the enormous debt this war must occasion, but all their vast preceding debt, or the interest of it, and while America is enriching itself by prizes made upon the British commerce, more than ever it did by any commerce of its own, under the restraints of a British monopoly, and the diminution of its revenues, and of course less able to discharge the present indiscreet increase of its expences.

5. Respecting prospects of greater future ability, Britain has none such. Her islands are circumscribed by the ocean; and excepting a few parks or forests, she has no new land to cultivate, and cannot therefore extend her improvements. Her numbers too, instead of increasing from increased sub sistence, are continually diminishing from growing luxury, and the increasing difficulties of maintaining families, which of course discourage early marriages. Thus she will have fewer people to assist in paying her debts, and that diminishing number will be poorer. America, on the contrary, has, besides her lands already cultivated, a vast territory yet to be cultivated; which, being cultivated, continually increases in value with the increase of people; and the people, who double themselves by a natural propagation every twenty-five years, will double yet faster, by the accession of strangers, as long as lands are to be had for new families; so that every twenty years there will be a double number of inhabitants obliged to discharge the public debts; and those inhabitants, being more opulent, may pay their shares with greater ease.

6. Respecting prudence in general affairs, and the advantages to be expected from the loan desired; the Americans are cultivators of land; those engaged in fishery and commerce are few, compared with the others. They have ever conducted their several governments with wisdom, avoiding wars, and vain expensive projects, delighting only in their peaceable occupations, which must, considering the extent of their uncultivated territory, find them employment still for ages. Whereas England, ever unquiet, ambitious, avaricious, imprudent, and quarrelsome, is half of the time engaged in war, always at an expence infinitely

greater than the advantages to be obtained by it, if successful. Thus they made war against Spain in 1739, for a claim of about 95,000l. (scarce a groat for each individual of the nation) and spent forty millions sterling in the war, and the lives of fifty thousand men; and finally made peace without obtaining satisfaction for the sum claimed. Indeed, there is scarce a nation in Europe, against which she has not made war on some frivolous pretext or other, and thereby imprudently accumulated a debt, that has brought her on the verge of bankruptcy. But the most indiscreet of all her wars, is the present against America, with whom she might, for ages, have preserved her profitable connection only by a just and equitable conduct. She is now acting like a mad shop-keeper, who, by beating those that pass his doors, attempts to make them come in and be his customers. America cannot submit to such treatment, without being first ruined, and, being ruined, her custom will be worth nothing. England, to effect this, is increasing her. debt, and irretrievably ruining herself. America, on the other hand, aims only to establish her liberty, and that freedom of commerce which will be advantageous to all Europe; and by abolishing that monopoly which she labored under, she will profit infinitely more than enough to repay any debt, which she may contract to accomplish it.

7. Respecting character in the honest payment of debts; the punctuality with which America has discharged her public debts was shown under the first head. And the ge neral good disposition of the people to such punctuality has been manifested in their faithful payment of private debts to England, since the commencement of this war. There were not wanting some politicians [in America] who proposed stopping that payment, until peace should be restored, alleging, that in the usual course of commerce, and of the credit given, there was always a debt existing equal to the trade of eighteen months: that the trade amounting to five millions sterling per annum, the debt must be seven millions and an half; that this sum paid to the British merchants would operate to prevent that distress, intended to

be brought upon Britain, by our stoppage of commerce with her; for the merchants, receiving this money, and no orders with it for farther supplies, would either lay it out in public funds, or in employing manufacturers to accumulate goods for a future hungry market in America upon an expected accommodation, by which means the funds would be kept up and the manufacturers prevented from murmuring. But against this it was alleged, that injuries from ministers should not be revenged on merchants; that the credit was in consequence of private contracts, made in confidence of good faith; that these ought to be held sacred and faithfully complied with; for that, whatever public utility might be supposed to arise from a breach of private faith, it was unjust, and would in the end be found unwise -honesty being in truth the best policy. On this principle the proposition was universally rejected; and though the English prosecuted the war with unexampled barbarity, burning our defenceless towns in the midst of winter, and arming savages against us; the debt was punctually paid; and the merchants of London have testified to the parliament, and will testify to all the world, that from their experience in dealing with us they had, before the war, no apprehension of our unfairness and that since the war they have been convinced, that their good opinion of us was well founded. England, on the contrary, an old, corrupt government, extravagant, and profligate nation, sees herself deep in debt, which she is in no condition to pay; and yet is madly, and dishonestly running deeper, without any possibility of discharging her debt, but by a public bankruptcy.

:

It appears, therefore, from the general industry, frugality, ability, prudence, and virtue of America, that she is a much safer debtor than Britain;-to say nothing of the satisfaction generous minds must have in reflecting, that by loans to America they are opposing tyranny, and aiding the cause of liberty, which is the cause of all mankind.

LETTER RESPECTING CAPTAIN COOK.

To all captains and commanders of armed ships, acting by commis sion from the congress of the United States of America, now in war with Great Britain.

GENTLEMEN,

A SHIP having been fitted out from England, before the commencement of this war, to make discoveries of new countries in unknown seas, under the conduct of that most celebrated navigator, captain Cook,-an undertaking truly laudable in itself, as the increase of geographical knowlege, facilitates the communication between distant nations, in the exchange of useful products and manufactures, and the extension of arts, whereby the common enjoyments of human life are multiplied and augmented, and science of other kinds increased, to the benefit of mankind in general.This is therefore most earnestly to recommend to every one of you, that in case the said ship, which is now expected to be soon in the European seas on her return, should happen to fall into your hands, you would not consider her as an enemy, nor suffer any plunder to be made of the effects contained in her, nor obstruct her immediate return to England, by detaining her or sending her into any other part of Europe or America, but that you would treat the said captain Cook and his people with all civility and kindness, affording them, as common friends to mankind, all the assistance in your power, which they may happen to stand in need of. In so doing, you will not only gratify the generosity of your own dispositions, but there is no doubt of your obtaining the approbation of the congress, and of your own American owners.

I have the honor to be, &c.

B. FRANKLIN,

Minister plenipotentiary from the congress of the
United States to the court of France.

At Passy, near Paris,

this 10th day of March, 1779.

a Dr. Kippis, a very distinguished literary character, who published a Biographical Dictionary which would have been respectable, had it not been

POLITICAL.

ESSAYS AND CORRESPONDENCE.

APPERTAINING TO THE REVOLUTION.

Attempts of Dr. Franklin for Conciliation of Great Britain with the

DEAR SIR,

Colonies b.

London, Nov. 28, 1768.

I RECEIVED your obliging favor of the 12th instant. Your sentiments of the importance of the present dispute between Great Britain and the colonies, appear to me extremely just. There is nothing I wish for more than to see it amicably and equitably settled.

But Providence will bring about its own ends by its own means; and if it intends the downfal of a nation, that na

defiled by a royal pension, and a prostitution of history to varnish over crimes; in his Life of Captain Cook, had asserted, upon what he deemed authority, that Dr. Franklin's orders were instantly reversed, and that it was directed by congress, to seize captain Cook, if an opportunity of doing it occurred: but Dr. Kippis finding that the information he had published was false, he addressed a letter to the editor of the Gentleman's Magazine, in September, 1795, and then publicly acknowleged his mistake. Indeed the magnanimous proceeding of Dr. Franklin in writing the passport was so well known in England, and the sentiments it manifested so much approved by the British government itself, that, when Cook's Voyage was printed, the admiralty board sent a copy of the work in three volumes quarto to Dr. Franklin, accompanied with the elegant collection of plates, and a very polite letter from lord Howe, signifying, that the present was made with the king's express approbation; and the royal society having, in honor of that illustrious navigator, one of their members, struck some gold medals to be distributed among his friends and the friends of his voyage; one of those medals was also sent to Dr. Franklin, by order of the society, together with a letter from their president, sir Joseph Banks, expressing likewise, that it was sent with the approbation of the king.

b It is uncertain what is the publication promised in this letter; unless it alludes to the Essay, entitled "Causes of the American Discontents before 1768," in which case there is a mistake in the date of the month.