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Thucydides. He mentions nothing of ancient ftory more honourable, more respectable, than this despised meeting.

The Congress is treated harfhly-I wish we would imitate their temper; firm, indeed, if you please-but Congress is conducted with firmnefs and moderation. I with our House of Commons as freely and uncorruptly chofen.

The proceedings from hence arife from ignorance of the circumstances of America.-The idea of coercion by Troops, where they were not the natural refource, was wanton and idle.

Anger was your motive in all you did. "What! fhall "America prefume to be free? Don't hear them-chaftife "them!" This was your language caftigat auditque-the fevereft Judge, though he chaftifes, alfo hears the party.

All the mischief has arifen from your anger; for your not adapting your means to your ends; troops and violence were ill means to answer the ends of Peace.

I understand Government is not altogether fatisfied with the Commander of your troops; he has not been quick enough to fhed blood; his moderation is ridiculed: but I know that Gentleman, an Officer of long service, has acted prudently; it was want of wisdom to place an army there--I have heard of armies of obfervation, but this is an army of irritation.

In the civil war of Paris, where thofe great men, the Prince of Condé and Marshal Turenne commanded the two partiesMarshal Turenne was faid often to have been near the Prince.The Queen was angry; fhe did not fee why, when he was fo near the Prince, he fhould not take him; fhe was offended, and with fome anger asked, " Quand vous etiez fi pris, pourquoi “n'avez-vous pus pris le Prince?" That great Officer who knew his bufinefs, anfwered coolly, "J'avois peur, Madame, qu'il ne m'eut prit."

The Ministry tell you, that the Americans will not abide by the Congrefs;-they are tired of the Association ;-true, many of the Merchants may be-but it does not now depend on the

Merchants,

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Merchants, nor do the accounts come even from the principal Merchants, but from the runners of Miniftry. But were the diffatisfaction among the Merchants ever fo great, the account is no way conformable to the nature of America.

The nation of America, who have the virtues of the People they sprung from, will not be flaves. Their language is, if Trade and Slavery are companions, we quit the Trade; let Trade and Slavery go where they will, they are not for us.

Your anger represents them as refractory and ungrateful, in not fubmitting to the parent they sprung from; but they are in truth grown an acceffion of ftrength to this country; they know their importance; they wish to continue their utility to you: but though they may be fick of the Affociation, thofe sons of the earth will never be diffuaded from their Affociation.

After the repeal of the Stamp Act, two years after, I was int the country an hundred miles off; a Gentleman who knew the country, told me, that if regiments had landed at that time, and fhips had been fent to deftroy the towns, they had come to a refolution to retire back into the country.-It is a fact-a Noble Lord fimiles; if I were to mention the Gentleman's name, it would not increase his fmile.

I wish the young Gentlemen of our time, would imitate those Americans that are mifreprefented to them; I wish they would imitate their frugality; I wifh they would imitate that Liberty which the Americans love better than life; imitate that courage which a love of Liberty produces.

One word more. I will fend my Plan, if the state of a miferable conftitution ftretches me on a fick-bed. It is to put an end to the quarrel. "What before you know whether they "will come to terms?" Yes, let my expectations be what they will, I fhould recall the troops; it partakes of a nullity to accept fubmiffion under the influence of arms.

I foretel, thefe Bills must be repealed.-I fubmit to be called an idiot if they are not; three millions of men ready to be armed, and talk of forcing them?

There

There may be dangerous men, and dangerous men and dangerous councils, who would inftil bad doctrines, advise the enflaving of America; they might not endanger the Crown, perhaps, but they would render it not worth the wearing.

The caufe of America is allied to every true Whig. They will not bear the enflaving of America. Some Whigs may love their fortunes better than their principles; but the body of Whigs will join; they will not enflave America. The whole Irish nation, all the true English Whigs, the whole nation of America, these combined make many millions of Whigs, averse to the fyftem. France has her full attention upon you; war is at your door; carrying a question here, will not fave your country in fuch extremities.

This being the ftate of things, my advice is, to proceed to allay heats; I would at the inftant begin, and do something towards allaying and softening resentment.

My Motion, you fee, refpects the army, and their dangerous fituation. Not to undervalue General Gage, who has ferved. with credit, he acts upon his inftructions; if he has not been alert enough to shed blood;

Non dimicare quam vincere maluit.

And he judged well. The Americans too have acted with a prudence and moderation, that had been worthy of our example, were we wife ;-to their moderation it is owing, that our troops have fo long remained in fafety.

Mal-Adminiftration has run its line-it has not a move left-it is a check-mate.

Forty thousand men are not adequate to the idea of subduing them to your Taxation. Taxation exifts only in Reprefentation; take them to your heart, who knows what their generosity may effect?

I am not to be understood as meaning a naked, uncondi tional repeal; no, I would maintain the fuperiority of this country at all events.

But

But you are anxious who fhall difarm first. That great Poet, and, perhaps, a wifer and greater Politician than ever he was a Poet, has given you wisest counsel, follow it:

Tuque prior, tu parce; genus qui ducis Olympo.

Projice tela manu.

Who is this man that will own this fyftem of force as practicable? And is it not the height of folly to pursue a fyftem that is owned to be impracticable.

I therefore move, that an humble Addrefs be prefented to his Majefty, most humbly to advise and befeech his Majefty, that, in order to open the ways towards an happy fettlement of the dangerous troubles in America, by beginning to allay ferments and soften animofities there; and above all, for preventing in the mean time, any fudden and fatal catastrophe at Boston, now suffering under the daily irritation of an army before their eyes, pofted in their town, it may graciously please his Majesty, that immediate orders may be dispatched to General Gage, for removing his Majesty's forces from the town of Boston, as soon as the rigour of the feafon, and other circumftances indifpenfable to the fafety and accommodation of the faid troops may render the fame practicable.

The Earl of Chatham, Jan. 20, 1775.

I ENTIRELY agree with the Honourable Gentleman who feconded the Motion for an Addrefs to his Majefty, that every man ought now to speak out; and in a moment fo important as the present to the whole empire, I think it ill becomes the dignity and duty of Parliament to lose itself in fuch a fulfome, adulatory Addrefs to the Throne as that now propofed. We ought rather, Sir, to approach our Sovereign with found and wholefome advice, and even with Remonftrances against the conduct of his Minifters, who have precipitated the nation into an unjust, ruinous, felonious and murderous war. I call the war with our brethren in America an unjust, felonious war,

because

because the primary cause and confeffed origin of it is, to attempt to take their money from them without their confent, contrary to the common rights of all mankind, and thofe great fundamental principles of the English conftitution, for which Hampden bled. I affert, Sir, that it is in confequence a murderous war; because it is an attempt to deprive men of their lives, for standing up in the just cause of the defence of their property and their clear rights. It becomes no less a murderous war, with refpect to many of our fellow-fubjects of this ifland for every man, either of the navy or army, who has been fent by government to America, and has fallen a victim in this unnatural and unjuft conteft, has been murdered by Adminiftration, and his blood lies at their door. Such a war, I fear, Sir, will draw down the vengeance of heaven upon this devoted kingdom.

I think this war, Sir, fatal and ruinous to our country. It abfolutely annihilates the only great fource of our wealth, which we enjoyed unrivaled by other nations; and deprives us of the fruits of the laborious induftry of near three millions of fubjects, which centered here. That commerce has already taken its flight, and our American Merchants are now deploring the confequences of a wretched policy, which has been pursued to their deftruction. It is, Sir, no lefs ruinous with regard to the enormous expences of the fleets and armies neceffary for this nefarious undertaking; so that we are wafting our present wealth, while we are deftroying the fources of all we might.

have in future.

I speak, Sir, as a friend to England and America, but ftill more to univerfal liberty, and the rights of all mankind. I truft no part of the subjects of this vast empire will ever submit to be flaves. I am fure the Americans are too high spirited to brook the idea. Your whole power, and that of your allies, if you had any, and of all the German troops you can hire, cannot effect fo wicked a purpose. The conduct of the present Adminiftration has already wrefted the fceptre of America out of the VOL. I.

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