +Such, Sir, being, amongst us, the foundation of monarchy itself, much +more clearly and much more peculiarly is it the ground of all +Parliamentary power. Parliament is a security provided for the +protection of freedom, and not a subtile fiction, contrived to amuse the +people in its place. The authority of both Houses can still less than +that of the crown be supported upon different principles in different +places, so as to be for one part of your subjects a protector of +liberty, and for another a fund of despotism, through which prerogative +is extended by occasional powers, whenever an arbitrary will finds +itself straitened by the restrictions of law. Had it seemed good to +Parliament to consider itself as the indulgent guardian and strong +protector of the freedom of the subordinate popular assemblies, instead +of exercising its powers to their annihilation, there is no doubt that +it never could have been their inclination, because not their interest, +to raise questions on the extent of Parliamentary rights, or to +enfeeble privileges which were the security of their own. Powers evident +from necessity, and not suspicious from an alarming mode or purpose in +the exertion, would, as formerly they were, be cheerfully submitted to; +and these would have been fully sufficient for conservation of unity in +the empire, and for directing its wealth to one common centre. Another +use has produced other consequences; and a power which refuses to be +limited by moderation must either be lost, or find other more distinct +and satisfactory limitations. + +As for us, a supposed, or, if it could be, a real, participation in +arbitrary power would never reconcile our minds to its establishment. We +should be ashamed to stand before your Majesty, boldly asserting in our +own favor inherent rights which bind and regulate the crown itself, and +yet insisting on the exercise, in our own persons, of a more arbitrary +sway over our fellow-citizens and fellow-freemen. + +These, gracious sovereign, are the sentiments which we consider +ourselves as bound, in justification of our present conduct, in the most +serious and solemn manner to lay at your Majesty's feet. We have been +called by your Majesty's writs and proclamations, and we have been +authorized, either by hereditary privilege or the choice of your people, +to confer and treat with your Majesty, in your highest councils, upon +the arduous affairs of your kingdom. We are sensible of the whole +importance of the duty which this constitutional summons implies. We +know the religious punctuality of attendance which, in the ordinary +course, it demands. It is no light cause which, even for a time, could +persuade us to relax in any part of that attendance. The British empire +is in convulsions which threaten its dissolution. Those particular +proceedings which cause and inflame this disorder, after many years' +incessant struggle, we find ourselves wholly unable to oppose and +unwilling to behold. All our endeavors having proved fruitless, we are +fearful at this time of irritating by contention those passions which we +have found it impracticable to compose by reason. We cannot permit +ourselves to countenance, by the appearance of a silent assent, +proceedings fatal to the liberty and unity of the empire,--proceedings +which exhaust the strength of all your Majesty's dominions, destroy all +trust and dependence of our allies, and leave us, both at home and +abroad, exposed to the suspicious mercy and uncertain inclinations of +our neighbor and rival powers, to whom, by this desperate course, we are +driving our countrymen for protection, and with whom we have forced them +into connections, and may bind them by habits and by interests,--an evil +which no victories that may be obtained, no severities which may be +exorcised, ever will or can remove. + +If but the smallest hope should from any circumstances appear of a +return to the ancient maxims and true policy of this kingdom, we shall +with joy and readiness return to our attendance, in order to give our +hearty support to whatever means may be left for alleviating the +complicated evils which oppress this nation. + +If this should not happen, we have discharged our consciences by this +faithful representation to your Majesty and our country; and however few +in number, or however we may be overborne by practices whose operation +is but too powerful, by the revival of dangerous exploded principles, +or by the misguided zeal of such arbitrary factions as formerly +prevailed in this kingdom, and always to its detriment and disgrace, we +have the satisfaction of standing forth and recording our names in +assertion of those principles whose operation hath, in better times, +made your Majesty a great prince, and the British dominions a mighty +empire. + + + + +ADDRESS + +TO THE + +BRITISH COLONISTS IN NORTH AMERICA. + + +The very dangerous crisis into which the British empire is brought, as +it accounts for, so it justifies, the unusual step we take in addressing +ourselves to you. + +The distempers of the state are grown to such a degree of violence and +malignity as to render all ordinary remedies vain and frivolous. In such +a deplorable situation, an adherence to the common forms of business +appears to us rather as an apology to cover a supine neglect of duty +than the means of performing it in a manner adequate to the exigency +that presses upon us. The common means we have already tried, and tried +to no purpose. As our last resource, we turn ourselves to you. We +address you merely in our private capacity, vested with no other +authority than what will naturally attend those in whose declarations of +benevolence you have no reason to apprehend any mixture of dissimulation +or design. + +We have this title to your attention: we call upon it in a moment of the +utmost importance to us all. We find, with infinite concern, that +arguments are used to persuade you of the necessity of separating +yourselves from your ancient connection with your parent country, +grounded on a supposition that a general principle of alienation and +enmity to you had pervaded the whole of this kingdom, and that there +does no longer subsist between you and us any common and kindred +principles upon which we can possibly unite, consistently with those +ideas of liberty in which you have justly placed your whole happiness. + +If this fact were true, the inference drawn from it would be +irresistible. But nothing is less founded. We admit, indeed, that +violent addresses have been procured with uncommon pains by wicked and +designing men, purporting to be the genuine voice of the whole people of +England,--that they have been published by authority here, and made +known to you by proclamations, in order, by despair and resentment, +incurably to poison your minds against the origin of your race, and to +render all cordial reconciliation between us utterly impracticable. The +same wicked men, for the same bad purposes, have so far surprised the +justice of Parliament as to cut off all communication betwixt us, except +what is to go in their own fallacious and hostile channel. + +But we conjure you by the invaluable pledges which have hitherto united, +and which we trust will hereafter lastingly unite us, that you do not +suffer yourselves to be persuaded or provoked into an opinion that you +are at war with this nation. Do not think that the whole, or even the +uninfluenced majority, of Englishmen in this island are enemies to their +own blood on the American continent. Much delusion has been practised, +much corrupt influence treacherously employed. But still a large, and we +trust the largest and soundest, part of this kingdom perseveres in the +most perfect unity of sentiments, principles, and affections with you. +It spreads out a large and liberal platform of common liberty, upon +which we may all unite forever. It abhors the hostilities which have +been carried on against you, as much as you who feel the cruel effect of +them. It has disclaimed in the most solemn manner, at the foot of the +throne itself, the addresses which tended to irritate your sovereign +against his colonies. We are persuaded that even many of those who +unadvisedly have put their hands to such intemperate and inflammatory +addresses have not at all apprehended to what such proceedings naturally +lead, and would sooner die than afford them the least countenance, if +they were sensible of their fatal effects on the union and liberty of +the empire. + +For ourselves, we faithfully assure you, that we have ever considered +you as rational creatures, as free agents, as men willing to pursue and +able to discern your own true interest. We have wished to continue +united with you, in order that a people of one origin and one character +should be directed to the rational objects of government by joint +counsels, and protected in them by a common force. Other subordination +in you we require none. We have never pressed that argument of general +union to the extinction of your local, natural, and just privileges. +Sensible of what is due both to the dignity and weakness of man, we have +never wished to place over you any government, over which, in great, +fundamental points, you should have no sort of check or control in your +own hands, or which should be repugnant to your situation, principles, +and character. + +No circumstances of fortune, you may be assured, will ever induce us to +form or tolerate any such design. If the disposition of Providence +(which we deprecate) should even prostrate you at our feet, broken in +power and in spirit, it would be our duty and inclination to revive, by +every practicable means, that free energy of mind which a fortune +unsuitable to your virtue had damped and dejected, and to put you +voluntarily in possession of those very privileges which you had in vain +attempted to assert by arms. For we solemnly declare, that, although we +should look upon a separation from you as an heavy calamity, (and the +heavier, because we know you must have your full share in it,) yet we +had much rather see you totally independent of this crown and kingdom +than joined to it by so unnatural a conjunction as that of freedom with +servitude,--a conjunction which, if it were at all practicable, could +not fail, in the end, of being more mischievous to the peace, +prosperity, greatness, and power of this nation than beneficial by any +enlargement of the bounds of nominal empire. + +But because, brethren, these professions are general, and such as even +enemies may make, when they reserve to themselves the construction of +what servitude and what liberty are, we inform you that we adopt your +own standard of the blessing of free government. We are of opinion that +you ought to enjoy the sole and exclusive right of freely granting, and +applying to the support of your administration, what God has freely +granted as a reward to your industry. And we do not confine this +immunity from exterior coercion, in this great point, solely to what +regards your local establishment, but also to what may be thought proper +for the maintenance of the whole empire. In this resource we cheerfully +trust and acquiesce, satisfied by evident reason that no other +expectation of revenue can possibly be given by freemen, and knowing +from an experience uniform both on yours and on our side of the ocean +that such an expectation has never yet been disappointed. We know of no +road to your coffers but through your affections. + +To manifest our sentiments the more clearly to you and to the world on +this subject, we declare our opinion, that, if no revenue at all (which, +however, we are far from supposing) were to be obtained from you to this +kingdom, yet, as long as it is our happiness to be joined with you in +the bonds of fraternal charity and freedom, with an open and flowing +commerce between us, one principle of enmity and friendship pervading, +and one right of war and peace directing the strength of the whole +empire, we are likely to be at least as powerful as any nation, or as +any combination of nations, which in the course of human events may be +formed against us. We are sensible that a very large proportion of the +wealth and power of every empire must necessarily be thrown upon the +presiding state. We are sensible that such a state ever has borne and +ever must bear the greatest part, and sometimes the whole, of the public +expenses: and we think her well indemnified for that (rather apparent +than real) inequality of charge, in the dignity and preeminence she +enjoys, and in the superior opulence which, after all charges defrayed, +must necessarily remain at the centre of affairs. Of this principle we +are not without evidence in our remembrance (not yet effaced) of the +glorious and happy days of this empire. We are therefore incapable of +that prevaricating style, by which, when taxes without your consent are +to be extorted from you, this nation is represented as in the lowest +state of impoverishment and public distress, but when we are called upon +to oppress you by force of arms, it is painted as scarcely feeling its +impositions, abounding with wealth, and inexhaustible in its resources. + +We also reason and feel as you do on the invasion of your charters. +Because the charters comprehend the essential forms by which you enjoy +your liberties, we regard them as most sacred, and by no means to be +taken away or altered without process, without examination, and without +hearing, as they have lately been. We even think that they ought by no +means to be altered at all, but at the desire of the greater part of the +people who live under them. We cannot look upon men as delinquents in +the mass; much less are we desirous of lording over our brethren, +insulting their honest pride, and wantonly overturning establishments +judged to be just and convenient by the public wisdom of this nation at +their institution, and which long and inveterate use has taught you to +look up to with affection and reverence. As we disapproved of the +proceedings with regard to the forms of your constitution, so we are +equally tender of every leading principle of free government. We never +could think with approbation of putting the military power out of the +coercion of the civil justice in the country where it acts. + +We disclaim also any sort of share in that other measure which has been +used to alienate your affections from this country,--namely, the +introduction of foreign mercenaries. We saw their employment with shame +and regret, especially in numbers so far exceeding the English forces as +in effect to constitute vassals, who have no sense of freedom, and +strangers, who have no common interest or feelings, as the arbiters of +our unhappy domestic quarrel. + +We likewise saw with shame the African slaves, who had been sold to you +on public faith, and under the sanction of acts of Parliament, to be +your servants and your guards, employed to cut the throats of their +masters. + +You will not, we trust, believe, that, born in a civilized country, +formed to gentle manners, trained in a merciful religion, and living in +enlightened and polished times, where even foreign hostility is softened +from its original sternness, we could have thought of letting loose upon +you, our late beloved brethren, these fierce tribes of savages and +cannibals, in whom the traces of human nature are effaced by ignorance +and barbarity. We rather wished to have joined with you in bringing +gradually that unhappy part of mankind into civility, order, piety, and +virtuous discipline, than to have confirmed their evil habits and +increased their natural ferocity by fleshing them in the slaughter of +you, whom our wiser and better ancestors had sent into the wilderness +with the express view of introducing, along with our holy religion, its +humane and charitable manners. We do not hold that all things are lawful +in war. We should think that every barbarity, in fire, in wasting, in +murders, in tortures, and other cruelties, too horrible and too full of +turpitude for Christian mouths to utter or ears to hear, if done at our +instigation, by those who we know will make war thus, if they make it at +all, to be, to all intents and purposes, as if done by ourselves. We +clear ourselves to you our brethren, to the present age, and to future +generations, to our king and our country, and to Europe, which, as a +spectator, beholds this tragic scene, of every part or share in adding +this last and worst of evils to the inevitable mischiefs of a civil war. + +We do not call you rebels and traitors. We do not call for the vengeance +of the crown against you. We do not know how to qualify millions of our +countrymen, contending with one heart for an admission to privileges +which we have ever thought our own happiness and honor, by odious and +unworthy names. On the contrary, we highly revere the principles on +which you act, though we lament some of their effects. Armed as you are, +we embrace you as our friends and as our brethren by the best and +dearest ties of relation. + +We view the establishment of the English colonies on principles of +liberty as that which is to render this kingdom venerable to future +ages. In comparison of this, we regard all the victories and conquests +of our warlike ancestors, or of our own times, as barbarous, vulgar +distinctions, in which many nations, whom we look upon with little +respect or value, have equalled, if not far exceeded us. This is the +peculiar and appropriated glory of England. Those who _have and who +hold_ to that foundation of common liberty, whether on this or on your +side of the ocean, we consider as the true, and the only true, +Englishmen. Those who depart from it, whether there or here, are +attainted, corrupted in blood, and wholly fallen from their original +rank and value. They are the real rebels to the fair constitution and +just supremacy of England. + +We exhort you, therefore, to cleave forever to those principles, as +being the true bond of union in this empire,--and to show by a manly +perseverance that the sentiments of honor and the rights of mankind are +not held by the uncertain events of war, as you have hitherto shown a +glorious and affecting example to the world that they are not dependent +on the ordinary conveniences and satisfactions of life. + +Knowing no other arguments to be used to men of liberal minds, it is +upon these very principles, and these alone, we hope and trust that no +flattering and no alarming circumstances shall permit you to listen to +the seductions of those who would alienate you from your dependence on +the crown and Parliament of this kingdom. That very liberty which you so +justly prize above all things originated here; and it may be very +doubtful, whether, without being constantly fed from the original +fountain, it can be at all perpetuated or preserved in its native purity +and perfection. Untried forms of government may, to unstable minds, +recommend themselves even by their novelty. But you will do well to +remember that England has been great and happy under the present limited +monarchy (subsisting in more or less vigor and purity) for several +hundred years. None but England can communicate to you the benefits of +such a constitution. We apprehend you are not now, nor for ages are +likely to be, capable of that form of constitution in an independent +state. Besides, let us suggest to you our apprehensions that your +present union (in which we rejoice, and which we wish long to subsist) +cannot always subsist without the authority and weight of this great and +long respected body, to equipoise, and to preserve you amongst +yourselves in a just and fair equality. It may not even be impossible +that a long course of war with the administration of this country may be +but a prelude to a series of wars and contentions among yourselves, to +end at length (as such scenes have too often ended) in a species of +humiliating repose, which nothing but the preceding calamities would +reconcile to the dispirited few who survived them. We allow that even +this evil is worth the risk to men of honor, when rational liberty is at +stake, as in the present case we confess and lament that it is. But if +ever a real security by Parliament is given against the terror or the +abuse of unlimited power, and after such security given you should +persevere in resistance, we leave you to consider whether the risk is +not incurred without an object, or incurred for an object infinitely +diminished by such concessions in its importance and value. + +As to other points of discussion, when these grand fundamentals of your +grants and charters are once settled and ratified by clear Parliamentary +authority, as the ground for peace and forgiveness on our side, and for +a manly and liberal obedience on yours, treaty and a spirit of +reconciliation will easily and securely adjust whatever may remain. Of +this we give you our word, that, so far as we are at present concerned, +and if by any event we should become more concerned hereafter, you may +rest assured, upon the pledges of honor not forfeited, faith not +violated, and uniformity of character and profession not yet broken, we +at least, on these grounds, will never fail you. + +Respecting your wisdom, and valuing your safety, we do not call upon you +to trust your existence to your enemies. We do not advise you to an +unconditional submission. With satisfaction we assure you that almost +all in both Houses (however unhappily they have been deluded, so as not +to give any immediate effect to their opinion) disclaim that idea. You +can have no friends in whom you cannot rationally confide. But +Parliament is your friend from the moment in which, removing its +confidence from those who have constantly deceived its good intentions, +it adopts the sentiments of those who have made sacrifices, (inferior, +indeed, to yours,) but have, however, sacrificed enough to demonstrate +the sincerity of their regard and value for your liberty and prosperity. + +Arguments may be used to weaken your confidence in that public security; +because, from some unpleasant appearances, there is a suspicion that +Parliament itself is somewhat fallen from its independent spirit. How +far this supposition may be founded in fact we are unwilling to +determine. But we are well assured from experience, that, even if all +were true that is contended for, and in the extent, too, in which it is +argued, yet, as long as the solid and well-disposed forms of this +Constitution remain, there ever is within Parliament itself a power of +renovating its principles, and effecting a self-reformation, which no +other plan of government has ever contained. This Constitution has +therefore admitted innumerable improvements, either for the correction +of the original scheme, or for removing corruptions, or for bringing its +principles better to suit those changes which have successively happened +in the circumstances of the nation or in the manners of the people. + +We feel that the growth of the colonies is such a change of +circumstances, and that our present dispute is an exigency as pressing +as any which ever demanded a revision of our government. Public troubles +have often called upon this country to look into its Constitution. It +has ever been bettered by such a revision. If our happy and luxuriant +increase of dominion, and our diffused population, have outgrown the +limits of a Constitution made for a contracted object, we ought to bless +God, who has furnished us with this noble occasion for displaying our +skill and beneficence in enlarging the scale of rational happiness, and +of making the politic generosity of this kingdom as extensive as its +fortune. If we set about this great work, on both sides, with the same +conciliatory turn of mind, we may now, as in former times, owe even to +our mutual mistakes, contentions, and animosities, the lasting concord, +freedom, happiness, and glory of this empire. + +Gentlemen, the distance between us, with other obstructions, has caused +much misrepresentation of our mutual sentiments. We, therefore, to +obviate them as well as we are able, take this method of assuring you of +our thorough detestation of the whole war, and particularly the +mercenary and savage war carried on or attempted against you,--our +thorough abhorrence of all addresses adverse to you, whether public or +private,--our assurances of an invariable affection towards you,--our +constant regard to your privileges and liberties,--and our opinion of +the solid security you ought to enjoy for them, under the paternal care +and nurture of a protecting Parliament. + +Though many of us have earnestly wished that the authority of that +august and venerable body, so necessary in many respects to the union of +the whole, should be rather limited by its own equity and discretion, +than by any bounds described by positive laws and public compacts,--and +though we felt the extreme difficulty, by any theoretical limitations, +of qualifying that authority, so as to preserve one part and deny +another,--and though you (as we gratefully acknowledge) had acquiesced +most cheerfully under that prudent reserve of the Constitution, at that +happy moment when neither you nor we apprehended a further return of the +exercise of invidious powers, we are now as fully persuaded as you can +be, by the malice, inconstancy, and perverse inquietude of many men, and +by the incessant endeavors of an arbitrary faction, now too powerful, +that our common necessities do require a full explanation and ratified +security for your liberties and our quiet. + +Although his Majesty's condescension, in committing the direction of his +affairs into the hands of the known friends of his family and of the +liberties of all his people, would, we admit, be a great means of giving +repose to your minds, as it must give infinite facility to +reconciliation, yet we assure you that we think, with such a security as +we recommend, adopted from necessity and not choice, even by the unhappy +authors and instruments of the public misfortunes, that the terms of +reconciliation, if once accepted by Parliament, would not be broken. We +also pledge ourselves to you, that we should give, even to those +unhappy persons, an hearty support in effectuating the peace of the +empire, and every opposition in an attempt to cast it again into +disorder. + +When that happy hour shall arrive, let us in all affection, recommend to +you the wisdom of continuing, as in former times, or even in a more +ample measure, the support of your government, and even to give to your +administration some degree of reciprocal interest in your freedom. We +earnestly wish you not to furnish your enemies, here or elsewhere, with +any sort of pretexts for reviving quarrels by too reserved and severe or +penurious an exercise of those sacred rights which no pretended abuse in +the exercise ought to impair, nor, by overstraining the principles of +freedom, to make them less compatible with those haughty sentiments in +others which the very same principles may be apt to breed in minds not +tempered with the utmost equity and justice. + +The well-wishers of the liberty and union of this empire salute you, and +recommend you most heartily to the Divine protection. + + + + +A + +LETTER + +TO + +THE RIGHT HON. EDMUND S. PERY + +SPEAKER OF THE IRISH HOUSE OF COMMONS, + +IN RELATION TO + +A BILL FOR THE RELIEF OF THE ROMAN CATHOLICS OF IRELAND. + +JULY 18, 1778. + + +NOTE. + + This Letter is addressed to Mr. Pery, (afterwards Lord Pery,) + then Speaker of the House of Commons of Ireland. It appears, + there had been much correspondence between that gentleman and + Mr. Burke, on the subject of Heads of a bill (which had + passed the Irish House of Commons in the summer of the year + 1778, and had been transmitted by the Irish Privy Council of + [to?] England) for the relief of his Majesty's Roman Catholic + subjects in Ireland. The bill contained a clause for + exempting the Protestant Dissenters of Ireland from the + sacramental test, which created a strong objection to the + whole measure on the part of the English government. Mr. + Burke employed his most strenuous efforts to remove the + prejudice which the king's ministers entertained against the + clause, but the bill was ultimately returned without it, and + in that shape passed the Irish Parliament. (17th and 18th + Geo. III cap. 49.) In the subsequent session, however, a + separate act was passed for the relief of the Protestant + Dissenters of Ireland. + + +LETTER. + +My Dear Sir,--I received in due course your two very interesting and +judicious letters, which gave me many new lights, and excited me to +fresh activity in the important subject they related to. However, from +that time I have not been perfectly free from doubt and uneasiness. I +used a liberty with those letters, which, perhaps, nothing can +thoroughly justify, and which certainly nothing but the delicacy of the +crisis, the clearness of my intentions, and your great good-nature can +at all excuse. I might conceal this from you; but I think it better to +lay the whole matter before you, and submit myself to your +mercy,--assuring you, at the same time, that, if you are so kind as to +continue your confidence on this, or to renew it upon any other +occasion, I shall never be tempted again to make so bold and +unauthorized an use of the trust you place in me. I will state to you +the history of the business since my last, and then you will see how far +I am excusable by the circumstances. + +On the 3rd of July I received a letter from the Attorney-General, dated +the day before, in which, in a very open and obliging manner, he desires +my thoughts of the Irish Toleration Bill, and particularly of the +Dissenters' clause. I gave them to him, by the return of the post, at +large; but, as the time pressed, I kept no copy of the letter. The +general drift was strongly to recommend the _whole_, and principally to +obviate the objections to the part that related to the Dissenters, with +regard both to the general propriety and to the temporary policy at this +juncture. I took, likewise, a good deal of pains to state the difference +which had always subsisted with regard to the treatment of the +Protestant Dissenters in Ireland and in England, and what I conceived +the reason of that difference to be. About the same time I was called to +town for a day; and I took an opportunity, in Westminster Hall, of +urging the same points, with all the force I was master of, to the +Solicitor-General. I attempted to see the Chancellor for the same +purpose, but was not fortunate enough to meet him at home. Soon after my +return hither, on Tuesday, I received a very polite and I may say +friendly letter from him, wishing me (on supposition that I had +continued in town) to dine with him as [on?] that day, in order to talk +over the business of the Toleration Act, then before him. Unluckily I +had company with me, and was not able to leave them until Thursday, when +I went to town and called at his house, but missed him. However, in +answer to his letter, I had before, and instantly on the receipt of it, +written to him at large, and urged such topics, both with regard to the +Catholics and Dissenters, as I imagined were the most likely to be +prevalent with him. This letter I followed to town on Thursday. On my +arrival I was much alarmed with a report that the ministry had thoughts +of rejecting the whole bill. Mr. M'Namara seemed apprehensive that it +was a determined measure; and there seemed to be but too much reason for +his fears. + +Not having met the Chancellor at home, either on my first visit or my +second after receiving his letter, and fearful that the Cabinet should +come to come unpleasant resolution, I went to the Treasury on Friday. +There I saw Sir G. Cooper. I possessed him of the danger of a partial, +and the inevitable mischief of the total rejection of the bill. I +reminded him of the understood compact between parties, upon which the +whole scheme of the toleration originating in the English bill was +formed,--of the fair part which the Whigs had acted in a business which, +though first started by them, was supposed equally acceptable to all +sides, and the risk of which they took upon themselves, when others +declined it. To this I added such matter as I thought most fit to engage +government, as government,--not to sport with a singular opportunity +which offered for the union of every description of men amongst us in +support of the common interest of the whole; and I ended by desiring to +see Lord North upon the subject. Sir Grey Cooper showed a very right +sense of the matter, and in a few minutes after our conversation I went +down from the Treasury chambers to Lord North's house. I had a great +deal of discourse with him. He told me that his ideas of toleration were +large, but that, large as they were, they did not comprehend a +promiscuous establishment, even in matters merely civil; that he thought +the established religion ought to be the religion of the state; that, in +this idea, he was not for the repeal of the sacramental test; that, +indeed, he knew the Dissenters in general did not greatly scruple it; +but that very want of scruple showed less zeal against the +Establishment; and, after all, there could no provision be made by human +laws against those who made light of the tests which were formed to +discriminate opinions. On all this he spoke with a good deal of temper. +He did not, indeed, seem to think the test itself, which was rightly +considered by Dissenters as in a manner dispensed with by an annual act +of Parliament, and which in Ireland was of a late origin, and of much +less extent than here, a matter of much moment. The thing which seemed +to affect him most was the offence that would be taken at the repeal by +the leaders among the Church clergy here, on one hand, and, on the +other, the steps which would be taken for its repeal in England in the +next session, in consequence of the repeal in Ireland. I assured him, +with great truth, that we had no idea among the Whigs of moving the +repeal of the test. I confessed very freely, for my own part, that, if +it were brought in, I should certainly vote for it; but that I should +neither use, nor did I think applicable, any arguments drawn from the +analogy of what was done in other parts of the British dominions. We did +not argue from analogy, even in this island and United Kingdom. +Presbytery was established in Scotland. It became no reason either for +its religious or civil establishment here. In New England the +Independent Congregational Churches had an established legal +maintenance; whilst that country continued part of the British empire, +no argument in favor of Independency was adduced from the practice of +New England. Government itself lately thought fit to establish the Roman +Catholic religion in Canada; but they would not suffer an argument of +analogy to be used for its establishment anywhere else. These things +were governed, as all things of that nature are governed, not by general +maxims, but their own local and peculiar circumstances. Finding, +however, that, though he was very cool and patient, I made no great way +in the business of the Dissenters, I turned myself to try whether, +falling in with his maxims, some modification might not be found, the +hint of which I received from your letter relative to the Irish Militia +Bill, and the point I labored was so to alter the clause as to repeal +the test _quoad_ military and revenue offices: for these being only +subservient parts in the economy and execution, rather than the +administration of affairs, the politic, civil, and judicial parts would +still continue in the hands of the conformists to religious +establishments. Without giving any hopes, he, however, said that this +distinction deserved to be considered. After this, I strongly pressed +the mischief of rejecting the whole bill: that a notion went abroad, +that government was not at this moment very well pleased with the +Dissenters, as not very well affected to the monarchy; that, in general, +I conceived this to be a mistake,--but if it were not, the rejection of +a bill in favor _of others_, because something in favor of _them_ was +inserted, instead of humbling and mortifying, would infinitely exalt +them: for, if the legislature had no means of favoring those whom they +meant to favor, as long as the Dissenters could find means to get +themselves included, this would make them, instead of their only being +subject to restraint themselves, the arbitrators of the fate of others, +and that not so much by their own strength (which could not be prevented +in its operation) as by the coöperation of those whom they opposed. In +the conclusion, I recommended, that, if they wished well to the measure +which was the main object of the bill, they must explicitly make it +their own, and stake themselves upon it; that hitherto all their +difficulties had arisen from their indecision and their wrong measures; +and to make Lord North sensible of the necessity of giving a firm +support to some part of the bill, and to add weighty authority to my +reasons, I read him your letter of the 10th of July. It seemed, in some +measure, to answer the purpose which I intended. I pressed the necessity +of the management of the affair, both as to conduct and as to gaining of +men; and I renewed my former advice, that the Lord Lieutenant should be +instructed to consult and cooperate with you in the whole affair. All +this was, apparently, very fairly taken. + +In the evening of that day I saw the Lord Chancellor. With him, too, I +had much discourse. You know that he is intelligent, sagacious, +systematic, and determined. At first he seemed of opinion that the +relief contained in the bill was so inadequate to the mass of oppression +it was intended to remove, that it would be better to let it stand over, +until a more perfect and better digested plan could be settled. This +seemed to possess him very strongly. In order to combat this notion, and +to show that the bill, all things considered, was a very great +acquisition, and that it was rather a preliminary than an obstruction to +relief, I ventured to show him your letter. It had its effect. He +declared himself roundly against giving anything to a confederacy, real +or apparent, to distress government; that, if anything was done for +Catholics or Dissenters, it should be done on its own separate merits, +and not by way of bargain and compromise; that they should be each of +them obliged to government, not each to the other; that this would be a +perpetual nursery of faction. In a word, he seemed so determined on not +uniting these plans, that all I could say, and I said everything I could +think of, was to no purpose. But when I insisted on the disgrace to +government which must arise from their rejecting a proposition +recommended by themselves, because their opposers had made a mixture, +separable too by themselves, I was better heard. On the whole, I found +him well disposed. + +As soon as I had returned to the country, this affair lay so much on my +mind, and the absolute necessity of government's making a serious +business of it, agreeably to the seriousness they professed, and the +object required, that I wrote to Sir G. Cooper, to remind him of the +principles upon which we went in our conversation, and to press the plan +which was suggested for carrying them into execution. He wrote to me on +the 20th, and assured me, "that Lord North had given all due attention +and respect to what you said to him on Friday, and will pay the same +respect to the sentiments conveyed in your letter: everything you say or +write on the subject undoubtedly demands it." Whether this was mere +civility, or showed anything effectual in their intentions, time and the +success of this measure will show. It is wholly with them; and if it +should fail, you are a witness that nothing on our part has been wanting +to free so large a part of our fellow-subjects and fellow-citizens from +slavery, and to free government from the weakness and danger of ruling +them by force. As to my own particular part, the desire of doing this +has betrayed me into a step which I cannot perfectly reconcile to +myself. You are to judge how far, on the circumstances, it may be +excused. I think it had a good effect. You may be assured that I made +this communication in a manner effectually to exclude so false and +groundless an idea as that I confer with you, any more than I confer +with them, on any party principle whatsoever,--or that in this affair we +look further than the measure which is in profession, and I am sure +ought to be in reason, theirs. + +I am ever, with the sincerest affection and esteem, + +My dear Sir, + +Your most faithful and obedient humble servant, + +EDMUND BURKE. + +BEACONSFIELD, 18th July, 1778. + + +I intended to have written sooner, but it has not been in my power. + +To the Speaker of the House of Commons of Ireland. + + + + +TWO LETTERS + +TO + +THOMAS BURGH, ESQ., + +AND + +JOHN MERLOTT, ESQ., + +IN VINDICATION OF HIS PARLIAMENTARY CONDUCT RELATIVE TO THE AFFAIRS OF +IRELAND. + +1780. + + + + +LETTER + +TO THOMAS BURGH, ESQ.[14] + + +My Dear Sir,--I do not know in what manner I am to thank you properly +for the very friendly solicitude you have been so good as to express for +my reputation. The concern you have done me the honor to take in my +affairs will be an ample indemnity from all that I may suffer from the +rapid judgments of those who choose to form their opinions of men, not +from the life, but from their portraits in a newspaper. I confess to you +that my frame of mind is so constructed, I have in me so little of the +constitution of a great man, that I am more gratified with a very +moderate share of approbation from those few who know me than I should +be with the most clamorous applause from those multitudes who love to +admire at a due distance. + +I am not, however, Stoic enough to be able to affirm with truth, or +hypocrite enough affectedly to pretend, that I am wholly unmoved at the +difficulty which you and others of my friends in Ireland have found in +vindicating my conduct towards my native country. It undoubtedly hurts +me in some degree: but the wound is not very deep. If I had sought +popularity in Ireland, when, in the cause of that country, I was ready +to sacrifice, and did sacrifice, a much nearer, a much more immediate, +and a much more advantageous popularity here, I should find myself +perfectly unhappy, because I should be totally disappointed in my +expectations,--because I should discover, when it was too late, what +common sense might have told me very early, that I risked the capital of +my fame in the most disadvantageous lottery in the world. But I acted +then, as I act now, and as I hope I shall act always, from a strong +impulse of right, and from motives in which popularity, either here or +there, has but a very little part. + +With the support of that consciousness I can bear a good deal of the +coquetry of public opinion, which has her caprices, and must have her +way. _Miseri, quibus intentata nitet_! I, too, have had my holiday of +popularity in Ireland. I have even heard of an intention to erect a +statue.[15] I believe my intimate acquaintance know how little that idea +was encouraged by me; and I was sincerely glad that it never took +effect. Such honors belong exclusively to the tomb,--the natural and +only period of human inconstancy, with regard either to desert or to +opinion: for they are the very same hands which erect, that very +frequently (and sometimes with reason enough) pluck down the statue. Had +such an unmerited and unlooked-for compliment been paid to me two years +ago, the fragments of the piece might at this hour have the advantage of +seeing actual service, while they were moving, according to the law of +projectiles, to the windows of the Attorney-General, or of my old +friend, Monk Mason. + +To speak seriously,--let me assure you, my dear Sir, that, though I am +not permitted to rejoice at _all_ its effects, there is not one man on +your side of the water more pleased to see the situation of Ireland so +prosperous as that she can afford to throw away her friends. She has +obtained, solely by her own efforts, the fruits of a great victory, +which I am very ready to allow that the best efforts of her best +well-wishers here could not have done for her so effectually in a great +number of years, and perhaps could not have done at all. I could wish, +however, merely for the sake of her own dignity, that, in turning her +poor relations and antiquated friends out of doors, (though one of the +most common effects of new prosperity,) she had thought proper to +dismiss us with fewer tokens of unkindness. It is true that there is no +sort of danger in affronting men who are not of importance enough to +have any trust of ministerial, of royal, or of national honor to +surrender. The unforced and unbought services of humble men, who have no +medium of influence in great assemblies, but through the precarious +force of reason, must be looked upon with contempt by those who by their +wisdom and spirit have improved the critical moment of their fortune, +and have debated with authority against pusillanimous dissent and +ungracious compliance, at the head of forty thousand men. + +Such feeble auxiliaries (as I talk of) to such a force, employed +against such resistance, I must own, in the present moment, very little +worthy of your attention. Yet, if one were to look forward, it scarcely +seems altogether politic to bestow so much liberality of invective on +the Whigs of this kingdom as I find has been the fashion to do both in +and out of Parliament. That you should pay compliments, in some tone or +other, whether ironical or serious, to the minister from whose +imbecility you have extorted what you could never obtain from his +bounty, is not unnatural. In the first effusions of Parliamentary +gratitude to that minister for the early and voluntary benefits he has +conferred upon Ireland, it might appear that you were wanting to the +triumph of his surrender, if you did not lead some of his enemies +captive before him. Neither could you feast him with decorum, if his +particular taste were not consulted. A minister, who has never defended +his measures in any other way than by railing at his adversaries, cannot +have his palate made all at once to the relish of positive commendation. +I cannot deny but that on this occasion there was displayed a great deal +of the good-breeding which consists in the accommodation of the +entertainment to the relish of the guest. + +But that ceremony being past, it would not be unworthy of the wisdom of +Ireland to consider what consequences the extinguishing every spark of +freedom in this country may have upon your own liberties. You are at +this instant flushed with victory, and full of the confidence natural to +recent and untried power. We are in a temper equally natural, though +very different. We feel as men do, who, having placed an unbounded +reliance on their force, have found it totally to fail on trial. We +feel faint and heartless, and without the smallest degree of +self-opinion. In plain words, we are _cowed_. When men give up their +violence and injustice without a struggle, their condition is next to +desperate. When no art, no management, no argument, is necessary to +abate their pride and overcome their prejudices, and their uneasiness +only excites an obscure and feeble rattling in their throat, their final +dissolution seems not far off. In this miserable state we are still +further depressed by the overbearing influence of the crown. It acts +with the officious cruelty of a mercenary nurse, who, under pretence of +tenderness, stifles us with our clothes, and plucks the pillow from our +heads. _Injectu multæ vestis opprimi senem jubet_. Under this influence +we have so little will of our own, that, even in any apparent activity +we may be got to assume, I may say, without any violence to sense, and +with very little to language, we are merely passive. We have yielded to +your demands this session. In the last session we refused to prevent +them. In both cases, the passive and the active, our principle was the +same. Had the crown pleased to retain the spirit, with regard to +Ireland, which seems to be now all directed to America, we should have +neglected our own immediate defence, and sent over the last man of our +militia to fight with the last man of your volunteers. + +To this influence the principle of action, the principle of policy, and +the principle of union of the present minority are opposed. These +principles of the opposition are the only thing which preserves a single +symptom of life in the nation. That opposition is composed of the far +greater part of the independent property and independent rank of the +kingdom, of whatever is most untainted in character, and of whatever +ability remains unextinguished in the people, and of all which tends to +draw the attention of foreign countries upon this. It is now in its +final and conclusive struggle. It has to struggle against a force to +which, I am afraid, it is not equal. The _whole_ kingdom of Scotland +ranges with the venal, the unprincipled, and the wrong-principled of +this; and if the kingdom of Ireland thinks proper to pass into the same +camp, we shall certainly be obliged to quit the field. In that case, if +I know anything of this country, another constitutional opposition _can +never_ be formed in it; and if this be impossible, it will be at least +as much so (if there can be degrees in impossibility) to have a +constitutional administration at any future time. The possibility of the +former is the only security for the existence of the latter. Whether the +present administration be in the least like one, I must venture to +doubt, even in the honey-moon of the Irish fondness to Lord North, which +has succeeded to all their slappings and scratchings. + +If liberty cannot maintain its ground in this kingdom, I am sure that it +cannot have any long continuance in yours. Our liberty might now and +then jar and strike a discord with that of Ireland. The thing is +possible: but still the instruments might play in concert. But if ours +be unstrung, yours will be hung up on a peg, and both will be mute +forever. Your new military force may give you confidence, and it serves +well for a turn; but you and I know that it has not root. It is not +perennial, and would prove but a poor shelter for your liberty, when +this nation, having no interest in its own, could look upon yours with +the eye of envy and disgust. I cannot, therefore, help thinking, and +telling you what with great submission I think, that, if the Parliament +of Ireland be so jealous of the spirit of our common Constitution as she +seems to be, it was not so discreet to mix with the panegyric on the +minister so large a portion of acrimony to the independent part of this +nation. You never received any sort of injury from them, and you are +grown to that degree of importance that the discourses in your +Parliament will have a much greater effect on our immediate fortune than +our conversation can have upon yours. In the end they will seriously, +affect both. + +I have looked back upon our conduct and our public conversations in +order to discover what it is that can have given you offence. I have +done so, because I am ready to admit that to offend you without any +cause would be as contrary to true policy as I am sure it must be to the +inclinations of almost every one of us. About two years ago Lord Nugent +moved six propositions in favor of Ireland in the House of Commons. At +the time of the motions, and during the debate, Lord North was either +wholly out of the House, or engaged in other matters of business or +pleasantry, in the remotest recesses of the West Saxon corner. He took +no part whatsoever in the affair; but it was supposed his neutrality was +more inclined towards the side of favor. The mover being a person in +office was, however, the only indication that was given of such a +leaning. We who supported the propositions, finding them better relished +than at first we looked for, pursued our advantage, and began to open a +way for more essential benefits to Ireland. On the other hand, those +who had hitherto opposed them in vain redoubled their efforts, and +became exceedingly clamorous. Then it was that Lord North found it +necessary to come out of his fastness, and to interpose between the +contending parties. In this character of mediator, he declared, that, if +anything beyond the first six resolutions should be attempted, he would +oppose the whole, but that, if we rested there, the original motions +should have his support. On this a sort of convention took place between +him and the managers of the Irish business, in which the six resolutions +were to be considered as an _uti possidetis_, and to be held sacred. + +By this time other parties began to appear. A good many of the trading +towns, and manufactures of various kinds, took the alarm. Petitions +crowded in upon one another, and the bar was occupied by a formidable +body of council. Lord N. was staggered by this new battery. He is not of +a constitution to encounter such an opposition as had then risen, when +there were no other objects in view than those that were then before the +House. In order not to lose him, we were obliged to abandon, bit by bit, +the most considerable part of the original agreement. + +In several parts, however, he continued fair and firm. For my own part, +I acted, as I trust I commonly do, with decision. I saw very well that +the things we had got were of no great consideration; but they were, +even in their defects, somewhat leading. I was in hopes that we might +obtain gradually and by parts what we might attempt at once and in the +whole without success,--that one concession would lead to another,--and +that the people of England discovering by a progressive experience that +none of the concessions actually made were followed by the consequences +they had dreaded, their fears from what they were yet to yield would +considerably diminish. But that to which I attached myself the most +particularly was, to fix _the principle_ of a free trade in all the +ports of these islands, as founded in justice, and beneficial to the +whole, but principally to this, the seat of the supreme power. And this +I labored to the utmost of my might, upon general principles, +illustrated by all the commercial detail with which my little inquiries +in life were able to furnish me. I ought to forget such trifling things +as those, with all concerning myself; and possibly I might have +forgotten them, if the Lord Advocate of Scotland had not, in a very +flattering manner, revived them in my memory, in a full House in this +session. He told me that my arguments, such as they were, had made him, +at the period I allude to, change the opinion with which he had come +into the House strongly impressed. I am sure that at the time at least +twenty more told me the same thing. I certainly ought not to take their +style of compliment as a testimony to fact; neither do I. But all this +showed sufficiently, not what they thought of my ability, but what they +saw of my zeal. I could say more in proof of the effects of that zeal, +and of the unceasing industry with which I then acted, both in my +endeavors which were apparent and those that were not so visible. Let it +be remembered that I showed those dispositions while the Parliament of +England was in a capacity to deliberate and in a situation to refuse, +when there was something to be risked here by being suspected of a +partiality to Ireland, when there was an honorable danger attending the +profession of friendship to you, which heightened its relish, and made +it worthy of a reception in manly minds. But as for the awkward and +nauseous parade of debate without opposition, the flimsy device of +tricking out necessity and disguising it in the habit of choice, the +shallow stratagem of defending by argument, what all the world must +perceive is yielded to force,--these are a sort of acts of friendship +which I am sorry that any of my countrymen should require of their real +friends. They are things not _to my taste_; and if they are looked upon +as tests of friendship, I desire for one that I may be considered as an +enemy. + +What party purpose did my conduct answer at that time? I acted with Lord +N. I went to all the ministerial meetings,--and he and his associates in +office will do me the justice to say, that, aiming at the concord of the +empire, I made it my business to give his concessions all the value of +which they were capable, whilst some of those who were covered with his +favors derogated from them, treated them with contempt, and openly +threatened to oppose them. If I had acted with my dearest and most +valued friends, if I had acted with the Marquis of Rockingham or the +Duke of Richmond, in that situation, I could not have attended more to +their honor, or endeavored more earnestly to give efficacy to the +measures I had taken in common with them. The return which I, and all +who acted as I did, have met with from him, does not make me repent the +conduct which I then held. + +As to the rest of the gentlemen with whom I have the honor to act, they +did not then, or at any other time, make a party affair of Irish +politics. That matter was always taken up without concert; but, in +general, from the operation of our known liberal principles in +government, in commerce, in religion, in everything, it was taken up +favorably for Ireland. Where some local interests bore hard upon the +members, they acted on the sense of their constituents, upon ideas +which, though I do not always follow, I cannot blame. However, two or +three persons, high in opposition, and high in public esteem, ran great +risks in their boroughs on that occasion. But all this was without any +particular plan. I need not say, that Ireland was in that affair much +obliged to the liberal mind and enlarged understanding of Charles Fox, +to Mr. Thomas Townshend, to Lord Midleton, and others. On reviewing that +affair, which gave rise to all the subsequent manoeuvres, I am convinced +that the whole of what has this day been done might have then been +effected. But then the minister must have taken it up as a great plan of +national policy, and paid with his person in every lodgment of his +approach. He must have used that influence to quiet prejudice, which he +has so often, used to corrupt principle: and I know, that, if he had, he +must have succeeded. Many of the most active in opposition would have +given him an unequivocal support. The corporation of London, and the +great body of the London West India merchants and planters, which forms +the greatest mass of that vast interest, were disposed to fall in with +such a plan. They certainly gave no sort of discountenance to what was +done or what was proposed. But these are not the kind of objects for +which our ministers bring out the heavy artillery of the state. +Therefore, as things stood at that time, a great deal more was not +practicable. + +Last year another proposition was brought out for the relief of Ireland. +It was started without any communication with a single person of +activity in the country party, and, as it should seem, without any kind +of concert with government. It appeared to me extremely raw and +undigested. The behavior of Lord N., on the opening of that business, +was the exact transcript of his conduct on the Irish question in the +former session. It was a mode of proceeding which his nature has wrought +into the texture of his politics, and which is inseparable from them. He +chose to absent himself on the proposition and during the agitation of +that business,--although the business of the House is that alone for +which he has any kind of relish, or, as I am told, can be persuaded to +listen to with any degree of attention. But he was willing to let it +take its course. If it should pass without any considerable difficulty, +he would bring his acquiescence to tell for merit in Ireland, and he +would have the credit, out of his indolence, of giving quiet to that +country. If difficulties should arise on the part of England, he knew +that the House was so well trained that he might at his pleasure call us +off from the hottest scent. As he acted in his usual manner and upon his +usual principle, opposition acted upon theirs, and rather generally +supported the measure. As to myself, I expressed a disapprobation at the +practice of bringing imperfect and indigested projects into the House, +before means were used to quiet the clamors which a misconception of +what we were doing might occasion at home, and before measures were +settled with men of weight and authority in Ireland, in order to render +our acts useful and acceptable to that country. I said, that the only +thing which could make the influence of the crown (enormous without as +well as within the House) in any degree tolerable was, that it might be +employed to give something of order and system to the proceedings of a +popular assembly; that government being so situated as to have a large +range of prospect, and as it were a bird's-eye view of everything, they +might see distant dangers and distant advantages which were not so +visible to those who stood on the common level; they might, besides, +observe them, from this advantage, in their relative and combined state, +which people locally instructed and partially informed could behold only +in an insulated and unconnected manner;--but that for many years past we +suffered under all the evils, without any one of the advantages of a +government influence; that the business of a minister, or of those who +acted as such, had been still further to contract the narrowness of +men's ideas, to confirm inveterate prejudices, to inflame vulgar +passions, and to abet all sorts of popular absurdities, in order the +better to destroy popular rights and privileges; that, so far from +methodizing the business of the House, they had let all things run into +an inextricable confusion, and had left affairs of the most delicate +policy wholly to chance. + +After I had expressed myself with the warmth I felt on seeing all +government and order buried under the ruins of liberty, and after I had +made my protest against the insufficiency of the propositions, I +supported the principle of enlargement at which they aimed, though short +and somewhat wide of the mark,--giving, as my sole reason, that the more +frequently these matters came into discussion, the more it would tend +to dispel fears and to eradicate prejudices. + +This was the only part I took. The detail was in the hands of Lord +Newhaven and Lord Beauchamp, with some assistance from Earl Nugent and +some independent gentlemen of Irish property. The dead weight of the +minister being removed, the House recovered its tone and elasticity. We +had a temporary appearance of a deliberative character. The business was +debated freely on both sides, and with sufficient temper. And the sense +of the members being influenced by nothing but what will naturally +influence men unbought, their reason and their prejudices, these two +principles had a fair conflict, and prejudice was obliged to give way to +reason. A majority appeared, on a division, in favor of the +propositions. + +As these proceedings got out of doors, Glasgow and Manchester, and, I +think, Liverpool, began to move, but in a manner much more slow and +languid than formerly. Nothing, in my opinion, would have been less +difficult than entirely to have overborne their opposition. The London +West India trade was, as on the former occasion, so on this, perfectly +liberal and perfectly quiet; and there is abroad so much respect for the +united wisdom of the House, when supposed to act upon a fair view of a +political situation, that I scarcely ever remember any considerable +uneasiness out of doors, when the most active members, and those of most +property and consideration in the minority, have joined themselves to +the administration. Many factious people in the towns I mentioned began, +indeed, to revile Lord North, and to reproach his neutrality as +treacherous and ungrateful to those who had so heartily and so warmly +entered into all his views with regard to America. That noble lord, +whose decided character it is to give way to the latest and nearest +pressure, without any sort of regard to distant consequences of any +kind, thought fit to appear, on this signification of the pleasure of +those his worthy friends and partisans, and, putting himself at the head +of the _posse scaccarii_, wholly regardless of the dignity and +consistency of our miserable House, drove the propositions entirely out +of doors by a majority newly summoned to duty. + +In order to atone to Ireland for this gratification to Manchester, he +graciously permitted, or rather forwarded, two bills,--that for +encouraging the growth of tobacco, and that for giving a bounty on +exportation of hemp from Ireland. They were brought in by two very +worthy members, and on good principles; but I was sorry to see them, +and, after expressing my doubts of their propriety, left the House. +Little also [else?] was said upon them. My objections were two: the +first, that the cultivation of those weeds (if one of them could be at +all cultivated to profit) was adverse to the introduction of a good +course of agriculture; the other, that the encouragement given to them +tended to establish that mischievous policy of considering Ireland as a +country of staple, and a producer of raw materials. + +When the rejection of the first propositions and the acceptance of the +last had jointly, as it was natural, raised a very strong discontent in +Ireland, Lord Rockingham, who frequently said that there never seemed a +more opportune time for the relief of Ireland than that moment when Lord +North had rejected all rational propositions for its relief, without +consulting, I believe, any one living, did what he is not often very +willing to do; but he thought this an occasion of magnitude enough to +justify an extraordinary step. He went into the closet, and made a +strong representation on the matter to the king, which was not ill +received, and I believe produced good effects. He then made the motion +in the House of Lords which you may recollect; but he was content to +withdraw all of censure which it contained, on the solemn promise of +ministry, that they would in the recess of Parliament prepare a plan for +the benefit of Ireland, and have it in readiness to produce at the next +meeting. You may recollect that Lord Gower became in a particular manner +bound for the fulfilling this engagement. Even this did not satisfy, and +most of the minority were very unwilling that Parliament should be +prorogued until something effectual on the subject should be +done,--particularly as we saw that the distresses, discontents, and +armaments of Ireland were increasing every day, and that we are not so +much lost to common sense as not to know the wisdom and efficacy of +early concession in circumstances such as ours. + +The session was now at an end. The ministers, instead of attending to a +duty that was so urgent on them, employed themselves, as usual, in +endeavors to destroy the reputation of those who were bold enough to +remind them of it. They caused it to be industriously circulated through +the nation, that the distresses of Ireland were of a nature hard to be +traced to the true source, that they had been monstrously magnified, and +that, in particular, the official reports from Ireland had given the lie +(that was their phrase) to Lord Rockingham's representations: and +attributing the origin of the Irish proceedings wholly to us, they +asserted that everything done in Parliament upon the subject was with a +view of stirring up rebellion; "that neither the Irish legislature nor +their constituents had signified any dissatisfaction at the relief +obtained in the session preceding the last; that, to convince both of +the impropriety of their _peaceable_ conduct, opposition, by making +demands in the name of Ireland, pointed out what she might extort from +Great Britain; that the facility with which relief was (formerly) +granted, instead of satisfying opposition, was calculated to create new +demands; these demands, as they _interfered_ with the commerce of Great +Britain, were _certain_ of being opposed,--a circumstance which could +not fail to create that desirable confusion which suits the views of the +party; that they (the Irish) had long felt their own misery, _without +knowing well from whence it came_; our worthy patriots, by _pointing out +Great Britain_ as the _cause of Irish distress_, may have some chance of +rousing Irish resentment." This I quote from a pamphlet as perfectly +contemptible in point of writing as it is false in its facts and wicked +in its design: but as it is written under the authority of ministers, by +one of their principal literary pensioners, and was circulated with +great diligence, and, as I am credibly informed, at a considerable +expense to the public, I use the words of that book to let you see in +what manner the friends and patrons of Ireland, the heroes of your +Parliament, represented all efforts for your relief here, what means +they took to dispose the minds of the people towards that great object, +and what encouragement they gave to all who should choose to exert +themselves in your favor. Their unwearied endeavors were not wholly +without success, and the unthinking people in many places became +ill-affected towards us on this account. For the ministers proceeded in +your affairs just as they did with regard to those of America. They +always represented you as a parcel of blockheads, without sense, or even +feeling; that all your words were only the echo of faction here; and (as +you have seen above) that you had not understanding enough to know that +your trade was cramped by restrictive acts of the British Parliament, +unless we had, for factious purposes, given you the information. They +were so far from giving the least intimation of the measures which have +since taken place, that those who were supposed the best to know their +intentions declared them impossible in the actual state of the two +kingdoms, and spoke of nothing but an act of union, as the only way that +could be found of giving freedom of trade to Ireland, consistently with +the interests of this kingdom. Even when the session opened, Lord North +declared that he did not know what remedy to apply to a disease of the +cause of which he was ignorant; and ministry not being then entirely +resolved how far they should submit to your energy, they, by +anticipation, set the above author or some of his associates to fill the +newspapers with invectives against us, as distressing the minister by +extravagant demands in favor of Ireland. + +I need not inform you, that everything they asserted of the steps taken +in Ireland, as the result of our machinations, was utterly false and +groundless. For myself, I seriously protest to you, that I neither wrote +a word or received a line upon any matter relative to the trade of +Ireland, or to the polities of it, from the beginning of the last +session to the day that I was honored with your letter. It would be an +affront to the talents in the Irish Parliament to say one word more. + +What was done in Ireland during that period, in and out of Parliament, +never will be forgotten. You raised an army new in its kind and adequate +to its purposes. It effected its end without its exertion. It was not +under the authority of law, most certainly, but it derived from an +authority still higher; and as they say of faith, that it is not +contrary to reason, but above it, so this army did not so much +contradict the spirit of the law as supersede it. What you did in the +legislative body is above all praise. By your proceeding with regard to +the supplies, you revived the grand use and characteristic benefit of +Parliament, which was on the point of being entirely lost amongst us. +These sentiments I never concealed, and never shall; and Mr. Fox +expressed them with his usual power, when he spoke on the subject. + +All this is very honorable to you. But in what light must we see it? How +are we to consider your armament without commission from the crown, when +some of the first people in _this_ kingdom have been refused arms, at +the time they did not only not reject, but solicited the king's +commissions? Here to arm and embody would be represented as little less +than high treason, if done on private authority: with you it receives +the thanks of a Privy Counsellor of Great Britain, who obeys the Irish +House of Lords in that point with pleasure, and is made Secretary of +State, the moment he lands here, for his reward. You shortened the +credit given to the crown to six months; you hung up the public credit +of your kingdom by a thread; you refused to raise any taxes, whilst you +confessed the public debt and public exigencies to be great and urgent +beyond example. You certainly acted in a great style, and on sound and +invincible principles. But if we in the opposition, which fills Ireland +with such loyal horrors, had even attempted, what we never did even +attempt, the smallest delay or the smallest limitation of supply, in +order to a constitutional coercion of the crown, we should have been +decried by all the court and Tory mouths of this kingdom, as a desperate +faction, aiming at the direct ruin of the country, and to surrender it +bound hand and foot to a foreign enemy. By actually doing what we never +ventured to attempt, you have paid your court with such address, and +have won so much favor with his Majesty and his cabinet, that they have, +of their special grace and mere motion, raised you to new titles, and +for the first time, ill a speech from the throne, complimented you with +the appellation of "faithful and loyal,"--and, in order to insult our +low-spirited and degenerate obedience, have thrown these epithets and +your resistance together in our teeth! What do you think were the +feelings of every man who looks upon Parliament in an higher light than +that of a market-overt for legalizing a base traffic of votes and +pensions, when he saw you employ such means of coercion to the crown, in +order to coerce our Parliament through _that_ medium? How much his +Majesty is pleased with _his_ part of the civility must be left to his +own taste. But as to us, you declared to the world that you knew that +the way of bringing us to reason was to apply yourselves to the true +source of all our opinions and the only motive to all our conduct! Now, +it seems, you think yourselves affronted, because a few of us express +some indignation at the minister who has thought fit to strip us stark +naked, and expose the true state of our poxed and pestilential habit to +the world! Think or say what you will in Ireland, I shall ever think it +a crime hardly to be expiated by his blood. He might, and ought, by a +longer continuance or by an earlier meeting of this Parliament, to have +given us the credit of some wisdom in foreseeing and anticipating an +approaching force. So far from it, Lord Gower, coming out of his own +cabinet, declares that one principal cause of his resignation was his +not being able to prevail on the present minister to give any sort of +application to this business. Even on the late meeting of Parliament, +nothing determinate could be drawn from him, or from any of his +associates, until you had actually passed the short money bill,--which +measure they flattered themselves, and assured others, you would never +come up to. Disappointed in their expectation at [of?] seeing the siege +raised, they surrendered at discretion. + +Judge, my dear Sir, of our surprise at finding your censure directed +against those whose only crime was in accusing the ministers of not +having prevented your demands by our graces, of not having given you the +natural advantages of your country in the most ample, the most early, +and the most liberal manner, and for not having given away authority in +such a manner as to insure friendship. That you should make the +panegyric of the ministers is what I expected; because, in praising +their bounty, you paid a just compliment to your own force. But that you +should rail at us, either individually or collectively, is what I can +scarcely think a natural proceeding. I can easily conceive that +gentlemen might grow frightened at what they had done,--that they might +imagine they had undertaken a business above their direction,--that, +having obtained a state of independence for their country, they meant to +take the deserted helm into their own hands, and supply by their very +real abilities the total inefficacy of the nominal government. All these +might be real, and might be very justifiable motives for their +reconciling themselves cordially to the present court system. But I do +not so well discover the reasons that could induce them, at the first +feeble dawning of life in this country, to do all in their power to cast +a cloud over it, and to prevent the least hope of our effecting the +necessary reformations which are aimed at in our Constitution and in our +national economy. + +But, it seems, I was silent at the passing the resolutions. Why, what +had I to say? If I had thought them too much, I should have been accused +of an endeavor to inflame England. If I should represent them as too +little, I should have been charged with a design of fomenting the +discontents of Ireland into actual rebellion. The Treasury bench +represented that the affair was a matter of state: they represented it +truly. I therefore only asked whether they knew these propositions to be +such as would satisfy Ireland; for if they were so, they would satisfy +me. This did not indicate that I thought them too ample. In this our +silence (however dishonorable to Parliament) there was one +advantage,--that the whole passed, as far as it is gone, with complete +unanimity, and so quickly that there was no time left to excite any +opposition to it out of doors. In the West India business, reasoning on +what had lately passed in the Parliament of Ireland, and on the mode in +which it was opened here, I thought I saw much matter of perplexity. +But I have now better reason than ever to be pleased with my silence. If +I had spoken, one of the most honest and able men[16] in the Irish +Parliament would probably have thought my observation an endeavor to sow +dissension, which he was resolved to prevent,--and one of the most, +ingenious and one of the most amiable men[17] that ever graced yours or +any House of Parliament might have looked on it as a chimera. In the +silence I observed, I was strongly countenanced (to say no more of it) +by every gentleman of Ireland that I had the honor of conversing with in +London. The only word, for that reason, which I spoke, was to restrain a +worthy county member,[18] who had received some communication from a +great trading place in the county he represents, which, if it had been +opened to the House, would have led to a perplexing discussion of one of +the most troublesome matters that could arise in this business. I got up +to put a stop to it; and I believe, if you knew what the topic was, you +would commend my discretion. + +That it should be a matter of public discretion in me to be silent on +the affairs of Ireland is what on all accounts I bitterly lament. I +stated to the House what I felt; and I felt, as strongly as human +sensibility can feel, the extinction of my Parliamentary capacity, where +I wished to use it most. When I came into this Parliament, just fourteen +years ago,--into this Parliament, then, in vulgar opinion at least, the +presiding council of the greatest empire existing, (and perhaps, all +things considered, that ever did exist,) obscure and a stranger as I +was, I considered myself as raised to the highest dignity to which a +creature of our species could aspire. In that opinion, one of the chief +pleasures in my situation, what was first and-uppermost in my thoughts, +was the hope, without injury to this country, to be somewhat useful to +the place of my birth and education, which in many respects, internal +and external, I thought ill and impolitically governed. But when I found +that the House, surrendering itself to the guidance of an authority, not +grown out of an experienced wisdom and integrity, but out of the +accidents of court favor, had become the sport of the passions of men at +once rash and pusillanimous,--that it had even got into the habit of +refusing everything to reason and surrendering everything to force, all +my power of obliging either my country or individuals was gone, all the +lustre of my imaginary rank was tarnished, and I felt degraded even by +my elevation. I said this, or something to this effect. If it gives +offence to Ireland, I am sorry for it: it was the reason I gave for my +silence; and it was, as far as it went, the true one. + +With you, this silence of mine and of others was represented as +factious, and as a discountenance to the measure of your relief. Do you +think us children? If it had been our wish to embroil matters, and, for +the sake of distressing ministry, to commit the two kingdoms in a +dispute, we had nothing to do but (without at all condemning the +propositions) to have gone into the commercial detail of the objects of +them. It could not have been refused to us: and you, who know the nature +of business so well, must know that this would have caused such delays, +and given rise during that delay to such discussions, as all the wisdom +of your favorite minister could never have settled. But, indeed, you +mistake your men. We tremble at the idea of a disunion of these two +nations. The only thing in which we differ with you is this,--that we do +not think your attaching yourselves to the court and quarrelling with +the independent part of this people is the way to promote the union of +two free countries, or of holding them together by the most natural and +salutary ties. + + * * * * * + +You will be frightened, when you see this long letter. I smile, when I +consider the length of it myself. I never, that I remember, wrote any of +the same extent. But it shows me that the reproaches of the country that +I once belonged to, and in which I still have a dearness of instinct +more than I can justify to reason, make a greater impression on me than +I had imagined. But parting words are admitted to be a little tedious, +because they are not likely to be renewed. If it will not be making +yourself as troublesome to others as I am to you, I shall be obliged to +you, if you will show this, at their greatest leisure, to the Speaker, +to your excellent kinsman, to Mr. Grattan, Mr. Yelverton, and Mr. Daly: +all these I have the honor of being personally known to, except Mr. +Yelverton, to whom I am only known by my obligations to him. If you live +in any habits with my old friend, the Provost, I shall be glad that he, +too, sees this my humble apology. + +Adieu! once more accept my best thanks for the interest you take in me. +Believe that it is received by an heart not yet so old as to have lost +its susceptibility. All here give you the best old-fashioned wishes of +the season; and believe me, with the greatest truth and regard, + +My dear Sir, + +Your most faithful and obliged humble servant, + +EDMUND BURKE. + +BEACONSFIELD, New year's Day, 1780. + + +I am frightened at the trouble I give you and our friends; but I +recollect that you are mostly lawyers, and habituated to read long, +tiresome papers--and, where your friendship is concerned, without a fee; +I am sure, too, that you will not act the lawyer in scrutinizing too +minutely every expression which my haste may make me use. I forgot to +mention my friend O'Hara, and others; but you will communicate it as you +please. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[14] Mr. Thomas Burgh, of Old Town, was a member of the House of Commons +in Ireland.--It appears from a letter written by this gentleman to Mr. +Burke, December 24, 1779, and to which the following is an answer, that +the part Mr. Burke had taken in the discussion which the affairs of +Ireland had undergone in the preceding sessions of Parliament in England +had been grossly misrepresented and much censured in Ireland. + +[15] This intention was communicated to Mr. Burke in a letter from Mr. +Pery, the Speaker of the House of Commons in Ireland. + +[16] Mr. Grattan. + +[17] Mr. Hussey Burgh + +[18] Mr. Stanley, member for Lancashire. + + + + +LETTER + +TO JOHN MERLOTT, ESQ.[19] + + +Dear Sir,--I am very unhappy to find that my conduct in the business of +Ireland, on a former occasion, had made many to be cold and indifferent +who would otherwise have been warm in my favor. I really thought that +events would have produced a quite contrary effect, and would have +proved to all the inhabitants of Bristol that it was no desire of +opposing myself to their wishes, but a certain knowledge of the +necessity of their affairs, and a tender regard to their honor and +interest, which induced me to take the part which I then took. They +placed me in a situation which might enable me to discern what was fit +to be done, on a consideration of the relative circumstances of this +country and all its neighbors. This was what you could not so well do +yourselves; but you had a right to expect that I should avail myself of +the advantage which I derived from your favor. Under the impression-of +this duty and this trust, I had endeavored to render, by preventive +graces and concessions, every act of power at the same time an act of +lenity,--the result of English bounty, and not of English timidity and +distress. I really flattered myself that the events which have proved +beyond dispute the prudence of such a maxim would have obtained pardon +for me, if not approbation. But if I have not been so fortunate, I do +most sincerely regret my great loss,--this comfort, however, that, if I +have disobliged my constituents, it was not in pursuit of any sinister +interest or any party passion of my own, but in endeavoring to save them +from disgrace, along with the whole community to which they and I +belong. I shall be concerned for this, and very much so; but I should be +more concerned, if, in gratifying a present humor of theirs, I had +rendered myself unworthy of their former or their future choice. I +confess that I could not bear to face my constituents at the next +general election, if I had been a rival to Lord North in the glory of +having refused some small, insignificant concessions, in favor of +Ireland, to the arguments and supplications of English members of +Parliament,--and in the very next session, on the demand of forty +thousand Irish bayonets, of having made a speech of two hours long to +prove that my former conduct was founded upon no one right principle, +either of policy, justice, or commerce. I never heard a more elaborate, +more able, more convincing, and more shameful speech. The debater +obtained credit, but the statesman was disgraced forever. Amends were +made for having refused small, but timely concessions, by an unlimited +and untimely surrender, not only of every one of the objects of former +restraints, but virtually of the whole legislative power itself which +had made them. For it is not necessary to inform you, that the +unfortunate Parliament of this kingdom did not dare to qualify the very +liberty she gave of trading with her _own_ plantations, by applying, of +her _own_ authority, any one of the commercial regulations to the new +traffic of Ireland, which bind us here under the several Acts of +Navigation. We were obliged to refer them to the Parliament of Ireland, +as conditions, just in the same manner as if we were bestowing a +privilege of the same sort on France and Spain, or any other independent +power, and, indeed, with more studied caution than we should have used, +not to shock the principle of their independence. How the minister +reconciled the refusal to reason, and the surrender to arms raised in +defiance of the prerogatives of the crown, to his master, I know not: it +has probably been settled, in some way or other, between themselves. But +however the king and his ministers may settle the question of his +dignity and his rights, I thought it became me, by vigilance and +foresight, to take care of yours: I thought I ought rather to lighten +the ship in time than expose it to a total wreck. The conduct pursued +seemed to me without weight or judgment, and more fit for a member for +Banbury than a member for Bristol. I stood, therefore, silent with grief +and vexation, on that day of the signal shame and humiliation of this +degraded king and country. But it seems the pride of Ireland, in the day +of her power, was equal to ours, when we dreamt we were powerful too. I +have been abused there even for my silence, which was construed into a +desire of exciting discontent in England. But, thank God, my letter to +Bristol was in print, my sentiments on the policy of the measure were +known and determined, and such as no man could think me absurd enough to +contradict. When I am no longer a free agent, I am obliged in the crowd +to yield to necessity: it is surely enough that I silently submit to +power; it is enough that I do not foolishly affront the conqueror; it is +too hard to force me to sing his praises, whilst I am led in triumph +before him,--or to make the panegyric of our own minister, who would put +me neither in a condition to surrender with honor or to fight with the +smallest hope of victory. I was, I confess, sullen and silent on that +day,--and shall continue so, until I see some disposition to inquire +into this and other causes of the national disgrace. If I suffer in my +reputation for it in Ireland, I am sorry; but it neither does nor can +affect me so nearly as my suffering in Bristol for having wished to +unite the interests of the two nations in a manner that would secure the +supremacy of this. + +Will you have the goodness to excuse the length of this letter? My +earnest desire of explaining myself in every point which may affect the +mind of any worthy gentleman in Bristol is the cause of it. To yourself, +and to your liberal and manly notions, I know it is not so necessary. +Believe me, + +My dear Sir, + +Your most faithful and obedient humble servant, + +EDMUND BURKE. + +BEACONSFIELD, April 4th, 1780. + + +To JOHN MERLOTT, Esq., Bristol. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[19] An eminent merchant in the city of Bristol, of which Mr. Burke was +one of the representatives in Parliament.--It relates to the same +subject as the preceding Letter. + + + + +LETTERS AND REFLECTIONS + +ON THE + +EXECUTIONS OF THE RIOTERS + +IN 1780. + + + + +LETTERS. + + + + + +_To the Lord Chancellor_. + + +My Lord,--I hope I am not too late with the inclosed slight +observations. If the execution already ordered cannot be postponed, +might I venture to recommend that it should extend to one only? and then +the plan suggested in the inclosed paper may, if your Lordship thinks +well of it, take place, with such improvements as your better judgment +may dictate. As to fewness of the executions, and the good effects of +that policy, I cannot, for my own part, entertain the slightest doubt. + +If you have no objection, and think it may not occupy more of his +Majesty's time than such a thing is worth, I should not be sorry that +the inclosed was put into the king's hands. + +I have the honor to be, my Lord, + +Your Lordship's most obedient humble servant, + +EDMUND BURKE. + +CHARLES STREET, July 10, 1780. + + + * * * * * + + + + +_To the Earl Bathurst, Lord President of the Council_ + + +My Lord,-- + +I came to town but yesterday, and therefore did not learn more early the +probable extent of the executions in consequence of the late +disturbances. I take the liberty of laying before you, with the +sincerest deference to your judgment, what appeared to me very early as +reasonable in this business. Further thoughts have since occurred to me. +I confess my mind is under no small degree of solicitude and anxiety on +the subject; I am fully persuaded that a proper use of mercy would not +only recommend the wisdom and steadiness of government, but, if properly +used, might be made a means of drawing out the principal movers in this +wicked business, who have hitherto eluded your scrutiny. I beg pardon +for this intrusion, and have the honor to be, with great regard and +esteem, + +My Lord, + +Your Lordship's most obedient humble servant, + +EDMUND BURKE. + +CHARLES STREET, July 18, 1780. + + + * * * * * + + +_To Sir Grey Cooper, Bart_.[20] + + +Dear Sir,-- + +According to your desire, I send you a copy of the few reflections on +the subject of the present executions which occurred to me in the +earliest period of the late disturbances, and which all my experience +and observation since have most strongly confirmed. The executions, +taking those which have been made, which are now ordered, and which may +be the natural consequence of the convictions in Surrey, will be +undoubtedly too many to answer any good purpose. Great slaughter +attended the suppression of the tumults, and this ought to be taken in +discount from the execution of the law. For God's sake entreat of Lord +North to take a view of the sum total of the deaths, before any are +ordered for execution; for by not doing something of this kind people +are decoyed in detail into severities they never would have dreamed of, +if they had the whole in their view at once. The scene in Surrey would +have affected the hardest heart that ever was in an human breast. +Justice and mercy have not such opposite interests as people are apt to +imagine. I saw Lord Loughborough last night. He seemed strongly +impressed with the sense of what necessity obliged him to go through, +and I believe will enter into our ideas on the subject. On this matter +you see that no time is to be lost. Before a final determination, the +first thing I would recommend is, that, if the very next execution +cannot be delayed, (by the way, I do not see why it may not,) it may be +of but a single person, and that afterwards you should not exceed two or +three; for it is enough for one riot, where the very act of Parliament +on which you proceed is rather a little hard in its sanctions and its +construction: not that I mean to complain of the latter as either new or +strained, but it was rigid from the first. + +I am, dear Sir, + +Your most obedient humble servant, + +EDMUND BURKE. + +Tuesday, 18th July, 1780. + + +I really feel uneasy on this business, and should consider it as a sort +of personal favor, if you do something to limit the extent and severity +of the law on this point. Present my best compliments to Lord North, and +if he thinks that I have had wishes to be serviceable to government on +the late occasion, I shall on my part think myself abundantly rewarded, +if a few lives less than first intended should be saved [taken?]; I +should sincerely set it down as a personal obligation, though the thing +stands upon general and strong reason of its own.[21] + +FOOTNOTES: + +[20] One of the Secretaries of the Treasury. + +[21] It appears by the following extract from a letter written by the +Earl of Mansfield to Mr. Burke, dated the 17th July, 1780, that these +Reflections had also been communicated to him:--"I have received the +honor of your letter and very judicious thoughts. Having been so greatly +injured myself, I have thought it more decent not to attend the reports, +and consequently have not been present at any deliberation upon the +subject." + + + + +SOME THOUGHTS + +ON THE APPROACHING EXECUTIONS, + +HUMBLY OFFERED TO CONSIDERATION. + + +As the number of persons convicted on account of the late unhappy +tumults will probably exceed what any one's idea of vengeance or example +would deliver to capital punishment, it is to be wished that the whole +business, as well with regard to the number and description of those who +are to suffer death as with regard to those who shall be delivered over +to lighter punishment or wholly pardoned, should be entirely a work of +reason. + +It has happened frequently, in cases of this nature, that the fate of +the convicts has depended more upon the accidental circumstance of their +being brought earlier or later to trial than to any steady principle of +equity applied to their several cases. Without great care and sobriety, +criminal justice generally begins with anger and ends in negligence. The +first that are brought forward suffer the extremity of the law, with +circumstances of mitigation of their case; and after a time, the most +atrocious delinquents escape merely by the satiety of punishment. + +In the business now before his Majesty, the following thoughts are +humbly submitted. + +If I understand the temper of the public at this moment, a very great +part of the lower and some of the middling people of this city are in a +very critical disposition, and such as ought to be managed with firmness +and delicacy. In general, they rather approve than blame the principles +of the rioters, though the better sort of them are afraid of the +consequences of those very principles which they approve. This keeps +their minds in a suspended and anxious state, which may very easily be +exasperated by an injudicious severity into desperate resolutions,--or +by weak measures on the part of government it may be encouraged to the +pursuit of courses which may be of the most dangerous consequences to +the public. + +There is no doubt that the approaching executions will very much +determine the future conduct of those people. They ought to be such as +will humble, not irritate. Nothing will make government more awful to +them than to see that it does not proceed by chance or under the +influence of passion. + +It is therefore proposed that no execution should be made until the +number of persons which government thinks fit to try is completed. When +the whole is at once under the eye, an examination ought to be made into +the circumstances of every particular convict; and _six_, at the very +utmost, of the fittest examples may then be selected for execution, who +ought to be brought out and put to death on one and the same day, in six +different places, and in the most solemn manner that can be devised. +Afterwards great care should be taken that their bodies may not be +delivered to their friends, or to others who may make them objects of +compassion or even veneration: some instances of the kind have happened +with regard to the bodies of those killed in the riots. The rest of the +malefactors ought to be either condemned, for larger [longer?] or +shorter terms, to the lighters, houses of correction, service in the +navy, and the like, according to the case. + +This small number of executions, and all at one time, though in +different places, is seriously recommended; because it is certain that a +great havoc among criminals hardens rather than subdues the minds of +people inclined to the same crimes, and therefore fails of answering its +purpose as an example. Men who see their lives respected and thought of +value by others come to respect that gift of God themselves. To have +compassion for oneself, or to care, more or less, for one's own life, is +a lesson to be learned just as every other; and I believe it will be +found that conspiracies have been most common and most desperate where +their punishment has been most extensive and most severe. + +Besides, the least excess in this way excites a tenderness in the milder +sort of people, which makes them consider government in an harsh and +odious light. The sense of justice in men is overloaded and fatigued +with a long series of executions, or with such a carnage at once as +rather resembles a massacre than a sober execution of the laws. The laws +thus lose their terror in the minds of the wicked, and their reverence +in the minds of the virtuous. + +I have ever observed that the execution of one man fixes the attention +and excites awe; the execution of multitudes dissipates and weakens the +effect: but men reason themselves into disapprobation and disgust; they +compute more as they feel less; and every severe act which does not +appear to be necessary is sure to be offensive. + +In selecting the criminals, a very different line ought to be followed +from that recommended by the champions of the Protestant Association. +They recommend that the offenders for plunder ought to be punished, and +the offenders from principle spared. But the contrary rule ought to be +followed. The ordinary executions, of which there are enough in +conscience, are for the former species of delinquents; but such common +plunderers would furnish no example in the present case, where the false +or pretended principle of religion, which leads to crimes, is the very +thing to be discouraged. + +But the reason which ought to make these people objects of selection for +punishment confines the selection to very few. For we must consider that +the whole nation has been for a long time guilty of their crime. +Toleration is a new virtue in any country. It is a late ripe fruit in +the best climates. We ought to recollect the poison which, under the +name of antidotes against Popery, and such like mountebank titles, has +been circulated from our pulpits and from our presses, from the heads of +the Church of England and the heads of the Dissenters. These +publications, by degrees, have tended to drive all religion from our own +minds, and to fill them with nothing but a violent hatred of the +religion of other people, and, of course, with a hatred of their +persons; and so, by a very natural progression, they have led men to the +destruction of their goods and houses, and to attempts upon their lives. + +This delusion furnishes no reason for suffering that abominable spirit +to be kept alive by inflammatory libels or seditious assemblies, or for +government's yielding to it, in the smallest degree, any point of +justice, equity, or sound policy. The king certainly ought not to give +up any part of his subjects to the prejudices of another. So far from +it, I am clearly of opinion that on the late occasion the Catholics +ought to have been taken, more avowedly than they were, under the +protection of government, as the Dissenters had been on a similar +occasion. + +But though we ought to protect against violence the bigotry of others, +and to correct our own too, if we have any left, we ought to reflect, +that an offence which in its cause is national ought not in its effects +to be vindicated on individuals, but with a very well-tempered severity. + +For my own part, I think the fire is not extinguished,--on the contrary, +it seems to require the attention of government more than ever; but, as +a part of any methodical plan for extinguishing this flame, it really +seems necessary that the execution of justice should be as steady and as +cool as possible. + + + + +SOME ADDITIONAL REFLECTIONS + +ON THE EXECUTIONS. + + +The great number of sufferers seems to arise from the misfortune +incident to the variety of judicatures which have tried the crimes. It +were well, if the whole had been the business of one commission; for now +every trial seems as if it were a separate business, and in that light +each offence is not punished with greater severity than single offences +of the kind are commonly marked: but in reality and fact, this +unfortunate affair, though diversified in the multitude of overt acts, +has been one and the same riot; and therefore the executions, so far as +regards the general effect on the minds of men, will have a reference to +the unity of the offence, and will appear to be much more severe than +such a riot, atrocious as it was, can well justify in government. I pray +that it may be recollected that the chief delinquents have hitherto +escaped, and very many of those who are fallen into the hands of justice +are a poor, thoughtless set of creatures, very little aware of the +nature of their offence. None of the list-makers, the assemblers of the +mob, the directors and arrangers, have been convicted. The preachers of +mischief remain safe, and are wicked enough not to feel for their +deluded disciples,--no, not at all. I would not plead the ignorance of +the law in any, even the most ignorant, as a justification; but I am +sure, that, when the question is of mercy, it is a very great and +powerful argument. I have all the reason in the world to believe that +they did not know their offence was capital. + +There is one argument, which I beg may not be considered as brought for +any invidious purpose, or meant as imputing blame anywhere, but which, I +think, with candid and considerate men, will have much weight. The +unfortunate delinquents were perhaps much encouraged by some remissness +on the part of government itself. The absolute and entire impunity +attending the same offence in Edinburgh, which was over and over again +urged as an example and encouragement to these unfortunate people, might +be a means of deluding them. Perhaps, too, a languor in the beginning of +the riots here (which suffered the leaders to proceed, until very many, +as it were by the contagion of a sort of fashion, were carried to these +excesses) might make these people think that there was something in the +case which induced government to wink at the irregularity of the +proceedings. + +The conduct and condition of the Lord Mayor ought, in my opinion, to be +considered. His answers to Lord Beauchamp, to Mr. Malo, and to Mr. +Langdale make him appear rather an accomplice in the crimes than guilty +of negligence as a magistrate. Such an example set to the mob by the +first magistrate of the city tends greatly to palliate their offence. + +The license, and complete impunity too, of the publications which from +the beginning instigated the people to such actions, and in the midst of +trials and executions still continues, does in a great degree render +these creatures an object of compassion. In the Public Advertiser of +this morning there are two or three paragraphs strongly recommending +such outrages, and stimulating the people to violence against the houses +and persons of Roman Catholics, and even against the chapels of the +foreign ministers. + +I would not go so far as to adopt the maxim, _Quicquid multis peccatur +inultum_; but certainly offences committed by vast multitudes are +somewhat palliated in the _individuals_, who, when so many escape, are +always looked upon rather as unlucky than criminal. All our loose ideas +of justice, as it affects any individual, have in them something of +comparison to the situation of others; and no systematic reasoning can +wholly free us from such impressions. + +Phil. de Comines says our English civil wars were less destructive than +others, because the cry of the conqueror always was, "Spare the common +people." This principle of war should be at least as prevalent in the +execution of justice. The appetite of justice is easily satisfied, and +it is best nourished with the least possible blood. We may, too, +recollect that between capital punishment and total impunity there are +many stages. + +On the whole, every circumstance of mercy, and of comparative justice, +does, in my opinion, plead in favor of such low, untaught, or ill-taught +wretches. But above all, the policy of government is deeply interested +that the punishments should appear _one_, solemn, deliberate act, aimed +not at random, and at particular offences, but done with a relation to +the general spirit of the tumults; and they ought to be nothing more +than what is sufficient to mark and discountenance that spirit. + +CIRCUMSTANCES FOR MERCY. + + Not being principal. + Probable want of early and deliberate purposes. + Youth where the highest malice does not appear. + Sex where the highest malice does not appear. + Intoxication and levity, or mere wantonness of any kind. + + + + +A + +LETTER + +TO + +THE RIGHT HON. HENRY DUNDAS, + +ONE OF HIS MAJESTY'S PRINCIPAL SECRETARIES OF STATE. + +WITH THE + +SKETCH OF A NEGRO CODE. + +1792. + + +Dear Sir,--I should have been punctual in sending you the sketch I +promised of my old African Code, if some friends from London had not +come in upon me last Saturday, and engaged me till noon this day: I send +this packet by one of them who is still here. If what I send be, as +under present circumstances it must be, imperfect, you will excuse it, +as being done near twelve years ago. About four years since I made an +abstract of it, upon which I cannot at present lay my hands; but I hope +the marginal heads will in some measure supply it. + +If the African trade could be considered with regard to itself only, and +as a single object, I should think the utter abolition to be on the +whole more advisable than any scheme of regulation an reform. Rather +than suffer it to continue as it is, I heartily wish it at an end. What +has been lately done has been done by a popular spirit, which seldom +calls for, and indeed very rarely relishes, a system made up of a great +variety of parts, and which is to operate its effect in a great length +of time. The people like short methods; the consequences of which they +sometimes have reason to repent of. Abolition is but a single act. To +prove the nature of the trade, and to expose it properly, required, +indeed, a vast collection of materials, which have been laboriously +collected, and compiled with great judgment. It required also much +perseverance and address to excite the spirit which has been excited +without doors, and which has carried it through. The greatest eloquence +ever displayed in the House has been employed to second the efforts +which have been made abroad. All this, however, leads but to one single +resolve. When this was done, all was done. I speak of absolute and +immediate abolition, the point which the first motions went to, and +which is in effect still pressed; though in this session, according to +order, it cannot take effect. A _remote_, and a _gradual_ abolition, +though they may be connected, are not the same thing. The idea of the +House seems to me, if I rightly comprehend it, that the two things are +to be combined: that is to say, that the trade is gradually to decline, +and to cease entirely at a determinate period. To make the abolition +gradual, the regulations must operate as a strong discouragement. But it +is much to be feared that a trade continued and discouraged, and with a +sentence of death passed upon it, will perpetuate much ill blood between +those who struggle for the abolition and those who contend for an +effectual continuance. + +At the time when I formed the plan which I have the honor to transmit to +you, an abolition of the slave trade would have appeared a very +chimerical project. My plan, therefore, supposes the continued existence +of that commerce. Taking for my basis that I had an incurable evil to +deal with, I cast about how I should make it as small an evil as +possible, and draw out of it some collateral good. + +In turning the matter over in my mind at that time and since, I never +was able to consider the African trade upon a ground disconnected with +the employment of negroes in the West Indies, and distinct from their +condition in the plantations whereon they serve. I conceived that the +true origin of the trade was not in the place it was begun at, but at +the place of its final destination. I therefore was, and I still am, of +opinion that the whole work ought to be taken up together, and that a +gradual abolition of slavery in the West Indies ought to go hand in hand +with anything which, should be done with regard to its supply from the +coast of Africa. I could not trust a cessation of the demand for this +supply to the mere operation of any abstract principle, (such as, that, +if their supply was cut off, the planters would encourage and produce an +effectual population,) knowing that nothing can be more uncertain than +the operation of general principles, if they are not embodied in +specific regulations. I am very apprehensive, that, so long as the +slavery continues, some means for its supply will be found. If so, I am +persuaded that it is better to allow the evil, in order to correct it, +than, by endeavoring to forbid what we cannot be able wholly to prevent, +to leave it under an illegal, and therefore an unreformed existence. It +is not that my plan does not lead to the extinction of the slave trade, +but it is through a very slow progress, the chief effect of which is to +be operated in our own plantations, by rendering, in a length of time, +all foreign supply unnecessary. It was my wish, whilst the slavery +continued, and the consequent commerce, to take such measures as to +civilize the coast of Africa by the trade, which now renders it more +barbarous, and to lead by degrees to a more reputable, and, possibly, a +more profitable connection with it, than we maintain at present. + +I am sure that you will consider as a mark of my confidence in yours and +Mr. Pitt's honor and generosity, that I venture to put into your hands +a scheme composed of many and intricate combinations, without a full +explanatory preface, or any attendant notes, to point out the principles +upon which I proceeded in every regulation which I have proposed towards +the civilization and gradual manumission of negroes in the two +hemispheres. I confess I trust infinitely more (according to the sound +principles of those who ever have at any time meliorated the state of +mankind) to the effect and influence of religion than to all the rest of +the regulations put together. + +Whenever, in my proposed reformation, we take our _point of departure_ +from a state of slavery, we must precede the donation of freedom by +disposing the minds of the objects to a disposition to receive it +without danger to themselves or to us. The process of bringing _free_ +savages to order and civilization is very different. When a state of +slavery is that upon which we are to work, the very means which lead to +liberty must partake of compulsion. The minds of men, being crippled +with that restraint, can do nothing for themselves: everything must be +done for them. The regulations can owe little to consent. Everything +must be the creature of power. Hence it is that regulations must be +multiplied, particularly as you have two parties to deal with. The +planter you must at once restrain and support, and you must control at +the same time that you ease the servant. This necessarily makes the work +a matter of care, labor, and expense. It becomes in its nature complex. +But I think neither the object impracticable nor the expense +intolerable; and I am fully convinced that the cause of humanity would +be far more benefited by the continuance of the trade and servitude, +regulated and reformed, than by the total destruction of both or either. +What I propose, however, is but a beginning of a course of measures +which an experience of the effects of the evil and the reform will +enable the legislature hereafter to supply and correct. + +I need not observe to you, that the forms are often neglected, penalties +not provided, &c., &c., &c. But all this is merely mechanical, and what +a couple of days' application would set to rights. + +I have seen what has been done by the West Indian Assemblies. It is +arrant trifling. They have done little; and what they have done is good +for nothing,--for it is totally destitute of an _executory_ principle. +This is the point to which I have applied my whole diligence. It is easy +enough to say what shall be done: to cause it to be done,--_hic labor, +hoc opus_. + +I ought not to apologize for letting this scheme lie beyond the period +of the Horatian keeping,--I ought much more to entreat an excuse for +producing it now. Its whole value (if it has any) is the coherence and +mutual dependency of parts in the scheme; separately they can be of +little or no use. + +I have the honor to be, with very great respect and regard, + +Dear Sir, + +Your most faithful and obedient humble servant, + +EDMUND BURKE. + +BEACONSFIELD, Easter-Monday night, 1792. + + + + +SKETCH OF A NEGRO CODE. + + +This constitution consists of four principal members. + +I. The rules for qualifying a ship for the African trade. + +II. The mode of carrying on the trade upon the coast of Africa, which +includes a plan for introducing civilization in that part of the world. + +III. What is to be observed from the time of shipping negroes to the +sale in the West India islands. + +IV. The regulations relative to the state and condition of slaves in the +West Indies, their manumission, &c. + + +[Sidenote: PREAMBLE.] + +Whereas it is expedient, and comformable to the principles of true +religion and morality, and to the rules of sound policy, to put an end +to all traffic in the persons of men, and to the detention of their said +persons in a state of slavery, as soon as the same may be effected +without producing great inconveniences in the sudden change of practices +of such long standing, and during the time of the continuance of the +said practices it is desirable and expedient by proper regulations to +lessen the inconveniences and evils attendant on the said traffic and +state of servitude, until both shall be gradually done away: + +And whereas the objects of the said trade and consequential servitude, +and the grievances resulting therefrom, come under the principal heads +following, the regulations ought thereto to be severally applied: that +is to say, that provision should be made by the said regulations, + +1st, For duly qualifying ships for the said traffic; + +2nd, For the mode and conditions of permitting the said trade to be +carried on upon the coast of Africa; + +3rd, For the treatment of the negroes in their passage to the West India +islands; + +4th, For the government of the negroes which are or shall be employed in +his Majesty's colonies and plantations in the West Indies: + +[Sidenote: Ships to be registered.] + +Be it therefore enacted, that every ship or trading vessel which is +intended for the negro trade, with the name of the owner or owners +thereof, shall be entered and registered as ships trading to the West +Indies are by law to be registered, with the further provisions +following: + +[Sidenote: Measured and surveyed.] + +1. The same entry and register shall contain an account of the greatest +number of negroes of all descriptions which are proposed to be taken +into the said ship or trading vessel; and the said ship, before she is +permitted to be entered outwards, shall be surveyed by a ship-carpenter, +to be appointed by the collector of the port from which the said vessel +is to depart, and by a surgeon, also appointed by the collector, who +hath been conversant in the service of the said trade, but not at the +time actually engaged or covenanted therein; and the said carpenter and +surgeon shall report to the collector, or in his absence, to the next +principal officer of the port; upon oath, (which oath the said collector +or principal officer is hereby empowered to administer,) her +measurement, and what she contains in builder's tonnage, and that she +has ---- feet of grated portholes between the decks, and that she is +otherwise fitly found as a good transport vessel. + +[Sidenote: Number of slaves limited.] + +2. And be it enacted, that no ship employed in the said trade shall upon +any pretence take in more negroes than one grown man or woman for one +ton and half of builder's tonnage, nor more than one boy or girl for one +ton. + +[Sidenote: Provisions.] + +3. That the said ship or other vessel shall lay in, in proportion to the +ship's company of the said vessel, and the number of negroes registered, +a full and sufficient store of sound provision, so as to be secure +against all probable delays and accidents, namely, salted beef, pork, +salt-fish, butter, cheese, biscuit, flour, rice, oat-meal, and white +peas, but no horse-beans, or other inferior provisions; and the said +ship shall be properly provided with water-casks or jars, in proportion +to the intended number of the said negroes; and the said ship shall be +also provided with a proper and sufficient stock of coals or firewood. + +[Sidenote: Stores.] + +4. And every ship entered as aforesaid shall take out a coarse shirt and +a pair of trousers, or petticoat, for each negro intended to be taken +aboard; as also a mat, or coarse mattress, or hammock, for the use of +the said negroes. The proportions of provision, fuel, and clothing to be +regulated by the table annexed to this act. + +[Sidenote: Certificate thereof.] + +5. And be it enacted, that no ship shall be permitted to proceed on the +said voyage or adventure, until the searcher of the port from whence the +said vessel shall sail, or such person as he shall appoint to act for +him, shall report to the collector that he hath inspected the said +stores, and that the ship is accommodated and provided in the manner +hereby directed. + +[Sidenote: Guns for trade to be inspected.] + +6. And be it enacted, that no guns be exported to the coast of Africa, +in the said or any other trade, unless the same be duly marked with the +maker's name on the barrels before they are put into the stocks, and +vouched by an inspector in the place where the same are made to be +without fraud, and sufficient and merchantable arms. + +[Sidenote: Owners and masters to enter into bonds.] + +7. And be it enacted, that, before any ship as aforesaid shall proceed +on her voyage, the owner or owners, or an attorney by them named, if the +owners are more than two, and the master, shall severally give bond, the +owners by themselves, the master for himself, that the said master shall +duly conform himself in all things to the regulations in this act +contained, so far as the same regards his part in executing and +conforming to the same. + + * * * * * + +II. And whereas, in providing for the second object of this act, that is +to say, for the trade on the coast of Africa, it is first prudent not +only to provide against the manifold abuses to which a trade of that +nature is liable, but that the same may be accompanied, as far as it is +possible, with such advantages to the natives as may tend to the +civilizing them, and enabling them to enrich themselves by means more +desirable, and to carry on hereafter a trade more advantageous and +honorable to all parties: + +And whereas religion, order, morality, and virtue are the elemental +principles, and the knowledge of letters, arts, and handicraft trades, +the chief means of such civilization and improvement: for the better +attainment of the said good purposes, + +[Sidenote: Marts to be established on the coast.] + +1. Be it hereby enacted, that the coast of Africa, on which the said +trade for negroes may be carried on, shall be and is hereby divided into +marts or staples, as hereafter follows. [Here name the marts.] And be it +enacted, that it shall not be lawful for the master of any ship to +purchase any negro or negroes, but at one of the said marts or staples. + +[Sidenote: Governors and counsellors.] + +2. That the directors of the African Company shall appoint, where not +already appointed, a governor, with three counsellors, at each of the +said marts, with a salary of ---- to the governor, and of ---- to each +of the said counsellors. The said governor, or, in his absence or +illness, the senior counsellor, shall and is hereby empowered to act as +a justice of the peace, and they, or either of them, are authorized, +ordered, and directed to provide for the peace of the settlement, and +the good regulation of their station and stations severally, according +to the rules of justice, to the directions of this act, and the +instructions they shall receive from time to time from the said African +Company. And the said African Company is hereby authorized to prepare +instructions, with the assent of the Lords of his Majesty's Privy +Council, which shall be binding in all things not contrary to this act, +or to the laws of England, on the said governors and counsellors, and +every of them, and on all persons acting in commission with them under +this act, and on all persons residing within the jurisdiction of the +magistrates of the said mart. + +[Sidenote: Ships of war stationed.] + +3. And be it enacted, that the Lord High Admiral, or commissioners for +executing his office, shall appoint one or more, as they shall see +convenient, of his Majesty's ships or sloops of war, under the command +severally of a post-captain, or master and commander, to each mart, as a +naval station. + +[Sidenote: Inspectors appointed.] + +4. And be it enacted, that the Lord High Treasurer, or the commissioners +for executing his office, shall name two inspectors of the said trade at +every mart, who shall provide for the execution of this act, according +to the directions thereof, so far as shall relate to them; and it is +hereby provided and enacted, that, as cases of sudden emergency may +arise, the said governor or first counsellor, and the first commander of +his Majesty's ship or ships on the said station, and the said +inspectors, or the majority of them, the governor having a double or +casting vote, shall have power and authority to make such occasional +rules and orders relating to the said trade as shall not be contrary to +the instructions of the African Company, and which shall be valid until +the same are revoked by the said African Company. + +[Sidenote: Lands may be purchased.] + +5. That the said African Company is hereby authorized to purchase, if +the same may conveniently be done, with the consent of the Privy +Council, any lands adjoining to the fort or principal mart aforesaid, +not exceeding ---- acres, and to make allotments of the same; no +allotment to one person to exceed (on pain of forfeiture) ---- acres. + +[Sidenote: Churches and schoolhouses, and hospitals to be erected.] + +[Sidenote: Chaplain and assistant.] + +[Sidenote: Clerk and catechist.] + +6. That the African Company shall, at each fort or mart, cause to be +erected, in a convenient place, and at a moderate cost, the estimate of +which shall be approved by the Treasury, one church, and one +school-house, and one hospital; and shall appoint one principal +chaplain, with a curate or assistant in holy orders, both of whom shall +be recommended by the Lord Bishop of London; and the said chaplain or +his assistant shall perform divine service, and administer the +sacraments, according to the usage of the Church of England, or to such +mode not contrary thereto as to the said bishop shall seem more suitable +to the circumstances of the people. And the said principal chaplain +shall be the third member in the council, and shall be entitled to +receive from the directors of the said African Company a salary of ----, +and his assistant a salary of ----, and he shall have power to appoint +one sober and discreet person, white or black, to be his clerk and +catechist, at a salary of ----. + +[Sidenote: Schoolmaster.] + +[Sidenote: Carpenter and blacksmith.] + +[Sidenote: Native apprentices.] + +[Sidenote: Surgeon and mate.] + +[Sidenote: Native apprentice.] + +7. And be it enacted, that the African Company shall appoint one +sufficient schoolmaster, who shall be approved by the Bishop of London, +and who shall be capable of teaching writing, arithmetic, surveying, and +mensuration, at a salary of ----. And the said African Company is hereby +authorized to provide for each settlement a carpenter and blacksmith, +with such encouragement as to them shall seem expedient, who shall take +each two apprentices from amongst the natives; to instruct them in the +several trades, the African Company allowing them, as a fee for each +apprentice, ----. And the said African Company shall appoint one surgeon +and one surgeon's mate, who are to be approved on examination, at +Surgeons' Hall, to each fort or mart, with a salary of ---- for the +surgeon, and for his mate ----; and the said surgeon shall take one +native apprentice, at a fee to be settled by the African Company. + +[Sidenote: How removable.] + +8. And be it enacted, that the said catechist, schoolmaster, surgeon, +and surgeon's mate, as well as the tradesmen in the Company's service, +shall be obedient to the orders they shall from time to time receive +from the governor and council of each fort; and if they, or any of them, +or any other person, in whatever station, shall appear, on complaint and +proof to the majority of the commissioners, to lead a disorderly and +debauched life, or use any profane or impious discourses, to the danger +of defeating the purposes of this institution, and to the scandal of the +natives, who are to be led by all due means into a respect for our holy +religion, and a desire of partaking of the benefits thereof, they are +authorized and directed to suspend the said person from his office, or +the exercise of his trade, and to send him to England (but without any +hard confinement, except in case of resistance) with a complaint, with +inquiry and proofs adjoined, to the African Company. + +9. And be it enacted, that the Bishop of London for the time being shall +have full authority to remove the said chaplain for such causes as to +him shall seem reasonable. + +[Sidenote: No public officer to be concerned in the negro trade.] + +10. That no governor, counsellor, inspector, chaplain, surgeon, or +schoolmaster shall be concerned, or have any share, directly or +indirectly, in the negro trade, on pain of ----. + +[Sidenote: Journals and letter-books to be kept and transmitted.] + +11. Be it enacted, that the said governor and council shall keep a +journal of all their proceedings, and a book in which copies of all +their correspondence shall be entered, and they shall transmit copies of +the said journals and letter-book, and their books of accounts, to the +African Company, who, within ---- of their receipt thereof, shall +communicate the same to one of his Majesty's principal secretaries of +state. + +[Sidenote: Chaplain to report to the Bishop of London.] + +12. And be it enacted, that the said chaplain or principal minister, +shall correspond with the Bishop of London, and faithfully and +diligently transmit to him an account of whatever hath been done for the +advancement of religion, morality, and learning amongst the natives. + +[Sidenote: Negroes to be attested before sale.] + +13. And be it enacted, that no negro shall be conclusively sold, until +he shall be attested by the two inspectors and chaplain, or, in case of +the illness of any of them, by one inspector, and the governor, or one +of the council, who are hereby authorized and directed, by the best +means in their power, to examine into the circumstances and condition of +the persons exposed to sale. + +[Sidenote: Causes for rejection.] + +14. And for the better direction of the said inspectors, no persons are +to be sold, who, to the best judgment of the said inspectors, shall be +above thirty-five years of age, or who shall appear, on examination, +stolen or carried away by the dealers by surprise; nor any person who is +able to read in the Arabian or any other book; nor any woman who shall +appear to be advanced three months in pregnancy; nor any person +distorted or feeble, unless the said persons are consenting to such +sale; or any person afflicted with a grievous or contagious distemper: +but if any person so offered is only lightly disordered, the said person +may be sold, but must be kept in the hospital of the mart, and shall not +be shipped until completely cured. + +[Sidenote: Traders to be licensed by the governors.] + +15. Be it enacted, that no black or European factor or trader into the +interior country, or on the coast, (the masters of English ships only +excepted, for whose good conduct provision is otherwise herein made,) +shall be permitted to buy or sell in any of the said marts, unless he be +approved by the governor of the mart in which he is to deal, or, in his +absence or disability, by the senior counsellor for the time being, and +obtaining a license from such governor or counsellor; and the said +traders and factors shall, severally or jointly, as they shall be +concerned, before they shall obtain the said license, be bound in a +recognizance, with such surety for his or their good behavior as to the +said governor shall seem the best that can be obtained. + +[Sidenote: Offences how to be tried and punished.] + +16. Be it enacted, that the said governor, or other authority aforesaid, +shall examine, by duty of office, into the conduct of all such traders +and factors, and shall receive and publicly hear (with the assistance of +the council and inspectors aforesaid, and of the commodore, captain, or +other principal commander of one of his Majesty's ships on the said +station, or as many of the same as can be assembled, two whereof, with +the governor, are hereby enabled to act) all complaints against them, or +any of them; and if any black or white trader or factor, (other than in +this act excepted,) either on inquisition of office or on complaint, +shall be convicted by a majority of the said commissioners present of +stealing or taking by surprise any person or persons whatsoever, whether +free or the slaves of others, without the consent of their masters, or +of wilfully and maliciously killing or maiming any person, or of any +cruelty, (necessary restraint only excepted,) or of firing houses, or +destroying goods, the said trader or factor shall be deemed to have +forfeited his recognizance, and his surety to have forfeited his; and +the said trader or factor, so convicted, shall be forever disabled from +dealing in any of the said marts, unless the offence shall not be that +of murder, maiming, arson, or stealing or surprising the person, and +shall appear to the commissioners aforesaid to merit only, besides the +penalty of his bond, a suspension for one year; and the said trader or +factor, so convicted of murder, maiming, arson, stealing or surprising +the person, shall, if a native, be delivered over to the prince to whom +he belongs, to execute further justice on him. But it is hereby provided +and enacted, that, if any European shall be convicted of any of the said +offences, he shall be sent to Europe, together with the evidence against +him; and on the warrant of the said commissioners, the keeper of any of +his Majesty's jails in London, Bristol, Liverpool, or Glasgow shall +receive him, until he be delivered according to due course of law, as if +the said offences had been committed within the cities and towns +aforesaid. + +[Sidenote: Negroes exposed to sale contrary to the provisions of this +act, how to be dealt with.] + +17. Be it further enacted, that, if the said governor, &c, shall be +satisfied that person or persons are exposed to sale, who have been +stolen or surprised as aforesaid, or are not within the qualifications +of sale in this act described, they are hereby authorized and required, +if it can be done, to send the persons so exposed to sale to their +original habitation or settlement, in the manner they shall deem best +for their security, (the reasonable charges whereof shall be allowed to +the said governor by the African Company,) unless the said persons +choose to sell themselves; and then, and in that case, their value in +money and goods, at their pleasure, shall be secured to them, and be +applicable to their use,-without any dominion over the same of any +purchaser, or of any master to whom they may in any colony or plantation +be sold, and which shall always be in some of his master's [Majesty's?] +colonies and plantations only. And the master of the ship in which such +person shall embark shall give bond for the faithful execution of his +part of the trust at the island where he shall break bulk. + +18. Be it further enacted, that, besides the hospitals on shore, one or +more hospital-ships shall be employed at each of the said chief marts, +wherein slaves taken ill in the trading ships shall be accommodated, +until they shall be cured; and then the owner may reclaim and shall +receive them, paying the charges which shall be settled by regulation to +be made by the authority in this act enabled to provide such +regulations. + + * * * * * + +III. And whereas it is necessary that regulations be made to prevent +abuses in the passage from Africa to the West Indies: + +[Sidenote: Slave ships to be examined on the coast.] + +1. Be it further enacted, that the commander or lieutenant of the king's +ship on each station shall have authority, as often as he shall see +occasion, attended with one other of his officers, and his surgeon or +mate, to enter into and inspect every trading ship, in order to provide +for the due execution of this act, and of any ordinances made in virtue +thereof and conformable thereto by the authorities herein constituted +and appointed; and the said officer and officers are hereby required to +examine every trading ship before she sails, and to stop the sailing of +the said ship for the breach of the said rules and ordinances, until the +governor in council shall order and direct otherwise: and the master of] +the said ship shall not presume, under the penalty of ----, to be +recovered in the courts of the West Indies, to sail without a +certificate from the commander aforesaid, and one of the inspectors in +this act appointed, that the vessel is provided with stores and other +accommodation sufficient for her voyage, and has not a greater number of +slaves on board than by the provisions of this act is allowed. + +[Sidenote: Governor to give special instructions.] + +2. And be it enacted, that the governor and council, with the assistance +of the said naval commander, shall have power to give such special +written instructions for the health, discipline, and care of the said +slaves, during their passage, as to them shall seem good, + +[Sidenote: Presents and musical instruments to be provided.] + +3. And be it further enacted, that each slave, at entering the said +ship, is to receive some present, not exceeding in value ----, to be +provided according to the instructions aforesaid; and musical +instruments, according to the fashion of the country, are to be +provided. + +[Sidenote: Table of allowances.] + +4. And be it further enacted, that the negroes on board the transports, +and the seamen who navigate the same, are to receive their daily +allowance according to the table hereunto annexed, together with a +certain quantity of spirits to be mixed with their water. And it is +enacted, that the table is to be fixed, and continue for one week after +sailing, in some conspicuous part of the said ship, for the seamen's +inspection of the same. + +[Sidenote: Negro superintendents to be appointed.] + +5. And be it enacted, that the captain of each trading vessel shall be +enabled and is to divide the slaves in his ship into crews of not less +than ten nor more than twenty persons each, and to appoint one negro man +to have such authority severally over each crew, as according to his +judgment, with the advice of the mate and surgeon, he and they shall see +good to commit to them, and to allow to each of them some compensation, +in extraordinary diet and presents, not exceeding [ten shillings]. + +[Sidenote: Communication with female slaves, how punished.] + +6. And be it enacted, that any European officer or seaman, having +unlawful communication with any woman slave, shall, if an officer, pay +five pounds to the use of the said woman, on landing her from the said +ship, to be stopped out of his wages, or if a seaman, forty shillings: +the said penalties to be recovered on the testimony of the woman so +abused, and one other. + +[Sidenote: Premium to commanders of slave-ships.] + +7. And be it enacted, that all and every commander of a vessel or +vessels employed in slave trade, having received certificates from the +port of the outfit, and from the proper officers in Africa and the West +Indies, of their having conformed to the regulations of this act, and of +their not having lost more than one in thirty of their slaves by death, +shall be entitled to a bounty or premium of [ten pounds]. + + * * * * * + +IV. And whereas the condition of persons in a state of slavery is such +that they are utterly unable to take advantage of any remedy which the +laws may provide for their protection and the amendment of their +condition, and have not the proper means of pursuing any process for +the same, but are and must be under guardianship: and whereas it is not +fitting that they should be under the sole guardianship of their +masters, or their attorneys and overseers, to whom their grievances, +whenever they suffer any, must ordinarily be owing: + +[Sidenote: Attorney-General to be protector of negroes.] + +[Sidenote: To inquire and file information _ex officio_.] + +1. Be it therefore enacted, that his Majesty's Attorney-General for the +time being successively shall, by his office, exercise the trust and +employment of protector of negroes within the island in which he is or +shall be Attorney-General to his Majesty, his heirs and successors; and +that the said Attorney-General, protector of negroes, is hereby +authorized to hear any complaint on the part of any negro or negroes, +and inquire into the same, or to institute an inquiry _ex officio_ into +any abuses, formations and to call before him and examine witnesses upon +oath, relative to the subject-matter of the said official inquiry or +complaint: and it is hereby enacted and declared, that the said +Attorney-General, protector of negroes, is hereby authorized and +empowered, at his discretion, to file an information _ex officio_ for +any offences committed against the provisions of this act, or for any +misdemeanors or wrongs against the said negroes, or any of them. + +[Sidenote: Power to challenge jurors.] + +2. And it is further enacted, that in all trials of such informations +the said protector of negroes may and is hereby authorized to challenge +peremptorily a number not exceeding ---- of the jury who shall be +impanelled to try the charge in the said information contained. + +[Sidenote: To appoint inspectors of districts.] + +[Sidenote: who are to report to him twice in the year the number and +condition of the slaves.] + +3. And be it enacted, that the said Attorney-General, protector of +negroes, shall appoint inspectors, not exceeding the number of ----, at +his discretion; and the said inspectors shall be placed in convenient +districts in each island severally, or shall twice in the year make a +circuit in the same, according to the direction which they shall receive +from the protector of negroes aforesaid; and the inspectors shall and +they are hereby required, twice in the year, to report in writing to the +protector aforesaid the state and condition of the negroes in their +districts or on their circuit severally, the number, sex, age, and +occupation of the said negroes on each plantation; and the overseer or +chief manager on each plantation is hereby required to furnish an +account thereof within [ten days] after the demand of the said +inspectors, and to permit the inspector or inspectors aforesaid to +examine into the same; and the said inspectors shall set forth, in the +said report, the distempers to which the negroes are most liable in the +several parts of the island. + +[Sidenote: Instructions to be formed for inspectors.] + +4. And be it enacted, that the said protector of negroes, by and with +the consent the governor and chief judge of each island, shall form +instructions, by which the said inspectors shall discharge their trust +in the manner the least capable of exciting any unreasonable hopes in +the said negroes, or of weakening the proper authority of the overseer, +and shall transmit them to one of his Majesty's principal secretaries of +state; and when sent back with his approbation, the same shall become +the rule for the conduct of the said inspectors. + +[Sidenote: Registry.] + +5. And be it enacted, that the said Attorney-General, protector of +negroes, shall appoint an office for registering all proceedings +relative to the duty of his place as protector of negroes, and shall +appoint his chief clerk to be registrar, with a salary not exceeding +----. + +[Sidenote: Ports where negroes are to be landed. Vessels to be +inspected.] + +[Sidenote: Masters or officers offending to be fined.] + +6. And be it enacted, that no negroes shall be landed for sale in any +but the ports following: that is to say, ----. And the collector of each +of the said ports severally shall, within ---- days after the arrival of +any ship transporting negroes, report the same to the protector of +negroes, or to one of his inspectors; and the said protector is hereby +authorized and required to examine, or cause to be examined by one of +his inspectors, with the assistance of the said collector, or his +deputy, and a surgeon to be called in on the occasion, the state of the +said ship and negroes; and upon what shall appear to them, the said +protector of negroes, and the said collector and surgeon, to be a +sufficient proof, either as arising from their own inspection, or +sufficient information on a summary process, of any contravention of +this act, or cruelty to the negroes, or other malversation of the said +captain, or any of his officers the said protector shall impose a fine +on him or them, not exceeding ----; which shall not, however, weaken or +invalidate any penalty growing from the bond of the said master or his +owners. And it is hereby provided, that, if the said master, or any of +his officers, shall find himself aggrieved by the said fine, he may +within ---- days appeal to the chief judge, if the court shall be +sitting, or to the governor, who shall and are required to hear the said +parties, and on hearing are to annul or confirm the same. + +[Sidenote: Rates respecting the sale of negroes.] + +7. And be it enacted, that no sale of negroes shall be made but in the +presence of an inspector, and all negroes shall be sold severally, or in +known and ascertained lots, and not otherwise; and a paper containing +the state and description of each negro severally sold, and of each lot, +shall be taken and registered in the office aforesaid; and if, on +inspection or information, it shall be found that any negroes shall +have, in the same ship, or any other at the same time examined, a wife, +an husband, a brother, sister, or child, the person or persons so +related shall not be sold separately at that or any future sale. + +[Sidenote: Every island to be divided into districts.] + +[Sidenote: A church to be built in each.] + +8. And be it enacted, that each and every of his Majesty's islands and +plantations, in which negroes are used in cultivation, shall be, by the +governor and the protector of negroes for the time being, divided into +districts, allowing as much as convenience will admit to the present +division into parishes, and subdividing them, where necessary, into +districts, according to the number of negroes. And the said governor and +protector of negroes shall cause in each district a church to be built +in a convenient place, and a cemetery annexed, and an house for the +residence of a clergyman, with ---- acres of land annexed; and they are +hereby authorized to treat for the necessary ground with the proprietor, +who is hereby obliged to sell and dispose of the same to the said use; +and in case of dispute concerning the value, the same to be settled by a +jury, as in like cases is accustomed. + +[Sidenote: Appointment of a priest and clerk.] + +9. And be it enacted, that in each of the said districts shall be +established a presbyter of the Church of England as by law established, +who shall appoint under him one clerk, who shall be a free negro, when +such properly qualified can be found, (otherwise, a white man,) with a +salary, in each case, of ----; and the said minister and clerk, both or +one, shall instruct the said negroes in the Church Catechism, or such +other as shall be provided by the authority in this act named; and the +said minister shall baptize, as he shall think fit, all negroes not +baptized, and not belonging to Dissenters from the Church of England. + +[Sidenote: Owner to deliver a list of negroes to the minister, and to +cause them to attend divine service.] + +10. And the principal overseer of each plantation is hereby required to +deliver annually unto the minister a list of all the negroes upon his +plantation, distinguishing their sex and age, and shall, under a penalty +of ----, cause all the negroes under his care, above the age of ---- +years, to attend divine service once on every Sunday, except in case of +sickness, infirmity, or other necessary cause, to be given at the time, +and shall, by himself or one of those who are under him, provide for the +orderly behavior of the negroes under him, and cause them to return to +his plantation, when divine service, or administration of sacraments, or +catechism, is ended. + +[Sidenote: Mister to direct punishment for disorderly conduct.] + +11. And be it enacted, that the minister shall have power to punish any +negro for disorderly conduct during divine service, by a punishment not +exceeding [ten] blows to be given in one day and for one offence, which +the overseer or his under agent or agents is hereby directed, according +to the orders of the said minister, effectually to inflict, whenever the +same shall be ordered. + +[Sidenote: Spirituous liquors not to be sold.] + +12. And be it enacted, that no spirituous liquors of any kind shall be +sold, except in towns, within ---- miles distance of any church, nor +within any district during divine service, and an hour preceding and an +hour following the same; and the minister of each parish shall and is +hereby authorized to act as a justice of the peace in enforcing the said +regulation. + +[Sidenote: Register of births, burials, and marriages.] + +13. And be it enacted, that every minister shall keep a register of +births, burials, and marriages of all negroes and mulattoes in his +district. + +[Sidenote: Synod to assemble annually, and to form regulations,] + +14. And be it enacted, that the ministers of the several districts shall +meet annually, on the ---- day of ----, in a synod of the island to +which they belong; and the said synod shall have for its president such +person as the Bishop of London shall appoint for his commissary; and the +said synod or general assembly is hereby authorized, by a majority of +voices, to make regulations, which regulations shall be transmitted by +the said president or commissary to the Bishop of London; and when +returned by the Bishop of London approved of, then, and not before, the +said regulations shall be held in force to bind the said clergy, their +assistants, clerks, and schoolmasters only, and no other persons. + +[Sidenote: and to report to the Bishop of London.] + +15. And be it enacted, that the said president shall collect matter in +the said assembly, and shall make a report of the state of religion and +morals in the several parishes from whence the synod is deputed, and +shall transmit the same, once in the year, in duplicate, through the +governor and protector of negroes, to the Bishop of London. + +[Sidenote: Bishop of London to be patron of the cures.] + +16. And be it enacted and declared, that the Bishop of London for the +time being patron of the shall be patron to all and every the said +cures in this act directed; and the said bishop is hereby required to +provide for the due filling thereof, and is to receive, from the fund in +this act provided for the due execution of this act, a sum not exceeding +---- for each of the said ministers, for his outfit and passage. + +[Sidenote: and to have power of suspending and removing ministers.] + +17. And be it enacted, that, on misbehavior, and on complaint from the +said synod, and on hearing the party accused in a plain and summary +manner, it shall and may be lawful for the Bishop of London to suspend +or to remove any minister from his cure, as his said offences shall +appear to merit. + +[Sidenote: Schools for young negroes.] + +18. And be it enacted, that for every two districts a school shall be +established for young negroes to be taught three days in the week, and +to be detained from their owner four hours in each day, the number not +to be more or fewer than twenty males in each district, who shall be +chosen, and vacancies filled, by the minister of the district; and the +said minister shall pay to the owner of the said boy, and shall be +allowed the same in his accounts at the synod, to the age of twelve +years old, three-pence by the day, and for every boy from twelve years +old to fifteen, five-pence by the day. + +[Sidenote: Extraordinary abilities to be encouraged.] + +19. And it is enacted, that, if the president of the synod aforesaid +shall certify to the protector of negroes, that any boys in the said +schools (provided that the number in no one year shall exceed one in the +island of Jamaica, and one in two years in the islands of Barbadoes, +Antigua, and Grenada, and one in four years in any of the other islands) +do show a remarkable aptitude for learning, the said protector is hereby +authorized and directed to purchase the said boy at the best rate at +which boys of that age and strength have been sold within the year; and +the said negro so purchased shall be under the entire guardianship of +the said protector of negroes, who shall send him to the Bishop of +London for his further education in England, and may charge in his +accounts for the expense of transporting him to England; and the Bishop +of London shall provide for the education of such of the said negroes as +he shall think proper subjects, until the age of twenty-four years, and +shall order those who shall fall short of expectation after one year to +be bound apprentice to some handicraft trade; and when his +apprenticeship is finished, the Lord Mayor of London is hereby +authorized and directed to receive the said negro from his master, and +to transmit him to the island from which he came, in the West Indies, to +be there as a free negro, subject, however, to the direction of the +protector of negroes, relatively to his behavior and employment. + +[Sidenote: Negroes of Dissenters.] + +[Sidenote: their marriages, &c., to be registered.] + +20. And it is hereby enacted and provided, that any planter, or owner of +negroes, not being of the Church of England, and not choosing to send +his negroes to attend divine service in manner by this act directed, +shall give, jointly or severally, as the case shall require, security to +the protector of negroes that a competent minister of some Christian +church or congregation shall be provided for the due instruction of the +negroes, and for their performing divine service according to the +description of the religion of the master or masters, in some church or +house thereto allotted, in the manner and with the regulations in this +act prescribed with regard to the exercise of religion according to the +Church of England: provided always, that the marriages of the said +negroes belonging to Dissenters shall be celebrated only in the church +of the said district, and that a register of the births shall be +transmitted to the minister of the said district. + +[Sidenote: Regulations concerning marriage.] + +21. And whereas a state of matrimony, and the government of a family, is +a principal means of forming men to a fitness for freedom, and to become +good citizens: Be it enacted, that all negro men and women, above +eighteen years of age for the man and sixteen for the woman, who have +cohabited together for twelve months or upwards, or shall cohabit for +the same time, and have a child or children, shall be deemed to all +intents and purposes to be married, and either of the parties is +authorized to require of the ministers of the district to be married in +the face of the church. + +[Sidenote: Concerning the same.] + +22. And be it enacted, that, from and after the ---- of ----, all negro +men in an healthy condition, and so reported to be, in case the same is +denied, by a surgeon and by an inspector of negroes, and being +twenty-one years old, or upwards, until fifty, and not being before +married, shall, on requisition of the inspectors, be provided by their +masters or overseers with a woman not having children living, and not +exceeding the age of the man, nor, in any case, exceeding the age of +twenty-five years; and such persons shall be married publicly in the +face of the church. + +[Sidenote: Concerning the same.] + +23. And be it enacted, that, if any negro shall refuse a competent +marriage tendered to him, and shall not demand another specifically, +such as it may be in his master's power to provide, the master or +overseer shall be authorized to constrain him by an increase of work or +a lessening of allowance. + +[Sidenote: Adultery, &c., how to be punished.] + +24. And be it enacted, that the minister in each district shall have, +with the assent of the inspector, full power and authority to punish all +acts of adultery, unlawful concubinage, and fornication, amongst +negroes, on hearing and a summary process, by ordering a number of +blows, not exceeding ----, for each offence; and if any white person +shall be proved, on information in the supreme court, to be exhibited by +the protector of negroes, to have committed adultery with any negro +woman, or to have corrupted any negro woman under sixteen years of age +he shall be fined in the sum of ----, and shall be forever disabled from +serving the office of overseer of negroes, or being attorney to any +plantation. + +[Sidenote: Concerning marriage.] + +25. And be it enacted, that no slaves shall be compelled to do any work +for their masters for [three] days after their marriage. + +[Sidenote: Concerning pregnant women.] + +26. And be it enacted, that no woman shall be obliged to field-work, or +any other laborious work, for one month before her delivery, or for six +weeks afterwards. + +[Sidenote: Separation of husband and wife, and children, to be avoided.] + +27. And be it enacted, that no husband and wife shall be sold +separately, if originally belonging to the same master; nor shall any +children under sixteen be sold separately from their parents, or one +parent, if one be living. + +[Sidenote: Concerning the same.] + +28. And be it enacted, that, if an husband and wife, which before their +intermarriage belonged to different owners, shall be sold, they shall +not be sold at such a distance as to prevent mutual help and +cohabitation; and of this distance the minister shall judge, and his +certificate of the inconvenient distance shall be valid, so as to make +such sale unlawful, and to render the same null and void. + +[Sidenote: Negroes not to work on Saturday afternoon or Sunday.] + +29. And be it enacted, that no negro shall be compelled to work for his +owner at field-work, or any service relative to a plantation, or to work +at any handicraft trade, from eleven o'clock on Saturday forenoon until +the usual working hour on Monday morning. + +[Sidenote: Other cases of exemption from labor.] + +30. And whereas habits of industry and sobriety, and the means of +acquiring and preserving property, are proper and reasonable +preparatives to freedom, and will secure against an abuse of the same: +Be it enacted, that every negro man, who shall have served ten years, +and is thirty years of age, and is married, and has had two children +born of any marriage, shall obtain the whole of Saturday for himself and +his wife, and for his own benefit, and after thirty-seven years of age, +the whole of Friday for himself and his wife: provided that in both +cases the minister of the district and the inspector of negroes shall +certify that they know nothing against his peaceable, orderly, and +industrious behavior. + +[Sidenote: Huts and land to be appropriated.] + +31. And be it enacted, that the master of every plantation shall provide +the materials of a good and substantial hut for each married field +negro; and if his plantation shall exceed ---- acres, he shall allot to +the same a portion of land not less than ----: and the said hut and land +shall remain and stand annexed to the said negro, for his natural life, +or during his bondage; but the same shall not be alienated without the +consent of the owners. + +[Sidenote: Property of negroes secured.] + +32. And be it enacted, that it shall not be lawful for the owner of any +negro, by himself or any other, to take from him any land, house, +cattle, goods, or money, acquired by the said negro, whether by +purchase, donation, or testament, whether the same has been derived from +the owner of the said negro, or any other. + +33. And be it enacted, that, if the said negro shall die possessed of +any lands, goods, or chattels, and dies without leaving a wife or issue, +it shall be lawful for the said negro to devise or bequeath the same by +his last will; but in case the said negro shall die intestate, and leave +a wife and children, the same shall be distributed amongst them, +according to the usage under the statute, commonly called the Statute of +Distributions; but if the said negro shall die intestate without wife or +children, then, and in that case, his estate shall go to the fund +provided for the better execution of this act. + +34. And be it enacted, that no negro, who is married, and hath resided +upon any plantation for twelve months, shall be sold, either privately +or by the decree of any court, but along with the plantation on which he +hath resided, unless he should himself request to be separated +therefrom. + +[Sidenote: Of the punishment of negroes.] + +35. And be it enacted, that no blows or stripes exceeding thirteen, +shall be inflicted for one offence upon any negro, without the order of +one of his Majesty's justices of peace. + +[Sidenote: Of the same.] + +36. And it is enacted, that it shall be lawful for the protector of +negroes, as often as on complaint and hearing he shall be of opinion +that any negro hath been cruelly and inhumanly treated, or when it +shall be made to appear to him that an overseer hath any particular +malice, to order, at the desire of the suffering party, the said negro +to be sold to another master. + +37. And be it enacted, that, in all cases of injury to member or life, +the offences against a negro shall be deemed and taken to all intents +and purposes as if the same were perpetrated against any of his +Majesty's subjects; and the protector of negroes, on complaint, or if he +shall receive credible information thereof, shall cause an indictment to +be presented for the same; and in case of suspicion of any murder of a +negro, an inquest by the coroner, or officer acting as such, shall, if +practicable, be held into the same. + +[Sidenote: Of the manumission of negroes.] + +38. And in order to a gradual manumission of slaves, as they shall seem +fitted to fill the offices of freemen, be it enacted, that every negro +slave, being thirty years of ago and upwards, and who has had three +children born to him in lawful matrimony, and who hath received a +certificate from the minister of his district, or any other Christian +teacher, of his regularity in the duties of religion, and of his orderly +and good behavior, may purchase, at rates to be fixed by two justices of +peace, the freedom of himself, or his wife or children, or of any of +them separately, valuing the wife and children, if purchased into +liberty by the father of the family, at half only of their marketable +values: provided that the said father shall bind himself in a penalty of +---- for the good behavior of his children. + +[Sidenote: Of the same.] + +39. And be it enacted, that it shall be lawful for the protector of +negroes to purchase the freedom of any negro who shall appear to him to +excel in any mechanical art, or other knowledge or practice deemed +liberal, and the value shall be settled by a jury. + +[Sidenote: Free negroes how to be punished.] + +40. And be it enacted, that the protector of negroes shall be and is +authorized and required to act as a magistrate for the coercion of all +idle, disobedient, or disorderly free negroes, and he shall by office +prosecute them for the offences of idleness, drunkenness, quarrelling, +gaming, or vagrancy, in the supreme court, or cause them to be +prosecuted before one justice of peace, as the case may require. + +[Sidenote: Of the same.] + +41. And be it enacted, that, if any free negro hath been twice convicted +for any of the said misdemeanors, and is judged by the said protector of +negroes, calling to his assistance two justices of the peace, to be +incorrigibly idle, dissolute, and vicious, it shall be lawful, by the +order of the said protector and two justices of peace, to sell the said +free negro into slavery: the purchase-money to be paid to the person so +remanded into servitude, or kept in hand by the protector and governor +for the benefit of his family. + +[Sidenote: Governor to receive and transmit annual reports.] + +42. And be it enacted, that the governor in each colony shall be +assistant to the execution of this act, and shall receive the reports of +the protector, and such other accounts as he shall judge material, +relative thereto, and shall transmit the same annually to one of his +Majesty's principal secretaries of state. + + + + +LETTER + +TO + +THE CHAIRMAN OF THE BUCKINGHAMSHIRE MEETING, + +HELD AT AYLESBURY, APRIL 13, 1780, + +ON THE SUBJECT OF + +PARLIAMENTARY REFORM. + + + + +NOTE. + + The meeting of the freeholders of the County of Buckingham, + which occasioned the following Letter, was called for the + purpose of taking into consideration a petition to Parliament + for shortening the duration of Parliaments, and for a more + equal representation of the people in the House of Commons. + + +Sir,--Having heard yesterday, by mere accident, that there is an +intention of laying before the county meeting _new matter, which is not +contained in our petition_, and the consideration of which had been +deferred to a fitter time by a majority of our committee in London, +permit me to take this method of submitting to you my reasons for +thinking, with our committee, that nothing ought to be hastily deter +mined upon the subject. + +Our petition arose naturally from distresses which we _felt_; and the +requests which we made were in effect nothing more than that such things +should be done in Parliament as it was evidently the duty of Parliament +to do. But the affair which will be proposed to you by a person of rank +and ability is an alteration in the constitution of Parliament itself. +It is impossible for you to have a subject before you of more +importance, and that requires a more cool and more mature consideration, +both on its own account, and for the credit of our sobriety of mind, who +are to resolve upon it. + +The county will in some way or other be called upon to declare it your +opinion, that the House of Commons is not sufficiently numerous, and +that the elections are not sufficiently frequent,--that an hundred new +knights of the shire ought to be added, and that we are to have a new +election once in three years for certain, and as much oftener as the +king pleases. Such will be the state of things, if the proposition made +shall take effect. + +All this may be proper. But, as an honest man, I cannot possibly give my +rote for it, until I have considered it more fully. I will not deny that +our Constitution may have faults, and that those faults, when found, +ought to be corrected; but, on the whole, that Constitution has been our +own pride, and an object of admiration to all other nations. It is not +everything which appears at first view to be faulty, in such a +complicated plan, that is to be determined to be so in reality. To +enable us to correct the Constitution, the whole Constitution must be +viewed together; and it must be compared with the actual state of the +people, and the circumstances of the time. For that which taken singly +and by itself may appear to be wrong, when considered with relation to +other things, may be perfectly right,--or at least such as ought to be +patiently endured, as the means of preventing something that is worse. +So far with regard to what at first view may appear a _distemper_ in the +Constitution. As to the _remedy_ of that distemper an equal caution +ought to be used; because this latter consideration is not single and +separate, no more than the former. There are many things in reformation +which would be proper to be done, if other things can be done along with +them, but which, if they cannot be so accompanied, ought not to be done +at all. I therefore wish, when any new matter of this deep nature is +proposed to me, to have the whole scheme distinctly in my view, and full +time to consider of it. Please God, I will walk with caution, whenever I +am not able clearly to see my way before me. + +I am now growing old. I have from my very early youth been conversant in +reading and thinking upon the subject of our laws and Constitution, as +well as upon those of other times and other countries; I have been for +fifteen years a very laborious member of Parliament, and in that time +have had great opportunities of seeing with my own eyes the working of +the machine of our government, and remarking where it went smoothly and +did its business, and where it checked in its movements, or where it +damaged its work; I have also had and used the opportunities of +conversing with men of the greatest wisdom and fullest experience in +those matters; and I do declare to you most solemnly and most truly, +that, on the result of all this reading, thinking, experience, and +communication, I am not able to come to an immediate resolution in favor +of a change of the groundwork of our Constitution, and in particular, +that, in the present state of the country, in the present state of our +representation, in the present state of our rights and modes of +electing, in the present state of the several prevalent interests, in +the present state of the affairs and manners of this country, the +addition of an hundred knights of the shire, and hurrying election on +election, will be things advantageous to liberty or good government. + +This is the present condition of my mind; and this is my apology for not +going as fast as others may choose to go in this business. I do not by +any means reject the propositions; much less do I condemn the gentlemen +who, with equal good intentions, with much better abilities, and with +infinitely greater personal weight and consideration than mine, are of +opinion that this matter ought to be decided upon instantly. + +I most heartily wish that the deliberate sense of the kingdom on this +great subject should be known. When it is known, it _must_ be prevalent. +It would be dreadful indeed, if there was any power in the nation +capable of resisting its unanimous desire, or even the desire of any +very great and decided majority of the people. The people may be +deceived in their choice of an object; but I can scarcely conceive any +choice they can make to be so very mischievous as the existence of any +human force capable of resisting it. It will certainly be the duty of +every man, in the situation to which God has called him, to give his +best opinion and advice upon the matter: it will _not_ be his duty, let +him think what he will, to use any violent or any fraudulent means of +counteracting the general wish, or even of employing the legal and +constructive organ of expressing the people's sense against the sense +which they do actually entertain. + +In order that the real sense of the people should be known upon so great +an affair as this, it is of absolute necessity that timely notice should +be given,--that the matter should be prepared in open committees, from a +choice into which no class or description of men is to be excluded,--and +the subsequent county meetings should be as full and as well attended as +possible. Without these precautions, the true sense of the people will +ever be uncertain. Sure I am, that no precipitate resolution on a great +change in the fundamental constitution of any country can ever be called +the real sense of the people. + +I trust it will not be taken amiss, if, as an inhabitant and freeholder +of this county, (one, indeed, among the most inconsiderable,) I assert +my right of dissenting (as I do dissent fully and directly) from any +resolution whatsoever on the subject of an alteration in the +representation and election of the kingdom _at this time_. By preserving +this light, and exercising it with temper and moderation, I trust I +cannot offend the noble proposer, for whom no man professes or feels +more respect and regard than I do. A want of concurrence in _everything_ +which _can_ be proposed will in no sort weaken the energy or distract +the efforts of men of upright intentions upon those points in which they +are agreed. Assemblies that are met, and with a resolution to be all of +a mind, are assemblies that can have no opinion at all of their own. The +first proposer of any measure must be their master. I do not know that +an amicable variety of sentiment, conducted with mutual good-will, has +any sort of resemblance to discord, or that it can give any advantage +whatsoever to the enemies of our common cause. On the contrary, a forced +and fictitious agreement (which every universal agreement must be) is +not becoming the cause of freedom. If, however, any evil should arise +from it, (which I confess I do not foresee,) I am happy that those who +have brought forward new and arduous matter, when very great doubts and +some diversity of opinion must be foreknown, are of authority and weight +enough to stand against the consequences. + +I humbly lay these my sentiments before the county. They are not taken +up to serve any interests of my own, or to be subservient to the +interests of any man or set of men under heaven. I could wish to be able +to attend our meeting, or that I had time to reason this matter more +fully by letter; but I am detained here upon our business: what you have +already put upon us is as much as we can do. If we are prevented from +going through it with any effect, I fear it will be in part owing not +more to the resistance of the enemies of our cause than to our imposing +on ourselves such tasks as no human faculties, employed as we are, can +be equal to. Our worthy members have shown distinguished ability and +zeal in support of our petition. I am just going down to a bill brought +in to frustrate a capital part of your desires. The minister is +preparing to transfer the cognizance of the public accounts from those +whom you and the Constitution have chosen to control them, to unknown +persons, creatures of his own. For so much he annihilates Parliament. + +I have the honor, &c. + +EDMUND BURKE. + +CHARLES STREET, 12th April, 1780. + + + + +FRAGMENTS OF A TRACT + +RELATIVE TO + +THE LAWS AGAINST POPERY + +IN IRELAND. + + +NOTE. + + The condition of the Roman Catholics in Ireland appears to + lave engaged the attention of Mr. Burke at a very early + period of his political life. It was probably soon after the + year 1765 that he formed the plan of a work upon that + subject, the fragments of which are now given to the public. + No title is prefixed to it in the original manuscript; and + the _Plan_, which it has been thought proper to insert here, + was evidently designed merely for the convenience of the + author. Of the first chapter some unconnected fragments only, + too imperfect for publication, have been found. Of the second + there is a considerable portion, perhaps nearly the whole; + but the copy from which it is printed is evidently a first + rough draught. The third chapter, as far as it goes, is taken + from a fair, corrected copy; but the end of the second part + of the first head is left unfinished, and the discussion of + the second and third heads was either never entered upon or + the manuscript containing it has unfortunately been lost. + What follows the third chapter appears to have been designed + for the beginning of the fourth, and is evidently the first + rough draught; and to this we have added a fragment which + appears to have been a part either of this or the first + chapter. + + In the volume with which it is intended to close this + posthumous publication of Mr. Burke's Works, we shall have + occasion to enter into a more particular account of the part + which he took in the discussion of this great political + question. At present it may suffice to say, that the Letter + to Mr. Smith, the Second Letter to Sir Hercules Langrishe, + and the Letter to his Son, which here follow in order the + Fragment on the Popery Laws, are the only writings upon this + subject found amongst his papers in a state fit to appear in + this stage of the publication. What remain are some small + fragments of the Tract, and a few letters containing no new + matter of importance. + + + + +TRACT + +ON THE POPERY LAWS + + +THE PLAN. + + +I propose, first, to make an Introduction, in order to show the +propriety of a closer inspection into the affairs of Ireland; and this +takes up the first chapter, which is to be spent in this introductory +matter, and in stating the Popery laws in general, as one leading cause +of the imbecility of the country. + +CH. II. states particularly the laws themselves, in a plain and popular +manner. + +CH. III. begins the remarks upon them, under the heads of, 1st, The +object,--which is a numerous people; 2ndly, Their means,--a restraint on +property; 3rdly, Their instruments of execution,--corrupted morals, +which affect the national prosperity. + +CH. IV. The impolicy of those laws, as they affect the national +security. + +CH. V. Reasons by which the laws are supported, and answers to them. + + + + +CHAPTER II. + + +In order to lay this matter with full satisfaction before the reader, I +shall collect into one point of view, and state as shortly and as +clearly as I am able, the purport of these laws, according to the +objects which they affect, without making at present any further +observation upon them, but just what shall be necessary to render the +drift; and intention of the legislature and the tendency and operation +of the laws the more distinct and evident. + +I shall begin with those which relate to the possession and inheritance +of landed property in Popish hands. The first operation of those acts +upon this object was wholly to change the course of descent by the +Common Law, to take away the right of primogeniture, and, in lieu +thereof, to substitute and establish a new species of Statute Gavelkind. +By this law, on the death of a Papist possessed of an estate in fee +simple or in fee tail, the land is to be divided by equal portions +between all the male children; and those portions are likewise to be +parcelled out, share and share alike, amongst the descendants of each +son, and so to proceed in a similar distribution _ad infinitum_. From +this regulation it was proposed that some important consequences should +follow. First, by taking away the right of primogeniture, perhaps in the +very first generation, certainly in the second, the families of Papists, +however respectable, and their fortunes, however considerable, would be +wholly dissipated, and reduced to obscurity and indigence, without any +possibility that they should repair them by their industry or +abilities,--being, as we shall see anon, disabled from every species of +permanent acquisition. Secondly, by this law the right of testamentation +is taken away, which the inferior tenures had always enjoyed, and all +tenures from the 27th Hen. VIII; Thirdly, the right of settlement was +taken away, that no such persons should, from the moment the act passed, +be enabled to advance themselves in fortune or connection by marriage, +being disabled from making any disposition, in consideration of such +marriage, but what the law had previously regulated: the reputable +establishment of the eldest son, as representative of the family, or to +settle a jointure, being commonly the great object in such settlements, +which was the very power which the law had absolutely taken away. + +The operation of this law, however certain, might be too slow. The +present possessors might happen to be long-lived. The legislature knew +the natural impatience of expectants, and upon this principle they gave +encouragement to children to anticipate the inheritance. For it is +provided, that the eldest son of any Papist shall, immediately on his +conformity, change entirely the nature and properties of his father's +legal estate: if he before held in fee simple, or, in other words, had +the entire and absolute dominion over the land, he is reduced to an +estate for his life only, with all the consequences of the natural +debility of that estate, by which he becomes disqualified to sell, +mortgage, charge, (except for his life,) or in any wise to do any act by +which he may raise money for relief in his most urgent necessities. The +eldest son, so conforming, immediately acquires, and in the lifetime of +his father, the permanent part, what our law calls the reversion and +inheritance of the estate; and he discharges it by retrospect, and +annuls every sort of voluntary settlement made by the father ever so +long before his conversion. This he may sell or dispose of immediately, +and alienate it from the family forever. + +Having thus reduced his father's estate, he may also bring his father +into the Court of Chancery, where he may compel him to swear to the +value of his estate, and to allow him out of that possession (which had +been before reduced to an estate for life) such an immediate annual +allowance as the Lord Chancellor or Lord Keeper shall judge suitable to +his ago and quality. + +This indulgence is not confined to the eldest son. The other children +likewise, by conformity, may acquire the same privileges, and in the +same manner force from their father an immediate and independent +maintenance. It is very well worth remarking, that the statutes have +avoided to fix any determinate age for these emancipating conversions; +so that the children, at any age, however incapable of choice in other +respects, however immature or even infantile, are yet considered +sufficiently capable to disinherit their parents, and totally to +subtract themselves from their direction and control, either at their +own option, or by the instigation of others. By this law the tenure and +value of a Roman Catholic in his real property is not only rendered +extremely limited and altogether precarious, but the paternal power is +in all such families so enervated that it may well be considered as +entirely taken away; even the principle upon which it is founded seems +to be directly reversed. However, the legislature feared that enough was +not yet done upon this head. The Roman Catholic parent, by selling his +real estate, might in some sort preserve the dominion over his substance +and his family, and thereby evade the operation of these laws, which +intended to take away both. Besides, frequent revolutions and many +conversions had so broken the landed property of Papists in that +kingdom, that it was apprehended that this law could have in a short +time but a few objects upon which it would be capable of operating. + +To obviate these inconveniences another law was made, by which the +dominion of children over their parents was extended universally +throughout the whole Popish part of the nation, and every child of every +Popish parent was encouraged to come into what is called a court of +equity, to prefer a bill against his father, and compel him to confess, +upon oath, the quantity and value of his substance, personal as well as +real, of what nature soever, or howsoever it might be employed; upon +which discovery, the court is empowered to seize upon and allocate, for +the immediate maintenance of such child or children, any sum not +exceeding a third of the whole fortune: and as to their future +establishment on the death of the father, no limits are assigned; the +Chancery may, if it thinks fit, take the whole property, personal as +well as real, money, stock in trade, &c, out of the power of the +possessor, and secure it in any manner they judge expedient for that +purpose; for the act has not assigned any sort of limit with regard to +the quantity which is to be charged, or given any direction concerning +the means of charging and securing it: a law which supersedes all +observation. + +But the law is still more extensive in its provision. Because there was +a possibility that the parent, though sworn, might by false +representations evade the discovery of the ultimate value of his estate, +a new bill may be at any time brought, by one, any, or all of the +children, for a further discovery; his effects are to undergo a fresh +scrutiny, and a now distribution is to be made in consequence of it. So +that the parent has no security against perpetual inquietude, and the +reiteration of Chancery suits, but by (what is somewhat difficult for +human nature to comply with) fully, and without reserve, abandoning his +whole property to the discretion of the court, to be disposed of in +favor of such children. + +But is this enough, and has the parent purchased his repose by such a +surrender? Very far from it. The law expressly, and very carefully, +provides that he shall not: before he can be secure from the persecution +of his children, it requires another and a much more extraordinary +condition: the children are authorized, if they can find that their +parent has by his industry, or otherwise, increased the value of his +property since their first bill, to bring another, compelling a new +account of the value of his estate, in order to a new distribution +proportioned to the value of the estate at the time of the new bill +preferred. They may bring such bills, _toties quoties_, upon every +improvement of his fortune, without any sort of limitation of time, or +regard to the frequency of such bills, or to the quantity of the +increase of the estate, which shall justify the bringing them. This act +expressly provides that he shall have no respite from the persecution of +his children, but by totally abandoning all thoughts of improvement and +acquisition. + +This is going a great way, surely: but the laws in question have gone +much further. Not satisfied with calling upon children to revolt against +their parents, and to possess themselves of their substance, there are +cases where the withdrawing of the child from his father's obedience is +not left to the option of the child himself: for, if the wife of a Roman +Catholic should choose to change her religion, from that moment she +deprives her husband of all management and direction of his children, +and even of all the tender satisfaction which a parent can feel in their +society, and which is the only indemnification he can have for all his +cares and sorrows; and they are to be torn forever, at the earliest age, +from his house and family: for the Lord Chancellor is not only +authorized, but he is strongly required, to take away all his children +from such Popish parent, to appoint where, in what manner, and by whom +they are to be educated; and the father is compelled to pay, not for the +ransom, but for the deprivation of his children, and to furnish such a +sum as the Chancellor thinks proper to appoint for their education to +the age of eighteen years. The case is the same, if the husband should +be the conformist; though how the law is to operate in this case I do +not see: for the act expressly says, that the child shall be taken from +such Popish parent; and whilst such husband and wife cohabit, it will be +impossible to put it into execution without taking the child from one as +well as from the other; and then the effect of the law will be, that, if +either husband or wife becomes Protestant, both are to be deprived of +their children. + +The paternal power thus being wholly abrogated, it is evident that by +the last regulation the power of an husband over his wife is also +considerably impaired; because, if it be in her power, whenever she +pleases, to subtract the children from his protection and obedience, she +herself by that hold inevitably acquires a power and superiority over +her husband. + +But she is not left dependent upon this oblique influence: for, if in +any marriage settlement the husband has reserved to him a power of +making a jointure, and he dies without settling any, her conformity +executes his powers, and executes them in as large extent as the +Chancellor thinks fit. The husband is deprived of that coercive power +over his wife which he had in his hands by the use he might make of the +discretionary power reserved in the settlement. + +But if no such power had been reserved, and no such settlement existed, +yet, if the husband dies, leaving his conforming wife without a filed +provision by some settlement on his real estate, his wife may apply to +Chancery, where she shall be allotted a portion from his leases, and +other personal estate, not exceeding one third of his whole clear +substance. The laws in this instance, as well as in the former, have +presumed that the husband has omitted to make all the provision which he +might have done, for no other reason than that of her religion. If, +therefore, she chooses to balance any domestic misdemeanors to her +husband by the public merit of conformity to the Protestant religion, +the law will suffer no plea of such misdemeanors to be urged on the +husband's part, nor proof of that kind to be entered into. She acquires +a provision totally independent of his favor, and deprives him of that +source of domestic authority which the Common Law had left to him, that +of rewarding or punishing, by a voluntary distribution of his effects, +what in his opinion was the good or ill behavior of his wife. + +Thus the laws stand with regard to the property already acquired, to its +mode of descent, and to family powers. Now as to the new acquisition of +real property, and both to the acquisition and security of personal, the +law stands thus:-- + +All persons of that persuasion are disabled from taking or purchasing, +directly or by a trust, any lands, any mortgage upon land, any rents or +profits from land, any lease, interest, or term of any land, any +annuity for life or lives or years, or any estate whatsoever, chargeable +upon, or which may in any manner affect, any lands. + +One exception, and one only, is admitted by the statutes to the +universality of this exclusion, viz., a lease for a term not exceeding +thirty-one years. But even this privilege is charged with a prior +qualification. This remnant of a right is doubly curtailed: 1st, that on +such a short lease a rent not less than two thirds of the full improved +yearly value, at the time of the making it, shall be reserved during the +whole continuance of the term; and, 2ndly, it does not extend to the +whole kingdom. This lease must also be in possession, and not in +reversion. If any lease is made, exceeding either in duration or value, +and in the smallest degree, the above limits, the whole interest is +forfeited, and vested _ipso facto_ in the first Protestant discoverer or +informer. This discoverer, thus invested with the property, is enabled +to sue for it as his own right. The courts of law are not alone open to +him; he may (and this is the usual method) enter into either of the +courts of equity, and call upon the parties, and those whom he suspects +to be their trustees, upon oath, and under the penalties of perjury, to +discover against themselves the exact nature and value of their estates +in every particular, in order to induce their forfeiture on the +discovery. In such suits the informer is not liable to those delays +which the ordinary procedure of those courts throws into the way of the +justest claimant; nor has the Papist the indulgence which he [it?] +allows to the most fraudulent defendant, that of plea and demurrer; but +the defendant is obliged to answer the whole directly upon oath. The +rule of _favores ampliandi,_ &c., is reversed by this act, lest any +favor should be shown, or the force and operation of the law in any part +of its progress be enervated. All issues to be tried on this act are to +be tried by none but known Protestants. + +It is here necessary to state as a part of this law what has been for +some time generally understood as a certain consequence of it. The act +had expressly provided that a Papist could possess no sort of estate +which might affect land (except as before excepted). On this a +difficulty did, not unnaturally, arise. It is generally known, a +judgment being obtained or acknowledged for any debt, since the statute +of Westm. 2, 13 Ed. I. c. 18, one half of the debtor's land is to be +delivered unto the creditor until the obligation is satisfied, under a +writ called _Elegit_, and this writ has been ever since the ordinary +assurance of the land, and the great foundation of general credit in the +nation. Although the species of holding under this writ is not specified +in the statute, the received opinion, though not juridically delivered, +has been, that, if they attempt to avail themselves of that security, +because it may create an estate, however precarious, in land, their +whole debt or charge is forfeited, and becomes the property of the +Protestant informer. Thus you observe, first, that by the express words +of the law all possibility of acquiring any species of valuable +property, in any sort connected with land, is taken away; and, secondly, +by the construction all security for money is also cut off. No security +is left, except what is merely personal, and which, therefore, most +people who lend money would, I believe, consider as none at all. + +Under this head of the acquisition of property, the law meets them in +every road of industry, and in its direct and consequential provisions +throws almost all sorts of obstacles in their way. For they are not only +excluded from all offices in Church and State, which, though a just and +necessary provision, is yet no small restraint in the acquisition, but +they are interdicted from the army, and the law, in all its branches. +This point is carried to so scrupulous a severity, that chamber +practice, and even private conveyancing, the most voluntary agency, are +prohibited to them under the severest penalties and the most rigid modes +of inquisition. They have gone beyond even this: for every barrister, +six clerk, attorney, or solicitor, is obliged to take a solemn oath not +to employ persons of that persuasion,--no, not as hackney clerks, at the +miserable salary of seven shillings a week. No tradesman of that +persuasion is capable by any service or settlement to obtain his freedom +in any town corporate; so that they trade and work in their own native +towns as aliens, paying, as such, quarterage, and other charges and +impositions. They are expressly forbidden, in whatever employment, to +take more than two apprentices, except in the linen manufacture only. + + * * * * * + +In every state, next to the care of the life and properties of the +subject, the education of their youth has been a subject of attention. +In the Irish laws this point has not been neglected. Those who are +acquainted with the constitution of our universities need not be +informed that none but those who conform to the Established Church can +be at all admitted to study there, and that none can obtain degrees in +them who do not previously take all the tests, oaths, and declarations. +Lest they should be enabled to supply this defect by private academies +and schools of their own, the law has armed itself with all its terrors +against such a practice. Popish schoolmasters of every species are +proscribed by those acts, and it is made felony to teach even in a +private family. So that Papists are entirely excluded from an education +in any of our authorized establishments for learning at home. In order +to shut up every avenue to instruction, the act of King William in +Ireland has added to this restraint by precluding them from all foreign +education. + +This act is worthy of attention on account of the singularity of some of +its provisions. Being sent for education to any Popish school or college +abroad, upon conviction, incurs (if the party sent has any estate of +inheritance) a kind of unalterable and perpetual outlawry. The tender +and incapable age of such a person, his natural subjection to the will +of others, his necessary, unavoidable ignorance of the laws, stands for +nothing in his favor. He is disabled to sue in law or equity; to be +guardian, executor, or administrator; he is rendered incapable of any +legacy or deed of gift; he forfeits all his goods and chattels forever; +and he forfeits for his life all his lands, hereditaments, offices, and +estate of freehold, and all trusts, powers, or interests therein. All +persons concerned in sending them or maintaining them abroad, by the +least assistance of money or otherwise, are involved in the same +disabilities, and subjected to the same penalties. + +The mode of conviction is as extraordinary as the penal sanctions of +this act. A justice of peace, upon information that any child is sent +away, may require to be brought before him all persons charged or even +suspected of sending or assisting, and examine them and other persons +on oath concerning the fact. If on this examination he finds it +_probable_ that the party was sent contrary to this act, he is then, to +bind over the parties and witnesses in any sum he thinks fit, but not +less than two hundred pounds, to appear and take their trial at the next +quarter sessions. Here the justices are to reexamine evidence, until +they arrive, as before, to what shall appear to them a probability. For +the rest they resort to the accused: if they can prove that any person, +or any money, or any bill of exchange, has been sent abroad by the party +accused, they throw the proof upon him to show for what innocent +purposes it was sent; and on failure of such proof, he is subjected to +all the above-mentioned penalties. Half the forfeiture is given to the +crown; the other half goes to the informer. + +It ought here to be remarked, that this mode of conviction not only +concludes the party has failed in his expurgatory proof, but it is +sufficient also to subject to the penalties and incapacities of the law +the infant upon whose account the person has been so convicted. It must +be confessed that the law has not left him without some species of +remedy in this case apparently of much hardship, where one man is +convicted upon evidence given against another, if he has the good +fortune to live; for, within a twelvemonth after his return, or his age +of twenty-one, he has a, right to call for a new trial, in which he also +is to undertake the negative proof, and to show by sufficient evidence +that he has not been sent abroad against the intention of the act. If he +succeeds in this difficult exculpation, and demonstrates his innocence +to the satisfaction of the court, he forfeits all his goods and +chattels, and all the profits of his lands incurred and received before +such acquittal; but he is freed from all other forfeitures, and from all +subsequent incapacities. There is also another method allowed by the law +in favor of persons under such unfortunate circumstances, as in the +former case for their innocence, in this upon account of their +expiation: if within six months after their return, with the punctilious +observation of many ceremonies, they conform to the Established Church, +and take all the oaths and subscriptions, the legislature, in +consideration of the incapable age in which they were sent abroad, of +the merit of their early conformity, and to encourage conversions, only +confiscates, as in the former case, the whole personal estate, and the +profits of the real; in all other respects, restoring and rehabilitating +the party. + + * * * * * + +So far as to property and education. There remain some other heads upon +which the acts have changed the course of the Common Law; and first, +with regard to the right of self-defence, which consists in the use of +arms. This, though one of the rights by the law of Nature, yet is so +capable of abuses that it may not be unwise to make some regulations +concerning them; and many wise nations have thought proper to set +several restrictions on this right, especially temporary ones, with +regard to suspected persons, and on occasion of some imminent danger to +the public from foreign invasion or domestic commotions. + +But provisions in time of trouble proper, and perhaps necessary, may +become in time of profound peace a scheme of tyranny. The method which +the statute law of Ireland has taken upon this delicate article is, to +get rid of all difficulties at once by an universal prohibition to all +persons, at all times, and under all circumstances, who are not +Protestants, of using or keeping any kind of weapons whatsoever. In +order to enforce this regulation, the whole spirit of the Common Law is +changed, very severe penalties are enjoined, the largest powers are +vested in the lowest magistrates. Any two justices of peace, or +magistrates of a town, with or without information, at their pleasure, +by themselves or their warrant, are empowered to enter and search the +house of any Papist, or even of any other person, whom they suspect to +keep such arms in trust for them. The only limitation to the extent of +this power is, that the search is to be made between the rising and +setting of the sun: but even this qualification extends no further than +to the execution of the act in the open country; for in all cities and +their suburbs, in towns corporate and market-towns, they may at their +discretion, and without information, break open houses and institute +such search at any hour of the day or night. This, I say, they may do at +their discretion; and it seems a pretty ample power in the hands of such +magistrates. However, the matter does by no means totally rest on their +discretion. Besides the discretionary and occasional search, the statute +has prescribed one that is general and periodical. It is to be made +annually, by the warrant of the justices at their midsummer quarter +sessions, by the high and petty constables, or any others whom they may +authorize, and by all corporate magistrates, in all houses of Papists, +and every other where they suspect arms for the use of such persons to +be concealed, with the same powers, in all respects, which attend the +occasional search. The whole of this regulation, concerning both the +general and particular search, seems to have been made by a legislature +which was not at all extravagantly jealous of personal liberty. Not +trusting, however, to the activity of the magistrate acting officially, +the law has invited all voluntary informers by considerable rewards, and +even pressed involuntary informers into this service by the dread of +heavy penalties. With regard to the latter method, two justices of +peace, or the magistrate of any corporation, are empowered to summon +before them any persons whatsoever, to tender them an oath by which they +oblige them to discover all persons who have any arms concealed contrary +to law. Their refusal or declining to appear, or, appearing, their +refusal to inform, subjects them to the severest penalties. If peers or +peeresses are summoned (for they may be summoned by the bailiff of a +corporation of six cottages) to perform this honorable service, and +refuse to inform, the first offence is three hundred pounds penalty; the +second is _præmunire_,--that is to say, imprisonment for life, and +forfeiture of all their goods. Persons of an inferior order are, for the +first offence, fined thirty pounds; for the second, they, too, are +subjected to _præmunire_. So far as to involuntary;--now as to voluntary +informers: the law entitles them to half the penalty incurred by +carrying or keeping arms; for, on conviction of this offence, the +penalty upon persons, of whatever substance, is the sum of fifty pounds +and a year's imprisonment, which cannot be remitted even by the crown. + +The only exception to this law is a license from the Lord Lieutenant and +Council to carry arms, which, by its nature, is extremely limited, and I +do not suppose that there are six persons now in the kingdom who have +been fortunate enough to obtain it. + + * * * * * + +There remains, after this system concerning property and defence, to say +something concerning the exercise of religion, winch is carried on in +all persuasions, but especially in the Romish, by persons appointed for +that purpose. The law of King William and Queen Anne ordered all Popish +parsons exercising ecclesiastical jurisdiction, all orders of monks and +friars, and all priests, not then actually in parishes, and to be +registered, to be banished the kingdom; and if they should return from +exile, to be hanged, drawn, and quartered. Twenty pounds reward is given +for apprehending them. Penalty on harboring and concealing. + +As all the priests then in being and registered are long since dead, and +as these laws are made perpetual, every Popish priest is liable to the +law. + + * * * * * + +The reader has now before him a tolerably complete view of the Popery +laws relative to property by descent or acquisition, to education, to +defence, and to the free exercise of religion, which may be necessary to +enable him to form some judgment of the spirit of the whole system, and +of the subsequent reflections that are to be made upon it. + + + + +CHAPTER III. + +PART I. + + +The system which we have just reviewed, and the manner in which +religious influence on the public is made to operate upon the laws +concerning property in Ireland, is in its nature very singular, and +differs, I apprehend, essentially, and perhaps to its disadvantage, from +any scheme of religious persecution now existing in any other country in +Europe, or which has prevailed in any time or nation with which history +has made us acquainted. I believe it will not be difficult to show that +it is unjust, impolitic, and inefficacious; that it has the most unhappy +influence on the prosperity, the morals, and the safety of that country; +that this influence is not accidental, but has flowed as the necessary +and direct consequence of the laws themselves, first on account of the +object which they affect, and next by the quality of the greatest part +of the instruments they employ. Upon all these points, first upon the +general, and then on the particular, this question will be considered +with as much order as can be followed in a matter of itself as involved +and intricate as it is important. + + * * * * * + +The first and most capital consideration with regard to this, as to +every object, is the extent of it. And here it is necessary to premise, +this system of penalty and incapacity has for its object no small sect +or obscure party, but a very numerous body of men,--a body which +comprehends at least two thirds of that whole nation: it amounts to +2,800,000 souls, a number sufficient for the materials constituent of a +great people. Now it is well worthy of a serious and dispassionate +examination, whether such a system, respecting such an object, be in +reality agreeable to any sound principles of legislation or any +authorized definition of law; for if our reasons or practices differ +from the general informed sense of mankind, it is very moderate to say +that they are at least suspicious. + +This consideration of the magnitude of the object ought to attend us +through the whole inquiry: if it does not always affect the reason, it +is always decisive on the importance of the question. It not only makes +in itself a more leading point, but complicates itself with every other +part of the matter, giving every error, minute in itself, a character +and significance from its application. It is therefore not to be +wondered at, if we perpetually recur to it in the course of this essay. + +In the making of a new law it is undoubtedly the duty of the legislator +to see that no injustice be done even to an individual: for there is +then nothing to be unsettled, and the matter is under his hands to mould +it as he pleases; and if he finds it untractable in the working, he may +abandon it without incurring any new inconvenience. But in the question +concerning the repeal of an old one, the work is of more difficulty; +because laws, like houses, lean on one another, and the operation is +delicate, and should be necessary: the objection, in such a case, ought +not to arise from the natural infirmity of human institutions, but from +substantial faults which contradict the nature and end of law +itself,--faults not arising from the imperfection, but from the +misapplication and abuse of our reason. As no legislators can regard the +_minima_ of equity, a law may in some instances be a just subject of +censure without being at all an object of repeal. But if its +transgressions against common right and, the ends of just government +should be considerable in their nature and spreading in their effects, +as this objection goes to the root and principle of the law, it renders +it void in its obligatory quality on the mind, and therefore determines +it as the proper object of abrogation and repeal, so far as regards its +civil existence. The objection here is, as we observed, by no means on +account of the imperfection of the law; it is on account of its +erroneous principle: for if this be fundamentally wrong, the more +perfect the law is made, the worse it becomes. It cannot be said to have +the properties of genuine law, even in its imperfections and defects. +The true weakness and opprobrium of our best general constitutions is, +that they cannot provide beneficially for every particular case, and +thus fill, adequately to their intentions, the circle of universal +justice. But where the principle is faulty, the erroneous part of the +law is the beneficial, and justice only finds refuge in those holes and +corners which had escaped the sagacity and inquisition of the +legislator. The happiness or misery of multitudes can never be a thing +indifferent. A law against the majority of the people is in substance a +law against the people itself; its extent determines its invalidity; it +even changes its character as it enlarges its operation: it is not +particular injustice, but general oppression; and can no longer be +considered as a private hardship, which might be borne, but spreads and +grows up into the unfortunate importance of a national calamity. + +Now as a law directed against the mass of the nation has not the nature +of a reasonable institution, so neither has it the authority: for in all +forms of government the people is the true legislator; and whether the +immediate and instrumental cause of the law be a single person or many, +the remote and efficient cause is the consent of the people, either +actual or implied; and such consent is absolutely essential to its +validity. To the solid establishment of every law two things are +essentially requisite: first, a proper and sufficient human power to +declare and modify the matter of the law; and next, such a fit and +equitable constitution as they have a right to declare and render +binding. With regard to the first requisite, the human authority, it is +their judgment they give up, not their right. The people, indeed, are +presumed to consent to whatever the legislature ordains for their +benefit; and they are to acquiesce in it, though they do not clearly see +into the propriety of the means by which they are conducted to that +desirable end. This they owe as an act of homage and just deference to a +reason which the necessity of government has made superior to their own. +But though the means, and indeed the nature, of a public advantage may +not always be evident to the understanding of the subject, no one is so +gross and stupid as not to distinguish between a benefit and an injury. +No one can imagine, then, an exclusion of a great body of men, not from +favors, privileges, and trusts, but from the common advantages of +society, can ever be a thing intended for their good, or can ever be +ratified by any implied consent of theirs. If, therefore, at least an +implied human consent is necessary to the existence of a law, such a +constitution cannot in propriety be a law at all. + +But if we could suppose that such a ratification was made, not +virtually, but actually, by the people, not representatively, but even +collectively, still it would be null and void. They have no right to +make a law prejudicial to the whole community, even though the +delinquents in making such an act should be themselves the chief +sufferers by it; because it would be-made against the principle of a +superior law, which it is not in the power of any community, or of the +whole race of man, to alter,--I mean the will of Him who gave us our +nature, and in giving impressed an invariable law upon it. It would be +hard to point out any error more truly subversive of all the order and +beauty, of all the peace and happiness of human society, than the +position, that any body of men have a right to make what laws they +please,--or that laws can derive any authority from their institution +merely, and independent of the quality of the subject-matter. No +arguments of policy, reason of state, or preservation of the +constitution can be pleaded in favor of such a practice. They may, +indeed, impeach the frame of that constitution, but can never touch this +immovable principle. This seems to be, indeed, the doctrine which Hobbes +broached in the last century, and which was then so frequently and so +ably refuted. Cicero exclaims with the utmost indignation and contempt +against such a notion:[22] he considers it not only as unworthy of a +philosopher, but of an illiterate peasant; that of all things this was +the most truly absurd, to fancy that the rule of justice was to be taken +from the constitutions of commonwealths, or that laws derived their +authority from the statutes of the people, the edicts of princes, or +the decrees of judges. If it be admitted that it is not the black-letter +and the king's arms that makes the law, we are to look for it elsewhere. + +In reality there are two, and only two, foundations of law; and they are +both of them conditions without which nothing can give it any force: I +mean equity and utility. With respect to the former, it grows out of the +great rule of equality, which is grounded upon our common nature, and +which Philo, with propriety and beauty, calls the mother of justice. All +human laws are, properly speaking, only declaratory; they may alter the +mode and application, but have no power over the substance of original +justice. The other foundation of law, which is utility, must be +understood, not of partial or limited, but of general and public +utility, connected in the same manner with, and derived directly from, +our rational nature: for any other utility may be the utility of a +robber, but cannot be that of a citizen,--the interest of the domestic +enemy, and not that of a member of the commonwealth. This present +equality can never be the foundation of statutes which create an +artificial difference between men, as the laws before us do, in order to +induce a consequential inequality in the distribution of justice. Law is +a mode of human action respecting society, and must be governed by the +same rules of equity which govern every private action; and so Tully +considers it in his Offices as the only utility agreeable to that +nature: "_Unum debet esse omnibus propositum, ut eadem sit utilitas +uniuscujusque et universorum; quam si ad se quisque rapiat, dissolvetur +omnis humana consortio_." + +If any proposition can be clear in itself, it is this: that a law which +shuts out from all secure and valuable property the bulk of the people +cannot be made for the utility of the party so excluded. This, +therefore, is not the utility which Tully mentions. But if it were true +(as it is not) that the real interest of any part of the community could +be separated from the happiness of the rest, still it would afford no +just foundation for a statute providing exclusively for that interest at +the expense of the other; because it would be repugnant to the essence +of law, which requires that it be made as much as possible for the +benefit of the whole. If this principle be denied or evaded, what ground +have we left to reason on? We must at once make a total change in all +our ideas, and look for a new definition of law. Where to find it I +confess myself at a loss. If we resort to the fountains of +jurisprudence, they will not supply us with any that is for our purpose. +"_Jus_" (says Paulus) "_pluribus modis dicitur: uno modo, cum id, quod +semper æquum et bonum est, jus dicitur, ut est jus naturale"_;--this +sense of the word will not be thought, I imagine, very applicable to our +penal laws;--"_altero modo, quod omnibus aut pluribus in unaquaque +civitate utile est, ut est jus civile_." Perhaps this latter will be as +insufficient, and would rather seem a censure and condemnation of the +Popery Acts than a definition that includes them; and there is no other +to be found in the whole Digest; neither are there any modern writers +whose ideas of law are at all narrower. + +It would be far more easy to heap up authorities on this article than to +excuse the prolixity and tediousness of producing any at all in proof of +a point which, though too often practically denied, is in its theory +almost self-evident. For Suarez, handling this very question, _Utrum de +ratione et substantia legis esse ut propter commune bonum feratur_, does +not hesitate a moment, finding no ground in reason or authority to +render the affirmative in the least degree disputable: "_In quæstione +ergo proposita"_ (says he) "_nulla est inter authores controversia; sed +omnium commune est axioma de substantia et ratione legis esse, ut pro +communi bono feratur; ita ut propter illud præcipue tradatur_"; having +observed in another place, "_Contra omnem rectitudinem est bonum commune +ad privatum ordinare, seu totum ad partem propter ipsum referre_." +Partiality and law are contradictory terms. Neither the merits nor the +ill deserts, neither the wealth and importance nor the indigence and +obscurity, of the one part or of the other, can make any alteration in +this fundamental truth. On any other scheme, I defy any man living to +settle a correct standard which may discriminate between equitable rule +and the most direct tyranny. For if we can once prevail upon ourselves +to depart from the strictness and integrity of this principle in favor +even of a considerable party, the argument will hold for one that is +less so; and thus we shall go on, narrowing the bottom of public right, +until step by step we arrive, though after no very long or very forced +deduction, at what one of our poets calls the _enormous faith_,--the +faith of the many, created for the advantage of a single person. I +cannot see a glimmering of distinction to evade it; nor is it possible +to allege any reason for the proscription of so large a part of the +kingdom, which would not hold equally to support, under parallel +circumstances, the proscription of the whole. + +I am sensible that these principles, in their abstract light, will not +be very strenuously opposed. Reason is never inconvenient, but when it +comes to be applied. Mere general truths interfere very little with the +passions. They can, until they are roused by a troublesome application, +rest in great tranquillity, side by side with tempers and proceedings +the most directly opposite to them. Men want to be reminded, who do not +want to be taught; because those original ideas of rectitude, to which +the mind is compelled to assent when they are proposed, are not always +as present to it as they ought to be. When people are gone, if not into +a denial, at least into a sort of oblivion of those ideas, when they +know them only as barren speculations, and not as practical motives for +conduct, it will be proper to press, as well as to offer them to the +understanding; and when one is attacked by prejudices which aim to +intrude themselves into the place of law, what is left for us but to +vouch and call to warranty those principles of original justice from +whence alone our title to everything valuable in society is derived? Can +it be thought to arise from a superfluous, vain parade of displaying +general and uncontroverted maxims, that we should revert at this time to +the first principles of law, when we have directly under our +consideration a whole body of statutes, which, I say, are so many +contradictions, which their advocates allow to be so many exceptions +from those very principles? Take them in the most favorable light, every +exception from the original and fixed rule of equality and justice ought +surely to be very well authorized in the reason of their deviation, and +very rare in their use. For, if they should grow to be frequent, in what +would they differ from an abrogation of the rule itself? By becoming +thus frequent, they might even go further, and, establishing themselves +into a principle, convert the rule into the exception. It cannot be +dissembled that this is not at all remote from the case before us, where +the great body of the people are excluded from all valuable +property,--where the greatest and most ordinary benefits of society are +conferred as privileges, and not enjoyed on the footing of common +rights. + +The clandestine manner in which those in power carry on such designs is +a sufficient argument of the sense they inwardly entertain of the true +nature of their proceedings. Seldom is the title or preamble of the law +of the same import with the body and enacting part; but they generally +place some other color uppermost, which differs from that which is +afterwards to appear, or at least one that is several shades fainter. +Thus, the penal laws in question are not called laws to oblige men +baptized and educated in Popery to renounce their religion or their +property, but are called laws to prevent the growth of Popery; as if +their purpose was only to prevent conversions to that sect, and not to +persecute a million of people already engaged in it. But of all the +instances of this sort of legislative artifice, and of the principles +that produced it, I never met with any which made a stronger impression +on me than that of Louis the Fourteenth, in the revocation of the Edict +of Nantes. That monarch had, when he made that revocation, as few +measures to keep with public opinion as any man. In the exercise of the +most unresisted authority at home, in a career of uninterrupted victory +abroad, and in a course of flattery equal to the circumstances of his +greatness in both these particulars, he might be supposed to have as +little need as disposition to render any sort of account to the world of +his procedure towards his subjects. But the persecution of so vast a +body of men as the Huguenots was too strong a measure even for the law +of pride and power. It was too glaring a contradiction even to those +principles upon which persecution itself is supported. Shocked at the +naked attempt, he had recourse, for a palliation of his conduct, to an +unkingly denial of the fact which made against him. In the preamble, +therefore, to his Act of Revocation, he sets forth that the Edict of +Nantes was no longer necessary, as the object of it (the Protestants of +his kingdom) were then reduced to a very small number. The refugees in +Holland cried out against this misrepresentation. They asserted, I +believe with truth, that this revocation had driven two hundred thousand +of them out of their country, and that they could readily demonstrate +there still remained six hundred thousand Protestants in France. If this +were the fact, (as it was undoubtedly,) no argument of policy could have +been strong enough to excuse a measure by which eight hundred thousand +men were despoiled, at one stroke, of so many of their rights and +privileges. Louis the Fourteenth confessed, by this sort of apology, +that, if the number had been large, the revocation had been unjust. But, +after all, is it not most evident that this act of injustice, which let +loose on that monarch such a torrent of invective and reproach, and +which threw so dark a cloud over all the splendor of a most illustrious +reign, falls far short of the case in Ireland? The privileges which the +Protestants of that kingdom enjoyed antecedent to this revocation were +far greater than the Roman Catholics of Ireland ever aspired to under a +contrary establishment. The number of their sufferers, if considered +absolutely, is not half of ours; if considered relatively to the body of +each community, it is not perhaps a twentieth part. And then the +penalties and incapacities which grew from that revocation are not so +grievous in their nature, nor so certain in their execution, nor so +ruinous by a great deal to the civil prosperity of the state, as those +which we have established for a perpetual law in our unhappy country. It +cannot be thought to arise from affectation, that I call it so. What +other name can be given to a country which contains so many hundred +thousands of human creatures reduced to a state of the most abject +servitude? + +In putting this parallel, I take it for granted that we can stand for +this short time very clear of our party distinctions. If it were enough, +by the use of an odious and unpopular word, to determine the question, +it would be no longer a subject of rational disquisition; since that +very prejudice which gives these odious names, and which is the party +charged for doing so, and for the consequences of it, would then become +the judge also. But I flatter myself that not a few will be found who do +not think that the names of Protestant and Papist can make any change in +the nature of essential justice. Such men will not allow that to be +proper treatment to the one of these denominations which would be +cruelty to the other, and which converts its very crime into the +instrument of its defence: they will hardly persuade themselves that +what was bad policy in France can be good in Ireland, or that what was +intolerable injustice in an arbitrary monarch becomes, only by being +more extended and more violent, an equitable procedure in a country +professing to be governed by law. It is, however, impossible not to +observe with some concern, that there are many also of a different +disposition,--a number of persons whose minds are so formed that they +find the communion of religion to be a close and an endearing tie, and +their country to be no bond at all,--to whom common altars are a better +relation than common habitations and a common civil interest,--whose +hearts are touched with the distresses of foreigners, and are abundantly +awake to all the tenderness of human feeling on such an occasion, even +at the moment that they are inflicting the very same distresses, or +worse, on their fellow-citizens, without the least sting of compassion +or remorse. To commiserate the distresses of all men suffering +innocently, perhaps meritoriously, is generous, and very agreeable to +the better part of our nature,--a disposition that ought by all means to +be cherished. But to transfer humanity from its natural basis, our +legitimate and home-bred connections,--to lose all feeling for those who +have grown up by our sides, in our eyes, the benefit of whose cares and +labors we have partaken from our birth, and meretriciously to hunt +abroad after foreign affections, is such a disarrangement of the whole +system of our duties, that I do not know whether benevolence so +displaced is not almost the same thing as destroyed, or what effect +bigotry could have produced that is more fatal to society. This no one +could help observing, who has seen our doors kindly and bountifully +thrown open to foreign sufferers for conscience, whilst through the same +ports were issuing fugitives of our own, driven from their country for a +cause which to an indifferent person would seem to be exactly similar, +whilst we stood by, without any sense of the impropriety of this +extraordinary scene, accusing and practising injustice. For my part, +there is no circumstance, in all the contradictions of our most +mysterious nature, that appears to be more humiliating than the use we +are disposed to make of those sad examples which seem purposely marked +for our correction and improvement. Every instance of fury and bigotry +in other men, one should think, would naturally fill us with an horror +of that disposition. The effect, however, is directly contrary. We are +inspired, it is true, with a very sufficient hatred for the party, but +with no detestation at all of the proceeding. Nay, we are apt to urge +our dislike of such measures as a reason for imitating them,--and, by an +almost incredible absurdity, because some powers have destroyed their +country by their persecuting spirit, to argue, that we ought to +retaliate on them by destroying our own. Such are the effects, and such, +I fear, has been the intention, of those numberless books which are +daily printed and industriously spread, of the persecutions in other +countries and other religious persuasions.--These observations, which +are a digression, but hardly, I think, can be considered as a departure +from the subject, have detained us some time: we will now come more +directly to our purpose. + +It has been shown, I hope with sufficient evidence, that a constitution +against the interest of the many is rather of the nature of a grievance +than of a law; that of all grievances it is the most weighty and +important; that it is made without due authority, against all the +acknowledged principles of jurisprudence, against the opinions of all +the great lights in that science; and that such is the tacit sense even +of those who act in the most contrary manner. These points are, indeed, +so evident, that I apprehend the abettors of the penal system will +ground their defence on an admission, and not on a denial of them. They +will lay it down as a principle, that the Protestant religion is a thing +beneficial for the whole community, as well in its civil interests as in +those of a superior order. From thence they will argue, that, the end +being essentially beneficial, the means become instrumentally so; that +these penalties and incapacities are not final causes of the law, but +only a discipline to bring over a deluded people to their real interest, +and therefore, though they may be harsh in their operation, they will be +pleasant in their effects; and be they what they will, they cannot be +considered as a very extraordinary hardship, as it is in the power of +the sufferer to free himself when he pleases, and that only by +converting to a better religion, which it is his duty to embrace, even +though it were attended with all those penalties from whence in reality +it delivers him: if he suffers, it is his own fault; _volenti non fit +injuria_. + +I shall be very short, without being, I think, the less satisfactory, in +my answer to these topics, because they never can be urged from a +conviction of their validity, and are, indeed, only the usual and +impotent struggles of those who are unwilling to abandon a practice +which they are unable to defend. First, then, I observe, that, if the +principle of their final and beneficial intention be admitted as a just +ground for such proceedings, there never was, in the blamable sense of +the word, nor ever can be, such a thing as a religious persecution in +the world. Such an intention is pretended by all men,--who all not only +insist that their religion has the sanction of Heaven, but is likewise, +and for that reason, the best and most convenient to human society. All +religious persecution, Mr. Bayle well observes, is grounded upon a +miserable _petitio principii_. You are wrong, I am right; you must come +over to me, or you must suffer. Let me add, that the great inlet by +which a color for oppression has entered into the world is by one man's +pretending to determine concerning the happiness of another, and by +claiming a right to use what means he thinks proper in order to bring +him to a sense of it. It is the ordinary and trite sophism of +oppression. But there is not yet such a convenient ductility in the +human understanding as to make us capable of being persuaded that men +can possibly mean the ultimate good of the whole society by rendering +miserable for a century together the greater part of it,--or that any +one has such a reversionary benevolence as seriously to intend the +remote good of a late posterity, who can give up the present enjoyment +which every honest man must have in the happiness of his contemporaries. +Everybody is satisfied that a conservation and secure enjoyment of our +natural rights is the great and ultimate purpose of civil society, and +that therefore all forms whatsoever of government are only good as they +are subservient to that purpose to which they are entirely subordinate. +Now to aim at the establishment of any form of government by sacrificing +what is the substance of it, to take away or at least to suspend the +rights of Nature in order to an approved system for the protection of +them, and for the sake of that about which men must dispute forever to +postpone those things about which they have no controversy at all, and +this not in minute and subordinate, but large and principal objects, is +a procedure as preposterous and absurd in argument as it is oppressive +and cruel in its effect. For the Protestant religion, nor (I speak it +with reverence, I am sure) the truth of our common Christianity, is not +so clear as this proposition,--that all men, at least the majority of +men in the society, ought to enjoy the common advantages of it. You +fall, therefore, into a double error: first, you incur a certain +mischief for an advantage which is comparatively problematical, even +though you were sure of obtaining it; secondly, whatever the proposed +advantage may be, were it of a certain nature, the attainment of it is +by no means certain; and such deep gaming for stakes so valuable ought +not to be admitted: the risk is of too much consequence to society. If +no other country furnished examples of this risk, yet our laws and our +country are enough fully to demonstrate the fact: Ireland, after almost +a century of persecution, is at this hour full of penalties and full of +Papists. This is a point which would lead us a great way; but it is only +just touched here, having much to say upon it in its proper place. So +that you have incurred a certain and an immediate inconvenience for a +remote and for a doubly uncertain benefit.--Thus far as to the argument +which would sanctify the injustice of these laws by the benefits which +are proposed to arise from them, and as to that liberty which, by a new +political chemistry, was to be extracted out of a system of oppression. + +Now as to the other point, that the objects of these laws suffer +voluntarily: this seems to me to be an insult rather than an argument. +For, besides that it totally annihilates every characteristic and +therefore every faulty idea of persecution, just as the former does, it +supposes, what is false in fact, that it is in a man's moral power to +change his religion whenever his convenience requires it. If he be +beforehand satisfied that your opinion is better than his, he will +voluntarily come over to you, and without compulsion, and then your law +would be unnecessary; but if he is not so convinced, he must know that +it is his duty in this point to sacrifice his interest here to his +opinion of his eternal happiness, else he could have in reality no +religion at all. In the former case, therefore, as your law would be +unnecessary, in the latter it would be persecuting: that is, it would +put your penalty and his ideas of duty in the opposite scales; which is, +or I know not what is, the precise idea of persecution. If, then, you +require a renunciation of his conscience, as a preliminary to his +admission to the rights of society, you annex, morally speaking, an +impossible condition to it. In this case, in the language of reason and +jurisprudence, the condition would be void, and the gift absolute; as +the practice runs, it is to establish the condition, and to withhold the +benefit. The suffering is, then, not voluntary. And I never heard any +other argument, drawn from the nature of laws and the good of human +society, urged in favor of those proscriptive statutes, except those +which have just been mentioned. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[22] Cicero _de Legibus_, Lib. L 14,15 et 16.--"O rem dignam, in qua non +modo docti, verum etiam agrestes erubescant! Jam vero illud stultissimum +existimare omnia justa esse, quæ scita sint in populorum institutis aut +legibus," etc. "Quod si populorum jussis, si principum decretis, si +sententiis judicum jura constituerentur, jus esset latrocinari, jus +adulterare, jus testamenta falsa supponere, si hæc suffragiis aut scitis +multitudinis probarentur." + + + + +CHAPTER III. + +PART II. + + +The second head upon which I propose to consider those statutes with +regard to their object, and which is the next in importance to the +magnitude, and of almost equal concern in the inquiry into the justice +of these laws, is its possession. It is proper to recollect that this +religion, which is so persecuted in its members, is the old religion of +the country, and the once established religion of the state,--the very +same which had for centuries received the countenance and sanction of +the laws, and from which it would at one time have been highly penal to +have dissented. In proportion as mankind has become enlightened, the +idea of religious persecution, under any circumstances, has been almost +universally exploded by all good and thinking men. The only faint shadow +of difficulty which remains is concerning the introduction of new +opinions. Experience has shown, that, if it has been favorable to the +cause of truth, it has not been always conducive to the peace of +society. Though a new religious sect should even be totally free in +itself from any tumultuous and disorderly zeal, which, however, is +rarely the case, it has a tendency to create a resistance from the +establishment in possession, productive of great disorders, and thus +becomes, innocently indeed, but yet very certainly, the cause of the +bitterest dissensions in the commonwealth. To a mind not thoroughly +saturated with the tolerating maxims of the Gospel, a preventive +persecution, on such principles, might come recommended by strong, and, +apparently, no immoral motives of policy, whilst yet the contagion was +recent, and had laid hold but on a few persons. The truth is, these +politics are rotten and hollow at bottom, as all that are founded upon +any however minute a degree of positive injustice must ever be. But they +are specious, and sufficiently so to delude a man of sense and of +integrity. But it is quite otherwise with the attempt to eradicate by +violence a wide-spreading and established religious opinion. If the +people are in an error, to inform them is not only fair, but charitable; +to drive them is a strain of the most manifest injustice. If not the +right, the presumption, at least, is ever on the side of possession. Are +they mistaken? if it does not fully justify them, it is a great +alleviation of guilt, which may be mingled with their misfortune, that +the error is none of their forging,--that they received it on as good a +footing as they can receive your laws and your legislative authority, +because it was handed down to them from their ancestors. The opinion may +be erroneous, but the principle is undoubtedly right; and you punish +them for acting upon a principle which of all others is perhaps the most +necessary for preserving society, an implicit admiration and adherence +to the establishments of their forefathers. + +If, indeed, the legislative authority was on all hands admitted to be +the ground of religious persuasion, I should readily allow that dissent +would be rebellion. In this case it would make no difference whether the +opinion was sucked in with the milk or imbibed yesterday; because the +same legislative authority which had settled could destroy it with all +the power of a creator over his creature. But this doctrine is +universally disowned, and for a very plain reason. Religion, to have +any force on men's understandings, indeed to exist at all, must be +supposed paramount to laws, and independent for its substance upon any +human institution,--else it would be the absurdest thing in the world, +an acknowledged cheat. Religion, therefore, is not believed because the +laws have established it, but it is established because the leading part +of the community have previously believed it to be true. As no water can +rise higher than its spring, no establishment can have more authority +than it derives from its principle; and the power of the government can +with no appearance of reason go further coercively than to bind and hold +down those who have once consented to their opinions. The consent is the +origin of the whole. If they attempt to proceed further, they disown the +foundation upon which their own establishment was built, and they claim +a religious assent upon mere human authority, which has been just now +shown to be absurd and preposterous, and which they in fact confess to +be so. + +However, we are warranted to go thus far. The people often actually do +(and perhaps they cannot in general do better) take their religion, not +on the coercive, which is impossible, but on the influencing authority +of their governors, as wise and informed men. But if they once take a +religion on the word of the state, they cannot in common sense do so a +second time, unless they have some concurrent reason for it. The +prejudice in favor of your wisdom is shook by your change. You confess +that you have been wrong, and yet you would pretend to dictate by your +sole authority; whereas you disengage the mind by embarrassing it. For +why should I prefer your opinion of to-day to your persuasion of +yesterday? If we must resort to prepossessions for the ground of +opinion, it is in the nature of man rather to defer to the wisdom of +times past, whose weakness is not before his eyes, than to the present, +of whose imbecility he has daily experience. Veneration of antiquity is +congenial to the human, mind. When, therefore, an establishment would +persecute an opinion in possession, it sets against it all the powerful +prejudices of human nature. It even sets its own authority, when it is +of most weight, against itself in that very circumstance in which it +must necessarily have the least; and it opposes the stable prejudice of +time against a new opinion founded on mutability: a consideration that +must render compulsion in such a case the more grievous, as there is no +security, that, when the mind is settled in the new opinion, it may not +be obliged to give place to one that is still newer, or even, to a +return of the old. But when an ancient establishment begins early to +persecute an innovation, it stands upon quite other grounds, and it has +all the prejudices and presumptions on its side. It puts its own +authority, not only of compulsion, but prepossession, the veneration of +past age, as well as the activity of the present time, against the +opinion only of a private man or set of men. If there be no reason, +there is at least some consistency in its proceedings. Commanding to +constancy, it does nothing but that of which it sets an example itself. +But an opinion at once new and persecuting is a monster; because, in the +very instant in which it takes a liberty of change, it does not leave to +you even a liberty of perseverance. + +Is, then, no improvement to be brought into society? Undoubtedly; but +not by compulsion,--but by encouragement,--but by countenance, favor, +privileges, which are powerful, and are lawful instruments. The coercive +authority of the state is limited to what is necessary for its +existence. To this belongs the whole order of criminal law. It considers +as crimes (that is, the object of punishment) trespasses against those +rules for which society was instituted. The law punishes delinquents, +not because they are not good men, but because they are intolerably +wicked. It does bear, and must, with the vices and the follies of men, +until they actually strike at the root of order. This it does in things +actually moral. In all matters of speculative improvement the case is +stronger, even where the matter is properly of human cognizance. But to +consider an averseness to improvement, the not arriving at perfection, +as a crime, is against all tolerably correct jurisprudence; for, if the +resistance to improvement should be great and any way general, they +would in effect give up the necessary and substantial part in favor of +the perfection and the finishing. + +But, say the abettors of our penal laws, this old possessed superstition +is such in its principles, that society, on its general principles, +cannot subsist along with it. Could a man think such an objection +possible, if he had not actually heard it made,--an objection +contradicted, not by hypothetical reasonings, but the clear evidence of +the most decisive facts? Society not only exists, but flourishes at this +hour, with this superstition, in many countries, under every form of +government,--in some established, in some tolerated, in others upon an +equal footing. And was there no civil society at all in these kingdoms +before the Reformation? To say it was not as well constituted as it +ought to be is saying nothing at all to the purpose; for that assertion +evidently regards improvement, not existence. It certainly did then +exist; and it as certainly then was at least as much to the advantage of +a very great part of society as what we have brought in the place of it: +which is, indeed, a great blessing to those who have profited of the +change; but to all the rest, as we have wrought, that is, by blending +general persecution with partial reformation, it is the very reverse. We +found the people heretics and idolaters; we have, by way of improving +their condition, rendered them slaves and beggars: they remain in all +the misfortune of their old errors, and all the superadded misery of +their recent punishment. They were happy enough, in their opinion at +least, before the change; what benefits society then had, they partook +of them all. They are now excluded from those benefits; and, so far as +civil society comprehends them, and as we have managed the matter, our +persecutions are so far from being necessary to its existence, that our +very reformation is made in a degree noxious. If this be improvement, +truly I know not what can be called a depravation of society. + +But as those who argue in this manner are perpetually shifting the +question, having begun with objecting, in order to give a fair and +public color to their scheme, to a toleration of those opinions as +subversive of society in general, they will surely end by abandoning the +broad part of the argument, and attempting to show that a toleration of +them is inconsistent with the established government among us. Now, +though this position be in reality as untenable as the other, it is not +altogether such an absurdity on the face of it. All I shall here observe +is, that those who lay it down little consider what a wound they are +giving to that establishment for which they pretend so much zeal. +However, as this is a consideration, not of general justice, but of +particular and national policy, and as I have reserved a place +expressly, where it will undergo a thorough discussion, I shall not here +embarrass myself with it,--being resolved to preserve all the order in +my power, in the examination of this important, melancholy subject. + +However, before we pass from this point concerning possession, it will +be a relaxation of the mind, not wholly foreign to our purpose, to take +a short review of the extraordinary policy which has been held with +regard to religion in that kingdom, from the time our ancestors took +possession of it. The most able antiquaries are of opinion, and +Archbishop Usher, whom I reckon amongst the first of them, has, I think, +shown, that a religion not very remote from the present Protestant +persuasion was that of the Irish before the union of that kingdom to the +crown of England. If this was not directly the fact, this at least seems +very probable, that Papal authority was much lower in Ireland than in +other countries. This union was made under the authority of an arbitrary +grant of Pope Adrian, in order that the Church of Ireland should be +reduced to the same servitude with those that were nearer to his see. It +is not very wonderful that an ambitious monarch should make use of any +pretence in his way to so considerable an object. What is extraordinary +is, that for a very long time, even quite down to the Reformation, and +in their most solemn acts, the kings of England founded their title +wholly on this grant: they called for obedience from the people of +Ireland, not on principles of subjection, but as vassals and mesne lords +between them and the Popes; and they omitted no measure of force or +policy to establish that Papal authority, with all the distinguishing +articles of religion connected with it, and to make it take deep root in +the minds of the people. Not to crowd instances unnecessary, I shall +select two, one of which is in print, the other on record,--the one a +treaty, the other an act of Parliament. The first is the submission of +the Irish chiefs to Richard the Second, mentioned by Sir John Davies. In +this pact they bind themselves for the future to preserve peace and +allegiance to the kings of England, under certain pecuniary penalties. +But what is remarkable, these fines were all covenanted to be paid into +the Apostolical Chamber, supposing the Pope as the superior power, whose +peace was broken and whose majesty was violated in disobeying his +governor. By this time, so far as regarded England, the kings had +extremely abridged the Papal power in many material particulars: they +had passed the Statute of Provisors, the Statute of _Præmunire_,--and, +indeed, struck out of the Papal authority all things, at least, that +seemed to infringe on their temporal independence. In Ireland, however, +their proceeding was directly the reverse: there they thought it +expedient to exalt it at least as high as ever: for, so late as the +reign of Edward the Fourth, the following short, but very explicit, act +of Parliament was passed:-- + + IV. ED. Cap. 3. + + "An act, whereby letters patent of pardon from the king to + those that sue to Rome for certain benefices is void. Rot. + Parl. + + "Item, At the request of the commons, it is ordeyned and + established, by authority of the said Parliament, that all + maner letters patents of the king, of pardons or pardon + granted by the king, or hereafter to be granted, to any + provisor that claim any title by the bulls of the Pope to any + maner benefices, where, at the time of the impetrating of the + said bulls of provision, the benefice is full of an + incumbent, that then the said letters patents of pardon or + pardons be void in law and of none effect." + +When, by every expedient of force and policy, by a war of some +centuries, by extirpating a number of the old, and by bringing in a +number of new people full of those opinions and intending to propagate +them, they had fully compassed their object, they suddenly took another +turn,--commenced an opposite persecution, made heavy laws, carried on +mighty wars, inflicted and suffered the worst evils, extirpated the mass +of the old, brought in new inhabitants; and they continue at this day an +oppressive system, and may for four hundred years to come, to eradicate +opinions which by the same violent means they had been four hundred +years endeavoring by every means to establish. They compelled the people +to submit, by the forfeiture of all their civil rights, to the Pope's +authority, in its most extravagant and unbounded sense, as a giver of +kingdoms; and now they refuse even to tolerate them in the most moderate +and chastised sentiments concerning it. No country, I believe, since +the world began, has suffered so much on account of religion, or has +been so variously harassed both for Popery and for Protestantism. + +It will now be seen, that, even if these laws could be supposed +agreeable to those of Nature in these particulars, on another and almost +as strong a principle they are yet unjust, as being contrary to positive +compact, and the public faith most solemnly plighted. On the surrender +of Limerick, and some other Irish garrisons, in the war of the +Revolution, the Lords Justices of Ireland and the commander-in-chief of +the king's forces signed a capitulation with the Irish, which was +afterwards ratified by the king himself by _inspeximus_ under the great +seal of England. It contains some public articles relative to the whole +body of the Roman Catholics in that kingdom, and some with regard to the +security of the greater part of the inhabitants of five counties. What +the latter were, or in what manner they were observed, is at this day of +much less public concern. The former are two,--the first and the ninth. +The first is of this tenor:--"The Roman Catholics of this kingdom +[Ireland] shall enjoy such privileges in the exercise of their religion +as are consistent with the laws of Ireland, or as they did enjoy in the +reign of King Charles the Second. And their Majesties, as soon as +affairs will permit them to summon a Parliament in this kingdom, will +endeavor to procure the said Roman Catholics such farther security in +that particular as may preserve them from any disturbance upon the +account of their said religion." The ninth article is to this +effect:--"The oath to be administered to such Roman Catholics as submit +to their Majesties' government shall be the oath abovesaid, and no +other,"--viz., the oath of allegiance, made by act of Parliament in +England, in the first year of their then Majesties; as required by the +second of the Articles of Limerick. Compare this latter article with the +penal laws, as they are stated in the Second Chapter, and judge whether +they seem to be the public acts of the same power, and observe whether +other oaths are tendered to them, and under what penalties. Compare the +former with the same laws, from the beginning to the end, and judge +whether the Roman Catholics have been preserved, agreeably to the sense +of the article, from any disturbance upon account of their religion,--or +rather, whether on that account there is a single right of Nature or +benefit of society which has not been either totally taken away or +considerably impaired. + +But it is said, that the legislature was not bound by this article, as +it has never been ratified in Parliament. I do admit that it never had +that sanction, and that the Parliament was under no obligation to ratify +these articles by any express act of theirs But still I am at a loss how +they came to be the less valid, on the principles of our Constitution, +by being without that sanction. They certainly bound the king and his +successors. The words of the article do this, or they do nothing; and so +far as the crown had a share in passing those acts, the public faith was +unquestionably broken. In Ireland such a breach on the part of the crown +was much more unpardonable in administration than it would have been +here. They have in Ireland a way of preventing any bill even from +approaching the royal presence, in matters of far less importance than +the honor and faith of the crown and the well-being of a great body of +the people. For, besides that they might have opposed the very first +suggestion of it in the House of Commons, it could not be framed into a +bill without the approbation of the Council in Ireland. It could not be +returned to them again without the approbation of the King and Council +here. They might have met it again in its second passage through that +House of Parliament in which it was originally suggested, as well as in +the other. If it had escaped them through all these mazes, it was again +to come before the Lord Lieutenant, who might have sunk it by a refusal +of the royal assent. The Constitution of Ireland has interposed all +those checks to the passing of any constitutional act, however +insignificant in its own nature. But did the administration in that +reign avail themselves of any one of those opportunities? They never +gave the act of the eleventh of Queen Anne the least degree of +opposition in any one stage of its progress. What is rather the fact, +many of the queen's servants encouraged it, recommended it, were in +reality the true authors of its passing in Parliament, instead of +recommending and using their utmost endeavor to establish a law directly +opposite in its tendency, as they were bound to do by the express letter +of the very first article of the Treaty of Limerick. To say nothing +further of the ministry, who in this instance most shamefully betrayed +the faith of government, may it not be a matter of some degree of doubt, +whether the Parliament, who do not claim a right of dissolving the force +of moral obligation, did not make themselves a party in this breach of +contract, by presenting a bill to the crown in direct violation of those +articles so solemnly and so recently executed, which by the +Constitution they had full authority to execute? + +It may be further objected, that, when the Irish requested the +ratification of Parliament to those articles, they did, in effect, +themselves entertain a doubt concerning their validity without such a +ratification. To this I answer, that the collateral security was meant +to bind the crown, and to hold it firm to its engagements. They did not, +therefore, call it a _perfecting_ of the security, but an _additional_ +security, which it could not have been, if the first had been void; for +the Parliament could not bind itself more than the crown had bound +itself. And if all had made but _one_ security, neither of them could be +called _additional_ with propriety or common sense. But let us suppose +that they did apprehend there might have been something wanting in this +security without the sanction of Parliament. They were, however, +evidently mistaken; and this surplusage of theirs did not weaken the +validity of the single contract, upon the known principle of law, _Non +solent, quæ abundant, vitiare scripturas_. For nothing is more evident +than that the crown was bound, and that no act can be made without the +royal assent. But the Constitution will warrant us in going a great deal +further, and in affirming, that a treaty executed by the crown, and +contradictory of no preceding law, is full as binding on the whole body +of the nation as if it had twenty times received the sanction of +Parliament; because the very same Constitution which has given to the +Houses of Parliament their definite authority has also left in the crown +the trust of making peace, as a consequence, and much the best +consequence, of the prerogative of making war. If the peace was ill +made, my Lord Galmoy, Coningsby, and Porter, who signed it, were +responsible; because they were subject to the community. But its own +contracts are not subject to it: it is subject to them; and the compact +of the king acting constitutionally was the compact of the nation. + +Observe what monstrous consequences would result from a contrary +position. A foreign enemy has entered, or a strong domestic one has +arisen in the nation. In such events the circumstances may be, and often +have been, such that a Parliament cannot sit. This was precisely the +case in that rebellion in Ireland. It will be admitted also, that their +power may be so great as to make it very prudent to treat with them, in +order to save effusion of blood, perhaps to save the nation. Now could +such a treaty be at all made, if your enemies, or rebels, were fully +persuaded, that, in these times of confusion, there was no authority in +the state which could hold out to them an inviolable pledge for their +future security, but that there lurked in the Constitution a dormant, +but irresistible power, who would not think itself bound by the ordinary +subsisting and contracting authority, but might rescind its acts and +obligations at pleasure? This would be a doctrine made to perpetuate and +exasperate war; and on that principle it directly impugns the law of +nations, which is built upon this principle, that war should be softened +as much as possible, and that it should cease as soon as possible, +between contending parties and communities. The king has a power to +pardon individuals. If the king holds out his faith to a robber, to come +in on a promise of pardon, of life and estate, and, in all respects, of +a full indemnity, shall the Parliament say that he must nevertheless be +executed, that his estate must be forfeited, or that he shall be +abridged of any of the privileges which he before held as a subject? +Nobody will affirm it. In such a case, the breach of faith would not +only be on the part of the king who assented to such an act, but on the +part of the Parliament who made it. As the king represents the whole +contracting capacity of the nation, so far as his prerogative +(unlimited, as I said before, by any precedent law) can extend, he acts +as the national procurator on all such occasions. What is true of a +robber is true of a rebel; and what is true of one robber or rebel is as +true, and it is a much more important truth, of one hundred thousand. + +To urge this part of the argument further is, indeed, I fear, not +necessary, for two reasons: first, that it seems tolerably evident in +itself; and next, that there is but too much ground to apprehend that +the actual ratification of Parliament would, in the then temper of +parties, have proved but a very slight and trivial security. Of this +there is a very strong example in the history of those very articles: +for, though the Parliament omitted in the reign of King William to +ratify the first and most general of them, they did actually confirm the +second and more limited, that which related to the security of the +inhabitants of those five counties which were in arms when the treaty +was made. + + + + +CHAPTER IV. + + +In the foregoing book we considered these laws in a very simple point of +view, and in a very general one,--merely as a system of hardship +imposed on the body of the community; and from thence, and from some +other arguments, inferred the general injustice of such a procedure. In +this we shall be obliged to be more minute; and the matter will become +more complex as we undertake to demonstrate the mischievous and +impolitic consequences which the particular mode of this oppressive +system, and the instruments which it employs, operating, as we said, on +this extensive object, produce on the national prosperity, quiet, and +security. + +The stock of materials by which any nation is rendered flourishing and +prosperous are its industry, its knowledge or skill, its morals, its +execution of justice, its courage, and the national union in directing +these powers to one point, and making them all centre in the public +benefit. Other than these, I do not know and scarcely can conceive any +means by which a community may flourish. + +If we show that these penal laws of Ireland destroy not one only, but +every one, of these materials of public prosperity, it will not be +difficult to perceive that Great Britain, whilst they subsist, never can +draw from that country all the advantages to which the bounty of Nature +has entitled it. + +To begin with the first great instrument of national happiness and +strength, its industry: I must observe, that, although these penal laws +do, indeed, inflict many hardships on those who are obnoxious to them, +yet their chief, their most extensive, and most certain operation is +upon property. Those civil constitutions which promote industry are such +as facilitate the acquisition, secure the holding, enable the fixing, +and suffer the alienation of property. Every law which obstructs it in +any part of this distribution is, in proportion to the force and extent +of the obstruction, a discouragement to industry. For a law against +property is a law against industry,--the latter having always the +former, and nothing else, for its object. Now as to the acquisition of +landed property, which is the foundation and support of all the other +kinds, the laws have disabled three fourths of the inhabitants of +Ireland from acquiring any estate of inheritance for life or years, or +any charge whatsoever on which two thirds of the improved yearly value +is not reserved for thirty years. + +This confinement of landed property to one set of hands, and preventing +its free circulation through the community, is a most leading article of +ill policy; because it is one of the most capital discouragements to all +that industry which may be employed on the lasting improvement of the +soil, or is any way conversant about land. A tenure of thirty years is +evidently no tenure upon which to build, to plant, to raise inclosures, +to change the nature of the ground, to make any new experiment which +might improve agriculture, or to do anything more than what may answer +the immediate and momentary calls of rent to the landlord, and leave +subsistence to the tenant and his family. The desire of acquisition is +always a passion of long views. Confine a man to momentary possession, +and you at once cut off that laudable avarice which every wise state has +cherished as one of the first principles of its greatness. Allow a man +but a temporary possession, lay it down as a maxim that he never can +have any other, and you immediately and infallibly turn him to temporary +enjoyments: and these enjoyments are never the pleasures of labor and +free industry, whose quality it is to famish the present hours and +squander all upon prospect and futurity; they are, on the contrary, +those of a thoughtless, loitering, and dissipated life. The people must +be inevitably disposed to such pernicious habits, merely from the short +duration of their tenure which the law has allowed. But it is not enough +that industry is checked by the confinement of its views; it is further +discouraged by the limitation of its own direct object, profit. This is +a regulation extremely worthy of our attention, as it is not a +consequential, but a direct discouragement to melioration,--as directly +as if the law had said in express terms, "Thou shalt not improve." + +But we have an additional argument to demonstrate the ill policy of +denying the occupiers of land any solid property in it. Ireland is a +country wholly unplanted. The farms have neither dwelling-houses nor +good offices; nor are the lands, almost anywhere, provided with fences +and communications: in a word, in a very unimproved state. The +land-owner there never takes upon him, as it is usual in this kingdom, +to supply all these conveniences, and to set down his tenant in what may +be called a completely furnished farm. If the tenant will not do it, it +is never done. This circumstance shows how miserably and peculiarly +impolitic it has been in Ireland to tie down the body of the tenantry to +short and unprofitable tenures. A finished and furnished house will be +taken for any term, however short: if the repair lies on the owner, the +shorter the better. But no one will take one not only unfurnished, but +half built, but upon a term which, on calculation, will answer with +profit all his charges. It is on this principle that the Romans +established their _emphyteusis_, or fee-farm. For though they extended +the ordinary term of their location only to nine years, yet they +encouraged a more permanent letting to farm with the condition of +improvement, as well as of annual payment, on the part of the tenant, +where the land had lain rough and neglected,--and therefore invented +this species of engrafted holding, in the later times, when property +came to be worse distributed by falling into a few hands. + +This denial of landed property to the gross of the people has this +further evil effect in preventing the improvement of land, that it +prevents any of the property acquired in trade to be regorged, as it +were, upon the land. They must have observed very little, who have not +remarked the bold and liberal spirit of improvement which persons bred +to trade have often exerted on their land-purchases: that they usually +come to them with a more abundant command of ready money than most +landed men possess; and that they have in general a much better idea, by +long habits of calculative dealings, of the propriety of expending in +order to acquire. Besides, such men often bring their spirit of commerce +into their estates with them, and make manufactures take a root, where +the mere landed gentry had perhaps no capital, perhaps no inclination, +and, most frequently, not sufficient knowledge, to effect anything of +the kind. By these means, what beautiful and useful spots have there not +been made about trading and manufacturing towns, and how has agriculture +had reason to bless that happy alliance with commerce! and how miserable +must that nation be, whose frame of polity has disjoined the landing and +the trading interests! + + * * * * * + +The great prop of this whole system is not pretended to be its justice +or its utility, but the supposed danger to the state, which gave rise to +it originally, and which, they apprehend, would return, if this system +were overturned. Whilst, say they, the Papists of this kingdom were +possessed of landed property, and of the influence consequent to such +property, their allegiance to the crown of Great Britain was ever +insecure, the public peace was ever liable to be broken, and Protestants +never could be a moment secure either of their properties or of their +lives. Indulgence only made them arrogant, and power daring; confidence +only excited and enabled them to exert their inherent treachery; and the +times which they generally selected for their most wicked and desperate +rebellions were those in which they enjoyed the greatest ease and the +most perfect tranquillity. + +Such are the arguments that are used, both publicly and privately, in +every discussion upon this point. They are generally full of passion and +of error, and built upon facts which in themselves are most false. It +cannot, I confess, be denied, that those miserable performances which go +about under the names of Histories of Ireland do, indeed, represent +those events after this manner; and they would persuade us, contrary to +the known order of Nature, that indulgence and moderation in governors +is the natural incitement in subjects to rebel. But there is an interior +history of Ireland, the genuine voice of its records and monuments, +which speaks a very different language from these histories, from Temple +and from Clarendon: these restore Nature to its just rights, and policy +to its proper order. For they even now show to those who have been at +the pains to examine them, and they may show one day to all the world, +that these rebellions were not produced by toleration, but by +persecution,--that they arose not from just and mild government, but +from the most unparalleled oppression. These records will be far from +giving the least countenance to a doctrine so repugnant to humanity and +good sense as that the security of any establishment, civil or +religious, can ever depend upon the misery of those who live under it, +or that its danger can arise from their quiet and prosperity. God forbid +that the history of this or any country should give such encouragement +to the folly or vices of those who govern! If it can be shown that the +great rebellions of Ireland have arisen from attempts to reduce the +natives to the state to which they are now reduced, it will show that an +attempt to continue them in that state will rather be disadvantageous to +the public peace than any kind of security to it. These things have in +some measure begun to appear already; and as far as regards the argument +drawn from former rebellions, it will fall readily to the ground. But, +for my part, I think the real danger to every state is, to render its +subjects justly discontented; nor is there in polities or science any +more effectual secret for their security than to establish in their +people a firm opinion that no change can be for their advantage. It is +true that bigotry and fanaticism may for a time draw great multitudes of +people from a knowledge of their true and substantial interest. But upon +this I have to remark three things. First, that such a temper can never +become universal, or last for a long time. The principle of religion is +seldom lasting; the majority of men are in no persuasion bigots; they +are not willing to sacrifice, on every vain imagination that +superstition or enthusiasm holds forth, or that even zeal and piety +recommend, the certain possession of their temporal happiness. And if +such a spirit has been at any time roused in a society, after it has had +its paroxysm it commonly subsides and is quiet, and is even the weaker +for the violence of its first exertion: security and ease are its mortal +enemies. But, secondly, if anything can tend to revive and keep it up, +it is to keep alive the passions of men by ill usage. This is enough to +irritate even those who have not a spark of bigotry in their +constitution to the most desperate enterprises; it certainly will +inflame, darken, and render more dangerous the spirit of bigotry in +those who are possessed by it. Lastly, by rooting out any sect, you are +never secure against the effects of fanaticism; it may arise on the side +of the most favored opinions; and many are the instances wherein the +established religion of a state has grown ferocious and turned upon its +keeper, and has often torn to pieces the civil establishment that had +cherished it, and which it was designed to support: +France,--England,--Holland. + +But there may be danger of wishing a change, even where no religious +motive can operate; and every enemy to such a state comes as a friend to +the subject; and where other countries are under terror, they begin to +hope. + +This argument _ad verecundiam_ has as much force as any such have. But I +think it fares but very indifferently with those who make use of it; for +they would get but little to be proved abettors of tyranny at the +expense of putting me to an inconvenient acknowledgment. For if I were +to confess that there are circumstances in which it would be better to +establish such a religion.... + + * * * * * + +With regard to the Pope's interest. This foreign chief of their religion +cannot be more formidable to us than to other Protestant countries. To +conquer that country for himself is a wild chimera; to encourage revolt +in favor of foreign princes is an exploded idea in the politics of that +court. Perhaps it would be full as dangerous to have the people under +the conduct of factious pastors of their own as under a foreign +ecclesiastical court. + + * * * * * + +In the second year of the reign of Queen Elizabeth were enacted several +limitations in the acquisition or the retaining of property, which had, +so far as regarded any general principles, hitherto remained untouched +under all changes. + +These bills met no opposition either in the Irish Parliament or in the +English Council, except from private agents, who were little attended +to; and they passed into laws with the highest and most general +applauses, as all such things are in the beginning, not as a system of +persecution, but as masterpieces of the most subtle and refined +politics. And to say the truth, these laws, at first view, have rather +an appearance of a plan of vexatious litigation and crooked +law-chicanery than of a direct and sanguinary attack upon the rights of +private conscience: because they did not affect life, at least with +regard to the laity; and making the Catholic opinions rather the subject +of civil regulations than of criminal prosecutions, to those who are +not lawyers and read these laws they only appear to be a species of +jargon. For the execution of criminal law has always a certain +appearance of violence. Being exercised directly on the persons of the +supposed offenders, and commonly executed in the face of the public, +such executions are apt to excite sentiments of pity for the sufferers, +and indignation against those who are employed in such cruelties,--being +seen as single acts of cruelty, rather than as ill general principles of +government. But the operation of the laws in question being such as +common feeling brings home to every man's bosom, they operate in a sort +of comparative silence and obscurity; and though their cruelty is +exceedingly great, it is never seen in a single exertion, and always +escapes commiseration, being scarce known, except to those who view them +in a general, which is always a cold and phlegmatic light. The first of +these laws being made with so general a satisfaction, as the chief +governors found that such things were extremely acceptable to the +leading people in that country, they were willing enough to gratify them +with the ruin of their fellow-citizens; they were not sorry to divert +their attention from other inquiries, and to keep them fixed to this, as +if this had been the only real object of their national politics; and +for many years there was no speech from the throne which did not with +great appearance of seriousness recommend the passing of such laws, and +scarce a session went over without in effect passing some of them, until +they have by degrees grown to be the most considerable head in the Irish +statute-book. At the same time giving a temporary and occasional +mitigation to the severity of some of the harshest of those laws, they +appeared in some sort the protectors of those whom they were in reality +destroying by the establishment of general constitutions against them. +At length, however, the policy of this expedient is worn out; the +passions of men are cooled; those laws begin to disclose themselves, and +to produce effects very different from those which were promised in +making them: for crooked counsels are ever unwise; and nothing can be +more absurd and dangerous than to tamper with the natural foundations of +society, in hopes of keeping it up by certain contrivances. + + * * * * * + + + + +A + +LETTER + +TO + +WILLIAM SMITH, ESQ., + +ON THE SUBJECT OF + +CATHOLIC EMANCIPATION. + +JANUARY 29, 1795. + + +LETTER.[23] + + +My Dear sir,--Your letter is, to myself, infinitely obliging: with +regard to you, I can find no fault with it, except that of a tone of +humility and disqualification, which neither your rank, nor the place +you are in, nor the profession you belong to, nor your very +extraordinary learning and talents, will in propriety demand or perhaps +admit. These dispositions will be still less proper, if you should feel +them in the extent your modesty leads you to express them. You have +certainly given by far too strong a proof of self-diffidence by asking +the opinion of a man circumstanced as I am, on the important subject of +your letter. You are far more capable of forming just conceptions upon +it than I can be. However, since you are pleased to command me to lay +before you my thoughts, as materials upon which your better judgment may +operate, I shall obey you, and submit them, with great deference, to +your melioration or rejection. + +But first permit me to put myself in the right. I owe you an answer to +your former letter. It did not desire one, but it deserved it. If not +for an answer, it called for an acknowledgment. It was a new favor; and, +indeed, I should be worse than insensible, if I did not consider the +honors you have heaped upon me with no sparing hand with becoming +gratitude. But your letter arrived to me at a time when the closing of +my long and last business in life, a business extremely complex, and +full of difficulties and vexations of all sorts, occupied me in a manner +which those who have not seen the interior as well as exterior of it +cannot easily imagine. I confess that in the crisis of that rude +conflict I neglected many things that well deserved my best +attention,--none that deserved it better, or have caused me more regret +in the neglect, than your letter. The instant that business was over, +and the House had passed its judgment on the conduct of the managers, I +lost no time to execute what for years I had resolved on: it was, to +quit my public station, and to seek that tranquillity, in my very +advanced age, to which, after a very tempestuous life, I thought myself +entitled. But God has thought fit (and I unfeignedly acknowledge His +justice) to dispose of things otherwise. So heavy a calamity has fallen +upon me as to disable me for business and to disqualify me for repose. +The existence I have I do not know that I can call life. Accordingly, I +do not meddle with any one measure of government, though, for what +reasons I know not, you seem to suppose me deeply in the secret of +affairs. I only know, so far as your side of the water is concerned, +that your present excellent Lord Lieutenant (the best man in every +relation that I have ever been acquainted with) has perfectly pure +intentions with regard to Ireland, and of course that he wishes +cordially well to those who form the great mass of its inhabitants, and +who, as they are well or ill managed, must form an important part of its +strength or weakness. If with regard to that great object he has +carried over any ready-made system, I assure you it is perfectly unknown +to me: I am very much retired from the world, and live in much +ignorance. This, I hope, will form my humble apology, if I should err in +the notions I entertain of the question which is soon to become the +subject of your deliberations. At the same time accept it as an apology +for my neglects. + +You need make no apology for your attachment to the religious +description you belong to. It proves (as in you it is sincere) your +attachment to the great points in which the leading divisions are +agreed, when the lesser, in which they differ, are so dear to you. I +shall never call any religious opinions, which appear important to +serious and pious minds, things of no consideration. Nothing is so fatal +to religion as indifference, which is, at least, half infidelity. As +long as men hold charity and justice to be essential integral parts of +religion, there can be little danger from a strong attachment to +particular tenets in faith. This I am perfectly sure is your case; but I +am not equally sure that either zeal for the tenets of faith, or the +smallest degree of charity or justice, have much influenced the +gentlemen who, under pretexts of zeal, have resisted the enfranchisement +of their country. My dear son, who was a person of discernment, as well +as clear and acute in his expressions, said, in a letter of his which I +have seen, "that, in order to grace their cause, and to draw some +respect to their persons, they pretend to be bigots." But here, I take +it, we have not much to do with the theological tenets on the one side +of the question or the other. The point itself is practically decided. +That religion is owned by the state. Except in a settled maintenance, it +is protected. A great deal of the rubbish, which, as a nuisance, long +obstructed the way, is removed. One impediment remained longer, as a +matter to justify the proscription of the body of our country; after the +rest had been abandoned as untenable ground. But the business of the +Pope (that mixed person of polities and religion) has long ceased to be +a bugbear: for some time past he has ceased to be even a colorable +pretext. This was well known, when the Catholics of these kingdoms, for +our amusement, were obliged on oath to disclaim him in his political +capacity,--which implied an allowance for them to recognize him in some +sort of ecclesiastical superiority. It was a compromise of the old +dispute. + +For my part, I confess I wish that we had been less eager in this point. +I don't think, indeed, that much mischief will happen from it, if things +are otherwise properly managed. Too nice an inquisition ought not to be +made into opinions that are dying away of themselves. Had we lived an +hundred and fifty years ago, I should have been as earnest and anxious +as anybody for this sort of abjuration; but, living at the time in which +I live, and obliged to speculate forward instead of backward, I must +fairly say, I could well endure the existence of every sort of +collateral aid which opinion might, in the now state of things, afford +to authority. I must see much more danger than in my life I have seen, +or than others will venture seriously to affirm that they see, in the +Pope aforesaid, (though a foreign power, and with his long tail of _et +ceteras_,) before I should be active in weakening any hold which +government might think it prudent to resort to, in the management of +that large part of the king's subjects. I do not choose to direct all my +precautions to the part where the danger does not press, and to leave +myself open and unguarded where I am not only really, but visibly +attacked. + +My whole politics, at present, centre in one point, and to this the +merit or demerit of every measure (with me) is referable,--that is, what +will most promote or depress the cause of Jacobinism. What is +Jacobinism? It is an attempt (hitherto but too successful) to eradicate +prejudice out of the minds of men, for the purpose of putting all power +and authority into the hands of the persons capable of occasionally +enlightening the minds of the people. For this purpose the Jacobins have +resolved to destroy the whole frame and fabric of the old societies of +the world, and to regenerate them after their fashion. To obtain an army +for this purpose, they everywhere engage the poor by holding out to them +as a bribe the spoils of the rich. This I take to be a fair description +of the principles and leading maxims of the enlightened of our day who +are commonly called Jacobins. + +As the grand prejudice, and that which holds all the other prejudices +together, the first, last, and middle object of their hostility is +religion. With that they are at inexpiable war. They make no distinction +of sects. A Christian, as such, is to them an enemy. What, then, is left +to a real Christian, (Christian as a believer and as a statesman,) but +to make a league between all the grand divisions of that name, to +protect and to cherish them all, and by no means to proscribe in any +manner, more or less, any member of our common party? The divisions +which formerly prevailed in the Church, with all their overdone zeal, +only purified and ventilated our common faith, because there was no +common enemy arrayed and embattled to take advantage of their +dissensions; but now nothing but inevitable ruin will be the consequence +of our quarrels. I think we may dispute, rail, persecute, and provoke +the Catholics out of their prejudices; but it is not in ours they will +take refuge. If anything is, one more than another, out of the power of +man, it is to _create_ a prejudice. Somebody has said, that a king may +make a nobleman, but he cannot make a gentleman. + +All the principal religions in Europe stand upon one common bottom. The +support that the whole or the favored parts may have in the secret +dispensations of Providence it is impossible to tell; but, humanly +speaking, they are all _prescriptive_ religions. They have all stood +long enough to make prescription and its chain of legitimate prejudices +their main stay. The people who compose the four grand divisions of +Christianity have now their religion as an habit, and upon authority, +and not on disputation,--as all men who have their religion derived from +their parents and the fruits of education _must_ have it, however the +one more than the other may be able to reconcile his faith to his own +reason or to that of other men. Depend upon it, they must all be +supported, or they must all fall in the crash of a common ruin. The +Catholics are the far more numerous part of the Christians in your +country; and how can Christianity (that is now the point in issue) be +supported under the persecution, or even under the discountenance, of +the greater number of Christians? It is a great truth, and which in one +of the debates I stated as strongly as I could to the House of Commons +in the last session, that, if the Catholic religion is destroyed by the +infidels, it is a most contemptible and absurd idea, that this, or any +Protestant Church, can survive that event. Therefore my humble and +decided opinion is, that all the three religions prevalent more or less +in various parts of these islands ought all, in subordination to the +legal establishments as they stand in the several countries, to be all +countenanced, protected, and cherished, and that in Ireland particularly +the Roman Catholic religion should be upheld in high respect and +veneration, and should be, in its place, provided with all the means of +making it a blessing to the people who profess it,--that it ought to be +cherished as a good, (though not as the most preferable good, if a +choice was now to be made,) and not tolerated as an inevitable evil. If +this be my opinion as to the Catholic religion as a sect, you must see +that I must be to the last degree averse to put a man, upon that +account, upon a bad footing with relation to the privileges which the +fundamental laws of this country give him as a subject. I am the more +serious on the positive encouragement to be given to this religion, +(always, however, as secondary,) because the serious and earnest belief +and practice of it by its professors forms, as things stand, the most +effectual barrier, if not the sole barrier, against Jacobinism. The +Catholics form the great body of the lower ranks of your community, and +no small part of those classes of the middling that come nearest to +them. You know that the seduction of that part of mankind from the +principles of religion, morality, subordination, and social order is the +great object of the Jacobins. Let them grow lax, skeptical, careless, +and indifferent with regard to religion, and, so sure as we have an +existence, it is not a zealous Anglican or Scottish Church principle, +but direct Jacobinism, which will enter into that breach. Two hundred +years dreadfully spent in experiments to force that people to change the +form of their religion have proved fruitless. You have now your choice, +for full four fifths of your people, of the Catholic religion or +Jacobinism. If things appear to you to stand on this alternative, I +think you will not be long in making your option. + +You have made, as you naturally do, a very able analysis of powers, and +have separated, as the things are separable, civil from political +powers. You start, too, a question, whether the civil can be secured +without some share in the political. For my part, as abstract questions, +I should find some difficulty in an attempt to resolve them. But as +applied to the state of Ireland, to the form of our commonwealth, to the +parties that divide us, and to the dispositions of the leading men in +those parties, I cannot hesitate to lay before you my opinion, that, +whilst any kind of discouragements and disqualifications remain on the +Catholics, an handle will be made by a factious power utterly to defeat +the benefits of any civil rights they may apparently possess. I need not +go to very remote times for my examples. It was within the course of +about a twelvemonth, that, after Parliament had been led into a step +quite unparalleled in its records, after they had resisted all +concession, and even hearing, with an obstinacy equal to anything that +could have actuated a party domination in the second or eighth of Queen +Anne, after the strange adventure of the Grand Juries, and after +Parliament had listened to the sovereign pleading for the emancipation +of his subjects,--it was after all this, that such a grudging and +discontent was expressed as must justly have alarmed, as it did +extremely alarm, the whole of the Catholic body: and I remember but one +period in my whole life (I mean the savage period between 1781 and 1767) +in which they have been more harshly or contumeliously treated than +since the last partial enlargement. And thus I am convinced it will be, +by paroxysms, as long as any stigma remains on them, and whilst they are +considered as no better than half citizens. If they are kept such for +any length of time, they will be made whole Jacobins. Against this grand +and dreadful evil of our time (I do not love to cheat myself or others) +I do not know any solid security whatsoever; but I am quite certain that +what will come nearest to it is to interest as many as you can in the +present order of things, religiously, civilly, politically, by all the +ties and principles by which mankind are held. This is like to be +effectual policy: I am sure it is honorable policy: and it is better to +fail, if fail we must, in the paths of direct and manly than of low and +crooked wisdom. + +As to the capacity of sitting in Parliament, after all the capacities +for voting, for the army, for the navy, for the professions, for civil +offices, it is a dispute _de lana caprina_, in my poor opinion,--at +least on the part of those who oppose it. In the first place, this +admission to office, and this exclusion from Parliament, on the +principle of an exclusion from political power, is the very reverse of +the principle of the English Test Act. If I were to form a judgment from +experience rather than theory, I should doubt much whether the capacity +for or even the possession of a seat in Parliament did really convey +much of power to be properly called political. I have sat there, with +some observation, for nine-and-twenty years, or thereabouts. The power +of a member of Parliament is uncertain and indirect; and if power, +rather than splendor and fame, were the object, I should think that any +of the principal clerks in office, to say nothing of their superiors, +(several of whom are disqualified by law for seats in Parliament,) +possess far more power than nine tenths of the members of the House of +Commons. I might say this of men who seemed, from their fortunes, their +weight in their country, and their talents, to be persons of figure +there,--and persons, too, not in opposition to the prevailing party in +government. But be they what they will, on a fair canvass of the several +prevalent Parliamentary interests in Ireland, I cannot, out of the three +hundred members of whom the Irish Parliament is composed, discover that +above three, or at the utmost four, Catholics would be returned to the +House of Commons. But suppose they should amount to thirty, that is, to +a tenth part, (a thing I hold impossible for a long series of years, and +never very likely to happen,) what is this to those who are to balance +them in the one House, and the clear and settled majority in the other? +For I think it absolutely impossible, that, in the course of many years, +above four or five peers should be created of that communion. In fact, +the exclusion of them seems to me only to mark jealousy and suspicion, +and not to provide security in any way.--But I return to the old ground. +The danger is not there: these are things long since done away. The +grand controversy is no longer between you and them. + +Forgive this length. My pen has insensibly run on. You are yourself to +blame, if you are much fatigued. I congratulate you on the auspicious +opening of your session. Surely Great Britain and Ireland ought to join +in wreathing a never-fading garland for the head of Grattan. Adieu, my +dear Sir. Good nights to you!--I never can have any. + +Yours always most sincerely, + +EDMUND BURKE. + +Jan. 29th, 1795. Twelve at night. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[23] William Smith, Esq., to whom this Letter is addressed, was then a +member of the Irish Parliament: he is now (1812) one of the Barons of +the Court of Exchequer in Ireland. + + + + +SECOND LETTER + +TO + +SIR HERCULES LANGRISHE + +ON THE + +CATHOLIC QUESTION. + +MAY 26, 1795. + + +My Dear Sir,--If I am not as early as I ought to be in my +acknowledgments for your very kind letter, pray do me the justice to +attribute my failure to its natural and but too real cause, a want of +the most ordinary power of exertion, owing to the impressions made upon +an old and infirm constitution by private misfortune and by public +calamity. It is true, I make occasional efforts to rouse myself to +something better,--but I soon relapse into that state of languor which +must be the habit of my body and understanding to the end of my short +and cheerless existence in this world. + +I am sincerely grateful for your kindness in connecting the interest you +take in the sentiments of an old friend with the able part you take in +the service of your country. It is an instance, among many, of that +happy temper which has always given a character of amenity to your +virtues and a good-natured direction to your talents. + +Your speech on the Catholic question I read with much satisfaction. It +is solid; it is convincing; it is eloquent; and it ought, on the spot, +to have produced that effect which its reason, and that contained in the +other excellent speeches on the same side of the question, cannot +possibly fail (though with less pleasant consequences) to produce +hereafter. What a sad thing it is, that the grand instructor, Time, has +not yet been able to teach the grand lesson of his own value, and that, +in every question of moral and political prudence, it is the choice of +the moment which renders the measure serviceable or useless, noxious or +salutary! + +In the Catholic question I considered only one point: Was it, at the +time, and in the circumstances, a measure which tended to promote the +concord of the citizens? I have no difficulty in saying it was,--and as +little in saying that the present concord of the citizens was worth +buying, at a critical season, by granting a few _capacities_, which +probably no one man now living is likely to be served or hurt by. When +any man tells _you_ and _me_, that, if these places were left in the +discretion of a Protestant crown, and these memberships in the +discretion of Protestant electors or patrons, we should have a Popish +official system, and a Popish representation, capable of overturning the +Establishment, he only insults our understandings. When any man tells +this to _Catholics_, he insults their understandings, and he galls their +feelings. It is not the question of the places and seats, it is the real +hostile disposition and the _pretended_ fears, that leave stings in the +minds of the people. I really thought that in the total of the late +circumstances, with regard to persons, to things, to principles, and to +measures, was to be found a conjuncture favorable to the introduction +and to the perpetuation of a general harmony, producing a general +strength, which to that hour Ireland was never so happy as to enjoy. My +sanguine hopes are blasted, and I must consign my feelings on that +terrible disappointment to the same patience in which I have been +obliged to bury the vexation I suffered on the defeat of the other +great, just, and honorable causes in which I have had some share, and +which have given more of dignity than of peace and advantage to a long, +laborious life. Though, perhaps, a want of success might be urged as a +reason for making me doubt of the justice of the part I have taken, yet, +until I have other lights than one side of the debate has furnished me, +I must see things, and feel them too, as I see and feel them. I think I +can hardly overrate the malignity of the principles of Protestant +ascendency, as they affect Ireland,--or of Indianism, as they affect +these countries, and as they affect Asia,--or of Jacobinism, as they +affect all Europe and the state of human society itself. The last is the +greatest evil. But it readily combines with the others, and flows from +them. Whatever breeds discontent at this time will produce that great +master-mischief most infallibly. Whatever tends to persuade the people +that the _few_, called by whatever name you please, religious or +political, are of opinion that their interest is not compatible with +that of the _many_, is a great point gained to Jacobinism. Whatever +tends to irritate the talents of a country, which have at all times, and +at these particularly, a mighty influence on the public mind, is of +infinite service to that formidable cause. Unless where Heaven has +mingled uncommon ingredients of virtue in the composition,--_quos +meliore luto finxit præcordia Titan,_--talents naturally gravitate to +Jacobinism. Whatever ill-humors are afloat in the state, they will be +sure to discharge themselves in a mingled torrent in the _Cloaca Maxima_ +of Jacobinism. Therefore people ought well to look about them. First, +the physicians are to take care that they do nothing to irritate this +epidemical distemper. It is a foolish thing to have the better of the +patient in a dispute. The complaint or its cause ought to be removed, +and wise and lenient arts ought to precede the measures of vigor. They +ought to be the _ultima_, not the _prima_, not the _tota_ ratio of a +wise government. God forbid, that, on a worthy occasion, authority +should want the means of force, or the disposition to use it! But where +a prudent and enlarged policy does not precede it, and attend it too, +where the hearts of the better sort of people do not go with the hands +of the soldiery, you may call your Constitution what you will, in effect +it will consist of three parts, (orders, if you please,) cavalry, +infantry, and artillery,--and of nothing else or better. I agree with +you in your dislike of the discourses in Francis Street: but I like as +little some of those in College Green. I am even less pleased with the +temper that predominated in the latter, as better things might have been +expected in the regular family mansion of public discretion than, in a +new and hasty assembly of unexperienced men, congregated under +circumstances of no small irritation. After people have taken your +tests, prescribed by yourselves as proofs of their allegiance, to be +marked as enemies, traitors, or at best as suspected and dangerous +persons, and that they are not to be believed on their oaths, we are not +to be surprised, if they fall into a passion, and talk as men in a +passion do, intemperately and idly. + +The worst of the matter is this: you are partly leading, partly driving +into Jacobinism that description of your people whose religious +principles, church polity, and habitual discipline might make them an +invincible dike against that inundation. This you have a thousand +mattocks and pickaxes lifted up to demolish. You make a sad story of the +Pope. _O seri studiorum_! It will not be difficult to get many called +Catholics to laugh at this fundamental part of their religion. Never +doubt it. You have succeeded in part, and you may succeed completely. +But in the present state of men's minds and affairs, do not flatter +yourselves that they will piously look to the head of our Church in the +place of that Pope whom you make them forswear, and out of all reverence +to whom you bully and rail and buffoon them. Perhaps you may succeed in +the same manner with all the other tenets of doctrine and usages of +discipline amongst the Catholics; but what security have you, that, in +the temper and on the principles on which they have made this change, +they will stop at the exact sticking-places you have marked in _your_ +articles? You have no security for anything, but that they will become +what are called _Franco-Jacobins_, and reject the whole together. No +converts now will be made in a considerable number from one of our sects +to the other upon a really religious principle. Controversy moves in +another direction. + +Next to religion, _property_ is the great point of Jacobin attack. Here +many of the debaters in your majority, and their writers, have given the +Jacobins all the assistance their hearts can wish. When the Catholics +desire places and seats, you tell them that this is only a pretext, +(though Protestants might suppose it just _possible_ for men to like +good places and snug boroughs for their own merits,) but that their real +view is, to strip Protestants of their property To my certain knowledge, +till those Jacobin lectures were opened in the House of Commons, they +never dreamt of any such thing; but now the great professors may +stimulate them to inquire (on the new principles) into the foundation of +that property, and of all property. If you treat men as robbers, why, +robbers, sooner or later, they will become. + +A third point of Jacobin attack is on _old traditionary constitutions_. +You are apprehensive for yours, which leans from its perpendicular, and +does not stand firm on its theory. I like Parliamentary reforms as +little as any man who has boroughs to sell for money, or for peerages in +Ireland. But it passes my comprehension, in what manner it is that men +can be reconciled to the _practical_ merits of a constitution, the +theory of which is in litigation, by being _practically_ excluded from +any of its advantages. Let us put ourselves in the place of these +people, and try an experiment of the effects of such a procedure on our +own minds. Unquestionably, we should be perfectly satisfied, when we +were told that Houses of Parliament, instead of being places of refuge +for popular liberty, were citadels for keeping us in order as a +conquered people. These things play the Jacobin game to a nicety. + +Indeed, my dear Sir, there is not a single particular in the +Francis-Street declamations, which has not, to your and to my certain +knowledge, been taught by the jealous ascendants, sometimes by doctrine, +sometimes by example, always by provocation. Remember the whole of 1781 +and 1782, in Parliament and out of Parliament; at this very day, and in +the worst acts and designs, observe the tenor of the objections with +which the College-Green orators of the ascendency reproach the +Catholics. You have observed, no doubt, how much they rely on the +affair of Jackson. Is it not pleasant to hear Catholics reproached for a +supposed connection--with whom?--with Protestant clergymen! with +Protestant gentlemen! with Mr. Jackson! with Mr. Rowan, &c, &c.! But +_egomet mî ignosco_. Conspiracies and treasons are privileged pleasures, +not to be profaned by the impure and unhallowed touch of Papists. +Indeed, all this will do, perhaps, well enough, with detachments of +dismounted cavalry and fencibles from England. But let us not say to +Catholics, by way of _argument_, that they are to be kept in a degraded +state, because some of them are no better than many of us Protestants. +The thing I most disliked in some of their speeches (those, I mean, of +the Catholics) was what is called the spirit of liberality, so much and +so diligently taught by the ascendants, by which they are made to +abandon their own particular interests, and to merge them in the general +discontents of the country. It gave me no pleasure to hear of the +dissolution of the committee. There were in it a majority, to my +knowledge, of very sober, well-intentioned men; and there were none in +it but such who, if not continually goaded and irritated, might be made +useful to the tranquillity of the country. It is right always to have a +few of every description, through whom you may quietly operate on the +many, both for the interests of the description, and for the general +interest. + +Excuse me, my dear friend, if I have a little tried your patience. You +have brought this trouble on yourself, by your thinking of a man forgot, +and who has no objection to be forgot, by the world. These things we +discussed together four or five and thirty years ago. We were then, and +at bottom ever since, of the same opinion on the justice and policy of +the whole and of every part of the penal system. You and I, and +everybody, must now and then ply and bend to the occasion, and take what +can be got. But very sure I am, that, whilst there remains in the law +any principle whatever which can furnish to certain politicians an +excuse for raising an opinion of their own importance, as necessary to +keep their fellow-subjects in order, the obnoxious people will be +fretted, harassed, insulted, provoked to discontent and disorder, and +practically excluded from the partial advantages from which the letter +of the law does not exclude them. + +Adieu! my dear Sir, + +And believe me very truly yours, + +EDMUND BURKE. + +BEACONSFIELD, May 26, 1795. + + + + +A + +LETTER + +TO + +RICHARD BURKE, ESQ., + +ON + +PROTESTANT ASCENDENCY IN IRELAND. + +1793. + + +My dear son,--We are all again assembled in town, to finish the last, +but the most laborious, of the tasks which have been imposed upon me +during my Parliamentary service. We are as well as at our time of life +we can expect to be. We have, indeed, some moments of anxiety about you. +You are engaged in an undertaking similar in its principle to mine. You +are engaged in the relief of an oppressed people. In that service you +must necessarily excite the same sort of passions in those who have +exercised, and who wish to continue that oppression, that I have had to +struggle with in this long labor. As your father has done, you must make +enemies of many of the rich, of the proud, and of the powerful. I and +you began in the same way. I must confess, that, if our place was of our +choice, I could wish it had been your lot to begin the career of your +life with an endeavor to render some more moderate and less invidious +service to the public But being engaged in a great and critical work, I +have not the least hesitation about your having hitherto done your duty +as becomes you. If I had not an assurance not to be shaken from the +character of your mind, I should be satisfied on that point by the cry +that is raised against you. If you had behaved, as they call it, +discreetly, that is, faintly and treacherously, in the execution of your +trust, you would have had, for a while, the good word of all sorts of +men, even of many of those whose cause you had betrayed,--and whilst +your favor lasted, you might have coined that false reputation into a +true and solid interest to yourself. This you are well apprised of; and +you do not refuse to travel that beaten road from an ignorance, but from +a contempt, of the objects it leads to. + +When you choose an arduous and slippery path, God forbid that any weak +feelings of my declining age, which calls for soothings and supports, +and which can have none but from you, should make me wish that you +should abandon what you are about, or should trifle with it! In this +house we submit, though with troubled minds, to that order which has +connected all great duties with toils and with perils, which has +conducted the road to glory through the regions of obloquy and reproach, +and which will never suffer the disparaging alliance of spurious, false, +and fugitive praise with genuine and permanent reputation. We know that +the Power which has settled that order, and subjected you to it by +placing you in the situation you are in, is able to bring you out of it +with credit and with safety. His will be done! All must come right. You +may open the way with pain and under reproach: others will pursue it +with ease and with applause. + +I am sorry to find that pride and passion, and that sort of zeal for +religion which never shows any wonderful heat but when it afflicts and +mortifies our neighbor, will not let the ruling description perceive +that the privilege for which your clients contend is very nearly as much +for the benefit of those who refuse it as those who ask it. I am not to +examine into the charges that are daily made on the administration of +Ireland. I am not qualified to say how much in them is cold truth, and +how much rhetorical exaggeration. Allowing some foundation to the +complaint, it is to no purpose that these people allege that their +government is a job in its administration. I am sure it is a job in its +constitution; nor is it possible a scheme of polity, which, in total +exclusion of the body of the community, confines (with little or no +regard to their rank or condition in life) to a certain set of favored +citizens the rights which formerly belonged to the whole, should not, by +the operation of the same selfish and narrow principles, teach the +persons who administer in that government to prefer their own +particular, but well-understood, private interest to the false and +ill-calculated private interest of the monopolizing company they belong +to. Eminent characters, to be sure, overrule places and circumstances. I +have nothing to say to that virtue which shoots up in full force by the +native vigor of the seminal principle, in spite of the adverse soil and +climate that it grows in. But speaking of things in their ordinary +course, in a country of monopoly there _can_ be no patriotism. There may +be a party spirit, but public spirit there can be none. As to a spirit +of liberty, still less can it exist, or anything like it. A liberty made +up of penalties! a liberty made up of incapacities! a liberty made up of +exclusion and proscription, continued for ages, of four fifths, perhaps, +of the inhabitants of all ranks and fortunes In what does such liberty +differ from the description of the most shocking kind of servitude? + +But it will be said, in that country some people are free. Why, this is +the very description of despotism. _Partial freedom is privilege and +prerogative, and not liberty._ Liberty, such as deserves the name, is +an honest, equitable, diffusive, and impartial principle. It is a great +and enlarged virtue, and not a sordid, selfish, and illiberal vice. It +is the portion of the mass of the citizens, and not the haughty license +of some potent individual or some predominant faction. + +If anything ought to be despotic in a country, it is its government; +because there is no cause of constant operation to make its yoke +unequal. But the dominion of a party must continually, steadily, and by +its very essence, lean upon the prostrate description. A constitution +formed so as to enable a party to overrule its very government, and to +overpower the people too, answers the purposes neither of government nor +of freedom. It compels that power which ought, and often would be +disposed, _equally_ to protect the subjects, to fail in its trust, to +counteract its purposes, and to become no better than the instrument of +the wrongs of a faction. Some degree of influence must exist in all +governments. But a government which has no interest to please the body +of the people, and can neither support them nor with safety call for +their support, nor is of power to sway the domineering faction, can only +exist by corruption; and taught by that monopolizing party which usurps +the title and qualities of the public to consider the body of the people +as out of the constitution, they will consider those who are in it in +the light in which they choose to consider themselves. The whole +relation of government and of freedom will be a battle or a traffic. + +This system, in its real nature, and under its proper appellations, is +odious and unnatural, especially when a constitution is admitted which +not only, as all constitutions do profess, has a regard to the good of +the multitude, but in its theory makes profession of their power also. +But of late this scheme of theirs has been new-christened,--_honestum +nomen imponitur vitio_. A word has been lately struck in the mint of the +Castle of Dublin; thence it was conveyed to the Tholsel, or City-Hall, +where, having passed the touch of the corporation, so respectably +stamped and vouched, it soon became current in Parliament, and was +carried back by the Speaker of the House of Commons in great pomp, as an +offering of homage from whence it came. The word is _ascendency_. It is +not absolutely new. But the sense in which I have hitherto seen it used +was to signify an influence obtained over the minds of some other person +by love and reverence, or by superior management and dexterity. It had, +therefore, to this its promotion no more than a moral, not a civil or +political use. But I admit it is capable of being so applied; and if the +Lord Mayor of Dublin, and the Speaker of the Irish Parliament, who +recommend the preservation of the Protestant ascendency, mean to employ +the word in that sense,--that is, if they understand by it the +preservation of the influence of that description of gentlemen over the +Catholics by means of an authority derived from their wisdom and virtue, +and from an opinion they raise in that people of a pious regard and +affection for their freedom and happiness,--it is impossible not to +commend their adoption of so apt a term into the family of politics. It +may be truly said to enrich the language. Even if the Lord Mayor and +Speaker mean to insinuate that this influence is to be obtained and held +by flattering their people, by managing them, by skilfully adapting +themselves to the humors and passions of those whom they would govern, +he must be a very untoward critic who would cavil even at this use of +the word, though such cajoleries would perhaps be more prudently +practised than professed. These are all meanings laudable, or at least +tolerable. But when we look a little more narrowly, and compare it with +the plan to which it owes its present technical application, I find it +has strayed far from its original sense. It goes much further than the +privilege allowed by Horace. It is more than _parce detortum_. This +Protestant ascendency means nothing less than an influence obtained by +virtue, by love, or even by artifice and seduction,--full as little an +influence derived from the means by which ministers have obtained an +influence which might be called, without straining, an _ascendency_, in +public assemblies in England, that is, by a liberal distribution of +places and pensions, and other graces of government. This last is wide +indeed of the signification of the word. New _ascendency_ is the old +_mastership_. It is neither more nor less than the resolution of one set +of people in Ireland to consider themselves as the sole citizens in the +commonwealth, and to keep a dominion over the rest by reducing them to +absolute slavery under a military power, and, thus fortified in their +power, to divide the public estate, which is the result of general +contribution, as a military booty, solely amongst themselves. + +The poor word _ascendency_, so soft and melodious in its sound, so +lenitive and emollient in its first usage, is now employed to cover to +the world the most rigid, and perhaps not the most wise, of all plans of +policy. The word is large enough in its comprehension. I cannot +conceive what mode of oppression in civil life, or what mode of +religious persecution, may not come within the methods of preserving an +_ascendency_. In plain old English, as they apply it, it signifies +_pride and dominion_ on the one part of the relation, and on the other +_subserviency and contempt_,--and it signifies nothing else. The old +words are as fit to be set to music as the new: but use has long since +affixed to them their true signification, and they sound, as the other +will, harshly and odiously to the moral and intelligent ears of mankind. + +This ascendency, by being a _Protestant_ ascendency, does not better it +from the combination of a note or two more in this anti-harmonic scale. +If Protestant ascendency means the proscription from citizenship of by +far the major part of the people of any country, then Protestant +ascendency is a bad thing, and it ought to have no existence. But there +is a deeper evil. By the use that is so frequently made of the term, and +the policy which is engrafted on it, the name Protestant becomes nothing +more or better than the name of a persecuting faction, with a relation +of some sort of theological hostility to others, but without any sort of +ascertained tenets of its own upon the ground of which it persecutes +other men: for the patrons of this Protestant ascendency neither do nor +can, by anything positive, define or describe what they mean by the word +Protestant. It is defined, as Cowley defines wit, not by what it is, but +by what it is not. It is not the Christian religion as professed in the +churches holding communion with Rome, the majority of Christians: that +is all which, in the latitude of the term, is known about its +signification. This makes such persecutors ten times worse than any of +that description that hitherto have been known in the world. The old +persecutors, whether Pagan or Christian, whether Arian or Orthodox, +whether Catholics, Anglicans, or Calvinists, actually were, or at least +had the decorum to pretend to be, strong dogmatists. They pretended that +their religious maxims were clear and ascertained, and so useful that +they were bound, for the eternal benefit of mankind, to defend or +diffuse them, though by any sacrifices of the temporal good of those who +were the objects of their system of experiment. + +The bottom of this theory of persecution is false. It is not permitted +to us to sacrifice the temporal good of any body of men to our own ideas +of the truth and falsehood of any religious opinions. By making men +miserable in this life, they counteract one of the great ends of +charity, which is, in as much as in us lies, to make men happy in every +period of their existence, and most in what most depends upon us. But +give to these old persecutors their mistaken principle, in their +reasoning they are consistent, and in their tempers they may be even +kind and good-natured. But whenever a faction would render millions of +mankind miserable, some millions of the race coexistent with themselves, +and many millions in their succession, without knowing or so much as +pretending to ascertain the doctrines of their own school, (in which +there is much of the lash and nothing of the lesson,) the errors which +the persons in such a faction fall into are not those that are natural +to human imbecility, nor is the least mixture of mistaken kindness to +mankind an ingredient in the severities they inflict. The whole is +nothing but pure and perfect malice. It is, indeed, a perfection in that +kind belonging to beings of an higher order than man, and to them we +ought to leave it. + +This kind of persecutors without zeal, without charity, know well enough +that religion, to pass by all questions of the truth or falsehood of any +of its particular systems, (a matter I abandon to the theologians on all +sides,) is a source of great comfort to us mortals, in this our short, +but tedious journey through the world. They know, that, to enjoy this +consolation, men must believe their religion upon some principle or +other, whether of education, habit, theory, or authority. When men are +driven from any of those principles on which they have received +religion, without embracing with the same assurance and cordiality some +other system, a dreadful void is left in their minds, and a terrible +shook is given to their morals. They lose their guide, their comfort, +their hope. None but the most cruel and hardhearted of men, who had +banished all natural tenderness from their minds, such as those beings +of iron, the atheists, could bring themselves to any persecution like +this. Strange it is, but so it is, that men, driven by force from their +habits in one mode of religion, have, by contrary habits, under the same +force, often quietly settled in another. They suborn their reason to +declare in favor of their necessity. Man and his conscience cannot +always be at war. If the first races have not been able to make a +pacification between the conscience and the convenience, their +descendants come generally to submit to the violence of the laws, +without violence to their minds. As things stood formerly, they +possessed a _positive_ scheme of direction and of consolation. In this +men may acquiesce. The harsh methods in use with the old class of +persecutors were to make converts, not apostates only. If they +perversely hated other sects and factions, they loved their own +inordinately. But in this Protestant persecution there is anything but +benevolence at work. What do the Irish statutes? They do not make a +conformity to the _established_ religion, and to its doctrines and +practices, the condition of getting out of servitude. No such thing. Let +three millions of people but abandon all that they and their ancestors +have been taught to believe sacred, and to forswear it publicly in terms +the most degrading, scurrilous, and indecent for men of integrity and +virtue, and to abuse the whole of their former lives, and to slander the +education they have received, and nothing more is required of them. +There is no system of folly, or impiety, or blasphemy, or atheism, into +which they may not throw themselves, and which they may not profess +openly, and as a system, consistently with the enjoyment of all the +privileges of a free citizen in the happiest constitution in the world. + +Some of the unhappy assertors of this strange scheme say they are not +persecutors on account of religion. In the first place, they say what is +not true. For what else do they disfranchise the people? If the man gets +rid of a religion through which their malice operates, he gets rid of +all their penalties and incapacities at once. They never afterwards +inquire about him. I speak here of their pretexts, and not of the true +spirit of the transaction, in which religious bigotry, I apprehend, has +little share. Every man has his taste; but I think, if I were so +miserable and undone as to be guilty of premeditated and continued +violence towards any set of men, I had rather that my conduct was +supposed to arise from wild conceits concerning their religious +advantages than from low and ungenerous motives relative to my own +selfish interest. I had rather be thought insane in my charity than +rational in my malice. This much, my dear son, I have to say of this +Protestant persecution,--that is, a persecution of religion itself. + +A very great part of the mischiefs that vex the world arises from words. +People soon forget the meaning, but the impression and the passion +remain. The word Protestant is the charm that looks up in the dungeon of +servitude three millions of your people. It is not amiss to consider +this spell of potency, this abracadabra, that is hung about the necks of +the unhappy, not to heal, but to communicate disease. We sometimes hear +of a Protestant _religion_, frequently of a Protestant _interest_. We +hear of the latter the most frequently, because it has a positive +meaning. The other has none. We hear of it the most frequently, because +it has a word in the phrase which, well or ill understood, has animated +to persecution and oppression at all times infinitely more than all the +dogmas in dispute between religious factions. These are, indeed, well +formed to perplex and torment the intellect, but not half so well +calculated to inflame the passions and animosities of men. + +I do readily admit that a great deal of the wars, seditions, and +troubles of the world did formerly turn upon the contention between +_interests_ that went by the names of Protestant and Catholic. But I +imagined that at this time no one was weak enough to believe, or +impudent enough to pretend, that questions of Popish and Protestant +opinions or interest are the things by which men are at present menaced +with crusades by foreign invasion, or with seditions which shake the +foundations of the state at home. It is long since all this combination +of things has vanished from the view of intelligent observers. The +existence of quite another system of opinions and interests is now plain +to the grossest sense. Are these the questions that raise a flame in the +minds of men at this day? If ever the Church and the Constitution of +England should fall in these islands, (and they will fall together,) it +is not Presbyterian discipline nor Popish hierarchy that will rise upon +their ruins. It will not be the Church of Rome nor the Church of +Scotland, not the Church of Luther nor the Church of Calvin. On the +contrary, all these churches are menaced, and menaced alike. It is the +new fanatical religion, now in the heat of its first ferment, of the +Rights of Man, which rejects all establishments, all discipline, all +ecclesiastical, and in truth all civil order, which will triumph, and +which will lay prostrate your Church, which will destroy your +distinctions, and which will put all your properties to auction, and +disperse you over the earth. If the present establishment should fall, +it is this religion which will triumph in Ireland and in England, as it +has triumphed in France. This religion, which laughs at creeds and +dogmas and confessions of faith, may be fomented equally amongst all +descriptions and all sects,--amongst nominal Catholics, and amongst +nominal Churchmen, and amongst those Dissenters who know little and care +less about a presbytery, or any of its discipline, or any of its +doctrine. Against this new, this growing, this exterminatory system, all +these churches have a common concern to defend themselves. How the +enthusiasts of this rising sect rejoice to see you of the old churches +play their game, and stir and rake the cinders of animosities sunk in +their ashes, in order to keep up the execution of their plan for your +common ruin! + +I suppress all that is in my mind about the blindness of those of our +clergy who will shut their eyes to a thing which glares in such manifest +day. If some wretches amongst an indigent and disorderly part of the +populace raise a riot about tithes, there are of these gentlemen ready +to cry out that this is an overt act of a treasonable conspiracy. Here +the bulls, and the pardons, and the crusade, and the Pope, and the +thunders of the Vatican are everywhere at work. There is a plot to bring +in a foreign power to destroy the Church. Alas! it is not about popes, +but about potatoes, that the minds of this unhappy people are agitated. +It is not from the spirit of zeal, but the spirit of whiskey, that these +wretches act. Is it, then, not conceived possible that a poor clown can +be unwilling, after paying three pounds rent to a gentleman in a brown +coat, to pay fourteen shillings to one in a black coat, for his acre of +potatoes, and tumultuously to desire some modification of the charge, +without being supposed to have no other motive than a frantic zeal for +being thus double-taxed to another set of landholders and another set of +priests? Have men no self-interest, no avarice, no repugnance to public +imposts? Have they no sturdy and restive minds, no undisciplined habits? +Is there nothing in the whole mob of irregular passions, which might +precipitate some of the common people, in some places, to quarrel with a +legal, because they feel it to be a burdensome imposition? According to +these gentlemen, no offence can be committed by Papists but from zeal to +their religion. To make room for the vices of Papists, they clear the +house of all the vices of men. Some of the common people (not one, +however, in ten thousand) commit disorders. Well! punish them as you do, +and as you ought to punish them, for their violence against the just +property of each individual clergyman, as each individual suffers. +Support the injured rector, or the injured impropriator, in the +enjoyment of the estate of which (whether on the best plan or not) the +laws have put him in possession. Let the crime and the punishment stand +upon their own bottom. But now we ought all of us, clergymen most +particularly, to avoid assigning another cause of quarrel, in order to +infuse a new source of bitterness into a dispute which personal feelings +on both sides will of themselves make bitter enough, and thereby involve +in it by religious descriptions men who have individually no share +whatsoever in those irregular acts. Let us not make the malignant +fictions of our own imaginations, heated with factious controversies, +reasons for keeping men that are neither guilty nor justly suspected of +crime in a servitude equally dishonorable and unsafe to religion and to +the state. When men are constantly accused, but know themselves not to +be guilty, they must naturally abhor their accusers. There is no +character, when malignantly taken up and deliberately pursued, which +more naturally excites indignation and abhorrence in mankind, especially +in that part of mankind which suffers from it. + +I do not pretend to take pride in an extravagant attachment to any sect. +Some gentlemen in Ireland affect that sort of glory. It is to their +taste. Their piety, I take it for granted, justifies the fervor of their +zeal, and may palliate the excess of it. Being myself no more than a +common layman, commonly informed in controversies, leading only a very +common life, and having only a common citizen's interest in the Church +or in the State, yet to you I will say, in justice to my own sentiments, +that not one of those zealots for a Protestant interest wishes more +sincerely than I do, perhaps not half so sincerely, for the support of +the Established Church in both these kingdoms. It is a great link +towards holding fast the connection of religion with the State, and for +keeping these two islands, in their present critical independence of +constitution, in a close connection of _opinion and affection_. I wish +it well, as the religion of the greater number of the primary +land-proprietors of the kingdom, with whom all establishments of Church +and Stats, for strong political reasons, ought in my opinion to be +firmly connected. I wish it well, because it is more closely combined +than any other of the church systems with the _crown_, which is the stay +of the mixed Constitution,--because it is, as things now stand, the sole +connecting _political_ principle between the constitutions of the two +independent kingdoms. I have another and infinitely a stronger reason +for wishing it well: it is, that in the present time I consider it as +one of the main pillars of the Christian religion itself. The body and +substance of every religion I regard much more than any of the forms and +dogmas of the particular sects. Its fall would leave a great void, which +nothing else, of which I can form any distinct idea, might fill. I +respect the Catholic hierarchy and the Presbyterian republic; but I +know that the hope or the fear of establishing either of them is, in +these kingdoms, equally chimerical, even if I preferred one or the other +of them to the Establishment, which certainly I do not. + +These are some of my reasons for wishing the support of the Church of +Ireland as by law established. These reasons are founded as well on the +absolute as on the relative situation of that kingdom. But is it because +I love the Church, and the King, and the privileges of Parliament, that +I am to be ready for any violence, or any injustice, or any absurdity, +in the means of supporting any of these powers, or all of them together? +Instead of prating about Protestant ascendencies, Protestant Parliaments +ought, in my opinion, to think at last of becoming patriot Parliaments. + +The legislature of Ireland, like all legislatures, ought to frame its +laws to suit the people and the circumstances of the country, and not +any longer to make it their whole business to force the nature, the +temper, and the inveterate habits of a nation to a conformity to +speculative systems concerning any kind of laws. Ireland has an +established government, and a religion legally established, which are to +be preserved. It has a people who are to be preserved too, and to be led +by reason, principle, sentiment, and interest to acquiesce in that +government. Ireland is a country under peculiar circumstances. The +people of Ireland are a very mixed people; and the quantities of the +several ingredients in the mixture are very much disproportioned to each +other. Are we to govern this mixed body as if it were composed of the +most simple elements, comprehending the whole in one system of +benevolent legislation? or are we not rather to provide for the several +parts according to the various and diversified necessities of the +heterogeneous nature of the mass? Would not common reason and common +honesty dictate to us the policy of regulating the people, in the +several descriptions of which they are composed, according to the +natural ranks and classes of an orderly civil society, under a common +protecting sovereign, and under a form of constitution favorable at once +to authority and to freedom,--such as the British Constitution boasts to +be, and such as it is to those who enjoy it? + +You have an ecclesiastical establishment, which, though the religion of +the prince, and of most of the first class of landed proprietors, is not +the religion of the major part of the inhabitants, and which +consequently does not answer to _them_ any one purpose of a religious +establishment. This is a state of things which no man in his senses can +call perfectly happy. But it is the state of Ireland. Two hundred years +of experiment show it to be unalterable. Many a fierce struggle has +passed between the parties. The result is, you cannot make the people +Protestants, and they cannot shake off a Protestant government. This is +what experience teaches, and what all men of sense of all descriptions +know. To-day the question is this: Are we to make the best of this +situation, which we cannot alter? The question is: Shall the condition +of the body of the people be alleviated in other things, on account of +their necessary suffering from their being subject to the burdens of two +religious establishments, from one of which they do not partake the +least, living or dying, either of instruction or of consolation,--or +shall it be aggravated, by stripping the people thus loaded of +everything which might support and indemnify them in this state, so as +to leave them naked of every sort of right and of every name of +franchise, to outlaw them from the Constitution, and to cut off +(perhaps) three millions of plebeian subjects, without reference to +property, or any other qualification, from all connection with the +popular representation, of the kingdom? + +As to religion, it has nothing at all to do with the proceeding. Liberty +is not sacrificed to a zeal for religion, but a zeal for religion is +pretended and assumed to destroy liberty. The Catholic religion is +completely free. It has no establishment,--but it is recognized, +permitted, and, in a degree, protected by the laws. If a man is +satisfied to be a slave, he may be a Papist with perfect impunity. He +may say mass, or hear it, as he pleases; but he must consider himself as +an outlaw from the British Constitution. If the constitutional liberty +of the subject were not the thing aimed at, the direct reverse course +would be taken. The franchise would have been permitted, and the mass +exterminated. But the conscience of a man left, and a tenderness for it +hypocritically pretended, is to make it a trap to catch his liberty. + +So much is this the design, that the violent partisans of this scheme +fairly take up all the maxims and arguments, as well as the practices, +by which tyranny has fortified itself at all times. Trusting wholly in +their strength and power, (and upon this they reckon, as always ready to +strike wherever they wish to direct the storm,) they abandon all pretext +of the general good of the community. They say, that, if the people, +under any given modification, obtain the smallest portion or particle of +constitutional freedom, it will be impossible for them to hold their +property. They tell us that they act only on the defensive. They inform +the public of Europe that their estates are made up of forfeitures and +confiscations from the natives; that, if the body of people obtain +votes, any number of votes, however small, it will be a step to the +choice of members of their own religion; that the House of Commons, in +spite of the influence of nineteen parts in twenty of the landed +interest now in their hands, will be composed in the whole, or in far +the major part, of Papists; that this Popish House of Commons will +instantly pass a law to confiscate all their estates, which it will not +be in their power to save even by entering into that Popish party +themselves, because there are prior claimants to be satisfied; that, as +to the House of Lords, though neither Papists nor Protestants have a +share in electing them, the body of the peerage will be so obliging and +disinterested as to fall in with this exterminatory scheme, which is to +forfeit all their estates, the largest part of the kingdom; and, to +crown all, that his Majesty will give his cheerful assent to this +causeless act of attainder of his innocent and faithful Protestant +subjects; that they will be or are to be left, without house or land, to +the dreadful resource of living by their wits, out of which they are +already frightened by the apprehension of this spoliation with which +they are threatened; that, therefore, they cannot so much as listen to +any arguments drawn from equity or from national or constitutional +policy: the sword is at their throats; beggary and famine at their door. +See what it is to have a good look-out, and to see danger at the end of +a sufficiently long perspective! + +This is, indeed, to speak plain, though to speak nothing very new. The +same thing has been said in all times and in all languages. The language +of tyranny has been invariable: "The general good is inconsistent with +my personal safety." Justice and liberty seem so alarming to these +gentlemen, that they are not ashamed even to slander their own titles, +to calumniate and call in doubt their right to their own estates, and to +consider themselves as novel disseizors, usurpers, and intruders, rather +than lose a pretext for becoming oppressors of their fellow-citizens, +whom they (not I) choose to describe themselves as having robbed. + +Instead of putting themselves in this odious point of light, one would +think they would wish to let Time draw his oblivious veil over the +unpleasant modes by which lordships and demesnes have been acquired in +theirs, and almost in all other countries upon earth. It might be +imagined, that, when the sufferer (if a sufferer exists) had forgot the +wrong, they would be pleased to forget it too,--that they would permit +the sacred name of possession to stand in the place of the melancholy +and unpleasant title of grantees of confiscation, which, though firm and +valid in law, surely merits the name that a great Roman jurist gave to a +title at least as valid in his nation as confiscation would be either in +his or in ours: _Tristis et luctuosa successio_. + +Such is the situation of every man who comes in upon the ruin of +another; his succeeding, under this circumstance, is _tristis et +luctuosa successio_. If it had been the fate of any gentleman to profit +by the confiscation of his neighbor, one would think he would be more +disposed to give him a valuable interest under him in his land, or to +allow him a pension, as I understand one worthy person has done, without +fear or apprehension that his benevolence to a ruined family would be +construed into a recognition of the forfeited title. The public of +England, the other day, acted in this manner towards Lord Newburgh, a +Catholic. Though the estate had been vested by law in the greatest of +the public charities, they have given him a pension from his +confiscation. They have gone further in other cases. On the last +rebellion, in 1745, in Scotland, several forfeitures were incurred. They +had been disposed of by Parliament to certain laudable uses. Parliament +reversed the method which they had adopted in Lord Newburgh's case, and +in my opinion did better: they gave the forfeited estates to the +successors of the forfeiting proprietors, chargeable in part with the +uses. Is this, or anything like this, asked in favor of any human +creature in Ireland? It is bounty, it is charity,--wise bounty, and +politic charity; but no man can claim it as a right. Here no such thing +is claimed as right, or begged as charity. The demand has an object as +distant from all considerations of this sort as any two extremes can be. +The people desire the privileges inseparably annexed, since Magna +Charta, to the freehold which they have by descent or obtain as the +fruits of their industry. They call for no man's estate; they desire not +to be dispossessed of their own. + +But this melancholy and invidious title is a favorite (and, like +favorites, always of the least merit) with those who possess every other +title upon earth along with it. For this purpose they revive the bitter +memory of every dissension which has torn to pieces their miserable +country for ages. After what has passed in 1782, one would not think +that decorum, to say nothing of policy, would permit them to call up, by +magic charms, the grounds, reasons, and principles of those terrible +confiscatory and exterminatory periods. They would not set men upon +calling from the quiet sleep of death any Samuel, to ask him by what act +of arbitrary monarchs, by what inquisitions of corrupted tribunals and +tortured jurors, by what fictitious tenures invented to dispossess whole +unoffending tribes and their chieftains. They would not conjure up the +ghosts from the ruins of castles and churches, to tell for what attempt +to struggle for the independence of an Irish legislature, and to raise +armies of volunteers without regular commissions from the crown in +support of that independence, the estates of the old Irish nobility and +gentry had been confiscated. They would not wantonly call on those +phantoms to tell by what English acts of Parliament, forced upon two +reluctant kings, the lands of their country were put up to a mean and +scandalous auction in every goldsmith's shop in London, or chopped to +pieces and out into rations, to pay the mercenary soldiery of a regicide +usurper. They would not be so fond of titles under Cromwell, who, if he +avenged an Irish rebellion against the sovereign authority of the +Parliament of England, had himself rebelled against the very Parliament +whose sovereignty he asserted, full as much as the Irish nation, which +he was sent to subdue and confiscate, could rebel against that +Parliament, or could rebel against the king, against whom both he and +the Parliament which he served, and which he betrayed, had both of them +rebelled. + +The gentlemen who hold the language of the day know perfectly well that +the Irish in 1641 pretended, at least, that they did not rise against +the king: nor in fact did they, whatever constructions law might put +upon their act. But full surely they rebelled against the authority of +the Parliament of England, and they openly professed so to do. Admitting +(I have now no time to discuss the matter) the enormous and unpardonable +magnitude of this their crime, they rued it in their persons, and in +those of their children and their grandchildren, even to the fifth and +sixth generations. Admitting, then, the enormity of this unnatural +rebellion in favor of the independence of Ireland, will it follow that +it must be avenged forever? Will it follow that it must be avenged on +thousands and perhaps hundreds of thousands of those whom they can never +trace, by the labors of the most subtle metaphysician of the traduction +of crimes, or the most inquisitive genealogist of proscription, to the +descendant of any one concerned in that nefarious Irish rebellion +against the Parliament of England? + +If, however, you could find out those pedigrees of guilt, I do not think +the difference would be essential. History records many things which +ought to make us hate evil actions; but neither history, nor morals, nor +policy can teach us to punish innocent men on that account. What lesson +does the iniquity of prevalent factions read to us? It ought to lesson +us into an abhorrence of the abuse of our own power in our own day, when +we hate its excesses so much in other persons and in other times. To +that school true statesmen ought to be satisfied to leave mankind. They +ought not to call from the dead all the discussions and litigations +which formerly inflamed the furious factions which had torn their +country to pieces; they ought not to rake into the hideous and +abominable things which were done in the turbulent fury of an injured, +robbed, and persecuted people, and which were afterwards cruelly +revenged in the execution, and as outrageously and shamefully +exaggerated in the representation, in order, an hundred and fifty years +after, to find some color for justifying them in the eternal +proscription and civil excommunication of a whole people. + +Let us come to a later period of those confiscations with the memory of +which the gentlemen who triumph in the acts of 1782 are so much +delighted. The Irish again rebelled against the English Parliament in +1688, and the English Parliament again put up to sale the greatest part +of their estates. I do not presume to defend the Irish for this +rebellion, nor to blame the English Parliament for this confiscation. +The Irish, it is true, did not revolt from King James's power. He threw +himself upon their fidelity, and they supported him to the best of their +feeble power. Be the crime of that obstinate adherence to an abdicated +sovereign, against a prince whom the Parliaments of Ireland and Scotland +had recognized, what it may, I do not mean to justify this rebellion +more than the former. It might, however, admit some palliation in them. +In generous minds some small degree of compassion might be excited for +an error, where they were misled, as Cicero says to a conqueror, _quadam +specie et similitudine pacis_, not without a mistaken appearance of +duty, and for which the guilty have suffered, by exile abroad and +slavery at home, to the extent of their folly or their offence. The best +calculators compute that Ireland lost two hundred thousand of her +inhabitants in that struggle. If the principle of the English and +Scottish resistance at the Revolution is to be justified, (as sure I am +it is,) the submission of Ireland must be somewhat extenuated. For, if +the Irish resisted King William, they resisted him on the very same +principle that the English and Scotch resisted King James. The Irish +Catholics must have been the very worst and the most truly unnatural of +rebels, if they had not supported a prince whom they had seen attacked, +not for any designs against _their_ religion or _their_ liberties, but +for an extreme partiality for their sect, and who, far from trespassing +on _their_ liberties and properties, secured both them and the +independence of their country in much the same manner that we have seen +the same things done at the period of 1782,--I trust the last revolution +in Ireland. + +That the Irish Parliament of King James did in some particulars, though +feebly, imitate the rigor which had been used towards the Irish, is true +enough. Blamable enough they were for what they had done, though under +the greatest possible provocation. I shall never praise confiscations or +counter-confiscations as long as I live. When they happen by necessity, +I shall think the necessity lamentable and odious: I shall think that +anything done under it ought not to pass into precedent, or to be +adopted by choice, or to produce any of those shocking retaliations +which never suffer dissensions to subside. Least of all would I fix the +transitory spirit of civil fury by perpetuating and methodizing it in +tyrannic government. If it were permitted to argue with power, might one +not ask these gentlemen whether it would not be more natural, instead of +wantonly mooting these questions concerning their property, as if it +were an exercise in law, to found it on the solid rock of +prescription,--the soundest, the most general, and the most recognized +title between man and man that is known in municipal or in public +jurisprudence?--a title in which not arbitrary institutions, but the +eternal order of things, gives judgment; a title which is not the +creature, but the master, of positive law; a title which, though not +fixed in its term, is rooted in its principle in the law of Nature +itself, and is indeed the original ground of all known property: for all +property in soil will always be traced back to that source, and will +rest there. The miserable natives of Ireland, who ninety-nine in an +hundred are tormented with quite other cares, and are bowed down to +labor for the bread of the hour, are not, as gentlemen pretend, plodding +with antiquaries for titles of centuries ago to the estates of the great +lords and squires for whom they labor. But if they were thinking of the +titles which gentlemen labor to beat into their heads, where can they +bottom their own claims, but in a presumption and a proof that these +lands had at some time been possessed by their ancestors? These +gentlemen (for they have lawyers amongst them) know as well as I that in +England we have had always a prescription or limitation, as all nations +have, against each other. The crown was excepted; but that exception is +destroyed, and we have lately established a sixty years' possession as +against the crown. All titles terminate in prescription,--in which +(differently from Time in the fabulous instances) the son devours the +father, and the last prescription eats up all the former. + + * * * * * + + + + +A + +LETTER + +ON + +THE AFFAIRS OF IRELAND. + +1797. + + +Dear Sir,--In the reduced state of body and in the dejected state of +mind in which I find myself at this very advanced period of my life, it +is a great consolation to me to know that a cause I ever have had so +very near my heart is taken up by a man of your activity and talents. + +It is very true that your late friend, my ever dear and honored son, was +in the highest degree solicitous about the final event of a business +which he also had pursued for a long time with infinite zeal, and no +small degree of success. It was not above half an hour before he left me +forever that he spoke with considerable earnestness on this very +subject. If I had needed any incentives to do my best for freeing the +body of my country from the grievances under which they labor, this +alone would certainly call forth all my endeavors. + +The person who succeeded to the government of Ireland about the time of +that afflicting event had been all along of my sentiments and yours upon +this subject; and far from needing to be stimulated by me, that +incomparable person, and those in whom he strictly confided, even went +before me in their resolution to pursue the great end of government, the +satisfaction and concord of the people with whose welfare they were +charged. I cannot bear to think on the causes by which this great plan +of policy, so manifestly beneficial to both kingdoms, has been +defeated. + +Your mistake with regard to me lies in supposing that I did not, when +his removal was in agitation, strongly and personally represent to +several of his Majesty's ministers, to whom I could have the most ready +access, the true state of Ireland, and the mischiefs which sooner or +later must arise from subjecting the mass of the people to the +capricious and interested domination of an exceeding small faction and +its dependencies. + +That representation was made the last time, or very nearly the last +time, that I have ever had the honor of seeing those ministers. I am so +far from having any credit with them, on this, or any other public +matters, that I have reason to be certain, if it were known that any +person in office in Ireland, from the highest to the lowest, were +influenced by my opinions, and disposed to act upon them, such an one +would be instantly turned out of his employment. Yon have formed, to my +person a flattering, yet in truth a very erroneous opinion, of my power +with those who direct the public measures. I never have been directly or +indirectly consulted about anything that is done. The judgment of the +eminent and able persons who conduct public affairs is undoubtedly +superior to mine; but self-partiality induces almost every man to defer +something to his own. Nothing is more notorious than that I have the +misfortune of thinking that no one capital measure relative to political +arrangements, and still less that a new military plan for the defence of +either kingdom in this arduous war, has been taken upon any other +principle than such as must conduct us to inevitable ruin. + +In the state of my mind, so discordant with the tone of ministers, and +still more discordant with the tone of opposition, you may judge what +degree of weight I am likely to have with either of the parties who +divide this kingdom,--even though I were endowed with strength of body, +or were possessed of any active situation in the government, which might +give success to my endeavors. But the fact is, since the day of my +unspeakable calamity, except in the attentions of a very few old and +compassionate friends, I am totally out of all social intercourse. My +health has gone down very rapidly; and I have been brought hither with +very faint hopes of life, and enfeebled to such a degree as those who +had known me some time ago could scarcely think credible. Since I came +hither, my sufferings have been greatly aggravated, and my little +strength still further reduced; so that, though I am told the symptoms +of my disorder begin to carry a more favorable aspect, I pass the far +larger part of the twenty-four hours, indeed almost the whole, either in +my bed or lying upon the couch from which I dictate this. Had you been +apprised of this circumstance, you could not have expected anything, as +you seem to do, from my active exertions. I could do nothing, if I was +still stronger, not even _si meus adforet Hector_. + +There is no hope for the body of the people of Ireland, as long as those +who are in power with you shall make it the great object of their policy +to propagate an opinion on this side of the water that the mass of their +countrymen are not to be trusted by their government, and that the only +hold which England has upon Ireland consists in preserving a certain +very small number of gentlemen in full possession of a monopoly of that +kingdom. This system has disgusted many others besides Catholics and +Dissenters. + +As to those who on your side are in the opposition to government, they +are composed of persons several of whom I love and revere. They have +been irritated by a treatment too much for the ordinary patience of +mankind to bear into the adoption of schemes which, however +_argumentatively_ specious, would go _practically_ to the inevitable +ruin of the kingdom. The opposition always connects the emancipation of +the Catholics with these schemes of reformation: indeed, it makes the +former only a member of the latter project. The gentlemen who enforce +that opposition are, in my opinion, playing the game of their +adversaries with all their might; and there is no third party in Ireland +(nor in England neither) to separate things that are in themselves so +distinct,--I mean the admitting people to the benefits of the +Constitution, and a change in the form of the Constitution itself. + +As every one knows that a great part of the constitution of the Irish +House of Commons was formed about the year 1614 expressly for bringing +that House into a state of dependence, and that the new representative +was at that time seated and installed by force and violence, nothing can +be more impolitic than for those who wish the House to stand on its +present basis (as, for one, I most sincerely do) to make it appear to +have kept too much the principle of its first institution, and to +continue to be as little a virtual as it is an actual representative of +the commons. It is the _degeneracy_ of such an institution, _so vicious +in its principle_, that is to be wished for. If men have the real +benefit of a _sympathetic_ representation, none but those who are heated +and intoxicated with theory will look for any other. This sort of +representation, my dear Sir, must wholly depend, not on the force with +which it is upheld, but upon the _prudence_ of those who have influence +upon it. Indeed, without some such prudence in the use of authority, I +do not know, at least in the present time, how any power can long +continue. + +If it be true that both parties are carrying things to extremities in +different ways, the object which you and I have in common, that is to +say, the union and concord of our country _on the basis of the actual +representation_, without risking those evils which any change in the +form of our legislature must inevitably bring on, can never be obtained. +On the part of the Catholics (that is to say, of the body of the people +of the kingdom) it is a terrible alternative, either to submit to the +yoke of declared and insulting enemies, or to seek a remedy in plunging +themselves into the horrors and crimes of that Jacobinism which +unfortunately is not disagreeable to the principles and inclinations of, +I am afraid, the majority of what we call the Protestants of Ireland. +The Protestant part of that kingdom is represented by the government +itself to be, by whole counties, in nothing less than open rebellion. I +am sure that it is everywhere teeming with dangerous conspiracy. + +I believe it will be found, that, though the principles of the +Catholics, and the incessant endeavors of their clergy, have kept them +from being generally infected with the systems of this time, yet, +whenever their situation brings them nearer into contact with the +Jacobin Protestants, they are more or less infected with their +doctrines. + +It is a matter for melancholy reflection, but I am fully convinced, that +many persons in Ireland would be glad that the Catholics should become +more and more infected with the Jacobin madness, in order to furnish new +arguments for fortifying them in their monopoly. On any other ground it +is impossible to account for the late language of your men in power. If +statesmen, (let me suppose for argument,) upon the most solid political +principles, conceive themselves obliged to resist the wishes of the far +more numerous, and, as things stand, not the worse part of the +community, one would think they would naturally put their refusal as +much as possible upon temporary grounds, and that they would act towards +them in the most conciliatory manner, and would talk to them in the most +gentle and soothing language: for refusal, in itself, is not a very +gracious thing; and, unfortunately, men are very quickly irritated out +of their principles. Nothing is more discouraging to the loyalty of any +description of men than to represent to them that their humiliation and +subjection make a principal part in the fundamental and invariable +policy which regards the conjunction of these two kingdoms. This is not +the way to give them a warm interest in that conjunction. + +My poor opinion is, that the closest connection between Great Britain +and Ireland is essential to the well-being, I had almost said, to the +very being, of the two kingdoms. For that purpose I humbly conceive that +the whole of the superior, and what I should call _imperial_ politics, +ought to have its residence here; and that Ireland, locally, civilly, +and commercially independent, ought politically to look up to Great +Britain in all matters of peace or of war,--in all those points to be +guided by her.--and, in a word, with her to live and to die. At bottom, +Ireland has no other choice,--I mean, no other rational choice. + +I think, indeed, that Great Britain would be ruined by the separation of +Ireland; but as there are degrees even in ruin, it would fall the most +heavily on Ireland. By such a separation Ireland would be the most +completely undone country in the world,--the most wretched, the most +distracted, and, in the end, the most desolate part of the habitable +globe. Little do many people in Ireland consider how much of its +prosperity has been owing to, and still depends upon, its intimate +connection with this kingdom. But, more sensible of this great truth, +than perhaps any other man, I have never conceived, or can conceive, +that the connection is strengthened by making the major part of the +inhabitants of your country believe that their ease, and their +satisfaction, and their equalization with the rest of their +fellow-subjects of Ireland are things adverse to the principles of that +connection,--or that their subjection to a small monopolizing junto, +composed of one of the smallest of their own internal factions, is the +very condition upon which the harmony of the two kingdoms essentially +depends. I was sorry to hear that this principle, or something not +unlike it, was publicly and fully avowed by persons of great rank and +authority in the House of Lords in Ireland. + +As to a participation on the part of the Catholics in the privileges and +capacities which are withheld, without meaning wholly to depreciate +their importance, if I had the honor of being an Irish Catholic, I +should be content to expect satisfaction upon that subject with +patience, until the minds of my adversaries, few, but powerful, were +come to a proper temper: because, if the Catholics did enjoy, without +fraud, chicane, or partiality, some fair portion of those advantages +which the law, even as now the law is, leaves open to them, and if the +rod were not shaken over them at every turn, their present condition +would be tolerable; as compared with their former condition, it would be +happy. But the most favorable laws can do very little towards the +happiness of a people, when the disposition of the ruling power is +adverse to them. Men do not live upon blotted paper. The favorable or +the hostile mind of the ruling power is of far more importance to +mankind, for good or evil, than the black-letter of any statute. Late +acts of Parliament, whilst they fixed at least a temporary bar to the +hopes and progress of the larger description of the nation, opened to +them certain subordinate objects of equality; but it is impossible that +the people should imagine that any fair measure of advantage is intended +to them, when they hear the laws by which they were admitted to this +limited qualification publicly reprobated as excessive and +inconsiderate. They must think that there is a hankering after the old +penal and persecuting code. Their alarm must be great, when that +declaration is made by a person in very high and important office in the +House of Commons, and as the very first specimen and auspice of a new +government. + +All this is very unfortunate. I have the honor of an old acquaintance, +and entertain, in common with you, a very high esteem for the few +English persons who are concerned in the government of Ireland; but I am +not ignorant of the relation these transitory ministers bear to the +more settled Irish part of your administration. It is a delicate topic, +upon which I wish to say but little, though my reflections upon it are +many and serious. There is a great cry against English influence. I am +quite sure that it is Irish influence that dreads the English habits. + +Great disorders have long prevailed in Ireland. It is not long since +that the Catholics were the suffering party from those disorders. I am +sure they were not protected as the case required. Their sufferings +became a matter of discussion in Parliament. It produced the most +infuriated declamation against them that I have ever read. An inquiry +was moved into the facts. The declamation was at least tolerated, if not +approved. The inquiry was absolutely rejected. In that case, what is +left for those who are abandoned by government, but to join with the +persons who are capable of injuring them or protecting them as they +oppose or concur in their designs? This will produce a very fatal kind +of union amongst the people; but it is an union, which an unequal +administration of justice tends necessarily to produce. + +If anything could astonish one at this time, it is the war that the +rulers in Ireland think it proper to carry on against the person whom +they call the Pope, and against all his adherents, whenever they think +they have the power of manifesting their hostility. Without in the least +derogating from the talents of your theological politicians, or from the +military abilities of your commanders (who act on the same principles) +in Ireland, and without derogating from the zeal of either, it appears +to me that the Protestant Directory of Paris, as statesmen, and the +Protestant hero, Buonaparte, as a general, have done more to destroy +the said Pope and all his adherents, in all their capacities, than the +junto in Ireland have ever been able to effect. You must submit your +_fasces_ to theirs, and at best be contented to follow with songs of +gratulation, or invectives, according to your humor, the triumphal car +of those great conquerors. Had that true Protestant, Hoche, with an army +not infected with the slightest tincture of Popery, made good his +landing in Ireland, he would have saved you from a great deal of the +trouble which is taken to keep under a description of your +fellow-citizens obnoxious to you from their religion. It would not have +a month's existence, supposing his success. This is the alliance which, +under the appearance of hostility, we act as if we wished to promote. +All is well, provided we are safe from Popery. + +It was not necessary for you, my dear Sir, to explain yourself to _me_ +(in justification of your good wishes to your fellow-citizens) +concerning your total alienation from the principles of the Catholics. I +am more concerned in what we agree than in what we differ. You know the +impossibility of our forming any judgment upon the opinions, religious, +moral, or political, of those who in the largest sense are called +Protestants,--at least, as these opinions and tenets form a +qualification for holding any civil, judicial, military, or even +ecclesiastical situation. I have no doubt of the orthodox opinion of +many, both of the clergy and laity, professing the established religion +in Ireland, and of many even amongst the Dissenters, relative to the +great points of the Christian faith: but that orthodoxy concerns them +only as _individuals_. As a _qualification_ for employment, we all know +that in Ireland it is not necessary that they should profess any +religion at all: so that the war that we make is upon certain +theological tenets, about which scholastic disputes are carried on _æquo +Marte_, by controvertists, on their side, as able and as learned, and +perhaps as well-intentioned, as those are who fight the battle on the +other part. To them I would leave those controversies. I would turn my +mind to what is more within its competence, and has been more my study, +(though, for a man of the world, I have thought of those things,)--I +mean, the moral, civil, and political good of the countries we belong +to, and in which God has appointed your station and mine. Let every man +be as pious as he pleases, and in the way that he pleases; but it is +agreeable neither to piety nor to policy to give exclusively all manner +of civil privileges and advantages to a _negative_ religion, (such is +the Protestant without a certain creed,) and at the same time to deny +those privileges to men whom we know to agree to an iota in every one +_positive_ doctrine which all of us who profess the religion +authoritatively taught in England hold ourselves, according to our +faculties, bound to believe. The Catholics of Ireland (as I have said) +have the whole of our _positive_ religion: our difference is only a +negation of certain tenets of theirs. If we strip ourselves of _that_ +part of Catholicism, we abjure Christianity. If we drive them from that +holding, without engaging them in some other positive religion, (which +you know by our qualifying laws we do not,) what do we better than to +hold out to them terrors on the one side, and bounties on the other, in +favor of that which, for anything we know to the contrary, may be pure +atheism? + +You are well aware, that, when a man renounces the Roman religion, +there is no civil inconvenience or incapacity whatsoever which shall +hinder him from joining any new or old sect of Dissenters, or of forming +a sect of his own invention upon the most anti-christian principles. Let +Mr. Thomas Paine obtain a pardon, (as on change of ministry he may,) +there is nothing to hinder him from setting up a church of his own in +the very midst of you. He is a natural-born British subject. His French +citizenship does not disqualify him, at least upon a peace. This +Protestant apostle is as much above all suspicion of Popery as the +greatest and most zealous of your sanhedrim in Ireland can possibly be. +On purchasing a qualification, (which his friends of the Directory are +not so poor as to be unable to effect,) he may sit in Parliament; and +there is no doubt that there is not one of your tests against Popery +that he will not take as fairly, and as much _ex animo_, as the best of +your zealot statesmen. I push this point no further, and only adduce +this example (a pretty strong one, and fully in point) to show what I +take to be the madness and folly of driving men, under the existing +circumstances, from any _positive_ religion whatever into the irreligion +of the times, and its sure concomitant principles of anarchy. + +When religion is brought into a question of civil and political +arrangement, it must be considered more politically than theologically, +at least by us, who are nothing more than mere laymen. In that light, +the case of the Catholics of Ireland is peculiarly hard, whether they be +laity or clergy. If any of them take part, like the gentleman you +mention, with some of the most accredited Protestants of the country, in +projects which cannot be more abhorrent to your nature and disposition +than they are to mine,--in that case, however few these Catholic +factions who are united with factious Protestants may be, (and very few +they are now, whatever shortly they may become,) on their account the +whole body is considered as of suspected fidelity to the crown, and as +wholly undeserving of its favor. But if, on the contrary, in those +districts of the kingdom where their numbers are the greatest, where +they make, in a manner, the whole body of the people, (as, out of +cities, in three fourths of the kingdom they do,) these Catholics show +every mark of loyalty and zeal in support of the government, which at +best looks on them with an evil eye, then their very loyalty is turned +against their claims. They are represented as a contented and happy +people, and that it is unnecessary to do anything more in their favor. +Thus the factious disposition of a few among the Catholics and the +loyalty of the whole mass are equally assigned as reasons for not +putting them on a par with those Protestants who are asserted by the +government itself, which frowns upon Papists, to be in a state of +nothing short of actual rebellion, and in a strong disposition to make +common cause with the worst foreign enemy that these countries have ever +had to deal with. What in the end can come of all this? + +As to the Irish Catholic clergy, their condition is likewise most +critical. If they endeavor by their influence to keep a dissatisfied +laity in quiet, they are in danger of losing the little credit they +possess, by being considered as the instruments of a government adverse +to the civil interests of their flock. If they let things take their +course, they will be represented as colluding with sedition, or at least +tacitly encouraging it. If they remonstrate against persecution, they +propagate rebellion. Whilst government publicly avows hostility to that +people, as a part of a regular system, there is no road they can take +which does not lead to their ruin. + +If nothing can be done on your side of the water, I promise you that +nothing will be done here. Whether in reality or only in appearance I +cannot positively determine, but you will be left to yourselves by the +ruling powers here. It is thus ostensibly and above-board; and in part, +I believe, the disposition is real. As to the people at large in this +country, I am sure they have no disposition to intermeddle in your +affairs. They mean you no ill whatever; and they are too ignorant of the +state of your affairs to be able to do you any good. Whatever opinion +they have on your subject is very faint and indistinct; and if there is +anything like a formed notion, even that amounts to no more than a sort +of humming that remains on their ears of the burden of the old song +about Popery. Poor souls, they are to be pitied, who think of nothing +but dangers long passed by, and but little of the perils that actually +surround them. + + * * * * * + +I have been long, but it is almost a necessary consequence of dictating, +and that by snatches, as a relief from pain gives me the means of +expressing my sentiments. They can have little weight, as coming from +me; and I have not power enough of mind or body to bring them out with +their natural force. But I do not wish to have it concealed that I am of +the same opinion, to my last breath, which I entertained when my +faculties were at the best; and I have not held back from men in power +in this kingdom, to whom I have very good wishes, any part of my +sentiments on this melancholy subject, so long as I had means of access +to persons of their consideration. + +I have the honor to be, &c. + + + + +END OF VOL. VI. + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Works of the Right Honourable +Edmund Burke, Vol. VI. 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(of 12), by Edmund Burke + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. VI. (of 12) + +Author: Edmund Burke + +Release Date: April 24, 2005 [EBook #15702] +[Date last updated: May 5, 2006] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK BURKE VOL 6 *** + + + + +Produced by Paul Murray, Susan Skinner and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team from images generously made +available by the Bibliothèque nationale de France +(BnF/Gallica) at http://gallica.bnf.fr + + + + + + +</pre> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<h2>THE WORKS +<br /><br /> +<span style="font-size: 71%">OF</span> +<br /><br /> +THE RIGHT HONOURABLE<br /> + +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 200%">EDMUND BURKE</span></h2> + +<h3>IN TWELVE VOLUMES<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: smaller">VOLUME THE SIXTH</span></h3> +<p /> +<div style="text-align: center"> +<img src="images/001.png" alt="BURKE COAT OF ARMS." title="BURKE COAT OF ARMS" /> +</div> +<p /> +<p style="text-align: center; text-indent: 0"><b>London</b><br /> +<br /> + +JOHN C. NIMMO<br /> +<br /> +14, KING WILLIAM STREET, STRAND, W.C.<br /> + +MDCCCLXXXVII<br /></p> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + + + +<h2><a name="CONTENTS_OF_VOL_VI" id="CONTENTS_OF_VOL_VI" />CONTENTS OF VOL. VI.</h2> + +<ul class="TOC"> +<li><a href="#PREFACE">PREFACE TO THE SECOND POSTHUMOUS VOLUME, IN A LETTER TO THE RIGHT + HON. WILLIAM ELLIOT</a> <span class="tocright">v</span></li> + +<li><a href="#FOURTH_LETTER">FOURTH LETTER ON THE PROPOSALS FOR PEACE WITH THE REGICIDE DIRECTORY + OF FRANCE; WITH THE PRELIMINARY CORRESPONDENCE</a> <span class="tocright"><a href="#Page_1">1</a></span></li> + +<li><a href="#EMPRESS_OF_RUSSIA">LETTER TO THE EMPRESS OF RUSSIA, November 1, 1791</a> <span class="tocright"><a href="#Page_113">113</a></span></li> + +<li><a href="#SIR_CHARLES_BINGHAM">LETTER TO SIR CHARLES BINGHAM, BART., ON THE IRISH ABSENTEE TAX, + October 30, 1773</a> <span class="tocright"><a href="#Page_121">121</a></span></li> + +<li><a href="#CHARLES_JAMES_FOX">LETTER TO THE HON. CHARLES JAMES FOX, ON THE AMERICAN WAR, + October 8, 1777</a> <span class="tocright"><a href="#Page_135">135</a></span></li> + +<li><a href="#THE_MARQUIS_OF_ROCKINGHAM">LETTER TO THE MARQUIS OF ROCKINGHAM, WITH ADDRESSES TO THE KING, + AND THE BRITISH COLONISTS IN NORTH AMERICA, IN RELATION TO THE + MEASURES OF GOVERNMENT IN THE AMERICAN CONTEST, AND A PROPOSED + SECESSION OF THE OPPOSITION FROM PARLIAMENT, January, 1777</a> <span class="tocright"><a href="#Page_149">149</a></span></li> + +<li><a href="#EDMUND_S_PERY">LETTER TO THE RIGHT HON. EDMUND S. PERRY, IN RELATION TO A BILL + FOR THE RELIEF OF THE ROMAN CATHOLICS OF IRELAND, July 18, 1778</a> <span class="tocright"><a href="#Page_197">197</a></span></li> + +<li><a href="#TWO_LETTERS">TWO LETTERS TO THOMAS BURGH, ESQ., AND JOHN MERLOTT, ESQ., IN + VINDICATION OF HIS PARLIAMENTARY CONDUCT RELATIVE TO THE AFFAIRS + OF IRELAND, 1780</a> <span class="tocright"><a href="#Page_207">207</a></span></li> + +<li><a href="#LETTERS_AND_REFLECTIONS">LETTERS AND REFLECTIONS ON THE EXECUTIONS OF THE RIOTERS IN 1780</a> <span class="tocright"><a href="#Page_239">239</a></span></li> + +<li><a href="#THE_RIGHT_HON_HENRY_DUNDAS">LETTER TO THE RIGHT HON. HENRY DUNDAS: WITH THE SKETCH OF A NEGRO + CODE, 1792</a> <span class="tocright"><a href="#Page_255">255</a></span></li> + +<li><a href="#CHAIRMAN_OF_THE_BUCKINGHAMSHIRE">LETTER TO THE CHAIRMAN OF THE BUCKINGHAMSHIRE MEETING, HELD AT + AYLESBURY, APRIL 13, 1780, ON THE SUBJECT OF PARLIAMENTARY + REFORM</a> <span class="tocright"><a href="#Page_291">291</a></span></li> + +<li><a href="#FRAGMENTS_OF_A_TRACT">FRAGMENTS OF A TRACT RELATIVE TO THE LAWS AGAINST POPERY IN IRELAND</a> <span class="tocright"><a href="#Page_299">299</a></span></li> + +<li><a href="#WILLIAM_SMITH_ESQ">LETTER TO WILLIAM SMITH, ESQ., ON THE SUBJECT OF CATHOLIC + EMANCIPATION, January 29, 1795</a> <span class="tocright"><a href="#Page_361">361</a></span></li> + +<li><a href="#SIR_HERCULES_LANGRISHE">SECOND LETTER TO SIR HERCULES LANGRISHE, ON THE CATHOLIC QUESTION, + May 26, 1795</a> <span class="tocright"><a href="#Page_375">375</a></span></li> + +<li><a href="#RICHARD_BURKE_ESQ">LETTER TO RICHARD BURKE, ESQ., ON PROTESTANT ASCENDENCY IN IRELAND, + 1793 </a> <span class="tocright"><a href="#Page_385">385</a></span></li> + +<li><a href="#THE_AFFAIRS_OF_IRELAND">LETTER ON THE AFFAIRS OF IRELAND, 1797</a> <span class="tocright"><a href="#Page_413">413</a></span></li> +</ul> +<p><a name="Page_v" id="Page_v" title="v" class="pagenum"></a></p> + + +<p><a name="PREFACE" id="PREFACE" /></p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>PREFACE<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 70%;">TO THE SECOND POSTHUMOUS VOLUME,<a name="FNanchor_1_1" id="FNanchor_1_1"></a><a href="#Footnote_1_1" class="fnanchor">[1]</a></span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 60%;">IN A LETTER TO</span><br /> +<br /> +THE RIGHT HON. WILLIAM ELLIOT</h2> + + +<p>My dear sir,—As some prefatory account of +the materials which compose this second posthumous +volume of the Works of Mr. Burke, and of +the causes which have prevented its earlier appearance, +will be expected from me, I hope I may be indulged +in the inclination I feel to run over these +matters in a letter to you, rather than in a formal +address to the public.</p> + +<p>Of the delay that has intervened since the publication +of the former volume I shall first say a few +words. Having undertaken, in conjunction with the +late Dr. Laurence, to examine the manuscript papers +of Mr. Burke, and to select and prepare for +the press such of them as should be thought proper +for publication, the difficulties attending our coöperation<a name="Page_vi" id="Page_vi" title="vi" class="pagenum"></a> +were soon experienced by us. The remoteness +of our places of residence in summer, and our professional +and other avocations in winter, opposed perpetual +obstacles to the progress of our undertaking.</p> + +<p>Soon after the publication of the fourth volume, +I was rendered incapable of attending to any business +by a severe and tedious illness. And it was not long +after my recovery before the health of our invaluable +friend began gradually to decline, and soon became +unequal to the increasing labors of his profession and +the discharge of his Parliamentary duties. At length +we lost a man, of whom, as I shall have occasion to +speak more particularly in another part of this undertaking, +I will now content myself with saying, that +in my humble opinion he merited, and certainly obtained +with those best acquainted with his extensive +learning and information, a considerable rank amongst +the eminent persons who have adorned the age in +which we have lived, and of whose services the public +have been deprived by a premature death.</p> + +<p>From these causes little progress had been made +in our work when I was deprived of my coadjutor. +But from that time you can testify of me that I have +not been idle. You can bear witness to the confused +state in which the materials that compose the present +volume came into my hands. The difficulty of reading +many of the manuscripts, obscured by innumerable +erasures, corrections, interlineations, and marginal +insertions, would perhaps have been insuperable<a name="Page_vii" id="Page_vii" title="vii" class="pagenum"></a> +to any person less conversant in the manuscripts of +Mr. Burke than myself. To this difficulty succeeded +that of selecting from several detached papers, written +upon the same subject and the same topics, such +as appeared to contain the author's last thoughts and +emendations. When these difficulties were overcome, +there still remained, in many instances, that of assigning +its proper place to many detached members +of the same piece, where no direct note of connection +had been made. These circumstances, whilst they +will lead the reader not to expect, in the cases to +which they apply, the finished productions of Mr. +Burke, imposed upon me a task of great delicacy +and difficulty,—namely, that of deciding upon the +publication of any, and which, of these unfinished +pieces. I must here beg permission of you, and +Lord Fitzwilliam, to inform the public, that in the +execution of this part of my duty I requested and +obtained your assistance.</p> + +<p>Our first care was to ascertain, from such evidence, +internal and external, as the manuscripts themselves +afforded, what pieces appeared to have been at any +time intended by the author for publication. Our +next was to select such as, though not originally intended +for publication, yet appeared to contain matter +that might contribute to the gratification and instruction +of the public. Our last object was to determine +what degree of imperfection and incorrectness +in papers of either of these classes ought<a name="Page_viii" id="Page_viii" title="viii" class="pagenum"></a> or +ought not to exclude them from a place in the present +volume. This was, doubtless, the most nice and +arduous part of our undertaking. The difficulty, +however, was, in our minds, greatly diminished by +our conviction that the reputation of our author stood +far beyond the reach of injury from any injudicious +conduct of ours in making this selection. On the +other hand, we were desirous that nothing should be +withheld, from which the public might derive any +possible benefit.</p> + +<p>Nothing more is now necessary than that I should +give a short account of the writings which compose +the present volume.</p> + + +<p>I. Fourth Letter on a Regicide Peace.</p> + +<p>Some account has already been given of this Letter +in the Advertisement to the fourth quarto volume.<a name="FNanchor_2_2" id="FNanchor_2_2"></a><a href="#Footnote_2_2" class="fnanchor">[2]</a> +That part of it which is contained between the first +and the middle of the page 67<a name="FNanchor_3_3" id="FNanchor_3_3"></a><a href="#Footnote_3_3" class="fnanchor">[3]</a> is taken from a manuscript +which, nearly to the conclusion, had received +the author's last corrections: the subsequent part, to +the middle of the page 71,<a name="FNanchor_4_4" id="FNanchor_4_4"></a><a href="#Footnote_4_4" class="fnanchor">[4]</a> is taken from some loose +manuscripts, that were dictated by the author, but do +not appear to have been revised by him; and though +they, as well as what follows to the conclusion, were +evidently designed to make a part of this<a name="Page_ix" id="Page_ix" title="ix" class="pagenum"></a> Letter, the +editor alone is responsible for the order in which they +are here placed. The last part, from the middle of +the page 71, had been printed as a part of the Letter +which was originally intended to be the third on Regicide +Peace, as in the preface to the fourth volume +has already been noticed.</p> + +<p>It was thought proper to communicate this Letter +before its publication to Lord Auckland, the author +of the pamphlet so frequently alluded to in it. His +Lordship, in consequence of this communication, was +pleased to put into my hands a letter with which he +had sent his pamphlet to Mr. Burke at the time of its +publication, and Mr. Burke's answer to that letter. +These pieces, together with the note with which his +Lordship transmitted them to me, are prefixed to the +Letter on Regicide Peace.</p> + + +<p>II. Letter to the Empress of Russia.</p> +<p>III. Letter to Sir Charles Bingham.</p> +<p>IV. Letter to the Honorable Charles James Fox.</p> + + +<p>Of these Letters it will be sufficient to remark, that +they come under the second of those classes into +which, as I before observed, we divided the papers +that presented themselves to our consideration.</p> + + +<p>V. Letter to the Marquis of Rockingham.</p> +<p>VI. An Address to the King.</p> +<p>VII. An Address to the British Colonists in North America.</p> + + +<p>These pieces relate to a most important period in<a name="Page_x" id="Page_x" title="x" class="pagenum"></a> +the present reign; and I hope no apology will be +necessary for giving them to the public.</p> + + +<p>VIII. Letter to the Right Honorable Edmund [Sexton] Pery.</p> +<p>IX. Letter to Thomas Burgh, Esq.</p> +<p>X. Letter to John Merlott, Esq.</p> + + +<p>The reader will find, in a note annexed to each of +these Letters, an account of the occasions on which +they were written. The Letter to T. Burgh, Esq., +had found its way into some of the periodical prints +of the time in Dublin.</p> + + +<p>XI. Reflections on the Approaching Executions.</p> + + +<p>It may not, perhaps, now be generally known that +Mr. Burke was a marked object of the rioters in this +disgraceful commotion, from whose fury he narrowly +escaped. The Reflections will be found to contain +maxims of the soundest judicial policy, and do equal +honor to the head and heart of their illustrious +writer.</p> + + +<p>XII. Letter to the Right Honorable Henry Dundas; +with the Sketch of a Negro Code.</p> + + +<p>Mr. Burke, in the Letter to Mr. Dundas, has entered +fully into his own views of the Slave Trade, and +has thereby rendered any further explanation on that +subject at present unnecessary. With respect to the +Code itself, an unsuccessful attempt was made to procure +the copy of it transmitted to Mr. Dundas. It +was not to be found amongst his papers. The Editor<a name="Page_xi" id="Page_xi" title="xi" class="pagenum"></a> +has therefore been obliged to have recourse to a +rough draft of it in Mr. Burke's own handwriting; +from which he hopes he has succeeded in making a +pretty correct transcript of it, as well as in the attempt +he has made to supply the marginal references alluded +to in Mr. Burke's Letter to Mr. Dundas.</p> + + +<p>XIII. Letter to the Chairman of the Buckinghamshire Meeting.</p> + + +<p>Of the occasion of this Letter an account is given +in the note subjoined [prefixed] to it.</p> + +<p>XIV. Tracts and Letters relative to the Laws +against Popery in Ireland.</p> + + +<p>These pieces consist of,—</p> + +<p>1. An unfinished Tract on the Popery Laws. Of +this Tract the reader will find an account in +the note prefixed to it.</p> + +<p>2. A Letter to William Smith, Esq. Several copies +of this letter having got abroad, it was +printed and published in Dublin without the +permission of Mr. Burke, or of the gentleman +to whom it was addressed.</p> + +<p>3. Second Letter to Sir Hercules Langrishe. This +may be considered as supplementary to the +first letter, addressed to the same person in +January, 1792, which was published in the +third volume.<a name="FNanchor_5_5" id="FNanchor_5_5"></a><a href="#Footnote_5_5" class="fnanchor">[5]</a></p> + +<p>4. Letter to Richard Burke, Esq. Of this letter<a name="Page_xii" id="Page_xii" title="xii" class="pagenum"></a> +it will be necessary to observe, that the first +part of it appears to have been originally addressed +by Mr. Burke to his son in the manner +in which it is now printed, but to have been +left unfinished; after whose death he probably +designed to have given the substance of it, +with additional observations, to the public in +some other form, but never found leisure or +inclination to finish it.</p> + +<p>5. A Letter on the Affairs of Ireland, written in +the year 1797. The name of the person to +whom this letter was addressed does not appear +on the manuscript; nor has the letter +been found to which it was written as an answer. +And as the gentleman whom he employed +as an amanuensis is not now living, +no discovery of it can be made, unless this +publication of the letter should produce some +information respecting it, that may enable us +in a future volume to gratify, on this point, +the curiosity of the reader. The letter was +dictated, as he himself tells us, from his couch +at Bath; to which place he had gone, by the +advice of his physicians, in March, 1797. His +health was now rapidly declining; the vigor +of his mind remained unimpaired. This, my +dear friend, was, I believe, the last letter dictated +by him on public affairs:—here ended +his political labors.<a name="Page_xiii" id="Page_xiii" title="xiii" class="pagenum"></a></p> + + +<p>XV. Fragments and Notes of Speeches in Parliament.</p> + + +<p>1. Speech on the Acts of Uniformity.</p> + +<p>2. Speech on a Bill for the Relief of Protestant +Dissenters.</p> + +<p>3. Speech on the Petition of the Unitarians.</p> + +<p>4. Speech on the Middlesex Election.</p> + +<p>5. Speech on a Bill for shortening the Duration +of Parliaments.</p> + +<p>6. Speech on the Reform of the Representation +in Parliament.</p> + +<p>7. Speech on a Bill for explaining the Powers +of Juries in Prosecutions for Libels.</p> + +<p>*7. Letter relative to the same subject.</p> + +<p>8. Speech on a Bill for repealing the Marriage +Act.</p> + +<p>9. Speech on a Bill to quiet the Possessions of +the Subject against Dormant Claims of +the Church.</p> + +<p>With respect to these fragments, I have already +stated the reasons by which we were influenced in +our determination to publish them. An account of +the state in which these manuscripts were found is +given in the note prefixed to this article.</p> + + +<p>XVI. Hints for an Essay on the Drama.</p> + + +<p>This fragment was perused in manuscript by a +learned and judicious critic, our late lamented friend, +Mr. Malone; and under the protection of his opinion<a name="Page_xiv" id="Page_xiv" title="xiv" class="pagenum"></a> +we can feel no hesitation in submitting it to the judgment +of the public.</p> + + +<p>XVII. We are now come to the concluding article +of this volume,—the Essay on the +History of England.</p> + +<p>At what time of the author's life it was written +cannot now be exactly ascertained; but it was certainly +begun before he had attained the age of twenty-seven +years, as it appears from an entry in the +books of the late Mr. Dodsley, that eight sheets of +it, which contain the first seventy-four pages of the +present edition,<a name="FNanchor_6_6" id="FNanchor_6_6"></a><a href="#Footnote_6_6" class="fnanchor">[6]</a> were printed in the year 1757. This +is the only part that has received the finishing +stroke of the author. In those who are acquainted +with the manner in which Mr. Burke usually composed +his graver literary works, and of which some +account is given in the Advertisement prefixed to the +fourth volume, this circumstance will excite a deep +regret; and whilst the public partakes with us in +this feeling, it will doubtless be led to judge with +candor and indulgence of a work left in this imperfect +and unfinished state by its author.</p> + +<p>Before I conclude, it may not be improper to take +this opportunity of acquainting the public with the +progress that has been made towards the completion +of this undertaking. The sixth and seventh volumes,<a name="Page_xv" id="Page_xv" title="xv" class="pagenum"></a> +which will consist entirely of papers that +have a relation to the affairs of the East India +Company, and to the impeachment of Mr. Hastings, +are now in the press. The suspension of the +consideration of the affairs of the East India Company +in Parliament till its nest session has made me +very desirous to get the sixth volume out as early as +possible in the next winter. The Ninth and Eleventh +Reports of the Select Committee, appointed to take +into consideration certain affairs of the East India +Company in the year 1783, were written by Mr. +Burke, and will be given in that volume. They +contain a full and comprehensive view of the commerce, +revenues, civil establishment, and general +policy of the Company, and will therefore be peculiarly +interesting at this time to the public.</p> + +<p>The eighth and last volume will contain a narrative +of the life of Mr. Burke, which will be accompanied +with such parts of his familiar correspondence, +and other occasional productions, as shall be thought +fit for publication.<a name="FNanchor_7_7" id="FNanchor_7_7"></a><a href="#Footnote_7_7" class="fnanchor">[7]</a> The materials relating to the +early years of his life, alluded to in the Advertisement +to the fourth volume, have been lately recovered; +and the communication of such as may +still remain in the possession of any private individuals +is again most earnestly requested.</p> + +<p>Unequal as I feel myself to the task, I shall, my +dear friend, lose no time, nor spare any pains, in<a name="Page_xvi" id="Page_xvi" title="xvi" class="pagenum"></a> +discharging the arduous duty that has devolved upon +me. You know the peculiar difficulties I labor under +from the failure of my eyesight; and you may congratulate +me upon the assistance which I have now +procured from my neighbor, the worthy chaplain<a name="FNanchor_8_8" id="FNanchor_8_8"></a><a href="#Footnote_8_8" class="fnanchor">[8]</a> of +Bromley College, who to the useful qualification of a +most patient amanuensis adds that of a good scholar +and intelligent critic.</p> + +<p>And now, adieu, my dear friend,</p> + +<p>And believe me ever affectionately yours,</p> + +<p>WR. ROFFEN.</p> + +<p>BROMLEY HOUSE, August 1, 1812.</p> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_1_1" id="Footnote_1_1"></a><a href="#FNanchor_1_1"><span class="label">[1]</span></a> Works, Vol. V., quarto edition, (London, F., C., & J. Rivington, +1812,)—Vol. IV. of that edition (London, F. & C. Rivington, +1802) being the first posthumous volume,—and Vols. I., II., and +III. (London, J. Dodsley, 1792) comprising the collection published +during the lifetime of Mr. Burke.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_2_2" id="Footnote_2_2"></a><a href="#FNanchor_2_2"><span class="label">[2]</span></a> Prefixed to the first volume, in the other editions. For the account +referred to, see, in the present edition, Vol. I., pp. xiii., xiv.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_3_3" id="Footnote_3_3"></a><a href="#FNanchor_3_3"><span class="label">[3]</span></a> Page 86 of the present edition.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_4_4" id="Footnote_4_4"></a><a href="#FNanchor_4_4"><span class="label">[4]</span></a> In this edition, p. 91, near the top.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_5_5" id="Footnote_5_5"></a><a href="#FNanchor_5_5"><span class="label">[5]</span></a> In the fourth volume of the present edition.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_6_6" id="Footnote_6_6"></a><a href="#FNanchor_6_6"><span class="label">[6]</span></a> The quarto edition,—extending as far as Book II. ch. 2, near +the middle of the paragraph commencing, "The same regard to the +welfare of the people," &c.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_7_7" id="Footnote_7_7"></a><a href="#FNanchor_7_7"><span class="label">[7]</span></a> This design the editor did not live to execute.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_8_8" id="Footnote_8_8"></a><a href="#FNanchor_8_8"><span class="label">[8]</span></a> The Rev. J.J. Talman.</p></div> +</div> + +<p><a name="Page_1" id="Page_1" title="1" class="pagenum"></a> +<a name="FOURTH_LETTER" id="FOURTH_LETTER" /></p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>FOURTH LETTER<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 60%;">ON THE</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%;">PROPOSALS FOR PEACE WITH THE REGICIDE +DIRECTORY OF FRANCE.</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 60%;">ADDRESSED TO</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%;">THE EARL FITZWILLIAM.</span><br /> +<br /> +1795-7.</h2> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><a name="Page_2" id="Page_2" title="2" class="pagenum"></a></p> +<p><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3" title="3" class="pagenum"></a></p> +<h2>PRELIMINARY CORRESPONDENCE.</h2> + +<h3><i>Letter from the Right Honorable the Lord Auckland to the +Lord Bishop of Rochester</i>.</h3> + +<p class="quotdate">EDEN FARM, KENT, July 18th, 1812.</p> + +<p>My dear Lord,—Mr. Burke's fourth letter +to Lord Fitzwilliam is personally interesting to +me: I have perused it with a respectful attention.</p> + +<p>When I communicated to Mr. Burke, in 1795, the +printed work which he arraigns and discusses, I was +aware that he would differ from me.</p> + +<p>Some light is thrown on the transaction by my +note which gave rise to it, and by his answer, which +exhibits the admirable powers of his great and good +mind, deeply suffering at the time under a domestic +calamity.</p> + +<p>I have selected these two papers from my manuscript +collection, and now transmit them to your Lordship +with a wish that they may be annexed to the +publication in question.</p> + +<p>I have the honor to be, my dear Lord,</p> + +<p>Yours most sincerely,</p> + +<p>AUCKLAND.</p> + +<p>TO THE RIGHT REV. THE LORD BISHOP OF ROCHESTER.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p><a name="Page_4" id="Page_4" title="4" class="pagenum"></a></p> +<h3><i>Letter from Lord Auckland to the Right Honorable +Edmund Burke</i>.</h3> + + +<p class="quotdate">EDEN FARM, KENT, October 28th, 1795.</p> + +<p>My dear Sir,—</p> + +<p>Though in the stormy ocean of the last twenty-three +years we have seldom sailed on the same tack, +there has been nothing hostile in our signals or manoeuvres, +and, on my part at least, there has been +a cordial disposition towards friendly and respectful +sentiments. Under that influence, I now send to you +a small work which exhibits my fair and full opinions +on the arduous circumstances of the moment, "as +far as the cautions necessary to be observed will +permit me to go beyond general ideas."</p> + +<p>Three or four of those friends with whom I am +most connected in public and private life are pleased +to think that the statement in question (which at +first made part of a confidential paper) may do good, +and accordingly a very large impression will be published +to-day. I neither seek to avow the publication +nor do I wish to disavow it. I have no anxiety in +that respect, but to contribute my mite to do service, +at a moment when service is much wanted.</p> + +<p>I am, my dear Sir,</p> + +<p>Most sincerely yours,</p> + +<p>AUCKLAND.</p> + +<p>RIGHT HON. EDMUND BURKE.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<h3><i>Letter from the Right Honorable Edmund Burke to Lord +Auckland</i>.</h3> + +<p>My dear Lord,—</p> + +<p>I am perfectly sensible of the very flattering honor +you have done me in turning any part of your attention<a name="Page_5" id="Page_5" title="5" class="pagenum"></a> +towards a dejected old man, buried in the +anticipated grave of a feeble old age, forgetting and +forgotten in an obscure and melancholy retreat.</p> + +<p>In this retreat I have nothing relative to this world +to do, but to study all the tranquillity that in the +state of my mind I am capable of. To that end I +find it but too necessary to call to my aid an oblivion +of most of the circumstances, pleasant and unpleasant, +of my life,—to think as little and indeed to +know as little as I can of everything that is doing +about me,—and, above all, to divert my mind from +all presagings and prognostications of what I must (if +I let my speculations loose) consider as of absolute +necessity to happen after my death, and possibly even +before it. Your address to the public, which you +have been so good as to send to me, obliges me to +break in upon that plan, and to look a little on what +is behind, and very much on what is before me. It +creates in my mind a variety of thoughts, and all of +them unpleasant.</p> + +<p>It is true, my Lord, what you say, that, through +our public life, we have generally sailed on somewhat +different tacks. We have so, undoubtedly; and we +should do so still, if I had continued longer to keep +the sea. In that difference, you rightly observe that +I have always done justice to your skill and ability as +a navigator, and to your good intentions towards the +safety of the cargo and of the ship's company. I +cannot say now that we are on different tacks. There +would be no propriety in the metaphor. I can sail +no longer. My vessel cannot be said to be even in +port. She is wholly condemned and broken up. To +have an idea of that vessel, you must call to mind +what you have often seen on the Kentish road. Those<a name="Page_6" id="Page_6" title="6" class="pagenum"></a> +planks of tough and hardy oak, that used for years +to brave the buffets of the Bay of Biscay, are now +turned, with their warped grain and empty trunnion-holes, +into very wretched pales for the inclosure of a +wretched farm-yard.</p> + +<p>The style of your pamphlet, and the eloquence and +power of composition you display in it, are such as +do great honor to your talents, and in conveying any +other sentiments would give me very great pleasure. +Perhaps I do not very perfectly comprehend your +purpose, and the drift of your arguments. If I do +not, pray do not attribute my mistake to want of +candor, but to want of sagacity. I confess, your address +to the public, together with other accompanying +circumstances, has filled me with a degree of +grief and dismay which I cannot find words to express. +If the plan of politics there recommended—pray +excuse my freedom—should be adopted by the +king's councils, and by the good people of this kingdom, +(as, so recommended, undoubtedly it will,) nothing +can be the consequence but utter and irretrievable +ruin to the ministry, to the crown, to the succession,—to +the importance, to the independence, to the very +existence, of this country. This is my feeble, perhaps, +but clear, positive, decided, long and maturely +reflected and frequently declared opinion, from which +all the events which have lately come to pass, so far +from turning me, have tended to confirm beyond the +power of alteration, even by your eloquence and authority. +I find, my dear Lord, that you think some +persons, who are not satisfied with the securities of a +Jacobin peace, to be persons of intemperate minds. +I may be, and I fear I am, with you in that description; +but pray, my Lord, recollect that very few of<a name="Page_7" id="Page_7" title="7" class="pagenum"></a> +the causes which make men intemperate can operate +upon me. Sanguine hopes, vehement desires, inordinate +ambition, implacable animosity, party attachments, +or party interests,—all these with me have +no existence. For myself, or for a family, (alas! I +have none,) I have nothing to hope or to fear in this +world. I am attached, by principle, inclination, and +gratitude, to the king, and to the present ministry.</p> + +<p>Perhaps you may think that my animosity to opposition +is the cause of my dissent, on seeing the politics +of Mr. Fox (which, while I was in the world, I combated +by every instrument which God had put into +my hands, and in every situation in which I had +taken part) so completely, if I at all understand you, +adopted in your Lordship's book: but it was with +pain I broke with that great man forever in that +cause; and I assure you, it is not without pain that +I differ with your Lordship on the same principles. +But it is of no concern. I am far below the region of +those great and tempestuous passions. I feel nothing +of the intemperance of mind. It is rather sorrow and +dejection than anger.</p> + +<p>Once more my best thanks for your very polite attention; +and do me the favor to believe me, with the +most perfect sentiments of respect and regard,</p> + +<p>My dear Lord,</p> + +<p>Your Lordship's most obedient and humble servant,</p> + +<p>EDMUND BURKE.</p> + +<p>BEACONSFIELD, Oct. 30th, 1795.</p> + +<p>Friday Evening.</p> + + +<p><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8" title="8" class="pagenum"></a></p> +<p><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9" title="9" class="pagenum"></a></p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>LETTER IV.<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%;">TO THE EARL FITZWILLIAM.</span></h2> + + +<p>My dear Lord,—I am not sure that the best +way of discussing any subject, except those that +concern the abstracted sciences, is not somewhat in +the way of dialogue. To this mode, however, there +are two objections: the first, that it happens, as in +the puppet-show, one man speaks for all the personages. +An unnatural uniformity of tone is in a manner +unavoidable. The other and more serious objection +is, that, as the author (if not an absolute +skeptic) must have some opinion of his own to enforce, +he will be continually tempted to enervate the +arguments he puts into the mouth of his adversary, +or to place them in a point of view most commodious +for their refutation. There is, however, a sort of dialogue +not quite so liable to these objections, because +it approaches more nearly to truth and Nature: it +is called CONTROVERSY. Here the parties speak for +themselves. If the writer who attacks another's notions +does not deal fairly with his adversary, the +diligent reader has it always in his power, by resorting +to the work examined, to do justice to the +original author and to himself. For this reason you +will not blame me, if, in my discussion of the merits +of a Regicide Peace, I do not choose to trust to my +own statements, but to bring forward along with<a name="Page_10" id="Page_10" title="10" class="pagenum"></a> +them the arguments of the advocates for that measure. +If I choose puny adversaries, writers of no estimation +or authority, then you will justly blame me. +I might as well bring in at once a fictitious speaker, +and thus fall into all the inconveniences of an imaginary +dialogue. This I shall avoid; and I shall take +no notice of any author who my friends in town do +not tell me is in estimation with those whose opinions +he supports.</p> + +<p>A piece has been sent to me, called "Some Remarks +on the Apparent Circumstances of the War in +the Fourth Week of October, 1795," with a French +motto: "<i>Que faire encore une fois dans une telle nuit? +Attendre le jour</i>." The very title seemed to me striking +and peculiar, and to announce something uncommon. +In the time I have lived to, I always seem to +walk on enchanted ground. Everything is new, and, +according to the fashionable phrase, revolutionary. +In former days authors valued themselves upon the +maturity and fulness of their deliberations. Accordingly, +they predicted (perhaps with more arrogance +than reason) an eternal duration to their works. +The quite contrary is our present fashion. Writers +value themselves now on the instability of their opinions +and the transitory life of their productions. On +this kind of credit the modern institutors open their +schools. They write for youth, and it is sufficient, +if the instruction "lasts as long as a present love, or +as the painted silks and cottons of the season."</p> + +<p>The doctrines in this work are applied, for their +standard, with great exactness, to the shortest possible +periods both of conception and duration. The +title is "Some Remarks on the <i>Apparent</i> Circumstances +of the War <i>in the Fourth Week of October</i>,<a name="Page_11" id="Page_11" title="11" class="pagenum"></a> +1795." The time is critically chosen. A month or +so earlier would have made it the anniversary of a +bloody Parisian September, when the French massacre +one another. A day or two later would have carried +it into a London November, the gloomy month +in which it is said by a pleasant author that Englishmen +hang and drown themselves. In truth, this +work has a tendency to alarm us with symptoms +of public suicide. However, there is one comfort +to be taken even from the gloomy time of year. It +is a rotting season. If what is brought to market is +not good, it is not likely to keep long. Even buildings +run up in haste with untempered mortar in that +humid weather, if they are ill-contrived tenements, +do not threaten long to incumber the earth. The +author tells us (and I believe he is the very first +author that ever told such a thing to his readers) +"that the <i>entire fabric</i> of his speculations might be +overset by unforeseen vicissitudes," and what is far +more extraordinary, "that even the <i>whole</i> consideration +might be <i>varied whilst he was writing those +pages."</i> Truly, in my poor judgment, this circumstance +formed a very substantial motive for his not +publishing those ill-considered considerations at all. +He ought to have followed the good advice of his +motto: "<i>Que faire encore dans une telle nuit? Attendre +le jour</i>." He ought to have waited till he had +got a little more daylight on this subject. Night itself +is hardly darker than the fogs of that time.</p> + +<p>Finding the <i>last week in October</i> so particularly referred +to, and not perceiving any particular event, +relative to the war, which happened on any of the +days in that week, I thought it possible that they +were marked by some astrological superstition, to<a name="Page_12" id="Page_12" title="12" class="pagenum"></a> +which the greatest politicians have been subject. I +therefore had recourse to my Rider's Almanack. +There I found, indeed, something that characterized +the work, and that gave directions concerning the +sudden political and natural variations, and for eschewing +the maladies that are most prevalent in that +aguish intermittent season, "the last week of October." +On that week the sagacious astrologer, Rider, +in his note on the third column of the calendar side, +teaches us to expect "<i>variable and cold weather";</i> +but instead of encouraging us to trust ourselves to +the haze and mist and doubtful lights of that changeable +week, on the answerable part of the opposite +page he gives us a salutary caution (indeed, it is very +nearly in the words of the author's motto): "<i>Avoid</i>," +says he, "<i>being out late at night and in foggy weather, +for a cold now caught may last the whole winter</i>."<a name="FNanchor_9_9" id="FNanchor_9_9"></a><a href="#Footnote_9_9" class="fnanchor">[9]</a> +This ingenious author, who disdained the prudence +of the Almanack, walked out in the very fog he complains +of, and has led us to a very unseasonable airing +at that time. Whilst this noble writer, by the +vigor of an excellent constitution, formed for the violent +changes he prognosticates, may shake off the +importunate rheum and malignant influenza of this +disagreeable week, a whole Parliament may go on +spitting and snivelling, and wheezing and coughing, +during a whole session. All this from listening to +variable, hebdomadal politicians, who run away from +their opinions without giving us a month's warning,—and<a name="Page_13" id="Page_13" title="13" class="pagenum"></a> +for not listening to the wise and friendly +admonitions of Dr. Cardanus Rider, who never apprehends +he may change his opinions before his pen is +out of his hand, but always enables us to lay in at +least a year's stock of useful information.</p> + +<p>At first I took comfort. I said to myself, that, if I +should, as I fear I must, oppose the doctrines of <i>the +last week of October</i>, it is probable that by this time +they are no longer those of the eminent writer to +whom they are attributed. He gives us hopes that +long before this he may have embraced the direct +contrary sentiments. If I am found in a conflict +with those of the last week of October, I may be in +full agreement with those of the last week in December, +or the first week in January, 1796. But a second +edition, and a French translation, (for the benefit, +I must suppose, of the new Regicide Directory,) have +let down a little of these flattering hopes. We and +the Directory know that the author, whatever changes +his works seemed made to indicate, like a weathercock +grown rusty, remains just where he was in the +last week of last October. It is true, that his protest +against binding him to his opinions, and his reservation +of a right to whatever opinions he pleases, remain +in their full force. This variability is pleasant, and +shows a fertility of fancy:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Qualis in æthereo felix Vertumnus Olympo<br /></span> +<span>Mille habet ornatus, mille decenter habet.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Yet, doing all justice to the sportive variability +of these weekly, daily, or hourly speculators, shall +I be pardoned, if I attempt a word on the part of +us simple country folk? It is not good for <i>us</i>, however +it may be so for great statesmen, that we should +be treated with variable politics. I consider different<a name="Page_14" id="Page_14" title="14" class="pagenum"></a> +relations as prescribing a different conduct. I +allow, that, in transactions with an enemy, a minister +may, and often must, vary his demands with the +day, possibly with the hour. With an enemy, a fixed +plan, variable arrangements. This is the rule the +nature of the transaction prescribes. But all this +belongs to treaty. All these shiftings and changes +are a sort of secret amongst the parties, till a definite +settlement is brought about. Such is the spirit of +the proceedings in the doubtful and transitory state +of things between enmity and friendship. In this +change the subjects of the transformation are by nature +carefully wrapt up in their cocoons. The gay +ornament of summer is not seemly in his aurelia +state. This mutability is allowed to a foreign negotiator; +but when a great politician condescends publicly +to instruct his own countrymen on a matter +which may fix their fate forever, his opinions ought +not to be diurnal, or even weekly. These ephemerides +of politics are not made for our slow and coarse +understandings. Our appetite demands a <i>piece of +resistance</i>. We require some food that will stick to +the ribs. We call for sentiments to which we can +attach ourselves,—sentiments in which we can take +an interest,—sentiments on which we can warm, +on which we can ground some confidence in ourselves +or in others. We do not want a largess of +inconstancy. Poor souls, we have enough of that +sort of poverty at home. There is a difference, too, +between deliberation and doctrine: a man ought to +be decided in his opinions before he attempts to +teach. His fugitive lights may serve himself in some +unknown region, but they cannot free us from the effects +of the error into which we have been betrayed.<a name="Page_15" id="Page_15" title="15" class="pagenum"></a> +His active Will-o'-the-wisp may be gone nobody can +guess where, whilst he leaves us bemired and benighted +in the bog.</p> + +<p>Having premised these few reflections upon this +new mode of teaching a lesson, which whilst the +scholar is getting by heart the master forgets, I come +to the lesson itself. On the fullest consideration of +it, I am utterly incapable of saying with any great +certainty what it is, in the detail, that the author +means to affirm or deny, to dissuade or recommend. +His march is mostly oblique, and his doctrine rather +in the way of insinuation than of dogmatic assertion. +It is not only fugitive in its duration, but is slippery +in the extreme whilst it lasts. Examining it part +by part, it seems almost everywhere to contradict +itself; and the author, who claims the privilege of +varying his opinions, has exercised this privilege in +every section of his remarks. For this reason, +amongst others, I follow the advice which the able +writer gives in his last page, which is, "to consider +the <i>impression</i> of what he has urged, taken from the +<i>whole</i>, and not from detached paragraphs." That +caution was not absolutely necessary. I should +think it unfair to the author and to myself to have +proceeded otherwise. This author's <i>whole</i>, however, +like every other whole, cannot be so well comprehended +without some reference to the parts; but they +shall be again referred to the whole. Without this +latter attention, several of the passages would certainly +remain covered with an impenetrable and truly +oracular obscurity.</p> + +<p>The great, general, pervading purpose, of the whole +pamphlet is to reconcile us to peace with the present +usurpation in France. In this general drift of the<a name="Page_16" id="Page_16" title="16" class="pagenum"></a> +author I can hardly be mistaken. The other purposes, +less general, and subservient to the preceding +scheme, are to show, first, that the time of the Remarks +was the favorable time for making that peace +upon our side; secondly, that on the enemy's side +their disposition towards the acceptance of such +terms as he is pleased to offer was rationally to be +expected; the third purpose was, to make some sort +of disclosure of the terms which, if the Regicides are +pleased to grant them, this nation ought to be contented +to accept: these form the basis of the negotiation +which the author, whoever he is, proposes to +open.</p> + +<p>Before I consider these Remarks along with the +other reasonings which I hear on the same subject, +I beg leave to recall to your mind the observation +I made early in our correspondence, and which ought +to attend us quite through the discussion of this proposed +peace, amity, or fraternity, or whatever you +may call it,—that is, the real quality and character +of the party you have to deal with. This I find, as +a thing of no importance, has everywhere escaped +the author of the October Remarks. That hostile +power, to the period of the fourth week in that +month, has been ever called and considered as an +usurpation. In that week, for the first time, it +changed its name of an usurped power, and took +the simple name of <i>France</i>. The word France is +slipped in just as if the government stood exactly +as before that Revolution which has astonished, terrified, +and almost overpowered Europe. "France," +says the author, "will do this,"—"it is the interest +of France,"—"the returning honor and generosity +of France," &c., &c.—always merely France: just<a name="Page_17" id="Page_17" title="17" class="pagenum"></a> +as if we were in a common political war with an +old recognized member of the commonwealth of +Christian Europe,—and as if our dispute had turned +upon a mere matter of territorial or commercial controversy, +which a peace might settle by the imposition +or the taking off a duty, with the gain or the +loss of a remote island or a frontier town or two, +on the one side or the other. This shifting of persons +could not be done without the hocus-pocus of +<i>abstraction</i>. We have been in a grievous error: we +thought that we had been at war with <i>rebels</i> against +the lawful government, but that we were friends and +allies of what is properly France, friends and allies +to the legal body politic of France. But by sleight +of hand the Jacobins are clean vanished, and it is +France we have got under our cup. "Blessings on +his soul that first invented sleep!" said Don Sancho +Panza the Wise. All those blessings, and ten thousand +times more, on him who found out abstraction, +personification, and impersonals! In certain cases +they are the first of all soporifics. Terribly alarmed +we should be, if things were proposed to us in the +<i>concrete</i>, and if fraternity was held out to us with the +individuals who compose this France by their proper +names and descriptions,—if we were told that it was +very proper to enter into the closest bonds of amity<a name="Page_18" id="Page_18" title="18" class="pagenum"></a> +and good correspondence with the devout, pacific, +and tender-hearted Sieyès, with the all-accomplished +Reubell, with the humane guillotinists of Bordeaux, +Tallien and Isabeau, with the meek butcher, Legendre, +and with "the returned humanity and generosity" +(that had been only on a visit abroad) of the +virtuous regicide brewer, Santerre. This would seem +at the outset a very strange scheme of amity and +concord,—nay, though we had held out to us, as +an additional <i>douceur</i>, an assurance of the cordial +fraternal embrace of our pious and patriotic countryman, +Thomas Paine. But plain truth would here +be shocking and absurd; therefore comes in <i>abstraction</i> +and personification. "Make your peace with +France." That word <i>France</i> sounds quite as well +as any other; and it conveys no idea but that of a +very pleasant country and very hospitable inhabitants. +Nothing absurd and shocking in amity and +good correspondence with <i>France</i>. Permit me to say, +that I am not yet well acquainted with this new-coined +France, and without a careful assay I am not +willing to receive it in currency in place of the old +Louis-d'or.</p> + +<p>Having, therefore, slipped the persons with whom +we are to treat out of view, we are next to be satisfied +that the French Revolution, which this peace is to fix +and consolidate, ought to give us no just cause of apprehension. +Though the author labors this point, yet +he confesses a fact (indeed, he could not conceal it) +which renders all his labors utterly fruitless. He confesses +that the Regicide means to <i>dictate</i> a pacification, +and that this pacification, according to their decree +passed but a very few days before his publication appeared, +is to "unite to their empire, either in possession +or dependence, new barriers, many frontier places +of strength, a large sea-coast, and many sea-ports." +He ought to have stated it, that they would annex +to their territory a country about a third as large as +France, and much more than half as rich, and in a +situation the most important for command that it +would be possible for her anywhere to possess.</p> + +<p>To remove this terror, (even if the Regicides should<a name="Page_19" id="Page_19" title="19" class="pagenum"></a> +carry their point,) and to give us perfect repose with +regard to their empire, whatever they may acquire, +or whomsoever they might destroy, he raises a doubt +"whether France will not be ruined by <i>retaining</i> these +conquests, and whether she will not wholly lose that +preponderance which she has held in the scale of European +powers, and will not eventually be destroyed +by the effect of her present successes, or, at least, +whether, so far as the <i>political interests of England +are concerned</i>, she [France] will remain an object of +as <i>much jealousy and alarm as she was under the reign +of a monarch</i>." Here, indeed, is a paragraph full of +meaning! It gives matter for meditation almost in +every word of it. The secret of the pacific politicians +is out. This republic, at all hazards, is to be maintained. +It is to be confined within some bounds, if +we can; if not, with every possible acquisition of +power, it is still to be cherished and supported. It is +the return of the monarchy we are to dread, and +therefore we ought to pray for the permanence of the +Regicide authority. <i>Esto perpetua</i> is the devout +ejaculation of our Frà Paolo for the Republic one +and indivisible. It was the monarchy that rendered +France dangerous: Regicide neutralizes all the acrimony +of that power, and renders it safe and social. +The October speculator is of opinion that monarchy +is of so poisonous a quality that a moderate territorial +power is far more dangerous to its neighbors under +that abominable regimen than the greatest empire in +the hands of a republic. This is Jacobinism sublimed +and exalted into most pure and perfect essence. It +is a doctrine, I admit, made to allure and captivate, +if anything in the world can, the Jacobin Directory, +to mollify the ferocity of Regicide, and to persuade<a name="Page_20" id="Page_20" title="20" class="pagenum"></a> +those patriotic hangmen, after their reiterated oaths +for our extirpation, to admit this well-humbled nation +to the fraternal embrace. I do not wonder that this +tub of October has been racked off into a French cask. +It must make its fortune at Paris. That translation +seems the language the most suited to these sentiments. +Our author tells the French Jacobins, that +the political interests of Great Britain are in perfect +unison with the principles of their government,—that +they may take and keep the keys of the civilized +world, for they are safe in their unambitious +and faithful custody. We say to them, "We may, +indeed, wish you to be a little less murderous, wicked, +and atheistical, for the sake of morals; we may +think it were better you were less new-fangled in +your speech, for the sake of grammar; but, as <i>politicians</i>, +provided you keep clear of monarchy, all our +fears, alarms, and jealousies are at an end: at least, +they sink into nothing in comparison of our dread +of your detestable royalty." A flatterer of Cardinal +Mazarin said, when that minister had just settled the +match between the young Louis the Fourteenth and +a daughter of Spain, that this alliance had the effect +of faith and had removed mountains,—that the Pyrenees +were levelled by that marriage. You may now +compliment Reubell in the same spirit on the miracles +of regicide, and tell him that the guillotine of +Louis the Sixteenth had consummated a marriage +between Great Britain and France, which dried up +the Channel, and restored the two countries to the +unity which it is said they had before the unnatural +rage of seas and earthquakes had broke off their +happy junction. It will be a fine subject for the poets +who are to prophesy the blessings of this peace.<a name="Page_21" id="Page_21" title="21" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>I am now convinced that the Remarks of the last +week of October cannot come from the author to +whom they are given, they are such a direct contradiction +to the style of manly indignation with which +he spoke of those miscreants and murderers in his excellent +memorial to the States of Holland,—to that +very state which the author who presumes to personate +him does not find it contrary to the political interests +of England to leave in the hands of these very +miscreants, against whom on the part of England he +took so much pains to animate their republic. This +cannot be; and if this argument wanted anything +to give it new force, it is strengthened by an additional +reason, that is irresistible. Knowing that noble +person, as well as myself, to be under very great +obligations to the crown, I am confident he would not +so very directly contradict, even in the paroxysm of +his zeal against monarchy, the declarations made in +the name and with the fullest approbation of our sovereign, +his master, and our common benefactor. In +those declarations you will see that the king, instead +of being sensible of greater alarm and jealousy from +a neighboring crowned head than from, these regicides, +attributes all the dangers of Europe to the +latter. Let this writer hear the description given +in the royal declaration of the scheme of power of +these miscreants, as "<i>a system destructive of all public +order, maintained by proscriptions, exiles, and confiscations +without number, by arbitrary imprisonments, +by massacres which cannot be remembered without horror, +and at length by the execrable murder of a just and +beneficent sovereign, and of the illustrious princess, who +with an unshaken firmness has shared all the misfortunes +of her royal consort, his protracted sufferings, his</i><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22" title="22" class="pagenum"></a> +<i>cruel captivity, his ignominious death</i>." After thus describing, +with an eloquence and energy equalled only +by its truth, the means by which this usurped power +had been acquired and maintained, that government +is characterized with equal force. His Majesty, far +from thinking monarchy in France to be a greater +object of jealousy than the Regicide usurpation, calls +upon the French to reestablish "<i>a monarchical government</i>" +for the purpose of shaking off "<i>the yoke +of a sanguinary anarchy</i>,—<i>of that anarchy which has +broken all the most sacred bonds of society, dissolved +all the relations of civil life, violated every right, confounded +every duty</i>,—<i>which uses the name of liberty +to exercise the most cruel tyranny, to annihilate all +property, to seize on all possessions</i>,—<i>which founds +its power on the pretended consent of the people, and +itself carries fire and sword through extensive provinces, +for having demanded their laws, their religion, and their +lawful sovereign</i>."</p> + +<p>"That strain I heard was of a higher mood." That +declaration of our sovereign was worthy of his throne. +It is in a style which neither the pen of the writer of +October nor such a poor crow-quill as mine can ever +hope to equal. I am happy to enrich my letter with +this fragment of nervous and manly eloquence, which, +if it had not emanated from the awful authority of a +throne, if it were not recorded amongst the most valuable +monuments of history, and consecrated in the +archives of states, would be worthy, as a private composition, +to live forever in the memory of men.</p> + +<p>In those admirable pieces does his Majesty discover +this new opinion of his political security, in having +the chair of the scorner, that is, the discipline +of atheism, and the block of regicide, set up by his<a name="Page_23" id="Page_23" title="23" class="pagenum"></a> +side, elevated on the same platform, and shouldering, +with the vile image of their grim and bloody +idol, the inviolable majesty of his throne? The sentiments +of these declarations are the very reverse: +they could not be other. Speaking of the spirit of +that usurpation, the royal manifesto describes, with +perfect truth, its internal tyranny to have been established +as the very means of shaking the security +of all other states,—as "<i>disposing arbitrarily of the +property and blood of the inhabitants of France, in order +to disturb the tranquillity of other nations, and to +render all Europe the theatre of the same crimes and +of the same misfortunes</i>." It was but a natural inference +from this fact, that the royal manifesto does +not at all rest the justification of this war on common +principles: that it was "<i>not only to defend his +own rights, and those of his allies</i>," but "<i>that all the +dearest interests of his people imposed upon him a duty +still more important</i>,—<i>that of exerting his efforts for +the preservation of civil society itself, as happily established +among the nations of Europe</i>." On that ground, +the protection offered is to "those who, by declaring +for a <i>monarchical government</i>, shall shake off the yoke +of a sanguinary anarchy." It is for that purpose the +declaration calls on them "to join the standard of +an <i>hereditary monarchy</i>,"—declaring that the <i>peace +and safety</i> of this kingdom and the other powers of +Europe "<i>materially depend on the reëstablishment of +order in France</i>." His Majesty does not hesitate to +declare that "<i>the reëstablishment of monarchy, in the +person of Louis the Seventeenth, and the lawful heirs of +the crown, appears to him</i> [his Majesty] <i>the best mode +of accomplishing these just and salutary views</i>."</p> + +<p>This is what his Majesty does not hesitate to declare<a name="Page_24" id="Page_24" title="24" class="pagenum"></a> +relative to the political safety and peace of his +kingdom and of Europe, and with regard to France +under her ancient hereditary monarchy in the course +and order of legal succession. But in comes a gentleman, +in the fag end of October, dripping with the +fogs of that humid and uncertain season, and does +not hesitate in diameter to contradict this wise and +just royal declaration, and stoutly, on his part, to +make a counter declaration,—that France, so far as +the political interests of England are concerned, will +not remain, under the despotism of Regicide, and +with the better part of Europe in her hands, so much +an object of jealousy and alarm as she was under the +reign of a monarch. When I hear the master and +reason on one side, and the servant and his single +and unsupported assertion on the other, my part is +taken.</p> + +<p>This is what the Octobrist says of the political interests +of England, which it looks as if he completely +disconnected with those of all other nations. But +not quite so: he just allows it possible (with an "at +least") that the other powers may not find it quite +their interest that their territories should be conquered +and their subjects tyrannized over by the +Regicides. No fewer than ten sovereign princes +had, some the whole, all a very considerable part of +their dominions under the yoke of that dreadful faction. +Amongst these was to be reckoned the first +republic in the world, and the closest ally of this +kingdom, which, under the insulting name of an independency, +is under her iron yoke, and, as long as +a faction averse to the old government is suffered +there to domineer, cannot be otherwise. I say nothing +of the Austrian Netherlands, countries of a vast<a name="Page_25" id="Page_25" title="25" class="pagenum"></a> +extent, and amongst the most fertile and populous of +Europe, and, with regard to us, most critically situated. +The rest will readily occur to you.</p> + +<p>But if there are yet existing any people, like me, +old-fashioned enough to consider that we have an important +part of our very existence beyond our limits, +and who therefore stretch their thoughts beyond the +<i>pomoerium</i> of England, for them, too, he has a comfort +which will remove all their jealousies and alarms +about the extent of the empire of Regicide. "<i>These +conquests eventually will be the cause of her destruction</i>." +So that they who hate the cause of usurpation, +and dread the power of France under any form, are +to wish her to be a conqueror, in order to accelerate +her ruin. A little more conquest would be still better. +Will he tell us what dose of dominion is to be +the <i>quantum sufficit</i> for her destruction?—for she +seems very voracious of the food of her distemper. +To be sure, she is ready to perish with repletion; +she has a <i>boulimia</i>, and hardly has bolted down one +state than she calls for two or three more. There is +a good deal of wit in all this; but it seems to me +(with all respect to the author) to be carrying the +joke a great deal too far. I cannot yet think that +the armies of the Allies were of this way of thinking, +and that, when they evacuated all these countries, it +was a stratagem of war to decoy France into ruin,—or +that, if in a treaty we should surrender them forever +into the hands of the usurpation, (the lease the +author supposes,) it is a master-stroke of policy to +effect the destruction of a formidable rival, and to +render her no longer an object of jealousy and alarm. +This, I assure the author, will infinitely facilitate the +treaty. The usurpers will catch at this bait, without<a name="Page_26" id="Page_26" title="26" class="pagenum"></a> +minding the hook which this crafty angler for the +Jacobin gudgeons of the new Directory has so dexterously +placed under it.</p> + +<p>Every symptom of the exacerbation of the public +malady is, with him, (as with the Doctor in Molière,) +a happy prognostic of recovery.—Flanders gone. +<i>Tant mieux</i>.—Holland subdued. Charming!—Spain +beaten, and all the hither Germany conquered. +Bravo! Better and better still!—But they will retain +all their conquests on a treaty. Best of all!—What +a delightful thing it is to have a gay physician, +who sees all things, as the French express it, <i>couleur +de rose!</i> What an escape we have had, that we +and our allies were not the conquerors! By these +conquests, previous to her utter destruction, she is +"wholly to lose that preponderance which she held +in the scale of the European powers." Bless me! +this new system of France, after changing all other +laws, reverses the law of gravitation. By throwing +in weight after weight, her scale rises, and will by-and-by +kick the beam. Certainly there is one sense +in which she loses her preponderance: that is, she is +no longer preponderant against the countries she has +conquered. They are part of herself. But I beg the +author to keep his eyes fixed on the scales for a +moment longer, and then to tell me, in downright +earnest, whether he sees hitherto any signs of her +losing preponderance by an augmentation of weight +and power. Has she lost her preponderance over +Spain by her influence in Spain? Are there any +signs that the conquest of Savoy and Nice begins to +lessen her preponderance over Switzerland and the +Italian States,—or that the Canton of Berne, Genoa, +and Tuscany, for example, have taken arms against<a name="Page_27" id="Page_27" title="27" class="pagenum"></a> +her,—or that Sardinia is more adverse than ever to a +treacherous pacification? Was it in the last week of +October that the German States showed that Jacobin. +France was losing her preponderance? Did the King +of Prussia, when he delivered into her safe custody +his territories on this side of the Rhine, manifest any +tokens of his opinion of her loss of preponderance? +Look on Sweden and on Denmark: is her preponderance +less visible there?</p> + +<p>It is true, that, in a course of ages, empires have +fallen, and, in the opinion of some, not in mine, by +their own weight. Sometimes they have been unquestionably +embarrassed in their movements by the +dissociated situation of their dominions. Such was +the case of the empire of Charles the Fifth and of his +successor. It might be so of others. But so compact +a body of empire, so fitted in all the parts for mutual +support, with a frontier by Nature and Art so impenetrable, +with such facility of breaking out with irresistible +force from every quarter, was never seen in +such an extent of territory, from the beginning of +time, as in that empire which the Jacobins possessed +in October, 1795, and which Boissy d'Anglas, in his +report, settled as the law for Europe, and the dominion +assigned by Nature for the Republic of Regicide. +But this empire is to be her ruin, and to take away +all alarm and jealousy on the part of England, and to +destroy her preponderance over the miserable remains +of Europe.</p> + +<p>These are choice speculations with which the author +amuses himself, and tries to divert us, in the +blackest hours of the dismay, defeat, and calamity of +all civilized nations. They have but one fault,—that +they are directly contrary to the common sense and<a name="Page_28" id="Page_28" title="28" class="pagenum"></a> +common feeling of mankind. If I had but one hour +to live, I would employ it in decrying this wretched +system, and die with my pen in my hand to mark out +the dreadful consequences of receiving an arrangement +of empire dictated by the despotism of Regicide +to my own country, and to the lawful sovereigns of +the Christian world.</p> + +<p>I trust I shall hardly be told, in palliation of this +shameful system of politics, that the author expresses +his sentiments only as doubts. In such things, it +may be truly said, that "once to doubt is once to be +resolved." It would be a strange reason for wasting +the treasures and shedding the blood of our country, +to prevent arrangements on the part of another power, +of which we were doubtful whether they might +not be even to our advantage, and render our neighbor +less than before the object of our jealousy and +alarm. In this doubt there is much decision. No nation +would consent to carry on a war of skepticism. +But the fact is, this expression of doubt is only a +mode of putting an opinion, when it is not the drift +of the author to overturn the doubt. Otherwise, the +doubt is never stated as the author's own, nor left, as +here it is, unanswered. Indeed, the mode of stating +the most decided opinions in the form of questions is +so little uncommon, particularly since the excellent +queries of the excellent Berkeley, that it became for +a good while a fashionable mode of composition.</p> + +<p>Here, then, the author of the Fourth Week of +October is ready for the worst, and would strike the +bargain of peace on these conditions. I must leave it +to you and to every considerate man to reflect upon +the effect of this on any Continental alliances, present +or future, and whether it would be possible (if this<a name="Page_29" id="Page_29" title="29" class="pagenum"></a> +book was thought of the least authority) that its +maxims with regard to our political interest must not +naturally push them to be beforehand with us in the +fraternity with Regicide, and thus not only strip us +of any steady alliance at present, but leave us without +any of that communion of interest which could +produce alliances in future. Indeed, with these maxims, +we should be well divided from the world.</p> + +<p>Notwithstanding this new kind of barrier and security +that is found against her ambition in her conquests, +yet in the very same paragraph he admits, +that, "for the <i>present</i>, at least, it is subversive of the +balance of power." This, I confess, is not a direct +contradiction, because the benefits which he promises +himself from it, according to his hypothesis, are future +and more remote.</p> + +<p>So disposed is this author to peace, that, having +laid a comfortable foundation for our security in the +greatness of her empire, he has another in reserve, if +that should fail, upon quite a contrary ground: that +is, a speculation of her crumbling to pieces, and being +thrown into a number of little separate republics. +After paying the tribute of humanity to those +who will be ruined by all these changes, on the +whole he is of opinion that "the change might be +compatible with general tranquillity, and with the establishment +of a peaceful and prosperous commerce +among nations." Whether France be great or small, +firm and entire or dissipated and divided, all is well, +provided we can have peace with her.</p> + +<p>But without entering into speculations about her +dismemberment, whilst she is adding great nations +to her empire, is it, then, quite so certain that the +dissipation of France into such a cluster of petty<a name="Page_30" id="Page_30" title="30" class="pagenum"></a> +republics would be so very favorable to the true balance +of power in Europe as this author imagines it +would be, and to the commerce of nations? I greatly +differ from him. I perhaps shall prove in a future +letter, with the political map of Europe before my +eye, that the general liberty and independence of the +great Christian commonwealth could not exist with +such a dismemberment, unless it were followed (as +probably enough it would) by the dismemberment +of every other considerable country in Europe: and +what convulsions would arise in the constitution of +every state in Europe it is not easy to conjecture +in the mode, impossible not to foresee in the mass. +Speculate on, good my Lord! provided you ground +no part of your politics on such unsteady speculations. +But as to any practice to ensue, are we not +yet cured of the malady of speculating on the circumstances +of things totally different from those in +which we live and move? Five years has this monster +continued whole and entire in all its members. +Far from falling into a division within itself, it is augmented +by tremendous additions. We cannot bear +to look that frightful form in the face, as it is, and +in its own actual shape. We dare not be wise; we +have not the fortitude of rational fear; we will not +provide for our future safety; but we endeavor to +hush the cries of present timidity by guesses at what +may be hereafter,—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>"To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="noindent">Is this our style of talk, when</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>"all our yesterdays have lighted fools<br /></span> +<span>The way to dusty death"?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="noindent">Talk not to me of what swarm of republics may come +from this carcass! It is no carcass. Now, now,<a name="Page_31" id="Page_31" title="31" class="pagenum"></a> +whilst we are talking, it is full of life and action. +What say you to the Regicide empire of to-day? +Tell me, my friend, do its terrors appall you into +an abject submission, or rouse you to a vigorous defence? +But do—I no longer prevent it—do go on,—look +into futurity. Has this empire nothing to +alarm you when all struggle against it is over, when +mankind shall be silent before it, when all nations +shall be disarmed, disheartened, and <i>truly divided</i> by +a treacherous peace? Its malignity towards humankind +will subsist with undiminished heat, whilst the +means of giving it effect must proceed, and every +means of resisting it must inevitably and rapidly +decline.</p> + +<p>Against alarm on their politic and military empire +these are the writer's sedative remedies. But he +leaves us sadly in the dark with regard to the moral +consequences, which he states have threatened to demolish +a system of civilization under which his country +enjoys a prosperity unparalleled in the history of +man. We had emerged from our first terrors, but +here we sink into them again,—however, only to +shake them off upon the credit of his being a man +of very sanguine hopes.</p> + +<p>Against the moral terrors of this successful empire +of barbarism, though he has given us no consolation +here, in another place he has formed other securities,—securities, +indeed, which will make even the enormity +of the crimes and atrocities of France a benefit +to the world. We are to be cured by her diseases. +We are to grow proud of our Constitution upon, the +distempers of theirs. Governments throughout all +Europe are to become much stronger by this event. +This, too, comes in the favorite mode of <i>doubt</i> and<a name="Page_32" id="Page_32" title="32" class="pagenum"></a> +<i>perhaps</i>. "To those," he says, "who meditate on +the workings of the human mind, a doubt may +perhaps arise, whether the effects which I have described," +(namely, the change he supposes to be +wrought on the public mind with regard to the +French doctrines,) "though <i>at present</i> a salutary +check to the dangerous spirit of innovation, may +not prove favorable to abuses of power, by creating +a timidity in the just cause of liberty." Here the +current of our apprehensions takes a contrary course. +Instead of trembling for the existence of our government +from the spirit of licentiousness and anarchy, +the author would make us believe we are to tremble +for our liberties from the great accession of power +which is to accrue to government.</p> + +<p>I believe I have read in some author who criticized +the productions of the famous Jurieu, that it is not +very wise in people who dash away in prophecy, to +fix the time of accomplishment at too short a period. +Mr. Brothers may meditate upon this at his leisure. +He was a melancholy prognosticator, and has had +the fate of melancholy men. But they who prophesy +pleasant things get great present applause; and in +days of calamity people have something else to think +of: they lose, in their feeling of their distress, all +memory of those who flattered them in their prosperity. +But merely for the credit of the prediction, +nothing could have happened more unluckily for the +noble lord's sanguine expectations of the amendment +of the public mind, and the consequent greater security +to government, from the examples in France, +than what happened in the week after the publication +of his hebdomadal system. I am not sure it was not +in the very week one of the most violent and dangerous<a name="Page_33" id="Page_33" title="33" class="pagenum"></a> +seditions broke out that we have seen in several +years. This sedition, menacing to the public security, +endangering the sacred person of the king, and violating +in the most audacious manner the authority +of Parliament, surrounded our sovereign with a murderous +yell and war-whoop for that peace which the +noble lord considers as a cure for all domestic disturbances +and dissatisfactions.</p> + +<p>So far as to this general cure for popular disorders. +As for government, the two Houses of Parliament, +instead of being guided by the speculations of the +Fourth Week in October, and throwing up new barriers +against the dangerous power of the crown, which +the noble lord considered as no unplausible subject of +apprehension, the two Houses of Parliament thought +fit to pass two acts for the further strengthening of +that very government against a most dangerous and +wide-spread faction.</p> + +<p>Unluckily, too, for this kind of sanguine speculation, +on the very first day of the ever-famed "last week of +October," a large, daring, and seditious meeting was +publicly held, from which meeting this atrocious attempt +against the sovereign publicly originated.</p> + +<p>No wonder that the author should tell us that the +whole consideration might be varied <i>whilst he was +writing those pages</i>. In one, and that the most material +instance, his speculations not only might be, but +were at that very time, entirely overset. Their war-cry +for peace with France was the same with that of +this gentle author, but in a different note. His is the +<i>gemitus columbæ</i>, cooing and wooing fraternity; theirs +the funereal screams of birds of night calling for their +ill-omened paramours. But they are both songs of +courtship. These Regicides considered a Regicide<a name="Page_34" id="Page_34" title="34" class="pagenum"></a> +peace as a cure for all their evils; and so far as I can +find, they showed nothing at all of the timidity which +the noble lord apprehends in what they call the just +cause of liberty.</p> + +<p>However, it seems, that, notwithstanding these awkward +appearances with regard to the strength of government, +he has still his fears and doubts about our +liberties. To a free people this would be a matter of +alarm; but this physician of October has in his shop +all sorts of salves for all sorts of sores. It is curious +that they all come from the inexhaustible drug-shop +of the Regicide dispensary. It costs him nothing to +excite terror, because he lays it at his pleasure. He +finds a security for this danger to liberty from the +wonderful wisdom to be taught to kings, to nobility, +and even, to the lowest of the people, by the late transactions.</p> + +<p>I confess I was always blind enough to regard the +French Revolution, in the act, and much more in the +example, as one of the greatest calamities that had +ever fallen upon mankind. I now find that in its effects +it is to be the greatest of all blessings. If so, +we owe <i>amende honorable</i> to the Jacobins. They, it +seems, were right; and if they were right a little earlier +than we are, it only shows that they exceeded us +in sagacity. If they brought out their right ideas +somewhat in a disorderly manner, it must be remembered +that great zeal produces some irregularity; +but when greatly in the right, it must be pardoned by +those who are very regularly and temperately in the +wrong. The master Jacobins had told me this a +thousand times. I never believed the masters; nor +do I now find myself disposed to give credit to the +disciple. I will not much dispute with our author,<a name="Page_35" id="Page_35" title="35" class="pagenum"></a> +which party has the best of this Revolution,—that +which is from thence to learn wisdom, or that which +from the same event has obtained power. The dispute +on the preference of strength to wisdom may +perhaps be decided as Horace has decided the controversy +between Art and Nature. I do not like to +leave all the power to my adversary, and to secure +nothing to myself but the untimely wisdom that is +taught by the consequences of folly. I do not like +my share in the partition: because to his strength my +adversary may possibly add a good deal of cunning, +whereas my wisdom may totally fail in producing to +me the same degree of strength. But to descend +from the author's generalities a little nearer to meaning, +the security given to liberty is this,—"that +governments will have learned not to precipitate +themselves into embarrassments by speculative wars. +Sovereigns and princes will not forget that steadiness, +moderation, and economy are the best supports of the +eminence on which they stand." There seems to me +a good deal of oblique reflection in this lesson. As to +the lesson itself, it is at all times a good one. One +would think, however, by this formal introduction of +it as a recommendation of the arrangements proposed +by the author, it had never been taught before, either +by precept or by experience,—and that these maxims +are discoveries reserved for a Regicide peace. But is +it permitted to ask what security it affords to the liberty +of the subject, that the prince is pacific or frugal? +The very contrary has happened in our history. Our +best securities for freedom have been obtained from +princes who were either warlike, or prodigal, or both.</p> + +<p>Although the amendment of princes in these points +can have no effect in quieting our apprehensions for<a name="Page_36" id="Page_36" title="36" class="pagenum"></a> +liberty on account of the strength to be acquired to +government by a Regicide peace, I allow that the +avoiding of speculative wars may possibly be an advantage, +provided I well understand what the author +means by a speculative war. I suppose he means a +war grounded on speculative advantages, and not +wars founded on a just speculation of danger. Does +he mean to include this war, which we are now carrying +on, amongst those speculative wars which this +Jacobin peace is to teach sovereigns to avoid hereafter? +If so, it is doing the party an important service. +Does he mean that we are to avoid such wars +as that of the Grand Alliance, made on a speculation +of danger to the independence of Europe? I suspect +he has a sort of retrospective view to the American +war, as a speculative war, carried on by England +upon one side and by Louis the Sixteenth on the +other. As to our share of that war, let reverence +to the dead and respect to the living prevent us from +reading lessons of this kind at their expense. I don't +know how far the author may find himself at liberty +to wanton on that subject; but, for my part, I entered +into a coalition which, when I had no longer a duty +relative to that business, made me think myself bound +in honor not to call it up without necessity. But if +he puts England out of the question, and reflects only +on Louis the Sixteenth, I have only to say, "Dearly +has he answered it!" I will not defend him. But +all those who pushed on the Revolution by which he +was deposed were much more in fault than he was. +They have murdered him, and have divided his kingdom +as a spoil; but they who are the guilty are +not they who furnish the example. They who reign +through his fault are not among those sovereigns<a name="Page_37" id="Page_37" title="37" class="pagenum"></a> +who are likely to be taught to avoid speculative +wars by the murder of their master. I think the +author will not be hardy enough to assert that they +have shown less disposition to meddle in the concerns +of that very America than he did, and in a way not +less likely to kindle the flame of speculative war. +Here is one sovereign not yet reclaimed by these +healing examples. Will he point out the other sovereigns +who are to be reformed by this peace? Their +wars may not be speculative. But the world will not +be much mended by turning wars from unprofitable +and speculative to practical and lucrative, whether +the liberty or the repose of mankind is regarded. If +the author's new sovereign in France is not reformed +by the example of his own Revolution, that +Revolution has not added much to the security and +repose of Poland, for instance, or taught the three +great partitioning powers more moderation in their +second than they had shown in their first division +of that devoted country. The first division, which +preceded these destructive examples, was moderation +itself, in comparison of what has been, done since the +period of the author's amendment.</p> + +<p>This paragraph is written with something of a +studied obscurity. If it means anything, it seems +to hint as if sovereigns were to learn moderation, +and an attention to the liberties of their people, +from <i>the fate of the sovereigns who have suffered in +this war</i>, and eminently of Louis the Sixteenth.</p> + +<p>Will he say whether the King of Sardinia's horrible +tyranny was the cause of the loss of Savoy and of +Nice? What lesson of moderation does it teach the +Pope? I desire to know whether his Holiness is to +learn not to massacre his subjects, nor to waste and<a name="Page_38" id="Page_38" title="38" class="pagenum"></a> +destroy such beautiful countries as that of Avignon, +lest he should call to their assistance that great deliverer +of nations, <i>Jourdan Coupe-tête</i>? What lesson +does it give of moderation to the Emperor, whose +predecessor never put one man to death after a general +rebellion of the Low Countries, that the Regicides +never spared man, woman, or child, whom they +but suspected of dislike to their usurpations? What, +then, are all these lessons about the <i>softening</i> the +character of sovereigns by this Regicide peace? On +reading this section, one would imagine that the poor +tame sovereigns of Europe had been a sort of furious +wild beasts, that stood in need of some uncommonly +rough discipline to subdue the ferocity of their +savage nature.</p> + +<p>As to the example to be learnt from the murder +of Louis the Sixteenth, if a lesson to kings is not +derived from his fate, I do not know whence it can +come. The author, however, ought not to have left +us in the dark upon that subject, to break our shins +over his hints and insinuations. Is it, then, true, that +this unfortunate monarch drew his punishment upon +himself by his want of moderation, and his oppressing +the liberties of which he had found his people +in possession? Is not the direct contrary the fact? +And is not the example of this Revolution the very +reverse of anything which can lead to that <i>softening</i> +of character in princes which the author supposes as +a security to the people, and has brought forward as +a recommendation to fraternity with those who have +administered that happy emollient in the murder +of their king and the slavery and desolation of their +country?</p> + +<p>But the author does not confine the benefit of the<a name="Page_39" id="Page_39" title="39" class="pagenum"></a> +Regicide lesson to kings alone. He has a diffusive +bounty. Nobles, and men of property, will likewise +be greatly reformed. They, too, will be led to a review +of their social situation and duties,—"and will +reflect, that their large allotment of worldly advantages +is for the aid and benefit of the whole." Is it, +then, from the fate of Juigné, Archbishop of Paris, +or of the Cardinal de Rochefoucault, and of so many +others, who gave their fortunes, and, I may say, their +very beings, to the poor, that the rich are to learn, +that their "fortunes are for the aid and benefit of +the whole"? I say nothing of the liberal persons +of great rank and property, lay and ecclesiastic, men +and women, to whom we have had the honor and +happiness of affording an asylum: I pass by these, +lest I should never have done, or lest I should omit +some as deserving as any I might mention. Why +will the author, then, suppose that the nobles and +men of property in France have been banished, confiscated, +and murdered, on account of the savageness +and ferocity of their character, and their being tainted +with vices beyond those of the same order and +description in other countries? No judge of a revolutionary +tribunal, with his hands dipped in their +blood and his maw gorged with their property, has +yet dared to assert what this author has been pleased, +by way of a moral lesson, to insinuate.</p> + +<p>Their nobility, and their men of property, in a +mass, had the very same virtues, and the very same +vices, and in the very same proportions, with the +same description of men in this and in other nations. +I must do justice to suffering honor, generosity, +and integrity. I do not know that any time +or any country has furnished more splendid examples<a name="Page_40" id="Page_40" title="40" class="pagenum"></a> +of every virtue, domestic and public. I do not +enter into the councils of Providence; but, humanly +speaking, many of these nobles and men of property, +from whose disastrous fate we are, it seems, to learn +a general softening of character, and a revision of our +social situations and duties, appear to me full as little +deserving of that fate as the author, whoever he +is, can be. Many of them, I am sure, were such +as I should be proud indeed to be able to compare +myself with, in knowledge, in integrity, and in every +other virtue. My feeble nature might shrink, +though theirs did not, from the proof; but my reason +and my ambition tell me that it would be a good +bargain to purchase their merits with their fate.</p> + +<p>For which of his vices did that great magistrate, +D'Espréménil, lose his fortune and his head? What +were the abominations of Malesherbes, that other excellent +magistrate, whose sixty years of uniform virtue +was acknowledged, in the very act of his murder, by +the judicial butchers who condemned him? On account +of what misdemeanors was he robbed of his +property, and slaughtered with two generations of +his offspring,—and the remains of the third race, +with a refinement of cruelty, and lest they should +appear to reclaim the property forfeited by the virtues +of their ancestor, confounded in an hospital with +the thousands of those unhappy foundling infants +who are abandoned, without relation and without +name, by the wretchedness or by the profligacy of +their parents?</p> + +<p>Is the fate of the Queen of France to produce this +softening of character? Was she a person so very +ferocious and cruel, as, by the example of her death, +to frighten us into common humanity? Is there no <a name="Page_41" id="Page_41" title="41" class="pagenum"></a> +way to teach the Emperor a <i>softening</i> of character, +and a review of his social situation and duty, but +his consent, by an infamous accord with Regicide, +to drive a second coach with the Austrian arms +through the streets of Paris, along which, after a +series of preparatory horrors exceeding the atrocities +of the bloody execution itself, the glory of the Imperial +race had been carried to an ignominious death? +Is this a lesson of <i>moderation</i> to a descendant of +Maria Theresa, drawn from the fate of the daughter +of that incomparable woman and sovereign? If +he learns this lesson from such an object, and from +such teachers, the man may remain, but the king is +deposed. If he does not carry quite another memory +of that transaction in the inmost recesses of his heart, +he is unworthy to reign, he is unworthy to live. In +the chronicle of disgrace he will have but this short +tale told of him: "He was the first emperor of his +house that embraced a regicide; he was the last that +wore the imperial purple." Far am I from thinking +so ill of this august sovereign, who is at the head of +the monarchies of Europe, and who is the trustee of +their dignities and his own.</p> + +<p>What ferocity of character drew on the fate of +Elizabeth, the sister of King Louis the Sixteenth? +For which of the vices of that pattern of benevolence, +of piety, and of all the virtues, did they put +her to death? For which of her vices did they put +to death the mildest of all human creatures, the Duchess +of Biron? What were the crimes of those crowds +of matrons and virgins of condition, whom they mas +sacred, with their juries of blood, in prisons and on +scaffolds? What were the enormities of the infant +king, whom they caused, by lingering tortures, to<a name="Page_42" id="Page_42" title="42" class="pagenum"></a> +perish in their dungeon, and whom if at last they +dispatched by poison, it was in that detestable crime +the only act of mercy they have ever shown?</p> + +<p>What softening of character is to be had, what +review of their social situations and duties is to be +taught by these examples to kings, to nobles, to men +of property, to women, and to infants? The royal +family perished because it was royal. The nobles +perished because they were noble. The men, women, +and children, who had property, because they +had property to be robbed of. The priests were punished, +after they had been robbed of their all, not +for their vices, but for their virtues and their piety, +which made them an honor to their sacred profession, +and to that nature of which we ought to be proud, +since they belong to it. My Lord, nothing can be +learned from such examples, except the danger of +being kings, queens, nobles, priests, and children, to +be butchered on account of their inheritance. These +are things at which not vice, not crime, not folly, +but wisdom, goodness, learning, justice, probity, beneficence, +stand aghast. By these examples our reason +and our moral sense are not enlightened, but confounded; +and there is no refuge for astonished and +affrighted virtue, but being annihilated in humility +and submission, sinking into a silent adoration of +the inscrutable dispensations of Providence, and flying +with trembling wings from this world of daring +crimes, and feeble, pusillanimous, half-bred, bastard +justice, to the asylum of another order of things, in +an unknown form, but in a better life.</p> + +<p>Whatever the politician or preacher of September +or of October may think of the matter, it is a +most comfortless, disheartening, desolating example.<a name="Page_43" id="Page_43" title="43" class="pagenum"></a> +Dreadful is the example of ruined innocence and +virtue, and the completest triumph of the completest +villany that ever vexed and disgraced mankind! +The example is ruinous in every point of view, religious, +moral, civil, political. It establishes that +dreadful maxim of Machiavel, that in great affairs +men are not to be wicked by halves. This maxim is +not made for a middle sort of beings, who, because +they cannot be angels, ought to thwart their ambition, +and not endeavor to become infernal spirits. It +is too well exemplified in the present time, where the +faults and errors of humanity, checked by the imperfect, +timorous virtues, have been overpowered by +those who have stopped at no crime. It is a dreadful +part of the example, that infernal malevolence +has had pious apologists, who read their lectures on +frailties in favor of crimes,—who abandon the weak, +and court the friendship of the wicked. To root out +these maxims, and the examples that support them, +is a wise object of years of war. This is that war. +This is that moral war. It was said by old Trivulzio, +that the Battle of Marignano was the Battle of the +Giants,—that all the rest of the many he had seen +were those of the Cranes and Pygmies. This is true +of the objects, at least, of the contest: for the greater +part of those which we have hitherto contended +for, in comparison, were the toys of children.</p> + +<p>The October politician is so full of charity and +good-nature, that he supposes that these very robbers +and murderers themselves are in a course of melioration: +on what ground I cannot conceive, except on +the long practice of every crime, and by its complete +success. He is an Origenist, and believes in the conversion +of the Devil. All that runs in the place of<a name="Page_44" id="Page_44" title="44" class="pagenum"></a> +blood in his veins is nothing but the milk of human +kindness. He is as soft as a curd,—though, as a politician, +he might be supposed to be made of sterner +stuff. He supposes (to use his own expression) +"that the salutary truths which he inculcates are +making their way into their bosoms." Their bosom +is a rock of granite, on which Falsehood has long +since built her stronghold. Poor Truth has had a +hard work of it, with her little pickaxe. Nothing +but gunpowder will do.</p> + +<p>As a proof, however, of the progress of this sap of +Truth, he gives us a confession they had made not +long before he wrote. "'Their fraternity' (as was +lately stated by themselves in a solemn report) 'has +been the brotherhood of Cain and Abel,' and 'they +have organized nothing but bankruptcy and famine.'" +A very honest confession, truly,—and much in the +spirit of their oracle, Rousseau. Yet, what is still +more marvellous than the confession, this is the very +fraternity to which our author gives us such an obliging +invitation to accede. There is, indeed, a vacancy +in the fraternal corps: a brother and a partner is +wanted. If we please, we may fill up the place of +the butchered Abel; and whilst we wait the destiny +of the departed brother, we may enjoy the advantages +of the partnership, by entering without delay into a +shop of ready-made bankruptcy and famine. These +are the <i>douceurs</i> by which we are invited to Regicide +fraternity and friendship. But still our author considers +the confession as a proof that "truth is making +its way into their bosoms." No! It is not making +its way into their bosoms. It has forced its way +into their mouths! The evil spirit by which they +are possessed, though essentially a liar, is forced by<a name="Page_45" id="Page_45" title="45" class="pagenum"></a> +the tortures of conscience to confess the truth,—to +confess enough for their condemnation, but not for +their amendment. Shakspeare very aptly expresses +this kind of confession, devoid of repentance, from the +mouth of an usurper, a murderer, and a regicide:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">"We are ourselves compelled,<br /></span> +<span>Even to the teeth and forehead of our faults,<br /></span> +<span>To give in evidence."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Whence is their amendment? Why, the author +writes, that, on their murderous insurrectionary system, +their own lives are not sure for an hour; nor +has their power a greater stability. True. They are +convinced of it; and accordingly the wretches have +done all they can to preserve their lives, and to secure +their power; but not one step have they taken +to amend the one or to make a more just use of the +other. Their wicked policy has obliged them to make +a pause in the only massacres in which their treachery +and cruelty had operated as a kind of savage justice,—that +is, the massacre of the accomplices of +their crimes: they have ceased to shed the inhuman +blood of their fellow-murderers; but when they take +any of those persons who contend for their lawful +government, their property, and their religion, notwithstanding +the truth which this author says is making +its way into their bosoms, it has not taught them +the least tincture of mercy. This we plainly see by +their massacre at Quiberon, where they put to death, +with every species of contumely, and without any exception, +every prisoner of war who did not escape out +of their hands. To have had property, to have been +robbed of it, and to endeavor to regain it,—these are +crimes irremissible, to which every man who regards +his property or his life, in every country, ought well<a name="Page_46" id="Page_46" title="46" class="pagenum"></a> +to look in all connection with those with whom to +have had property was an offence, to endeavor to keep +it a second offence, to attempt to regain it a crime +that puts the offender out of all the laws of peace or +war. You cannot see one of those wretches without +an alarm for your life as well as your goods. They +are like the worst of the French and Italian banditti, +who, whenever they robbed, were sure to murder.</p> + +<p>Are they not the very same ruffians, thieves, assassins, +and regicides that they were from the beginning? +Have they diversified the scene by the least +variety, or produced the face of a single new villany? +<i>Tædet harum quotidianarum formarum</i>. Oh! but I +shall be answered, "It is now quite another thing;—they +are all changed. You have not seen them in +their state dresses;—this makes an amazing difference. +The new habit of the Directory is so charmingly +fancied, that it is impossible not to fall in love +with so well-dressed a Constitution;—the costume +of the <i>sans-culotte</i> Constitution of 1793 was absolutely +insufferable. The Committee for Foreign Affairs were +such slovens, and stunk so abominably, that no <i>muscadin</i> +ambassador of the smallest degree of delicacy +of nerves could come within ten yards of them; but +now they are so powdered, and perfumed, and ribanded, +and sashed, and plumed, that, though they are +grown infinitely more insolent in their fine clothes +even than they were in their rags, (and that was +enough,) as they now appear, there is something in +it more grand and noble, something more suitable +to an awful Roman Senate receiving the homage of +dependent tetrarchs. Like that Senate, (their perpetual +model for conduct towards other nations,) +they permit their vassals (during their good pleasure)<a name="Page_47" id="Page_47" title="47" class="pagenum"></a> +to assume the name of kings, in order to bestow +more dignity on the suite and retinue of the sovereign +Republic by the nominal rank of their slaves: +<i>Ut habeant instrumenta servitutis et reges</i>." All this +is very fine, undoubtedly; and ambassadors whose +hands are almost out for want of employment may +long to have their part in this august ceremony of +the Republic one and indivisible. But, with great +deference to the new diplomatic taste, we old people +must retain some square-toed predilection, for the +fashions of our youth.</p> + +<p>I am afraid you will find me, my Lord, again falling +into my usual vanity, in valuing myself on the +eminent men whose society I once enjoyed. I remember, +in a conversation I once had with my ever dear +friend Garrick, who was the first of actors, because +he was the most acute observer of Nature I ever +knew, I asked him how it happened, that, whenever +a senate appeared on the stage, the audience seemed +always disposed to laughter. He said, the reason +was plain: the audience was well acquainted with +the faces of most of the senators. They knew that +they were no other than candle-snuffers, revolutionary +scene-shifters, second and third mob, prompters, +clerks, executioners, who stand with their axe on +their shoulders by the wheel, grinners in the pantomime, +murderers in tragedies, who make ugly faces +under black wigs,—in short, the very scum and +refuse of the theatre; and it was of course that the +contrast of the vileness of the actors with the pomp +of their habits naturally excited ideas of contempt +and ridicule.</p> + +<p>So it was at Paris on the inaugural day of the Constitution +for the present year. The foreign ministers<a name="Page_48" id="Page_48" title="48" class="pagenum"></a> +were ordered to attend at this investiture of the +Directory;—for so they call the managers of their +burlesque government. The diplomacy, who were +a sort of strangers, were quite awe-struck with the +"pride, pomp, and circumstance" of this majestic +senate; whilst the <i>sans-culotte</i> gallery instantly recognized +their old insurrectionary acquaintance, burst +out into a horse-laugh at their absurd finery, and +held them in infinitely greater contempt than whilst +they prowled about the streets in the pantaloons of +the last year's Constitution, when their legislators +appeared honestly, with their daggers in their belts, +and their pistols peeping out of their side-pocket-holes, +like a bold, brave banditti, as they are. The +Parisians (and I am much of their mind) think that +a thief with a crape on his visage is much worse than +a barefaced knave, and that such robbers richly deserve +all the penalties of all the black acts. In this +their thin disguise, their comrades of the late abdicated +sovereign <i>canaille</i> hooted and hissed them, and +from that day have no other name for them than +what is not quite so easy to render into English, +impossible to make it very civil English: it belongs, +indeed, to the language of the <i>halles</i>: but, without being +instructed in that dialect, it was the opinion of +the polite Lord Chesterfield that no man could be a +complete master of French. Their Parisian brethren +called them <i>gueux plumés</i>, which, though not elegant, +is expressive and characteristic: <i>feathered scoundrels</i>, +I think, comes the nearest to it in that kind +of English. But we are now to understand that +these <i>gueux</i>, for no other reason, that I can divine, +except their red and white clothes, form at last a +state with which we may cultivate amity, and have a<a name="Page_49" id="Page_49" title="49" class="pagenum"></a> +prospect of the blessings of a secure and permanent +peace. In effect, then, it was not with the men, or +their principles, or their polities, that we quarrelled: +our sole dislike was to the cut of their clothes.</p> + +<p>But to pass over <i>their</i> dresses,—good God! in +what habits did the representatives of the crowned +heads of Europe appear, when they came to swell the +pomp of their humiliation, and attended in solemn +function this inauguration of Regicide? That would +be the curiosity. Under what robes did they cover +the disgrace and degradation of the whole college +of kings? What warehouses of masks and dominoes +furnished a cover to the nakedness of their shame? +The shop ought to be known; it willsoon have a +good trade. Were the dresses of the ministers of +those lately called potentates, who attended on that +occasion, taken from the wardrobe of that property-man +at the opera, from whence my old acquaintance, +Anacharsis Clootz, some years ago equipped a body +of ambassadors, whom he conducted, as from all the +nations of the world, to the bar of what was called +the Constituent Assembly? Among those mock ministers, +one of the most conspicuous figures was the +representative of the British nation, who unluckily +was wanting at the late ceremony. In the face of all +the real ambassadors of the sovereigns of Europe was +this ludicrous representation of their several subjects, +under the name of <i>oppressed sovereigns</i>,<a name="FNanchor_10_10" id="FNanchor_10_10"></a><a href="#Footnote_10_10" class="fnanchor">[10]</a> exhibited to +the Assembly. That Assembly received an harangue, +in the name of those sovereigns, against their kings, +delivered by this Clootz, actually a subject of Prussia, +under the name of Ambassador of the Human Race.<a name="Page_50" id="Page_50" title="50" class="pagenum"></a> +At that time there was only a feeble reclamation from +one of the ambassadors of these tyrants and oppressors. +A most gracious answer was given to the ministers +of the oppressed sovereigns; and they went so +far on that occasion as to assign them, in that assumed +character, a box at one of their festivals.</p> + +<p>I was willing to indulge myself in an hope that this +second appearance of ambassadors was only an insolent +mummery of the same kind; but, alas! Anacharsis +himself, all fanatic as he was, could not have +imagined that his opera procession should have been +the prototype of the real appearance of the representatives +of all the sovereigns of Europe themselves, to +make the same prostration that was made by those +who dared to represent their people in a complaint +against them. But in this the French Republic has +followed, as they always affect to do, and have hitherto +done with success, the example of the ancient Romans, +who shook all governments by listening to the +complaints of their subjects, and soon after brought +the kings themselves to answer at their bar. At this +last ceremony the ambassadors had not Clootz for +their Cotterel. Pity that Clootz had not had a reprieve +from the guillotine till he had completed his +work! But that engine fell before the curtain had +fallen upon all the dignity of the earth.</p> + +<p>On this their gaudy day the new Regicide Directory +sent for that diplomatic rabble, as bad as themselves +in principle, but infinitely worse in degradation. +They called them out by a sort of roll of their nations, +one after another, much in the manner in which they +called wretches out of their prison to the guillotine. +When these ambassadors of infamy appeared before +them, the chief Director, in the name of the rest,<a name="Page_51" id="Page_51" title="51" class="pagenum"></a> +treated each of them with a short, affected, pedantic, +insolent, theatric laconium,—a sort of epigram of +contempt. When they had thus insulted them in a +style and language which never before was heard, and +which no sovereign would for a moment endure from +another, supposing any of them frantic enough to use +it, to finish their outrage, they drummed and trumpeted +the wretches out of their hall of audience.</p> + +<p>Among the objects of this insolent buffoonery was +a person supposed to represent the King of Prussia. +To this worthy representative they did not so much as +condescend to mention his master; they did not seem +to know that he had one; they addressed themselves +solely to Prussia in the abstract, notwithstanding the +infinite obligation they owed to their early protector +for their first recognition and alliance, and for the +part of his territory he gave into their hands for the +first-fruits of his homage. None but dead monarchs +are so much as mentioned by them, and those only to +insult the living by an invidious comparison. They +told the Prussians they ought to learn, after the +example of Frederick the Great, a love for France. +What a pity it is, that he, who loved France so well +as to chastise it, was not now alive, by an unsparing +use of the rod (which, indeed, he would have spared +little) to give them another instance of his paternal +affection! But the Directory were mistaken. These +are not days in which monarchs value themselves upon +the title of <i>great</i>: they are grown <i>philosophic</i>: they +are satisfied to be good.</p> + +<p>Your Lordship will pardon me for this no very long +reflection on the short, but excellent speech of the +plumed Director to the ambassador of Cappadocia. +The Imperial ambassador was not in waiting, but they<a name="Page_52" id="Page_52" title="52" class="pagenum"></a> +found for Austria a good Judean representation. +With great judgment, his Highness, the Grand Duke, +had sent the most atheistic coxcomb to be found in +Florence, to represent at the bar of impiety the House +of Apostolic Majesty, and the descendants of the pious, +though high-minded, Maria Theresa. He was sent to +humble the whole race of Austria before those grim +assassins, reeking with the blood of the daughter of +Maria Theresa, whom they sent half dead, in a dung-cart, +to a cruel execution; and this true-born son of +apostasy and infidelity, this renegado from the faith +and from all honor and all humanity, drove an Austrian +coach over the stones which were yet wet with +her blood,—with that blood which dropped every +step through her tumbrel, all the way she was drawn +from the horrid prison, in which they had finished all +the cruelty and horrors not executed in the face of +the sun. The Hungarian subjects of Maria Theresa, +when they drew their swords to defend her rights +against France, called her, with correctness of truth, +though not with the same correctness, perhaps, of +grammar, a king: "<i>Moriamur pro rege nostro, Maria +Theresa.</i>" SHE lived and died a king; and others will +have subjects ready to make the same vow, when, in +either sex, they show themselves real kings.</p> + +<p>When the Directory came to this miserable fop, +they bestowed a compliment on his matriculation +into <i>their</i> philosophy; but as to his master, they +made to him, as was reasonable, a reprimand, not +without a pardon, and an oblique hint at the whole +family. What indignities have been offered through +this wretch to his master, and how well borne, it is +not necessary that I should dwell on at present. I +hope that those who yet wear royal, imperial, and<a name="Page_53" id="Page_53" title="53" class="pagenum"></a> +ducal crowns will learn to feel as men and as kings: +if not, I predict to them, they will not long exist as +kings or as men.</p> + +<p>Great Britain was not there. Almost in despair, +I hope she will never, in any rags and <i>coversluts</i> of +infamy, be seen at such an exhibition. The hour of +her final degradation is not yet come; she did not herself +appear in the Regicide presence, to be the sport +and mockery of those bloody buffoons, who, in the merriment +of their pride, were insulting with every species +of contumely the fallen dignity of the rest of Europe. +But Britain, though not personally appearing +to bear her part in this monstrous tragi-comedy, was +very far from being forgotten. The new-robed regicides +found a representative for her. And who was +this representative? Without a previous knowledge, +any one would have given a thousand guesses before +he could arrive at a tolerable divination of their rancorous +insolence. They chose to address what they +had to say concerning this nation to the ambassador +of America. They did not apply to this ambassador +for a mediation: that, indeed, would have indicated +a want of every kind of decency; but it would have +indicated nothing more. But in this their American +apostrophe, your Lordship will observe, they did not +so much as pretend to hold out to us directly, or +through any mediator, though in the most humiliating +manner, any idea whatsoever of peace, or the +smallest desire of reconciliation. To the States of +America themselves they paid no compliment. They +paid their compliment to Washington solely: and on +what ground? This most respectable commander +and magistrate might deserve commendation on very +many of those qualities which they who most disapprove<a name="Page_54" id="Page_54" title="54" class="pagenum"></a> +some part of his proceedings, not more justly +than freely, attribute to him; but they found nothing +to commend in him "<i>but the hatred he bore to Great +Britain</i>." I verily believe, that, in the whole history +of our European wars, there never was such a compliment +paid from the sovereign of one state to a +great chief of another. Not one ambassador from +any one of those powers who pretend to live in amity +with this kingdom took the least notice of that unheard-of +declaration; nor will Great Britain, till she +is known with certainty to be true to her own dignity, +find any one disposed to feel for the indignities +that are offered to her. To say the truth, those miserable +creatures were all silent under the insults that +were offered to themselves. They pocketed their +epigrams, as ambassadors formerly took the gold +boxes and miniature pictures set in diamonds presented +them by sovereigns at whose courts they had +resided. It is to be presumed that by the next post +they faithfully and promptly transmitted to their masters +the honors they had received. I can easily conceive +the epigram which will be presented to Lord +Auckland, or to the Duke of Bedford, as hereafter, +according to circumstances, they may happen to represent +this kingdom. Few can have so little imagination +as not readily to conceive the nature of the boxes +of epigrammatic lozenges that will be presented +to them.</p> + +<p>But <i>hæ nugæ seria ducunt in mala</i>. The conduct +of the Regicide faction is perfectly systematic in every +particular, and it appears absurd only as it is strange +and uncouth, not as it has an application to the ends +and objects of their policy. When by insult after +insult they have rendered the character of sovereigns<a name="Page_55" id="Page_55" title="55" class="pagenum"></a> +vile in the eyes of their subjects, they know there +is but one step more to their utter destruction. All +authority, in a great degree, exists in opinion: royal +authority most of all. The supreme majesty of a +monarch cannot be allied with contempt. Men would +reason, not unplausibly, that it would be better to get +rid of the monarchy at once than to suffer that which +was instituted, and well instituted, to support the +glory of the nation, to become the instrument of its +degradation and disgrace.</p> + +<p>A good many reflections will arise in your Lordship's +mind upon the time and circumstances of that +most insulting and atrocious declaration of hostility +against this kingdom. The declaration was made +subsequent to the noble lord's encomium on the +new Regicide Constitution,—after the pamphlet had +made something more than advances towards a reconciliation +with that ungracious race, and had directly +disowned all those who adhered to the original +declaration in favor of monarchy. It was even +subsequent to the unfortunate declaration in the +speech from the throne (which this pamphlet but +too truly announced) of the readiness of our government +to enter into connections of friendship with +that faction. Here was the answer from the throne +of Regicide to the speech from the throne of Great +Britain. They go out of their way to compliment +General Washington on the supposed rancor of his +heart towards this country. It is very remarkable, +that they make this compliment of malice to the +chief of the United States, who had first signed a +treaty of peace, amity, and commerce with this kingdom. +This radical hatred, according to their way of +thinking, the most recent, solemn compacts of friendship<a name="Page_56" id="Page_56" title="56" class="pagenum"></a> +cannot or ought not to remove. In this malice +to England, as in the one great comprehensive virtue, +all other merits of this illustrious person are entirely +merged. For my part, I do not believe the fact to be +so as they represent it. Certainly it is not for Mr. +Washington's honor as a gentleman, a Christian, or a +President of the United States, after the treaty he has +signed, to entertain such sentiments. I have a moral +assurance that the representation of the Regicide Directory +is absolutely false and groundless. If it be, +it is a stronger mark of their audacity and insolence, +and still a stronger proof of the support they mean to +give to the mischievous faction they are known to +nourish there, to the ruin of those States, and to the +end that no British affections should ever arise in +that important part of the world, which would naturally +lead to a cordial, hearty British alliance, upon +the bottom of mutual interest and ancient affection. +It shows in what part it is, and with what a weapon, +they mean a deadly blow at the heart of Great Britain. +One really would have expected, from this new +Constitution of theirs, which had been announced as +a great reform, and which was to be, more than any +of their former experimental schemes, alliable with +other nations, that they would, in their very first +public act, and their declaration to the collected representation +of Europe and America, have affected +some degree of moderation, or, at least, have observed +a guarded silence with regard to their temper +and their views. No such thing: they were in haste +to declare the principles which are spun into the +primitive staple of their frame. They were afraid +that a moment's doubt should exist about them. In +their very infancy they were in haste to put their<a name="Page_57" id="Page_57" title="57" class="pagenum"></a> +hand on their infernal altar, and to swear the same +immortal hatred to England which was sworn in the +succession of all the short-lived constitutions that +preceded it. With them everything else perishes +almost as soon as it is formed; this hatred alone is +immortal. This is their impure Vestal fire that never +is extinguished: and never will it be extinguished, +whilst the system of Regicide exists in France. What! +are we not to believe them? Men are too apt to be +deceitful enough in their professions of friendship, +and this makes a wise man walk with some caution +through life. Such professions, in some cases, may +be even a ground of further distrust. But when a +man declares himself your unalterable enemy! No +man ever declared to another a rancor towards him +which he did not feel. <i>Falsos in amore odia, non fingere</i>, +said an author who points his observations so as +to make them remembered.</p> + +<p>Observe, my Lord, that, from their invasion of +Flanders and Holland to this hour, they have never +made the smallest signification of a desire of peace +with this kingdom, with Austria, or, indeed, with any +other power that I know of. As superiors, they expect +others to begin. We have complied, as you +may see. The hostile insolence with which they +gave such a rebuff to our first overture, in the speech +from the throne, did not hinder us from making, +from the same throne, a second advance. The two +Houses a second time coincided in the same sentiments, +with a degree of apparent unanimity, (for +there was no dissentient voice but yours,) with +which, when they reflect on it, they will be as much +ashamed as I am. To this our new humiliating overture +(such, at whatever hazard, I must call it) what<a name="Page_58" id="Page_58" title="58" class="pagenum"></a> +did the Regicide Directory answer? Not one public +word of a readiness to treat. No,—they feel their +proud situation too well. They never declared whether +they would grant peace to you or not. They only +signified to you their pleasure as to the terms on +which alone they would in any case admit you to it. +You showed your general disposition to peace, and, +to forward it, you left everything open to negotiations. +As to any terms you can possibly obtain, they +shut out all negotiation at the very commencement. +They declared that they never would make a peace +by which anything that ever belonged to France +should be ceded. We would not treat with the monarchy, +weakened as it must obviously be in any circumstance +of restoration, without a reservation of +something for indemnity and security,—and that, +too, in words of the largest comprehension. You +treat with the Regicides without any reservation at +all. On their part, they assure you formally and +publicly, that they will give you nothing in the name +of indemnity or security, or for any other purpose.</p> + +<p>It is impossible not to pause here for a moment, +and to consider the manner in which such declarations +would have been taken by your ancestors from +a monarch distinguished for his arrogance,—an +arrogance which, even more than his ambition, incensed +and combined all Europe against him. Whatever +his inward intentions may have been, did Louis +the Fourteenth ever make a declaration that the +true bounds of France were the ocean, the Mediterranean, +and the Rhine? In any overtures for peace, +did he ever declare that he would make no sacrifices +to promote it? His declarations were always directly +to the contrary; and at the Peace of Ryswick his<a name="Page_59" id="Page_59" title="59" class="pagenum"></a> +actions were to the contrary. At the close of the +war, almost in every instance victorious, all Europe +was astonished, even those who received them were +astonished, at his concessions. Let those who have a +mind to see how little, in comparison, the most powerful +and ambitious of all monarchs is to be dreaded +consult the very judicious critical observations on the +politics of that reign, inserted in the military treatise +of the Marquis de Montalembert. Let those who +wish to know what is to be dreaded from an ambitious +republic consult no author, no military critic, +no historical critic. Let them open their own eyes, +which degeneracy and pusillanimity have shut from +the light that pains them, and let them not vainly +seek their security in a voluntary ignorance of their +danger.</p> + +<p>To dispose us towards this peace,—an attempt in +which our author has, I do not know whether to call +it the good or ill fortune to agree with whatever is +most seditious, factious, and treasonable in this country,—we +are told by many dealers in speculation, +but not so distinctly by the author himself, (too great +distinctness of affirmation not being his fault,)—but +we are told, that the French have lately obtained a +very pretty sort of Constitution, and that it resembles +the British Constitution as if they had been twinned +together in the womb,—<i>mire sagaces fallere hospites +discrimen obscurum</i>. It may be so: but I confess I +am not yet made to it: nor is the noble author. He +finds the "elements" excellent, but the disposition +very inartificial indeed. Contrary to what we might +expect at Paris, the meat is good, the cookery abominable. +I agree with him fully in the last; and if +I were forced to allow the first, I should still think,<a name="Page_60" id="Page_60" title="60" class="pagenum"></a> +with our old coarse by-word, that the same power +which furnished all their former <i>restaurateurs</i> sent +also their present cooks. I have a great opinion of +Thomas Paine, and of all his productions: I remember +his having been one of the committee for forming +one of their annual Constitutions, I mean the admirable +Constitution of 1793, after having been a chamber +council to the no less admirable Constitution of +1791. This pious patriot has his eyes still directed +to his dear native country, notwithstanding her in +gratitude to so kind a benefactor. This outlaw of +England, and lawgiver to France, is now, in secret +probably, trying his hand again, and inviting us to +him by making his Constitution such as may give +his disciples in England some plausible pretext for +going into the house that he has opened. We have +discovered, it seems, that all which the boasted wisdom +of our ancestors has labored to bring to perfection +for six or seven centuries is nearly, or altogether, +matched in six or seven days, at the leisure hours and +sober intervals of Citizen Thomas Paine.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span style="margin-left: -.5em;">"But though the treacherous tapster, Thomas,<br /></span> +<span>Hangs a new Angel two doors from us,<br /></span> +<span>As fine as dauber's hands can make it,<br /></span> +<span>In hopes that strangers may mistake it,<br /></span> +<span>We think it both a shame and sin<br /></span> +<span>To quit the good old Angel Inn,"<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="noindent">Indeed, in this good old house, where everything at +least is well aired, I shall be content to put up my +fatigued horses, and here take a bed for the long +night that begins to darken upon me. Had I, however, +the honor (I must now call it so) of being a +member of any of the constitutional clubs, I should +think I had carried my point most completely. It is<a name="Page_61" id="Page_61" title="61" class="pagenum"></a> +clear, by the applauses bestowed on what the author +calls this new Constitution, a mixed oligarchy, that +the difference between the clubbists and the old adherents +to the monarchy of this country is hardly +worth a scuffle. Let it depart in peace, and light +lie the earth on the British Constitution! By this +easy manner of treating the most difficult of all subjects, +the constitution for a great kingdom, and by +letting loose an opinion that they may be made by +any adventurers in speculation in a small given time, +and for any country, all the ties, which, whether of +reason or prejudice, attach mankind to their old, habitual, +domestic governments, are not a little loosened; +all communion, which the similarity of the +basis has produced between all the governments that +compose what we call the Christian world and the +republic of Europe, would be dissolved. By these +hazarded speculations France is more approximated +to us in constitution than in situation; and in proportion +as we recede from the ancient system of Europe, +we approach to that connection which alone +can remain to us, a close alliance with the new-discovered +moral and political world in France.</p> + +<p>These theories would be of little importance, if +we did not only know, but sorely feel, that there is +a strong Jacobin faction in this country, which has +long employed itself in speculating upon constitutions, +and to whom the circumstance of their government +being home-bred and prescriptive seems no +sort of recommendation. What seemed to us to be +the best system of liberty that a nation ever enjoyed +to them seems the yoke of an intolerable slavery. +This speculative faction had long been at work. The +French Revolution did not cause it: it only discovered<a name="Page_62" id="Page_62" title="62" class="pagenum"></a> +it, increased it, and gave fresh vigor to its operations. +I have reason to be persuaded that it was in +this country, and from English writers and English +caballers, that France herself was instituted in this +revolutionary fury. The communion of these two +factions upon any pretended basis of similarity is +a matter of very serious consideration. They are +always considering the formal distributions of power +in a constitution: the moral basis they consider +as nothing. Very different is my opinion: I consider +the moral basis as everything,—the formal arrangements, +further than as they promote the moral +principles of government, and the keeping desperately +wicked persons as the subjects of laws and +not the makers of them, to be of little importance. +What signifies the cutting and shuffling of cards, +while the pack still remains the same? As a basis +for such a connection as has subsisted between +the powers of Europe, we had nothing to fear, but +from the lapses and frailties of men,—and that was +enough; but this new pretended republic has given +us more to apprehend from what they call their virtues +than we had to dread from the vices of other +men. Avowedly and systematically, they have given +the upperhand to all the vicious and degenerate part +of human nature. It is from their lapses and deviations +from their principle that alone we have anything +to hope.</p> + +<p>I hear another inducement to fraternity with the +present rulers. They have murdered one Robespierre. +This Robespierre, they tell us, was a cruel +tyrant, and now that he is put out of the way, all will +go well in France. Astræa will again return to that +earth from which she has been an emigrant, and all<a name="Page_63" id="Page_63" title="63" class="pagenum"></a> +nations will resort to her golden scales. It is very +extraordinary, that, the very instant the mode of +Paris is known here, it becomes all the fashion in +London. This is their jargon. It is the old <i>bon-ton</i> +of robbers, who cast their common crimes on the +wickedness of their departed associates. I care little +about the memory of this same Robespierre. I am +sure he was an execrable villain. I rejoiced at his +punishment neither more nor less than I should at +the execution of the present Directory, or any of its +members. But who gave Robespierre the power of +being a tyrant? and who were the instruments of his +tyranny? The present virtuous constitution-mongers. +He was a tyrant; they were his satellites +and his hangmen. Their sole merit is in the murder +of their colleague. They have expiated their +other murders by a new murder. It has always +been the case among this banditti. They have always +had the knife at each other's throats, after they +had almost blunted it at the throats of every honest +man. These people thought, that, in the commerce +of murder, he was like to have the better of the bargain, +if any time was lost; they therefore took one +of their short revolutionary methods, and massacred +him in a manner so perfidious and cruel as would +shock all humanity, if the stroke was not struck by +the present rulers on one of their own associates. +But this last act of infidelity and murder is to expiate +all the rest, and to qualify them for the amity +of an humane and virtuous sovereign and civilized +people. I have heard that a Tartar believes, when +he has killed a man, that all his estimable qualities +pass with his clothes and arms to the murderer; but +I have never heard that it was the opinion of any savage<a name="Page_64" id="Page_64" title="64" class="pagenum"></a> +Scythian, that, if he kills a brother villain, he is, +<i>ipso facto</i>, absolved of all his own offences. The Tartarian +doctrine is the most tenable opinion. The +murderers of Robespierre, besides what they are entitled +to by being engaged in the same tontine of infamy, +are his representatives, have inherited all his +murderous qualities, in addition to their own private +stock. But it seems we are always to be of a party +with the last and victorious assassins. I confess I +am of a different mind, and am rather inclined, of +the two, to think and speak less hardly of a dead +ruffian than to associate with the living. I could +better bear the stench of the gibbeted murderer than +the society of the bloody felons who yet annoy the +world. Whilst they wait the recompense due to +their ancient crimes, they merit new punishment by +the new offences they commit. There is a period +to the offences of Robespierre. They survive in his +assassins. "Better a living dog," says the old proverb, +"than a dead lion." Not so here. Murderers +and hogs never look well till they are hanged. From +villany no good can arise, but in the example of its +fate. So I leave them their dead Robespierre, either +to gibbet his memory, or to deify him in their Pantheon +with their Marat and their Mirabeau.</p> + +<p>It is asserted that this government promises stability. +God of his mercy forbid! If it should, nothing +upon earth besides itself can be stable. We declare +this stability to be the ground of our making peace +with them. Assuming it, therefore, that the men +and the system are what I have described, and that +they have a determined hostility against this country,—an +hostility not only of policy, but of predilection,—then +I think that every rational being would go<a name="Page_65" id="Page_65" title="65" class="pagenum"></a> +along with me in considering its permanence as the +greatest of all possible evils. If, therefore, we are to +look for peace with such a thing in any of its monstrous +shapes, which I deprecate, it must be in that +state of disorder, confusion, discord, anarchy, and insurrection, +such as might oblige the momentary rulers +to forbear their attempts on neighboring states, +or to render these attempts less operative, if they +should kindle new wars. When was it heard before, +that the internal repose of a determined and wicked +enemy, and the strength of his government, became +the wish of his neighbor, and a security, against +either his malice or his ambition? The direct contrary +has always been inferred from that state of +things: accordingly, it has ever been the policy of +those who would preserve themselves against the enterprises +of such a malignant and mischievous power +to cut out so much work for him in his own states +as might keep his dangerous activity employed at +home.</p> + +<p>It is said, in vindication of this system, which demands +the stability of the Regicide power as a ground +for peace with them, that, when they have obtained, +as now it is said (though not by this noble author) +they have, a permanent government, they will be <i>able</i> +to preserve amity with this kingdom, and with others +who have the misfortune to be in their neighborhood. +Granted. They will be <i>able</i> to do so, without +question; but are they willing to do so? Produce +the act; produce the declaration. Have they +made any single step towards it? Have they ever +once proposed to treat?</p> + +<p>The assurance of a stable peace, grounded on the +stability of their system, proceeds on this hypothesis,—that<a name="Page_66" id="Page_66" title="66" class="pagenum"></a> +their hostility to other nations has proceeded +from their anarchy at home, and from the +prevalence of a populace which their government had +not strength enough to master. This I utterly deny. +I insist upon it as a fact, that, in the daring +commencement of all their hostilities, and their astonishing +perseverance in them, so as never once, +in any fortune, high or low, to propose a treaty of +peace to any power in Europe, they have never been +actuated by the people: on the contrary, the people, +I will not say have been moved, but impelled by +them, and have generally acted under a compulsion, +of which most of us are as yet, thank God, unable +to form an adequate idea. The war against Austria +was formally declared by the unhappy Louis the Sixteenth; +but who has ever considered Louis the Sixteenth, +since the Revolution, to have been the government? +The second Regicide Assembly, then the only +government, was the author of that war; and neither +the nominal king nor the nominal people had anything +to do with it, further than in a reluctant obedience. +It is to delude ourselves, to consider the state +of France, since their Revolution, as a state of anarchy: +it is something far worse. Anarchy it is, undoubtedly, +if compared with government pursuing +the peace, order, morals, and prosperity of the people; +but regarding only the power that has really +guided from the day of the Revolution to this time, +it has been of all governments the most absolute, despotic, +and effective that has hitherto appeared on +earth. Never were the views and politics of any +government pursued with half the regularity, system, +and method that a diligent observer must have +contemplated with amazement and terror in theirs.<a name="Page_67" id="Page_67" title="67" class="pagenum"></a> +Their state is not an anarchy, but a series of short-lived +tyrannies. We do not call a republic with +annual magistrates an anarchy: theirs is that kind +of republic; but the succession is not effected by the +expiration of the term of the magistrate's service, but +by his murder. Every new magistracy, succeeding +by homicide, is auspicated by accusing its predecessors +in the office of tyranny, and it continues by the +exercise of what they charged upon others.</p> + +<p>This strong hand is the law, and the sole law, in +their state. I defy any person to show any other +law,—or if any such should be found on paper, that +it is in the smallest degree, or in any one instance, +regarded or practised. In all their successions, not +one magistrate, or one form of magistracy, has expired +by a mere occasional popular tumult; everything +has been the effect of the studied machinations +of the one revolutionary cabal, operating within itself +upon itself. That cabal is all in all. France +has no public; it is the only nation I ever heard of, +where the people are absolutely slaves, in the fullest +sense, in all affairs, public and private, great +and small, even down to the minutest and most recondite +parts of their household concerns. The helots +of Laconia, the regardants to the manor in Russia +and in Poland, even the negroes in the West Indies, +know nothing of so searching, so penetrating, so +heart-breaking a slavery. Much would these servile +wretches call for our pity under that unheard-of +yoke, if for their perfidious and unnatural rebellion, +and for their murder of the mildest of all +monarchs, they did not richly deserve a punishment +not greater than their crime.</p> + +<p>On the whole, therefore, I take it to be a great<a name="Page_68" id="Page_68" title="68" class="pagenum"></a> +mistake to think that the want of power in the government +furnished a natural cause of war; whereas +the greatness of its power, joined to its use of that +power, the nature of its system, and the persons +who acted in it, did naturally call for a strong military +resistance to oppose them, and rendered it not +only just, but necessary. But at present I say no +more on the genius and character of the power set +up in France. I may probably trouble you with it +more at large hereafter: this subject calls for a very +full exposure: at present it is enough for me, if I +point it out as a matter well worthy of consideration, +whether the true ground of hostility was not rightly +conceived very early in this war, and whether anything +has happened to change that system, except our +ill success in a war which in no principal instance +had its true destination as the object of its operations. +That the war has succeeded ill in many cases +is undoubted; but then let us speak the truth, and +say we are defeated, exhausted, dispirited, and must +submit. This would be intelligible. The world would +be inclined to pardon the abject conduct of an undone +nation. But let us not conceal from <i>ourselves</i> +our real situation, whilst, by every species of humiliation, +we are but too strongly displaying our sense of +it to the enemy.</p> + +<p>The writer of the Remarks in the Last Week of +October appears to think that the present government +in France contains many of the elements which, when +properly arranged, are known to form the best practical +governments,—and that the system, whatever +may become its particular form, is no longer likely +to be an obstacle to negotiation. If its form now be +no obstacle to such negotiation, I do not know why<a name="Page_69" id="Page_69" title="69" class="pagenum"></a> +it was ever so. Suppose that this government promised +greater permanency than any of the former, (a +point on which I can form no judgment,) still a link +is wanting to couple the permanence of the government +with the permanence of the peace. On this +not one word is said: nor can there be, in my opinion. +This deficiency is made up by strengthening the +first ringlet of the chain, that ought to be, but that +is not, stretched to connect the two propositions. All +seems to be done, if we can make out that the last +French edition of Regicide is like to prove stable.</p> + +<p>As a prognostic of this stability, it is said to be accepted +by the people. Here again I join issue with +the fraternizers, and positively deny the fact. Some +submission or other has been obtained, by some +means or other, to every government that hitherto +has been set up. And the same submission would, +by the same means, be obtained for any other project +that the wit or folly of man could possibly devise. +The Constitution of 1790 was universally received. +The Constitution which followed it, under the name +of a Convention, was universally submitted to. The +Constitution of 1793 was universally accepted. Unluckily, +this year's Constitution, which was formed, +and its genethliacon sung by the noble author while +it was yet in embryo, or was but just come bloody +from the womb, is the only one which in its very formation +has been generally resisted by a very great +and powerful party in many parts of the kingdom, +and particularly in the capital. It never had a popular +choice even in show: those who arbitrarily +erected the new building out of the old materials of +their own Convention were obliged to send for an army +to support their work: like brave gladiators, they<a name="Page_70" id="Page_70" title="70" class="pagenum"></a> +fought it out in the streets of Paris, and even massacred +each other in their house of assembly, in the +most edifying manner, and for the entertainment and +instruction of their Excellencies the foreign ambassadors, +who had a box in this constitutional amphitheatre +of a free people.</p> + +<p>At length, after a terrible struggle, the troops prevailed +over the citizens. The citizen soldiers, the +ever-famed national guards, who had deposed and +murdered their sovereign, were disarmed by the inferior +trumpeters of that rebellion. Twenty thousand +regular troops garrison Paris. Thus a complete military +government is formed. It has the strength, and +it may count on the stability, of that kind of power. +This power is to last as long as the Parisians think +proper. Every other ground of stability, but from +military force and terror, is clean out of the question. +To secure them further, they have a strong +corps of irregulars, ready-armed. Thousands of +those hell-hounds called Terrorists, whom they had +shut up in prison, on their last Revolution, as the satellites +of tyranny, are let loose on the people. The +whole of their government, in its origination, in its +continuance, in all its actions, and in all its resources, +is force, and nothing but force: a forced constitution, +a forced election, a forced subsistence, a forced requisition +of soldiers, a forced loan of money.</p> + +<p>They differ nothing from all the preceding usurpations, +but that to the same odium a good deal more +of contempt is added. In this situation, notwithstanding +all their military force, strengthened with +the undisciplined power of the Terrorists, and the +nearly general disarming of Paris, there would almost +certainly have been before this an insurrection<a name="Page_71" id="Page_71" title="71" class="pagenum"></a> +against them, but for one cause. The people of +France languish for peace. They all despaired of obtaining +it from the coalesced powers, whilst they had +a gang of professed regicides at their head; and several +of the least desperate republicans would have +joined with better men to shake them wholly off, and +to produce something more ostensible, if they had not +been reiteratedly told that their sole hope of peace +was the very contrary to what they naturally imagined: +that they must leave off their cabals and +insurrections, which could serve no purpose but to +bring in that royalty which was wholly rejected by +the coalesced kings; that, to satisfy them, they must +tranquilly, if they could not cordially, submit themselves +to the tyranny and the tyrants they despised +and abhorred. Peace was held out by the allied +monarchies to the people of France, as a bounty for +supporting the Republic of Regicides. In fact, a coalition, +begun for the avowed purpose of destroying +that den of robbers, now exists only for their support. +If evil happens to the princes of Europe from the success +and stability of this infernal business, it is their +own absolute crime.</p> + +<p>We are to understand, however, (for sometimes +so the author hints,) that something stable in the +Constitution of Regicide was required for our amity +with it; but the noble Remarker is no more solicitous +about this point than he is for the permanence +of the whole body of his October speculations. "If," +says he, speaking of the Regicide, "they can obtain a +practicable constitution, even for a limited period of +time, they will be in a condition to reestablish the accustomed +relations of peace and amity." Pray let +us leave this bush-fighting. What is meant by a <i>limited<a name="Page_72" id="Page_72" title="72" class="pagenum"></a> +period of time</i>? Does it mean the direct contrary +to the terms, <i>an unlimited period</i>? If it is a limited +period, what limitation does he fix as a ground +for his opinion? Otherwise, his limitation is unlimited. +If he only requires a constitution that will last +while the treaty goes on, ten days' existence will satisfy +his demands. He knows that France never did +want a practicable constitution, nor a government, +which endured for a limited period of time. Her +constitutions were but too practicable; and short as +was their duration, it was but too long. They endured +time enough for treaties which benefited themselves +and have done infinite mischief to our cause. +But, granting him his strange thesis, that hitherto +the mere form or the mere term of their constitutions, +and not their indisposition, but their instability, +has been the cause of their not preserving the relations +of amity,—how could a constitution which +might not last half an hour after the noble lord's +signature of the treaty, in the company in which he +must sign it, insure its observance? If you trouble +yourself at all with their constitutions, you are certainly +more concerned with them after the treaty than +before it, as the observance of conventions is of infinitely +more consequence than the making them. +Can anything be more palpably absurd and senseless +than to object to a treaty of peace for want of durability +in constitutions which had an actual duration, +and to trust a constitution that at the time of the +writing had not so much as a practical existence? +There is no way of accounting for such discourse in +the mouths of men of sense, but by supposing that +they secretly entertain a hope that the very act of +having made a peace with the Regicides will give a<a name="Page_73" id="Page_73" title="73" class="pagenum"></a> +stability to the Regicide system. This will not clear +the discourse from the absurdity, but it will account +for the conduct, which such reasoning so ill defends. +What a roundabout way is this to peace,—to make +war for the destruction of regicides, and then to +give them peace in order to insure a stability that +will enable them to observe it! I say nothing of the +honor displayed in such a system. It is plain it militates +with itself almost in all the parts of it. In one +part, it supposes stability in their Constitution, as a +ground of a stable peace; in another part, we are to +hope for peace in a different way,—that is, by splitting +this brilliant orb into little stars, and this would +make the face of heaven so fine! No, there is no system +upon which the peace which in humility we are +to supplicate can possibly stand.</p> + +<p>I believe, before this time, that the more form of a +constitution, in any country, never was fixed as the +sole ground of objecting to a treaty with it. With +other circumstances it may be of great moment. +What is incumbent on the assertors of the Fourth +Week of October system to prove is not whether +their then expected Constitution was likely to be stable +or transitory, but whether it promised to this +country and its allies, and to the peace and settlement +of all Europe, more good-will or more good faith +than any of the experiments which have gone before +it. On these points I would willingly join issue.</p> + +<p>Observe first the manner in which the Remarker +describes (very truly, as I conceive) the people of +France under that auspicious government, and then +observe the conduct of that government to other nations. +"The people without <i>any</i> established constitution; +distracted by popular convulsions; in a state<a name="Page_74" id="Page_74" title="74" class="pagenum"></a> +of inevitable bankruptcy; without any commerce; +with their principal ports blockaded; and without +a fleet that could venture to face one of our <i>detached +squadrons</i>." Admitting, as fully as he has stated it, +this condition of France, I would fain know how he +reconciles this condition with his ideas of <i>any kind of +a practicable constitution</i>, or <i>duration for a limited period</i>, +which are his <i>sine qua non</i> of peace. But passing +by contradictions, as no fair objections to reasoning, +this state of things would naturally, at other +times, and in other governments, have produced a +disposition to peace, almost on any terms. But, in +that state of their country, did the Regicide government +solicit peace or amity with other nations, or +even lay any specious grounds for it, in propositions +of affected moderation, or in the most loose and general +conciliatory language? The direct contrary. It +was but a very few days before the noble writer had +commenced his Remarks, as if it were to refute him +by anticipation, that his France thought fit to lay out +a new territorial map of dominion, and to declare to +us and to all Europe what territories she was willing +to allot to her own empire, and what she is content +(during her good pleasure) to leave to others.</p> + +<p>This their law of empire was promulgated without +any requisition on that subject, and proclaimed in a +style and upon principles which never had been heard +of in the annals of arrogance and ambition. She +prescribed the limits to her empire, not upon principles +of treaty, convention, possession, usage, habitude, +the distinction of tribes, nations, or languages, but by +physical aptitudes. Having fixed herself as the arbiter +of physical dominion, she construed the limits +of Nature by her convenience. That was Nature<a name="Page_75" id="Page_75" title="75" class="pagenum"></a> +which most extended and best secured the empire of +France.</p> + +<p>I need say no more on the insult offered not only +to all equity and justice, but to the common sense of +mankind, in deciding legal property by physical principles, +and establishing the convenience of a party as +a rule of public law. The noble advocate for peace +has, indeed, perfectly well exploded this daring and +outrageous system of pride and tyranny. I am most +happy in commending him, when he writes like himself. +But hear still further and in the same good +strain the great patron and advocate of amity with +this accommodating, mild, and unassuming power, +when he reports to you the law they give, and its immediate +effects:—"They amount," says he, "to the +sacrifice of powers that have been the most nearly +connected with us,—the direct or indirect annexation +to France of all the ports of the Continent from +Dunkirk to Hamburg,—an immense accession of +territory,—and, in one word, THE ABANDONMENT OF +THE INDEPENDENCE OF EUROPE!" This is the LAW +(the author and I use no different terms) which this +new government, almost as soon as it could cry in +the cradle, and as one of the very first acts by which +it auspicated its entrance into function, the pledge +it gives of the firmness of its policy,—such is the +law that this proud power prescribes to abject nations. +What is the comment upon this law by the +great jurist who recommends us to the tribunal +which issued the decree? "An obedience to it +would be" (says he) "dishonorable to us, and exhibit +us to the present age and to posterity as +submitting to the law prescribed to us by our enemy."<a name="Page_76" id="Page_76" title="76" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>Here I recognize the voice of a British plenipotentiary: +I begin to feel proud of my country. But, +alas! the short date of human elevation! The accents +of dignity died upon his tongue. This author +will not assure us of his sentiments for the whole of +a pamphlet; but, in the sole energetic part of it, he +does not continue the same through an whole sentence, +if it happens to be of any sweep or compass. +In the very womb of this last sentence, pregnant, as +it should seem, with a Hercules, there is formed a +little bantling of the mortal race, a degenerate, puny +parenthesis, that totally frustrates our most sanguine +views and expectations, and disgraces the whole gestation. +Here is this destructive parenthesis: "Unless +some adequate compensation be secured <i>to us</i>." +<i>To us!</i> The Christian world may shift for itself, Europe +may groan in slavery, we may be dishonored by +receiving law from an enemy,—but all is well, provided +the compensation <i>to us</i> be adequate. To what +are we reserved? An <i>adequate</i> compensation "for +the sacrifice of powers the most nearly connected +with us";—an <i>adequate</i> compensation "for the +direct or indirect annexation to France of all the +ports of the Continent from Dunkirk to Hamburg";—an +<i>adequate</i> compensation "for the abandonment +of the independence of Europe"! Would that, when +all our manly sentiments are thus changed, our manly +language were changed along with them, and that the +English tongue were not employed to utter what our +ancestors never dreamed could enter into an English +heart!</p> + +<p>But let us consider this matter of adequate compensation. +Who is to furnish it? From what funds +is it to be drawn? Is it by another treaty of commerce?<a name="Page_77" id="Page_77" title="77" class="pagenum"></a> +I have no objections to treaties of commerce +upon principles of commerce. Traffic for traffic,—all +is fair. But commerce in exchange for empire, +for safety, for glory! We set out in our dealing with +a miserable cheat upon ourselves. I know it may +be said, that we may prevail on this proud, philosophical, +military Republic, which looks down with +contempt on trade, to declare it unfit for the sovereign +of nations to be <i>eundem negotiatorem et dominum</i>: +that, in virtue of this maxim of her state, the English +in France may be permitted, as the Jews are in Poland +and in Turkey, to execute all the little inglorious +occupations,—to be the sellers of new and the +buyers of old clothes, to be their brokers and factors, +and to be employed in casting up their debits +and credits, whilst the master Republic cultivates the +arts of empire, prescribes the forms of peace to nations, +and dictates laws to a subjected world. But +are we quite sure, that, when we have surrendered +half Europe to them in hope of this compensation, +the Republic will confer upon us those privileges of +dishonor? Are we quite certain that she will permit +us to farm the guillotine,—to contract for the provision +of her twenty thousand Bastiles,—to furnish +transports for the myriads of her exiles to Guiana,—to +become commissioners for her naval stores,—or to +engage for the clothing of those armies which are to +subdue the poor relics of Christian Europe? No! +She is bespoke by the Jew subjects of her own Amsterdam +for all these services.</p> + +<p>But if these, or matters similar, are not the +compensations the Remarker demands, and that on +consideration he finds them neither adequate nor certain, +who else is to be the chapman, and to furnish<a name="Page_78" id="Page_78" title="78" class="pagenum"></a> +the purchase-money, at this market, of all the grand +principles of empire, of law, of civilization, of morals, +and of religion, where British faith and honor are to +be sold by inch of candle? Who is to be the <i>dedecorum +pretiosus emptor</i>? Is it the <i>navis Hispanæ magister</i>? +Is it to be furnished by the Prince of Peace? +Unquestionably. Spain as yet possesses mines of +gold and silver, and may give us in <i>pesos duros</i> an +adequate compensation for our honor and our virtue. +When these things are at all to be sold, they are the +vilest commodities at market.</p> + +<p>It is full as singular as any of the other singularities +in this work, that the Remarker, talking so +much as he does of cessions and compensations, +passes by Spain in his general settlement, as if there +were no such country on the globe,—as if there +were no Spain in Europe, no Spain in America. But +this great matter of political deliberation cannot be +put out of our thoughts by his silence. She <i>has</i> furnished +compensations,—not to you, but to France. +The Regicide Republic and the still nominally subsisting +monarchy of Spain are united,—and are united +upon a principle of jealousy, if not of bitter enmity, +to Great Britain. The noble writer has here another +matter for meditation. It is not from Dunkirk to +Hamburg that the ports are in the hands of France: +they are in the hands of France from Hamburg to +Gibraltar. How long the new dominion will last I +cannot tell; but France the Republic has conquered +Spain, and the ruling party in that court acts by her +orders and exists by her power.</p> + +<p>The noble writer, in his views into futurity, has +forgotten to look back to the past. If he chooses it, +he may recollect, that, on the prospect of the death<a name="Page_79" id="Page_79" title="79" class="pagenum"></a> +of Philip the Fourth, and still more on the event, all +Europe was moved to its foundations. In the treaties +of partition that first were entered into, and in +the war that afterwards blazed out to prevent those +crowns from being actually or virtually united in the +House of Bourbon, the predominance of France in +Spain, and above all, in the Spanish Indies, was the +great object of all these movements in the cabinet +and in the field. The Grand Alliance was formed +upon that apprehension. On that apprehension the +mighty war was continued during such a number of +years as the degenerate and pusillanimous impatience +of our dwindled race can hardly bear to have reckoned: +a war equal, within a few years, in duration, +and not, perhaps, inferior in bloodshed, to any of those +great contests for empire which in history make the +most awful matter of recorded memory.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Ad confligendum venientibus undique Poenis,<br /></span> +<span>Omnia cum belli trepido concussa tumultu<br /></span> +<span>Horrida contremuere sub altis ætheris auris,<br /></span> +<span>In dubioque fuit sub utrorum regna cadendum<br /></span> +<span>Omnibus humanis esset terrâque marique.—<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>When this war was ended, (I cannot stay now to +examine how,) the object of the war was the object +of the treaty. When it was found impracticable, or +less desirable than before, wholly to exclude a branch +of the Bourbon race from that immense succession, +the point of Utrecht was to prevent the mischiefs to +arise from the influence of the greater upon the lesser +branch. His Lordship is a great member of the +diplomatic body; he has, of course, all the fundamental +treaties which make the public statute law +of Europe by heart: and, indeed, no active member +of Parliament ought to be ignorant of their general<a name="Page_80" id="Page_80" title="80" class="pagenum"></a> +tenor and leading provisions. In the treaty which +closed that war, and of which it is a fundamental +part, because relating to the whole policy of the compact, +it was agreed that Spain should not give anything +from her territory in the West Indies to France. +This article, apparently onerous to Spain, was in truth +highly beneficial. But, oh, the blindness of the greatest +statesman to the infinite and unlooked-for combinations +of things which lie hid in the dark prolific +womb of futurity! The great trunk of Bourbon is +cut down; the withered branch is worked up into the +construction of a French Regicide Republic. Here +we have formed a new, unlooked-for, monstrous, heterogeneous +alliance,—a double-natured monster, republic +above and monarchy below. There is no centaur +of fiction, no poetic satyr of the woods, nothing +short of the hieroglyphic monsters of Egypt, dog in +head and man in body, that can give an idea of it. +None of these things can subsist in Nature (so, at +least, it is thought); but the moral world admits +monsters which the physical rejects.</p> + +<p>In this metamorphosis, the first thing done by +Spain, in the honey-moon of her new servitude, was, +with all the hardihood of pusillanimity, utterly to +defy the most solemn treaties with Great Britain +and the guaranty of Europe. She has yielded the +largest and fairest part of one of the largest and fairest +islands in the West Indies, perhaps on the globe, +to the usurped powers of France. She completes the +title of those powers to the whole of that important +central island of Hispaniola. She has solemnly surrendered +to the regicides and butchers of the Bourbon +family what that court never ventured, perhaps +never wished, to bestow on the patriarchal stock of +her own august house.<a name="Page_81" id="Page_81" title="81" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>The noble negotiator takes no notice of this portentous +junction and this audacious surrender. The +effect is no less than the total subversion of the balance +of power in the West Indies, and indeed everywhere +else. This arrangement, considered in itself, +but much more as it indicates a complete union of +France with Spain, is truly alarming. Does he feel +nothing of the change this makes in that part of his +description of the state of France where he supposes +her not able to face one of our detached squadrons? +Does he feel nothing for the condition of Portugal +under this new coalition? Is it for this state of +things he recommends our junction in that common +alliance as a remedy? It is surely already monstrous +enough. We see every standing principle of policy, +every old governing opinion of nations, completely +gone, and with it the foundation of all their establishments. +Can Spain keep herself internally where +she is, with this connection? Does he dream that +Spain, unchristian, or even uncatholic, can exist as +a monarchy? This author indulges himself in speculations +of the division of the French Republic. I +only say, that with much greater reason he might +speculate on the republicanism and the subdivision +of Spain.</p> + +<p>It is not peace with France which secures that feeble +government; it is that peace which, if it shall continue, +decisively ruins Spain. Such a peace is not the +peace which the remnant of Christianity celebrates at +this holy season. In it there is no glory to God on +high, and not the least tincture of good-will to man. +What things we have lived to see! The King of +Spain in a group of Moors, Jews, and Renegadoes; +and the clergy taxed to pay for his conversion! The<a name="Page_82" id="Page_82" title="82" class="pagenum"></a> +Catholic King in the strict embraces of the most +Unchristian Republic! I hope we shall never see +his Apostolic Majesty, his Faithful Majesty, and the +King, Defender of the Faith, added to that unhallowed +and impious fraternity.</p> + +<p>The noble author has glimpses of the consequences +of peace, as well as I. He feels for the colonies of +Great Britain, one of the principal resources of our +commerce and our naval power, if piratical France +shall be established, as he knows she must be, in +the West Indies, if we sue for peace on such terms +as they may condescend to grant us. He feels that +their very colonial system for the interior is not compatible +with the existence of our colonies. I tell him, +and doubt not I shall be able to demonstrate, that, +being what she is, if she possesses a rock there, we +cannot be safe. Has this author had in his view the +transactions between the Regicide Republic and the +yet nominally subsisting monarchy of Spain?</p> + +<p>I bring this matter under your Lordship's consideration, +that you may have a more complete view +than this author chooses to give of the <i>true France</i> +you have to deal with, as to its nature, and to its +force and its disposition. Mark it, my Lord, France, +in giving her law to Spain, stipulated for none of +her indemnities in Europe, no enlargement whatever +of her frontier. Whilst we are looking for indemnities +from France, betraying our own safety in a +sacrifice of the independence of Europe, France secures +hers by the most important acquisition of territory +ever made in the West Indies since their first +settlement. She appears (it is only in appearance) +to give up the frontier of Spain; and she is compensated, +not in appearance, but in reality, by a territory<a name="Page_83" id="Page_83" title="83" class="pagenum"></a> +that makes a dreadful frontier to the colonies of +Great Britain.</p> + +<p>It is sufficiently alarming that she is to have the +possession of this great island. But all the Spanish +colonies, virtually, are hers. Is there so puny a +whipster in the <i>petty form</i> of the school of politics +who can be at a loss for the fate of the British colonies, +when he combines the French and Spanish consolidation +with the known critical and dubious dispositions +of the United States of America, as they are +at present, but which, when a peace is made, when +the basis of a Regicide ascendency in Spain is laid, +will no longer be so good as dubious and critical? +But I go a great deal further; and on much consideration +of the condition and circumstances of the +West Indies, and of the genius of this new republic, +as it has operated and is likely to operate on them, +I say, that, if a single rock in the West Indies is in +the hands of this <i>transatlantic Morocco</i>, we have not +an hour's safety there.</p> + +<p>The Remarker, though he slips aside from the +main consideration, seems aware that this arrangement, +standing as it does, in the West Indies, leaves +us at the mercy of the new coalition, or rather at the +mercy of the sole guiding part of it. He does not, +indeed, adopt a supposition such as I make, who am +confident that anything which can give them a single +good port and opportune piratical station there +would lead to our ruin: the author proceeds upon an +idea that the Regicides may be an existing and considerable +territorial power in the West Indies, and, +of course, her piratical system more dangerous and +as real. However, for that desperate case he has +an easy remedy; but, surely, in his whole shop there<a name="Page_84" id="Page_84" title="84" class="pagenum"></a> +is nothing so extraordinary. It is, that we three, +France, Spain, and England, (there are no other of +any moment,) should adopt some "<i>analogy</i> in the +interior systems of government in the several islands +which we may respectively retain after the closing of +the war." This plainly can be done only by a convention +between the parties; and I believe it would +be the first war ever made to terminate in an analogy +of the interior government of any country, or +any parts of such countries. Such a partnership in +domestic government is, I think, carrying fraternity +as far as it will go.</p> + +<p>It will be an affront to your sagacity to pursue +this matter into all its details: suffice it to say, that, +if this convention for analogous domestic government +is made, it immediately gives a right for the residence +of a consul (in all likelihood some negro or +man of color) in every one of your islands; a Regicide +ambassador in London will be at all your meetings +of West India merchants and planters, and, in +effect, in all our colonial councils. Not one order +of Council can hereafter be made, or any one act of +Parliament relative to the West India colonies even +be agitated, which will not always afford reasons for +protests and perpetual interference; the Regicide Republic +will become an integral part of the colonial +legislature, and, so far as the colonies are concerned, +of the British too. But it will be still worse: as all +our domestic affairs are interlaced more or less intimately +with our external, this intermeddling must +everywhere insinuate itself into all other interior +transactions, and produce a copartnership in our domestic +concerns of every description.</p> + +<p>Such are the plain, inevitable consequences of this<a name="Page_85" id="Page_85" title="85" class="pagenum"></a> +arrangement of a system, of analogous interior government. +On the other hand, without it, the author +assures us, and in this I heartily agree with him, +"that the correspondence and communications between +the neighboring colonies will be great, that +the disagreements will be incessant, and that causes +even of national quarrels will arise <i>from day to day</i>." +Most true. But, for the reasons I have given, the +case, if possible, will be worse by the proposed remedy, +by the triple fraternal interior analogy,—an +analogy itself most fruitful, and more foodful than +the old Ephesian statue with the three tier of breasts. +Your Lordship must also observe how infinitely this +business must be complicated by our interference in +the slow-paced Saturnian movements of Spain and +the rapid parabolic flights of France. But such is +the disease,—such is the cure,—such is, and must +be, the effect of Regicide vicinity.</p> + +<p>But what astonishes me is, that the negotiator, +who has certainly an exercised understanding, did +not see that every person habituated to such meditations +must necessarily pursue the train of thought +further than he has carried it, and must ask himself +whether what he states so truly of the necessity of +our arranging an analogous interior government, in +consequence of the vicinity of our possessions, in the +West Indies, does not as extensively apply, and much +more forcibly, to the circumstance of our much nearer +vicinity with the parent and author of this mischief. +I defy even his acuteness and ingenuity to show me +any one point in which the cases differ, except that +it is plainly more necessary in Europe than in America. +Indeed, the further we trace the details of the +proposed peace, the more your Lordship will be satisfied<a name="Page_86" id="Page_86" title="86" class="pagenum"></a> +that I have not been guilty of any abuse of terms, +when I use indiscriminately (as I always do, in speaking +of arrangements with Regicide) the words peace +and fraternity. An analogy between our interior governments +must be the consequence. The noble negotiator +sees it as well as I do. I deprecate this Jacobin +interior analogy. But hereafter, perhaps, I may +say a good deal more upon this part of the subject.</p> + +<p>The noble lord insists on very little more than on +the excellence of their Constitution, the hope of their +dwindling into little republics, and this close copartnership +in government. I hear of others, indeed, +that offer by other arguments to reconcile us to this +peace and fraternity. The Regicides, they say, have +renounced the creed of the Rights of Man, and declared +equality a chimera. This is still more strange +than all the rest. They have apostatized from their +apostasy. They are renegadoes from that impious +faith for which they subverted the ancient government, +murdered their king, and imprisoned, butchered, +confiscated, and banished their fellow-subjects, +and to which they forced every man to swear at the +peril of his life. And now, to reconcile themselves +to the world, they declare this creed, bought by so +much blood, to be an imposture and a chimera. I +have no doubt that they always thought it to be so, +when they were destroying everything at home and +abroad for its establishment. It is no strange thing, +to those who look into the nature of corrupted man, +to find a violent persecutor a perfect unbeliever of his +own creed. But this is the very first time that any +man or set of men were hardy enough to attempt to +lay the ground of confidence in them by an acknowledgment +of their own falsehood, fraud, hypocrisy,<a name="Page_87" id="Page_87" title="87" class="pagenum"></a> +treachery, heterodox doctrine, persecution, and cruelty. +Everything we hear from them is new, and, +to use a phrase of their own, <i>revolutionary</i>; everything +supposes a total revolution in all the principles +of reason, prudence, and moral feeling. If possible, +this their recantation of the chief parts in the +canon of the Rights of Man is more infamous and +causes greater horror than their originally promulgating +and forcing down the throats of mankind +that symbol of all evil. It is raking too much into +the dirt and ordure of human nature to say more +of it.</p> + +<p>I hear it said, too, that they have lately declared +in favor of property. This is exactly of the same sort +with the former. What need had they to make this +declaration, if they did not know that by their doctrines +and practices they had totally subverted all +property? What government of Europe, either in +its origin or its continuance, has thought it necessary +to declare itself in favor of property? The more +recent ones were formed for its protection against +former violations; the old consider the inviolability +of property and their own existence as one and +the same thing, and that a proclamation for its safety +would be sounding an alarm on its danger. But the +Regicide banditti knew that this was not the first +time they have been obliged to give such assurances, +and had as often falsified them. They knew, +that, after butchering hundreds of men, women, +and children, for no other cause than to lay hold +on their property, such a declaration might have a +chance of encouraging other nations to run the risk +of establishing a commercial house amongst them. +It is notorious, that these very Jacobins, upon an<a name="Page_88" id="Page_88" title="88" class="pagenum"></a> +alarm of the shopkeeper of Paris, made this declaration +in favor of property. These brave fellows +received the apprehensions expressed on that head +with indignation, and said that property could be +in no danger, because all the world knew it was +under the protection of the <i>sans-culottes</i>. At what +period did they not give this assurance? Did they +not give it; when they fabricated their first Constitution? +Did they not then solemnly declare it one +of the rights of a citizen (a right, of course, only declared, +and not then fabricated) to depart from his +country, and choose another <i>domicilium</i>, without detriment +to his property? Did they not declare that +no property should be confiscated from the children +for the crime of the parent? Can they now declare +more fully their respect for property than they did +at that time? And yet was there ever known such +horrid violences and confiscations as instantly followed +under the very persons now in power, many +of them leading members of that Assembly, and all +of them violators of that engagement which was the +very basis of their republic,—confiscations in which +hundreds of men, women, and children, not guilty +of one act of duty in resisting their usurpation, were +involved? This keeping of their old is, then, to give +us a confidence in their new engagements. But examine +the matter, and you will see that the prevaricating +sons of violence give no relief at all, where at +all it can be wanted. They renew their old fraudulent +declaration against confiscations, and then they +expressly exclude all adherents to their ancient lawful +government from any benefit of it: that is to say, +they promise that they will secure all their brother +plunderers in their share of the common plunder.<a name="Page_89" id="Page_89" title="89" class="pagenum"></a> +The fear of being robbed by every new succession +of robbers, who do not keep even the faith of that +kind of society, absolutely required that they should +give security to the dividends of spoil, else they could +not exist a moment. But it was necessary, in giving +security to robbers, that honest men should be deprived +of all hope of restitution; and thus their interests +were made utterly and eternally incompatible. +So that it appears that this boasted security of property +is nothing more than a seal put upon its destruction; +this ceasing of confiscation is to secure the +confiscators against the innocent proprietors. That +very thing which is held out to you as your cure is +that which makes your malady, and renders it, if +once it happens, utterly incurable. You, my Lord, +who possess a considerable, though not an invidious +estate, may be well assured, that, if, by being engaged, +as you assuredly would be, in the defence +of your religion, your king, your order, your laws, +and liberties, that estate should be put under confiscation, +the property would be secured, but in the +same manner, at your expense.</p> + +<p>But, after all, for what purpose are we told of this +reformation in their principles, and what is the policy +of all this softening in ours, which is to be produced +by their example? It is not to soften us to +suffering innocence and virtue, but to mollify us to +the crimes and to the society of robbers and ruffians. +But I trust that our countrymen will not be softened +to that kind of crimes and criminals; for, if we +should, our hearts will be hardened to everything +which has a claim on our benevolence. A kind +Providence has placed in our breasts a hatred of the +unjust and cruel, in order that we may preserve ourselves<a name="Page_90" id="Page_90" title="90" class="pagenum"></a> +from cruelty and injustice. They who bear +cruelty are accomplices in it. The pretended gentleness +which excludes that charitable rancor produces +an indifference which is half an approbation. They +never will love where they ought to love, who do not +hate where they ought to hate.</p> + +<p>There is another piece of policy, not more laudable +than this, in reading these moral lectures, which lessens +our hatred to criminals and our pity to sufferers +by insinuating that it has been owing to their fault +or folly that the latter have become the prey of the +former. By flattering us that we are not subject to +the same vices and follies, it induces a confidence +that we shall not suffer the same evils by a contact +with the infamous gang of robbers who have thus +robbed and butchered our neighbors before our faces. +We must not be flattered to our ruin. Our vices +are the same as theirs, neither more nor less. If +any faults we had, which wanted this French example +to call us to a "<i>softening</i> of character, and a review +of our social relations and duties," there is yet +no sign that we have commenced our reformation. +We seem, by the best accounts I have from the world, +to go on just as formerly, "some to undo, and some +to be undone." There is no change at all: and if +we are not bettered by the sufferings of war, this +peace, which, for reasons to himself best known, the +author fixes as the period of our reformation, must +have something very extraordinary in it; because +hitherto ease, opulence, and their concomitant pleasure +have never greatly disposed mankind to that serious +reflection and review which the author supposes +to be the result of the approaching peace with vice +and crime. I believe he forms a right estimate of<a name="Page_91" id="Page_91" title="91" class="pagenum"></a> +the nature of this peace, and that it will want many +of those circumstances which formerly characterizes +that state of things.</p> + +<p>If I am right in my ideas of this new republic, the +different states of peace and war will make no difference +in her pursuits. It is not an enemy of accident +that we have to deal with. Enmity to us, and to all +civilized nations, is wrought into the very stamina of +its Constitution. It was made to pursue the purposes +of that fundamental enmity. The design will +go on regularly in every position and in every relation. +Their hostility is to break us to their dominion; +their amity is to debauch us to their principles. +In the former, we are to contend with their force; in +the latter, with their intrigues. But we stand in a +very different posture of defence in the two situations. +In war, so long as government is supported, +we fight with the whole united force of the kingdom. +When under the name of peace the war of intrigue +begins, we do not contend against our enemies with +the whole force of the kingdom. No,—we shall +have to fight, (if it should be a fight at all, and not +an ignominious surrender of everything which has +made our country venerable in our eyes and dear +to our hearts,) we shall have to light with but a +portion of our strength against the whole of theirs. +Gentlemen who not long since thought with us, but +who now recommend a Jacobin peace, were at that +time sufficiently aware of the existence of a dangerous +Jacobin faction within this kingdom. Awhile +ago they seemed to be tremblingly alive to the number +of those who composed it, to their dark subtlety, +to their fierce audacity, to their admiration of everything +that passes in France, to their eager desire of a<a name="Page_92" id="Page_92" title="92" class="pagenum"></a> +close communication with the mother faction there. +At this moment, when the question is upon the opening +of that communication, not a word of our English +Jacobins. That faction is put out of sight and out +of thought. "It vanished at the crowing of the +cock." Scarcely had the Gallic harbinger of peace +and light begun to utter his lively notes, than all the +cackling of us poor Tory geese to alarm the garrison +of the Capitol was forgot.<a name="FNanchor_11_11" id="FNanchor_11_11"></a><a href="#Footnote_11_11" class="fnanchor">[11]</a> There was enough of +indemnity before. Now a complete act of oblivion +is passed about the Jacobins of England, though one +would naturally imagine it would make a principal +object in all fair deliberation upon the merits of a +project of amity with the Jacobins of France. But +however others may choose to forget the faction, the +faction does not choose to forget itself, nor, however +gentlemen may choose to flatter themselves, it does +not forget them.</p> + +<p>Never, in any civil contest, has a part been taken +with more of the warmth, or carried on with more of +the arts of a party. The Jacobins are worse than lost +to their country. Their hearts are abroad. Their +sympathy with the Regicides of France is complete. +Just as in a civil contest, they exult in all their victories, +they are dejected and mortified in all their +defeats. Nothing that the Regicides can do (and +they have labored hard for the purpose) can alienate +them from their cause. You and I, my dear Lord, +have often observed on the spirit of their conduct. +When the Jacobins of France, by their studied, deliberated, +catalogued files of murders with the poniard, +the sabre, and the tribunal, have shocked whatever<a name="Page_93" id="Page_93" title="93" class="pagenum"></a> +remained of human sensibility in our breasts, then it +was they distinguished the resources of party policy. +They did not venture directly to confront the public +sentiment; for a very short time they seemed to partake +of it. They began with a reluctant and sorrowful +confession; they deplored the stains which +tarnished the lustre of a good cause. After keeping +a decent time of retirement, in a few days crept out +an apology for the excesses of men cruelly irritated +by the attacks of unjust power. Grown bolder, as +the first feeling of mankind decayed and the color +of these horrors began to fade upon the imagination, +they proceeded from apology to defence. They urged, +but still deplored, the absolute necessity of such a +proceeding. Then they made a bolder stride, and +marched from defence to recrimination. They attempted +to assassinate the memory of those whose +bodies their friends had massacred, and to consider +their murder as a less formal act of justice. They +endeavored even to debauch our pity, and to suborn +it in favor of cruelty. They wept over the lot of +those who were driven by the crimes of aristocrats to +republican vengeance. Every pause of their cruelty +they considered as a return of their natural sentiments +of benignity and justice. Then they had recourse +to history, and found out all the recorded +cruelties that deform the annals of the world, in order +that the massacres of the Regicides might pass +for a common event, and even that the most merciful +of princes, who suffered by their hands, should +bear the iniquity of all the tyrants who have at any +time infested the earth. In order to reconcile us the +better to this republican tyranny, they confounded +the bloodshed of war with the murders of peace;<a name="Page_94" id="Page_94" title="94" class="pagenum"></a> +and they computed how much greater prodigality of +blood was exhibited in battles and in the storm of +cities than in the frugal, well-ordered massacres of the +revolutionary tribunals of France.</p> + +<p>As to foreign powers, so long as they were conjoined +with Great Britain in this contest, so long +they were treated as the most abandoned tyrants, +and, indeed, the basest of the human race. The moment +any of them quits the cause of this government, +and of all governments, he is rehabilitated, his +honor is restored, all attainders are purged. The +friends of Jacobins are no longer despots; the betrayers +of the common cause are no longer traitors.</p> + +<p>That you may not doubt that they look on this war +as a civil war, and the Jacobins of France as of their +party, and that they look upon us, though locally +their countrymen, in reality as enemies, they have +never failed to run a parallel between our late civil +war and this war with the Jacobins of France. They +justify their partiality to those Jacobins by the partiality +which was shown by several here to the Colonies, +and they sanction their cry for peace with the +Regicides of France by some of our propositions for +peace with the English in America.</p> + +<p>This I do not mention as entering into the controversy +how far they are right or wrong in this parallel, +but to show that they do make it, and that they +do consider themselves as of a party with the Jacobins +of France. You cannot forget their constant correspondence +with the Jacobins, whilst it was in their +power to carry it on. When the communication is +again opened, the interrupted correspondence will +commence. We cannot be blind to the advantage +which such a party affords to Regicide France in all<a name="Page_95" id="Page_95" title="95" class="pagenum"></a> +her views,—and, on the other hand, what an advantage +Regicide France holds out to the views of the +republican party in England. Slightly as they have +considered their subject, I think this can hardly have +escaped the writers of political ephemerides for any +month or year. They have told us much of the +amendment of the Regicides of France, and of their +returning honor and generosity. Have they told +anything of the reformation and of the returning +loyalty of the Jacobins of England? Have they told +us of <i>their</i> gradual softening towards royalty? Have +they told us what measures <i>they</i> are taking for "putting +the crown in commission," and what approximations +of any kind <i>they</i> are making towards the old +Constitution of their country? Nothing of this. The +silence of these writers is dreadfully expressive. They +dare not touch the subject. But it is not annihilated +by their silence, nor by our indifference. It is +but too plain that our Constitution cannot exist with +such a communication. Our humanity, our manners, +our morals, our religion, cannot stand with such a +communication. The Constitution is made by those +things, and for those things: without them it cannot +exist; and without them it is no matter whether it +exists or not.</p> + +<p>It was an ingenious Parliamentary Christmas play, +by which, in both Houses, you anticipated the holidays; +it was a relaxation from your graver employment; +it was a pleasant discussion you had, which +part of the family of the Constitution was the elder +branch,—whether one part did not exist prior to the +others, and whether it might exist and flourish, if +"the others were cast into the fire."<a name="FNanchor_12_12" id="FNanchor_12_12"></a><a href="#Footnote_12_12" class="fnanchor">[12]</a> In order to<a name="Page_96" id="Page_96" title="96" class="pagenum"></a> +make this Saturnalian amusement general in the family, +you sent it down stairs, that judges and juries +might partake of the entertainment. The unfortunate +antiquary and augur who is the butt of all this +sport may suffer in the roistering horse-play and practical +jokes of the servants' hall. But whatever may +become of him, the discussion itself, and the timing it, +put me in mind of what I have read, (where I do not +recollect,) that the subtle nation of the Greeks were +busily employed, in the Church of Santa Sophia, in +a dispute of mixed natural philosophy, metaphysics, +and theology, whether the light on Mount Tabor was +created or uncreated, and were ready to massacre +the holders of the unfashionable opinion, at the very +moment when the ferocious enemy of all philosophy +and religion, Mahomet the Second, entered through +a breach into the capital of the Christian world. I +may possibly suffer much more than Mr. Reeves (I +shall certainly give much more general offence) for +breaking in upon this constitutional amusement concerning +the created or uncreated nature of the two +Houses of Parliament, and by calling their attention +to a problem which may entertain them less, but +which concerns them a great deal more,—that is, +whether, with this Gallic Jacobin fraternity, which +they are desired by some writers to court, all the +parts of the government, about whose combustible +or incombustible qualities they are contending, may +"not be cast into the fire" together. He is a strange +visionary (but he is nothing worse) who fancies that +any one part of our Constitution, whatever right of +primogeniture it may claim, or whatever astrologers<a name="Page_97" id="Page_97" title="97" class="pagenum"></a> +may divine from its horoscope, can possibly survive +the others. As they have lived, so they will die, together. +I must do justice to the impartiality of the +Jacobins. I have not observed amongst <i>them</i> the least +predilection for any of those parts. If there has been +any difference in their malice, I think they have +shown a worse disposition to the House of Commons +than to the crown. As to the House of Lords, they +do not speculate at all about it, and for reasons that +are too obvious to detail.</p> + +<p>The question will be concerning the effect of this +French fraternity on the whole mass. Have we anything +to apprehend from Jacobin communication, or +have we not? If we have not, is it by our experience +before the war that we are to presume that after +the war no dangerous communion can exist between +those who are well affected to the new Constitution +of France and ill affected to the old Constitution +here?</p> + +<p>In conversation I have not yet found nor heard of +any persons, except those who undertake to instruct +the public, so unconscious of the actual state of things, +or so little prescient of the future, who do not shudder +all over and feel a secret horror at the approach +of this communication. I do not except from this +observation those who are willing, more than I find +myself disposed, to submit to this fraternity. Never +has it been mentioned in my hearing, or from what I +can learn in my inquiry, without the suggestion of +an Alien Bill, or some other measures of the same +nature, as a defence against its manifest mischief. +Who does not see the utter insufficiency of such a +remedy, if such a remedy could be at all adopted? +We expel suspected foreigners from hence; and we<a name="Page_98" id="Page_98" title="98" class="pagenum"></a> +suffer every Englishman to pass over into France to +be initiated in all the infernal discipline of the place, +to cabal and to be corrupted by every means of cabal +and of corruption, and then to return to England, +charged with their worst dispositions and designs. +In France he is out of the reach of your police; and +when he returns to England, one such English emissary +is worse than a legion of French, who are either +tongue-tied, or whose speech betrays them. But the +worst aliens are the ambassador and his train. These +you cannot expel without a proof (always difficult) +of direct practice against the state. A French ambassador, +at the head of a French party, is an evil +which we have never experienced. The mischief is +by far more visible than the remedy. But, after all, +every such measure as an Alien Bill is a measure of +hostility, a preparation for it, or a cause of dispute +that shall bring it on. In effect, it is fundamentally +contrary to a relation of amity, whose essence is a +perfectly free communication. Everything done to +prevent it will provoke a foreign war. Everything, +when we let it proceed, will produce domestic distraction. +We shall be in a perpetual dilemma. But +it is easy to see which side of the dilemma will be +taken. The same temper which brings us to solicit +a Jacobin peace will induce us to temporize with all +the evils of it. By degrees our minds will be made +to our circumstances. The novelty of such things, +which produces half the horror and all the disgust, +will be worn off. Our ruin will be disguised in profit, +and the sale of a few wretched baubles will bribe +a degenerate people to barter away the most precious +jewel of their souls. Our Constitution is not made +for this kind of warfare. It provides greatly for our<a name="Page_99" id="Page_99" title="99" class="pagenum"></a> +happiness, it furnishes few means for our defence. +It is formed, in a great measure, upon the principle +of jealousy of the crown,—and as things stood, when +it took that turn, with very great reason. I go farther: +it must keep alive some part of that fire of jealousy +eternally and chastely burning, or it cannot be +the British Constitution. At various periods we have +had tyranny in this country, more than enough. We +have had rebellions with more or less justification. +Some of our kings have made adulterous connections +abroad, and trucked away for foreign gold the interests +and glory of their crown. But, before this time, +our liberty has never been corrupted. I mean to say, +that it has never been debauched from its domestic +relations. To this time it has been English liberty, +and English liberty only. Our love of liberty and +our love of our country were not distinct things. +Liberty is now, it seems, put upon a larger and more +liberal bottom. We are men,—and as men, undoubtedly, +nothing human is foreign to us. We cannot +be too liberal in our general wishes for the happiness +of our kind. But in all questions on the +mode of procuring it for any particular community, +we ought to be fearful of admitting those who have +no interest in it, or who have, perhaps, an interest +against it, into the consultation. Above all, we cannot +be too cautious in our communication with those +who seek their happiness by other roads than those +of humanity, morals, and religion, and whose liberty +consists, and consists alone, in being free from those +restraints which are imposed by the virtues upon the +passions.</p> + +<p>When we invite danger from a confidence in defensive +measures, we ought, first of all, to be sure that<a name="Page_100" id="Page_100" title="100" class="pagenum"></a> +it is a species of danger against which any defensive +measures that can be adopted will be sufficient. +Next, we ought to know that the spirit of our laws, +or that our own dispositions, which are stronger than +laws, are susceptible of all those defensive measures +which the occasion may require. A third consideration +is, whether these measures will not bring more +odium than strength to government; and the last, +whether the authority that makes them, in a general +corruption of manners and principles, can insure +their execution. Let no one argue, from the state +of things, as he sees them at present, concerning what +will be the means and capacities of government, when +the time arrives which shall call for remedies commensurate +to enormous evils.</p> + +<p>It is an obvious truth, that no constitution can defend +itself: it must be defended by the wisdom and +fortitude of men. These are what no constitution +can give: they are the gifts of God; and He alone +knows whether we shall possess such gifts at the time +we stand in need of them. Constitutions furnish +the civil means of getting at the natural: it is all +that in this case they can do. But our Constitution +has more impediments than helps. Its excellencies, +when they come to be put to this sort of proof, may +be found among its defects.</p> + +<p>Nothing looks more awful and imposing than an +ancient fortification. Its lofty, embattled walls, its +bold, projecting, rounded towers, that pierce the sky, +strike the imagination and promise inexpugnable +strength. But they are the very things that make +its weakness. You may as well think of opposing +one of these old fortresses to the mass of artillery +brought by a French irruption into the field as to<a name="Page_101" id="Page_101" title="101" class="pagenum"></a> +think of resisting by your old laws and your old +forms the new destruction which the corps of Jacobin +engineers of to-day prepare for all such forms and all +such laws. Besides the debility and false principle of +their construction to resist the present modes of attack, +the fortress itself is in ruinous repair, and there +is a practicable breach in every part of it.</p> + +<p>Such is the work. But miserable works have been +defended by the constancy of the garrison. Weather-beaten +ships have been brought safe to port by the +spirit and alertness of the crew. But it is here that +we shall eminently fail. The day that, by their consent, +the seat of Regicide has its place among the +thrones of Europe, there is no longer a motive for +zeal in their favor; it will at best be cold, unimpassioned, +dejected, melancholy duty. The glory will +seem all on the other side. The friends of the crown +will appear, not as champions, but as victims; discountenanced, +mortified, lowered, defeated, they will +fall into listlessness and indifference. They will leave +things to take their course, enjoy the present hour, +and submit to the common fate.</p> + +<p>Is it only an oppressive nightmare with which we +have been loaded? Is it, then, all a frightful dream, +and are there no regicides in the world? Have we +not heard of that prodigy of a ruffian who would not +suffer his benignant sovereign, with his hands tied +behind him, and stripped for execution, to say one +parting word to his deluded people,—of Santerre, +who commanded the drums and trumpets to strike +up to stifle his voice, and dragged him backward to +the machine of murder! This nefarious villain (for +a few days I may call him so) stands high in France, +as in a republic of robbers and murderers he ought.<a name="Page_102" id="Page_102" title="102" class="pagenum"></a> +What hinders this monster from being sent as ambassador +to convey to his Majesty the first compliments +of his brethren, the Regicide Directory? They +have none that can represent them more properly. I +anticipate the day of his arrival. He will make his +public entry into London on one of the pale horses +of his brewery. As he knows that we are pleased +with the Paris taste for the orders of knighthood,<a name="FNanchor_13_13" id="FNanchor_13_13"></a><a href="#Footnote_13_13" class="fnanchor">[13]</a> +he will fling a bloody sash across his shoulders, with +the order of the holy guillotine surmounting the +crown appendant to the riband. Thus adorned, he +will proceed from Whitechapel to the further end of +Pall Mall, all the music of London playing the Marseillaise +Hymn before him, and escorted by a chosen +detachment of the <i>Légion de l'Échafaud</i>. It were +only to be wished that no ill-fated loyalist, for the +imprudence of his zeal, may stand in the pillory at +Charing Cross, under the statue of King Charles the +First, at the time of this grand procession, lest some +of the rotten eggs which the Constitutional Society +shall let fly at his indiscreet head may hit the virtuous +murderer of his king. They might soil the +state dress which the ministers of so many crowned +heads have admired, and in which Sir Clement Cotterel +is to introduce him at St. James's.</p> + +<p>If Santerre cannot be spared from the constitutional +butcheries at home, Tallien may supply his +place, and, in point of figure, with advantage. He +has been habituated to commissions; and he is as +well qualified as Santerre for this. Nero wished<a name="Page_103" id="Page_103" title="103" class="pagenum"></a> +the Roman people had but one neck. The wish of +the more exalted Tallien, when he sat in judgment, +was, that his sovereign had eighty-three heads, that +he might send one to every one of the Departments. +Tallien will make an excellent figure at Guildhall +at the next Sheriff's feast. He may open the ball +with my Lady Mayoress. But this will be after +he has retired from the public table, and gone into +the private room for the enjoyment of more social +and unreserved conversation with the ministers of +state and the judges of the bench. There these ministers +and magistrates will hear him entertain the +worthy aldermen with an instructing and pleasing +narrative of the manner in which he made the rich +citizens of Bordeaux squeak, and gently led them +by the public credit of the guillotine to disgorge +their anti-revolutionary pelf.</p> + +<p>All this will be the display, and the town-talk, +when our regicide is on a visit of ceremony. At +home nothing will equal the pomp and splendor of +the <i>Hôtel de la République</i>. There another scene of +gaudy grandeur will be opened. When his Citizen +Excellency keeps the festival, which every citizen is +ordered to observe, for the glorious execution of +Louis the Sixteenth, and renews his oath of detestation +of kings, a grand ball of course will be given +on the occasion. Then what a hurly-burly! what +a crowding! what a glare of a thousand flambeaux +in the square! what a clamor of footmen contending +at the door! what a rattling of a thousand +coaches of duchesses, countesses, and Lady Marys, +choking the way, and overturning each other, in a +struggle who should be first to pay her court to the +<i>Citoyenne</i>, the spouse of the twenty-first husband, he<a name="Page_104" id="Page_104" title="104" class="pagenum"></a> +the husband of the thirty-first wife, and to hail her +in the rank of honorable matrons before the four +days' duration of marriage is expired!—Morals, as +they were, decorum, the great outguard of the sex, +and the proud sentiment of honor, which makes virtue +more respectable, where it is, and conceals human +frailty, where virtue may not be, will be banished +from this land of propriety, modesty, and reserve.</p> + +<p>We had before an ambassador from the most Christian +King. We shall have then one, perhaps two, as +lately, from the most Anti-Christian Republic. His +chapel will be great and splendid, formed on the +model of the Temple of Reason at Paris; while the +famous ode of the infamous Chénier will be sung, +and a prostitute of the street adored as a goddess. +We shall then have a French ambassador without +a suspicion of Popery. One good it will have: it +will go some way in quieting the minds of that +synod of zealous Protestant lay elders who govern +Ireland on the pacific principles of polemic theology, +and who now, from dread of the Pope, cannot take +a cool bottle of claret, or enjoy an innocent Parliamentary +job, with any tolerable quiet.</p> + +<p>So far as to the French communication here:—what +will be the effect of our communication there? +We know that our new brethren, whilst they everywhere +shut up the churches, increased in Paris, at +one time at least fourfold, the opera-houses, the playhouses, +the public shows of all kinds; and even in +their state of indigence and distress, no expense was +spared for their equipment and decoration. They +were made an affair of state. There is no invention +of seduction, never wholly wanting in that place, +that has not been increased,—brothels, gaming-houses,<a name="Page_105" id="Page_105" title="105" class="pagenum"></a> +everything. And there is no doubt, but, +when they are settled in a triumphant peace, they +will carry all these arts to their utmost perfection, +and cover them with every species of imposing magnificence. +They have all along avowed them as a +part of their policy; and whilst they corrupt young +minds through pleasure, they form them to crimes. +Every idea of corporal gratification is carried to the +highest excess, and wooed with all the elegance that +belongs to the senses. All elegance of mind and manners +is banished. A theatrical, bombastic, windy +phraseology of heroic virtue, blended and mingled +up with a worse dissoluteness, and joined to a murderous +and savage ferocity, forms the tone and idiom +of their language and their manners. Any one, +who attends to all their own descriptions, narratives, +and dissertations, will find in that whole place +more of the air of a body of assassins, banditti, housebreakers, +and outlawed smugglers, joined to that of +a gang of strolling players expelled from and exploded +orderly theatres, with their prostitutes in a +brothel, at their debauches and bacchanals, than anything +of the refined and perfected virtues, or the polished, +mitigated vices of a great capital.</p> + +<p>Is it for this benefit we open "the usual relations +of peace and amity"? Is it for this our youth of +both sexes are to form themselves by travel? Is it +for this that with expense and pains we form their +lisping infant accents to the language of France? I +shall be told that this abominable medley is made +rather to revolt young and ingenuous minds. So it is +in the description. So perhaps it may in reality to a +chosen few. So it may be, when the magistrate, the +law, and the church frown on such manners, and the<a name="Page_106" id="Page_106" title="106" class="pagenum"></a> +wretches to whom they belong,—when they are +chased from the eye of day, and the society of civil +life, into night-cellars and caves and woods. But when +these men themselves are the magistrates,—when all +the consequence, weight, and authority of a great nation +adopt them,—when we see them conjoined with +victory, glory, power, and dominion, and homage paid +to them by every government,—it is not possible that +the downhill should not be slid into, recommended +by everything which has opposed it. Let it be remembered +that no young man can go to any part of +Europe without taking this place of pestilential contagion +in his way; and whilst the less active part +of the community will be debauched by this travel, +whilst children are poisoned at these schools, our +trade will put the finishing hand to our ruin. No +factory will be settled in France, that will not become +a club of complete French Jacobins. The minds of +young men of that description will receive a taint in +their religion, their morals, and their politics, which +they will in a short time communicate to the whole +kingdom.</p> + +<p>Whilst everything prepares the body to debauch +and the mind to crime, a regular church of avowed +atheism, established by law, with a direct and sanguinary +persecution of Christianity, is formed to prevent +all amendment and remorse. Conscience is +formally deposed from its dominion over the mind. +What fills the measure of horror is, that schools of +atheism are set up at the public charge in every part +of the country. That some English parents will be +wicked enough to send their children to such schools +there is no doubt. Better this island should be sunk +to the bottom of the sea than that (so far as human<a name="Page_107" id="Page_107" title="107" class="pagenum"></a> +infirmity admits) it should not be a country of religion +and morals!</p> + +<p>With all these causes of corruption, we may well +judge what the general fashion of mind will be +through both sexes and all conditions. Such spectacles +and such examples will overbear all the laws +that ever blackened the cumbrous volumes of our +statutes. When royalty shall have disavowed itself,—when +it shall have relaxed all the principles of its +own support,—when it has rendered the system of +Regicide fashionable, and received it as triumphant, +in the very persons who have consolidated that system +by the perpetration, of every crime, who have +not only massacred the prince, but the very laws +and magistrates which were the support of royalty, +and slaughtered with an indiscriminate proscription, +without regard to either sex or age, every person +that was suspected of an inclination to king, law, +or magistracy,—I say, will any one dare to be +loyal? Will any one presume, against both authority +and opinion, to hold up this unfashionable, antiquated, +exploded Constitution?</p> + +<p>The Jacobin faction in England must grow in +strength and audacity; it will be supported by other +intrigues and supplied by other resources than +yet we have seen in action. Confounded at its +growth, the government may fly to Parliament for +its support. But who will answer for the temper +of a House of Commons elected under these circumstances? +Who will answer for the courage of a +House of Commons to arm the crown with the extraordinary +powers that it may demand? But the +ministers will not venture to ask half of what they +know they want. They will lose half of that half<a name="Page_108" id="Page_108" title="108" class="pagenum"></a> +in the contest; and when they have obtained their +nothing, they will be driven by the cries of faction +either to demolish the feeble works they have thrown +up in a hurry, or, in effect, to abandon them. As to +the House of Lords, it is not worth mentioning. The +peers ought naturally to be the pillars of the crown; +but when their titles are rendered contemptible, and +their property invidious, and a part of their weakness, +and not of their strength, they will be found so +many degraded and trembling individuals, who will +seek by evasion to put off the evil day of their ruin. +Both Houses will be in perpetual oscillation between +abortive attempts at energy and still more unsuccessful +attempts at compromise. You will be impatient +of your disease, and abhorrent of your remedy. +A spirit of subterfuge and a tone of apology will +enter into all your proceedings, whether of law or +legislation. Your judges, who now sustain so masculine +an authority, will appear more on their trial +than the culprits they have before them. The awful +frown of criminal justice will be smoothed into +the silly smile of seduction. Judges will think to insinuate +and soothe the accused into conviction and +condemnation, and to wheedle to the gallows the +most artful of all delinquents. But they will not +be so wheedled. They will not submit even to the +appearance of persons on their trial. Their claim +to this exemption will be admitted. The place in +which some of the greatest names which ever distinguished +the history of this country have stood +will appear beneath their dignity. The criminal +will climb from the dock to the side-bar, and take +his place and his tea with the counsel. From the +bar of the counsel, by a natural progress, he will ascend<a name="Page_109" id="Page_109" title="109" class="pagenum"></a> +to the bench, which long before had been virtually +abandoned. They who escape from justice +will not suffer a question upon reputation. They +will take the crown of the causeway; they will be +revered as martyrs; they will triumph as conquerors. +Nobody will dare to censure that popular part of +the tribunal whose only restraint on misjudgment +is the censure of the public. They who find fault +with the decision will be represented as enemies to +the institution. Juries that convict for the crown +will be loaded with obloquy. The juries who acquit +will be held up as models of justice. If Parliament +orders a prosecution, and fails, (as fail it will,) it +will be treated to its face as guilty of a conspiracy +maliciously to prosecute. Its care in discovering a +conspiracy against the state will be treated as a +forged plot to destroy the liberty of the subject: +every such discovery, instead of strengthening government, +will weaken its reputation.</p> + +<p>In this state things will be suffered to proceed, lest +measures of vigor should precipitate a crisis. The +timid will act thus from character, the wise from necessity. +Our laws had done all that the old condition +of things dictated to render our judges erect and +independent; but they will naturally fail on the side +upon which they had taken no precautions. The judicial +magistrates will find themselves safe as against +the crown, whose will is not their tenure; the power +of executing their office will be held at the pleasure +of those who deal out fame or abuse as they think fit. +They will begin rather to consult their own repose +and their own popularity than the critical and perilous +trust that is in their hands. They will speculate +on consequences, when they see at court an ambassador<a name="Page_110" id="Page_110" title="110" class="pagenum"></a> +whose robes are lined with a scarlet dyed in the +blood of judges. It is no wonder, nor are they to +blame, when they are to consider how they shall answer +for their conduct to the criminal of to-day +turned into the magistrate of to-morrow.</p> + +<p>The press———</p> + +<p>The army———</p> + +<p>When thus the helm of justice is abandoned, an +universal abandonment of all other posts will succeed. +Government will be for a while the sport of +contending factions, who, whilst they fight with one +another, will all strike at her. She will be buffeted +and beat forward and backward by the conflict of +those billows, until at length, tumbling from the +Gallic coast, the victorious tenth wave shall ride, like +the bore, over all the rest, and poop the shattered, +weather-beaten, leaky, water-logged vessel, and sink +her to the bottom of the abyss.</p> + +<p>Among other miserable remedies that have been +found in the <i>materia medica</i>, of the old college, a +change of ministry will be proposed, and probably +will take place. They who go out can never long +with zeal and good-will support government in the +hands of those they hate. In a situation of fatal dependence +on popularity, and without one aid from the +little remaining power of the crown, it is not to be expected +that they will take on them that odium which +more or less attaches upon every exertion of strong +power. The ministers of popularity will lose all their +credit at a stroke, if they pursue any of those means +necessary to give life, vigor, and consistence to government. +They will be considered as venal wretches, +apostates, recreant to all their own principles, acts, +and declarations. They cannot preserve their credit,<a name="Page_111" id="Page_111" title="111" class="pagenum"></a> +but by betraying that authority of which they are the +guardians.</p> + +<p>To be sure, no prognosticating symptoms of these +things have as yet appeared,—nothing even resembling +their beginnings. May they never appear! +May these prognostications of the author be justly +laughed at and speedily forgotten! If nothing as +yet to cause them has discovered itself, let us consider, +in the author's excuse, that we have not yet +seen a Jacobin legation in England. The natural, +declared, sworn ally of sedition has not yet fixed +its head-quarters in London.</p> + +<p>There never was a political contest, upon better +or worse grounds, that by the heat of party-spirit +may not ripen into civil confusion. If ever a party +adverse to the crown should be in a condition here +publicly to declare itself, and to divide, however unequally, +the natural force of the kingdom, they are +sure of an aid of fifty thousand men, at ten days' +warning, from the opposite coast of France. But +against this infusion of a foreign force the crown has +its guaranties, old and new. But I should be glad +to hear something said of the assistance which loyal +subjects in France have received from other powers +in support of that lawful government which secured +their lawful property. I should be glad to know, if +they are so disposed to a neighborly, provident, and +sympathetic attention to their public engagements, +by what means they are to come at us. Is it from +the powerful states of Holland we are to reclaim our +guaranty? Is it from the King of Prussia, and his +steady good affections, and his powerful navy, that +we are to look for the guaranty of our security? Is +it from the Netherlands, which the French may cover<a name="Page_112" id="Page_112" title="112" class="pagenum"></a> +with the swarms of their citizen-soldiers in twenty-four +hours, that we are to look for this assistance? +This is to suppose, too, that all these powers have no +views offensive or necessities defensive of their own. +They will cut out work for one another, and France +will cut out work for them all.</p> + +<p>That the Christian religion cannot exist in this +country with such a fraternity will not, I think, be +disputed with me. On that religion, according to +our mode, all our laws and institutions stand, as +upon their base. That scheme is supposed in every +transaction of life; and if that were done away, everything +else, as in France, must be changed along +with it. Thus, religion perishing, and with it this +Constitution, it is a matter of endless meditation +what order of things would follow it. But what +disorder would fill the space between the present and +that which is to come, in the gross, is no matter of +doubtful conjecture. It is a great evil, that of a civil +war. But, in that state of things, a civil war, which +would give to good men and a good cause some +means of struggle, is a blessing of comparison that +England will not enjoy. The moment the struggle +begins, it ends. They talk of Mr. Hume's euthanasia +of the British Constitution gently expiring, without +a groan, in the paternal arms of a mere monarchy. +In a monarchy!—fine trifling indeed!—there is no +such euthanasia for the British Constitution.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<h3>The manuscript copy of this Letter ends here.</h3> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_9_9" id="Footnote_9_9"></a><a href="#FNanchor_9_9"><span class="label">[9]</span></a> Here I have fallen into an unintentional mistake. Rider's Almanack +for 1794 lay before me; and, in troth, I then had no other. +For variety, that sage astrologer has made some small changes on the +weather side of 1795; but the caution is the same on the opposite page +of instruction.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_10_10" id="Footnote_10_10"></a><a href="#FNanchor_10_10"><span class="label">[10]</span></a> <i>Souverains opprimés</i>.—See the whole proceeding in the <i>Procès-Verbal</i> +of the National Assembly.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_11_11" id="Footnote_11_11"></a><a href="#FNanchor_11_11"><span class="label">[11]</span></a> +</p> +<p><br /> +Hic auratis volitans argenteus anser<br /> +Porticibus GALLOS in limine adesse canebat.<br /> +</p> +</div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_12_12" id="Footnote_12_12"></a><a href="#FNanchor_12_12"><span class="label">[12]</span></a> See debates in Parliament upon motions made in both Houses +for prosecuting Mr. Reeves for a libel upon the Constitution, Dec., +1795.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_13_13" id="Footnote_13_13"></a><a href="#FNanchor_13_13"><span class="label">[13]</span></a> "In the costume assumed by the members of the legislative body +we almost behold the revival of the extinguished insignia of knighthood," +&c., &c.—See <i>A View of the Relative State of Great Britain and +France at the Commencement of the Year</i> 1796.</p></div> +</div> +<p><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113" title="113" class="pagenum"></a> + +<a name="EMPRESS_OF_RUSSIA" id="EMPRESS_OF_RUSSIA" /></p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><span style="font-size: 60%;">A</span><br /> +<br /> +LETTER<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 60%;">TO</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%;">THE EMPRESS OF RUSSIA.</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 60%;">NOVEMBER 1, 1791.</span></h2> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114" title="114" class="pagenum"></a></p> +<p><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115" title="115" class="pagenum"></a></p> +<p>Madam,—The Comte de Woronzow, your Imperial +Majesty's minister, and Mr. Fawkener, +have informed me of the very gracious manner in +which your Imperial Majesty, and, after your example, +the Archduke and Archduchess, have condescended +to accept my humble endeavors in the service +of that cause which connects the rights and +duties of sovereigns with the true interest and happiness +of their people.</p> + +<p>If, confiding in titles derived from your own goodness, +I venture to address directly to your Imperial +Majesty the expressions of my gratitude for so distinguished +an honor, I hope it will not be thought a +presumptuous intrusion. I hope, too, that the willing +homage I pay to the high and ruling virtues +which distinguish your Imperial Majesty, and which +form the felicity of so large a part of the world, will +not be looked upon as the language of adulation to +power and greatness. In my humble situation, I can +behold majesty in its splendor without being dazzled, +and I am capable of respecting it in its fall.</p> + +<p>It is, Madam, from my strong sense of what is due +to dignity in undeserved misfortune, that I am led +to felicitate your Imperial Majesty on the use you +have lately made of your power. The princes and +nobility of France, who from honor and duty, from +blood and from principle, are attached to that unhappy<a name="Page_116" id="Page_116" title="116" class="pagenum"></a> +crown, have experienced your favor and countenance; +and there is no doubt that they will finally +enjoy the full benefit of your protection. The generosity +of your Imperial Majesty has induced you to +take an interest in their cause; and your sagacity +has made you perceive that in the case of the sovereign +of France the cause of all sovereigns is tried,—that +in the case of its church, the cause of all +churches,—and that in the case of its nobility is +tried the cause of all the respectable orders of all +society, and even of society itself.</p> + +<p>Your Imperial Majesty has sent your minister to +reside where the crown of France, in this disastrous +eclipse of royalty, can alone truly and freely be represented, +that is, in its royal blood,—where alone +the nation can be represented, that is, in its natural +and inherent dignity. A throne cannot be represented +by a prison. The honor of a nation cannot +be represented by an assembly which disgraces and +degrades it: at Coblentz only the king and the nation +of France are to be found.</p> + +<p>Your Imperial Majesty, who reigns and lives for +glory, has nobly and wisely disdained to associate +your crown with a faction which has for its object +the subversion of all thrones.</p> + +<p>You have not recognized this universal public enemy +as a part of the system of Europe. You have +refused to sully the lustre of your empire by any +communion with a body of fanatical usurpers and +tyrants, drawn out of the dregs of society, and exalted +to their evil eminence by the enormity of their +crimes,—an assemblage of tyrants, wholly destitute +of any distinguished qualification in a single person +amongst them, that can command reverence from our<a name="Page_117" id="Page_117" title="117" class="pagenum"></a> +reason, or seduce it from our prejudices. These enemies +of sovereigns, if at all acknowledged, must be +acknowledged on account of that enmity alone: they +have nothing else to recommend them.</p> + +<p>Madam, it is dangerous to praise any human virtue +before the accomplishment of the tasks which it +imposes on itself. But in expressing my part of what +I hope is, or will become, the general voice, in admiration +of what you have done, I run no risk at all. +With your Imperial Majesty, declaration and execution, +beginning and conclusion, are, at their different +seasons, one and the same thing.</p> + +<p>On the faith and declaration of some of the first +potentates of Europe, several thousands of persons, +comprehending the best men and the best gentlemen +in France, have given up their country, their houses, +their fortunes, their professional situation, their all, +and are now in foreign lands, struggling under the +most grievous distresses. Whatever appearances may +menace, nobody fears that they can be finally abandoned. +Such a dereliction could not be without a +strong imputation on the public and private honor +of sovereignty itself, nor without an irreparable injury +to its interests. It would give occasion to represent +monarchs as natural enemies to each other, and +that they never support or countenance any subjects +of a brother prince, except when they rebel against +him. We individuals, mere spectators of the scene, +but who sock our liberties under the shade of legal +authority, and of course sympathize with the sufferers +in that cause, never can permit ourselves to believe +that such an event can disgrace the history of +our time. The only thing to be feared is delay, in +winch are included many mischiefs. The constancy<a name="Page_118" id="Page_118" title="118" class="pagenum"></a> +of the oppressed will be broken; the power of tyrants +will be confirmed. Already the multitude of +French officers, drawn from their several corps by +hopes inspired by the freely declared disposition of +sovereigns, have left all the posts in which they might +one day have effectually served the good cause abandoned +to the enemy.</p> + +<p>Tour Imperial Majesty's just influence, which is +still greater than your extensive power, will animate +and expedite the efforts of other sovereigns. From +your wisdom other states will learn that they who +wait until all the powers of Europe are at once in +motion can never move at all. It would add to the +unexampled calamities of our time, if the uncommon +union of sentiment in so many powers should prove +the very cause of defeating the benefit which ought +to flow from their general good disposition. No sovereign +can run any risk from the designs of other +powers, whilst engaged in tins glorious and necessary +work. If any attempt could be feared, your Imperial +Majesty's power and justice would secure your allies +against all danger. Madam, your glory will be complete, +if, after having given peace to Europe by your +moderation, you shall bestow stability on all its governments +by your vigor and decision. The debt +which your Imperial Majesty's august predecessors +have contracted to the ancient manners of Europe, +by means of which they civilized a vast empire, will +be nobly repaid by preserving those manners from +the hideous change with which they are now menaced. +By the intervention of Russia the world will +be preserved from barbarism and ruin.</p> + +<p>A private individual, of a remote country, in himself +wholly without importance, unauthorized and<a name="Page_119" id="Page_119" title="119" class="pagenum"></a> +unconnected, not as an English subject, but as a +citizen of the world, presumes to submit his thoughts +to one of the greatest and wisest sovereigns that Europe +has seen. He does it without fear, because he +does not involve in his weakness (if such it is) his +king, his country, or his friends. He is not' afraid +that he shall offend your Imperial Majesty,—because, +secure in itself, true greatness is always accessible, +and because respectfully to speak what we conceive +to be truth is the best homage which can be paid to +true dignity.</p> + +<p>I am, Madam, with the utmost possible respect and +veneration,</p> + +<p>Your Imperial Majesty's</p> + +<p>Most obedient and most humble servant,</p> + +<p>EDM. BURKE.</p> + +<p>BEACONSFIELD, November 1st, 1791.</p> +<p><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120" title="120" class="pagenum"></a></p> +<p><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121" title="121" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p><a name="SIR_CHARLES_BINGHAM" id="SIR_CHARLES_BINGHAM" /></p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<h2><span style="font-size: 60%;">A</span><br /> +<br /> +LETTER<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 60%;">TO</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%;">SIR CHARLES BINGHAM, BART.,</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 60%;">ON THE</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%;">IRISH ABSENTEE TAX.</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 60%;">OCTOBER 30, 1773.</span></h2> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122" title="122" class="pagenum"></a></p> +<h2>NOTE.</h2> + + +<div class="blockquot"><p>From authentic documents found with the copy of this Letter +among Mr. Burke's papers, it appears that in the year 1773 a +project of imposing a tax upon all proprietors of landed estates +in Ireland, whose ordinary residence should be in Great Britain, +had been adopted and avowed by his Majesty's ministers at that +time. A remonstrance against this measure, as highly unjust +and impolitic, was presented to the ministers by several of the +principal Irish absentees, and the project was subsequently abandoned.</p></div> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> +<p><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123" title="123" class="pagenum"></a></p> +<h2>LETTER.</h2> + +<p>Dear Sir,—I am much flattered by your very +obliging letter, and the rather because it promises +an opening to our future correspondence. This +may be my only indemnification for very great losses. +One of the most odious parts of the proposed Absentee +Tax is its tendency to separate friends, and +to make as ugly breaches in private society as it +must make in the unity of the great political body. +I am sure that much of the satisfaction of some circles +in London will be lost by it. Do you think that +our friend Mrs. Vesey will suffer her husband to +vote for a tax that is to destroy the evenings at Bolton +Row? I trust we shall have other supporters +of the same sex, equally powerful, and equally deserving +to be so, who will not abandon the common +cause of their own liberties and our satisfactions. +We shall be barbarized on both sides of the water, +if we do not see one another now and then. <i>We</i> +shall sink into surly, brutish Johns, and <i>you</i> will degenerate +into wild Irish. It is impossible that we +should be the wiser or the more agreeable, certainly +we shall not love one another the better, for this +forced separation, which our ministers, who have already +done so much for the dissolution of every other +sort of good connection, are now meditating for the +further improvement of this too well united empire. +Their next step will be to encourage all the colonies,<a name="Page_124" id="Page_124" title="124" class="pagenum"></a> +about thirty separate governments, to keep their people +from all intercourse with each other and with the +mother country. A gentleman of New York or Barbadoes +will be as much gazed at as a strange animal +from Nova Zembla or Otaheite; and those rogues, +the travellers, will tell us what stories they please +about poor old Ireland.</p> + +<p>In all seriousness, (though I am a great deal more +than half serious in what I have been saying,) I +look upon this projected tax in a very evil light; I +think it is not advisable; I am sure it is not necessary; +and as it is not a mere matter of finance, but +involves a political question of much, importance, I +consider the principle and precedent as far worse +than the thing itself. You are too kind in imagining +I can suggest anything new upon the subject. The +objections to it are very glaring, and must strike the +eyes of all those who have not their reasons for shutting +them against evident truth. I have no feelings +or opinions on this subject which I do not partake +with all the sensible and informed people that I meet +with. At first I could scarcely meet with any one +who could believe that this scheme originated from +the English government. They considered it not only +as absurd, but as something monstrous and unnatural. +In the first instance, it strikes at the power of +this country; in the end, at the union of the whole +empire. I do not mean to express, most certainly I +do not entertain in my mind, anything invidious concerning +the superintending authority of Great Britain. +But if it be true that the several bodies which +make up this complicated mass are to be preserved +as one empire, an authority sufficient to preserve +that unity, and by its equal weight and pressure<a name="Page_125" id="Page_125" title="125" class="pagenum"></a> +to consolidate the various parts that compose it, +must reside somewhere: that somewhere can only +be in England. Possibly any one member, distinctly +taken, might decide in favor of that residence +within itself; but certainly no member would give +its voice for any other except this. So that I look +upon the residence of the supreme power to be settled +here: not by force, or tyranny, or even by mere +long usage, but by the very nature of things, and the +joint consent of the whole body.</p> + +<p>If all this be admitted, then without question this +country must have the sole right to the imperial +legislation: by which I mean that law which regulates +the polity and economy of the several parts, as +they relate to one another and to the whole. But if +any of the parts, which (not for oppression, but for +order) are placed in a subordinate situation, will assume +to themselves the power of hindering or checking +the resort of their municipal subjects to the centre, +or even to any other part of the empire, they +arrogate to themselves the imperial rights, which do +not, which cannot, belong to them, and, so far as +in them lies, destroy the happy arrangement of the +entire empire.</p> + +<p>A free communication by <i>discretionary residence</i> is +necessary to all the other purposes of communication. +For what purpose are the Irish and Plantation +laws sent hither, but as means of preserving this sovereign +constitution? Whether such a constitution +was originally right or wrong this is not the time of +day to dispute. If any evils arise from it, let us not +strip it of what may be useful in it. By taking the +English Privy Council into your legislature, you obtain +a new, a further, and possibly a more liberal consideration<a name="Page_126" id="Page_126" title="126" class="pagenum"></a> +of all your acts. If a local legislature shall +by oblique means tend to deprive any of the people +of this benefit, and shall make it penal to them to follow +into England the laws which may affect them, +then the English Privy Council will have to decide +upon your acts without those lights that may enable +them to judge upon what grounds you made them, or +how far they ought to be modified, received, or rejected.</p> + +<p>To what end is the ultimate appeal in judicature +lodged in this kingdom, if men may be disabled from +following their suits here, and may be taxed into an +absolute <i>denied of justice</i>? You observe, my dear +Sir, that I do not assert that in all cases two shillings +will necessarily cut off this means of correcting legislative +and judicial mistakes, and thus amount to +a denial of justice. I might, indeed, state cases in +which this very quantum of tax would be fully sufficient +to defeat this right. But I argue not on the +case, but on the principle, and I am sure the principle +implies it. They who may restrain may prohibit; +they who may impose two shillings may impose ten +shillings in the pound; and those who may condition +the tax to six months' annual absence may carry +that condition to six weeks, or even to six days, and +thereby totally defeat the wise means which have been +provided for extensive and impartial justice, and for +orderly, well-poised, and well-connected government.</p> + +<p>What is taxing the resort to and residence in any +place, but declaring that your connection with that +place is a grievance? Is not such an Irish tax as is +now proposed a virtual declaration that England is +a foreign country, and a renunciation on your part +of the principle of <i>common naturalization</i>, which runs +through this whole empire?<a name="Page_127" id="Page_127" title="127" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>Do you, or does any Irish gentleman, think it a +mean privilege, that, the moment he sets his foot +upon this ground, he is to all intents and purposes +an Englishman? You will not be pleased with a law +which by its operation tends to disqualify you from a +seat in this Parliament; and if your own virtue or +fortune, or if that of your children, should carry you +or them to it, should you like to be excluded from +the possibility of a peerage in this kingdom? If in +Ireland we lay it down as a maxim, that a residence +in Great Britain is a political evil, and to be discouraged +by penal taxes, you must necessarily reject all +the privileges and benefits which are connected with +such a residence.</p> + +<p>I can easily conceive that a citizen of Dublin, who +looks no further than his counter, may think that +Ireland will be repaid for such a loss by any small +diminution of taxes, or any increase in the circulation +of money that may be laid out in the purchase +of claret or groceries in his corporation. In such a +man an error of that kind, as it would be natural, +would be excusable. But I cannot think that any +educated man, any man who looks with an enlightened +eye on the interest of Ireland, can believe that +it is not highly for the advantage of Ireland, that this +Parliament, which, whether right or wrong, whether +we will or not, will make some laws to bind Ireland, +should always have in it some persons who by connection, +by property, or by early prepossessions and +affections, are attached to the welfare of that country. +I am so clear upon this point, not only from +the clear reason of the thing, but from the constant +course of my observation, by now having sat eight +sessions in Parliament, that I declare it to you as my<a name="Page_128" id="Page_128" title="128" class="pagenum"></a> +sincere opinion, that (if you must do either the one +or the other) it would be wiser by far, and far better +for Ireland, that some new privileges should attend the +estates of Irishmen, members of the two Houses here, +than that their characters should be stained by penal +impositions, and their properties loaded by unequal +and unheard-of modes of taxation. I do really trust, +that, when the matter comes a little to be considered, +a majority of our gentlemen will never consent to +establish such a principle of disqualification against +themselves and their posterity, and, for the sake of +gratifying the schemes of a transitory administration +of the cockpit or the castle, or in compliance with +the lightest part of the most vulgar and transient +popularity, fix so irreparable an injury on the permanent +interest of their country.</p> + +<p>This law seems, therefore, to me to go directly +against the fundamental points of the legislative and +judicial constitution of these kingdoms, and against +the happy communion of their privileges. But there +is another matter in the tax proposed, that contradicts +as essentially a very great principle necessary +for preserving the union of the various parts of a +state; because it does, in effect, discountenance mutual +intermarriage and inheritance, things that bind +countries more closely together than any laws or constitutions +whatsoever. Is it right that a woman who +marries into Ireland, and perhaps well purchases her +jointure or her dower there, should not after her +husband's death have it in her choice to return to +her country and her friends without being taxed for +it? If an Irish heiress should marry into an English +family, and that great property in both countries +should thereby come to be united in this common<a name="Page_129" id="Page_129" title="129" class="pagenum"></a> +issue, shall the descendant of that marriage abandon +his natural connection, his family interests, his public +and his private duties, and be compelled to take up +his residence in Ireland? Is there any sense or any +justice in it, unless you affirm that there should be +no such intermarriage and no such mutual inheritance +between the natives? Is there a shadow of +reason, that, because a Lord Rockingham, a Duke of +Devonshire, a Sir George Savile, possess property in +Ireland, which has descended to them without any +act of theirs, they should abandon their duty in Parliament, +and spend the winters in Dublin? or, having +spent the session in Westminster, must they +abandon their seats and all their family interests +in Yorkshire and Derbyshire, and pass the rest of +the year in Wicklow, in Cork, or Tyrone?</p> + +<p>See what the consequence must be from a municipal +legislature considering itself as an unconnected +body, and attempting to enforce a partial residence. +A man may have property in more parts than two +of this empire. He may have property in Jamaica +and in North America, as well as in England and +Ireland. I know some that have property in all of +them. What shall we say to this case? After the +poor distracted citizen of the whole empire has, in +compliance with your partial law, removed his family, +bid adieu to his connections, and settled himself +quietly and snug in a pretty box by the Liffey, he +hears that the Parliament of Great Britain is of +opinion that all English estates ought to be spent +in England, and that they will tax him double, if he +does not return. Suppose him then (if the nature +of the two laws will permit it) providing a flying +camp, and dividing his year as well as he can between<a name="Page_130" id="Page_130" title="130" class="pagenum"></a> +England and Ireland, and at the charge of two town +houses and two country-houses in both kingdoms; in +this situation he receives an account, that a law is +transmitted from Jamaica, and another from Pennsylvania, +to tax absentees from these provinces, which +are impoverished by the European residence of the +possessors of their lands. How is he to escape this +<i>ricochet</i> cross-firing of so many opposite batteries of +police and regulation? If he attempts to comply, he +is likely to be more a citizen of the Atlantic Ocean +and the Irish Sea than of any of these countries. The +matter is absurd and ridiculous, and, while ever the +idea of mutual marriages, inheritances, purchases, +and privileges subsist, can never be carried into execution +with common sense or common justice.</p> + +<p>I do not know how gentlemen of Ireland reconcile +such an idea to their own liberties, or to the natural +use and enjoyment of their estates. If any of their +children should be left in a minority, and a guardian +should think, as many do, (it matters not whether +properly or no,) that his ward had better he educated +in a school or university here than in Ireland, is he +sure that he can justify the bringing a tax of ten per +cent, perhaps twenty, on his pupil's estate, by giving +what in his opinion is the best education in general, +or the best for that pupil's particular character and +circumstances? Can he justify his sending him to +travel, a necessary part of the higher style of education, +and, notwithstanding what some narrow writers +have said, of great benefit to all countries, but very +particularly so to Ireland? Suppose a guardian, +under the authority or pretence of such a tax of +police, had prevented our dear friend, Lord Charlemont, +from going abroad, would he have lost no<a name="Page_131" id="Page_131" title="131" class="pagenum"></a> +satisfaction? would his friends have lost nothing in +the companion? would his country have lost nothing +in the cultivated taste with which he has adorned +it in so many ways? His natural elegance of mind +would undoubtedly do a great deal; but I will venture +to assert, without the danger of being contradicted, +that he adorns his present residence in Ireland +much the more for having resided a long time out of +it. Will Mr. Flood himself think he ought to have +been driven by taxes into Ireland, whilst he prepared +himself by an English education to understand and +to defend the rights of the subject in Ireland, or to +support the dignity of government there, according +as his opinions, or the situation of things, may lead +him to take either part, upon respectable principles? +I hope it is not forgot that an Irish act of Parliament +sends its youth to England for the study of the law, +and compels a residence in the inns of court hero +for some years. Will you send out with one breath +and recall with another? This act plainly provides +for that intercourse which supposes the strictest union +in laws and policy, in both which the intended tax +supposes an entire separation.</p> + +<p>It would be endless to go into all the inconveniences +this tax will lead to, in the conduct of private +life, and the use of property. How many infirm +people are obliged to change their climate, whose +life depends upon that change! How many families +straitened in their circumstances are there, who, from +the shame, sometimes from the utter impossibility +otherwise of retrenching, are obliged to remove from +their country, in order to preserve their estates in +their families! You begin, then, to burden these +people precisely at the time when their circumstances<a name="Page_132" id="Page_132" title="132" class="pagenum"></a> +of health and fortune render them rather objects of +relief and commiseration.</p> + +<p>I know very well that a great proportion of the +money of every subordinate country will flow towards +the metropolis. This is unavoidable. Other +inconveniences, too, will result to particular parts: +and why? Why, because they are particular parts,—each +a member of a greater, and not an whole +within itself. But those members are to consider +whether these inconveniences are not fully balanced, +perhaps more than balanced, by the united strength +of a great and compact body. I am sensible, too, +of a difficulty that will be started against the application +of some of the principles which I reason upon +to the case of Ireland. It will be said, that Ireland, +in many particulars, is not bound to consider itself +as a part of the British body; because this country, +in many instances, is mistaken enough to treat you +as foreigners, and draws away your money by absentees, +without suffering you to enjoy your natural +advantages in trade and commerce. No man living +loves restrictive regulations of any kind less than +myself; at best, nine times in ten, they are little +better than laborious and vexatious follies. Often, +as in your case, they are great oppressions, as well as +great absurdities. But still an injury is not always +a reason for retaliation; nor is the folly of others +with regard to us a reason for imitating it with regard +to them. Before we attempt to retort, we ought +to consider whether we may not injure ourselves even +more than our adversary; since, in the contest who +shall go the greatest length in absurdity, the victor +is generally the greatest sufferer. Besides, when +there is an unfortunate emulation in restraints and<a name="Page_133" id="Page_133" title="133" class="pagenum"></a> +oppressions, the question of <i>strength</i> is of the highest +importance. It little becomes the feeble to be unjust. +Justice is the shield of the weak; and when they +choose to lay this down, and fight naked in the contest +of mere power, the event will be what must be +expected from such imprudence.</p> + +<p>I ought to beg your pardon for running into this +length. You want no arguments to convince you +on this subject, and you want no resources of matter +to convince others. I ought, too, to ask pardon for +having delayed my answer so long; but I received +your letter on Tuesday, in town, and I was obliged +to come to the country on business. From the country +I write at present; but this day I shall go to town +again. I shall see Lord Rockingham, who has spared +neither time nor trouble in making a vigorous opposition +to this inconsiderate measure. I hope to be +able to send you the papers which will give you information +of the steps he has taken. He has pursued +this business with the foresight, diligence, and good +sense with which he generally resists unconstitutional +attempts of government. A life of disinterestedness, +generosity, and public spirit are his titles to have it +believed that the effect which the tax may have upon +his private property is not the sole nor the principal +motive to his exertions. I know he is of opinion that +the opposition in Ireland ought to be carried on with +that spirit as if no aid was expected from this country, +and here as if nothing would be done in Ireland: +many things have been lost by not acting in +this manner.</p> + +<p>I am told that you are not likely to be alone in the +generous stand you are to make against this unnatural +monster of court popularity. It is said, Mr. Hussey,<a name="Page_134" id="Page_134" title="134" class="pagenum"></a> +who is so very considerable at present, and who +is everything in expectation, will give you his assistance. +I rejoice to see (that very rare spectacle) a +good mind, a great genius, and public activity united +together, and united so early in life. By not running +into every popular humor, he may depend upon +it, the popularity of his character will wear the better.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Non ponebat enim rumores ante salutem;<br /></span> +<span>Ergo postque magisque viri nunc gloria claret.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Adieu, my dear Sir. Give my best respects to +Lady Bingham; and believe me, with great truth +and esteem,</p> + +<p>Your most obedient and most humble servant,</p> + +<p>EDM. BURKE.</p> + +<p>BEACONSFIELD, 30th October, 1773.</p> + +<p>TO SIR CHARLES BINGHAM.</p> +<p><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135" title="135" class="pagenum"></a> + +<a name="CHARLES_JAMES_FOX" id="CHARLES_JAMES_FOX" /></p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><span style="font-size: 60%;">A</span><br /> +<br /> +LETTER<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 60%;">TO</span><br /> +<br /> +THE HON. CHARLES JAMES FOX,<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%;">ON THE AMERICAN WAR.</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 60%;">OCTOBER 8, 1777.</span></h2> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136" title="136" class="pagenum"></a></p> +<p><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137" title="137" class="pagenum"></a></p> +<p>My Dear Charles,—I am, on many accounts, +exceedingly pleased with your journey +to Ireland. I do not think it was possible to dispose +better of the interval between this and the meeting +of Parliament. I told you as much, in the same general +terms, by the post. My opinion of the infidelity +of that conveyance hindered me from being particular. +I now sit down with malice prepense to kill you with +a very long letter, and must take my chance for some +safe method of conveying the dose. Before I say anything +to you of the place you are in, or the business +of it, on which, by the way, a great deal might be +said, I will turn myself to the concluding part of +your letter from Chatsworth.</p> + +<p>You are sensible that I do not differ from you in +many things; and most certainly I do not dissent +from the main of your doctrine concerning the heresy +of depending upon contingencies. You must +recollect how uniform my sentiments have been on +that subject. I have ever wished a settled plan of +our own, founded in the very essence of the American +business, wholly unconnected with the events of +the war, and framed in such a manner as to keep +up our credit and maintain our system at home, in +spite of anything which may happen abroad. I am +now convinced, by a long and somewhat vexatious +experience, that such a plan is absolutely impracticable.<a name="Page_138" id="Page_138" title="138" class="pagenum"></a> +I think with you, that some faults in the +constitution of those whom we must love and trust +are among the causes of this impracticability; they +are faults, too, that one can hardly wish them perfectly +cured of, as I am afraid they are intimately +connected with honest, disinterested intentions, plentiful +fortunes, assured rank, and quiet homes. A +great deal of activity and enterprise can scarcely +ever be expected from such men, unless some horrible +calamity is just over their heads, or unless they +suffer some gross personal insults from power, the +resentment of which may be as unquiet and stimulating +a principle in their minds as ambition is in +those of a different complexion. To say the truth, +I cannot greatly blame them. We live at a time +when men are not repaid in fame for what they +sacrifice in interest or repose.</p> + +<p>On the whole, when I consider of what discordant, +and particularly of what fleeting materials the +opposition has been all along composed, and at the +same time review what Lord Rockingham has done, +with that and with his own shattered constitution, +for these last twelve years, I confess I am rather surprised +that he has done so much and persevered so +long, than that he has felt now and then some cold +fits, and that he grows somewhat languid and desponding +at last. I know that he, and those who +are much prevalent with him, though they are not +thought so much devoted to popularity as others, do +very much look to the people, and more than I think +is wise in them, who do so little to guide and direct +the public opinion. Without this they act, indeed; +but they act as it were from compulsion, and +because it is impossible, in their situation, to avoid<a name="Page_139" id="Page_139" title="139" class="pagenum"></a> +taking some part. All this it is impossible to change, +and to no purpose to complain of.</p> + +<p>As to that popular humor which is the medium +we float in, if I can discern anything at all of its +present state, it is far worse than I have ever known +or could ever imagine it. The faults of the people +are not popular vices; at least, they are not such as +grow out of what we used to take to be the English +temper and character. The greatest number have a +sort of an heavy, lumpish acquiescence in government, +without much respect or esteem for those that +compose it. I really cannot avoid making some very +unpleasant prognostics from this disposition of the +people. I think that many of the symptoms must +have struck you: I will mention one or two that are +to me very remarkable. You must know that at Bristol +we grow, as an election interest, and even as a +party interest, rather stronger than we were when I +was chosen. We have just now a majority in the corporation. +In this state of matters, what, think you, +have they done? They have voted their freedom to +Lord Sandwich and Lord Suffolk!—to the first, at +the very moment when the American privateers were +domineering in the Irish Sea, and taking the Bristol +traders in the Bristol Channel;—to the latter, when +his remonstrances on the subject of captures were +the jest of Paris and of Europe. This fine step was +taken, it seems, in honor of the zeal of these two +profound statesmen in the prosecution of John the +Painter: so totally negligent are they of everything +essential, and so long and so deeply affected +with trash the most low and contemptible; just as +if they thought the merit of Sir John Fielding was +the most shining point in the character of great ministers,<a name="Page_140" id="Page_140" title="140" class="pagenum"></a> +in the most critical of all times, and, of all +others, the most deeply interesting to the commercial +world! My best friends in the corporation had +no other doubts on the occasion than whether it did +not belong to me, by right of my representative capacity, +to be the bearer of this auspicious compliment. +In addition to this, if it could receive any +addition, they now employ me to solicit, as a favor +of no small magnitude, that, after the example of +Newcastle, they may be suffered to arm vessels for +their own defence in the Channel. Their memorial, +under the seal of Merchants' Hall, is now lying on +the table before me. Not a soul has the least sensibility, +on finding themselves, now for the first time, +obliged to act as if the community were dissolved, +and, after enormous payments towards the common +protection, each part was to defend itself, as if it +were a separate state.</p> + +<p>I don't mention Bristol as if that were the part +furthest gone in this mortification. Far from it: I +know that there is, rather, a little more life in us than +in any other place. In Liverpool they are literally +almost ruined by this American war; but they love +it as they suffer from it. In short, from whatever +I see, and from whatever quarter I hear, I am convinced +that everything that is not absolute stagnation +is evidently a party-spirit very adverse to our politics, +and to the principles from whence they arise. There +are manifest marks of the resurrection of the Tory +party. They no longer criticize, as all disengaged +people in the world will, on the acts of government; +but they are silent under every evil, and hide and +cover up every ministerial blander and misfortune, +with the officious zeal of men who think they have a<a name="Page_141" id="Page_141" title="141" class="pagenum"></a> +party of their own to support in power. The Tories +do universally think their power and consequence +involved in the success of this American business. +The clergy are astonishingly warm in it; and what +the Tories are, when embodied and united with their +natural head, the crown, and animated by their clergy, +no man knows better than yourself. As to the +Whigs, I think them far from extinct. They are, +what they always were, (except by the able use of +opportunities,) by far the weakest party in this country. +They have not yet learned the application of +their principles to the present state of things; and +as to the Dissenters, the main effective part of the +Whig strength, they are, to use a favorite expression +of our American campaign style, "not all in force." +They will do very little, and, as far as I can discern, +are rather intimidated than provoked at the denunciations +of the court in the Archbishop of York's sermon. +I thought that sermon rather imprudent, when +I first saw it; but it seems to have done its business.</p> + +<p>In this temper of the people, I do not wholly wonder +that our Northern friends look a little towards +events. In war, particularly, I am afraid it must be +so. There is something so weighty and decisive in +the events of war, something that so completely overpowers +the imagination of the vulgar, that all counsels +must in a great degree be subordinate to and +attendant on them. I am sure it was so in the last +war, very eminently. So that, on the whole, what +with the temper of the people, the temper of our own +friends, and the domineering necessities of war, we +must quietly give up all ideas of any settled, preconcerted +plan. We shall be lucky enough, if, keeping +ourselves attentive and alert, we can contrive to profit<a name="Page_142" id="Page_142" title="142" class="pagenum"></a> +of the occasions as they arise: though I am sensible +that those who are best provided with a general +scheme are fittest to take advantage of all contingencies. +However, to act with any people with the +least degree of comfort, I believe we must contrive +a little to assimilate to their character. We must +gravitate towards them, if we would keep in the +same system, or expect that they should approach +towards us. They are, indeed, worthy of much +concession and management. I am quite convinced +that they are the honestest public men that ever appeared +in this country, and I am sure that they are +the wisest, by far, of those who appear in it at present. +None of those who are continually complaining of +them, but are themselves just as chargeable with all +their faults, and have a decent stock of their own +into the bargain. They (our friends) are, I admit, +as you very truly represent them, but indifferently +qualified for storming a citadel. After all, God +knows whether this citadel is to be stormed by them, +or by anybody else, by the means they use, or by +any means. I know that as they are, abstractedly +speaking, to blame, so there are those who cry out +against them for it, not with a friendly complaint, +as we do, but with the bitterness of enemies. But I +know, too, that those who blame them for want of +enterprise have shown no activity at all against the +common enemy: all their skill and all their spirit +have been shown only in weakening, dividing, and +indeed destroying their allies. What they are and +what we are is now pretty evidently experienced; +and it is certain, that, partly by our common faults, +but much more by the difficulties of our situation, +and some circumstances of unavoidable misfortune,<a name="Page_143" id="Page_143" title="143" class="pagenum"></a> +we are in little better than a sort of <i>cul-de-sac</i>. For +my part, I do all I can to give ease to my mind in +this strange position. I remember, some years ago, +when I was pressing some points with great eagerness +and anxiety, and complaining with great vexation +to the Duke of Richmond of the little progress I +make, he told me kindly, and I believe very truly, +that, though he was far from thinking so himself, +other people could not be persuaded I had not +some latent private interest in pushing these matters, +which I urged with an earnestness so extreme, +and so much approaching to passion. He was certainly +in the right. I am thoroughly resolved to +give, both to myself and to my friends, less vexation +on these subjects than hitherto I have done,—much +less, indeed.</p> + +<p>If <i>you</i> should grow too earnest, you will be still +more inexcusable than I was. Your having entered +into affairs so much younger ought to make them too +familiar to you to be the cause of much agitation, and +you have much more before you for your work. Do +not be in haste. Lay your foundations deep in public +opinion. Though (as you are sensible) I have +never given you the least hint of advice about joining +yourself in a declared connection with our party, +nor do I now, yet, as I love that party very well, and +am clear that you are better able to serve them than +any man I know, I wish that things should be so +kept as to leave you mutually very open to one another +in all changes and contingencies; and I wish +this the rather, because, in order to be very great, as +I am anxious that you should be, (always presuming +that you are disposed to make a good use of power,) +you will certainly want some better support than<a name="Page_144" id="Page_144" title="144" class="pagenum"></a> +merely that of the crown. For I much doubt, whether, +with all your parts, you are the man formed for +acquiring real interior favor in this court, or in any; +I therefore wish you a firm ground in the country; +and I do not know so firm and so sound a bottom to +build on as our party.—Well, I have done with this +matter; and you think I ought to have finished it +long ago. Now I turn to Ireland.</p> + +<p>Observe, that I have not heard a word of any news +relative to it, from thence or from London; so that I +am only going to state to you my conjectures as to +facts, and to speculate again on these conjectures. I +have a strong notion that the lateness of our meeting +is owing to the previous arrangements intended in +Ireland. I suspect they mean that Ireland should +take a sort of lead, and act an efficient part in this +war, both with men and money. It will sound well, +when we meet, to tell us of the active zeal and loyalty +of the people of Ireland, and contrast it with +the rebellious spirit of America. It will be a popular +topic,—the perfect confidence of Ireland in the +power of the British Parliament. From thence they +will argue the little danger which any dependency +of the crown has to apprehend from the enforcement +of that authority. It will be, too, somewhat flattering +to the country gentlemen, who might otherwise +begin to be sullen, to hold out that the burden is not +wholly to rest upon them; and it will pique our +pride to be told that Ireland has cheerfully stepped +forward: and when a dependant of this kingdom has +already engaged itself in another year's war, merely +for our dignity, how can we, who are principals in +the quarrel, hold off? This scheme of policy seems +to me so very obvious, and is likely to be of so much<a name="Page_145" id="Page_145" title="145" class="pagenum"></a> +service to the present system, that I cannot conceive +it possible they should neglect it, or something like it. +They have already put the people of Ireland to the +proof. Have they not borne the Earl of Buckinghamshire, +the person who was employed to move the +fiery committee in the House of Lords in order to +stimulate the ministry to this war, who was in the +chair, and who moved the resolutions?</p> + +<p>It is within a few days of eleven years since I was +in Ireland, and then after an absence of two. Those +who have been absent from any scene for even a +much shorter time generally lose the true practical +notion of the country, and of what may or may not +be done in it. When I knew Ireland, it was very +different from the state of England, where government +is a vast deal, the public something, but individuals +comparatively very little. But if Ireland +bears any resemblance to what it was some years +ago, neither government nor public opinion can do +a great deal; almost the whole is in the hands of a +few leading people. The populace of Dublin, and +some parts in the North, are in some sort an exception. +But the Primate, Lord Hillsborough, and Lord +Hertford have great sway in the latter; and the former +may be considerable or not, pretty much as the +Duke of Leinster pleases. On the whole, the success +of government usually depended on the bargain made +with a very few men. The resident lieutenancy may +have made some change, and given a strength to government, +which formerly, I know, it had not; still, +however, I am of opinion, the former state, though +in other hands perhaps, and in another manner, still +continues. The house you are connected with is +grown into a much greater degree of power than it<a name="Page_146" id="Page_146" title="146" class="pagenum"></a> +had, though it was very considerable, at the period I +speak of. If the D. of L. takes a popular part, he is +sure of the city of Dublin, and he has a young man +attached to him who stands very forward in Parliament +and in profession, and, by what I hear, with +more good-will and less envy than usually attends so +rapid a progress. The movement of one or two principal +men, if they manage the little popular strength +which is to be found in Dublin and Ulster, may do a +great deal, especially when money is to be saved and +taxes to be kept off. I confess I should despair of +your succeeding with any of them, if they cannot be +satisfied that every job which they can look for on account +of carrying this measure would be just as sure +to them for their ordinary support of government. +They are essential to government, which at this time +must not be disturbed, and their neutrality will be +purchased at as high a price as their alliance offensive +and defensive. Now, as by supporting they may +get as much as by betraying their country, it must +be a great leaning to turpitude that can make them +take a part in this war. I am satisfied, that, if the +Duke of Leinster and Lord Shannon would act together, +this business could not go on; or if either of +them took part with Ponsonby, it would have no better +success. Hutchinson's situation is much altered +since I saw you. To please Tisdall, he had been in +a manner laid aside at the Castle. It is now to be +seen whether he prefers the gratification of his resentment +and his appetite for popularity, both of +which are strong enough in him, to the advantages +which his independence gives him, of making a new +bargain, and accumulating new offices on his heap. +Pray do not be asleep in this scene of action,—at<a name="Page_147" id="Page_147" title="147" class="pagenum"></a> +this time, if I am right, the principal. The Protestants +of Ireland will be, I think, in general, backward: +they form infinitely the greatest part of the +landed and the moneyed interests; and they will not +like to pay. The Papists are reduced to beasts of +burden: they will give all they have, their shoulders, +readily enough, if they are flattered. Surely +the state of Ireland ought forever to teach parties +moderation in their victories. People crushed by law +have no hopes but from power. If laws are their +enemies, they will be enemies to laws; and those +who have much to hope and nothing to lose will always +be dangerous, more or less. But this is not +our present business. If all this should prove a +dream, however, let it not hinder you from writing +to me and tolling me so. You will easily refute, in +your conversation, the little topics which they will set +afloat: such as, that Ireland is a boat, and must go +with the ship; that, if the Americans contended only +for their liberties, it would be different,—but since +they have declared independence, and so forth—</p> + +<p>You are happy in enjoying Townshend's company. +Remember me to him. How does he like his private +situation in a country where he was the son of the +sovereign?—Mrs. Burke and the two Richards salute +you cordially.</p> + +<p>E.B.</p> + +<p>BEACONSFIELD, October 8th, 1777.</p> + +<p><a name="Page_148" id="Page_148" title="148" class="pagenum"></a></p> +<p><a name="Page_149" id="Page_149" title="149" class="pagenum"></a></p> +<p><a name="THE_MARQUIS_OF_ROCKINGHAM" id="THE_MARQUIS_OF_ROCKINGHAM" /></p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><span style="font-size: 60%;">A</span><br /> +<br /> +LETTER<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 60%;">TO</span><br /> +<br /> +THE MARQUIS OF ROCKINGHAM,<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 60%;">WITH</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 90%;">ADDRESSES TO THE KING,</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 60%;">AND</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%;">THE BRITISH COLONISTS IN NORTH AMERICA,</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 60%;">IN RELATION TO</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%;">THE MEASURES OF GOVERNMENT IN THE AMERICAN +CONTEST, AND A PROPOSED SECESSION OF +THE OPPOSITION FROM PARLIAMENT.</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 60%;">JANUARY, 1777.</span></h2> +<p><a name="Page_150" id="Page_150" title="150" class="pagenum"></a></p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + + + +<h2>NOTE.</h2> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>This Letter, with the two Addresses which follow it, was written +upon occasion of a proposed secession from Parliament of the +members in both Houses who had opposed the measures of government, +in the contest between this country and the colonies in +North America, from the time of the repeal of the Stamp Act. +It appears, from an indorsement written by Mr. Burke on the +manuscript, that he warmly recommended the measure, but (for +what reasons is not stated) it was not adopted.</p></div> + +<p><br /></p> +<p><a name="Page_151" id="Page_151" title="151" class="pagenum"></a></p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<h2>LETTER<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%;">TO THE MARQUIS OF ROCKINGHAM.</span></h2> + +<p>My Dear Lord,—I am afraid that I ought +rather to beg your pardon for troubling you +at all in this season of repose, than to apologize for +having been so long silent on the approaching business. +It comes upon us, not indeed in the most +agreeable manner, but it does come-upon us; and +I believe your friends in general are in expectation +of finding your Lordship resolved in what way you +are to meet it. The deliberation is full of difficulties; +but the determination is necessary.</p> + +<p>The affairs of America seem to be drawing towards +a crisis. The Howes are at this time in possession +of, or are able to awe, the whole middle coast of +America, from Delaware to the western boundary of +Massachusetts Bay; the naval barrier on the side of +Canada is broken; a great tract of country is open +for the supply of the troops; the river Hudson opens +a way into the heart of the provinces; and nothing +can, in all probability, prevent an early and offensive +campaign. What the Americans <i>have</i> done is, in +their circumstances, truly astonishing; it is, indeed, +infinitely more than I expected from them. But +having done so much, for some short time I began to +entertain an opinion that they might do more. It is +now, however, evident that they cannot look standing<a name="Page_152" id="Page_152" title="152" class="pagenum"></a> +armies in the face. They are inferior in everything, +even in numbers,—I mean, in the number of those +whom they keep in constant duty and in regular pay. +There seem, by the best accounts, not to be above ten +or twelve thousand men, at most, in their grand army. +The rest are militia, and not wonderfully well +composed or disciplined. They decline a general +engagement,—prudently enough, if their object had +been to make the war attend upon a treaty of good +terms of subjection; but when they look further, this +will not do. An army that is obliged at all times +and in all situations to decline an engagement may +delay their ruin, but can never defend their country. +Foreign assistance they have little or none, nor are +likely soon to have more. France, in effect, has no +king, nor any minister accredited enough either with +the court or nation to undertake a design of great +magnitude.</p> + +<p>In this state of things, I persuade myself Franklin +is come to Paris to draw from that court a definitive +and satisfactory answer concerning the support of the +colonies. If he cannot get such an answer, (and I +am of opinion that at present he cannot,) then it +is to be presumed he is authorized to negotiate with +Lord Stormont on the basis of dependence on the +crown. This I take to be his errand: for I never +can believe that he is come thither as a fugitive from +his cause in the hour of its distress, or that he is going +to conclude a long life, which has brightened every +hour it has continued, with so foul and dishonorable +a flight. On this supposition, I thought it not +wholly impossible that the Whig party might be made +a sort of mediators of the peace. It is unnatural +to suppose, that, in making an accommodation, the<a name="Page_153" id="Page_153" title="153" class="pagenum"></a> +Americans should not choose rather to give credit +to those who all along have opposed the measure +of ministers, than to throw themselves wholly on the +mercy of their bitter, uniform, and systematic enemies. +It is, indeed, the victorious enemy that has +the terms to offer; the vanquished party and their +friends are, both of them, reduced in their power; +and it is certain that those who are utterly broken +and subdued have no option. But, as this is hardly +yet the case of the Americans, in this middle state +of their affairs, (much impaired, but not perfectly +ruined,) one would think it must be their interest +to provide, if possible, some further security for the +terms which they may obtain from their enemies. +If the Congress could be brought to declare in favor +of those terms for which one hundred members of the +House of Commons voted last year, with some civility +to the party which held out those terms, it would +undoubtedly have an effect to revive the cause of +our liberties in England, and to give the colonies +some sort of mooring and anchorage in this country. +It seemed to me that Franklin might be made +to feel the propriety of such a step; and as I have +an acquaintance with him, I had a strong desire +of taking a turn to Paris. Everything else failing, +one might obtain a better knowledge of the general +aspect of affairs abroad than, I believe, any of us +possess at present. The Duke of Portland approved +the idea. But when I had conversed with the very +few of your Lordship's friends who were in town, +and considered a little more maturely the constant +temper and standing maxims of the party, I laid +aside the design,—not being desirous of risking the +displeasure of those for whose sake alone I wished<a name="Page_154" id="Page_154" title="154" class="pagenum"></a> +to take that fatiguing journey at this severe season +of the year.</p> + +<p>The Duke of Portland has taken with him some +heads of deliberation, which were the result of a discourse +with his Grace and Mr. Montagu at Burlington House. +It seems essential to the cause that your +Lordship should meet your friends with some settled +plan either of action or inaction. Your friends will +certainly require such a plan; and I am sure the +state of affairs requires it, whether they call for it or +not. As to the measure of a secession with reasons, +after rolling the matter in my head a good deal, and +turning it an hundred ways, I confess I still think it +the most advisable, notwithstanding the serious objections +that lie against it, and indeed the extreme uncertainty +of all political measures, especially at this +time. It provides for your honor. I know of nothing +else that can so well do this. It is something, +perhaps all, that can be done in our present situation. +Some precaution, in this respect, is not without its +motives. That very estimation for which you have +sacrificed everything else is in some danger of suffering +in the general wreck; and perhaps it is likely to +suffer the more, because you have hitherto confided +more than was quite prudent in the clearness of your +intentions, and in the solidity of the popular judgment +upon them. The former, indeed, is out of the +power of events; the latter is full of levity, and the +very creature of fortune. However, such as it is, +(and for one I do not think I am inclined to overvalue +it,) both our interest and our duty make it +necessary for us to attend to it very carefully, so +long as we act a part in public. The measure you +take for this purpose may produce no immediate effect;<a name="Page_155" id="Page_155" title="155" class="pagenum"></a> +but with regard to the party, and the principles +for whose sake the party exists, all hope of their +preservation or recovery depends upon your preserving +your reputation.</p> + +<p>By the conversation of some friends, it seemed +as if they were willing to fall in with this design, +because it promised to emancipate them from the +servitude of irksome business, and to afford them +an opportunity of retiring to ease and tranquillity. +If that be their object in the secession and addresses +proposed, there surely never were means worse chosen +to gain their end; and if this be any part of the project, +it were a thousand times better it were never +undertaken. The measure is not only unusual, and +as such critical, but it is in its own nature strong and +vehement in a high degree. The propriety, therefore, +of adopting it depends entirely upon the spirit +with which it is supported and followed. To pursue +violent measures with languor and irresolution is not +very consistent in speculation, and not more reputable +or safe in practice. If your Lordship's friends do +not go to this business with their whole hearts, if they +do not feel themselves uneasy without it, if they do +not undertake it with a certain degree of zeal, and +even with warmth and indignation, it had better be +removed wholly out of our thoughts. A measure of +less strength, and more in the beaten circle of affairs, +if supported with spirit and industry, would be on all +accounts infinitely more eligible. We have to consider +what it is that in this undertaking we have +against us. We have the weight of King, Lords, and +Commons in the other scale; we have against us, +within a trifle, the whole body of the law; we +oppose the more considerable part of the landed<a name="Page_156" id="Page_156" title="156" class="pagenum"></a> +and mercantile interests; we contend, in a manner, +against the whole Church; we set our faces against +great armies flushed with victory, and navies who +have tasted of civil spoil, and have a strong appetite +for more; our strength, whatever it is, must depend, +for a good part of its effect, upon events not very +probable. In such a situation, such a step requires +not only great magnanimity, but unwearied activity +and perseverance, with a good deal, too, of dexterity +and management, to improve every accident in +our favor.</p> + +<p>The delivery of this paper may have very important +consequences. It is true that the court may +pass it over in silence, with a real or affected contempt. +But this I do not think so likely. If they +do take notice of it, the mildest course will be such +an address from Parliament as the House of Commons +made to the king on the London Remonstrance +in the year 1769. This address will be followed by +addresses of a similar tendency, from all parts of the +kingdom, in order to overpower you with what they +will endeavor to pass as the united voice and sense +of the nation. But if they intend to proceed further, +and to take steps of a more decisive nature, you are +then to consider, not what they may legally and justly +do, but what a Parliament omnipotent in power, +influenced with party rage and personal resentment, +operating under the implicit military obedience of +court discipline, is capable of. Though they have +made some successful experiments on juries, they +will hardly trust enough to them to order a prosecution +for a supposed libel. They may proceed in +two ways: either by an <i>impeachment</i>, in which the +Tories may retort on the Whigs (but with better<a name="Page_157" id="Page_157" title="157" class="pagenum"></a> +success, though in a worse cause) the proceedings in +the case of Sacheverell, or they may, without this +form, proceed, as against the Bishop of Rochester, by +a bill of pains and penalties more or less grievous. +The similarity of the cases, or the justice, is (as I +said) out of the question. The mode of proceeding +has several very ancient and very recent precedents. +None of these methods is impossible. The court may +select three or four of the most distinguished among +you for the victims; and therefore nothing is more +remote from the tendency of the proposed act than any +idea of retirement or repose. On the contrary, you +have, all of you, as principals or auxiliaries, a much +better [hotter?] and more desperate conflict, in all +probability, to undergo, than any you have been yet +engaged in. The only question is, whether the risk +ought to be run for the chance (and it is no more) +of recalling the people of England to their ancient +principles, and to that personal interest which formerly +they took in all public affairs. At any rate, +I am sure it is right, if we take this step, to take it +with a full view of the consequences, and with minds +and measures in a state of preparation to meet them. +It is not becoming that your boldness should arise +from a want of foresight. It is more reputable, and +certainly it is more safe too, that it should be grounded +on the evident necessity of encountering the dangers +which you foresee.</p> + +<p>Your Lordship will have the goodness to excuse +me, if I state in strong terms the difficulties attending +a measure which on the whole I heartily concur +in. But as, from my want of importance, I can be +personally little subject to the most trying part of +the consequences, it is as little my desire to urge<a name="Page_158" id="Page_158" title="158" class="pagenum"></a> +others to dangers in which I am myself to have no +inconsiderable a share.</p> + +<p>If this measure should be thought too great for +our strength or the dispositions of the times, then +the point will be to consider what is to be done in +Parliament. A weak, irregular, desultory, peevish +opposition there will be as much too little as +the other may be too big. Our scheme ought to +be such as to have in it a succession of measures: +else it is impossible to secure anything like a regular +attendance; opposition will otherwise always +carry a disreputable air; neither will it be possible, +without that attendance, to persuade the people +that we are in earnest. Above all, a motion should +be well digested for the first day. There is one +thing in particular I wish to recommend to your +Lordship's consideration: that is, the opening of +the doors of the House of Commons. Without +this, I am clearly convinced, it will be in the power +of ministry to make our opposition appear without +doors just in what light they please. To obtain +a gallery is the easiest thing in the world, if we +are satisfied to cultivate the esteem of our adversaries +by the resolution and energy with which we +act against them: but if their satisfaction and good-humor +be any part of our object, the attempt, I admit, +is idle.</p> + +<p>I had some conversation, before I left town, with +the D. of M. He is of opinion, that, if you adhere +to your resolution of seceding, you ought not to +appear on the first day of the meeting. He thinks +it can have no effect, except to break the continuity +of your conduct, and thereby to weaken and +fritter away the impression of it. It certainly will<a name="Page_159" id="Page_159" title="159" class="pagenum"></a> +seem odd to give solemn reasons for a discontinuance +of your attendance in Parliament, after having +two or three times returned to it, and immediately +after a vigorous act of opposition. As to trials of +the temper of the House, there have been of that +sort so many already that I see no reason for making +another that would not hold equally good for +another after that,—particularly as nothing has happened +in the least calculated to alter the disposition +of the House. If the secession were to be general, +such an attendance, followed by such an act, +would have force; but being in its nature incomplete +and broken, to break it further by retreats and returns +to the chase must entirely destroy its effect. +I confess I am quite of the D. of M.'s opinion in +this point.</p> + +<p>I send your Lordship a corrected copy of the paper: +your Lordship will be so good to communicate +it, if you should approve of the alterations, to Lord +J.C. and Sir G.S. I showed it to the D. of P. +before his Grace left town; and at his, the D. of P.'s, +desire, I have sent it to the D. of R. The principal +alteration is in the pages last but one. It is made +to remove a difficulty which had been suggested to +Sir G.S., and which he thought had a good deal in +it. I think it much the better for that alteration. +Indeed, it may want still more corrections, in order +to adapt it to the present or probable future state +of things.</p> + +<p>What shall I say in excuse for this long letter, +which frightens me when I look back upon it? +Your Lordship will take it, and all in it, with +your usual incomparable temper, which carries you +through so much both from enemies and friends.<a name="Page_160" id="Page_160" title="160" class="pagenum"></a> +My most humble respects to Lady R., and believe +me, with the highest regard, ever, &c.</p> + +<p>E.B.</p> + +<p>I hear that Dr. Franklin has had a most extraordinary +reception at Paris from all ranks of people.</p> + +<p>BEACONSFIELD, Monday night, Jan. 6, 1777.</p> + + +<p><a name="Page_161" id="Page_161" title="161" class="pagenum"></a></p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>ADDRESS TO THE KING.</h2> + + +<p>We, your Majesty's most dutiful and loyal subjects, +several of the peers of the realm, and +several members of the House of Commons chosen +by the people to represent them in Parliament, do +in our individual capacity, but with hearts filled +with a warm affection to your Majesty, with a strong +attachment to your royal house, and with the most +unfeigned devotion to your true interest, beg leave, +at this crisis of your affairs, in all humility to approach +your royal presence.</p> + +<p>Whilst we lament the measures adopted by the +public councils of the kingdom, we do not mean to +question the legal validity of their proceedings. We +do not desire to appeal from them to any person +whatsoever. We do not dispute the conclusive authority +of the bodies in which we have a place over +all their members. We know that it is our ordinary +duty to submit ourselves to the determinations +of the majority in everything, except what regards +the just defence of our honor and reputation. But +the situation into which the British empire has been +brought, and the conduct to which we are reluctantly +driven in that situation, we hold ourselves bound +by the relation in which we stand both to the crown +and the people clearly to explain to your Majesty +and our country.<a name="Page_162" id="Page_162" title="162" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>We have been called upon in the speech from the +throne at the opening of this session of Parliament, +in a manner peculiarly marked, singularly emphatical, +and from a place from whence anything implying +censure falls with no common weight, to concur +in unanimous approbation of those measures which +have produced our present distresses and threaten +us in future with others far more grievous. We +trust, therefore, that we shall stand justified in offering +to our sovereign and the public our reasons +for persevering inflexibly in our uniform dissent from +every part of those measures. We lament them from +an experience of their mischief, as we originally opposed +them from a sure foresight of their unhappy +and inevitable tendency.</p> + +<p>We see nothing in the present events in the least +degree sufficient to warrant an alteration in our opinion. +We were always steadily averse to this civil +war,—not because we thought it impossible that it +should be attended with victory, but because we were +fully persuaded that in such a contest victory would +only vary the mode of our ruin, and by making it +less immediately sensible would render it the more +lasting and the more irretrievable. Experience had +but too fully instructed us in the possibility of the +reduction of a free people to slavery by foreign mercenary +armies. But we had an horror of becoming +the instruments in a design, of which, in our turn, +we might become the victims. Knowing the inestimable +value of peace, and the contemptible value +of what was sought by war, we wished to compose +the distractions of our country, not by the use of +foreign arms, but by prudent regulations in our own +domestic policy. We deplored, as your Majesty has<a name="Page_163" id="Page_163" title="163" class="pagenum"></a> +done in your speech from the throne, the disorders +which prevail in your empire; but we are convinced +that the disorders of the people, in the present time +and in the present place, are owing to the usual and +natural cause of such disorders at all times and in +all places, where such have prevailed,—the misconduct +of government;—that they are owing to plans +laid in error, pursued with obstinacy, and conducted +without wisdom.</p> + +<p>We cannot attribute so much to the power of faction, +at the expense of human nature, as to suppose, +that, in any part of the world, a combination of +men, few in number, not considerable in rank, of +no natural hereditary dependencies, should be able, +by the efforts of their policy alone, or the mere exertion +of any talents, to bring the people of your +American dominions into the disposition which has +produced the present troubles. We cannot conceive, +that, without some powerful concurring cause, any +management should prevail on some millions of people, +dispersed over an whole continent, in thirteen +provinces, not only unconnected, but, in many particulars +of religion, manners, government, and local +interest, totally different and adverse, voluntarily to +submit themselves to a suspension of all the profits +of industry and all the comforts of civil life, added +to all the evils of an unequal war, carried on with +circumstances of the greatest asperity and rigor. +This, Sir, we conceive, could never have happened, +but from a general sense of some grievance so radical +in its nature and so spreading in its effects as +to poison all the ordinary satisfactions of life, to discompose +the frame of society, and to convert into fear +and hatred that habitual reverence ever paid by mankind +to an ancient and venerable government.<a name="Page_164" id="Page_164" title="164" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>That grievance is as simple in its nature, and as +level to the most ordinary understanding, as it is +powerful in affecting the most languid passions: it +is—</p> + +<p>"AN ATTEMPT MADE TO DISPOSE OF THE PROPERTY +OF A WHOLE PEOPLE WITHOUT THEIR CONSENT."</p> + +<p>Your Majesty's English subjects in the colonies, possessing +the ordinary faculties of mankind, know that +to live under such a plan of government is not to live +in a state of freedom. Your English subjects in the +colonies, still impressed with the ancient feelings of +the people from whom they are derived, cannot live +under a government which does not establish freedom +as its basis.</p> + +<p>This scheme, being, therefore, set up in direct opposition +to the rooted and confirmed sentiments and +habits of thinking of an whole people, has produced +the effects which ever must result from such a collision +of power and opinion. For we beg leave, with +all duty and humility, to represent to your Majesty, +(what we fear has been industriously concealed from +you,) that it is not merely the opinion of a very great +number, or even of the majority, but the universal +sense of the whole body of the people in those provinces, +that the practice of taxing, in the mode and on +the principles which have been lately contended for +and enforced, is subversive of all their rights.</p> + +<p>This sense has been declared, as we understand on +good information, by the unanimous voice of all their +Assemblies: each Assembly also, on this point, is perfectly +unanimous within itself. It has been declared +as fully by the actual voice of the people without +these Assemblies as by the constructive voice within +them, as well by those in that country who addressed<a name="Page_165" id="Page_165" title="165" class="pagenum"></a> +as by those who remonstrated; and it is as much +the avowed opinion of those who have hazarded their +all, rather than take up arms against your Majesty's +forces, as of those who have run the same risk to +oppose them. The difference among them is not on +the grievance, but on the mode of redress; and we +are sorry to say, that they who have conceived hopes +from the placability of the ministers who influence +the public councils of this kingdom disappear in the +multitude of those who conceive that passive compliance +only confirms and emboldens oppression.</p> + +<p>The sense of a whole people, most gracious sovereign, +never ought to be contemned by wise and +beneficent rulers,—whatever may be the abstract +claims, or even rights, of <i>the supreme power</i>. We +have been too early instructed, and too long habituated +to believe, that the only firm seat of all authority +is in the minds, affections, and interests of the +people, to change our opinions on the theoretic reasonings +of speculative men, or for the convenience of +a mere temporary arrangement of state. It is not +consistent with equity or wisdom to set at defiance +the general feelings of great communities, and of all +the orders which compose them. Much power is tolerated, +and passes unquestioned, where much is yielded +to opinion. All is disputed, where everything is +enforced.</p> + +<p>Such are our sentiments on the duty and policy of +conforming to the prejudices of a whole people, even +where the foundation of such prejudices may be false +or disputable. But permit us to lay at your Majesty's +feet our deliberate judgment on the real merits +of that principle, the violation of which is the known +ground and origin of these troubles. We assure your<a name="Page_166" id="Page_166" title="166" class="pagenum"></a> +Majesty, that, on our parts, we should think ourselves +unjustifiable, as good citizens, and not influenced +by the true spirit of Englishmen, if, with any +effectual means of prevention in our hands, we were +to submit to taxes to which we did not consent, either +directly, or by a representation of the people securing +to us the substantial benefit of an absolutely free disposition +of our own property in that important case. +And we add, Sir, that, if fortune, instead of blessing +us with a situation where we may have daily access +to the propitious presence of a gracious prince, had +fixed us in settlements on the remotest part of the +globe, we must carry these sentiments with us, as +part of our being,—persuaded that the distance of +situation would render this privilege in the disposal +of property but the more necessary. If no provision +had been made for it, such provision ought to be +made or permitted. Abuses of subordinate authority +increase, and all means of redress lessen, as the +distance of the subject removes him from the seat of +the supreme power. What, in those circumstances, +can save him from the last extremes of indignity and +oppression, but something left in his own hands which +may enable him to conciliate the favor and control +the excesses of government? When no means of +power to awe or to oblige are possessed, the strongest +ties which connect mankind in every relation, +social and civil, and which teach them mutually to +respect each other, are broken. Independency, from +that moment, virtually exists. Its formal declaration +will quickly follow. Such must be our feelings for +ourselves: we are not in possession of another rule +for our brethren.</p> + +<p>When the late attempt practically to annihilate<a name="Page_167" id="Page_167" title="167" class="pagenum"></a> +that inestimable privilege was made, great disorders +and tumults, very unhappily and very naturally, arose +from it. In this state of things, we were of opinion +that satisfaction ought instantly to be given, or that, +at least, the punishment of the disorder ought to be +attended with the redress of the grievance. We were +of opinion, that, if our dependencies had so outgrown +the positive institutions made for the preservation of +liberty in this kingdom, that the operation of their +powers was become rather a pressure than a relief +to the subjects in the colonies, wisdom dictated that +the spirit of the Constitution should rather be applied +to their circumstances, than its authority enforced +with violence in those very parts where its reason +became wholly inapplicable.</p> + +<p>Other methods were then recommended and followed, +as infallible means of restoring peace and order. +We looked upon them to be, what they have +since proved to be, the cause of inflaming discontent +into disobedience, and resistance into revolt. The +subversion of solemn, fundamental charters, on a suggestion +of abuse, without citation, evidence, or hearing,—the +total suspension of the commerce of a +great maritime city, the capital of a great maritime +province, during the pleasure of the crown,—the establishment +of a military force, not accountable to +the ordinary tribunals of the country in which it +was kept up,—these and other proceedings at that +time, if no previous cause of dissension had subsisted, +were sufficient to produce great troubles: unjust at +all times, they were then irrational.</p> + +<p>We could not conceive, when disorders had arisen +from the complaint of one violated right, that to violate +every other was the proper means of quieting an<a name="Page_168" id="Page_168" title="168" class="pagenum"></a> +exasperated people. It seemed to us absurd and preposterous +to hold out, as the means of calming a people +in a state of extreme inflammation, and ready to +take up arms, the austere law which a rigid conqueror +would impose as the sequel of the most decisive +victories.</p> + +<p>Recourse, indeed, was at the same time had to +force; and we saw a force sent out, enough to menace +liberty, but not to awe opposition,—tending to +bring odium on the civil power, and contempt on the +military,—at once to provoke and encourage resistance. +Force was sent out not sufficient to hold one +town; laws were passed to inflame thirteen provinces.</p> + +<p>This mode of proceeding, by harsh laws and feeble +armies, could not be defended on the principle of +mercy and forbearance. For mercy, as we conceive, +consists, not in the weakness of the means, but in the +benignity of the ends. We apprehend that mild measures +may be powerfully enforced, and that acts of extreme +rigor and injustice may be attended with as +much feebleness in the execution as severity in the +formation.</p> + +<p>In consequence of these terrors, which, falling +upon some, threatened all, the colonies made a common +cause with the sufferers, and proceeded, on +their part, to acts of resistance. In that alarming +situation, we besought your Majesty's ministers to +entertain some distrust of the operation of coercive +measures, and to profit of their experience. Experience +had no effect. The modes of legislative rigor +were construed, not to have been erroneous in their +policy, but too limited in their extent. New severities +were adopted. The fisheries of your people in<a name="Page_169" id="Page_169" title="169" class="pagenum"></a> +America followed their charters; and their mutual +combination to defend what they thought their common +rights brought on a total prohibition of their +mutual commercial intercourse. No distinction of +persons or merits was observed: the peaceable and +the mutinous, friends and foes, were alike involved, +as if the rigor of the laws had a certain tendency to +recommend the authority of the legislator.</p> + +<p>Whilst the penal laws increased in rigor, and extended +in application over all the colonies, the direct +force was applied but to one part. Had the great +fleet and foreign army since employed been at that +time called for, the greatness of the preparation would +have declared the magnitude of the danger. The nation +would have been alarmed, and taught the necessity +of some means of reconciliation with our countrymen +in America, who, whenever they are provoked +to resistance, demand a force to reduce them to +obedience full as destructive to us as to them. But +Parliament and the people, by a premeditated concealment +of their real situation, were drawn into +perplexities which furnished excuses for further +armaments, and whilst they were taught to believe +themselves called to suppress a riot, they found themselves +involved in a mighty war.</p> + +<p>At length British blood was spilled by British +hands: a fatal era, which we must ever deplore, because +your empire will forever feel it. Your Majesty +was touched with a sense of so great a disaster. +Your paternal breast was affected with the sufferings +of your English subjects in America. In your speech +from the throne, in the beginning of the session of +1775, you were graciously pleased to declare yourself +inclined to relieve their distresses and to pardon<a name="Page_170" id="Page_170" title="170" class="pagenum"></a> +their errors. You felt their sufferings under the late +penal acts of Parliament. But your ministry felt differently. +Not discouraged by the pernicious effects +of all they had hitherto advised, and notwithstanding +the gracious declaration of your Majesty, they obtained +another act of Parliament, in which the rigors +of all the former were consolidated, and embittered +by circumstances of additional severity and outrage. +The whole trading property of America (even unoffending +shipping in port) was indiscriminately and +irrecoverably given, as the plunder of foreign enemies, +to the sailors of your navy. This property was +put out of the reach of your mercy. Your people +were despoiled; and your navy, by a new, dangerous, +and prolific example, corrupted with the plunder of +their countrymen. Your people in that part of your +dominions were put, in their general and political, as +well as their personal capacity, wholly out of the protection +of your government.</p> + +<p>Though unwilling to dwell on all the improper +modes of carrying on this unnatural and ruinous +war, and which have led directly to the present unhappy +separation of Great Britain and its colonies, we +must beg leave to represent two particulars, which we +are sure must have been entirely contrary to your +Majesty's order or approbation. Every course of action +in hostility, however that hostility may be just or +merited, is not justifiable or excusable. It is the duty +of those who claim to rule over others not to provoke +them beyond the necessity of the case, nor to +leave stings in their minds which must long rankle +even when the appearance of tranquillity is restored. +We therefore assure your Majesty that it is with +shame and sorrow we have seen several acts of<a name="Page_171" id="Page_171" title="171" class="pagenum"></a> +hostility which could have no other tendency than +incurably to alienate the minds of your American +subjects. To excite, by a proclamation issued by +your Majesty's governor, an universal insurrection +of negro slaves in any of the colonies is a measure +full of complicated horrors, absolutely illegal, suitable +neither to the practice of war nor to the laws of +peace. Of the same quality we look upon all attempts +to bring down on your subjects an irruption of those +fierce and cruel tribes of savages and cannibals in +whom the vestiges of human nature are nearly effaced +by ignorance and barbarity. They are not fit +allies for your Majesty in a war with your people. +They are not fit instruments of an English government. +These and many other acts we disclaim as +having advised, or approved when done; and we +clear ourselves to your Majesty, and to all civilized +nations, from any participation whatever, before or +after the fact, in such unjustifiable and horrid proceedings.</p> + +<p>But there is one weighty circumstance which we +lament equally with the causes of the war, and with +the modes of carrying it on,—that no disposition +whatsoever towards peace or reconciliation has ever +been shown by those who have directed the public +councils of this kingdom, either before the breaking +out of these hostilities or during the unhappy continuance +of them. Every proposition made in your +Parliament to remove the original cause of these +troubles, by taking off taxes obnoxious for their +principle or their design, has been overruled,—every +bill brought in for quiet rejected, even on +the first proposition. The petitions of the colonies +have not been admitted even to an hearing. The<a name="Page_172" id="Page_172" title="172" class="pagenum"></a> +very possibility of public agency, by which such petitions +could authentically arrive at Parliament, has +been evaded and chicaned away. All the public declarations +which indicate anything resembling a disposition +to reconciliation seem to us loose, general, +equivocal, capable of various meanings, or of none; +and they are accordingly construed differently, at different +times, by those on whose recommendation they +have been made: being wholly unlike the precision +and stability of public faith, and bearing no mark +of that ingenuous simplicity and native candor and +integrity which formerly characterized the English +nation.</p> + +<p>Instead of any relaxation of the claim of taxing at +the discretion of Parliament, your ministers have devised +a new mode of enforcing that claim, much more +effectual for the oppression of the colonies, though +not for your Majesty's service, both as to the quantity +and application, than any of the former methods; +and their mode has been expressly held out by ministers +as a plan not to be departed from by the House +of Commons, and as the very condition on which the +legislature is to accept the dependence of the colonies.</p> + +<p>At length, when, after repeated refusals to hear or +to conciliate, an act dissolving your government, by +putting your people in America out of your protection, +was passed, your ministers suffered several +months to elapse without affording to them, or to +any community or any individual amongst them, the +means of entering into that protection, even on unconditional +submission, contrary to your Majesty's +gracious declaration from the throne, and in direct +violation of the public faith.<a name="Page_173" id="Page_173" title="173" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>We cannot, therefore, agree to unite in new severities +against the brethren of our blood for their asserting +an independency, to which we know, in our +conscience, they have been necessitated by the conduct +of those very persons who now make use of that +argument to provoke us to a continuance and repetition +of the acts which in a regular series have led to +this great misfortune.</p> + +<p>The reasons, dread Sir, which have been used to +justify this perseverance in a refusal to hear or conciliate +have been reduced into a sort of Parliamentary +maxims which we do not approve. The first of these +maxims is, "that the two Houses ought not to receive +(as they have hitherto refused to receive) petitions +containing matter derogatory to any part of the +authority they claim." We conceive this maxim and +the consequent practice to be unjustifiable by reason +or the practice of other sovereign powers, and that it +must be productive, if adhered to, of a total separation +between this kingdom and its dependencies. +The supreme power, being in ordinary cases the +ultimate judge, can, as we conceive, suffer nothing +in having any part of his rights excepted to, or even +discussed before himself. We know that sovereigns +in other countries, where the assertion of absolute +regal power is as high as the assertion of absolute +power in any politic body can possibly be here, have +received many petitions in direct opposition to many +of their claims of prerogative,—have listened to +them,—condescended to discuss, and to give answers +to them. This refusal to admit even the discussion +of any part of an undefined prerogative will +naturally tend to annihilate any privilege that can be +claimed by every inferior dependent community, and +every subordinate order in the state.<a name="Page_174" id="Page_174" title="174" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>The next maxim which has been put as a bar +to any plan of accommodation is, "that no offer of +terms of peace ought to be made, before Parliament +is assured that these terms will be accepted." On +this we beg leave to represent to your Majesty, that, +if, in all events, the policy of this kingdom is to govern +the people in your colonies as a free people, no +mischief can possibly happen from a declaration to +them, and to the world, of the manner and form in +which Parliament proposes that they shall enjoy the +freedom it protects. It is an encouragement to the +innocent and meritorious, that they at least shall enjoy +those advantages which they patiently expected +rather from the benignity of Parliament than their +own efforts. Persons more contumacious may also +see that they are resisting terms of perhaps greater +freedom and happiness than they are now in arms +to obtain. The glory and propriety of offered mercy +is neither tarnished nor weakened by the folly of +those who refuse to take advantage of it.</p> + +<p>We cannot think that the declaration of independency +makes any natural difference in the reason +and policy of the offer. No prince out of the possession +of his dominions, and become a sovereign <i>de +jure</i> only, ever thought it derogatory to his rights +or his interests to hold out to his former subjects +a distinct prospect of the advantages to be derived +from his readmission, and a security for some of +the most fundamental of those popular privileges in +vindication of which he had been deposed. On the +contrary, such offers have been almost uniformly +made under similar circumstances. Besides, as your +Majesty has been graciously pleased, in your speech +from the throne, to declare your intention of restoring<a name="Page_175" id="Page_175" title="175" class="pagenum"></a> +your people in the colonies to a state of law and +liberty, no objection can possibly lie against defining +what that law and liberty are; because those who +offer and those who are to receive terms frequently +differ most widely and most materially in the signification +of these words, and in the objects to which +they apply.</p> + +<p>To say that we do not know, at this day, what +the grievances of the colonies are (be they real or +pretended) would be unworthy of us. But whilst +we are thus waiting to be informed of what we perfectly +know, we weaken the powers of the commissioners,—we +delay, perhaps we lose, the happy hour +of peace,—we are wasting the substance of both +countries,—we are continuing the effusion of human, +of Christian, of English blood.</p> + +<p>We are sure that we must have your Majesty's +heart along with us, when we declare in favor of +mixing something conciliatory with our force. Sir, +we abhor the idea of making a conquest of our countrymen. +We wish that they may yield to well-ascertained, +well-authenticated, and well-secured terms +of reconciliation,—not that your Majesty should +owe the recovery of your dominions to their total +waste and destruction. Humanity will not permit +us to entertain such a desire; nor will the reverence +we bear to the civil rights of mankind make us even +wish that questions of great difficulty, of the last importance, +and lying deep in the vital principles of +the British Constitution, should be solved by the +arms of foreign mercenary soldiers.</p> + +<p>It is not, Sir, from a want of the most inviolable +duty to your Majesty, not from a want of a partial +and passionate regard to that part of your empire<a name="Page_176" id="Page_176" title="176" class="pagenum"></a> +in which we reside, and which we wish to be supreme, +that we have hitherto withstood all attempts +to render the supremacy of one part of your dominions +inconsistent with the liberty and safety of all +the rest. The motives of our opposition are found +in those very sentiments which we are supposed to +violate. For we are convinced beyond a doubt, that +a system of dependence which leaves no security to +the people for any part of their freedom in their own +hands cannot be established in any inferior member +of the British empire, without consequentially destroying +the freedom of that very body in favor of +whose boundless pretensions such a scheme is adopted. +We know and feel that arbitrary power over +distant regions is not within the competence, nor to +be exercised agreeably to the forms or consistently +with the spirit, of great popular assemblies. If such +assemblies are called to a nominal share in the exercise +of such power, in order to screen, under general +participation, the guilt of desperate measures, it +tends only the more deeply to corrupt the deliberative +character of those assemblies, in training them +to blind obedience, in habituating them to proceed +upon grounds of fact with which they can rarely be +sufficiently acquainted, and in rendering them executive +instruments of designs the bottom of which they +cannot possibly fathom.</p> + +<p>To leave any real freedom to Parliament, freedom +must be left to the colonies. A military government +is the only substitute for civil liberty. That the establishment +of such a power in America will utterly +ruin our finances (though its certain effect) is the +smallest part of our concern. It will become an +apt, powerful, and certain engine for the destruction<a name="Page_177" id="Page_177" title="177" class="pagenum"></a> +of our freedom here. Great bodies of armed +men, trained to a contempt of popular assemblies +representative of an English people,—kept up for +the purpose of exacting impositions without their +consent, and maintained by that exaction,—instruments +in subverting, without any process of law, great +ancient establishments and respected forms of governments,—set +free from, and therefore above, the +ordinary English tribunals of the country where they +serve,—these men cannot so transform themselves, +merely by crossing the sea, as to behold with love +and reverence, and submit with profound obedience +to, the very same things in Great Britain which in +America they had been taught to despise, and had +been accustomed to awe and humble. All your Majesty's +troops, in the rotation of service, will pass +through this discipline and contract these habits. If +we could flatter ourselves that this would not happen, +we must be the weakest of men; we must be +the worst, if we were indifferent whether it happened +or not. What, gracious sovereign, is the empire of +America to us, or the empire of the world, if we lose +our own liberties? We deprecate this last of evils. +We deprecate the effect of the doctrines which must +support and countenance the government over conquered +Englishmen.</p> + +<p>As it will be impossible long to resist the powerful +and equitable arguments in favor of the freedom of +these unhappy people that are to be drawn from the +principle of our own liberty, attempts will be made, +attempts have been made, to ridicule and to argue +away this principle, and to inculcate into the minds +of your people other maxims of government and other +grounds of obedience than those which have prevailed<a name="Page_178" id="Page_178" title="178" class="pagenum"></a> +at and since the glorious Revolution. By +degrees, these doctrines, by being convenient, may +grow prevalent. The consequence is not certain; +but a general change of principles rarely happens +among a people without leading to a change of government.</p> + +<p>Sir, your throne cannot stand secure upon the principles +of unconditional submission and passive obedience,—on +powers exercised without the concurrence +of the people to be governed,—on acts made +in defiance of their prejudices and habits,—on acquiescence +procured by foreign mercenary troops, +and secured by standing armies. These may possibly +be the foundation of other thrones: they must be +the subversion of yours. It was not to passive principles +in our ancestors that we owe the honor of appearing +before a sovereign who cannot feel that he +is a prince without knowing that we ought to be +free. The Revolution is a departure from the ancient +course of the descent of this monarchy. The +people at that time reentered into their original +rights; and it was not because a positive law authorized +what was then done, but because the freedom +and safety of the subject, the origin and cause +of all laws, required a proceeding paramount and +superior to them. At that ever memorable and instructive +period, the letter of the law was superseded +in favor of the substance of liberty. To the free +choice, therefore, of the people, without either King +or Parliament, we owe that happy establishment out +of which both King and Parliament were regenerated. +From that great principle of liberty have +originated the statutes confirming and ratifying the +establishment from which your Majesty derives your<a name="Page_179" id="Page_179" title="179" class="pagenum"></a> +right to rule over us. Those statutes have not given +us our liberties: our liberties have produced them. +Every hour of your Majesty's reign, your title stands +upon the very same foundation on which it was at +first laid; and we do not know a better on which +it can possibly be placed.</p> + +<p>Convinced, Sir, that you cannot have different +rights and a different security in different parts of +your dominions, we wish to lay an even platform +for your throne, and to give it an unmovable stability, +by laying it on the general freedom of your +people, and by securing to your Majesty that confidence +and affection in all parts of your dominions +which makes your best security and dearest title in +this the chief seat of your empire.</p> + +<p>Such, Sir, being, amongst us, the foundation of +monarchy itself, much more clearly and much more +peculiarly is it the ground of all Parliamentary power. +Parliament is a security provided for the protection +of freedom, and not a subtile fiction, contrived +to amuse the people in its place. The authority of +both Houses can still less than that of the crown +be supported upon different principles in different +places, so as to be for one part of your subjects a +protector of liberty, and for another a fund of despotism, +through which prerogative is extended by +occasional powers, whenever an arbitrary will finds +itself straitened by the restrictions of law. Had it +seemed good to Parliament to consider itself as the +indulgent guardian and strong protector of the freedom +of the subordinate popular assemblies, instead of +exercising its powers to their annihilation, there is no +doubt that it never could have been their inclination, +because not their interest, to raise questions on the<a name="Page_180" id="Page_180" title="180" class="pagenum"></a> +extent of Parliamentary rights, or to enfeeble privileges +which were the security of their own. Powers +evident from necessity, and not suspicious from an +alarming mode or purpose in the exertion, would, +as formerly they were, be cheerfully submitted to; +and these would have been fully sufficient for conservation +of unity in the empire, and for directing +its wealth to one common centre. Another use has +produced other consequences; and a power which +refuses to be limited by moderation must either be +lost, or find other more distinct and satisfactory +limitations.</p> + +<p>As for us, a supposed, or, if it could be, a real, +participation in arbitrary power would never reconcile +our minds to its establishment. We should be +ashamed to stand before your Majesty, boldly asserting +in our own favor inherent rights which bind and +regulate the crown itself, and yet insisting on the +exercise, in our own persons, of a more arbitrary +sway over our fellow-citizens and fellow-freemen.</p> + +<p>These, gracious sovereign, are the sentiments which +we consider ourselves as bound, in justification of our +present conduct, in the most serious and solemn manner +to lay at your Majesty's feet. We have been +called by your Majesty's writs and proclamations, +and we have been authorized, either by hereditary +privilege or the choice of your people, to confer and +treat with your Majesty, in your highest councils, +upon the arduous affairs of your kingdom. We are +sensible of the whole importance of the duty which +this constitutional summons implies. We know the +religious punctuality of attendance which, in the ordinary +course, it demands. It is no light cause which, +even for a time, could persuade us to relax in any<a name="Page_181" id="Page_181" title="181" class="pagenum"></a> +part of that attendance. The British empire is in +convulsions which threaten its dissolution. Those +particular proceedings which cause and inflame this +disorder, after many years' incessant struggle, we +find ourselves wholly unable to oppose and unwilling +to behold. All our endeavors having proved +fruitless, we are fearful at this time of irritating by +contention those passions which we have found it +impracticable to compose by reason. We cannot +permit ourselves to countenance, by the appearance +of a silent assent, proceedings fatal to the liberty and +unity of the empire,—proceedings which exhaust +the strength of all your Majesty's dominions, destroy +all trust and dependence of our allies, and leave us, +both at home and abroad, exposed to the suspicious +mercy and uncertain inclinations of our neighbor and +rival powers, to whom, by this desperate course, we +are driving our countrymen for protection, and with +whom we have forced them into connections, and may +bind them by habits and by interests,—an evil which +no victories that may be obtained, no severities which +may be exorcised, ever will or can remove.</p> + +<p>If but the smallest hope should from any circumstances +appear of a return to the ancient maxims and +true policy of this kingdom, we shall with joy and +readiness return to our attendance, in order to give +our hearty support to whatever means may be left +for alleviating the complicated evils which oppress +this nation.</p> + +<p>If this should not happen, we have discharged our +consciences by this faithful representation to your +Majesty and our country; and however few in number, +or however we may be overborne by practices +whose operation is but too powerful, by the revival<a name="Page_182" id="Page_182" title="182" class="pagenum"></a> +of dangerous exploded principles, or by the misguided +zeal of such arbitrary factions as formerly prevailed +in this kingdom, and always to its detriment +and disgrace, we have the satisfaction of standing +forth and recording our names in assertion of those +principles whose operation hath, in better times, made +your Majesty a great prince, and the British dominions +a mighty empire.</p> + +<p><a name="Page_183" id="Page_183" title="183" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>ADDRESS<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 60%;">TO THE</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%;">BRITISH COLONISTS IN NORTH AMERICA.</span></h2> + + +<p>The very dangerous crisis into which the British +empire is brought, as it accounts for, so it justifies, +the unusual step we take in addressing ourselves +to you.</p> + +<p>The distempers of the state are grown to such a +degree of violence and malignity as to render all +ordinary remedies vain and frivolous. In such a +deplorable situation, an adherence to the common +forms of business appears to us rather as an apology +to cover a supine neglect of duty than the means of +performing it in a manner adequate to the exigency +that presses upon us. The common means we have +already tried, and tried to no purpose. As our last +resource, we turn ourselves to you. We address you +merely in our private capacity, vested with no other +authority than what will naturally attend those in +whose declarations of benevolence you have no reason +to apprehend any mixture of dissimulation or +design.</p> + +<p>We have this title to your attention: we call upon +it in a moment of the utmost importance to us all. +We find, with infinite concern, that arguments are +used to persuade you of the necessity of separating +yourselves from your ancient connection with your<a name="Page_184" id="Page_184" title="184" class="pagenum"></a> +parent country, grounded on a supposition that a +general principle of alienation and enmity to you +had pervaded the whole of this kingdom, and that +there does no longer subsist between you and us any +common and kindred principles upon which we can +possibly unite, consistently with those ideas of liberty +in which you have justly placed your whole happiness.</p> + +<p>If this fact were true, the inference drawn from it +would be irresistible. But nothing is less founded. +We admit, indeed, that violent addresses have been +procured with uncommon pains by wicked and designing +men, purporting to be the genuine voice of +the whole people of England,—that they have been +published by authority here, and made known to you +by proclamations, in order, by despair and resentment, +incurably to poison your minds against the origin of +your race, and to render all cordial reconciliation between +us utterly impracticable. The same wicked +men, for the same bad purposes, have so far surprised +the justice of Parliament as to cut off all communication +betwixt us, except what is to go in their own +fallacious and hostile channel.</p> + +<p>But we conjure you by the invaluable pledges +which have hitherto united, and which we trust will +hereafter lastingly unite us, that you do not suffer +yourselves to be persuaded or provoked into an opinion +that you are at war with this nation. Do not +think that the whole, or even the uninfluenced majority, +of Englishmen in this island are enemies to +their own blood on the American continent. Much +delusion has been practised, much corrupt influence +treacherously employed. But still a large, and we +trust the largest and soundest, part of this kingdom<a name="Page_185" id="Page_185" title="185" class="pagenum"></a> +perseveres in the most perfect unity of sentiments, +principles, and affections with you. It spreads out +a large and liberal platform of common liberty, upon +which we may all unite forever. It abhors the hostilities +which have been carried on against you, as +much as you who feel the cruel effect of them. It has +disclaimed in the most solemn manner, at the foot of +the throne itself, the addresses which tended to irritate +your sovereign against his colonies. We are +persuaded that even many of those who unadvisedly +have put their hands to such intemperate and inflammatory +addresses have not at all apprehended to what +such proceedings naturally lead, and would sooner +die than afford them the least countenance, if they +were sensible of their fatal effects on the union and +liberty of the empire.</p> + +<p>For ourselves, we faithfully assure you, that we +have ever considered you as rational creatures, as +free agents, as men willing to pursue and able to +discern your own true interest. We have wished to +continue united with you, in order that a people of +one origin and one character should be directed to +the rational objects of government by joint counsels, +and protected in them by a common force. Other +subordination in you we require none. We have +never pressed that argument of general union to the +extinction of your local, natural, and just privileges. +Sensible of what is due both to the dignity and weakness +of man, we have never wished to place over you +any government, over which, in great, fundamental +points, you should have no sort of check or control +in your own hands, or which should be repugnant +to your situation, principles, and character.</p> + +<p>No circumstances of fortune, you may be assured,<a name="Page_186" id="Page_186" title="186" class="pagenum"></a> +will ever induce us to form or tolerate any such design. +If the disposition of Providence (which we +deprecate) should even prostrate you at our feet, +broken in power and in spirit, it would be our duty +and inclination to revive, by every practicable means, +that free energy of mind which a fortune unsuitable +to your virtue had damped and dejected, and to put +you voluntarily in possession of those very privileges +which you had in vain attempted to assert by arms. +For we solemnly declare, that, although we should +look upon a separation from you as an heavy calamity, +(and the heavier, because we know you must +have your full share in it,) yet we had much rather +see you totally independent of this crown and kingdom +than joined to it by so unnatural a conjunction +as that of freedom with servitude,—a conjunction +which, if it were at all practicable, could not fail, +in the end, of being more mischievous to the peace, +prosperity, greatness, and power of this nation than +beneficial by any enlargement of the bounds of nominal +empire.</p> + +<p>But because, brethren, these professions are general, +and such as even enemies may make, when they +reserve to themselves the construction of what servitude +and what liberty are, we inform you that we +adopt your own standard of the blessing of free government. +We are of opinion that you ought to enjoy +the sole and exclusive right of freely granting, and +applying to the support of your administration, what +God has freely granted as a reward to your industry. +And we do not confine this immunity from exterior +coercion, in this great point, solely to what regards +your local establishment, but also to what may be +thought proper for the maintenance of the whole<a name="Page_187" id="Page_187" title="187" class="pagenum"></a> +empire. In this resource we cheerfully trust and +acquiesce, satisfied by evident reason that no other +expectation of revenue can possibly be given by freemen, +and knowing from an experience uniform both +on yours and on our side of the ocean that such an +expectation has never yet been disappointed. We +know of no road to your coffers but through your +affections.</p> + +<p>To manifest our sentiments the more clearly to +you and to the world on this subject, we declare +our opinion, that, if no revenue at all (which, however, +we are far from supposing) were to be obtained +from you to this kingdom, yet, as long as it is our +happiness to be joined with you in the bonds of fraternal +charity and freedom, with an open and flowing +commerce between us, one principle of enmity and +friendship pervading, and one right of war and peace +directing the strength of the whole empire, we are +likely to be at least as powerful as any nation, or as +any combination of nations, which in the course of +human events may be formed against us. We are +sensible that a very large proportion of the wealth +and power of every empire must necessarily be +thrown upon the presiding state. We are sensible +that such a state ever has borne and ever must bear +the greatest part, and sometimes the whole, of the +public expenses: and we think her well indemnified +for that (rather apparent than real) inequality of +charge, in the dignity and preeminence she enjoys, +and in the superior opulence which, after all charges +defrayed, must necessarily remain at the centre +of affairs. Of this principle we are not without +evidence in our remembrance (not yet effaced) of +the glorious and happy days of this empire. We<a name="Page_188" id="Page_188" title="188" class="pagenum"></a> +are therefore incapable of that prevaricating style, +by which, when taxes without your consent are to +be extorted from you, this nation is represented as +in the lowest state of impoverishment and public distress, +but when we are called upon to oppress you by +force of arms, it is painted as scarcely feeling its impositions, +abounding with wealth, and inexhaustible +in its resources.</p> + +<p>We also reason and feel as you do on the invasion +of your charters. Because the charters comprehend +the essential forms by which you enjoy your liberties, +we regard them as most sacred, and by no means to +be taken away or altered without process, without +examination, and without hearing, as they have lately +been. We even think that they ought by no means +to be altered at all, but at the desire of the greater +part of the people who live under them. We cannot +look upon men as delinquents in the mass; much less +are we desirous of lording over our brethren, insulting +their honest pride, and wantonly overturning establishments +judged to be just and convenient by the +public wisdom of this nation at their institution, and +which long and inveterate use has taught you to look +up to with affection and reverence. As we disapproved +of the proceedings with regard to the forms +of your constitution, so we are equally tender of +every leading principle of free government. We +never could think with approbation of putting the +military power out of the coercion of the civil justice +in the country where it acts.</p> + +<p>We disclaim also any sort of share in that other +measure which has been used to alienate your affections +from this country,—namely, the introduction +of foreign mercenaries. We saw their employment<a name="Page_189" id="Page_189" title="189" class="pagenum"></a> +with shame and regret, especially in numbers so far +exceeding the English forces as in effect to constitute +vassals, who have no sense of freedom, and strangers, +who have no common interest or feelings, as the arbiters +of our unhappy domestic quarrel.</p> + +<p>We likewise saw with shame the African slaves, +who had been sold to you on public faith, and under +the sanction of acts of Parliament, to be your servants +and your guards, employed to cut the throats of their +masters.</p> + +<p>You will not, we trust, believe, that, born in a +civilized country, formed to gentle manners, trained +in a merciful religion, and living in enlightened and +polished times, where even foreign hostility is softened +from its original sternness, we could have +thought of letting loose upon you, our late beloved +brethren, these fierce tribes of savages and cannibals, +in whom the traces of human nature are effaced by +ignorance and barbarity. We rather wished to have +joined with you in bringing gradually that unhappy +part of mankind into civility, order, piety, and virtuous +discipline, than to have confirmed their evil habits +and increased their natural ferocity by fleshing +them in the slaughter of you, whom our wiser and +better ancestors had sent into the wilderness with +the express view of introducing, along with our holy +religion, its humane and charitable manners. We +do not hold that all things are lawful in war. We +should think that every barbarity, in fire, in wasting, +in murders, in tortures, and other cruelties, too horrible +and too full of turpitude for Christian mouths +to utter or ears to hear, if done at our instigation, +by those who we know will make war thus, if they +make it at all, to be, to all intents and purposes,<a name="Page_190" id="Page_190" title="190" class="pagenum"></a> +as if done by ourselves. We clear ourselves to you +our brethren, to the present age, and to future generations, +to our king and our country, and to Europe, +which, as a spectator, beholds this tragic scene, +of every part or share in adding this last and worst +of evils to the inevitable mischiefs of a civil war.</p> + +<p>We do not call you rebels and traitors. We do +not call for the vengeance of the crown against you. +We do not know how to qualify millions of our +countrymen, contending with one heart for an admission +to privileges which we have ever thought +our own happiness and honor, by odious and unworthy +names. On the contrary, we highly revere +the principles on which you act, though we lament +some of their effects. Armed as you are, we embrace +you as our friends and as our brethren by the +best and dearest ties of relation.</p> + +<p>We view the establishment of the English colonies +on principles of liberty as that which is to render +this kingdom venerable to future ages. In comparison +of this, we regard all the victories and conquests +of our warlike ancestors, or of our own times, as +barbarous, vulgar distinctions, in which many nations, +whom we look upon with little respect or +value, have equalled, if not far exceeded us. This +is the peculiar and appropriated glory of England. +Those who <i>have and who hold</i> to that foundation of +common liberty, whether on this or on your side of +the ocean, we consider as the true, and the only +true, Englishmen. Those who depart from it, whether +there or here, are attainted, corrupted in blood, +and wholly fallen from their original rank and value. +They are the real rebels to the fair constitution and +just supremacy of England.<a name="Page_191" id="Page_191" title="191" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>We exhort you, therefore, to cleave forever to +those principles, as being the true bond of union +in this empire,—and to show by a manly perseverance +that the sentiments of honor and the rights of +mankind are not held by the uncertain events of +war, as you have hitherto shown a glorious and affecting +example to the world that they are not +dependent on the ordinary conveniences and satisfactions +of life.</p> + +<p>Knowing no other arguments to be used to men +of liberal minds, it is upon these very principles, and +these alone, we hope and trust that no flattering and +no alarming circumstances shall permit you to listen +to the seductions of those who would alienate you +from your dependence on the crown and Parliament +of this kingdom. That very liberty which you so +justly prize above all things originated here; and it +may be very doubtful, whether, without being constantly +fed from the original fountain, it can be at +all perpetuated or preserved in its native purity and +perfection. Untried forms of government may, to +unstable minds, recommend themselves even by their +novelty. But you will do well to remember that +England has been great and happy under the present +limited monarchy (subsisting in more or less +vigor and purity) for several hundred years. None +but England can communicate to you the benefits +of such a constitution. We apprehend you are not +now, nor for ages are likely to be, capable of that +form of constitution in an independent state. Besides, +let us suggest to you our apprehensions that +your present union (in which we rejoice, and which +we wish long to subsist) cannot always subsist without +the authority and weight of this great and long<a name="Page_192" id="Page_192" title="192" class="pagenum"></a> +respected body, to equipoise, and to preserve you +amongst yourselves in a just and fair equality. It +may not even be impossible that a long course of +war with the administration of this country may be +but a prelude to a series of wars and contentions +among yourselves, to end at length (as such scenes +have too often ended) in a species of humiliating +repose, which nothing but the preceding calamities +would reconcile to the dispirited few who survived +them. We allow that even this evil is worth the +risk to men of honor, when rational liberty is at +stake, as in the present case we confess and lament +that it is. But if ever a real security by Parliament +is given against the terror or the abuse of +unlimited power, and after such security given you +should persevere in resistance, we leave you to consider +whether the risk is not incurred without an +object, or incurred for an object infinitely diminished +by such concessions in its importance and +value.</p> + +<p>As to other points of discussion, when these grand +fundamentals of your grants and charters are once +settled and ratified by clear Parliamentary authority, +as the ground for peace and forgiveness on our +side, and for a manly and liberal obedience on yours, +treaty and a spirit of reconciliation will easily and +securely adjust whatever may remain. Of this we +give you our word, that, so far as we are at present +concerned, and if by any event we should become +more concerned hereafter, you may rest assured, +upon the pledges of honor not forfeited, faith +not violated, and uniformity of character and profession +not yet broken, we at least, on these grounds, +will never fail you.<a name="Page_193" id="Page_193" title="193" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>Respecting your wisdom, and valuing your safety, +we do not call upon you to trust your existence to +your enemies. We do not advise you to an unconditional +submission. With satisfaction we assure you +that almost all in both Houses (however unhappily +they have been deluded, so as not to give any immediate +effect to their opinion) disclaim that idea. +You can have no friends in whom you cannot rationally +confide. But Parliament is your friend +from the moment in which, removing its confidence +from those who have constantly deceived its good +intentions, it adopts the sentiments of those who +have made sacrifices, (inferior, indeed, to yours,) +but have, however, sacrificed enough to demonstrate +the sincerity of their regard and value for your liberty +and prosperity.</p> + +<p>Arguments may be used to weaken your confidence +in that public security; because, from some unpleasant +appearances, there is a suspicion that Parliament +itself is somewhat fallen from its independent +spirit. How far this supposition may be founded +in fact we are unwilling to determine. But we +are well assured from experience, that, even if all +were true that is contended for, and in the extent, +too, in which it is argued, yet, as long as the solid +and well-disposed forms of this Constitution remain, +there ever is within Parliament itself a power of +renovating its principles, and effecting a self-reformation, +which no other plan of government has ever +contained. This Constitution has therefore admitted +innumerable improvements, either for the correction +of the original scheme, or for removing corruptions, +or for bringing its principles better to suit those +changes which have successively happened in the<a name="Page_194" id="Page_194" title="194" class="pagenum"></a> +circumstances of the nation or in the manners of +the people.</p> + +<p>We feel that the growth of the colonies is such +a change of circumstances, and that our present dispute +is an exigency as pressing as any which ever +demanded a revision of our government. Public +troubles have often called upon this country to look +into its Constitution. It has ever been bettered by +such a revision. If our happy and luxuriant increase +of dominion, and our diffused population, +have outgrown the limits of a Constitution made +for a contracted object, we ought to bless God, who +has furnished us with this noble occasion for displaying +our skill and beneficence in enlarging the +scale of rational happiness, and of making the politic +generosity of this kingdom as extensive as its +fortune. If we set about this great work, on both +sides, with the same conciliatory turn of mind, we +may now, as in former times, owe even to our mutual +mistakes, contentions, and animosities, the lasting +concord, freedom, happiness, and glory of this +empire.</p> + +<p>Gentlemen, the distance between us, with other +obstructions, has caused much misrepresentation of +our mutual sentiments. We, therefore, to obviate +them as well as we are able, take this method of +assuring you of our thorough detestation of the +whole war, and particularly the mercenary and savage +war carried on or attempted against you,—our +thorough abhorrence of all addresses adverse +to you, whether public or private,—our assurances +of an invariable affection towards you,—our constant +regard to your privileges and liberties,—and +our opinion of the solid security you ought to enjoy<a name="Page_195" id="Page_195" title="195" class="pagenum"></a> +for them, under the paternal care and nurture +of a protecting Parliament.</p> + +<p>Though many of us have earnestly wished that +the authority of that august and venerable body, +so necessary in many respects to the union of the +whole, should be rather limited by its own equity +and discretion, than by any bounds described by +positive laws and public compacts,—and though we +felt the extreme difficulty, by any theoretical limitations, +of qualifying that authority, so as to preserve +one part and deny another,—and though you +(as we gratefully acknowledge) had acquiesced most +cheerfully under that prudent reserve of the Constitution, +at that happy moment when neither you +nor we apprehended a further return of the exercise +of invidious powers, we are now as fully persuaded +as you can be, by the malice, inconstancy, +and perverse inquietude of many men, and by the +incessant endeavors of an arbitrary faction, now too +powerful, that our common necessities do require a +full explanation and ratified security for your liberties +and our quiet.</p> + +<p>Although his Majesty's condescension, in committing +the direction of his affairs into the hands of the +known friends of his family and of the liberties of +all his people, would, we admit, be a great means of +giving repose to your minds, as it must give infinite +facility to reconciliation, yet we assure you that we +think, with such a security as we recommend, adopted +from necessity and not choice, even by the unhappy +authors and instruments of the public misfortunes, +that the terms of reconciliation, if once +accepted by Parliament, would not be broken. We +also pledge ourselves to you, that we should give,<a name="Page_196" id="Page_196" title="196" class="pagenum"></a> +even to those unhappy persons, an hearty support +in effectuating the peace of the empire, and every +opposition in an attempt to cast it again into disorder.</p> + +<p>When that happy hour shall arrive, let us in all +affection, recommend to you the wisdom of continuing, +as in former times, or even in a more ample +measure, the support of your government, and even +to give to your administration some degree of reciprocal +interest in your freedom. We earnestly wish +you not to furnish your enemies, here or elsewhere, +with any sort of pretexts for reviving quarrels by too +reserved and severe or penurious an exercise of those +sacred rights which no pretended abuse in the exercise +ought to impair, nor, by overstraining the principles +of freedom, to make them less compatible with +those haughty sentiments in others which the very +same principles may be apt to breed in minds not +tempered with the utmost equity and justice.</p> + +<p>The well-wishers of the liberty and union of this +empire salute you, and recommend you most heartily +to the Divine protection.</p> + +<p><a name="Page_197" id="Page_197" title="197" class="pagenum"></a> +<a name="EDMUND_S_PERY" id="EDMUND_S_PERY" /></p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><span style="font-size: 60%;">A</span><br /> +<br /> +LETTER<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 60%;">TO</span><br /> +<br /> +THE RIGHT HON. EDMUND S. PERY<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 40%;">SPEAKER OF THE IRISH HOUSE OF COMMONS,</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 60%;">IN RELATION TO</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%;">A BILL FOR THE RELIEF OF THE ROMAN +CATHOLICS OF IRELAND.</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 60%;">JULY 18, 1778.</span></h2> + +<p><a name="Page_198" id="Page_198" title="198" class="pagenum"></a></p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<h2>NOTE.</h2> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>This Letter is addressed to Mr. Pery, (afterwards Lord Pery,) +then Speaker of the House of Commons of Ireland. It appears, +there had been much correspondence between that gentleman and +Mr. Burke, on the subject of Heads of a bill (which had passed +the Irish House of Commons in the summer of the year 1778, +and had been transmitted by the Irish Privy Council of [to?] +England) for the relief of his Majesty's Roman Catholic subjects +in Ireland. The bill contained a clause for exempting the Protestant +Dissenters of Ireland from the sacramental test, which +created a strong objection to the whole measure on the part of +the English government. Mr. Burke employed his most strenuous +efforts to remove the prejudice which the king's ministers +entertained against the clause, but the bill was ultimately returned +without it, and in that shape passed the Irish Parliament. +(17th and 18th Geo. III cap. 49.) In the subsequent session, +however, a separate act was passed for the relief of the Protestant +Dissenters of Ireland.<br /></p></div> + +<p><a name="Page_199" id="Page_199" title="199" class="pagenum"></a></p> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + + +<h2>LETTER.</h2> + +<p>My Dear Sir,—I received in due course your +two very interesting and judicious letters, +which gave me many new lights, and excited me to +fresh activity in the important subject they related +to. However, from that time I have not been perfectly +free from doubt and uneasiness. I used a liberty +with those letters, which, perhaps, nothing can +thoroughly justify, and which certainly nothing but +the delicacy of the crisis, the clearness of my intentions, +and your great good-nature can at all excuse. +I might conceal this from you; but I think it better +to lay the whole matter before you, and submit myself +to your mercy,—assuring you, at the same time, +that, if you are so kind as to continue your confidence +on this, or to renew it upon any other occasion, I +shall never be tempted again to make so bold and +unauthorized an use of the trust you place in me. I +will state to you the history of the business since +my last, and then you will see how far I am excusable +by the circumstances.</p> + +<p>On the 3rd of July I received a letter from the +Attorney-General, dated the day before, in which, in +a very open and obliging manner, he desires my +thoughts of the Irish Toleration Bill, and particularly +of the Dissenters' clause. I gave them to him, by +the return of the post, at large; but, as the time +pressed, I kept no copy of the letter. The general<a name="Page_200" id="Page_200" title="200" class="pagenum"></a> +drift was strongly to recommend the <i>whole</i>, and principally +to obviate the objections to the part that related +to the Dissenters, with regard both to the general +propriety and to the temporary policy at this +juncture. I took, likewise, a good deal of pains to +state the difference which had always subsisted with +regard to the treatment of the Protestant Dissenters +in Ireland and in England, and what I conceived the +reason of that difference to be. About the same time +I was called to town for a day; and I took an opportunity, +in Westminster Hall, of urging the same points, +with all the force I was master of, to the Solicitor-General. +I attempted to see the Chancellor for the +same purpose, but was not fortunate enough to meet +him at home. Soon after my return hither, on Tuesday, +I received a very polite and I may say friendly +letter from him, wishing me (on supposition that I +had continued in town) to dine with him as [on?] +that day, in order to talk over the business of the Toleration +Act, then before him. Unluckily I had company +with me, and was not able to leave them until +Thursday, when I went to town and called at his +house, but missed him. However, in answer to his +letter, I had before, and instantly on the receipt of it, +written to him at large, and urged such topics, both +with regard to the Catholics and Dissenters, as I imagined +were the most likely to be prevalent with him. +This letter I followed to town on Thursday. On my +arrival I was much alarmed with a report that the +ministry had thoughts of rejecting the whole bill. +Mr. M'Namara seemed apprehensive that it was a +determined measure; and there seemed to be but too +much reason for his fears.</p> + +<p>Not having met the Chancellor at home, either on<a name="Page_201" id="Page_201" title="201" class="pagenum"></a> +my first visit or my second after receiving his letter, +and fearful that the Cabinet should come to come unpleasant +resolution, I went to the Treasury on Friday. +There I saw Sir G. Cooper. I possessed him of the +danger of a partial, and the inevitable mischief of +the total rejection of the bill. I reminded him of the +understood compact between parties, upon which +the whole scheme of the toleration originating in +the English bill was formed,—of the fair part +which the Whigs had acted in a business which, +though first started by them, was supposed equally +acceptable to all sides, and the risk of which they +took upon themselves, when others declined it. To +this I added such matter as I thought most fit to engage +government, as government,—not to sport with +a singular opportunity which offered for the union of +every description of men amongst us in support of +the common interest of the whole; and I ended by +desiring to see Lord North upon the subject. Sir +Grey Cooper showed a very right sense of the matter, +and in a few minutes after our conversation I went +down from the Treasury chambers to Lord North's +house. I had a great deal of discourse with him. +He told me that his ideas of toleration were large, but +that, large as they were, they did not comprehend a +promiscuous establishment, even in matters merely +civil; that he thought the established religion ought +to be the religion of the state; that, in this idea, he +was not for the repeal of the sacramental test; that, +indeed, he knew the Dissenters in general did not +greatly scruple it; but that very want of scruple +showed less zeal against the Establishment; and, after +all, there could no provision be made by human +laws against those who made light of the tests which<a name="Page_202" id="Page_202" title="202" class="pagenum"></a> +were formed to discriminate opinions. On all this he +spoke with a good deal of temper. He did not, indeed, +seem to think the test itself, which was rightly +considered by Dissenters as in a manner dispensed +with by an annual act of Parliament, and which in +Ireland was of a late origin, and of much less extent +than here, a matter of much moment. The thing +which seemed to affect him most was the offence that +would be taken at the repeal by the leaders among +the Church clergy here, on one hand, and, on the +other, the steps which would be taken for its repeal in +England in the next session, in consequence of the +repeal in Ireland. I assured him, with great truth, +that we had no idea among the Whigs of moving the +repeal of the test. I confessed very freely, for my +own part, that, if it were brought in, I should certainly +vote for it; but that I should neither use, nor did +I think applicable, any arguments drawn from the +analogy of what was done in other parts of the British +dominions. We did not argue from analogy, +even in this island and United Kingdom. Presbytery +was established in Scotland. It became no reason +either for its religious or civil establishment here. +In New England the Independent Congregational +Churches had an established legal maintenance; +whilst that country continued part of the British empire, +no argument in favor of Independency was adduced +from the practice of New England. Government +itself lately thought fit to establish the Roman +Catholic religion in Canada; but they would not suffer +an argument of analogy to be used for its establishment +anywhere else. These things were governed, +as all things of that nature are governed, not by general +maxims, but their own local and peculiar circumstances.<a name="Page_203" id="Page_203" title="203" class="pagenum"></a> +Finding, however, that, though he was +very cool and patient, I made no great way in the +business of the Dissenters, I turned myself to try +whether, falling in with his maxims, some modification +might not be found, the hint of which I received from +your letter relative to the Irish Militia Bill, and the +point I labored was so to alter the clause as to repeal +the test <i>quoad</i> military and revenue offices: for these +being only subservient parts in the economy and execution, +rather than the administration of affairs, the +politic, civil, and judicial parts would still continue +in the hands of the conformists to religious establishments. +Without giving any hopes, he, however, said +that this distinction deserved to be considered. After +this, I strongly pressed the mischief of rejecting the +whole bill: that a notion went abroad, that government +was not at this moment very well pleased with +the Dissenters, as not very well affected to the monarchy; +that, in general, I conceived this to be a mistake,—but +if it were not, the rejection of a bill in +favor <i>of others</i>, because something in favor of <i>them</i> +was inserted, instead of humbling and mortifying, +would infinitely exalt them: for, if the legislature +had no means of favoring those whom they meant +to favor, as long as the Dissenters could find means +to get themselves included, this would make them, +instead of their only being subject to restraint themselves, +the arbitrators of the fate of others, and that +not so much by their own strength (which could not +be prevented in its operation) as by the coöperation +of those whom they opposed. In the conclusion, I +recommended, that, if they wished well to the measure +which was the main object of the bill, they must +explicitly make it their own, and stake themselves<a name="Page_204" id="Page_204" title="204" class="pagenum"></a> +upon it; that hitherto all their difficulties had arisen +from their indecision and their wrong measures; and +to make Lord North sensible of the necessity of giving +a firm support to some part of the bill, and to add +weighty authority to my reasons, I read him your letter +of the 10th of July. It seemed, in some measure, +to answer the purpose which I intended. I pressed +the necessity of the management of the affair, both +as to conduct and as to gaining of men; and I renewed +my former advice, that the Lord Lieutenant +should be instructed to consult and cooperate with +you in the whole affair. All this was, apparently, +very fairly taken.</p> + +<p>In the evening of that day I saw the Lord Chancellor. +With him, too, I had much discourse. You +know that he is intelligent, sagacious, systematic, and +determined. At first he seemed of opinion that the +relief contained in the bill was so inadequate to the +mass of oppression it was intended to remove, that it +would be better to let it stand over, until a more perfect +and better digested plan could be settled. This +seemed to possess him very strongly. In order to +combat this notion, and to show that the bill, all +things considered, was a very great acquisition, and +that it was rather a preliminary than an obstruction +to relief, I ventured to show him your letter. It had +its effect. He declared himself roundly against giving +anything to a confederacy, real or apparent, to +distress government; that, if anything was done for +Catholics or Dissenters, it should be done on its own +separate merits, and not by way of bargain and compromise; +that they should be each of them obliged +to government, not each to the other; that this would +be a perpetual nursery of faction. In a word, he<a name="Page_205" id="Page_205" title="205" class="pagenum"></a> +seemed so determined on not uniting these plans, +that all I could say, and I said everything I could +think of, was to no purpose. But when I insisted +on the disgrace to government which must arise from +their rejecting a proposition recommended by themselves, +because their opposers had made a mixture, +separable too by themselves, I was better heard. On +the whole, I found him well disposed.</p> + +<p>As soon as I had returned to the country, this affair +lay so much on my mind, and the absolute necessity +of government's making a serious business of it, +agreeably to the seriousness they professed, and the +object required, that I wrote to Sir G. Cooper, to remind +him of the principles upon which we went in +our conversation, and to press the plan which was +suggested for carrying them into execution. He +wrote to me on the 20th, and assured me, "that +Lord North had given all due attention and respect +to what you said to him on Friday, and will pay the +same respect to the sentiments conveyed in your +letter: everything you say or write on the subject +undoubtedly demands it." Whether this was mere +civility, or showed anything effectual in their intentions, +time and the success of this measure will show. +It is wholly with them; and if it should fail, you are +a witness that nothing on our part has been wanting +to free so large a part of our fellow-subjects and fellow-citizens +from slavery, and to free government from +the weakness and danger of ruling them by force. As +to my own particular part, the desire of doing this +has betrayed me into a step which I cannot perfectly +reconcile to myself. You are to judge how far, on +the circumstances, it may be excused. I think it had +a good effect. You may be assured that I made this<a name="Page_206" id="Page_206" title="206" class="pagenum"></a> +communication in a manner effectually to exclude so +false and groundless an idea as that I confer with +you, any more than I confer with them, on any party +principle whatsoever,—or that in this affair we look +further than the measure which is in profession, and +I am sure ought to be in reason, theirs.</p> + +<p>I am ever, with the sincerest affection and esteem,</p> + +<p>My dear Sir,</p> + +<p>Your most faithful and obedient humble servant,</p> + +<p>EDMUND BURKE.</p> + +<p>BEACONSFIELD, 18th July, 1778.</p> + + +<p>I intended to have written sooner, but it has not +been in my power.</p> + +<p>To the Speaker of the House of Commons of Ireland.</p> + +<p><a name="Page_207" id="Page_207" title="207" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p><a name="TWO_LETTERS" id="TWO_LETTERS" /></p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>TWO LETTERS<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 60%;">TO</span><br /> +<br /> +THOMAS BURGH, ESQ.,<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 60%;">AND</span><br /> +<br /> +JOHN MERLOTT, ESQ.,<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%;">IN VINDICATION OF HIS PARLIAMENTARY CONDUCT +RELATIVE TO THE AFFAIRS OF IRELAND.</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 60%;">1780.</span></h2> + + +<p><a name="Page_208" id="Page_208" title="208" class="pagenum"></a></p> +<p><a name="Page_209" id="Page_209" title="209" class="pagenum"></a></p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>LETTER<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%;">TO THOMAS BURGH, ESQ.</span><a name="FNanchor_14_14" id="FNanchor_14_14"></a><a href="#Footnote_14_14" class="fnanchor">[14]</a></h2> + + +<p>My Dear Sir,—I do not know in what manner +I am to thank you properly for the very +friendly solicitude you have been so good as to express +for my reputation. The concern you have done +me the honor to take in my affairs will be an ample +indemnity from all that I may suffer from the rapid +judgments of those who choose to form their opinions +of men, not from the life, but from their portraits +in a newspaper. I confess to you that my frame +of mind is so constructed, I have in me so little of +the constitution of a great man, that I am more gratified +with a very moderate share of approbation from +those few who know me than I should be with the +most clamorous applause from those multitudes who +love to admire at a due distance.</p> + +<p>I am not, however, Stoic enough to be able to affirm +with truth, or hypocrite enough affectedly to +pretend, that I am wholly unmoved at the difficulty<a name="Page_210" id="Page_210" title="210" class="pagenum"></a> +which you and others of my friends in Ireland have +found in vindicating my conduct towards my native +country. It undoubtedly hurts me in some degree: +but the wound is not very deep. If I had sought +popularity in Ireland, when, in the cause of that +country, I was ready to sacrifice, and did sacrifice, +a much nearer, a much more immediate, and a much +more advantageous popularity here, I should find +myself perfectly unhappy, because I should be totally +disappointed in my expectations,—because I +should discover, when it was too late, what common +sense might have told me very early, that I +risked the capital of my fame in the most disadvantageous +lottery in the world. But I acted then, as I +act now, and as I hope I shall act always, from a +strong impulse of right, and from motives in which +popularity, either here or there, has but a very little +part.</p> + +<p>With the support of that consciousness I can bear +a good deal of the coquetry of public opinion, which +has her caprices, and must have her way. <i>Miseri, +quibus intentata nitet</i>! I, too, have had my holiday +of popularity in Ireland. I have even heard of an +intention to erect a statue.<a name="FNanchor_15_15" id="FNanchor_15_15"></a><a href="#Footnote_15_15" class="fnanchor">[15]</a> I believe my intimate +acquaintance know how little that idea was encouraged +by me; and I was sincerely glad that it never +took effect. Such honors belong exclusively to the +tomb,—the natural and only period of human inconstancy, +with regard either to desert or to opinion: for +they are the very same hands which erect, that very +frequently (and sometimes with reason enough) pluck +down the statue. Had such an unmerited and unlooked-for<a name="Page_211" id="Page_211" title="211" class="pagenum"></a> +compliment been paid to me two years +ago, the fragments of the piece might at this hour +have the advantage of seeing actual service, while +they were moving, according to the law of projectiles, +to the windows of the Attorney-General, or of +my old friend, Monk Mason.</p> + +<p>To speak seriously,—let me assure you, my dear +Sir, that, though I am not permitted to rejoice at <i>all</i> +its effects, there is not one man on your side of the +water more pleased to see the situation of Ireland so +prosperous as that she can afford to throw away her +friends. She has obtained, solely by her own efforts, +the fruits of a great victory, which I am very ready +to allow that the best efforts of her best well-wishers +here could not have done for her so effectually in a +great number of years, and perhaps could not have +done at all. I could wish, however, merely for the +sake of her own dignity, that, in turning her poor relations +and antiquated friends out of doors, (though +one of the most common effects of new prosperity,) +she had thought proper to dismiss us with fewer tokens +of unkindness. It is true that there is no sort +of danger in affronting men who are not of importance +enough to have any trust of ministerial, of +royal, or of national honor to surrender. The unforced +and unbought services of humble men, who +have no medium of influence in great assemblies, but +through the precarious force of reason, must be looked +upon with contempt by those who by their wisdom and +spirit have improved the critical moment of their fortune, +and have debated with authority against pusillanimous +dissent and ungracious compliance, at the +head of forty thousand men.</p> + +<p>Such feeble auxiliaries (as I talk of) to such a<a name="Page_212" id="Page_212" title="212" class="pagenum"></a> +force, employed against such resistance, I must own, +in the present moment, very little worthy of your attention. +Yet, if one were to look forward, it scarcely +seems altogether politic to bestow so much liberality +of invective on the Whigs of this kingdom as I find +has been the fashion to do both in and out of Parliament. +That you should pay compliments, in some +tone or other, whether ironical or serious, to the minister +from whose imbecility you have extorted what +you could never obtain from his bounty, is not unnatural. +In the first effusions of Parliamentary gratitude +to that minister for the early and voluntary +benefits he has conferred upon Ireland, it might appear +that you were wanting to the triumph of his surrender, +if you did not lead some of his enemies captive +before him. Neither could you feast him with +decorum, if his particular taste were not consulted. +A minister, who has never defended his measures +in any other way than by railing at his adversaries, +cannot have his palate made all at once to the relish +of positive commendation. I cannot deny but +that on this occasion there was displayed a great +deal of the good-breeding which consists in the accommodation +of the entertainment to the relish of +the guest.</p> + +<p>But that ceremony being past, it would not be unworthy +of the wisdom of Ireland to consider what consequences +the extinguishing every spark of freedom +in this country may have upon your own liberties. +You are at this instant flushed with victory, and full +of the confidence natural to recent and untried power. +We are in a temper equally natural, though very +different. We feel as men do, who, having placed an +unbounded reliance on their force, have found it totally<a name="Page_213" id="Page_213" title="213" class="pagenum"></a> +to fail on trial. We feel faint and heartless, and +without the smallest degree of self-opinion. In plain +words, we are <i>cowed</i>. When men give up their violence +and injustice without a struggle, their condition +is next to desperate. When no art, no management, +no argument, is necessary to abate their pride and +overcome their prejudices, and their uneasiness only +excites an obscure and feeble rattling in their throat, +their final dissolution seems not far off. In this miserable +state we are still further depressed by the overbearing +influence of the crown. It acts with the +officious cruelty of a mercenary nurse, who, under +pretence of tenderness, stifles us with our clothes, +and plucks the pillow from our heads. <i>Injectu multæ +vestis opprimi senem jubet</i>. Under this influence we +have so little will of our own, that, even in any apparent +activity we may be got to assume, I may say, +without any violence to sense, and with very little to +language, we are merely passive. We have yielded +to your demands this session. In the last session we +refused to prevent them. In both cases, the passive +and the active, our principle was the same. Had the +crown pleased to retain the spirit, with regard to Ireland, +which seems to be now all directed to America, +we should have neglected our own immediate defence, +and sent over the last man of our militia to fight with +the last man of your volunteers.</p> + +<p>To this influence the principle of action, the principle +of policy, and the principle of union of the present +minority are opposed. These principles of the +opposition are the only thing which preserves a single +symptom of life in the nation. That opposition +is composed of the far greater part of the independent +property and independent rank of the kingdom,<a name="Page_214" id="Page_214" title="214" class="pagenum"></a> +of whatever is most untainted in character, and of +whatever ability remains unextinguished in the people, +and of all which tends to draw the attention of +foreign countries upon this. It is now in its final +and conclusive struggle. It has to struggle against +a force to which, I am afraid, it is not equal. The +<i>whole</i> kingdom of Scotland ranges with the venal, +the unprincipled, and the wrong-principled of this; +and if the kingdom of Ireland thinks proper to pass +into the same camp, we shall certainly be obliged to +quit the field. In that case, if I know anything of +this country, another constitutional opposition <i>can +never</i> be formed in it; and if this be impossible, it +will be at least as much so (if there can be degrees +in impossibility) to have a constitutional administration +at any future time. The possibility of the +former is the only security for the existence of the +latter. Whether the present administration be in +the least like one, I must venture to doubt, even in +the honey-moon of the Irish fondness to Lord North, +which has succeeded to all their slappings and scratchings.</p> + +<p>If liberty cannot maintain its ground in this kingdom, +I am sure that it cannot have any long continuance +in yours. Our liberty might now and then +jar and strike a discord with that of Ireland. The +thing is possible: but still the instruments might +play in concert. But if ours be unstrung, yours +will be hung up on a peg, and both will be mute +forever. Your new military force may give you confidence, +and it serves well for a turn; but you and +I know that it has not root. It is not perennial, and +would prove but a poor shelter for your liberty, when +this nation, having no interest in its own, could look<a name="Page_215" id="Page_215" title="215" class="pagenum"></a> +upon yours with the eye of envy and disgust. I +cannot, therefore, help thinking, and telling you +what with great submission I think, that, if the Parliament +of Ireland be so jealous of the spirit of our +common Constitution as she seems to be, it was not +so discreet to mix with the panegyric on the minister +so large a portion of acrimony to the independent +part of this nation. You never received any sort +of injury from them, and you are grown to that +degree of importance that the discourses in your +Parliament will have a much greater effect on our +immediate fortune than our conversation can have +upon yours. In the end they will seriously, affect +both.</p> + +<p>I have looked back upon our conduct and our +public conversations in order to discover what it is +that can have given you offence. I have done so, +because I am ready to admit that to offend you without +any cause would be as contrary to true policy +as I am sure it must be to the inclinations of almost +every one of us. About two years ago Lord Nugent +moved six propositions in favor of Ireland in the +House of Commons. At the time of the motions, +and during the debate, Lord North was either wholly +out of the House, or engaged in other matters +of business or pleasantry, in the remotest recesses of +the West Saxon corner. He took no part whatsoever +in the affair; but it was supposed his neutrality +was more inclined towards the side of favor. The +mover being a person in office was, however, the +only indication that was given of such a leaning. +We who supported the propositions, finding them better +relished than at first we looked for, pursued our +advantage, and began to open a way for more essential<a name="Page_216" id="Page_216" title="216" class="pagenum"></a> +benefits to Ireland. On the other hand, those +who had hitherto opposed them in vain redoubled +their efforts, and became exceedingly clamorous. +Then it was that Lord North found it necessary to +come out of his fastness, and to interpose between +the contending parties. In this character of mediator, +he declared, that, if anything beyond the first +six resolutions should be attempted, he would oppose +the whole, but that, if we rested there, the original +motions should have his support. On this a sort of +convention took place between him and the managers +of the Irish business, in which the six resolutions +were to be considered as an <i>uti possidetis</i>, and +to be held sacred.</p> + +<p>By this time other parties began to appear. A +good many of the trading towns, and manufactures of +various kinds, took the alarm. Petitions crowded in +upon one another, and the bar was occupied by a +formidable body of council. Lord N. was staggered +by this new battery. He is not of a constitution to +encounter such an opposition as had then risen, when +there were no other objects in view than those that +were then before the House. In order not to lose +him, we were obliged to abandon, bit by bit, the most +considerable part of the original agreement.</p> + +<p>In several parts, however, he continued fair and +firm. For my own part, I acted, as I trust I commonly +do, with decision. I saw very well that the +things we had got were of no great consideration; +but they were, even in their defects, somewhat leading. +I was in hopes that we might obtain gradually +and by parts what we might attempt at once and +in the whole without success,—that one concession +would lead to another,—and that the people of England<a name="Page_217" id="Page_217" title="217" class="pagenum"></a> +discovering by a progressive experience that none +of the concessions actually made were followed by the +consequences they had dreaded, their fears from what +they were yet to yield would considerably diminish. +But that to which I attached myself the most particularly +was, to fix <i>the principle</i> of a free trade in all +the ports of these islands, as founded in justice, and +beneficial to the whole, but principally to this, the seat +of the supreme power. And this I labored to the +utmost of my might, upon general principles, illustrated +by all the commercial detail with which my little +inquiries in life were able to furnish me. I ought +to forget such trifling things as those, with all concerning +myself; and possibly I might have forgotten +them, if the Lord Advocate of Scotland had not, in a +very flattering manner, revived them in my memory, +in a full House in this session. He told me that my +arguments, such as they were, had made him, at the +period I allude to, change the opinion with which he +had come into the House strongly impressed. I am +sure that at the time at least twenty more told me +the same thing. I certainly ought not to take their +style of compliment as a testimony to fact; neither +do I. But all this showed sufficiently, not what they +thought of my ability, but what they saw of my zeal. +I could say more in proof of the effects of that zeal, +and of the unceasing industry with which I then acted, +both in my endeavors which were apparent and +those that were not so visible. Let it be remembered +that I showed those dispositions while the Parliament +of England was in a capacity to deliberate and in a +situation to refuse, when there was something to be +risked here by being suspected of a partiality to Ireland, +when there was an honorable danger attending<a name="Page_218" id="Page_218" title="218" class="pagenum"></a> +the profession of friendship to you, which heightened +its relish, and made it worthy of a reception in manly +minds. But as for the awkward and nauseous +parade of debate without opposition, the flimsy device +of tricking out necessity and disguising it in the habit +of choice, the shallow stratagem of defending by +argument, what all the world must perceive is yielded +to force,—these are a sort of acts of friendship which +I am sorry that any of my countrymen should require +of their real friends. They are things not <i>to my taste</i>; +and if they are looked upon as tests of friendship, I +desire for one that I may be considered as an enemy.</p> + +<p>What party purpose did my conduct answer at +that time? I acted with Lord N. I went to all the +ministerial meetings,—and he and his associates in +office will do me the justice to say, that, aiming at the +concord of the empire, I made it my business to give +his concessions all the value of which they were capable, +whilst some of those who were covered with his +favors derogated from them, treated them with contempt, +and openly threatened to oppose them. If I +had acted with my dearest and most valued friends, +if I had acted with the Marquis of Rockingham or +the Duke of Richmond, in that situation, I could not +have attended more to their honor, or endeavored +more earnestly to give efficacy to the measures I had +taken in common with them. The return which I, +and all who acted as I did, have met with from him, +does not make me repent the conduct which I then +held.</p> + +<p>As to the rest of the gentlemen with whom I have +the honor to act, they did not then, or at any other +time, make a party affair of Irish politics. That +matter was always taken up without concert; but,<a name="Page_219" id="Page_219" title="219" class="pagenum"></a> +in general, from the operation of our known liberal +principles in government, in commerce, in religion, +in everything, it was taken up favorably for Ireland. +Where some local interests bore hard upon the members, +they acted on the sense of their constituents, +upon ideas which, though I do not always follow, +I cannot blame. However, two or three persons, +high in opposition, and high in public esteem, ran +great risks in their boroughs on that occasion. But +all this was without any particular plan. I need +not say, that Ireland was in that affair much obliged +to the liberal mind and enlarged understanding of +Charles Fox, to Mr. Thomas Townshend, to Lord +Midleton, and others. On reviewing that affair, +which gave rise to all the subsequent manoeuvres, +I am convinced that the whole of what has this day +been done might have then been effected. But then +the minister must have taken it up as a great plan +of national policy, and paid with his person in every +lodgment of his approach. He must have used that +influence to quiet prejudice, which he has so often, +used to corrupt principle: and I know, that, if he +had, he must have succeeded. Many of the most +active in opposition would have given him an unequivocal +support. The corporation of London, and +the great body of the London West India merchants +and planters, which forms the greatest mass of that +vast interest, were disposed to fall in with such a +plan. They certainly gave no sort of discountenance +to what was done or what was proposed. But these +are not the kind of objects for which our ministers +bring out the heavy artillery of the state. Therefore, +as things stood at that time, a great deal more +was not practicable.<a name="Page_220" id="Page_220" title="220" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>Last year another proposition was brought out for +the relief of Ireland. It was started without any +communication with a single person of activity in +the country party, and, as it should seem, without +any kind of concert with government. It appeared +to me extremely raw and undigested. The behavior +of Lord N., on the opening of that business, +was the exact transcript of his conduct on the Irish +question in the former session. It was a mode of +proceeding which his nature has wrought into the +texture of his politics, and which is inseparable from +them. He chose to absent himself on the proposition +and during the agitation of that business,—although +the business of the House is that alone +for which he has any kind of relish, or, as I am +told, can be persuaded to listen to with any degree +of attention. But he was willing to let it take its +course. If it should pass without any considerable +difficulty, he would bring his acquiescence to tell +for merit in Ireland, and he would have the credit, +out of his indolence, of giving quiet to that country. +If difficulties should arise on the part of England, +he knew that the House was so well trained +that he might at his pleasure call us off from the +hottest scent. As he acted in his usual manner and +upon his usual principle, opposition acted upon theirs, +and rather generally supported the measure. As to +myself, I expressed a disapprobation at the practice +of bringing imperfect and indigested projects into the +House, before means were used to quiet the clamors +which a misconception of what we were doing +might occasion at home, and before measures were +settled with men of weight and authority in Ireland, +in order to render our acts useful and acceptable<a name="Page_221" id="Page_221" title="221" class="pagenum"></a> +to that country. I said, that the only thing which +could make the influence of the crown (enormous +without as well as within the House) in any degree +tolerable was, that it might be employed to give +something of order and system to the proceedings +of a popular assembly; that government being so +situated as to have a large range of prospect, and +as it were a bird's-eye view of everything, they might +see distant dangers and distant advantages which +were not so visible to those who stood on the common +level; they might, besides, observe them, from +this advantage, in their relative and combined state, +which people locally instructed and partially informed +could behold only in an insulated and unconnected +manner;—but that for many years past we suffered +under all the evils, without any one of the advantages +of a government influence; that the business +of a minister, or of those who acted as such, had +been still further to contract the narrowness of men's +ideas, to confirm inveterate prejudices, to inflame +vulgar passions, and to abet all sorts of popular +absurdities, in order the better to destroy popular +rights and privileges; that, so far from methodizing +the business of the House, they had let all things +run into an inextricable confusion, and had left affairs +of the most delicate policy wholly to chance.</p> + +<p>After I had expressed myself with the warmth I +felt on seeing all government and order buried under +the ruins of liberty, and after I had made my protest +against the insufficiency of the propositions, I supported +the principle of enlargement at which they +aimed, though short and somewhat wide of the mark,—giving, +as my sole reason, that the more frequently +these matters came into discussion, the more it<a name="Page_222" id="Page_222" title="222" class="pagenum"></a> +would tend to dispel fears and to eradicate prejudices.</p> + +<p>This was the only part I took. The detail was in +the hands of Lord Newhaven and Lord Beauchamp, +with some assistance from Earl Nugent and some independent +gentlemen of Irish property. The dead +weight of the minister being removed, the House +recovered its tone and elasticity. We had a temporary +appearance of a deliberative character. The +business was debated freely on both sides, and with +sufficient temper. And the sense of the members +being influenced by nothing but what will naturally +influence men unbought, their reason and their prejudices, +these two principles had a fair conflict, and +prejudice was obliged to give way to reason. A majority +appeared, on a division, in favor of the propositions.</p> + +<p>As these proceedings got out of doors, Glasgow +and Manchester, and, I think, Liverpool, began to +move, but in a manner much more slow and languid +than formerly. Nothing, in my opinion, would have +been less difficult than entirely to have overborne +their opposition. The London West India trade was, +as on the former occasion, so on this, perfectly liberal +and perfectly quiet; and there is abroad so much respect +for the united wisdom of the House, when supposed +to act upon a fair view of a political situation, +that I scarcely ever remember any considerable uneasiness +out of doors, when the most active members, +and those of most property and consideration in the +minority, have joined themselves to the administration. +Many factious people in the towns I mentioned +began, indeed, to revile Lord North, and to reproach +his neutrality as treacherous and ungrateful to those<a name="Page_223" id="Page_223" title="223" class="pagenum"></a> +who had so heartily and so warmly entered into all +his views with regard to America. That noble lord, +whose decided character it is to give way to the latest +and nearest pressure, without any sort of regard to +distant consequences of any kind, thought fit to appear, +on this signification of the pleasure of those his +worthy friends and partisans, and, putting himself at +the head of the <i>posse scaccarii</i>, wholly regardless of +the dignity and consistency of our miserable House, +drove the propositions entirely out of doors by a majority +newly summoned to duty.</p> + +<p>In order to atone to Ireland for this gratification +to Manchester, he graciously permitted, or rather forwarded, +two bills,—that for encouraging the growth +of tobacco, and that for giving a bounty on exportation +of hemp from Ireland. They were brought in +by two very worthy members, and on good principles; +but I was sorry to see them, and, after expressing +my doubts of their propriety, left the House. +Little also [else?] was said upon them. My objections +were two: the first, that the cultivation of +those weeds (if one of them could be at all cultivated +to profit) was adverse to the introduction of +a good course of agriculture; the other, that the encouragement +given to them tended to establish that +mischievous policy of considering Ireland as a country +of staple, and a producer of raw materials.</p> + +<p>When the rejection of the first propositions and the +acceptance of the last had jointly, as it was natural, +raised a very strong discontent in Ireland, Lord Rockingham, who +frequently said that there never seemed +a more opportune time for the relief of Ireland than +that moment when Lord North had rejected all rational +propositions for its relief, without consulting, I<a name="Page_224" id="Page_224" title="224" class="pagenum"></a> +believe, any one living, did what he is not often very +willing to do; but he thought this an occasion of +magnitude enough to justify an extraordinary step. +He went into the closet, and made a strong representation +on the matter to the king, which was not ill received, +and I believe produced good effects. He then +made the motion in the House of Lords which you +may recollect; but he was content to withdraw all +of censure which it contained, on the solemn promise +of ministry, that they would in the recess of Parliament +prepare a plan for the benefit of Ireland, and +have it in readiness to produce at the next meeting. +You may recollect that Lord Gower became in a particular +manner bound for the fulfilling this engagement. +Even this did not satisfy, and most of the minority +were very unwilling that Parliament should +be prorogued until something effectual on the subject +should be done,—particularly as we saw that the distresses, +discontents, and armaments of Ireland were increasing +every day, and that we are not so much lost +to common sense as not to know the wisdom and efficacy +of early concession in circumstances such as ours.</p> + +<p>The session was now at an end. The ministers, +instead of attending to a duty that was so urgent on +them, employed themselves, as usual, in endeavors to +destroy the reputation of those who were bold enough +to remind them of it. They caused it to be industriously +circulated through the nation, that the distresses +of Ireland were of a nature hard to be traced to the +true source, that they had been monstrously magnified, +and that, in particular, the official reports from +Ireland had given the lie (that was their phrase) to +Lord Rockingham's representations: and attributing +the origin of the Irish proceedings wholly to us, they<a name="Page_225" id="Page_225" title="225" class="pagenum"></a> +asserted that everything done in Parliament upon +the subject was with a view of stirring up rebellion; +"that neither the Irish legislature nor their constituents +had signified any dissatisfaction at the relief +obtained in the session preceding the last; that, to +convince both of the impropriety of their <i>peaceable</i> +conduct, opposition, by making demands in the name +of Ireland, pointed out what she might extort from +Great Britain; that the facility with which relief was +(formerly) granted, instead of satisfying opposition, +was calculated to create new demands; these demands, +as they <i>interfered</i> with the commerce of +Great Britain, were <i>certain</i> of being opposed,—a +circumstance which could not fail to create that desirable +confusion which suits the views of the party; +that they (the Irish) had long felt their own misery, +<i>without knowing well from whence it came</i>; our worthy +patriots, by <i>pointing out Great Britain</i> as the <i>cause of +Irish distress</i>, may have some chance of rousing Irish +resentment." This I quote from a pamphlet as perfectly +contemptible in point of writing as it is false in +its facts and wicked in its design: but as it is written +under the authority of ministers, by one of their principal +literary pensioners, and was circulated with +great diligence, and, as I am credibly informed, at a +considerable expense to the public, I use the words of +that book to let you see in what manner the friends +and patrons of Ireland, the heroes of your Parliament, +represented all efforts for your relief here, +what means they took to dispose the minds of the +people towards that great object, and what encouragement +they gave to all who should choose to exert +themselves in your favor. Their unwearied endeavors +were not wholly without success, and the unthinking<a name="Page_226" id="Page_226" title="226" class="pagenum"></a> +people in many places became ill-affected towards +us on this account. For the ministers proceeded in +your affairs just as they did with regard to those of +America. They always represented you as a parcel +of blockheads, without sense, or even feeling; that all +your words were only the echo of faction here; and +(as you have seen above) that you had not understanding +enough to know that your trade was cramped +by restrictive acts of the British Parliament, unless we +had, for factious purposes, given you the information. +They were so far from giving the least intimation of +the measures which have since taken place, that those +who were supposed the best to know their intentions +declared them impossible in the actual state of the +two kingdoms, and spoke of nothing but an act of +union, as the only way that could be found of giving +freedom of trade to Ireland, consistently with the +interests of this kingdom. Even when the session +opened, Lord North declared that he did not know +what remedy to apply to a disease of the cause of +which he was ignorant; and ministry not being then +entirely resolved how far they should submit to your +energy, they, by anticipation, set the above author +or some of his associates to fill the newspapers with +invectives against us, as distressing the minister by +extravagant demands in favor of Ireland.</p> + +<p>I need not inform you, that everything they asserted +of the steps taken in Ireland, as the result of +our machinations, was utterly false and groundless. +For myself, I seriously protest to you, that I neither +wrote a word or received a line upon any matter +relative to the trade of Ireland, or to the polities of it, +from the beginning of the last session to the day that +I was honored with your letter. It would be an affront<a name="Page_227" id="Page_227" title="227" class="pagenum"></a> +to the talents in the Irish Parliament to say one +word more.</p> + +<p>What was done in Ireland during that period, in +and out of Parliament, never will be forgotten. You +raised an army new in its kind and adequate to its +purposes. It effected its end without its exertion. It +was not under the authority of law, most certainly, +but it derived from an authority still higher; and as +they say of faith, that it is not contrary to reason, but +above it, so this army did not so much contradict the +spirit of the law as supersede it. What you did in +the legislative body is above all praise. By your proceeding +with regard to the supplies, you revived the +grand use and characteristic benefit of Parliament, +which was on the point of being entirely lost amongst +us. These sentiments I never concealed, and never +shall; and Mr. Fox expressed them with his usual +power, when he spoke on the subject.</p> + +<p>All this is very honorable to you. But in what +light must we see it? How are we to consider your +armament without commission from the crown, when +some of the first people in <i>this</i> kingdom have been refused +arms, at the time they did not only not reject, +but solicited the king's commissions? Here to arm +and embody would be represented as little less than +high treason, if done on private authority: with you +it receives the thanks of a Privy Counsellor of Great +Britain, who obeys the Irish House of Lords in that +point with pleasure, and is made Secretary of State, +the moment he lands here, for his reward. You +shortened the credit given to the crown to six months; +you hung up the public credit of your kingdom by a +thread; you refused to raise any taxes, whilst you +confessed the public debt and public exigencies to<a name="Page_228" id="Page_228" title="228" class="pagenum"></a> +be great and urgent beyond example. You certainly +acted in a great style, and on sound and invincible +principles. But if we in the opposition, which fills +Ireland with such loyal horrors, had even attempted, +what we never did even attempt, the smallest delay or +the smallest limitation of supply, in order to a constitutional +coercion of the crown, we should have been +decried by all the court and Tory mouths of this kingdom, +as a desperate faction, aiming at the direct ruin +of the country, and to surrender it bound hand and +foot to a foreign enemy. By actually doing what we +never ventured to attempt, you have paid your court +with such address, and have won so much favor with +his Majesty and his cabinet, that they have, of their +special grace and mere motion, raised you to new +titles, and for the first time, ill a speech from the +throne, complimented you with the appellation of +"faithful and loyal,"—and, in order to insult our +low-spirited and degenerate obedience, have thrown +these epithets and your resistance together in our +teeth! What do you think were the feelings of every +man who looks upon Parliament in an higher light +than that of a market-overt for legalizing a base traffic +of votes and pensions, when he saw you employ +such means of coercion to the crown, in order to +coerce our Parliament through <i>that</i> medium? How +much his Majesty is pleased with <i>his</i> part of the civility +must be left to his own taste. But as to us, you +declared to the world that you knew that the way of +bringing us to reason was to apply yourselves to the +true source of all our opinions and the only motive to +all our conduct! Now, it seems, you think yourselves +affronted, because a few of us express some indignation +at the minister who has thought fit to strip us<a name="Page_229" id="Page_229" title="229" class="pagenum"></a> +stark naked, and expose the true state of our poxed +and pestilential habit to the world! Think or say +what you will in Ireland, I shall ever think it a crime +hardly to be expiated by his blood. He might, and +ought, by a longer continuance or by an earlier meeting +of this Parliament, to have given us the credit of +some wisdom in foreseeing and anticipating an approaching +force. So far from it, Lord Gower, coming +out of his own cabinet, declares that one principal +cause of his resignation was his not being able to prevail +on the present minister to give any sort of application +to this business. Even on the late meeting of +Parliament, nothing determinate could be drawn from +him, or from any of his associates, until you had actually +passed the short money bill,—which measure +they flattered themselves, and assured others, you +would never come up to. Disappointed in their expectation +at [of?] seeing the siege raised, they surrendered +at discretion.</p> + +<p>Judge, my dear Sir, of our surprise at finding your +censure directed against those whose only crime was +in accusing the ministers of not having prevented +your demands by our graces, of not having given +you the natural advantages of your country in the +most ample, the most early, and the most liberal +manner, and for not having given away authority +in such a manner as to insure friendship. That you +should make the panegyric of the ministers is what I +expected; because, in praising their bounty, you paid +a just compliment to your own force. But that you +should rail at us, either individually or collectively, +is what I can scarcely think a natural proceeding. I +can easily conceive that gentlemen might grow frightened +at what they had done,—that they might imagine<a name="Page_230" id="Page_230" title="230" class="pagenum"></a> +they had undertaken a business above their direction,—that, +having obtained a state of independence +for their country, they meant to take the deserted +helm into their own hands, and supply by their +very real abilities the total inefficacy of the nominal +government. All these might be real, and might be +very justifiable motives for their reconciling themselves +cordially to the present court system. But I +do not so well discover the reasons that could induce +them, at the first feeble dawning of life in this country, +to do all in their power to cast a cloud over it, +and to prevent the least hope of our effecting the necessary +reformations which are aimed at in our Constitution +and in our national economy.</p> + +<p>But, it seems, I was silent at the passing the resolutions. +Why, what had I to say? If I had +thought them too much, I should have been accused +of an endeavor to inflame England. If I should represent +them as too little, I should have been charged +with a design of fomenting the discontents of Ireland +into actual rebellion. The Treasury bench represented +that the affair was a matter of state: they represented +it truly. I therefore only asked whether they +knew these propositions to be such as would satisfy +Ireland; for if they were so, they would satisfy me. +This did not indicate that I thought them too ample. +In this our silence (however dishonorable to Parliament) +there was one advantage,—that the whole +passed, as far as it is gone, with complete unanimity, +and so quickly that there was no time left to excite +any opposition to it out of doors. In the West India +business, reasoning on what had lately passed in the +Parliament of Ireland, and on the mode in which it +was opened here, I thought I saw much matter of<a name="Page_231" id="Page_231" title="231" class="pagenum"></a> +perplexity. But I have now better reason than ever +to be pleased with my silence. If I had spoken, one +of the most honest and able men<a name="FNanchor_16_16" id="FNanchor_16_16"></a><a href="#Footnote_16_16" class="fnanchor">[16]</a> in the Irish Parliament +would probably have thought my observation +an endeavor to sow dissension, which he was resolved +to prevent,—and one of the most, ingenious and one +of the most amiable men<a name="FNanchor_17_17" id="FNanchor_17_17"></a><a href="#Footnote_17_17" class="fnanchor">[17]</a> that ever graced yours or +any House of Parliament might have looked on it as +a chimera. In the silence I observed, I was strongly +countenanced (to say no more of it) by every gentleman +of Ireland that I had the honor of conversing +with in London. The only word, for that reason, +which I spoke, was to restrain a worthy county member,<a name="FNanchor_18_18" id="FNanchor_18_18"></a><a href="#Footnote_18_18" class="fnanchor">[18]</a> +who had received some communication from a +great trading place in the county he represents, which, +if it had been opened to the House, would have led +to a perplexing discussion of one of the most troublesome +matters that could arise in this business. I got +up to put a stop to it; and I believe, if you knew +what the topic was, you would commend my discretion.</p> + +<p>That it should be a matter of public discretion in +me to be silent on the affairs of Ireland is what on all +accounts I bitterly lament. I stated to the House +what I felt; and I felt, as strongly as human sensibility +can feel, the extinction of my Parliamentary +capacity, where I wished to use it most. When I +came into this Parliament, just fourteen years ago,—into +this Parliament, then, in vulgar opinion at least, +the presiding council of the greatest empire existing, +(and perhaps, all things considered, that ever did +exist,) obscure and a stranger as I was, I considered<a name="Page_232" id="Page_232" title="232" class="pagenum"></a> +myself as raised to the highest dignity to which +a creature of our species could aspire. In that opinion, +one of the chief pleasures in my situation, what +was first and-uppermost in my thoughts, was the +hope, without injury to this country, to be somewhat +useful to the place of my birth and education, +which in many respects, internal and external, I +thought ill and impolitically governed. But when I +found that the House, surrendering itself to the guidance +of an authority, not grown out of an experienced +wisdom and integrity, but out of the accidents of court +favor, had become the sport of the passions of men at +once rash and pusillanimous,—that it had even got +into the habit of refusing everything to reason and +surrendering everything to force, all my power of +obliging either my country or individuals was gone, +all the lustre of my imaginary rank was tarnished, +and I felt degraded even by my elevation. I said +this, or something to this effect. If it gives offence +to Ireland, I am sorry for it: it was the reason I +gave for my silence; and it was, as far as it went, +the true one.</p> + +<p>With you, this silence of mine and of others was +represented as factious, and as a discountenance to +the measure of your relief. Do you think us children? +If it had been our wish to embroil matters, +and, for the sake of distressing ministry, to commit +the two kingdoms in a dispute, we had nothing to do +but (without at all condemning the propositions) to +have gone into the commercial detail of the objects +of them. It could not have been refused to us: and +you, who know the nature of business so well, must +know that this would have caused such delays, and +given rise during that delay to such discussions, as<a name="Page_233" id="Page_233" title="233" class="pagenum"></a> +all the wisdom of your favorite minister could never +have settled. But, indeed, you mistake your men. +We tremble at the idea of a disunion of these two +nations. The only thing in which we differ with you +is this,—that we do not think your attaching yourselves +to the court and quarrelling with the independent +part of this people is the way to promote +the union of two free countries, or of holding them +together by the most natural and salutary ties.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>You will be frightened, when you see this long +letter. I smile, when I consider the length of it myself. +I never, that I remember, wrote any of the +same extent. But it shows me that the reproaches +of the country that I once belonged to, and in which +I still have a dearness of instinct more than I can +justify to reason, make a greater impression on me +than I had imagined. But parting words are admitted +to be a little tedious, because they are not +likely to be renewed. If it will not be making yourself +as troublesome to others as I am to you, I shall +be obliged to you, if you will show this, at their +greatest leisure, to the Speaker, to your excellent +kinsman, to Mr. Grattan, Mr. Yelverton, and Mr. +Daly: all these I have the honor of being personally +known to, except Mr. Yelverton, to whom I am +only known by my obligations to him. If you +live in any habits with my old friend, the Provost, +I shall be glad that he, too, sees this my humble +apology.</p> + +<p>Adieu! once more accept my best thanks for the +interest you take in me. Believe that it is received +by an heart not yet so old as to have lost its susceptibility. +All here give you the best old-fashioned<a name="Page_234" id="Page_234" title="234" class="pagenum"></a> +wishes of the season; and believe me, with the greatest +truth and regard,</p> + +<p>My dear Sir,</p> + +<p>Your most faithful and obliged humble servant,</p> + +<p>EDMUND BURKE.</p> + +<p>BEACONSFIELD, New year's Day, 1780.</p> + + +<p>I am frightened at the trouble I give you and our +friends; but I recollect that you are mostly lawyers, +and habituated to read long, tiresome papers—and, +where your friendship is concerned, without a fee; +I am sure, too, that you will not act the lawyer in +scrutinizing too minutely every expression which my +haste may make me use. I forgot to mention my +friend O'Hara, and others; but you will communicate +it as you please.</p> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_14_14" id="Footnote_14_14"></a><a href="#FNanchor_14_14"><span class="label">[14]</span></a> Mr. Thomas Burgh, of Old Town, was a member of the House +of Commons in Ireland.—It appears from a letter written by this +gentleman to Mr. Burke, December 24, 1779, and to which the following +is an answer, that the part Mr. Burke had taken in the discussion +which the affairs of Ireland had undergone in the preceding +sessions of Parliament in England had been grossly misrepresented +and much censured in Ireland.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_15_15" id="Footnote_15_15"></a><a href="#FNanchor_15_15"><span class="label">[15]</span></a> This intention was communicated to Mr. Burke in a letter from +Mr. Pery, the Speaker of the House of Commons in Ireland.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_16_16" id="Footnote_16_16"></a><a href="#FNanchor_16_16"><span class="label">[16]</span></a> Mr. Grattan.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_17_17" id="Footnote_17_17"></a><a href="#FNanchor_17_17"><span class="label">[17]</span></a> Mr. Hussey Burgh</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_18_18" id="Footnote_18_18"></a><a href="#FNanchor_18_18"><span class="label">[18]</span></a> Mr. Stanley, member for Lancashire.</p></div> +</div> + +<p><a name="Page_235" id="Page_235" title="235" class="pagenum"></a></p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>LETTER<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%;">TO JOHN MERLOTT, ESQ.<a name="FNanchor_19_19" id="FNanchor_19_19"></a><a href="#Footnote_19_19" class="fnanchor">[19]</a></span></h2> + + +<p>Dear Sir,—I am very unhappy to find that +my conduct in the business of Ireland, on a former +occasion, had made many to be cold and indifferent +who would otherwise have been warm in my +favor. I really thought that events would have produced +a quite contrary effect, and would have proved +to all the inhabitants of Bristol that it was no desire +of opposing myself to their wishes, but a certain +knowledge of the necessity of their affairs, and a +tender regard to their honor and interest, which induced +me to take the part which I then took. They +placed me in a situation which might enable me to +discern what was fit to be done, on a consideration +of the relative circumstances of this country and all +its neighbors. This was what you could not so well +do yourselves; but you had a right to expect that +I should avail myself of the advantage which I derived +from your favor. Under the impression-of +this duty and this trust, I had endeavored to render, +by preventive graces and concessions, every act +of power at the same time an act of lenity,—the +result of English bounty, and not of English timidity +and distress. I really flattered myself that the events<a name="Page_236" id="Page_236" title="236" class="pagenum"></a> +which have proved beyond dispute the prudence of +such a maxim would have obtained pardon for me, +if not approbation. But if I have not been so fortunate, +I do most sincerely regret my great loss,—this +comfort, however, that, if I have disobliged +my constituents, it was not in pursuit of any sinister +interest or any party passion of my own, but in +endeavoring to save them from disgrace, along with +the whole community to which they and I belong. +I shall be concerned for this, and very much so; +but I should be more concerned, if, in gratifying a +present humor of theirs, I had rendered myself unworthy +of their former or their future choice. I +confess that I could not bear to face my constituents +at the next general election, if I had been a rival +to Lord North in the glory of having refused some +small, insignificant concessions, in favor of Ireland, +to the arguments and supplications of English members +of Parliament,—and in the very next session, +on the demand of forty thousand Irish bayonets, of +having made a speech of two hours long to prove +that my former conduct was founded upon no one +right principle, either of policy, justice, or commerce. +I never heard a more elaborate, more able, more convincing, +and more shameful speech. The debater +obtained credit, but the statesman was disgraced +forever. Amends were made for having refused +small, but timely concessions, by an unlimited and +untimely surrender, not only of every one of the +objects of former restraints, but virtually of the +whole legislative power itself which had made them. +For it is not necessary to inform you, that the unfortunate +Parliament of this kingdom did not dare +to qualify the very liberty she gave of trading with<a name="Page_237" id="Page_237" title="237" class="pagenum"></a> +her <i>own</i> plantations, by applying, of her <i>own</i> authority, +any one of the commercial regulations to the +new traffic of Ireland, which bind us here under the +several Acts of Navigation. We were obliged to refer +them to the Parliament of Ireland, as conditions, +just in the same manner as if we were bestowing +a privilege of the same sort on France and Spain, +or any other independent power, and, indeed, with +more studied caution than we should have used, not +to shock the principle of their independence. How +the minister reconciled the refusal to reason, and the +surrender to arms raised in defiance of the prerogatives +of the crown, to his master, I know not: it has +probably been settled, in some way or other, between +themselves. But however the king and his ministers +may settle the question of his dignity and his rights, +I thought it became me, by vigilance and foresight, +to take care of yours: I thought I ought rather to +lighten the ship in time than expose it to a total +wreck. The conduct pursued seemed to me without +weight or judgment, and more fit for a member +for Banbury than a member for Bristol. I stood, +therefore, silent with grief and vexation, on that day +of the signal shame and humiliation of this degraded +king and country. But it seems the pride of Ireland, +in the day of her power, was equal to ours, +when we dreamt we were powerful too. I have been +abused there even for my silence, which was construed +into a desire of exciting discontent in England. +But, thank God, my letter to Bristol was in +print, my sentiments on the policy of the measure +were known and determined, and such as no man +could think me absurd enough to contradict. When +I am no longer a free agent, I am obliged in the crowd<a name="Page_238" id="Page_238" title="238" class="pagenum"></a> +to yield to necessity: it is surely enough that I silently +submit to power; it is enough that I do not +foolishly affront the conqueror; it is too hard to +force me to sing his praises, whilst I am led in triumph +before him,—or to make the panegyric of our +own minister, who would put me neither in a condition +to surrender with honor or to fight with the +smallest hope of victory. I was, I confess, sullen and +silent on that day,—and shall continue so, until I +see some disposition to inquire into this and other +causes of the national disgrace. If I suffer in my +reputation for it in Ireland, I am sorry; but it neither +does nor can affect me so nearly as my suffering +in Bristol for having wished to unite the interests of +the two nations in a manner that would secure the +supremacy of this.</p> + +<p>Will you have the goodness to excuse the length +of this letter? My earnest desire of explaining myself +in every point which may affect the mind of +any worthy gentleman in Bristol is the cause of it. +To yourself, and to your liberal and manly notions, +I know it is not so necessary. Believe me,</p> + +<p>My dear Sir,</p> + +<p>Your most faithful and obedient humble servant,</p> + +<p>EDMUND BURKE.</p> + +<p>BEACONSFIELD, April 4th, 1780.</p> + + +<p>To JOHN MERLOTT, Esq., Bristol.</p> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_19_19" id="Footnote_19_19"></a><a href="#FNanchor_19_19"><span class="label">[19]</span></a> An eminent merchant in the city of Bristol, of which Mr. Burke +was one of the representatives in Parliament.—It relates to the same +subject as the preceding Letter.</p></div> +</div> + +<p><a name="Page_239" id="Page_239" title="239" class="pagenum"></a><a name="LETTERS_AND_REFLECTIONS" id="LETTERS_AND_REFLECTIONS" /></p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>LETTERS AND REFLECTIONS<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 60%;">ON THE</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%;">EXECUTIONS OF THE RIOTERS</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 60%;">IN 1780.</span></h2> + +<p><a name="Page_240" id="Page_240" title="240" class="pagenum"></a></p> +<p><a name="Page_241" id="Page_241" title="241" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>LETTERS.</h2> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h3><i>To the Lord Chancellor</i>.</h3> + + +<p>My Lord,—I hope I am not too late with the +inclosed slight observations. If the execution +already ordered cannot be postponed, might I venture +to recommend that it should extend to one +only? and then the plan suggested in the inclosed +paper may, if your Lordship thinks well of it, take +place, with such improvements as your better judgment +may dictate. As to fewness of the executions, +and the good effects of that policy, I cannot, for my +own part, entertain the slightest doubt.</p> + +<p>If you have no objection, and think it may not occupy +more of his Majesty's time than such a thing is +worth, I should not be sorry that the inclosed was put +into the king's hands.</p> + +<p>I have the honor to be, my Lord,</p> + +<p>Your Lordship's most obedient humble servant,</p> + +<p>EDMUND BURKE.</p> + +<p>CHARLES STREET, July 10, 1780.</p> + + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3><i>To the Earl Bathurst, Lord President of the Council</i></h3> + + +<p>My Lord,—</p> + +<p>I came to town but yesterday, and therefore did +not learn more early the probable extent of the executions +in consequence of the late disturbances. I<a name="Page_242" id="Page_242" title="242" class="pagenum"></a> +take the liberty of laying before you, with the sincerest +deference to your judgment, what appeared to +me very early as reasonable in this business. Further +thoughts have since occurred to me. I confess my +mind is under no small degree of solicitude and anxiety +on the subject; I am fully persuaded that a +proper use of mercy would not only recommend the +wisdom and steadiness of government, but, if properly +used, might be made a means of drawing out the +principal movers in this wicked business, who have +hitherto eluded your scrutiny. I beg pardon for this +intrusion, and have the honor to be, with great regard +and esteem,</p> + +<p>My Lord,</p> + +<p>Your Lordship's most obedient humble servant,</p> + +<p>EDMUND BURKE.</p> + +<p>CHARLES STREET, July 18, 1780.</p> + + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3><i>To Sir Grey Cooper, Bart</i>.<a name="FNanchor_20_20" id="FNanchor_20_20"></a><a href="#Footnote_20_20" class="fnanchor">[20]</a></h3> + + +<p>Dear Sir,—</p> + +<p>According to your desire, I send you a copy of the +few reflections on the subject of the present executions +which occurred to me in the earliest period of +the late disturbances, and which all my experience +and observation since have most strongly confirmed. +The executions, taking those which have been made, +which are now ordered, and which may be the natural +consequence of the convictions in Surrey, will be +undoubtedly too many to answer any good purpose. +Great slaughter attended the suppression of the tumults, +and this ought to be taken in discount from +the execution of the law. For God's sake entreat of<a name="Page_243" id="Page_243" title="243" class="pagenum"></a> +Lord North to take a view of the sum total of the +deaths, before any are ordered for execution; for by +not doing something of this kind people are decoyed +in detail into severities they never would have dreamed +of, if they had the whole in their view at once. The +scene in Surrey would have affected the hardest heart +that ever was in an human breast. Justice and mercy +have not such opposite interests as people are apt +to imagine. I saw Lord Loughborough last night. +He seemed strongly impressed with the sense of what +necessity obliged him to go through, and I believe +will enter into our ideas on the subject. On this matter +you see that no time is to be lost. Before a final +determination, the first thing I would recommend is, +that, if the very next execution cannot be delayed, +(by the way, I do not see why it may not,) it may be +of but a single person, and that afterwards you should +not exceed two or three; for it is enough for one riot, +where the very act of Parliament on which you proceed +is rather a little hard in its sanctions and its +construction: not that I mean to complain of the latter +as either new or strained, but it was rigid from +the first.</p> + +<p>I am, dear Sir,</p> + +<p>Your most obedient humble servant,</p> + +<p>EDMUND BURKE.</p> + +<p>Tuesday, 18th July, 1780.</p> + + +<p>I really feel uneasy on this business, and should +consider it as a sort of personal favor, if you do something +to limit the extent and severity of the law on +this point. Present my best compliments to Lord +North, and if he thinks that I have had wishes to be +serviceable to government on the late occasion, I shall<a name="Page_244" id="Page_244" title="244" class="pagenum"></a> +on my part think myself abundantly rewarded, if a +few lives less than first intended should be saved +[taken?]; I should sincerely set it down as a personal +obligation, though the thing stands upon general +and strong reason of its own.<a name="FNanchor_21_21" id="FNanchor_21_21"></a><a href="#Footnote_21_21" class="fnanchor">[21]</a></p> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_20_20" id="Footnote_20_20"></a><a href="#FNanchor_20_20"><span class="label">[20]</span></a> One of the Secretaries of the Treasury.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_21_21" id="Footnote_21_21"></a><a href="#FNanchor_21_21"><span class="label">[21]</span></a> It appears by the following extract from a letter written by the +Earl of Mansfield to Mr. Burke, dated the 17th July, 1780, that these +Reflections had also been communicated to him:—"I have received +the honor of your letter and very judicious thoughts. Having been so +greatly injured myself, I have thought it more decent not to attend +the reports, and consequently have not been present at any deliberation +upon the subject."</p></div> +</div> + +<p><a name="Page_245" id="Page_245" title="245" class="pagenum"></a></p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>SOME THOUGHTS<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%;">ON THE APPROACHING EXECUTIONS,</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 60%;">HUMBLY OFFERED TO CONSIDERATION.</span></h2> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p>As the number of persons convicted on account +of the late unhappy tumults will probably exceed +what any one's idea of vengeance or example +would deliver to capital punishment, it is to be +wished that the whole business, as well with regard +to the number and description of those who are to +suffer death as with regard to those who shall be +delivered over to lighter punishment or wholly pardoned, +should be entirely a work of reason.</p> + +<p>It has happened frequently, in cases of this nature, +that the fate of the convicts has depended more upon +the accidental circumstance of their being brought +earlier or later to trial than to any steady principle +of equity applied to their several cases. Without +great care and sobriety, criminal justice generally begins +with anger and ends in negligence. The first +that are brought forward suffer the extremity of the +law, with circumstances of mitigation of their case; +and after a time, the most atrocious delinquents escape +merely by the satiety of punishment.</p> + +<p>In the business now before his Majesty, the following +thoughts are humbly submitted.</p> + +<p>If I understand the temper of the public at this +moment, a very great part of the lower and some of<a name="Page_246" id="Page_246" title="246" class="pagenum"></a> +the middling people of this city are in a very critical +disposition, and such as ought to be managed with +firmness and delicacy. In general, they rather approve +than blame the principles of the rioters, though +the better sort of them are afraid of the consequences +of those very principles which they approve. This +keeps their minds in a suspended and anxious state, +which may very easily be exasperated by an injudicious +severity into desperate resolutions,—or by +weak measures on the part of government it may +be encouraged to the pursuit of courses which may +be of the most dangerous consequences to the public.</p> + +<p>There is no doubt that the approaching executions +will very much determine the future conduct of those +people. They ought to be such as will humble, not +irritate. Nothing will make government more awful +to them than to see that it does not proceed by chance +or under the influence of passion.</p> + +<p>It is therefore proposed that no execution should +be made until the number of persons which government +thinks fit to try is completed. When the whole +is at once under the eye, an examination ought to be +made into the circumstances of every particular convict; +and <i>six</i>, at the very utmost, of the fittest examples +may then be selected for execution, who ought +to be brought out and put to death on one and the +same day, in six different places, and in the most +solemn manner that can be devised. Afterwards +great care should be taken that their bodies may not +be delivered to their friends, or to others who may +make them objects of compassion or even veneration: +some instances of the kind have happened with regard +to the bodies of those killed in the riots. The +rest of the malefactors ought to be either condemned,<a name="Page_247" id="Page_247" title="247" class="pagenum"></a> +for larger [longer?] or shorter terms, to the lighters, +houses of correction, service in the navy, and the like, +according to the case.</p> + +<p>This small number of executions, and all at one +time, though in different places, is seriously recommended; +because it is certain that a great havoc +among criminals hardens rather than subdues the +minds of people inclined to the same crimes, and +therefore fails of answering its purpose as an example. +Men who see their lives respected and thought +of value by others come to respect that gift of God +themselves. To have compassion for oneself, or to +care, more or less, for one's own life, is a lesson to +be learned just as every other; and I believe it will +be found that conspiracies have been most common +and most desperate where their punishment has been +most extensive and most severe.</p> + +<p>Besides, the least excess in this way excites a tenderness +in the milder sort of people, which makes +them consider government in an harsh and odious +light. The sense of justice in men is overloaded and +fatigued with a long series of executions, or with +such a carnage at once as rather resembles a massacre +than a sober execution of the laws. The laws +thus lose their terror in the minds of the wicked, +and their reverence in the minds of the virtuous.</p> + +<p>I have ever observed that the execution of one man +fixes the attention and excites awe; the execution +of multitudes dissipates and weakens the effect: but +men reason themselves into disapprobation and disgust; +they compute more as they feel less; and every +severe act which does not appear to be necessary is +sure to be offensive.</p> + +<p>In selecting the criminals, a very different line<a name="Page_248" id="Page_248" title="248" class="pagenum"></a> +ought to be followed from that recommended by the +champions of the Protestant Association. They recommend +that the offenders for plunder ought to be +punished, and the offenders from principle spared. +But the contrary rule ought to be followed. The +ordinary executions, of which there are enough in +conscience, are for the former species of delinquents; +but such common plunderers would furnish no example +in the present case, where the false or pretended +principle of religion, which leads to crimes, is the +very thing to be discouraged.</p> + +<p>But the reason which ought to make these people +objects of selection for punishment confines the selection +to very few. For we must consider that the +whole nation has been for a long time guilty of their +crime. Toleration is a new virtue in any country. +It is a late ripe fruit in the best climates. We ought +to recollect the poison which, under the name of antidotes +against Popery, and such like mountebank titles, +has been circulated from our pulpits and from +our presses, from the heads of the Church of England +and the heads of the Dissenters. These publications, +by degrees, have tended to drive all religion +from our own minds, and to fill them with nothing but +a violent hatred of the religion of other people, and, +of course, with a hatred of their persons; and so, by +a very natural progression, they have led men to the +destruction of their goods and houses, and to attempts +upon their lives.</p> + +<p>This delusion furnishes no reason for suffering that +abominable spirit to be kept alive by inflammatory +libels or seditious assemblies, or for government's +yielding to it, in the smallest degree, any point of +justice, equity, or sound policy. The king certainly<a name="Page_249" id="Page_249" title="249" class="pagenum"></a> +ought not to give up any part of his subjects to the +prejudices of another. So far from it, I am clearly +of opinion that on the late occasion the Catholics +ought to have been taken, more avowedly than they +were, under the protection of government, as the +Dissenters had been on a similar occasion.</p> + +<p>But though we ought to protect against violence +the bigotry of others, and to correct our own too, if +we have any left, we ought to reflect, that an offence +which in its cause is national ought not in its effects +to be vindicated on individuals, but with a very well-tempered +severity.</p> + +<p>For my own part, I think the fire is not extinguished,— +on the contrary, it seems to require the +attention of government more than ever; but, as a +part of any methodical plan for extinguishing this +flame, it really seems necessary that the execution of +justice should be as steady and as cool as possible.</p> + + +<p><a name="Page_250" id="Page_250" title="250" class="pagenum"></a></p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>SOME ADDITIONAL REFLECTIONS<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%;">ON THE EXECUTIONS.</span></h2> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p>The great number of sufferers seems to arise from +the misfortune incident to the variety of judicatures +which have tried the crimes. It were well, if +the whole had been the business of one commission; +for now every trial seems as if it were a separate +business, and in that light each offence is not punished +with greater severity than single offences of the +kind are commonly marked: but in reality and fact, +this unfortunate affair, though diversified in the multitude +of overt acts, has been one and the same riot; +and therefore the executions, so far as regards the +general effect on the minds of men, will have a reference +to the unity of the offence, and will appear to +be much more severe than such a riot, atrocious as it +was, can well justify in government. I pray that it +may be recollected that the chief delinquents have +hitherto escaped, and very many of those who are +fallen into the hands of justice are a poor, thoughtless +set of creatures, very little aware of the nature of +their offence. None of the list-makers, the assemblers +of the mob, the directors and arrangers, have +been convicted. The preachers of mischief remain +safe, and are wicked enough not to feel for their deluded +disciples,—no, not at all.</p> + +<p>I would not plead the ignorance of the law in any,<a name="Page_251" id="Page_251" title="251" class="pagenum"></a> +even the most ignorant, as a justification; but I am +sure, that, when the question is of mercy, it is a very +great and powerful argument. I have all the reason +in the world to believe that they did not know their +offence was capital.</p> + +<p>There is one argument, which I beg may not be +considered as brought for any invidious purpose, or +meant as imputing blame anywhere, but which, I +think, with candid and considerate men, will have +much weight. The unfortunate delinquents were +perhaps much encouraged by some remissness on the +part of government itself. The absolute and entire +impunity attending the same offence in Edinburgh, +which was over and over again urged as an example +and encouragement to these unfortunate people, +might be a means of deluding them. Perhaps, too, +a languor in the beginning of the riots here (which +suffered the leaders to proceed, until very many, as +it were by the contagion of a sort of fashion, were +carried to these excesses) might make these people +think that there was something in the case which induced +government to wink at the irregularity of the +proceedings.</p> + +<p>The conduct and condition of the Lord Mayor +ought, in my opinion, to be considered. His answers +to Lord Beauchamp, to Mr. Malo, and to Mr. +Langdale make him appear rather an accomplice in +the crimes than guilty of negligence as a magistrate. +Such an example set to the mob by the first magistrate +of the city tends greatly to palliate their offence.</p> + +<p>The license, and complete impunity too, of the +publications which from the beginning instigated the +people to such actions, and in the midst of trials +and executions still continues, does in a great degree<a name="Page_252" id="Page_252" title="252" class="pagenum"></a> +render these creatures an object of compassion. In +the Public Advertiser of this morning there are two +or three paragraphs strongly recommending such +outrages, and stimulating the people to violence +against the houses and persons of Roman Catholics, +and even against the chapels of the foreign ministers.</p> + +<p>I would not go so far as to adopt the maxim, <i>Quicquid +multis peccatur inultum</i>; but certainly offences +committed by vast multitudes are somewhat palliated +in the <i>individuals</i>, who, when so many escape, are always +looked upon rather as unlucky than criminal. +All our loose ideas of justice, as it affects any individual, +have in them something of comparison to the +situation of others; and no systematic reasoning can +wholly free us from such impressions.</p> + +<p>Phil. de Comines says our English civil wars were +less destructive than others, because the cry of the +conqueror always was, "Spare the common people." +This principle of war should be at least as prevalent +in the execution of justice. The appetite of justice +is easily satisfied, and it is best nourished with the +least possible blood. We may, too, recollect that between +capital punishment and total impunity there +are many stages.</p> + +<p>On the whole, every circumstance of mercy, and of +comparative justice, does, in my opinion, plead in favor +of such low, untaught, or ill-taught wretches. +But above all, the policy of government is deeply +interested that the punishments should appear <i>one</i>, +solemn, deliberate act, aimed not at random, and at +particular offences, but done with a relation to the +general spirit of the tumults; and they ought to be +nothing more than what is sufficient to mark and +discountenance that spirit.<a name="Page_253" id="Page_253" title="253" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<h3>CIRCUMSTANCES FOR MERCY.</h3> + + +<ul style="list-style: none;"><li>Not being principal.</li> +<li>Probable want of early and deliberate purposes.</li> +<li>Youth where the highest malice does not appear.</li> +<li>Sex where the highest malice does not appear.</li> +<li>Intoxication and levity, or mere wantonness of any kind.</li></ul> +<p><a name="Page_254" id="Page_254" title="254" class="pagenum"></a></p> +<p><a name="Page_255" id="Page_255" title="255" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p><a name="THE_RIGHT_HON_HENRY_DUNDAS" id="THE_RIGHT_HON_HENRY_DUNDAS" /></p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><span style="font-size: 60%;">A</span><br /> +<br /> +LETTER<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 60%;">TO</span><br /> +<br /> +THE RIGHT HON. HENRY DUNDAS,<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 40%;">ONE OF HIS MAJESTY'S PRINCIPAL SECRETARIES OF STATE.</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 60%;">WITH THE</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%;">SKETCH OF A NEGRO CODE.</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 60%;">1792.</span></h2> +<p><a name="Page_256" id="Page_256" title="256" class="pagenum"></a></p> +<p><a name="Page_257" id="Page_257" title="257" class="pagenum"></a></p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p>Dear Sir,—I should have been punctual in +sending you the sketch I promised of my old +African Code, if some friends from London had not +come in upon me last Saturday, and engaged me till +noon this day: I send this packet by one of them who +is still here. If what I send be, as under present circumstances +it must be, imperfect, you will excuse it, +as being done near twelve years ago. About four +years since I made an abstract of it, upon which I +cannot at present lay my hands; but I hope the marginal +heads will in some measure supply it.</p> + +<p>If the African trade could be considered with regard +to itself only, and as a single object, I should +think the utter abolition to be on the whole more +advisable than any scheme of regulation an reform. +Rather than suffer it to continue as it is, I heartily +wish it at an end. What has been lately done has +been done by a popular spirit, which seldom calls for, +and indeed very rarely relishes, a system made up of +a great variety of parts, and which is to operate its +effect in a great length of time. The people like +short methods; the consequences of which they sometimes +have reason to repent of. Abolition is but a +single act. To prove the nature of the trade, and to +expose it properly, required, indeed, a vast collection +of materials, which have been laboriously collected, +and compiled with great judgment. It required also<a name="Page_258" id="Page_258" title="258" class="pagenum"></a> +much perseverance and address to excite the spirit +which has been excited without doors, and which has +carried it through. The greatest eloquence ever displayed +in the House has been employed to second the +efforts which have been made abroad. All this, however, +leads but to one single resolve. When this was +done, all was done. I speak of absolute and immediate +abolition, the point which the first motions went +to, and which is in effect still pressed; though in this +session, according to order, it cannot take effect. A +<i>remote</i>, and a <i>gradual</i> abolition, though they may be +connected, are not the same thing. The idea of the +House seems to me, if I rightly comprehend it, that +the two things are to be combined: that is to say, +that the trade is gradually to decline, and to cease +entirely at a determinate period. To make the abolition +gradual, the regulations must operate as a strong +discouragement. But it is much to be feared that a +trade continued and discouraged, and with a sentence +of death passed upon it, will perpetuate much ill blood +between those who struggle for the abolition and those +who contend for an effectual continuance.</p> + +<p>At the time when I formed the plan which I have +the honor to transmit to you, an abolition of the slave +trade would have appeared a very chimerical project. +My plan, therefore, supposes the continued existence +of that commerce. Taking for my basis that I had +an incurable evil to deal with, I cast about how I +should make it as small an evil as possible, and draw +out of it some collateral good.</p> + +<p>In turning the matter over in my mind at that time +and since, I never was able to consider the African +trade upon a ground disconnected with the employment +of negroes in the West Indies, and distinct from<a name="Page_259" id="Page_259" title="259" class="pagenum"></a> +their condition in the plantations whereon they serve. +I conceived that the true origin of the trade was not +in the place it was begun at, but at the place of its +final destination. I therefore was, and I still am, of +opinion that the whole work ought to be taken up +together, and that a gradual abolition of slavery in +the West Indies ought to go hand in hand with anything +which, should be done with regard to its supply +from the coast of Africa. I could not trust a cessation +of the demand for this supply to the mere operation +of any abstract principle, (such as, that, if their supply +was cut off, the planters would encourage and +produce an effectual population,) knowing that nothing +can be more uncertain than the operation of general +principles, if they are not embodied in specific +regulations. I am very apprehensive, that, so long +as the slavery continues, some means for its supply +will be found. If so, I am persuaded that it is better +to allow the evil, in order to correct it, than, by endeavoring +to forbid what we cannot be able wholly to +prevent, to leave it under an illegal, and therefore an +unreformed existence. It is not that my plan does +not lead to the extinction of the slave trade, but it is +through a very slow progress, the chief effect of which +is to be operated in our own plantations, by rendering, +in a length of time, all foreign supply unnecessary. +It was my wish, whilst the slavery continued, and the +consequent commerce, to take such measures as to +civilize the coast of Africa by the trade, which now +renders it more barbarous, and to lead by degrees to +a more reputable, and, possibly, a more profitable connection +with it, than we maintain at present.</p> + +<p>I am sure that you will consider as a mark of my +confidence in yours and Mr. Pitt's honor and generosity,<a name="Page_260" id="Page_260" title="260" class="pagenum"></a> +that I venture to put into your hands a +scheme composed of many and intricate combinations, +without a full explanatory preface, or any attendant +notes, to point out the principles upon which +I proceeded in every regulation which I have proposed +towards the civilization and gradual manumission +of negroes in the two hemispheres. I confess +I trust infinitely more (according to the sound principles +of those who ever have at any time meliorated +the state of mankind) to the effect and influence of +religion than to all the rest of the regulations put +together.</p> + +<p>Whenever, in my proposed reformation, we take +our <i>point of departure</i> from a state of slavery, we +must precede the donation of freedom by disposing +the minds of the objects to a disposition to receive +it without danger to themselves or to us. The process +of bringing <i>free</i> savages to order and civilization +is very different. When a state of slavery is +that upon which we are to work, the very means +which lead to liberty must partake of compulsion. +The minds of men, being crippled with that restraint, +can do nothing for themselves: everything +must be done for them. The regulations can owe +little to consent. Everything must be the creature +of power. Hence it is that regulations must be +multiplied, particularly as you have two parties to +deal with. The planter you must at once restrain +and support, and you must control at the same +time that you ease the servant. This necessarily +makes the work a matter of care, labor, and expense. +It becomes in its nature complex. But I +think neither the object impracticable nor the expense +intolerable; and I am fully convinced that<a name="Page_261" id="Page_261" title="261" class="pagenum"></a> +the cause of humanity would be far more benefited +by the continuance of the trade and servitude, regulated +and reformed, than by the total destruction +of both or either. What I propose, however, is but +a beginning of a course of measures which an experience +of the effects of the evil and the reform will +enable the legislature hereafter to supply and correct.</p> + +<p>I need not observe to you, that the forms are often +neglected, penalties not provided, &c., &c., &c. +But all this is merely mechanical, and what a couple +of days' application would set to rights.</p> + +<p>I have seen what has been done by the West Indian +Assemblies. It is arrant trifling. They have +done little; and what they have done is good for +nothing,—for it is totally destitute of an <i>executory</i> +principle. This is the point to which I have applied +my whole diligence. It is easy enough to say what +shall be done: to cause it to be done,—<i>hic labor, +hoc opus</i>.</p> + +<p>I ought not to apologize for letting this scheme +lie beyond the period of the Horatian keeping,—I +ought much more to entreat an excuse for producing +it now. Its whole value (if it has any) is the +coherence and mutual dependency of parts in the +scheme; separately they can be of little or no use.</p> + +<p>I have the honor to be, with very great respect +and regard,</p> + +<p>Dear Sir,</p> + +<p>Your most faithful and obedient humble servant,</p> + +<p>EDMUND BURKE.</p> + +<p>BEACONSFIELD, Easter-Monday night, 1792.</p> + + +<p><a name="Page_262" id="Page_262" title="262" class="pagenum"></a></p> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> +<h2>SKETCH OF A NEGRO CODE.</h2> + +<p>This constitution consists of four principal members.</p> + +<p>I. The rules for qualifying a ship for the African +trade.</p> + +<p>II. The mode of carrying on the trade upon the +coast of Africa, which includes a plan for introducing +civilization in that part of the world.</p> + +<p>III. What is to be observed from the time of shipping +negroes to the sale in the West India islands.</p> + +<p>IV. The regulations relative to the state and condition +of slaves in the West Indies, their manumission, +&c.</p> + + +<p><span class="sidenote">PREAMBLE.</span>Whereas it is expedient, and comformable +to the principles of true religion and morality, and +to the rules of sound policy, to put an end to all +traffic in the persons of men, and to the detention of +their said persons in a state of slavery, as soon as the +same may be effected without producing great inconveniences +in the sudden change of practices of such +long standing, and during the time of the continuance +of the said practices it is desirable and expedient +by proper regulations to lessen the inconveniences +and evils attendant on the said traffic and state of +servitude, until both shall be gradually done away:</p> + +<p>And whereas the objects of the said trade and +consequential servitude, and the grievances resulting<a name="Page_263" id="Page_263" title="263" class="pagenum"></a> +therefrom, come under the principal heads following, +the regulations ought thereto to be severally applied: +that is to say, that provision should be made by the +said regulations,</p> + +<p>1st, For duly qualifying ships for the said traffic;</p> + +<p>2nd, For the mode and conditions of permitting +the said trade to be carried on upon the coast of +Africa;</p> + +<p>3rd, For the treatment of the negroes in their passage +to the West India islands;</p> + +<p>4th, For the government of the negroes which are +or shall be employed in his Majesty's colonies and +plantations in the West Indies:</p> + +<p><span class="sidenote">Ships to be registered.</span>Be it therefore enacted, that every ship +or trading vessel which is intended for the +negro trade, with the name of the owner or owners +thereof, shall be entered and registered as ships trading +to the West Indies are by law to be registered, +with the further provisions following:</p> + +<p><span class="sidenote">Measured and surveyed.</span>1. The same entry and register shall contain +an account of the greatest number of +negroes of all descriptions which are proposed to be +taken into the said ship or trading vessel; and the +said ship, before she is permitted to be entered outwards, +shall be surveyed by a ship-carpenter, to be +appointed by the collector of the port from which the +said vessel is to depart, and by a surgeon, also appointed +by the collector, who hath been conversant in +the service of the said trade, but not at the time actually +engaged or covenanted therein; and the said +carpenter and surgeon shall report to the collector, +or in his absence, to the next principal officer of the +port; upon oath, (which oath the said collector or +principal officer is hereby empowered to administer,)<a name="Page_264" id="Page_264" title="264" class="pagenum"></a> +her measurement, and what she contains in builder's +tonnage, and that she has —— feet of grated portholes +between the decks, and that she is otherwise +fitly found as a good transport vessel.</p> + +<p><span class="sidenote">Number of slaves limited.</span>2. And be it enacted, that no ship employed +in the said trade shall upon any pretence +take in more negroes than one grown man or +woman for one ton and half of builder's tonnage, nor +more than one boy or girl for one ton.</p> + +<p><span class="sidenote">Provisions.</span>3. That the said ship or other vessel shall +lay in, in proportion to the ship's company of the said +vessel, and the number of negroes registered, a full +and sufficient store of sound provision, so as to be +secure against all probable delays and accidents, +namely, salted beef, pork, salt-fish, butter, cheese, +biscuit, flour, rice, oat-meal, and white peas, but no +horse-beans, or other inferior provisions; and the said +ship shall be properly provided with water-casks or +jars, in proportion to the intended number of the said +negroes; and the said ship shall be also provided +with a proper and sufficient stock of coals or firewood.</p> + +<p><span class="sidenote">Stores.</span>4. And every ship entered as aforesaid +shall take out a coarse shirt and a pair of trousers, +or petticoat, for each negro intended to be taken +aboard; as also a mat, or coarse mattress, or hammock, +for the use of the said negroes. +The proportions of provision, fuel, and clothing to +be regulated by the table annexed to this act.</p> + +<p><span class="sidenote">Certificate thereof.</span>5. And be it enacted, that no ship shall +be permitted to proceed on the said voyage +or adventure, until the searcher of the port from +whence the said vessel shall sail, or such person as +he shall appoint to act for him, shall report to the<a name="Page_265" id="Page_265" title="265" class="pagenum"></a> +collector that he hath inspected the said stores, and +that the ship is accommodated and provided in the +manner hereby directed.</p> + +<p><span class="sidenote">Guns for trade to be inspected.</span>6. And be it enacted, that no guns be +exported to the coast of Africa, in the said +or any other trade, unless the same be duly marked +with the maker's name on the barrels before they +are put into the stocks, and vouched by an inspector +in the place where the same are made to be without +fraud, and sufficient and merchantable arms.</p> + +<p><span class="sidenote">Owners and masters to enter into bonds.</span>7. And be it enacted, that, before any +ship as aforesaid shall proceed on her voyage, +the owner or owners, or an attorney +by them named, if the owners are more than two, +and the master, shall severally give bond, the owners +by themselves, the master for himself, that the +said master shall duly conform himself in all things +to the regulations in this act contained, so far as the +same regards his part in executing and conforming +to the same.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>II. And whereas, in providing for the second object +of this act, that is to say, for the trade on the +coast of Africa, it is first prudent not only to provide +against the manifold abuses to which a trade +of that nature is liable, but that the same may be +accompanied, as far as it is possible, with such advantages +to the natives as may tend to the civilizing +them, and enabling them to enrich themselves by +means more desirable, and to carry on hereafter a +trade more advantageous and honorable to all parties:</p> + +<p>And whereas religion, order, morality, and virtue +are the elemental principles, and the knowledge of<a name="Page_266" id="Page_266" title="266" class="pagenum"></a> +letters, arts, and handicraft trades, the chief means +of such civilization and improvement: for the better +attainment of the said good purposes,</p> + +<p><span class="sidenote">Marts to be established on the coast.</span>1. Be it hereby enacted, that the coast +of Africa, on which the said trade for negroes +may be carried on, shall be and is hereby divided +into marts or staples, as hereafter follows. [Here +name the marts.] And be it enacted, that it shall +not be lawful for the master of any ship to purchase +any negro or negroes, but at one of the said +marts or staples.</p> + +<p><span class="sidenote">Governors and counsellors.</span>2. That the directors of the African Company +shall appoint, where not already appointed, +a governor, with three counsellors, at each +of the said marts, with a salary of —— to the governor, +and of —— to each of the said counsellors. +The said governor, or, in his absence or illness, the +senior counsellor, shall and is hereby empowered to +act as a justice of the peace, and they, or either of +them, are authorized, ordered, and directed to provide +for the peace of the settlement, and the good +regulation of their station and stations severally, according +to the rules of justice, to the directions of +this act, and the instructions they shall receive from +time to time from the said African Company. And +the said African Company is hereby authorized to +prepare instructions, with the assent of the Lords of +his Majesty's Privy Council, which shall be binding +in all things not contrary to this act, or to the laws +of England, on the said governors and counsellors, +and every of them, and on all persons acting in commission +with them under this act, and on all persons +residing within the jurisdiction of the magistrates +of the said mart.<a name="Page_267" id="Page_267" title="267" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p><span class="sidenote">Ships of war stationed.</span>3. And be it enacted, that the Lord High +Admiral, or commissioners for executing his +office, shall appoint one or more, as they shall see +convenient, of his Majesty's ships or sloops of war, under +the command severally of a post-captain, or master +and commander, to each mart, as a naval station.</p> + +<p><span class="sidenote">Inspectors appointed.</span>4. And be it enacted, that the Lord High +Treasurer, or the commissioners for executing +his office, shall name two inspectors of the said +trade at every mart, who shall provide for the execution +of this act, according to the directions thereof, +so far as shall relate to them; and it is hereby provided +and enacted, that, as cases of sudden emergency +may arise, the said governor or first counsellor, +and the first commander of his Majesty's ship or +ships on the said station, and the said inspectors, or +the majority of them, the governor having a double +or casting vote, shall have power and authority to +make such occasional rules and orders relating to +the said trade as shall not be contrary to the instructions +of the African Company, and which shall be +valid until the same are revoked by the said African +Company.</p> + +<p><span class="sidenote">Lands may be purchased.</span>5. That the said African Company is hereby +authorized to purchase, if the same may +conveniently be done, with the consent of the Privy +Council, any lands adjoining to the fort or principal +mart aforesaid, not exceeding —— acres, and to +make allotments of the same; no allotment to one +person to exceed (on pain of forfeiture) —— acres.</p> + +<p><span class="sidenote">Churches and schoolhouses, and hospitals to be erected.<br /> +Chaplain and assistant.<br /> +Clerk and catechist.</span>6. That the African Company shall, at +each fort or mart, cause to be erected, in +a convenient place, and at a moderate cost,<a name="Page_268" id="Page_268" title="268" class="pagenum"></a> +the estimate of which shall be approved by the Treasury, +one church, and one school-house, and one hospital; +and shall appoint one principal chaplain, +with a curate or assistant in holy +orders, both of whom shall be recommended by the +Lord Bishop of London; and the said chaplain or +his assistant shall perform divine service, and administer +the sacraments, according to the usage of +the Church of England, or to such mode not contrary +thereto as to the said bishop shall seem more +suitable to the circumstances of the people. And +the said principal chaplain shall be the third member +in the council, and shall be entitled to receive +from the directors of the said African Company a +salary of ——, and his assistant a salary of ——, +and he shall have power to appoint one sober and +discreet person, white or black, to be his +clerk and catechist, at a salary of ——.</p> + +<p><span class="sidenote">Schoolmaster.<br /> +Carpenter and blacksmith.<br /> +Native apprentices.<br /> +Surgeon and mate.<br /> +Native apprentice.</span>7. And be it enacted, that the African +Company shall appoint one sufficient schoolmaster, +who shall be approved by the Bishop of London, +and who shall be capable of teaching writing, +arithmetic, surveying, and mensuration, at a salary +of ——. And the said African Company is hereby +authorized to provide for each settlement a carpenter +and blacksmith, with such encouragement +as to them shall seem expedient, who shall +take each two apprentices from amongst +the natives; to instruct them in the several +trades, the African Company allowing them, as a fee +for each apprentice, ——. And the said African +Company shall appoint one surgeon and one +surgeon's mate, who are to be approved on +examination, at Surgeons' Hall, to each fort or mart,<a name="Page_269" id="Page_269" title="269" class="pagenum"></a> +with a salary of —— for the surgeon, and for his +mate ——; and the said surgeon shall take one +native apprentice, at a fee to be settled by +the African Company.</p> + +<p><span class="sidenote">How removable.</span>8. And be it enacted, that the said catechist, +schoolmaster, surgeon, and surgeon's +mate, as well as the tradesmen in the Company's service, +shall be obedient to the orders they shall from +time to time receive from the governor and council of +each fort; and if they, or any of them, or any other +person, in whatever station, shall appear, on complaint +and proof to the majority of the commissioners, to lead +a disorderly and debauched life, or use any profane +or impious discourses, to the danger of defeating the +purposes of this institution, and to the scandal of the +natives, who are to be led by all due means into a +respect for our holy religion, and a desire of partaking +of the benefits thereof, they are authorized and +directed to suspend the said person from his office, +or the exercise of his trade, and to send him to England +(but without any hard confinement, except in +case of resistance) with a complaint, with inquiry +and proofs adjoined, to the African Company.</p> + +<p>9. And be it enacted, that the Bishop of London +for the time being shall have full authority to remove +the said chaplain for such causes as to him shall seem +reasonable.</p> + +<p><span class="sidenote">No public officer to be concerned in the negro trade.</span>10. That no governor, counsellor, inspector, +chaplain, surgeon, or schoolmaster shall +be concerned, or have any share, directly or +indirectly, in the negro trade, on pain of ——.</p> + + + +<p><span class="sidenote">Journals and letter-books to be kept and transmitted.</span>11. Be it enacted, that the said governor +and council shall keep a journal of all their +proceedings, and a book in which copies of<a name="Page_270" id="Page_270" title="270" class="pagenum"></a> +all their correspondence shall be entered, and they +shall transmit copies of the said journals and letter-book, +and their books of accounts, to the African +Company, who, within —— of their receipt thereof, +shall communicate the same to one of his Majesty's +principal secretaries of state.</p> + + + +<p><span class="sidenote">Chaplain to report to the Bishop of London.</span>12. And be it enacted, that the said chaplain +or principal minister, shall correspond +with the Bishop of London, and faithfully +and diligently transmit to him an account of whatever +hath been done for the advancement of religion, morality, +and learning amongst the natives.</p> + +<p><span class="sidenote">Negroes to be attested before sale.</span>13. And be it enacted, that no negro +shall be conclusively sold, until he shall be +attested by the two inspectors and chaplain, or, in +case of the illness of any of them, by one inspector, +and the governor, or one of the council, who are +hereby authorized and directed, by the best means in +their power, to examine into the circumstances and +condition of the persons exposed to sale.</p> + + + +<p><span class="sidenote">Causes for rejection.</span>14. And for the better direction of the +said inspectors, no persons are to be sold, +who, to the best judgment of the said inspectors, shall +be above thirty-five years of age, or who shall appear, +on examination, stolen or carried away by the dealers +by surprise; nor any person who is able to read in +the Arabian or any other book; nor any woman who +shall appear to be advanced three months in pregnancy; +nor any person distorted or feeble, unless the said +persons are consenting to such sale; or any person +afflicted with a grievous or contagious distemper: +but if any person so offered is only lightly disordered, +the said person may be sold, but must be kept in the +hospital of the mart, and shall not be shipped until +completely cured.<a name="Page_271" id="Page_271" title="271" class="pagenum"></a></p> + + + +<p><span class="sidenote">Traders to be licensed by the governors.</span>15. Be it enacted, that no black or European +factor or trader into the interior country, +or on the coast, (the masters of English +ships only excepted, for whose good conduct provision +is otherwise herein made,) shall be permitted to buy +or sell in any of the said marts, unless he be approved +by the governor of the mart in which he is to deal, or, +in his absence or disability, by the senior counsellor +for the time being, and obtaining a license from such +governor or counsellor; and the said traders and +factors shall, severally or jointly, as they shall be +concerned, before they shall obtain the said license, +be bound in a recognizance, with such surety for his +or their good behavior as to the said governor shall +seem the best that can be obtained.</p> + + + +<p><span class="sidenote">Offences how to be tried and punished.</span>16. Be it enacted, that the said governor, +or other authority aforesaid, shall examine, +by duty of office, into the conduct of all +such traders and factors, and shall receive and publicly +hear (with the assistance of the council and inspectors +aforesaid, and of the commodore, captain, or +other principal commander of one of his Majesty's +ships on the said station, or as many of the same as +can be assembled, two whereof, with the governor, +are hereby enabled to act) all complaints against +them, or any of them; and if any black or white +trader or factor, (other than in this act excepted,) +either on inquisition of office or on complaint, shall +be convicted by a majority of the said commissioners +present of stealing or taking by surprise any person +or persons whatsoever, whether free or the slaves of +others, without the consent of their masters, or of +wilfully and maliciously killing or maiming any person, +or of any cruelty, (necessary restraint only excepted,)<a name="Page_272" id="Page_272" title="272" class="pagenum"></a> +or of firing houses, or destroying goods, the +said trader or factor shall be deemed to have forfeited +his recognizance, and his surety to have forfeited his; +and the said trader or factor, so convicted, shall be forever +disabled from dealing in any of the said marts, +unless the offence shall not be that of murder, maiming, +arson, or stealing or surprising the person, and +shall appear to the commissioners aforesaid to merit +only, besides the penalty of his bond, a suspension +for one year; and the said trader or factor, so convicted +of murder, maiming, arson, stealing or surprising +the person, shall, if a native, be delivered over to +the prince to whom he belongs, to execute further +justice on him. But it is hereby provided and enacted, +that, if any European shall be convicted of any +of the said offences, he shall be sent to Europe, together +with the evidence against him; and on the +warrant of the said commissioners, the keeper of any +of his Majesty's jails in London, Bristol, Liverpool, +or Glasgow shall receive him, until he be delivered +according to due course of law, as if the said offences +had been committed within the cities and towns aforesaid.</p> + +<p><span class="sidenote">Negroes exposed to sale contrary +to the provisions of this act, how to be dealt with.</span>17. Be it further enacted, that, if the +said governor, &c, shall be satisfied that +person or persons are exposed to sale, +who have been stolen or surprised as aforesaid, +or are not within the qualifications of +sale in this act described, they are hereby authorized +and required, if it can be done, to send the persons +so exposed to sale to their original habitation or settlement, +in the manner they shall deem best for their +security, (the reasonable charges whereof shall be +allowed to the said governor by the African Company,)<a name="Page_273" id="Page_273" title="273" class="pagenum"></a> +unless the said persons choose to sell themselves; +and then, and in that case, their value in +money and goods, at their pleasure, shall be secured +to them, and be applicable to their use,-without any +dominion over the same of any purchaser, or of any +master to whom they may in any colony or plantation +be sold, and which shall always be in some of his +master's [Majesty's?] colonies and plantations only. +And the master of the ship in which such person +shall embark shall give bond for the faithful execution +of his part of the trust at the island where he +shall break bulk.</p> + +<p>18. Be it further enacted, that, besides the hospitals +on shore, one or more hospital-ships shall be employed +at each of the said chief marts, wherein slaves +taken ill in the trading ships shall be accommodated, +until they shall be cured; and then the owner may +reclaim and shall receive them, paying the charges +which shall be settled by regulation to be made by +the authority in this act enabled to provide such regulations.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>III. And whereas it is necessary that regulations +be made to prevent abuses in the passage from Africa +to the West Indies:</p> + +<p><span class="sidenote">Slave ships to be examined on the coast.</span>1. Be it further enacted, that the commander +or lieutenant of the king's ship on +each station shall have authority, as often +as he shall see occasion, attended with one other of +his officers, and his surgeon or mate, to enter into and +inspect every trading ship, in order to provide for the +due execution of this act, and of any ordinances made +in virtue thereof and conformable thereto by the authorities +herein constituted and appointed; and the<a name="Page_274" id="Page_274" title="274" class="pagenum"></a> +said officer and officers are hereby required to examine +every trading ship before she sails, and to stop +the sailing of the said ship for the breach of the said +rules and ordinances, until the governor in council +shall order and direct otherwise: and the master of] +the said ship shall not presume, under the penalty of ——, +to be recovered in the courts of the West +Indies, to sail without a certificate from the commander +aforesaid, and one of the inspectors in this +act appointed, that the vessel is provided with stores +and other accommodation sufficient for her voyage, +and has not a greater number of slaves on board +than by the provisions of this act is allowed.</p> + + + +<p><span class="sidenote">Governor to give special instructions.</span>2. And be it enacted, that the governor +and council, with the assistance of the said +naval commander, shall have power to give such special +written instructions for the health, discipline, and +care of the said slaves, during their passage, as to +them shall seem good,</p> + + + +<p><span class="sidenote">Presents and musical instruments to be provided.</span>3. And be it further enacted, that each +slave, at entering the said ship, is to receive +some present, not exceeding in value ——, +to be provided according to the instructions aforesaid; +and musical instruments, according to the fashion of +the country, are to be provided.</p> + + + +<p><span class="sidenote">Table of allowances.</span>4. And be it further enacted, that the +negroes on board the transports, and the +seamen who navigate the same, are to receive their +daily allowance according to the table hereunto annexed, +together with a certain quantity of spirits to +be mixed with their water. And it is enacted, that +the table is to be fixed, and continue for one week +after sailing, in some conspicuous part of the said +ship, for the seamen's inspection of the same.<a name="Page_275" id="Page_275" title="275" class="pagenum"></a></p> + + + +<p><span class="sidenote">Negro superintendents +to be appointed.</span>5. And be it enacted, that the captain of +each trading vessel shall be enabled and is +to divide the slaves in his ship into +crews of not less than ten nor more than twenty +persons each, and to appoint one negro man to have +such authority severally over each crew, as according +to his judgment, with the advice of the mate and surgeon, +he and they shall see good to commit to them, +and to allow to each of them some compensation, in +extraordinary diet and presents, not exceeding [ten +shillings].</p> + + + +<p><span class="sidenote">Communication +with female +slaves, +how punished.</span>6. And be it enacted, that any European officer +or seaman, having unlawful communication +with any woman slave, shall, if an +officer, pay five pounds to the use of the said woman, +on landing her from the said ship, to be stopped out +of his wages, or if a seaman, forty shillings: the said +penalties to be recovered on the testimony of the +woman so abused, and one other.</p> + + + +<p><span class="sidenote">Premium to +commanders +of slave-ships.</span>7. And be it enacted, that all and every +commander of a vessel or vessels employed +in slave trade, having received certificates from the +port of the outfit, and from the proper officers in +Africa and the West Indies, of their having conformed +to the regulations of this act, and of their +not having lost more than one in thirty of their +slaves by death, shall be entitled to a bounty or +premium of [ten pounds].</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>IV. And whereas the condition of persons in a +state of slavery is such that they are utterly unable +to take advantage of any remedy which the laws may +provide for their protection and the amendment of +their condition, and have not the proper means of<a name="Page_276" id="Page_276" title="276" class="pagenum"></a> +pursuing any process for the same, but are and must +be under guardianship: and whereas it is not fitting +that they should be under the sole guardianship of +their masters, or their attorneys and overseers, to +whom their grievances, whenever they suffer any, +must ordinarily be owing:</p> + + +<p><span class="sidenote">Attorney-General to be protector of negroes.<br /> +To inquire and file information +<i>ex officio</i>.</span>1. Be it therefore enacted, that his Majesty's +Attorney-General for the time being +successively shall, by his office, exercise the +trust and employment of protector of negroes within +the island in which he is or shall be Attorney-General +to his Majesty, his heirs and successors; and that the +said Attorney-General, protector of negroes, is hereby +authorized to hear any complaint on the part of any +negro or negroes, and inquire into the same, or to institute +an inquiry <i>ex officio</i> into any abuses, +formations and to call before him and examine witnesses +upon oath, relative to the subject-matter +of the said official inquiry or complaint: and +it is hereby enacted and declared, that the said Attorney-General, +protector of negroes, is hereby authorized +and empowered, at his discretion, to file +an information <i>ex officio</i> for any offences committed +against the provisions of this act, or for any misdemeanors +or wrongs against the said negroes, or any +of them.</p> + + + +<p><span class="sidenote">Power to challenge jurors.</span>2. And it is further enacted, that in all +trials of such informations the said protector +of negroes may and is hereby authorized to challenge +peremptorily a number not exceeding —— of the +jury who shall be impanelled to try the charge in the +said information contained.</p> + + +<p><span class="sidenote">To appoint inspectors of districts, +who are to +report to him +twice in the +year the number and +condition of +the slaves.</span>3. And be it enacted, that the said Attorney-General, +protector of negroes, shall<a name="Page_277" id="Page_277" title="277" class="pagenum"></a> +appoint inspectors, not exceeding the number of ——, +at his discretion; and the said inspectors +shall be placed in convenient districts in each island +severally, or shall twice in the year make a circuit in +the same, according to the direction which they shall +receive from the protector of negroes aforesaid; and +the inspectors shall and they are hereby required, +twice in the year, to report in writing to the +protector aforesaid the state and condition +of the negroes in their districts or on their +circuit severally, the number, sex, age, and +occupation of the said negroes on each plantation; +and the overseer or chief manager on each plantation +is hereby required to furnish an account thereof +within [ten days] after the demand of the said inspectors, +and to permit the inspector or inspectors +aforesaid to examine into the same; and the said +inspectors shall set forth, in the said report, the distempers +to which the negroes are most liable in the +several parts of the island.</p> + +<p><span class="sidenote">Instructions +to be formed +for inspectors.</span>4. And be it enacted, that the said protector +of negroes, by and with the consent +the governor and chief judge of each +island, shall form instructions, by which the said +inspectors shall discharge their trust in the manner +the least capable of exciting any unreasonable hopes +in the said negroes, or of weakening the proper authority +of the overseer, and shall transmit them to +one of his Majesty's principal secretaries of state; and +when sent back with his approbation, the same shall +become the rule for the conduct of the said inspectors.</p> + + + +<p><span class="sidenote">Registry.</span>5. And be it enacted, that the said Attorney-General, +protector of negroes, shall appoint an<a name="Page_278" id="Page_278" title="278" class="pagenum"></a> +office for registering all proceedings relative to the +duty of his place as protector of negroes, and shall +appoint his chief clerk to be registrar, with a salary +not exceeding ——.</p> + +<p><span class="sidenote">Ports where negroes are to be landed. Vessels to be inspected.<br /> +Masters or officers offending to be fined.</span>6. And be it enacted, that no negroes +shall be landed for sale in any but the ports +following: that is to say, ——. And the +collector of each of the said ports severally shall, +within —— days after the arrival of any ship transporting +negroes, report the same to the protector of +negroes, or to one of his inspectors; and the said +protector is hereby authorized and required to examine, +or cause to be examined by one of his inspectors, +with the assistance of the said collector, or his deputy, +and a surgeon to be called in on the occasion, the +state of the said ship and negroes; and upon what +shall appear to them, the said protector of negroes, +and the said collector and surgeon, to be a sufficient +proof, either as arising from their own inspection, or +sufficient information on a summary process, of any +contravention of this act, or cruelty to the negroes, or +other malversation of the said captain, or any of his +officers the said protector shall impose a +fine on him or them, not exceeding ——; +which shall not, however, weaken or invalidate +any penalty growing from the bond of the +said master or his owners. And it is hereby provided, +that, if the said master, or any of his officers, +shall find himself aggrieved by the said fine, +he may within —— days appeal to the chief +judge, if the court shall be sitting, or to the governor, +who shall and are required to hear the said +parties, and on hearing are to annul or confirm the +same.<a name="Page_279" id="Page_279" title="279" class="pagenum"></a></p> + + + +<p><span class="sidenote">Rates respecting the sale of negroes.</span>7. And be it enacted, that no sale of +negroes shall be made but in the presence +of an inspector, and all negroes shall be sold +severally, or in known and ascertained lots, and not +otherwise; and a paper containing the state and description +of each negro severally sold, and of each +lot, shall be taken and registered in the office aforesaid; +and if, on inspection or information, it shall be +found that any negroes shall have, in the same ship, +or any other at the same time examined, a wife, an +husband, a brother, sister, or child, the person or persons +so related shall not be sold separately at that or +any future sale.</p> + +<p><span class="sidenote">Every island to be divided into districts.<br /> +A church to be built in each.</span>8. And be it enacted, that each and every +of his Majesty's islands and plantations, in +which negroes are used in cultivation, shall +be, by the governor and the protector of negroes for +the time being, divided into districts, allowing as +much as convenience will admit to the present division +into parishes, and subdividing them, where necessary, +into districts, according to the number of +negroes. And the said governor and protector of negroes +shall cause in each district a church +to be built in a convenient place, and a cemetery +annexed, and an house for the residence of a +clergyman, with —— acres of land annexed; and +they are hereby authorized to treat for the necessary +ground with the proprietor, who is hereby obliged to +sell and dispose of the same to the said use; and in +case of dispute concerning the value, the same to be +settled by a jury, as in like cases is accustomed.</p> + +<p><span class="sidenote">Appointment of a priest and clerk.</span>9. And be it enacted, that in each of the +said districts shall be established a presbyter +of the Church of England as by law established,<a name="Page_280" id="Page_280" title="280" class="pagenum"></a> +who shall appoint under him one clerk, who +shall be a free negro, when such properly qualified +can be found, (otherwise, a white man,) with a salary, +in each case, of ——; and the said minister and +clerk, both or one, shall instruct the said negroes in +the Church Catechism, or such other as shall be provided +by the authority in this act named; and the +said minister shall baptize, as he shall think fit, all +negroes not baptized, and not belonging to Dissenters +from the Church of England.</p> + +<p><span class="sidenote">Owner to +deliver a list +of negroes to +the minister, +and to cause +them to attend +divine +service.</span>10. And the principal overseer of each +plantation is hereby required to deliver annually +unto the minister a list of all the +negroes upon his plantation, distinguishing +their sex and age, and shall, under a penalty +of ——, cause all the negroes under his care, +above the age of —— years, to attend divine service +once on every Sunday, except in case of sickness, +infirmity, or other necessary cause, to be given +at the time, and shall, by himself or one of those who +are under him, provide for the orderly behavior of +the negroes under him, and cause them to return to +his plantation, when divine service, or administration +of sacraments, or catechism, is ended.</p> + +<p><span class="sidenote">Mister to +direct punishment +for +disorderly +conduct.</span>11. And be it enacted, that the minister +shall have power to punish any negro for +disorderly conduct during divine service, by +a punishment not exceeding [ten] blows to be given +in one day and for one offence, which the overseer +or his under agent or agents is hereby directed, according +to the orders of the said minister, effectually +to inflict, whenever the same shall be ordered.</p> + +<p><span class="sidenote">Spirituous +liquors not to +be sold.</span>12. And be it enacted, that no spirituous +liquors of any kind shall be sold, except in<a name="Page_281" id="Page_281" title="281" class="pagenum"></a> +towns, within —— miles distance of any church, nor +within any district during divine service, and an hour +preceding and an hour following the same; and the +minister of each parish shall and is hereby authorized +to act as a justice of the peace in enforcing the +said regulation.</p> + +<p><span class="sidenote">Register of +births, burials, +and marriages.</span>13. And be it enacted, that every minister +shall keep a register of births, burials, +and marriages of all negroes and mulattoes +in his district.</p> + + + +<p><span class="sidenote">Synod to assemble +annually, +and +to form regulations,</span>14. And be it enacted, that the ministers +of the several districts shall meet annually, +on the —— day of ——, in a synod of +the island to which they belong; and the said synod +shall have for its president such person as the Bishop +of London shall appoint for his commissary; and the +said synod or general assembly is hereby authorized, +by a majority of voices, to make regulations, which +regulations shall be transmitted by the said president +or commissary to the Bishop of London; and when +returned by the Bishop of London approved of, then, +and not before, the said regulations shall be held in +force to bind the said clergy, their assistants, clerks, +and schoolmasters only, and no other persons.</p> + + + +<p><span class="sidenote">and to report +to the Bishop +of London.</span>15. And be it enacted, that the said president +shall collect matter in the said assembly, +and shall make a report of the state of religion +and morals in the several parishes from whence the +synod is deputed, and shall transmit the same, once +in the year, in duplicate, through the governor and +protector of negroes, to the Bishop of London.</p> + + + +<p><span class="sidenote">Bishop of +London to be +patron of the +cures.</span>16. And be it enacted and declared, that +the Bishop of London for the time being patron of the +shall be patron to all and every the said<a name="Page_282" id="Page_282" title="282" class="pagenum"></a> +cures in this act directed; and the said bishop is +hereby required to provide for the due filling thereof, +and is to receive, from the fund in this act provided +for the due execution of this act, a sum not +exceeding —— for each of the said ministers, for +his outfit and passage.</p> + + + +<p><span class="sidenote">and to have +power of suspending +and +removing +ministers.</span>17. And be it enacted, that, on misbehavior, +and on complaint from the said synod, +and on hearing the party accused in a plain +and summary manner, it shall and may be lawful for +the Bishop of London to suspend or to remove any +minister from his cure, as his said offences shall appear +to merit.</p> + + + +<p><span class="sidenote">Schools for +young negroes.</span>18. And be it enacted, that for every two +districts a school shall be established for +young negroes to be taught three days in the week, +and to be detained from their owner four hours in +each day, the number not to be more or fewer than +twenty males in each district, who shall be chosen, +and vacancies filled, by the minister of the district; +and the said minister shall pay to the owner of the +said boy, and shall be allowed the same in his accounts +at the synod, to the age of twelve years old, +three-pence by the day, and for every boy from twelve +years old to fifteen, five-pence by the day.</p> + + + +<p><span class="sidenote">Extraordinary +abilities +to be encouraged.</span>19. And it is enacted, that, if the president of the +synod aforesaid shall certify to the protector of negroes, +that any boys in the said schools (provided +that the number in no one year shall exceed one in +the island of Jamaica, and one in two years in the +islands of Barbadoes, Antigua, and Grenada, and one +in four years in any of the other islands) +do show a remarkable aptitude for learning, +the said protector is hereby authorized and<a name="Page_283" id="Page_283" title="283" class="pagenum"></a> +directed to purchase the said boy at the best rate at +which boys of that age and strength have been sold +within the year; and the said negro so purchased +shall be under the entire guardianship of the said +protector of negroes, who shall send him to the +Bishop of London for his further education in England, +and may charge in his accounts for the expense +of transporting him to England; and the Bishop of +London shall provide for the education of such of the +said negroes as he shall think proper subjects, until +the age of twenty-four years, and shall order those +who shall fall short of expectation after one year to +be bound apprentice to some handicraft trade; and +when his apprenticeship is finished, the Lord Mayor +of London is hereby authorized and directed to receive +the said negro from his master, and to transmit +him to the island from which he came, in the West +Indies, to be there as a free negro, subject, however, +to the direction of the protector of negroes, relatively +to his behavior and employment.</p> + + +<p><span class="sidenote">Negroes of +Dissenters,<br /> +their marriages, +&c., +to be registered.</span>20. And it is hereby enacted and provided, +that any planter, or owner of negroes, +not being of the Church of England, and not choosing +to send his negroes to attend divine service in +manner by this act directed, shall give, jointly or severally, +as the case shall require, security to the protector +of negroes that a competent minister of some +Christian church or congregation shall be provided +for the due instruction of the negroes, and for their +performing divine service according to the description +of the religion of the master or masters, in some +church or house thereto allotted, in the manner and +with the regulations in this act prescribed with regard +to the exercise of religion according to the<a name="Page_284" id="Page_284" title="284" class="pagenum"></a> +Church of England: provided always, that +the marriages of the said negroes belonging +to Dissenters shall be celebrated only in the +church of the said district, and that a register of the +births shall be transmitted to the minister of the said +district.</p> + +<p><span class="sidenote">Regulations +concerning +marriage.</span>21. And whereas a state of matrimony, +and the government of a family, is a principal +means of forming men to a fitness for freedom, +and to become good citizens: Be it enacted, that all +negro men and women, above eighteen years of age +for the man and sixteen for the woman, who have +cohabited together for twelve months or upwards, or +shall cohabit for the same time, and have a child or +children, shall be deemed to all intents and purposes +to be married, and either of the parties is authorized +to require of the ministers of the district to be married +in the face of the church.</p> + +<p><span class="sidenote">Concerning +the same.</span>22. And be it enacted, that, from and after +the —— of ——, all negro men in +an healthy condition, and so reported to be, in case +the same is denied, by a surgeon and by an inspector +of negroes, and being twenty-one years old, or upwards, +until fifty, and not being before married, shall, +on requisition of the inspectors, be provided by their +masters or overseers with a woman not having children +living, and not exceeding the age of the man, +nor, in any case, exceeding the age of twenty-five +years; and such persons shall be married publicly in +the face of the church.</p> + +<p><span class="sidenote">Concerning +the same.</span>23. And be it enacted, that, if any negro +shall refuse a competent marriage tendered +to him, and shall not demand another specifically, +such as it may be in his master's power to provide,<a name="Page_285" id="Page_285" title="285" class="pagenum"></a> +the master or overseer shall be authorized to constrain +him by an increase of work or a lessening of allowance.</p> + + +<p><span class="sidenote">Adultery, +&c., how +to be punished.</span>24. And be it enacted, that the minister +in each district shall have, with the assent +of the inspector, full power and authority +to punish all acts of adultery, unlawful concubinage, +and fornication, amongst negroes, on hearing and a +summary process, by ordering a number of blows, +not exceeding ——, for each offence; and if any +white person shall be proved, on information in the +supreme court, to be exhibited by the protector of +negroes, to have committed adultery with any negro +woman, or to have corrupted any negro woman under +sixteen years of age he shall be fined in the sum of ——, +and shall be forever disabled from serving +the office of overseer of negroes, or being attorney to +any plantation.</p> + +<p><span class="sidenote">Concerning +marriage.</span>25. And be it enacted, that no slaves +shall be compelled to do any work for their +masters for [three] days after their marriage.</p> + + + +<p><span class="sidenote">Concerning +pregnant +women.</span>26. And be it enacted, that no woman +shall be obliged to field-work, or any other +laborious work, for one month before her delivery, or +for six weeks afterwards.</p> + + + +<p><span class="sidenote">Separation +of husband +and wife, +and children, +to be avoided.</span>27. And be it enacted, that no husband +and wife shall be sold separately, if originally +belonging to the same master; nor shall +any children under sixteen be sold separately +from their parents, or one parent, if one be +living.</p> + + + +<p><span class="sidenote">Concerning +the same.</span>28. And be it enacted, that, if an husband +and wife, which before their intermarriage +belonged to different owners, shall be sold, they shall<a name="Page_286" id="Page_286" title="286" class="pagenum"></a> +not be sold at such a distance as to prevent mutual +help and cohabitation; and of this distance the minister +shall judge, and his certificate of the inconvenient +distance shall be valid, so as to make such sale unlawful, +and to render the same null and void.</p> + + + +<p><span class="sidenote">Negroes not +to work on +Saturday +afternoon or +Sunday.</span>29. And be it enacted, that no negro +shall be compelled to work for his owner at +field-work, or any service relative to a plantation, +or to work at any handicraft trade, from eleven +o'clock on Saturday forenoon until the usual working +hour on Monday morning.</p> + + + +<p><span class="sidenote">Other cases +of exemption +from labor.</span>30. And whereas habits of industry and +sobriety, and the means of acquiring and +preserving property, are proper and reasonable preparatives +to freedom, and will secure against an +abuse of the same: Be it enacted, that every negro +man, who shall have served ten years, and is thirty +years of age, and is married, and has had two children +born of any marriage, shall obtain the whole of +Saturday for himself and his wife, and for his own +benefit, and after thirty-seven years of age, the whole +of Friday for himself and his wife: provided that in +both cases the minister of the district and the inspector +of negroes shall certify that they know nothing +against his peaceable, orderly, and industrious behavior.</p> + + + +<p><span class="sidenote">Huts and +land to be +appropriated.</span>31. And be it enacted, that the master +of every plantation shall provide the materials +of a good and substantial hut for each +married field negro; and if his plantation shall exceed —— acres, +he shall allot to the same a portion of +land not less than ——: and the said hut and land +shall remain and stand annexed to the said negro, +for his natural life, or during his bondage; but the<a name="Page_287" id="Page_287" title="287" class="pagenum"></a> +same shall not be alienated without the consent of +the owners.</p> + +<p><span class="sidenote">Property +of negroes +secured.</span>32. And be it enacted, that it shall not +be lawful for the owner of any negro, by +himself or any other, to take from him any land, +house, cattle, goods, or money, acquired by the said +negro, whether by purchase, donation, or testament, +whether the same has been derived from the owner +of the said negro, or any other.</p> + +<p>33. And be it enacted, that, if the said negro shall +die possessed of any lands, goods, or chattels, and +dies without leaving a wife or issue, it shall be lawful +for the said negro to devise or bequeath the same +by his last will; but in case the said negro shall die +intestate, and leave a wife and children, the same +shall be distributed amongst them, according to the +usage under the statute, commonly called the Statute +of Distributions; but if the said negro shall die +intestate without wife or children, then, and in that +case, his estate shall go to the fund provided for the +better execution of this act.</p> + +<p>34. And be it enacted, that no negro, who is married, +and hath resided upon any plantation for twelve +months, shall be sold, either privately or by the decree +of any court, but along with the plantation on +which he hath resided, unless he should himself request +to be separated therefrom.</p> + + + +<p><span class="sidenote">Of the +punishment +of negroes.</span>35. And be it enacted, that no blows or +stripes exceeding thirteen, shall be inflicted +for one offence upon any negro, without the order +of one of his Majesty's justices of peace.</p> + + + +<p><span class="sidenote">Of the same.</span>36. And it is enacted, that it shall be +lawful for the protector of negroes, as often as on +complaint and hearing he shall be of opinion that<a name="Page_288" id="Page_288" title="288" class="pagenum"></a> +any negro hath been cruelly and inhumanly treated, +or when it shall be made to appear to him that an +overseer hath any particular malice, to order, at the +desire of the suffering party, the said negro to be +sold to another master.</p> + +<p>37. And be it enacted, that, in all cases of injury +to member or life, the offences against a negro shall +be deemed and taken to all intents and purposes +as if the same were perpetrated against any of his +Majesty's subjects; and the protector of negroes, on +complaint, or if he shall receive credible information +thereof, shall cause an indictment to be presented +for the same; and in case of suspicion of any +murder of a negro, an inquest by the coroner, or +officer acting as such, shall, if practicable, be held +into the same.</p> + + + +<p><span class="sidenote">Of the manumission +of +negroes.</span>38. And in order to a gradual manumission +of slaves, as they shall seem fitted to +fill the offices of freemen, be it enacted, that every +negro slave, being thirty years of ago and upwards, +and who has had three children born to him in lawful +matrimony, and who hath received a certificate +from the minister of his district, or any other Christian +teacher, of his regularity in the duties of religion, +and of his orderly and good behavior, may purchase, +at rates to be fixed by two justices of peace, +the freedom of himself, or his wife or children, or +of any of them separately, valuing the wife and children, +if purchased into liberty by the father of the +family, at half only of their marketable values: provided +that the said father shall bind himself in a +penalty of —— for the good behavior of his children.</p> + + + +<p><span class="sidenote">Of the same.</span>39. And be it enacted, that it shall be<a name="Page_289" id="Page_289" title="289" class="pagenum"></a> +lawful for the protector of negroes to purchase the +freedom of any negro who shall appear to him to +excel in any mechanical art, or other knowledge or +practice deemed liberal, and the value shall be settled +by a jury.</p> + + + +<p><span class="sidenote">Free +negroes +how to be +punished.</span>40. And be it enacted, that the protector +of negroes shall be and is authorized and +required to act as a magistrate for the coercion +of all idle, disobedient, or disorderly free negroes, +and he shall by office prosecute them for the +offences of idleness, drunkenness, quarrelling, gaming, +or vagrancy, in the supreme court, or cause +them to be prosecuted before one justice of peace, +as the case may require.</p> + +<p><span class="sidenote">Of the same.</span>41. And be it enacted, that, if any free +negro hath been twice convicted for any of the said +misdemeanors, and is judged by the said protector +of negroes, calling to his assistance two justices of +the peace, to be incorrigibly idle, dissolute, and vicious, +it shall be lawful, by the order of the said +protector and two justices of peace, to sell the said +free negro into slavery: the purchase-money to be +paid to the person so remanded into servitude, or +kept in hand by the protector and governor for the +benefit of his family.</p> + + + +<p><span class="sidenote">Governor to +receive and +transmit annual +reports.</span>42. And be it enacted, that the governor +in each colony shall be assistant to the +execution of this act, and shall receive the +reports of the protector, and such other accounts as +he shall judge material, relative thereto, and shall +transmit the same annually to one of his Majesty's +principal secretaries of state.<a name="Page_290" id="Page_290" title="290" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p><a name="Page_291" id="Page_291" title="291" class="pagenum"></a> +<a name="CHAIRMAN_OF_THE_BUCKINGHAMSHIRE" id="CHAIRMAN_OF_THE_BUCKINGHAMSHIRE" /></p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><span style="font-size: 60%;">A</span><br /> +<br /> +LETTER<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 60%;">TO</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%;">THE CHAIRMAN OF THE BUCKINGHAMSHIRE +MEETING,</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 60%;">HELD AT AYLESBURY, APRIL 13, 1780,</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 60%;">ON THE SUBJECT OF</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%;">PARLIAMENTARY REFORM.</span></h2> + +<p><a name="Page_292" id="Page_292" title="292" class="pagenum"></a></p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>NOTE.</h2> + +<div class="blockquote"><p>The meeting of the freeholders of the County of Buckingham, +which occasioned the following Letter, was called for the +purpose of taking into consideration a petition to Parliament for +shortening the duration of Parliaments, and for a more equal +representation of the people in the House of Commons.</p></div> +<p><br /></p> + +<p><a name="Page_293" id="Page_293" title="293" class="pagenum"></a></p> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> +<h2>LETTER</h2> + +<p>Sir,—Having heard yesterday, by mere accident, +that there is an intention of laying before the +county meeting <i>new matter, which is not contained in +our petition</i>, and the consideration of which had been +deferred to a fitter time by a majority of our committee +in London, permit me to take this method of submitting +to you my reasons for thinking, with our +committee, that nothing ought to be hastily deter +mined upon the subject.</p> + +<p>Our petition arose naturally from distresses which +we <i>felt</i>; and the requests which we made were in +effect nothing more than that such things should be +done in Parliament as it was evidently the duty of +Parliament to do. But the affair which will be proposed +to you by a person of rank and ability is an +alteration in the constitution of Parliament itself. It +is impossible for you to have a subject before you of +more importance, and that requires a more cool and +more mature consideration, both on its own account, +and for the credit of our sobriety of mind, who are +to resolve upon it.</p> + +<p>The county will in some way or other be called +upon to declare it your opinion, that the House of +Commons is not sufficiently numerous, and that the +elections are not sufficiently frequent,—that an hundred +new knights of the shire ought to be added, and +that we are to have a new election once in three<a name="Page_294" id="Page_294" title="294" class="pagenum"></a> +years for certain, and as much oftener as the king +pleases. Such will be the state of things, if the proposition +made shall take effect.</p> + +<p>All this may be proper. But, as an honest man, I +cannot possibly give my rote for it, until I have considered +it more fully. I will not deny that our Constitution +may have faults, and that those faults, when +found, ought to be corrected; but, on the whole, +that Constitution has been our own pride, and an +object of admiration to all other nations. It is not +everything which appears at first view to be faulty, +in such a complicated plan, that is to be determined +to be so in reality. To enable us to correct the Constitution, +the whole Constitution must be viewed together; +and it must be compared with the actual +state of the people, and the circumstances of the +time. For that which taken singly and by itself may +appear to be wrong, when considered with relation +to other things, may be perfectly right,—or at least +such as ought to be patiently endured, as the means +of preventing something that is worse. So far with +regard to what at first view may appear a <i>distemper</i> in +the Constitution. As to the <i>remedy</i> of that distemper +an equal caution ought to be used; because this latter +consideration is not single and separate, no more +than the former. There are many things in reformation +which would be proper to be done, if other things +can be done along with them, but which, if they +cannot be so accompanied, ought not to be done at +all. I therefore wish, when any new matter of this +deep nature is proposed to me, to have the whole +scheme distinctly in my view, and full time to consider +of it. Please God, I will walk with caution, whenever +I am not able clearly to see my way before me.<a name="Page_295" id="Page_295" title="295" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>I am now growing old. I have from my very early +youth been conversant in reading and thinking upon +the subject of our laws and Constitution, as well as +upon those of other times and other countries; I +have been for fifteen years a very laborious member +of Parliament, and in that time have had great opportunities +of seeing with my own eyes the working of +the machine of our government, and remarking where +it went smoothly and did its business, and where it +checked in its movements, or where it damaged its +work; I have also had and used the opportunities of +conversing with men of the greatest wisdom and fullest +experience in those matters; and I do declare to +you most solemnly and most truly, that, on the result +of all this reading, thinking, experience, and communication, +I am not able to come to an immediate resolution +in favor of a change of the groundwork of our +Constitution, and in particular, that, in the present +state of the country, in the present state of our representation, +in the present state of our rights and modes +of electing, in the present state of the several prevalent +interests, in the present state of the affairs and +manners of this country, the addition of an hundred +knights of the shire, and hurrying election on election, +will be things advantageous to liberty or good +government.</p> + +<p>This is the present condition of my mind; and +this is my apology for not going as fast as others may +choose to go in this business. I do not by any means +reject the propositions; much less do I condemn the +gentlemen who, with equal good intentions, with +much better abilities, and with infinitely greater personal +weight and consideration than mine, are of +opinion that this matter ought to be decided upon +instantly.<a name="Page_296" id="Page_296" title="296" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>I most heartily wish that the deliberate sense of +the kingdom on this great subject should be known. +When it is known, it <i>must</i> be prevalent. It would +be dreadful indeed, if there was any power in the +nation capable of resisting its unanimous desire, or +even the desire of any very great and decided majority +of the people. The people may be deceived in their +choice of an object; but I can scarcely conceive any +choice they can make to be so very mischievous as +the existence of any human force capable of resisting +it. It will certainly be the duty of every man, in the +situation to which God has called him, to give his +best opinion and advice upon the matter: it will <i>not</i> +be his duty, let him think what he will, to use any +violent or any fraudulent means of counteracting the +general wish, or even of employing the legal and +constructive organ of expressing the people's sense +against the sense which they do actually entertain.</p> + +<p>In order that the real sense of the people should be +known upon so great an affair as this, it is of absolute +necessity that timely notice should be given,—that +the matter should be prepared in open committees, +from a choice into which no class or description of +men is to be excluded,—and the subsequent county +meetings should be as full and as well attended as +possible. Without these precautions, the true sense +of the people will ever be uncertain. Sure I am, +that no precipitate resolution on a great change in +the fundamental constitution of any country can ever +be called the real sense of the people.</p> + +<p>I trust it will not be taken amiss, if, as an inhabitant +and freeholder of this county, (one, indeed, +among the most inconsiderable,) I assert my right of +dissenting (as I do dissent fully and directly) from<a name="Page_297" id="Page_297" title="297" class="pagenum"></a> +any resolution whatsoever on the subject of an alteration +in the representation and election of the kingdom +<i>at this time</i>. By preserving this light, and exercising +it with temper and moderation, I trust I +cannot offend the noble proposer, for whom no man +professes or feels more respect and regard than I do. +A want of concurrence in <i>everything</i> which <i>can</i> be +proposed will in no sort weaken the energy or distract +the efforts of men of upright intentions upon +those points in which they are agreed. Assemblies +that are met, and with a resolution to be all of a +mind, are assemblies that can have no opinion at all +of their own. The first proposer of any measure +must be their master. I do not know that an amicable +variety of sentiment, conducted with mutual +good-will, has any sort of resemblance to discord, or +that it can give any advantage whatsoever to the enemies +of our common cause. On the contrary, a +forced and fictitious agreement (which every universal +agreement must be) is not becoming the cause of +freedom. If, however, any evil should arise from it, +(which I confess I do not foresee,) I am happy that +those who have brought forward new and arduous +matter, when very great doubts and some diversity +of opinion must be foreknown, are of authority and +weight enough to stand against the consequences.</p> + +<p>I humbly lay these my sentiments before the county. +They are not taken up to serve any interests of +my own, or to be subservient to the interests of any +man or set of men under heaven. I could wish to +be able to attend our meeting, or that I had time to +reason this matter more fully by letter; but I am +detained here upon our business: what you have already +put upon us is as much as we can do. If we<a name="Page_298" id="Page_298" title="298" class="pagenum"></a> +are prevented from going through it with any effect, +I fear it will be in part owing not more to the resistance +of the enemies of our cause than to our imposing +on ourselves such tasks as no human faculties, +employed as we are, can be equal to. Our worthy +members have shown distinguished ability and zeal +in support of our petition. I am just going down to +a bill brought in to frustrate a capital part of your +desires. The minister is preparing to transfer the +cognizance of the public accounts from those whom +you and the Constitution have chosen to control them, +to unknown persons, creatures of his own. For so +much he annihilates Parliament.</p> + +<p>I have the honor, &c.</p> + +<p>EDMUND BURKE.</p> + +<p>CHARLES STREET, 12th April, 1780.</p> + +<p><a name="Page_299" id="Page_299" title="299" class="pagenum"></a> +<a name="FRAGMENTS_OF_A_TRACT" id="FRAGMENTS_OF_A_TRACT" /></p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<h2>FRAGMENTS OF A TRACT<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 60%;">RELATIVE TO</span><br /> +<br /> +THE LAWS AGAINST POPERY<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%;">IN IRELAND.</span></h2> +<p><a name="Page_300" id="Page_300" title="300" class="pagenum"></a></p> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<h2>NOTE.</h2> + +<div class="blockquote"><p>The condition of the Roman Catholics in Ireland appears to +lave engaged the attention of Mr. Burke at a very early period +of his political life. It was probably soon after the year 1765 +that he formed the plan of a work upon that subject, the fragments +of which are now given to the public. No title is prefixed +to it in the original manuscript; and the <i>Plan</i>, which it +has been thought proper to insert here, was evidently designed +merely for the convenience of the author. Of the first chapter +some unconnected fragments only, too imperfect for publication, +have been found. Of the second there is a considerable portion, +perhaps nearly the whole; but the copy from which it is printed +is evidently a first rough draught. The third chapter, as far as +it goes, is taken from a fair, corrected copy; but the end of the +second part of the first head is left unfinished, and the discussion +of the second and third heads was either never entered upon or +the manuscript containing it has unfortunately been lost. What +follows the third chapter appears to have been designed for the +beginning of the fourth, and is evidently the first rough draught; +and to this we have added a fragment which appears to have +been a part either of this or the first chapter.</p> + +<p>In the volume with which it is intended to close this posthumous +publication of Mr. Burke's Works, we shall have occasion +to enter into a more particular account of the part which he +took in the discussion of this great political question. At present +it may suffice to say, that the Letter to Mr. Smith, the Second +Letter to Sir Hercules Langrishe, and the Letter to his Son, +which here follow in order the Fragment on the Popery Laws, +are the only writings upon this subject found amongst his papers +in a state fit to appear in this stage of the publication. What +remain are some small fragments of the Tract, and a few letters +containing no new matter of importance.<a name="Page_301" id="Page_301" title="301" class="pagenum"></a></p></div> +<p><br /></p> + + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> +<h2>TRACT<br /> +<br /> +ON THE POPERY LAWS</h2> + + +<h3>THE PLAN.</h3> + + +<p>I propose, first, to make an Introduction, in order +to show the propriety of a closer inspection +into the affairs of Ireland; and this takes up the first +chapter, which is to be spent in this introductory +matter, and in stating the Popery laws in general, as +one leading cause of the imbecility of the country.</p> + +<p>CH. II. states particularly the laws themselves, in +a plain and popular manner.</p> + +<p>CH. III. begins the remarks upon them, under the +heads of, 1st, The object,—which is a numerous people; +2ndly, Their means,—a restraint on property; +3rdly, Their instruments of execution,—corrupted +morals, which affect the national prosperity.</p> + +<p>CH. IV. The impolicy of those laws, as they affect +the national security.</p> + +<p>CH. V. Reasons by which the laws are supported, +and answers to them.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> +<h3>CHAPTER II.</h3> + + +<p>In order to lay this matter with full satisfaction +before the reader, I shall collect into one point of +view, and state as shortly and as clearly as I am +able, the purport of these laws, according to the<a name="Page_302" id="Page_302" title="302" class="pagenum"></a> +objects which they affect, without making at present +any further observation upon them, but just what +shall be necessary to render the drift; and intention of +the legislature and the tendency and operation of the +laws the more distinct and evident.</p> + +<p>I shall begin with those which relate to the possession +and inheritance of landed property in Popish +hands. The first operation of those acts upon this +object was wholly to change the course of descent by +the Common Law, to take away the right of primogeniture, +and, in lieu thereof, to substitute and establish +a new species of Statute Gavelkind. By this +law, on the death of a Papist possessed of an estate +in fee simple or in fee tail, the land is to be divided +by equal portions between all the male children; and +those portions are likewise to be parcelled out, share +and share alike, amongst the descendants of each son, +and so to proceed in a similar distribution <i>ad infinitum</i>. +From this regulation it was proposed that some +important consequences should follow. First, by taking +away the right of primogeniture, perhaps in the +very first generation, certainly in the second, the +families of Papists, however respectable, and their fortunes, +however considerable, would be wholly dissipated, +and reduced to obscurity and indigence, without +any possibility that they should repair them by their +industry or abilities,—being, as we shall see anon, +disabled from every species of permanent acquisition. +Secondly, by this law the right of testamentation is +taken away, which the inferior tenures had always +enjoyed, and all tenures from the 27th Hen. VIII; +Thirdly, the right of settlement was taken away, that +no such persons should, from the moment the act +passed, be enabled to advance themselves in fortune<a name="Page_303" id="Page_303" title="303" class="pagenum"></a> +or connection by marriage, being disabled from making +any disposition, in consideration of such marriage, +but what the law had previously regulated: the reputable +establishment of the eldest son, as representative +of the family, or to settle a jointure, being commonly +the great object in such settlements, which was the +very power which the law had absolutely taken away.</p> + +<p>The operation of this law, however certain, might +be too slow. The present possessors might happen to +be long-lived. The legislature knew the natural impatience +of expectants, and upon this principle they +gave encouragement to children to anticipate the +inheritance. For it is provided, that the eldest son +of any Papist shall, immediately on his conformity, +change entirely the nature and properties of his father's +legal estate: if he before held in fee simple, +or, in other words, had the entire and absolute dominion +over the land, he is reduced to an estate for +his life only, with all the consequences of the natural +debility of that estate, by which he becomes disqualified +to sell, mortgage, charge, (except for his life,) +or in any wise to do any act by which he may raise +money for relief in his most urgent necessities. The +eldest son, so conforming, immediately acquires, and +in the lifetime of his father, the permanent part, what +our law calls the reversion and inheritance of the +estate; and he discharges it by retrospect, and annuls +every sort of voluntary settlement made by the +father ever so long before his conversion. This he +may sell or dispose of immediately, and alienate it +from the family forever.</p> + +<p>Having thus reduced his father's estate, he may +also bring his father into the Court of Chancery, +where he may compel him to swear to the value of<a name="Page_304" id="Page_304" title="304" class="pagenum"></a> +his estate, and to allow him out of that possession +(which had been before reduced to an estate for life) +such an immediate annual allowance as the Lord +Chancellor or Lord Keeper shall judge suitable to his +ago and quality.</p> + +<p>This indulgence is not confined to the eldest son. +The other children likewise, by conformity, may acquire +the same privileges, and in the same manner +force from their father an immediate and independent +maintenance. It is very well worth remarking, +that the statutes have avoided to fix any determinate +age for these emancipating conversions; so that the +children, at any age, however incapable of choice in +other respects, however immature or even infantile, +are yet considered sufficiently capable to disinherit +their parents, and totally to subtract themselves from +their direction and control, either at their own option, +or by the instigation of others. By this law the tenure +and value of a Roman Catholic in his real property +is not only rendered extremely limited and altogether +precarious, but the paternal power is in all +such families so enervated that it may well be considered +as entirely taken away; even the principle upon +which it is founded seems to be directly reversed. +However, the legislature feared that enough was not +yet done upon this head. The Roman Catholic parent, +by selling his real estate, might in some sort preserve +the dominion over his substance and his family, +and thereby evade the operation of these laws, which +intended to take away both. Besides, frequent revolutions +and many conversions had so broken the +landed property of Papists in that kingdom, that it +was apprehended that this law could have in a short +time but a few objects upon which it would be capable +of operating.<a name="Page_305" id="Page_305" title="305" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>To obviate these inconveniences another law was +made, by which the dominion of children over their +parents was extended universally throughout the +whole Popish part of the nation, and every child of +every Popish parent was encouraged to come into +what is called a court of equity, to prefer a bill +against his father, and compel him to confess, upon +oath, the quantity and value of his substance, personal +as well as real, of what nature soever, or howsoever +it might be employed; upon which discovery, +the court is empowered to seize upon and allocate, for +the immediate maintenance of such child or children, +any sum not exceeding a third of the whole fortune: +and as to their future establishment on the death of +the father, no limits are assigned; the Chancery may, +if it thinks fit, take the whole property, personal as +well as real, money, stock in trade, &c, out of the +power of the possessor, and secure it in any manner +they judge expedient for that purpose; for the act +has not assigned any sort of limit with regard to the +quantity which is to be charged, or given any direction +concerning the means of charging and securing +it: a law which supersedes all observation.</p> + +<p>But the law is still more extensive in its provision. +Because there was a possibility that the parent, +though sworn, might by false representations evade +the discovery of the ultimate value of his estate, a +new bill may be at any time brought, by one, any, or +all of the children, for a further discovery; his effects +are to undergo a fresh scrutiny, and a now distribution +is to be made in consequence of it. So that the +parent has no security against perpetual inquietude, +and the reiteration of Chancery suits, but by (what +is somewhat difficult for human nature to comply<a name="Page_306" id="Page_306" title="306" class="pagenum"></a> +with) fully, and without reserve, abandoning his +whole property to the discretion of the court, to be +disposed of in favor of such children.</p> + +<p>But is this enough, and has the parent purchased +his repose by such a surrender? Very far from it. +The law expressly, and very carefully, provides that he +shall not: before he can be secure from the persecution +of his children, it requires another and a much +more extraordinary condition: the children are authorized, +if they can find that their parent has by +his industry, or otherwise, increased the value of his +property since their first bill, to bring another, compelling +a new account of the value of his estate, in +order to a new distribution proportioned to the value +of the estate at the time of the new bill preferred. +They may bring such bills, <i>toties quoties</i>, upon every +improvement of his fortune, without any sort of limitation +of time, or regard to the frequency of such +bills, or to the quantity of the increase of the estate, +which shall justify the bringing them. This act expressly +provides that he shall have no respite from +the persecution of his children, but by totally abandoning +all thoughts of improvement and acquisition.</p> + +<p>This is going a great way, surely: but the laws in +question have gone much further. Not satisfied with +calling upon children to revolt against their parents, +and to possess themselves of their substance, there +are cases where the withdrawing of the child from +his father's obedience is not left to the option of the +child himself: for, if the wife of a Roman Catholic +should choose to change her religion, from that moment +she deprives her husband of all management +and direction of his children, and even of all the tender +satisfaction which a parent can feel in their society,<a name="Page_307" id="Page_307" title="307" class="pagenum"></a> +and which is the only indemnification he can +have for all his cares and sorrows; and they are to +be torn forever, at the earliest age, from his house +and family: for the Lord Chancellor is not only authorized, +but he is strongly required, to take away +all his children from such Popish parent, to appoint +where, in what manner, and by whom they are to be +educated; and the father is compelled to pay, not for +the ransom, but for the deprivation of his children, +and to furnish such a sum as the Chancellor thinks +proper to appoint for their education to the age of +eighteen years. The case is the same, if the husband +should be the conformist; though how the law is to +operate in this case I do not see: for the act expressly +says, that the child shall be taken from such Popish +parent; and whilst such husband and wife cohabit, +it will be impossible to put it into execution without +taking the child from one as well as from the other; +and then the effect of the law will be, that, if either +husband or wife becomes Protestant, both are to be +deprived of their children.</p> + +<p>The paternal power thus being wholly abrogated, it +is evident that by the last regulation the power of an +husband over his wife is also considerably impaired; +because, if it be in her power, whenever she pleases, +to subtract the children from his protection and obedience, +she herself by that hold inevitably acquires a +power and superiority over her husband.</p> + +<p>But she is not left dependent upon this oblique +influence: for, if in any marriage settlement the husband +has reserved to him a power of making a jointure, +and he dies without settling any, her conformity +executes his powers, and executes them in as large +extent as the Chancellor thinks fit. The husband is<a name="Page_308" id="Page_308" title="308" class="pagenum"></a> +deprived of that coercive power over his wife which +he had in his hands by the use he might make of the +discretionary power reserved in the settlement.</p> + +<p>But if no such power had been reserved, and no +such settlement existed, yet, if the husband dies, leaving +his conforming wife without a filed provision by +some settlement on his real estate, his wife may apply +to Chancery, where she shall be allotted a portion +from his leases, and other personal estate, not exceeding +one third of his whole clear substance. The laws +in this instance, as well as in the former, have presumed +that the husband has omitted to make all the +provision which he might have done, for no other +reason than that of her religion. If, therefore, she +chooses to balance any domestic misdemeanors to +her husband by the public merit of conformity to +the Protestant religion, the law will suffer no plea +of such misdemeanors to be urged on the husband's +part, nor proof of that kind to be entered into. She +acquires a provision totally independent of his favor, +and deprives him of that source of domestic authority +which the Common Law had left to him, that of rewarding +or punishing, by a voluntary distribution of +his effects, what in his opinion was the good or ill +behavior of his wife.</p> + +<p>Thus the laws stand with regard to the property +already acquired, to its mode of descent, and to family +powers. Now as to the new acquisition of real +property, and both to the acquisition and security of +personal, the law stands thus:—</p> + +<p>All persons of that persuasion are disabled from +taking or purchasing, directly or by a trust, any +lands, any mortgage upon land, any rents or profits +from land, any lease, interest, or term of any land,<a name="Page_309" id="Page_309" title="309" class="pagenum"></a> +any annuity for life or lives or years, or any estate +whatsoever, chargeable upon, or which may in any +manner affect, any lands.</p> + +<p>One exception, and one only, is admitted by the +statutes to the universality of this exclusion, viz., a +lease for a term not exceeding thirty-one years. But +even this privilege is charged with a prior qualification. +This remnant of a right is doubly curtailed: +1st, that on such a short lease a rent not less than +two thirds of the full improved yearly value, at the +time of the making it, shall be reserved during the +whole continuance of the term; and, 2ndly, it does +not extend to the whole kingdom. This lease must +also be in possession, and not in reversion. If any +lease is made, exceeding either in duration or value, +and in the smallest degree, the above limits, the whole +interest is forfeited, and vested <i>ipso facto</i> in the first +Protestant discoverer or informer. This discoverer, +thus invested with the property, is enabled to sue for +it as his own right. The courts of law are not alone +open to him; he may (and this is the usual method) +enter into either of the courts of equity, and call upon +the parties, and those whom he suspects to be their +trustees, upon oath, and under the penalties of perjury, +to discover against themselves the exact nature +and value of their estates in every particular, in order +to induce their forfeiture on the discovery. In such +suits the informer is not liable to those delays which +the ordinary procedure of those courts throws into +the way of the justest claimant; nor has the Papist +the indulgence which he [it?] allows to the most +fraudulent defendant, that of plea and demurrer; but +the defendant is obliged to answer the whole directly +upon oath. The rule of <i>favores ampliandi,</i> &c., is reversed<a name="Page_310" id="Page_310" title="310" class="pagenum"></a> +by this act, lest any favor should be shown, or +the force and operation of the law in any part of its +progress be enervated. All issues to be tried on this +act are to be tried by none but known Protestants.</p> + +<p>It is here necessary to state as a part of this law +what has been for some time generally understood as +a certain consequence of it. The act had expressly +provided that a Papist could possess no sort of estate +which might affect land (except as before excepted). +On this a difficulty did, not unnaturally, arise. It is +generally known, a judgment being obtained or acknowledged +for any debt, since the statute of Westm. +2, 13 Ed. I. c. 18, one half of the debtor's land is to +be delivered unto the creditor until the obligation is +satisfied, under a writ called <i>Elegit</i>, and this writ has +been ever since the ordinary assurance of the land, +and the great foundation of general credit in the +nation. Although the species of holding under this +writ is not specified in the statute, the received opinion, +though not juridically delivered, has been, that, +if they attempt to avail themselves of that security, +because it may create an estate, however precarious, +in land, their whole debt or charge is forfeited, and +becomes the property of the Protestant informer. +Thus you observe, first, that by the express words of +the law all possibility of acquiring any species of valuable +property, in any sort connected with land, is +taken away; and, secondly, by the construction all security +for money is also cut off. No security is left, +except what is merely personal, and which, therefore, +most people who lend money would, I believe, consider +as none at all.</p> + +<p>Under this head of the acquisition of property, the +law meets them in every road of industry, and in its<a name="Page_311" id="Page_311" title="311" class="pagenum"></a> +direct and consequential provisions throws almost all +sorts of obstacles in their way. For they are not only +excluded from all offices in Church and State, which, +though a just and necessary provision, is yet no small +restraint in the acquisition, but they are interdicted +from the army, and the law, in all its branches. +This point is carried to so scrupulous a severity, +that chamber practice, and even private conveyancing, +the most voluntary agency, are prohibited to them under +the severest penalties and the most rigid modes +of inquisition. They have gone beyond even this: +for every barrister, six clerk, attorney, or solicitor, is +obliged to take a solemn oath not to employ persons +of that persuasion,—no, not as hackney clerks, at +the miserable salary of seven shillings a week. No +tradesman of that persuasion is capable by any service +or settlement to obtain his freedom in any town +corporate; so that they trade and work in their own +native towns as aliens, paying, as such, quarterage, +and other charges and impositions. They are expressly +forbidden, in whatever employment, to take more +than two apprentices, except in the linen manufacture +only.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>In every state, next to the care of the life and +properties of the subject, the education of their youth +has been a subject of attention. In the Irish laws +this point has not been neglected. Those who are +acquainted with the constitution of our universities +need not be informed that none but those who conform +to the Established Church can be at all admitted +to study there, and that none can obtain degrees in +them who do not previously take all the tests, oaths, +and declarations. Lest they should be enabled to supply<a name="Page_312" id="Page_312" title="312" class="pagenum"></a> +this defect by private academies and schools of +their own, the law has armed itself with all its terrors +against such a practice. Popish schoolmasters of every +species are proscribed by those acts, and it is +made felony to teach even in a private family. So +that Papists are entirely excluded from an education +in any of our authorized establishments for learning +at home. In order to shut up every avenue to instruction, +the act of King William in Ireland has +added to this restraint by precluding them from all +foreign education.</p> + +<p>This act is worthy of attention on account of the +singularity of some of its provisions. Being sent for +education to any Popish school or college abroad, +upon conviction, incurs (if the party sent has any +estate of inheritance) a kind of unalterable and perpetual +outlawry. The tender and incapable age of +such a person, his natural subjection to the will of +others, his necessary, unavoidable ignorance of the +laws, stands for nothing in his favor. He is disabled +to sue in law or equity; to be guardian, executor, or +administrator; he is rendered incapable of any legacy +or deed of gift; he forfeits all his goods and chattels +forever; and he forfeits for his life all his lands, +hereditaments, offices, and estate of freehold, and all +trusts, powers, or interests therein. All persons concerned +in sending them or maintaining them abroad, +by the least assistance of money or otherwise, are involved +in the same disabilities, and subjected to the +same penalties.</p> + +<p>The mode of conviction is as extraordinary as the +penal sanctions of this act. A justice of peace, upon +information that any child is sent away, may require +to be brought before him all persons charged or even<a name="Page_313" id="Page_313" title="313" class="pagenum"></a> +suspected of sending or assisting, and examine them +and other persons on oath concerning the fact. If +on this examination he finds it <i>probable</i> that the party +was sent contrary to this act, he is then, to bind over +the parties and witnesses in any sum he thinks fit, +but not less than two hundred pounds, to appear and +take their trial at the next quarter sessions. Here +the justices are to reexamine evidence, until they +arrive, as before, to what shall appear to them a +probability. For the rest they resort to the accused: +if they can prove that any person, or any money, or +any bill of exchange, has been sent abroad by the +party accused, they throw the proof upon him to +show for what innocent purposes it was sent; and on +failure of such proof, he is subjected to all the above-mentioned +penalties. Half the forfeiture is given to +the crown; the other half goes to the informer.</p> + +<p>It ought here to be remarked, that this mode of +conviction not only concludes the party has failed in +his expurgatory proof, but it is sufficient also to subject +to the penalties and incapacities of the law the +infant upon whose account the person has been so +convicted. It must be confessed that the law has not +left him without some species of remedy in this case +apparently of much hardship, where one man is convicted +upon evidence given against another, if he has +the good fortune to live; for, within a twelvemonth +after his return, or his age of twenty-one, he has a, +right to call for a new trial, in which he also is to undertake +the negative proof, and to show by sufficient +evidence that he has not been sent abroad against the +intention of the act. If he succeeds in this difficult +exculpation, and demonstrates his innocence to the +satisfaction of the court, he forfeits all his goods and<a name="Page_314" id="Page_314" title="314" class="pagenum"></a> +chattels, and all the profits of his lands incurred and +received before such acquittal; but he is freed from +all other forfeitures, and from all subsequent incapacities. +There is also another method allowed by +the law in favor of persons under such unfortunate +circumstances, as in the former case for their innocence, +in this upon account of their expiation: if within +six months after their return, with the punctilious +observation of many ceremonies, they conform to the +Established Church, and take all the oaths and subscriptions, +the legislature, in consideration of the +incapable age in which they were sent abroad, of the +merit of their early conformity, and to encourage +conversions, only confiscates, as in the former case, +the whole personal estate, and the profits of the real; +in all other respects, restoring and rehabilitating the +party.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>So far as to property and education. There remain +some other heads upon which the acts have changed +the course of the Common Law; and first, with regard +to the right of self-defence, which consists in the +use of arms. This, though one of the rights by the +law of Nature, yet is so capable of abuses that it may +not be unwise to make some regulations concerning +them; and many wise nations have thought proper to +set several restrictions on this right, especially temporary +ones, with regard to suspected persons, and on +occasion of some imminent danger to the public +from foreign invasion or domestic commotions.</p> + +<p>But provisions in time of trouble proper, and perhaps +necessary, may become in time of profound +peace a scheme of tyranny. The method which the +statute law of Ireland has taken upon this delicate<a name="Page_315" id="Page_315" title="315" class="pagenum"></a> +article is, to get rid of all difficulties at once by an +universal prohibition to all persons, at all times, and +under all circumstances, who are not Protestants, of +using or keeping any kind of weapons whatsoever. +In order to enforce this regulation, the whole spirit +of the Common Law is changed, very severe penalties +are enjoined, the largest powers are vested in the +lowest magistrates. Any two justices of peace, or +magistrates of a town, with or without information, +at their pleasure, by themselves or their warrant, are +empowered to enter and search the house of any +Papist, or even of any other person, whom they +suspect to keep such arms in trust for them. The +only limitation to the extent of this power is, that the +search is to be made between the rising and setting +of the sun: but even this qualification extends no +further than to the execution of the act in the open +country; for in all cities and their suburbs, in towns +corporate and market-towns, they may at their discretion, +and without information, break open houses +and institute such search at any hour of the day or +night. This, I say, they may do at their discretion; +and it seems a pretty ample power in the hands of +such magistrates. However, the matter does by no +means totally rest on their discretion. Besides the +discretionary and occasional search, the statute has +prescribed one that is general and periodical. It is +to be made annually, by the warrant of the justices at +their midsummer quarter sessions, by the high and +petty constables, or any others whom they may authorize, +and by all corporate magistrates, in all houses +of Papists, and every other where they suspect arms +for the use of such persons to be concealed, with the +same powers, in all respects, which attend the occasional<a name="Page_316" id="Page_316" title="316" class="pagenum"></a> +search. The whole of this regulation, concerning +both the general and particular search, seems to +have been made by a legislature which was not at all +extravagantly jealous of personal liberty. Not trusting, +however, to the activity of the magistrate acting +officially, the law has invited all voluntary informers +by considerable rewards, and even pressed involuntary +informers into this service by the dread of heavy +penalties. With regard to the latter method, two +justices of peace, or the magistrate of any corporation, +are empowered to summon before them any persons +whatsoever, to tender them an oath by which +they oblige them to discover all persons who have +any arms concealed contrary to law. Their refusal +or declining to appear, or, appearing, their refusal to +inform, subjects them to the severest penalties. If +peers or peeresses are summoned (for they may be +summoned by the bailiff of a corporation of six cottages) +to perform this honorable service, and refuse +to inform, the first offence is three hundred pounds +penalty; the second is <i>præmunire</i>,—that is to say, imprisonment +for life, and forfeiture of all their goods. +Persons of an inferior order are, for the first offence, +fined thirty pounds; for the second, they, too, are +subjected to <i>præmunire</i>. So far as to involuntary;—now +as to voluntary informers: the law entitles +them to half the penalty incurred by carrying or +keeping arms; for, on conviction of this offence, the +penalty upon persons, of whatever substance, is the +sum of fifty pounds and a year's imprisonment, which +cannot be remitted even by the crown.</p> + +<p>The only exception to this law is a license from the +Lord Lieutenant and Council to carry arms, which, +by its nature, is extremely limited, and I do not suppose<a name="Page_317" id="Page_317" title="317" class="pagenum"></a> +that there are six persons now in the kingdom +who have been fortunate enough to obtain it.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>There remains, after this system concerning property +and defence, to say something concerning the +exercise of religion, winch is carried on in all persuasions, +but especially in the Romish, by persons +appointed for that purpose. The law of King William +and Queen Anne ordered all Popish parsons exercising +ecclesiastical jurisdiction, all orders of monks and +friars, and all priests, not then actually in parishes, +and to be registered, to be banished the kingdom; +and if they should return from exile, to be hanged, +drawn, and quartered. Twenty pounds reward is +given for apprehending them. Penalty on harboring +and concealing.</p> + +<p>As all the priests then in being and registered are +long since dead, and as these laws are made perpetual, +every Popish priest is liable to the law.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>The reader has now before him a tolerably complete +view of the Popery laws relative to property by descent +or acquisition, to education, to defence, and to +the free exercise of religion, which may be necessary +to enable him to form some judgment of the spirit of +the whole system, and of the subsequent reflections +that are to be made upon it.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h3>CHAPTER III.<br /> +<br /> +PART I.</h3> + +<p>The system which we have just reviewed, and the +manner in which religious influence on the public is<a name="Page_318" id="Page_318" title="318" class="pagenum"></a> +made to operate upon the laws concerning property +in Ireland, is in its nature very singular, and differs, +I apprehend, essentially, and perhaps to its disadvantage, +from any scheme of religious persecution now +existing in any other country in Europe, or which +has prevailed in any time or nation with which history +has made us acquainted. I believe it will not +be difficult to show that it is unjust, impolitic, and inefficacious; +that it has the most unhappy influence +on the prosperity, the morals, and the safety of that +country; that this influence is not accidental, but +has flowed as the necessary and direct consequence +of the laws themselves, first on account of the object +which they affect, and next by the quality of the +greatest part of the instruments they employ. Upon +all these points, first upon the general, and then on +the particular, this question will be considered with +as much order as can be followed in a matter of itself +as involved and intricate as it is important.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>The first and most capital consideration with regard +to this, as to every object, is the extent of it. And +here it is necessary to premise, this system of penalty +and incapacity has for its object no small sect or +obscure party, but a very numerous body of men,—a +body which comprehends at least two thirds of that +whole nation: it amounts to 2,800,000 souls, a number +sufficient for the materials constituent of a great +people. Now it is well worthy of a serious and +dispassionate examination, whether such a system, +respecting such an object, be in reality agreeable to +any sound principles of legislation or any authorized +definition of law; for if our reasons or practices differ +from the general informed sense of mankind, it is very +moderate to say that they are at least suspicious.<a name="Page_319" id="Page_319" title="319" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>This consideration of the magnitude of the object +ought to attend us through the whole inquiry: if it +does not always affect the reason, it is always decisive +on the importance of the question. It not only makes +in itself a more leading point, but complicates itself +with every other part of the matter, giving every +error, minute in itself, a character and significance +from its application. It is therefore not to be wondered +at, if we perpetually recur to it in the course +of this essay.</p> + +<p>In the making of a new law it is undoubtedly +the duty of the legislator to see that no injustice +be done even to an individual: for there is then +nothing to be unsettled, and the matter is under his +hands to mould it as he pleases; and if he finds it +untractable in the working, he may abandon it without +incurring any new inconvenience. But in the +question concerning the repeal of an old one, the +work is of more difficulty; because laws, like houses, +lean on one another, and the operation is delicate, +and should be necessary: the objection, in such a +case, ought not to arise from the natural infirmity +of human institutions, but from substantial faults +which contradict the nature and end of law itself,—faults +not arising from the imperfection, but from +the misapplication and abuse of our reason. As no +legislators can regard the <i>minima</i> of equity, a law +may in some instances be a just subject of censure +without being at all an object of repeal. But if its +transgressions against common right and, the ends +of just government should be considerable in their +nature and spreading in their effects, as this objection +goes to the root and principle of the law, it +renders it void in its obligatory quality on the mind,<a name="Page_320" id="Page_320" title="320" class="pagenum"></a> +and therefore determines it as the proper object of +abrogation and repeal, so far as regards its civil existence. +The objection here is, as we observed, by +no means on account of the imperfection of the law; +it is on account of its erroneous principle: for if this +be fundamentally wrong, the more perfect the law +is made, the worse it becomes. It cannot be said +to have the properties of genuine law, even in its +imperfections and defects. The true weakness and +opprobrium of our best general constitutions is, that +they cannot provide beneficially for every particular +case, and thus fill, adequately to their intentions, the +circle of universal justice. But where the principle +is faulty, the erroneous part of the law is the beneficial, +and justice only finds refuge in those holes +and corners which had escaped the sagacity and inquisition +of the legislator. The happiness or misery +of multitudes can never be a thing indifferent. A +law against the majority of the people is in substance +a law against the people itself; its extent determines +its invalidity; it even changes its character +as it enlarges its operation: it is not particular +injustice, but general oppression; and can no longer +be considered as a private hardship, which might +be borne, but spreads and grows up into the unfortunate +importance of a national calamity.</p> + +<p>Now as a law directed against the mass of the +nation has not the nature of a reasonable institution, +so neither has it the authority: for in all forms of +government the people is the true legislator; and +whether the immediate and instrumental cause of +the law be a single person or many, the remote and +efficient cause is the consent of the people, either +actual or implied; and such consent is absolutely<a name="Page_321" id="Page_321" title="321" class="pagenum"></a> +essential to its validity. To the solid establishment +of every law two things are essentially requisite: +first, a proper and sufficient human power to declare +and modify the matter of the law; and next, such a +fit and equitable constitution as they have a right +to declare and render binding. With regard to the +first requisite, the human authority, it is their judgment +they give up, not their right. The people, indeed, +are presumed to consent to whatever the legislature +ordains for their benefit; and they are to acquiesce +in it, though they do not clearly see into the +propriety of the means by which they are conducted +to that desirable end. This they owe as an act +of homage and just deference to a reason which the +necessity of government has made superior to their +own. But though the means, and indeed the nature, +of a public advantage may not always be evident +to the understanding of the subject, no one +is so gross and stupid as not to distinguish between +a benefit and an injury. No one can imagine, then, +an exclusion of a great body of men, not from favors, +privileges, and trusts, but from the common +advantages of society, can ever be a thing intended +for their good, or can ever be ratified by any implied +consent of theirs. If, therefore, at least an +implied human consent is necessary to the existence +of a law, such a constitution cannot in propriety be +a law at all.</p> + +<p>But if we could suppose that such a ratification +was made, not virtually, but actually, by the people, +not representatively, but even collectively, still it +would be null and void. They have no right to +make a law prejudicial to the whole community, +even though the delinquents in making such an act<a name="Page_322" id="Page_322" title="322" class="pagenum"></a> +should be themselves the chief sufferers by it; because +it would be-made against the principle of a +superior law, which it is not in the power of any +community, or of the whole race of man, to alter,—I +mean the will of Him who gave us our nature, and +in giving impressed an invariable law upon it. It +would be hard to point out any error more truly +subversive of all the order and beauty, of all the +peace and happiness of human society, than the position, +that any body of men have a right to make +what laws they please,—or that laws can derive any +authority from their institution merely, and independent +of the quality of the subject-matter. No +arguments of policy, reason of state, or preservation +of the constitution can be pleaded in favor of such +a practice. They may, indeed, impeach the frame +of that constitution, but can never touch this immovable +principle. This seems to be, indeed, the +doctrine which Hobbes broached in the last century, +and which was then so frequently and so ably refuted. +Cicero exclaims with the utmost indignation +and contempt against such a notion:<a name="FNanchor_22_22" id="FNanchor_22_22"></a><a href="#Footnote_22_22" class="fnanchor">[22]</a> he considers +it not only as unworthy of a philosopher, but of an illiterate +peasant; that of all things this was the most +truly absurd, to fancy that the rule of justice was to +be taken from the constitutions of commonwealths, +or that laws derived their authority from the statutes<a name="Page_323" id="Page_323" title="323" class="pagenum"></a> +of the people, the edicts of princes, or the decrees of +judges. If it be admitted that it is not the black-letter +and the king's arms that makes the law, we +are to look for it elsewhere.</p> + +<p>In reality there are two, and only two, foundations +of law; and they are both of them conditions without +which nothing can give it any force: I mean +equity and utility. With respect to the former, it +grows out of the great rule of equality, which is +grounded upon our common nature, and which Philo, +with propriety and beauty, calls the mother of +justice. All human laws are, properly speaking, +only declaratory; they may alter the mode and application, +but have no power over the substance of +original justice. The other foundation of law, which +is utility, must be understood, not of partial or limited, +but of general and public utility, connected in +the same manner with, and derived directly from, +our rational nature: for any other utility may be the +utility of a robber, but cannot be that of a citizen,—the +interest of the domestic enemy, and not that of a +member of the commonwealth. This present equality +can never be the foundation of statutes which create +an artificial difference between men, as the laws +before us do, in order to induce a consequential inequality +in the distribution of justice. Law is a mode +of human action respecting society, and must be +governed by the same rules of equity which govern +every private action; and so Tully considers it in his +Offices as the only utility agreeable to that nature: +"<i>Unum debet esse omnibus propositum, ut eadem sit +utilitas uniuscujusque et universorum; quam si ad se +quisque rapiat, dissolvetur omnis humana consortio</i>."</p> + +<p>If any proposition can be clear in itself, it is this:<a name="Page_324" id="Page_324" title="324" class="pagenum"></a> +that a law which shuts out from all secure and valuable +property the bulk of the people cannot be made +for the utility of the party so excluded. This, therefore, +is not the utility which Tully mentions. But +if it were true (as it is not) that the real interest of +any part of the community could be separated from +the happiness of the rest, still it would afford no just +foundation for a statute providing exclusively for that +interest at the expense of the other; because it would +be repugnant to the essence of law, which requires +that it be made as much as possible for the benefit +of the whole. If this principle be denied or evaded, +what ground have we left to reason on? We must at +once make a total change in all our ideas, and look +for a new definition of law. Where to find it I confess +myself at a loss. If we resort to the fountains +of jurisprudence, they will not supply us with any +that is for our purpose. "<i>Jus</i>" (says Paulus) "<i>pluribus +modis dicitur: uno modo, cum id, quod semper +æquum et bonum est, jus dicitur, ut est jus naturale"</i>;—this +sense of the word will not be thought, I imagine, +very applicable to our penal laws;—"<i>altero +modo, quod omnibus aut pluribus in unaquaque civitate +utile est, ut est jus civile</i>." Perhaps this latter will be +as insufficient, and would rather seem a censure and +condemnation of the Popery Acts than a definition +that includes them; and there is no other to be +found in the whole Digest; neither are there any +modern writers whose ideas of law are at all narrower.</p> + +<p>It would be far more easy to heap up authorities +on this article than to excuse the prolixity and tediousness +of producing any at all in proof of a point +which, though too often practically denied, is in its<a name="Page_325" id="Page_325" title="325" class="pagenum"></a> +theory almost self-evident. For Suarez, handling +this very question, <i>Utrum de ratione et substantia +legis esse ut propter commune bonum feratur</i>, does +not hesitate a moment, finding no ground in reason +or authority to render the affirmative in the +least degree disputable: "<i>In quæstione ergo proposita"</i> +(says he) "<i>nulla est inter authores controversia; +sed omnium commune est axioma de substantia et +ratione legis esse, ut pro communi bono feratur; ita ut +propter illud præcipue tradatur</i>"; having observed in +another place, "<i>Contra omnem rectitudinem est bonum +commune ad privatum ordinare, seu totum ad partem +propter ipsum referre</i>." Partiality and law are contradictory +terms. Neither the merits nor the ill deserts, +neither the wealth and importance nor the indigence +and obscurity, of the one part or of the other, +can make any alteration in this fundamental truth. +On any other scheme, I defy any man living to settle +a correct standard which may discriminate between +equitable rule and the most direct tyranny. For if +we can once prevail upon ourselves to depart from +the strictness and integrity of this principle in favor +even of a considerable party, the argument will hold +for one that is less so; and thus we shall go on, narrowing +the bottom of public right, until step by step +we arrive, though after no very long or very forced +deduction, at what one of our poets calls the <i>enormous +faith</i>,—the faith of the many, created for the advantage +of a single person. I cannot see a glimmering +of distinction to evade it; nor is it possible to allege +any reason for the proscription of so large a part of +the kingdom, which would not hold equally to support, +under parallel circumstances, the proscription +of the whole.<a name="Page_326" id="Page_326" title="326" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>I am sensible that these principles, in their abstract +light, will not be very strenuously opposed. +Reason is never inconvenient, but when it comes to +be applied. Mere general truths interfere very little +with the passions. They can, until they are roused +by a troublesome application, rest in great tranquillity, +side by side with tempers and proceedings the +most directly opposite to them. Men want to be +reminded, who do not want to be taught; because +those original ideas of rectitude, to which the mind +is compelled to assent when they are proposed, are not +always as present to it as they ought to be. When +people are gone, if not into a denial, at least into a +sort of oblivion of those ideas, when they know them +only as barren speculations, and not as practical motives +for conduct, it will be proper to press, as well as +to offer them to the understanding; and when one is +attacked by prejudices which aim to intrude themselves +into the place of law, what is left for us but to +vouch and call to warranty those principles of original +justice from whence alone our title to everything +valuable in society is derived? Can it be thought to +arise from a superfluous, vain parade of displaying +general and uncontroverted maxims, that we should +revert at this time to the first principles of law, when +we have directly under our consideration a whole +body of statutes, which, I say, are so many contradictions, +which their advocates allow to be so many exceptions +from those very principles? Take them in +the most favorable light, every exception from the +original and fixed rule of equality and justice ought +surely to be very well authorized in the reason of +their deviation, and very rare in their use. For, if +they should grow to be frequent, in what would they<a name="Page_327" id="Page_327" title="327" class="pagenum"></a> +differ from an abrogation of the rule itself? By becoming +thus frequent, they might even go further, +and, establishing themselves into a principle, convert +the rule into the exception. It cannot be dissembled +that this is not at all remote from the case before us, +where the great body of the people are excluded from +all valuable property,—where the greatest and most +ordinary benefits of society are conferred as privileges, +and not enjoyed on the footing of common rights.</p> + +<p>The clandestine manner in which those in power +carry on such designs is a sufficient argument of the +sense they inwardly entertain of the true nature of +their proceedings. Seldom is the title or preamble of +the law of the same import with the body and enacting +part; but they generally place some other color uppermost, +which differs from that which is afterwards to +appear, or at least one that is several shades fainter. +Thus, the penal laws in question are not called laws +to oblige men baptized and educated in Popery to +renounce their religion or their property, but are +called laws to prevent the growth of Popery; as if +their purpose was only to prevent conversions to that +sect, and not to persecute a million of people already +engaged in it. But of all the instances of this sort +of legislative artifice, and of the principles that produced +it, I never met with any which made a stronger +impression on me than that of Louis the Fourteenth, +in the revocation of the Edict of Nantes. +That monarch had, when he made that revocation, +as few measures to keep with public opinion as any +man. In the exercise of the most unresisted authority +at home, in a career of uninterrupted victory +abroad, and in a course of flattery equal to the circumstances +of his greatness in both these particulars,<a name="Page_328" id="Page_328" title="328" class="pagenum"></a> +he might be supposed to have as little need as disposition +to render any sort of account to the world of +his procedure towards his subjects. But the persecution +of so vast a body of men as the Huguenots was +too strong a measure even for the law of pride and +power. It was too glaring a contradiction even to +those principles upon which persecution itself is supported. +Shocked at the naked attempt, he had recourse, +for a palliation of his conduct, to an unkingly +denial of the fact which made against him. In the +preamble, therefore, to his Act of Revocation, he sets +forth that the Edict of Nantes was no longer necessary, +as the object of it (the Protestants of his kingdom) +were then reduced to a very small number. +The refugees in Holland cried out against this misrepresentation. +They asserted, I believe with truth, +that this revocation had driven two hundred thousand +of them out of their country, and that they +could readily demonstrate there still remained six +hundred thousand Protestants in France. If this +were the fact, (as it was undoubtedly,) no argument +of policy could have been strong enough to excuse a +measure by which eight hundred thousand men were +despoiled, at one stroke, of so many of their rights +and privileges. Louis the Fourteenth confessed, by +this sort of apology, that, if the number had been +large, the revocation had been unjust. But, after +all, is it not most evident that this act of injustice, +which let loose on that monarch such a torrent of +invective and reproach, and which threw so dark a +cloud over all the splendor of a most illustrious reign, +falls far short of the case in Ireland? The privileges +which the Protestants of that kingdom enjoyed +antecedent to this revocation were far greater than<a name="Page_329" id="Page_329" title="329" class="pagenum"></a> +the Roman Catholics of Ireland ever aspired to under +a contrary establishment. The number of their sufferers, +if considered absolutely, is not half of ours; if +considered relatively to the body of each community, +it is not perhaps a twentieth part. And then the +penalties and incapacities which grew from that revocation +are not so grievous in their nature, nor so certain +in their execution, nor so ruinous by a great +deal to the civil prosperity of the state, as those which +we have established for a perpetual law in our unhappy +country. It cannot be thought to arise from affectation, +that I call it so. What other name can be +given to a country which contains so many hundred +thousands of human creatures reduced to a state of +the most abject servitude?</p> + +<p>In putting this parallel, I take it for granted that +we can stand for this short time very clear of our +party distinctions. If it were enough, by the use +of an odious and unpopular word, to determine the +question, it would be no longer a subject of rational +disquisition; since that very prejudice which gives +these odious names, and which is the party charged +for doing so, and for the consequences of it, would +then become the judge also. But I flatter myself +that not a few will be found who do not think that +the names of Protestant and Papist can make any +change in the nature of essential justice. Such men +will not allow that to be proper treatment to the one +of these denominations which would be cruelty to the +other, and which converts its very crime into the instrument +of its defence: they will hardly persuade +themselves that what was bad policy in France can +be good in Ireland, or that what was intolerable +injustice in an arbitrary monarch becomes, only by<a name="Page_330" id="Page_330" title="330" class="pagenum"></a> +being more extended and more violent, an equitable +procedure in a country professing to be governed +by law. It is, however, impossible not to observe +with some concern, that there are many also of a +different disposition,—a number of persons whose +minds are so formed that they find the communion +of religion to be a close and an endearing tie, and +their country to be no bond at all,—to whom common +altars are a better relation than common habitations +and a common civil interest,—whose hearts +are touched with the distresses of foreigners, and are +abundantly awake to all the tenderness of human +feeling on such an occasion, even at the moment +that they are inflicting the very same distresses, or +worse, on their fellow-citizens, without the least sting +of compassion or remorse. To commiserate the distresses +of all men suffering innocently, perhaps meritoriously, +is generous, and very agreeable to the better +part of our nature,—a disposition that ought by +all means to be cherished. But to transfer humanity +from its natural basis, our legitimate and home-bred +connections,—to lose all feeling for those who have +grown up by our sides, in our eyes, the benefit of +whose cares and labors we have partaken from our +birth, and meretriciously to hunt abroad after foreign +affections, is such a disarrangement of the whole system +of our duties, that I do not know whether benevolence +so displaced is not almost the same thing as +destroyed, or what effect bigotry could have produced +that is more fatal to society. This no one could help +observing, who has seen our doors kindly and bountifully +thrown open to foreign sufferers for conscience, +whilst through the same ports were issuing fugitives +of our own, driven from their country for a cause<a name="Page_331" id="Page_331" title="331" class="pagenum"></a> +which to an indifferent person would seem to be exactly +similar, whilst we stood by, without any sense +of the impropriety of this extraordinary scene, accusing +and practising injustice. For my part, there is +no circumstance, in all the contradictions of our most +mysterious nature, that appears to be more humiliating +than the use we are disposed to make of those sad +examples which seem purposely marked for our correction +and improvement. Every instance of fury and +bigotry in other men, one should think, would naturally +fill us with an horror of that disposition. The +effect, however, is directly contrary. We are inspired, +it is true, with a very sufficient hatred for +the party, but with no detestation at all of the proceeding. +Nay, we are apt to urge our dislike of such +measures as a reason for imitating them,—and, by +an almost incredible absurdity, because some powers +have destroyed their country by their persecuting +spirit, to argue, that we ought to retaliate on them +by destroying our own. Such are the effects, and +such, I fear, has been the intention, of those numberless +books which are daily printed and industriously +spread, of the persecutions in other countries +and other religious persuasions.—These observations, +which are a digression, but hardly, I think, can be +considered as a departure from the subject, have +detained us some time: we will now come more directly +to our purpose.</p> + +<p>It has been shown, I hope with sufficient evidence, +that a constitution against the interest of the many is +rather of the nature of a grievance than of a law; +that of all grievances it is the most weighty and +important; that it is made without due authority, +against all the acknowledged principles of jurisprudence,<a name="Page_332" id="Page_332" title="332" class="pagenum"></a> +against the opinions of all the great lights in +that science; and that such is the tacit sense even of +those who act in the most contrary manner. These +points are, indeed, so evident, that I apprehend the +abettors of the penal system will ground their defence +on an admission, and not on a denial of them. +They will lay it down as a principle, that the Protestant +religion is a thing beneficial for the whole community, +as well in its civil interests as in those of a +superior order. From thence they will argue, that, +the end being essentially beneficial, the means become +instrumentally so; that these penalties and incapacities +are not final causes of the law, but only +a discipline to bring over a deluded people to their +real interest, and therefore, though they may be +harsh in their operation, they will be pleasant in +their effects; and be they what they will, they cannot +be considered as a very extraordinary hardship, +as it is in the power of the sufferer to free himself +when he pleases, and that only by converting to a +better religion, which it is his duty to embrace, even +though it were attended with all those penalties from +whence in reality it delivers him: if he suffers, it is +his own fault; <i>volenti non fit injuria</i>.</p> + +<p>I shall be very short, without being, I think, the +less satisfactory, in my answer to these topics, because +they never can be urged from a conviction of their +validity, and are, indeed, only the usual and impotent +struggles of those who are unwilling to abandon a +practice which they are unable to defend. First, +then, I observe, that, if the principle of their final +and beneficial intention be admitted as a just ground +for such proceedings, there never was, in the blamable +sense of the word, nor ever can be, such a thing<a name="Page_333" id="Page_333" title="333" class="pagenum"></a> +as a religious persecution in the world. Such an intention +is pretended by all men,—who all not only +insist that their religion has the sanction of Heaven, +but is likewise, and for that reason, the best and most +convenient to human society. All religious persecution, +Mr. Bayle well observes, is grounded upon a +miserable <i>petitio principii</i>. You are wrong, I am +right; you must come over to me, or you must suffer. +Let me add, that the great inlet by which a +color for oppression has entered into the world is by +one man's pretending to determine concerning the +happiness of another, and by claiming a right to use +what means he thinks proper in order to bring him to +a sense of it. It is the ordinary and trite sophism of +oppression. But there is not yet such a convenient +ductility in the human understanding as to make us +capable of being persuaded that men can possibly +mean the ultimate good of the whole society by rendering +miserable for a century together the greater +part of it,—or that any one has such a reversionary +benevolence as seriously to intend the remote good of +a late posterity, who can give up the present enjoyment +which every honest man must have in the happiness +of his contemporaries. Everybody is satisfied +that a conservation and secure enjoyment of our natural +rights is the great and ultimate purpose of civil +society, and that therefore all forms whatsoever of +government are only good as they are subservient to +that purpose to which they are entirely subordinate. +Now to aim at the establishment of any form of government +by sacrificing what is the substance of it, to +take away or at least to suspend the rights of Nature +in order to an approved system for the protection of +them, and for the sake of that about which men must<a name="Page_334" id="Page_334" title="334" class="pagenum"></a> +dispute forever to postpone those things about which +they have no controversy at all, and this not in minute +and subordinate, but large and principal objects, +is a procedure as preposterous and absurd in argument +as it is oppressive and cruel in its effect. For +the Protestant religion, nor (I speak it with reverence, +I am sure) the truth of our common Christianity, +is not so clear as this proposition,—that all men, +at least the majority of men in the society, ought to +enjoy the common advantages of it. You fall, therefore, +into a double error: first, you incur a certain +mischief for an advantage which is comparatively +problematical, even though you were sure of obtaining +it; secondly, whatever the proposed advantage +may be, were it of a certain nature, the attainment +of it is by no means certain; and such deep gaming +for stakes so valuable ought not to be admitted: the +risk is of too much consequence to society. If no +other country furnished examples of this risk, yet +our laws and our country are enough fully to demonstrate +the fact: Ireland, after almost a century of +persecution, is at this hour full of penalties and full +of Papists. This is a point which would lead us a +great way; but it is only just touched here, having +much to say upon it in its proper place. So that you +have incurred a certain and an immediate inconvenience +for a remote and for a doubly uncertain benefit.—Thus +far as to the argument which would +sanctify the injustice of these laws by the benefits +which are proposed to arise from them, and as to that +liberty which, by a new political chemistry, was to be +extracted out of a system of oppression.</p> + +<p>Now as to the other point, that the objects of these +laws suffer voluntarily: this seems to me to be an<a name="Page_335" id="Page_335" title="335" class="pagenum"></a> +insult rather than an argument. For, besides that it +totally annihilates every characteristic and therefore +every faulty idea of persecution, just as the former +does, it supposes, what is false in fact, that it is in a +man's moral power to change his religion whenever +his convenience requires it. If he be beforehand satisfied +that your opinion is better than his, he will voluntarily +come over to you, and without compulsion, +and then your law would be unnecessary; but if he +is not so convinced, he must know that it is his duty +in this point to sacrifice his interest here to his opinion +of his eternal happiness, else he could have in +reality no religion at all. In the former case, therefore, +as your law would be unnecessary, in the latter +it would be persecuting: that is, it would put your +penalty and his ideas of duty in the opposite scales; +which is, or I know not what is, the precise idea of +persecution. If, then, you require a renunciation of +his conscience, as a preliminary to his admission to +the rights of society, you annex, morally speaking, an +impossible condition to it. In this case, in the language +of reason and jurisprudence, the condition +would be void, and the gift absolute; as the practice +runs, it is to establish the condition, and to withhold +the benefit. The suffering is, then, not voluntary. +And I never heard any other argument, drawn from +the nature of laws and the good of human society, +urged in favor of those proscriptive statutes, except +those which have just been mentioned.</p> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_22_22" id="Footnote_22_22"></a><a href="#FNanchor_22_22"><span class="label">[22]</span></a> Cicero <i>de Legibus</i>, Lib. L 14,15 et 16.—"O rem dignam, in qua +non modo docti, verum etiam agrestes erubescant! Jam vero illud +stultissimum existimare omnia justa esse, quæ scita sint in populorum +institutis aut legibus," etc. "Quod si populorum jussis, si +principum decretis, si sententiis judicum jura constituerentur, jus esset +latrocinari, jus adulterare, jus testamenta falsa supponere, si hæc +suffragiis aut scitis multitudinis probarentur."</p></div> +</div> +<p><a name="Page_336" id="Page_336" title="336" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> +<h3>CHAPTER III.<br /> +<br /> +PART II.</h3> + + +<p>The second head upon which I propose to consider +those statutes with regard to their object, and which +is the next in importance to the magnitude, and of +almost equal concern in the inquiry into the justice +of these laws, is its possession. It is proper to recollect +that this religion, which is so persecuted in its +members, is the old religion of the country, and the +once established religion of the state,—the very same +which had for centuries received the countenance and +sanction of the laws, and from which it would at one +time have been highly penal to have dissented. In +proportion as mankind has become enlightened, the +idea of religious persecution, under any circumstances, +has been almost universally exploded by all +good and thinking men. The only faint shadow of +difficulty which remains is concerning the introduction +of new opinions. Experience has shown, that, +if it has been favorable to the cause of truth, it has +not been always conducive to the peace of society. +Though a new religious sect should even be totally +free in itself from any tumultuous and disorderly +zeal, which, however, is rarely the case, it has a tendency +to create a resistance from the establishment +in possession, productive of great disorders, and thus +becomes, innocently indeed, but yet very certainly, +the cause of the bitterest dissensions in the commonwealth. +To a mind not thoroughly saturated with +the tolerating maxims of the Gospel, a preventive +persecution, on such principles, might come recommended +by strong, and, apparently, no immoral motives<a name="Page_337" id="Page_337" title="337" class="pagenum"></a> +of policy, whilst yet the contagion was recent, +and had laid hold but on a few persons. The +truth is, these politics are rotten and hollow at bottom, +as all that are founded upon any however minute +a degree of positive injustice must ever be. But +they are specious, and sufficiently so to delude a man +of sense and of integrity. But it is quite otherwise +with the attempt to eradicate by violence a wide-spreading +and established religious opinion. If the +people are in an error, to inform them is not only +fair, but charitable; to drive them is a strain of the +most manifest injustice. If not the right, the presumption, +at least, is ever on the side of possession. +Are they mistaken? if it does not fully justify them, +it is a great alleviation of guilt, which may be mingled +with their misfortune, that the error is none of +their forging,—that they received it on as good a +footing as they can receive your laws and your +legislative authority, because it was handed down +to them from their ancestors. The opinion may be +erroneous, but the principle is undoubtedly right; +and you punish them for acting upon a principle +which of all others is perhaps the most necessary +for preserving society, an implicit admiration and +adherence to the establishments of their forefathers.</p> + +<p>If, indeed, the legislative authority was on all +hands admitted to be the ground of religious persuasion, +I should readily allow that dissent would +be rebellion. In this case it would make no difference +whether the opinion was sucked in with the +milk or imbibed yesterday; because the same legislative +authority which had settled could destroy it +with all the power of a creator over his creature. +But this doctrine is universally disowned, and for a<a name="Page_338" id="Page_338" title="338" class="pagenum"></a> +very plain reason. Religion, to have any force on +men's understandings, indeed to exist at all, must +be supposed paramount to laws, and independent +for its substance upon any human institution,—else +it would be the absurdest thing in the world, an acknowledged +cheat. Religion, therefore, is not believed +because the laws have established it, but it is +established because the leading part of the community +have previously believed it to be true. As no +water can rise higher than its spring, no establishment +can have more authority than it derives from +its principle; and the power of the government can +with no appearance of reason go further coercively +than to bind and hold down those who have once +consented to their opinions. The consent is the origin +of the whole. If they attempt to proceed further, +they disown the foundation upon which their +own establishment was built, and they claim a religious +assent upon mere human authority, which has +been just now shown to be absurd and preposterous, +and which they in fact confess to be so.</p> + +<p>However, we are warranted to go thus far. The +people often actually do (and perhaps they cannot +in general do better) take their religion, not on the +coercive, which is impossible, but on the influencing +authority of their governors, as wise and informed +men. But if they once take a religion on the word +of the state, they cannot in common sense do so a +second time, unless they have some concurrent reason +for it. The prejudice in favor of your wisdom +is shook by your change. You confess that you have +been wrong, and yet you would pretend to dictate +by your sole authority; whereas you disengage the +mind by embarrassing it. For why should I prefer<a name="Page_339" id="Page_339" title="339" class="pagenum"></a> +your opinion of to-day to your persuasion of yesterday? +If we must resort to prepossessions for the +ground of opinion, it is in the nature of man rather +to defer to the wisdom of times past, whose weakness +is not before his eyes, than to the present, of +whose imbecility he has daily experience. Veneration +of antiquity is congenial to the human, mind. +When, therefore, an establishment would persecute +an opinion in possession, it sets against it all the powerful +prejudices of human nature. It even sets its +own authority, when it is of most weight, against +itself in that very circumstance in which it must necessarily +have the least; and it opposes the stable +prejudice of time against a new opinion founded on +mutability: a consideration that must render compulsion +in such a case the more grievous, as there is no +security, that, when the mind is settled in the new +opinion, it may not be obliged to give place to one +that is still newer, or even, to a return of the old. +But when an ancient establishment begins early to +persecute an innovation, it stands upon quite other +grounds, and it has all the prejudices and presumptions +on its side. It puts its own authority, not only +of compulsion, but prepossession, the veneration of +past age, as well as the activity of the present time, +against the opinion only of a private man or set of +men. If there be no reason, there is at least some +consistency in its proceedings. Commanding to constancy, +it does nothing but that of which it sets an +example itself. But an opinion at once new and persecuting +is a monster; because, in the very instant +in which it takes a liberty of change, it does not +leave to you even a liberty of perseverance.</p> + +<p>Is, then, no improvement to be brought into society?<a name="Page_340" id="Page_340" title="340" class="pagenum"></a> +Undoubtedly; but not by compulsion,—but by +encouragement,—but by countenance, favor, privileges, +which are powerful, and are lawful instruments. +The coercive authority of the state is limited to what +is necessary for its existence. To this belongs the +whole order of criminal law. It considers as crimes +(that is, the object of punishment) trespasses against +those rules for which society was instituted. The +law punishes delinquents, not because they are not +good men, but because they are intolerably wicked. +It does bear, and must, with the vices and the follies +of men, until they actually strike at the root of +order. This it does in things actually moral. In +all matters of speculative improvement the case is +stronger, even where the matter is properly of human +cognizance. But to consider an averseness to improvement, +the not arriving at perfection, as a crime, +is against all tolerably correct jurisprudence; for, if +the resistance to improvement should be great and +any way general, they would in effect give up the necessary +and substantial part in favor of the perfection +and the finishing.</p> + +<p>But, say the abettors of our penal laws, this old +possessed superstition is such in its principles, that +society, on its general principles, cannot subsist along +with it. Could a man think such an objection possible, +if he had not actually heard it made,—an objection +contradicted, not by hypothetical reasonings, +but the clear evidence of the most decisive facts? +Society not only exists, but flourishes at this hour, +with this superstition, in many countries, under every +form of government,—in some established, in some +tolerated, in others upon an equal footing. And was +there no civil society at all in these kingdoms before<a name="Page_341" id="Page_341" title="341" class="pagenum"></a> +the Reformation? To say it was not as well constituted +as it ought to be is saying nothing at all to the +purpose; for that assertion evidently regards improvement, +not existence. It certainly did then exist; +and it as certainly then was at least as much to the +advantage of a very great part of society as what we +have brought in the place of it: which is, indeed, a +great blessing to those who have profited of the +change; but to all the rest, as we have wrought, +that is, by blending general persecution with partial +reformation, it is the very reverse. We found the +people heretics and idolaters; we have, by way of +improving their condition, rendered them slaves and +beggars: they remain in all the misfortune of their +old errors, and all the superadded misery of their recent +punishment. They were happy enough, in their +opinion at least, before the change; what benefits +society then had, they partook of them all. They +are now excluded from those benefits; and, so far +as civil society comprehends them, and as we have +managed the matter, our persecutions are so far from +being necessary to its existence, that our very reformation +is made in a degree noxious. If this be +improvement, truly I know not what can be called +a depravation of society.</p> + +<p>But as those who argue in this manner are perpetually +shifting the question, having begun with objecting, +in order to give a fair and public color to their +scheme, to a toleration of those opinions as subversive +of society in general, they will surely end by abandoning +the broad part of the argument, and attempting +to show that a toleration of them is inconsistent +with the established government among us. Now, +though this position be in reality as untenable as the<a name="Page_342" id="Page_342" title="342" class="pagenum"></a> +other, it is not altogether such an absurdity on the +face of it. All I shall here observe is, that those who +lay it down little consider what a wound they are +giving to that establishment for which they pretend +so much zeal. However, as this is a consideration, +not of general justice, but of particular and national +policy, and as I have reserved a place expressly, +where it will undergo a thorough discussion, I shall +not here embarrass myself with it,—being resolved +to preserve all the order in my power, in the examination +of this important, melancholy subject.</p> + +<p>However, before we pass from this point concerning +possession, it will be a relaxation of the mind, +not wholly foreign to our purpose, to take a short +review of the extraordinary policy which has been +held with regard to religion in that kingdom, from +the time our ancestors took possession of it. The +most able antiquaries are of opinion, and Archbishop +Usher, whom I reckon amongst the first of them, +has, I think, shown, that a religion not very remote +from the present Protestant persuasion was that of +the Irish before the union of that kingdom to the +crown of England. If this was not directly the fact, +this at least seems very probable, that Papal authority +was much lower in Ireland than in other countries. +This union was made under the authority of +an arbitrary grant of Pope Adrian, in order that the +Church of Ireland should be reduced to the same servitude +with those that were nearer to his see. It is +not very wonderful that an ambitious monarch should +make use of any pretence in his way to so considerable +an object. What is extraordinary is, that for a +very long time, even quite down to the Reformation, +and in their most solemn acts, the kings of England<a name="Page_343" id="Page_343" title="343" class="pagenum"></a> +founded their title wholly on this grant: they called +for obedience from the people of Ireland, not on principles +of subjection, but as vassals and mesne lords +between them and the Popes; and they omitted no +measure of force or policy to establish that Papal authority, +with all the distinguishing articles of religion +connected with it, and to make it take deep root in +the minds of the people. Not to crowd instances unnecessary, +I shall select two, one of which is in print, +the other on record,—the one a treaty, the other an +act of Parliament. The first is the submission of the +Irish chiefs to Richard the Second, mentioned by Sir +John Davies. In this pact they bind themselves for +the future to preserve peace and allegiance to the +kings of England, under certain pecuniary penalties. +But what is remarkable, these fines were all covenanted +to be paid into the Apostolical Chamber, +supposing the Pope as the superior power, whose +peace was broken and whose majesty was violated +in disobeying his governor. By this time, so far as +regarded England, the kings had extremely abridged +the Papal power in many material particulars: they +had passed the Statute of Provisors, the Statute of +<i>Præmunire</i>,—and, indeed, struck out of the Papal +authority all things, at least, that seemed to infringe +on their temporal independence. In Ireland, however, +their proceeding was directly the reverse: there +they thought it expedient to exalt it at least as high +as ever: for, so late as the reign of Edward the +Fourth, the following short, but very explicit, act +of Parliament was passed:—<a name="Page_344" id="Page_344" title="344" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<div class="blockquote"><p>IV. ED. Cap. 3.</p> + +<p>"An act, whereby letters patent of pardon from the +king to those that sue to Rome for certain benefices +is void. Rot. Parl.</p> + +<p>"Item, At the request of the commons, it is ordeyned +and established, by authority of the said Parliament, +that all maner letters patents of the king, +of pardons or pardon granted by the king, or hereafter +to be granted, to any provisor that claim any +title by the bulls of the Pope to any maner benefices, +where, at the time of the impetrating of the said bulls +of provision, the benefice is full of an incumbent, that +then the said letters patents of pardon or pardons be +void in law and of none effect."</p></div> + +<p>When, by every expedient of force and policy, by +a war of some centuries, by extirpating a number of +the old, and by bringing in a number of new people +full of those opinions and intending to propagate +them, they had fully compassed their object, they +suddenly took another turn,—commenced an opposite +persecution, made heavy laws, carried on mighty +wars, inflicted and suffered the worst evils, extirpated +the mass of the old, brought in new inhabitants; and +they continue at this day an oppressive system, and +may for four hundred years to come, to eradicate +opinions which by the same violent means they had +been four hundred years endeavoring by every means +to establish. They compelled the people to submit, +by the forfeiture of all their civil rights, to the Pope's +authority, in its most extravagant and unbounded +sense, as a giver of kingdoms; and now they refuse +even to tolerate them in the most moderate and chastised<a name="Page_345" id="Page_345" title="345" class="pagenum"></a> +sentiments concerning it. No country, I believe, +since the world began, has suffered so much +on account of religion, or has been so variously harassed +both for Popery and for Protestantism.</p> + +<p>It will now be seen, that, even if these laws could +be supposed agreeable to those of Nature in these +particulars, on another and almost as strong a principle +they are yet unjust, as being contrary to positive +compact, and the public faith most solemnly plighted. +On the surrender of Limerick, and some other +Irish garrisons, in the war of the Revolution, the +Lords Justices of Ireland and the commander-in-chief +of the king's forces signed a capitulation with +the Irish, which was afterwards ratified by the king +himself by <i>inspeximus</i> under the great seal of England. +It contains some public articles relative to the +whole body of the Roman Catholics in that kingdom, +and some with regard to the security of the greater +part of the inhabitants of five counties. What the +latter were, or in what manner they were observed, is +at this day of much less public concern. The former +are two,—the first and the ninth. The first is of +this tenor:—"The Roman Catholics of this kingdom +[Ireland] shall enjoy such privileges in the exercise +of their religion as are consistent with the laws +of Ireland, or as they did enjoy in the reign of King +Charles the Second. And their Majesties, as soon as +affairs will permit them to summon a Parliament in +this kingdom, will endeavor to procure the said Roman +Catholics such farther security in that particular +as may preserve them from any disturbance upon +the account of their said religion." The ninth article +is to this effect:—"The oath to be administered +to such Roman Catholics as submit to their Majesties'<a name="Page_346" id="Page_346" title="346" class="pagenum"></a> +government shall be the oath abovesaid, and no other,"—viz., +the oath of allegiance, made by act of +Parliament in England, in the first year of their then +Majesties; as required by the second of the Articles +of Limerick. Compare this latter article with +the penal laws, as they are stated in the Second +Chapter, and judge whether they seem to be the +public acts of the same power, and observe whether +other oaths are tendered to them, and under what +penalties. Compare the former with the same laws, +from the beginning to the end, and judge whether +the Roman Catholics have been preserved, agreeably +to the sense of the article, from any disturbance upon +account of their religion,—or rather, whether on +that account there is a single right of Nature or +benefit of society which has not been either totally +taken away or considerably impaired.</p> + +<p>But it is said, that the legislature was not bound +by this article, as it has never been ratified in Parliament. +I do admit that it never had that sanction, +and that the Parliament was under no obligation to +ratify these articles by any express act of theirs +But still I am at a loss how they came to be the less +valid, on the principles of our Constitution, by being +without that sanction. They certainly bound the +king and his successors. The words of the article +do this, or they do nothing; and so far as the crown +had a share in passing those acts, the public faith +was unquestionably broken. In Ireland such a breach +on the part of the crown was much more unpardonable +in administration than it would have been here. +They have in Ireland a way of preventing any bill +even from approaching the royal presence, in matters +of far less importance than the honor and faith<a name="Page_347" id="Page_347" title="347" class="pagenum"></a> +of the crown and the well-being of a great body of +the people. For, besides that they might have opposed +the very first suggestion of it in the House of +Commons, it could not be framed into a bill without +the approbation of the Council in Ireland. It could +not be returned to them again without the approbation +of the King and Council here. They might have +met it again in its second passage through that House +of Parliament in which it was originally suggested, as +well as in the other. If it had escaped them through +all these mazes, it was again to come before the Lord +Lieutenant, who might have sunk it by a refusal of +the royal assent. The Constitution of Ireland has +interposed all those checks to the passing of any +constitutional act, however insignificant in its own +nature. But did the administration in that reign +avail themselves of any one of those opportunities? +They never gave the act of the eleventh of Queen +Anne the least degree of opposition in any one stage +of its progress. What is rather the fact, many of the +queen's servants encouraged it, recommended it, were +in reality the true authors of its passing in Parliament, +instead of recommending and using their utmost +endeavor to establish a law directly opposite in +its tendency, as they were bound to do by the express +letter of the very first article of the Treaty of Limerick. +To say nothing further of the ministry, who in +this instance most shamefully betrayed the faith of +government, may it not be a matter of some degree +of doubt, whether the Parliament, who do not claim +a right of dissolving the force of moral obligation, +did not make themselves a party in this breach of +contract, by presenting a bill to the crown in direct +violation of those articles so solemnly and so recently<a name="Page_348" id="Page_348" title="348" class="pagenum"></a> +executed, which by the Constitution they had full +authority to execute?</p> + +<p>It may be further objected, that, when the Irish +requested the ratification of Parliament to those articles, +they did, in effect, themselves entertain a +doubt concerning their validity without such a ratification. +To this I answer, that the collateral security +was meant to bind the crown, and to hold it firm +to its engagements. They did not, therefore, call it +a <i>perfecting</i> of the security, but an <i>additional</i> security, +which it could not have been, if the first had been +void; for the Parliament could not bind itself more +than the crown had bound itself. And if all had +made but <i>one</i> security, neither of them could be +called <i>additional</i> with propriety or common sense. +But let us suppose that they did apprehend there +might have been something wanting in this security +without the sanction of Parliament. They were, however, +evidently mistaken; and this surplusage of theirs +did not weaken the validity of the single contract, +upon the known principle of law, <i>Non solent, quæ +abundant, vitiare scripturas</i>. For nothing is more +evident than that the crown was bound, and that no +act can be made without the royal assent. But the +Constitution will warrant us in going a great deal +further, and in affirming, that a treaty executed by +the crown, and contradictory of no preceding law, is +full as binding on the whole body of the nation as +if it had twenty times received the sanction of Parliament; +because the very same Constitution which +has given to the Houses of Parliament their definite +authority has also left in the crown the trust of making +peace, as a consequence, and much the best consequence, +of the prerogative of making war. If the<a name="Page_349" id="Page_349" title="349" class="pagenum"></a> +peace was ill made, my Lord Galmoy, Coningsby, +and Porter, who signed it, were responsible; because +they were subject to the community. But its own +contracts are not subject to it: it is subject to them; +and the compact of the king acting constitutionally +was the compact of the nation.</p> + +<p>Observe what monstrous consequences would result +from a contrary position. A foreign enemy has +entered, or a strong domestic one has arisen in the +nation. In such events the circumstances may be, +and often have been, such that a Parliament cannot +sit. This was precisely the case in that rebellion in +Ireland. It will be admitted also, that their power +may be so great as to make it very prudent to treat +with them, in order to save effusion of blood, perhaps +to save the nation. Now could such a treaty be at +all made, if your enemies, or rebels, were fully persuaded, +that, in these times of confusion, there was +no authority in the state which could hold out to +them an inviolable pledge for their future security, +but that there lurked in the Constitution a dormant, +but irresistible power, who would not think itself +bound by the ordinary subsisting and contracting +authority, but might rescind its acts and obligations +at pleasure? This would be a doctrine made to perpetuate +and exasperate war; and on that principle it +directly impugns the law of nations, which is built +upon this principle, that war should be softened as +much as possible, and that it should cease as soon as +possible, between contending parties and communities. +The king has a power to pardon individuals. +If the king holds out his faith to a robber, to come in +on a promise of pardon, of life and estate, and, in all +respects, of a full indemnity, shall the Parliament say<a name="Page_350" id="Page_350" title="350" class="pagenum"></a> +that he must nevertheless be executed, that his estate +must be forfeited, or that he shall be abridged of any +of the privileges which he before held as a subject? +Nobody will affirm it. In such a case, the breach of +faith would not only be on the part of the king who +assented to such an act, but on the part of the Parliament +who made it. As the king represents the +whole contracting capacity of the nation, so far as his +prerogative (unlimited, as I said before, by any precedent +law) can extend, he acts as the national procurator +on all such occasions. What is true of a robber +is true of a rebel; and what is true of one robber +or rebel is as true, and it is a much more important +truth, of one hundred thousand.</p> + +<p>To urge this part of the argument further is, indeed, +I fear, not necessary, for two reasons: first, +that it seems tolerably evident in itself; and next, +that there is but too much ground to apprehend that +the actual ratification of Parliament would, in the +then temper of parties, have proved but a very slight +and trivial security. Of this there is a very strong +example in the history of those very articles: for, +though the Parliament omitted in the reign of King +William to ratify the first and most general of them, +they did actually confirm the second and more limited, +that which related to the security of the inhabitants +of those five counties which were in arms when +the treaty was made.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> +<h3>CHAPTER IV.</h3> + + +<p>In the foregoing book we considered these laws +in a very simple point of view, and in a very general<a name="Page_351" id="Page_351" title="351" class="pagenum"></a> +one,—merely as a system of hardship imposed on +the body of the community; and from thence, and +from some other arguments, inferred the general injustice +of such a procedure. In this we shall be +obliged to be more minute; and the matter will become +more complex as we undertake to demonstrate +the mischievous and impolitic consequences which the +particular mode of this oppressive system, and the +instruments which it employs, operating, as we said, +on this extensive object, produce on the national prosperity, +quiet, and security.</p> + +<p>The stock of materials by which any nation is rendered +flourishing and prosperous are its industry, its +knowledge or skill, its morals, its execution of justice, +its courage, and the national union in directing these +powers to one point, and making them all centre in +the public benefit. Other than these, I do not know +and scarcely can conceive any means by which a +community may flourish.</p> + +<p>If we show that these penal laws of Ireland destroy +not one only, but every one, of these materials of public +prosperity, it will not be difficult to perceive that +Great Britain, whilst they subsist, never can draw +from that country all the advantages to which the +bounty of Nature has entitled it.</p> + +<p>To begin with the first great instrument of national +happiness and strength, its industry: I must observe, +that, although these penal laws do, indeed, inflict +many hardships on those who are obnoxious to +them, yet their chief, their most extensive, and most +certain operation is upon property. Those civil constitutions +which promote industry are such as facilitate +the acquisition, secure the holding, enable the +fixing, and suffer the alienation of property. Every<a name="Page_352" id="Page_352" title="352" class="pagenum"></a> +law which obstructs it in any part of this distribution +is, in proportion to the force and extent of the obstruction, +a discouragement to industry. For a law +against property is a law against industry,—the latter +having always the former, and nothing else, for +its object. Now as to the acquisition of landed property, +which is the foundation and support of all the +other kinds, the laws have disabled three fourths of +the inhabitants of Ireland from acquiring any estate +of inheritance for life or years, or any charge whatsoever +on which two thirds of the improved yearly +value is not reserved for thirty years.</p> + +<p>This confinement of landed property to one set of +hands, and preventing its free circulation through the +community, is a most leading article of ill policy; because +it is one of the most capital discouragements +to all that industry which may be employed on the +lasting improvement of the soil, or is any way conversant +about land. A tenure of thirty years is evidently +no tenure upon which to build, to plant, to +raise inclosures, to change the nature of the ground, +to make any new experiment which might improve +agriculture, or to do anything more than what may +answer the immediate and momentary calls of rent +to the landlord, and leave subsistence to the tenant +and his family. The desire of acquisition is always +a passion of long views. Confine a man to momentary +possession, and you at once cut off that laudable +avarice which every wise state has cherished as one +of the first principles of its greatness. Allow a man +but a temporary possession, lay it down as a maxim +that he never can have any other, and you immediately +and infallibly turn him to temporary enjoyments: +and these enjoyments are never the pleasures<a name="Page_353" id="Page_353" title="353" class="pagenum"></a> +of labor and free industry, whose quality it is to +famish the present hours and squander all upon +prospect and futurity; they are, on the contrary, +those of a thoughtless, loitering, and dissipated life. +The people must be inevitably disposed to such pernicious +habits, merely from the short duration of +their tenure which the law has allowed. But it is +not enough that industry is checked by the confinement +of its views; it is further discouraged by the +limitation of its own direct object, profit. This is a +regulation extremely worthy of our attention, as it is +not a consequential, but a direct discouragement to +melioration,—as directly as if the law had said in +express terms, "Thou shalt not improve."</p> + +<p>But we have an additional argument to demonstrate +the ill policy of denying the occupiers of land +any solid property in it. Ireland is a country wholly +unplanted. The farms have neither dwelling-houses +nor good offices; nor are the lands, almost anywhere, +provided with fences and communications: in +a word, in a very unimproved state. The land-owner +there never takes upon him, as it is usual in this +kingdom, to supply all these conveniences, and to set +down his tenant in what may be called a completely +furnished farm. If the tenant will not do it, it is +never done. This circumstance shows how miserably +and peculiarly impolitic it has been in Ireland to tie +down the body of the tenantry to short and unprofitable +tenures. A finished and furnished house will +be taken for any term, however short: if the repair +lies on the owner, the shorter the better. But no +one will take one not only unfurnished, but half +built, but upon a term which, on calculation, will answer +with profit all his charges. It is on this principle<a name="Page_354" id="Page_354" title="354" class="pagenum"></a> +that the Romans established their <i>emphyteusis</i>, or +fee-farm. For though they extended the ordinary +term of their location only to nine years, yet they +encouraged a more permanent letting to farm with +the condition of improvement, as well as of annual +payment, on the part of the tenant, where the land +had lain rough and neglected,—and therefore invented +this species of engrafted holding, in the later +times, when property came to be worse distributed +by falling into a few hands.</p> + +<p>This denial of landed property to the gross of the +people has this further evil effect in preventing the +improvement of land, that it prevents any of the property +acquired in trade to be regorged, as it were, upon +the land. They must have observed very little, +who have not remarked the bold and liberal spirit of +improvement which persons bred to trade have often +exerted on their land-purchases: that they usually +come to them with a more abundant command of +ready money than most landed men possess; and +that they have in general a much better idea, by +long habits of calculative dealings, of the propriety +of expending in order to acquire. Besides, such men +often bring their spirit of commerce into their estates +with them, and make manufactures take a root, where +the mere landed gentry had perhaps no capital, perhaps +no inclination, and, most frequently, not sufficient +knowledge, to effect anything of the kind. By +these means, what beautiful and useful spots have +there not been made about trading and manufacturing +towns, and how has agriculture had reason to bless +that happy alliance with commerce! and how miserable +must that nation be, whose frame of polity has +disjoined the landing and the trading interests!</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p><a name="Page_355" id="Page_355" title="355" class="pagenum"></a>The great prop of this whole system is not pretended +to be its justice or its utility, but the supposed +danger to the state, which gave rise to it originally, +and which, they apprehend, would return, if this +system were overturned. Whilst, say they, the Papists +of this kingdom were possessed of landed property, +and of the influence consequent to such property, +their allegiance to the crown of Great Britain +was ever insecure, the public peace was ever liable to +be broken, and Protestants never could be a moment +secure either of their properties or of their lives. +Indulgence only made them arrogant, and power +daring; confidence only excited and enabled them +to exert their inherent treachery; and the times +which they generally selected for their most wicked +and desperate rebellions were those in which they +enjoyed the greatest ease and the most perfect tranquillity.</p> + +<p>Such are the arguments that are used, both publicly +and privately, in every discussion upon this +point. They are generally full of passion and of +error, and built upon facts which in themselves are +most false. It cannot, I confess, be denied, that those +miserable performances which go about under the +names of Histories of Ireland do, indeed, represent +those events after this manner; and they would +persuade us, contrary to the known order of Nature, +that indulgence and moderation in governors +is the natural incitement in subjects to rebel. But +there is an interior history of Ireland, the genuine +voice of its records and monuments, which speaks +a very different language from these histories, from +Temple and from Clarendon: these restore Nature +to its just rights, and policy to its proper order. For<a name="Page_356" id="Page_356" title="356" class="pagenum"></a> +they even now show to those who have been at the +pains to examine them, and they may show one day +to all the world, that these rebellions were not produced +by toleration, but by persecution,—that they +arose not from just and mild government, but from +the most unparalleled oppression. These records will +be far from giving the least countenance to a doctrine +so repugnant to humanity and good sense as that the +security of any establishment, civil or religious, can +ever depend upon the misery of those who live under +it, or that its danger can arise from their quiet and +prosperity. God forbid that the history of this or +any country should give such encouragement to the +folly or vices of those who govern! If it can be +shown that the great rebellions of Ireland have +arisen from attempts to reduce the natives to the +state to which they are now reduced, it will show +that an attempt to continue them in that state will +rather be disadvantageous to the public peace than +any kind of security to it. These things have in +some measure begun to appear already; and as far +as regards the argument drawn from former rebellions, +it will fall readily to the ground. But, for my +part, I think the real danger to every state is, to render +its subjects justly discontented; nor is there in +polities or science any more effectual secret for their +security than to establish in their people a firm opinion +that no change can be for their advantage. It is +true that bigotry and fanaticism may for a time draw +great multitudes of people from a knowledge of their +true and substantial interest. But upon this I have +to remark three things. First, that such a temper +can never become universal, or last for a long time. +The principle of religion is seldom lasting; the majority<a name="Page_357" id="Page_357" title="357" class="pagenum"></a> +of men are in no persuasion bigots; they are +not willing to sacrifice, on every vain imagination that +superstition or enthusiasm holds forth, or that even +zeal and piety recommend, the certain possession of +their temporal happiness. And if such a spirit has +been at any time roused in a society, after it has had +its paroxysm it commonly subsides and is quiet, and +is even the weaker for the violence of its first exertion: +security and ease are its mortal enemies. But, +secondly, if anything can tend to revive and keep it +up, it is to keep alive the passions of men by ill usage. +This is enough to irritate even those who have not a +spark of bigotry in their constitution to the most desperate +enterprises; it certainly will inflame, darken, +and render more dangerous the spirit of bigotry in +those who are possessed by it. Lastly, by rooting out +any sect, you are never secure against the effects of +fanaticism; it may arise on the side of the most favored +opinions; and many are the instances wherein +the established religion of a state has grown ferocious +and turned upon its keeper, and has often +torn to pieces the civil establishment that had cherished +it, and which it was designed to support: +France,—England,—Holland.</p> + +<p>But there may be danger of wishing a change, +even where no religious motive can operate; and +every enemy to such a state comes as a friend to +the subject; and where other countries are under +terror, they begin to hope.</p> + +<p>This argument <i>ad verecundiam</i> has as much force +as any such have. But I think it fares but very indifferently +with those who make use of it; for they +would get but little to be proved abettors of tyranny +at the expense of putting me to an inconvenient acknowledgment.<a name="Page_358" id="Page_358" title="358" class="pagenum"></a> +For if I were to confess that there +are circumstances in which it would be better to +establish such a religion....</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>With regard to the Pope's interest. This foreign +chief of their religion cannot be more formidable to +us than to other Protestant countries. To conquer +that country for himself is a wild chimera; to encourage +revolt in favor of foreign princes is an exploded +idea in the politics of that court. Perhaps it +would be full as dangerous to have the people under +the conduct of factious pastors of their own as under +a foreign ecclesiastical court.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>In the second year of the reign of Queen Elizabeth +were enacted several limitations in the acquisition or +the retaining of property, which had, so far as regarded +any general principles, hitherto remained untouched +under all changes.</p> + +<p>These bills met no opposition either in the Irish +Parliament or in the English Council, except from +private agents, who were little attended to; and they +passed into laws with the highest and most general +applauses, as all such things are in the beginning, +not as a system of persecution, but as masterpieces +of the most subtle and refined politics. And to say +the truth, these laws, at first view, have rather an +appearance of a plan of vexatious litigation and +crooked law-chicanery than of a direct and sanguinary +attack upon the rights of private conscience: +because they did not affect life, at least with regard +to the laity; and making the Catholic opinions rather +the subject of civil regulations than of criminal prosecutions,<a name="Page_359" id="Page_359" title="359" class="pagenum"></a> +to those who are not lawyers and read these +laws they only appear to be a species of jargon. For +the execution of criminal law has always a certain +appearance of violence. Being exercised directly on +the persons of the supposed offenders, and commonly +executed in the face of the public, such executions +are apt to excite sentiments of pity for the sufferers, +and indignation against those who are employed in +such cruelties,—being seen as single acts of cruelty, +rather than as ill general principles of government. +But the operation of the laws in question being such +as common feeling brings home to every man's bosom, +they operate in a sort of comparative silence and obscurity; +and though their cruelty is exceedingly great, +it is never seen in a single exertion, and always escapes +commiseration, being scarce known, except to +those who view them in a general, which is always a +cold and phlegmatic light. The first of these laws +being made with so general a satisfaction, as the +chief governors found that such things were extremely +acceptable to the leading people in that +country, they were willing enough to gratify them +with the ruin of their fellow-citizens; they were not +sorry to divert their attention from other inquiries, +and to keep them fixed to this, as if this had been +the only real object of their national politics; and +for many years there was no speech from the throne +which did not with great appearance of seriousness +recommend the passing of such laws, and scarce a +session went over without in effect passing some of +them, until they have by degrees grown to be the +most considerable head in the Irish statute-book. At +the same time giving a temporary and occasional +mitigation to the severity of some of the harshest<a name="Page_360" id="Page_360" title="360" class="pagenum"></a> +of those laws, they appeared in some sort the protectors +of those whom they were in reality destroying +by the establishment of general constitutions against +them. At length, however, the policy of this expedient +is worn out; the passions of men are cooled; +those laws begin to disclose themselves, and to produce +effects very different from those which were +promised in making them: for crooked counsels are +ever unwise; and nothing can be more absurd and +dangerous than to tamper with the natural foundations +of society, in hopes of keeping it up by certain +contrivances.</p> + +<p><a name="Page_361" id="Page_361" title="361" class="pagenum"></a> +<a name="WILLIAM_SMITH_ESQ" id="WILLIAM_SMITH_ESQ" /></p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><span style="font-size: 60%;">A</span><br /> +<br /> +LETTER<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 60%;">TO</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%;">WILLIAM SMITH, ESQ.,</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 60%;">ON THE SUBJECT OF</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%;">CATHOLIC EMANCIPATION.</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 60%;">JANUARY 29, 1795.</span></h2> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> +<p><a name="Page_362" id="Page_362" title="362" class="pagenum"></a></p> +<p><a name="Page_363" id="Page_363" title="363" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<h2>LETTER.<a name="FNanchor_23_23" id="FNanchor_23_23"></a><a href="#Footnote_23_23" class="fnanchor">[23]</a></h2> + + +<p>My Dear sir,—Your letter is, to myself, infinitely +obliging: with regard to you, I can find +no fault with it, except that of a tone of humility and +disqualification, which neither your rank, nor the +place you are in, nor the profession you belong to, +nor your very extraordinary learning and talents, +will in propriety demand or perhaps admit. These +dispositions will be still less proper, if you should +feel them in the extent your modesty leads you to +express them. You have certainly given by far too +strong a proof of self-diffidence by asking the opinion +of a man circumstanced as I am, on the important +subject of your letter. You are far more capable +of forming just conceptions upon it than I can be. +However, since you are pleased to command me to +lay before you my thoughts, as materials upon which +your better judgment may operate, I shall obey you, +and submit them, with great deference, to your melioration +or rejection.</p> + +<p>But first permit me to put myself in the right. I +owe you an answer to your former letter. It did not +desire one, but it deserved it. If not for an answer, +it called for an acknowledgment. It was a new favor; +and, indeed, I should be worse than insensible,<a name="Page_364" id="Page_364" title="364" class="pagenum"></a> +if I did not consider the honors you have heaped +upon me with no sparing hand with becoming gratitude. +But your letter arrived to me at a time when +the closing of my long and last business in life, a business +extremely complex, and full of difficulties and +vexations of all sorts, occupied me in a manner which +those who have not seen the interior as well as exterior +of it cannot easily imagine. I confess that +in the crisis of that rude conflict I neglected many +things that well deserved my best attention,—none +that deserved it better, or have caused me more regret +in the neglect, than your letter. The instant +that business was over, and the House had passed its +judgment on the conduct of the managers, I lost no +time to execute what for years I had resolved on: it +was, to quit my public station, and to seek that tranquillity, +in my very advanced age, to which, after +a very tempestuous life, I thought myself entitled. +But God has thought fit (and I unfeignedly acknowledge +His justice) to dispose of things otherwise. So +heavy a calamity has fallen upon me as to disable me +for business and to disqualify me for repose. The +existence I have I do not know that I can call life. +Accordingly, I do not meddle with any one measure +of government, though, for what reasons I know not, +you seem to suppose me deeply in the secret of affairs. +I only know, so far as your side of the water +is concerned, that your present excellent Lord Lieutenant +(the best man in every relation that I have +ever been acquainted with) has perfectly pure intentions +with regard to Ireland, and of course that he +wishes cordially well to those who form the great +mass of its inhabitants, and who, as they are well +or ill managed, must form an important part of its<a name="Page_365" id="Page_365" title="365" class="pagenum"></a> +strength or weakness. If with regard to that great +object he has carried over any ready-made system, I +assure you it is perfectly unknown to me: I am very +much retired from the world, and live in much ignorance. +This, I hope, will form my humble apology, +if I should err in the notions I entertain of the question +which is soon to become the subject of your +deliberations. At the same time accept it as an +apology for my neglects.</p> + +<p>You need make no apology for your attachment +to the religious description you belong to. It proves +(as in you it is sincere) your attachment to the great +points in which the leading divisions are agreed, when +the lesser, in which they differ, are so dear to you. +I shall never call any religious opinions, which appear +important to serious and pious minds, things of +no consideration. Nothing is so fatal to religion as +indifference, which is, at least, half infidelity. As +long as men hold charity and justice to be essential +integral parts of religion, there can be little danger +from a strong attachment to particular tenets in faith. +This I am perfectly sure is your case; but I am not +equally sure that either zeal for the tenets of faith, +or the smallest degree of charity or justice, have +much influenced the gentlemen who, under pretexts +of zeal, have resisted the enfranchisement of their +country. My dear son, who was a person of discernment, +as well as clear and acute in his expressions, +said, in a letter of his which I have seen, +"that, in order to grace their cause, and to draw +some respect to their persons, they pretend to be +bigots." But here, I take it, we have not much to +do with the theological tenets on the one side of +the question or the other. The point itself is practically<a name="Page_366" id="Page_366" title="366" class="pagenum"></a> +decided. That religion is owned by the state. +Except in a settled maintenance, it is protected. A +great deal of the rubbish, which, as a nuisance, long +obstructed the way, is removed. One impediment +remained longer, as a matter to justify the proscription +of the body of our country; after the rest had +been abandoned as untenable ground. But the business +of the Pope (that mixed person of polities and +religion) has long ceased to be a bugbear: for some +time past he has ceased to be even a colorable pretext. +This was well known, when the Catholics of +these kingdoms, for our amusement, were obliged +on oath to disclaim him in his political capacity,—which +implied an allowance for them to recognize +him in some sort of ecclesiastical superiority. It +was a compromise of the old dispute.</p> + +<p>For my part, I confess I wish that we had been +less eager in this point. I don't think, indeed, that +much mischief will happen from it, if things are +otherwise properly managed. Too nice an inquisition +ought not to be made into opinions that are dying +away of themselves. Had we lived an hundred +and fifty years ago, I should have been as earnest +and anxious as anybody for this sort of abjuration; +but, living at the time in which I live, and obliged +to speculate forward instead of backward, I must +fairly say, I could well endure the existence of every +sort of collateral aid which opinion might, in the now +state of things, afford to authority. I must see much +more danger than in my life I have seen, or than +others will venture seriously to affirm that they see, +in the Pope aforesaid, (though a foreign power, and +with his long tail of <i>et ceteras</i>,) before I should be +active in weakening any hold which government<a name="Page_367" id="Page_367" title="367" class="pagenum"></a> +might think it prudent to resort to, in the management +of that large part of the king's subjects. I +do not choose to direct all my precautions to the +part where the danger does not press, and to leave +myself open and unguarded where I am not only +really, but visibly attacked.</p> + +<p>My whole politics, at present, centre in one point, +and to this the merit or demerit of every measure +(with me) is referable,—that is, what will most promote +or depress the cause of Jacobinism. What is +Jacobinism? It is an attempt (hitherto but too successful) +to eradicate prejudice out of the minds of +men, for the purpose of putting all power and authority +into the hands of the persons capable of occasionally +enlightening the minds of the people. For this +purpose the Jacobins have resolved to destroy the +whole frame and fabric of the old societies of the +world, and to regenerate them after their fashion. +To obtain an army for this purpose, they everywhere +engage the poor by holding out to them as a bribe the +spoils of the rich. This I take to be a fair description +of the principles and leading maxims of the enlightened +of our day who are commonly called Jacobins.</p> + +<p>As the grand prejudice, and that which holds all +the other prejudices together, the first, last, and middle +object of their hostility is religion. With that +they are at inexpiable war. They make no distinction +of sects. A Christian, as such, is to them an enemy. +What, then, is left to a real Christian, (Christian +as a believer and as a statesman,) but to make a +league between all the grand divisions of that name, +to protect and to cherish them all, and by no means +to proscribe in any manner, more or less, any member +of our common party? The divisions which formerly<a name="Page_368" id="Page_368" title="368" class="pagenum"></a> +prevailed in the Church, with all their overdone +zeal, only purified and ventilated our common faith, +because there was no common enemy arrayed and +embattled to take advantage of their dissensions; but +now nothing but inevitable ruin will be the consequence +of our quarrels. I think we may dispute, rail, +persecute, and provoke the Catholics out of their prejudices; +but it is not in ours they will take refuge. +If anything is, one more than another, out of the +power of man, it is to <i>create</i> a prejudice. Somebody +has said, that a king may make a nobleman, but he +cannot make a gentleman.</p> + +<p>All the principal religions in Europe stand upon +one common bottom. The support that the whole or +the favored parts may have in the secret dispensations +of Providence it is impossible to tell; but, humanly +speaking, they are all <i>prescriptive</i> religions. They +have all stood long enough to make prescription and +its chain of legitimate prejudices their main stay. +The people who compose the four grand divisions of +Christianity have now their religion as an habit, and +upon authority, and not on disputation,—as all men +who have their religion derived from their parents +and the fruits of education <i>must</i> have it, however the +one more than the other may be able to reconcile his +faith to his own reason or to that of other men. Depend +upon it, they must all be supported, or they +must all fall in the crash of a common ruin. The +Catholics are the far more numerous part of the +Christians in your country; and how can Christianity +(that is now the point in issue) be supported +under the persecution, or even under the discountenance, +of the greater number of Christians? It is a +great truth, and which in one of the debates I stated<a name="Page_369" id="Page_369" title="369" class="pagenum"></a> +as strongly as I could to the House of Commons in +the last session, that, if the Catholic religion is destroyed +by the infidels, it is a most contemptible and +absurd idea, that this, or any Protestant Church, can +survive that event. Therefore my humble and decided +opinion is, that all the three religions prevalent +more or less in various parts of these islands ought +all, in subordination to the legal establishments as +they stand in the several countries, to be all countenanced, +protected, and cherished, and that in Ireland +particularly the Roman Catholic religion should +be upheld in high respect and veneration, and should +be, in its place, provided with all the means of making +it a blessing to the people who profess it,—that +it ought to be cherished as a good, (though not as +the most preferable good, if a choice was now to be +made,) and not tolerated as an inevitable evil. If +this be my opinion as to the Catholic religion as a +sect, you must see that I must be to the last degree +averse to put a man, upon that account, upon a bad +footing with relation to the privileges which the fundamental +laws of this country give him as a subject. +I am the more serious on the positive encouragement +to be given to this religion, (always, however, as secondary,) +because the serious and earnest belief and +practice of it by its professors forms, as things stand, +the most effectual barrier, if not the sole barrier, +against Jacobinism. The Catholics form the great +body of the lower ranks of your community, and no +small part of those classes of the middling that come +nearest to them. You know that the seduction of +that part of mankind from the principles of religion, +morality, subordination, and social order is the great +object of the Jacobins. Let them grow lax, skeptical,<a name="Page_370" id="Page_370" title="370" class="pagenum"></a> +careless, and indifferent with regard to religion, and, +so sure as we have an existence, it is not a zealous +Anglican or Scottish Church principle, but direct +Jacobinism, which will enter into that breach. Two +hundred years dreadfully spent in experiments to +force that people to change the form of their religion +have proved fruitless. You have now your choice, +for full four fifths of your people, of the Catholic +religion or Jacobinism. If things appear to you to +stand on this alternative, I think you will not be +long in making your option.</p> + +<p>You have made, as you naturally do, a very able +analysis of powers, and have separated, as the things +are separable, civil from political powers. You start, +too, a question, whether the civil can be secured +without some share in the political. For my part, +as abstract questions, I should find some difficulty +in an attempt to resolve them. But as applied to +the state of Ireland, to the form of our commonwealth, +to the parties that divide us, and to the dispositions +of the leading men in those parties, I cannot +hesitate to lay before you my opinion, that, whilst +any kind of discouragements and disqualifications remain +on the Catholics, an handle will be made by a +factious power utterly to defeat the benefits of any +civil rights they may apparently possess. I need not +go to very remote times for my examples. It was +within the course of about a twelvemonth, that, after +Parliament had been led into a step quite unparalleled +in its records, after they had resisted all concession, +and even hearing, with an obstinacy equal to +anything that could have actuated a party domination +in the second or eighth of Queen Anne, after +the strange adventure of the Grand Juries, and after<a name="Page_371" id="Page_371" title="371" class="pagenum"></a> +Parliament had listened to the sovereign pleading for +the emancipation of his subjects,—it was after all +this, that such a grudging and discontent was expressed +as must justly have alarmed, as it did extremely +alarm, the whole of the Catholic body: and +I remember but one period in my whole life (I mean +the savage period between 1781 and 1767) in which +they have been more harshly or contumeliously treated +than since the last partial enlargement. And thus +I am convinced it will be, by paroxysms, as long as +any stigma remains on them, and whilst they are +considered as no better than half citizens. If they +are kept such for any length of time, they will be +made whole Jacobins. Against this grand and dreadful +evil of our time (I do not love to cheat myself or +others) I do not know any solid security whatsoever; +but I am quite certain that what will come nearest +to it is to interest as many as you can in the present +order of things, religiously, civilly, politically, by all +the ties and principles by which mankind are held. +This is like to be effectual policy: I am sure it is +honorable policy: and it is better to fail, if fail we +must, in the paths of direct and manly than of low +and crooked wisdom.</p> + +<p>As to the capacity of sitting in Parliament, after +all the capacities for voting, for the army, for the +navy, for the professions, for civil offices, it is a dispute +<i>de lana caprina</i>, in my poor opinion,—at least +on the part of those who oppose it. In the first +place, this admission to office, and this exclusion from +Parliament, on the principle of an exclusion from +political power, is the very reverse of the principle +of the English Test Act. If I were to form a judgment +from experience rather than theory, I should<a name="Page_372" id="Page_372" title="372" class="pagenum"></a> +doubt much whether the capacity for or even the +possession of a seat in Parliament did really convey +much of power to be properly called political. I +have sat there, with some observation, for nine-and-twenty +years, or thereabouts. The power of a member +of Parliament is uncertain and indirect; and +if power, rather than splendor and fame, were the +object, I should think that any of the principal clerks +in office, to say nothing of their superiors, (several of +whom are disqualified by law for seats in Parliament,) +possess far more power than nine tenths of the members +of the House of Commons. I might say this of +men who seemed, from their fortunes, their weight in +their country, and their talents, to be persons of figure +there,—and persons, too, not in opposition to the +prevailing party in government. But be they what +they will, on a fair canvass of the several prevalent +Parliamentary interests in Ireland, I cannot, out of +the three hundred members of whom the Irish Parliament +is composed, discover that above three, or at +the utmost four, Catholics would be returned to the +House of Commons. But suppose they should amount +to thirty, that is, to a tenth part, (a thing I hold impossible +for a long series of years, and never very +likely to happen,) what is this to those who are to +balance them in the one House, and the clear and +settled majority in the other? For I think it absolutely +impossible, that, in the course of many years, +above four or five peers should be created of that +communion. In fact, the exclusion of them seems to +me only to mark jealousy and suspicion, and not to +provide security in any way.—But I return to the +old ground. The danger is not there: these are +things long since done away. The grand controversy +is no longer between you and them.<a name="Page_373" id="Page_373" title="373" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>Forgive this length. My pen has insensibly run +on. You are yourself to blame, if you are much +fatigued. I congratulate you on the auspicious opening +of your session. Surely Great Britain and Ireland +ought to join in wreathing a never-fading garland +for the head of Grattan. Adieu, my dear Sir. +Good nights to you!—I never can have any.</p> + +<p>Yours always most sincerely,</p> + +<p>EDMUND BURKE.</p> + +<p>Jan. 29th, 1795. Twelve at night.</p> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_23_23" id="Footnote_23_23"></a><a href="#FNanchor_23_23"><span class="label">[23]</span></a> William Smith, Esq., to whom this Letter is addressed, was then +a member of the Irish Parliament: he is now (1812) one of the Barons +of the Court of Exchequer in Ireland.</p></div> +</div> + +<p><a name="Page_374" id="Page_374" title="374" class="pagenum"></a></p> +<p><a name="Page_375" id="Page_375" title="375" class="pagenum"></a> +<a name="SIR_HERCULES_LANGRISHE" id="SIR_HERCULES_LANGRISHE" /></p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>SECOND LETTER<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 60%;">TO</span><br /> +<br /> +SIR HERCULES LANGRISHE<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 60%;">ON THE</span><br /> +<br /> +CATHOLIC QUESTION.<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 60%;">MAY 26, 1795.</span></h2> +<p><a name="Page_376" id="Page_376" title="376" class="pagenum"></a></p> +<p><a name="Page_377" id="Page_377" title="377" class="pagenum"></a></p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p>My Dear Sir,—If I am not as early as I +ought to be in my acknowledgments for your +very kind letter, pray do me the justice to attribute +my failure to its natural and but too real cause, a +want of the most ordinary power of exertion, owing +to the impressions made upon an old and infirm constitution +by private misfortune and by public calamity. +It is true, I make occasional efforts to rouse myself +to something better,—but I soon relapse into +that state of languor which must be the habit of my +body and understanding to the end of my short and +cheerless existence in this world.</p> + +<p>I am sincerely grateful for your kindness in connecting +the interest you take in the sentiments of +an old friend with the able part you take in the +service of your country. It is an instance, among +many, of that happy temper which has always given +a character of amenity to your virtues and a good-natured +direction to your talents.</p> + +<p>Your speech on the Catholic question I read with +much satisfaction. It is solid; it is convincing; it +is eloquent; and it ought, on the spot, to have produced +that effect which its reason, and that contained +in the other excellent speeches on the same +side of the question, cannot possibly fail (though +with less pleasant consequences) to produce hereafter. +What a sad thing it is, that the grand instructor,<a name="Page_378" id="Page_378" title="378" class="pagenum"></a> +Time, has not yet been able to teach the +grand lesson of his own value, and that, in every +question of moral and political prudence, it is the +choice of the moment which renders the measure +serviceable or useless, noxious or salutary!</p> + +<p>In the Catholic question I considered only one +point: Was it, at the time, and in the circumstances, +a measure which tended to promote the +concord of the citizens? I have no difficulty in saying +it was,—and as little in saying that the present +concord of the citizens was worth buying, at a critical +season, by granting a few <i>capacities</i>, which probably +no one man now living is likely to be served or +hurt by. When any man tells <i>you</i> and <i>me</i>, that, if +these places were left in the discretion of a Protestant +crown, and these memberships in the discretion +of Protestant electors or patrons, we should have a +Popish official system, and a Popish representation, +capable of overturning the Establishment, he only insults +our understandings. When any man tells this +to <i>Catholics</i>, he insults their understandings, and he +galls their feelings. It is not the question of the +places and seats, it is the real hostile disposition and +the <i>pretended</i> fears, that leave stings in the minds +of the people. I really thought that in the total of +the late circumstances, with regard to persons, to +things, to principles, and to measures, was to be +found a conjuncture favorable to the introduction and +to the perpetuation of a general harmony, producing +a general strength, which to that hour Ireland was +never so happy as to enjoy. My sanguine hopes are +blasted, and I must consign my feelings on that terrible +disappointment to the same patience in which +I have been obliged to bury the vexation I suffered<a name="Page_379" id="Page_379" title="379" class="pagenum"></a> +on the defeat of the other great, just, and honorable +causes in which I have had some share, and which +have given more of dignity than of peace and advantage +to a long, laborious life. Though, perhaps, a +want of success might be urged as a reason for making +me doubt of the justice of the part I have taken, +yet, until I have other lights than one side of the debate +has furnished me, I must see things, and feel +them too, as I see and feel them. I think I can +hardly overrate the malignity of the principles of +Protestant ascendency, as they affect Ireland,—or +of Indianism, as they affect these countries, and as +they affect Asia,—or of Jacobinism, as they affect +all Europe and the state of human society itself. +The last is the greatest evil. But it readily combines +with the others, and flows from them. Whatever +breeds discontent at this time will produce that great +master-mischief most infallibly. Whatever tends to +persuade the people that the <i>few</i>, called by whatever +name you please, religious or political, are of opinion +that their interest is not compatible with that of +the <i>many</i>, is a great point gained to Jacobinism. +Whatever tends to irritate the talents of a country, +which have at all times, and at these particularly, +a mighty influence on the public mind, is of infinite +service to that formidable cause. Unless where +Heaven has mingled uncommon ingredients of virtue +in the composition,—<i>quos meliore luto finxit præcordia +Titan,</i>—talents naturally gravitate to Jacobinism. +Whatever ill-humors are afloat in the state, +they will be sure to discharge themselves in a mingled +torrent in the <i>Cloaca Maxima</i> of Jacobinism. +Therefore people ought well to look about them. +First, the physicians are to take care that they do<a name="Page_380" id="Page_380" title="380" class="pagenum"></a> +nothing to irritate this epidemical distemper. It is +a foolish thing to have the better of the patient in +a dispute. The complaint or its cause ought to be +removed, and wise and lenient arts ought to precede +the measures of vigor. They ought to be the <i>ultima</i>, +not the <i>prima</i>, not the <i>tota</i> ratio of a wise government. +God forbid, that, on a worthy occasion, authority +should want the means of force, or the disposition +to use it! But where a prudent and enlarged +policy does not precede it, and attend it too, where +the hearts of the better sort of people do not go +with the hands of the soldiery, you may call your +Constitution what you will, in effect it will consist +of three parts, (orders, if you please,) cavalry, infantry, +and artillery,—and of nothing else or better. +I agree with you in your dislike of the discourses +in Francis Street: but I like as little some of those +in College Green. I am even less pleased with the +temper that predominated in the latter, as better +things might have been expected in the regular +family mansion of public discretion than, in a new +and hasty assembly of unexperienced men, congregated +under circumstances of no small irritation. +After people have taken your tests, prescribed by +yourselves as proofs of their allegiance, to be marked +as enemies, traitors, or at best as suspected and dangerous +persons, and that they are not to be believed +on their oaths, we are not to be surprised, if they +fall into a passion, and talk as men in a passion do, +intemperately and idly.</p> + +<p>The worst of the matter is this: you are partly +leading, partly driving into Jacobinism that description +of your people whose religious principles, church +polity, and habitual discipline might make them an<a name="Page_381" id="Page_381" title="381" class="pagenum"></a> +invincible dike against that inundation. This you +have a thousand mattocks and pickaxes lifted up to +demolish. You make a sad story of the Pope. <i>O +seri studiorum</i>! It will not be difficult to get many +called Catholics to laugh at this fundamental part of +their religion. Never doubt it. You have succeeded +in part, and you may succeed completely. But in the +present state of men's minds and affairs, do not flatter +yourselves that they will piously look to the head of +our Church in the place of that Pope whom you make +them forswear, and out of all reverence to whom you +bully and rail and buffoon them. Perhaps you may +succeed in the same manner with all the other tenets +of doctrine and usages of discipline amongst the Catholics; +but what security have you, that, in the temper +and on the principles on which they have made this +change, they will stop at the exact sticking-places you +have marked in <i>your</i> articles? You have no security +for anything, but that they will become what are +called <i>Franco-Jacobins</i>, and reject the whole together. +No converts now will be made in a considerable +number from one of our sects to the other upon a +really religious principle. Controversy moves in another +direction.</p> + +<p>Next to religion, <i>property</i> is the great point of Jacobin +attack. Here many of the debaters in your +majority, and their writers, have given the Jacobins +all the assistance their hearts can wish. When the +Catholics desire places and seats, you tell them that +this is only a pretext, (though Protestants might +suppose it just <i>possible</i> for men to like good places +and snug boroughs for their own merits,) but that +their real view is, to strip Protestants of their property +To my certain knowledge, till those Jacobin<a name="Page_382" id="Page_382" title="382" class="pagenum"></a> +lectures were opened in the House of Commons, they +never dreamt of any such thing; but now the great +professors may stimulate them to inquire (on the new +principles) into the foundation of that property, and +of all property. If you treat men as robbers, why, +robbers, sooner or later, they will become.</p> + +<p>A third point of Jacobin attack is on <i>old traditionary +constitutions</i>. You are apprehensive for yours, +which leans from its perpendicular, and does not +stand firm on its theory. I like Parliamentary reforms +as little as any man who has boroughs to sell +for money, or for peerages in Ireland. But it passes +my comprehension, in what manner it is that men +can be reconciled to the <i>practical</i> merits of a constitution, +the theory of which is in litigation, by being +<i>practically</i> excluded from any of its advantages. Let +us put ourselves in the place of these people, and try +an experiment of the effects of such a procedure on +our own minds. Unquestionably, we should be perfectly +satisfied, when we were told that Houses of +Parliament, instead of being places of refuge for popular +liberty, were citadels for keeping us in order as +a conquered people. These things play the Jacobin +game to a nicety.</p> + +<p>Indeed, my dear Sir, there is not a single particular +in the Francis-Street declamations, which has not, +to your and to my certain knowledge, been taught +by the jealous ascendants, sometimes by doctrine, +sometimes by example, always by provocation. Remember +the whole of 1781 and 1782, in Parliament +and out of Parliament; at this very day, and in the +worst acts and designs, observe the tenor of the objections +with which the College-Green orators of the +ascendency reproach the Catholics. You have observed,<a name="Page_383" id="Page_383" title="383" class="pagenum"></a> +no doubt, how much they rely on the affair +of Jackson. Is it not pleasant to hear Catholics reproached +for a supposed connection—with whom?—with +Protestant clergymen! with Protestant gentlemen! +with Mr. Jackson! with Mr. Rowan, &c., &c.! +But <i>egomet mî ignosco</i>. Conspiracies and treasons are +privileged pleasures, not to be profaned by the impure +and unhallowed touch of Papists. Indeed, all this +will do, perhaps, well enough, with detachments of +dismounted cavalry and fencibles from England. But +let us not say to Catholics, by way of <i>argument</i>, that +they are to be kept in a degraded state, because some +of them are no better than many of us Protestants. +The thing I most disliked in some of their speeches +(those, I mean, of the Catholics) was what is called +the spirit of liberality, so much and so diligently +taught by the ascendants, by which they are made to +abandon their own particular interests, and to merge +them in the general discontents of the country. It +gave me no pleasure to hear of the dissolution of +the committee. There were in it a majority, to my +knowledge, of very sober, well-intentioned men; and +there were none in it but such who, if not continually +goaded and irritated, might be made useful to +the tranquillity of the country. It is right always +to have a few of every description, through whom +you may quietly operate on the many, both for the +interests of the description, and for the general interest.</p> + +<p>Excuse me, my dear friend, if I have a little tried +your patience. You have brought this trouble on +yourself, by your thinking of a man forgot, and who +has no objection to be forgot, by the world. These +things we discussed together four or five and thirty<a name="Page_384" id="Page_384" title="384" class="pagenum"></a> +years ago. We were then, and at bottom ever since, +of the same opinion on the justice and policy of the +whole and of every part of the penal system. You +and I, and everybody, must now and then ply and +bend to the occasion, and take what can be got. But +very sure I am, that, whilst there remains in the law +any principle whatever which can furnish to certain +politicians an excuse for raising an opinion of their +own importance, as necessary to keep their fellow-subjects +in order, the obnoxious people will be fretted, +harassed, insulted, provoked to discontent and disorder, +and practically excluded from the partial advantages +from which the letter of the law does not exclude +them.</p> + +<p>Adieu! my dear Sir,</p> + +<p>And believe me very truly yours,</p> + +<p>EDMUND BURKE.</p> + +<p>BEACONSFIELD, May 26, 1795.</p> + +<p><a name="Page_385" id="Page_385" title="385" class="pagenum"></a> +<a name="RICHARD_BURKE_ESQ" id="RICHARD_BURKE_ESQ" /></p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><span style="font-size: 60%;">A</span><br /> +<br /> +LETTER<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 60%;">TO</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%;">RICHARD BURKE, ESQ.,</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 60%;">ON</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%;">PROTESTANT ASCENDENCY IN IRELAND.</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 60%;">1793.</span></h2> +<p><a name="Page_386" id="Page_386" title="386" class="pagenum"></a></p> +<p><a name="Page_387" id="Page_387" title="387" class="pagenum"></a></p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p>My dear son,—We are all again assembled +in town, to finish the last, but the most laborious, +of the tasks which have been imposed upon me +during my Parliamentary service. We are as well +as at our time of life we can expect to be. We have, +indeed, some moments of anxiety about you. You +are engaged in an undertaking similar in its principle +to mine. You are engaged in the relief of an oppressed +people. In that service you must necessarily +excite the same sort of passions in those who have +exercised, and who wish to continue that oppression, +that I have had to struggle with in this long labor. +As your father has done, you must make enemies of +many of the rich, of the proud, and of the powerful. +I and you began in the same way. I must confess, +that, if our place was of our choice, I could wish it +had been your lot to begin the career of your life +with an endeavor to render some more moderate and +less invidious service to the public But being engaged +in a great and critical work, I have not the +least hesitation about your having hitherto done your +duty as becomes you. If I had not an assurance +not to be shaken from the character of your mind, I +should be satisfied on that point by the cry that is +raised against you. If you had behaved, as they call +it, discreetly, that is, faintly and treacherously, in +the execution of your trust, you would have had, for<a name="Page_388" id="Page_388" title="388" class="pagenum"></a> +a while, the good word of all sorts of men, even of +many of those whose cause you had betrayed,—and +whilst your favor lasted, you might have coined that +false reputation into a true and solid interest to yourself. +This you are well apprised of; and you do not +refuse to travel that beaten road from an ignorance, +but from a contempt, of the objects it leads to.</p> + +<p>When you choose an arduous and slippery path, +God forbid that any weak feelings of my declining +age, which calls for soothings and supports, and +which can have none but from you, should make me +wish that you should abandon what you are about, +or should trifle with it! In this house we submit, +though with troubled minds, to that order which has +connected all great duties with toils and with perils, +which has conducted the road to glory through the +regions of obloquy and reproach, and which will never +suffer the disparaging alliance of spurious, false, +and fugitive praise with genuine and permanent reputation. +We know that the Power which has settled +that order, and subjected you to it by placing you in +the situation you are in, is able to bring you out of +it with credit and with safety. His will be done! +All must come right. You may open the way with +pain and under reproach: others will pursue it with +ease and with applause.</p> + +<p>I am sorry to find that pride and passion, and that +sort of zeal for religion which never shows any wonderful +heat but when it afflicts and mortifies our +neighbor, will not let the ruling description perceive +that the privilege for which your clients contend +is very nearly as much for the benefit of those +who refuse it as those who ask it. I am not to examine +into the charges that are daily made on the administration<a name="Page_389" id="Page_389" title="389" class="pagenum"></a> +of Ireland. I am not qualified to say +how much in them is cold truth, and how much rhetorical +exaggeration. Allowing some foundation to +the complaint, it is to no purpose that these people +allege that their government is a job in its administration. +I am sure it is a job in its constitution; nor +is it possible a scheme of polity, which, in total exclusion +of the body of the community, confines (with +little or no regard to their rank or condition in life) +to a certain set of favored citizens the rights which +formerly belonged to the whole, should not, by the +operation of the same selfish and narrow principles, +teach the persons who administer in that government +to prefer their own particular, but well-understood, +private interest to the false and ill-calculated private +interest of the monopolizing company they belong to. +Eminent characters, to be sure, overrule places and +circumstances. I have nothing to say to that virtue +which shoots up in full force by the native vigor of +the seminal principle, in spite of the adverse soil and +climate that it grows in. But speaking of things in +their ordinary course, in a country of monopoly there +<i>can</i> be no patriotism. There may be a party spirit, +but public spirit there can be none. As to a spirit +of liberty, still less can it exist, or anything like it. +A liberty made up of penalties! a liberty made up +of incapacities! a liberty made up of exclusion and +proscription, continued for ages, of four fifths, perhaps, +of the inhabitants of all ranks and fortunes +In what does such liberty differ from the description +of the most shocking kind of servitude?</p> + +<p>But it will be said, in that country some people +are free. Why, this is the very description of despotism. +<i>Partial freedom is privilege and prerogative,<a name="Page_390" id="Page_390" title="390" class="pagenum"></a> +and not liberty.</i> Liberty, such as deserves the name, +is an honest, equitable, diffusive, and impartial principle. +It is a great and enlarged virtue, and not a +sordid, selfish, and illiberal vice. It is the portion +of the mass of the citizens, and not the haughty +license of some potent individual or some predominant +faction.</p> + +<p>If anything ought to be despotic in a country, it is +its government; because there is no cause of constant +operation to make its yoke unequal. But the +dominion of a party must continually, steadily, and +by its very essence, lean upon the prostrate description. +A constitution formed so as to enable a party +to overrule its very government, and to overpower +the people too, answers the purposes neither of government +nor of freedom. It compels that power +which ought, and often would be disposed, <i>equally</i> +to protect the subjects, to fail in its trust, to counteract +its purposes, and to become no better than the +instrument of the wrongs of a faction. Some degree +of influence must exist in all governments. But a +government which has no interest to please the body +of the people, and can neither support them nor with +safety call for their support, nor is of power to sway +the domineering faction, can only exist by corruption; +and taught by that monopolizing party which +usurps the title and qualities of the public to consider +the body of the people as out of the constitution, +they will consider those who are in it in the light +in which they choose to consider themselves. The +whole relation of government and of freedom will be +a battle or a traffic.</p> + +<p>This system, in its real nature, and under its proper +appellations, is odious and unnatural, especially when<a name="Page_391" id="Page_391" title="391" class="pagenum"></a> +a constitution is admitted which not only, as all constitutions +do profess, has a regard to the good of the +multitude, but in its theory makes profession of their +power also. But of late this scheme of theirs has been +new-christened,—<i>honestum nomen imponitur vitio</i>. A +word has been lately struck in the mint of the Castle +of Dublin; thence it was conveyed to the Tholsel, or +City-Hall, where, having passed the touch of the corporation, +so respectably stamped and vouched, it soon +became current in Parliament, and was carried back +by the Speaker of the House of Commons in great +pomp, as an offering of homage from whence it came. +The word is <i>ascendency</i>. It is not absolutely new. +But the sense in which I have hitherto seen it used +was to signify an influence obtained over the minds +of some other person by love and reverence, or by +superior management and dexterity. It had, therefore, +to this its promotion no more than a moral, not +a civil or political use. But I admit it is capable of +being so applied; and if the Lord Mayor of Dublin, +and the Speaker of the Irish Parliament, who recommend +the preservation of the Protestant ascendency, +mean to employ the word in that sense,—that is, if +they understand by it the preservation of the influence +of that description of gentlemen over the Catholics +by means of an authority derived from their wisdom +and virtue, and from an opinion they raise in +that people of a pious regard and affection for their +freedom and happiness,—it is impossible not to commend +their adoption of so apt a term into the family +of politics. It may be truly said to enrich the language. +Even if the Lord Mayor and Speaker mean +to insinuate that this influence is to be obtained and +held by flattering their people, by managing them, by<a name="Page_392" id="Page_392" title="392" class="pagenum"></a> +skilfully adapting themselves to the humors and passions +of those whom they would govern, he must be +a very untoward critic who would cavil even at this +use of the word, though such cajoleries would perhaps +be more prudently practised than professed. +These are all meanings laudable, or at least tolerable. +But when we look a little more narrowly, and +compare it with the plan to which it owes its present +technical application, I find it has strayed far from +its original sense. It goes much further than the +privilege allowed by Horace. It is more than <i>parce +detortum</i>. This Protestant ascendency means nothing +less than an influence obtained by virtue, by +love, or even by artifice and seduction,—full as little +an influence derived from the means by which +ministers have obtained an influence which might +be called, without straining, an <i>ascendency</i>, in public +assemblies in England, that is, by a liberal distribution +of places and pensions, and other graces +of government. This last is wide indeed of the signification +of the word. New <i>ascendency</i> is the old +<i>mastership</i>. It is neither more nor less than the resolution +of one set of people in Ireland to consider +themselves as the sole citizens in the commonwealth, +and to keep a dominion over the rest by reducing +them to absolute slavery under a military power, +and, thus fortified in their power, to divide the public +estate, which is the result of general contribution, +as a military booty, solely amongst themselves.</p> + +<p>The poor word <i>ascendency</i>, so soft and melodious +in its sound, so lenitive and emollient in its first +usage, is now employed to cover to the world the +most rigid, and perhaps not the most wise, of all +plans of policy. The word is large enough in its<a name="Page_393" id="Page_393" title="393" class="pagenum"></a> +comprehension. I cannot conceive what mode of +oppression in civil life, or what mode of religious +persecution, may not come within the methods of +preserving an <i>ascendency</i>. In plain old English, as +they apply it, it signifies <i>pride and dominion</i> on the +one part of the relation, and on the other <i>subserviency +and contempt</i>,—and it signifies nothing else. +The old words are as fit to be set to music as the +new: but use has long since affixed to them their +true signification, and they sound, as the other will, +harshly and odiously to the moral and intelligent +ears of mankind.</p> + +<p>This ascendency, by being a <i>Protestant</i> ascendency, +does not better it from the combination of a note +or two more in this anti-harmonic scale. If Protestant +ascendency means the proscription from citizenship +of by far the major part of the people of any +country, then Protestant ascendency is a bad thing, +and it ought to have no existence. But there is a +deeper evil. By the use that is so frequently made +of the term, and the policy which is engrafted on +it, the name Protestant becomes nothing more or +better than the name of a persecuting faction, with +a relation of some sort of theological hostility to others, +but without any sort of ascertained tenets of its +own upon the ground of which it persecutes other +men: for the patrons of this Protestant ascendency +neither do nor can, by anything positive, define or +describe what they mean by the word Protestant. +It is defined, as Cowley defines wit, not by what it +is, but by what it is not. It is not the Christian +religion as professed in the churches holding communion +with Rome, the majority of Christians: that +is all which, in the latitude of the term, is known<a name="Page_394" id="Page_394" title="394" class="pagenum"></a> +about its signification. This makes such persecutors +ten times worse than any of that description +that hitherto have been known in the world. The +old persecutors, whether Pagan or Christian, whether +Arian or Orthodox, whether Catholics, Anglicans, or +Calvinists, actually were, or at least had the decorum +to pretend to be, strong dogmatists. They pretended +that their religious maxims were clear and ascertained, +and so useful that they were bound, for +the eternal benefit of mankind, to defend or diffuse +them, though by any sacrifices of the temporal good +of those who were the objects of their system of experiment.</p> + +<p>The bottom of this theory of persecution is false. +It is not permitted to us to sacrifice the temporal +good of any body of men to our own ideas of the +truth and falsehood of any religious opinions. By +making men miserable in this life, they counteract +one of the great ends of charity, which is, in as much +as in us lies, to make men happy in every period +of their existence, and most in what most depends +upon us. But give to these old persecutors their +mistaken principle, in their reasoning they are consistent, +and in their tempers they may be even kind +and good-natured. But whenever a faction would +render millions of mankind miserable, some millions +of the race coexistent with themselves, and many +millions in their succession, without knowing or so +much as pretending to ascertain the doctrines of +their own school, (in which there is much of the lash +and nothing of the lesson,) the errors which the +persons in such a faction fall into are not those that +are natural to human imbecility, nor is the least mixture +of mistaken kindness to mankind an ingredient<a name="Page_395" id="Page_395" title="395" class="pagenum"></a> +in the severities they inflict. The whole is nothing +but pure and perfect malice. It is, indeed, a perfection +in that kind belonging to beings of an higher +order than man, and to them we ought to leave it.</p> + +<p>This kind of persecutors without zeal, without +charity, know well enough that religion, to pass by +all questions of the truth or falsehood of any of its +particular systems, (a matter I abandon to the theologians +on all sides,) is a source of great comfort to +us mortals, in this our short, but tedious journey +through the world. They know, that, to enjoy this +consolation, men must believe their religion upon +some principle or other, whether of education, habit, +theory, or authority. When men are driven from +any of those principles on which they have received +religion, without embracing with the same assurance +and cordiality some other system, a dreadful void is +left in their minds, and a terrible shook is given to +their morals. They lose their guide, their comfort, +their hope. None but the most cruel and hardhearted +of men, who had banished all natural tenderness +from their minds, such as those beings of +iron, the atheists, could bring themselves to any +persecution like this. Strange it is, but so it is, that +men, driven by force from their habits in one mode +of religion, have, by contrary habits, under the same +force, often quietly settled in another. They suborn +their reason to declare in favor of their necessity. +Man and his conscience cannot always be at war. If +the first races have not been able to make a pacification +between the conscience and the convenience, +their descendants come generally to submit to the +violence of the laws, without violence to their minds. +As things stood formerly, they possessed a <i>positive</i><a name="Page_396" id="Page_396" title="396" class="pagenum"></a> +scheme of direction and of consolation. In this men +may acquiesce. The harsh methods in use with the +old class of persecutors were to make converts, not +apostates only. If they perversely hated other sects +and factions, they loved their own inordinately. But +in this Protestant persecution there is anything but +benevolence at work. What do the Irish statutes? +They do not make a conformity to the <i>established</i> +religion, and to its doctrines and practices, the condition +of getting out of servitude. No such thing. +Let three millions of people but abandon all that they +and their ancestors have been taught to believe sacred, +and to forswear it publicly in terms the most degrading, +scurrilous, and indecent for men of integrity +and virtue, and to abuse the whole of their former +lives, and to slander the education they have received, +and nothing more is required of them. There is no +system of folly, or impiety, or blasphemy, or atheism, +into which they may not throw themselves, and which +they may not profess openly, and as a system, consistently +with the enjoyment of all the privileges of +a free citizen in the happiest constitution in the +world.</p> + +<p>Some of the unhappy assertors of this strange +scheme say they are not persecutors on account of +religion. In the first place, they say what is not +true. For what else do they disfranchise the people? +If the man gets rid of a religion through which their +malice operates, he gets rid of all their penalties and +incapacities at once. They never afterwards inquire +about him. I speak here of their pretexts, and not of +the true spirit of the transaction, in which religious +bigotry, I apprehend, has little share. Every man +has his taste; but I think, if I were so miserable and<a name="Page_397" id="Page_397" title="397" class="pagenum"></a> +undone as to be guilty of premeditated and continued +violence towards any set of men, I had rather that +my conduct was supposed to arise from wild conceits +concerning their religious advantages than from low +and ungenerous motives relative to my own selfish +interest. I had rather be thought insane in my +charity than rational in my malice. This much, my +dear son, I have to say of this Protestant persecution,—that +is, a persecution of religion itself.</p> + +<p>A very great part of the mischiefs that vex the +world arises from words. People soon forget the +meaning, but the impression and the passion remain. +The word Protestant is the charm that looks up in +the dungeon of servitude three millions of your people. +It is not amiss to consider this spell of potency, +this abracadabra, that is hung about the necks of the +unhappy, not to heal, but to communicate disease. +We sometimes hear of a Protestant <i>religion</i>, frequently +of a Protestant <i>interest</i>. We hear of the latter the +most frequently, because it has a positive meaning. +The other has none. We hear of it the most frequently, +because it has a word in the phrase which, +well or ill understood, has animated to persecution +and oppression at all times infinitely more than all the +dogmas in dispute between religious factions. These +are, indeed, well formed to perplex and torment the +intellect, but not half so well calculated to inflame +the passions and animosities of men.</p> + +<p>I do readily admit that a great deal of the wars, +seditions, and troubles of the world did formerly turn +upon the contention between <i>interests</i> that went by +the names of Protestant and Catholic. But I imagined +that at this time no one was weak enough to +believe, or impudent enough to pretend, that questions<a name="Page_398" id="Page_398" title="398" class="pagenum"></a> +of Popish and Protestant opinions or interest are +the things by which men are at present menaced with +crusades by foreign invasion, or with seditions which +shake the foundations of the state at home. It is +long since all this combination of things has vanished +from the view of intelligent observers. The existence +of quite another system of opinions and interests is +now plain to the grossest sense. Are these the questions +that raise a flame in the minds of men at this +day? If ever the Church and the Constitution of +England should fall in these islands, (and they will +fall together,) it is not Presbyterian discipline nor +Popish hierarchy that will rise upon their ruins. It +will not be the Church of Rome nor the Church of +Scotland, not the Church of Luther nor the Church +of Calvin. On the contrary, all these churches are +menaced, and menaced alike. It is the new fanatical +religion, now in the heat of its first ferment, of +the Rights of Man, which rejects all establishments, +all discipline, all ecclesiastical, and in truth all civil +order, which will triumph, and which will lay prostrate +your Church, which will destroy your distinctions, +and which will put all your properties to auction, +and disperse you over the earth. If the present establishment +should fall, it is this religion which will +triumph in Ireland and in England, as it has triumphed +in France. This religion, which laughs at +creeds and dogmas and confessions of faith, may be +fomented equally amongst all descriptions and all +sects,—amongst nominal Catholics, and amongst +nominal Churchmen, and amongst those Dissenters +who know little and care less about a presbytery, or +any of its discipline, or any of its doctrine. Against +this new, this growing, this exterminatory system, all<a name="Page_399" id="Page_399" title="399" class="pagenum"></a> +these churches have a common concern to defend +themselves. How the enthusiasts of this rising sect +rejoice to see you of the old churches play their game, +and stir and rake the cinders of animosities sunk in +their ashes, in order to keep up the execution of +their plan for your common ruin!</p> + +<p>I suppress all that is in my mind about the blindness +of those of our clergy who will shut their eyes +to a thing which glares in such manifest day. If +some wretches amongst an indigent and disorderly +part of the populace raise a riot about tithes, there +are of these gentlemen ready to cry out that this is +an overt act of a treasonable conspiracy. Here the +bulls, and the pardons, and the crusade, and the Pope, +and the thunders of the Vatican are everywhere at +work. There is a plot to bring in a foreign power to +destroy the Church. Alas! it is not about popes, +but about potatoes, that the minds of this unhappy +people are agitated. It is not from the spirit of zeal, +but the spirit of whiskey, that these wretches act. Is +it, then, not conceived possible that a poor clown can +be unwilling, after paying three pounds rent to a gentleman +in a brown coat, to pay fourteen shillings to +one in a black coat, for his acre of potatoes, and tumultuously +to desire some modification of the charge, +without being supposed to have no other motive than +a frantic zeal for being thus double-taxed to another +set of landholders and another set of priests? Have +men no self-interest, no avarice, no repugnance to +public imposts? Have they no sturdy and restive +minds, no undisciplined habits? Is there nothing +in the whole mob of irregular passions, which might +precipitate some of the common people, in some +places, to quarrel with a legal, because they feel it<a name="Page_400" id="Page_400" title="400" class="pagenum"></a> +to be a burdensome imposition? According to these +gentlemen, no offence can be committed by Papists +but from zeal to their religion. To make room for +the vices of Papists, they clear the house of all the +vices of men. Some of the common people (not one, +however, in ten thousand) commit disorders. Well! +punish them as you do, and as you ought to punish +them, for their violence against the just property of +each individual clergyman, as each individual suffers. +Support the injured rector, or the injured impropriator, +in the enjoyment of the estate of which (whether +on the best plan or not) the laws have put him in +possession. Let the crime and the punishment stand +upon their own bottom. But now we ought all of +us, clergymen most particularly, to avoid assigning +another cause of quarrel, in order to infuse a new +source of bitterness into a dispute which personal +feelings on both sides will of themselves make bitter +enough, and thereby involve in it by religious descriptions +men who have individually no share whatsoever +in those irregular acts. Let us not make the +malignant fictions of our own imaginations, heated +with factious controversies, reasons for keeping men +that are neither guilty nor justly suspected of crime +in a servitude equally dishonorable and unsafe to religion +and to the state. When men are constantly +accused, but know themselves not to be guilty, they +must naturally abhor their accusers. There is no +character, when malignantly taken up and deliberately +pursued, which more naturally excites indignation +and abhorrence in mankind, especially in that +part of mankind which suffers from it.</p> + +<p>I do not pretend to take pride in an extravagant +attachment to any sect. Some gentlemen in Ireland<a name="Page_401" id="Page_401" title="401" class="pagenum"></a> +affect that sort of glory. It is to their taste. Their +piety, I take it for granted, justifies the fervor of their +zeal, and may palliate the excess of it. Being myself +no more than a common layman, commonly informed +in controversies, leading only a very common +life, and having only a common citizen's interest in +the Church or in the State, yet to you I will say, in +justice to my own sentiments, that not one of those +zealots for a Protestant interest wishes more sincerely +than I do, perhaps not half so sincerely, for the support +of the Established Church in both these kingdoms. +It is a great link towards holding fast the +connection of religion with the State, and for keeping +these two islands, in their present critical independence +of constitution, in a close connection of +<i>opinion and affection</i>. I wish it well, as the religion +of the greater number of the primary land-proprietors +of the kingdom, with whom all establishments +of Church and Stats, for strong political reasons, +ought in my opinion to be firmly connected. I +wish it well, because it is more closely combined +than any other of the church systems with the <i>crown</i>, +which is the stay of the mixed Constitution,—because +it is, as things now stand, the sole connecting +<i>political</i> principle between the constitutions of the +two independent kingdoms. I have another and +infinitely a stronger reason for wishing it well: it +is, that in the present time I consider it as one of +the main pillars of the Christian religion itself. The +body and substance of every religion I regard much +more than any of the forms and dogmas of the particular +sects. Its fall would leave a great void, which +nothing else, of which I can form any distinct idea, +might fill. I respect the Catholic hierarchy and the<a name="Page_402" id="Page_402" title="402" class="pagenum"></a> +Presbyterian republic; but I know that the hope or +the fear of establishing either of them is, in these +kingdoms, equally chimerical, even if I preferred one +or the other of them to the Establishment, which certainly +I do not.</p> + +<p>These are some of my reasons for wishing the support +of the Church of Ireland as by law established. +These reasons are founded as well on the absolute +as on the relative situation of that kingdom. But +is it because I love the Church, and the King, and +the privileges of Parliament, that I am to be ready for +any violence, or any injustice, or any absurdity, in the +means of supporting any of these powers, or all of +them together? Instead of prating about Protestant +ascendencies, Protestant Parliaments ought, in my +opinion, to think at last of becoming patriot Parliaments.</p> + +<p>The legislature of Ireland, like all legislatures, +ought to frame its laws to suit the people and the +circumstances of the country, and not any longer +to make it their whole business to force the nature, +the temper, and the inveterate habits of a nation to +a conformity to speculative systems concerning any +kind of laws. Ireland has an established government, +and a religion legally established, which are +to be preserved. It has a people who are to be preserved +too, and to be led by reason, principle, sentiment, +and interest to acquiesce in that government. +Ireland is a country under peculiar circumstances. +The people of Ireland are a very mixed people; and +the quantities of the several ingredients in the mixture +are very much disproportioned to each other. +Are we to govern this mixed body as if it were composed +of the most simple elements, comprehending<a name="Page_403" id="Page_403" title="403" class="pagenum"></a> +the whole in one system of benevolent legislation? +or are we not rather to provide for the several parts +according to the various and diversified necessities +of the heterogeneous nature of the mass? Would +not common reason and common honesty dictate to +us the policy of regulating the people, in the several +descriptions of which they are composed, according +to the natural ranks and classes of an orderly civil +society, under a common protecting sovereign, and +under a form of constitution favorable at once to authority +and to freedom,—such as the British Constitution +boasts to be, and such as it is to those who +enjoy it?</p> + +<p>You have an ecclesiastical establishment, which, +though the religion of the prince, and of most of +the first class of landed proprietors, is not the religion +of the major part of the inhabitants, and which +consequently does not answer to <i>them</i> any one purpose +of a religious establishment. This is a state of +things which no man in his senses can call perfectly +happy. But it is the state of Ireland. Two hundred +years of experiment show it to be unalterable. Many +a fierce struggle has passed between the parties. The +result is, you cannot make the people Protestants, and +they cannot shake off a Protestant government. This +is what experience teaches, and what all men of sense +of all descriptions know. To-day the question is +this: Are we to make the best of this situation, +which we cannot alter? The question is: Shall +the condition of the body of the people be alleviated +in other things, on account of their necessary +suffering from their being subject to the burdens of +two religious establishments, from one of which they +do not partake the least, living or dying, either of<a name="Page_404" id="Page_404" title="404" class="pagenum"></a> +instruction or of consolation,—or shall it be aggravated, +by stripping the people thus loaded of everything +which might support and indemnify them in +this state, so as to leave them naked of every sort of +right and of every name of franchise, to outlaw them +from the Constitution, and to cut off (perhaps) three +millions of plebeian subjects, without reference to +property, or any other qualification, from all connection +with the popular representation, of the kingdom?</p> + +<p>As to religion, it has nothing at all to do with the +proceeding. Liberty is not sacrificed to a zeal for religion, +but a zeal for religion is pretended and assumed +to destroy liberty. The Catholic religion is +completely free. It has no establishment,—but it +is recognized, permitted, and, in a degree, protected +by the laws. If a man is satisfied to be a slave, he +may be a Papist with perfect impunity. He may say +mass, or hear it, as he pleases; but he must consider +himself as an outlaw from the British Constitution. +If the constitutional liberty of the subject were not +the thing aimed at, the direct reverse course would +be taken. The franchise would have been permitted, +and the mass exterminated. But the conscience of +a man left, and a tenderness for it hypocritically pretended, +is to make it a trap to catch his liberty.</p> + +<p>So much is this the design, that the violent partisans +of this scheme fairly take up all the maxims and +arguments, as well as the practices, by which tyranny +has fortified itself at all times. Trusting wholly in +their strength and power, (and upon this they reckon, +as always ready to strike wherever they wish to +direct the storm,) they abandon all pretext of the +general good of the community. They say, that, if<a name="Page_405" id="Page_405" title="405" class="pagenum"></a> +the people, under any given modification, obtain the +smallest portion or particle of constitutional freedom, +it will be impossible for them to hold their property. +They tell us that they act only on the defensive. +They inform the public of Europe that their estates +are made up of forfeitures and confiscations from the +natives; that, if the body of people obtain votes, any +number of votes, however small, it will be a step to +the choice of members of their own religion; that the +House of Commons, in spite of the influence of nineteen +parts in twenty of the landed interest now in +their hands, will be composed in the whole, or in far +the major part, of Papists; that this Popish House of +Commons will instantly pass a law to confiscate all +their estates, which it will not be in their power to +save even by entering into that Popish party themselves, +because there are prior claimants to be satisfied; +that, as to the House of Lords, though neither +Papists nor Protestants have a share in electing them, +the body of the peerage will be so obliging and disinterested +as to fall in with this exterminatory scheme, +which is to forfeit all their estates, the largest part of +the kingdom; and, to crown all, that his Majesty will +give his cheerful assent to this causeless act of attainder +of his innocent and faithful Protestant subjects; +that they will be or are to be left, without house +or land, to the dreadful resource of living by their +wits, out of which they are already frightened by the +apprehension of this spoliation with which they are +threatened; that, therefore, they cannot so much as +listen to any arguments drawn from equity or from +national or constitutional policy: the sword is at their +throats; beggary and famine at their door. See +what it is to have a good look-out, and to see danger +at the end of a sufficiently long perspective!<a name="Page_406" id="Page_406" title="406" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>This is, indeed, to speak plain, though to speak +nothing very new. The same thing has been said in +all times and in all languages. The language of tyranny +has been invariable: "The general good is inconsistent +with my personal safety." Justice and liberty +seem so alarming to these gentlemen, that they are +not ashamed even to slander their own titles, to calumniate +and call in doubt their right to their own estates, +and to consider themselves as novel disseizors, +usurpers, and intruders, rather than lose a pretext for +becoming oppressors of their fellow-citizens, whom +they (not I) choose to describe themselves as having +robbed.</p> + +<p>Instead of putting themselves in this odious point +of light, one would think they would wish to let Time +draw his oblivious veil over the unpleasant modes by +which lordships and demesnes have been acquired in +theirs, and almost in all other countries upon earth. +It might be imagined, that, when the sufferer (if a +sufferer exists) had forgot the wrong, they would be +pleased to forget it too,—that they would permit the +sacred name of possession to stand in the place of the +melancholy and unpleasant title of grantees of confiscation, +which, though firm and valid in law, surely +merits the name that a great Roman jurist gave to a +title at least as valid in his nation as confiscation +would be either in his or in ours: <i>Tristis et luctuosa +successio</i>.</p> + +<p>Such is the situation of every man who comes in +upon the ruin of another; his succeeding, under this +circumstance, is <i>tristis et luctuosa successio</i>. If it had +been the fate of any gentleman to profit by the confiscation +of his neighbor, one would think he would be +more disposed to give him a valuable interest under<a name="Page_407" id="Page_407" title="407" class="pagenum"></a> +him in his land, or to allow him a pension, as I understand +one worthy person has done, without fear or +apprehension that his benevolence to a ruined family +would be construed into a recognition of the forfeited +title. The public of England, the other day, acted +in this manner towards Lord Newburgh, a Catholic. +Though the estate had been vested by law in the +greatest of the public charities, they have given him +a pension from his confiscation. They have gone +further in other cases. On the last rebellion, in +1745, in Scotland, several forfeitures were incurred. +They had been disposed of by Parliament to certain +laudable uses. Parliament reversed the method +which they had adopted in Lord Newburgh's case, and +in my opinion did better: they gave the forfeited estates +to the successors of the forfeiting proprietors, +chargeable in part with the uses. Is this, or anything +like this, asked in favor of any human creature +in Ireland? It is bounty, it is charity,—wise bounty, +and politic charity; but no man can claim it as a +right. Here no such thing is claimed as right, or +begged as charity. The demand has an object as +distant from all considerations of this sort as any two +extremes can be. The people desire the privileges inseparably +annexed, since Magna Charta, to the freehold +which they have by descent or obtain as the fruits +of their industry. They call for no man's estate; +they desire not to be dispossessed of their own.</p> + +<p>But this melancholy and invidious title is a favorite +(and, like favorites, always of the least merit) with +those who possess every other title upon earth along +with it. For this purpose they revive the bitter memory +of every dissension which has torn to pieces their +miserable country for ages. After what has passed<a name="Page_408" id="Page_408" title="408" class="pagenum"></a> +in 1782, one would not think that decorum, to say +nothing of policy, would permit them to call up, by +magic charms, the grounds, reasons, and principles +of those terrible confiscatory and exterminatory periods. +They would not set men upon calling from +the quiet sleep of death any Samuel, to ask him by +what act of arbitrary monarchs, by what inquisitions +of corrupted tribunals and tortured jurors, by what +fictitious tenures invented to dispossess whole unoffending +tribes and their chieftains. They would not +conjure up the ghosts from the ruins of castles and +churches, to tell for what attempt to struggle for the +independence of an Irish legislature, and to raise armies +of volunteers without regular commissions from +the crown in support of that independence, the estates +of the old Irish nobility and gentry had been +confiscated. They would not wantonly call on those +phantoms to tell by what English acts of Parliament, +forced upon two reluctant kings, the lands of their +country were put up to a mean and scandalous auction +in every goldsmith's shop in London, or chopped +to pieces and out into rations, to pay the mercenary +soldiery of a regicide usurper. They would not be +so fond of titles under Cromwell, who, if he avenged +an Irish rebellion against the sovereign authority +of the Parliament of England, had himself rebelled +against the very Parliament whose sovereignty he +asserted, full as much as the Irish nation, which he +was sent to subdue and confiscate, could rebel against +that Parliament, or could rebel against the king, +against whom both he and the Parliament which he +served, and which he betrayed, had both of them rebelled.</p> + +<p>The gentlemen who hold the language of the day<a name="Page_409" id="Page_409" title="409" class="pagenum"></a> +know perfectly well that the Irish in 1641 pretended, +at least, that they did not rise against the king: nor +in fact did they, whatever constructions law might +put upon their act. But full surely they rebelled +against the authority of the Parliament of England, +and they openly professed so to do. Admitting (I +have now no time to discuss the matter) the enormous +and unpardonable magnitude of this their crime, +they rued it in their persons, and in those of their +children and their grandchildren, even to the fifth +and sixth generations. Admitting, then, the enormity +of this unnatural rebellion in favor of the independence +of Ireland, will it follow that it must be +avenged forever? Will it follow that it must be +avenged on thousands and perhaps hundreds of thousands +of those whom they can never trace, by the labors +of the most subtle metaphysician of the traduction +of crimes, or the most inquisitive genealogist of +proscription, to the descendant of any one concerned +in that nefarious Irish rebellion against the Parliament +of England?</p> + +<p>If, however, you could find out those pedigrees of +guilt, I do not think the difference would be essential. +History records many things which ought to make us +hate evil actions; but neither history, nor morals, +nor policy can teach us to punish innocent men on +that account. What lesson does the iniquity of prevalent +factions read to us? It ought to lesson us +into an abhorrence of the abuse of our own power +in our own day, when we hate its excesses so much +in other persons and in other times. To that school +true statesmen ought to be satisfied to leave mankind. +They ought not to call from the dead all the discussions +and litigations which formerly inflamed the<a name="Page_410" id="Page_410" title="410" class="pagenum"></a> +furious factions which had torn their country to +pieces; they ought not to rake into the hideous and +abominable things which were done in the turbulent +fury of an injured, robbed, and persecuted people, +and which were afterwards cruelly revenged in the +execution, and as outrageously and shamefully exaggerated +in the representation, in order, an hundred +and fifty years after, to find some color for justifying +them in the eternal proscription and civil excommunication +of a whole people.</p> + +<p>Let us come to a later period of those confiscations +with the memory of which the gentlemen who triumph +in the acts of 1782 are so much delighted. The +Irish again rebelled against the English Parliament +in 1688, and the English Parliament again put up to +sale the greatest part of their estates. I do not presume +to defend the Irish for this rebellion, nor to +blame the English Parliament for this confiscation. +The Irish, it is true, did not revolt from King James's +power. He threw himself upon their fidelity, and +they supported him to the best of their feeble power. +Be the crime of that obstinate adherence to an abdicated +sovereign, against a prince whom the Parliaments +of Ireland and Scotland had recognized, what +it may, I do not mean to justify this rebellion more +than the former. It might, however, admit some palliation +in them. In generous minds some small degree +of compassion might be excited for an error, where +they were misled, as Cicero says to a conqueror, +<i>quadam specie et similitudine pacis</i>, not without a mistaken +appearance of duty, and for which the guilty +have suffered, by exile abroad and slavery at home, +to the extent of their folly or their offence. The best +calculators compute that Ireland lost two hundred<a name="Page_411" id="Page_411" title="411" class="pagenum"></a> +thousand of her inhabitants in that struggle. If the +principle of the English and Scottish resistance at the +Revolution is to be justified, (as sure I am it is,) the +submission of Ireland must be somewhat extenuated. +For, if the Irish resisted King William, they resisted +him on the very same principle that the English and +Scotch resisted King James. The Irish Catholics +must have been the very worst and the most truly unnatural +of rebels, if they had not supported a prince +whom they had seen attacked, not for any designs +against <i>their</i> religion or <i>their</i> liberties, but for an +extreme partiality for their sect, and who, far from +trespassing on <i>their</i> liberties and properties, secured +both them and the independence of their country in +much the same manner that we have seen the same +things done at the period of 1782,—I trust the last +revolution in Ireland.</p> + +<p>That the Irish Parliament of King James did in +some particulars, though feebly, imitate the rigor +which had been used towards the Irish, is true +enough. Blamable enough they were for what they +had done, though under the greatest possible provocation. +I shall never praise confiscations or counter-confiscations +as long as I live. When they happen +by necessity, I shall think the necessity lamentable +and odious: I shall think that anything done under +it ought not to pass into precedent, or to be adopted +by choice, or to produce any of those shocking retaliations +which never suffer dissensions to subside. +Least of all would I fix the transitory spirit of civil +fury by perpetuating and methodizing it in tyrannic +government. If it were permitted to argue with +power, might one not ask these gentlemen whether +it would not be more natural, instead of wantonly +mooting these questions concerning their property, +as if it were an exercise in law, to found it on the +solid rock of prescription,—the soundest, the most +general, and the most recognized title between man +and man that is known in municipal or in public +jurisprudence?—a title in which not arbitrary institutions, +but the eternal order of things, gives judgment; +a title which is not the creature, but the +master, of positive law; a title which, though not +fixed in its term, is rooted in its principle in the +law of Nature itself, and is indeed the original +ground of all known property: for all property in +soil will always be traced back to that source, and +will rest there. The miserable natives of Ireland, +who ninety-nine in an hundred are tormented with +quite other cares, and are bowed down to labor for +the bread of the hour, are not, as gentlemen pretend, +plodding with antiquaries for titles of centuries +ago to the estates of the great lords and squires for +whom they labor. But if they were thinking of the +titles which gentlemen labor to beat into their heads, +where can they bottom their own claims, but in a +presumption and a proof that these lands had at +some time been possessed by their ancestors? These +gentlemen (for they have lawyers amongst them) +know as well as I that in England we have had always +a prescription or limitation, as all nations have, +against each other. The crown was excepted; but +that exception is destroyed, and we have lately established +a sixty years' possession as against the +crown. All titles terminate in prescription,—in +which (differently from Time in the fabulous instances) +the son devours the father, and the last +prescription eats up all the former.<a name="Page_412" id="Page_412" title="412" class="pagenum"></a></p> + + +<p><a name="Page_413" id="Page_413" title="413" class="pagenum"></a> +<a name="THE_AFFAIRS_OF_IRELAND" id="THE_AFFAIRS_OF_IRELAND" /></p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><span style="font-size: 60%;">A</span><br /> +<br /> +LETTER<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 60%;">ON</span><br /> +<br /> +THE AFFAIRS OF IRELAND.<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 60%;">1797.</span></h2> +<p><a name="Page_414" id="Page_414" title="414" class="pagenum"></a></p> +<p><a name="Page_415" id="Page_415" title="415" class="pagenum"></a></p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p>Dear Sir,—In the reduced state of body and +in the dejected state of mind in which I find +myself at this very advanced period of my life, it is +a great consolation to me to know that a cause I ever +have had so very near my heart is taken up by a +man of your activity and talents.</p> + +<p>It is very true that your late friend, my ever dear +and honored son, was in the highest degree solicitous +about the final event of a business which he also had +pursued for a long time with infinite zeal, and no +small degree of success. It was not above half an +hour before he left me forever that he spoke with +considerable earnestness on this very subject. If I +had needed any incentives to do my best for freeing +the body of my country from the grievances under +which they labor, this alone would certainly call forth +all my endeavors.</p> + +<p>The person who succeeded to the government of +Ireland about the time of that afflicting event had +been all along of my sentiments and yours upon this +subject; and far from needing to be stimulated by +me, that incomparable person, and those in whom he +strictly confided, even went before me in their resolution +to pursue the great end of government, the satisfaction +and concord of the people with whose welfare +they were charged. I cannot bear to think on the +causes by which this great plan of policy, so manifestly<a name="Page_416" id="Page_416" title="416" class="pagenum"></a> +beneficial to both kingdoms, has been defeated.</p> + +<p>Your mistake with regard to me lies in supposing +that I did not, when his removal was in agitation, +strongly and personally represent to several of his +Majesty's ministers, to whom I could have the most +ready access, the true state of Ireland, and the mischiefs +which sooner or later must arise from subjecting +the mass of the people to the capricious and interested +domination of an exceeding small faction and +its dependencies.</p> + +<p>That representation was made the last time, or +very nearly the last time, that I have ever had the +honor of seeing those ministers. I am so far from +having any credit with them, on this, or any other +public matters, that I have reason to be certain, if it +were known that any person in office in Ireland, from +the highest to the lowest, were influenced by my opinions, +and disposed to act upon them, such an one +would be instantly turned out of his employment. +Yon have formed, to my person a flattering, yet in +truth a very erroneous opinion, of my power with +those who direct the public measures. I never have +been directly or indirectly consulted about anything +that is done. The judgment of the eminent and able +persons who conduct public affairs is undoubtedly +superior to mine; but self-partiality induces almost +every man to defer something to his own. Nothing +is more notorious than that I have the misfortune of +thinking that no one capital measure relative to political +arrangements, and still less that a new military +plan for the defence of either kingdom in this arduous +war, has been taken upon any other principle than +such as must conduct us to inevitable ruin.<a name="Page_417" id="Page_417" title="417" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>In the state of my mind, so discordant with the +tone of ministers, and still more discordant with the +tone of opposition, you may judge what degree of +weight I am likely to have with either of the parties +who divide this kingdom,—even though I were endowed +with strength of body, or were possessed of +any active situation in the government, which might +give success to my endeavors. But the fact is, since +the day of my unspeakable calamity, except in the attentions +of a very few old and compassionate friends, +I am totally out of all social intercourse. My health +has gone down very rapidly; and I have been brought +hither with very faint hopes of life, and enfeebled to +such a degree as those who had known me some time +ago could scarcely think credible. Since I came +hither, my sufferings have been greatly aggravated, +and my little strength still further reduced; so that, +though I am told the symptoms of my disorder begin +to carry a more favorable aspect, I pass the far larger +part of the twenty-four hours, indeed almost the +whole, either in my bed or lying upon the couch +from which I dictate this. Had you been apprised +of this circumstance, you could not have expected +anything, as you seem to do, from my active exertions. +I could do nothing, if I was still stronger, not +even <i>si meus adforet Hector</i>.</p> + +<p>There is no hope for the body of the people of Ireland, +as long as those who are in power with you +shall make it the great object of their policy to propagate +an opinion on this side of the water that the +mass of their countrymen are not to be trusted by +their government, and that the only hold which England +has upon Ireland consists in preserving a certain +very small number of gentlemen in full possession<a name="Page_418" id="Page_418" title="418" class="pagenum"></a> +of a monopoly of that kingdom. This system +has disgusted many others besides Catholics and Dissenters.</p> + +<p>As to those who on your side are in the opposition +to government, they are composed of persons several +of whom I love and revere. They have been irritated +by a treatment too much for the ordinary patience +of mankind to bear into the adoption of schemes +which, however <i>argumentatively</i> specious, would go +<i>practically</i> to the inevitable ruin of the kingdom. +The opposition always connects the emancipation of +the Catholics with these schemes of reformation: indeed, +it makes the former only a member of the latter +project. The gentlemen who enforce that opposition +are, in my opinion, playing the game of their +adversaries with all their might; and there is no +third party in Ireland (nor in England neither) to +separate things that are in themselves so distinct,—I +mean the admitting people to the benefits of the Constitution, +and a change in the form of the Constitution +itself.</p> + +<p>As every one knows that a great part of the constitution +of the Irish House of Commons was formed +about the year 1614 expressly for bringing that +House into a state of dependence, and that the new +representative was at that time seated and installed +by force and violence, nothing can be more impolitic +than for those who wish the House to stand on +its present basis (as, for one, I most sincerely do) +to make it appear to have kept too much the principle +of its first institution, and to continue to be as +little a virtual as it is an actual representative of the +commons. It is the <i>degeneracy</i> of such an institution, +<i>so vicious in its principle</i>, that is to be wished for. If<a name="Page_419" id="Page_419" title="419" class="pagenum"></a> +men have the real benefit of a <i>sympathetic</i> representation, +none but those who are heated and intoxicated +with theory will look for any other. This sort of representation, +my dear Sir, must wholly depend, not +on the force with which it is upheld, but upon the +<i>prudence</i> of those who have influence upon it. Indeed, +without some such prudence in the use of authority, +I do not know, at least in the present time, +how any power can long continue.</p> + +<p>If it be true that both parties are carrying things +to extremities in different ways, the object which you +and I have in common, that is to say, the union and +concord of our country <i>on the basis of the actual representation</i>, +without risking those evils which any +change in the form of our legislature must inevitably +bring on, can never be obtained. On the part of the +Catholics (that is to say, of the body of the people of +the kingdom) it is a terrible alternative, either to +submit to the yoke of declared and insulting enemies, +or to seek a remedy in plunging themselves into the +horrors and crimes of that Jacobinism which unfortunately +is not disagreeable to the principles and inclinations +of, I am afraid, the majority of what we call +the Protestants of Ireland. The Protestant part of +that kingdom is represented by the government itself +to be, by whole counties, in nothing less than open +rebellion. I am sure that it is everywhere teeming +with dangerous conspiracy.</p> + +<p>I believe it will be found, that, though the principles +of the Catholics, and the incessant endeavors +of their clergy, have kept them from being generally +infected with the systems of this time, yet, whenever +their situation brings them nearer into contact +with the Jacobin Protestants, they are more or less +infected with their doctrines.<a name="Page_420" id="Page_420" title="420" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>It is a matter for melancholy reflection, but I am +fully convinced, that many persons in Ireland would +be glad that the Catholics should become more and +more infected with the Jacobin madness, in order to +furnish new arguments for fortifying them in their +monopoly. On any other ground it is impossible to +account for the late language of your men in power. +If statesmen, (let me suppose for argument,) upon +the most solid political principles, conceive themselves +obliged to resist the wishes of the far more numerous, +and, as things stand, not the worse part of +the community, one would think they would naturally +put their refusal as much as possible upon temporary +grounds, and that they would act towards them +in the most conciliatory manner, and would talk to +them in the most gentle and soothing language: for +refusal, in itself, is not a very gracious thing; and, +unfortunately, men are very quickly irritated out +of their principles. Nothing is more discouraging to +the loyalty of any description of men than to represent +to them that their humiliation and subjection +make a principal part in the fundamental and invariable +policy which regards the conjunction of these +two kingdoms. This is not the way to give them a +warm interest in that conjunction.</p> + +<p>My poor opinion is, that the closest connection between +Great Britain and Ireland is essential to the +well-being, I had almost said, to the very being, of +the two kingdoms. For that purpose I humbly +conceive that the whole of the superior, and what I +should call <i>imperial</i> politics, ought to have its residence +here; and that Ireland, locally, civilly, and +commercially independent, ought politically to look +up to Great Britain in all matters of peace or of<a name="Page_421" id="Page_421" title="421" class="pagenum"></a> +war,—in all those points to be guided by her.—and, +in a word, with her to live and to die. At +bottom, Ireland has no other choice,—I mean, no +other rational choice.</p> + +<p>I think, indeed, that Great Britain would be ruined +by the separation of Ireland; but as there are degrees +even in ruin, it would fall the most heavily on Ireland. +By such a separation Ireland would be the +most completely undone country in the world,—the +most wretched, the most distracted, and, in the end, +the most desolate part of the habitable globe. Little +do many people in Ireland consider how much of its +prosperity has been owing to, and still depends upon, +its intimate connection with this kingdom. But, more +sensible of this great truth, than perhaps any other +man, I have never conceived, or can conceive, that +the connection is strengthened by making the major +part of the inhabitants of your country believe that +their ease, and their satisfaction, and their equalization +with the rest of their fellow-subjects of Ireland +are things adverse to the principles of that connection,—or +that their subjection to a small monopolizing +junto, composed of one of the smallest of their +own internal factions, is the very condition upon +which the harmony of the two kingdoms essentially +depends. I was sorry to hear that this principle, or +something not unlike it, was publicly and fully avowed +by persons of great rank and authority in the House +of Lords in Ireland.</p> + +<p>As to a participation on the part of the Catholics +in the privileges and capacities which are withheld, +without meaning wholly to depreciate their importance, +if I had the honor of being an Irish Catholic, +I should be content to expect satisfaction upon that<a name="Page_422" id="Page_422" title="422" class="pagenum"></a> +subject with patience, until the minds of my adversaries, +few, but powerful, were come to a proper temper: +because, if the Catholics did enjoy, without +fraud, chicane, or partiality, some fair portion of +those advantages which the law, even as now the law +is, leaves open to them, and if the rod were not shaken +over them at every turn, their present condition +would be tolerable; as compared with their former +condition, it would be happy. But the most favorable +laws can do very little towards the happiness of +a people, when the disposition of the ruling power +is adverse to them. Men do not live upon blotted +paper. The favorable or the hostile mind of the +ruling power is of far more importance to mankind, +for good or evil, than the black-letter of any statute. +Late acts of Parliament, whilst they fixed at least a +temporary bar to the hopes and progress of the larger +description of the nation, opened to them certain subordinate +objects of equality; but it is impossible that +the people should imagine that any fair measure of +advantage is intended to them, when they hear the +laws by which they were admitted to this limited +qualification publicly reprobated as excessive and inconsiderate. +They must think that there is a hankering +after the old penal and persecuting code. Their +alarm must be great, when that declaration is made +by a person in very high and important office in the +House of Commons, and as the very first specimen +and auspice of a new government.</p> + +<p>All this is very unfortunate. I have the honor of +an old acquaintance, and entertain, in common with +you, a very high esteem for the few English persons +who are concerned in the government of Ireland; +but I am not ignorant of the relation these transitory<a name="Page_423" id="Page_423" title="423" class="pagenum"></a> +ministers bear to the more settled Irish part of your +administration. It is a delicate topic, upon which I +wish to say but little, though my reflections upon it +are many and serious. There is a great cry against +English influence. I am quite sure that it is Irish +influence that dreads the English habits.</p> + +<p>Great disorders have long prevailed in Ireland. It +is not long since that the Catholics were the suffering +party from those disorders. I am sure they were not +protected as the case required. Their sufferings became +a matter of discussion in Parliament. It produced +the most infuriated declamation against them +that I have ever read. An inquiry was moved into +the facts. The declamation was at least tolerated, if +not approved. The inquiry was absolutely rejected. +In that case, what is left for those who are abandoned +by government, but to join with the persons who are +capable of injuring them or protecting them as they +oppose or concur in their designs? This will produce +a very fatal kind of union amongst the people; but +it is an union, which an unequal administration of +justice tends necessarily to produce.</p> + +<p>If anything could astonish one at this time, it is +the war that the rulers in Ireland think it proper to +carry on against the person whom they call the Pope, +and against all his adherents, whenever they think +they have the power of manifesting their hostility. +Without in the least derogating from the talents of +your theological politicians, or from the military abilities +of your commanders (who act on the same principles) +in Ireland, and without derogating from the +zeal of either, it appears to me that the Protestant +Directory of Paris, as statesmen, and the Protestant +hero, Buonaparte, as a general, have done more to<a name="Page_424" id="Page_424" title="424" class="pagenum"></a> +destroy the said Pope and all his adherents, in all +their capacities, than the junto in Ireland have ever +been able to effect. You must submit your <i>fasces</i> to +theirs, and at best be contented to follow with songs +of gratulation, or invectives, according to your humor, +the triumphal car of those great conquerors. Had +that true Protestant, Hoche, with an army not infected +with the slightest tincture of Popery, made good his +landing in Ireland, he would have saved you from a +great deal of the trouble which is taken to keep under +a description of your fellow-citizens obnoxious to you +from their religion. It would not have a month's existence, +supposing his success. This is the alliance +which, under the appearance of hostility, we act as +if we wished to promote. All is well, provided we +are safe from Popery.</p> + +<p>It was not necessary for you, my dear Sir, to explain +yourself to <i>me</i> (in justification of your good wishes to +your fellow-citizens) concerning your total alienation +from the principles of the Catholics. I am more concerned +in what we agree than in what we differ. You +know the impossibility of our forming any judgment +upon the opinions, religious, moral, or political, of +those who in the largest sense are called Protestants,—at +least, as these opinions and tenets form a +qualification for holding any civil, judicial, military, +or even ecclesiastical situation. I have no doubt of +the orthodox opinion of many, both of the clergy and +laity, professing the established religion in Ireland, +and of many even amongst the Dissenters, relative +to the great points of the Christian faith: but that +orthodoxy concerns them only as <i>individuals</i>. As a +<i>qualification</i> for employment, we all know that in Ireland +it is not necessary that they should profess any<a name="Page_425" id="Page_425" title="425" class="pagenum"></a> +religion at all: so that the war that we make is upon +certain theological tenets, about which scholastic disputes +are carried on <i>æquo Marte</i>, by controvertists, +on their side, as able and as learned, and perhaps as +well-intentioned, as those are who fight the battle on +the other part. To them I would leave those controversies. +I would turn my mind to what is more +within its competence, and has been more my study, +(though, for a man of the world, I have thought of +those things,)—I mean, the moral, civil, and political +good of the countries we belong to, and in which God +has appointed your station and mine. Let every man +be as pious as he pleases, and in the way that he +pleases; but it is agreeable neither to piety nor to +policy to give exclusively all manner of civil privileges +and advantages to a <i>negative</i> religion, (such is +the Protestant without a certain creed,) and at the +same time to deny those privileges to men whom we +know to agree to an iota in every one <i>positive</i> doctrine +which all of us who profess the religion authoritatively +taught in England hold ourselves, according +to our faculties, bound to believe. The Catholics of +Ireland (as I have said) have the whole of our <i>positive</i> +religion: our difference is only a negation of certain +tenets of theirs. If we strip ourselves of <i>that</i> +part of Catholicism, we abjure Christianity. If we +drive them from that holding, without engaging them +in some other positive religion, (which you know by +our qualifying laws we do not,) what do we better +than to hold out to them terrors on the one side, +and bounties on the other, in favor of that which, +for anything we know to the contrary, may be pure +atheism?</p> + +<p>You are well aware, that, when a man renounces<a name="Page_426" id="Page_426" title="426" class="pagenum"></a> +the Roman religion, there is no civil inconvenience +or incapacity whatsoever which shall hinder him from +joining any new or old sect of Dissenters, or of forming +a sect of his own invention upon the most anti-christian +principles. Let Mr. Thomas Paine obtain a +pardon, (as on change of ministry he may,) there is +nothing to hinder him from setting up a church of +his own in the very midst of you. He is a natural-born +British subject. His French citizenship does +not disqualify him, at least upon a peace. This +Protestant apostle is as much above all suspicion of +Popery as the greatest and most zealous of your sanhedrim +in Ireland can possibly be. On purchasing a +qualification, (which his friends of the Directory are +not so poor as to be unable to effect,) he may sit in +Parliament; and there is no doubt that there is not +one of your tests against Popery that he will not take +as fairly, and as much <i>ex animo</i>, as the best of your +zealot statesmen. I push this point no further, and +only adduce this example (a pretty strong one, and +fully in point) to show what I take to be the madness +and folly of driving men, under the existing circumstances, +from any <i>positive</i> religion whatever into the +irreligion of the times, and its sure concomitant principles +of anarchy.</p> + +<p>When religion is brought into a question of civil +and political arrangement, it must be considered +more politically than theologically, at least by us, +who are nothing more than mere laymen. In that +light, the case of the Catholics of Ireland is peculiarly +hard, whether they be laity or clergy. If any of them +take part, like the gentleman you mention, with some +of the most accredited Protestants of the country, in +projects which cannot be more abhorrent to your nature<a name="Page_427" id="Page_427" title="427" class="pagenum"></a> +and disposition than they are to mine,—in that +case, however few these Catholic factions who are +united with factious Protestants may be, (and very +few they are now, whatever shortly they may become,) +on their account the whole body is considered +as of suspected fidelity to the crown, and as wholly +undeserving of its favor. But if, on the contrary, in +those districts of the kingdom where their numbers +are the greatest, where they make, in a manner, the +whole body of the people, (as, out of cities, in three +fourths of the kingdom they do,) these Catholics +show every mark of loyalty and zeal in support of +the government, which at best looks on them with +an evil eye, then their very loyalty is turned against +their claims. They are represented as a contented +and happy people, and that it is unnecessary to do +anything more in their favor. Thus the factious disposition +of a few among the Catholics and the loyalty +of the whole mass are equally assigned as reasons for +not putting them on a par with those Protestants who +are asserted by the government itself, which frowns +upon Papists, to be in a state of nothing short of actual +rebellion, and in a strong disposition to make +common cause with the worst foreign enemy that +these countries have ever had to deal with. What +in the end can come of all this?</p> + +<p>As to the Irish Catholic clergy, their condition is +likewise most critical. If they endeavor by their influence +to keep a dissatisfied laity in quiet, they are +in danger of losing the little credit they possess, by +being considered as the instruments of a government +adverse to the civil interests of their flock. If they +let things take their course, they will be represented +as colluding with sedition, or at least tacitly encouraging<a name="Page_428" id="Page_428" title="428" class="pagenum"></a> +it. If they remonstrate against persecution, +they propagate rebellion. Whilst government publicly +avows hostility to that people, as a part of a +regular system, there is no road they can take which +does not lead to their ruin.</p> + +<p>If nothing can be done on your side of the water, I +promise you that nothing will be done here. Whether +in reality or only in appearance I cannot positively +determine, but you will be left to yourselves by the +ruling powers here. It is thus ostensibly and above-board; +and in part, I believe, the disposition is real. +As to the people at large in this country, I am sure +they have no disposition to intermeddle in your affairs. +They mean you no ill whatever; and they are +too ignorant of the state of your affairs to be able to +do you any good. Whatever opinion they have on +your subject is very faint and indistinct; and if there +is anything like a formed notion, even that amounts +to no more than a sort of humming that remains on +their ears of the burden of the old song about Popery. +Poor souls, they are to be pitied, who think of +nothing but dangers long passed by, and but little of +the perils that actually surround them.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>I have been long, but it is almost a necessary consequence +of dictating, and that by snatches, as a relief +from pain gives me the means of expressing my sentiments. +They can have little weight, as coming from +me; and I have not power enough of mind or body +to bring them out with their natural force. But I do +not wish to have it concealed that I am of the same +opinion, to my last breath, which I entertained when +my faculties were at the best; and I have not held +back from men in power in this kingdom, to whom I<a name="Page_429" id="Page_429" title="429" class="pagenum"></a> +have very good wishes, any part of my sentiments on +this melancholy subject, so long as I had means of +access to persons of their consideration.</p> + +<p>I have the honor to be, &c.</p> + + + + +<h3>END OF VOL. VI.</h3> + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Works of the Right Honourable +Edmund Burke, Vol. VI. 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Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + https://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. + +*** END: FULL LICENSE *** + + + +</pre> + +</body> +</html> diff --git a/15702-h/images/001.png b/15702-h/images/001.png Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..aac8ab0 --- /dev/null +++ b/15702-h/images/001.png diff --git a/15702.txt b/15702.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..83e5c17 --- /dev/null +++ b/15702.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11704 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund +Burke, Vol. VI. (of 12), by Edmund Burke + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. VI. (of 12) + +Author: Edmund Burke + +Release Date: April 24, 2005 [EBook #15702] +[Date last updated: May 5, 2006] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK BURKE VOL 6 *** + + + + +Produced by Paul Murray, Susan Skinner and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team from images generously made +available by the Bibliotheque nationale de France +(BnF/Gallica) at http://gallica.bnf.fr + + + + + + + + +THE WORKS + +OF + +THE RIGHT HONOURABLE + +EDMUND BURKE + + +IN TWELVE VOLUMES + +VOLUME THE SIXTH + + +[Illustration: Burke Coat of Arms.] + + +LONDON +JOHN C. NIMMO +14, KING WILLIAM STREET, STRAND, W.C. +MDCCCLXXXVII + + + + +CONTENTS OF VOL. VI. + + +PREFACE TO THE SECOND POSTHUMOUS VOLUME, IN A LETTER TO THE RIGHT + HON. WILLIAM ELLIOT v + +FOURTH LETTER ON THE PROPOSALS FOR PEACE WITH THE REGICIDE DIRECTORY + OF FRANCE; WITH THE PRELIMINARY CORRESPONDENCE 1 + +LETTER TO THE EMPRESS OF RUSSIA, November 1, 1791 113 + +LETTER TO SIR CHARLES BINGHAM, BART., ON THE IRISH ABSENTEE TAX, + October 30, 1773 121 + +LETTER TO THE HON. CHARLES JAMES FOX, ON THE AMERICAN WAR, + October 8, 1777 135 + +LETTER TO THE MARQUIS OF ROCKINGHAM, WITH ADDRESSES TO THE KING, + AND THE BRITISH COLONISTS IN NORTH AMERICA, IN RELATION TO THE + MEASURES OF GOVERNMENT IN THE AMERICAN CONTEST, AND A PROPOSED + SECESSION OF THE OPPOSITION FROM PARLIAMENT, January, 1777 149 + +LETTER TO THE RIGHT HON. EDMUND S. PERRY, IN RELATION TO A BILL + FOR THE RELIEF OF THE ROMAN CATHOLICS OF IRELAND, July 18, 1778 197 + +TWO LETTERS TO THOMAS BURGH, ESQ., AND JOHN MERLOTT, ESQ., IN + VINDICATION OF HIS PARLIAMENTARY CONDUCT RELATIVE TO THE AFFAIRS + OF IRELAND, 1780 207 + +LETTERS AND REFLECTIONS ON THE EXECUTIONS OF THE RIOTERS IN 1780 239 + +LETTER TO THE RIGHT HON. HENRY DUNDAS: WITH THE SKETCH OF A NEGRO + CODE, 1792 255 + +LETTER TO THE CHAIRMAN OF THE BUCKINGHAMSHIRE MEETING, HELD AT + AYLESBURY, APRIL 13, 1780, ON THE SUBJECT OF PARLIAMENTARY + REFORM 291 + +FRAGMENTS OF A TRACT RELATIVE TO THE LAWS AGAINST POPERY IN IRELAND 299 + +LETTER TO WILLIAM SMITH, ESQ., ON THE SUBJECT OF CATHOLIC + EMANCIPATION, January 29, 1795 361 + +SECOND LETTER TO SIR HERCULES LANGRISHE, ON THE CATHOLIC QUESTION, + May 26, 1795 375 + +LETTER TO RICHARD BURKE, ESQ., ON PROTESTANT ASCENDENCY IN IRELAND, + 1793 385 + +LETTER ON THE AFFAIRS OF IRELAND, 1797 413 + + + + +PREFACE + +TO THE SECOND POSTHUMOUS VOLUME,[1] + +IN A LETTER TO + +THE RIGHT HON. WILLIAM ELLIOT + + +My dear sir,--As some prefatory account of the materials which compose +this second posthumous volume of the Works of Mr. Burke, and of the +causes which have prevented its earlier appearance, will be expected +from me, I hope I may be indulged in the inclination I feel to run over +these matters in a letter to you, rather than in a formal address to the +public. + +Of the delay that has intervened since the publication of the former +volume I shall first say a few words. Having undertaken, in conjunction +with the late Dr. Laurence, to examine the manuscript papers of Mr. +Burke, and to select and prepare for the press such of them as should be +thought proper for publication, the difficulties attending our +cooeperation were soon experienced by us. The remoteness of our places +of residence in summer, and our professional and other avocations in +winter, opposed perpetual obstacles to the progress of our undertaking. + +Soon after the publication of the fourth volume, I was rendered +incapable of attending to any business by a severe and tedious illness. +And it was not long after my recovery before the health of our +invaluable friend began gradually to decline, and soon became unequal to +the increasing labors of his profession and the discharge of his +Parliamentary duties. At length we lost a man, of whom, as I shall have +occasion to speak more particularly in another part of this undertaking, +I will now content myself with saying, that in my humble opinion he +merited, and certainly obtained with those best acquainted with his +extensive learning and information, a considerable rank amongst the +eminent persons who have adorned the age in which we have lived, and of +whose services the public have been deprived by a premature death. + +From these causes little progress had been made in our work when I was +deprived of my coadjutor. But from that time you can testify of me that +I have not been idle. You can bear witness to the confused state in +which the materials that compose the present volume came into my hands. +The difficulty of reading many of the manuscripts, obscured by +innumerable erasures, corrections, interlineations, and marginal +insertions, would perhaps have been insuperable to any person less +conversant in the manuscripts of Mr. Burke than myself. To this +difficulty succeeded that of selecting from several detached papers, +written upon the same subject and the same topics, such as appeared to +contain the author's last thoughts and emendations. When these +difficulties were overcome, there still remained, in many instances, +that of assigning its proper place to many detached members of the same +piece, where no direct note of connection had been made. These +circumstances, whilst they will lead the reader not to expect, in the +cases to which they apply, the finished productions of Mr. Burke, +imposed upon me a task of great delicacy and difficulty,--namely, that +of deciding upon the publication of any, and which, of these unfinished +pieces. I must here beg permission of you, and Lord Fitzwilliam, to +inform the public, that in the execution of this part of my duty I +requested and obtained your assistance. + +Our first care was to ascertain, from such evidence, internal and +external, as the manuscripts themselves afforded, what pieces appeared +to have been at any time intended by the author for publication. Our +next was to select such as, though not originally intended for +publication, yet appeared to contain matter that might contribute to the +gratification and instruction of the public. Our last object was to +determine what degree of imperfection and incorrectness in papers of +either of these classes ought or ought not to exclude them from a place +in the present volume. This was, doubtless, the most nice and arduous +part of our undertaking. The difficulty, however, was, in our minds, +greatly diminished by our conviction that the reputation of our author +stood far beyond the reach of injury from any injudicious conduct of +ours in making this selection. On the other hand, we were desirous that +nothing should be withheld, from which the public might derive any +possible benefit. + +Nothing more is now necessary than that I should give a short account of +the writings which compose the present volume. + + +I. Fourth Letter on a Regicide Peace. + +Some account has already been given of this Letter in the Advertisement +to the fourth quarto volume.[2] That part of it which is contained +between the first and the middle of the page 67[3] is taken from a +manuscript which, nearly to the conclusion, had received the author's +last corrections: the subsequent part, to the middle of the page 71,[4] +is taken from some loose manuscripts, that were dictated by the author, +but do not appear to have been revised by him; and though they, as well +as what follows to the conclusion, were evidently designed to make a +part of this Letter, the editor alone is responsible for the order in +which they are here placed. The last part, from the middle of the page +71, had been printed as a part of the Letter which was originally +intended to be the third on Regicide Peace, as in the preface to the +fourth volume has already been noticed. + +It was thought proper to communicate this Letter before its publication +to Lord Auckland, the author of the pamphlet so frequently alluded to in +it. His Lordship, in consequence of this communication, was pleased to +put into my hands a letter with which he had sent his pamphlet to Mr. +Burke at the time of its publication, and Mr. Burke's answer to that +letter. These pieces, together with the note with which his Lordship +transmitted them to me, are prefixed to the Letter on Regicide Peace. + +II. Letter to the Empress of Russia. +III. Letter to Sir Charles Bingham. +IV. Letter to the Honorable Charles James Fox. + +Of these Letters it will be sufficient to remark, that they come under +the second of those classes into which, as I before observed, we divided +the papers that presented themselves to our consideration. + +V. Letter to the Marquis of Rockingham. +VI. An Address to the King. +VII. An Address to the British Colonists in North America. + +These pieces relate to a most important period in the present reign; +and I hope no apology will be necessary for giving them to the public. + +VIII. Letter to the Right Honorable Edmund [Sexton] Pery. +IX. Letter to Thomas Burgh, Esq. +X. Letter to John Merlott, Esq. + +The reader will find, in a note annexed to each of these Letters, an +account of the occasions on which they were written. The Letter to T. +Burgh, Esq., had found its way into some of the periodical prints of the +time in Dublin. + +XI. Reflections on the Approaching Executions. + +It may not, perhaps, now be generally known that Mr. Burke was a marked +object of the rioters in this disgraceful commotion, from whose fury he +narrowly escaped. The Reflections will be found to contain maxims of the +soundest judicial policy, and do equal honor to the head and heart of +their illustrious writer. + +XII. Letter to the Right Honorable Henry Dundas; with the Sketch of a +Negro Code. + +Mr. Burke, in the Letter to Mr. Dundas, has entered fully into his own +views of the Slave Trade, and has thereby rendered any further +explanation on that subject at present unnecessary. With respect to the +Code itself, an unsuccessful attempt was made to procure the copy of it +transmitted to Mr. Dundas. It was not to be found amongst his papers. +The Editor has therefore been obliged to have recourse to a rough draft +of it in Mr. Burke's own handwriting; from which he hopes he has +succeeded in making a pretty correct transcript of it, as well as in the +attempt he has made to supply the marginal references alluded to in Mr. +Burke's Letter to Mr. Dundas. + +XIII. Letter to the Chairman of the Buckinghamshire Meeting. + +Of the occasion of this Letter an account is given in the note subjoined +[prefixed] to it. + +XIV. Tracts and Letters relative to the Laws against Popery in Ireland. + +These pieces consist of,-- + +1. An unfinished Tract on the Popery Laws. Of this Tract the reader will +find an account in the note prefixed to it. + +2. A Letter to William Smith, Esq. Several copies of this letter having +got abroad, it was printed and published in Dublin without the +permission of Mr. Burke, or of the gentleman to whom it was addressed. + +3. Second Letter to Sir Hercules Langrishe. This may be considered as +supplementary to the first letter, addressed to the same person in +January, 1792, which was published in the third volume.[5] + +4. Letter to Richard Burke, Esq. Of this letter it will be necessary to +observe, that the first part of it appears to have been originally +addressed by Mr. Burke to his son in the manner in which it is now +printed, but to have been left unfinished; after whose death he probably +designed to have given the substance of it, with additional +observations, to the public in some other form, but never found leisure +or inclination to finish it. + +5. A Letter on the Affairs of Ireland, written in the year 1797. The +name of the person to whom this letter was addressed does not appear on +the manuscript; nor has the letter been found to which it was written as +an answer. And as the gentleman whom he employed as an amanuensis is not +now living, no discovery of it can be made, unless this publication of +the letter should produce some information respecting it, that may +enable us in a future volume to gratify, on this point, the curiosity of +the reader. The letter was dictated, as he himself tells us, from his +couch at Bath; to which place he had gone, by the advice of his +physicians, in March, 1797. His health was now rapidly declining; the +vigor of his mind remained unimpaired. This, my dear friend, was, I +believe, the last letter dictated by him on public affairs:--here ended +his political labors. + +XV. Fragments and Notes of Speeches in Parliament. + +1. Speech on the Acts of Uniformity. + +2. Speech on a Bill for the Relief of Protestant Dissenters. + +3. Speech on the Petition of the Unitarians. + +4. Speech on the Middlesex Election. + +5. Speech on a Bill for shortening the Duration of Parliaments. + +6. Speech on the Reform of the Representation in Parliament. + +7. Speech on a Bill for explaining the Powers of Juries in Prosecutions +for Libels. + +*7. Letter relative to the same subject. + +8. Speech on a Bill for repealing the Marriage Act. + +9. Speech on a Bill to quiet the Possessions of the Subject against +Dormant Claims of the Church. + +With respect to these fragments, I have already stated the reasons by +which we were influenced in our determination to publish them. An +account of the state in which these manuscripts were found is given in +the note prefixed to this article. + +XVI. Hints for an Essay on the Drama. + +This fragment was perused in manuscript by a learned and judicious +critic, our late lamented friend, Mr. Malone; and under the protection +of his opinion we can feel no hesitation in submitting it to the +judgment of the public. + +XVII. We are now come to the concluding article of this volume,--the +Essay on the History of England. + +At what time of the author's life it was written cannot now be exactly +ascertained; but it was certainly begun before he had attained the age +of twenty-seven years, as it appears from an entry in the books of the +late Mr. Dodsley, that eight sheets of it, which contain the first +seventy-four pages of the present edition,[6] were printed in the year +1757. This is the only part that has received the finishing stroke of +the author. In those who are acquainted with the manner in which Mr. +Burke usually composed his graver literary works, and of which some +account is given in the Advertisement prefixed to the fourth volume, +this circumstance will excite a deep regret; and whilst the public +partakes with us in this feeling, it will doubtless be led to judge with +candor and indulgence of a work left in this imperfect and unfinished +state by its author. + +Before I conclude, it may not be improper to take this opportunity of +acquainting the public with the progress that has been made towards the +completion of this undertaking. The sixth and seventh volumes, which +will consist entirely of papers that have a relation to the affairs of +the East India Company, and to the impeachment of Mr. Hastings, are now +in the press. The suspension of the consideration of the affairs of the +East India Company in Parliament till its nest session has made me very +desirous to get the sixth volume out as early as possible in the next +winter. The Ninth and Eleventh Reports of the Select Committee, +appointed to take into consideration certain affairs of the East India +Company in the year 1783, were written by Mr. Burke, and will be given +in that volume. They contain a full and comprehensive view of the +commerce, revenues, civil establishment, and general policy of the +Company, and will therefore be peculiarly interesting at this time to +the public. + +The eighth and last volume will contain a narrative of the life of Mr. +Burke, which will be accompanied with such parts of his familiar +correspondence, and other occasional productions, as shall be thought +fit for publication.[7] The materials relating to the early years of his +life, alluded to in the Advertisement to the fourth volume, have been +lately recovered; and the communication of such as may still remain in +the possession of any private individuals is again most earnestly +requested. + +Unequal as I feel myself to the task, I shall, my dear friend, lose no +time, nor spare any pains, in discharging the arduous duty that has +devolved upon me. You know the peculiar difficulties I labor under from +the failure of my eyesight; and you may congratulate me upon the +assistance which I have now procured from my neighbor, the worthy +chaplain[8] of Bromley College, who to the useful qualification of a +most patient amanuensis adds that of a good scholar and intelligent +critic. + +And now, adieu, my dear friend, + +And believe me ever affectionately yours, + +WR. ROFFEN. + +BROMLEY HOUSE, August 1, 1812. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[1] Works, Vol. V., quarto edition, (London, F., C., & J. Rivington, +1812,)--Vol. IV. of that edition (London, F. & C. Rivington, 1802) being +the first posthumous volume,--and Vols. I., II., and III. (London, J. +Dodsley, 1792) comprising the collection published during the lifetime +of Mr. Burke. + +[2] Prefixed to the first volume, in the other editions. For the account +referred to, see, in the present edition, Vol. I., pp. xiii., xiv. + +[3] Page 86 of the present edition. + +[4] In this edition, p. 91, near the top. + +[5] In the fourth volume of the present edition. + +[6] The quarto edition,--extending as far as Book II. ch. 2, near the +middle of the paragraph commencing, "The same regard to the welfare of +the people," &c. + +[7] This design the editor did not live to execute. + +[8] The Rev. J.J. Talman. + + + + +FOURTH LETTER + +ON THE + +PROPOSALS FOR PEACE WITH THE REGICIDE DIRECTORY OF FRANCE. + +ADDRESSED TO + +THE EARL FITZWILLIAM. +1795-7. + + +PRELIMINARY CORRESPONDENCE. + +_Letter from the Right Honorable the Lord Auckland to the Lord Bishop of +Rochester_. + +EDEN FARM, KENT, July 18th, 1812. + +My dear Lord,--Mr. Burke's fourth letter to Lord Fitzwilliam is +personally interesting to me: I have perused it with a respectful +attention. + +When I communicated to Mr. Burke, in 1795, the printed work which he +arraigns and discusses, I was aware that he would differ from me. + +Some light is thrown on the transaction by my note which gave rise to +it, and by his answer, which exhibits the admirable powers of his great +and good mind, deeply suffering at the time under a domestic calamity. + +I have selected these two papers from my manuscript collection, and now +transmit them to your Lordship with a wish that they may be annexed to +the publication in question. + +I have the honor to be, my dear Lord, + +Yours most sincerely, + +AUCKLAND. + +TO THE RIGHT REV. THE LORD BISHOP OF ROCHESTER. + + * * * * * + +_Letter from Lord Auckland to the Right Honorable Edmund Burke_. + + +EDEN FARM, KENT, October 28th, 1795. + +My dear Sir,-- + +Though in the stormy ocean of the last twenty-three years we have seldom +sailed on the same tack, there has been nothing hostile in our signals +or manoeuvres, and, on my part at least, there has been a cordial +disposition towards friendly and respectful sentiments. Under that +influence, I now send to you a small work which exhibits my fair and +full opinions on the arduous circumstances of the moment, "as far as the +cautions necessary to be observed will permit me to go beyond general +ideas." + +Three or four of those friends with whom I am most connected in public +and private life are pleased to think that the statement in question +(which at first made part of a confidential paper) may do good, and +accordingly a very large impression will be published to-day. I neither +seek to avow the publication nor do I wish to disavow it. I have no +anxiety in that respect, but to contribute my mite to do service, at a +moment when service is much wanted. + +I am, my dear Sir, + +Most sincerely yours, + +AUCKLAND. + +RIGHT HON. EDMUND BURKE. + + * * * * * + +_Letter from the Right Honorable Edmund Burke to Lord Auckland_. + +My dear Lord,-- + +I am perfectly sensible of the very flattering honor you have done me in +turning any part of your attention towards a dejected old man, buried +in the anticipated grave of a feeble old age, forgetting and forgotten +in an obscure and melancholy retreat. + +In this retreat I have nothing relative to this world to do, but to +study all the tranquillity that in the state of my mind I am capable of. +To that end I find it but too necessary to call to my aid an oblivion of +most of the circumstances, pleasant and unpleasant, of my life,--to +think as little and indeed to know as little as I can of everything that +is doing about me,--and, above all, to divert my mind from all +presagings and prognostications of what I must (if I let my speculations +loose) consider as of absolute necessity to happen after my death, and +possibly even before it. Your address to the public, which you have been +so good as to send to me, obliges me to break in upon that plan, and to +look a little on what is behind, and very much on what is before me. It +creates in my mind a variety of thoughts, and all of them unpleasant. + +It is true, my Lord, what you say, that, through our public life, we +have generally sailed on somewhat different tacks. We have so, +undoubtedly; and we should do so still, if I had continued longer to +keep the sea. In that difference, you rightly observe that I have always +done justice to your skill and ability as a navigator, and to your good +intentions towards the safety of the cargo and of the ship's company. I +cannot say now that we are on different tacks. There would be no +propriety in the metaphor. I can sail no longer. My vessel cannot be +said to be even in port. She is wholly condemned and broken up. To have +an idea of that vessel, you must call to mind what you have often seen +on the Kentish road. Those planks of tough and hardy oak, that used for +years to brave the buffets of the Bay of Biscay, are now turned, with +their warped grain and empty trunnion-holes, into very wretched pales +for the inclosure of a wretched farm-yard. + +The style of your pamphlet, and the eloquence and power of composition +you display in it, are such as do great honor to your talents, and in +conveying any other sentiments would give me very great pleasure. +Perhaps I do not very perfectly comprehend your purpose, and the drift +of your arguments. If I do not, pray do not attribute my mistake to want +of candor, but to want of sagacity. I confess, your address to the +public, together with other accompanying circumstances, has filled me +with a degree of grief and dismay which I cannot find words to express. +If the plan of politics there recommended--pray excuse my +freedom--should be adopted by the king's councils, and by the good +people of this kingdom, (as, so recommended, undoubtedly it will,) +nothing can be the consequence but utter and irretrievable ruin to the +ministry, to the crown, to the succession,--to the importance, to the +independence, to the very existence, of this country. This is my feeble, +perhaps, but clear, positive, decided, long and maturely reflected and +frequently declared opinion, from which all the events which have lately +come to pass, so far from turning me, have tended to confirm beyond the +power of alteration, even by your eloquence and authority. I find, my +dear Lord, that you think some persons, who are not satisfied with the +securities of a Jacobin peace, to be persons of intemperate minds. I may +be, and I fear I am, with you in that description; but pray, my Lord, +recollect that very few of the causes which make men intemperate can +operate upon me. Sanguine hopes, vehement desires, inordinate ambition, +implacable animosity, party attachments, or party interests,--all these +with me have no existence. For myself, or for a family, (alas! I have +none,) I have nothing to hope or to fear in this world. I am attached, +by principle, inclination, and gratitude, to the king, and to the +present ministry. + +Perhaps you may think that my animosity to opposition is the cause of my +dissent, on seeing the politics of Mr. Fox (which, while I was in the +world, I combated by every instrument which God had put into my hands, +and in every situation in which I had taken part) so completely, if I at +all understand you, adopted in your Lordship's book: but it was with +pain I broke with that great man forever in that cause; and I assure +you, it is not without pain that I differ with your Lordship on the same +principles. But it is of no concern. I am far below the region of those +great and tempestuous passions. I feel nothing of the intemperance of +mind. It is rather sorrow and dejection than anger. + +Once more my best thanks for your very polite attention; and do me the +favor to believe me, with the most perfect sentiments of respect and +regard, + +My dear Lord, + +Your Lordship's most obedient and humble servant, + +EDMUND BURKE. + +BEACONSFIELD, Oct. 30th, 1795. + +Friday Evening. + + + + +LETTER IV. + +TO THE EARL FITZWILLIAM. + + +My dear Lord,--I am not sure that the best way of discussing any +subject, except those that concern the abstracted sciences, is not +somewhat in the way of dialogue. To this mode, however, there are two +objections: the first, that it happens, as in the puppet-show, one man +speaks for all the personages. An unnatural uniformity of tone is in a +manner unavoidable. The other and more serious objection is, that, as +the author (if not an absolute skeptic) must have some opinion of his +own to enforce, he will be continually tempted to enervate the arguments +he puts into the mouth of his adversary, or to place them in a point of +view most commodious for their refutation. There is, however, a sort of +dialogue not quite so liable to these objections, because it approaches +more nearly to truth and Nature: it is called CONTROVERSY. Here the +parties speak for themselves. If the writer who attacks another's +notions does not deal fairly with his adversary, the diligent reader has +it always in his power, by resorting to the work examined, to do justice +to the original author and to himself. For this reason you will not +blame me, if, in my discussion of the merits of a Regicide Peace, I do +not choose to trust to my own statements, but to bring forward along +with them the arguments of the advocates for that measure. If I choose +puny adversaries, writers of no estimation or authority, then you will +justly blame me. I might as well bring in at once a fictitious speaker, +and thus fall into all the inconveniences of an imaginary dialogue. This +I shall avoid; and I shall take no notice of any author who my friends +in town do not tell me is in estimation with those whose opinions he +supports. + +A piece has been sent to me, called "Some Remarks on the Apparent +Circumstances of the War in the Fourth Week of October, 1795," with a +French motto: "_Que faire encore une fois dans une telle nuit? Attendre +le jour_." The very title seemed to me striking and peculiar, and to +announce something uncommon. In the time I have lived to, I always seem +to walk on enchanted ground. Everything is new, and, according to the +fashionable phrase, revolutionary. In former days authors valued +themselves upon the maturity and fulness of their deliberations. +Accordingly, they predicted (perhaps with more arrogance than reason) an +eternal duration to their works. The quite contrary is our present +fashion. Writers value themselves now on the instability of their +opinions and the transitory life of their productions. On this kind of +credit the modern institutors open their schools. They write for youth, +and it is sufficient, if the instruction "lasts as long as a present +love, or as the painted silks and cottons of the season." + +The doctrines in this work are applied, for their standard, with great +exactness, to the shortest possible periods both of conception and +duration. The title is "Some Remarks on the _Apparent_ Circumstances of +the War _in the Fourth Week of October_, 1795." The time is critically +chosen. A month or so earlier would have made it the anniversary of a +bloody Parisian September, when the French massacre one another. A day +or two later would have carried it into a London November, the gloomy +month in which it is said by a pleasant author that Englishmen hang and +drown themselves. In truth, this work has a tendency to alarm us with +symptoms of public suicide. However, there is one comfort to be taken +even from the gloomy time of year. It is a rotting season. If what is +brought to market is not good, it is not likely to keep long. Even +buildings run up in haste with untempered mortar in that humid weather, +if they are ill-contrived tenements, do not threaten long to incumber +the earth. The author tells us (and I believe he is the very first +author that ever told such a thing to his readers) "that the _entire +fabric_ of his speculations might be overset by unforeseen +vicissitudes," and what is far more extraordinary, "that even the +_whole_ consideration might be _varied whilst he was writing those +pages."_ Truly, in my poor judgment, this circumstance formed a very +substantial motive for his not publishing those ill-considered +considerations at all. He ought to have followed the good advice of his +motto: "_Que faire encore dans une telle nuit? Attendre le jour_." He +ought to have waited till he had got a little more daylight on this +subject. Night itself is hardly darker than the fogs of that time. + +Finding the _last week in October_ so particularly referred to, and not +perceiving any particular event, relative to the war, which happened on +any of the days in that week, I thought it possible that they were +marked by some astrological superstition, to which the greatest +politicians have been subject. I therefore had recourse to my Rider's +Almanack. There I found, indeed, something that characterized the work, +and that gave directions concerning the sudden political and natural +variations, and for eschewing the maladies that are most prevalent in +that aguish intermittent season, "the last week of October." On that +week the sagacious astrologer, Rider, in his note on the third column of +the calendar side, teaches us to expect "_variable and cold weather";_ +but instead of encouraging us to trust ourselves to the haze and mist +and doubtful lights of that changeable week, on the answerable part of +the opposite page he gives us a salutary caution (indeed, it is very +nearly in the words of the author's motto): "_Avoid_," says he, "_being +out late at night and in foggy weather, for a cold now caught may last +the whole winter_."[9] This ingenious author, who disdained the prudence +of the Almanack, walked out in the very fog he complains of, and has led +us to a very unseasonable airing at that time. Whilst this noble writer, +by the vigor of an excellent constitution, formed for the violent +changes he prognosticates, may shake off the importunate rheum and +malignant influenza of this disagreeable week, a whole Parliament may go +on spitting and snivelling, and wheezing and coughing, during a whole +session. All this from listening to variable, hebdomadal politicians, +who run away from their opinions without giving us a month's +warning,--and for not listening to the wise and friendly admonitions of +Dr. Cardanus Rider, who never apprehends he may change his opinions +before his pen is out of his hand, but always enables us to lay in at +least a year's stock of useful information. + +At first I took comfort. I said to myself, that, if I should, as I fear +I must, oppose the doctrines of _the last week of October_, it is +probable that by this time they are no longer those of the eminent +writer to whom they are attributed. He gives us hopes that long before +this he may have embraced the direct contrary sentiments. If I am found +in a conflict with those of the last week of October, I may be in full +agreement with those of the last week in December, or the first week in +January, 1796. But a second edition, and a French translation, (for the +benefit, I must suppose, of the new Regicide Directory,) have let down a +little of these flattering hopes. We and the Directory know that the +author, whatever changes his works seemed made to indicate, like a +weathercock grown rusty, remains just where he was in the last week of +last October. It is true, that his protest against binding him to his +opinions, and his reservation of a right to whatever opinions he +pleases, remain in their full force. This variability is pleasant, and +shows a fertility of fancy:-- + + Qualis in aethereo felix Vertumnus Olympo + Mille habet ornatus, mille decenter habet. + +Yet, doing all justice to the sportive variability of these weekly, +daily, or hourly speculators, shall I be pardoned, if I attempt a word +on the part of us simple country folk? It is not good for _us_, however +it may be so for great statesmen, that we should be treated with +variable politics. I consider different relations as prescribing a +different conduct. I allow, that, in transactions with an enemy, a +minister may, and often must, vary his demands with the day, possibly +with the hour. With an enemy, a fixed plan, variable arrangements. This +is the rule the nature of the transaction prescribes. But all this +belongs to treaty. All these shiftings and changes are a sort of secret +amongst the parties, till a definite settlement is brought about. Such +is the spirit of the proceedings in the doubtful and transitory state of +things between enmity and friendship. In this change the subjects of the +transformation are by nature carefully wrapt up in their cocoons. The +gay ornament of summer is not seemly in his aurelia state. This +mutability is allowed to a foreign negotiator; but when a great +politician condescends publicly to instruct his own countrymen on a +matter which may fix their fate forever, his opinions ought not to be +diurnal, or even weekly. These ephemerides of politics are not made for +our slow and coarse understandings. Our appetite demands a _piece of +resistance_. We require some food that will stick to the ribs. We call +for sentiments to which we can attach ourselves,--sentiments in which we +can take an interest,--sentiments on which we can warm, on which we can +ground some confidence in ourselves or in others. We do not want a +largess of inconstancy. Poor souls, we have enough of that sort of +poverty at home. There is a difference, too, between deliberation and +doctrine: a man ought to be decided in his opinions before he attempts +to teach. His fugitive lights may serve himself in some unknown region, +but they cannot free us from the effects of the error into which we have +been betrayed. His active Will-o'-the-wisp may be gone nobody can guess +where, whilst he leaves us bemired and benighted in the bog. + +Having premised these few reflections upon this new mode of teaching a +lesson, which whilst the scholar is getting by heart the master forgets, +I come to the lesson itself. On the fullest consideration of it, I am +utterly incapable of saying with any great certainty what it is, in the +detail, that the author means to affirm or deny, to dissuade or +recommend. His march is mostly oblique, and his doctrine rather in the +way of insinuation than of dogmatic assertion. It is not only fugitive +in its duration, but is slippery in the extreme whilst it lasts. +Examining it part by part, it seems almost everywhere to contradict +itself; and the author, who claims the privilege of varying his +opinions, has exercised this privilege in every section of his remarks. +For this reason, amongst others, I follow the advice which the able +writer gives in his last page, which is, "to consider the _impression_ +of what he has urged, taken from the _whole_, and not from detached +paragraphs." That caution was not absolutely necessary. I should think +it unfair to the author and to myself to have proceeded otherwise. This +author's _whole_, however, like every other whole, cannot be so well +comprehended without some reference to the parts; but they shall be +again referred to the whole. Without this latter attention, several of +the passages would certainly remain covered with an impenetrable and +truly oracular obscurity. + +The great, general, pervading purpose, of the whole pamphlet is to +reconcile us to peace with the present usurpation in France. In this +general drift of the author I can hardly be mistaken. The other +purposes, less general, and subservient to the preceding scheme, are to +show, first, that the time of the Remarks was the favorable time for +making that peace upon our side; secondly, that on the enemy's side +their disposition towards the acceptance of such terms as he is pleased +to offer was rationally to be expected; the third purpose was, to make +some sort of disclosure of the terms which, if the Regicides are pleased +to grant them, this nation ought to be contented to accept: these form +the basis of the negotiation which the author, whoever he is, proposes +to open. + +Before I consider these Remarks along with the other reasonings which I +hear on the same subject, I beg leave to recall to your mind the +observation I made early in our correspondence, and which ought to +attend us quite through the discussion of this proposed peace, amity, or +fraternity, or whatever you may call it,--that is, the real quality and +character of the party you have to deal with. This I find, as a thing of +no importance, has everywhere escaped the author of the October Remarks. +That hostile power, to the period of the fourth week in that month, has +been ever called and considered as an usurpation. In that week, for the +first time, it changed its name of an usurped power, and took the simple +name of _France_. The word France is slipped in just as if the +government stood exactly as before that Revolution which has astonished, +terrified, and almost overpowered Europe. "France," says the author, +"will do this,"--"it is the interest of France,"--"the returning honor +and generosity of France," &c., &c.--always merely France: just as if +we were in a common political war with an old recognized member of the +commonwealth of Christian Europe,--and as if our dispute had turned upon +a mere matter of territorial or commercial controversy, which a peace +might settle by the imposition or the taking off a duty, with the gain +or the loss of a remote island or a frontier town or two, on the one +side or the other. This shifting of persons could not be done without +the hocus-pocus of _abstraction_. We have been in a grievous error: we +thought that we had been at war with _rebels_ against the lawful +government, but that we were friends and allies of what is properly +France, friends and allies to the legal body politic of France. But by +sleight of hand the Jacobins are clean vanished, and it is France we +have got under our cup. "Blessings on his soul that first invented +sleep!" said Don Sancho Panza the Wise. All those blessings, and ten +thousand times more, on him who found out abstraction, personification, +and impersonals! In certain cases they are the first of all soporifics. +Terribly alarmed we should be, if things were proposed to us in the +_concrete_, and if fraternity was held out to us with the individuals +who compose this France by their proper names and descriptions,--if we +were told that it was very proper to enter into the closest bonds of +amity and good correspondence with the devout, pacific, and +tender-hearted Sieyes, with the all-accomplished Reubell, with the +humane guillotinists of Bordeaux, Tallien and Isabeau, with the meek +butcher, Legendre, and with "the returned humanity and generosity" (that +had been only on a visit abroad) of the virtuous regicide brewer, +Santerre. This would seem at the outset a very strange scheme of amity +and concord,--nay, though we had held out to us, as an additional +_douceur_, an assurance of the cordial fraternal embrace of our pious +and patriotic countryman, Thomas Paine. But plain truth would here be +shocking and absurd; therefore comes in _abstraction_ and +personification. "Make your peace with France." That word _France_ +sounds quite as well as any other; and it conveys no idea but that of a +very pleasant country and very hospitable inhabitants. Nothing absurd +and shocking in amity and good correspondence with _France_. Permit me +to say, that I am not yet well acquainted with this new-coined France, +and without a careful assay I am not willing to receive it in currency +in place of the old Louis-d'or. + +Having, therefore, slipped the persons with whom we are to treat out of +view, we are next to be satisfied that the French Revolution, which this +peace is to fix and consolidate, ought to give us no just cause of +apprehension. Though the author labors this point, yet he confesses a +fact (indeed, he could not conceal it) which renders all his labors +utterly fruitless. He confesses that the Regicide means to _dictate_ a +pacification, and that this pacification, according to their decree +passed but a very few days before his publication appeared, is to "unite +to their empire, either in possession or dependence, new barriers, many +frontier places of strength, a large sea-coast, and many sea-ports." He +ought to have stated it, that they would annex to their territory a +country about a third as large as France, and much more than half as +rich, and in a situation the most important for command that it would be +possible for her anywhere to possess. + +To remove this terror, (even if the Regicides should carry their +point,) and to give us perfect repose with regard to their empire, +whatever they may acquire, or whomsoever they might destroy, he raises a +doubt "whether France will not be ruined by _retaining_ these conquests, +and whether she will not wholly lose that preponderance which she has +held in the scale of European powers, and will not eventually be +destroyed by the effect of her present successes, or, at least, whether, +so far as the _political interests of England are concerned_, she +[France] will remain an object of as _much jealousy and alarm as she was +under the reign of a monarch_." Here, indeed, is a paragraph full of +meaning! It gives matter for meditation almost in every word of it. The +secret of the pacific politicians is out. This republic, at all hazards, +is to be maintained. It is to be confined within some bounds, if we can; +if not, with every possible acquisition of power, it is still to be +cherished and supported. It is the return of the monarchy we are to +dread, and therefore we ought to pray for the permanence of the Regicide +authority. _Esto perpetua_ is the devout ejaculation of our Fra Paolo +for the Republic one and indivisible. It was the monarchy that rendered +France dangerous: Regicide neutralizes all the acrimony of that power, +and renders it safe and social. The October speculator is of opinion +that monarchy is of so poisonous a quality that a moderate territorial +power is far more dangerous to its neighbors under that abominable +regimen than the greatest empire in the hands of a republic. This is +Jacobinism sublimed and exalted into most pure and perfect essence. It +is a doctrine, I admit, made to allure and captivate, if anything in the +world can, the Jacobin Directory, to mollify the ferocity of Regicide, +and to persuade those patriotic hangmen, after their reiterated oaths +for our extirpation, to admit this well-humbled nation to the fraternal +embrace. I do not wonder that this tub of October has been racked off +into a French cask. It must make its fortune at Paris. That translation +seems the language the most suited to these sentiments. Our author tells +the French Jacobins, that the political interests of Great Britain are +in perfect unison with the principles of their government,--that they +may take and keep the keys of the civilized world, for they are safe in +their unambitious and faithful custody. We say to them, "We may, indeed, +wish you to be a little less murderous, wicked, and atheistical, for the +sake of morals; we may think it were better you were less new-fangled in +your speech, for the sake of grammar; but, as _politicians_, provided +you keep clear of monarchy, all our fears, alarms, and jealousies are at +an end: at least, they sink into nothing in comparison of our dread of +your detestable royalty." A flatterer of Cardinal Mazarin said, when +that minister had just settled the match between the young Louis the +Fourteenth and a daughter of Spain, that this alliance had the effect of +faith and had removed mountains,--that the Pyrenees were levelled by +that marriage. You may now compliment Reubell in the same spirit on the +miracles of regicide, and tell him that the guillotine of Louis the +Sixteenth had consummated a marriage between Great Britain and France, +which dried up the Channel, and restored the two countries to the unity +which it is said they had before the unnatural rage of seas and +earthquakes had broke off their happy junction. It will be a fine +subject for the poets who are to prophesy the blessings of this peace. + +I am now convinced that the Remarks of the last week of October cannot +come from the author to whom they are given, they are such a direct +contradiction to the style of manly indignation with which he spoke of +those miscreants and murderers in his excellent memorial to the States +of Holland,--to that very state which the author who presumes to +personate him does not find it contrary to the political interests of +England to leave in the hands of these very miscreants, against whom on +the part of England he took so much pains to animate their republic. +This cannot be; and if this argument wanted anything to give it new +force, it is strengthened by an additional reason, that is irresistible. +Knowing that noble person, as well as myself, to be under very great +obligations to the crown, I am confident he would not so very directly +contradict, even in the paroxysm of his zeal against monarchy, the +declarations made in the name and with the fullest approbation of our +sovereign, his master, and our common benefactor. In those declarations +you will see that the king, instead of being sensible of greater alarm +and jealousy from a neighboring crowned head than from, these regicides, +attributes all the dangers of Europe to the latter. Let this writer hear +the description given in the royal declaration of the scheme of power of +these miscreants, as "_a system destructive of all public order, +maintained by proscriptions, exiles, and confiscations without number, +by arbitrary imprisonments, by massacres which cannot be remembered +without horror, and at length by the execrable murder of a just and +beneficent sovereign, and of the illustrious princess, who with an +unshaken firmness has shared all the misfortunes of her royal consort, +his protracted sufferings, his cruel captivity, his ignominious +death_." After thus describing, with an eloquence and energy equalled +only by its truth, the means by which this usurped power had been +acquired and maintained, that government is characterized with equal +force. His Majesty, far from thinking monarchy in France to be a greater +object of jealousy than the Regicide usurpation, calls upon the French +to reestablish "_a monarchical government_" for the purpose of shaking +off "_the yoke of a sanguinary anarchy_,--_of that anarchy which has +broken all the most sacred bonds of society, dissolved all the relations +of civil life, violated every right, confounded every duty_,--_which +uses the name of liberty to exercise the most cruel tyranny, to +annihilate all property, to seize on all possessions_,--_which founds +its power on the pretended consent of the people, and itself carries +fire and sword through extensive provinces, for having demanded their +laws, their religion, and their lawful sovereign_." + +"That strain I heard was of a higher mood." That declaration of our +sovereign was worthy of his throne. It is in a style which neither the +pen of the writer of October nor such a poor crow-quill as mine can ever +hope to equal. I am happy to enrich my letter with this fragment of +nervous and manly eloquence, which, if it had not emanated from the +awful authority of a throne, if it were not recorded amongst the most +valuable monuments of history, and consecrated in the archives of +states, would be worthy, as a private composition, to live forever in +the memory of men. + +In those admirable pieces does his Majesty discover this new opinion of +his political security, in having the chair of the scorner, that is, the +discipline of atheism, and the block of regicide, set up by his side, +elevated on the same platform, and shouldering, with the vile image of +their grim and bloody idol, the inviolable majesty of his throne? The +sentiments of these declarations are the very reverse: they could not be +other. Speaking of the spirit of that usurpation, the royal manifesto +describes, with perfect truth, its internal tyranny to have been +established as the very means of shaking the security of all other +states,--as "_disposing arbitrarily of the property and blood of the +inhabitants of France, in order to disturb the tranquillity of other +nations, and to render all Europe the theatre of the same crimes and of +the same misfortunes_." It was but a natural inference from this fact, +that the royal manifesto does not at all rest the justification of this +war on common principles: that it was "_not only to defend his own +rights, and those of his allies_," but "_that all the dearest interests +of his people imposed upon him a duty still more important_,--_that of +exerting his efforts for the preservation of civil society itself, as +happily established among the nations of Europe_." On that ground, the +protection offered is to "those who, by declaring for a _monarchical +government_, shall shake off the yoke of a sanguinary anarchy." It is +for that purpose the declaration calls on them "to join the standard of +an _hereditary monarchy_,"--declaring that the _peace and safety_ of +this kingdom and the other powers of Europe "_materially depend on the +reestablishment of order in France_." His Majesty does not hesitate to +declare that "_the reestablishment of monarchy, in the person of Louis +the Seventeenth, and the lawful heirs of the crown, appears to him_ [his +Majesty] _the best mode of accomplishing these just and salutary +views_." + +This is what his Majesty does not hesitate to declare relative to the +political safety and peace of his kingdom and of Europe, and with regard +to France under her ancient hereditary monarchy in the course and order +of legal succession. But in comes a gentleman, in the fag end of +October, dripping with the fogs of that humid and uncertain season, and +does not hesitate in diameter to contradict this wise and just royal +declaration, and stoutly, on his part, to make a counter +declaration,--that France, so far as the political interests of England +are concerned, will not remain, under the despotism of Regicide, and +with the better part of Europe in her hands, so much an object of +jealousy and alarm as she was under the reign of a monarch. When I hear +the master and reason on one side, and the servant and his single and +unsupported assertion on the other, my part is taken. + +This is what the Octobrist says of the political interests of England, +which it looks as if he completely disconnected with those of all other +nations. But not quite so: he just allows it possible (with an "at +least") that the other powers may not find it quite their interest that +their territories should be conquered and their subjects tyrannized over +by the Regicides. No fewer than ten sovereign princes had, some the +whole, all a very considerable part of their dominions under the yoke of +that dreadful faction. Amongst these was to be reckoned the first +republic in the world, and the closest ally of this kingdom, which, +under the insulting name of an independency, is under her iron yoke, +and, as long as a faction averse to the old government is suffered there +to domineer, cannot be otherwise. I say nothing of the Austrian +Netherlands, countries of a vast extent, and amongst the most fertile +and populous of Europe, and, with regard to us, most critically +situated. The rest will readily occur to you. + +But if there are yet existing any people, like me, old-fashioned enough +to consider that we have an important part of our very existence beyond +our limits, and who therefore stretch their thoughts beyond the +_pomoerium_ of England, for them, too, he has a comfort which will +remove all their jealousies and alarms about the extent of the empire of +Regicide. "_These conquests eventually will be the cause of her +destruction_." So that they who hate the cause of usurpation, and dread +the power of France under any form, are to wish her to be a conqueror, +in order to accelerate her ruin. A little more conquest would be still +better. Will he tell us what dose of dominion is to be the _quantum +sufficit_ for her destruction?--for she seems very voracious of the food +of her distemper. To be sure, she is ready to perish with repletion; she +has a _boulimia_, and hardly has bolted down one state than she calls +for two or three more. There is a good deal of wit in all this; but it +seems to me (with all respect to the author) to be carrying the joke a +great deal too far. I cannot yet think that the armies of the Allies +were of this way of thinking, and that, when they evacuated all these +countries, it was a stratagem of war to decoy France into ruin,--or +that, if in a treaty we should surrender them forever into the hands of +the usurpation, (the lease the author supposes,) it is a master-stroke +of policy to effect the destruction of a formidable rival, and to render +her no longer an object of jealousy and alarm. This, I assure the +author, will infinitely facilitate the treaty. The usurpers will catch +at this bait, without minding the hook which this crafty angler for the +Jacobin gudgeons of the new Directory has so dexterously placed under +it. + +Every symptom of the exacerbation of the public malady is, with him, (as +with the Doctor in Moliere,) a happy prognostic of recovery.--Flanders +gone. _Tant mieux_.--Holland subdued. Charming!--Spain beaten, and all +the hither Germany conquered. Bravo! Better and better still!--But they +will retain all their conquests on a treaty. Best of all!--What a +delightful thing it is to have a gay physician, who sees all things, as +the French express it, _couleur de rose!_ What an escape we have had, +that we and our allies were not the conquerors! By these conquests, +previous to her utter destruction, she is "wholly to lose that +preponderance which she held in the scale of the European powers." Bless +me! this new system of France, after changing all other laws, reverses +the law of gravitation. By throwing in weight after weight, her scale +rises, and will by-and-by kick the beam. Certainly there is one sense in +which she loses her preponderance: that is, she is no longer +preponderant against the countries she has conquered. They are part of +herself. But I beg the author to keep his eyes fixed on the scales for a +moment longer, and then to tell me, in downright earnest, whether he +sees hitherto any signs of her losing preponderance by an augmentation +of weight and power. Has she lost her preponderance over Spain by her +influence in Spain? Are there any signs that the conquest of Savoy and +Nice begins to lessen her preponderance over Switzerland and the Italian +States,--or that the Canton of Berne, Genoa, and Tuscany, for example, +have taken arms against her,--or that Sardinia is more adverse than +ever to a treacherous pacification? Was it in the last week of October +that the German States showed that Jacobin. France was losing her +preponderance? Did the King of Prussia, when he delivered into her safe +custody his territories on this side of the Rhine, manifest any tokens +of his opinion of her loss of preponderance? Look on Sweden and on +Denmark: is her preponderance less visible there? + +It is true, that, in a course of ages, empires have fallen, and, in the +opinion of some, not in mine, by their own weight. Sometimes they have +been unquestionably embarrassed in their movements by the dissociated +situation of their dominions. Such was the case of the empire of Charles +the Fifth and of his successor. It might be so of others. But so compact +a body of empire, so fitted in all the parts for mutual support, with a +frontier by Nature and Art so impenetrable, with such facility of +breaking out with irresistible force from every quarter, was never seen +in such an extent of territory, from the beginning of time, as in that +empire which the Jacobins possessed in October, 1795, and which Boissy +d'Anglas, in his report, settled as the law for Europe, and the dominion +assigned by Nature for the Republic of Regicide. But this empire is to +be her ruin, and to take away all alarm and jealousy on the part of +England, and to destroy her preponderance over the miserable remains of +Europe. + +These are choice speculations with which the author amuses himself, and +tries to divert us, in the blackest hours of the dismay, defeat, and +calamity of all civilized nations. They have but one fault,--that they +are directly contrary to the common sense and common feeling of +mankind. If I had but one hour to live, I would employ it in decrying +this wretched system, and die with my pen in my hand to mark out the +dreadful consequences of receiving an arrangement of empire dictated by +the despotism of Regicide to my own country, and to the lawful +sovereigns of the Christian world. + +I trust I shall hardly be told, in palliation of this shameful system of +politics, that the author expresses his sentiments only as doubts. In +such things, it may be truly said, that "once to doubt is once to be +resolved." It would be a strange reason for wasting the treasures and +shedding the blood of our country, to prevent arrangements on the part +of another power, of which we were doubtful whether they might not be +even to our advantage, and render our neighbor less than before the +object of our jealousy and alarm. In this doubt there is much decision. +No nation would consent to carry on a war of skepticism. But the fact +is, this expression of doubt is only a mode of putting an opinion, when +it is not the drift of the author to overturn the doubt. Otherwise, the +doubt is never stated as the author's own, nor left, as here it is, +unanswered. Indeed, the mode of stating the most decided opinions in the +form of questions is so little uncommon, particularly since the +excellent queries of the excellent Berkeley, that it became for a good +while a fashionable mode of composition. + +Here, then, the author of the Fourth Week of October is ready for the +worst, and would strike the bargain of peace on these conditions. I must +leave it to you and to every considerate man to reflect upon the effect +of this on any Continental alliances, present or future, and whether it +would be possible (if this book was thought of the least authority) +that its maxims with regard to our political interest must not naturally +push them to be beforehand with us in the fraternity with Regicide, and +thus not only strip us of any steady alliance at present, but leave us +without any of that communion of interest which could produce alliances +in future. Indeed, with these maxims, we should be well divided from the +world. + +Notwithstanding this new kind of barrier and security that is found +against her ambition in her conquests, yet in the very same paragraph he +admits, that, "for the _present_, at least, it is subversive of the +balance of power." This, I confess, is not a direct contradiction, +because the benefits which he promises himself from it, according to his +hypothesis, are future and more remote. + +So disposed is this author to peace, that, having laid a comfortable +foundation for our security in the greatness of her empire, he has +another in reserve, if that should fail, upon quite a contrary ground: +that is, a speculation of her crumbling to pieces, and being thrown into +a number of little separate republics. After paying the tribute of +humanity to those who will be ruined by all these changes, on the whole +he is of opinion that "the change might be compatible with general +tranquillity, and with the establishment of a peaceful and prosperous +commerce among nations." Whether France be great or small, firm and +entire or dissipated and divided, all is well, provided we can have +peace with her. + +But without entering into speculations about her dismemberment, whilst +she is adding great nations to her empire, is it, then, quite so certain +that the dissipation of France into such a cluster of petty republics +would be so very favorable to the true balance of power in Europe as +this author imagines it would be, and to the commerce of nations? I +greatly differ from him. I perhaps shall prove in a future letter, with +the political map of Europe before my eye, that the general liberty and +independence of the great Christian commonwealth could not exist with +such a dismemberment, unless it were followed (as probably enough it +would) by the dismemberment of every other considerable country in +Europe: and what convulsions would arise in the constitution of every +state in Europe it is not easy to conjecture in the mode, impossible not +to foresee in the mass. Speculate on, good my Lord! provided you ground +no part of your politics on such unsteady speculations. But as to any +practice to ensue, are we not yet cured of the malady of speculating on +the circumstances of things totally different from those in which we +live and move? Five years has this monster continued whole and entire in +all its members. Far from falling into a division within itself, it is +augmented by tremendous additions. We cannot bear to look that frightful +form in the face, as it is, and in its own actual shape. We dare not be +wise; we have not the fortitude of rational fear; we will not provide +for our future safety; but we endeavor to hush the cries of present +timidity by guesses at what may be hereafter,-- + + "To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow." + +Is this our style of talk, when + + "all our yesterdays have lighted fools + The way to dusty death"? + +Talk not to me of what swarm of republics may come from this carcass! It +is no carcass. Now, now, whilst we are talking, it is full of life and +action. What say you to the Regicide empire of to-day? Tell me, my +friend, do its terrors appall you into an abject submission, or rouse +you to a vigorous defence? But do--I no longer prevent it--do go +on,--look into futurity. Has this empire nothing to alarm you when all +struggle against it is over, when mankind shall be silent before it, +when all nations shall be disarmed, disheartened, and _truly divided_ by +a treacherous peace? Its malignity towards humankind will subsist with +undiminished heat, whilst the means of giving it effect must proceed, +and every means of resisting it must inevitably and rapidly decline. + +Against alarm on their politic and military empire these are the +writer's sedative remedies. But he leaves us sadly in the dark with +regard to the moral consequences, which he states have threatened to +demolish a system of civilization under which his country enjoys a +prosperity unparalleled in the history of man. We had emerged from our +first terrors, but here we sink into them again,--however, only to shake +them off upon the credit of his being a man of very sanguine hopes. + +Against the moral terrors of this successful empire of barbarism, though +he has given us no consolation here, in another place he has formed +other securities,--securities, indeed, which will make even the enormity +of the crimes and atrocities of France a benefit to the world. We are to +be cured by her diseases. We are to grow proud of our Constitution upon, +the distempers of theirs. Governments throughout all Europe are to +become much stronger by this event. This, too, comes in the favorite +mode of _doubt_ and _perhaps_. "To those," he says, "who meditate on +the workings of the human mind, a doubt may perhaps arise, whether the +effects which I have described," (namely, the change he supposes to be +wrought on the public mind with regard to the French doctrines,) "though +_at present_ a salutary check to the dangerous spirit of innovation, may +not prove favorable to abuses of power, by creating a timidity in the +just cause of liberty." Here the current of our apprehensions takes a +contrary course. Instead of trembling for the existence of our +government from the spirit of licentiousness and anarchy, the author +would make us believe we are to tremble for our liberties from the great +accession of power which is to accrue to government. + +I believe I have read in some author who criticized the productions of +the famous Jurieu, that it is not very wise in people who dash away in +prophecy, to fix the time of accomplishment at too short a period. Mr. +Brothers may meditate upon this at his leisure. He was a melancholy +prognosticator, and has had the fate of melancholy men. But they who +prophesy pleasant things get great present applause; and in days of +calamity people have something else to think of: they lose, in their +feeling of their distress, all memory of those who flattered them in +their prosperity. But merely for the credit of the prediction, nothing +could have happened more unluckily for the noble lord's sanguine +expectations of the amendment of the public mind, and the consequent +greater security to government, from the examples in France, than what +happened in the week after the publication of his hebdomadal system. I +am not sure it was not in the very week one of the most violent and +dangerous seditions broke out that we have seen in several years. This +sedition, menacing to the public security, endangering the sacred person +of the king, and violating in the most audacious manner the authority of +Parliament, surrounded our sovereign with a murderous yell and war-whoop +for that peace which the noble lord considers as a cure for all domestic +disturbances and dissatisfactions. + +So far as to this general cure for popular disorders. As for government, +the two Houses of Parliament, instead of being guided by the +speculations of the Fourth Week in October, and throwing up new barriers +against the dangerous power of the crown, which the noble lord +considered as no unplausible subject of apprehension, the two Houses of +Parliament thought fit to pass two acts for the further strengthening of +that very government against a most dangerous and wide-spread faction. + +Unluckily, too, for this kind of sanguine speculation, on the very first +day of the ever-famed "last week of October," a large, daring, and +seditious meeting was publicly held, from which meeting this atrocious +attempt against the sovereign publicly originated. + +No wonder that the author should tell us that the whole consideration +might be varied _whilst he was writing those pages_. In one, and that +the most material instance, his speculations not only might be, but were +at that very time, entirely overset. Their war-cry for peace with France +was the same with that of this gentle author, but in a different note. +His is the _gemitus columbae_, cooing and wooing fraternity; theirs the +funereal screams of birds of night calling for their ill-omened +paramours. But they are both songs of courtship. These Regicides +considered a Regicide peace as a cure for all their evils; and so far +as I can find, they showed nothing at all of the timidity which the +noble lord apprehends in what they call the just cause of liberty. + +However, it seems, that, notwithstanding these awkward appearances with +regard to the strength of government, he has still his fears and doubts +about our liberties. To a free people this would be a matter of alarm; +but this physician of October has in his shop all sorts of salves for +all sorts of sores. It is curious that they all come from the +inexhaustible drug-shop of the Regicide dispensary. It costs him nothing +to excite terror, because he lays it at his pleasure. He finds a +security for this danger to liberty from the wonderful wisdom to be +taught to kings, to nobility, and even, to the lowest of the people, by +the late transactions. + +I confess I was always blind enough to regard the French Revolution, in +the act, and much more in the example, as one of the greatest calamities +that had ever fallen upon mankind. I now find that in its effects it is +to be the greatest of all blessings. If so, we owe _amende honorable_ to +the Jacobins. They, it seems, were right; and if they were right a +little earlier than we are, it only shows that they exceeded us in +sagacity. If they brought out their right ideas somewhat in a disorderly +manner, it must be remembered that great zeal produces some +irregularity; but when greatly in the right, it must be pardoned by +those who are very regularly and temperately in the wrong. The master +Jacobins had told me this a thousand times. I never believed the +masters; nor do I now find myself disposed to give credit to the +disciple. I will not much dispute with our author, which party has the +best of this Revolution,--that which is from thence to learn wisdom, or +that which from the same event has obtained power. The dispute on the +preference of strength to wisdom may perhaps be decided as Horace has +decided the controversy between Art and Nature. I do not like to leave +all the power to my adversary, and to secure nothing to myself but the +untimely wisdom that is taught by the consequences of folly. I do not +like my share in the partition: because to his strength my adversary may +possibly add a good deal of cunning, whereas my wisdom may totally fail +in producing to me the same degree of strength. But to descend from the +author's generalities a little nearer to meaning, the security given to +liberty is this,--"that governments will have learned not to precipitate +themselves into embarrassments by speculative wars. Sovereigns and +princes will not forget that steadiness, moderation, and economy are the +best supports of the eminence on which they stand." There seems to me a +good deal of oblique reflection in this lesson. As to the lesson itself, +it is at all times a good one. One would think, however, by this formal +introduction of it as a recommendation of the arrangements proposed by +the author, it had never been taught before, either by precept or by +experience,--and that these maxims are discoveries reserved for a +Regicide peace. But is it permitted to ask what security it affords to +the liberty of the subject, that the prince is pacific or frugal? The +very contrary has happened in our history. Our best securities for +freedom have been obtained from princes who were either warlike, or +prodigal, or both. + +Although the amendment of princes in these points can +have no effect in quieting our apprehensions for liberty on account of +the strength to be acquired to government by a Regicide peace, I allow +that the avoiding of speculative wars may possibly be an advantage, +provided I well understand what the author means by a speculative war. I +suppose he means a war grounded on speculative advantages, and not wars +founded on a just speculation of danger. Does he mean to include this +war, which we are now carrying on, amongst those speculative wars which +this Jacobin peace is to teach sovereigns to avoid hereafter? If so, it +is doing the party an important service. Does he mean that we are to +avoid such wars as that of the Grand Alliance, made on a speculation of +danger to the independence of Europe? I suspect he has a sort of +retrospective view to the American war, as a speculative war, carried on +by England upon one side and by Louis the Sixteenth on the other. As to +our share of that war, let reverence to the dead and respect to the +living prevent us from reading lessons of this kind at their expense. I +don't know how far the author may find himself at liberty to wanton on +that subject; but, for my part, I entered into a coalition which, when I +had no longer a duty relative to that business, made me think myself +bound in honor not to call it up without necessity. But if he puts +England out of the question, and reflects only on Louis the Sixteenth, I +have only to say, "Dearly has he answered it!" I will not defend him. +But all those who pushed on the Revolution by which he was deposed were +much more in fault than he was. They have murdered him, and have divided +his kingdom as a spoil; but they who are the guilty are not they who +furnish the example. They who reign through his fault are not among +those sovereigns who are likely to be taught to avoid speculative wars +by the murder of their master. I think the author will not be hardy +enough to assert that they have shown less disposition to meddle in the +concerns of that very America than he did, and in a way not less likely +to kindle the flame of speculative war. Here is one sovereign not yet +reclaimed by these healing examples. Will he point out the other +sovereigns who are to be reformed by this peace? Their wars may not be +speculative. But the world will not be much mended by turning wars from +unprofitable and speculative to practical and lucrative, whether the +liberty or the repose of mankind is regarded. If the author's new +sovereign in France is not reformed by the example of his own +Revolution, that Revolution has not added much to the security and +repose of Poland, for instance, or taught the three great partitioning +powers more moderation in their second than they had shown in their +first division of that devoted country. The first division, which +preceded these destructive examples, was moderation itself, in +comparison of what has been, done since the period of the author's +amendment. + +This paragraph is written with something of a studied obscurity. If it +means anything, it seems to hint as if sovereigns were to learn +moderation, and an attention to the liberties of their people, from _the +fate of the sovereigns who have suffered in this war_, and eminently of +Louis the Sixteenth. + +Will he say whether the King of Sardinia's horrible tyranny was the +cause of the loss of Savoy and of Nice? What lesson of moderation does +it teach the Pope? I desire to know whether his Holiness is to learn not +to massacre his subjects, nor to waste and destroy such beautiful +countries as that of Avignon, lest he should call to their assistance +that great deliverer of nations, _Jourdan Coupe-tete_? What lesson does +it give of moderation to the Emperor, whose predecessor never put one +man to death after a general rebellion of the Low Countries, that the +Regicides never spared man, woman, or child, whom they but suspected of +dislike to their usurpations? What, then, are all these lessons about +the _softening_ the character of sovereigns by this Regicide peace? On +reading this section, one would imagine that the poor tame sovereigns of +Europe had been a sort of furious wild beasts, that stood in need of +some uncommonly rough discipline to subdue the ferocity of their savage +nature. + +As to the example to be learnt from the murder of Louis the Sixteenth, +if a lesson to kings is not derived from his fate, I do not know whence +it can come. The author, however, ought not to have left us in the dark +upon that subject, to break our shins over his hints and insinuations. +Is it, then, true, that this unfortunate monarch drew his punishment +upon himself by his want of moderation, and his oppressing the liberties +of which he had found his people in possession? Is not the direct +contrary the fact? And is not the example of this Revolution the very +reverse of anything which can lead to that _softening_ of character in +princes which the author supposes as a security to the people, and has +brought forward as a recommendation to fraternity with those who have +administered that happy emollient in the murder of their king and the +slavery and desolation of their country? + +But the author does not confine the benefit of the Regicide lesson to +kings alone. He has a diffusive bounty. Nobles, and men of property, +will likewise be greatly reformed. They, too, will be led to a review of +their social situation and duties,--"and will reflect, that their large +allotment of worldly advantages is for the aid and benefit of the +whole." Is it, then, from the fate of Juigne, Archbishop of Paris, or of +the Cardinal de Rochefoucault, and of so many others, who gave their +fortunes, and, I may say, their very beings, to the poor, that the rich +are to learn, that their "fortunes are for the aid and benefit of the +whole"? I say nothing of the liberal persons of great rank and property, +lay and ecclesiastic, men and women, to whom we have had the honor and +happiness of affording an asylum: I pass by these, lest I should never +have done, or lest I should omit some as deserving as any I might +mention. Why will the author, then, suppose that the nobles and men of +property in France have been banished, confiscated, and murdered, on +account of the savageness and ferocity of their character, and their +being tainted with vices beyond those of the same order and description +in other countries? No judge of a revolutionary tribunal, with his hands +dipped in their blood and his maw gorged with their property, has yet +dared to assert what this author has been pleased, by way of a moral +lesson, to insinuate. + +Their nobility, and their men of property, in a mass, had the very same +virtues, and the very same vices, and in the very same proportions, with +the same description of men in this and in other nations. I must do +justice to suffering honor, generosity, and integrity. I do not know +that any time or any country has furnished more splendid examples of +every virtue, domestic and public. I do not enter into the councils of +Providence; but, humanly speaking, many of these nobles and men of +property, from whose disastrous fate we are, it seems, to learn a +general softening of character, and a revision of our social situations +and duties, appear to me full as little deserving of that fate as the +author, whoever he is, can be. Many of them, I am sure, were such as I +should be proud indeed to be able to compare myself with, in knowledge, +in integrity, and in every other virtue. My feeble nature might shrink, +though theirs did not, from the proof; but my reason and my ambition +tell me that it would be a good bargain to purchase their merits with +their fate. + +For which of his vices did that great magistrate, D'Espremenil, lose his +fortune and his head? What were the abominations of Malesherbes, that +other excellent magistrate, whose sixty years of uniform virtue was +acknowledged, in the very act of his murder, by the judicial butchers +who condemned him? On account of what misdemeanors was he robbed of his +property, and slaughtered with two generations of his offspring,--and +the remains of the third race, with a refinement of cruelty, and lest +they should appear to reclaim the property forfeited by the virtues of +their ancestor, confounded in an hospital with the thousands of those +unhappy foundling infants who are abandoned, without relation and +without name, by the wretchedness or by the profligacy of their parents? + +Is the fate of the Queen of France to produce this softening of +character? Was she a person so very ferocious and cruel, as, by the +example of her death, to frighten us into common humanity? Is there no +way to teach the Emperor a _softening_ of character, and a review of +his social situation and duty, but his consent, by an infamous accord +with Regicide, to drive a second coach with the Austrian arms through +the streets of Paris, along which, after a series of preparatory horrors +exceeding the atrocities of the bloody execution itself, the glory of +the Imperial race had been carried to an ignominious death? Is this a +lesson of _moderation_ to a descendant of Maria Theresa, drawn from the +fate of the daughter of that incomparable woman and sovereign? If he +learns this lesson from such an object, and from such teachers, the man +may remain, but the king is deposed. If he does not carry quite another +memory of that transaction in the inmost recesses of his heart, he is +unworthy to reign, he is unworthy to live. In the chronicle of disgrace +he will have but this short tale told of him: "He was the first emperor +of his house that embraced a regicide; he was the last that wore the +imperial purple." Far am I from thinking so ill of this august +sovereign, who is at the head of the monarchies of Europe, and who is +the trustee of their dignities and his own. + +What ferocity of character drew on the fate of Elizabeth, the sister of +King Louis the Sixteenth? For which of the vices of that pattern of +benevolence, of piety, and of all the virtues, did they put her to +death? For which of her vices did they put to death the mildest of all +human creatures, the Duchess of Biron? What were the crimes of those +crowds of matrons and virgins of condition, whom they mas sacred, with +their juries of blood, in prisons and on scaffolds? What were the +enormities of the infant king, whom they caused, by lingering tortures, +to perish in their dungeon, and whom if at last they dispatched by +poison, it was in that detestable crime the only act of mercy they have +ever shown? + +What softening of character is to be had, what review of their social +situations and duties is to be taught by these examples to kings, to +nobles, to men of property, to women, and to infants? The royal family +perished because it was royal. The nobles perished because they were +noble. The men, women, and children, who had property, because they had +property to be robbed of. The priests were punished, after they had been +robbed of their all, not for their vices, but for their virtues and +their piety, which made them an honor to their sacred profession, and to +that nature of which we ought to be proud, since they belong to it. My +Lord, nothing can be learned from such examples, except the danger of +being kings, queens, nobles, priests, and children, to be butchered on +account of their inheritance. These are things at which not vice, not +crime, not folly, but wisdom, goodness, learning, justice, probity, +beneficence, stand aghast. By these examples our reason and our moral +sense are not enlightened, but confounded; and there is no refuge for +astonished and affrighted virtue, but being annihilated in humility and +submission, sinking into a silent adoration of the inscrutable +dispensations of Providence, and flying with trembling wings from this +world of daring crimes, and feeble, pusillanimous, half-bred, bastard +justice, to the asylum of another order of things, in an unknown form, +but in a better life. + +Whatever the politician or preacher of September or of October may think +of the matter, it is a most comfortless, disheartening, desolating +example. Dreadful is the example of ruined innocence and virtue, and +the completest triumph of the completest villany that ever vexed and +disgraced mankind! The example is ruinous in every point of view, +religious, moral, civil, political. It establishes that dreadful maxim +of Machiavel, that in great affairs men are not to be wicked by halves. +This maxim is not made for a middle sort of beings, who, because they +cannot be angels, ought to thwart their ambition, and not endeavor to +become infernal spirits. It is too well exemplified in the present time, +where the faults and errors of humanity, checked by the imperfect, +timorous virtues, have been overpowered by those who have stopped at no +crime. It is a dreadful part of the example, that infernal malevolence +has had pious apologists, who read their lectures on frailties in favor +of crimes,--who abandon the weak, and court the friendship of the +wicked. To root out these maxims, and the examples that support them, is +a wise object of years of war. This is that war. This is that moral war. +It was said by old Trivulzio, that the Battle of Marignano was the +Battle of the Giants,--that all the rest of the many he had seen were +those of the Cranes and Pygmies. This is true of the objects, at least, +of the contest: for the greater part of those which we have hitherto +contended for, in comparison, were the toys of children. + +The October politician is so full of charity and good-nature, that he +supposes that these very robbers and murderers themselves are in a +course of melioration: on what ground I cannot conceive, except on the +long practice of every crime, and by its complete success. He is an +Origenist, and believes in the conversion of the Devil. All that runs in +the place of blood in his veins is nothing but the milk of human +kindness. He is as soft as a curd,--though, as a politician, he might be +supposed to be made of sterner stuff. He supposes (to use his own +expression) "that the salutary truths which he inculcates are making +their way into their bosoms." Their bosom is a rock of granite, on which +Falsehood has long since built her stronghold. Poor Truth has had a hard +work of it, with her little pickaxe. Nothing but gunpowder will do. + +As a proof, however, of the progress of this sap of Truth, he gives us a +confession they had made not long before he wrote. "'Their fraternity' +(as was lately stated by themselves in a solemn report) 'has been the +brotherhood of Cain and Abel,' and 'they have organized nothing but +bankruptcy and famine.'" A very honest confession, truly,--and much in +the spirit of their oracle, Rousseau. Yet, what is still more marvellous +than the confession, this is the very fraternity to which our author +gives us such an obliging invitation to accede. There is, indeed, a +vacancy in the fraternal corps: a brother and a partner is wanted. If we +please, we may fill up the place of the butchered Abel; and whilst we +wait the destiny of the departed brother, we may enjoy the advantages of +the partnership, by entering without delay into a shop of ready-made +bankruptcy and famine. These are the _douceurs_ by which we are invited +to Regicide fraternity and friendship. But still our author considers +the confession as a proof that "truth is making its way into their +bosoms." No! It is not making its way into their bosoms. It has forced +its way into their mouths! The evil spirit by which they are possessed, +though essentially a liar, is forced by the tortures of conscience to +confess the truth,--to confess enough for their condemnation, but not +for their amendment. Shakspeare very aptly expresses this kind of +confession, devoid of repentance, from the mouth of an usurper, a +murderer, and a regicide:-- + + "We are ourselves compelled, + Even to the teeth and forehead of our faults, + To give in evidence." + +Whence is their amendment? Why, the author writes, that, on their +murderous insurrectionary system, their own lives are not sure for an +hour; nor has their power a greater stability. True. They are convinced +of it; and accordingly the wretches have done all they can to preserve +their lives, and to secure their power; but not one step have they taken +to amend the one or to make a more just use of the other. Their wicked +policy has obliged them to make a pause in the only massacres in which +their treachery and cruelty had operated as a kind of savage +justice,--that is, the massacre of the accomplices of their crimes: they +have ceased to shed the inhuman blood of their fellow-murderers; but +when they take any of those persons who contend for their lawful +government, their property, and their religion, notwithstanding the +truth which this author says is making its way into their bosoms, it has +not taught them the least tincture of mercy. This we plainly see by +their massacre at Quiberon, where they put to death, with every species +of contumely, and without any exception, every prisoner of war who did +not escape out of their hands. To have had property, to have been robbed +of it, and to endeavor to regain it,--these are crimes irremissible, to +which every man who regards his property or his life, in every country, +ought well to look in all connection with those with whom to have had +property was an offence, to endeavor to keep it a second offence, to +attempt to regain it a crime that puts the offender out of all the laws +of peace or war. You cannot see one of those wretches without an alarm +for your life as well as your goods. They are like the worst of the +French and Italian banditti, who, whenever they robbed, were sure to +murder. + +Are they not the very same ruffians, thieves, assassins, and regicides +that they were from the beginning? Have they diversified the scene by +the least variety, or produced the face of a single new villany? _Taedet +harum quotidianarum formarum_. Oh! but I shall be answered, "It is now +quite another thing;--they are all changed. You have not seen them in +their state dresses;--this makes an amazing difference. The new habit of +the Directory is so charmingly fancied, that it is impossible not to +fall in love with so well-dressed a Constitution;--the costume of the +_sans-culotte_ Constitution of 1793 was absolutely insufferable. The +Committee for Foreign Affairs were such slovens, and stunk so +abominably, that no _muscadin_ ambassador of the smallest degree of +delicacy of nerves could come within ten yards of them; but now they are +so powdered, and perfumed, and ribanded, and sashed, and plumed, that, +though they are grown infinitely more insolent in their fine clothes +even than they were in their rags, (and that was enough,) as they now +appear, there is something in it more grand and noble, something more +suitable to an awful Roman Senate receiving the homage of dependent +tetrarchs. Like that Senate, (their perpetual model for conduct towards +other nations,) they permit their vassals (during their good pleasure) +to assume the name of kings, in order to bestow more dignity on the +suite and retinue of the sovereign Republic by the nominal rank of their +slaves: _Ut habeant instrumenta servitutis et reges_." All this is very +fine, undoubtedly; and ambassadors whose hands are almost out for want +of employment may long to have their part in this august ceremony of the +Republic one and indivisible. But, with great deference to the new +diplomatic taste, we old people must retain some square-toed +predilection, for the fashions of our youth. + +I am afraid you will find me, my Lord, again falling into my usual +vanity, in valuing myself on the eminent men whose society I once +enjoyed. I remember, in a conversation I once had with my ever dear +friend Garrick, who was the first of actors, because he was the most +acute observer of Nature I ever knew, I asked him how it happened, that, +whenever a senate appeared on the stage, the audience seemed always +disposed to laughter. He said, the reason was plain: the audience was +well acquainted with the faces of most of the senators. They knew that +they were no other than candle-snuffers, revolutionary scene-shifters, +second and third mob, prompters, clerks, executioners, who stand with +their axe on their shoulders by the wheel, grinners in the pantomime, +murderers in tragedies, who make ugly faces under black wigs,--in short, +the very scum and refuse of the theatre; and it was of course that the +contrast of the vileness of the actors with the pomp of their habits +naturally excited ideas of contempt and ridicule. + +So it was at Paris on the inaugural day of the Constitution for the +present year. The foreign ministers were ordered to attend at this +investiture of the Directory;--for so they call the managers of their +burlesque government. The diplomacy, who were a sort of strangers, were +quite awe-struck with the "pride, pomp, and circumstance" of this +majestic senate; whilst the _sans-culotte_ gallery instantly recognized +their old insurrectionary acquaintance, burst out into a horse-laugh at +their absurd finery, and held them in infinitely greater contempt than +whilst they prowled about the streets in the pantaloons of the last +year's Constitution, when their legislators appeared honestly, with +their daggers in their belts, and their pistols peeping out of their +side-pocket-holes, like a bold, brave banditti, as they are. The +Parisians (and I am much of their mind) think that a thief with a crape +on his visage is much worse than a barefaced knave, and that such +robbers richly deserve all the penalties of all the black acts. In this +their thin disguise, their comrades of the late abdicated sovereign +_canaille_ hooted and hissed them, and from that day have no other name +for them than what is not quite so easy to render into English, +impossible to make it very civil English: it belongs, indeed, to the +language of the _halles_: but, without being instructed in that dialect, +it was the opinion of the polite Lord Chesterfield that no man could be +a complete master of French. Their Parisian brethren called them _gueux +plumes_, which, though not elegant, is expressive and characteristic: +_feathered scoundrels_, I think, comes the nearest to it in that kind of +English. But we are now to understand that these _gueux_, for no other +reason, that I can divine, except their red and white clothes, form at +last a state with which we may cultivate amity, and have a prospect of +the blessings of a secure and permanent peace. In effect, then, it was +not with the men, or their principles, or their polities, that we +quarrelled: our sole dislike was to the cut of their clothes. + +But to pass over _their_ dresses,--good God! in what habits did the +representatives of the crowned heads of Europe appear, when they came to +swell the pomp of their humiliation, and attended in solemn function +this inauguration of Regicide? That would be the curiosity. Under what +robes did they cover the disgrace and degradation of the whole college +of kings? What warehouses of masks and dominoes furnished a cover to the +nakedness of their shame? The shop ought to be known; it will soon have +a good trade. Were the dresses of the ministers of those lately called +potentates, who attended on that occasion, taken from the wardrobe of +that property-man at the opera, from whence my old acquaintance, +Anacharsis Clootz, some years ago equipped a body of ambassadors, whom +he conducted, as from all the nations of the world, to the bar of what +was called the Constituent Assembly? Among those mock ministers, one of +the most conspicuous figures was the representative of the British +nation, who unluckily was wanting at the late ceremony. In the face of +all the real ambassadors of the sovereigns of Europe was this ludicrous +representation of their several subjects, under the name of _oppressed +sovereigns_,[10] exhibited to the Assembly. That Assembly received an +harangue, in the name of those sovereigns, against their kings, +delivered by this Clootz, actually a subject of Prussia, under the name +of Ambassador of the Human Race. At that time there was only a feeble +reclamation from one of the ambassadors of these tyrants and oppressors. +A most gracious answer was given to the ministers of the oppressed +sovereigns; and they went so far on that occasion as to assign them, in +that assumed character, a box at one of their festivals. + +I was willing to indulge myself in an hope that this second appearance +of ambassadors was only an insolent mummery of the same kind; but, alas! +Anacharsis himself, all fanatic as he was, could not have imagined that +his opera procession should have been the prototype of the real +appearance of the representatives of all the sovereigns of Europe +themselves, to make the same prostration that was made by those who +dared to represent their people in a complaint against them. But in this +the French Republic has followed, as they always affect to do, and have +hitherto done with success, the example of the ancient Romans, who shook +all governments by listening to the complaints of their subjects, and +soon after brought the kings themselves to answer at their bar. At this +last ceremony the ambassadors had not Clootz for their Cotterel. Pity +that Clootz had not had a reprieve from the guillotine till he had +completed his work! But that engine fell before the curtain had fallen +upon all the dignity of the earth. + +On this their gaudy day the new Regicide Directory sent for that +diplomatic rabble, as bad as themselves in principle, but infinitely +worse in degradation. They called them out by a sort of roll of their +nations, one after another, much in the manner in which they called +wretches out of their prison to the guillotine. When these ambassadors +of infamy appeared before them, the chief Director, in the name of the +rest, treated each of them with a short, affected, pedantic, insolent, +theatric laconium,--a sort of epigram of contempt. When they had thus +insulted them in a style and language which never before was heard, and +which no sovereign would for a moment endure from another, supposing any +of them frantic enough to use it, to finish their outrage, they drummed +and trumpeted the wretches out of their hall of audience. + +Among the objects of this insolent buffoonery was a person supposed to +represent the King of Prussia. To this worthy representative they did +not so much as condescend to mention his master; they did not seem to +know that he had one; they addressed themselves solely to Prussia in the +abstract, notwithstanding the infinite obligation they owed to their +early protector for their first recognition and alliance, and for the +part of his territory he gave into their hands for the first-fruits of +his homage. None but dead monarchs are so much as mentioned by them, and +those only to insult the living by an invidious comparison. They told +the Prussians they ought to learn, after the example of Frederick the +Great, a love for France. What a pity it is, that he, who loved France +so well as to chastise it, was not now alive, by an unsparing use of the +rod (which, indeed, he would have spared little) to give them another +instance of his paternal affection! But the Directory were mistaken. +These are not days in which monarchs value themselves upon the title of +_great_: they are grown _philosophic_: they are satisfied to be good. + +Your Lordship will pardon me for this no very long reflection on the +short, but excellent speech of the plumed Director to the ambassador of +Cappadocia. The Imperial ambassador was not in waiting, but they found +for Austria a good Judean representation. With great judgment, his +Highness, the Grand Duke, had sent the most atheistic coxcomb to be +found in Florence, to represent at the bar of impiety the House of +Apostolic Majesty, and the descendants of the pious, though high-minded, +Maria Theresa. He was sent to humble the whole race of Austria before +those grim assassins, reeking with the blood of the daughter of Maria +Theresa, whom they sent half dead, in a dung-cart, to a cruel execution; +and this true-born son of apostasy and infidelity, this renegado from +the faith and from all honor and all humanity, drove an Austrian coach +over the stones which were yet wet with her blood,--with that blood +which dropped every step through her tumbrel, all the way she was drawn +from the horrid prison, in which they had finished all the cruelty and +horrors not executed in the face of the sun. The Hungarian subjects of +Maria Theresa, when they drew their swords to defend her rights against +France, called her, with correctness of truth, though not with the same +correctness, perhaps, of grammar, a king: "_Moriamur pro rege nostro, +Maria Theresa._" SHE lived and died a king; and others will have +subjects ready to make the same vow, when, in either sex, they show +themselves real kings. + +When the Directory came to this miserable fop, they bestowed a +compliment on his matriculation into _their_ philosophy; but as to his +master, they made to him, as was reasonable, a reprimand, not without a +pardon, and an oblique hint at the whole family. What indignities have +been offered through this wretch to his master, and how well borne, it +is not necessary that I should dwell on at present. I hope that those +who yet wear royal, imperial, and ducal crowns will learn to feel as +men and as kings: if not, I predict to them, they will not long exist as +kings or as men. + +Great Britain was not there. Almost in despair, I hope she will never, +in any rags and _coversluts_ of infamy, be seen at such an exhibition. +The hour of her final degradation is not yet come; she did not herself +appear in the Regicide presence, to be the sport and mockery of those +bloody buffoons, who, in the merriment of their pride, were insulting +with every species of contumely the fallen dignity of the rest of +Europe. But Britain, though not personally appearing to bear her part in +this monstrous tragi-comedy, was very far from being forgotten. The +new-robed regicides found a representative for her. And who was this +representative? Without a previous knowledge, any one would have given a +thousand guesses before he could arrive at a tolerable divination of +their rancorous insolence. They chose to address what they had to say +concerning this nation to the ambassador of America. They did not apply +to this ambassador for a mediation: that, indeed, would have indicated a +want of every kind of decency; but it would have indicated nothing more. +But in this their American apostrophe, your Lordship will observe, they +did not so much as pretend to hold out to us directly, or through any +mediator, though in the most humiliating manner, any idea whatsoever of +peace, or the smallest desire of reconciliation. To the States of +America themselves they paid no compliment. They paid their compliment +to Washington solely: and on what ground? This most respectable +commander and magistrate might deserve commendation on very many of +those qualities which they who most disapprove some part of his +proceedings, not more justly than freely, attribute to him; but they +found nothing to commend in him "_but the hatred he bore to Great +Britain_." I verily believe, that, in the whole history of our European +wars, there never was such a compliment paid from the sovereign of one +state to a great chief of another. Not one ambassador from any one of +those powers who pretend to live in amity with this kingdom took the +least notice of that unheard-of declaration; nor will Great Britain, +till she is known with certainty to be true to her own dignity, find any +one disposed to feel for the indignities that are offered to her. To say +the truth, those miserable creatures were all silent under the insults +that were offered to themselves. They pocketed their epigrams, as +ambassadors formerly took the gold boxes and miniature pictures set in +diamonds presented them by sovereigns at whose courts they had resided. +It is to be presumed that by the next post they faithfully and promptly +transmitted to their masters the honors they had received. I can easily +conceive the epigram which will be presented to Lord Auckland, or to the +Duke of Bedford, as hereafter, according to circumstances, they may +happen to represent this kingdom. Few can have so little imagination as +not readily to conceive the nature of the boxes of epigrammatic lozenges +that will be presented to them. + +But _hae nugae seria ducunt in mala_. The conduct of the Regicide faction +is perfectly systematic in every particular, and it appears absurd only +as it is strange and uncouth, not as it has an application to the ends +and objects of their policy. When by insult after insult they have +rendered the character of sovereigns vile in the eyes of their +subjects, they know there is but one step more to their utter +destruction. All authority, in a great degree, exists in opinion: royal +authority most of all. The supreme majesty of a monarch cannot be allied +with contempt. Men would reason, not unplausibly, that it would be +better to get rid of the monarchy at once than to suffer that which was +instituted, and well instituted, to support the glory of the nation, to +become the instrument of its degradation and disgrace. + +A good many reflections will arise in your Lordship's mind upon the time +and circumstances of that most insulting and atrocious declaration of +hostility against this kingdom. The declaration was made subsequent to +the noble lord's encomium on the new Regicide Constitution,--after the +pamphlet had made something more than advances towards a reconciliation +with that ungracious race, and had directly disowned all those who +adhered to the original declaration in favor of monarchy. It was even +subsequent to the unfortunate declaration in the speech from the throne +(which this pamphlet but too truly announced) of the readiness of our +government to enter into connections of friendship with that faction. +Here was the answer from the throne of Regicide to the speech from the +throne of Great Britain. They go out of their way to compliment General +Washington on the supposed rancor of his heart towards this country. It +is very remarkable, that they make this compliment of malice to the +chief of the United States, who had first signed a treaty of peace, +amity, and commerce with this kingdom. This radical hatred, according to +their way of thinking, the most recent, solemn compacts of friendship +cannot or ought not to remove. In this malice to England, as in the one +great comprehensive virtue, all other merits of this illustrious person +are entirely merged. For my part, I do not believe the fact to be so as +they represent it. Certainly it is not for Mr. Washington's honor as a +gentleman, a Christian, or a President of the United States, after the +treaty he has signed, to entertain such sentiments. I have a moral +assurance that the representation of the Regicide Directory is +absolutely false and groundless. If it be, it is a stronger mark of +their audacity and insolence, and still a stronger proof of the support +they mean to give to the mischievous faction they are known to nourish +there, to the ruin of those States, and to the end that no British +affections should ever arise in that important part of the world, which +would naturally lead to a cordial, hearty British alliance, upon the +bottom of mutual interest and ancient affection. It shows in what part +it is, and with what a weapon, they mean a deadly blow at the heart of +Great Britain. One really would have expected, from this new +Constitution of theirs, which had been announced as a great reform, and +which was to be, more than any of their former experimental schemes, +alliable with other nations, that they would, in their very first public +act, and their declaration to the collected representation of Europe and +America, have affected some degree of moderation, or, at least, have +observed a guarded silence with regard to their temper and their views. +No such thing: they were in haste to declare the principles which are +spun into the primitive staple of their frame. They were afraid that a +moment's doubt should exist about them. In their very infancy they were +in haste to put their hand on their infernal altar, and to swear the +same immortal hatred to England which was sworn in the succession of all +the short-lived constitutions that preceded it. With them everything +else perishes almost as soon as it is formed; this hatred alone is +immortal. This is their impure Vestal fire that never is extinguished: +and never will it be extinguished, whilst the system of Regicide exists +in France. What! are we not to believe them? Men are too apt to be +deceitful enough in their professions of friendship, and this makes a +wise man walk with some caution through life. Such professions, in some +cases, may be even a ground of further distrust. But when a man declares +himself your unalterable enemy! No man ever declared to another a rancor +towards him which he did not feel. _Falsos in amore odia, non fingere_, +said an author who points his observations so as to make them +remembered. + +Observe, my Lord, that, from their invasion of Flanders and Holland to +this hour, they have never made the smallest signification of a desire +of peace with this kingdom, with Austria, or, indeed, with any other +power that I know of. As superiors, they expect others to begin. We have +complied, as you may see. The hostile insolence with which they gave +such a rebuff to our first overture, in the speech from the throne, did +not hinder us from making, from the same throne, a second advance. The +two Houses a second time coincided in the same sentiments, with a degree +of apparent unanimity, (for there was no dissentient voice but yours,) +with which, when they reflect on it, they will be as much ashamed as I +am. To this our new humiliating overture (such, at whatever hazard, I +must call it) what did the Regicide Directory answer? Not one public +word of a readiness to treat. No,--they feel their proud situation too +well. They never declared whether they would grant peace to you or not. +They only signified to you their pleasure as to the terms on which alone +they would in any case admit you to it. You showed your general +disposition to peace, and, to forward it, you left everything open to +negotiations. As to any terms you can possibly obtain, they shut out all +negotiation at the very commencement. They declared that they never +would make a peace by which anything that ever belonged to France should +be ceded. We would not treat with the monarchy, weakened as it must +obviously be in any circumstance of restoration, without a reservation +of something for indemnity and security,--and that, too, in words of the +largest comprehension. You treat with the Regicides without any +reservation at all. On their part, they assure you formally and +publicly, that they will give you nothing in the name of indemnity or +security, or for any other purpose. + +It is impossible not to pause here for a moment, and to consider the +manner in which such declarations would have been taken by your +ancestors from a monarch distinguished for his arrogance,--an arrogance +which, even more than his ambition, incensed and combined all Europe +against him. Whatever his inward intentions may have been, did Louis the +Fourteenth ever make a declaration that the true bounds of France were +the ocean, the Mediterranean, and the Rhine? In any overtures for peace, +did he ever declare that he would make no sacrifices to promote it? His +declarations were always directly to the contrary; and at the Peace of +Ryswick his actions were to the contrary. At the close of the war, +almost in every instance victorious, all Europe was astonished, even +those who received them were astonished, at his concessions. Let those +who have a mind to see how little, in comparison, the most powerful and +ambitious of all monarchs is to be dreaded consult the very judicious +critical observations on the politics of that reign, inserted in the +military treatise of the Marquis de Montalembert. Let those who wish to +know what is to be dreaded from an ambitious republic consult no author, +no military critic, no historical critic. Let them open their own eyes, +which degeneracy and pusillanimity have shut from the light that pains +them, and let them not vainly seek their security in a voluntary +ignorance of their danger. + +To dispose us towards this peace,--an attempt in which our author has, I +do not know whether to call it the good or ill fortune to agree with +whatever is most seditious, factious, and treasonable in this +country,--we are told by many dealers in speculation, but not so +distinctly by the author himself, (too great distinctness of affirmation +not being his fault,)--but we are told, that the French have lately +obtained a very pretty sort of Constitution, and that it resembles the +British Constitution as if they had been twinned together in the +womb,--_mire sagaces fallere hospites discrimen obscurum_. It may be so: +but I confess I am not yet made to it: nor is the noble author. He finds +the "elements" excellent, but the disposition very inartificial indeed. +Contrary to what we might expect at Paris, the meat is good, the cookery +abominable. I agree with him fully in the last; and if I were forced to +allow the first, I should still think, with our old coarse by-word, +that the same power which furnished all their former _restaurateurs_ +sent also their present cooks. I have a great opinion of Thomas Paine, +and of all his productions: I remember his having been one of the +committee for forming one of their annual Constitutions, I mean the +admirable Constitution of 1793, after having been a chamber council to +the no less admirable Constitution of 1791. This pious patriot has his +eyes still directed to his dear native country, notwithstanding her in +gratitude to so kind a benefactor. This outlaw of England, and lawgiver +to France, is now, in secret probably, trying his hand again, and +inviting us to him by making his Constitution such as may give his +disciples in England some plausible pretext for going into the house +that he has opened. We have discovered, it seems, that all which the +boasted wisdom of our ancestors has labored to bring to perfection for +six or seven centuries is nearly, or altogether, matched in six or seven +days, at the leisure hours and sober intervals of Citizen Thomas Paine. + + "But though the treacherous tapster, Thomas, + Hangs a new Angel two doors from us, + As fine as dauber's hands can make it, + In hopes that strangers may mistake it, + We think it both a shame and sin + To quit the good old Angel Inn," + +Indeed, in this good old house, where everything at least is well aired, +I shall be content to put up my fatigued horses, and here take a bed for +the long night that begins to darken upon me. Had I, however, the honor +(I must now call it so) of being a member of any of the constitutional +clubs, I should think I had carried my point most completely. It is +clear, by the applauses bestowed on what the author calls this new +Constitution, a mixed oligarchy, that the difference between the +clubbists and the old adherents to the monarchy of this country is +hardly worth a scuffle. Let it depart in peace, and light lie the earth +on the British Constitution! By this easy manner of treating the most +difficult of all subjects, the constitution for a great kingdom, and by +letting loose an opinion that they may be made by any adventurers in +speculation in a small given time, and for any country, all the ties, +which, whether of reason or prejudice, attach mankind to their old, +habitual, domestic governments, are not a little loosened; all +communion, which the similarity of the basis has produced between all +the governments that compose what we call the Christian world and the +republic of Europe, would be dissolved. By these hazarded speculations +France is more approximated to us in constitution than in situation; and +in proportion as we recede from the ancient system of Europe, we +approach to that connection which alone can remain to us, a close +alliance with the new-discovered moral and political world in France. + +These theories would be of little importance, if we did not only know, +but sorely feel, that there is a strong Jacobin faction in this country, +which has long employed itself in speculating upon constitutions, and to +whom the circumstance of their government being home-bred and +prescriptive seems no sort of recommendation. What seemed to us to be +the best system of liberty that a nation ever enjoyed to them seems the +yoke of an intolerable slavery. This speculative faction had long been +at work. The French Revolution did not cause it: it only discovered it, +increased it, and gave fresh vigor to its operations. I have reason to +be persuaded that it was in this country, and from English writers and +English caballers, that France herself was instituted in this +revolutionary fury. The communion of these two factions upon any +pretended basis of similarity is a matter of very serious consideration. +They are always considering the formal distributions of power in a +constitution: the moral basis they consider as nothing. Very different +is my opinion: I consider the moral basis as everything,--the formal +arrangements, further than as they promote the moral principles of +government, and the keeping desperately wicked persons as the subjects +of laws and not the makers of them, to be of little importance. What +signifies the cutting and shuffling of cards, while the pack still +remains the same? As a basis for such a connection as has subsisted +between the powers of Europe, we had nothing to fear, but from the +lapses and frailties of men,--and that was enough; but this new +pretended republic has given us more to apprehend from what they call +their virtues than we had to dread from the vices of other men. Avowedly +and systematically, they have given the upperhand to all the vicious and +degenerate part of human nature. It is from their lapses and deviations +from their principle that alone we have anything to hope. + +I hear another inducement to fraternity with the present rulers. They +have murdered one Robespierre. This Robespierre, they tell us, was a +cruel tyrant, and now that he is put out of the way, all will go well in +France. Astraea will again return to that earth from which she has been +an emigrant, and all nations will resort to her golden scales. It is +very extraordinary, that, the very instant the mode of Paris is known +here, it becomes all the fashion in London. This is their jargon. It is +the old _bon-ton_ of robbers, who cast their common crimes on the +wickedness of their departed associates. I care little about the memory +of this same Robespierre. I am sure he was an execrable villain. I +rejoiced at his punishment neither more nor less than I should at the +execution of the present Directory, or any of its members. But who gave +Robespierre the power of being a tyrant? and who were the instruments of +his tyranny? The present virtuous constitution-mongers. He was a tyrant; +they were his satellites and his hangmen. Their sole merit is in the +murder of their colleague. They have expiated their other murders by a +new murder. It has always been the case among this banditti. They have +always had the knife at each other's throats, after they had almost +blunted it at the throats of every honest man. These people thought, +that, in the commerce of murder, he was like to have the better of the +bargain, if any time was lost; they therefore took one of their short +revolutionary methods, and massacred him in a manner so perfidious and +cruel as would shock all humanity, if the stroke was not struck by the +present rulers on one of their own associates. But this last act of +infidelity and murder is to expiate all the rest, and to qualify them +for the amity of an humane and virtuous sovereign and civilized people. +I have heard that a Tartar believes, when he has killed a man, that all +his estimable qualities pass with his clothes and arms to the murderer; +but I have never heard that it was the opinion of any savage Scythian, +that, if he kills a brother villain, he is, _ipso facto_, absolved of +all his own offences. The Tartarian doctrine is the most tenable +opinion. The murderers of Robespierre, besides what they are entitled to +by being engaged in the same tontine of infamy, are his representatives, +have inherited all his murderous qualities, in addition to their own +private stock. But it seems we are always to be of a party with the last +and victorious assassins. I confess I am of a different mind, and am +rather inclined, of the two, to think and speak less hardly of a dead +ruffian than to associate with the living. I could better bear the +stench of the gibbeted murderer than the society of the bloody felons +who yet annoy the world. Whilst they wait the recompense due to their +ancient crimes, they merit new punishment by the new offences they +commit. There is a period to the offences of Robespierre. They survive +in his assassins. "Better a living dog," says the old proverb, "than a +dead lion." Not so here. Murderers and hogs never look well till they +are hanged. From villany no good can arise, but in the example of its +fate. So I leave them their dead Robespierre, either to gibbet his +memory, or to deify him in their Pantheon with their Marat and their +Mirabeau. + +It is asserted that this government promises stability. God of his mercy +forbid! If it should, nothing upon earth besides itself can be stable. +We declare this stability to be the ground of our making peace with +them. Assuming it, therefore, that the men and the system are what I +have described, and that they have a determined hostility against this +country,--an hostility not only of policy, but of predilection,--then I +think that every rational being would go along with me in considering +its permanence as the greatest of all possible evils. If, therefore, we +are to look for peace with such a thing in any of its monstrous shapes, +which I deprecate, it must be in that state of disorder, confusion, +discord, anarchy, and insurrection, such as might oblige the momentary +rulers to forbear their attempts on neighboring states, or to render +these attempts less operative, if they should kindle new wars. When was +it heard before, that the internal repose of a determined and wicked +enemy, and the strength of his government, became the wish of his +neighbor, and a security, against either his malice or his ambition? The +direct contrary has always been inferred from that state of things: +accordingly, it has ever been the policy of those who would preserve +themselves against the enterprises of such a malignant and mischievous +power to cut out so much work for him in his own states as might keep +his dangerous activity employed at home. + +It is said, in vindication of this system, which demands the stability +of the Regicide power as a ground for peace with them, that, when they +have obtained, as now it is said (though not by this noble author) they +have, a permanent government, they will be _able_ to preserve amity with +this kingdom, and with others who have the misfortune to be in their +neighborhood. Granted. They will be _able_ to do so, without question; +but are they willing to do so? Produce the act; produce the declaration. +Have they made any single step towards it? Have they ever once proposed +to treat? + +The assurance of a stable peace, grounded on the stability of their +system, proceeds on this hypothesis,--that their hostility to other +nations has proceeded from their anarchy at home, and from the +prevalence of a populace which their government had not strength enough +to master. This I utterly deny. I insist upon it as a fact, that, in the +daring commencement of all their hostilities, and their astonishing +perseverance in them, so as never once, in any fortune, high or low, to +propose a treaty of peace to any power in Europe, they have never been +actuated by the people: on the contrary, the people, I will not say have +been moved, but impelled by them, and have generally acted under a +compulsion, of which most of us are as yet, thank God, unable to form an +adequate idea. The war against Austria was formally declared by the +unhappy Louis the Sixteenth; but who has ever considered Louis the +Sixteenth, since the Revolution, to have been the government? The second +Regicide Assembly, then the only government, was the author of that war; +and neither the nominal king nor the nominal people had anything to do +with it, further than in a reluctant obedience. It is to delude +ourselves, to consider the state of France, since their Revolution, as a +state of anarchy: it is something far worse. Anarchy it is, undoubtedly, +if compared with government pursuing the peace, order, morals, and +prosperity of the people; but regarding only the power that has really +guided from the day of the Revolution to this time, it has been of all +governments the most absolute, despotic, and effective that has hitherto +appeared on earth. Never were the views and politics of any government +pursued with half the regularity, system, and method that a diligent +observer must have contemplated with amazement and terror in theirs. +Their state is not an anarchy, but a series of short-lived tyrannies. We +do not call a republic with annual magistrates an anarchy: theirs is +that kind of republic; but the succession is not effected by the +expiration of the term of the magistrate's service, but by his murder. +Every new magistracy, succeeding by homicide, is auspicated by accusing +its predecessors in the office of tyranny, and it continues by the +exercise of what they charged upon others. + +This strong hand is the law, and the sole law, in their state. I defy +any person to show any other law,--or if any such should be found on +paper, that it is in the smallest degree, or in any one instance, +regarded or practised. In all their successions, not one magistrate, or +one form of magistracy, has expired by a mere occasional popular tumult; +everything has been the effect of the studied machinations of the one +revolutionary cabal, operating within itself upon itself. That cabal is +all in all. France has no public; it is the only nation I ever heard of, +where the people are absolutely slaves, in the fullest sense, in all +affairs, public and private, great and small, even down to the minutest +and most recondite parts of their household concerns. The helots of +Laconia, the regardants to the manor in Russia and in Poland, even the +negroes in the West Indies, know nothing of so searching, so +penetrating, so heart-breaking a slavery. Much would these servile +wretches call for our pity under that unheard-of yoke, if for their +perfidious and unnatural rebellion, and for their murder of the mildest +of all monarchs, they did not richly deserve a punishment not greater +than their crime. + +On the whole, therefore, I take it to be a great mistake to think that +the want of power in the government furnished a natural cause of war; +whereas the greatness of its power, joined to its use of that power, the +nature of its system, and the persons who acted in it, did naturally +call for a strong military resistance to oppose them, and rendered it +not only just, but necessary. But at present I say no more on the genius +and character of the power set up in France. I may probably trouble you +with it more at large hereafter: this subject calls for a very full +exposure: at present it is enough for me, if I point it out as a matter +well worthy of consideration, whether the true ground of hostility was +not rightly conceived very early in this war, and whether anything has +happened to change that system, except our ill success in a war which in +no principal instance had its true destination as the object of its +operations. That the war has succeeded ill in many cases is undoubted; +but then let us speak the truth, and say we are defeated, exhausted, +dispirited, and must submit. This would be intelligible. The world would +be inclined to pardon the abject conduct of an undone nation. But let us +not conceal from _ourselves_ our real situation, whilst, by every +species of humiliation, we are but too strongly displaying our sense of +it to the enemy. + +The writer of the Remarks in the Last Week of October appears to think +that the present government in France contains many of the elements +which, when properly arranged, are known to form the best practical +governments,--and that the system, whatever may become its particular +form, is no longer likely to be an obstacle to negotiation. If its form +now be no obstacle to such negotiation, I do not know why it was ever +so. Suppose that this government promised greater permanency than any of +the former, (a point on which I can form no judgment,) still a link is +wanting to couple the permanence of the government with the permanence +of the peace. On this not one word is said: nor can there be, in my +opinion. This deficiency is made up by strengthening the first ringlet +of the chain, that ought to be, but that is not, stretched to connect +the two propositions. All seems to be done, if we can make out that the +last French edition of Regicide is like to prove stable. + +As a prognostic of this stability, it is said to be accepted by the +people. Here again I join issue with the fraternizers, and positively +deny the fact. Some submission or other has been obtained, by some means +or other, to every government that hitherto has been set up. And the +same submission would, by the same means, be obtained for any other +project that the wit or folly of man could possibly devise. The +Constitution of 1790 was universally received. The Constitution which +followed it, under the name of a Convention, was universally submitted +to. The Constitution of 1793 was universally accepted. Unluckily, this +year's Constitution, which was formed, and its genethliacon sung by the +noble author while it was yet in embryo, or was but just come bloody +from the womb, is the only one which in its very formation has been +generally resisted by a very great and powerful party in many parts of +the kingdom, and particularly in the capital. It never had a popular +choice even in show: those who arbitrarily erected the new building out +of the old materials of their own Convention were obliged to send for an +army to support their work: like brave gladiators, they fought it out +in the streets of Paris, and even massacred each other in their house of +assembly, in the most edifying manner, and for the entertainment and +instruction of their Excellencies the foreign ambassadors, who had a box +in this constitutional amphitheatre of a free people. + +At length, after a terrible struggle, the troops prevailed over the +citizens. The citizen soldiers, the ever-famed national guards, who had +deposed and murdered their sovereign, were disarmed by the inferior +trumpeters of that rebellion. Twenty thousand regular troops garrison +Paris. Thus a complete military government is formed. It has the +strength, and it may count on the stability, of that kind of power. This +power is to last as long as the Parisians think proper. Every other +ground of stability, but from military force and terror, is clean out of +the question. To secure them further, they have a strong corps of +irregulars, ready-armed. Thousands of those hell-hounds called +Terrorists, whom they had shut up in prison, on their last Revolution, +as the satellites of tyranny, are let loose on the people. The whole of +their government, in its origination, in its continuance, in all its +actions, and in all its resources, is force, and nothing but force: a +forced constitution, a forced election, a forced subsistence, a forced +requisition of soldiers, a forced loan of money. + +They differ nothing from all the preceding usurpations, but that to the +same odium a good deal more of contempt is added. In this situation, +notwithstanding all their military force, strengthened with the +undisciplined power of the Terrorists, and the nearly general disarming +of Paris, there would almost certainly have been before this an +insurrection against them, but for one cause. The people of France +languish for peace. They all despaired of obtaining it from the +coalesced powers, whilst they had a gang of professed regicides at their +head; and several of the least desperate republicans would have joined +with better men to shake them wholly off, and to produce something more +ostensible, if they had not been reiteratedly told that their sole hope +of peace was the very contrary to what they naturally imagined: that +they must leave off their cabals and insurrections, which could serve no +purpose but to bring in that royalty which was wholly rejected by the +coalesced kings; that, to satisfy them, they must tranquilly, if they +could not cordially, submit themselves to the tyranny and the tyrants +they despised and abhorred. Peace was held out by the allied monarchies +to the people of France, as a bounty for supporting the Republic of +Regicides. In fact, a coalition, begun for the avowed purpose of +destroying that den of robbers, now exists only for their support. If +evil happens to the princes of Europe from the success and stability of +this infernal business, it is their own absolute crime. + +We are to understand, however, (for sometimes so the author hints,) that +something stable in the Constitution of Regicide was required for our +amity with it; but the noble Remarker is no more solicitous about this +point than he is for the permanence of the whole body of his October +speculations. "If," says he, speaking of the Regicide, "they can obtain +a practicable constitution, even for a limited period of time, they will +be in a condition to reestablish the accustomed relations of peace and +amity." Pray let us leave this bush-fighting. What is meant by a +_limited period of time_? Does it mean the direct contrary to the +terms, _an unlimited period_? If it is a limited period, what limitation +does he fix as a ground for his opinion? Otherwise, his limitation is +unlimited. If he only requires a constitution that will last while the +treaty goes on, ten days' existence will satisfy his demands. He knows +that France never did want a practicable constitution, nor a government, +which endured for a limited period of time. Her constitutions were but +too practicable; and short as was their duration, it was but too long. +They endured time enough for treaties which benefited themselves and +have done infinite mischief to our cause. But, granting him his strange +thesis, that hitherto the mere form or the mere term of their +constitutions, and not their indisposition, but their instability, has +been the cause of their not preserving the relations of amity,--how +could a constitution which might not last half an hour after the noble +lord's signature of the treaty, in the company in which he must sign it, +insure its observance? If you trouble yourself at all with their +constitutions, you are certainly more concerned with them after the +treaty than before it, as the observance of conventions is of infinitely +more consequence than the making them. Can anything be more palpably +absurd and senseless than to object to a treaty of peace for want of +durability in constitutions which had an actual duration, and to trust a +constitution that at the time of the writing had not so much as a +practical existence? There is no way of accounting for such discourse in +the mouths of men of sense, but by supposing that they secretly +entertain a hope that the very act of having made a peace with the +Regicides will give a stability to the Regicide system. This will not +clear the discourse from the absurdity, but it will account for the +conduct, which such reasoning so ill defends. What a roundabout way is +this to peace,--to make war for the destruction of regicides, and then +to give them peace in order to insure a stability that will enable them +to observe it! I say nothing of the honor displayed in such a system. It +is plain it militates with itself almost in all the parts of it. In one +part, it supposes stability in their Constitution, as a ground of a +stable peace; in another part, we are to hope for peace in a different +way,--that is, by splitting this brilliant orb into little stars, and +this would make the face of heaven so fine! No, there is no system upon +which the peace which in humility we are to supplicate can possibly +stand. + +I believe, before this time, that the more form of a constitution, in +any country, never was fixed as the sole ground of objecting to a treaty +with it. With other circumstances it may be of great moment. What is +incumbent on the assertors of the Fourth Week of October system to prove +is not whether their then expected Constitution was likely to be stable +or transitory, but whether it promised to this country and its allies, +and to the peace and settlement of all Europe, more good-will or more +good faith than any of the experiments which have gone before it. On +these points I would willingly join issue. + +Observe first the manner in which the Remarker describes (very truly, as +I conceive) the people of France under that auspicious government, and +then observe the conduct of that government to other nations. "The +people without _any_ established constitution; distracted by popular +convulsions; in a state of inevitable bankruptcy; without any commerce; +with their principal ports blockaded; and without a fleet that could +venture to face one of our _detached squadrons_." Admitting, as fully as +he has stated it, this condition of France, I would fain know how he +reconciles this condition with his ideas of _any kind of a practicable +constitution_, or _duration for a limited period_, which are his _sine +qua non_ of peace. But passing by contradictions, as no fair objections +to reasoning, this state of things would naturally, at other times, and +in other governments, have produced a disposition to peace, almost on +any terms. But, in that state of their country, did the Regicide +government solicit peace or amity with other nations, or even lay any +specious grounds for it, in propositions of affected moderation, or in +the most loose and general conciliatory language? The direct contrary. +It was but a very few days before the noble writer had commenced his +Remarks, as if it were to refute him by anticipation, that his France +thought fit to lay out a new territorial map of dominion, and to declare +to us and to all Europe what territories she was willing to allot to her +own empire, and what she is content (during her good pleasure) to leave +to others. + +This their law of empire was promulgated without any requisition on that +subject, and proclaimed in a style and upon principles which never had +been heard of in the annals of arrogance and ambition. She prescribed +the limits to her empire, not upon principles of treaty, convention, +possession, usage, habitude, the distinction of tribes, nations, or +languages, but by physical aptitudes. Having fixed herself as the +arbiter of physical dominion, she construed the limits of Nature by her +convenience. That was Nature which most extended and best secured the +empire of France. + +I need say no more on the insult offered not only to all equity and +justice, but to the common sense of mankind, in deciding legal property +by physical principles, and establishing the convenience of a party as a +rule of public law. The noble advocate for peace has, indeed, perfectly +well exploded this daring and outrageous system of pride and tyranny. I +am most happy in commending him, when he writes like himself. But hear +still further and in the same good strain the great patron and advocate +of amity with this accommodating, mild, and unassuming power, when he +reports to you the law they give, and its immediate effects:--"They +amount," says he, "to the sacrifice of powers that have been the most +nearly connected with us,--the direct or indirect annexation to France +of all the ports of the Continent from Dunkirk to Hamburg,--an immense +accession of territory,--and, in one word, THE ABANDONMENT OF THE +INDEPENDENCE OF EUROPE!" This is the LAW (the author and I use no +different terms) which this new government, almost as soon as it could +cry in the cradle, and as one of the very first acts by which it +auspicated its entrance into function, the pledge it gives of the +firmness of its policy,--such is the law that this proud power +prescribes to abject nations. What is the comment upon this law by the +great jurist who recommends us to the tribunal which issued the decree? +"An obedience to it would be" (says he) "dishonorable to us, and exhibit +us to the present age and to posterity as submitting to the law +prescribed to us by our enemy." + +Here I recognize the voice of a British plenipotentiary: I begin to feel +proud of my country. But, alas! the short date of human elevation! The +accents of dignity died upon his tongue. This author will not assure us +of his sentiments for the whole of a pamphlet; but, in the sole +energetic part of it, he does not continue the same through an whole +sentence, if it happens to be of any sweep or compass. In the very womb +of this last sentence, pregnant, as it should seem, with a Hercules, +there is formed a little bantling of the mortal race, a degenerate, puny +parenthesis, that totally frustrates our most sanguine views and +expectations, and disgraces the whole gestation. Here is this +destructive parenthesis: "Unless some adequate compensation be secured +_to us_." _To us!_ The Christian world may shift for itself, Europe may +groan in slavery, we may be dishonored by receiving law from an +enemy,--but all is well, provided the compensation _to us_ be adequate. +To what are we reserved? An _adequate_ compensation "for the sacrifice +of powers the most nearly connected with us";--an _adequate_ +compensation "for the direct or indirect annexation to France of all the +ports of the Continent from Dunkirk to Hamburg";--an _adequate_ +compensation "for the abandonment of the independence of Europe"! Would +that, when all our manly sentiments are thus changed, our manly language +were changed along with them, and that the English tongue were not +employed to utter what our ancestors never dreamed could enter into an +English heart! + +But let us consider this matter of adequate compensation. Who is to +furnish it? From what funds is it to be drawn? Is it by another treaty +of commerce? I have no objections to treaties of commerce upon +principles of commerce. Traffic for traffic,--all is fair. But commerce +in exchange for empire, for safety, for glory! We set out in our dealing +with a miserable cheat upon ourselves. I know it may be said, that we +may prevail on this proud, philosophical, military Republic, which looks +down with contempt on trade, to declare it unfit for the sovereign of +nations to be _eundem negotiatorem et dominum_: that, in virtue of this +maxim of her state, the English in France may be permitted, as the Jews +are in Poland and in Turkey, to execute all the little inglorious +occupations,--to be the sellers of new and the buyers of old clothes, to +be their brokers and factors, and to be employed in casting up their +debits and credits, whilst the master Republic cultivates the arts of +empire, prescribes the forms of peace to nations, and dictates laws to a +subjected world. But are we quite sure, that, when we have surrendered +half Europe to them in hope of this compensation, the Republic will +confer upon us those privileges of dishonor? Are we quite certain that +she will permit us to farm the guillotine,--to contract for the +provision of her twenty thousand Bastiles,--to furnish transports for +the myriads of her exiles to Guiana,--to become commissioners for her +naval stores,--or to engage for the clothing of those armies which are +to subdue the poor relics of Christian Europe? No! She is bespoke by the +Jew subjects of her own Amsterdam for all these services. + +But if these, or matters similar, are not the compensations the Remarker +demands, and that on consideration he finds them neither adequate nor +certain, who else is to be the chapman, and to furnish the +purchase-money, at this market, of all the grand principles of empire, +of law, of civilization, of morals, and of religion, where British faith +and honor are to be sold by inch of candle? Who is to be the _dedecorum +pretiosus emptor_? Is it the _navis Hispanae magister_? Is it to be +furnished by the Prince of Peace? Unquestionably. Spain as yet possesses +mines of gold and silver, and may give us in _pesos duros_ an adequate +compensation for our honor and our virtue. When these things are at all +to be sold, they are the vilest commodities at market. + +It is full as singular as any of the other singularities in this work, +that the Remarker, talking so much as he does of cessions and +compensations, passes by Spain in his general settlement, as if there +were no such country on the globe,--as if there were no Spain in Europe, +no Spain in America. But this great matter of political deliberation +cannot be put out of our thoughts by his silence. She _has_ furnished +compensations,--not to you, but to France. The Regicide Republic and the +still nominally subsisting monarchy of Spain are united,--and are united +upon a principle of jealousy, if not of bitter enmity, to Great Britain. +The noble writer has here another matter for meditation. It is not from +Dunkirk to Hamburg that the ports are in the hands of France: they are +in the hands of France from Hamburg to Gibraltar. How long the new +dominion will last I cannot tell; but France the Republic has conquered +Spain, and the ruling party in that court acts by her orders and exists +by her power. + +The noble writer, in his views into futurity, has forgotten to look back +to the past. If he chooses it, he may recollect, that, on the prospect +of the death of Philip the Fourth, and still more on the event, all +Europe was moved to its foundations. In the treaties of partition that +first were entered into, and in the war that afterwards blazed out to +prevent those crowns from being actually or virtually united in the +House of Bourbon, the predominance of France in Spain, and above all, in +the Spanish Indies, was the great object of all these movements in the +cabinet and in the field. The Grand Alliance was formed upon that +apprehension. On that apprehension the mighty war was continued during +such a number of years as the degenerate and pusillanimous impatience of +our dwindled race can hardly bear to have reckoned: a war equal, within +a few years, in duration, and not, perhaps, inferior in bloodshed, to +any of those great contests for empire which in history make the most +awful matter of recorded memory. + + Ad confligendum venientibus undique Poenis, + Omnia cum belli trepido concussa tumultu + Horrida contremuere sub altis aetheris auris, + In dubioque fuit sub utrorum regna cadendum + Omnibus humanis esset terraque marique.-- + +When this war was ended, (I cannot stay now to examine how,) the object +of the war was the object of the treaty. When it was found +impracticable, or less desirable than before, wholly to exclude a branch +of the Bourbon race from that immense succession, the point of Utrecht +was to prevent the mischiefs to arise from the influence of the greater +upon the lesser branch. His Lordship is a great member of the diplomatic +body; he has, of course, all the fundamental treaties which make the +public statute law of Europe by heart: and, indeed, no active member of +Parliament ought to be ignorant of their general tenor and leading +provisions. In the treaty which closed that war, and of which it is a +fundamental part, because relating to the whole policy of the compact, +it was agreed that Spain should not give anything from her territory in +the West Indies to France. This article, apparently onerous to Spain, +was in truth highly beneficial. But, oh, the blindness of the greatest +statesman to the infinite and unlooked-for combinations of things which +lie hid in the dark prolific womb of futurity! The great trunk of +Bourbon is cut down; the withered branch is worked up into the +construction of a French Regicide Republic. Here we have formed a new, +unlooked-for, monstrous, heterogeneous alliance,--a double-natured +monster, republic above and monarchy below. There is no centaur of +fiction, no poetic satyr of the woods, nothing short of the hieroglyphic +monsters of Egypt, dog in head and man in body, that can give an idea of +it. None of these things can subsist in Nature (so, at least, it is +thought); but the moral world admits monsters which the physical +rejects. + +In this metamorphosis, the first thing done by Spain, in the honey-moon +of her new servitude, was, with all the hardihood of pusillanimity, +utterly to defy the most solemn treaties with Great Britain and the +guaranty of Europe. She has yielded the largest and fairest part of one +of the largest and fairest islands in the West Indies, perhaps on the +globe, to the usurped powers of France. She completes the title of those +powers to the whole of that important central island of Hispaniola. She +has solemnly surrendered to the regicides and butchers of the Bourbon +family what that court never ventured, perhaps never wished, to bestow +on the patriarchal stock of her own august house. + +The noble negotiator takes no notice of this portentous junction and +this audacious surrender. The effect is no less than the total +subversion of the balance of power in the West Indies, and indeed +everywhere else. This arrangement, considered in itself, but much more +as it indicates a complete union of France with Spain, is truly +alarming. Does he feel nothing of the change this makes in that part of +his description of the state of France where he supposes her not able to +face one of our detached squadrons? Does he feel nothing for the +condition of Portugal under this new coalition? Is it for this state of +things he recommends our junction in that common alliance as a remedy? +It is surely already monstrous enough. We see every standing principle +of policy, every old governing opinion of nations, completely gone, and +with it the foundation of all their establishments. Can Spain keep +herself internally where she is, with this connection? Does he dream +that Spain, unchristian, or even uncatholic, can exist as a monarchy? +This author indulges himself in speculations of the division of the +French Republic. I only say, that with much greater reason he might +speculate on the republicanism and the subdivision of Spain. + +It is not peace with France which secures that feeble government; it is +that peace which, if it shall continue, decisively ruins Spain. Such a +peace is not the peace which the remnant of Christianity celebrates at +this holy season. In it there is no glory to God on high, and not the +least tincture of good-will to man. What things we have lived to see! +The King of Spain in a group of Moors, Jews, and Renegadoes; and the +clergy taxed to pay for his conversion! The Catholic King in the strict +embraces of the most Unchristian Republic! I hope we shall never see his +Apostolic Majesty, his Faithful Majesty, and the King, Defender of the +Faith, added to that unhallowed and impious fraternity. + +The noble author has glimpses of the consequences of peace, as well as +I. He feels for the colonies of Great Britain, one of the principal +resources of our commerce and our naval power, if piratical France shall +be established, as he knows she must be, in the West Indies, if we sue +for peace on such terms as they may condescend to grant us. He feels +that their very colonial system for the interior is not compatible with +the existence of our colonies. I tell him, and doubt not I shall be able +to demonstrate, that, being what she is, if she possesses a rock there, +we cannot be safe. Has this author had in his view the transactions +between the Regicide Republic and the yet nominally subsisting monarchy +of Spain? + +I bring this matter under your Lordship's consideration, that you may +have a more complete view than this author chooses to give of the _true +France_ you have to deal with, as to its nature, and to its force and +its disposition. Mark it, my Lord, France, in giving her law to Spain, +stipulated for none of her indemnities in Europe, no enlargement +whatever of her frontier. Whilst we are looking for indemnities from +France, betraying our own safety in a sacrifice of the independence of +Europe, France secures hers by the most important acquisition of +territory ever made in the West Indies since their first settlement. She +appears (it is only in appearance) to give up the frontier of Spain; and +she is compensated, not in appearance, but in reality, by a territory +that makes a dreadful frontier to the colonies of Great Britain. + +It is sufficiently alarming that she is to have the possession of this +great island. But all the Spanish colonies, virtually, are hers. Is +there so puny a whipster in the _petty form_ of the school of politics +who can be at a loss for the fate of the British colonies, when he +combines the French and Spanish consolidation with the known critical +and dubious dispositions of the United States of America, as they are at +present, but which, when a peace is made, when the basis of a Regicide +ascendency in Spain is laid, will no longer be so good as dubious and +critical? But I go a great deal further; and on much consideration of +the condition and circumstances of the West Indies, and of the genius of +this new republic, as it has operated and is likely to operate on them, +I say, that, if a single rock in the West Indies is in the hands of this +_transatlantic Morocco_, we have not an hour's safety there. + +The Remarker, though he slips aside from the main consideration, seems +aware that this arrangement, standing as it does, in the West Indies, +leaves us at the mercy of the new coalition, or rather at the mercy of +the sole guiding part of it. He does not, indeed, adopt a supposition +such as I make, who am confident that anything which can give them a +single good port and opportune piratical station there would lead to our +ruin: the author proceeds upon an idea that the Regicides may be an +existing and considerable territorial power in the West Indies, and, of +course, her piratical system more dangerous and as real. However, for +that desperate case he has an easy remedy; but, surely, in his whole +shop there is nothing so extraordinary. It is, that we three, France, +Spain, and England, (there are no other of any moment,) should adopt +some "_analogy_ in the interior systems of government in the several +islands which we may respectively retain after the closing of the war." +This plainly can be done only by a convention between the parties; and I +believe it would be the first war ever made to terminate in an analogy +of the interior government of any country, or any parts of such +countries. Such a partnership in domestic government is, I think, +carrying fraternity as far as it will go. + +It will be an affront to your sagacity to pursue this matter into all +its details: suffice it to say, that, if this convention for analogous +domestic government is made, it immediately gives a right for the +residence of a consul (in all likelihood some negro or man of color) in +every one of your islands; a Regicide ambassador in London will be at +all your meetings of West India merchants and planters, and, in effect, +in all our colonial councils. Not one order of Council can hereafter be +made, or any one act of Parliament relative to the West India colonies +even be agitated, which will not always afford reasons for protests and +perpetual interference; the Regicide Republic will become an integral +part of the colonial legislature, and, so far as the colonies are +concerned, of the British too. But it will be still worse: as all our +domestic affairs are interlaced more or less intimately with our +external, this intermeddling must everywhere insinuate itself into all +other interior transactions, and produce a copartnership in our domestic +concerns of every description. + +Such are the plain, inevitable consequences of this arrangement of a +system, of analogous interior government. On the other hand, without it, +the author assures us, and in this I heartily agree with him, "that the +correspondence and communications between the neighboring colonies will +be great, that the disagreements will be incessant, and that causes even +of national quarrels will arise _from day to day_." Most true. But, for +the reasons I have given, the case, if possible, will be worse by the +proposed remedy, by the triple fraternal interior analogy,--an analogy +itself most fruitful, and more foodful than the old Ephesian statue with +the three tier of breasts. Your Lordship must also observe how +infinitely this business must be complicated by our interference in the +slow-paced Saturnian movements of Spain and the rapid parabolic flights +of France. But such is the disease,--such is the cure,--such is, and +must be, the effect of Regicide vicinity. + +But what astonishes me is, that the negotiator, who has certainly an +exercised understanding, did not see that every person habituated to +such meditations must necessarily pursue the train of thought further +than he has carried it, and must ask himself whether what he states so +truly of the necessity of our arranging an analogous interior +government, in consequence of the vicinity of our possessions, in the +West Indies, does not as extensively apply, and much more forcibly, to +the circumstance of our much nearer vicinity with the parent and author +of this mischief. I defy even his acuteness and ingenuity to show me any +one point in which the cases differ, except that it is plainly more +necessary in Europe than in America. Indeed, the further we trace the +details of the proposed peace, the more your Lordship will be satisfied +that I have not been guilty of any abuse of terms, when I use +indiscriminately (as I always do, in speaking of arrangements with +Regicide) the words peace and fraternity. An analogy between our +interior governments must be the consequence. The noble negotiator sees +it as well as I do. I deprecate this Jacobin interior analogy. But +hereafter, perhaps, I may say a good deal more upon this part of the +subject. + +The noble lord insists on very little more than on the excellence of +their Constitution, the hope of their dwindling into little republics, +and this close copartnership in government. I hear of others, indeed, +that offer by other arguments to reconcile us to this peace and +fraternity. The Regicides, they say, have renounced the creed of the +Rights of Man, and declared equality a chimera. This is still more +strange than all the rest. They have apostatized from their apostasy. +They are renegadoes from that impious faith for which they subverted the +ancient government, murdered their king, and imprisoned, butchered, +confiscated, and banished their fellow-subjects, and to which they +forced every man to swear at the peril of his life. And now, to +reconcile themselves to the world, they declare this creed, bought by so +much blood, to be an imposture and a chimera. I have no doubt that they +always thought it to be so, when they were destroying everything at home +and abroad for its establishment. It is no strange thing, to those who +look into the nature of corrupted man, to find a violent persecutor a +perfect unbeliever of his own creed. But this is the very first time +that any man or set of men were hardy enough to attempt to lay the +ground of confidence in them by an acknowledgment of their own +falsehood, fraud, hypocrisy, treachery, heterodox doctrine, +persecution, and cruelty. Everything we hear from them is new, and, to +use a phrase of their own, _revolutionary_; everything supposes a total +revolution in all the principles of reason, prudence, and moral feeling. +If possible, this their recantation of the chief parts in the canon of +the Rights of Man is more infamous and causes greater horror than their +originally promulgating and forcing down the throats of mankind that +symbol of all evil. It is raking too much into the dirt and ordure of +human nature to say more of it. + +I hear it said, too, that they have lately declared in favor of +property. This is exactly of the same sort with the former. What need +had they to make this declaration, if they did not know that by their +doctrines and practices they had totally subverted all property? What +government of Europe, either in its origin or its continuance, has +thought it necessary to declare itself in favor of property? The more +recent ones were formed for its protection against former violations; +the old consider the inviolability of property and their own existence +as one and the same thing, and that a proclamation for its safety would +be sounding an alarm on its danger. But the Regicide banditti knew that +this was not the first time they have been obliged to give such +assurances, and had as often falsified them. They knew, that, after +butchering hundreds of men, women, and children, for no other cause than +to lay hold on their property, such a declaration might have a chance of +encouraging other nations to run the risk of establishing a commercial +house amongst them. It is notorious, that these very Jacobins, upon an +alarm of the shopkeeper of Paris, made this declaration in favor of +property. These brave fellows received the apprehensions expressed on +that head with indignation, and said that property could be in no +danger, because all the world knew it was under the protection of the +_sans-culottes_. At what period did they not give this assurance? Did +they not give it; when they fabricated their first Constitution? Did +they not then solemnly declare it one of the rights of a citizen (a +right, of course, only declared, and not then fabricated) to depart from +his country, and choose another _domicilium_, without detriment to his +property? Did they not declare that no property should be confiscated +from the children for the crime of the parent? Can they now declare more +fully their respect for property than they did at that time? And yet was +there ever known such horrid violences and confiscations as instantly +followed under the very persons now in power, many of them leading +members of that Assembly, and all of them violators of that engagement +which was the very basis of their republic,--confiscations in which +hundreds of men, women, and children, not guilty of one act of duty in +resisting their usurpation, were involved? This keeping of their old is, +then, to give us a confidence in their new engagements. But examine the +matter, and you will see that the prevaricating sons of violence give no +relief at all, where at all it can be wanted. They renew their old +fraudulent declaration against confiscations, and then they expressly +exclude all adherents to their ancient lawful government from any +benefit of it: that is to say, they promise that they will secure all +their brother plunderers in their share of the common plunder. The fear +of being robbed by every new succession of robbers, who do not keep even +the faith of that kind of society, absolutely required that they should +give security to the dividends of spoil, else they could not exist a +moment. But it was necessary, in giving security to robbers, that honest +men should be deprived of all hope of restitution; and thus their +interests were made utterly and eternally incompatible. So that it +appears that this boasted security of property is nothing more than a +seal put upon its destruction; this ceasing of confiscation is to secure +the confiscators against the innocent proprietors. That very thing which +is held out to you as your cure is that which makes your malady, and +renders it, if once it happens, utterly incurable. You, my Lord, who +possess a considerable, though not an invidious estate, may be well +assured, that, if, by being engaged, as you assuredly would be, in the +defence of your religion, your king, your order, your laws, and +liberties, that estate should be put under confiscation, the property +would be secured, but in the same manner, at your expense. + +But, after all, for what purpose are we told of this reformation in +their principles, and what is the policy of all this softening in ours, +which is to be produced by their example? It is not to soften us to +suffering innocence and virtue, but to mollify us to the crimes and to +the society of robbers and ruffians. But I trust that our countrymen +will not be softened to that kind of crimes and criminals; for, if we +should, our hearts will be hardened to everything which has a claim on +our benevolence. A kind Providence has placed in our breasts a hatred of +the unjust and cruel, in order that we may preserve ourselves from +cruelty and injustice. They who bear cruelty are accomplices in it. The +pretended gentleness which excludes that charitable rancor produces an +indifference which is half an approbation. They never will love where +they ought to love, who do not hate where they ought to hate. + +There is another piece of policy, not more laudable than this, in +reading these moral lectures, which lessens our hatred to criminals and +our pity to sufferers by insinuating that it has been owing to their +fault or folly that the latter have become the prey of the former. By +flattering us that we are not subject to the same vices and follies, it +induces a confidence that we shall not suffer the same evils by a +contact with the infamous gang of robbers who have thus robbed and +butchered our neighbors before our faces. We must not be flattered to +our ruin. Our vices are the same as theirs, neither more nor less. If +any faults we had, which wanted this French example to call us to a +"_softening_ of character, and a review of our social relations and +duties," there is yet no sign that we have commenced our reformation. We +seem, by the best accounts I have from the world, to go on just as +formerly, "some to undo, and some to be undone." There is no change at +all: and if we are not bettered by the sufferings of war, this peace, +which, for reasons to himself best known, the author fixes as the period +of our reformation, must have something very extraordinary in it; +because hitherto ease, opulence, and their concomitant pleasure have +never greatly disposed mankind to that serious reflection and review +which the author supposes to be the result of the approaching peace with +vice and crime. I believe he forms a right estimate of the nature of +this peace, and that it will want many of those circumstances which +formerly characterizes that state of things. + +If I am right in my ideas of this new republic, the different states of +peace and war will make no difference in her pursuits. It is not an +enemy of accident that we have to deal with. Enmity to us, and to all +civilized nations, is wrought into the very stamina of its Constitution. +It was made to pursue the purposes of that fundamental enmity. The +design will go on regularly in every position and in every relation. +Their hostility is to break us to their dominion; their amity is to +debauch us to their principles. In the former, we are to contend with +their force; in the latter, with their intrigues. But we stand in a very +different posture of defence in the two situations. In war, so long as +government is supported, we fight with the whole united force of the +kingdom. When under the name of peace the war of intrigue begins, we do +not contend against our enemies with the whole force of the kingdom. +No,--we shall have to fight, (if it should be a fight at all, and not an +ignominious surrender of everything which has made our country venerable +in our eyes and dear to our hearts,) we shall have to light with but a +portion of our strength against the whole of theirs. Gentlemen who not +long since thought with us, but who now recommend a Jacobin peace, were +at that time sufficiently aware of the existence of a dangerous Jacobin +faction within this kingdom. Awhile ago they seemed to be tremblingly +alive to the number of those who composed it, to their dark subtlety, to +their fierce audacity, to their admiration of everything that passes in +France, to their eager desire of a close communication with the mother +faction there. At this moment, when the question is upon the opening of +that communication, not a word of our English Jacobins. That faction is +put out of sight and out of thought. "It vanished at the crowing of the +cock." Scarcely had the Gallic harbinger of peace and light begun to +utter his lively notes, than all the cackling of us poor Tory geese to +alarm the garrison of the Capitol was forgot.[11] There was enough of +indemnity before. Now a complete act of oblivion is passed about the +Jacobins of England, though one would naturally imagine it would make a +principal object in all fair deliberation upon the merits of a project +of amity with the Jacobins of France. But however others may choose to +forget the faction, the faction does not choose to forget itself, nor, +however gentlemen may choose to flatter themselves, it does not forget +them. + +Never, in any civil contest, has a part been taken with more of the +warmth, or carried on with more of the arts of a party. The Jacobins are +worse than lost to their country. Their hearts are abroad. Their +sympathy with the Regicides of France is complete. Just as in a civil +contest, they exult in all their victories, they are dejected and +mortified in all their defeats. Nothing that the Regicides can do (and +they have labored hard for the purpose) can alienate them from their +cause. You and I, my dear Lord, have often observed on the spirit of +their conduct. When the Jacobins of France, by their studied, +deliberated, catalogued files of murders with the poniard, the sabre, +and the tribunal, have shocked whatever remained of human sensibility +in our breasts, then it was they distinguished the resources of party +policy. They did not venture directly to confront the public sentiment; +for a very short time they seemed to partake of it. They began with a +reluctant and sorrowful confession; they deplored the stains which +tarnished the lustre of a good cause. After keeping a decent time of +retirement, in a few days crept out an apology for the excesses of men +cruelly irritated by the attacks of unjust power. Grown bolder, as the +first feeling of mankind decayed and the color of these horrors began to +fade upon the imagination, they proceeded from apology to defence. They +urged, but still deplored, the absolute necessity of such a proceeding. +Then they made a bolder stride, and marched from defence to +recrimination. They attempted to assassinate the memory of those whose +bodies their friends had massacred, and to consider their murder as a +less formal act of justice. They endeavored even to debauch our pity, +and to suborn it in favor of cruelty. They wept over the lot of those +who were driven by the crimes of aristocrats to republican vengeance. +Every pause of their cruelty they considered as a return of their +natural sentiments of benignity and justice. Then they had recourse to +history, and found out all the recorded cruelties that deform the annals +of the world, in order that the massacres of the Regicides might pass +for a common event, and even that the most merciful of princes, who +suffered by their hands, should bear the iniquity of all the tyrants who +have at any time infested the earth. In order to reconcile us the better +to this republican tyranny, they confounded the bloodshed of war with +the murders of peace; and they computed how much greater prodigality of +blood was exhibited in battles and in the storm of cities than in the +frugal, well-ordered massacres of the revolutionary tribunals of France. + +As to foreign powers, so long as they were conjoined with Great Britain +in this contest, so long they were treated as the most abandoned +tyrants, and, indeed, the basest of the human race. The moment any of +them quits the cause of this government, and of all governments, he is +rehabilitated, his honor is restored, all attainders are purged. The +friends of Jacobins are no longer despots; the betrayers of the common +cause are no longer traitors. + +That you may not doubt that they look on this war as a civil war, and +the Jacobins of France as of their party, and that they look upon us, +though locally their countrymen, in reality as enemies, they have never +failed to run a parallel between our late civil war and this war with +the Jacobins of France. They justify their partiality to those Jacobins +by the partiality which was shown by several here to the Colonies, and +they sanction their cry for peace with the Regicides of France by some +of our propositions for peace with the English in America. + +This I do not mention as entering into the controversy how far they are +right or wrong in this parallel, but to show that they do make it, and +that they do consider themselves as of a party with the Jacobins of +France. You cannot forget their constant correspondence with the +Jacobins, whilst it was in their power to carry it on. When the +communication is again opened, the interrupted correspondence will +commence. We cannot be blind to the advantage which such a party affords +to Regicide France in all her views,--and, on the other hand, what an +advantage Regicide France holds out to the views of the republican party +in England. Slightly as they have considered their subject, I think this +can hardly have escaped the writers of political ephemerides for any +month or year. They have told us much of the amendment of the Regicides +of France, and of their returning honor and generosity. Have they told +anything of the reformation and of the returning loyalty of the Jacobins +of England? Have they told us of _their_ gradual softening towards +royalty? Have they told us what measures _they_ are taking for "putting +the crown in commission," and what approximations of any kind _they_ are +making towards the old Constitution of their country? Nothing of this. +The silence of these writers is dreadfully expressive. They dare not +touch the subject. But it is not annihilated by their silence, nor by +our indifference. It is but too plain that our Constitution cannot exist +with such a communication. Our humanity, our manners, our morals, our +religion, cannot stand with such a communication. The Constitution is +made by those things, and for those things: without them it cannot +exist; and without them it is no matter whether it exists or not. + +It was an ingenious Parliamentary Christmas play, by which, in both +Houses, you anticipated the holidays; it was a relaxation from your +graver employment; it was a pleasant discussion you had, which part of +the family of the Constitution was the elder branch,--whether one part +did not exist prior to the others, and whether it might exist and +flourish, if "the others were cast into the fire."[12] In order to make +this Saturnalian amusement general in the family, you sent it down +stairs, that judges and juries might partake of the entertainment. The +unfortunate antiquary and augur who is the butt of all this sport may +suffer in the roistering horse-play and practical jokes of the servants' +hall. But whatever may become of him, the discussion itself, and the +timing it, put me in mind of what I have read, (where I do not +recollect,) that the subtle nation of the Greeks were busily employed, +in the Church of Santa Sophia, in a dispute of mixed natural philosophy, +metaphysics, and theology, whether the light on Mount Tabor was created +or uncreated, and were ready to massacre the holders of the +unfashionable opinion, at the very moment when the ferocious enemy of +all philosophy and religion, Mahomet the Second, entered through a +breach into the capital of the Christian world. I may possibly suffer +much more than Mr. Reeves (I shall certainly give much more general +offence) for breaking in upon this constitutional amusement concerning +the created or uncreated nature of the two Houses of Parliament, and by +calling their attention to a problem which may entertain them less, but +which concerns them a great deal more,--that is, whether, with this +Gallic Jacobin fraternity, which they are desired by some writers to +court, all the parts of the government, about whose combustible or +incombustible qualities they are contending, may "not be cast into the +fire" together. He is a strange visionary (but he is nothing worse) who +fancies that any one part of our Constitution, whatever right of +primogeniture it may claim, or whatever astrologers may divine from its +horoscope, can possibly survive the others. As they have lived, so they +will die, together. I must do justice to the impartiality of the +Jacobins. I have not observed amongst _them_ the least predilection for +any of those parts. If there has been any difference in their malice, I +think they have shown a worse disposition to the House of Commons than +to the crown. As to the House of Lords, they do not speculate at all +about it, and for reasons that are too obvious to detail. + +The question will be concerning the effect of this French fraternity on +the whole mass. Have we anything to apprehend from Jacobin +communication, or have we not? If we have not, is it by our experience +before the war that we are to presume that after the war no dangerous +communion can exist between those who are well affected to the new +Constitution of France and ill affected to the old Constitution here? + +In conversation I have not yet found nor heard of any persons, except +those who undertake to instruct the public, so unconscious of the actual +state of things, or so little prescient of the future, who do not +shudder all over and feel a secret horror at the approach of this +communication. I do not except from this observation those who are +willing, more than I find myself disposed, to submit to this fraternity. +Never has it been mentioned in my hearing, or from what I can learn in +my inquiry, without the suggestion of an Alien Bill, or some other +measures of the same nature, as a defence against its manifest mischief. +Who does not see the utter insufficiency of such a remedy, if such a +remedy could be at all adopted? We expel suspected foreigners from +hence; and we suffer every Englishman to pass over into France to be +initiated in all the infernal discipline of the place, to cabal and to +be corrupted by every means of cabal and of corruption, and then to +return to England, charged with their worst dispositions and designs. In +France he is out of the reach of your police; and when he returns to +England, one such English emissary is worse than a legion of French, who +are either tongue-tied, or whose speech betrays them. But the worst +aliens are the ambassador and his train. These you cannot expel without +a proof (always difficult) of direct practice against the state. A +French ambassador, at the head of a French party, is an evil which we +have never experienced. The mischief is by far more visible than the +remedy. But, after all, every such measure as an Alien Bill is a measure +of hostility, a preparation for it, or a cause of dispute that shall +bring it on. In effect, it is fundamentally contrary to a relation of +amity, whose essence is a perfectly free communication. Everything done +to prevent it will provoke a foreign war. Everything, when we let it +proceed, will produce domestic distraction. We shall be in a perpetual +dilemma. But it is easy to see which side of the dilemma will be taken. +The same temper which brings us to solicit a Jacobin peace will induce +us to temporize with all the evils of it. By degrees our minds will be +made to our circumstances. The novelty of such things, which produces +half the horror and all the disgust, will be worn off. Our ruin will be +disguised in profit, and the sale of a few wretched baubles will bribe a +degenerate people to barter away the most precious jewel of their souls. +Our Constitution is not made for this kind of warfare. It provides +greatly for our happiness, it furnishes few means for our defence. It +is formed, in a great measure, upon the principle of jealousy of the +crown,--and as things stood, when it took that turn, with very great +reason. I go farther: it must keep alive some part of that fire of +jealousy eternally and chastely burning, or it cannot be the British +Constitution. At various periods we have had tyranny in this country, +more than enough. We have had rebellions with more or less +justification. Some of our kings have made adulterous connections +abroad, and trucked away for foreign gold the interests and glory of +their crown. But, before this time, our liberty has never been +corrupted. I mean to say, that it has never been debauched from its +domestic relations. To this time it has been English liberty, and +English liberty only. Our love of liberty and our love of our country +were not distinct things. Liberty is now, it seems, put upon a larger +and more liberal bottom. We are men,--and as men, undoubtedly, nothing +human is foreign to us. We cannot be too liberal in our general wishes +for the happiness of our kind. But in all questions on the mode of +procuring it for any particular community, we ought to be fearful of +admitting those who have no interest in it, or who have, perhaps, an +interest against it, into the consultation. Above all, we cannot be too +cautious in our communication with those who seek their happiness by +other roads than those of humanity, morals, and religion, and whose +liberty consists, and consists alone, in being free from those +restraints which are imposed by the virtues upon the passions. + +When we invite danger from a confidence in defensive measures, we ought, +first of all, to be sure that it is a species of danger against which +any defensive measures that can be adopted will be sufficient. Next, we +ought to know that the spirit of our laws, or that our own dispositions, +which are stronger than laws, are susceptible of all those defensive +measures which the occasion may require. A third consideration is, +whether these measures will not bring more odium than strength to +government; and the last, whether the authority that makes them, in a +general corruption of manners and principles, can insure their +execution. Let no one argue, from the state of things, as he sees them +at present, concerning what will be the means and capacities of +government, when the time arrives which shall call for remedies +commensurate to enormous evils. + +It is an obvious truth, that no constitution can defend itself: it must +be defended by the wisdom and fortitude of men. These are what no +constitution can give: they are the gifts of God; and He alone knows +whether we shall possess such gifts at the time we stand in need of +them. Constitutions furnish the civil means of getting at the natural: +it is all that in this case they can do. But our Constitution has more +impediments than helps. Its excellencies, when they come to be put to +this sort of proof, may be found among its defects. + +Nothing looks more awful and imposing than an ancient fortification. Its +lofty, embattled walls, its bold, projecting, rounded towers, that +pierce the sky, strike the imagination and promise inexpugnable +strength. But they are the very things that make its weakness. You may +as well think of opposing one of these old fortresses to the mass of +artillery brought by a French irruption into the field as to think of +resisting by your old laws and your old forms the new destruction which +the corps of Jacobin engineers of to-day prepare for all such forms and +all such laws. Besides the debility and false principle of their +construction to resist the present modes of attack, the fortress itself +is in ruinous repair, and there is a practicable breach in every part of +it. + +Such is the work. But miserable works have been defended by the +constancy of the garrison. Weather-beaten ships have been brought safe +to port by the spirit and alertness of the crew. But it is here that we +shall eminently fail. The day that, by their consent, the seat of +Regicide has its place among the thrones of Europe, there is no longer a +motive for zeal in their favor; it will at best be cold, unimpassioned, +dejected, melancholy duty. The glory will seem all on the other side. +The friends of the crown will appear, not as champions, but as victims; +discountenanced, mortified, lowered, defeated, they will fall into +listlessness and indifference. They will leave things to take their +course, enjoy the present hour, and submit to the common fate. + +Is it only an oppressive nightmare with which we have been loaded? Is +it, then, all a frightful dream, and are there no regicides in the +world? Have we not heard of that prodigy of a ruffian who would not +suffer his benignant sovereign, with his hands tied behind him, and +stripped for execution, to say one parting word to his deluded +people,--of Santerre, who commanded the drums and trumpets to strike up +to stifle his voice, and dragged him backward to the machine of murder! +This nefarious villain (for a few days I may call him so) stands high in +France, as in a republic of robbers and murderers he ought. What +hinders this monster from being sent as ambassador to convey to his +Majesty the first compliments of his brethren, the Regicide Directory? +They have none that can represent them more properly. I anticipate the +day of his arrival. He will make his public entry into London on one of +the pale horses of his brewery. As he knows that we are pleased with the +Paris taste for the orders of knighthood,[13] he will fling a bloody +sash across his shoulders, with the order of the holy guillotine +surmounting the crown appendant to the riband. Thus adorned, he will +proceed from Whitechapel to the further end of Pall Mall, all the music +of London playing the Marseillaise Hymn before him, and escorted by a +chosen detachment of the _Legion de l'Echafaud_. It were only to be +wished that no ill-fated loyalist, for the imprudence of his zeal, may +stand in the pillory at Charing Cross, under the statue of King Charles +the First, at the time of this grand procession, lest some of the rotten +eggs which the Constitutional Society shall let fly at his indiscreet +head may hit the virtuous murderer of his king. They might soil the +state dress which the ministers of so many crowned heads have admired, +and in which Sir Clement Cotterel is to introduce him at St. James's. + +If Santerre cannot be spared from the constitutional butcheries at home, +Tallien may supply his place, and, in point of figure, with advantage. +He has been habituated to commissions; and he is as well qualified as +Santerre for this. Nero wished the Roman people had but one neck. The +wish of the more exalted Tallien, when he sat in judgment, was, that his +sovereign had eighty-three heads, that he might send one to every one of +the Departments. Tallien will make an excellent figure at Guildhall at +the next Sheriff's feast. He may open the ball with my Lady Mayoress. +But this will be after he has retired from the public table, and gone +into the private room for the enjoyment of more social and unreserved +conversation with the ministers of state and the judges of the bench. +There these ministers and magistrates will hear him entertain the worthy +aldermen with an instructing and pleasing narrative of the manner in +which he made the rich citizens of Bordeaux squeak, and gently led them +by the public credit of the guillotine to disgorge their +anti-revolutionary pelf. + +All this will be the display, and the town-talk, when our regicide is on +a visit of ceremony. At home nothing will equal the pomp and splendor of +the _Hotel de la Republique_. There another scene of gaudy grandeur will +be opened. When his Citizen Excellency keeps the festival, which every +citizen is ordered to observe, for the glorious execution of Louis the +Sixteenth, and renews his oath of detestation of kings, a grand ball of +course will be given on the occasion. Then what a hurly-burly! what a +crowding! what a glare of a thousand flambeaux in the square! what a +clamor of footmen contending at the door! what a rattling of a thousand +coaches of duchesses, countesses, and Lady Marys, choking the way, and +overturning each other, in a struggle who should be first to pay her +court to the _Citoyenne_, the spouse of the twenty-first husband, he +the husband of the thirty-first wife, and to hail her in the rank of +honorable matrons before the four days' duration of marriage is +expired!--Morals, as they were, decorum, the great outguard of the sex, +and the proud sentiment of honor, which makes virtue more respectable, +where it is, and conceals human frailty, where virtue may not be, will +be banished from this land of propriety, modesty, and reserve. + +We had before an ambassador from the most Christian King. We shall have +then one, perhaps two, as lately, from the most Anti-Christian Republic. +His chapel will be great and splendid, formed on the model of the Temple +of Reason at Paris; while the famous ode of the infamous Chenier will be +sung, and a prostitute of the street adored as a goddess. We shall then +have a French ambassador without a suspicion of Popery. One good it will +have: it will go some way in quieting the minds of that synod of zealous +Protestant lay elders who govern Ireland on the pacific principles of +polemic theology, and who now, from dread of the Pope, cannot take a +cool bottle of claret, or enjoy an innocent Parliamentary job, with any +tolerable quiet. + +So far as to the French communication here:--what will be the effect of +our communication there? We know that our new brethren, whilst they +everywhere shut up the churches, increased in Paris, at one time at +least fourfold, the opera-houses, the playhouses, the public shows of +all kinds; and even in their state of indigence and distress, no expense +was spared for their equipment and decoration. They were made an affair +of state. There is no invention of seduction, never wholly wanting in +that place, that has not been increased,--brothels, gaming-houses, +everything. And there is no doubt, but, when they are settled in a +triumphant peace, they will carry all these arts to their utmost +perfection, and cover them with every species of imposing magnificence. +They have all along avowed them as a part of their policy; and whilst +they corrupt young minds through pleasure, they form them to crimes. +Every idea of corporal gratification is carried to the highest excess, +and wooed with all the elegance that belongs to the senses. All elegance +of mind and manners is banished. A theatrical, bombastic, windy +phraseology of heroic virtue, blended and mingled up with a worse +dissoluteness, and joined to a murderous and savage ferocity, forms the +tone and idiom of their language and their manners. Any one, who attends +to all their own descriptions, narratives, and dissertations, will find +in that whole place more of the air of a body of assassins, banditti, +housebreakers, and outlawed smugglers, joined to that of a gang of +strolling players expelled from and exploded orderly theatres, with +their prostitutes in a brothel, at their debauches and bacchanals, than +anything of the refined and perfected virtues, or the polished, +mitigated vices of a great capital. + +Is it for this benefit we open "the usual relations of peace and amity"? +Is it for this our youth of both sexes are to form themselves by travel? +Is it for this that with expense and pains we form their lisping infant +accents to the language of France? I shall be told that this abominable +medley is made rather to revolt young and ingenuous minds. So it is in +the description. So perhaps it may in reality to a chosen few. So it may +be, when the magistrate, the law, and the church frown on such manners, +and the wretches to whom they belong,--when they are chased from the +eye of day, and the society of civil life, into night-cellars and caves +and woods. But when these men themselves are the magistrates,--when all +the consequence, weight, and authority of a great nation adopt +them,--when we see them conjoined with victory, glory, power, and +dominion, and homage paid to them by every government,--it is not +possible that the downhill should not be slid into, recommended by +everything which has opposed it. Let it be remembered that no young man +can go to any part of Europe without taking this place of pestilential +contagion in his way; and whilst the less active part of the community +will be debauched by this travel, whilst children are poisoned at these +schools, our trade will put the finishing hand to our ruin. No factory +will be settled in France, that will not become a club of complete +French Jacobins. The minds of young men of that description will receive +a taint in their religion, their morals, and their politics, which they +will in a short time communicate to the whole kingdom. + +Whilst everything prepares the body to debauch and the mind to crime, a +regular church of avowed atheism, established by law, with a direct and +sanguinary persecution of Christianity, is formed to prevent all +amendment and remorse. Conscience is formally deposed from its dominion +over the mind. What fills the measure of horror is, that schools of +atheism are set up at the public charge in every part of the country. +That some English parents will be wicked enough to send their children +to such schools there is no doubt. Better this island should be sunk to +the bottom of the sea than that (so far as human infirmity admits) it +should not be a country of religion and morals! + +With all these causes of corruption, we may well judge what the general +fashion of mind will be through both sexes and all conditions. Such +spectacles and such examples will overbear all the laws that ever +blackened the cumbrous volumes of our statutes. When royalty shall have +disavowed itself,--when it shall have relaxed all the principles of its +own support,--when it has rendered the system of Regicide fashionable, +and received it as triumphant, in the very persons who have consolidated +that system by the perpetration, of every crime, who have not only +massacred the prince, but the very laws and magistrates which were the +support of royalty, and slaughtered with an indiscriminate proscription, +without regard to either sex or age, every person that was suspected of +an inclination to king, law, or magistracy,--I say, will any one dare to +be loyal? Will any one presume, against both authority and opinion, to +hold up this unfashionable, antiquated, exploded Constitution? + +The Jacobin faction in England must grow in strength and audacity; it +will be supported by other intrigues and supplied by other resources +than yet we have seen in action. Confounded at its growth, the +government may fly to Parliament for its support. But who will answer +for the temper of a House of Commons elected under these circumstances? +Who will answer for the courage of a House of Commons to arm the crown +with the extraordinary powers that it may demand? But the ministers will +not venture to ask half of what they know they want. They will lose half +of that half in the contest; and when they have obtained their nothing, +they will be driven by the cries of faction either to demolish the +feeble works they have thrown up in a hurry, or, in effect, to abandon +them. As to the House of Lords, it is not worth mentioning. The peers +ought naturally to be the pillars of the crown; but when their titles +are rendered contemptible, and their property invidious, and a part of +their weakness, and not of their strength, they will be found so many +degraded and trembling individuals, who will seek by evasion to put off +the evil day of their ruin. Both Houses will be in perpetual oscillation +between abortive attempts at energy and still more unsuccessful attempts +at compromise. You will be impatient of your disease, and abhorrent of +your remedy. A spirit of subterfuge and a tone of apology will enter +into all your proceedings, whether of law or legislation. Your judges, +who now sustain so masculine an authority, will appear more on their +trial than the culprits they have before them. The awful frown of +criminal justice will be smoothed into the silly smile of seduction. +Judges will think to insinuate and soothe the accused into conviction +and condemnation, and to wheedle to the gallows the most artful of all +delinquents. But they will not be so wheedled. They will not submit even +to the appearance of persons on their trial. Their claim to this +exemption will be admitted. The place in which some of the greatest +names which ever distinguished the history of this country have stood +will appear beneath their dignity. The criminal will climb from the dock +to the side-bar, and take his place and his tea with the counsel. From +the bar of the counsel, by a natural progress, he will ascend to the +bench, which long before had been virtually abandoned. They who escape +from justice will not suffer a question upon reputation. They will take +the crown of the causeway; they will be revered as martyrs; they will +triumph as conquerors. Nobody will dare to censure that popular part of +the tribunal whose only restraint on misjudgment is the censure of the +public. They who find fault with the decision will be represented as +enemies to the institution. Juries that convict for the crown will be +loaded with obloquy. The juries who acquit will be held up as models of +justice. If Parliament orders a prosecution, and fails, (as fail it +will,) it will be treated to its face as guilty of a conspiracy +maliciously to prosecute. Its care in discovering a conspiracy against +the state will be treated as a forged plot to destroy the liberty of the +subject: every such discovery, instead of strengthening government, will +weaken its reputation. + +In this state things will be suffered to proceed, lest measures of vigor +should precipitate a crisis. The timid will act thus from character, the +wise from necessity. Our laws had done all that the old condition of +things dictated to render our judges erect and independent; but they +will naturally fail on the side upon which they had taken no +precautions. The judicial magistrates will find themselves safe as +against the crown, whose will is not their tenure; the power of +executing their office will be held at the pleasure of those who deal +out fame or abuse as they think fit. They will begin rather to consult +their own repose and their own popularity than the critical and perilous +trust that is in their hands. They will speculate on consequences, when +they see at court an ambassador whose robes are lined with a scarlet +dyed in the blood of judges. It is no wonder, nor are they to blame, +when they are to consider how they shall answer for their conduct to the +criminal of to-day turned into the magistrate of to-morrow. + +The press------ + +The army------ + +When thus the helm of justice is abandoned, an universal abandonment of +all other posts will succeed. Government will be for a while the sport +of contending factions, who, whilst they fight with one another, will +all strike at her. She will be buffeted and beat forward and backward by +the conflict of those billows, until at length, tumbling from the Gallic +coast, the victorious tenth wave shall ride, like the bore, over all the +rest, and poop the shattered, weather-beaten, leaky, water-logged +vessel, and sink her to the bottom of the abyss. + +Among other miserable remedies that have been found in the _materia +medica_, of the old college, a change of ministry will be proposed, and +probably will take place. They who go out can never long with zeal and +good-will support government in the hands of those they hate. In a +situation of fatal dependence on popularity, and without one aid from +the little remaining power of the crown, it is not to be expected that +they will take on them that odium which more or less attaches upon every +exertion of strong power. The ministers of popularity will lose all +their credit at a stroke, if they pursue any of those means necessary to +give life, vigor, and consistence to government. They will be considered +as venal wretches, apostates, recreant to all their own principles, +acts, and declarations. They cannot preserve their credit, but by +betraying that authority of which they are the guardians. + +To be sure, no prognosticating symptoms of these things have as yet +appeared,--nothing even resembling their beginnings. May they never +appear! May these prognostications of the author be justly laughed at +and speedily forgotten! If nothing as yet to cause them has discovered +itself, let us consider, in the author's excuse, that we have not yet +seen a Jacobin legation in England. The natural, declared, sworn ally of +sedition has not yet fixed its head-quarters in London. + +There never was a political contest, upon better or worse grounds, that +by the heat of party-spirit may not ripen into civil confusion. If ever +a party adverse to the crown should be in a condition here publicly to +declare itself, and to divide, however unequally, the natural force of +the kingdom, they are sure of an aid of fifty thousand men, at ten days' +warning, from the opposite coast of France. But against this infusion of +a foreign force the crown has its guaranties, old and new. But I should +be glad to hear something said of the assistance which loyal subjects in +France have received from other powers in support of that lawful +government which secured their lawful property. I should be glad to +know, if they are so disposed to a neighborly, provident, and +sympathetic attention to their public engagements, by what means they +are to come at us. Is it from the powerful states of Holland we are to +reclaim our guaranty? Is it from the King of Prussia, and his steady +good affections, and his powerful navy, that we are to look for the +guaranty of our security? Is it from the Netherlands, which the French +may cover with the swarms of their citizen-soldiers in twenty-four +hours, that we are to look for this assistance? This is to suppose, too, +that all these powers have no views offensive or necessities defensive +of their own. They will cut out work for one another, and France will +cut out work for them all. + +That the Christian religion cannot exist in this country with such a +fraternity will not, I think, be disputed with me. On that religion, +according to our mode, all our laws and institutions stand, as upon +their base. That scheme is supposed in every transaction of life; and if +that were done away, everything else, as in France, must be changed +along with it. Thus, religion perishing, and with it this Constitution, +it is a matter of endless meditation what order of things would follow +it. But what disorder would fill the space between the present and that +which is to come, in the gross, is no matter of doubtful conjecture. It +is a great evil, that of a civil war. But, in that state of things, a +civil war, which would give to good men and a good cause some means of +struggle, is a blessing of comparison that England will not enjoy. The +moment the struggle begins, it ends. They talk of Mr. Hume's euthanasia +of the British Constitution gently expiring, without a groan, in the +paternal arms of a mere monarchy. In a monarchy!--fine trifling +indeed!--there is no such euthanasia for the British Constitution. + + * * * * * + +The manuscript copy of this Letter ends here. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[9] Here I have fallen into an unintentional mistake. Rider's Almanack +for 1794 lay before me; and, in troth, I then had no other. For variety, +that sage astrologer has made some small changes on the weather side of +1795; but the caution is the same on the opposite page of instruction. + +[10] _Souverains opprimes_.--See the whole proceeding in the +_Proces-Verbal_ of the National Assembly. + +[11] + + Hic auratis volitans argenteus anser + Porticibus GALLOS in limine adesse canebat. + + + +[12] See debates in Parliament upon motions made in both Houses for +prosecuting Mr. Reeves for a libel upon the Constitution, Dec., 1795. + +[13] "In the costume assumed by the members of the legislative body we +almost behold the revival of the extinguished insignia of knighthood," +&c., &c.--See _A View of the Relative State of Great Britain and France +at the Commencement of the Year_ 1796. + + + + +A + +LETTER + +TO + +THE EMPRESS OF RUSSIA. + +NOVEMBER 1, 1791. + + +Madam,--The Comte de Woronzow, your Imperial Majesty's minister, and Mr. +Fawkener, have informed me of the very gracious manner in which your +Imperial Majesty, and, after your example, the Archduke and Archduchess, +have condescended to accept my humble endeavors in the service of that +cause which connects the rights and duties of sovereigns with the true +interest and happiness of their people. + +If, confiding in titles derived from your own goodness, I venture to +address directly to your Imperial Majesty the expressions of my +gratitude for so distinguished an honor, I hope it will not be thought a +presumptuous intrusion. I hope, too, that the willing homage I pay to +the high and ruling virtues which distinguish your Imperial Majesty, and +which form the felicity of so large a part of the world, will not be +looked upon as the language of adulation to power and greatness. In my +humble situation, I can behold majesty in its splendor without being +dazzled, and I am capable of respecting it in its fall. + +It is, Madam, from my strong sense of what is due to dignity in +undeserved misfortune, that I am led to felicitate your Imperial Majesty +on the use you have lately made of your power. The princes and nobility +of France, who from honor and duty, from blood and from principle, are +attached to that unhappy crown, have experienced your favor and +countenance; and there is no doubt that they will finally enjoy the full +benefit of your protection. The generosity of your Imperial Majesty has +induced you to take an interest in their cause; and your sagacity has +made you perceive that in the case of the sovereign of France the cause +of all sovereigns is tried,--that in the case of its church, the cause +of all churches,--and that in the case of its nobility is tried the +cause of all the respectable orders of all society, and even of society +itself. + +Your Imperial Majesty has sent your minister to reside where the crown +of France, in this disastrous eclipse of royalty, can alone truly and +freely be represented, that is, in its royal blood,--where alone the +nation can be represented, that is, in its natural and inherent dignity. +A throne cannot be represented by a prison. The honor of a nation cannot +be represented by an assembly which disgraces and degrades it: at +Coblentz only the king and the nation of France are to be found. + +Your Imperial Majesty, who reigns and lives for glory, has nobly and +wisely disdained to associate your crown with a faction which has for +its object the subversion of all thrones. + +You have not recognized this universal public enemy as a part of the +system of Europe. You have refused to sully the lustre of your empire by +any communion with a body of fanatical usurpers and tyrants, drawn out +of the dregs of society, and exalted to their evil eminence by the +enormity of their crimes,--an assemblage of tyrants, wholly destitute of +any distinguished qualification in a single person amongst them, that +can command reverence from our reason, or seduce it from our +prejudices. These enemies of sovereigns, if at all acknowledged, must be +acknowledged on account of that enmity alone: they have nothing else to +recommend them. + +Madam, it is dangerous to praise any human virtue before the +accomplishment of the tasks which it imposes on itself. But in +expressing my part of what I hope is, or will become, the general voice, +in admiration of what you have done, I run no risk at all. With your +Imperial Majesty, declaration and execution, beginning and conclusion, +are, at their different seasons, one and the same thing. + +On the faith and declaration of some of the first potentates of Europe, +several thousands of persons, comprehending the best men and the best +gentlemen in France, have given up their country, their houses, their +fortunes, their professional situation, their all, and are now in +foreign lands, struggling under the most grievous distresses. Whatever +appearances may menace, nobody fears that they can be finally abandoned. +Such a dereliction could not be without a strong imputation on the +public and private honor of sovereignty itself, nor without an +irreparable injury to its interests. It would give occasion to represent +monarchs as natural enemies to each other, and that they never support +or countenance any subjects of a brother prince, except when they rebel +against him. We individuals, mere spectators of the scene, but who sock +our liberties under the shade of legal authority, and of course +sympathize with the sufferers in that cause, never can permit ourselves +to believe that such an event can disgrace the history of our time. The +only thing to be feared is delay, in winch are included many mischiefs. +The constancy of the oppressed will be broken; the power of tyrants +will be confirmed. Already the multitude of French officers, drawn from +their several corps by hopes inspired by the freely declared disposition +of sovereigns, have left all the posts in which they might one day have +effectually served the good cause abandoned to the enemy. + +Tour Imperial Majesty's just influence, which is still greater than your +extensive power, will animate and expedite the efforts of other +sovereigns. From your wisdom other states will learn that they who wait +until all the powers of Europe are at once in motion can never move at +all. It would add to the unexampled calamities of our time, if the +uncommon union of sentiment in so many powers should prove the very +cause of defeating the benefit which ought to flow from their general +good disposition. No sovereign can run any risk from the designs of +other powers, whilst engaged in tins glorious and necessary work. If any +attempt could be feared, your Imperial Majesty's power and justice would +secure your allies against all danger. Madam, your glory will be +complete, if, after having given peace to Europe by your moderation, you +shall bestow stability on all its governments by your vigor and +decision. The debt which your Imperial Majesty's august predecessors +have contracted to the ancient manners of Europe, by means of which they +civilized a vast empire, will be nobly repaid by preserving those +manners from the hideous change with which they are now menaced. By the +intervention of Russia the world will be preserved from barbarism and +ruin. + +A private individual, of a remote country, in himself wholly without +importance, unauthorized and unconnected, not as an English subject, +but as a citizen of the world, presumes to submit his thoughts to one of +the greatest and wisest sovereigns that Europe has seen. He does it +without fear, because he does not involve in his weakness (if such it +is) his king, his country, or his friends. He is not' afraid that he +shall offend your Imperial Majesty,--because, secure in itself, true +greatness is always accessible, and because respectfully to speak what +we conceive to be truth is the best homage which can be paid to true +dignity. + +I am, Madam, with the utmost possible respect and veneration, + +Your Imperial Majesty's + +Most obedient and most humble servant, + +EDM. BURKE. + +BEACONSFIELD, November 1st, 1791. + + + + +A + +LETTER + +TO + +SIR CHARLES BINGHAM, BART., + +ON THE + +IRISH ABSENTEE TAX. + +OCTOBER 30, 1773. + + +NOTE. + + + From authentic documents found with the copy of this Letter + among Mr. Burke's papers, it appears that in the year 1773 a + project of imposing a tax upon all proprietors of landed + estates in Ireland, whose ordinary residence should be in + Great Britain, had been adopted and avowed by his Majesty's + ministers at that time. A remonstrance against this measure, + as highly unjust and impolitic, was presented to the + ministers by several of the principal Irish absentees, and + the project was subsequently abandoned. + + +LETTER. + +Dear Sir,--I am much flattered by your very obliging letter, and the +rather because it promises an opening to our future correspondence. This +may be my only indemnification for very great losses. One of the most +odious parts of the proposed Absentee Tax is its tendency to separate +friends, and to make as ugly breaches in private society as it must make +in the unity of the great political body. I am sure that much of the +satisfaction of some circles in London will be lost by it. Do you think +that our friend Mrs. Vesey will suffer her husband to vote for a tax +that is to destroy the evenings at Bolton Row? I trust we shall have +other supporters of the same sex, equally powerful, and equally +deserving to be so, who will not abandon the common cause of their own +liberties and our satisfactions. We shall be barbarized on both sides of +the water, if we do not see one another now and then. _We_ shall sink +into surly, brutish Johns, and _you_ will degenerate into wild Irish. It +is impossible that we should be the wiser or the more agreeable, +certainly we shall not love one another the better, for this forced +separation, which our ministers, who have already done so much for the +dissolution of every other sort of good connection, are now meditating +for the further improvement of this too well united empire. Their next +step will be to encourage all the colonies, about thirty separate +governments, to keep their people from all intercourse with each other +and with the mother country. A gentleman of New York or Barbadoes will +be as much gazed at as a strange animal from Nova Zembla or Otaheite; +and those rogues, the travellers, will tell us what stories they please +about poor old Ireland. + +In all seriousness, (though I am a great deal more than half serious in +what I have been saying,) I look upon this projected tax in a very evil +light; I think it is not advisable; I am sure it is not necessary; and +as it is not a mere matter of finance, but involves a political question +of much, importance, I consider the principle and precedent as far worse +than the thing itself. You are too kind in imagining I can suggest +anything new upon the subject. The objections to it are very glaring, +and must strike the eyes of all those who have not their reasons for +shutting them against evident truth. I have no feelings or opinions on +this subject which I do not partake with all the sensible and informed +people that I meet with. At first I could scarcely meet with any one who +could believe that this scheme originated from the English government. +They considered it not only as absurd, but as something monstrous and +unnatural. In the first instance, it strikes at the power of this +country; in the end, at the union of the whole empire. I do not mean to +express, most certainly I do not entertain in my mind, anything +invidious concerning the superintending authority of Great Britain. But +if it be true that the several bodies which make up this complicated +mass are to be preserved as one empire, an authority sufficient to +preserve that unity, and by its equal weight and pressure to +consolidate the various parts that compose it, must reside somewhere: +that somewhere can only be in England. Possibly any one member, +distinctly taken, might decide in favor of that residence within itself; +but certainly no member would give its voice for any other except this. +So that I look upon the residence of the supreme power to be settled +here: not by force, or tyranny, or even by mere long usage, but by the +very nature of things, and the joint consent of the whole body. + +If all this be admitted, then without question this country must have +the sole right to the imperial legislation: by which I mean that law +which regulates the polity and economy of the several parts, as they +relate to one another and to the whole. But if any of the parts, which +(not for oppression, but for order) are placed in a subordinate +situation, will assume to themselves the power of hindering or checking +the resort of their municipal subjects to the centre, or even to any +other part of the empire, they arrogate to themselves the imperial +rights, which do not, which cannot, belong to them, and, so far as in +them lies, destroy the happy arrangement of the entire empire. + +A free communication by _discretionary residence_ is necessary to all +the other purposes of communication. For what purpose are the Irish and +Plantation laws sent hither, but as means of preserving this sovereign +constitution? Whether such a constitution was originally right or wrong +this is not the time of day to dispute. If any evils arise from it, let +us not strip it of what may be useful in it. By taking the English Privy +Council into your legislature, you obtain a new, a further, and possibly +a more liberal consideration of all your acts. If a local legislature +shall by oblique means tend to deprive any of the people of this +benefit, and shall make it penal to them to follow into England the laws +which may affect them, then the English Privy Council will have to +decide upon your acts without those lights that may enable them to judge +upon what grounds you made them, or how far they ought to be modified, +received, or rejected. + +To what end is the ultimate appeal in judicature lodged in this kingdom, +if men may be disabled from following their suits here, and may be taxed +into an absolute _denied of justice_? You observe, my dear Sir, that I +do not assert that in all cases two shillings will necessarily cut off +this means of correcting legislative and judicial mistakes, and thus +amount to a denial of justice. I might, indeed, state cases in which +this very quantum of tax would be fully sufficient to defeat this right. +But I argue not on the case, but on the principle, and I am sure the +principle implies it. They who may restrain may prohibit; they who may +impose two shillings may impose ten shillings in the pound; and those +who may condition the tax to six months' annual absence may carry that +condition to six weeks, or even to six days, and thereby totally defeat +the wise means which have been provided for extensive and impartial +justice, and for orderly, well-poised, and well-connected government. + +What is taxing the resort to and residence in any place, but declaring +that your connection with that place is a grievance? Is not such an +Irish tax as is now proposed a virtual declaration that England is a +foreign country, and a renunciation on your part of the principle of +_common naturalization_, which runs through this whole empire? + +Do you, or does any Irish gentleman, think it a mean privilege, that, +the moment he sets his foot upon this ground, he is to all intents and +purposes an Englishman? You will not be pleased with a law which by its +operation tends to disqualify you from a seat in this Parliament; and if +your own virtue or fortune, or if that of your children, should carry +you or them to it, should you like to be excluded from the possibility +of a peerage in this kingdom? If in Ireland we lay it down as a maxim, +that a residence in Great Britain is a political evil, and to be +discouraged by penal taxes, you must necessarily reject all the +privileges and benefits which are connected with such a residence. + +I can easily conceive that a citizen of Dublin, who looks no further +than his counter, may think that Ireland will be repaid for such a loss +by any small diminution of taxes, or any increase in the circulation of +money that may be laid out in the purchase of claret or groceries in his +corporation. In such a man an error of that kind, as it would be +natural, would be excusable. But I cannot think that any educated man, +any man who looks with an enlightened eye on the interest of Ireland, +can believe that it is not highly for the advantage of Ireland, that +this Parliament, which, whether right or wrong, whether we will or not, +will make some laws to bind Ireland, should always have in it some +persons who by connection, by property, or by early prepossessions and +affections, are attached to the welfare of that country. I am so clear +upon this point, not only from the clear reason of the thing, but from +the constant course of my observation, by now having sat eight sessions +in Parliament, that I declare it to you as my sincere opinion, that (if +you must do either the one or the other) it would be wiser by far, and +far better for Ireland, that some new privileges should attend the +estates of Irishmen, members of the two Houses here, than that their +characters should be stained by penal impositions, and their properties +loaded by unequal and unheard-of modes of taxation. I do really trust, +that, when the matter comes a little to be considered, a majority of our +gentlemen will never consent to establish such a principle of +disqualification against themselves and their posterity, and, for the +sake of gratifying the schemes of a transitory administration of the +cockpit or the castle, or in compliance with the lightest part of the +most vulgar and transient popularity, fix so irreparable an injury on +the permanent interest of their country. + +This law seems, therefore, to me to go directly against the fundamental +points of the legislative and judicial constitution of these kingdoms, +and against the happy communion of their privileges. But there is +another matter in the tax proposed, that contradicts as essentially a +very great principle necessary for preserving the union of the various +parts of a state; because it does, in effect, discountenance mutual +intermarriage and inheritance, things that bind countries more closely +together than any laws or constitutions whatsoever. Is it right that a +woman who marries into Ireland, and perhaps well purchases her jointure +or her dower there, should not after her husband's death have it in her +choice to return to her country and her friends without being taxed for +it? If an Irish heiress should marry into an English family, and that +great property in both countries should thereby come to be united in +this common issue, shall the descendant of that marriage abandon his +natural connection, his family interests, his public and his private +duties, and be compelled to take up his residence in Ireland? Is there +any sense or any justice in it, unless you affirm that there should be +no such intermarriage and no such mutual inheritance between the +natives? Is there a shadow of reason, that, because a Lord Rockingham, a +Duke of Devonshire, a Sir George Savile, possess property in Ireland, +which has descended to them without any act of theirs, they should +abandon their duty in Parliament, and spend the winters in Dublin? or, +having spent the session in Westminster, must they abandon their seats +and all their family interests in Yorkshire and Derbyshire, and pass the +rest of the year in Wicklow, in Cork, or Tyrone? + +See what the consequence must be from a municipal legislature +considering itself as an unconnected body, and attempting to enforce a +partial residence. A man may have property in more parts than two of +this empire. He may have property in Jamaica and in North America, as +well as in England and Ireland. I know some that have property in all of +them. What shall we say to this case? After the poor distracted citizen +of the whole empire has, in compliance with your partial law, removed +his family, bid adieu to his connections, and settled himself quietly +and snug in a pretty box by the Liffey, he hears that the Parliament of +Great Britain is of opinion that all English estates ought to be spent +in England, and that they will tax him double, if he does not return. +Suppose him then (if the nature of the two laws will permit it) +providing a flying camp, and dividing his year as well as he can +between England and Ireland, and at the charge of two town houses and +two country-houses in both kingdoms; in this situation he receives an +account, that a law is transmitted from Jamaica, and another from +Pennsylvania, to tax absentees from these provinces, which are +impoverished by the European residence of the possessors of their lands. +How is he to escape this _ricochet_ cross-firing of so many opposite +batteries of police and regulation? If he attempts to comply, he is +likely to be more a citizen of the Atlantic Ocean and the Irish Sea than +of any of these countries. The matter is absurd and ridiculous, and, +while ever the idea of mutual marriages, inheritances, purchases, and +privileges subsist, can never be carried into execution with common +sense or common justice. + +I do not know how gentlemen of Ireland reconcile such an idea to their +own liberties, or to the natural use and enjoyment of their estates. If +any of their children should be left in a minority, and a guardian +should think, as many do, (it matters not whether properly or no,) that +his ward had better he educated in a school or university here than in +Ireland, is he sure that he can justify the bringing a tax of ten per +cent, perhaps twenty, on his pupil's estate, by giving what in his +opinion is the best education in general, or the best for that pupil's +particular character and circumstances? Can he justify his sending him +to travel, a necessary part of the higher style of education, and, +notwithstanding what some narrow writers have said, of great benefit to +all countries, but very particularly so to Ireland? Suppose a guardian, +under the authority or pretence of such a tax of police, had prevented +our dear friend, Lord Charlemont, from going abroad, would he have lost +no satisfaction? would his friends have lost nothing in the companion? +would his country have lost nothing in the cultivated taste with which +he has adorned it in so many ways? His natural elegance of mind would +undoubtedly do a great deal; but I will venture to assert, without the +danger of being contradicted, that he adorns his present residence in +Ireland much the more for having resided a long time out of it. Will Mr. +Flood himself think he ought to have been driven by taxes into Ireland, +whilst he prepared himself by an English education to understand and to +defend the rights of the subject in Ireland, or to support the dignity +of government there, according as his opinions, or the situation of +things, may lead him to take either part, upon respectable principles? I +hope it is not forgot that an Irish act of Parliament sends its youth to +England for the study of the law, and compels a residence in the inns of +court hero for some years. Will you send out with one breath and recall +with another? This act plainly provides for that intercourse which +supposes the strictest union in laws and policy, in both which the +intended tax supposes an entire separation. + +It would be endless to go into all the inconveniences this tax will lead +to, in the conduct of private life, and the use of property. How many +infirm people are obliged to change their climate, whose life depends +upon that change! How many families straitened in their circumstances +are there, who, from the shame, sometimes from the utter impossibility +otherwise of retrenching, are obliged to remove from their country, in +order to preserve their estates in their families! You begin, then, to +burden these people precisely at the time when their circumstances of +health and fortune render them rather objects of relief and +commiseration. + +I know very well that a great proportion of the money of every +subordinate country will flow towards the metropolis. This is +unavoidable. Other inconveniences, too, will result to particular parts: +and why? Why, because they are particular parts,--each a member of a +greater, and not an whole within itself. But those members are to +consider whether these inconveniences are not fully balanced, perhaps +more than balanced, by the united strength of a great and compact body. +I am sensible, too, of a difficulty that will be started against the +application of some of the principles which I reason upon to the case of +Ireland. It will be said, that Ireland, in many particulars, is not +bound to consider itself as a part of the British body; because this +country, in many instances, is mistaken enough to treat you as +foreigners, and draws away your money by absentees, without suffering +you to enjoy your natural advantages in trade and commerce. No man +living loves restrictive regulations of any kind less than myself; at +best, nine times in ten, they are little better than laborious and +vexatious follies. Often, as in your case, they are great oppressions, +as well as great absurdities. But still an injury is not always a reason +for retaliation; nor is the folly of others with regard to us a reason +for imitating it with regard to them. Before we attempt to retort, we +ought to consider whether we may not injure ourselves even more than our +adversary; since, in the contest who shall go the greatest length in +absurdity, the victor is generally the greatest sufferer. Besides, when +there is an unfortunate emulation in restraints and oppressions, the +question of _strength_ is of the highest importance. It little becomes +the feeble to be unjust. Justice is the shield of the weak; and when +they choose to lay this down, and fight naked in the contest of mere +power, the event will be what must be expected from such imprudence. + +I ought to beg your pardon for running into this length. You want no +arguments to convince you on this subject, and you want no resources of +matter to convince others. I ought, too, to ask pardon for having +delayed my answer so long; but I received your letter on Tuesday, in +town, and I was obliged to come to the country on business. From the +country I write at present; but this day I shall go to town again. I +shall see Lord Rockingham, who has spared neither time nor trouble in +making a vigorous opposition to this inconsiderate measure. I hope to be +able to send you the papers which will give you information of the steps +he has taken. He has pursued this business with the foresight, +diligence, and good sense with which he generally resists +unconstitutional attempts of government. A life of disinterestedness, +generosity, and public spirit are his titles to have it believed that +the effect which the tax may have upon his private property is not the +sole nor the principal motive to his exertions. I know he is of opinion +that the opposition in Ireland ought to be carried on with that spirit +as if no aid was expected from this country, and here as if nothing +would be done in Ireland: many things have been lost by not acting in +this manner. + +I am told that you are not likely to be alone in the generous stand you +are to make against this unnatural monster of court popularity. It is +said, Mr. Hussey, who is so very considerable at present, and who is +everything in expectation, will give you his assistance. I rejoice to +see (that very rare spectacle) a good mind, a great genius, and public +activity united together, and united so early in life. By not running +into every popular humor, he may depend upon it, the popularity of his +character will wear the better. + + Non ponebat enim rumores ante salutem; + Ergo postque magisque viri nunc gloria claret. + +Adieu, my dear Sir. Give my best respects to Lady Bingham; and believe +me, with great truth and esteem, + +Your most obedient and most humble servant, + +EDM. BURKE. + +BEACONSFIELD, 30th October, 1773. + +TO SIR CHARLES BINGHAM. + + + + +A + +LETTER + +TO + +THE HON. CHARLES JAMES FOX, + +ON THE AMERICAN WAR. + +OCTOBER 8, 1777. + + +My Dear Charles,--I am, on many accounts, exceedingly pleased with your +journey to Ireland. I do not think it was possible to dispose better of +the interval between this and the meeting of Parliament. I told you as +much, in the same general terms, by the post. My opinion of the +infidelity of that conveyance hindered me from being particular. I now +sit down with malice prepense to kill you with a very long letter, and +must take my chance for some safe method of conveying the dose. Before I +say anything to you of the place you are in, or the business of it, on +which, by the way, a great deal might be said, I will turn myself to the +concluding part of your letter from Chatsworth. + +You are sensible that I do not differ from you in many things; and most +certainly I do not dissent from the main of your doctrine concerning the +heresy of depending upon contingencies. You must recollect how uniform +my sentiments have been on that subject. I have ever wished a settled +plan of our own, founded in the very essence of the American business, +wholly unconnected with the events of the war, and framed in such a +manner as to keep up our credit and maintain our system at home, in +spite of anything which may happen abroad. I am now convinced, by a long +and somewhat vexatious experience, that such a plan is absolutely +impracticable. I think with you, that some faults in the constitution +of those whom we must love and trust are among the causes of this +impracticability; they are faults, too, that one can hardly wish them +perfectly cured of, as I am afraid they are intimately connected with +honest, disinterested intentions, plentiful fortunes, assured rank, and +quiet homes. A great deal of activity and enterprise can scarcely ever +be expected from such men, unless some horrible calamity is just over +their heads, or unless they suffer some gross personal insults from +power, the resentment of which may be as unquiet and stimulating a +principle in their minds as ambition is in those of a different +complexion. To say the truth, I cannot greatly blame them. We live at a +time when men are not repaid in fame for what they sacrifice in interest +or repose. + +On the whole, when I consider of what discordant, and particularly of +what fleeting materials the opposition has been all along composed, and +at the same time review what Lord Rockingham has done, with that and +with his own shattered constitution, for these last twelve years, I +confess I am rather surprised that he has done so much and persevered so +long, than that he has felt now and then some cold fits, and that he +grows somewhat languid and desponding at last. I know that he, and those +who are much prevalent with him, though they are not thought so much +devoted to popularity as others, do very much look to the people, and +more than I think is wise in them, who do so little to guide and direct +the public opinion. Without this they act, indeed; but they act as it +were from compulsion, and because it is impossible, in their situation, +to avoid taking some part. All this it is impossible to change, and to +no purpose to complain of. + +As to that popular humor which is the medium we float in, if I can +discern anything at all of its present state, it is far worse than I +have ever known or could ever imagine it. The faults of the people are +not popular vices; at least, they are not such as grow out of what we +used to take to be the English temper and character. The greatest number +have a sort of an heavy, lumpish acquiescence in government, without +much respect or esteem for those that compose it. I really cannot avoid +making some very unpleasant prognostics from this disposition of the +people. I think that many of the symptoms must have struck you: I will +mention one or two that are to me very remarkable. You must know that at +Bristol we grow, as an election interest, and even as a party interest, +rather stronger than we were when I was chosen. We have just now a +majority in the corporation. In this state of matters, what, think you, +have they done? They have voted their freedom to Lord Sandwich and Lord +Suffolk!--to the first, at the very moment when the American privateers +were domineering in the Irish Sea, and taking the Bristol traders in the +Bristol Channel;--to the latter, when his remonstrances on the subject +of captures were the jest of Paris and of Europe. This fine step was +taken, it seems, in honor of the zeal of these two profound statesmen in +the prosecution of John the Painter: so totally negligent are they of +everything essential, and so long and so deeply affected with trash the +most low and contemptible; just as if they thought the merit of Sir John +Fielding was the most shining point in the character of great +ministers, in the most critical of all times, and, of all others, the +most deeply interesting to the commercial world! My best friends in the +corporation had no other doubts on the occasion than whether it did not +belong to me, by right of my representative capacity, to be the bearer +of this auspicious compliment. In addition to this, if it could receive +any addition, they now employ me to solicit, as a favor of no small +magnitude, that, after the example of Newcastle, they may be suffered to +arm vessels for their own defence in the Channel. Their memorial, under +the seal of Merchants' Hall, is now lying on the table before me. Not a +soul has the least sensibility, on finding themselves, now for the first +time, obliged to act as if the community were dissolved, and, after +enormous payments towards the common protection, each part was to defend +itself, as if it were a separate state. + +I don't mention Bristol as if that were the part furthest gone in this +mortification. Far from it: I know that there is, rather, a little more +life in us than in any other place. In Liverpool they are literally +almost ruined by this American war; but they love it as they suffer from +it. In short, from whatever I see, and from whatever quarter I hear, I +am convinced that everything that is not absolute stagnation is +evidently a party-spirit very adverse to our politics, and to the +principles from whence they arise. There are manifest marks of the +resurrection of the Tory party. They no longer criticize, as all +disengaged people in the world will, on the acts of government; but they +are silent under every evil, and hide and cover up every ministerial +blander and misfortune, with the officious zeal of men who think they +have a party of their own to support in power. The Tories do +universally think their power and consequence involved in the success of +this American business. The clergy are astonishingly warm in it; and +what the Tories are, when embodied and united with their natural head, +the crown, and animated by their clergy, no man knows better than +yourself. As to the Whigs, I think them far from extinct. They are, what +they always were, (except by the able use of opportunities,) by far the +weakest party in this country. They have not yet learned the application +of their principles to the present state of things; and as to the +Dissenters, the main effective part of the Whig strength, they are, to +use a favorite expression of our American campaign style, "not all in +force." They will do very little, and, as far as I can discern, are +rather intimidated than provoked at the denunciations of the court in +the Archbishop of York's sermon. I thought that sermon rather imprudent, +when I first saw it; but it seems to have done its business. + +In this temper of the people, I do not wholly wonder that our Northern +friends look a little towards events. In war, particularly, I am afraid +it must be so. There is something so weighty and decisive in the events +of war, something that so completely overpowers the imagination of the +vulgar, that all counsels must in a great degree be subordinate to and +attendant on them. I am sure it was so in the last war, very eminently. +So that, on the whole, what with the temper of the people, the temper of +our own friends, and the domineering necessities of war, we must quietly +give up all ideas of any settled, preconcerted plan. We shall be lucky +enough, if, keeping ourselves attentive and alert, we can contrive to +profit of the occasions as they arise: though I am sensible that those +who are best provided with a general scheme are fittest to take +advantage of all contingencies. However, to act with any people with the +least degree of comfort, I believe we must contrive a little to +assimilate to their character. We must gravitate towards them, if we +would keep in the same system, or expect that they should approach +towards us. They are, indeed, worthy of much concession and management. +I am quite convinced that they are the honestest public men that ever +appeared in this country, and I am sure that they are the wisest, by +far, of those who appear in it at present. None of those who are +continually complaining of them, but are themselves just as chargeable +with all their faults, and have a decent stock of their own into the +bargain. They (our friends) are, I admit, as you very truly represent +them, but indifferently qualified for storming a citadel. After all, God +knows whether this citadel is to be stormed by them, or by anybody else, +by the means they use, or by any means. I know that as they are, +abstractedly speaking, to blame, so there are those who cry out against +them for it, not with a friendly complaint, as we do, but with the +bitterness of enemies. But I know, too, that those who blame them for +want of enterprise have shown no activity at all against the common +enemy: all their skill and all their spirit have been shown only in +weakening, dividing, and indeed destroying their allies. What they are +and what we are is now pretty evidently experienced; and it is certain, +that, partly by our common faults, but much more by the difficulties of +our situation, and some circumstances of unavoidable misfortune, we are +in little better than a sort of _cul-de-sac_. For my part, I do all I +can to give ease to my mind in this strange position. I remember, some +years ago, when I was pressing some points with great eagerness and +anxiety, and complaining with great vexation to the Duke of Richmond of +the little progress I make, he told me kindly, and I believe very truly, +that, though he was far from thinking so himself, other people could not +be persuaded I had not some latent private interest in pushing these +matters, which I urged with an earnestness so extreme, and so much +approaching to passion. He was certainly in the right. I am thoroughly +resolved to give, both to myself and to my friends, less vexation on +these subjects than hitherto I have done,--much less, indeed. + +If _you_ should grow too earnest, you will be still more inexcusable +than I was. Your having entered into affairs so much younger ought to +make them too familiar to you to be the cause of much agitation, and you +have much more before you for your work. Do not be in haste. Lay your +foundations deep in public opinion. Though (as you are sensible) I have +never given you the least hint of advice about joining yourself in a +declared connection with our party, nor do I now, yet, as I love that +party very well, and am clear that you are better able to serve them +than any man I know, I wish that things should be so kept as to leave +you mutually very open to one another in all changes and contingencies; +and I wish this the rather, because, in order to be very great, as I am +anxious that you should be, (always presuming that you are disposed to +make a good use of power,) you will certainly want some better support +than merely that of the crown. For I much doubt, whether, with all your +parts, you are the man formed for acquiring real interior favor in this +court, or in any; I therefore wish you a firm ground in the country; and +I do not know so firm and so sound a bottom to build on as our +party.--Well, I have done with this matter; and you think I ought to +have finished it long ago. Now I turn to Ireland. + +Observe, that I have not heard a word of any news relative to it, from +thence or from London; so that I am only going to state to you my +conjectures as to facts, and to speculate again on these conjectures. I +have a strong notion that the lateness of our meeting is owing to the +previous arrangements intended in Ireland. I suspect they mean that +Ireland should take a sort of lead, and act an efficient part in this +war, both with men and money. It will sound well, when we meet, to tell +us of the active zeal and loyalty of the people of Ireland, and contrast +it with the rebellious spirit of America. It will be a popular +topic,--the perfect confidence of Ireland in the power of the British +Parliament. From thence they will argue the little danger which any +dependency of the crown has to apprehend from the enforcement of that +authority. It will be, too, somewhat flattering to the country +gentlemen, who might otherwise begin to be sullen, to hold out that the +burden is not wholly to rest upon them; and it will pique our pride to +be told that Ireland has cheerfully stepped forward: and when a +dependant of this kingdom has already engaged itself in another year's +war, merely for our dignity, how can we, who are principals in the +quarrel, hold off? This scheme of policy seems to me so very obvious, +and is likely to be of so much service to the present system, that I +cannot conceive it possible they should neglect it, or something like +it. They have already put the people of Ireland to the proof. Have they +not borne the Earl of Buckinghamshire, the person who was employed to +move the fiery committee in the House of Lords in order to stimulate the +ministry to this war, who was in the chair, and who moved the +resolutions? + +It is within a few days of eleven years since I was in Ireland, and then +after an absence of two. Those who have been absent from any scene for +even a much shorter time generally lose the true practical notion of the +country, and of what may or may not be done in it. When I knew Ireland, +it was very different from the state of England, where government is a +vast deal, the public something, but individuals comparatively very +little. But if Ireland bears any resemblance to what it was some years +ago, neither government nor public opinion can do a great deal; almost +the whole is in the hands of a few leading people. The populace of +Dublin, and some parts in the North, are in some sort an exception. But +the Primate, Lord Hillsborough, and Lord Hertford have great sway in the +latter; and the former may be considerable or not, pretty much as the +Duke of Leinster pleases. On the whole, the success of government +usually depended on the bargain made with a very few men. The resident +lieutenancy may have made some change, and given a strength to +government, which formerly, I know, it had not; still, however, I am of +opinion, the former state, though in other hands perhaps, and in another +manner, still continues. The house you are connected with is grown into +a much greater degree of power than it had, though it was very +considerable, at the period I speak of. If the D. of L. takes a popular +part, he is sure of the city of Dublin, and he has a young man attached +to him who stands very forward in Parliament and in profession, and, by +what I hear, with more good-will and less envy than usually attends so +rapid a progress. The movement of one or two principal men, if they +manage the little popular strength which is to be found in Dublin and +Ulster, may do a great deal, especially when money is to be saved and +taxes to be kept off. I confess I should despair of your succeeding with +any of them, if they cannot be satisfied that every job which they can +look for on account of carrying this measure would be just as sure to +them for their ordinary support of government. They are essential to +government, which at this time must not be disturbed, and their +neutrality will be purchased at as high a price as their alliance +offensive and defensive. Now, as by supporting they may get as much as +by betraying their country, it must be a great leaning to turpitude that +can make them take a part in this war. I am satisfied, that, if the Duke +of Leinster and Lord Shannon would act together, this business could not +go on; or if either of them took part with Ponsonby, it would have no +better success. Hutchinson's situation is much altered since I saw you. +To please Tisdall, he had been in a manner laid aside at the Castle. It +is now to be seen whether he prefers the gratification of his resentment +and his appetite for popularity, both of which are strong enough in him, +to the advantages which his independence gives him, of making a new +bargain, and accumulating new offices on his heap. Pray do not be asleep +in this scene of action,--at this time, if I am right, the principal. +The Protestants of Ireland will be, I think, in general, backward: they +form infinitely the greatest part of the landed and the moneyed +interests; and they will not like to pay. The Papists are reduced to +beasts of burden: they will give all they have, their shoulders, readily +enough, if they are flattered. Surely the state of Ireland ought forever +to teach parties moderation in their victories. People crushed by law +have no hopes but from power. If laws are their enemies, they will be +enemies to laws; and those who have much to hope and nothing to lose +will always be dangerous, more or less. But this is not our present +business. If all this should prove a dream, however, let it not hinder +you from writing to me and tolling me so. You will easily refute, in +your conversation, the little topics which they will set afloat: such +as, that Ireland is a boat, and must go with the ship; that, if the +Americans contended only for their liberties, it would be +different,--but since they have declared independence, and so forth-- + +You are happy in enjoying Townshend's company. Remember me to him. How +does he like his private situation in a country where he was the son of +the sovereign?--Mrs. Burke and the two Richards salute you cordially. + +E.B. + +BEACONSFIELD, October 8th, 1777. + + + + +A + +LETTER + +TO + +THE MARQUIS OF ROCKINGHAM, + +WITH + +ADDRESSES TO THE KING, + +AND + +THE BRITISH COLONISTS IN NORTH AMERICA, + +IN RELATION TO + +THE MEASURES OF GOVERNMENT IN THE AMERICAN CONTEST, AND A PROPOSED +SECESSION OF THE OPPOSITION FROM PARLIAMENT. + +JANUARY, 1777. + + +NOTE. + + + This Letter, with the two Addresses which follow it, was + written upon occasion of a proposed secession from Parliament + of the members in both Houses who had opposed the measures of + government, in the contest between this country and the + colonies in North America, from the time of the repeal of the + Stamp Act. It appears, from an indorsement written by Mr. + Burke on the manuscript, that he warmly recommended the + measure, but (for what reasons is not stated) it was not + adopted. + + +LETTER + +TO THE MARQUIS OF ROCKINGHAM. + +My Dear Lord,--I am afraid that I ought rather to beg your pardon for +troubling you at all in this season of repose, than to apologize for +having been so long silent on the approaching business. It comes upon +us, not indeed in the most agreeable manner, but it does come-upon us; +and I believe your friends in general are in expectation of finding your +Lordship resolved in what way you are to meet it. The deliberation is +full of difficulties; but the determination is necessary. + +The affairs of America seem to be drawing towards a crisis. The Howes +are at this time in possession of, or are able to awe, the whole middle +coast of America, from Delaware to the western boundary of Massachusetts +Bay; the naval barrier on the side of Canada is broken; a great tract of +country is open for the supply of the troops; the river Hudson opens a +way into the heart of the provinces; and nothing can, in all +probability, prevent an early and offensive campaign. What the Americans +_have_ done is, in their circumstances, truly astonishing; it is, +indeed, infinitely more than I expected from them. But having done so +much, for some short time I began to entertain an opinion that they +might do more. It is now, however, evident that they cannot look +standing armies in the face. They are inferior in everything, even in +numbers,--I mean, in the number of those whom they keep in constant duty +and in regular pay. There seem, by the best accounts, not to be above +ten or twelve thousand men, at most, in their grand army. The rest are +militia, and not wonderfully well composed or disciplined. They decline +a general engagement,--prudently enough, if their object had been to +make the war attend upon a treaty of good terms of subjection; but when +they look further, this will not do. An army that is obliged at all +times and in all situations to decline an engagement may delay their +ruin, but can never defend their country. Foreign assistance they have +little or none, nor are likely soon to have more. France, in effect, has +no king, nor any minister accredited enough either with the court or +nation to undertake a design of great magnitude. + +In this state of things, I persuade myself Franklin is come to Paris to +draw from that court a definitive and satisfactory answer concerning the +support of the colonies. If he cannot get such an answer, (and I am of +opinion that at present he cannot,) then it is to be presumed he is +authorized to negotiate with Lord Stormont on the basis of dependence on +the crown. This I take to be his errand: for I never can believe that he +is come thither as a fugitive from his cause in the hour of its +distress, or that he is going to conclude a long life, which has +brightened every hour it has continued, with so foul and dishonorable a +flight. On this supposition, I thought it not wholly impossible that the +Whig party might be made a sort of mediators of the peace. It is +unnatural to suppose, that, in making an accommodation, the Americans +should not choose rather to give credit to those who all along have +opposed the measure of ministers, than to throw themselves wholly on the +mercy of their bitter, uniform, and systematic enemies. It is, indeed, +the victorious enemy that has the terms to offer; the vanquished party +and their friends are, both of them, reduced in their power; and it is +certain that those who are utterly broken and subdued have no option. +But, as this is hardly yet the case of the Americans, in this middle +state of their affairs, (much impaired, but not perfectly ruined,) one +would think it must be their interest to provide, if possible, some +further security for the terms which they may obtain from their enemies. +If the Congress could be brought to declare in favor of those terms for +which one hundred members of the House of Commons voted last year, with +some civility to the party which held out those terms, it would +undoubtedly have an effect to revive the cause of our liberties in +England, and to give the colonies some sort of mooring and anchorage in +this country. It seemed to me that Franklin might be made to feel the +propriety of such a step; and as I have an acquaintance with him, I had +a strong desire of taking a turn to Paris. Everything else failing, one +might obtain a better knowledge of the general aspect of affairs abroad +than, I believe, any of us possess at present. The Duke of Portland +approved the idea. But when I had conversed with the very few of your +Lordship's friends who were in town, and considered a little more +maturely the constant temper and standing maxims of the party, I laid +aside the design,--not being desirous of risking the displeasure of +those for whose sake alone I wished to take that fatiguing journey at +this severe season of the year. + +The Duke of Portland has taken with him some heads of deliberation, +which were the result of a discourse with his Grace and Mr. Montagu at +Burlington House. It seems essential to the cause that your Lordship +should meet your friends with some settled plan either of action or +inaction. Your friends will certainly require such a plan; and I am sure +the state of affairs requires it, whether they call for it or not. As to +the measure of a secession with reasons, after rolling the matter in my +head a good deal, and turning it an hundred ways, I confess I still +think it the most advisable, notwithstanding the serious objections that +lie against it, and indeed the extreme uncertainty of all political +measures, especially at this time. It provides for your honor. I know of +nothing else that can so well do this. It is something, perhaps all, +that can be done in our present situation. Some precaution, in this +respect, is not without its motives. That very estimation for which you +have sacrificed everything else is in some danger of suffering in the +general wreck; and perhaps it is likely to suffer the more, because you +have hitherto confided more than was quite prudent in the clearness of +your intentions, and in the solidity of the popular judgment upon them. +The former, indeed, is out of the power of events; the latter is full of +levity, and the very creature of fortune. However, such as it is, (and +for one I do not think I am inclined to overvalue it,) both our interest +and our duty make it necessary for us to attend to it very carefully, so +long as we act a part in public. The measure you take for this purpose +may produce no immediate effect; but with regard to the party, and the +principles for whose sake the party exists, all hope of their +preservation or recovery depends upon your preserving your reputation. + +By the conversation of some friends, it seemed as if they were willing +to fall in with this design, because it promised to emancipate them from +the servitude of irksome business, and to afford them an opportunity of +retiring to ease and tranquillity. If that be their object in the +secession and addresses proposed, there surely never were means worse +chosen to gain their end; and if this be any part of the project, it +were a thousand times better it were never undertaken. The measure is +not only unusual, and as such critical, but it is in its own nature +strong and vehement in a high degree. The propriety, therefore, of +adopting it depends entirely upon the spirit with which it is supported +and followed. To pursue violent measures with languor and irresolution +is not very consistent in speculation, and not more reputable or safe in +practice. If your Lordship's friends do not go to this business with +their whole hearts, if they do not feel themselves uneasy without it, if +they do not undertake it with a certain degree of zeal, and even with +warmth and indignation, it had better be removed wholly out of our +thoughts. A measure of less strength, and more in the beaten circle of +affairs, if supported with spirit and industry, would be on all accounts +infinitely more eligible. We have to consider what it is that in this +undertaking we have against us. We have the weight of King, Lords, and +Commons in the other scale; we have against us, within a trifle, the +whole body of the law; we oppose the more considerable part of the +landed and mercantile interests; we contend, in a manner, against the +whole Church; we set our faces against great armies flushed with +victory, and navies who have tasted of civil spoil, and have a strong +appetite for more; our strength, whatever it is, must depend, for a good +part of its effect, upon events not very probable. In such a situation, +such a step requires not only great magnanimity, but unwearied activity +and perseverance, with a good deal, too, of dexterity and management, to +improve every accident in our favor. + +The delivery of this paper may have very important consequences. It is +true that the court may pass it over in silence, with a real or affected +contempt. But this I do not think so likely. If they do take notice of +it, the mildest course will be such an address from Parliament as the +House of Commons made to the king on the London Remonstrance in the year +1769. This address will be followed by addresses of a similar tendency, +from all parts of the kingdom, in order to overpower you with what they +will endeavor to pass as the united voice and sense of the nation. But +if they intend to proceed further, and to take steps of a more decisive +nature, you are then to consider, not what they may legally and justly +do, but what a Parliament omnipotent in power, influenced with party +rage and personal resentment, operating under the implicit military +obedience of court discipline, is capable of. Though they have made some +successful experiments on juries, they will hardly trust enough to them +to order a prosecution for a supposed libel. They may proceed in two +ways: either by an _impeachment_, in which the Tories may retort on the +Whigs (but with better success, though in a worse cause) the +proceedings in the case of Sacheverell, or they may, without this form, +proceed, as against the Bishop of Rochester, by a bill of pains and +penalties more or less grievous. The similarity of the cases, or the +justice, is (as I said) out of the question. The mode of proceeding has +several very ancient and very recent precedents. None of these methods +is impossible. The court may select three or four of the most +distinguished among you for the victims; and therefore nothing is more +remote from the tendency of the proposed act than any idea of retirement +or repose. On the contrary, you have, all of you, as principals or +auxiliaries, a much better [hotter?] and more desperate conflict, in all +probability, to undergo, than any you have been yet engaged in. The only +question is, whether the risk ought to be run for the chance (and it is +no more) of recalling the people of England to their ancient principles, +and to that personal interest which formerly they took in all public +affairs. At any rate, I am sure it is right, if we take this step, to +take it with a full view of the consequences, and with minds and +measures in a state of preparation to meet them. It is not becoming that +your boldness should arise from a want of foresight. It is more +reputable, and certainly it is more safe too, that it should be grounded +on the evident necessity of encountering the dangers which you foresee. + +Your Lordship will have the goodness to excuse me, if I state in strong +terms the difficulties attending a measure which on the whole I heartily +concur in. But as, from my want of importance, I can be personally +little subject to the most trying part of the consequences, it is as +little my desire to urge others to dangers in which I am myself to have +no inconsiderable a share. + +If this measure should be thought too great for our strength or the +dispositions of the times, then the point will be to consider what is to +be done in Parliament. A weak, irregular, desultory, peevish opposition +there will be as much too little as the other may be too big. Our scheme +ought to be such as to have in it a succession of measures: else it is +impossible to secure anything like a regular attendance; opposition will +otherwise always carry a disreputable air; neither will it be possible, +without that attendance, to persuade the people that we are in earnest. +Above all, a motion should be well digested for the first day. There is +one thing in particular I wish to recommend to your Lordship's +consideration: that is, the opening of the doors of the House of +Commons. Without this, I am clearly convinced, it will be in the power +of ministry to make our opposition appear without doors just in what +light they please. To obtain a gallery is the easiest thing in the +world, if we are satisfied to cultivate the esteem of our adversaries by +the resolution and energy with which we act against them: but if their +satisfaction and good-humor be any part of our object, the attempt, I +admit, is idle. + +I had some conversation, before I left town, with the D. of M. He is of +opinion, that, if you adhere to your resolution of seceding, you ought +not to appear on the first day of the meeting. He thinks it can have no +effect, except to break the continuity of your conduct, and thereby to +weaken and fritter away the impression of it. It certainly will seem +odd to give solemn reasons for a discontinuance of your attendance in +Parliament, after having two or three times returned to it, and +immediately after a vigorous act of opposition. As to trials of the +temper of the House, there have been of that sort so many already that I +see no reason for making another that would not hold equally good for +another after that,--particularly as nothing has happened in the least +calculated to alter the disposition of the House. If the secession were +to be general, such an attendance, followed by such an act, would have +force; but being in its nature incomplete and broken, to break it +further by retreats and returns to the chase must entirely destroy its +effect. I confess I am quite of the D. of M.'s opinion in this point. + +I send your Lordship a corrected copy of the paper: your Lordship will +be so good to communicate it, if you should approve of the alterations, +to Lord J.C. and Sir G.S. I showed it to the D. of P. before his Grace +left town; and at his, the D. of P.'s, desire, I have sent it to the D. +of R. The principal alteration is in the pages last but one. It is made +to remove a difficulty which had been suggested to Sir G.S., and which +he thought had a good deal in it. I think it much the better for that +alteration. Indeed, it may want still more corrections, in order to +adapt it to the present or probable future state of things. + +What shall I say in excuse for this long letter, which frightens me when +I look back upon it? Your Lordship will take it, and all in it, with +your usual incomparable temper, which carries you through so much both +from enemies and friends. My most humble respects to Lady R., and +believe me, with the highest regard, ever, &o. + +E.B. + +I hear that Dr. Franklin has had a most extraordinary reception at Paris +from all ranks of people. + +BEACONSFIELD, Monday night, Jan. 6, 1777. + + + + +ADDRESS TO THE KING. + + +We, your Majesty's most dutiful and loyal subjects, several of the peers +of the realm, and several members of the House of Commons chosen by the +people to represent them in Parliament, do in our individual capacity, +but with hearts filled with a warm affection to your Majesty, with a +strong attachment to your royal house, and with the most unfeigned +devotion to your true interest, beg leave, at this crisis of your +affairs, in all humility to approach your royal presence. + +Whilst we lament the measures adopted by the public councils of the +kingdom, we do not mean to question the legal validity of their +proceedings. We do not desire to appeal from them to any person +whatsoever. We do not dispute the conclusive authority of the bodies in +which we have a place over all their members. We know that it is our +ordinary duty to submit ourselves to the determinations of the majority +in everything, except what regards the just defence of our honor and +reputation. But the situation into which the British empire has been +brought, and the conduct to which we are reluctantly driven in that +situation, we hold ourselves bound by the relation in which we stand +both to the crown and the people clearly to explain to your Majesty and +our country. + +We have been called upon in the speech from the throne at the opening of +this session of Parliament, in a manner peculiarly marked, singularly +emphatical, and from a place from whence anything implying censure falls +with no common weight, to concur in unanimous approbation of those +measures which have produced our present distresses and threaten us in +future with others far more grievous. We trust, therefore, that we shall +stand justified in offering to our sovereign and the public our reasons +for persevering inflexibly in our uniform dissent from every part of +those measures. We lament them from an experience of their mischief, as +we originally opposed them from a sure foresight of their unhappy and +inevitable tendency. + +We see nothing in the present events in the least degree sufficient to +warrant an alteration in our opinion. We were always steadily averse to +this civil war,--not because we thought it impossible that it should be +attended with victory, but because we were fully persuaded that in such +a contest victory would only vary the mode of our ruin, and by making it +less immediately sensible would render it the more lasting and the more +irretrievable. Experience had but too fully instructed us in the +possibility of the reduction of a free people to slavery by foreign +mercenary armies. But we had an horror of becoming the instruments in a +design, of which, in our turn, we might become the victims. Knowing the +inestimable value of peace, and the contemptible value of what was +sought by war, we wished to compose the distractions of our country, not +by the use of foreign arms, but by prudent regulations in our own +domestic policy. We deplored, as your Majesty has done in your speech +from the throne, the disorders which prevail in your empire; but we are +convinced that the disorders of the people, in the present time and in +the present place, are owing to the usual and natural cause of such +disorders at all times and in all places, where such have +prevailed,--the misconduct of government;--that they are owing to plans +laid in error, pursued with obstinacy, and conducted without wisdom. + +We cannot attribute so much to the power of faction, at the expense of +human nature, as to suppose, that, in any part of the world, a +combination of men, few in number, not considerable in rank, of no +natural hereditary dependencies, should be able, by the efforts of their +policy alone, or the mere exertion of any talents, to bring the people +of your American dominions into the disposition which has produced the +present troubles. We cannot conceive, that, without some powerful +concurring cause, any management should prevail on some millions of +people, dispersed over an whole continent, in thirteen provinces, not +only unconnected, but, in many particulars of religion, manners, +government, and local interest, totally different and adverse, +voluntarily to submit themselves to a suspension of all the profits of +industry and all the comforts of civil life, added to all the evils of +an unequal war, carried on with circumstances of the greatest asperity +and rigor. This, Sir, we conceive, could never have happened, but from a +general sense of some grievance so radical in its nature and so +spreading in its effects as to poison all the ordinary satisfactions of +life, to discompose the frame of society, and to convert into fear and +hatred that habitual reverence ever paid by mankind to an ancient and +venerable government. + +That grievance is as simple in its nature, and as level to the most +ordinary understanding, as it is powerful in affecting the most languid +passions: it is-- + +"AN ATTEMPT MADE TO DISPOSE OF THE PROPERTY OF A WHOLE PEOPLE WITHOUT +THEIR CONSENT." + +Your Majesty's English subjects in the colonies, possessing the ordinary +faculties of mankind, know that to live under such a plan of government +is not to live in a state of freedom. Your English subjects in the +colonies, still impressed with the ancient feelings of the people from +whom they are derived, cannot live under a government which does not +establish freedom as its basis. + +This scheme, being, therefore, set up in direct opposition to the rooted +and confirmed sentiments and habits of thinking of an whole people, has +produced the effects which ever must result from such a collision of +power and opinion. For we beg leave, with all duty and humility, to +represent to your Majesty, (what we fear has been industriously +concealed from you,) that it is not merely the opinion of a very great +number, or even of the majority, but the universal sense of the whole +body of the people in those provinces, that the practice of taxing, in +the mode and on the principles which have been lately contended for and +enforced, is subversive of all their rights. + +This sense has been declared, as we understand on good information, by +the unanimous voice of all their Assemblies: each Assembly also, on this +point, is perfectly unanimous within itself. It has been declared as +fully by the actual voice of the people without these Assemblies as by +the constructive voice within them, as well by those in that country who +addressed as by those who remonstrated; and it is as much the avowed +opinion of those who have hazarded their all, rather than take up arms +against your Majesty's forces, as of those who have run the same risk to +oppose them. The difference among them is not on the grievance, but on +the mode of redress; and we are sorry to say, that they who have +conceived hopes from the placability of the ministers who influence the +public councils of this kingdom disappear in the multitude of those who +conceive that passive compliance only confirms and emboldens oppression. + +The sense of a whole people, most gracious sovereign, never ought to be +contemned by wise and beneficent rulers,--whatever may be the abstract +claims, or even rights, of _the supreme power_. We have been too early +instructed, and too long habituated to believe, that the only firm seat +of all authority is in the minds, affections, and interests of the +people, to change our opinions on the theoretic reasonings of +speculative men, or for the convenience of a mere temporary arrangement +of state. It is not consistent with equity or wisdom to set at defiance +the general feelings of great communities, and of all the orders which +compose them. Much power is tolerated, and passes unquestioned, where +much is yielded to opinion. All is disputed, where everything is +enforced. + +Such are our sentiments on the duty and policy of conforming to the +prejudices of a whole people, even where the foundation of such +prejudices may be false or disputable. But permit us to lay at your +Majesty's feet our deliberate judgment on the real merits of that +principle, the violation of which is the known ground and origin of +these troubles. We assure your Majesty, that, on our parts, we should +think ourselves unjustifiable, as good citizens, and not influenced by +the true spirit of Englishmen, if, with any effectual means of +prevention in our hands, we were to submit to taxes to which we did not +consent, either directly, or by a representation of the people securing +to us the substantial benefit of an absolutely free disposition of our +own property in that important case. And we add, Sir, that, if fortune, +instead of blessing us with a situation where we may have daily access +to the propitious presence of a gracious prince, had fixed us in +settlements on the remotest part of the globe, we must carry these +sentiments with us, as part of our being,--persuaded that the distance +of situation would render this privilege in the disposal of property but +the more necessary. If no provision had been made for it, such provision +ought to be made or permitted. Abuses of subordinate authority increase, +and all means of redress lessen, as the distance of the subject removes +him from the seat of the supreme power. What, in those circumstances, +can save him from the last extremes of indignity and oppression, but +something left in his own hands which may enable him to conciliate the +favor and control the excesses of government? When no means of power to +awe or to oblige are possessed, the strongest ties which connect mankind +in every relation, social and civil, and which teach them mutually to +respect each other, are broken. Independency, from that moment, +virtually exists. Its formal declaration will quickly follow. Such must +be our feelings for ourselves: we are not in possession of another rule +for our brethren. + +When the late attempt practically to annihilate that inestimable +privilege was made, great disorders and tumults, very unhappily and very +naturally, arose from it. In this state of things, we were of opinion +that satisfaction ought instantly to be given, or that, at least, the +punishment of the disorder ought to be attended with the redress of the +grievance. We were of opinion, that, if our dependencies had so outgrown +the positive institutions made for the preservation of liberty in this +kingdom, that the operation of their powers was become rather a pressure +than a relief to the subjects in the colonies, wisdom dictated that the +spirit of the Constitution should rather be applied to their +circumstances, than its authority enforced with violence in those very +parts where its reason became wholly inapplicable. + +Other methods were then recommended and followed, as infallible means of +restoring peace and order. We looked upon them to be, what they have +since proved to be, the cause of inflaming discontent into disobedience, +and resistance into revolt. The subversion of solemn, fundamental +charters, on a suggestion of abuse, without citation, evidence, or +hearing,--the total suspension of the commerce of a great maritime city, +the capital of a great maritime province, during the pleasure of the +crown,--the establishment of a military force, not accountable to the +ordinary tribunals of the country in which it was kept up,--these and +other proceedings at that time, if no previous cause of dissension had +subsisted, were sufficient to produce great troubles: unjust at all +times, they were then irrational. + +We could not conceive, when disorders had arisen from the complaint of +one violated right, that to violate every other was the proper means of +quieting an exasperated people. It seemed to us absurd and preposterous +to hold out, as the means of calming a people in a state of extreme +inflammation, and ready to take up arms, the austere law which a rigid +conqueror would impose as the sequel of the most decisive victories. + +Recourse, indeed, was at the same time had to force; and we saw a force +sent out, enough to menace liberty, but not to awe opposition,--tending +to bring odium on the civil power, and contempt on the military,--at +once to provoke and encourage resistance. Force was sent out not +sufficient to hold one town; laws were passed to inflame thirteen +provinces. + +This mode of proceeding, by harsh laws and feeble armies, could not be +defended on the principle of mercy and forbearance. For mercy, as we +conceive, consists, not in the weakness of the means, but in the +benignity of the ends. We apprehend that mild measures may be powerfully +enforced, and that acts of extreme rigor and injustice may be attended +with as much feebleness in the execution as severity in the formation. + +In consequence of these terrors, which, falling upon some, threatened +all, the colonies made a common cause with the sufferers, and proceeded, +on their part, to acts of resistance. In that alarming situation, we +besought your Majesty's ministers to entertain some distrust of the +operation of coercive measures, and to profit of their experience. +Experience had no effect. The modes of legislative rigor were construed, +not to have been erroneous in their policy, but too limited in their +extent. New severities were adopted. The fisheries of your people in +America followed their charters; and their mutual combination to defend +what they thought their common rights brought on a total prohibition of +their mutual commercial intercourse. No distinction of persons or merits +was observed: the peaceable and the mutinous, friends and foes, were +alike involved, as if the rigor of the laws had a certain tendency to +recommend the authority of the legislator. + +Whilst the penal laws increased in rigor, and extended in application +over all the colonies, the direct force was applied but to one part. Had +the great fleet and foreign army since employed been at that time called +for, the greatness of the preparation would have declared the magnitude +of the danger. The nation would have been alarmed, and taught the +necessity of some means of reconciliation with our countrymen in +America, who, whenever they are provoked to resistance, demand a force +to reduce them to obedience full as destructive to us as to them. But +Parliament and the people, by a premeditated concealment of their real +situation, were drawn into perplexities which furnished excuses for +further armaments, and whilst they were taught to believe themselves +called to suppress a riot, they found themselves involved in a mighty +war. + +At length British blood was spilled by British hands: a fatal era, which +we must ever deplore, because your empire will forever feel it. Your +Majesty was touched with a sense of so great a disaster. Your paternal +breast was affected with the sufferings of your English subjects in +America. In your speech from the throne, in the beginning of the session +of 1775, you were graciously pleased to declare yourself inclined to +relieve their distresses and to pardon their errors. You felt their +sufferings under the late penal acts of Parliament. But your ministry +felt differently. Not discouraged by the pernicious effects of all they +had hitherto advised, and notwithstanding the gracious declaration of +your Majesty, they obtained another act of Parliament, in which the +rigors of all the former were consolidated, and embittered by +circumstances of additional severity and outrage. The whole trading +property of America (even unoffending shipping in port) was +indiscriminately and irrecoverably given, as the plunder of foreign +enemies, to the sailors of your navy. This property was put out of the +reach of your mercy. Your people were despoiled; and your navy, by a +new, dangerous, and prolific example, corrupted with the plunder of +their countrymen. Your people in that part of your dominions were put, +in their general and political, as well as their personal capacity, +wholly out of the protection of your government. + +Though unwilling to dwell on all the improper modes of carrying on this +unnatural and ruinous war, and which have led directly to the present +unhappy separation of Great Britain and its colonies, we must beg leave +to represent two particulars, which we are sure must have been entirely +contrary to your Majesty's order or approbation. Every course of action +in hostility, however that hostility may be just or merited, is not +justifiable or excusable. It is the duty of those who claim to rule over +others not to provoke them beyond the necessity of the case, nor to +leave stings in their minds which must long rankle even when the +appearance of tranquillity is restored. We therefore assure your Majesty +that it is with shame and sorrow we have seen several acts of hostility +which could have no other tendency than incurably to alienate the minds +of your American subjects. To excite, by a proclamation issued by your +Majesty's governor, an universal insurrection of negro slaves in any of +the colonies is a measure full of complicated horrors, absolutely +illegal, suitable neither to the practice of war nor to the laws of +peace. Of the same quality we look upon all attempts to bring down on +your subjects an irruption of those fierce and cruel tribes of savages +and cannibals in whom the vestiges of human nature are nearly effaced by +ignorance and barbarity. They are not fit allies for your Majesty in a +war with your people. They are not fit instruments of an English +government. These and many other acts we disclaim as having advised, or +approved when done; and we clear ourselves to your Majesty, and to all +civilized nations, from any participation whatever, before or after the +fact, in such unjustifiable and horrid proceedings. + +But there is one weighty circumstance which we lament equally with the +causes of the war, and with the modes of carrying it on,--that no +disposition whatsoever towards peace or reconciliation has ever been +shown by those who have directed the public councils of this kingdom, +either before the breaking out of these hostilities or during the +unhappy continuance of them. Every proposition made in your Parliament +to remove the original cause of these troubles, by taking off taxes +obnoxious for their principle or their design, has been +overruled,--every bill brought in for quiet rejected, even on the first +proposition. The petitions of the colonies have not been admitted even +to an hearing. The very possibility of public agency, by which such +petitions could authentically arrive at Parliament, has been evaded and +chicaned away. All the public declarations which indicate anything +resembling a disposition to reconciliation seem to us loose, general, +equivocal, capable of various meanings, or of none; and they are +accordingly construed differently, at different times, by those on whose +recommendation they have been made: being wholly unlike the precision +and stability of public faith, and bearing no mark of that ingenuous +simplicity and native candor and integrity which formerly characterized +the English nation. + +Instead of any relaxation of the claim of taxing at the discretion of +Parliament, your ministers have devised a new mode of enforcing that +claim, much more effectual for the oppression of the colonies, though +not for your Majesty's service, both as to the quantity and application, +than any of the former methods; and their mode has been expressly held +out by ministers as a plan not to be departed from by the House of +Commons, and as the very condition on which the legislature is to accept +the dependence of the colonies. + +At length, when, after repeated refusals to hear or to conciliate, an +act dissolving your government, by putting your people in America out of +your protection, was passed, your ministers suffered several months to +elapse without affording to them, or to any community or any individual +amongst them, the means of entering into that protection, even on +unconditional submission, contrary to your Majesty's gracious +declaration from the throne, and in direct violation of the public +faith. + +We cannot, therefore, agree to unite in new severities against the +brethren of our blood for their asserting an independency, to which we +know, in our conscience, they have been necessitated by the conduct of +those very persons who now make use of that argument to provoke us to a +continuance and repetition of the acts which in a regular series have +led to this great misfortune. + +The reasons, dread Sir, which have been used to justify this +perseverance in a refusal to hear or conciliate have been reduced into a +sort of Parliamentary maxims which we do not approve. The first of these +maxims is, "that the two Houses ought not to receive (as they have +hitherto refused to receive) petitions containing matter derogatory to +any part of the authority they claim." We conceive this maxim and the +consequent practice to be unjustifiable by reason or the practice of +other sovereign powers, and that it must be productive, if adhered to, +of a total separation between this kingdom and its dependencies. The +supreme power, being in ordinary cases the ultimate judge, can, as we +conceive, suffer nothing in having any part of his rights excepted to, +or even discussed before himself. We know that sovereigns in other +countries, where the assertion of absolute regal power is as high as the +assertion of absolute power in any politic body can possibly be here, +have received many petitions in direct opposition to many of their +claims of prerogative,--have listened to them,--condescended to discuss, +and to give answers to them. This refusal to admit even the discussion +of any part of an undefined prerogative will naturally tend to +annihilate any privilege that can be claimed by every inferior dependent +community, and every subordinate order in the state. + +The next maxim which has been put as a bar to any plan of accommodation +is, "that no offer of terms of peace ought to be made, before Parliament +is assured that these terms will be accepted." On this we beg leave to +represent to your Majesty, that, if, in all events, the policy of this +kingdom is to govern the people in your colonies as a free people, no +mischief can possibly happen from a declaration to them, and to the +world, of the manner and form in which Parliament proposes that they +shall enjoy the freedom it protects. It is an encouragement to the +innocent and meritorious, that they at least shall enjoy those +advantages which they patiently expected rather from the benignity of +Parliament than their own efforts. Persons more contumacious may also +see that they are resisting terms of perhaps greater freedom and +happiness than they are now in arms to obtain. The glory and propriety +of offered mercy is neither tarnished nor weakened by the folly of those +who refuse to take advantage of it. + +We cannot think that the declaration of independency makes any natural +difference in the reason and policy of the offer. No prince out of the +possession of his dominions, and become a sovereign _de jure_ only, ever +thought it derogatory to his rights or his interests to hold out to his +former subjects a distinct prospect of the advantages to be derived from +his readmission, and a security for some of the most fundamental of +those popular privileges in vindication of which he had been deposed. On +the contrary, such offers have been almost uniformly made under similar +circumstances. Besides, as your Majesty has been graciously pleased, in +your speech from the throne, to declare your intention of restoring +your people in the colonies to a state of law and liberty, no objection +can possibly lie against defining what that law and liberty are; because +those who offer and those who are to receive terms frequently differ +most widely and most materially in the signification of these words, and +in the objects to which they apply. + +To say that we do not know, at this day, what the grievances of the +colonies are (be they real or pretended) would be unworthy of us. But +whilst we are thus waiting to be informed of what we perfectly know, we +weaken the powers of the commissioners,--we delay, perhaps we lose, the +happy hour of peace,--we are wasting the substance of both +countries,--we are continuing the effusion of human, of Christian, of +English blood. + +We are sure that we must have your Majesty's heart along with us, when +we declare in favor of mixing something conciliatory with our force. +Sir, we abhor the idea of making a conquest of our countrymen. We wish +that they may yield to well-ascertained, well-authenticated, and +well-secured terms of reconciliation,--not that your Majesty should owe +the recovery of your dominions to their total waste and destruction. +Humanity will not permit us to entertain such a desire; nor will the +reverence we bear to the civil rights of mankind make us even wish that +questions of great difficulty, of the last importance, and lying deep in +the vital principles of the British Constitution, should be solved by +the arms of foreign mercenary soldiers. + +It is not, Sir, from a want of the most inviolable duty to your Majesty, +not from a want of a partial and passionate regard to that part of your +empire in which we reside, and which we wish to be supreme, that we +have hitherto withstood all attempts to render the supremacy of one part +of your dominions inconsistent with the liberty and safety of all the +rest. The motives of our opposition are found in those very sentiments +which we are supposed to violate. For we are convinced beyond a doubt, +that a system of dependence which leaves no security to the people for +any part of their freedom in their own hands cannot be established in +any inferior member of the British empire, without consequentially +destroying the freedom of that very body in favor of whose boundless +pretensions such a scheme is adopted. We know and feel that arbitrary +power over distant regions is not within the competence, nor to be +exercised agreeably to the forms or consistently with the spirit, of +great popular assemblies. If such assemblies are called to a nominal +share in the exercise of such power, in order to screen, under general +participation, the guilt of desperate measures, it tends only the more +deeply to corrupt the deliberative character of those assemblies, in +training them to blind obedience, in habituating them to proceed upon +grounds of fact with which they can rarely be sufficiently acquainted, +and in rendering them executive instruments of designs the bottom of +which they cannot possibly fathom. + +To leave any real freedom to Parliament, freedom must be left to the +colonies. A military government is the only substitute for civil +liberty. That the establishment of such a power in America will utterly +ruin our finances (though its certain effect) is the smallest part of +our concern. It will become an apt, powerful, and certain engine for the +destruction of our freedom here. Great bodies of armed men, trained to +a contempt of popular assemblies representative of an English +people,--kept up for the purpose of exacting impositions without their +consent, and maintained by that exaction,--instruments in subverting, +without any process of law, great ancient establishments and respected +forms of governments,--set free from, and therefore above, the ordinary +English tribunals of the country where they serve,--these men cannot so +transform themselves, merely by crossing the sea, as to behold with love +and reverence, and submit with profound obedience to, the very same +things in Great Britain which in America they had been taught to +despise, and had been accustomed to awe and humble. All your Majesty's +troops, in the rotation of service, will pass through this discipline +and contract these habits. If we could flatter ourselves that this would +not happen, we must be the weakest of men; we must be the worst, if we +were indifferent whether it happened or not. What, gracious sovereign, +is the empire of America to us, or the empire of the world, if we lose +our own liberties? We deprecate this last of evils. We deprecate the +effect of the doctrines which must support and countenance the +government over conquered Englishmen. + +As it will be impossible long to resist the powerful and equitable +arguments in favor of the freedom of these unhappy people that are to be +drawn from the principle of our own liberty, attempts will be made, +attempts have been made, to ridicule and to argue away this principle, +and to inculcate into the minds of your people other maxims of +government and other grounds of obedience than those which have +prevailed at and since the glorious Revolution. By degrees, these +doctrines, by being convenient, may grow prevalent. The consequence is +not certain; but a general change of principles rarely happens among a +people without leading to a change of government. + +Sir, your throne cannot stand secure upon the principles of +unconditional submission and passive obedience,--on powers exercised +without the concurrence of the people to be governed,--on acts made in +defiance of their prejudices and habits,--on acquiescence procured by +foreign mercenary troops, and secured by standing armies. These may +possibly be the foundation of other thrones: they must be the subversion +of yours. It was not to passive principles in our ancestors that we owe +the honor of appearing before a sovereign who cannot feel that he is a +prince without knowing that we ought to be free. The Revolution is a +departure from the ancient course of the descent of this monarchy. The +people at that time reentered into their original rights; and it was not +because a positive law authorized what was then done, but because the +freedom and safety of the subject, the origin and cause of all laws, +required a proceeding paramount and superior to them. At that ever +memorable and instructive period, the letter of the law was superseded +in favor of the substance of liberty. To the free choice, therefore, of +the people, without either King or Parliament, we owe that happy +establishment out of which both King and Parliament were regenerated. +From that great principle of liberty have originated the statutes +confirming and ratifying the establishment from which your Majesty +derives your right to rule over us. Those statutes have not given us +our liberties: our liberties have produced them. Every hour of your +Majesty's reign, your title stands upon the very same foundation on +which it was at first laid; and we do not know a better on which it can +possibly be placed. + +Convinced, Sir, that you cannot have different rights and a different +security in different parts of your dominions, we wish to lay an even +platform for your throne, and to give it an unmovable stability, by +laying it on the general freedom of your people, and by securing to your +Majesty that confidence and affection in all parts of your dominions +which makes your best security and dearest title in this the chief seat +of your empire. + +Such, Sir, being, amongst us, the foundation of monarchy itself, much +more clearly and much more peculiarly is it the ground of all +Parliamentary power. Parliament is a security provided for the +protection of freedom, and not a subtile fiction, contrived to amuse the +people in its place. The authority of both Houses can still less than +that of the crown be supported upon different principles in different +places, so as to be for one part of your subjects a protector of +liberty, and for another a fund of despotism, through which prerogative +is extended by occasional powers, whenever an arbitrary will finds +itself straitened by the restrictions of law. Had it seemed good to +Parliament to consider itself as the indulgent guardian and strong +protector of the freedom of the subordinate popular assemblies, instead +of exercising its powers to their annihilation, there is no doubt that +it never could have been their inclination, because not their interest, +to raise questions on the extent of Parliamentary rights, or to +enfeeble privileges which were the security of their own. Powers evident +from necessity, and not suspicious from an alarming mode or purpose in +the exertion, would, as formerly they were, be cheerfully submitted to; +and these would have been fully sufficient for conservation of unity in +the empire, and for directing its wealth to one common centre. Another +use has produced other consequences; and a power which refuses to be +limited by moderation must either be lost, or find other more distinct +and satisfactory limitations. + +As for us, a supposed, or, if it could be, a real, participation in +arbitrary power would never reconcile our minds to its establishment. We +should be ashamed to stand before your Majesty, boldly asserting in our +own favor inherent rights which bind and regulate the crown itself, and +yet insisting on the exercise, in our own persons, of a more arbitrary +sway over our fellow-citizens and fellow-freemen. + +These, gracious sovereign, are the sentiments which we consider +ourselves as bound, in justification of our present conduct, in the most +serious and solemn manner to lay at your Majesty's feet. We have been +called by your Majesty's writs and proclamations, and we have been +authorized, either by hereditary privilege or the choice of your people, +to confer and treat with your Majesty, in your highest councils, upon +the arduous affairs of your kingdom. We are sensible of the whole +importance of the duty which this constitutional summons implies. We +know the religious punctuality of attendance which, in the ordinary +course, it demands. It is no light cause which, even for a time, could +persuade us to relax in any part of that attendance. The British empire +is in convulsions which threaten its dissolution. Those particular +proceedings which cause and inflame this disorder, after many years' +incessant struggle, we find ourselves wholly unable to oppose and +unwilling to behold. All our endeavors having proved fruitless, we are +fearful at this time of irritating by contention those passions which we +have found it impracticable to compose by reason. We cannot permit +ourselves to countenance, by the appearance of a silent assent, +proceedings fatal to the liberty and unity of the empire,--proceedings +which exhaust the strength of all your Majesty's dominions, destroy all +trust and dependence of our allies, and leave us, both at home and +abroad, exposed to the suspicious mercy and uncertain inclinations of +our neighbor and rival powers, to whom, by this desperate course, we are +driving our countrymen for protection, and with whom we have forced them +into connections, and may bind them by habits and by interests,--an evil +which no victories that may be obtained, no severities which may be +exorcised, ever will or can remove. + +If but the smallest hope should from any circumstances appear of a +return to the ancient maxims and true policy of this kingdom, we shall +with joy and readiness return to our attendance, in order to give our +hearty support to whatever means may be left for alleviating the +complicated evils which oppress this nation. + +If this should not happen, we have discharged our consciences by this +faithful representation to your Majesty and our country; and however few +in number, or however we may be overborne by practices whose operation +is but too powerful, by the revival of dangerous exploded principles, +or by the misguided zeal of such arbitrary factions as formerly +prevailed in this kingdom, and always to its detriment and disgrace, we +have the satisfaction of standing forth and recording our names in +assertion of those principles whose operation hath, in better times, +made your Majesty a great prince, and the British dominions a mighty +empire. + + + + +ADDRESS + +TO THE + +BRITISH COLONISTS IN NORTH AMERICA. + + +The very dangerous crisis into which the British empire is brought, as +it accounts for, so it justifies, the unusual step we take in addressing +ourselves to you. + +The distempers of the state are grown to such a degree of violence and +malignity as to render all ordinary remedies vain and frivolous. In such +a deplorable situation, an adherence to the common forms of business +appears to us rather as an apology to cover a supine neglect of duty +than the means of performing it in a manner adequate to the exigency +that presses upon us. The common means we have already tried, and tried +to no purpose. As our last resource, we turn ourselves to you. We +address you merely in our private capacity, vested with no other +authority than what will naturally attend those in whose declarations of +benevolence you have no reason to apprehend any mixture of dissimulation +or design. + +We have this title to your attention: we call upon it in a moment of the +utmost importance to us all. We find, with infinite concern, that +arguments are used to persuade you of the necessity of separating +yourselves from your ancient connection with your parent country, +grounded on a supposition that a general principle of alienation and +enmity to you had pervaded the whole of this kingdom, and that there +does no longer subsist between you and us any common and kindred +principles upon which we can possibly unite, consistently with those +ideas of liberty in which you have justly placed your whole happiness. + +If this fact were true, the inference drawn from it would be +irresistible. But nothing is less founded. We admit, indeed, that +violent addresses have been procured with uncommon pains by wicked and +designing men, purporting to be the genuine voice of the whole people of +England,--that they have been published by authority here, and made +known to you by proclamations, in order, by despair and resentment, +incurably to poison your minds against the origin of your race, and to +render all cordial reconciliation between us utterly impracticable. The +same wicked men, for the same bad purposes, have so far surprised the +justice of Parliament as to cut off all communication betwixt us, except +what is to go in their own fallacious and hostile channel. + +But we conjure you by the invaluable pledges which have hitherto united, +and which we trust will hereafter lastingly unite us, that you do not +suffer yourselves to be persuaded or provoked into an opinion that you +are at war with this nation. Do not think that the whole, or even the +uninfluenced majority, of Englishmen in this island are enemies to their +own blood on the American continent. Much delusion has been practised, +much corrupt influence treacherously employed. But still a large, and we +trust the largest and soundest, part of this kingdom perseveres in the +most perfect unity of sentiments, principles, and affections with you. +It spreads out a large and liberal platform of common liberty, upon +which we may all unite forever. It abhors the hostilities which have +been carried on against you, as much as you who feel the cruel effect of +them. It has disclaimed in the most solemn manner, at the foot of the +throne itself, the addresses which tended to irritate your sovereign +against his colonies. We are persuaded that even many of those who +unadvisedly have put their hands to such intemperate and inflammatory +addresses have not at all apprehended to what such proceedings naturally +lead, and would sooner die than afford them the least countenance, if +they were sensible of their fatal effects on the union and liberty of +the empire. + +For ourselves, we faithfully assure you, that we have ever considered +you as rational creatures, as free agents, as men willing to pursue and +able to discern your own true interest. We have wished to continue +united with you, in order that a people of one origin and one character +should be directed to the rational objects of government by joint +counsels, and protected in them by a common force. Other subordination +in you we require none. We have never pressed that argument of general +union to the extinction of your local, natural, and just privileges. +Sensible of what is due both to the dignity and weakness of man, we have +never wished to place over you any government, over which, in great, +fundamental points, you should have no sort of check or control in your +own hands, or which should be repugnant to your situation, principles, +and character. + +No circumstances of fortune, you may be assured, will ever induce us to +form or tolerate any such design. If the disposition of Providence +(which we deprecate) should even prostrate you at our feet, broken in +power and in spirit, it would be our duty and inclination to revive, by +every practicable means, that free energy of mind which a fortune +unsuitable to your virtue had damped and dejected, and to put you +voluntarily in possession of those very privileges which you had in vain +attempted to assert by arms. For we solemnly declare, that, although we +should look upon a separation from you as an heavy calamity, (and the +heavier, because we know you must have your full share in it,) yet we +had much rather see you totally independent of this crown and kingdom +than joined to it by so unnatural a conjunction as that of freedom with +servitude,--a conjunction which, if it were at all practicable, could +not fail, in the end, of being more mischievous to the peace, +prosperity, greatness, and power of this nation than beneficial by any +enlargement of the bounds of nominal empire. + +But because, brethren, these professions are general, and such as even +enemies may make, when they reserve to themselves the construction of +what servitude and what liberty are, we inform you that we adopt your +own standard of the blessing of free government. We are of opinion that +you ought to enjoy the sole and exclusive right of freely granting, and +applying to the support of your administration, what God has freely +granted as a reward to your industry. And we do not confine this +immunity from exterior coercion, in this great point, solely to what +regards your local establishment, but also to what may be thought proper +for the maintenance of the whole empire. In this resource we cheerfully +trust and acquiesce, satisfied by evident reason that no other +expectation of revenue can possibly be given by freemen, and knowing +from an experience uniform both on yours and on our side of the ocean +that such an expectation has never yet been disappointed. We know of no +road to your coffers but through your affections. + +To manifest our sentiments the more clearly to you and to the world on +this subject, we declare our opinion, that, if no revenue at all (which, +however, we are far from supposing) were to be obtained from you to this +kingdom, yet, as long as it is our happiness to be joined with you in +the bonds of fraternal charity and freedom, with an open and flowing +commerce between us, one principle of enmity and friendship pervading, +and one right of war and peace directing the strength of the whole +empire, we are likely to be at least as powerful as any nation, or as +any combination of nations, which in the course of human events may be +formed against us. We are sensible that a very large proportion of the +wealth and power of every empire must necessarily be thrown upon the +presiding state. We are sensible that such a state ever has borne and +ever must bear the greatest part, and sometimes the whole, of the public +expenses: and we think her well indemnified for that (rather apparent +than real) inequality of charge, in the dignity and preeminence she +enjoys, and in the superior opulence which, after all charges defrayed, +must necessarily remain at the centre of affairs. Of this principle we +are not without evidence in our remembrance (not yet effaced) of the +glorious and happy days of this empire. We are therefore incapable of +that prevaricating style, by which, when taxes without your consent are +to be extorted from you, this nation is represented as in the lowest +state of impoverishment and public distress, but when we are called upon +to oppress you by force of arms, it is painted as scarcely feeling its +impositions, abounding with wealth, and inexhaustible in its resources. + +We also reason and feel as you do on the invasion of your charters. +Because the charters comprehend the essential forms by which you enjoy +your liberties, we regard them as most sacred, and by no means to be +taken away or altered without process, without examination, and without +hearing, as they have lately been. We even think that they ought by no +means to be altered at all, but at the desire of the greater part of the +people who live under them. We cannot look upon men as delinquents in +the mass; much less are we desirous of lording over our brethren, +insulting their honest pride, and wantonly overturning establishments +judged to be just and convenient by the public wisdom of this nation at +their institution, and which long and inveterate use has taught you to +look up to with affection and reverence. As we disapproved of the +proceedings with regard to the forms of your constitution, so we are +equally tender of every leading principle of free government. We never +could think with approbation of putting the military power out of the +coercion of the civil justice in the country where it acts. + +We disclaim also any sort of share in that other measure which has been +used to alienate your affections from this country,--namely, the +introduction of foreign mercenaries. We saw their employment with shame +and regret, especially in numbers so far exceeding the English forces as +in effect to constitute vassals, who have no sense of freedom, and +strangers, who have no common interest or feelings, as the arbiters of +our unhappy domestic quarrel. + +We likewise saw with shame the African slaves, who had been sold to you +on public faith, and under the sanction of acts of Parliament, to be +your servants and your guards, employed to cut the throats of their +masters. + +You will not, we trust, believe, that, born in a civilized country, +formed to gentle manners, trained in a merciful religion, and living in +enlightened and polished times, where even foreign hostility is softened +from its original sternness, we could have thought of letting loose upon +you, our late beloved brethren, these fierce tribes of savages and +cannibals, in whom the traces of human nature are effaced by ignorance +and barbarity. We rather wished to have joined with you in bringing +gradually that unhappy part of mankind into civility, order, piety, and +virtuous discipline, than to have confirmed their evil habits and +increased their natural ferocity by fleshing them in the slaughter of +you, whom our wiser and better ancestors had sent into the wilderness +with the express view of introducing, along with our holy religion, its +humane and charitable manners. We do not hold that all things are lawful +in war. We should think that every barbarity, in fire, in wasting, in +murders, in tortures, and other cruelties, too horrible and too full of +turpitude for Christian mouths to utter or ears to hear, if done at our +instigation, by those who we know will make war thus, if they make it at +all, to be, to all intents and purposes, as if done by ourselves. We +clear ourselves to you our brethren, to the present age, and to future +generations, to our king and our country, and to Europe, which, as a +spectator, beholds this tragic scene, of every part or share in adding +this last and worst of evils to the inevitable mischiefs of a civil war. + +We do not call you rebels and traitors. We do not call for the vengeance +of the crown against you. We do not know how to qualify millions of our +countrymen, contending with one heart for an admission to privileges +which we have ever thought our own happiness and honor, by odious and +unworthy names. On the contrary, we highly revere the principles on +which you act, though we lament some of their effects. Armed as you are, +we embrace you as our friends and as our brethren by the best and +dearest ties of relation. + +We view the establishment of the English colonies on principles of +liberty as that which is to render this kingdom venerable to future +ages. In comparison of this, we regard all the victories and conquests +of our warlike ancestors, or of our own times, as barbarous, vulgar +distinctions, in which many nations, whom we look upon with little +respect or value, have equalled, if not far exceeded us. This is the +peculiar and appropriated glory of England. Those who _have and who +hold_ to that foundation of common liberty, whether on this or on your +side of the ocean, we consider as the true, and the only true, +Englishmen. Those who depart from it, whether there or here, are +attainted, corrupted in blood, and wholly fallen from their original +rank and value. They are the real rebels to the fair constitution and +just supremacy of England. + +We exhort you, therefore, to cleave forever to those principles, as +being the true bond of union in this empire,--and to show by a manly +perseverance that the sentiments of honor and the rights of mankind are +not held by the uncertain events of war, as you have hitherto shown a +glorious and affecting example to the world that they are not dependent +on the ordinary conveniences and satisfactions of life. + +Knowing no other arguments to be used to men of liberal minds, it is +upon these very principles, and these alone, we hope and trust that no +flattering and no alarming circumstances shall permit you to listen to +the seductions of those who would alienate you from your dependence on +the crown and Parliament of this kingdom. That very liberty which you so +justly prize above all things originated here; and it may be very +doubtful, whether, without being constantly fed from the original +fountain, it can be at all perpetuated or preserved in its native purity +and perfection. Untried forms of government may, to unstable minds, +recommend themselves even by their novelty. But you will do well to +remember that England has been great and happy under the present limited +monarchy (subsisting in more or less vigor and purity) for several +hundred years. None but England can communicate to you the benefits of +such a constitution. We apprehend you are not now, nor for ages are +likely to be, capable of that form of constitution in an independent +state. Besides, let us suggest to you our apprehensions that your +present union (in which we rejoice, and which we wish long to subsist) +cannot always subsist without the authority and weight of this great and +long respected body, to equipoise, and to preserve you amongst +yourselves in a just and fair equality. It may not even be impossible +that a long course of war with the administration of this country may be +but a prelude to a series of wars and contentions among yourselves, to +end at length (as such scenes have too often ended) in a species of +humiliating repose, which nothing but the preceding calamities would +reconcile to the dispirited few who survived them. We allow that even +this evil is worth the risk to men of honor, when rational liberty is at +stake, as in the present case we confess and lament that it is. But if +ever a real security by Parliament is given against the terror or the +abuse of unlimited power, and after such security given you should +persevere in resistance, we leave you to consider whether the risk is +not incurred without an object, or incurred for an object infinitely +diminished by such concessions in its importance and value. + +As to other points of discussion, when these grand fundamentals of your +grants and charters are once settled and ratified by clear Parliamentary +authority, as the ground for peace and forgiveness on our side, and for +a manly and liberal obedience on yours, treaty and a spirit of +reconciliation will easily and securely adjust whatever may remain. Of +this we give you our word, that, so far as we are at present concerned, +and if by any event we should become more concerned hereafter, you may +rest assured, upon the pledges of honor not forfeited, faith not +violated, and uniformity of character and profession not yet broken, we +at least, on these grounds, will never fail you. + +Respecting your wisdom, and valuing your safety, we do not call upon you +to trust your existence to your enemies. We do not advise you to an +unconditional submission. With satisfaction we assure you that almost +all in both Houses (however unhappily they have been deluded, so as not +to give any immediate effect to their opinion) disclaim that idea. You +can have no friends in whom you cannot rationally confide. But +Parliament is your friend from the moment in which, removing its +confidence from those who have constantly deceived its good intentions, +it adopts the sentiments of those who have made sacrifices, (inferior, +indeed, to yours,) but have, however, sacrificed enough to demonstrate +the sincerity of their regard and value for your liberty and prosperity. + +Arguments may be used to weaken your confidence in that public security; +because, from some unpleasant appearances, there is a suspicion that +Parliament itself is somewhat fallen from its independent spirit. How +far this supposition may be founded in fact we are unwilling to +determine. But we are well assured from experience, that, even if all +were true that is contended for, and in the extent, too, in which it is +argued, yet, as long as the solid and well-disposed forms of this +Constitution remain, there ever is within Parliament itself a power of +renovating its principles, and effecting a self-reformation, which no +other plan of government has ever contained. This Constitution has +therefore admitted innumerable improvements, either for the correction +of the original scheme, or for removing corruptions, or for bringing its +principles better to suit those changes which have successively happened +in the circumstances of the nation or in the manners of the people. + +We feel that the growth of the colonies is such a change of +circumstances, and that our present dispute is an exigency as pressing +as any which ever demanded a revision of our government. Public troubles +have often called upon this country to look into its Constitution. It +has ever been bettered by such a revision. If our happy and luxuriant +increase of dominion, and our diffused population, have outgrown the +limits of a Constitution made for a contracted object, we ought to bless +God, who has furnished us with this noble occasion for displaying our +skill and beneficence in enlarging the scale of rational happiness, and +of making the politic generosity of this kingdom as extensive as its +fortune. If we set about this great work, on both sides, with the same +conciliatory turn of mind, we may now, as in former times, owe even to +our mutual mistakes, contentions, and animosities, the lasting concord, +freedom, happiness, and glory of this empire. + +Gentlemen, the distance between us, with other obstructions, has caused +much misrepresentation of our mutual sentiments. We, therefore, to +obviate them as well as we are able, take this method of assuring you of +our thorough detestation of the whole war, and particularly the +mercenary and savage war carried on or attempted against you,--our +thorough abhorrence of all addresses adverse to you, whether public or +private,--our assurances of an invariable affection towards you,--our +constant regard to your privileges and liberties,--and our opinion of +the solid security you ought to enjoy for them, under the paternal care +and nurture of a protecting Parliament. + +Though many of us have earnestly wished that the authority of that +august and venerable body, so necessary in many respects to the union of +the whole, should be rather limited by its own equity and discretion, +than by any bounds described by positive laws and public compacts,--and +though we felt the extreme difficulty, by any theoretical limitations, +of qualifying that authority, so as to preserve one part and deny +another,--and though you (as we gratefully acknowledge) had acquiesced +most cheerfully under that prudent reserve of the Constitution, at that +happy moment when neither you nor we apprehended a further return of the +exercise of invidious powers, we are now as fully persuaded as you can +be, by the malice, inconstancy, and perverse inquietude of many men, and +by the incessant endeavors of an arbitrary faction, now too powerful, +that our common necessities do require a full explanation and ratified +security for your liberties and our quiet. + +Although his Majesty's condescension, in committing the direction of his +affairs into the hands of the known friends of his family and of the +liberties of all his people, would, we admit, be a great means of giving +repose to your minds, as it must give infinite facility to +reconciliation, yet we assure you that we think, with such a security as +we recommend, adopted from necessity and not choice, even by the unhappy +authors and instruments of the public misfortunes, that the terms of +reconciliation, if once accepted by Parliament, would not be broken. We +also pledge ourselves to you, that we should give, even to those +unhappy persons, an hearty support in effectuating the peace of the +empire, and every opposition in an attempt to cast it again into +disorder. + +When that happy hour shall arrive, let us in all affection, recommend to +you the wisdom of continuing, as in former times, or even in a more +ample measure, the support of your government, and even to give to your +administration some degree of reciprocal interest in your freedom. We +earnestly wish you not to furnish your enemies, here or elsewhere, with +any sort of pretexts for reviving quarrels by too reserved and severe or +penurious an exercise of those sacred rights which no pretended abuse in +the exercise ought to impair, nor, by overstraining the principles of +freedom, to make them less compatible with those haughty sentiments in +others which the very same principles may be apt to breed in minds not +tempered with the utmost equity and justice. + +The well-wishers of the liberty and union of this empire salute you, and +recommend you most heartily to the Divine protection. + + + + +A + +LETTER + +TO + +THE RIGHT HON. EDMUND S. PERY + +SPEAKER OF THE IRISH HOUSE OF COMMONS, + +IN RELATION TO + +A BILL FOR THE RELIEF OF THE ROMAN CATHOLICS OF IRELAND. + +JULY 18, 1778. + + +NOTE. + + This Letter is addressed to Mr. Pery, (afterwards Lord Pery,) + then Speaker of the House of Commons of Ireland. It appears, + there had been much correspondence between that gentleman and + Mr. Burke, on the subject of Heads of a bill (which had + passed the Irish House of Commons in the summer of the year + 1778, and had been transmitted by the Irish Privy Council of + [to?] England) for the relief of his Majesty's Roman Catholic + subjects in Ireland. The bill contained a clause for + exempting the Protestant Dissenters of Ireland from the + sacramental test, which created a strong objection to the + whole measure on the part of the English government. Mr. + Burke employed his most strenuous efforts to remove the + prejudice which the king's ministers entertained against the + clause, but the bill was ultimately returned without it, and + in that shape passed the Irish Parliament. (17th and 18th + Geo. III cap. 49.) In the subsequent session, however, a + separate act was passed for the relief of the Protestant + Dissenters of Ireland. + + +LETTER. + +My Dear Sir,--I received in due course your two very interesting and +judicious letters, which gave me many new lights, and excited me to +fresh activity in the important subject they related to. However, from +that time I have not been perfectly free from doubt and uneasiness. I +used a liberty with those letters, which, perhaps, nothing can +thoroughly justify, and which certainly nothing but the delicacy of the +crisis, the clearness of my intentions, and your great good-nature can +at all excuse. I might conceal this from you; but I think it better to +lay the whole matter before you, and submit myself to your +mercy,--assuring you, at the same time, that, if you are so kind as to +continue your confidence on this, or to renew it upon any other +occasion, I shall never be tempted again to make so bold and +unauthorized an use of the trust you place in me. I will state to you +the history of the business since my last, and then you will see how far +I am excusable by the circumstances. + +On the 3rd of July I received a letter from the Attorney-General, dated +the day before, in which, in a very open and obliging manner, he desires +my thoughts of the Irish Toleration Bill, and particularly of the +Dissenters' clause. I gave them to him, by the return of the post, at +large; but, as the time pressed, I kept no copy of the letter. The +general drift was strongly to recommend the _whole_, and principally to +obviate the objections to the part that related to the Dissenters, with +regard both to the general propriety and to the temporary policy at this +juncture. I took, likewise, a good deal of pains to state the difference +which had always subsisted with regard to the treatment of the +Protestant Dissenters in Ireland and in England, and what I conceived +the reason of that difference to be. About the same time I was called to +town for a day; and I took an opportunity, in Westminster Hall, of +urging the same points, with all the force I was master of, to the +Solicitor-General. I attempted to see the Chancellor for the same +purpose, but was not fortunate enough to meet him at home. Soon after my +return hither, on Tuesday, I received a very polite and I may say +friendly letter from him, wishing me (on supposition that I had +continued in town) to dine with him as [on?] that day, in order to talk +over the business of the Toleration Act, then before him. Unluckily I +had company with me, and was not able to leave them until Thursday, when +I went to town and called at his house, but missed him. However, in +answer to his letter, I had before, and instantly on the receipt of it, +written to him at large, and urged such topics, both with regard to the +Catholics and Dissenters, as I imagined were the most likely to be +prevalent with him. This letter I followed to town on Thursday. On my +arrival I was much alarmed with a report that the ministry had thoughts +of rejecting the whole bill. Mr. M'Namara seemed apprehensive that it +was a determined measure; and there seemed to be but too much reason for +his fears. + +Not having met the Chancellor at home, either on my first visit or my +second after receiving his letter, and fearful that the Cabinet should +come to come unpleasant resolution, I went to the Treasury on Friday. +There I saw Sir G. Cooper. I possessed him of the danger of a partial, +and the inevitable mischief of the total rejection of the bill. I +reminded him of the understood compact between parties, upon which the +whole scheme of the toleration originating in the English bill was +formed,--of the fair part which the Whigs had acted in a business which, +though first started by them, was supposed equally acceptable to all +sides, and the risk of which they took upon themselves, when others +declined it. To this I added such matter as I thought most fit to engage +government, as government,--not to sport with a singular opportunity +which offered for the union of every description of men amongst us in +support of the common interest of the whole; and I ended by desiring to +see Lord North upon the subject. Sir Grey Cooper showed a very right +sense of the matter, and in a few minutes after our conversation I went +down from the Treasury chambers to Lord North's house. I had a great +deal of discourse with him. He told me that his ideas of toleration were +large, but that, large as they were, they did not comprehend a +promiscuous establishment, even in matters merely civil; that he thought +the established religion ought to be the religion of the state; that, in +this idea, he was not for the repeal of the sacramental test; that, +indeed, he knew the Dissenters in general did not greatly scruple it; +but that very want of scruple showed less zeal against the +Establishment; and, after all, there could no provision be made by human +laws against those who made light of the tests which were formed to +discriminate opinions. On all this he spoke with a good deal of temper. +He did not, indeed, seem to think the test itself, which was rightly +considered by Dissenters as in a manner dispensed with by an annual act +of Parliament, and which in Ireland was of a late origin, and of much +less extent than here, a matter of much moment. The thing which seemed +to affect him most was the offence that would be taken at the repeal by +the leaders among the Church clergy here, on one hand, and, on the +other, the steps which would be taken for its repeal in England in the +next session, in consequence of the repeal in Ireland. I assured him, +with great truth, that we had no idea among the Whigs of moving the +repeal of the test. I confessed very freely, for my own part, that, if +it were brought in, I should certainly vote for it; but that I should +neither use, nor did I think applicable, any arguments drawn from the +analogy of what was done in other parts of the British dominions. We did +not argue from analogy, even in this island and United Kingdom. +Presbytery was established in Scotland. It became no reason either for +its religious or civil establishment here. In New England the +Independent Congregational Churches had an established legal +maintenance; whilst that country continued part of the British empire, +no argument in favor of Independency was adduced from the practice of +New England. Government itself lately thought fit to establish the Roman +Catholic religion in Canada; but they would not suffer an argument of +analogy to be used for its establishment anywhere else. These things +were governed, as all things of that nature are governed, not by general +maxims, but their own local and peculiar circumstances. Finding, +however, that, though he was very cool and patient, I made no great way +in the business of the Dissenters, I turned myself to try whether, +falling in with his maxims, some modification might not be found, the +hint of which I received from your letter relative to the Irish Militia +Bill, and the point I labored was so to alter the clause as to repeal +the test _quoad_ military and revenue offices: for these being only +subservient parts in the economy and execution, rather than the +administration of affairs, the politic, civil, and judicial parts would +still continue in the hands of the conformists to religious +establishments. Without giving any hopes, he, however, said that this +distinction deserved to be considered. After this, I strongly pressed +the mischief of rejecting the whole bill: that a notion went abroad, +that government was not at this moment very well pleased with the +Dissenters, as not very well affected to the monarchy; that, in general, +I conceived this to be a mistake,--but if it were not, the rejection of +a bill in favor _of others_, because something in favor of _them_ was +inserted, instead of humbling and mortifying, would infinitely exalt +them: for, if the legislature had no means of favoring those whom they +meant to favor, as long as the Dissenters could find means to get +themselves included, this would make them, instead of their only being +subject to restraint themselves, the arbitrators of the fate of others, +and that not so much by their own strength (which could not be prevented +in its operation) as by the cooeperation of those whom they opposed. In +the conclusion, I recommended, that, if they wished well to the measure +which was the main object of the bill, they must explicitly make it +their own, and stake themselves upon it; that hitherto all their +difficulties had arisen from their indecision and their wrong measures; +and to make Lord North sensible of the necessity of giving a firm +support to some part of the bill, and to add weighty authority to my +reasons, I read him your letter of the 10th of July. It seemed, in some +measure, to answer the purpose which I intended. I pressed the necessity +of the management of the affair, both as to conduct and as to gaining of +men; and I renewed my former advice, that the Lord Lieutenant should be +instructed to consult and cooperate with you in the whole affair. All +this was, apparently, very fairly taken. + +In the evening of that day I saw the Lord Chancellor. With him, too, I +had much discourse. You know that he is intelligent, sagacious, +systematic, and determined. At first he seemed of opinion that the +relief contained in the bill was so inadequate to the mass of oppression +it was intended to remove, that it would be better to let it stand over, +until a more perfect and better digested plan could be settled. This +seemed to possess him very strongly. In order to combat this notion, and +to show that the bill, all things considered, was a very great +acquisition, and that it was rather a preliminary than an obstruction to +relief, I ventured to show him your letter. It had its effect. He +declared himself roundly against giving anything to a confederacy, real +or apparent, to distress government; that, if anything was done for +Catholics or Dissenters, it should be done on its own separate merits, +and not by way of bargain and compromise; that they should be each of +them obliged to government, not each to the other; that this would be a +perpetual nursery of faction. In a word, he seemed so determined on not +uniting these plans, that all I could say, and I said everything I could +think of, was to no purpose. But when I insisted on the disgrace to +government which must arise from their rejecting a proposition +recommended by themselves, because their opposers had made a mixture, +separable too by themselves, I was better heard. On the whole, I found +him well disposed. + +As soon as I had returned to the country, this affair lay so much on my +mind, and the absolute necessity of government's making a serious +business of it, agreeably to the seriousness they professed, and the +object required, that I wrote to Sir G. Cooper, to remind him of the +principles upon which we went in our conversation, and to press the plan +which was suggested for carrying them into execution. He wrote to me on +the 20th, and assured me, "that Lord North had given all due attention +and respect to what you said to him on Friday, and will pay the same +respect to the sentiments conveyed in your letter: everything you say or +write on the subject undoubtedly demands it." Whether this was mere +civility, or showed anything effectual in their intentions, time and the +success of this measure will show. It is wholly with them; and if it +should fail, you are a witness that nothing on our part has been wanting +to free so large a part of our fellow-subjects and fellow-citizens from +slavery, and to free government from the weakness and danger of ruling +them by force. As to my own particular part, the desire of doing this +has betrayed me into a step which I cannot perfectly reconcile to +myself. You are to judge how far, on the circumstances, it may be +excused. I think it had a good effect. You may be assured that I made +this communication in a manner effectually to exclude so false and +groundless an idea as that I confer with you, any more than I confer +with them, on any party principle whatsoever,--or that in this affair we +look further than the measure which is in profession, and I am sure +ought to be in reason, theirs. + +I am ever, with the sincerest affection and esteem, + +My dear Sir, + +Your most faithful and obedient humble servant, + +EDMUND BURKE. + +BEACONSFIELD, 18th July, 1778. + + +I intended to have written sooner, but it has not been in my power. + +To the Speaker of the House of Commons of Ireland. + + + + +TWO LETTERS + +TO + +THOMAS BURGH, ESQ., + +AND + +JOHN MERLOTT, ESQ., + +IN VINDICATION OF HIS PARLIAMENTARY CONDUCT RELATIVE TO THE AFFAIRS OF +IRELAND. + +1780. + + + + +LETTER + +TO THOMAS BURGH, ESQ.[14] + + +My Dear Sir,--I do not know in what manner I am to thank you properly +for the very friendly solicitude you have been so good as to express for +my reputation. The concern you have done me the honor to take in my +affairs will be an ample indemnity from all that I may suffer from the +rapid judgments of those who choose to form their opinions of men, not +from the life, but from their portraits in a newspaper. I confess to you +that my frame of mind is so constructed, I have in me so little of the +constitution of a great man, that I am more gratified with a very +moderate share of approbation from those few who know me than I should +be with the most clamorous applause from those multitudes who love to +admire at a due distance. + +I am not, however, Stoic enough to be able to affirm with truth, or +hypocrite enough affectedly to pretend, that I am wholly unmoved at the +difficulty which you and others of my friends in Ireland have found in +vindicating my conduct towards my native country. It undoubtedly hurts +me in some degree: but the wound is not very deep. If I had sought +popularity in Ireland, when, in the cause of that country, I was ready +to sacrifice, and did sacrifice, a much nearer, a much more immediate, +and a much more advantageous popularity here, I should find myself +perfectly unhappy, because I should be totally disappointed in my +expectations,--because I should discover, when it was too late, what +common sense might have told me very early, that I risked the capital of +my fame in the most disadvantageous lottery in the world. But I acted +then, as I act now, and as I hope I shall act always, from a strong +impulse of right, and from motives in which popularity, either here or +there, has but a very little part. + +With the support of that consciousness I can bear a good deal of the +coquetry of public opinion, which has her caprices, and must have her +way. _Miseri, quibus intentata nitet_! I, too, have had my holiday of +popularity in Ireland. I have even heard of an intention to erect a +statue.[15] I believe my intimate acquaintance know how little that idea +was encouraged by me; and I was sincerely glad that it never took +effect. Such honors belong exclusively to the tomb,--the natural and +only period of human inconstancy, with regard either to desert or to +opinion: for they are the very same hands which erect, that very +frequently (and sometimes with reason enough) pluck down the statue. Had +such an unmerited and unlooked-for compliment been paid to me two years +ago, the fragments of the piece might at this hour have the advantage of +seeing actual service, while they were moving, according to the law of +projectiles, to the windows of the Attorney-General, or of my old +friend, Monk Mason. + +To speak seriously,--let me assure you, my dear Sir, that, though I am +not permitted to rejoice at _all_ its effects, there is not one man on +your side of the water more pleased to see the situation of Ireland so +prosperous as that she can afford to throw away her friends. She has +obtained, solely by her own efforts, the fruits of a great victory, +which I am very ready to allow that the best efforts of her best +well-wishers here could not have done for her so effectually in a great +number of years, and perhaps could not have done at all. I could wish, +however, merely for the sake of her own dignity, that, in turning her +poor relations and antiquated friends out of doors, (though one of the +most common effects of new prosperity,) she had thought proper to +dismiss us with fewer tokens of unkindness. It is true that there is no +sort of danger in affronting men who are not of importance enough to +have any trust of ministerial, of royal, or of national honor to +surrender. The unforced and unbought services of humble men, who have no +medium of influence in great assemblies, but through the precarious +force of reason, must be looked upon with contempt by those who by their +wisdom and spirit have improved the critical moment of their fortune, +and have debated with authority against pusillanimous dissent and +ungracious compliance, at the head of forty thousand men. + +Such feeble auxiliaries (as I talk of) to such a force, employed +against such resistance, I must own, in the present moment, very little +worthy of your attention. Yet, if one were to look forward, it scarcely +seems altogether politic to bestow so much liberality of invective on +the Whigs of this kingdom as I find has been the fashion to do both in +and out of Parliament. That you should pay compliments, in some tone or +other, whether ironical or serious, to the minister from whose +imbecility you have extorted what you could never obtain from his +bounty, is not unnatural. In the first effusions of Parliamentary +gratitude to that minister for the early and voluntary benefits he has +conferred upon Ireland, it might appear that you were wanting to the +triumph of his surrender, if you did not lead some of his enemies +captive before him. Neither could you feast him with decorum, if his +particular taste were not consulted. A minister, who has never defended +his measures in any other way than by railing at his adversaries, cannot +have his palate made all at once to the relish of positive commendation. +I cannot deny but that on this occasion there was displayed a great deal +of the good-breeding which consists in the accommodation of the +entertainment to the relish of the guest. + +But that ceremony being past, it would not be unworthy of the wisdom of +Ireland to consider what consequences the extinguishing every spark of +freedom in this country may have upon your own liberties. You are at +this instant flushed with victory, and full of the confidence natural to +recent and untried power. We are in a temper equally natural, though +very different. We feel as men do, who, having placed an unbounded +reliance on their force, have found it totally to fail on trial. We +feel faint and heartless, and without the smallest degree of +self-opinion. In plain words, we are _cowed_. When men give up their +violence and injustice without a struggle, their condition is next to +desperate. When no art, no management, no argument, is necessary to +abate their pride and overcome their prejudices, and their uneasiness +only excites an obscure and feeble rattling in their throat, their final +dissolution seems not far off. In this miserable state we are still +further depressed by the overbearing influence of the crown. It acts +with the officious cruelty of a mercenary nurse, who, under pretence of +tenderness, stifles us with our clothes, and plucks the pillow from our +heads. _Injectu multae vestis opprimi senem jubet_. Under this influence +we have so little will of our own, that, even in any apparent activity +we may be got to assume, I may say, without any violence to sense, and +with very little to language, we are merely passive. We have yielded to +your demands this session. In the last session we refused to prevent +them. In both cases, the passive and the active, our principle was the +same. Had the crown pleased to retain the spirit, with regard to +Ireland, which seems to be now all directed to America, we should have +neglected our own immediate defence, and sent over the last man of our +militia to fight with the last man of your volunteers. + +To this influence the principle of action, the principle of policy, and +the principle of union of the present minority are opposed. These +principles of the opposition are the only thing which preserves a single +symptom of life in the nation. That opposition is composed of the far +greater part of the independent property and independent rank of the +kingdom, of whatever is most untainted in character, and of whatever +ability remains unextinguished in the people, and of all which tends to +draw the attention of foreign countries upon this. It is now in its +final and conclusive struggle. It has to struggle against a force to +which, I am afraid, it is not equal. The _whole_ kingdom of Scotland +ranges with the venal, the unprincipled, and the wrong-principled of +this; and if the kingdom of Ireland thinks proper to pass into the same +camp, we shall certainly be obliged to quit the field. In that case, if +I know anything of this country, another constitutional opposition _can +never_ be formed in it; and if this be impossible, it will be at least +as much so (if there can be degrees in impossibility) to have a +constitutional administration at any future time. The possibility of the +former is the only security for the existence of the latter. Whether the +present administration be in the least like one, I must venture to +doubt, even in the honey-moon of the Irish fondness to Lord North, which +has succeeded to all their slappings and scratchings. + +If liberty cannot maintain its ground in this kingdom, I am sure that it +cannot have any long continuance in yours. Our liberty might now and +then jar and strike a discord with that of Ireland. The thing is +possible: but still the instruments might play in concert. But if ours +be unstrung, yours will be hung up on a peg, and both will be mute +forever. Your new military force may give you confidence, and it serves +well for a turn; but you and I know that it has not root. It is not +perennial, and would prove but a poor shelter for your liberty, when +this nation, having no interest in its own, could look upon yours with +the eye of envy and disgust. I cannot, therefore, help thinking, and +telling you what with great submission I think, that, if the Parliament +of Ireland be so jealous of the spirit of our common Constitution as she +seems to be, it was not so discreet to mix with the panegyric on the +minister so large a portion of acrimony to the independent part of this +nation. You never received any sort of injury from them, and you are +grown to that degree of importance that the discourses in your +Parliament will have a much greater effect on our immediate fortune than +our conversation can have upon yours. In the end they will seriously, +affect both. + +I have looked back upon our conduct and our public conversations in +order to discover what it is that can have given you offence. I have +done so, because I am ready to admit that to offend you without any +cause would be as contrary to true policy as I am sure it must be to the +inclinations of almost every one of us. About two years ago Lord Nugent +moved six propositions in favor of Ireland in the House of Commons. At +the time of the motions, and during the debate, Lord North was either +wholly out of the House, or engaged in other matters of business or +pleasantry, in the remotest recesses of the West Saxon corner. He took +no part whatsoever in the affair; but it was supposed his neutrality was +more inclined towards the side of favor. The mover being a person in +office was, however, the only indication that was given of such a +leaning. We who supported the propositions, finding them better relished +than at first we looked for, pursued our advantage, and began to open a +way for more essential benefits to Ireland. On the other hand, those +who had hitherto opposed them in vain redoubled their efforts, and +became exceedingly clamorous. Then it was that Lord North found it +necessary to come out of his fastness, and to interpose between the +contending parties. In this character of mediator, he declared, that, if +anything beyond the first six resolutions should be attempted, he would +oppose the whole, but that, if we rested there, the original motions +should have his support. On this a sort of convention took place between +him and the managers of the Irish business, in which the six resolutions +were to be considered as an _uti possidetis_, and to be held sacred. + +By this time other parties began to appear. A good many of the trading +towns, and manufactures of various kinds, took the alarm. Petitions +crowded in upon one another, and the bar was occupied by a formidable +body of council. Lord N. was staggered by this new battery. He is not of +a constitution to encounter such an opposition as had then risen, when +there were no other objects in view than those that were then before the +House. In order not to lose him, we were obliged to abandon, bit by bit, +the most considerable part of the original agreement. + +In several parts, however, he continued fair and firm. For my own part, +I acted, as I trust I commonly do, with decision. I saw very well that +the things we had got were of no great consideration; but they were, +even in their defects, somewhat leading. I was in hopes that we might +obtain gradually and by parts what we might attempt at once and in the +whole without success,--that one concession would lead to another,--and +that the people of England discovering by a progressive experience that +none of the concessions actually made were followed by the consequences +they had dreaded, their fears from what they were yet to yield would +considerably diminish. But that to which I attached myself the most +particularly was, to fix _the principle_ of a free trade in all the +ports of these islands, as founded in justice, and beneficial to the +whole, but principally to this, the seat of the supreme power. And this +I labored to the utmost of my might, upon general principles, +illustrated by all the commercial detail with which my little inquiries +in life were able to furnish me. I ought to forget such trifling things +as those, with all concerning myself; and possibly I might have +forgotten them, if the Lord Advocate of Scotland had not, in a very +flattering manner, revived them in my memory, in a full House in this +session. He told me that my arguments, such as they were, had made him, +at the period I allude to, change the opinion with which he had come +into the House strongly impressed. I am sure that at the time at least +twenty more told me the same thing. I certainly ought not to take their +style of compliment as a testimony to fact; neither do I. But all this +showed sufficiently, not what they thought of my ability, but what they +saw of my zeal. I could say more in proof of the effects of that zeal, +and of the unceasing industry with which I then acted, both in my +endeavors which were apparent and those that were not so visible. Let it +be remembered that I showed those dispositions while the Parliament of +England was in a capacity to deliberate and in a situation to refuse, +when there was something to be risked here by being suspected of a +partiality to Ireland, when there was an honorable danger attending the +profession of friendship to you, which heightened its relish, and made +it worthy of a reception in manly minds. But as for the awkward and +nauseous parade of debate without opposition, the flimsy device of +tricking out necessity and disguising it in the habit of choice, the +shallow stratagem of defending by argument, what all the world must +perceive is yielded to force,--these are a sort of acts of friendship +which I am sorry that any of my countrymen should require of their real +friends. They are things not _to my taste_; and if they are looked upon +as tests of friendship, I desire for one that I may be considered as an +enemy. + +What party purpose did my conduct answer at that time? I acted with Lord +N. I went to all the ministerial meetings,--and he and his associates in +office will do me the justice to say, that, aiming at the concord of the +empire, I made it my business to give his concessions all the value of +which they were capable, whilst some of those who were covered with his +favors derogated from them, treated them with contempt, and openly +threatened to oppose them. If I had acted with my dearest and most +valued friends, if I had acted with the Marquis of Rockingham or the +Duke of Richmond, in that situation, I could not have attended more to +their honor, or endeavored more earnestly to give efficacy to the +measures I had taken in common with them. The return which I, and all +who acted as I did, have met with from him, does not make me repent the +conduct which I then held. + +As to the rest of the gentlemen with whom I have the honor to act, they +did not then, or at any other time, make a party affair of Irish +politics. That matter was always taken up without concert; but, in +general, from the operation of our known liberal principles in +government, in commerce, in religion, in everything, it was taken up +favorably for Ireland. Where some local interests bore hard upon the +members, they acted on the sense of their constituents, upon ideas +which, though I do not always follow, I cannot blame. However, two or +three persons, high in opposition, and high in public esteem, ran great +risks in their boroughs on that occasion. But all this was without any +particular plan. I need not say, that Ireland was in that affair much +obliged to the liberal mind and enlarged understanding of Charles Fox, +to Mr. Thomas Townshend, to Lord Midleton, and others. On reviewing that +affair, which gave rise to all the subsequent manoeuvres, I am convinced +that the whole of what has this day been done might have then been +effected. But then the minister must have taken it up as a great plan of +national policy, and paid with his person in every lodgment of his +approach. He must have used that influence to quiet prejudice, which he +has so often, used to corrupt principle: and I know, that, if he had, he +must have succeeded. Many of the most active in opposition would have +given him an unequivocal support. The corporation of London, and the +great body of the London West India merchants and planters, which forms +the greatest mass of that vast interest, were disposed to fall in with +such a plan. They certainly gave no sort of discountenance to what was +done or what was proposed. But these are not the kind of objects for +which our ministers bring out the heavy artillery of the state. +Therefore, as things stood at that time, a great deal more was not +practicable. + +Last year another proposition was brought out for the relief of Ireland. +It was started without any communication with a single person of +activity in the country party, and, as it should seem, without any kind +of concert with government. It appeared to me extremely raw and +undigested. The behavior of Lord N., on the opening of that business, +was the exact transcript of his conduct on the Irish question in the +former session. It was a mode of proceeding which his nature has wrought +into the texture of his politics, and which is inseparable from them. He +chose to absent himself on the proposition and during the agitation of +that business,--although the business of the House is that alone for +which he has any kind of relish, or, as I am told, can be persuaded to +listen to with any degree of attention. But he was willing to let it +take its course. If it should pass without any considerable difficulty, +he would bring his acquiescence to tell for merit in Ireland, and he +would have the credit, out of his indolence, of giving quiet to that +country. If difficulties should arise on the part of England, he knew +that the House was so well trained that he might at his pleasure call us +off from the hottest scent. As he acted in his usual manner and upon his +usual principle, opposition acted upon theirs, and rather generally +supported the measure. As to myself, I expressed a disapprobation at the +practice of bringing imperfect and indigested projects into the House, +before means were used to quiet the clamors which a misconception of +what we were doing might occasion at home, and before measures were +settled with men of weight and authority in Ireland, in order to render +our acts useful and acceptable to that country. I said, that the only +thing which could make the influence of the crown (enormous without as +well as within the House) in any degree tolerable was, that it might be +employed to give something of order and system to the proceedings of a +popular assembly; that government being so situated as to have a large +range of prospect, and as it were a bird's-eye view of everything, they +might see distant dangers and distant advantages which were not so +visible to those who stood on the common level; they might, besides, +observe them, from this advantage, in their relative and combined state, +which people locally instructed and partially informed could behold only +in an insulated and unconnected manner;--but that for many years past we +suffered under all the evils, without any one of the advantages of a +government influence; that the business of a minister, or of those who +acted as such, had been still further to contract the narrowness of +men's ideas, to confirm inveterate prejudices, to inflame vulgar +passions, and to abet all sorts of popular absurdities, in order the +better to destroy popular rights and privileges; that, so far from +methodizing the business of the House, they had let all things run into +an inextricable confusion, and had left affairs of the most delicate +policy wholly to chance. + +After I had expressed myself with the warmth I felt on seeing all +government and order buried under the ruins of liberty, and after I had +made my protest against the insufficiency of the propositions, I +supported the principle of enlargement at which they aimed, though short +and somewhat wide of the mark,--giving, as my sole reason, that the more +frequently these matters came into discussion, the more it would tend +to dispel fears and to eradicate prejudices. + +This was the only part I took. The detail was in the hands of Lord +Newhaven and Lord Beauchamp, with some assistance from Earl Nugent and +some independent gentlemen of Irish property. The dead weight of the +minister being removed, the House recovered its tone and elasticity. We +had a temporary appearance of a deliberative character. The business was +debated freely on both sides, and with sufficient temper. And the sense +of the members being influenced by nothing but what will naturally +influence men unbought, their reason and their prejudices, these two +principles had a fair conflict, and prejudice was obliged to give way to +reason. A majority appeared, on a division, in favor of the +propositions. + +As these proceedings got out of doors, Glasgow and Manchester, and, I +think, Liverpool, began to move, but in a manner much more slow and +languid than formerly. Nothing, in my opinion, would have been less +difficult than entirely to have overborne their opposition. The London +West India trade was, as on the former occasion, so on this, perfectly +liberal and perfectly quiet; and there is abroad so much respect for the +united wisdom of the House, when supposed to act upon a fair view of a +political situation, that I scarcely ever remember any considerable +uneasiness out of doors, when the most active members, and those of most +property and consideration in the minority, have joined themselves to +the administration. Many factious people in the towns I mentioned began, +indeed, to revile Lord North, and to reproach his neutrality as +treacherous and ungrateful to those who had so heartily and so warmly +entered into all his views with regard to America. That noble lord, +whose decided character it is to give way to the latest and nearest +pressure, without any sort of regard to distant consequences of any +kind, thought fit to appear, on this signification of the pleasure of +those his worthy friends and partisans, and, putting himself at the head +of the _posse scaccarii_, wholly regardless of the dignity and +consistency of our miserable House, drove the propositions entirely out +of doors by a majority newly summoned to duty. + +In order to atone to Ireland for this gratification to Manchester, he +graciously permitted, or rather forwarded, two bills,--that for +encouraging the growth of tobacco, and that for giving a bounty on +exportation of hemp from Ireland. They were brought in by two very +worthy members, and on good principles; but I was sorry to see them, +and, after expressing my doubts of their propriety, left the House. +Little also [else?] was said upon them. My objections were two: the +first, that the cultivation of those weeds (if one of them could be at +all cultivated to profit) was adverse to the introduction of a good +course of agriculture; the other, that the encouragement given to them +tended to establish that mischievous policy of considering Ireland as a +country of staple, and a producer of raw materials. + +When the rejection of the first propositions and the acceptance of the +last had jointly, as it was natural, raised a very strong discontent in +Ireland, Lord Rockingham, who frequently said that there never seemed a +more opportune time for the relief of Ireland than that moment when Lord +North had rejected all rational propositions for its relief, without +consulting, I believe, any one living, did what he is not often very +willing to do; but he thought this an occasion of magnitude enough to +justify an extraordinary step. He went into the closet, and made a +strong representation on the matter to the king, which was not ill +received, and I believe produced good effects. He then made the motion +in the House of Lords which you may recollect; but he was content to +withdraw all of censure which it contained, on the solemn promise of +ministry, that they would in the recess of Parliament prepare a plan for +the benefit of Ireland, and have it in readiness to produce at the next +meeting. You may recollect that Lord Gower became in a particular manner +bound for the fulfilling this engagement. Even this did not satisfy, and +most of the minority were very unwilling that Parliament should be +prorogued until something effectual on the subject should be +done,--particularly as we saw that the distresses, discontents, and +armaments of Ireland were increasing every day, and that we are not so +much lost to common sense as not to know the wisdom and efficacy of +early concession in circumstances such as ours. + +The session was now at an end. The ministers, instead of attending to a +duty that was so urgent on them, employed themselves, as usual, in +endeavors to destroy the reputation of those who were bold enough to +remind them of it. They caused it to be industriously circulated through +the nation, that the distresses of Ireland were of a nature hard to be +traced to the true source, that they had been monstrously magnified, and +that, in particular, the official reports from Ireland had given the lie +(that was their phrase) to Lord Rockingham's representations: and +attributing the origin of the Irish proceedings wholly to us, they +asserted that everything done in Parliament upon the subject was with a +view of stirring up rebellion; "that neither the Irish legislature nor +their constituents had signified any dissatisfaction at the relief +obtained in the session preceding the last; that, to convince both of +the impropriety of their _peaceable_ conduct, opposition, by making +demands in the name of Ireland, pointed out what she might extort from +Great Britain; that the facility with which relief was (formerly) +granted, instead of satisfying opposition, was calculated to create new +demands; these demands, as they _interfered_ with the commerce of Great +Britain, were _certain_ of being opposed,--a circumstance which could +not fail to create that desirable confusion which suits the views of the +party; that they (the Irish) had long felt their own misery, _without +knowing well from whence it came_; our worthy patriots, by _pointing out +Great Britain_ as the _cause of Irish distress_, may have some chance of +rousing Irish resentment." This I quote from a pamphlet as perfectly +contemptible in point of writing as it is false in its facts and wicked +in its design: but as it is written under the authority of ministers, by +one of their principal literary pensioners, and was circulated with +great diligence, and, as I am credibly informed, at a considerable +expense to the public, I use the words of that book to let you see in +what manner the friends and patrons of Ireland, the heroes of your +Parliament, represented all efforts for your relief here, what means +they took to dispose the minds of the people towards that great object, +and what encouragement they gave to all who should choose to exert +themselves in your favor. Their unwearied endeavors were not wholly +without success, and the unthinking people in many places became +ill-affected towards us on this account. For the ministers proceeded in +your affairs just as they did with regard to those of America. They +always represented you as a parcel of blockheads, without sense, or even +feeling; that all your words were only the echo of faction here; and (as +you have seen above) that you had not understanding enough to know that +your trade was cramped by restrictive acts of the British Parliament, +unless we had, for factious purposes, given you the information. They +were so far from giving the least intimation of the measures which have +since taken place, that those who were supposed the best to know their +intentions declared them impossible in the actual state of the two +kingdoms, and spoke of nothing but an act of union, as the only way that +could be found of giving freedom of trade to Ireland, consistently with +the interests of this kingdom. Even when the session opened, Lord North +declared that he did not know what remedy to apply to a disease of the +cause of which he was ignorant; and ministry not being then entirely +resolved how far they should submit to your energy, they, by +anticipation, set the above author or some of his associates to fill the +newspapers with invectives against us, as distressing the minister by +extravagant demands in favor of Ireland. + +I need not inform you, that everything they asserted of the steps taken +in Ireland, as the result of our machinations, was utterly false and +groundless. For myself, I seriously protest to you, that I neither wrote +a word or received a line upon any matter relative to the trade of +Ireland, or to the polities of it, from the beginning of the last +session to the day that I was honored with your letter. It would be an +affront to the talents in the Irish Parliament to say one word more. + +What was done in Ireland during that period, in and out of Parliament, +never will be forgotten. You raised an army new in its kind and adequate +to its purposes. It effected its end without its exertion. It was not +under the authority of law, most certainly, but it derived from an +authority still higher; and as they say of faith, that it is not +contrary to reason, but above it, so this army did not so much +contradict the spirit of the law as supersede it. What you did in the +legislative body is above all praise. By your proceeding with regard to +the supplies, you revived the grand use and characteristic benefit of +Parliament, which was on the point of being entirely lost amongst us. +These sentiments I never concealed, and never shall; and Mr. Fox +expressed them with his usual power, when he spoke on the subject. + +All this is very honorable to you. But in what light must we see it? How +are we to consider your armament without commission from the crown, when +some of the first people in _this_ kingdom have been refused arms, at +the time they did not only not reject, but solicited the king's +commissions? Here to arm and embody would be represented as little less +than high treason, if done on private authority: with you it receives +the thanks of a Privy Counsellor of Great Britain, who obeys the Irish +House of Lords in that point with pleasure, and is made Secretary of +State, the moment he lands here, for his reward. You shortened the +credit given to the crown to six months; you hung up the public credit +of your kingdom by a thread; you refused to raise any taxes, whilst you +confessed the public debt and public exigencies to be great and urgent +beyond example. You certainly acted in a great style, and on sound and +invincible principles. But if we in the opposition, which fills Ireland +with such loyal horrors, had even attempted, what we never did even +attempt, the smallest delay or the smallest limitation of supply, in +order to a constitutional coercion of the crown, we should have been +decried by all the court and Tory mouths of this kingdom, as a desperate +faction, aiming at the direct ruin of the country, and to surrender it +bound hand and foot to a foreign enemy. By actually doing what we never +ventured to attempt, you have paid your court with such address, and +have won so much favor with his Majesty and his cabinet, that they have, +of their special grace and mere motion, raised you to new titles, and +for the first time, ill a speech from the throne, complimented you with +the appellation of "faithful and loyal,"--and, in order to insult our +low-spirited and degenerate obedience, have thrown these epithets and +your resistance together in our teeth! What do you think were the +feelings of every man who looks upon Parliament in an higher light than +that of a market-overt for legalizing a base traffic of votes and +pensions, when he saw you employ such means of coercion to the crown, in +order to coerce our Parliament through _that_ medium? How much his +Majesty is pleased with _his_ part of the civility must be left to his +own taste. But as to us, you declared to the world that you knew that +the way of bringing us to reason was to apply yourselves to the true +source of all our opinions and the only motive to all our conduct! Now, +it seems, you think yourselves affronted, because a few of us express +some indignation at the minister who has thought fit to strip us stark +naked, and expose the true state of our poxed and pestilential habit to +the world! Think or say what you will in Ireland, I shall ever think it +a crime hardly to be expiated by his blood. He might, and ought, by a +longer continuance or by an earlier meeting of this Parliament, to have +given us the credit of some wisdom in foreseeing and anticipating an +approaching force. So far from it, Lord Gower, coming out of his own +cabinet, declares that one principal cause of his resignation was his +not being able to prevail on the present minister to give any sort of +application to this business. Even on the late meeting of Parliament, +nothing determinate could be drawn from him, or from any of his +associates, until you had actually passed the short money bill,--which +measure they flattered themselves, and assured others, you would never +come up to. Disappointed in their expectation at [of?] seeing the siege +raised, they surrendered at discretion. + +Judge, my dear Sir, of our surprise at finding your censure directed +against those whose only crime was in accusing the ministers of not +having prevented your demands by our graces, of not having given you the +natural advantages of your country in the most ample, the most early, +and the most liberal manner, and for not having given away authority in +such a manner as to insure friendship. That you should make the +panegyric of the ministers is what I expected; because, in praising +their bounty, you paid a just compliment to your own force. But that you +should rail at us, either individually or collectively, is what I can +scarcely think a natural proceeding. I can easily conceive that +gentlemen might grow frightened at what they had done,--that they might +imagine they had undertaken a business above their direction,--that, +having obtained a state of independence for their country, they meant to +take the deserted helm into their own hands, and supply by their very +real abilities the total inefficacy of the nominal government. All these +might be real, and might be very justifiable motives for their +reconciling themselves cordially to the present court system. But I do +not so well discover the reasons that could induce them, at the first +feeble dawning of life in this country, to do all in their power to cast +a cloud over it, and to prevent the least hope of our effecting the +necessary reformations which are aimed at in our Constitution and in our +national economy. + +But, it seems, I was silent at the passing the resolutions. Why, what +had I to say? If I had thought them too much, I should have been accused +of an endeavor to inflame England. If I should represent them as too +little, I should have been charged with a design of fomenting the +discontents of Ireland into actual rebellion. The Treasury bench +represented that the affair was a matter of state: they represented it +truly. I therefore only asked whether they knew these propositions to be +such as would satisfy Ireland; for if they were so, they would satisfy +me. This did not indicate that I thought them too ample. In this our +silence (however dishonorable to Parliament) there was one +advantage,--that the whole passed, as far as it is gone, with complete +unanimity, and so quickly that there was no time left to excite any +opposition to it out of doors. In the West India business, reasoning on +what had lately passed in the Parliament of Ireland, and on the mode in +which it was opened here, I thought I saw much matter of perplexity. +But I have now better reason than ever to be pleased with my silence. If +I had spoken, one of the most honest and able men[16] in the Irish +Parliament would probably have thought my observation an endeavor to sow +dissension, which he was resolved to prevent,--and one of the most, +ingenious and one of the most amiable men[17] that ever graced yours or +any House of Parliament might have looked on it as a chimera. In the +silence I observed, I was strongly countenanced (to say no more of it) +by every gentleman of Ireland that I had the honor of conversing with in +London. The only word, for that reason, which I spoke, was to restrain a +worthy county member,[18] who had received some communication from a +great trading place in the county he represents, which, if it had been +opened to the House, would have led to a perplexing discussion of one of +the most troublesome matters that could arise in this business. I got up +to put a stop to it; and I believe, if you knew what the topic was, you +would commend my discretion. + +That it should be a matter of public discretion in me to be silent on +the affairs of Ireland is what on all accounts I bitterly lament. I +stated to the House what I felt; and I felt, as strongly as human +sensibility can feel, the extinction of my Parliamentary capacity, where +I wished to use it most. When I came into this Parliament, just fourteen +years ago,--into this Parliament, then, in vulgar opinion at least, the +presiding council of the greatest empire existing, (and perhaps, all +things considered, that ever did exist,) obscure and a stranger as I +was, I considered myself as raised to the highest dignity to which a +creature of our species could aspire. In that opinion, one of the chief +pleasures in my situation, what was first and-uppermost in my thoughts, +was the hope, without injury to this country, to be somewhat useful to +the place of my birth and education, which in many respects, internal +and external, I thought ill and impolitically governed. But when I found +that the House, surrendering itself to the guidance of an authority, not +grown out of an experienced wisdom and integrity, but out of the +accidents of court favor, had become the sport of the passions of men at +once rash and pusillanimous,--that it had even got into the habit of +refusing everything to reason and surrendering everything to force, all +my power of obliging either my country or individuals was gone, all the +lustre of my imaginary rank was tarnished, and I felt degraded even by +my elevation. I said this, or something to this effect. If it gives +offence to Ireland, I am sorry for it: it was the reason I gave for my +silence; and it was, as far as it went, the true one. + +With you, this silence of mine and of others was represented as +factious, and as a discountenance to the measure of your relief. Do you +think us children? If it had been our wish to embroil matters, and, for +the sake of distressing ministry, to commit the two kingdoms in a +dispute, we had nothing to do but (without at all condemning the +propositions) to have gone into the commercial detail of the objects of +them. It could not have been refused to us: and you, who know the nature +of business so well, must know that this would have caused such delays, +and given rise during that delay to such discussions, as all the wisdom +of your favorite minister could never have settled. But, indeed, you +mistake your men. We tremble at the idea of a disunion of these two +nations. The only thing in which we differ with you is this,--that we do +not think your attaching yourselves to the court and quarrelling with +the independent part of this people is the way to promote the union of +two free countries, or of holding them together by the most natural and +salutary ties. + + * * * * * + +You will be frightened, when you see this long letter. I smile, when I +consider the length of it myself. I never, that I remember, wrote any of +the same extent. But it shows me that the reproaches of the country that +I once belonged to, and in which I still have a dearness of instinct +more than I can justify to reason, make a greater impression on me than +I had imagined. But parting words are admitted to be a little tedious, +because they are not likely to be renewed. If it will not be making +yourself as troublesome to others as I am to you, I shall be obliged to +you, if you will show this, at their greatest leisure, to the Speaker, +to your excellent kinsman, to Mr. Grattan, Mr. Yelverton, and Mr. Daly: +all these I have the honor of being personally known to, except Mr. +Yelverton, to whom I am only known by my obligations to him. If you live +in any habits with my old friend, the Provost, I shall be glad that he, +too, sees this my humble apology. + +Adieu! once more accept my best thanks for the interest you take in me. +Believe that it is received by an heart not yet so old as to have lost +its susceptibility. All here give you the best old-fashioned wishes of +the season; and believe me, with the greatest truth and regard, + +My dear Sir, + +Your most faithful and obliged humble servant, + +EDMUND BURKE. + +BEACONSFIELD, New year's Day, 1780. + + +I am frightened at the trouble I give you and our friends; but I +recollect that you are mostly lawyers, and habituated to read long, +tiresome papers--and, where your friendship is concerned, without a fee; +I am sure, too, that you will not act the lawyer in scrutinizing too +minutely every expression which my haste may make me use. I forgot to +mention my friend O'Hara, and others; but you will communicate it as you +please. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[14] Mr. Thomas Burgh, of Old Town, was a member of the House of Commons +in Ireland.--It appears from a letter written by this gentleman to Mr. +Burke, December 24, 1779, and to which the following is an answer, that +the part Mr. Burke had taken in the discussion which the affairs of +Ireland had undergone in the preceding sessions of Parliament in England +had been grossly misrepresented and much censured in Ireland. + +[15] This intention was communicated to Mr. Burke in a letter from Mr. +Pery, the Speaker of the House of Commons in Ireland. + +[16] Mr. Grattan. + +[17] Mr. Hussey Burgh + +[18] Mr. Stanley, member for Lancashire. + + + + +LETTER + +TO JOHN MERLOTT, ESQ.[19] + + +Dear Sir,--I am very unhappy to find that my conduct in the business of +Ireland, on a former occasion, had made many to be cold and indifferent +who would otherwise have been warm in my favor. I really thought that +events would have produced a quite contrary effect, and would have +proved to all the inhabitants of Bristol that it was no desire of +opposing myself to their wishes, but a certain knowledge of the +necessity of their affairs, and a tender regard to their honor and +interest, which induced me to take the part which I then took. They +placed me in a situation which might enable me to discern what was fit +to be done, on a consideration of the relative circumstances of this +country and all its neighbors. This was what you could not so well do +yourselves; but you had a right to expect that I should avail myself of +the advantage which I derived from your favor. Under the impression-of +this duty and this trust, I had endeavored to render, by preventive +graces and concessions, every act of power at the same time an act of +lenity,--the result of English bounty, and not of English timidity and +distress. I really flattered myself that the events which have proved +beyond dispute the prudence of such a maxim would have obtained pardon +for me, if not approbation. But if I have not been so fortunate, I do +most sincerely regret my great loss,--this comfort, however, that, if I +have disobliged my constituents, it was not in pursuit of any sinister +interest or any party passion of my own, but in endeavoring to save them +from disgrace, along with the whole community to which they and I +belong. I shall be concerned for this, and very much so; but I should be +more concerned, if, in gratifying a present humor of theirs, I had +rendered myself unworthy of their former or their future choice. I +confess that I could not bear to face my constituents at the next +general election, if I had been a rival to Lord North in the glory of +having refused some small, insignificant concessions, in favor of +Ireland, to the arguments and supplications of English members of +Parliament,--and in the very next session, on the demand of forty +thousand Irish bayonets, of having made a speech of two hours long to +prove that my former conduct was founded upon no one right principle, +either of policy, justice, or commerce. I never heard a more elaborate, +more able, more convincing, and more shameful speech. The debater +obtained credit, but the statesman was disgraced forever. Amends were +made for having refused small, but timely concessions, by an unlimited +and untimely surrender, not only of every one of the objects of former +restraints, but virtually of the whole legislative power itself which +had made them. For it is not necessary to inform you, that the +unfortunate Parliament of this kingdom did not dare to qualify the very +liberty she gave of trading with her _own_ plantations, by applying, of +her _own_ authority, any one of the commercial regulations to the new +traffic of Ireland, which bind us here under the several Acts of +Navigation. We were obliged to refer them to the Parliament of Ireland, +as conditions, just in the same manner as if we were bestowing a +privilege of the same sort on France and Spain, or any other independent +power, and, indeed, with more studied caution than we should have used, +not to shock the principle of their independence. How the minister +reconciled the refusal to reason, and the surrender to arms raised in +defiance of the prerogatives of the crown, to his master, I know not: it +has probably been settled, in some way or other, between themselves. But +however the king and his ministers may settle the question of his +dignity and his rights, I thought it became me, by vigilance and +foresight, to take care of yours: I thought I ought rather to lighten +the ship in time than expose it to a total wreck. The conduct pursued +seemed to me without weight or judgment, and more fit for a member for +Banbury than a member for Bristol. I stood, therefore, silent with grief +and vexation, on that day of the signal shame and humiliation of this +degraded king and country. But it seems the pride of Ireland, in the day +of her power, was equal to ours, when we dreamt we were powerful too. I +have been abused there even for my silence, which was construed into a +desire of exciting discontent in England. But, thank God, my letter to +Bristol was in print, my sentiments on the policy of the measure were +known and determined, and such as no man could think me absurd enough to +contradict. When I am no longer a free agent, I am obliged in the crowd +to yield to necessity: it is surely enough that I silently submit to +power; it is enough that I do not foolishly affront the conqueror; it is +too hard to force me to sing his praises, whilst I am led in triumph +before him,--or to make the panegyric of our own minister, who would put +me neither in a condition to surrender with honor or to fight with the +smallest hope of victory. I was, I confess, sullen and silent on that +day,--and shall continue so, until I see some disposition to inquire +into this and other causes of the national disgrace. If I suffer in my +reputation for it in Ireland, I am sorry; but it neither does nor can +affect me so nearly as my suffering in Bristol for having wished to +unite the interests of the two nations in a manner that would secure the +supremacy of this. + +Will you have the goodness to excuse the length of this letter? My +earnest desire of explaining myself in every point which may affect the +mind of any worthy gentleman in Bristol is the cause of it. To yourself, +and to your liberal and manly notions, I know it is not so necessary. +Believe me, + +My dear Sir, + +Your most faithful and obedient humble servant, + +EDMUND BURKE. + +BEACONSFIELD, April 4th, 1780. + + +To JOHN MERLOTT, Esq., Bristol. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[19] An eminent merchant in the city of Bristol, of which Mr. Burke was +one of the representatives in Parliament.--It relates to the same +subject as the preceding Letter. + + + + +LETTERS AND REFLECTIONS + +ON THE + +EXECUTIONS OF THE RIOTERS + +IN 1780. + + + + +LETTERS. + + + + + +_To the Lord Chancellor_. + + +My Lord,--I hope I am not too late with the inclosed slight +observations. If the execution already ordered cannot be postponed, +might I venture to recommend that it should extend to one only? and then +the plan suggested in the inclosed paper may, if your Lordship thinks +well of it, take place, with such improvements as your better judgment +may dictate. As to fewness of the executions, and the good effects of +that policy, I cannot, for my own part, entertain the slightest doubt. + +If you have no objection, and think it may not occupy more of his +Majesty's time than such a thing is worth, I should not be sorry that +the inclosed was put into the king's hands. + +I have the honor to be, my Lord, + +Your Lordship's most obedient humble servant, + +EDMUND BURKE. + +CHARLES STREET, July 10, 1780. + + + * * * * * + + + + +_To the Earl Bathurst, Lord President of the Council_ + + +My Lord,-- + +I came to town but yesterday, and therefore did not learn more early the +probable extent of the executions in consequence of the late +disturbances. I take the liberty of laying before you, with the +sincerest deference to your judgment, what appeared to me very early as +reasonable in this business. Further thoughts have since occurred to me. +I confess my mind is under no small degree of solicitude and anxiety on +the subject; I am fully persuaded that a proper use of mercy would not +only recommend the wisdom and steadiness of government, but, if properly +used, might be made a means of drawing out the principal movers in this +wicked business, who have hitherto eluded your scrutiny. I beg pardon +for this intrusion, and have the honor to be, with great regard and +esteem, + +My Lord, + +Your Lordship's most obedient humble servant, + +EDMUND BURKE. + +CHARLES STREET, July 18, 1780. + + + * * * * * + + +_To Sir Grey Cooper, Bart_.[20] + + +Dear Sir,-- + +According to your desire, I send you a copy of the few reflections on +the subject of the present executions which occurred to me in the +earliest period of the late disturbances, and which all my experience +and observation since have most strongly confirmed. The executions, +taking those which have been made, which are now ordered, and which may +be the natural consequence of the convictions in Surrey, will be +undoubtedly too many to answer any good purpose. Great slaughter +attended the suppression of the tumults, and this ought to be taken in +discount from the execution of the law. For God's sake entreat of Lord +North to take a view of the sum total of the deaths, before any are +ordered for execution; for by not doing something of this kind people +are decoyed in detail into severities they never would have dreamed of, +if they had the whole in their view at once. The scene in Surrey would +have affected the hardest heart that ever was in an human breast. +Justice and mercy have not such opposite interests as people are apt to +imagine. I saw Lord Loughborough last night. He seemed strongly +impressed with the sense of what necessity obliged him to go through, +and I believe will enter into our ideas on the subject. On this matter +you see that no time is to be lost. Before a final determination, the +first thing I would recommend is, that, if the very next execution +cannot be delayed, (by the way, I do not see why it may not,) it may be +of but a single person, and that afterwards you should not exceed two or +three; for it is enough for one riot, where the very act of Parliament +on which you proceed is rather a little hard in its sanctions and its +construction: not that I mean to complain of the latter as either new or +strained, but it was rigid from the first. + +I am, dear Sir, + +Your most obedient humble servant, + +EDMUND BURKE. + +Tuesday, 18th July, 1780. + + +I really feel uneasy on this business, and should consider it as a sort +of personal favor, if you do something to limit the extent and severity +of the law on this point. Present my best compliments to Lord North, and +if he thinks that I have had wishes to be serviceable to government on +the late occasion, I shall on my part think myself abundantly rewarded, +if a few lives less than first intended should be saved [taken?]; I +should sincerely set it down as a personal obligation, though the thing +stands upon general and strong reason of its own.[21] + +FOOTNOTES: + +[20] One of the Secretaries of the Treasury. + +[21] It appears by the following extract from a letter written by the +Earl of Mansfield to Mr. Burke, dated the 17th July, 1780, that these +Reflections had also been communicated to him:--"I have received the +honor of your letter and very judicious thoughts. Having been so greatly +injured myself, I have thought it more decent not to attend the reports, +and consequently have not been present at any deliberation upon the +subject." + + + + +SOME THOUGHTS + +ON THE APPROACHING EXECUTIONS, + +HUMBLY OFFERED TO CONSIDERATION. + + +As the number of persons convicted on account of the late unhappy +tumults will probably exceed what any one's idea of vengeance or example +would deliver to capital punishment, it is to be wished that the whole +business, as well with regard to the number and description of those who +are to suffer death as with regard to those who shall be delivered over +to lighter punishment or wholly pardoned, should be entirely a work of +reason. + +It has happened frequently, in cases of this nature, that the fate of +the convicts has depended more upon the accidental circumstance of their +being brought earlier or later to trial than to any steady principle of +equity applied to their several cases. Without great care and sobriety, +criminal justice generally begins with anger and ends in negligence. The +first that are brought forward suffer the extremity of the law, with +circumstances of mitigation of their case; and after a time, the most +atrocious delinquents escape merely by the satiety of punishment. + +In the business now before his Majesty, the following thoughts are +humbly submitted. + +If I understand the temper of the public at this moment, a very great +part of the lower and some of the middling people of this city are in a +very critical disposition, and such as ought to be managed with firmness +and delicacy. In general, they rather approve than blame the principles +of the rioters, though the better sort of them are afraid of the +consequences of those very principles which they approve. This keeps +their minds in a suspended and anxious state, which may very easily be +exasperated by an injudicious severity into desperate resolutions,--or +by weak measures on the part of government it may be encouraged to the +pursuit of courses which may be of the most dangerous consequences to +the public. + +There is no doubt that the approaching executions will very much +determine the future conduct of those people. They ought to be such as +will humble, not irritate. Nothing will make government more awful to +them than to see that it does not proceed by chance or under the +influence of passion. + +It is therefore proposed that no execution should be made until the +number of persons which government thinks fit to try is completed. When +the whole is at once under the eye, an examination ought to be made into +the circumstances of every particular convict; and _six_, at the very +utmost, of the fittest examples may then be selected for execution, who +ought to be brought out and put to death on one and the same day, in six +different places, and in the most solemn manner that can be devised. +Afterwards great care should be taken that their bodies may not be +delivered to their friends, or to others who may make them objects of +compassion or even veneration: some instances of the kind have happened +with regard to the bodies of those killed in the riots. The rest of the +malefactors ought to be either condemned, for larger [longer?] or +shorter terms, to the lighters, houses of correction, service in the +navy, and the like, according to the case. + +This small number of executions, and all at one time, though in +different places, is seriously recommended; because it is certain that a +great havoc among criminals hardens rather than subdues the minds of +people inclined to the same crimes, and therefore fails of answering its +purpose as an example. Men who see their lives respected and thought of +value by others come to respect that gift of God themselves. To have +compassion for oneself, or to care, more or less, for one's own life, is +a lesson to be learned just as every other; and I believe it will be +found that conspiracies have been most common and most desperate where +their punishment has been most extensive and most severe. + +Besides, the least excess in this way excites a tenderness in the milder +sort of people, which makes them consider government in an harsh and +odious light. The sense of justice in men is overloaded and fatigued +with a long series of executions, or with such a carnage at once as +rather resembles a massacre than a sober execution of the laws. The laws +thus lose their terror in the minds of the wicked, and their reverence +in the minds of the virtuous. + +I have ever observed that the execution of one man fixes the attention +and excites awe; the execution of multitudes dissipates and weakens the +effect: but men reason themselves into disapprobation and disgust; they +compute more as they feel less; and every severe act which does not +appear to be necessary is sure to be offensive. + +In selecting the criminals, a very different line ought to be followed +from that recommended by the champions of the Protestant Association. +They recommend that the offenders for plunder ought to be punished, and +the offenders from principle spared. But the contrary rule ought to be +followed. The ordinary executions, of which there are enough in +conscience, are for the former species of delinquents; but such common +plunderers would furnish no example in the present case, where the false +or pretended principle of religion, which leads to crimes, is the very +thing to be discouraged. + +But the reason which ought to make these people objects of selection for +punishment confines the selection to very few. For we must consider that +the whole nation has been for a long time guilty of their crime. +Toleration is a new virtue in any country. It is a late ripe fruit in +the best climates. We ought to recollect the poison which, under the +name of antidotes against Popery, and such like mountebank titles, has +been circulated from our pulpits and from our presses, from the heads of +the Church of England and the heads of the Dissenters. These +publications, by degrees, have tended to drive all religion from our own +minds, and to fill them with nothing but a violent hatred of the +religion of other people, and, of course, with a hatred of their +persons; and so, by a very natural progression, they have led men to the +destruction of their goods and houses, and to attempts upon their lives. + +This delusion furnishes no reason for suffering that abominable spirit +to be kept alive by inflammatory libels or seditious assemblies, or for +government's yielding to it, in the smallest degree, any point of +justice, equity, or sound policy. The king certainly ought not to give +up any part of his subjects to the prejudices of another. So far from +it, I am clearly of opinion that on the late occasion the Catholics +ought to have been taken, more avowedly than they were, under the +protection of government, as the Dissenters had been on a similar +occasion. + +But though we ought to protect against violence the bigotry of others, +and to correct our own too, if we have any left, we ought to reflect, +that an offence which in its cause is national ought not in its effects +to be vindicated on individuals, but with a very well-tempered severity. + +For my own part, I think the fire is not extinguished,--on the contrary, +it seems to require the attention of government more than ever; but, as +a part of any methodical plan for extinguishing this flame, it really +seems necessary that the execution of justice should be as steady and as +cool as possible. + + + + +SOME ADDITIONAL REFLECTIONS + +ON THE EXECUTIONS. + + +The great number of sufferers seems to arise from the misfortune +incident to the variety of judicatures which have tried the crimes. It +were well, if the whole had been the business of one commission; for now +every trial seems as if it were a separate business, and in that light +each offence is not punished with greater severity than single offences +of the kind are commonly marked: but in reality and fact, this +unfortunate affair, though diversified in the multitude of overt acts, +has been one and the same riot; and therefore the executions, so far as +regards the general effect on the minds of men, will have a reference to +the unity of the offence, and will appear to be much more severe than +such a riot, atrocious as it was, can well justify in government. I pray +that it may be recollected that the chief delinquents have hitherto +escaped, and very many of those who are fallen into the hands of justice +are a poor, thoughtless set of creatures, very little aware of the +nature of their offence. None of the list-makers, the assemblers of the +mob, the directors and arrangers, have been convicted. The preachers of +mischief remain safe, and are wicked enough not to feel for their +deluded disciples,--no, not at all. I would not plead the ignorance of +the law in any, even the most ignorant, as a justification; but I am +sure, that, when the question is of mercy, it is a very great and +powerful argument. I have all the reason in the world to believe that +they did not know their offence was capital. + +There is one argument, which I beg may not be considered as brought for +any invidious purpose, or meant as imputing blame anywhere, but which, I +think, with candid and considerate men, will have much weight. The +unfortunate delinquents were perhaps much encouraged by some remissness +on the part of government itself. The absolute and entire impunity +attending the same offence in Edinburgh, which was over and over again +urged as an example and encouragement to these unfortunate people, might +be a means of deluding them. Perhaps, too, a languor in the beginning of +the riots here (which suffered the leaders to proceed, until very many, +as it were by the contagion of a sort of fashion, were carried to these +excesses) might make these people think that there was something in the +case which induced government to wink at the irregularity of the +proceedings. + +The conduct and condition of the Lord Mayor ought, in my opinion, to be +considered. His answers to Lord Beauchamp, to Mr. Malo, and to Mr. +Langdale make him appear rather an accomplice in the crimes than guilty +of negligence as a magistrate. Such an example set to the mob by the +first magistrate of the city tends greatly to palliate their offence. + +The license, and complete impunity too, of the publications which from +the beginning instigated the people to such actions, and in the midst of +trials and executions still continues, does in a great degree render +these creatures an object of compassion. In the Public Advertiser of +this morning there are two or three paragraphs strongly recommending +such outrages, and stimulating the people to violence against the houses +and persons of Roman Catholics, and even against the chapels of the +foreign ministers. + +I would not go so far as to adopt the maxim, _Quicquid multis peccatur +inultum_; but certainly offences committed by vast multitudes are +somewhat palliated in the _individuals_, who, when so many escape, are +always looked upon rather as unlucky than criminal. All our loose ideas +of justice, as it affects any individual, have in them something of +comparison to the situation of others; and no systematic reasoning can +wholly free us from such impressions. + +Phil. de Comines says our English civil wars were less destructive than +others, because the cry of the conqueror always was, "Spare the common +people." This principle of war should be at least as prevalent in the +execution of justice. The appetite of justice is easily satisfied, and +it is best nourished with the least possible blood. We may, too, +recollect that between capital punishment and total impunity there are +many stages. + +On the whole, every circumstance of mercy, and of comparative justice, +does, in my opinion, plead in favor of such low, untaught, or ill-taught +wretches. But above all, the policy of government is deeply interested +that the punishments should appear _one_, solemn, deliberate act, aimed +not at random, and at particular offences, but done with a relation to +the general spirit of the tumults; and they ought to be nothing more +than what is sufficient to mark and discountenance that spirit. + +CIRCUMSTANCES FOR MERCY. + + Not being principal. + Probable want of early and deliberate purposes. + Youth where the highest malice does not appear. + Sex where the highest malice does not appear. + Intoxication and levity, or mere wantonness of any kind. + + + + +A + +LETTER + +TO + +THE RIGHT HON. HENRY DUNDAS, + +ONE OF HIS MAJESTY'S PRINCIPAL SECRETARIES OF STATE. + +WITH THE + +SKETCH OF A NEGRO CODE. + +1792. + + +Dear Sir,--I should have been punctual in sending you the sketch I +promised of my old African Code, if some friends from London had not +come in upon me last Saturday, and engaged me till noon this day: I send +this packet by one of them who is still here. If what I send be, as +under present circumstances it must be, imperfect, you will excuse it, +as being done near twelve years ago. About four years since I made an +abstract of it, upon which I cannot at present lay my hands; but I hope +the marginal heads will in some measure supply it. + +If the African trade could be considered with regard to itself only, and +as a single object, I should think the utter abolition to be on the +whole more advisable than any scheme of regulation an reform. Rather +than suffer it to continue as it is, I heartily wish it at an end. What +has been lately done has been done by a popular spirit, which seldom +calls for, and indeed very rarely relishes, a system made up of a great +variety of parts, and which is to operate its effect in a great length +of time. The people like short methods; the consequences of which they +sometimes have reason to repent of. Abolition is but a single act. To +prove the nature of the trade, and to expose it properly, required, +indeed, a vast collection of materials, which have been laboriously +collected, and compiled with great judgment. It required also much +perseverance and address to excite the spirit which has been excited +without doors, and which has carried it through. The greatest eloquence +ever displayed in the House has been employed to second the efforts +which have been made abroad. All this, however, leads but to one single +resolve. When this was done, all was done. I speak of absolute and +immediate abolition, the point which the first motions went to, and +which is in effect still pressed; though in this session, according to +order, it cannot take effect. A _remote_, and a _gradual_ abolition, +though they may be connected, are not the same thing. The idea of the +House seems to me, if I rightly comprehend it, that the two things are +to be combined: that is to say, that the trade is gradually to decline, +and to cease entirely at a determinate period. To make the abolition +gradual, the regulations must operate as a strong discouragement. But it +is much to be feared that a trade continued and discouraged, and with a +sentence of death passed upon it, will perpetuate much ill blood between +those who struggle for the abolition and those who contend for an +effectual continuance. + +At the time when I formed the plan which I have the honor to transmit to +you, an abolition of the slave trade would have appeared a very +chimerical project. My plan, therefore, supposes the continued existence +of that commerce. Taking for my basis that I had an incurable evil to +deal with, I cast about how I should make it as small an evil as +possible, and draw out of it some collateral good. + +In turning the matter over in my mind at that time and since, I never +was able to consider the African trade upon a ground disconnected with +the employment of negroes in the West Indies, and distinct from their +condition in the plantations whereon they serve. I conceived that the +true origin of the trade was not in the place it was begun at, but at +the place of its final destination. I therefore was, and I still am, of +opinion that the whole work ought to be taken up together, and that a +gradual abolition of slavery in the West Indies ought to go hand in hand +with anything which, should be done with regard to its supply from the +coast of Africa. I could not trust a cessation of the demand for this +supply to the mere operation of any abstract principle, (such as, that, +if their supply was cut off, the planters would encourage and produce an +effectual population,) knowing that nothing can be more uncertain than +the operation of general principles, if they are not embodied in +specific regulations. I am very apprehensive, that, so long as the +slavery continues, some means for its supply will be found. If so, I am +persuaded that it is better to allow the evil, in order to correct it, +than, by endeavoring to forbid what we cannot be able wholly to prevent, +to leave it under an illegal, and therefore an unreformed existence. It +is not that my plan does not lead to the extinction of the slave trade, +but it is through a very slow progress, the chief effect of which is to +be operated in our own plantations, by rendering, in a length of time, +all foreign supply unnecessary. It was my wish, whilst the slavery +continued, and the consequent commerce, to take such measures as to +civilize the coast of Africa by the trade, which now renders it more +barbarous, and to lead by degrees to a more reputable, and, possibly, a +more profitable connection with it, than we maintain at present. + +I am sure that you will consider as a mark of my confidence in yours and +Mr. Pitt's honor and generosity, that I venture to put into your hands +a scheme composed of many and intricate combinations, without a full +explanatory preface, or any attendant notes, to point out the principles +upon which I proceeded in every regulation which I have proposed towards +the civilization and gradual manumission of negroes in the two +hemispheres. I confess I trust infinitely more (according to the sound +principles of those who ever have at any time meliorated the state of +mankind) to the effect and influence of religion than to all the rest of +the regulations put together. + +Whenever, in my proposed reformation, we take our _point of departure_ +from a state of slavery, we must precede the donation of freedom by +disposing the minds of the objects to a disposition to receive it +without danger to themselves or to us. The process of bringing _free_ +savages to order and civilization is very different. When a state of +slavery is that upon which we are to work, the very means which lead to +liberty must partake of compulsion. The minds of men, being crippled +with that restraint, can do nothing for themselves: everything must be +done for them. The regulations can owe little to consent. Everything +must be the creature of power. Hence it is that regulations must be +multiplied, particularly as you have two parties to deal with. The +planter you must at once restrain and support, and you must control at +the same time that you ease the servant. This necessarily makes the work +a matter of care, labor, and expense. It becomes in its nature complex. +But I think neither the object impracticable nor the expense +intolerable; and I am fully convinced that the cause of humanity would +be far more benefited by the continuance of the trade and servitude, +regulated and reformed, than by the total destruction of both or either. +What I propose, however, is but a beginning of a course of measures +which an experience of the effects of the evil and the reform will +enable the legislature hereafter to supply and correct. + +I need not observe to you, that the forms are often neglected, penalties +not provided, &c., &c., &c. But all this is merely mechanical, and what +a couple of days' application would set to rights. + +I have seen what has been done by the West Indian Assemblies. It is +arrant trifling. They have done little; and what they have done is good +for nothing,--for it is totally destitute of an _executory_ principle. +This is the point to which I have applied my whole diligence. It is easy +enough to say what shall be done: to cause it to be done,--_hic labor, +hoc opus_. + +I ought not to apologize for letting this scheme lie beyond the period +of the Horatian keeping,--I ought much more to entreat an excuse for +producing it now. Its whole value (if it has any) is the coherence and +mutual dependency of parts in the scheme; separately they can be of +little or no use. + +I have the honor to be, with very great respect and regard, + +Dear Sir, + +Your most faithful and obedient humble servant, + +EDMUND BURKE. + +BEACONSFIELD, Easter-Monday night, 1792. + + + + +SKETCH OF A NEGRO CODE. + + +This constitution consists of four principal members. + +I. The rules for qualifying a ship for the African trade. + +II. The mode of carrying on the trade upon the coast of Africa, which +includes a plan for introducing civilization in that part of the world. + +III. What is to be observed from the time of shipping negroes to the +sale in the West India islands. + +IV. The regulations relative to the state and condition of slaves in the +West Indies, their manumission, &c. + + +[Sidenote: PREAMBLE.] + +Whereas it is expedient, and comformable to the principles of true +religion and morality, and to the rules of sound policy, to put an end +to all traffic in the persons of men, and to the detention of their said +persons in a state of slavery, as soon as the same may be effected +without producing great inconveniences in the sudden change of practices +of such long standing, and during the time of the continuance of the +said practices it is desirable and expedient by proper regulations to +lessen the inconveniences and evils attendant on the said traffic and +state of servitude, until both shall be gradually done away: + +And whereas the objects of the said trade and consequential servitude, +and the grievances resulting therefrom, come under the principal heads +following, the regulations ought thereto to be severally applied: that +is to say, that provision should be made by the said regulations, + +1st, For duly qualifying ships for the said traffic; + +2nd, For the mode and conditions of permitting the said trade to be +carried on upon the coast of Africa; + +3rd, For the treatment of the negroes in their passage to the West India +islands; + +4th, For the government of the negroes which are or shall be employed in +his Majesty's colonies and plantations in the West Indies: + +[Sidenote: Ships to be registered.] + +Be it therefore enacted, that every ship or trading vessel which is +intended for the negro trade, with the name of the owner or owners +thereof, shall be entered and registered as ships trading to the West +Indies are by law to be registered, with the further provisions +following: + +[Sidenote: Measured and surveyed.] + +1. The same entry and register shall contain an account of the greatest +number of negroes of all descriptions which are proposed to be taken +into the said ship or trading vessel; and the said ship, before she is +permitted to be entered outwards, shall be surveyed by a ship-carpenter, +to be appointed by the collector of the port from which the said vessel +is to depart, and by a surgeon, also appointed by the collector, who +hath been conversant in the service of the said trade, but not at the +time actually engaged or covenanted therein; and the said carpenter and +surgeon shall report to the collector, or in his absence, to the next +principal officer of the port; upon oath, (which oath the said collector +or principal officer is hereby empowered to administer,) her +measurement, and what she contains in builder's tonnage, and that she +has ---- feet of grated portholes between the decks, and that she is +otherwise fitly found as a good transport vessel. + +[Sidenote: Number of slaves limited.] + +2. And be it enacted, that no ship employed in the said trade shall upon +any pretence take in more negroes than one grown man or woman for one +ton and half of builder's tonnage, nor more than one boy or girl for one +ton. + +[Sidenote: Provisions.] + +3. That the said ship or other vessel shall lay in, in proportion to the +ship's company of the said vessel, and the number of negroes registered, +a full and sufficient store of sound provision, so as to be secure +against all probable delays and accidents, namely, salted beef, pork, +salt-fish, butter, cheese, biscuit, flour, rice, oat-meal, and white +peas, but no horse-beans, or other inferior provisions; and the said +ship shall be properly provided with water-casks or jars, in proportion +to the intended number of the said negroes; and the said ship shall be +also provided with a proper and sufficient stock of coals or firewood. + +[Sidenote: Stores.] + +4. And every ship entered as aforesaid shall take out a coarse shirt and +a pair of trousers, or petticoat, for each negro intended to be taken +aboard; as also a mat, or coarse mattress, or hammock, for the use of +the said negroes. The proportions of provision, fuel, and clothing to be +regulated by the table annexed to this act. + +[Sidenote: Certificate thereof.] + +5. And be it enacted, that no ship shall be permitted to proceed on the +said voyage or adventure, until the searcher of the port from whence the +said vessel shall sail, or such person as he shall appoint to act for +him, shall report to the collector that he hath inspected the said +stores, and that the ship is accommodated and provided in the manner +hereby directed. + +[Sidenote: Guns for trade to be inspected.] + +6. And be it enacted, that no guns be exported to the coast of Africa, +in the said or any other trade, unless the same be duly marked with the +maker's name on the barrels before they are put into the stocks, and +vouched by an inspector in the place where the same are made to be +without fraud, and sufficient and merchantable arms. + +[Sidenote: Owners and masters to enter into bonds.] + +7. And be it enacted, that, before any ship as aforesaid shall proceed +on her voyage, the owner or owners, or an attorney by them named, if the +owners are more than two, and the master, shall severally give bond, the +owners by themselves, the master for himself, that the said master shall +duly conform himself in all things to the regulations in this act +contained, so far as the same regards his part in executing and +conforming to the same. + + * * * * * + +II. And whereas, in providing for the second object of this act, that is +to say, for the trade on the coast of Africa, it is first prudent not +only to provide against the manifold abuses to which a trade of that +nature is liable, but that the same may be accompanied, as far as it is +possible, with such advantages to the natives as may tend to the +civilizing them, and enabling them to enrich themselves by means more +desirable, and to carry on hereafter a trade more advantageous and +honorable to all parties: + +And whereas religion, order, morality, and virtue are the elemental +principles, and the knowledge of letters, arts, and handicraft trades, +the chief means of such civilization and improvement: for the better +attainment of the said good purposes, + +[Sidenote: Marts to be established on the coast.] + +1. Be it hereby enacted, that the coast of Africa, on which the said +trade for negroes may be carried on, shall be and is hereby divided into +marts or staples, as hereafter follows. [Here name the marts.] And be it +enacted, that it shall not be lawful for the master of any ship to +purchase any negro or negroes, but at one of the said marts or staples. + +[Sidenote: Governors and counsellors.] + +2. That the directors of the African Company shall appoint, where not +already appointed, a governor, with three counsellors, at each of the +said marts, with a salary of ---- to the governor, and of ---- to each +of the said counsellors. The said governor, or, in his absence or +illness, the senior counsellor, shall and is hereby empowered to act as +a justice of the peace, and they, or either of them, are authorized, +ordered, and directed to provide for the peace of the settlement, and +the good regulation of their station and stations severally, according +to the rules of justice, to the directions of this act, and the +instructions they shall receive from time to time from the said African +Company. And the said African Company is hereby authorized to prepare +instructions, with the assent of the Lords of his Majesty's Privy +Council, which shall be binding in all things not contrary to this act, +or to the laws of England, on the said governors and counsellors, and +every of them, and on all persons acting in commission with them under +this act, and on all persons residing within the jurisdiction of the +magistrates of the said mart. + +[Sidenote: Ships of war stationed.] + +3. And be it enacted, that the Lord High Admiral, or commissioners for +executing his office, shall appoint one or more, as they shall see +convenient, of his Majesty's ships or sloops of war, under the command +severally of a post-captain, or master and commander, to each mart, as a +naval station. + +[Sidenote: Inspectors appointed.] + +4. And be it enacted, that the Lord High Treasurer, or the commissioners +for executing his office, shall name two inspectors of the said trade at +every mart, who shall provide for the execution of this act, according +to the directions thereof, so far as shall relate to them; and it is +hereby provided and enacted, that, as cases of sudden emergency may +arise, the said governor or first counsellor, and the first commander of +his Majesty's ship or ships on the said station, and the said +inspectors, or the majority of them, the governor having a double or +casting vote, shall have power and authority to make such occasional +rules and orders relating to the said trade as shall not be contrary to +the instructions of the African Company, and which shall be valid until +the same are revoked by the said African Company. + +[Sidenote: Lands may be purchased.] + +5. That the said African Company is hereby authorized to purchase, if +the same may conveniently be done, with the consent of the Privy +Council, any lands adjoining to the fort or principal mart aforesaid, +not exceeding ---- acres, and to make allotments of the same; no +allotment to one person to exceed (on pain of forfeiture) ---- acres. + +[Sidenote: Churches and schoolhouses, and hospitals to be erected.] + +[Sidenote: Chaplain and assistant.] + +[Sidenote: Clerk and catechist.] + +6. That the African Company shall, at each fort or mart, cause to be +erected, in a convenient place, and at a moderate cost, the estimate of +which shall be approved by the Treasury, one church, and one +school-house, and one hospital; and shall appoint one principal +chaplain, with a curate or assistant in holy orders, both of whom shall +be recommended by the Lord Bishop of London; and the said chaplain or +his assistant shall perform divine service, and administer the +sacraments, according to the usage of the Church of England, or to such +mode not contrary thereto as to the said bishop shall seem more suitable +to the circumstances of the people. And the said principal chaplain +shall be the third member in the council, and shall be entitled to +receive from the directors of the said African Company a salary of ----, +and his assistant a salary of ----, and he shall have power to appoint +one sober and discreet person, white or black, to be his clerk and +catechist, at a salary of ----. + +[Sidenote: Schoolmaster.] + +[Sidenote: Carpenter and blacksmith.] + +[Sidenote: Native apprentices.] + +[Sidenote: Surgeon and mate.] + +[Sidenote: Native apprentice.] + +7. And be it enacted, that the African Company shall appoint one +sufficient schoolmaster, who shall be approved by the Bishop of London, +and who shall be capable of teaching writing, arithmetic, surveying, and +mensuration, at a salary of ----. And the said African Company is hereby +authorized to provide for each settlement a carpenter and blacksmith, +with such encouragement as to them shall seem expedient, who shall take +each two apprentices from amongst the natives; to instruct them in the +several trades, the African Company allowing them, as a fee for each +apprentice, ----. And the said African Company shall appoint one surgeon +and one surgeon's mate, who are to be approved on examination, at +Surgeons' Hall, to each fort or mart, with a salary of ---- for the +surgeon, and for his mate ----; and the said surgeon shall take one +native apprentice, at a fee to be settled by the African Company. + +[Sidenote: How removable.] + +8. And be it enacted, that the said catechist, schoolmaster, surgeon, +and surgeon's mate, as well as the tradesmen in the Company's service, +shall be obedient to the orders they shall from time to time receive +from the governor and council of each fort; and if they, or any of them, +or any other person, in whatever station, shall appear, on complaint and +proof to the majority of the commissioners, to lead a disorderly and +debauched life, or use any profane or impious discourses, to the danger +of defeating the purposes of this institution, and to the scandal of the +natives, who are to be led by all due means into a respect for our holy +religion, and a desire of partaking of the benefits thereof, they are +authorized and directed to suspend the said person from his office, or +the exercise of his trade, and to send him to England (but without any +hard confinement, except in case of resistance) with a complaint, with +inquiry and proofs adjoined, to the African Company. + +9. And be it enacted, that the Bishop of London for the time being shall +have full authority to remove the said chaplain for such causes as to +him shall seem reasonable. + +[Sidenote: No public officer to be concerned in the negro trade.] + +10. That no governor, counsellor, inspector, chaplain, surgeon, or +schoolmaster shall be concerned, or have any share, directly or +indirectly, in the negro trade, on pain of ----. + +[Sidenote: Journals and letter-books to be kept and transmitted.] + +11. Be it enacted, that the said governor and council shall keep a +journal of all their proceedings, and a book in which copies of all +their correspondence shall be entered, and they shall transmit copies of +the said journals and letter-book, and their books of accounts, to the +African Company, who, within ---- of their receipt thereof, shall +communicate the same to one of his Majesty's principal secretaries of +state. + +[Sidenote: Chaplain to report to the Bishop of London.] + +12. And be it enacted, that the said chaplain or principal minister, +shall correspond with the Bishop of London, and faithfully and +diligently transmit to him an account of whatever hath been done for the +advancement of religion, morality, and learning amongst the natives. + +[Sidenote: Negroes to be attested before sale.] + +13. And be it enacted, that no negro shall be conclusively sold, until +he shall be attested by the two inspectors and chaplain, or, in case of +the illness of any of them, by one inspector, and the governor, or one +of the council, who are hereby authorized and directed, by the best +means in their power, to examine into the circumstances and condition of +the persons exposed to sale. + +[Sidenote: Causes for rejection.] + +14. And for the better direction of the said inspectors, no persons are +to be sold, who, to the best judgment of the said inspectors, shall be +above thirty-five years of age, or who shall appear, on examination, +stolen or carried away by the dealers by surprise; nor any person who is +able to read in the Arabian or any other book; nor any woman who shall +appear to be advanced three months in pregnancy; nor any person +distorted or feeble, unless the said persons are consenting to such +sale; or any person afflicted with a grievous or contagious distemper: +but if any person so offered is only lightly disordered, the said person +may be sold, but must be kept in the hospital of the mart, and shall not +be shipped until completely cured. + +[Sidenote: Traders to be licensed by the governors.] + +15. Be it enacted, that no black or European factor or trader into the +interior country, or on the coast, (the masters of English ships only +excepted, for whose good conduct provision is otherwise herein made,) +shall be permitted to buy or sell in any of the said marts, unless he be +approved by the governor of the mart in which he is to deal, or, in his +absence or disability, by the senior counsellor for the time being, and +obtaining a license from such governor or counsellor; and the said +traders and factors shall, severally or jointly, as they shall be +concerned, before they shall obtain the said license, be bound in a +recognizance, with such surety for his or their good behavior as to the +said governor shall seem the best that can be obtained. + +[Sidenote: Offences how to be tried and punished.] + +16. Be it enacted, that the said governor, or other authority aforesaid, +shall examine, by duty of office, into the conduct of all such traders +and factors, and shall receive and publicly hear (with the assistance of +the council and inspectors aforesaid, and of the commodore, captain, or +other principal commander of one of his Majesty's ships on the said +station, or as many of the same as can be assembled, two whereof, with +the governor, are hereby enabled to act) all complaints against them, or +any of them; and if any black or white trader or factor, (other than in +this act excepted,) either on inquisition of office or on complaint, +shall be convicted by a majority of the said commissioners present of +stealing or taking by surprise any person or persons whatsoever, whether +free or the slaves of others, without the consent of their masters, or +of wilfully and maliciously killing or maiming any person, or of any +cruelty, (necessary restraint only excepted,) or of firing houses, or +destroying goods, the said trader or factor shall be deemed to have +forfeited his recognizance, and his surety to have forfeited his; and +the said trader or factor, so convicted, shall be forever disabled from +dealing in any of the said marts, unless the offence shall not be that +of murder, maiming, arson, or stealing or surprising the person, and +shall appear to the commissioners aforesaid to merit only, besides the +penalty of his bond, a suspension for one year; and the said trader or +factor, so convicted of murder, maiming, arson, stealing or surprising +the person, shall, if a native, be delivered over to the prince to whom +he belongs, to execute further justice on him. But it is hereby provided +and enacted, that, if any European shall be convicted of any of the said +offences, he shall be sent to Europe, together with the evidence against +him; and on the warrant of the said commissioners, the keeper of any of +his Majesty's jails in London, Bristol, Liverpool, or Glasgow shall +receive him, until he be delivered according to due course of law, as if +the said offences had been committed within the cities and towns +aforesaid. + +[Sidenote: Negroes exposed to sale contrary to the provisions of this +act, how to be dealt with.] + +17. Be it further enacted, that, if the said governor, &c, shall be +satisfied that person or persons are exposed to sale, who have been +stolen or surprised as aforesaid, or are not within the qualifications +of sale in this act described, they are hereby authorized and required, +if it can be done, to send the persons so exposed to sale to their +original habitation or settlement, in the manner they shall deem best +for their security, (the reasonable charges whereof shall be allowed to +the said governor by the African Company,) unless the said persons +choose to sell themselves; and then, and in that case, their value in +money and goods, at their pleasure, shall be secured to them, and be +applicable to their use,-without any dominion over the same of any +purchaser, or of any master to whom they may in any colony or plantation +be sold, and which shall always be in some of his master's [Majesty's?] +colonies and plantations only. And the master of the ship in which such +person shall embark shall give bond for the faithful execution of his +part of the trust at the island where he shall break bulk. + +18. Be it further enacted, that, besides the hospitals on shore, one or +more hospital-ships shall be employed at each of the said chief marts, +wherein slaves taken ill in the trading ships shall be accommodated, +until they shall be cured; and then the owner may reclaim and shall +receive them, paying the charges which shall be settled by regulation to +be made by the authority in this act enabled to provide such +regulations. + + * * * * * + +III. And whereas it is necessary that regulations be made to prevent +abuses in the passage from Africa to the West Indies: + +[Sidenote: Slave ships to be examined on the coast.] + +1. Be it further enacted, that the commander or lieutenant of the king's +ship on each station shall have authority, as often as he shall see +occasion, attended with one other of his officers, and his surgeon or +mate, to enter into and inspect every trading ship, in order to provide +for the due execution of this act, and of any ordinances made in virtue +thereof and conformable thereto by the authorities herein constituted +and appointed; and the said officer and officers are hereby required to +examine every trading ship before she sails, and to stop the sailing of +the said ship for the breach of the said rules and ordinances, until the +governor in council shall order and direct otherwise: and the master of] +the said ship shall not presume, under the penalty of ----, to be +recovered in the courts of the West Indies, to sail without a +certificate from the commander aforesaid, and one of the inspectors in +this act appointed, that the vessel is provided with stores and other +accommodation sufficient for her voyage, and has not a greater number of +slaves on board than by the provisions of this act is allowed. + +[Sidenote: Governor to give special instructions.] + +2. And be it enacted, that the governor and council, with the assistance +of the said naval commander, shall have power to give such special +written instructions for the health, discipline, and care of the said +slaves, during their passage, as to them shall seem good, + +[Sidenote: Presents and musical instruments to be provided.] + +3. And be it further enacted, that each slave, at entering the said +ship, is to receive some present, not exceeding in value ----, to be +provided according to the instructions aforesaid; and musical +instruments, according to the fashion of the country, are to be +provided. + +[Sidenote: Table of allowances.] + +4. And be it further enacted, that the negroes on board the transports, +and the seamen who navigate the same, are to receive their daily +allowance according to the table hereunto annexed, together with a +certain quantity of spirits to be mixed with their water. And it is +enacted, that the table is to be fixed, and continue for one week after +sailing, in some conspicuous part of the said ship, for the seamen's +inspection of the same. + +[Sidenote: Negro superintendents to be appointed.] + +5. And be it enacted, that the captain of each trading vessel shall be +enabled and is to divide the slaves in his ship into crews of not less +than ten nor more than twenty persons each, and to appoint one negro man +to have such authority severally over each crew, as according to his +judgment, with the advice of the mate and surgeon, he and they shall see +good to commit to them, and to allow to each of them some compensation, +in extraordinary diet and presents, not exceeding [ten shillings]. + +[Sidenote: Communication with female slaves, how punished.] + +6. And be it enacted, that any European officer or seaman, having +unlawful communication with any woman slave, shall, if an officer, pay +five pounds to the use of the said woman, on landing her from the said +ship, to be stopped out of his wages, or if a seaman, forty shillings: +the said penalties to be recovered on the testimony of the woman so +abused, and one other. + +[Sidenote: Premium to commanders of slave-ships.] + +7. And be it enacted, that all and every commander of a vessel or +vessels employed in slave trade, having received certificates from the +port of the outfit, and from the proper officers in Africa and the West +Indies, of their having conformed to the regulations of this act, and of +their not having lost more than one in thirty of their slaves by death, +shall be entitled to a bounty or premium of [ten pounds]. + + * * * * * + +IV. And whereas the condition of persons in a state of slavery is such +that they are utterly unable to take advantage of any remedy which the +laws may provide for their protection and the amendment of their +condition, and have not the proper means of pursuing any process for +the same, but are and must be under guardianship: and whereas it is not +fitting that they should be under the sole guardianship of their +masters, or their attorneys and overseers, to whom their grievances, +whenever they suffer any, must ordinarily be owing: + +[Sidenote: Attorney-General to be protector of negroes.] + +[Sidenote: To inquire and file information _ex officio_.] + +1. Be it therefore enacted, that his Majesty's Attorney-General for the +time being successively shall, by his office, exercise the trust and +employment of protector of negroes within the island in which he is or +shall be Attorney-General to his Majesty, his heirs and successors; and +that the said Attorney-General, protector of negroes, is hereby +authorized to hear any complaint on the part of any negro or negroes, +and inquire into the same, or to institute an inquiry _ex officio_ into +any abuses, formations and to call before him and examine witnesses upon +oath, relative to the subject-matter of the said official inquiry or +complaint: and it is hereby enacted and declared, that the said +Attorney-General, protector of negroes, is hereby authorized and +empowered, at his discretion, to file an information _ex officio_ for +any offences committed against the provisions of this act, or for any +misdemeanors or wrongs against the said negroes, or any of them. + +[Sidenote: Power to challenge jurors.] + +2. And it is further enacted, that in all trials of such informations +the said protector of negroes may and is hereby authorized to challenge +peremptorily a number not exceeding ---- of the jury who shall be +impanelled to try the charge in the said information contained. + +[Sidenote: To appoint inspectors of districts.] + +[Sidenote: who are to report to him twice in the year the number and +condition of the slaves.] + +3. And be it enacted, that the said Attorney-General, protector of +negroes, shall appoint inspectors, not exceeding the number of ----, at +his discretion; and the said inspectors shall be placed in convenient +districts in each island severally, or shall twice in the year make a +circuit in the same, according to the direction which they shall receive +from the protector of negroes aforesaid; and the inspectors shall and +they are hereby required, twice in the year, to report in writing to the +protector aforesaid the state and condition of the negroes in their +districts or on their circuit severally, the number, sex, age, and +occupation of the said negroes on each plantation; and the overseer or +chief manager on each plantation is hereby required to furnish an +account thereof within [ten days] after the demand of the said +inspectors, and to permit the inspector or inspectors aforesaid to +examine into the same; and the said inspectors shall set forth, in the +said report, the distempers to which the negroes are most liable in the +several parts of the island. + +[Sidenote: Instructions to be formed for inspectors.] + +4. And be it enacted, that the said protector of negroes, by and with +the consent the governor and chief judge of each island, shall form +instructions, by which the said inspectors shall discharge their trust +in the manner the least capable of exciting any unreasonable hopes in +the said negroes, or of weakening the proper authority of the overseer, +and shall transmit them to one of his Majesty's principal secretaries of +state; and when sent back with his approbation, the same shall become +the rule for the conduct of the said inspectors. + +[Sidenote: Registry.] + +5. And be it enacted, that the said Attorney-General, protector of +negroes, shall appoint an office for registering all proceedings +relative to the duty of his place as protector of negroes, and shall +appoint his chief clerk to be registrar, with a salary not exceeding +----. + +[Sidenote: Ports where negroes are to be landed. Vessels to be +inspected.] + +[Sidenote: Masters or officers offending to be fined.] + +6. And be it enacted, that no negroes shall be landed for sale in any +but the ports following: that is to say, ----. And the collector of each +of the said ports severally shall, within ---- days after the arrival of +any ship transporting negroes, report the same to the protector of +negroes, or to one of his inspectors; and the said protector is hereby +authorized and required to examine, or cause to be examined by one of +his inspectors, with the assistance of the said collector, or his +deputy, and a surgeon to be called in on the occasion, the state of the +said ship and negroes; and upon what shall appear to them, the said +protector of negroes, and the said collector and surgeon, to be a +sufficient proof, either as arising from their own inspection, or +sufficient information on a summary process, of any contravention of +this act, or cruelty to the negroes, or other malversation of the said +captain, or any of his officers the said protector shall impose a fine +on him or them, not exceeding ----; which shall not, however, weaken or +invalidate any penalty growing from the bond of the said master or his +owners. And it is hereby provided, that, if the said master, or any of +his officers, shall find himself aggrieved by the said fine, he may +within ---- days appeal to the chief judge, if the court shall be +sitting, or to the governor, who shall and are required to hear the said +parties, and on hearing are to annul or confirm the same. + +[Sidenote: Rates respecting the sale of negroes.] + +7. And be it enacted, that no sale of negroes shall be made but in the +presence of an inspector, and all negroes shall be sold severally, or in +known and ascertained lots, and not otherwise; and a paper containing +the state and description of each negro severally sold, and of each lot, +shall be taken and registered in the office aforesaid; and if, on +inspection or information, it shall be found that any negroes shall +have, in the same ship, or any other at the same time examined, a wife, +an husband, a brother, sister, or child, the person or persons so +related shall not be sold separately at that or any future sale. + +[Sidenote: Every island to be divided into districts.] + +[Sidenote: A church to be built in each.] + +8. And be it enacted, that each and every of his Majesty's islands and +plantations, in which negroes are used in cultivation, shall be, by the +governor and the protector of negroes for the time being, divided into +districts, allowing as much as convenience will admit to the present +division into parishes, and subdividing them, where necessary, into +districts, according to the number of negroes. And the said governor and +protector of negroes shall cause in each district a church to be built +in a convenient place, and a cemetery annexed, and an house for the +residence of a clergyman, with ---- acres of land annexed; and they are +hereby authorized to treat for the necessary ground with the proprietor, +who is hereby obliged to sell and dispose of the same to the said use; +and in case of dispute concerning the value, the same to be settled by a +jury, as in like cases is accustomed. + +[Sidenote: Appointment of a priest and clerk.] + +9. And be it enacted, that in each of the said districts shall be +established a presbyter of the Church of England as by law established, +who shall appoint under him one clerk, who shall be a free negro, when +such properly qualified can be found, (otherwise, a white man,) with a +salary, in each case, of ----; and the said minister and clerk, both or +one, shall instruct the said negroes in the Church Catechism, or such +other as shall be provided by the authority in this act named; and the +said minister shall baptize, as he shall think fit, all negroes not +baptized, and not belonging to Dissenters from the Church of England. + +[Sidenote: Owner to deliver a list of negroes to the minister, and to +cause them to attend divine service.] + +10. And the principal overseer of each plantation is hereby required to +deliver annually unto the minister a list of all the negroes upon his +plantation, distinguishing their sex and age, and shall, under a penalty +of ----, cause all the negroes under his care, above the age of ---- +years, to attend divine service once on every Sunday, except in case of +sickness, infirmity, or other necessary cause, to be given at the time, +and shall, by himself or one of those who are under him, provide for the +orderly behavior of the negroes under him, and cause them to return to +his plantation, when divine service, or administration of sacraments, or +catechism, is ended. + +[Sidenote: Mister to direct punishment for disorderly conduct.] + +11. And be it enacted, that the minister shall have power to punish any +negro for disorderly conduct during divine service, by a punishment not +exceeding [ten] blows to be given in one day and for one offence, which +the overseer or his under agent or agents is hereby directed, according +to the orders of the said minister, effectually to inflict, whenever the +same shall be ordered. + +[Sidenote: Spirituous liquors not to be sold.] + +12. And be it enacted, that no spirituous liquors of any kind shall be +sold, except in towns, within ---- miles distance of any church, nor +within any district during divine service, and an hour preceding and an +hour following the same; and the minister of each parish shall and is +hereby authorized to act as a justice of the peace in enforcing the said +regulation. + +[Sidenote: Register of births, burials, and marriages.] + +13. And be it enacted, that every minister shall keep a register of +births, burials, and marriages of all negroes and mulattoes in his +district. + +[Sidenote: Synod to assemble annually, and to form regulations,] + +14. And be it enacted, that the ministers of the several districts shall +meet annually, on the ---- day of ----, in a synod of the island to +which they belong; and the said synod shall have for its president such +person as the Bishop of London shall appoint for his commissary; and the +said synod or general assembly is hereby authorized, by a majority of +voices, to make regulations, which regulations shall be transmitted by +the said president or commissary to the Bishop of London; and when +returned by the Bishop of London approved of, then, and not before, the +said regulations shall be held in force to bind the said clergy, their +assistants, clerks, and schoolmasters only, and no other persons. + +[Sidenote: and to report to the Bishop of London.] + +15. And be it enacted, that the said president shall collect matter in +the said assembly, and shall make a report of the state of religion and +morals in the several parishes from whence the synod is deputed, and +shall transmit the same, once in the year, in duplicate, through the +governor and protector of negroes, to the Bishop of London. + +[Sidenote: Bishop of London to be patron of the cures.] + +16. And be it enacted and declared, that the Bishop of London for the +time being patron of the shall be patron to all and every the said +cures in this act directed; and the said bishop is hereby required to +provide for the due filling thereof, and is to receive, from the fund in +this act provided for the due execution of this act, a sum not exceeding +---- for each of the said ministers, for his outfit and passage. + +[Sidenote: and to have power of suspending and removing ministers.] + +17. And be it enacted, that, on misbehavior, and on complaint from the +said synod, and on hearing the party accused in a plain and summary +manner, it shall and may be lawful for the Bishop of London to suspend +or to remove any minister from his cure, as his said offences shall +appear to merit. + +[Sidenote: Schools for young negroes.] + +18. And be it enacted, that for every two districts a school shall be +established for young negroes to be taught three days in the week, and +to be detained from their owner four hours in each day, the number not +to be more or fewer than twenty males in each district, who shall be +chosen, and vacancies filled, by the minister of the district; and the +said minister shall pay to the owner of the said boy, and shall be +allowed the same in his accounts at the synod, to the age of twelve +years old, three-pence by the day, and for every boy from twelve years +old to fifteen, five-pence by the day. + +[Sidenote: Extraordinary abilities to be encouraged.] + +19. And it is enacted, that, if the president of the synod aforesaid +shall certify to the protector of negroes, that any boys in the said +schools (provided that the number in no one year shall exceed one in the +island of Jamaica, and one in two years in the islands of Barbadoes, +Antigua, and Grenada, and one in four years in any of the other islands) +do show a remarkable aptitude for learning, the said protector is hereby +authorized and directed to purchase the said boy at the best rate at +which boys of that age and strength have been sold within the year; and +the said negro so purchased shall be under the entire guardianship of +the said protector of negroes, who shall send him to the Bishop of +London for his further education in England, and may charge in his +accounts for the expense of transporting him to England; and the Bishop +of London shall provide for the education of such of the said negroes as +he shall think proper subjects, until the age of twenty-four years, and +shall order those who shall fall short of expectation after one year to +be bound apprentice to some handicraft trade; and when his +apprenticeship is finished, the Lord Mayor of London is hereby +authorized and directed to receive the said negro from his master, and +to transmit him to the island from which he came, in the West Indies, to +be there as a free negro, subject, however, to the direction of the +protector of negroes, relatively to his behavior and employment. + +[Sidenote: Negroes of Dissenters.] + +[Sidenote: their marriages, &c., to be registered.] + +20. And it is hereby enacted and provided, that any planter, or owner of +negroes, not being of the Church of England, and not choosing to send +his negroes to attend divine service in manner by this act directed, +shall give, jointly or severally, as the case shall require, security to +the protector of negroes that a competent minister of some Christian +church or congregation shall be provided for the due instruction of the +negroes, and for their performing divine service according to the +description of the religion of the master or masters, in some church or +house thereto allotted, in the manner and with the regulations in this +act prescribed with regard to the exercise of religion according to the +Church of England: provided always, that the marriages of the said +negroes belonging to Dissenters shall be celebrated only in the church +of the said district, and that a register of the births shall be +transmitted to the minister of the said district. + +[Sidenote: Regulations concerning marriage.] + +21. And whereas a state of matrimony, and the government of a family, is +a principal means of forming men to a fitness for freedom, and to become +good citizens: Be it enacted, that all negro men and women, above +eighteen years of age for the man and sixteen for the woman, who have +cohabited together for twelve months or upwards, or shall cohabit for +the same time, and have a child or children, shall be deemed to all +intents and purposes to be married, and either of the parties is +authorized to require of the ministers of the district to be married in +the face of the church. + +[Sidenote: Concerning the same.] + +22. And be it enacted, that, from and after the ---- of ----, all negro +men in an healthy condition, and so reported to be, in case the same is +denied, by a surgeon and by an inspector of negroes, and being +twenty-one years old, or upwards, until fifty, and not being before +married, shall, on requisition of the inspectors, be provided by their +masters or overseers with a woman not having children living, and not +exceeding the age of the man, nor, in any case, exceeding the age of +twenty-five years; and such persons shall be married publicly in the +face of the church. + +[Sidenote: Concerning the same.] + +23. And be it enacted, that, if any negro shall refuse a competent +marriage tendered to him, and shall not demand another specifically, +such as it may be in his master's power to provide, the master or +overseer shall be authorized to constrain him by an increase of work or +a lessening of allowance. + +[Sidenote: Adultery, &c., how to be punished.] + +24. And be it enacted, that the minister in each district shall have, +with the assent of the inspector, full power and authority to punish all +acts of adultery, unlawful concubinage, and fornication, amongst +negroes, on hearing and a summary process, by ordering a number of +blows, not exceeding ----, for each offence; and if any white person +shall be proved, on information in the supreme court, to be exhibited by +the protector of negroes, to have committed adultery with any negro +woman, or to have corrupted any negro woman under sixteen years of age +he shall be fined in the sum of ----, and shall be forever disabled from +serving the office of overseer of negroes, or being attorney to any +plantation. + +[Sidenote: Concerning marriage.] + +25. And be it enacted, that no slaves shall be compelled to do any work +for their masters for [three] days after their marriage. + +[Sidenote: Concerning pregnant women.] + +26. And be it enacted, that no woman shall be obliged to field-work, or +any other laborious work, for one month before her delivery, or for six +weeks afterwards. + +[Sidenote: Separation of husband and wife, and children, to be avoided.] + +27. And be it enacted, that no husband and wife shall be sold +separately, if originally belonging to the same master; nor shall any +children under sixteen be sold separately from their parents, or one +parent, if one be living. + +[Sidenote: Concerning the same.] + +28. And be it enacted, that, if an husband and wife, which before their +intermarriage belonged to different owners, shall be sold, they shall +not be sold at such a distance as to prevent mutual help and +cohabitation; and of this distance the minister shall judge, and his +certificate of the inconvenient distance shall be valid, so as to make +such sale unlawful, and to render the same null and void. + +[Sidenote: Negroes not to work on Saturday afternoon or Sunday.] + +29. And be it enacted, that no negro shall be compelled to work for his +owner at field-work, or any service relative to a plantation, or to work +at any handicraft trade, from eleven o'clock on Saturday forenoon until +the usual working hour on Monday morning. + +[Sidenote: Other cases of exemption from labor.] + +30. And whereas habits of industry and sobriety, and the means of +acquiring and preserving property, are proper and reasonable +preparatives to freedom, and will secure against an abuse of the same: +Be it enacted, that every negro man, who shall have served ten years, +and is thirty years of age, and is married, and has had two children +born of any marriage, shall obtain the whole of Saturday for himself and +his wife, and for his own benefit, and after thirty-seven years of age, +the whole of Friday for himself and his wife: provided that in both +cases the minister of the district and the inspector of negroes shall +certify that they know nothing against his peaceable, orderly, and +industrious behavior. + +[Sidenote: Huts and land to be appropriated.] + +31. And be it enacted, that the master of every plantation shall provide +the materials of a good and substantial hut for each married field +negro; and if his plantation shall exceed ---- acres, he shall allot to +the same a portion of land not less than ----: and the said hut and land +shall remain and stand annexed to the said negro, for his natural life, +or during his bondage; but the same shall not be alienated without the +consent of the owners. + +[Sidenote: Property of negroes secured.] + +32. And be it enacted, that it shall not be lawful for the owner of any +negro, by himself or any other, to take from him any land, house, +cattle, goods, or money, acquired by the said negro, whether by +purchase, donation, or testament, whether the same has been derived from +the owner of the said negro, or any other. + +33. And be it enacted, that, if the said negro shall die possessed of +any lands, goods, or chattels, and dies without leaving a wife or issue, +it shall be lawful for the said negro to devise or bequeath the same by +his last will; but in case the said negro shall die intestate, and leave +a wife and children, the same shall be distributed amongst them, +according to the usage under the statute, commonly called the Statute of +Distributions; but if the said negro shall die intestate without wife or +children, then, and in that case, his estate shall go to the fund +provided for the better execution of this act. + +34. And be it enacted, that no negro, who is married, and hath resided +upon any plantation for twelve months, shall be sold, either privately +or by the decree of any court, but along with the plantation on which he +hath resided, unless he should himself request to be separated +therefrom. + +[Sidenote: Of the punishment of negroes.] + +35. And be it enacted, that no blows or stripes exceeding thirteen, +shall be inflicted for one offence upon any negro, without the order of +one of his Majesty's justices of peace. + +[Sidenote: Of the same.] + +36. And it is enacted, that it shall be lawful for the protector of +negroes, as often as on complaint and hearing he shall be of opinion +that any negro hath been cruelly and inhumanly treated, or when it +shall be made to appear to him that an overseer hath any particular +malice, to order, at the desire of the suffering party, the said negro +to be sold to another master. + +37. And be it enacted, that, in all cases of injury to member or life, +the offences against a negro shall be deemed and taken to all intents +and purposes as if the same were perpetrated against any of his +Majesty's subjects; and the protector of negroes, on complaint, or if he +shall receive credible information thereof, shall cause an indictment to +be presented for the same; and in case of suspicion of any murder of a +negro, an inquest by the coroner, or officer acting as such, shall, if +practicable, be held into the same. + +[Sidenote: Of the manumission of negroes.] + +38. And in order to a gradual manumission of slaves, as they shall seem +fitted to fill the offices of freemen, be it enacted, that every negro +slave, being thirty years of ago and upwards, and who has had three +children born to him in lawful matrimony, and who hath received a +certificate from the minister of his district, or any other Christian +teacher, of his regularity in the duties of religion, and of his orderly +and good behavior, may purchase, at rates to be fixed by two justices of +peace, the freedom of himself, or his wife or children, or of any of +them separately, valuing the wife and children, if purchased into +liberty by the father of the family, at half only of their marketable +values: provided that the said father shall bind himself in a penalty of +---- for the good behavior of his children. + +[Sidenote: Of the same.] + +39. And be it enacted, that it shall be lawful for the protector of +negroes to purchase the freedom of any negro who shall appear to him to +excel in any mechanical art, or other knowledge or practice deemed +liberal, and the value shall be settled by a jury. + +[Sidenote: Free negroes how to be punished.] + +40. And be it enacted, that the protector of negroes shall be and is +authorized and required to act as a magistrate for the coercion of all +idle, disobedient, or disorderly free negroes, and he shall by office +prosecute them for the offences of idleness, drunkenness, quarrelling, +gaming, or vagrancy, in the supreme court, or cause them to be +prosecuted before one justice of peace, as the case may require. + +[Sidenote: Of the same.] + +41. And be it enacted, that, if any free negro hath been twice convicted +for any of the said misdemeanors, and is judged by the said protector of +negroes, calling to his assistance two justices of the peace, to be +incorrigibly idle, dissolute, and vicious, it shall be lawful, by the +order of the said protector and two justices of peace, to sell the said +free negro into slavery: the purchase-money to be paid to the person so +remanded into servitude, or kept in hand by the protector and governor +for the benefit of his family. + +[Sidenote: Governor to receive and transmit annual reports.] + +42. And be it enacted, that the governor in each colony shall be +assistant to the execution of this act, and shall receive the reports of +the protector, and such other accounts as he shall judge material, +relative thereto, and shall transmit the same annually to one of his +Majesty's principal secretaries of state. + + + + +LETTER + +TO + +THE CHAIRMAN OF THE BUCKINGHAMSHIRE MEETING, + +HELD AT AYLESBURY, APRIL 13, 1780, + +ON THE SUBJECT OF + +PARLIAMENTARY REFORM. + + + + +NOTE. + + The meeting of the freeholders of the County of Buckingham, + which occasioned the following Letter, was called for the + purpose of taking into consideration a petition to Parliament + for shortening the duration of Parliaments, and for a more + equal representation of the people in the House of Commons. + + +Sir,--Having heard yesterday, by mere accident, that there is an +intention of laying before the county meeting _new matter, which is not +contained in our petition_, and the consideration of which had been +deferred to a fitter time by a majority of our committee in London, +permit me to take this method of submitting to you my reasons for +thinking, with our committee, that nothing ought to be hastily deter +mined upon the subject. + +Our petition arose naturally from distresses which we _felt_; and the +requests which we made were in effect nothing more than that such things +should be done in Parliament as it was evidently the duty of Parliament +to do. But the affair which will be proposed to you by a person of rank +and ability is an alteration in the constitution of Parliament itself. +It is impossible for you to have a subject before you of more +importance, and that requires a more cool and more mature consideration, +both on its own account, and for the credit of our sobriety of mind, who +are to resolve upon it. + +The county will in some way or other be called upon to declare it your +opinion, that the House of Commons is not sufficiently numerous, and +that the elections are not sufficiently frequent,--that an hundred new +knights of the shire ought to be added, and that we are to have a new +election once in three years for certain, and as much oftener as the +king pleases. Such will be the state of things, if the proposition made +shall take effect. + +All this may be proper. But, as an honest man, I cannot possibly give my +rote for it, until I have considered it more fully. I will not deny that +our Constitution may have faults, and that those faults, when found, +ought to be corrected; but, on the whole, that Constitution has been our +own pride, and an object of admiration to all other nations. It is not +everything which appears at first view to be faulty, in such a +complicated plan, that is to be determined to be so in reality. To +enable us to correct the Constitution, the whole Constitution must be +viewed together; and it must be compared with the actual state of the +people, and the circumstances of the time. For that which taken singly +and by itself may appear to be wrong, when considered with relation to +other things, may be perfectly right,--or at least such as ought to be +patiently endured, as the means of preventing something that is worse. +So far with regard to what at first view may appear a _distemper_ in the +Constitution. As to the _remedy_ of that distemper an equal caution +ought to be used; because this latter consideration is not single and +separate, no more than the former. There are many things in reformation +which would be proper to be done, if other things can be done along with +them, but which, if they cannot be so accompanied, ought not to be done +at all. I therefore wish, when any new matter of this deep nature is +proposed to me, to have the whole scheme distinctly in my view, and full +time to consider of it. Please God, I will walk with caution, whenever I +am not able clearly to see my way before me. + +I am now growing old. I have from my very early youth been conversant in +reading and thinking upon the subject of our laws and Constitution, as +well as upon those of other times and other countries; I have been for +fifteen years a very laborious member of Parliament, and in that time +have had great opportunities of seeing with my own eyes the working of +the machine of our government, and remarking where it went smoothly and +did its business, and where it checked in its movements, or where it +damaged its work; I have also had and used the opportunities of +conversing with men of the greatest wisdom and fullest experience in +those matters; and I do declare to you most solemnly and most truly, +that, on the result of all this reading, thinking, experience, and +communication, I am not able to come to an immediate resolution in favor +of a change of the groundwork of our Constitution, and in particular, +that, in the present state of the country, in the present state of our +representation, in the present state of our rights and modes of +electing, in the present state of the several prevalent interests, in +the present state of the affairs and manners of this country, the +addition of an hundred knights of the shire, and hurrying election on +election, will be things advantageous to liberty or good government. + +This is the present condition of my mind; and this is my apology for not +going as fast as others may choose to go in this business. I do not by +any means reject the propositions; much less do I condemn the gentlemen +who, with equal good intentions, with much better abilities, and with +infinitely greater personal weight and consideration than mine, are of +opinion that this matter ought to be decided upon instantly. + +I most heartily wish that the deliberate sense of the kingdom on this +great subject should be known. When it is known, it _must_ be prevalent. +It would be dreadful indeed, if there was any power in the nation +capable of resisting its unanimous desire, or even the desire of any +very great and decided majority of the people. The people may be +deceived in their choice of an object; but I can scarcely conceive any +choice they can make to be so very mischievous as the existence of any +human force capable of resisting it. It will certainly be the duty of +every man, in the situation to which God has called him, to give his +best opinion and advice upon the matter: it will _not_ be his duty, let +him think what he will, to use any violent or any fraudulent means of +counteracting the general wish, or even of employing the legal and +constructive organ of expressing the people's sense against the sense +which they do actually entertain. + +In order that the real sense of the people should be known upon so great +an affair as this, it is of absolute necessity that timely notice should +be given,--that the matter should be prepared in open committees, from a +choice into which no class or description of men is to be excluded,--and +the subsequent county meetings should be as full and as well attended as +possible. Without these precautions, the true sense of the people will +ever be uncertain. Sure I am, that no precipitate resolution on a great +change in the fundamental constitution of any country can ever be called +the real sense of the people. + +I trust it will not be taken amiss, if, as an inhabitant and freeholder +of this county, (one, indeed, among the most inconsiderable,) I assert +my right of dissenting (as I do dissent fully and directly) from any +resolution whatsoever on the subject of an alteration in the +representation and election of the kingdom _at this time_. By preserving +this light, and exercising it with temper and moderation, I trust I +cannot offend the noble proposer, for whom no man professes or feels +more respect and regard than I do. A want of concurrence in _everything_ +which _can_ be proposed will in no sort weaken the energy or distract +the efforts of men of upright intentions upon those points in which they +are agreed. Assemblies that are met, and with a resolution to be all of +a mind, are assemblies that can have no opinion at all of their own. The +first proposer of any measure must be their master. I do not know that +an amicable variety of sentiment, conducted with mutual good-will, has +any sort of resemblance to discord, or that it can give any advantage +whatsoever to the enemies of our common cause. On the contrary, a forced +and fictitious agreement (which every universal agreement must be) is +not becoming the cause of freedom. If, however, any evil should arise +from it, (which I confess I do not foresee,) I am happy that those who +have brought forward new and arduous matter, when very great doubts and +some diversity of opinion must be foreknown, are of authority and weight +enough to stand against the consequences. + +I humbly lay these my sentiments before the county. They are not taken +up to serve any interests of my own, or to be subservient to the +interests of any man or set of men under heaven. I could wish to be able +to attend our meeting, or that I had time to reason this matter more +fully by letter; but I am detained here upon our business: what you have +already put upon us is as much as we can do. If we are prevented from +going through it with any effect, I fear it will be in part owing not +more to the resistance of the enemies of our cause than to our imposing +on ourselves such tasks as no human faculties, employed as we are, can +be equal to. Our worthy members have shown distinguished ability and +zeal in support of our petition. I am just going down to a bill brought +in to frustrate a capital part of your desires. The minister is +preparing to transfer the cognizance of the public accounts from those +whom you and the Constitution have chosen to control them, to unknown +persons, creatures of his own. For so much he annihilates Parliament. + +I have the honor, &c. + +EDMUND BURKE. + +CHARLES STREET, 12th April, 1780. + + + + +FRAGMENTS OF A TRACT + +RELATIVE TO + +THE LAWS AGAINST POPERY + +IN IRELAND. + + +NOTE. + + The condition of the Roman Catholics in Ireland appears to + lave engaged the attention of Mr. Burke at a very early + period of his political life. It was probably soon after the + year 1765 that he formed the plan of a work upon that + subject, the fragments of which are now given to the public. + No title is prefixed to it in the original manuscript; and + the _Plan_, which it has been thought proper to insert here, + was evidently designed merely for the convenience of the + author. Of the first chapter some unconnected fragments only, + too imperfect for publication, have been found. Of the second + there is a considerable portion, perhaps nearly the whole; + but the copy from which it is printed is evidently a first + rough draught. The third chapter, as far as it goes, is taken + from a fair, corrected copy; but the end of the second part + of the first head is left unfinished, and the discussion of + the second and third heads was either never entered upon or + the manuscript containing it has unfortunately been lost. + What follows the third chapter appears to have been designed + for the beginning of the fourth, and is evidently the first + rough draught; and to this we have added a fragment which + appears to have been a part either of this or the first + chapter. + + In the volume with which it is intended to close this + posthumous publication of Mr. Burke's Works, we shall have + occasion to enter into a more particular account of the part + which he took in the discussion of this great political + question. At present it may suffice to say, that the Letter + to Mr. Smith, the Second Letter to Sir Hercules Langrishe, + and the Letter to his Son, which here follow in order the + Fragment on the Popery Laws, are the only writings upon this + subject found amongst his papers in a state fit to appear in + this stage of the publication. What remain are some small + fragments of the Tract, and a few letters containing no new + matter of importance. + + + + +TRACT + +ON THE POPERY LAWS + + +THE PLAN. + + +I propose, first, to make an Introduction, in order to show the +propriety of a closer inspection into the affairs of Ireland; and this +takes up the first chapter, which is to be spent in this introductory +matter, and in stating the Popery laws in general, as one leading cause +of the imbecility of the country. + +CH. II. states particularly the laws themselves, in a plain and popular +manner. + +CH. III. begins the remarks upon them, under the heads of, 1st, The +object,--which is a numerous people; 2ndly, Their means,--a restraint on +property; 3rdly, Their instruments of execution,--corrupted morals, +which affect the national prosperity. + +CH. IV. The impolicy of those laws, as they affect the national +security. + +CH. V. Reasons by which the laws are supported, and answers to them. + + + + +CHAPTER II. + + +In order to lay this matter with full satisfaction before the reader, I +shall collect into one point of view, and state as shortly and as +clearly as I am able, the purport of these laws, according to the +objects which they affect, without making at present any further +observation upon them, but just what shall be necessary to render the +drift; and intention of the legislature and the tendency and operation +of the laws the more distinct and evident. + +I shall begin with those which relate to the possession and inheritance +of landed property in Popish hands. The first operation of those acts +upon this object was wholly to change the course of descent by the +Common Law, to take away the right of primogeniture, and, in lieu +thereof, to substitute and establish a new species of Statute Gavelkind. +By this law, on the death of a Papist possessed of an estate in fee +simple or in fee tail, the land is to be divided by equal portions +between all the male children; and those portions are likewise to be +parcelled out, share and share alike, amongst the descendants of each +son, and so to proceed in a similar distribution _ad infinitum_. From +this regulation it was proposed that some important consequences should +follow. First, by taking away the right of primogeniture, perhaps in the +very first generation, certainly in the second, the families of Papists, +however respectable, and their fortunes, however considerable, would be +wholly dissipated, and reduced to obscurity and indigence, without any +possibility that they should repair them by their industry or +abilities,--being, as we shall see anon, disabled from every species of +permanent acquisition. Secondly, by this law the right of testamentation +is taken away, which the inferior tenures had always enjoyed, and all +tenures from the 27th Hen. VIII; Thirdly, the right of settlement was +taken away, that no such persons should, from the moment the act passed, +be enabled to advance themselves in fortune or connection by marriage, +being disabled from making any disposition, in consideration of such +marriage, but what the law had previously regulated: the reputable +establishment of the eldest son, as representative of the family, or to +settle a jointure, being commonly the great object in such settlements, +which was the very power which the law had absolutely taken away. + +The operation of this law, however certain, might be too slow. The +present possessors might happen to be long-lived. The legislature knew +the natural impatience of expectants, and upon this principle they gave +encouragement to children to anticipate the inheritance. For it is +provided, that the eldest son of any Papist shall, immediately on his +conformity, change entirely the nature and properties of his father's +legal estate: if he before held in fee simple, or, in other words, had +the entire and absolute dominion over the land, he is reduced to an +estate for his life only, with all the consequences of the natural +debility of that estate, by which he becomes disqualified to sell, +mortgage, charge, (except for his life,) or in any wise to do any act by +which he may raise money for relief in his most urgent necessities. The +eldest son, so conforming, immediately acquires, and in the lifetime of +his father, the permanent part, what our law calls the reversion and +inheritance of the estate; and he discharges it by retrospect, and +annuls every sort of voluntary settlement made by the father ever so +long before his conversion. This he may sell or dispose of immediately, +and alienate it from the family forever. + +Having thus reduced his father's estate, he may also bring his father +into the Court of Chancery, where he may compel him to swear to the +value of his estate, and to allow him out of that possession (which had +been before reduced to an estate for life) such an immediate annual +allowance as the Lord Chancellor or Lord Keeper shall judge suitable to +his ago and quality. + +This indulgence is not confined to the eldest son. The other children +likewise, by conformity, may acquire the same privileges, and in the +same manner force from their father an immediate and independent +maintenance. It is very well worth remarking, that the statutes have +avoided to fix any determinate age for these emancipating conversions; +so that the children, at any age, however incapable of choice in other +respects, however immature or even infantile, are yet considered +sufficiently capable to disinherit their parents, and totally to +subtract themselves from their direction and control, either at their +own option, or by the instigation of others. By this law the tenure and +value of a Roman Catholic in his real property is not only rendered +extremely limited and altogether precarious, but the paternal power is +in all such families so enervated that it may well be considered as +entirely taken away; even the principle upon which it is founded seems +to be directly reversed. However, the legislature feared that enough was +not yet done upon this head. The Roman Catholic parent, by selling his +real estate, might in some sort preserve the dominion over his substance +and his family, and thereby evade the operation of these laws, which +intended to take away both. Besides, frequent revolutions and many +conversions had so broken the landed property of Papists in that +kingdom, that it was apprehended that this law could have in a short +time but a few objects upon which it would be capable of operating. + +To obviate these inconveniences another law was made, by which the +dominion of children over their parents was extended universally +throughout the whole Popish part of the nation, and every child of every +Popish parent was encouraged to come into what is called a court of +equity, to prefer a bill against his father, and compel him to confess, +upon oath, the quantity and value of his substance, personal as well as +real, of what nature soever, or howsoever it might be employed; upon +which discovery, the court is empowered to seize upon and allocate, for +the immediate maintenance of such child or children, any sum not +exceeding a third of the whole fortune: and as to their future +establishment on the death of the father, no limits are assigned; the +Chancery may, if it thinks fit, take the whole property, personal as +well as real, money, stock in trade, &c, out of the power of the +possessor, and secure it in any manner they judge expedient for that +purpose; for the act has not assigned any sort of limit with regard to +the quantity which is to be charged, or given any direction concerning +the means of charging and securing it: a law which supersedes all +observation. + +But the law is still more extensive in its provision. Because there was +a possibility that the parent, though sworn, might by false +representations evade the discovery of the ultimate value of his estate, +a new bill may be at any time brought, by one, any, or all of the +children, for a further discovery; his effects are to undergo a fresh +scrutiny, and a now distribution is to be made in consequence of it. So +that the parent has no security against perpetual inquietude, and the +reiteration of Chancery suits, but by (what is somewhat difficult for +human nature to comply with) fully, and without reserve, abandoning his +whole property to the discretion of the court, to be disposed of in +favor of such children. + +But is this enough, and has the parent purchased his repose by such a +surrender? Very far from it. The law expressly, and very carefully, +provides that he shall not: before he can be secure from the persecution +of his children, it requires another and a much more extraordinary +condition: the children are authorized, if they can find that their +parent has by his industry, or otherwise, increased the value of his +property since their first bill, to bring another, compelling a new +account of the value of his estate, in order to a new distribution +proportioned to the value of the estate at the time of the new bill +preferred. They may bring such bills, _toties quoties_, upon every +improvement of his fortune, without any sort of limitation of time, or +regard to the frequency of such bills, or to the quantity of the +increase of the estate, which shall justify the bringing them. This act +expressly provides that he shall have no respite from the persecution of +his children, but by totally abandoning all thoughts of improvement and +acquisition. + +This is going a great way, surely: but the laws in question have gone +much further. Not satisfied with calling upon children to revolt against +their parents, and to possess themselves of their substance, there are +cases where the withdrawing of the child from his father's obedience is +not left to the option of the child himself: for, if the wife of a Roman +Catholic should choose to change her religion, from that moment she +deprives her husband of all management and direction of his children, +and even of all the tender satisfaction which a parent can feel in their +society, and which is the only indemnification he can have for all his +cares and sorrows; and they are to be torn forever, at the earliest age, +from his house and family: for the Lord Chancellor is not only +authorized, but he is strongly required, to take away all his children +from such Popish parent, to appoint where, in what manner, and by whom +they are to be educated; and the father is compelled to pay, not for the +ransom, but for the deprivation of his children, and to furnish such a +sum as the Chancellor thinks proper to appoint for their education to +the age of eighteen years. The case is the same, if the husband should +be the conformist; though how the law is to operate in this case I do +not see: for the act expressly says, that the child shall be taken from +such Popish parent; and whilst such husband and wife cohabit, it will be +impossible to put it into execution without taking the child from one as +well as from the other; and then the effect of the law will be, that, if +either husband or wife becomes Protestant, both are to be deprived of +their children. + +The paternal power thus being wholly abrogated, it is evident that by +the last regulation the power of an husband over his wife is also +considerably impaired; because, if it be in her power, whenever she +pleases, to subtract the children from his protection and obedience, she +herself by that hold inevitably acquires a power and superiority over +her husband. + +But she is not left dependent upon this oblique influence: for, if in +any marriage settlement the husband has reserved to him a power of +making a jointure, and he dies without settling any, her conformity +executes his powers, and executes them in as large extent as the +Chancellor thinks fit. The husband is deprived of that coercive power +over his wife which he had in his hands by the use he might make of the +discretionary power reserved in the settlement. + +But if no such power had been reserved, and no such settlement existed, +yet, if the husband dies, leaving his conforming wife without a filed +provision by some settlement on his real estate, his wife may apply to +Chancery, where she shall be allotted a portion from his leases, and +other personal estate, not exceeding one third of his whole clear +substance. The laws in this instance, as well as in the former, have +presumed that the husband has omitted to make all the provision which he +might have done, for no other reason than that of her religion. If, +therefore, she chooses to balance any domestic misdemeanors to her +husband by the public merit of conformity to the Protestant religion, +the law will suffer no plea of such misdemeanors to be urged on the +husband's part, nor proof of that kind to be entered into. She acquires +a provision totally independent of his favor, and deprives him of that +source of domestic authority which the Common Law had left to him, that +of rewarding or punishing, by a voluntary distribution of his effects, +what in his opinion was the good or ill behavior of his wife. + +Thus the laws stand with regard to the property already acquired, to its +mode of descent, and to family powers. Now as to the new acquisition of +real property, and both to the acquisition and security of personal, the +law stands thus:-- + +All persons of that persuasion are disabled from taking or purchasing, +directly or by a trust, any lands, any mortgage upon land, any rents or +profits from land, any lease, interest, or term of any land, any +annuity for life or lives or years, or any estate whatsoever, chargeable +upon, or which may in any manner affect, any lands. + +One exception, and one only, is admitted by the statutes to the +universality of this exclusion, viz., a lease for a term not exceeding +thirty-one years. But even this privilege is charged with a prior +qualification. This remnant of a right is doubly curtailed: 1st, that on +such a short lease a rent not less than two thirds of the full improved +yearly value, at the time of the making it, shall be reserved during the +whole continuance of the term; and, 2ndly, it does not extend to the +whole kingdom. This lease must also be in possession, and not in +reversion. If any lease is made, exceeding either in duration or value, +and in the smallest degree, the above limits, the whole interest is +forfeited, and vested _ipso facto_ in the first Protestant discoverer or +informer. This discoverer, thus invested with the property, is enabled +to sue for it as his own right. The courts of law are not alone open to +him; he may (and this is the usual method) enter into either of the +courts of equity, and call upon the parties, and those whom he suspects +to be their trustees, upon oath, and under the penalties of perjury, to +discover against themselves the exact nature and value of their estates +in every particular, in order to induce their forfeiture on the +discovery. In such suits the informer is not liable to those delays +which the ordinary procedure of those courts throws into the way of the +justest claimant; nor has the Papist the indulgence which he [it?] +allows to the most fraudulent defendant, that of plea and demurrer; but +the defendant is obliged to answer the whole directly upon oath. The +rule of _favores ampliandi,_ &c., is reversed by this act, lest any +favor should be shown, or the force and operation of the law in any part +of its progress be enervated. All issues to be tried on this act are to +be tried by none but known Protestants. + +It is here necessary to state as a part of this law what has been for +some time generally understood as a certain consequence of it. The act +had expressly provided that a Papist could possess no sort of estate +which might affect land (except as before excepted). On this a +difficulty did, not unnaturally, arise. It is generally known, a +judgment being obtained or acknowledged for any debt, since the statute +of Westm. 2, 13 Ed. I. c. 18, one half of the debtor's land is to be +delivered unto the creditor until the obligation is satisfied, under a +writ called _Elegit_, and this writ has been ever since the ordinary +assurance of the land, and the great foundation of general credit in the +nation. Although the species of holding under this writ is not specified +in the statute, the received opinion, though not juridically delivered, +has been, that, if they attempt to avail themselves of that security, +because it may create an estate, however precarious, in land, their +whole debt or charge is forfeited, and becomes the property of the +Protestant informer. Thus you observe, first, that by the express words +of the law all possibility of acquiring any species of valuable +property, in any sort connected with land, is taken away; and, secondly, +by the construction all security for money is also cut off. No security +is left, except what is merely personal, and which, therefore, most +people who lend money would, I believe, consider as none at all. + +Under this head of the acquisition of property, the law meets them in +every road of industry, and in its direct and consequential provisions +throws almost all sorts of obstacles in their way. For they are not only +excluded from all offices in Church and State, which, though a just and +necessary provision, is yet no small restraint in the acquisition, but +they are interdicted from the army, and the law, in all its branches. +This point is carried to so scrupulous a severity, that chamber +practice, and even private conveyancing, the most voluntary agency, are +prohibited to them under the severest penalties and the most rigid modes +of inquisition. They have gone beyond even this: for every barrister, +six clerk, attorney, or solicitor, is obliged to take a solemn oath not +to employ persons of that persuasion,--no, not as hackney clerks, at the +miserable salary of seven shillings a week. No tradesman of that +persuasion is capable by any service or settlement to obtain his freedom +in any town corporate; so that they trade and work in their own native +towns as aliens, paying, as such, quarterage, and other charges and +impositions. They are expressly forbidden, in whatever employment, to +take more than two apprentices, except in the linen manufacture only. + + * * * * * + +In every state, next to the care of the life and properties of the +subject, the education of their youth has been a subject of attention. +In the Irish laws this point has not been neglected. Those who are +acquainted with the constitution of our universities need not be +informed that none but those who conform to the Established Church can +be at all admitted to study there, and that none can obtain degrees in +them who do not previously take all the tests, oaths, and declarations. +Lest they should be enabled to supply this defect by private academies +and schools of their own, the law has armed itself with all its terrors +against such a practice. Popish schoolmasters of every species are +proscribed by those acts, and it is made felony to teach even in a +private family. So that Papists are entirely excluded from an education +in any of our authorized establishments for learning at home. In order +to shut up every avenue to instruction, the act of King William in +Ireland has added to this restraint by precluding them from all foreign +education. + +This act is worthy of attention on account of the singularity of some of +its provisions. Being sent for education to any Popish school or college +abroad, upon conviction, incurs (if the party sent has any estate of +inheritance) a kind of unalterable and perpetual outlawry. The tender +and incapable age of such a person, his natural subjection to the will +of others, his necessary, unavoidable ignorance of the laws, stands for +nothing in his favor. He is disabled to sue in law or equity; to be +guardian, executor, or administrator; he is rendered incapable of any +legacy or deed of gift; he forfeits all his goods and chattels forever; +and he forfeits for his life all his lands, hereditaments, offices, and +estate of freehold, and all trusts, powers, or interests therein. All +persons concerned in sending them or maintaining them abroad, by the +least assistance of money or otherwise, are involved in the same +disabilities, and subjected to the same penalties. + +The mode of conviction is as extraordinary as the penal sanctions of +this act. A justice of peace, upon information that any child is sent +away, may require to be brought before him all persons charged or even +suspected of sending or assisting, and examine them and other persons +on oath concerning the fact. If on this examination he finds it +_probable_ that the party was sent contrary to this act, he is then, to +bind over the parties and witnesses in any sum he thinks fit, but not +less than two hundred pounds, to appear and take their trial at the next +quarter sessions. Here the justices are to reexamine evidence, until +they arrive, as before, to what shall appear to them a probability. For +the rest they resort to the accused: if they can prove that any person, +or any money, or any bill of exchange, has been sent abroad by the party +accused, they throw the proof upon him to show for what innocent +purposes it was sent; and on failure of such proof, he is subjected to +all the above-mentioned penalties. Half the forfeiture is given to the +crown; the other half goes to the informer. + +It ought here to be remarked, that this mode of conviction not only +concludes the party has failed in his expurgatory proof, but it is +sufficient also to subject to the penalties and incapacities of the law +the infant upon whose account the person has been so convicted. It must +be confessed that the law has not left him without some species of +remedy in this case apparently of much hardship, where one man is +convicted upon evidence given against another, if he has the good +fortune to live; for, within a twelvemonth after his return, or his age +of twenty-one, he has a, right to call for a new trial, in which he also +is to undertake the negative proof, and to show by sufficient evidence +that he has not been sent abroad against the intention of the act. If he +succeeds in this difficult exculpation, and demonstrates his innocence +to the satisfaction of the court, he forfeits all his goods and +chattels, and all the profits of his lands incurred and received before +such acquittal; but he is freed from all other forfeitures, and from all +subsequent incapacities. There is also another method allowed by the law +in favor of persons under such unfortunate circumstances, as in the +former case for their innocence, in this upon account of their +expiation: if within six months after their return, with the punctilious +observation of many ceremonies, they conform to the Established Church, +and take all the oaths and subscriptions, the legislature, in +consideration of the incapable age in which they were sent abroad, of +the merit of their early conformity, and to encourage conversions, only +confiscates, as in the former case, the whole personal estate, and the +profits of the real; in all other respects, restoring and rehabilitating +the party. + + * * * * * + +So far as to property and education. There remain some other heads upon +which the acts have changed the course of the Common Law; and first, +with regard to the right of self-defence, which consists in the use of +arms. This, though one of the rights by the law of Nature, yet is so +capable of abuses that it may not be unwise to make some regulations +concerning them; and many wise nations have thought proper to set +several restrictions on this right, especially temporary ones, with +regard to suspected persons, and on occasion of some imminent danger to +the public from foreign invasion or domestic commotions. + +But provisions in time of trouble proper, and perhaps necessary, may +become in time of profound peace a scheme of tyranny. The method which +the statute law of Ireland has taken upon this delicate article is, to +get rid of all difficulties at once by an universal prohibition to all +persons, at all times, and under all circumstances, who are not +Protestants, of using or keeping any kind of weapons whatsoever. In +order to enforce this regulation, the whole spirit of the Common Law is +changed, very severe penalties are enjoined, the largest powers are +vested in the lowest magistrates. Any two justices of peace, or +magistrates of a town, with or without information, at their pleasure, +by themselves or their warrant, are empowered to enter and search the +house of any Papist, or even of any other person, whom they suspect to +keep such arms in trust for them. The only limitation to the extent of +this power is, that the search is to be made between the rising and +setting of the sun: but even this qualification extends no further than +to the execution of the act in the open country; for in all cities and +their suburbs, in towns corporate and market-towns, they may at their +discretion, and without information, break open houses and institute +such search at any hour of the day or night. This, I say, they may do at +their discretion; and it seems a pretty ample power in the hands of such +magistrates. However, the matter does by no means totally rest on their +discretion. Besides the discretionary and occasional search, the statute +has prescribed one that is general and periodical. It is to be made +annually, by the warrant of the justices at their midsummer quarter +sessions, by the high and petty constables, or any others whom they may +authorize, and by all corporate magistrates, in all houses of Papists, +and every other where they suspect arms for the use of such persons to +be concealed, with the same powers, in all respects, which attend the +occasional search. The whole of this regulation, concerning both the +general and particular search, seems to have been made by a legislature +which was not at all extravagantly jealous of personal liberty. Not +trusting, however, to the activity of the magistrate acting officially, +the law has invited all voluntary informers by considerable rewards, and +even pressed involuntary informers into this service by the dread of +heavy penalties. With regard to the latter method, two justices of +peace, or the magistrate of any corporation, are empowered to summon +before them any persons whatsoever, to tender them an oath by which they +oblige them to discover all persons who have any arms concealed contrary +to law. Their refusal or declining to appear, or, appearing, their +refusal to inform, subjects them to the severest penalties. If peers or +peeresses are summoned (for they may be summoned by the bailiff of a +corporation of six cottages) to perform this honorable service, and +refuse to inform, the first offence is three hundred pounds penalty; the +second is _praemunire_,--that is to say, imprisonment for life, and +forfeiture of all their goods. Persons of an inferior order are, for the +first offence, fined thirty pounds; for the second, they, too, are +subjected to _praemunire_. So far as to involuntary;--now as to voluntary +informers: the law entitles them to half the penalty incurred by +carrying or keeping arms; for, on conviction of this offence, the +penalty upon persons, of whatever substance, is the sum of fifty pounds +and a year's imprisonment, which cannot be remitted even by the crown. + +The only exception to this law is a license from the Lord Lieutenant and +Council to carry arms, which, by its nature, is extremely limited, and I +do not suppose that there are six persons now in the kingdom who have +been fortunate enough to obtain it. + + * * * * * + +There remains, after this system concerning property and defence, to say +something concerning the exercise of religion, winch is carried on in +all persuasions, but especially in the Romish, by persons appointed for +that purpose. The law of King William and Queen Anne ordered all Popish +parsons exercising ecclesiastical jurisdiction, all orders of monks and +friars, and all priests, not then actually in parishes, and to be +registered, to be banished the kingdom; and if they should return from +exile, to be hanged, drawn, and quartered. Twenty pounds reward is given +for apprehending them. Penalty on harboring and concealing. + +As all the priests then in being and registered are long since dead, and +as these laws are made perpetual, every Popish priest is liable to the +law. + + * * * * * + +The reader has now before him a tolerably complete view of the Popery +laws relative to property by descent or acquisition, to education, to +defence, and to the free exercise of religion, which may be necessary to +enable him to form some judgment of the spirit of the whole system, and +of the subsequent reflections that are to be made upon it. + + + + +CHAPTER III. + +PART I. + + +The system which we have just reviewed, and the manner in which +religious influence on the public is made to operate upon the laws +concerning property in Ireland, is in its nature very singular, and +differs, I apprehend, essentially, and perhaps to its disadvantage, from +any scheme of religious persecution now existing in any other country in +Europe, or which has prevailed in any time or nation with which history +has made us acquainted. I believe it will not be difficult to show that +it is unjust, impolitic, and inefficacious; that it has the most unhappy +influence on the prosperity, the morals, and the safety of that country; +that this influence is not accidental, but has flowed as the necessary +and direct consequence of the laws themselves, first on account of the +object which they affect, and next by the quality of the greatest part +of the instruments they employ. Upon all these points, first upon the +general, and then on the particular, this question will be considered +with as much order as can be followed in a matter of itself as involved +and intricate as it is important. + + * * * * * + +The first and most capital consideration with regard to this, as to +every object, is the extent of it. And here it is necessary to premise, +this system of penalty and incapacity has for its object no small sect +or obscure party, but a very numerous body of men,--a body which +comprehends at least two thirds of that whole nation: it amounts to +2,800,000 souls, a number sufficient for the materials constituent of a +great people. Now it is well worthy of a serious and dispassionate +examination, whether such a system, respecting such an object, be in +reality agreeable to any sound principles of legislation or any +authorized definition of law; for if our reasons or practices differ +from the general informed sense of mankind, it is very moderate to say +that they are at least suspicious. + +This consideration of the magnitude of the object ought to attend us +through the whole inquiry: if it does not always affect the reason, it +is always decisive on the importance of the question. It not only makes +in itself a more leading point, but complicates itself with every other +part of the matter, giving every error, minute in itself, a character +and significance from its application. It is therefore not to be +wondered at, if we perpetually recur to it in the course of this essay. + +In the making of a new law it is undoubtedly the duty of the legislator +to see that no injustice be done even to an individual: for there is +then nothing to be unsettled, and the matter is under his hands to mould +it as he pleases; and if he finds it untractable in the working, he may +abandon it without incurring any new inconvenience. But in the question +concerning the repeal of an old one, the work is of more difficulty; +because laws, like houses, lean on one another, and the operation is +delicate, and should be necessary: the objection, in such a case, ought +not to arise from the natural infirmity of human institutions, but from +substantial faults which contradict the nature and end of law +itself,--faults not arising from the imperfection, but from the +misapplication and abuse of our reason. As no legislators can regard the +_minima_ of equity, a law may in some instances be a just subject of +censure without being at all an object of repeal. But if its +transgressions against common right and, the ends of just government +should be considerable in their nature and spreading in their effects, +as this objection goes to the root and principle of the law, it renders +it void in its obligatory quality on the mind, and therefore determines +it as the proper object of abrogation and repeal, so far as regards its +civil existence. The objection here is, as we observed, by no means on +account of the imperfection of the law; it is on account of its +erroneous principle: for if this be fundamentally wrong, the more +perfect the law is made, the worse it becomes. It cannot be said to have +the properties of genuine law, even in its imperfections and defects. +The true weakness and opprobrium of our best general constitutions is, +that they cannot provide beneficially for every particular case, and +thus fill, adequately to their intentions, the circle of universal +justice. But where the principle is faulty, the erroneous part of the +law is the beneficial, and justice only finds refuge in those holes and +corners which had escaped the sagacity and inquisition of the +legislator. The happiness or misery of multitudes can never be a thing +indifferent. A law against the majority of the people is in substance a +law against the people itself; its extent determines its invalidity; it +even changes its character as it enlarges its operation: it is not +particular injustice, but general oppression; and can no longer be +considered as a private hardship, which might be borne, but spreads and +grows up into the unfortunate importance of a national calamity. + +Now as a law directed against the mass of the nation has not the nature +of a reasonable institution, so neither has it the authority: for in all +forms of government the people is the true legislator; and whether the +immediate and instrumental cause of the law be a single person or many, +the remote and efficient cause is the consent of the people, either +actual or implied; and such consent is absolutely essential to its +validity. To the solid establishment of every law two things are +essentially requisite: first, a proper and sufficient human power to +declare and modify the matter of the law; and next, such a fit and +equitable constitution as they have a right to declare and render +binding. With regard to the first requisite, the human authority, it is +their judgment they give up, not their right. The people, indeed, are +presumed to consent to whatever the legislature ordains for their +benefit; and they are to acquiesce in it, though they do not clearly see +into the propriety of the means by which they are conducted to that +desirable end. This they owe as an act of homage and just deference to a +reason which the necessity of government has made superior to their own. +But though the means, and indeed the nature, of a public advantage may +not always be evident to the understanding of the subject, no one is so +gross and stupid as not to distinguish between a benefit and an injury. +No one can imagine, then, an exclusion of a great body of men, not from +favors, privileges, and trusts, but from the common advantages of +society, can ever be a thing intended for their good, or can ever be +ratified by any implied consent of theirs. If, therefore, at least an +implied human consent is necessary to the existence of a law, such a +constitution cannot in propriety be a law at all. + +But if we could suppose that such a ratification was made, not +virtually, but actually, by the people, not representatively, but even +collectively, still it would be null and void. They have no right to +make a law prejudicial to the whole community, even though the +delinquents in making such an act should be themselves the chief +sufferers by it; because it would be-made against the principle of a +superior law, which it is not in the power of any community, or of the +whole race of man, to alter,--I mean the will of Him who gave us our +nature, and in giving impressed an invariable law upon it. It would be +hard to point out any error more truly subversive of all the order and +beauty, of all the peace and happiness of human society, than the +position, that any body of men have a right to make what laws they +please,--or that laws can derive any authority from their institution +merely, and independent of the quality of the subject-matter. No +arguments of policy, reason of state, or preservation of the +constitution can be pleaded in favor of such a practice. They may, +indeed, impeach the frame of that constitution, but can never touch this +immovable principle. This seems to be, indeed, the doctrine which Hobbes +broached in the last century, and which was then so frequently and so +ably refuted. Cicero exclaims with the utmost indignation and contempt +against such a notion:[22] he considers it not only as unworthy of a +philosopher, but of an illiterate peasant; that of all things this was +the most truly absurd, to fancy that the rule of justice was to be taken +from the constitutions of commonwealths, or that laws derived their +authority from the statutes of the people, the edicts of princes, or +the decrees of judges. If it be admitted that it is not the black-letter +and the king's arms that makes the law, we are to look for it elsewhere. + +In reality there are two, and only two, foundations of law; and they are +both of them conditions without which nothing can give it any force: I +mean equity and utility. With respect to the former, it grows out of the +great rule of equality, which is grounded upon our common nature, and +which Philo, with propriety and beauty, calls the mother of justice. All +human laws are, properly speaking, only declaratory; they may alter the +mode and application, but have no power over the substance of original +justice. The other foundation of law, which is utility, must be +understood, not of partial or limited, but of general and public +utility, connected in the same manner with, and derived directly from, +our rational nature: for any other utility may be the utility of a +robber, but cannot be that of a citizen,--the interest of the domestic +enemy, and not that of a member of the commonwealth. This present +equality can never be the foundation of statutes which create an +artificial difference between men, as the laws before us do, in order to +induce a consequential inequality in the distribution of justice. Law is +a mode of human action respecting society, and must be governed by the +same rules of equity which govern every private action; and so Tully +considers it in his Offices as the only utility agreeable to that +nature: "_Unum debet esse omnibus propositum, ut eadem sit utilitas +uniuscujusque et universorum; quam si ad se quisque rapiat, dissolvetur +omnis humana consortio_." + +If any proposition can be clear in itself, it is this: that a law which +shuts out from all secure and valuable property the bulk of the people +cannot be made for the utility of the party so excluded. This, +therefore, is not the utility which Tully mentions. But if it were true +(as it is not) that the real interest of any part of the community could +be separated from the happiness of the rest, still it would afford no +just foundation for a statute providing exclusively for that interest at +the expense of the other; because it would be repugnant to the essence +of law, which requires that it be made as much as possible for the +benefit of the whole. If this principle be denied or evaded, what ground +have we left to reason on? We must at once make a total change in all +our ideas, and look for a new definition of law. Where to find it I +confess myself at a loss. If we resort to the fountains of +jurisprudence, they will not supply us with any that is for our purpose. +"_Jus_" (says Paulus) "_pluribus modis dicitur: uno modo, cum id, quod +semper aequum et bonum est, jus dicitur, ut est jus naturale"_;--this +sense of the word will not be thought, I imagine, very applicable to our +penal laws;--"_altero modo, quod omnibus aut pluribus in unaquaque +civitate utile est, ut est jus civile_." Perhaps this latter will be as +insufficient, and would rather seem a censure and condemnation of the +Popery Acts than a definition that includes them; and there is no other +to be found in the whole Digest; neither are there any modern writers +whose ideas of law are at all narrower. + +It would be far more easy to heap up authorities on this article than to +excuse the prolixity and tediousness of producing any at all in proof of +a point which, though too often practically denied, is in its theory +almost self-evident. For Suarez, handling this very question, _Utrum de +ratione et substantia legis esse ut propter commune bonum feratur_, does +not hesitate a moment, finding no ground in reason or authority to +render the affirmative in the least degree disputable: "_In quaestione +ergo proposita"_ (says he) "_nulla est inter authores controversia; sed +omnium commune est axioma de substantia et ratione legis esse, ut pro +communi bono feratur; ita ut propter illud praecipue tradatur_"; having +observed in another place, "_Contra omnem rectitudinem est bonum commune +ad privatum ordinare, seu totum ad partem propter ipsum referre_." +Partiality and law are contradictory terms. Neither the merits nor the +ill deserts, neither the wealth and importance nor the indigence and +obscurity, of the one part or of the other, can make any alteration in +this fundamental truth. On any other scheme, I defy any man living to +settle a correct standard which may discriminate between equitable rule +and the most direct tyranny. For if we can once prevail upon ourselves +to depart from the strictness and integrity of this principle in favor +even of a considerable party, the argument will hold for one that is +less so; and thus we shall go on, narrowing the bottom of public right, +until step by step we arrive, though after no very long or very forced +deduction, at what one of our poets calls the _enormous faith_,--the +faith of the many, created for the advantage of a single person. I +cannot see a glimmering of distinction to evade it; nor is it possible +to allege any reason for the proscription of so large a part of the +kingdom, which would not hold equally to support, under parallel +circumstances, the proscription of the whole. + +I am sensible that these principles, in their abstract light, will not +be very strenuously opposed. Reason is never inconvenient, but when it +comes to be applied. Mere general truths interfere very little with the +passions. They can, until they are roused by a troublesome application, +rest in great tranquillity, side by side with tempers and proceedings +the most directly opposite to them. Men want to be reminded, who do not +want to be taught; because those original ideas of rectitude, to which +the mind is compelled to assent when they are proposed, are not always +as present to it as they ought to be. When people are gone, if not into +a denial, at least into a sort of oblivion of those ideas, when they +know them only as barren speculations, and not as practical motives for +conduct, it will be proper to press, as well as to offer them to the +understanding; and when one is attacked by prejudices which aim to +intrude themselves into the place of law, what is left for us but to +vouch and call to warranty those principles of original justice from +whence alone our title to everything valuable in society is derived? Can +it be thought to arise from a superfluous, vain parade of displaying +general and uncontroverted maxims, that we should revert at this time to +the first principles of law, when we have directly under our +consideration a whole body of statutes, which, I say, are so many +contradictions, which their advocates allow to be so many exceptions +from those very principles? Take them in the most favorable light, every +exception from the original and fixed rule of equality and justice ought +surely to be very well authorized in the reason of their deviation, and +very rare in their use. For, if they should grow to be frequent, in what +would they differ from an abrogation of the rule itself? By becoming +thus frequent, they might even go further, and, establishing themselves +into a principle, convert the rule into the exception. It cannot be +dissembled that this is not at all remote from the case before us, where +the great body of the people are excluded from all valuable +property,--where the greatest and most ordinary benefits of society are +conferred as privileges, and not enjoyed on the footing of common +rights. + +The clandestine manner in which those in power carry on such designs is +a sufficient argument of the sense they inwardly entertain of the true +nature of their proceedings. Seldom is the title or preamble of the law +of the same import with the body and enacting part; but they generally +place some other color uppermost, which differs from that which is +afterwards to appear, or at least one that is several shades fainter. +Thus, the penal laws in question are not called laws to oblige men +baptized and educated in Popery to renounce their religion or their +property, but are called laws to prevent the growth of Popery; as if +their purpose was only to prevent conversions to that sect, and not to +persecute a million of people already engaged in it. But of all the +instances of this sort of legislative artifice, and of the principles +that produced it, I never met with any which made a stronger impression +on me than that of Louis the Fourteenth, in the revocation of the Edict +of Nantes. That monarch had, when he made that revocation, as few +measures to keep with public opinion as any man. In the exercise of the +most unresisted authority at home, in a career of uninterrupted victory +abroad, and in a course of flattery equal to the circumstances of his +greatness in both these particulars, he might be supposed to have as +little need as disposition to render any sort of account to the world of +his procedure towards his subjects. But the persecution of so vast a +body of men as the Huguenots was too strong a measure even for the law +of pride and power. It was too glaring a contradiction even to those +principles upon which persecution itself is supported. Shocked at the +naked attempt, he had recourse, for a palliation of his conduct, to an +unkingly denial of the fact which made against him. In the preamble, +therefore, to his Act of Revocation, he sets forth that the Edict of +Nantes was no longer necessary, as the object of it (the Protestants of +his kingdom) were then reduced to a very small number. The refugees in +Holland cried out against this misrepresentation. They asserted, I +believe with truth, that this revocation had driven two hundred thousand +of them out of their country, and that they could readily demonstrate +there still remained six hundred thousand Protestants in France. If this +were the fact, (as it was undoubtedly,) no argument of policy could have +been strong enough to excuse a measure by which eight hundred thousand +men were despoiled, at one stroke, of so many of their rights and +privileges. Louis the Fourteenth confessed, by this sort of apology, +that, if the number had been large, the revocation had been unjust. But, +after all, is it not most evident that this act of injustice, which let +loose on that monarch such a torrent of invective and reproach, and +which threw so dark a cloud over all the splendor of a most illustrious +reign, falls far short of the case in Ireland? The privileges which the +Protestants of that kingdom enjoyed antecedent to this revocation were +far greater than the Roman Catholics of Ireland ever aspired to under a +contrary establishment. The number of their sufferers, if considered +absolutely, is not half of ours; if considered relatively to the body of +each community, it is not perhaps a twentieth part. And then the +penalties and incapacities which grew from that revocation are not so +grievous in their nature, nor so certain in their execution, nor so +ruinous by a great deal to the civil prosperity of the state, as those +which we have established for a perpetual law in our unhappy country. It +cannot be thought to arise from affectation, that I call it so. What +other name can be given to a country which contains so many hundred +thousands of human creatures reduced to a state of the most abject +servitude? + +In putting this parallel, I take it for granted that we can stand for +this short time very clear of our party distinctions. If it were enough, +by the use of an odious and unpopular word, to determine the question, +it would be no longer a subject of rational disquisition; since that +very prejudice which gives these odious names, and which is the party +charged for doing so, and for the consequences of it, would then become +the judge also. But I flatter myself that not a few will be found who do +not think that the names of Protestant and Papist can make any change in +the nature of essential justice. Such men will not allow that to be +proper treatment to the one of these denominations which would be +cruelty to the other, and which converts its very crime into the +instrument of its defence: they will hardly persuade themselves that +what was bad policy in France can be good in Ireland, or that what was +intolerable injustice in an arbitrary monarch becomes, only by being +more extended and more violent, an equitable procedure in a country +professing to be governed by law. It is, however, impossible not to +observe with some concern, that there are many also of a different +disposition,--a number of persons whose minds are so formed that they +find the communion of religion to be a close and an endearing tie, and +their country to be no bond at all,--to whom common altars are a better +relation than common habitations and a common civil interest,--whose +hearts are touched with the distresses of foreigners, and are abundantly +awake to all the tenderness of human feeling on such an occasion, even +at the moment that they are inflicting the very same distresses, or +worse, on their fellow-citizens, without the least sting of compassion +or remorse. To commiserate the distresses of all men suffering +innocently, perhaps meritoriously, is generous, and very agreeable to +the better part of our nature,--a disposition that ought by all means to +be cherished. But to transfer humanity from its natural basis, our +legitimate and home-bred connections,--to lose all feeling for those who +have grown up by our sides, in our eyes, the benefit of whose cares and +labors we have partaken from our birth, and meretriciously to hunt +abroad after foreign affections, is such a disarrangement of the whole +system of our duties, that I do not know whether benevolence so +displaced is not almost the same thing as destroyed, or what effect +bigotry could have produced that is more fatal to society. This no one +could help observing, who has seen our doors kindly and bountifully +thrown open to foreign sufferers for conscience, whilst through the same +ports were issuing fugitives of our own, driven from their country for a +cause which to an indifferent person would seem to be exactly similar, +whilst we stood by, without any sense of the impropriety of this +extraordinary scene, accusing and practising injustice. For my part, +there is no circumstance, in all the contradictions of our most +mysterious nature, that appears to be more humiliating than the use we +are disposed to make of those sad examples which seem purposely marked +for our correction and improvement. Every instance of fury and bigotry +in other men, one should think, would naturally fill us with an horror +of that disposition. The effect, however, is directly contrary. We are +inspired, it is true, with a very sufficient hatred for the party, but +with no detestation at all of the proceeding. Nay, we are apt to urge +our dislike of such measures as a reason for imitating them,--and, by an +almost incredible absurdity, because some powers have destroyed their +country by their persecuting spirit, to argue, that we ought to +retaliate on them by destroying our own. Such are the effects, and such, +I fear, has been the intention, of those numberless books which are +daily printed and industriously spread, of the persecutions in other +countries and other religious persuasions.--These observations, which +are a digression, but hardly, I think, can be considered as a departure +from the subject, have detained us some time: we will now come more +directly to our purpose. + +It has been shown, I hope with sufficient evidence, that a constitution +against the interest of the many is rather of the nature of a grievance +than of a law; that of all grievances it is the most weighty and +important; that it is made without due authority, against all the +acknowledged principles of jurisprudence, against the opinions of all +the great lights in that science; and that such is the tacit sense even +of those who act in the most contrary manner. These points are, indeed, +so evident, that I apprehend the abettors of the penal system will +ground their defence on an admission, and not on a denial of them. They +will lay it down as a principle, that the Protestant religion is a thing +beneficial for the whole community, as well in its civil interests as in +those of a superior order. From thence they will argue, that, the end +being essentially beneficial, the means become instrumentally so; that +these penalties and incapacities are not final causes of the law, but +only a discipline to bring over a deluded people to their real interest, +and therefore, though they may be harsh in their operation, they will be +pleasant in their effects; and be they what they will, they cannot be +considered as a very extraordinary hardship, as it is in the power of +the sufferer to free himself when he pleases, and that only by +converting to a better religion, which it is his duty to embrace, even +though it were attended with all those penalties from whence in reality +it delivers him: if he suffers, it is his own fault; _volenti non fit +injuria_. + +I shall be very short, without being, I think, the less satisfactory, in +my answer to these topics, because they never can be urged from a +conviction of their validity, and are, indeed, only the usual and +impotent struggles of those who are unwilling to abandon a practice +which they are unable to defend. First, then, I observe, that, if the +principle of their final and beneficial intention be admitted as a just +ground for such proceedings, there never was, in the blamable sense of +the word, nor ever can be, such a thing as a religious persecution in +the world. Such an intention is pretended by all men,--who all not only +insist that their religion has the sanction of Heaven, but is likewise, +and for that reason, the best and most convenient to human society. All +religious persecution, Mr. Bayle well observes, is grounded upon a +miserable _petitio principii_. You are wrong, I am right; you must come +over to me, or you must suffer. Let me add, that the great inlet by +which a color for oppression has entered into the world is by one man's +pretending to determine concerning the happiness of another, and by +claiming a right to use what means he thinks proper in order to bring +him to a sense of it. It is the ordinary and trite sophism of +oppression. But there is not yet such a convenient ductility in the +human understanding as to make us capable of being persuaded that men +can possibly mean the ultimate good of the whole society by rendering +miserable for a century together the greater part of it,--or that any +one has such a reversionary benevolence as seriously to intend the +remote good of a late posterity, who can give up the present enjoyment +which every honest man must have in the happiness of his contemporaries. +Everybody is satisfied that a conservation and secure enjoyment of our +natural rights is the great and ultimate purpose of civil society, and +that therefore all forms whatsoever of government are only good as they +are subservient to that purpose to which they are entirely subordinate. +Now to aim at the establishment of any form of government by sacrificing +what is the substance of it, to take away or at least to suspend the +rights of Nature in order to an approved system for the protection of +them, and for the sake of that about which men must dispute forever to +postpone those things about which they have no controversy at all, and +this not in minute and subordinate, but large and principal objects, is +a procedure as preposterous and absurd in argument as it is oppressive +and cruel in its effect. For the Protestant religion, nor (I speak it +with reverence, I am sure) the truth of our common Christianity, is not +so clear as this proposition,--that all men, at least the majority of +men in the society, ought to enjoy the common advantages of it. You +fall, therefore, into a double error: first, you incur a certain +mischief for an advantage which is comparatively problematical, even +though you were sure of obtaining it; secondly, whatever the proposed +advantage may be, were it of a certain nature, the attainment of it is +by no means certain; and such deep gaming for stakes so valuable ought +not to be admitted: the risk is of too much consequence to society. If +no other country furnished examples of this risk, yet our laws and our +country are enough fully to demonstrate the fact: Ireland, after almost +a century of persecution, is at this hour full of penalties and full of +Papists. This is a point which would lead us a great way; but it is only +just touched here, having much to say upon it in its proper place. So +that you have incurred a certain and an immediate inconvenience for a +remote and for a doubly uncertain benefit.--Thus far as to the argument +which would sanctify the injustice of these laws by the benefits which +are proposed to arise from them, and as to that liberty which, by a new +political chemistry, was to be extracted out of a system of oppression. + +Now as to the other point, that the objects of these laws suffer +voluntarily: this seems to me to be an insult rather than an argument. +For, besides that it totally annihilates every characteristic and +therefore every faulty idea of persecution, just as the former does, it +supposes, what is false in fact, that it is in a man's moral power to +change his religion whenever his convenience requires it. If he be +beforehand satisfied that your opinion is better than his, he will +voluntarily come over to you, and without compulsion, and then your law +would be unnecessary; but if he is not so convinced, he must know that +it is his duty in this point to sacrifice his interest here to his +opinion of his eternal happiness, else he could have in reality no +religion at all. In the former case, therefore, as your law would be +unnecessary, in the latter it would be persecuting: that is, it would +put your penalty and his ideas of duty in the opposite scales; which is, +or I know not what is, the precise idea of persecution. If, then, you +require a renunciation of his conscience, as a preliminary to his +admission to the rights of society, you annex, morally speaking, an +impossible condition to it. In this case, in the language of reason and +jurisprudence, the condition would be void, and the gift absolute; as +the practice runs, it is to establish the condition, and to withhold the +benefit. The suffering is, then, not voluntary. And I never heard any +other argument, drawn from the nature of laws and the good of human +society, urged in favor of those proscriptive statutes, except those +which have just been mentioned. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[22] Cicero _de Legibus_, Lib. L 14,15 et 16.--"O rem dignam, in qua non +modo docti, verum etiam agrestes erubescant! Jam vero illud stultissimum +existimare omnia justa esse, quae scita sint in populorum institutis aut +legibus," etc. "Quod si populorum jussis, si principum decretis, si +sententiis judicum jura constituerentur, jus esset latrocinari, jus +adulterare, jus testamenta falsa supponere, si haec suffragiis aut scitis +multitudinis probarentur." + + + + +CHAPTER III. + +PART II. + + +The second head upon which I propose to consider those statutes with +regard to their object, and which is the next in importance to the +magnitude, and of almost equal concern in the inquiry into the justice +of these laws, is its possession. It is proper to recollect that this +religion, which is so persecuted in its members, is the old religion of +the country, and the once established religion of the state,--the very +same which had for centuries received the countenance and sanction of +the laws, and from which it would at one time have been highly penal to +have dissented. In proportion as mankind has become enlightened, the +idea of religious persecution, under any circumstances, has been almost +universally exploded by all good and thinking men. The only faint shadow +of difficulty which remains is concerning the introduction of new +opinions. Experience has shown, that, if it has been favorable to the +cause of truth, it has not been always conducive to the peace of +society. Though a new religious sect should even be totally free in +itself from any tumultuous and disorderly zeal, which, however, is +rarely the case, it has a tendency to create a resistance from the +establishment in possession, productive of great disorders, and thus +becomes, innocently indeed, but yet very certainly, the cause of the +bitterest dissensions in the commonwealth. To a mind not thoroughly +saturated with the tolerating maxims of the Gospel, a preventive +persecution, on such principles, might come recommended by strong, and, +apparently, no immoral motives of policy, whilst yet the contagion was +recent, and had laid hold but on a few persons. The truth is, these +politics are rotten and hollow at bottom, as all that are founded upon +any however minute a degree of positive injustice must ever be. But they +are specious, and sufficiently so to delude a man of sense and of +integrity. But it is quite otherwise with the attempt to eradicate by +violence a wide-spreading and established religious opinion. If the +people are in an error, to inform them is not only fair, but charitable; +to drive them is a strain of the most manifest injustice. If not the +right, the presumption, at least, is ever on the side of possession. Are +they mistaken? if it does not fully justify them, it is a great +alleviation of guilt, which may be mingled with their misfortune, that +the error is none of their forging,--that they received it on as good a +footing as they can receive your laws and your legislative authority, +because it was handed down to them from their ancestors. The opinion may +be erroneous, but the principle is undoubtedly right; and you punish +them for acting upon a principle which of all others is perhaps the most +necessary for preserving society, an implicit admiration and adherence +to the establishments of their forefathers. + +If, indeed, the legislative authority was on all hands admitted to be +the ground of religious persuasion, I should readily allow that dissent +would be rebellion. In this case it would make no difference whether the +opinion was sucked in with the milk or imbibed yesterday; because the +same legislative authority which had settled could destroy it with all +the power of a creator over his creature. But this doctrine is +universally disowned, and for a very plain reason. Religion, to have +any force on men's understandings, indeed to exist at all, must be +supposed paramount to laws, and independent for its substance upon any +human institution,--else it would be the absurdest thing in the world, +an acknowledged cheat. Religion, therefore, is not believed because the +laws have established it, but it is established because the leading part +of the community have previously believed it to be true. As no water can +rise higher than its spring, no establishment can have more authority +than it derives from its principle; and the power of the government can +with no appearance of reason go further coercively than to bind and hold +down those who have once consented to their opinions. The consent is the +origin of the whole. If they attempt to proceed further, they disown the +foundation upon which their own establishment was built, and they claim +a religious assent upon mere human authority, which has been just now +shown to be absurd and preposterous, and which they in fact confess to +be so. + +However, we are warranted to go thus far. The people often actually do +(and perhaps they cannot in general do better) take their religion, not +on the coercive, which is impossible, but on the influencing authority +of their governors, as wise and informed men. But if they once take a +religion on the word of the state, they cannot in common sense do so a +second time, unless they have some concurrent reason for it. The +prejudice in favor of your wisdom is shook by your change. You confess +that you have been wrong, and yet you would pretend to dictate by your +sole authority; whereas you disengage the mind by embarrassing it. For +why should I prefer your opinion of to-day to your persuasion of +yesterday? If we must resort to prepossessions for the ground of +opinion, it is in the nature of man rather to defer to the wisdom of +times past, whose weakness is not before his eyes, than to the present, +of whose imbecility he has daily experience. Veneration of antiquity is +congenial to the human, mind. When, therefore, an establishment would +persecute an opinion in possession, it sets against it all the powerful +prejudices of human nature. It even sets its own authority, when it is +of most weight, against itself in that very circumstance in which it +must necessarily have the least; and it opposes the stable prejudice of +time against a new opinion founded on mutability: a consideration that +must render compulsion in such a case the more grievous, as there is no +security, that, when the mind is settled in the new opinion, it may not +be obliged to give place to one that is still newer, or even, to a +return of the old. But when an ancient establishment begins early to +persecute an innovation, it stands upon quite other grounds, and it has +all the prejudices and presumptions on its side. It puts its own +authority, not only of compulsion, but prepossession, the veneration of +past age, as well as the activity of the present time, against the +opinion only of a private man or set of men. If there be no reason, +there is at least some consistency in its proceedings. Commanding to +constancy, it does nothing but that of which it sets an example itself. +But an opinion at once new and persecuting is a monster; because, in the +very instant in which it takes a liberty of change, it does not leave to +you even a liberty of perseverance. + +Is, then, no improvement to be brought into society? Undoubtedly; but +not by compulsion,--but by encouragement,--but by countenance, favor, +privileges, which are powerful, and are lawful instruments. The coercive +authority of the state is limited to what is necessary for its +existence. To this belongs the whole order of criminal law. It considers +as crimes (that is, the object of punishment) trespasses against those +rules for which society was instituted. The law punishes delinquents, +not because they are not good men, but because they are intolerably +wicked. It does bear, and must, with the vices and the follies of men, +until they actually strike at the root of order. This it does in things +actually moral. In all matters of speculative improvement the case is +stronger, even where the matter is properly of human cognizance. But to +consider an averseness to improvement, the not arriving at perfection, +as a crime, is against all tolerably correct jurisprudence; for, if the +resistance to improvement should be great and any way general, they +would in effect give up the necessary and substantial part in favor of +the perfection and the finishing. + +But, say the abettors of our penal laws, this old possessed superstition +is such in its principles, that society, on its general principles, +cannot subsist along with it. Could a man think such an objection +possible, if he had not actually heard it made,--an objection +contradicted, not by hypothetical reasonings, but the clear evidence of +the most decisive facts? Society not only exists, but flourishes at this +hour, with this superstition, in many countries, under every form of +government,--in some established, in some tolerated, in others upon an +equal footing. And was there no civil society at all in these kingdoms +before the Reformation? To say it was not as well constituted as it +ought to be is saying nothing at all to the purpose; for that assertion +evidently regards improvement, not existence. It certainly did then +exist; and it as certainly then was at least as much to the advantage of +a very great part of society as what we have brought in the place of it: +which is, indeed, a great blessing to those who have profited of the +change; but to all the rest, as we have wrought, that is, by blending +general persecution with partial reformation, it is the very reverse. We +found the people heretics and idolaters; we have, by way of improving +their condition, rendered them slaves and beggars: they remain in all +the misfortune of their old errors, and all the superadded misery of +their recent punishment. They were happy enough, in their opinion at +least, before the change; what benefits society then had, they partook +of them all. They are now excluded from those benefits; and, so far as +civil society comprehends them, and as we have managed the matter, our +persecutions are so far from being necessary to its existence, that our +very reformation is made in a degree noxious. If this be improvement, +truly I know not what can be called a depravation of society. + +But as those who argue in this manner are perpetually shifting the +question, having begun with objecting, in order to give a fair and +public color to their scheme, to a toleration of those opinions as +subversive of society in general, they will surely end by abandoning the +broad part of the argument, and attempting to show that a toleration of +them is inconsistent with the established government among us. Now, +though this position be in reality as untenable as the other, it is not +altogether such an absurdity on the face of it. All I shall here observe +is, that those who lay it down little consider what a wound they are +giving to that establishment for which they pretend so much zeal. +However, as this is a consideration, not of general justice, but of +particular and national policy, and as I have reserved a place +expressly, where it will undergo a thorough discussion, I shall not here +embarrass myself with it,--being resolved to preserve all the order in +my power, in the examination of this important, melancholy subject. + +However, before we pass from this point concerning possession, it will +be a relaxation of the mind, not wholly foreign to our purpose, to take +a short review of the extraordinary policy which has been held with +regard to religion in that kingdom, from the time our ancestors took +possession of it. The most able antiquaries are of opinion, and +Archbishop Usher, whom I reckon amongst the first of them, has, I think, +shown, that a religion not very remote from the present Protestant +persuasion was that of the Irish before the union of that kingdom to the +crown of England. If this was not directly the fact, this at least seems +very probable, that Papal authority was much lower in Ireland than in +other countries. This union was made under the authority of an arbitrary +grant of Pope Adrian, in order that the Church of Ireland should be +reduced to the same servitude with those that were nearer to his see. It +is not very wonderful that an ambitious monarch should make use of any +pretence in his way to so considerable an object. What is extraordinary +is, that for a very long time, even quite down to the Reformation, and +in their most solemn acts, the kings of England founded their title +wholly on this grant: they called for obedience from the people of +Ireland, not on principles of subjection, but as vassals and mesne lords +between them and the Popes; and they omitted no measure of force or +policy to establish that Papal authority, with all the distinguishing +articles of religion connected with it, and to make it take deep root in +the minds of the people. Not to crowd instances unnecessary, I shall +select two, one of which is in print, the other on record,--the one a +treaty, the other an act of Parliament. The first is the submission of +the Irish chiefs to Richard the Second, mentioned by Sir John Davies. In +this pact they bind themselves for the future to preserve peace and +allegiance to the kings of England, under certain pecuniary penalties. +But what is remarkable, these fines were all covenanted to be paid into +the Apostolical Chamber, supposing the Pope as the superior power, whose +peace was broken and whose majesty was violated in disobeying his +governor. By this time, so far as regarded England, the kings had +extremely abridged the Papal power in many material particulars: they +had passed the Statute of Provisors, the Statute of _Praemunire_,--and, +indeed, struck out of the Papal authority all things, at least, that +seemed to infringe on their temporal independence. In Ireland, however, +their proceeding was directly the reverse: there they thought it +expedient to exalt it at least as high as ever: for, so late as the +reign of Edward the Fourth, the following short, but very explicit, act +of Parliament was passed:-- + + IV. ED. Cap. 3. + + "An act, whereby letters patent of pardon from the king to + those that sue to Rome for certain benefices is void. Rot. + Parl. + + "Item, At the request of the commons, it is ordeyned and + established, by authority of the said Parliament, that all + maner letters patents of the king, of pardons or pardon + granted by the king, or hereafter to be granted, to any + provisor that claim any title by the bulls of the Pope to any + maner benefices, where, at the time of the impetrating of the + said bulls of provision, the benefice is full of an + incumbent, that then the said letters patents of pardon or + pardons be void in law and of none effect." + +When, by every expedient of force and policy, by a war of some +centuries, by extirpating a number of the old, and by bringing in a +number of new people full of those opinions and intending to propagate +them, they had fully compassed their object, they suddenly took another +turn,--commenced an opposite persecution, made heavy laws, carried on +mighty wars, inflicted and suffered the worst evils, extirpated the mass +of the old, brought in new inhabitants; and they continue at this day an +oppressive system, and may for four hundred years to come, to eradicate +opinions which by the same violent means they had been four hundred +years endeavoring by every means to establish. They compelled the people +to submit, by the forfeiture of all their civil rights, to the Pope's +authority, in its most extravagant and unbounded sense, as a giver of +kingdoms; and now they refuse even to tolerate them in the most moderate +and chastised sentiments concerning it. No country, I believe, since +the world began, has suffered so much on account of religion, or has +been so variously harassed both for Popery and for Protestantism. + +It will now be seen, that, even if these laws could be supposed +agreeable to those of Nature in these particulars, on another and almost +as strong a principle they are yet unjust, as being contrary to positive +compact, and the public faith most solemnly plighted. On the surrender +of Limerick, and some other Irish garrisons, in the war of the +Revolution, the Lords Justices of Ireland and the commander-in-chief of +the king's forces signed a capitulation with the Irish, which was +afterwards ratified by the king himself by _inspeximus_ under the great +seal of England. It contains some public articles relative to the whole +body of the Roman Catholics in that kingdom, and some with regard to the +security of the greater part of the inhabitants of five counties. What +the latter were, or in what manner they were observed, is at this day of +much less public concern. The former are two,--the first and the ninth. +The first is of this tenor:--"The Roman Catholics of this kingdom +[Ireland] shall enjoy such privileges in the exercise of their religion +as are consistent with the laws of Ireland, or as they did enjoy in the +reign of King Charles the Second. And their Majesties, as soon as +affairs will permit them to summon a Parliament in this kingdom, will +endeavor to procure the said Roman Catholics such farther security in +that particular as may preserve them from any disturbance upon the +account of their said religion." The ninth article is to this +effect:--"The oath to be administered to such Roman Catholics as submit +to their Majesties' government shall be the oath abovesaid, and no +other,"--viz., the oath of allegiance, made by act of Parliament in +England, in the first year of their then Majesties; as required by the +second of the Articles of Limerick. Compare this latter article with the +penal laws, as they are stated in the Second Chapter, and judge whether +they seem to be the public acts of the same power, and observe whether +other oaths are tendered to them, and under what penalties. Compare the +former with the same laws, from the beginning to the end, and judge +whether the Roman Catholics have been preserved, agreeably to the sense +of the article, from any disturbance upon account of their religion,--or +rather, whether on that account there is a single right of Nature or +benefit of society which has not been either totally taken away or +considerably impaired. + +But it is said, that the legislature was not bound by this article, as +it has never been ratified in Parliament. I do admit that it never had +that sanction, and that the Parliament was under no obligation to ratify +these articles by any express act of theirs But still I am at a loss how +they came to be the less valid, on the principles of our Constitution, +by being without that sanction. They certainly bound the king and his +successors. The words of the article do this, or they do nothing; and so +far as the crown had a share in passing those acts, the public faith was +unquestionably broken. In Ireland such a breach on the part of the crown +was much more unpardonable in administration than it would have been +here. They have in Ireland a way of preventing any bill even from +approaching the royal presence, in matters of far less importance than +the honor and faith of the crown and the well-being of a great body of +the people. For, besides that they might have opposed the very first +suggestion of it in the House of Commons, it could not be framed into a +bill without the approbation of the Council in Ireland. It could not be +returned to them again without the approbation of the King and Council +here. They might have met it again in its second passage through that +House of Parliament in which it was originally suggested, as well as in +the other. If it had escaped them through all these mazes, it was again +to come before the Lord Lieutenant, who might have sunk it by a refusal +of the royal assent. The Constitution of Ireland has interposed all +those checks to the passing of any constitutional act, however +insignificant in its own nature. But did the administration in that +reign avail themselves of any one of those opportunities? They never +gave the act of the eleventh of Queen Anne the least degree of +opposition in any one stage of its progress. What is rather the fact, +many of the queen's servants encouraged it, recommended it, were in +reality the true authors of its passing in Parliament, instead of +recommending and using their utmost endeavor to establish a law directly +opposite in its tendency, as they were bound to do by the express letter +of the very first article of the Treaty of Limerick. To say nothing +further of the ministry, who in this instance most shamefully betrayed +the faith of government, may it not be a matter of some degree of doubt, +whether the Parliament, who do not claim a right of dissolving the force +of moral obligation, did not make themselves a party in this breach of +contract, by presenting a bill to the crown in direct violation of those +articles so solemnly and so recently executed, which by the +Constitution they had full authority to execute? + +It may be further objected, that, when the Irish requested the +ratification of Parliament to those articles, they did, in effect, +themselves entertain a doubt concerning their validity without such a +ratification. To this I answer, that the collateral security was meant +to bind the crown, and to hold it firm to its engagements. They did not, +therefore, call it a _perfecting_ of the security, but an _additional_ +security, which it could not have been, if the first had been void; for +the Parliament could not bind itself more than the crown had bound +itself. And if all had made but _one_ security, neither of them could be +called _additional_ with propriety or common sense. But let us suppose +that they did apprehend there might have been something wanting in this +security without the sanction of Parliament. They were, however, +evidently mistaken; and this surplusage of theirs did not weaken the +validity of the single contract, upon the known principle of law, _Non +solent, quae abundant, vitiare scripturas_. For nothing is more evident +than that the crown was bound, and that no act can be made without the +royal assent. But the Constitution will warrant us in going a great deal +further, and in affirming, that a treaty executed by the crown, and +contradictory of no preceding law, is full as binding on the whole body +of the nation as if it had twenty times received the sanction of +Parliament; because the very same Constitution which has given to the +Houses of Parliament their definite authority has also left in the crown +the trust of making peace, as a consequence, and much the best +consequence, of the prerogative of making war. If the peace was ill +made, my Lord Galmoy, Coningsby, and Porter, who signed it, were +responsible; because they were subject to the community. But its own +contracts are not subject to it: it is subject to them; and the compact +of the king acting constitutionally was the compact of the nation. + +Observe what monstrous consequences would result from a contrary +position. A foreign enemy has entered, or a strong domestic one has +arisen in the nation. In such events the circumstances may be, and often +have been, such that a Parliament cannot sit. This was precisely the +case in that rebellion in Ireland. It will be admitted also, that their +power may be so great as to make it very prudent to treat with them, in +order to save effusion of blood, perhaps to save the nation. Now could +such a treaty be at all made, if your enemies, or rebels, were fully +persuaded, that, in these times of confusion, there was no authority in +the state which could hold out to them an inviolable pledge for their +future security, but that there lurked in the Constitution a dormant, +but irresistible power, who would not think itself bound by the ordinary +subsisting and contracting authority, but might rescind its acts and +obligations at pleasure? This would be a doctrine made to perpetuate and +exasperate war; and on that principle it directly impugns the law of +nations, which is built upon this principle, that war should be softened +as much as possible, and that it should cease as soon as possible, +between contending parties and communities. The king has a power to +pardon individuals. If the king holds out his faith to a robber, to come +in on a promise of pardon, of life and estate, and, in all respects, of +a full indemnity, shall the Parliament say that he must nevertheless be +executed, that his estate must be forfeited, or that he shall be +abridged of any of the privileges which he before held as a subject? +Nobody will affirm it. In such a case, the breach of faith would not +only be on the part of the king who assented to such an act, but on the +part of the Parliament who made it. As the king represents the whole +contracting capacity of the nation, so far as his prerogative +(unlimited, as I said before, by any precedent law) can extend, he acts +as the national procurator on all such occasions. What is true of a +robber is true of a rebel; and what is true of one robber or rebel is as +true, and it is a much more important truth, of one hundred thousand. + +To urge this part of the argument further is, indeed, I fear, not +necessary, for two reasons: first, that it seems tolerably evident in +itself; and next, that there is but too much ground to apprehend that +the actual ratification of Parliament would, in the then temper of +parties, have proved but a very slight and trivial security. Of this +there is a very strong example in the history of those very articles: +for, though the Parliament omitted in the reign of King William to +ratify the first and most general of them, they did actually confirm the +second and more limited, that which related to the security of the +inhabitants of those five counties which were in arms when the treaty +was made. + + + + +CHAPTER IV. + + +In the foregoing book we considered these laws in a very simple point of +view, and in a very general one,--merely as a system of hardship +imposed on the body of the community; and from thence, and from some +other arguments, inferred the general injustice of such a procedure. In +this we shall be obliged to be more minute; and the matter will become +more complex as we undertake to demonstrate the mischievous and +impolitic consequences which the particular mode of this oppressive +system, and the instruments which it employs, operating, as we said, on +this extensive object, produce on the national prosperity, quiet, and +security. + +The stock of materials by which any nation is rendered flourishing and +prosperous are its industry, its knowledge or skill, its morals, its +execution of justice, its courage, and the national union in directing +these powers to one point, and making them all centre in the public +benefit. Other than these, I do not know and scarcely can conceive any +means by which a community may flourish. + +If we show that these penal laws of Ireland destroy not one only, but +every one, of these materials of public prosperity, it will not be +difficult to perceive that Great Britain, whilst they subsist, never can +draw from that country all the advantages to which the bounty of Nature +has entitled it. + +To begin with the first great instrument of national happiness and +strength, its industry: I must observe, that, although these penal laws +do, indeed, inflict many hardships on those who are obnoxious to them, +yet their chief, their most extensive, and most certain operation is +upon property. Those civil constitutions which promote industry are such +as facilitate the acquisition, secure the holding, enable the fixing, +and suffer the alienation of property. Every law which obstructs it in +any part of this distribution is, in proportion to the force and extent +of the obstruction, a discouragement to industry. For a law against +property is a law against industry,--the latter having always the +former, and nothing else, for its object. Now as to the acquisition of +landed property, which is the foundation and support of all the other +kinds, the laws have disabled three fourths of the inhabitants of +Ireland from acquiring any estate of inheritance for life or years, or +any charge whatsoever on which two thirds of the improved yearly value +is not reserved for thirty years. + +This confinement of landed property to one set of hands, and preventing +its free circulation through the community, is a most leading article of +ill policy; because it is one of the most capital discouragements to all +that industry which may be employed on the lasting improvement of the +soil, or is any way conversant about land. A tenure of thirty years is +evidently no tenure upon which to build, to plant, to raise inclosures, +to change the nature of the ground, to make any new experiment which +might improve agriculture, or to do anything more than what may answer +the immediate and momentary calls of rent to the landlord, and leave +subsistence to the tenant and his family. The desire of acquisition is +always a passion of long views. Confine a man to momentary possession, +and you at once cut off that laudable avarice which every wise state has +cherished as one of the first principles of its greatness. Allow a man +but a temporary possession, lay it down as a maxim that he never can +have any other, and you immediately and infallibly turn him to temporary +enjoyments: and these enjoyments are never the pleasures of labor and +free industry, whose quality it is to famish the present hours and +squander all upon prospect and futurity; they are, on the contrary, +those of a thoughtless, loitering, and dissipated life. The people must +be inevitably disposed to such pernicious habits, merely from the short +duration of their tenure which the law has allowed. But it is not enough +that industry is checked by the confinement of its views; it is further +discouraged by the limitation of its own direct object, profit. This is +a regulation extremely worthy of our attention, as it is not a +consequential, but a direct discouragement to melioration,--as directly +as if the law had said in express terms, "Thou shalt not improve." + +But we have an additional argument to demonstrate the ill policy of +denying the occupiers of land any solid property in it. Ireland is a +country wholly unplanted. The farms have neither dwelling-houses nor +good offices; nor are the lands, almost anywhere, provided with fences +and communications: in a word, in a very unimproved state. The +land-owner there never takes upon him, as it is usual in this kingdom, +to supply all these conveniences, and to set down his tenant in what may +be called a completely furnished farm. If the tenant will not do it, it +is never done. This circumstance shows how miserably and peculiarly +impolitic it has been in Ireland to tie down the body of the tenantry to +short and unprofitable tenures. A finished and furnished house will be +taken for any term, however short: if the repair lies on the owner, the +shorter the better. But no one will take one not only unfurnished, but +half built, but upon a term which, on calculation, will answer with +profit all his charges. It is on this principle that the Romans +established their _emphyteusis_, or fee-farm. For though they extended +the ordinary term of their location only to nine years, yet they +encouraged a more permanent letting to farm with the condition of +improvement, as well as of annual payment, on the part of the tenant, +where the land had lain rough and neglected,--and therefore invented +this species of engrafted holding, in the later times, when property +came to be worse distributed by falling into a few hands. + +This denial of landed property to the gross of the people has this +further evil effect in preventing the improvement of land, that it +prevents any of the property acquired in trade to be regorged, as it +were, upon the land. They must have observed very little, who have not +remarked the bold and liberal spirit of improvement which persons bred +to trade have often exerted on their land-purchases: that they usually +come to them with a more abundant command of ready money than most +landed men possess; and that they have in general a much better idea, by +long habits of calculative dealings, of the propriety of expending in +order to acquire. Besides, such men often bring their spirit of commerce +into their estates with them, and make manufactures take a root, where +the mere landed gentry had perhaps no capital, perhaps no inclination, +and, most frequently, not sufficient knowledge, to effect anything of +the kind. By these means, what beautiful and useful spots have there not +been made about trading and manufacturing towns, and how has agriculture +had reason to bless that happy alliance with commerce! and how miserable +must that nation be, whose frame of polity has disjoined the landing and +the trading interests! + + * * * * * + +The great prop of this whole system is not pretended to be its justice +or its utility, but the supposed danger to the state, which gave rise to +it originally, and which, they apprehend, would return, if this system +were overturned. Whilst, say they, the Papists of this kingdom were +possessed of landed property, and of the influence consequent to such +property, their allegiance to the crown of Great Britain was ever +insecure, the public peace was ever liable to be broken, and Protestants +never could be a moment secure either of their properties or of their +lives. Indulgence only made them arrogant, and power daring; confidence +only excited and enabled them to exert their inherent treachery; and the +times which they generally selected for their most wicked and desperate +rebellions were those in which they enjoyed the greatest ease and the +most perfect tranquillity. + +Such are the arguments that are used, both publicly and privately, in +every discussion upon this point. They are generally full of passion and +of error, and built upon facts which in themselves are most false. It +cannot, I confess, be denied, that those miserable performances which go +about under the names of Histories of Ireland do, indeed, represent +those events after this manner; and they would persuade us, contrary to +the known order of Nature, that indulgence and moderation in governors +is the natural incitement in subjects to rebel. But there is an interior +history of Ireland, the genuine voice of its records and monuments, +which speaks a very different language from these histories, from Temple +and from Clarendon: these restore Nature to its just rights, and policy +to its proper order. For they even now show to those who have been at +the pains to examine them, and they may show one day to all the world, +that these rebellions were not produced by toleration, but by +persecution,--that they arose not from just and mild government, but +from the most unparalleled oppression. These records will be far from +giving the least countenance to a doctrine so repugnant to humanity and +good sense as that the security of any establishment, civil or +religious, can ever depend upon the misery of those who live under it, +or that its danger can arise from their quiet and prosperity. God forbid +that the history of this or any country should give such encouragement +to the folly or vices of those who govern! If it can be shown that the +great rebellions of Ireland have arisen from attempts to reduce the +natives to the state to which they are now reduced, it will show that an +attempt to continue them in that state will rather be disadvantageous to +the public peace than any kind of security to it. These things have in +some measure begun to appear already; and as far as regards the argument +drawn from former rebellions, it will fall readily to the ground. But, +for my part, I think the real danger to every state is, to render its +subjects justly discontented; nor is there in polities or science any +more effectual secret for their security than to establish in their +people a firm opinion that no change can be for their advantage. It is +true that bigotry and fanaticism may for a time draw great multitudes of +people from a knowledge of their true and substantial interest. But upon +this I have to remark three things. First, that such a temper can never +become universal, or last for a long time. The principle of religion is +seldom lasting; the majority of men are in no persuasion bigots; they +are not willing to sacrifice, on every vain imagination that +superstition or enthusiasm holds forth, or that even zeal and piety +recommend, the certain possession of their temporal happiness. And if +such a spirit has been at any time roused in a society, after it has had +its paroxysm it commonly subsides and is quiet, and is even the weaker +for the violence of its first exertion: security and ease are its mortal +enemies. But, secondly, if anything can tend to revive and keep it up, +it is to keep alive the passions of men by ill usage. This is enough to +irritate even those who have not a spark of bigotry in their +constitution to the most desperate enterprises; it certainly will +inflame, darken, and render more dangerous the spirit of bigotry in +those who are possessed by it. Lastly, by rooting out any sect, you are +never secure against the effects of fanaticism; it may arise on the side +of the most favored opinions; and many are the instances wherein the +established religion of a state has grown ferocious and turned upon its +keeper, and has often torn to pieces the civil establishment that had +cherished it, and which it was designed to support: +France,--England,--Holland. + +But there may be danger of wishing a change, even where no religious +motive can operate; and every enemy to such a state comes as a friend to +the subject; and where other countries are under terror, they begin to +hope. + +This argument _ad verecundiam_ has as much force as any such have. But I +think it fares but very indifferently with those who make use of it; for +they would get but little to be proved abettors of tyranny at the +expense of putting me to an inconvenient acknowledgment. For if I were +to confess that there are circumstances in which it would be better to +establish such a religion.... + + * * * * * + +With regard to the Pope's interest. This foreign chief of their religion +cannot be more formidable to us than to other Protestant countries. To +conquer that country for himself is a wild chimera; to encourage revolt +in favor of foreign princes is an exploded idea in the politics of that +court. Perhaps it would be full as dangerous to have the people under +the conduct of factious pastors of their own as under a foreign +ecclesiastical court. + + * * * * * + +In the second year of the reign of Queen Elizabeth were enacted several +limitations in the acquisition or the retaining of property, which had, +so far as regarded any general principles, hitherto remained untouched +under all changes. + +These bills met no opposition either in the Irish Parliament or in the +English Council, except from private agents, who were little attended +to; and they passed into laws with the highest and most general +applauses, as all such things are in the beginning, not as a system of +persecution, but as masterpieces of the most subtle and refined +politics. And to say the truth, these laws, at first view, have rather +an appearance of a plan of vexatious litigation and crooked +law-chicanery than of a direct and sanguinary attack upon the rights of +private conscience: because they did not affect life, at least with +regard to the laity; and making the Catholic opinions rather the subject +of civil regulations than of criminal prosecutions, to those who are +not lawyers and read these laws they only appear to be a species of +jargon. For the execution of criminal law has always a certain +appearance of violence. Being exercised directly on the persons of the +supposed offenders, and commonly executed in the face of the public, +such executions are apt to excite sentiments of pity for the sufferers, +and indignation against those who are employed in such cruelties,--being +seen as single acts of cruelty, rather than as ill general principles of +government. But the operation of the laws in question being such as +common feeling brings home to every man's bosom, they operate in a sort +of comparative silence and obscurity; and though their cruelty is +exceedingly great, it is never seen in a single exertion, and always +escapes commiseration, being scarce known, except to those who view them +in a general, which is always a cold and phlegmatic light. The first of +these laws being made with so general a satisfaction, as the chief +governors found that such things were extremely acceptable to the +leading people in that country, they were willing enough to gratify them +with the ruin of their fellow-citizens; they were not sorry to divert +their attention from other inquiries, and to keep them fixed to this, as +if this had been the only real object of their national politics; and +for many years there was no speech from the throne which did not with +great appearance of seriousness recommend the passing of such laws, and +scarce a session went over without in effect passing some of them, until +they have by degrees grown to be the most considerable head in the Irish +statute-book. At the same time giving a temporary and occasional +mitigation to the severity of some of the harshest of those laws, they +appeared in some sort the protectors of those whom they were in reality +destroying by the establishment of general constitutions against them. +At length, however, the policy of this expedient is worn out; the +passions of men are cooled; those laws begin to disclose themselves, and +to produce effects very different from those which were promised in +making them: for crooked counsels are ever unwise; and nothing can be +more absurd and dangerous than to tamper with the natural foundations of +society, in hopes of keeping it up by certain contrivances. + + * * * * * + + + + +A + +LETTER + +TO + +WILLIAM SMITH, ESQ., + +ON THE SUBJECT OF + +CATHOLIC EMANCIPATION. + +JANUARY 29, 1795. + + +LETTER.[23] + + +My Dear sir,--Your letter is, to myself, infinitely obliging: with +regard to you, I can find no fault with it, except that of a tone of +humility and disqualification, which neither your rank, nor the place +you are in, nor the profession you belong to, nor your very +extraordinary learning and talents, will in propriety demand or perhaps +admit. These dispositions will be still less proper, if you should feel +them in the extent your modesty leads you to express them. You have +certainly given by far too strong a proof of self-diffidence by asking +the opinion of a man circumstanced as I am, on the important subject of +your letter. You are far more capable of forming just conceptions upon +it than I can be. However, since you are pleased to command me to lay +before you my thoughts, as materials upon which your better judgment may +operate, I shall obey you, and submit them, with great deference, to +your melioration or rejection. + +But first permit me to put myself in the right. I owe you an answer to +your former letter. It did not desire one, but it deserved it. If not +for an answer, it called for an acknowledgment. It was a new favor; and, +indeed, I should be worse than insensible, if I did not consider the +honors you have heaped upon me with no sparing hand with becoming +gratitude. But your letter arrived to me at a time when the closing of +my long and last business in life, a business extremely complex, and +full of difficulties and vexations of all sorts, occupied me in a manner +which those who have not seen the interior as well as exterior of it +cannot easily imagine. I confess that in the crisis of that rude +conflict I neglected many things that well deserved my best +attention,--none that deserved it better, or have caused me more regret +in the neglect, than your letter. The instant that business was over, +and the House had passed its judgment on the conduct of the managers, I +lost no time to execute what for years I had resolved on: it was, to +quit my public station, and to seek that tranquillity, in my very +advanced age, to which, after a very tempestuous life, I thought myself +entitled. But God has thought fit (and I unfeignedly acknowledge His +justice) to dispose of things otherwise. So heavy a calamity has fallen +upon me as to disable me for business and to disqualify me for repose. +The existence I have I do not know that I can call life. Accordingly, I +do not meddle with any one measure of government, though, for what +reasons I know not, you seem to suppose me deeply in the secret of +affairs. I only know, so far as your side of the water is concerned, +that your present excellent Lord Lieutenant (the best man in every +relation that I have ever been acquainted with) has perfectly pure +intentions with regard to Ireland, and of course that he wishes +cordially well to those who form the great mass of its inhabitants, and +who, as they are well or ill managed, must form an important part of its +strength or weakness. If with regard to that great object he has +carried over any ready-made system, I assure you it is perfectly unknown +to me: I am very much retired from the world, and live in much +ignorance. This, I hope, will form my humble apology, if I should err in +the notions I entertain of the question which is soon to become the +subject of your deliberations. At the same time accept it as an apology +for my neglects. + +You need make no apology for your attachment to the religious +description you belong to. It proves (as in you it is sincere) your +attachment to the great points in which the leading divisions are +agreed, when the lesser, in which they differ, are so dear to you. I +shall never call any religious opinions, which appear important to +serious and pious minds, things of no consideration. Nothing is so fatal +to religion as indifference, which is, at least, half infidelity. As +long as men hold charity and justice to be essential integral parts of +religion, there can be little danger from a strong attachment to +particular tenets in faith. This I am perfectly sure is your case; but I +am not equally sure that either zeal for the tenets of faith, or the +smallest degree of charity or justice, have much influenced the +gentlemen who, under pretexts of zeal, have resisted the enfranchisement +of their country. My dear son, who was a person of discernment, as well +as clear and acute in his expressions, said, in a letter of his which I +have seen, "that, in order to grace their cause, and to draw some +respect to their persons, they pretend to be bigots." But here, I take +it, we have not much to do with the theological tenets on the one side +of the question or the other. The point itself is practically decided. +That religion is owned by the state. Except in a settled maintenance, it +is protected. A great deal of the rubbish, which, as a nuisance, long +obstructed the way, is removed. One impediment remained longer, as a +matter to justify the proscription of the body of our country; after the +rest had been abandoned as untenable ground. But the business of the +Pope (that mixed person of polities and religion) has long ceased to be +a bugbear: for some time past he has ceased to be even a colorable +pretext. This was well known, when the Catholics of these kingdoms, for +our amusement, were obliged on oath to disclaim him in his political +capacity,--which implied an allowance for them to recognize him in some +sort of ecclesiastical superiority. It was a compromise of the old +dispute. + +For my part, I confess I wish that we had been less eager in this point. +I don't think, indeed, that much mischief will happen from it, if things +are otherwise properly managed. Too nice an inquisition ought not to be +made into opinions that are dying away of themselves. Had we lived an +hundred and fifty years ago, I should have been as earnest and anxious +as anybody for this sort of abjuration; but, living at the time in which +I live, and obliged to speculate forward instead of backward, I must +fairly say, I could well endure the existence of every sort of +collateral aid which opinion might, in the now state of things, afford +to authority. I must see much more danger than in my life I have seen, +or than others will venture seriously to affirm that they see, in the +Pope aforesaid, (though a foreign power, and with his long tail of _et +ceteras_,) before I should be active in weakening any hold which +government might think it prudent to resort to, in the management of +that large part of the king's subjects. I do not choose to direct all my +precautions to the part where the danger does not press, and to leave +myself open and unguarded where I am not only really, but visibly +attacked. + +My whole politics, at present, centre in one point, and to this the +merit or demerit of every measure (with me) is referable,--that is, what +will most promote or depress the cause of Jacobinism. What is +Jacobinism? It is an attempt (hitherto but too successful) to eradicate +prejudice out of the minds of men, for the purpose of putting all power +and authority into the hands of the persons capable of occasionally +enlightening the minds of the people. For this purpose the Jacobins have +resolved to destroy the whole frame and fabric of the old societies of +the world, and to regenerate them after their fashion. To obtain an army +for this purpose, they everywhere engage the poor by holding out to them +as a bribe the spoils of the rich. This I take to be a fair description +of the principles and leading maxims of the enlightened of our day who +are commonly called Jacobins. + +As the grand prejudice, and that which holds all the other prejudices +together, the first, last, and middle object of their hostility is +religion. With that they are at inexpiable war. They make no distinction +of sects. A Christian, as such, is to them an enemy. What, then, is left +to a real Christian, (Christian as a believer and as a statesman,) but +to make a league between all the grand divisions of that name, to +protect and to cherish them all, and by no means to proscribe in any +manner, more or less, any member of our common party? The divisions +which formerly prevailed in the Church, with all their overdone zeal, +only purified and ventilated our common faith, because there was no +common enemy arrayed and embattled to take advantage of their +dissensions; but now nothing but inevitable ruin will be the consequence +of our quarrels. I think we may dispute, rail, persecute, and provoke +the Catholics out of their prejudices; but it is not in ours they will +take refuge. If anything is, one more than another, out of the power of +man, it is to _create_ a prejudice. Somebody has said, that a king may +make a nobleman, but he cannot make a gentleman. + +All the principal religions in Europe stand upon one common bottom. The +support that the whole or the favored parts may have in the secret +dispensations of Providence it is impossible to tell; but, humanly +speaking, they are all _prescriptive_ religions. They have all stood +long enough to make prescription and its chain of legitimate prejudices +their main stay. The people who compose the four grand divisions of +Christianity have now their religion as an habit, and upon authority, +and not on disputation,--as all men who have their religion derived from +their parents and the fruits of education _must_ have it, however the +one more than the other may be able to reconcile his faith to his own +reason or to that of other men. Depend upon it, they must all be +supported, or they must all fall in the crash of a common ruin. The +Catholics are the far more numerous part of the Christians in your +country; and how can Christianity (that is now the point in issue) be +supported under the persecution, or even under the discountenance, of +the greater number of Christians? It is a great truth, and which in one +of the debates I stated as strongly as I could to the House of Commons +in the last session, that, if the Catholic religion is destroyed by the +infidels, it is a most contemptible and absurd idea, that this, or any +Protestant Church, can survive that event. Therefore my humble and +decided opinion is, that all the three religions prevalent more or less +in various parts of these islands ought all, in subordination to the +legal establishments as they stand in the several countries, to be all +countenanced, protected, and cherished, and that in Ireland particularly +the Roman Catholic religion should be upheld in high respect and +veneration, and should be, in its place, provided with all the means of +making it a blessing to the people who profess it,--that it ought to be +cherished as a good, (though not as the most preferable good, if a +choice was now to be made,) and not tolerated as an inevitable evil. If +this be my opinion as to the Catholic religion as a sect, you must see +that I must be to the last degree averse to put a man, upon that +account, upon a bad footing with relation to the privileges which the +fundamental laws of this country give him as a subject. I am the more +serious on the positive encouragement to be given to this religion, +(always, however, as secondary,) because the serious and earnest belief +and practice of it by its professors forms, as things stand, the most +effectual barrier, if not the sole barrier, against Jacobinism. The +Catholics form the great body of the lower ranks of your community, and +no small part of those classes of the middling that come nearest to +them. You know that the seduction of that part of mankind from the +principles of religion, morality, subordination, and social order is the +great object of the Jacobins. Let them grow lax, skeptical, careless, +and indifferent with regard to religion, and, so sure as we have an +existence, it is not a zealous Anglican or Scottish Church principle, +but direct Jacobinism, which will enter into that breach. Two hundred +years dreadfully spent in experiments to force that people to change the +form of their religion have proved fruitless. You have now your choice, +for full four fifths of your people, of the Catholic religion or +Jacobinism. If things appear to you to stand on this alternative, I +think you will not be long in making your option. + +You have made, as you naturally do, a very able analysis of powers, and +have separated, as the things are separable, civil from political +powers. You start, too, a question, whether the civil can be secured +without some share in the political. For my part, as abstract questions, +I should find some difficulty in an attempt to resolve them. But as +applied to the state of Ireland, to the form of our commonwealth, to the +parties that divide us, and to the dispositions of the leading men in +those parties, I cannot hesitate to lay before you my opinion, that, +whilst any kind of discouragements and disqualifications remain on the +Catholics, an handle will be made by a factious power utterly to defeat +the benefits of any civil rights they may apparently possess. I need not +go to very remote times for my examples. It was within the course of +about a twelvemonth, that, after Parliament had been led into a step +quite unparalleled in its records, after they had resisted all +concession, and even hearing, with an obstinacy equal to anything that +could have actuated a party domination in the second or eighth of Queen +Anne, after the strange adventure of the Grand Juries, and after +Parliament had listened to the sovereign pleading for the emancipation +of his subjects,--it was after all this, that such a grudging and +discontent was expressed as must justly have alarmed, as it did +extremely alarm, the whole of the Catholic body: and I remember but one +period in my whole life (I mean the savage period between 1781 and 1767) +in which they have been more harshly or contumeliously treated than +since the last partial enlargement. And thus I am convinced it will be, +by paroxysms, as long as any stigma remains on them, and whilst they are +considered as no better than half citizens. If they are kept such for +any length of time, they will be made whole Jacobins. Against this grand +and dreadful evil of our time (I do not love to cheat myself or others) +I do not know any solid security whatsoever; but I am quite certain that +what will come nearest to it is to interest as many as you can in the +present order of things, religiously, civilly, politically, by all the +ties and principles by which mankind are held. This is like to be +effectual policy: I am sure it is honorable policy: and it is better to +fail, if fail we must, in the paths of direct and manly than of low and +crooked wisdom. + +As to the capacity of sitting in Parliament, after all the capacities +for voting, for the army, for the navy, for the professions, for civil +offices, it is a dispute _de lana caprina_, in my poor opinion,--at +least on the part of those who oppose it. In the first place, this +admission to office, and this exclusion from Parliament, on the +principle of an exclusion from political power, is the very reverse of +the principle of the English Test Act. If I were to form a judgment from +experience rather than theory, I should doubt much whether the capacity +for or even the possession of a seat in Parliament did really convey +much of power to be properly called political. I have sat there, with +some observation, for nine-and-twenty years, or thereabouts. The power +of a member of Parliament is uncertain and indirect; and if power, +rather than splendor and fame, were the object, I should think that any +of the principal clerks in office, to say nothing of their superiors, +(several of whom are disqualified by law for seats in Parliament,) +possess far more power than nine tenths of the members of the House of +Commons. I might say this of men who seemed, from their fortunes, their +weight in their country, and their talents, to be persons of figure +there,--and persons, too, not in opposition to the prevailing party in +government. But be they what they will, on a fair canvass of the several +prevalent Parliamentary interests in Ireland, I cannot, out of the three +hundred members of whom the Irish Parliament is composed, discover that +above three, or at the utmost four, Catholics would be returned to the +House of Commons. But suppose they should amount to thirty, that is, to +a tenth part, (a thing I hold impossible for a long series of years, and +never very likely to happen,) what is this to those who are to balance +them in the one House, and the clear and settled majority in the other? +For I think it absolutely impossible, that, in the course of many years, +above four or five peers should be created of that communion. In fact, +the exclusion of them seems to me only to mark jealousy and suspicion, +and not to provide security in any way.--But I return to the old ground. +The danger is not there: these are things long since done away. The +grand controversy is no longer between you and them. + +Forgive this length. My pen has insensibly run on. You are yourself to +blame, if you are much fatigued. I congratulate you on the auspicious +opening of your session. Surely Great Britain and Ireland ought to join +in wreathing a never-fading garland for the head of Grattan. Adieu, my +dear Sir. Good nights to you!--I never can have any. + +Yours always most sincerely, + +EDMUND BURKE. + +Jan. 29th, 1795. Twelve at night. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[23] William Smith, Esq., to whom this Letter is addressed, was then a +member of the Irish Parliament: he is now (1812) one of the Barons of +the Court of Exchequer in Ireland. + + + + +SECOND LETTER + +TO + +SIR HERCULES LANGRISHE + +ON THE + +CATHOLIC QUESTION. + +MAY 26, 1795. + + +My Dear Sir,--If I am not as early as I ought to be in my +acknowledgments for your very kind letter, pray do me the justice to +attribute my failure to its natural and but too real cause, a want of +the most ordinary power of exertion, owing to the impressions made upon +an old and infirm constitution by private misfortune and by public +calamity. It is true, I make occasional efforts to rouse myself to +something better,--but I soon relapse into that state of languor which +must be the habit of my body and understanding to the end of my short +and cheerless existence in this world. + +I am sincerely grateful for your kindness in connecting the interest you +take in the sentiments of an old friend with the able part you take in +the service of your country. It is an instance, among many, of that +happy temper which has always given a character of amenity to your +virtues and a good-natured direction to your talents. + +Your speech on the Catholic question I read with much satisfaction. It +is solid; it is convincing; it is eloquent; and it ought, on the spot, +to have produced that effect which its reason, and that contained in the +other excellent speeches on the same side of the question, cannot +possibly fail (though with less pleasant consequences) to produce +hereafter. What a sad thing it is, that the grand instructor, Time, has +not yet been able to teach the grand lesson of his own value, and that, +in every question of moral and political prudence, it is the choice of +the moment which renders the measure serviceable or useless, noxious or +salutary! + +In the Catholic question I considered only one point: Was it, at the +time, and in the circumstances, a measure which tended to promote the +concord of the citizens? I have no difficulty in saying it was,--and as +little in saying that the present concord of the citizens was worth +buying, at a critical season, by granting a few _capacities_, which +probably no one man now living is likely to be served or hurt by. When +any man tells _you_ and _me_, that, if these places were left in the +discretion of a Protestant crown, and these memberships in the +discretion of Protestant electors or patrons, we should have a Popish +official system, and a Popish representation, capable of overturning the +Establishment, he only insults our understandings. When any man tells +this to _Catholics_, he insults their understandings, and he galls their +feelings. It is not the question of the places and seats, it is the real +hostile disposition and the _pretended_ fears, that leave stings in the +minds of the people. I really thought that in the total of the late +circumstances, with regard to persons, to things, to principles, and to +measures, was to be found a conjuncture favorable to the introduction +and to the perpetuation of a general harmony, producing a general +strength, which to that hour Ireland was never so happy as to enjoy. My +sanguine hopes are blasted, and I must consign my feelings on that +terrible disappointment to the same patience in which I have been +obliged to bury the vexation I suffered on the defeat of the other +great, just, and honorable causes in which I have had some share, and +which have given more of dignity than of peace and advantage to a long, +laborious life. Though, perhaps, a want of success might be urged as a +reason for making me doubt of the justice of the part I have taken, yet, +until I have other lights than one side of the debate has furnished me, +I must see things, and feel them too, as I see and feel them. I think I +can hardly overrate the malignity of the principles of Protestant +ascendency, as they affect Ireland,--or of Indianism, as they affect +these countries, and as they affect Asia,--or of Jacobinism, as they +affect all Europe and the state of human society itself. The last is the +greatest evil. But it readily combines with the others, and flows from +them. Whatever breeds discontent at this time will produce that great +master-mischief most infallibly. Whatever tends to persuade the people +that the _few_, called by whatever name you please, religious or +political, are of opinion that their interest is not compatible with +that of the _many_, is a great point gained to Jacobinism. Whatever +tends to irritate the talents of a country, which have at all times, and +at these particularly, a mighty influence on the public mind, is of +infinite service to that formidable cause. Unless where Heaven has +mingled uncommon ingredients of virtue in the composition,--_quos +meliore luto finxit praecordia Titan,_--talents naturally gravitate to +Jacobinism. Whatever ill-humors are afloat in the state, they will be +sure to discharge themselves in a mingled torrent in the _Cloaca Maxima_ +of Jacobinism. Therefore people ought well to look about them. First, +the physicians are to take care that they do nothing to irritate this +epidemical distemper. It is a foolish thing to have the better of the +patient in a dispute. The complaint or its cause ought to be removed, +and wise and lenient arts ought to precede the measures of vigor. They +ought to be the _ultima_, not the _prima_, not the _tota_ ratio of a +wise government. God forbid, that, on a worthy occasion, authority +should want the means of force, or the disposition to use it! But where +a prudent and enlarged policy does not precede it, and attend it too, +where the hearts of the better sort of people do not go with the hands +of the soldiery, you may call your Constitution what you will, in effect +it will consist of three parts, (orders, if you please,) cavalry, +infantry, and artillery,--and of nothing else or better. I agree with +you in your dislike of the discourses in Francis Street: but I like as +little some of those in College Green. I am even less pleased with the +temper that predominated in the latter, as better things might have been +expected in the regular family mansion of public discretion than, in a +new and hasty assembly of unexperienced men, congregated under +circumstances of no small irritation. After people have taken your +tests, prescribed by yourselves as proofs of their allegiance, to be +marked as enemies, traitors, or at best as suspected and dangerous +persons, and that they are not to be believed on their oaths, we are not +to be surprised, if they fall into a passion, and talk as men in a +passion do, intemperately and idly. + +The worst of the matter is this: you are partly leading, partly driving +into Jacobinism that description of your people whose religious +principles, church polity, and habitual discipline might make them an +invincible dike against that inundation. This you have a thousand +mattocks and pickaxes lifted up to demolish. You make a sad story of the +Pope. _O seri studiorum_! It will not be difficult to get many called +Catholics to laugh at this fundamental part of their religion. Never +doubt it. You have succeeded in part, and you may succeed completely. +But in the present state of men's minds and affairs, do not flatter +yourselves that they will piously look to the head of our Church in the +place of that Pope whom you make them forswear, and out of all reverence +to whom you bully and rail and buffoon them. Perhaps you may succeed in +the same manner with all the other tenets of doctrine and usages of +discipline amongst the Catholics; but what security have you, that, in +the temper and on the principles on which they have made this change, +they will stop at the exact sticking-places you have marked in _your_ +articles? You have no security for anything, but that they will become +what are called _Franco-Jacobins_, and reject the whole together. No +converts now will be made in a considerable number from one of our sects +to the other upon a really religious principle. Controversy moves in +another direction. + +Next to religion, _property_ is the great point of Jacobin attack. Here +many of the debaters in your majority, and their writers, have given the +Jacobins all the assistance their hearts can wish. When the Catholics +desire places and seats, you tell them that this is only a pretext, +(though Protestants might suppose it just _possible_ for men to like +good places and snug boroughs for their own merits,) but that their real +view is, to strip Protestants of their property To my certain knowledge, +till those Jacobin lectures were opened in the House of Commons, they +never dreamt of any such thing; but now the great professors may +stimulate them to inquire (on the new principles) into the foundation of +that property, and of all property. If you treat men as robbers, why, +robbers, sooner or later, they will become. + +A third point of Jacobin attack is on _old traditionary constitutions_. +You are apprehensive for yours, which leans from its perpendicular, and +does not stand firm on its theory. I like Parliamentary reforms as +little as any man who has boroughs to sell for money, or for peerages in +Ireland. But it passes my comprehension, in what manner it is that men +can be reconciled to the _practical_ merits of a constitution, the +theory of which is in litigation, by being _practically_ excluded from +any of its advantages. Let us put ourselves in the place of these +people, and try an experiment of the effects of such a procedure on our +own minds. Unquestionably, we should be perfectly satisfied, when we +were told that Houses of Parliament, instead of being places of refuge +for popular liberty, were citadels for keeping us in order as a +conquered people. These things play the Jacobin game to a nicety. + +Indeed, my dear Sir, there is not a single particular in the +Francis-Street declamations, which has not, to your and to my certain +knowledge, been taught by the jealous ascendants, sometimes by doctrine, +sometimes by example, always by provocation. Remember the whole of 1781 +and 1782, in Parliament and out of Parliament; at this very day, and in +the worst acts and designs, observe the tenor of the objections with +which the College-Green orators of the ascendency reproach the +Catholics. You have observed, no doubt, how much they rely on the +affair of Jackson. Is it not pleasant to hear Catholics reproached for a +supposed connection--with whom?--with Protestant clergymen! with +Protestant gentlemen! with Mr. Jackson! with Mr. Rowan, &c, &c.! But +_egomet mi ignosco_. Conspiracies and treasons are privileged pleasures, +not to be profaned by the impure and unhallowed touch of Papists. +Indeed, all this will do, perhaps, well enough, with detachments of +dismounted cavalry and fencibles from England. But let us not say to +Catholics, by way of _argument_, that they are to be kept in a degraded +state, because some of them are no better than many of us Protestants. +The thing I most disliked in some of their speeches (those, I mean, of +the Catholics) was what is called the spirit of liberality, so much and +so diligently taught by the ascendants, by which they are made to +abandon their own particular interests, and to merge them in the general +discontents of the country. It gave me no pleasure to hear of the +dissolution of the committee. There were in it a majority, to my +knowledge, of very sober, well-intentioned men; and there were none in +it but such who, if not continually goaded and irritated, might be made +useful to the tranquillity of the country. It is right always to have a +few of every description, through whom you may quietly operate on the +many, both for the interests of the description, and for the general +interest. + +Excuse me, my dear friend, if I have a little tried your patience. You +have brought this trouble on yourself, by your thinking of a man forgot, +and who has no objection to be forgot, by the world. These things we +discussed together four or five and thirty years ago. We were then, and +at bottom ever since, of the same opinion on the justice and policy of +the whole and of every part of the penal system. You and I, and +everybody, must now and then ply and bend to the occasion, and take what +can be got. But very sure I am, that, whilst there remains in the law +any principle whatever which can furnish to certain politicians an +excuse for raising an opinion of their own importance, as necessary to +keep their fellow-subjects in order, the obnoxious people will be +fretted, harassed, insulted, provoked to discontent and disorder, and +practically excluded from the partial advantages from which the letter +of the law does not exclude them. + +Adieu! my dear Sir, + +And believe me very truly yours, + +EDMUND BURKE. + +BEACONSFIELD, May 26, 1795. + + + + +A + +LETTER + +TO + +RICHARD BURKE, ESQ., + +ON + +PROTESTANT ASCENDENCY IN IRELAND. + +1793. + + +My dear son,--We are all again assembled in town, to finish the last, +but the most laborious, of the tasks which have been imposed upon me +during my Parliamentary service. We are as well as at our time of life +we can expect to be. We have, indeed, some moments of anxiety about you. +You are engaged in an undertaking similar in its principle to mine. You +are engaged in the relief of an oppressed people. In that service you +must necessarily excite the same sort of passions in those who have +exercised, and who wish to continue that oppression, that I have had to +struggle with in this long labor. As your father has done, you must make +enemies of many of the rich, of the proud, and of the powerful. I and +you began in the same way. I must confess, that, if our place was of our +choice, I could wish it had been your lot to begin the career of your +life with an endeavor to render some more moderate and less invidious +service to the public But being engaged in a great and critical work, I +have not the least hesitation about your having hitherto done your duty +as becomes you. If I had not an assurance not to be shaken from the +character of your mind, I should be satisfied on that point by the cry +that is raised against you. If you had behaved, as they call it, +discreetly, that is, faintly and treacherously, in the execution of your +trust, you would have had, for a while, the good word of all sorts of +men, even of many of those whose cause you had betrayed,--and whilst +your favor lasted, you might have coined that false reputation into a +true and solid interest to yourself. This you are well apprised of; and +you do not refuse to travel that beaten road from an ignorance, but from +a contempt, of the objects it leads to. + +When you choose an arduous and slippery path, God forbid that any weak +feelings of my declining age, which calls for soothings and supports, +and which can have none but from you, should make me wish that you +should abandon what you are about, or should trifle with it! In this +house we submit, though with troubled minds, to that order which has +connected all great duties with toils and with perils, which has +conducted the road to glory through the regions of obloquy and reproach, +and which will never suffer the disparaging alliance of spurious, false, +and fugitive praise with genuine and permanent reputation. We know that +the Power which has settled that order, and subjected you to it by +placing you in the situation you are in, is able to bring you out of it +with credit and with safety. His will be done! All must come right. You +may open the way with pain and under reproach: others will pursue it +with ease and with applause. + +I am sorry to find that pride and passion, and that sort of zeal for +religion which never shows any wonderful heat but when it afflicts and +mortifies our neighbor, will not let the ruling description perceive +that the privilege for which your clients contend is very nearly as much +for the benefit of those who refuse it as those who ask it. I am not to +examine into the charges that are daily made on the administration of +Ireland. I am not qualified to say how much in them is cold truth, and +how much rhetorical exaggeration. Allowing some foundation to the +complaint, it is to no purpose that these people allege that their +government is a job in its administration. I am sure it is a job in its +constitution; nor is it possible a scheme of polity, which, in total +exclusion of the body of the community, confines (with little or no +regard to their rank or condition in life) to a certain set of favored +citizens the rights which formerly belonged to the whole, should not, by +the operation of the same selfish and narrow principles, teach the +persons who administer in that government to prefer their own +particular, but well-understood, private interest to the false and +ill-calculated private interest of the monopolizing company they belong +to. Eminent characters, to be sure, overrule places and circumstances. I +have nothing to say to that virtue which shoots up in full force by the +native vigor of the seminal principle, in spite of the adverse soil and +climate that it grows in. But speaking of things in their ordinary +course, in a country of monopoly there _can_ be no patriotism. There may +be a party spirit, but public spirit there can be none. As to a spirit +of liberty, still less can it exist, or anything like it. A liberty made +up of penalties! a liberty made up of incapacities! a liberty made up of +exclusion and proscription, continued for ages, of four fifths, perhaps, +of the inhabitants of all ranks and fortunes In what does such liberty +differ from the description of the most shocking kind of servitude? + +But it will be said, in that country some people are free. Why, this is +the very description of despotism. _Partial freedom is privilege and +prerogative, and not liberty._ Liberty, such as deserves the name, is +an honest, equitable, diffusive, and impartial principle. It is a great +and enlarged virtue, and not a sordid, selfish, and illiberal vice. It +is the portion of the mass of the citizens, and not the haughty license +of some potent individual or some predominant faction. + +If anything ought to be despotic in a country, it is its government; +because there is no cause of constant operation to make its yoke +unequal. But the dominion of a party must continually, steadily, and by +its very essence, lean upon the prostrate description. A constitution +formed so as to enable a party to overrule its very government, and to +overpower the people too, answers the purposes neither of government nor +of freedom. It compels that power which ought, and often would be +disposed, _equally_ to protect the subjects, to fail in its trust, to +counteract its purposes, and to become no better than the instrument of +the wrongs of a faction. Some degree of influence must exist in all +governments. But a government which has no interest to please the body +of the people, and can neither support them nor with safety call for +their support, nor is of power to sway the domineering faction, can only +exist by corruption; and taught by that monopolizing party which usurps +the title and qualities of the public to consider the body of the people +as out of the constitution, they will consider those who are in it in +the light in which they choose to consider themselves. The whole +relation of government and of freedom will be a battle or a traffic. + +This system, in its real nature, and under its proper appellations, is +odious and unnatural, especially when a constitution is admitted which +not only, as all constitutions do profess, has a regard to the good of +the multitude, but in its theory makes profession of their power also. +But of late this scheme of theirs has been new-christened,--_honestum +nomen imponitur vitio_. A word has been lately struck in the mint of the +Castle of Dublin; thence it was conveyed to the Tholsel, or City-Hall, +where, having passed the touch of the corporation, so respectably +stamped and vouched, it soon became current in Parliament, and was +carried back by the Speaker of the House of Commons in great pomp, as an +offering of homage from whence it came. The word is _ascendency_. It is +not absolutely new. But the sense in which I have hitherto seen it used +was to signify an influence obtained over the minds of some other person +by love and reverence, or by superior management and dexterity. It had, +therefore, to this its promotion no more than a moral, not a civil or +political use. But I admit it is capable of being so applied; and if the +Lord Mayor of Dublin, and the Speaker of the Irish Parliament, who +recommend the preservation of the Protestant ascendency, mean to employ +the word in that sense,--that is, if they understand by it the +preservation of the influence of that description of gentlemen over the +Catholics by means of an authority derived from their wisdom and virtue, +and from an opinion they raise in that people of a pious regard and +affection for their freedom and happiness,--it is impossible not to +commend their adoption of so apt a term into the family of politics. It +may be truly said to enrich the language. Even if the Lord Mayor and +Speaker mean to insinuate that this influence is to be obtained and held +by flattering their people, by managing them, by skilfully adapting +themselves to the humors and passions of those whom they would govern, +he must be a very untoward critic who would cavil even at this use of +the word, though such cajoleries would perhaps be more prudently +practised than professed. These are all meanings laudable, or at least +tolerable. But when we look a little more narrowly, and compare it with +the plan to which it owes its present technical application, I find it +has strayed far from its original sense. It goes much further than the +privilege allowed by Horace. It is more than _parce detortum_. This +Protestant ascendency means nothing less than an influence obtained by +virtue, by love, or even by artifice and seduction,--full as little an +influence derived from the means by which ministers have obtained an +influence which might be called, without straining, an _ascendency_, in +public assemblies in England, that is, by a liberal distribution of +places and pensions, and other graces of government. This last is wide +indeed of the signification of the word. New _ascendency_ is the old +_mastership_. It is neither more nor less than the resolution of one set +of people in Ireland to consider themselves as the sole citizens in the +commonwealth, and to keep a dominion over the rest by reducing them to +absolute slavery under a military power, and, thus fortified in their +power, to divide the public estate, which is the result of general +contribution, as a military booty, solely amongst themselves. + +The poor word _ascendency_, so soft and melodious in its sound, so +lenitive and emollient in its first usage, is now employed to cover to +the world the most rigid, and perhaps not the most wise, of all plans of +policy. The word is large enough in its comprehension. I cannot +conceive what mode of oppression in civil life, or what mode of +religious persecution, may not come within the methods of preserving an +_ascendency_. In plain old English, as they apply it, it signifies +_pride and dominion_ on the one part of the relation, and on the other +_subserviency and contempt_,--and it signifies nothing else. The old +words are as fit to be set to music as the new: but use has long since +affixed to them their true signification, and they sound, as the other +will, harshly and odiously to the moral and intelligent ears of mankind. + +This ascendency, by being a _Protestant_ ascendency, does not better it +from the combination of a note or two more in this anti-harmonic scale. +If Protestant ascendency means the proscription from citizenship of by +far the major part of the people of any country, then Protestant +ascendency is a bad thing, and it ought to have no existence. But there +is a deeper evil. By the use that is so frequently made of the term, and +the policy which is engrafted on it, the name Protestant becomes nothing +more or better than the name of a persecuting faction, with a relation +of some sort of theological hostility to others, but without any sort of +ascertained tenets of its own upon the ground of which it persecutes +other men: for the patrons of this Protestant ascendency neither do nor +can, by anything positive, define or describe what they mean by the word +Protestant. It is defined, as Cowley defines wit, not by what it is, but +by what it is not. It is not the Christian religion as professed in the +churches holding communion with Rome, the majority of Christians: that +is all which, in the latitude of the term, is known about its +signification. This makes such persecutors ten times worse than any of +that description that hitherto have been known in the world. The old +persecutors, whether Pagan or Christian, whether Arian or Orthodox, +whether Catholics, Anglicans, or Calvinists, actually were, or at least +had the decorum to pretend to be, strong dogmatists. They pretended that +their religious maxims were clear and ascertained, and so useful that +they were bound, for the eternal benefit of mankind, to defend or +diffuse them, though by any sacrifices of the temporal good of those who +were the objects of their system of experiment. + +The bottom of this theory of persecution is false. It is not permitted +to us to sacrifice the temporal good of any body of men to our own ideas +of the truth and falsehood of any religious opinions. By making men +miserable in this life, they counteract one of the great ends of +charity, which is, in as much as in us lies, to make men happy in every +period of their existence, and most in what most depends upon us. But +give to these old persecutors their mistaken principle, in their +reasoning they are consistent, and in their tempers they may be even +kind and good-natured. But whenever a faction would render millions of +mankind miserable, some millions of the race coexistent with themselves, +and many millions in their succession, without knowing or so much as +pretending to ascertain the doctrines of their own school, (in which +there is much of the lash and nothing of the lesson,) the errors which +the persons in such a faction fall into are not those that are natural +to human imbecility, nor is the least mixture of mistaken kindness to +mankind an ingredient in the severities they inflict. The whole is +nothing but pure and perfect malice. It is, indeed, a perfection in that +kind belonging to beings of an higher order than man, and to them we +ought to leave it. + +This kind of persecutors without zeal, without charity, know well enough +that religion, to pass by all questions of the truth or falsehood of any +of its particular systems, (a matter I abandon to the theologians on all +sides,) is a source of great comfort to us mortals, in this our short, +but tedious journey through the world. They know, that, to enjoy this +consolation, men must believe their religion upon some principle or +other, whether of education, habit, theory, or authority. When men are +driven from any of those principles on which they have received +religion, without embracing with the same assurance and cordiality some +other system, a dreadful void is left in their minds, and a terrible +shook is given to their morals. They lose their guide, their comfort, +their hope. None but the most cruel and hardhearted of men, who had +banished all natural tenderness from their minds, such as those beings +of iron, the atheists, could bring themselves to any persecution like +this. Strange it is, but so it is, that men, driven by force from their +habits in one mode of religion, have, by contrary habits, under the same +force, often quietly settled in another. They suborn their reason to +declare in favor of their necessity. Man and his conscience cannot +always be at war. If the first races have not been able to make a +pacification between the conscience and the convenience, their +descendants come generally to submit to the violence of the laws, +without violence to their minds. As things stood formerly, they +possessed a _positive_ scheme of direction and of consolation. In this +men may acquiesce. The harsh methods in use with the old class of +persecutors were to make converts, not apostates only. If they +perversely hated other sects and factions, they loved their own +inordinately. But in this Protestant persecution there is anything but +benevolence at work. What do the Irish statutes? They do not make a +conformity to the _established_ religion, and to its doctrines and +practices, the condition of getting out of servitude. No such thing. Let +three millions of people but abandon all that they and their ancestors +have been taught to believe sacred, and to forswear it publicly in terms +the most degrading, scurrilous, and indecent for men of integrity and +virtue, and to abuse the whole of their former lives, and to slander the +education they have received, and nothing more is required of them. +There is no system of folly, or impiety, or blasphemy, or atheism, into +which they may not throw themselves, and which they may not profess +openly, and as a system, consistently with the enjoyment of all the +privileges of a free citizen in the happiest constitution in the world. + +Some of the unhappy assertors of this strange scheme say they are not +persecutors on account of religion. In the first place, they say what is +not true. For what else do they disfranchise the people? If the man gets +rid of a religion through which their malice operates, he gets rid of +all their penalties and incapacities at once. They never afterwards +inquire about him. I speak here of their pretexts, and not of the true +spirit of the transaction, in which religious bigotry, I apprehend, has +little share. Every man has his taste; but I think, if I were so +miserable and undone as to be guilty of premeditated and continued +violence towards any set of men, I had rather that my conduct was +supposed to arise from wild conceits concerning their religious +advantages than from low and ungenerous motives relative to my own +selfish interest. I had rather be thought insane in my charity than +rational in my malice. This much, my dear son, I have to say of this +Protestant persecution,--that is, a persecution of religion itself. + +A very great part of the mischiefs that vex the world arises from words. +People soon forget the meaning, but the impression and the passion +remain. The word Protestant is the charm that looks up in the dungeon of +servitude three millions of your people. It is not amiss to consider +this spell of potency, this abracadabra, that is hung about the necks of +the unhappy, not to heal, but to communicate disease. We sometimes hear +of a Protestant _religion_, frequently of a Protestant _interest_. We +hear of the latter the most frequently, because it has a positive +meaning. The other has none. We hear of it the most frequently, because +it has a word in the phrase which, well or ill understood, has animated +to persecution and oppression at all times infinitely more than all the +dogmas in dispute between religious factions. These are, indeed, well +formed to perplex and torment the intellect, but not half so well +calculated to inflame the passions and animosities of men. + +I do readily admit that a great deal of the wars, seditions, and +troubles of the world did formerly turn upon the contention between +_interests_ that went by the names of Protestant and Catholic. But I +imagined that at this time no one was weak enough to believe, or +impudent enough to pretend, that questions of Popish and Protestant +opinions or interest are the things by which men are at present menaced +with crusades by foreign invasion, or with seditions which shake the +foundations of the state at home. It is long since all this combination +of things has vanished from the view of intelligent observers. The +existence of quite another system of opinions and interests is now plain +to the grossest sense. Are these the questions that raise a flame in the +minds of men at this day? If ever the Church and the Constitution of +England should fall in these islands, (and they will fall together,) it +is not Presbyterian discipline nor Popish hierarchy that will rise upon +their ruins. It will not be the Church of Rome nor the Church of +Scotland, not the Church of Luther nor the Church of Calvin. On the +contrary, all these churches are menaced, and menaced alike. It is the +new fanatical religion, now in the heat of its first ferment, of the +Rights of Man, which rejects all establishments, all discipline, all +ecclesiastical, and in truth all civil order, which will triumph, and +which will lay prostrate your Church, which will destroy your +distinctions, and which will put all your properties to auction, and +disperse you over the earth. If the present establishment should fall, +it is this religion which will triumph in Ireland and in England, as it +has triumphed in France. This religion, which laughs at creeds and +dogmas and confessions of faith, may be fomented equally amongst all +descriptions and all sects,--amongst nominal Catholics, and amongst +nominal Churchmen, and amongst those Dissenters who know little and care +less about a presbytery, or any of its discipline, or any of its +doctrine. Against this new, this growing, this exterminatory system, all +these churches have a common concern to defend themselves. How the +enthusiasts of this rising sect rejoice to see you of the old churches +play their game, and stir and rake the cinders of animosities sunk in +their ashes, in order to keep up the execution of their plan for your +common ruin! + +I suppress all that is in my mind about the blindness of those of our +clergy who will shut their eyes to a thing which glares in such manifest +day. If some wretches amongst an indigent and disorderly part of the +populace raise a riot about tithes, there are of these gentlemen ready +to cry out that this is an overt act of a treasonable conspiracy. Here +the bulls, and the pardons, and the crusade, and the Pope, and the +thunders of the Vatican are everywhere at work. There is a plot to bring +in a foreign power to destroy the Church. Alas! it is not about popes, +but about potatoes, that the minds of this unhappy people are agitated. +It is not from the spirit of zeal, but the spirit of whiskey, that these +wretches act. Is it, then, not conceived possible that a poor clown can +be unwilling, after paying three pounds rent to a gentleman in a brown +coat, to pay fourteen shillings to one in a black coat, for his acre of +potatoes, and tumultuously to desire some modification of the charge, +without being supposed to have no other motive than a frantic zeal for +being thus double-taxed to another set of landholders and another set of +priests? Have men no self-interest, no avarice, no repugnance to public +imposts? Have they no sturdy and restive minds, no undisciplined habits? +Is there nothing in the whole mob of irregular passions, which might +precipitate some of the common people, in some places, to quarrel with a +legal, because they feel it to be a burdensome imposition? According to +these gentlemen, no offence can be committed by Papists but from zeal to +their religion. To make room for the vices of Papists, they clear the +house of all the vices of men. Some of the common people (not one, +however, in ten thousand) commit disorders. Well! punish them as you do, +and as you ought to punish them, for their violence against the just +property of each individual clergyman, as each individual suffers. +Support the injured rector, or the injured impropriator, in the +enjoyment of the estate of which (whether on the best plan or not) the +laws have put him in possession. Let the crime and the punishment stand +upon their own bottom. But now we ought all of us, clergymen most +particularly, to avoid assigning another cause of quarrel, in order to +infuse a new source of bitterness into a dispute which personal feelings +on both sides will of themselves make bitter enough, and thereby involve +in it by religious descriptions men who have individually no share +whatsoever in those irregular acts. Let us not make the malignant +fictions of our own imaginations, heated with factious controversies, +reasons for keeping men that are neither guilty nor justly suspected of +crime in a servitude equally dishonorable and unsafe to religion and to +the state. When men are constantly accused, but know themselves not to +be guilty, they must naturally abhor their accusers. There is no +character, when malignantly taken up and deliberately pursued, which +more naturally excites indignation and abhorrence in mankind, especially +in that part of mankind which suffers from it. + +I do not pretend to take pride in an extravagant attachment to any sect. +Some gentlemen in Ireland affect that sort of glory. It is to their +taste. Their piety, I take it for granted, justifies the fervor of their +zeal, and may palliate the excess of it. Being myself no more than a +common layman, commonly informed in controversies, leading only a very +common life, and having only a common citizen's interest in the Church +or in the State, yet to you I will say, in justice to my own sentiments, +that not one of those zealots for a Protestant interest wishes more +sincerely than I do, perhaps not half so sincerely, for the support of +the Established Church in both these kingdoms. It is a great link +towards holding fast the connection of religion with the State, and for +keeping these two islands, in their present critical independence of +constitution, in a close connection of _opinion and affection_. I wish +it well, as the religion of the greater number of the primary +land-proprietors of the kingdom, with whom all establishments of Church +and Stats, for strong political reasons, ought in my opinion to be +firmly connected. I wish it well, because it is more closely combined +than any other of the church systems with the _crown_, which is the stay +of the mixed Constitution,--because it is, as things now stand, the sole +connecting _political_ principle between the constitutions of the two +independent kingdoms. I have another and infinitely a stronger reason +for wishing it well: it is, that in the present time I consider it as +one of the main pillars of the Christian religion itself. The body and +substance of every religion I regard much more than any of the forms and +dogmas of the particular sects. Its fall would leave a great void, which +nothing else, of which I can form any distinct idea, might fill. I +respect the Catholic hierarchy and the Presbyterian republic; but I +know that the hope or the fear of establishing either of them is, in +these kingdoms, equally chimerical, even if I preferred one or the other +of them to the Establishment, which certainly I do not. + +These are some of my reasons for wishing the support of the Church of +Ireland as by law established. These reasons are founded as well on the +absolute as on the relative situation of that kingdom. But is it because +I love the Church, and the King, and the privileges of Parliament, that +I am to be ready for any violence, or any injustice, or any absurdity, +in the means of supporting any of these powers, or all of them together? +Instead of prating about Protestant ascendencies, Protestant Parliaments +ought, in my opinion, to think at last of becoming patriot Parliaments. + +The legislature of Ireland, like all legislatures, ought to frame its +laws to suit the people and the circumstances of the country, and not +any longer to make it their whole business to force the nature, the +temper, and the inveterate habits of a nation to a conformity to +speculative systems concerning any kind of laws. Ireland has an +established government, and a religion legally established, which are to +be preserved. It has a people who are to be preserved too, and to be led +by reason, principle, sentiment, and interest to acquiesce in that +government. Ireland is a country under peculiar circumstances. The +people of Ireland are a very mixed people; and the quantities of the +several ingredients in the mixture are very much disproportioned to each +other. Are we to govern this mixed body as if it were composed of the +most simple elements, comprehending the whole in one system of +benevolent legislation? or are we not rather to provide for the several +parts according to the various and diversified necessities of the +heterogeneous nature of the mass? Would not common reason and common +honesty dictate to us the policy of regulating the people, in the +several descriptions of which they are composed, according to the +natural ranks and classes of an orderly civil society, under a common +protecting sovereign, and under a form of constitution favorable at once +to authority and to freedom,--such as the British Constitution boasts to +be, and such as it is to those who enjoy it? + +You have an ecclesiastical establishment, which, though the religion of +the prince, and of most of the first class of landed proprietors, is not +the religion of the major part of the inhabitants, and which +consequently does not answer to _them_ any one purpose of a religious +establishment. This is a state of things which no man in his senses can +call perfectly happy. But it is the state of Ireland. Two hundred years +of experiment show it to be unalterable. Many a fierce struggle has +passed between the parties. The result is, you cannot make the people +Protestants, and they cannot shake off a Protestant government. This is +what experience teaches, and what all men of sense of all descriptions +know. To-day the question is this: Are we to make the best of this +situation, which we cannot alter? The question is: Shall the condition +of the body of the people be alleviated in other things, on account of +their necessary suffering from their being subject to the burdens of two +religious establishments, from one of which they do not partake the +least, living or dying, either of instruction or of consolation,--or +shall it be aggravated, by stripping the people thus loaded of +everything which might support and indemnify them in this state, so as +to leave them naked of every sort of right and of every name of +franchise, to outlaw them from the Constitution, and to cut off +(perhaps) three millions of plebeian subjects, without reference to +property, or any other qualification, from all connection with the +popular representation, of the kingdom? + +As to religion, it has nothing at all to do with the proceeding. Liberty +is not sacrificed to a zeal for religion, but a zeal for religion is +pretended and assumed to destroy liberty. The Catholic religion is +completely free. It has no establishment,--but it is recognized, +permitted, and, in a degree, protected by the laws. If a man is +satisfied to be a slave, he may be a Papist with perfect impunity. He +may say mass, or hear it, as he pleases; but he must consider himself as +an outlaw from the British Constitution. If the constitutional liberty +of the subject were not the thing aimed at, the direct reverse course +would be taken. The franchise would have been permitted, and the mass +exterminated. But the conscience of a man left, and a tenderness for it +hypocritically pretended, is to make it a trap to catch his liberty. + +So much is this the design, that the violent partisans of this scheme +fairly take up all the maxims and arguments, as well as the practices, +by which tyranny has fortified itself at all times. Trusting wholly in +their strength and power, (and upon this they reckon, as always ready to +strike wherever they wish to direct the storm,) they abandon all pretext +of the general good of the community. They say, that, if the people, +under any given modification, obtain the smallest portion or particle of +constitutional freedom, it will be impossible for them to hold their +property. They tell us that they act only on the defensive. They inform +the public of Europe that their estates are made up of forfeitures and +confiscations from the natives; that, if the body of people obtain +votes, any number of votes, however small, it will be a step to the +choice of members of their own religion; that the House of Commons, in +spite of the influence of nineteen parts in twenty of the landed +interest now in their hands, will be composed in the whole, or in far +the major part, of Papists; that this Popish House of Commons will +instantly pass a law to confiscate all their estates, which it will not +be in their power to save even by entering into that Popish party +themselves, because there are prior claimants to be satisfied; that, as +to the House of Lords, though neither Papists nor Protestants have a +share in electing them, the body of the peerage will be so obliging and +disinterested as to fall in with this exterminatory scheme, which is to +forfeit all their estates, the largest part of the kingdom; and, to +crown all, that his Majesty will give his cheerful assent to this +causeless act of attainder of his innocent and faithful Protestant +subjects; that they will be or are to be left, without house or land, to +the dreadful resource of living by their wits, out of which they are +already frightened by the apprehension of this spoliation with which +they are threatened; that, therefore, they cannot so much as listen to +any arguments drawn from equity or from national or constitutional +policy: the sword is at their throats; beggary and famine at their door. +See what it is to have a good look-out, and to see danger at the end of +a sufficiently long perspective! + +This is, indeed, to speak plain, though to speak nothing very new. The +same thing has been said in all times and in all languages. The language +of tyranny has been invariable: "The general good is inconsistent with +my personal safety." Justice and liberty seem so alarming to these +gentlemen, that they are not ashamed even to slander their own titles, +to calumniate and call in doubt their right to their own estates, and to +consider themselves as novel disseizors, usurpers, and intruders, rather +than lose a pretext for becoming oppressors of their fellow-citizens, +whom they (not I) choose to describe themselves as having robbed. + +Instead of putting themselves in this odious point of light, one would +think they would wish to let Time draw his oblivious veil over the +unpleasant modes by which lordships and demesnes have been acquired in +theirs, and almost in all other countries upon earth. It might be +imagined, that, when the sufferer (if a sufferer exists) had forgot the +wrong, they would be pleased to forget it too,--that they would permit +the sacred name of possession to stand in the place of the melancholy +and unpleasant title of grantees of confiscation, which, though firm and +valid in law, surely merits the name that a great Roman jurist gave to a +title at least as valid in his nation as confiscation would be either in +his or in ours: _Tristis et luctuosa successio_. + +Such is the situation of every man who comes in upon the ruin of +another; his succeeding, under this circumstance, is _tristis et +luctuosa successio_. If it had been the fate of any gentleman to profit +by the confiscation of his neighbor, one would think he would be more +disposed to give him a valuable interest under him in his land, or to +allow him a pension, as I understand one worthy person has done, without +fear or apprehension that his benevolence to a ruined family would be +construed into a recognition of the forfeited title. The public of +England, the other day, acted in this manner towards Lord Newburgh, a +Catholic. Though the estate had been vested by law in the greatest of +the public charities, they have given him a pension from his +confiscation. They have gone further in other cases. On the last +rebellion, in 1745, in Scotland, several forfeitures were incurred. They +had been disposed of by Parliament to certain laudable uses. Parliament +reversed the method which they had adopted in Lord Newburgh's case, and +in my opinion did better: they gave the forfeited estates to the +successors of the forfeiting proprietors, chargeable in part with the +uses. Is this, or anything like this, asked in favor of any human +creature in Ireland? It is bounty, it is charity,--wise bounty, and +politic charity; but no man can claim it as a right. Here no such thing +is claimed as right, or begged as charity. The demand has an object as +distant from all considerations of this sort as any two extremes can be. +The people desire the privileges inseparably annexed, since Magna +Charta, to the freehold which they have by descent or obtain as the +fruits of their industry. They call for no man's estate; they desire not +to be dispossessed of their own. + +But this melancholy and invidious title is a favorite (and, like +favorites, always of the least merit) with those who possess every other +title upon earth along with it. For this purpose they revive the bitter +memory of every dissension which has torn to pieces their miserable +country for ages. After what has passed in 1782, one would not think +that decorum, to say nothing of policy, would permit them to call up, by +magic charms, the grounds, reasons, and principles of those terrible +confiscatory and exterminatory periods. They would not set men upon +calling from the quiet sleep of death any Samuel, to ask him by what act +of arbitrary monarchs, by what inquisitions of corrupted tribunals and +tortured jurors, by what fictitious tenures invented to dispossess whole +unoffending tribes and their chieftains. They would not conjure up the +ghosts from the ruins of castles and churches, to tell for what attempt +to struggle for the independence of an Irish legislature, and to raise +armies of volunteers without regular commissions from the crown in +support of that independence, the estates of the old Irish nobility and +gentry had been confiscated. They would not wantonly call on those +phantoms to tell by what English acts of Parliament, forced upon two +reluctant kings, the lands of their country were put up to a mean and +scandalous auction in every goldsmith's shop in London, or chopped to +pieces and out into rations, to pay the mercenary soldiery of a regicide +usurper. They would not be so fond of titles under Cromwell, who, if he +avenged an Irish rebellion against the sovereign authority of the +Parliament of England, had himself rebelled against the very Parliament +whose sovereignty he asserted, full as much as the Irish nation, which +he was sent to subdue and confiscate, could rebel against that +Parliament, or could rebel against the king, against whom both he and +the Parliament which he served, and which he betrayed, had both of them +rebelled. + +The gentlemen who hold the language of the day know perfectly well that +the Irish in 1641 pretended, at least, that they did not rise against +the king: nor in fact did they, whatever constructions law might put +upon their act. But full surely they rebelled against the authority of +the Parliament of England, and they openly professed so to do. Admitting +(I have now no time to discuss the matter) the enormous and unpardonable +magnitude of this their crime, they rued it in their persons, and in +those of their children and their grandchildren, even to the fifth and +sixth generations. Admitting, then, the enormity of this unnatural +rebellion in favor of the independence of Ireland, will it follow that +it must be avenged forever? Will it follow that it must be avenged on +thousands and perhaps hundreds of thousands of those whom they can never +trace, by the labors of the most subtle metaphysician of the traduction +of crimes, or the most inquisitive genealogist of proscription, to the +descendant of any one concerned in that nefarious Irish rebellion +against the Parliament of England? + +If, however, you could find out those pedigrees of guilt, I do not think +the difference would be essential. History records many things which +ought to make us hate evil actions; but neither history, nor morals, nor +policy can teach us to punish innocent men on that account. What lesson +does the iniquity of prevalent factions read to us? It ought to lesson +us into an abhorrence of the abuse of our own power in our own day, when +we hate its excesses so much in other persons and in other times. To +that school true statesmen ought to be satisfied to leave mankind. They +ought not to call from the dead all the discussions and litigations +which formerly inflamed the furious factions which had torn their +country to pieces; they ought not to rake into the hideous and +abominable things which were done in the turbulent fury of an injured, +robbed, and persecuted people, and which were afterwards cruelly +revenged in the execution, and as outrageously and shamefully +exaggerated in the representation, in order, an hundred and fifty years +after, to find some color for justifying them in the eternal +proscription and civil excommunication of a whole people. + +Let us come to a later period of those confiscations with the memory of +which the gentlemen who triumph in the acts of 1782 are so much +delighted. The Irish again rebelled against the English Parliament in +1688, and the English Parliament again put up to sale the greatest part +of their estates. I do not presume to defend the Irish for this +rebellion, nor to blame the English Parliament for this confiscation. +The Irish, it is true, did not revolt from King James's power. He threw +himself upon their fidelity, and they supported him to the best of their +feeble power. Be the crime of that obstinate adherence to an abdicated +sovereign, against a prince whom the Parliaments of Ireland and Scotland +had recognized, what it may, I do not mean to justify this rebellion +more than the former. It might, however, admit some palliation in them. +In generous minds some small degree of compassion might be excited for +an error, where they were misled, as Cicero says to a conqueror, _quadam +specie et similitudine pacis_, not without a mistaken appearance of +duty, and for which the guilty have suffered, by exile abroad and +slavery at home, to the extent of their folly or their offence. The best +calculators compute that Ireland lost two hundred thousand of her +inhabitants in that struggle. If the principle of the English and +Scottish resistance at the Revolution is to be justified, (as sure I am +it is,) the submission of Ireland must be somewhat extenuated. For, if +the Irish resisted King William, they resisted him on the very same +principle that the English and Scotch resisted King James. The Irish +Catholics must have been the very worst and the most truly unnatural of +rebels, if they had not supported a prince whom they had seen attacked, +not for any designs against _their_ religion or _their_ liberties, but +for an extreme partiality for their sect, and who, far from trespassing +on _their_ liberties and properties, secured both them and the +independence of their country in much the same manner that we have seen +the same things done at the period of 1782,--I trust the last revolution +in Ireland. + +That the Irish Parliament of King James did in some particulars, though +feebly, imitate the rigor which had been used towards the Irish, is true +enough. Blamable enough they were for what they had done, though under +the greatest possible provocation. I shall never praise confiscations or +counter-confiscations as long as I live. When they happen by necessity, +I shall think the necessity lamentable and odious: I shall think that +anything done under it ought not to pass into precedent, or to be +adopted by choice, or to produce any of those shocking retaliations +which never suffer dissensions to subside. Least of all would I fix the +transitory spirit of civil fury by perpetuating and methodizing it in +tyrannic government. If it were permitted to argue with power, might one +not ask these gentlemen whether it would not be more natural, instead of +wantonly mooting these questions concerning their property, as if it +were an exercise in law, to found it on the solid rock of +prescription,--the soundest, the most general, and the most recognized +title between man and man that is known in municipal or in public +jurisprudence?--a title in which not arbitrary institutions, but the +eternal order of things, gives judgment; a title which is not the +creature, but the master, of positive law; a title which, though not +fixed in its term, is rooted in its principle in the law of Nature +itself, and is indeed the original ground of all known property: for all +property in soil will always be traced back to that source, and will +rest there. The miserable natives of Ireland, who ninety-nine in an +hundred are tormented with quite other cares, and are bowed down to +labor for the bread of the hour, are not, as gentlemen pretend, plodding +with antiquaries for titles of centuries ago to the estates of the great +lords and squires for whom they labor. But if they were thinking of the +titles which gentlemen labor to beat into their heads, where can they +bottom their own claims, but in a presumption and a proof that these +lands had at some time been possessed by their ancestors? These +gentlemen (for they have lawyers amongst them) know as well as I that in +England we have had always a prescription or limitation, as all nations +have, against each other. The crown was excepted; but that exception is +destroyed, and we have lately established a sixty years' possession as +against the crown. All titles terminate in prescription,--in which +(differently from Time in the fabulous instances) the son devours the +father, and the last prescription eats up all the former. + + * * * * * + + + + +A + +LETTER + +ON + +THE AFFAIRS OF IRELAND. + +1797. + + +Dear Sir,--In the reduced state of body and in the dejected state of +mind in which I find myself at this very advanced period of my life, it +is a great consolation to me to know that a cause I ever have had so +very near my heart is taken up by a man of your activity and talents. + +It is very true that your late friend, my ever dear and honored son, was +in the highest degree solicitous about the final event of a business +which he also had pursued for a long time with infinite zeal, and no +small degree of success. It was not above half an hour before he left me +forever that he spoke with considerable earnestness on this very +subject. If I had needed any incentives to do my best for freeing the +body of my country from the grievances under which they labor, this +alone would certainly call forth all my endeavors. + +The person who succeeded to the government of Ireland about the time of +that afflicting event had been all along of my sentiments and yours upon +this subject; and far from needing to be stimulated by me, that +incomparable person, and those in whom he strictly confided, even went +before me in their resolution to pursue the great end of government, the +satisfaction and concord of the people with whose welfare they were +charged. I cannot bear to think on the causes by which this great plan +of policy, so manifestly beneficial to both kingdoms, has been +defeated. + +Your mistake with regard to me lies in supposing that I did not, when +his removal was in agitation, strongly and personally represent to +several of his Majesty's ministers, to whom I could have the most ready +access, the true state of Ireland, and the mischiefs which sooner or +later must arise from subjecting the mass of the people to the +capricious and interested domination of an exceeding small faction and +its dependencies. + +That representation was made the last time, or very nearly the last +time, that I have ever had the honor of seeing those ministers. I am so +far from having any credit with them, on this, or any other public +matters, that I have reason to be certain, if it were known that any +person in office in Ireland, from the highest to the lowest, were +influenced by my opinions, and disposed to act upon them, such an one +would be instantly turned out of his employment. Yon have formed, to my +person a flattering, yet in truth a very erroneous opinion, of my power +with those who direct the public measures. I never have been directly or +indirectly consulted about anything that is done. The judgment of the +eminent and able persons who conduct public affairs is undoubtedly +superior to mine; but self-partiality induces almost every man to defer +something to his own. Nothing is more notorious than that I have the +misfortune of thinking that no one capital measure relative to political +arrangements, and still less that a new military plan for the defence of +either kingdom in this arduous war, has been taken upon any other +principle than such as must conduct us to inevitable ruin. + +In the state of my mind, so discordant with the tone of ministers, and +still more discordant with the tone of opposition, you may judge what +degree of weight I am likely to have with either of the parties who +divide this kingdom,--even though I were endowed with strength of body, +or were possessed of any active situation in the government, which might +give success to my endeavors. But the fact is, since the day of my +unspeakable calamity, except in the attentions of a very few old and +compassionate friends, I am totally out of all social intercourse. My +health has gone down very rapidly; and I have been brought hither with +very faint hopes of life, and enfeebled to such a degree as those who +had known me some time ago could scarcely think credible. Since I came +hither, my sufferings have been greatly aggravated, and my little +strength still further reduced; so that, though I am told the symptoms +of my disorder begin to carry a more favorable aspect, I pass the far +larger part of the twenty-four hours, indeed almost the whole, either in +my bed or lying upon the couch from which I dictate this. Had you been +apprised of this circumstance, you could not have expected anything, as +you seem to do, from my active exertions. I could do nothing, if I was +still stronger, not even _si meus adforet Hector_. + +There is no hope for the body of the people of Ireland, as long as those +who are in power with you shall make it the great object of their policy +to propagate an opinion on this side of the water that the mass of their +countrymen are not to be trusted by their government, and that the only +hold which England has upon Ireland consists in preserving a certain +very small number of gentlemen in full possession of a monopoly of that +kingdom. This system has disgusted many others besides Catholics and +Dissenters. + +As to those who on your side are in the opposition to government, they +are composed of persons several of whom I love and revere. They have +been irritated by a treatment too much for the ordinary patience of +mankind to bear into the adoption of schemes which, however +_argumentatively_ specious, would go _practically_ to the inevitable +ruin of the kingdom. The opposition always connects the emancipation of +the Catholics with these schemes of reformation: indeed, it makes the +former only a member of the latter project. The gentlemen who enforce +that opposition are, in my opinion, playing the game of their +adversaries with all their might; and there is no third party in Ireland +(nor in England neither) to separate things that are in themselves so +distinct,--I mean the admitting people to the benefits of the +Constitution, and a change in the form of the Constitution itself. + +As every one knows that a great part of the constitution of the Irish +House of Commons was formed about the year 1614 expressly for bringing +that House into a state of dependence, and that the new representative +was at that time seated and installed by force and violence, nothing can +be more impolitic than for those who wish the House to stand on its +present basis (as, for one, I most sincerely do) to make it appear to +have kept too much the principle of its first institution, and to +continue to be as little a virtual as it is an actual representative of +the commons. It is the _degeneracy_ of such an institution, _so vicious +in its principle_, that is to be wished for. If men have the real +benefit of a _sympathetic_ representation, none but those who are heated +and intoxicated with theory will look for any other. This sort of +representation, my dear Sir, must wholly depend, not on the force with +which it is upheld, but upon the _prudence_ of those who have influence +upon it. Indeed, without some such prudence in the use of authority, I +do not know, at least in the present time, how any power can long +continue. + +If it be true that both parties are carrying things to extremities in +different ways, the object which you and I have in common, that is to +say, the union and concord of our country _on the basis of the actual +representation_, without risking those evils which any change in the +form of our legislature must inevitably bring on, can never be obtained. +On the part of the Catholics (that is to say, of the body of the people +of the kingdom) it is a terrible alternative, either to submit to the +yoke of declared and insulting enemies, or to seek a remedy in plunging +themselves into the horrors and crimes of that Jacobinism which +unfortunately is not disagreeable to the principles and inclinations of, +I am afraid, the majority of what we call the Protestants of Ireland. +The Protestant part of that kingdom is represented by the government +itself to be, by whole counties, in nothing less than open rebellion. I +am sure that it is everywhere teeming with dangerous conspiracy. + +I believe it will be found, that, though the principles of the +Catholics, and the incessant endeavors of their clergy, have kept them +from being generally infected with the systems of this time, yet, +whenever their situation brings them nearer into contact with the +Jacobin Protestants, they are more or less infected with their +doctrines. + +It is a matter for melancholy reflection, but I am fully convinced, that +many persons in Ireland would be glad that the Catholics should become +more and more infected with the Jacobin madness, in order to furnish new +arguments for fortifying them in their monopoly. On any other ground it +is impossible to account for the late language of your men in power. If +statesmen, (let me suppose for argument,) upon the most solid political +principles, conceive themselves obliged to resist the wishes of the far +more numerous, and, as things stand, not the worse part of the +community, one would think they would naturally put their refusal as +much as possible upon temporary grounds, and that they would act towards +them in the most conciliatory manner, and would talk to them in the most +gentle and soothing language: for refusal, in itself, is not a very +gracious thing; and, unfortunately, men are very quickly irritated out +of their principles. Nothing is more discouraging to the loyalty of any +description of men than to represent to them that their humiliation and +subjection make a principal part in the fundamental and invariable +policy which regards the conjunction of these two kingdoms. This is not +the way to give them a warm interest in that conjunction. + +My poor opinion is, that the closest connection between Great Britain +and Ireland is essential to the well-being, I had almost said, to the +very being, of the two kingdoms. For that purpose I humbly conceive that +the whole of the superior, and what I should call _imperial_ politics, +ought to have its residence here; and that Ireland, locally, civilly, +and commercially independent, ought politically to look up to Great +Britain in all matters of peace or of war,--in all those points to be +guided by her.--and, in a word, with her to live and to die. At bottom, +Ireland has no other choice,--I mean, no other rational choice. + +I think, indeed, that Great Britain would be ruined by the separation of +Ireland; but as there are degrees even in ruin, it would fall the most +heavily on Ireland. By such a separation Ireland would be the most +completely undone country in the world,--the most wretched, the most +distracted, and, in the end, the most desolate part of the habitable +globe. Little do many people in Ireland consider how much of its +prosperity has been owing to, and still depends upon, its intimate +connection with this kingdom. But, more sensible of this great truth, +than perhaps any other man, I have never conceived, or can conceive, +that the connection is strengthened by making the major part of the +inhabitants of your country believe that their ease, and their +satisfaction, and their equalization with the rest of their +fellow-subjects of Ireland are things adverse to the principles of that +connection,--or that their subjection to a small monopolizing junto, +composed of one of the smallest of their own internal factions, is the +very condition upon which the harmony of the two kingdoms essentially +depends. I was sorry to hear that this principle, or something not +unlike it, was publicly and fully avowed by persons of great rank and +authority in the House of Lords in Ireland. + +As to a participation on the part of the Catholics in the privileges and +capacities which are withheld, without meaning wholly to depreciate +their importance, if I had the honor of being an Irish Catholic, I +should be content to expect satisfaction upon that subject with +patience, until the minds of my adversaries, few, but powerful, were +come to a proper temper: because, if the Catholics did enjoy, without +fraud, chicane, or partiality, some fair portion of those advantages +which the law, even as now the law is, leaves open to them, and if the +rod were not shaken over them at every turn, their present condition +would be tolerable; as compared with their former condition, it would be +happy. But the most favorable laws can do very little towards the +happiness of a people, when the disposition of the ruling power is +adverse to them. Men do not live upon blotted paper. The favorable or +the hostile mind of the ruling power is of far more importance to +mankind, for good or evil, than the black-letter of any statute. Late +acts of Parliament, whilst they fixed at least a temporary bar to the +hopes and progress of the larger description of the nation, opened to +them certain subordinate objects of equality; but it is impossible that +the people should imagine that any fair measure of advantage is intended +to them, when they hear the laws by which they were admitted to this +limited qualification publicly reprobated as excessive and +inconsiderate. They must think that there is a hankering after the old +penal and persecuting code. Their alarm must be great, when that +declaration is made by a person in very high and important office in the +House of Commons, and as the very first specimen and auspice of a new +government. + +All this is very unfortunate. I have the honor of an old acquaintance, +and entertain, in common with you, a very high esteem for the few +English persons who are concerned in the government of Ireland; but I am +not ignorant of the relation these transitory ministers bear to the +more settled Irish part of your administration. It is a delicate topic, +upon which I wish to say but little, though my reflections upon it are +many and serious. There is a great cry against English influence. I am +quite sure that it is Irish influence that dreads the English habits. + +Great disorders have long prevailed in Ireland. It is not long since +that the Catholics were the suffering party from those disorders. I am +sure they were not protected as the case required. Their sufferings +became a matter of discussion in Parliament. It produced the most +infuriated declamation against them that I have ever read. An inquiry +was moved into the facts. The declamation was at least tolerated, if not +approved. The inquiry was absolutely rejected. In that case, what is +left for those who are abandoned by government, but to join with the +persons who are capable of injuring them or protecting them as they +oppose or concur in their designs? This will produce a very fatal kind +of union amongst the people; but it is an union, which an unequal +administration of justice tends necessarily to produce. + +If anything could astonish one at this time, it is the war that the +rulers in Ireland think it proper to carry on against the person whom +they call the Pope, and against all his adherents, whenever they think +they have the power of manifesting their hostility. Without in the least +derogating from the talents of your theological politicians, or from the +military abilities of your commanders (who act on the same principles) +in Ireland, and without derogating from the zeal of either, it appears +to me that the Protestant Directory of Paris, as statesmen, and the +Protestant hero, Buonaparte, as a general, have done more to destroy +the said Pope and all his adherents, in all their capacities, than the +junto in Ireland have ever been able to effect. You must submit your +_fasces_ to theirs, and at best be contented to follow with songs of +gratulation, or invectives, according to your humor, the triumphal car +of those great conquerors. Had that true Protestant, Hoche, with an army +not infected with the slightest tincture of Popery, made good his +landing in Ireland, he would have saved you from a great deal of the +trouble which is taken to keep under a description of your +fellow-citizens obnoxious to you from their religion. It would not have +a month's existence, supposing his success. This is the alliance which, +under the appearance of hostility, we act as if we wished to promote. +All is well, provided we are safe from Popery. + +It was not necessary for you, my dear Sir, to explain yourself to _me_ +(in justification of your good wishes to your fellow-citizens) +concerning your total alienation from the principles of the Catholics. I +am more concerned in what we agree than in what we differ. You know the +impossibility of our forming any judgment upon the opinions, religious, +moral, or political, of those who in the largest sense are called +Protestants,--at least, as these opinions and tenets form a +qualification for holding any civil, judicial, military, or even +ecclesiastical situation. I have no doubt of the orthodox opinion of +many, both of the clergy and laity, professing the established religion +in Ireland, and of many even amongst the Dissenters, relative to the +great points of the Christian faith: but that orthodoxy concerns them +only as _individuals_. As a _qualification_ for employment, we all know +that in Ireland it is not necessary that they should profess any +religion at all: so that the war that we make is upon certain +theological tenets, about which scholastic disputes are carried on _aequo +Marte_, by controvertists, on their side, as able and as learned, and +perhaps as well-intentioned, as those are who fight the battle on the +other part. To them I would leave those controversies. I would turn my +mind to what is more within its competence, and has been more my study, +(though, for a man of the world, I have thought of those things,)--I +mean, the moral, civil, and political good of the countries we belong +to, and in which God has appointed your station and mine. Let every man +be as pious as he pleases, and in the way that he pleases; but it is +agreeable neither to piety nor to policy to give exclusively all manner +of civil privileges and advantages to a _negative_ religion, (such is +the Protestant without a certain creed,) and at the same time to deny +those privileges to men whom we know to agree to an iota in every one +_positive_ doctrine which all of us who profess the religion +authoritatively taught in England hold ourselves, according to our +faculties, bound to believe. The Catholics of Ireland (as I have said) +have the whole of our _positive_ religion: our difference is only a +negation of certain tenets of theirs. If we strip ourselves of _that_ +part of Catholicism, we abjure Christianity. If we drive them from that +holding, without engaging them in some other positive religion, (which +you know by our qualifying laws we do not,) what do we better than to +hold out to them terrors on the one side, and bounties on the other, in +favor of that which, for anything we know to the contrary, may be pure +atheism? + +You are well aware, that, when a man renounces the Roman religion, +there is no civil inconvenience or incapacity whatsoever which shall +hinder him from joining any new or old sect of Dissenters, or of forming +a sect of his own invention upon the most anti-christian principles. Let +Mr. Thomas Paine obtain a pardon, (as on change of ministry he may,) +there is nothing to hinder him from setting up a church of his own in +the very midst of you. He is a natural-born British subject. His French +citizenship does not disqualify him, at least upon a peace. This +Protestant apostle is as much above all suspicion of Popery as the +greatest and most zealous of your sanhedrim in Ireland can possibly be. +On purchasing a qualification, (which his friends of the Directory are +not so poor as to be unable to effect,) he may sit in Parliament; and +there is no doubt that there is not one of your tests against Popery +that he will not take as fairly, and as much _ex animo_, as the best of +your zealot statesmen. I push this point no further, and only adduce +this example (a pretty strong one, and fully in point) to show what I +take to be the madness and folly of driving men, under the existing +circumstances, from any _positive_ religion whatever into the irreligion +of the times, and its sure concomitant principles of anarchy. + +When religion is brought into a question of civil and political +arrangement, it must be considered more politically than theologically, +at least by us, who are nothing more than mere laymen. In that light, +the case of the Catholics of Ireland is peculiarly hard, whether they be +laity or clergy. If any of them take part, like the gentleman you +mention, with some of the most accredited Protestants of the country, in +projects which cannot be more abhorrent to your nature and disposition +than they are to mine,--in that case, however few these Catholic +factions who are united with factious Protestants may be, (and very few +they are now, whatever shortly they may become,) on their account the +whole body is considered as of suspected fidelity to the crown, and as +wholly undeserving of its favor. But if, on the contrary, in those +districts of the kingdom where their numbers are the greatest, where +they make, in a manner, the whole body of the people, (as, out of +cities, in three fourths of the kingdom they do,) these Catholics show +every mark of loyalty and zeal in support of the government, which at +best looks on them with an evil eye, then their very loyalty is turned +against their claims. They are represented as a contented and happy +people, and that it is unnecessary to do anything more in their favor. +Thus the factious disposition of a few among the Catholics and the +loyalty of the whole mass are equally assigned as reasons for not +putting them on a par with those Protestants who are asserted by the +government itself, which frowns upon Papists, to be in a state of +nothing short of actual rebellion, and in a strong disposition to make +common cause with the worst foreign enemy that these countries have ever +had to deal with. What in the end can come of all this? + +As to the Irish Catholic clergy, their condition is likewise most +critical. If they endeavor by their influence to keep a dissatisfied +laity in quiet, they are in danger of losing the little credit they +possess, by being considered as the instruments of a government adverse +to the civil interests of their flock. If they let things take their +course, they will be represented as colluding with sedition, or at least +tacitly encouraging it. If they remonstrate against persecution, they +propagate rebellion. Whilst government publicly avows hostility to that +people, as a part of a regular system, there is no road they can take +which does not lead to their ruin. + +If nothing can be done on your side of the water, I promise you that +nothing will be done here. Whether in reality or only in appearance I +cannot positively determine, but you will be left to yourselves by the +ruling powers here. It is thus ostensibly and above-board; and in part, +I believe, the disposition is real. As to the people at large in this +country, I am sure they have no disposition to intermeddle in your +affairs. They mean you no ill whatever; and they are too ignorant of the +state of your affairs to be able to do you any good. Whatever opinion +they have on your subject is very faint and indistinct; and if there is +anything like a formed notion, even that amounts to no more than a sort +of humming that remains on their ears of the burden of the old song +about Popery. Poor souls, they are to be pitied, who think of nothing +but dangers long passed by, and but little of the perils that actually +surround them. + + * * * * * + +I have been long, but it is almost a necessary consequence of dictating, +and that by snatches, as a relief from pain gives me the means of +expressing my sentiments. They can have little weight, as coming from +me; and I have not power enough of mind or body to bring them out with +their natural force. But I do not wish to have it concealed that I am of +the same opinion, to my last breath, which I entertained when my +faculties were at the best; and I have not held back from men in power +in this kingdom, to whom I have very good wishes, any part of my +sentiments on this melancholy subject, so long as I had means of access +to persons of their consideration. + +I have the honor to be, &c. + + + + +END OF VOL. VI. + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Works of the Right Honourable +Edmund Burke, Vol. VI. 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