"unprofitable." What merchants? As no treaty ever was more maturely considered, so the opinion of the Russia merchants in London was all along taken; and all the instructions sent over were in exact conformity to that opinion. Our minister there made no step without having previously consulted our merchants resident in Petersburgh, who, before the signing of the treaty, gave the most full and unanimous testimony in its favour. In their address to our minister at that court, among other things they say, It may afford some "additional satisfaction to your excellency, to "receive a publick acknowledgment of the entire "and unreserved approbation of every article in "this treaty, from us who are so immediately and "so nearly concerned in its consequences." This was signed by the consul-general, and every British merchant in Petersburgh. The approbation of those immediately concerned in the consequences is nothing to this author. He and his friends have so much tenderness for people's interests, and understand them so much better than they do themselves, that, whilst these politicians are contending for the best of possible terms, the claimants are obliged to go without any terms at all. One of the first and justest complaints against the administration of the author's friends, was the want of vigour in their foreign negociations. Their immediate successors endeavoured to correct that errour, along with others; and there was scarcely a foreign court, in which the new spirit that had arisen was not sensibly felt, acknowledged, and sometimes complained of. On their coming into administration, they found the demolition of Dunkirk entirely at a stand: instead of demolition, they found construction; for the French were then at work on the repair of the jettees. On the remonstrances of General Conway, some parts of these jettees were immediately destroyed. The Duke of Richmond personally surveyed the place, and obtained a fuller knowledge of its true state and condition than any of our ministers had done; and, in consequence, had larger offers from the Duke of Choiseul than had ever been received. But, as these were short of our just expectations under the treaty, he rejected them. Our then ministers, knowing that, in their administration, the people's minds were set at ease upon all the essential points of public and private liberty, and that no project of theirs could endanger the concord of the empire, were under no restraint from pursuing every just demand upon foreign nations. The author, towards the end of this work, falls into reflections upon the state of publick morals in this country: he draws use from this doctrine, by recommending his friend to the king and the publick, as another Duke of Sully; and he concludes the whole performance with a very devout prayer. The prayers of politicians may sometimes be sincere; and as this prayer is in substance, that the author, or his friends, may be soon brought into * P. 46. power, I have great reason to believe it is very much from the heart. It must be owned too that after he has drawn such a picture, such a shocking picture, of the state of this country, he has great faith in thinking the means he prays for sufficient to relieve us after the character he has given of its inhabitants of all ranks and classes, he has great charity in caring much about them; and indeed no less hope, in being of opinion, that such a detestable nation can ever become the care of Providence. He has not even found five good men in our devoted city. He talks indeed of men of virtue and ability. But where are his men of virtue and ability to be found? Are they in the present administration? Never were a set of people more blackened by this author. Are they among the party of those (no small body) who adhere to the system of 1766 ? These, it is the great purpose of this book to calumniate. Are they the persons who acted with his great friend, since the change in 1762, to his removal in 1765? Scarcely any of these are now out of employment; and we are in possession of his desideratum. Yet I think he hardly means to select, even some of the highest of them, as examples fit for the reformation of a corrupt world. He observes, that the virtue of the most exemplary prince that ever swayed a sceptre can never warm or illuminate the body of his people, "if foul mirrors are placed so near him as to "refract and dissipate the rays at their first 66 66 emanation." Without observing upon the propriety of this metaphor, or asking how mirrors come to have lost their old quality of reflecting, and to have acquired that of refracting and dissipating rays, and how far their foulness will account for this change; the remark itself is common and true: no less true, and equally surprising from him, is that which immediately precedes it; "it is in vain to endeavour to check "the progress of irreligion and licentiousness, by punishing such crimes in one individual, if others equally culpable are rewarded with the honours "and emoluments of the state." I am not in the secret of the author's manner of writing; but it appears to me, that he must intend these reflections as a satire upon the administration of his happy years. Were ever the honours and emoluments of the state more lavishly squandered upon persons scandalous in their lives than during that period? In these scandalous lives, was there any thing more scandalous than the mode of punishing one culpable individual? In that individual, is any thing more culpable than his having been seduced by the example of some of those very persons by whom he was thus persecuted? I The author is so eager to attack others, that he provides but indifferently for his own defence. believe, without going beyond the page I have now before me, he is very sensible, that I have sufficient matter of further, and, if possible, of heavier, charge against his friends, upon his own + Ibid. principle. But it is because the advantage is too great, that I decline making use of it. I wish the author had not thought that all methods are lawful in party. Above all he ought to have taken care not to wound his enemies through the sides of his country. This he has done, by making that monstrous and overcharged picture of the distresses of our situation. No wonder that he, who finds this country in the same condition with that of France at the time of Henry the Fourth, could also find a resemblance between his political friend and the Duke of Sully. As to those personal resemblances, people will often judge of them from their affections: they may imagine in these clouds whatsoever figures they please; but what is the conformation of that eye which can discover a resemblance of this country and these times to those with which the author compares them? France, a country just recovered out of twenty-five years of the most cruel and desolating civil war that perhaps was ever known. The kingdom, under the veil of momentary quiet, full of the most atrocious political, operating upon the most furious fanatical, factions. Some pretenders even to the crown; and those who did not pretend to the whole, aimed at the partition of the monarchy. There were almost as many competitors as provinces; and all abetted by the greatest, the most ambitious, and most enterprising power in Europe. No place safe from treason; no, not the bosoms on which the most amiable prince that ever lived reposed his head; not his mistresses; not even his queen. As to the finances, they had scarce an existence, but as a matter of plunder to the managers, and of grants to insatiable and ungrateful courtiers. How can our author have the heart to describe this as any sort of parallel to our situation? To be sure, an April shower has some resemblance to a water-spout; for they are both wet: and there is some likeness between a summer evening's breeze and an hurricane; they are both wind: but who can compare our disturbances, our situation, or our finances, to those of France in the time of Henry? Great Britain is indeed at this time wearied, but not broken, with the efforts of a victorious foreign war; not sufficiently relieved by an inadequate peace, but somewhat benefited by that peace, and infinitely by the consequences of that war. The powers of Europe awed by our victories, and lying in ruins upon every side of us. Burthened indeed we are with debt, but abounding with resources. We have a trade, not perhaps equal to our wishes, but more than ever we possessed. In effect, no pretender to the crown; nor nutriment for such desperate and destructive factions as have formerly shaken this kingdom. As to our finances, the author trifles with us. When Sully came to those of France, in what order was any part of the financial system? or what system was there at all? There is no man in office who must not be sensible that ours is, without the act of any parading minister, the most regular and orderly system perhaps that was ever known; the best secured against all frauds in the collection, and all misapplication in the expenditure of publick money. I admit that, in this flourishing state of things, there are appearances enough to excite uneasiness and apprehension. I admit there is a cankerworm in the rose; medio de fonte leporum Surgit amari aliquid, quod in ipsis floribus angat. There is nothing else than a spirit of disconnexion, of distrust, and of treachery among publick men. It is no accidental evil; nor has its effect been trusted to the usual frailty of nature; the distemper has been inoculated. The author is sensible of it, and we lament it together. This distemper is alone sufficient to take away considerably from the benefits of our constitution and situation, and perhaps to render their continuance precarious. If these evil dispositions should spread much farther they must end in our destruction; for nothing can save a people destitute of publick and private faith. However, the author, for the present state of things, has extended the charge by much too widely; as men are but too apt to take the measure of all mankind from their own particular acquaintance. Barren as this age may be in the growth of honour and virtue, the country does not want, at this moment, as strong, and those not a few, examples as were ever known, of an unshaken adherence to principle, and attachment to connexion, against every allurement of interest. Those examples are not furnished by the great alone; nor by those, whose activity in publick affairs may render it suspected that they make such a character one of the rounds in their ladder of ambition; but by men more quiet, and more in the shade, on whom an unmixed sense of honour alone could operate. Such examples indeed are not furnished in great abundance amongst those who are the subjects of the author's panegyrick. He must look for them in another camp. He, who complains of the ill effects of a divided and heterogeneous administration, is not justifiable in labouring to render odious in the eyes of the publick those men, whose principles, whose maxims of policy, and whose personal character, can alone administer a remedy to this capital evil of the age; neither is he consistent with himself, in constantly extolling those whom he knows to be the authors of the very mischief of which he complains, and which the whole nation feels so deeply. The persons who are the objects of his dislike and complaint are many of them of the first families, and weightiest properties, in the kingdom; but infinitely more distinguished for their untainted honour public and private, and their zealous but sober attachment to the constitution of their country, than they can be by any birth, or any station. If they are the friends of any one great man rather than another, it is not that they make his aggrandizement the end of their union; or because they know him to be the most active in caballing for his connexions the largest and speediest emoluments. It is because they know him, by personal experience, to have wise and enlarged ideas of the publick good, and an invincible constancy in adhering to it; because they are convinced, by the whole tenour of his actions, that he will never negociate away their honour or his own: and that, in or out of power, change of situation will make no alteration in his conduct. This will give to such a person in such a body, an authority and respect that no minister ever enjoyed among his venal dependents, in the highest plenitude of his power; such as servility never can give, such as ambition never can receive or relish. This body will often be reproached by their adversaries, for want of ability in their political transactions; they will be ridiculed for missing many favourable conjunctures, and not profiting of several brilliant opportunities of fortune; but they must be contented to endure that reproach; for they cannot acquire the reputation of that kind of ability without losing all the other reputation they possess. ability; and if they choose a vote for that purpose, perhaps it would not be quite impossible for them to procure it. But, if the disease be this distrust and disconnexion, it is easy to know who are sound, and who are tainted; who are fit to restore us to health, who to continue and to spread the contagion. The present ministry being made up of draughts from all parties in the kingdom, if they should profess any adherence to the connexions they have left, they must convict themselves of the blackest treachery. They therefore choose rather to renounce the principle itself, and to brand it with the name of pride and faction. This test with certainty discriminates the opinions of men. The other is a description vague and unsatisfactory. As to the unfortunate gentlemen who may at any time compose that system, which, under the plausible title of an administration, subsists but for the establishment of weakness and confusion; they fall into different classes, with different merits. I think the situation of some people in that state may deserve a certain degree of compassion; at the same time that they furnish an example, which, it is to be hoped, by being a severe one, will have its effect, at least, on the growing generation; if an original seduction, on plausible but hollow pretences, into loss of honour, friendship, consistency, security, and repose, can furnish it. It is possible to draw, even from the very prosperity of ambition, examples of terrour, and motives to compassion. They will be charged too with a dangerous spirit of exclusion and proscription, for being unwilling to mix in schemes of administration, which have no bond of union, or principle of confidence. That charge too they must suffer with patience. If the reason of the thing had not spoken loudly enough, the miserable examples of the several administrations constructed upon the idea of systematick discord would be enough to frighten them from such monstrous and ruinous conjunctions. It is however false, that the idea of an united ad- I believe the instances are exceedingly rare of ministration carries with it that of a proscription men immediately passing over a clear, marked line of any other party. It does indeed imply the ne- of virtue into declared vice and corruption. There cessity of having the great strong holds of govern- are a sort of middle tints and shades between the ment in well-united hands, in order to secure the two extremes; there is something uncertain on predominance of right and uniform principles; of the confines of the two empires which they first having the capital offices of deliberation and exe- pass through, and which renders the change easy cution of those who can deliberate with mutual and imperceptible. There are even a sort of confidence, and who will execute what is resolved splendid impositions so well contrived, that, at the with firmness and fidelity. If this system cannot very time the path of rectitude is quitted for ever, be rigorously adhered to in practice, (and what men seem to be advancing into some higher and system can be so?) it ought to be the constant nobler road of publick conduct. Not that such aim of good men to approach as nearly to it as impositions are strong enough in themselves; but possible. No system of that kind can be formed, a powerful interest, often concealed from those which will not leave room fully sufficient for heal-whom it affects, works at the bottom, and secures ing coalitions: but no coalition, which, under the specious name of independency, carries in its bosom the unreconciled principles of the original discord of parties, ever was, or will be, an healing coalition. Nor will the mind of our Sovereign ever know repose, his kingdom settlement, or his business order, efficiency, or grace with his people, until things are established upon the basis of some set of men, who are trusted by the publick, and who can trust one another. This comes rather nearer to the mark than the author's description of a proper administration, under the name of men of ability and virtue, which conveys no definite idea at all; nor does it apply specifically to our grand national distemper. All parties pretend to these qualities. The present ministry, no favourites of the author, will be ready enough to declare themselves persons of virtue and the operation. Men are thus debauched away from those legitimate connexions, which they had formed on a judgment, early perhaps but sufficiently mature, and wholly unbiassed. They do not quit them upon any ground of complaint, for grounds of just complaint may exist, but upon the flattering and most dangerous of all principles, that of mending what is well. Gradually they are habituated to other company; and a change in their habitudes soon makes a way for a change in their opinions. Certain persons are no longer so very frightful, when they come to be known and to be serviceable. As to their old friends, the transition is easy; from friendship to civility; from civility to enmity: few are the steps from dereliction to persecution. People not very well grounded in the principles. of publick morality find a set of maxims in office ready made for them, which they assume as naturally and inevitably, as any of the insignia or instruments of the situation. A certain tone of the solid and practical is immediately acquired. Every former profession of publick spirit is to be considered as a debauch of youth, or, at best, as a visionary scheme of unattainable perfection. The very idea of consistency is exploded. The convenience of the business of the day is to furnish the principle for doing it. Then the whole ministerial cant is quickly got by heart. The prevalence of faction is to be lamented. All opposition is to be regarded as the effect of envy and disappointed ambition. All administrations are declared to be alike. The same necessity justifies all their measures. It is no longer a matter of discussion, who or what administration is; but that administration is to be supported, is a general maxim. Flattering themselves that their power is become necessary to the support of all order and government; every thing which tends to the support of that power is sanctified, and becomes a part of the publick interest. Growing every day more formed to affairs, and better knit in their limbs, when the occasion (now the only rule) requires it, they become capable of sacrificing those very persons to whom they had before sacrificed their original friends. It is now only in the ordinary course of business to alter an opinion or to betray a connexion. Frequently relinquishing one set of men and adopting another, they grow into a total indifference to human feeling, as they had before to moral obligation; until at length no one original impression remains upon their minds: every principle is obliterated; every sentiment effaced.' being sincere or right, or balanced in their minds, it is more than a chance, that, in the delirium of the last stage of their distempered power, they make an insane political testament, by which they throw all their remaining weight and consequence into the scale of their declared enemies, and the avowed authors of their destruction. Thus they finish their course. Had it been possible that the whole, or even a great part, of these effects on their minds, I say nothing of the effect upon their fortunes, could have appeared to them in their first departure from the right line, it is certain they would have rejected every temptation with horrour. The principle of these remarks, like every good principle in morality, is trite; but its frequent application is not the less necessary. they As to others, who are plain practical men, have been guiltless at all times of all publick pretence. Neither the author nor any one else has reason to be angry with them. They belonged to his friend for their interest; for their interest they quitted him; and when it is their interest, he may depend upon it, they will return to their former connexion. Such people subsist at all times, and, though the nuisance of all, are at no time a worthy subject of discussion. It is false virtue and plausible errour that do the mischief. If men come to government with right dispositions, they have not that unfavourable subject which this author represents to work upon. Our circumstances are indeed critical; but then they are the critical circumstances of a strong and mighty nation. If corruption and meanness are greatly spread, they are not spread universally. In the mean time, that power, which all these Many publick men are hitherto examples of pubchanges aimed at securing, remains still as totter- lick spirit and integrity. Whole parties, as far as ing and as uncertain as ever. They are delivered large bodies can be uniform, have preserved chaup into the hands of those who feel neither respect racter. However they may be deceived in some for their persons, nor gratitude for their favours; particulars, I know of no set of men amongst us, who are put about them in appearance to serve, which does not contain persons on whom the in reality to govern them; and, when the signal nation, in a difficult exigence, may well value is given, to abandon and destroy them in order to itself. Private life, which is the nursery of the set up some new dupe of ambition, who in his commonwealth, is yet in general pure, and on the turn is to be abandoned and destroyed. Thus whole disposed to virtue; and the people at large living in a state of continual uneasiness and fer- want neither generosity nor spirit. No small part ment, softened only by the miserable consolation of that very luxury, which is so much the subject of giving now and then preferments to those for of the author's declamation, but which, in most whom they have no value; they are unhappy in parts of life, by being well balanced and diffused, their situation, yet find it impossible to resign, is only decency and convenience, has perhaps as Until, at length, soured in temper, and disappoint- many or more good than evil consequences ated by the very attainment of their ends, in some tending it. It certainly excites industry, nourangry, in some haughty, or some negligent mo- ishes emulation, and inspires some sense of personal ment, they incur the displeasure of those upon value into all ranks of people. What we want is whom they have rendered their very being de- to establish more fully an opinion of uniformity, pendent. Then perierunt tempora longi servitii; and consistency of character, in the leading men they are cast off with scorn; they are turned out, of the state; such as will restore some confidence emptied of all natural character, of all intrinsick to profession and appearance, such as will fix subworth, of all essential dignity, and deprived of ordination upon esteem. Without this all schemes every consolation of friendship. Having rendered are begun at the wrong end. All who join in them all retreat to old principles ridiculous, and to old are liable to their consequences. All men who, regards impracticable, not being able to counter- under whatever pretext, take a part in the formafeit pleasure, or to discharge discontent, nothing|tion or the support of systems constructed in such a manner as must, in their nature, disable them | from the execution of their duty, have made themselves guilty of all the present distraction, and of the future ruin, which they may bring upon their country. It is a serious affair, this studied disunion in government. In cases where union is most consulted in the constitution of a ministry, and where persons are best disposed to promote it, differences, from the various ideas of men, will arise; and from their passions will often ferment into violent heats, so as greatly to disorder all publick business. What must be the consequence, when the very distemper is made the basis of the constitution; and the original weakness of human nature is still further enfeebled by art and contrivance? It must subvert government from the very foundation. It turns our publick councils into the most mischievous cabals; where the consideration is, not how the nation's business shall be carried on, but how those who ought to carry it on shall circumvent each other. In such a state of things, no order, uniformity, dignity, or effect, can appear in our proceedings either at home or abroad. Nor will it make much difference, whether some of the constituent parts of such an administration are men of virtue or ability, or not; supposing it possible that such men, with their eyes open, should choose to make a part in such a body. The effects of all human contrivances are in the hand of Providence. I do not like to answer, as our author so readily does, for the event of any speculation. But surely the nature of our disorders, if any thing, must indicate the proper remedy. Men who act steadily on the principles I have stated, may in all events be very serviceable to their country; in one case, by furnishing (if their Sovereign should be so advised) an administration formed upon ideas very different from those which have for some time been unfortunately fashionable. But, if this should not be the case, they may be still serviceable; for the example of a large body of men, steadily sacrificing ambition to principle, can never be without use. It will certainly be prolific, and draw others to an imitation. Vera gloria radices agit, atque etiam propagatur. I do not think myself of consequence enough to imitate my author, in troubling the world with the prayers or wishes I may form for the publick: full as little am I disposed to imitate his professions; those professions are long since worn out in the political service. If the work will not speak for the author, his own declarations deserve but little credit. APPENDIX. So much misplaced industry has been used by the author of The State of the Nation, as well as by other writers, to infuse discontent into the people, on, account of the late war, and of the effects of our national debt; that nothing ought to be omitted which may tend to disabuse the publick upon these subjects. When I had gone through the foregoing sheets, I recollected, that, in pages 58, 59, 60, I only gave the comparative states of the duties collected by the excise at large; together with the quantities of strong beer brewed in the two periods which are there compared. It might be still thought, that some other articles of popular consumption, of general convenience, and connected with our manufactures, might possibly have declined. I therefore now think it right to lay before the reader the state of the produce of three capital duties on such articles; duties which have frequently been made the subject of popular complaint. The duty on candles; that on soap, paper, &c.; and that on hides. Average of net produce of duty on soap, &c. for 8 years, ending 1767 Average of ditto for 8 years, ending 1754 £. 264,902 228,114 Average encrease £. 36,788 This encrease has not arisen from any additional duties. None have been imposed on these articles during the war. Notwithstanding the burthens of the war, and the late dearness of provisions, the consumption of all these articles has encreased, and the revenue along with it. There is another point in The State of the Nation, to which, I fear, I have not been so full in my answers as I ought to have been, and as I am well warranted to be. The author has endeavoured to throw a suspicion, or something more, on that salutary, and indeed necessary, measure of opening the ports of Jamaica. "Orders were 'given," says he, " in August, 1765, for the free |