we had no reason to expect more permanent advantages from the one than from the other. Were it not therefore more advifeable to conclude a peace, if an honourable peace could be obtained, with the prefent government of France, and truft to our caution and vigilance for the prefervation of evil designs against this country, than to continue hoftilities, attended with an enormous waste of blood and treasure, but not more productive of fecurity than a pacification? Allowing the danger to be equal in either cafe, that which freed us from an immenfe charge was, queftionlefs, preferable to the other. It was vain to calculate the refour ces of the French at the rate of a commercial proportion. They had no commerce; they derived no expectations from any other funds than the productions of their foil: thefe were the gifts of nature, and could not be taken from them: their induftry and ingenuity knew how to turn them to the best account. The depreciation of their paper- money had not depreffed their affairs: it had not retarded a moment the vigour nor the celerity of their military operations. Wherever men were willing and refolved to bear with hardhips, hiftorical experience had proved that their refources were inexhauftible. Courage and ability were the two main fupports in all difficulties, whether of a public or of a private nature. The French had confpicuously verified this maxim; and it behoved us, while we tefti. fed our abhorrence of their conduct in fo many inftances, to do them juftice in this particular: but in fo doing, we should alfo recolkeft how strong a proof it afforded VOL. XXXVI.

of the inutility of our efforts to reduce fuch a people to compliance with our demands. It was not long fince we had made a trial of this nature, to our fatal coft. Our American colonies were, if poffible; in a fituation more defperate and forlorn than the French: yet, amidst our daily taunts at their diftrefes, and our fanguine hopes of their being finally compelled to yield, they baffled all our ftrength, all our courage, all our skill, and, what we chiefly relied on, as we do at this prefent hour, all that profufion of treasure which had nearly brought us to deftruction, as it certainly tended to such an issue at this no lefs unhappy, if not more unfortunate period. In fhort, they might be faid to have fought out riches with their poverty: a ferious leflon to those who think that afflu ence can compafs all things.

Mo

Mr. Fox, in a very ferious tone of voice, implored the attention of the Houfe to this topic, as a blind and obftinate confidence in our own pecuniary refources, and in a failure of the pecuniary refources of France, was the great fpring of the calamities with which we were now befet and further threatened, even to national difgrace and ruin. ney is, in fact, only a mark or figa of the value of labour. In a general and comprehenfive view of things, money is not fo much the caufe, as the effect of exertion. Virtus preftantior auro, Great defigns: are not to be regulated and circumfcribed by the little rules of vulgar calculation. A nation may be fo powerful, and fo fertile in invention, as to fet derangements in finance, in fome meafure, at defiance. Productions of art, as. weil as reproductions of nature, may be

carried

carried on with very little, or even it is a refource that enables them without any money, as the French had already proved. The enthufi afm of liberty, though not, properly fpeaking, itfelf a refource, conducts men, by its native heat and light, to the difcovery and invention of refources. It excites every latent faculty of the foul; and the energies of the mind, in full exertion, fall upon means which it would have wholly overlooked in a state of inaction. Though in the prefent advanced state of commerce money be a general reprefentative, and equivalent for commodities of all kinds, among which we reckon military stores and military fervices, the order of nature, by which all things are procured by induftry and exertion, is not inverted. In times of peace men purfue the medium of exchanging, the fign of commodities. In times of war they fometimes, nay, very frequently, purfue by more compendious ways the thing fignified. In war it fometimes happens that courage and rage fupply the want of ordinary arms. Xenophon, in his Cyropædia, has obferved, that iron commands gold. The French, when their affignats fail, as it is predicted that they will do, may plunder their neighbours. It must be allowed that plunder is but a fleeting fource: yet when a nation has abandoned habits of peace and induftry, and acquired the views and manners of predatory warriors,

to fpread oppreffion and defolation far and near. The Arabs did not conquer fo large a portion of Afia and Africa, and even part of Europe, by money. The Tartars, or Scythians, had no money, not even affignats; yet they fubdued the Roman empire, as the Romans themfelves had by their hardihood and military difcipline and valour triumphed over the money and numerous mercenaries of Carthage. In our own times we have seen a people without money defeating the richeft nation at prefent on earth. Are we certain that when the refource of the affignats fhall be exhaufted, if it fhall be exhausted, the energy of liberty and the fertility of French invention will not be able to open others? The refources of commerce are fleeting and tranfient: but never, in the divided itate of individuals and nations, can there be a conjecture in which courage and numbers may not alarm the fears, and political intrigues, in various ways, practife on all the various paffions of human nature. It is not poffible, faid Mr. Fox, to imagine what new means of continuing the war may be invented by an ingenious pcople, actuated by a fpirit of national independence and honour and he deplored from the bottom of his heart the fatal error which administration was at fo much pains, in various ways *, to propagate.

Mr.

Alluding probably to certain pamphlets that were published at this time, endeavouring to prove that the certain ruin of the French affignats would be the certain ruin of the French republic. It was fome time after this, however, that Sir John d'Ivernois (author of a tract published in 1782, and another in 1795, respecting revolutions, at thofe periods, in Geneva) publifhed his reflections," Sur la Guerre," and his "Etat de Finance," &c. In the firft of thefe works his object is to fhew, ift, That the French republic will be ruined, juft as the monarchy was, by the fate of the finances; and that before the expiration of the year 1795,

at

Mr. Fox returned again to the fubject of the American war; between which and the prefent there were fo many ftriking points of refemblance, particularly in the fatal point, that in neither would minifters liften to any arguments or any reports, other than those that were agreeable to their own preju dices and paffions.

The lofs of America, through our felf-delufion, pride, and obftinacy, fhould teach us to be more moderate in our views of conqueft and fubjugation; efpecially when directed towards a country and people lefs liable than any other to become the flaves of their neighbours, and long accustomed to infpire them all with terror. After protracting the war with America to a ruinous length, Great Britain was glad to treat with that rebellious foe. Why not affent to a treaty with a power never depend ant on our jurifdiction, and whofe offences, however great, have been committed within itself, and are amenable only to the tribunal of opinion? It had been predicted, that to yield to the demands of

America, would be treason to Great Britain; but neceffity forced us to yield. It had been foretold that the ceffion of independence to America would produce every fpecies of national calamities, and fink us at once to the lowest degrada tion. But were either of these. predictions accomplished? After acquiefcing in thefe demands, did we not in a fhort space emerge out of every difficulty which that conteft had engendered? We loft in deed a multitude of fubjects, but we acquired a multitude of ufeful connexions, far more profitable than if retained in fubjection by purchase or by terror. In the fame manner, by relinquishing an attempt beyond the strength of Eu rope to atchieve, we should fall back into that profperous courfe which that enemy, whofe ambition we had taken up arms to reprefs, would never be able to difturb, while we convinced the world by our' conduct, that his imputations to our disadvantage were unjust, and that our intercourfe with other nations was founded on the stricteft principles of good faith and equity.

at fartheft. 2d, That Mr. Pitt will be confidered by futurity as a greater minifter, if poffible, than his father. The chances of war Sir John certainly fhewed to be all in favour of that party who poffeffed moft refources for prolonging the conteft. His miftake lay in affuming that the only refource and nerve of war is money: that the whole power of the French republic, and even its military exiftence, depended exclufively on the affignats; and that its momentary conquests were wholly owing to the profufion of paper-currency. Mr. de Calonne demon trated the fallacy of this opinion with great clearness of reafoning, and with an air of gaiety and pleafantry. The conftant and repeated predictions of Sir John d'Ivernos were uniformly falfified by events. He then took refuge in the obfer vation, that the French republic must have been ruined, as he had predicted, if it had confined its exactions to France, and not also laid violent hands on property of other nations: but that they would, in cafe of neceflity, be guilty of fuch violente, was a cafe very likely to happen. It was faid, and is fomewhere hinted by Sir John d'Ivernois himself, that he was employed to publish his doctrine refpect ing affignats by Mr. Pitt; who was naturally very defirous of convincing both himfelf and others of what he anxioufly wifhed to be true. This difpofition in al men, particularly the great, is the most plentiful source of the greatest errors.

improprieties in almost every atteinpt under their direction: they had framed plans, without providing the means of execution. The failure at Dunkirk, which proved the origin of the many fubfequent difafters, was entirely owing to mifmanagement. The advantages that might have refulted from the poffethon of Toulon, were loft by want of decision, and by an unpardonable procraftination of what fhould have fuffered no delay. But

waving thefe and other failures, and adverting only to the fitness of terminating this unpropitious war, it ought to be recommended, as an amendment to the address, that, without further objections to the fyftem of government established in France, the crown fhould treat with it for peace, upon fafe and honourable conditions. On putting the question, the address, without the amendment, was carried by 277 votes against 59.

CHAP. XI.

Military Preparations and Strength of France and Great Britain in the Course of 1793. A Body of Hefsian Troops arrive in the Isle of Wight. This Measure cenfured by Oppofition in the Houfe of Commons. Defended by the Minifterial Party. Motion for increafing the Number of Seamen for the Service of the Navy. For referring to the Committee of Supply, a Treaty with the King of Sardinia. That the Land Forces for the Service of the Current Year, should confift of 60,000 Men. Converfations and Diputa tions that arife in Confequence of thefe Motions. Supplies for the Profecution of the War. New Taxes. Act for restraining the Payment of Money to Perfons refiding in France during the War. Annual Motion by Mr. Wil berforce, for Leave to bring in a Bill for the Abolition of the Slave Trade, in the Houfe of Commons. Carried. Petitions against the Abolition of the Slave Trade. Motion by Mr. Maitland, refpecting French Officers in British Pay. Negatived,

TH

HE attention paid by the British miniftry to the means at profecuting the war againft France, was equal to the importance of which both they and the majority of the people feemed to confider it. The French, at the clofe of 1793, were complete mafters of the field on all their frontiers: they had expelled the Auftrians and Pruffians from their country they had taken poffeffion of the Netherlands, and menaced Holland with an invafion. Great Britain, the principal guardian of the balance of Europe, faw itself

involved by the critical circumftances of that period, in the difagreeable necefiity of interpofing between the contending powers, in order to preferve that equipoife between them, on which its political importance and commercial profperity fo effentially depend. The naval ftrength of the kingdom confifted of no more than forty-five fhips fit for fervice, of which onethird was of the line. They were manned by about 15,000 famen. The army amounted to its ufual peace eftablishment, of about 20,000, But the vigour and activity of go 03 vernment