will carve much more deeply and finifh much more fharply, in the work of retrenchment, than frugality and providence. I do not, therefore, wonder, that gentlemen have kept away from fuch a task, as well from good-nature as from prudence. Private feeling might, indeed, be overborne by legislative reafon; and a man of a longfighted and a strong nerved humanity, might bring himself, not fo much to confider from whom he takes a fuperfluous enjoyment, as for whom in the end he may preferve the abfolute neceffaries of life.

But it is much more eafy to reconcile this meafure to humanity, than to bring it to any agreement with prudence. I do not mean that little, felfish, pitiful, baftard thing, which fometimes goes by the name of a family in which it is not legitimate, and to which it is a difgrace;—I mean even that publick and enlarged prudence, which, apprehensive of being difabled from rendering acceptible fervices to the world, with-holds itself from thofe that are invidious. Gentlemen who

are, with me, verging towards the decline of life, and are apt to form their ideas of kings from kings of former times, might dread the anger of a reigning prince;-they who are more provident of the future, or by being young are more interested in it, might tremble at the refentment of the fucceffor; they might fee a long, dull, dreary, unvaried visto of despair and exclusion, for half a

century,

century, before them. This is no pleasant profpect at the outfet of a political journey.

Befides this, Sir, the private enemies to be made in all attempts of this kind are innumerable; and their enmity will be the more bitter, and the more dangerous too, because a sense of dignity will oblige them to conceal the caufe of their refentment. Very few men of great families and extenfive connections, but will feel the fmart of a cutting reform, in fome clofe relation, fome bofom friend, fome pleafant acquaintance, fome dear protected dependant. Emolument is taken from fome; patronage from others; objects of pursuit from all. Men, forced into an involuntary independence, will abhor the authors of a bleffing which in their eyes has fo very near a refemblance to a curse. When officers are removed, and the offices remain, you may fet the gratitude of fome against the anger of others; you may oppose the friends you oblige against the enemies you provoke. But fervices of the prefent fort create no attachments. The individual good felt in a publick benefit, is comparatively fo fmall, comes round through fuch an involved labyrinth of intricate and tedious revolutions; whilst a prefent perfonal detriment is fo heavy, where it falls, and fo inftant in its opcration, that the cold commendation of a publick advantage never was, and never will be, a match for the quick fenfibility of a private lofs: and

you

may

may depend upon it, Sir, that when many people have an interest in railing, fooner or later, they will bring a confiderable degree of unpopularity upon any measure. So that, for the prefent at leaft, the reformation will operate against the reformers; and revenge (as against them at the leaft) will produce all the effects of corruption.

This, Sir, is almost always the cafe, where the plan has complete fuccefs. But how stands the matter in the mere attempt? Nothing, you know, is more common, than for men to with, and call loudly too, for a reformation, who, when it arrives, do by no means like the severity of its af pect. Reformation is one of thofe pieces which must be put at some distance in order to please. Its greatest favourers love it better in the abstract than in the substance. When any old prejudice of their own, or any intereft that they value, is touched, they become fcrupulous, they become captious, and every man has his feparate exception. Some pluck out the black hairs, fome the grey; one point muft be given up to one; another point must be yielded to another; nothing is fuffered to prevail upon its own principle; the whole is fo frittered down, and disjointed, that scarcely a trace of the original scheme remains! Thus, between the resistance of power, and the unfyftematical procefs of popula rity, the undertaker and the undertaking are both

expofed,

expofed, and the poor reformer is hiffed off the Rage, both by friends and foes.

Obferve, Sir, that the apology for my undertaking (an apology, which, though long, is no longer than neceffary) is not grounded on my want of the fulleft fenfe of the difficult and invidious nature of the tafk I undertake. I rifk edium if I fucceed, and contempt if I fail. My excufe muft reft in mine and your conviction of the abfolute,, urgent neceffity there is, that fomething of the kind fhould be done. If there is any facrifice to be made, either of estimation or of fortune, the fmalleft is the beft. Commanders in chief are not to be put upon the forlorn hope. But, indeed it is neceffary that the attempt fhould be made. It is neceffary from our own political circumstances; it is neceffary from the operations of the enemy; it is neceflary from the demands of the people; whofe defires, when they do not militate with the stable and eternal rules of justice and reafon (rules which are above us, and above them) ought to be as a law to a house of commons.

As to our circumftances, I do not mean to aggravate the difficulties of them, by the ftrength of any colouring whatsoever. On the contrary, I obferve, and obferve with pleasure, that our affairs rather wear a more promifing afpect than they did on the opening of this feffion. We have had

fome

fome leading fucceffes. But thofe who rate them at the highest (higher a great deal indeed than I dare to do) are of opinion, that, upon the ground of fuch advantages, we cannot at this time hope to make any treaty of peace, which would not be ruinous and completely disgraceful. In fuch an anxious ftate of things, if dawnings of fuccefs ferve to animate our diligence, they are good; if they tend to increase our prefumption, they are worfe than defeats. The ftate of our affairs fhall then be as promifing as any one may choose to conceive it: it is however, but promising. We must recol lect, that with but half of our natural strength, we are at war against confederated powers, who have fingly threatened us with ruin; we must recollect, that whilft we are left naked on one fide, our other flank is uncovered by any alliance; that whilst we are weighing and balancing our fucceffes against our loffes, we are accumulating debt to the amount of at least fourteen millions in the year. That lofs is certain.

I have no wish to deny, that our fucceffes are as brilliant as any one chooses to make them; our refources too may, for me, be as unfathomable as they are reprefented. Indeed they are just whatever the people poffefs, and will fubmit to pay. Taxing is an easy business. Any projector can contrive new impofitions; any bungler can add to the old. But is it altogether wife to have no other