argue thus would not be allowed the views of an enlightened statesman. But as Reason also has her dignity and ascendency, the minister who should acknowledge her authority, and who, devoid alike of fear and of every selfish view, should dare to advance great truths, might perhaps force his way through prejudice, or habitual ideas. Ideas of this kind, I confess, have a most extensive influence, and sometimes possess the mind to such a degree, that we become strangers to the most natural sentiments. I cannot remember without shuddering, to have seen the following statement, in an estimate of the money requisite for the exigences of war: Forty thousand men to be embarked for the colonies To be deducted one-third for the first year's mortality . . . . .

40,000

13,333

Remainder 26,667

A clerk in office makes his calculation in cool blood. A minister, on the perusal, has seldom any other idea than of the expense, and turns with unconcern to the next leaf, to examine the result of the whole.

How can one here refrain from indulging very melancholy sensations? Alas! if by any law of nature unknown to me, mankind deserved so much indifference, I should be very wrong to write, and to be so earnestly solicitous for their welfare. I should be myself but a vile heap of dust, which the wind of life agitates for a moment. But I entertain a more exalted idea of our existence, and of the spirit that informs it. I entertain a more exalted idea of the relative impressions stamped by a divine hand, and which connect us all with each other.

Citizens, it is observed, are indebted to their country. Undoubtedly but it is government which regulates this debt; and, therefore, the sacrifices which it requires are just or unjust, supportable or dreadful, according to the wisdom of its deliberations.

Mankind, and the apologists for war, have, in every age, been accustomed to it. Certainly; and in every age also have storms destroyed the harvests: the pestilence has spread around its envenomed breath; intolerance has sacrificed her victims; and crimes of every kind have desolated the earth. But Reason also has obstinately fought against Folly; Morality against Vice; Art against Disease; and the industry of mankind against the rigour of bad seasons. That barbarous

nations, condemned to want and wretchedness by their ignorance have been impelled to seek countries in which the progress of the arts, and a variety of riches, promised them unknown advantages, is not to be wondered at; the motives for this invasion may be conceived, whenever, by consent, the authority of reason and humanity is discarded. But in our times, when the general perfection of industry, and the knowledge of commerce have rendered the enjoyments of mankind more equal, wars seem to depend rather upon the particular ambition of Princes, and the restless spirit of their councils.

But I hear it stated as a last objection that men delight in hazards, and often seek them of their own accord. I allow it; and many, in the career of danger, acquire distinguished affluence and honours. But those who have no other compensation for their blood than the most indispensable subsistence, if they are not enlisted in the service by force, nor retained in it by discipline, are actuated by a sentiment defined by example and opinion. But admitting that some men have voluntarily placed themselves in a situation which they know to be exposed to calamities, will the nature of these calamities be changed by that consideration? The ignorance of the vulgar is a protracted minority; and in every situation in which they may be impelled by circumstances, neither their first choice, nor their first impulse, is to be considered in this argument. We must study their sentiments in those moments when, distracted by a thousand excruciating pains, yet still lingering in existence, they are carried off in heaps from the fatal field in which they have been mowed down by the enemy: we must study their sentiments in those noisome hospitals in which they are crowded together, and where the sufferings they endure, to preserve a languishing existence, so forcibly prove the value they set upon the preservation of their lives, and the greatness of the sacrifice to which they had been exposed: we ought also to study their senti ments in those moments in which, perhaps, to such a variety of woe, is added the bitter remembrance of that momentary error, which has led them to such misery: we ought, more especially, to study their sentiments on board those ships on fire, in which there is but a moment between them and the most cruel death; and on those ramparts where subterraneous explosion announces, that in an instant they are to be buried under a tremendous heap of stones and rubbish. But the earth has covered them, the sea has swallowed them up, and

we think of them no more.

Their voice, extinguished for ever, can

no longer arraign the calamities of war. What unfeeling survivors. are we! While we walk over mutilated bodies and shattered bones, we exult in the glory and honours of which we alone are the heirs.

Let me not be reproached with having dwelt too long on these melancholy representations. We cannot exhibit them too often; so much are we accustomed, in the very midst of society, to behold nothing in war and all its attendant horrors, but an honourable employment for the courage of aspiring youth, and the school in which the talents of great officers are unfolded; and such is the effect of this transient intoxication, that the conversation of the polite circles in the capital is often taken for the general wish of the nation. Oh ! ye governors, do not suffer yourselves to be deceived by this mistaken voice. They, whose impulse you are so ready to follow, will be astonished soon at your condescension; so shallow are their sentiments, and so little conformable, especially to their real interest! To men of an indolent turn, events, and novelty in course, are necessary. After a long peace, they are impatient for the tumult of war, as we sometimes see the shepherds of the mountains, tired with the uniformity of the scene, long for a storm or tempest, that agitated nature may exhibit a new spectacle to their eyes.

Nor should it be forgotten, that in the midst of the bustle of society, the mind is set in motion by simple ideas only; not having leisure to enter into any deliberate discussions. Thus the hopes of success, the splendour of a victory, and the humbling of a nation, of whose greatness we are jealous, these are the ideas that are seized with avidity; but the magnitude of the expense, the happy and productive uses to which that expense might have been applied, and alas! must it be repeated? the death and destruction of those men, whose funeral processions we do not behold; all those different considerations which are necessarily connected with each other, are almost constantly disregarded, or the impression which they leave is at least too fugitive.

It is the duty, therefore, of superior minds, whose reflections are more enlarged and comprehensive, and who are guided by those two great lights, thought and sensibility; it is their duty to offer, to defend, to animate, if possible, those rational ideas that are propitious to mankind. It is their duty to draw those ideas from that obscurity in which they are involved, in order to invest them with their due

splendour and ascendancy. Nor is it less their duty, to avoid being dazzled by the illusions of false glory, that they may reserve their first homage for those general and beneficent virtues that, before all and above all, are the tutelar genii of nations. For my part, far from regretting that I have opposed, to the best of my abilities, those chimeras that are subversive of the happiness of mankind, and of the true greatness of states; far from being apprehensive that I have displayed to much zeal for truths that are repugnant to so many passions and pre possessions; I believe these truths to be so useful, so essential, and so perfectly just; in a word, I am so deeply affected by them, that after having supported them by my feeble voice in the course of my administration, and endeavoured even from my retirement to diffuse them wide, I could wish that the last drop of my blood were employed to trace them on the minds of all.

And you, more especially, I invite to enforce those principles who are peculiarly bound to do it, from the sacred character of your order, and the rank you occupy in the church. Never forget that you are ministers of peace; and when you are bestowing your benediction on the banners, when you are consecrating victories and trophies, let your heart be sensible above all to the miseries of mankind, and let your eloquence recal them to the consciences of kings. Leave to the world and its historians the care of celebrating the heroes of death and vengeance; for in the tumult of destructive passions, pity sits best on you. Endeavour to make the sovereign beloved for his virtues, and his ministers for their wisdom; but never adopt the language of courtiers, when you speak in the name of Him, before whom all the potentates of the earth are nothing.

The subject which I am now discussing is of importance to every nation; and it cannot be observed without pain, that war is not the only cause that multiplies the calamities of mankind. Another cause may be traced to that genius, absolutely military, which is sometimes the effect and sometimes the harbinger of war. Several States are already converted, as it were, into a vast body of barracks; and the successive augmentation of disciplined armies increases taxes, fear, and slavery, in the same proportion. In short, by an unfortunate reaction, the excessive expenses which are occasioned by this unnatural situation, excite the desire to render them productive by conquests; and in proportion as sovereigns succeed in extending their dominions,

despotism becomes more necessary to them; and one day, its influence will not be thought sufficiently rapid to connect so many parts together. Princes, then, may consider reflection as incompatible with their views; and actuated, perhaps, by an ambition, similar to that of mechanicians and machinists, their ultimate aim may be to discover some secret, in order to stop or put in motion, by a single spring, all the wishes of their subjects. What a degradation of human nature ! What a sacrifice offered to the ambition of an individual! These ideas, indeed, are less obvious, when in such monarchies, as is the case at present, there are several sovereigns endued with a superior spirit, and who, being often agitated by different sentiments, would reconcile the national genius from which they derive a personal satisfaction, with the military principles that are suitable to their politics; but men pass away; and with them sometimes vanish all the alleviations which resulted from their character.

The spirit of the reflections which I have hitherto made, is not applicable only to the nations whose interests are regulated by the pleasure of an individual. I address myself equally to you Great Nation,* to whom the spirit of liberty communicates all its force. Let the energy of your soul, let that abundance, or that community of knowledge which results from it, lead you to those sentiments of political humanity, which are so well connected with elevated thoughts. Be not influenced by a blind avidity for riches, by the pride of confidence, or a perpetual jealousy of others. And since the waves of the ocean free you from the imperious yoke of disciplined armies, recollect, that your first attention is due to the preservation of that precious government you enjoy. Tremble, lest you one day become indifferent to it, if from the excessive taxes which war accumulates, you expose to the dreadful conflicts of private interest, that public and patriotic sentiment which has so long been the source of your greatness and your felicity. In a word, as in every country, when the temporary reign of particular passions is over, men cast an eye on that depository of the rights of men and citizens of which you are still the guardians, recollect that you are accountable to all mankind for that liberty, the last remains of which you preserve; that if, in one part of the world, its traces are soon effaced, the type and remembrance of it may still be found somewhere.

Great Britain.