ples of ufurpation abroad, with tyranny and confufion at home-we muft judge whether we ought to fit down without fome fecurity against the confequences of fuch a fyftem being again brought into action. And this fecurity can only be obtained in one of three modes-1ft, That thefe principles fhall no longer predominate. Secondly, That thofe who are now engaged in them fhall be taught that they are impracticable, and convinced of their own want of power to carry them into execution; or 3dly, That the iffue of the prefent war fhall be fuch, as by weakening their power of attack fhall ftrengthen your power of refiftance. Without thefe, we may indeed have an armed truce, a temporary fufpenfion of hoftilities; but no permanent peace; no folid fecurity to guard us against the repetition of injury and the renewal of attack. If on thefe points we have made up our minds, if we are determined to profecute the war till we fhall obtain proper fatisfaction, and at leaft be able to provide fome fecurity for the continuance of peace, the prefent motion can only tend to fetter the operations of war, to delude the people, to gratify the factious, to inflame the difcontented, to difcourage our allies, to ftrengthen our enemies. What could be the effect of any negotiation for peace in the prefent moment? It is not merely to the character of Marat, with whom we would have to treat, that I object; it is not to the horror of thofe crimes which have ftained their legiflators, crimes in every flage rifing above another in point of enormity; but I object to the confequences of that character, and to

the effect of thofe crimes. They are fuch as render negotiation useless, and muft entirely deprive of ftability any peace which could be concluded in fuch circumftances.Where is our fecurity for the performance of a treaty, where we have neither the good faith of a nation, nor the refponfibility of a monarch? The moment that the mob of Paris comes under the influence of a new leader, mature deliberations are reversed, the most folemn engagements are retracted, or free will is altogether controled by force. In every one of the ftages of their repeated revolutions we have faid, "Now we have feen the worst, the measure of iniquity is complete, we shall no longer be fhocked or aftonished by the contemplation of added crimes and increafing enormities." The next mail gave us reafon to reproach ourselves with our credulity, and by prefenting us with fresh crimes and enormities ftill more dreadful, excited impreflions of new aftonifhment and accumulated horror. All the crimes which difgrace hiftory have occurred in one country, in a space fo fhort, and with circumftances fo highly aggravated, as outrun thought and exceed imagination. Should we treat with Marat, before we had finished the negotiation, he might again have defcended to the dregs of the people from whom he fprung, and have given place to a ftill more defperate villain. A band of leaders had fwayed the mob in conftant fucceffion, all refembling in guilt, but rifing above one another in point of enormity; each ftriving to improve upon the crime of his predeceffor, and fwell the black catalogue with new modes and N 4

higher

higher gradations of wickednefsno treaty can exist on their good faith, independent of the terms of peace. Could they be bound by engagements more folemn than thofe to which they had pledged themfelves in return for our neutrality? What new engagements can be more binding, or from what part of the character of the leaders, or what change in the principles of action, can we expect greater good faith, or ftri&ter attention to engagements, than were exhibited by their predeceffors. But if the motion, continued Mr. Pitt, can answer no good purpose, can it anfwer no bad one! May it not ferve to encourage the French; and will not the fad picture which the right hon. gentleman drew of the commerce of this country have that tendency? But our fitnation is not yet fo defperate. The ef. fect of the relief held out by the legiflature even before it was experienced, in the late interruption of public credit, was to reftore entire confidence and vigour to commerce; a proof that the embarraf fed ftate of credit was only temporary, and in a great meafure accidental. The prefent motion, he added, by magnifying the inconvenience we have fuftained into a calamity, is calculated to difcourage our allies, and infpire our enemies with confidence.

Mr. Huffey lamented the neceffity of heavy taxes, and the diminution of the revenue; while Mr. Pitt, though he apprehended the former, fupported the productive and increafing ftate of the latter.

After an animated reply from Mr. Fox, and fome obfervations against the motion from Mr. Drake, and Sir William Dolben, the Houfe

divided, when there appeared for the motion 47, against it 187.

On Friday the 21ft of June, both Houfes of parliament were prorogued, after his majefty had made the following fpeech from the

throne.

"My Lords and Gentlemen,

66

The, firmness, wisdom, and public fpirit, by which your conduct has been eminently diftinguifhed on the many important occafions which have arifen during the prefent feffion, demand my peculiar acknowledgments.

"Your firm determination to fupport the established conftitution, and the zealous and general concurrence in that fentiment, which my fubjects have fo ftrongly and feasonably manifefted, could not fail to check every attempt to difturb the internal repofe of thefe kingdoms; and you will, I doubt not, in your feveral counties, encourage the continuance of the fame vigilant attention to that important object.

"The rapid and fignal fucceffes which, in an early period of the campaign, have attended the operations of the combined armies; the refpectable and powerful force which you have enabled me to employ by fea and land; and the meafures which I have concerted with other powers for the effectual profecution of the war, afford the best profpect of a happy iffue to the important conteft in which we are engaged: it is only by perfeverance in vigorous exertions, and by endeavouring to improve the advantages already acquired, that we can hope to obtain the great end to which my views are uniformly directed, the refioration of peace on fuch terms as may be confiftent

"Gentlemen of the House of Commons, "I return you my particular thanks for the chearfulness and difpatch with which you have granted the neceffary fupplics; and I am happy to reflect, that you have been enabled liberally to provide for the exigencies of the public fervice in a manner fo little burdenfome to my people."

My Lords and Gentlemen, "The arrangements which you have formed for the government of the British territories in India, and for the regulation of our commerce with that part of the world, will, I doubt not, fecure and augment the important benefits which we have already derived from those valuable poffeffions. It has been impoflible for me to fee, without concern, the embarrassment which has lately arifen in the ftate of commercial credit; but the fteps which you have taken to prevent the progrefs of that evil appear already to have been productive of very falutary confequences; and while they have afforded a striking inftance of your attention to the interests of my people, their effect has furnished additional reafon to believe that the diftrefs, which has been felt, proceeded from a concurrence of temporary caufes, and not from any diminution of the real wealth, or any failure in the permanent refources of the

had unavoidably been affected to a more confiderable extent, it would not have been forgotten that we are contending for our future fe-. curity, and for the permanent prefervation of advantages, the most ftriking and the most valuable, which any nation has ever, by the bleffing of Providence, been permitted to enjoy."

The great national objects which occupied the attention of parliament during the prefent feffions, have already been prefented to the reader, as we truft, with becoming attention; either in the extracts which have been made from the debates that occafioned them, or by fuch obfervations as tended to illuftrate their nature and effects: we fhall, therefore, at this period of our hiftory, recur only to one of them, and we make it the particular object of our felection; becaufe we confider it as one of the moft diftinguithed operations of finance in our day; as well as one of the moft complete remedies applied to public exigency in any day. We allude to the commercial credit bill, a very prominent circumftance in the public meafures of the prefent year.

It is almoft unneceffary to repeat, that the state of public credit had, from various temporary, but unexpected caufes, affumed a very threatening alpect. It was, in truth, a very alarming moment. The immenfe circulation of paper was a bubble which every reflecting man forefaw would one day burft; and the war, though by no means the caufe of that event, certainly haftened the crifis. When, however, it arrived, a very general confternation accompanied it;

at

at the fame time, the leading commercial men, in the city of London, while they ftated the evil in its full extent to government, were not only unable to fuggeft a remedy, but could not comprehend the practical fuccefs of the fcheme propofed by the minifter to produce it. When Mr. Pitt declared his intention to iffue exchequer bills, to the amount of five millions, on certain terms, as an accredited medium, to fet the fufpended credit of the country in motion, the mercantile people doubted its operation. While the oppofition rang the knell of British commerce, predi&ted the ruin of our trade and manufactures; reprefented the exifling evil of fuch a magnitude, that five millions, in exchequer bills, would be but as a drop of water in the ocean; and confidered the whole as a proje&t which, while it was altogether unconftitutional, difcovered, at once the weakness, the incapacity and ignorance of its author. But this was not all. Many of thofe refpectable perfons who were entrusted by parliament to conduct and regulate the bufinefs, fufpected the efficacy of its operations: but, notwithstanding all the dire forebodings, trembling apprehenfion, and pointed ridicule, which this political exertion produced, it not only attained its object completely, entirely and immediately, but even with half the power it poffefled. Two millions and an half of the exchequer bills were found fufficient to invigorate pur langaid commerce, and to reftore univerfal confidence to the trading part of the nation.

This loan, after having proved the falvation of many opulent and respectable individuals, was after

wards completely redeemed without a fingle defaulter, with the pofitive gain of feveral thoufand pounds to government, after the payment of every expence attendant on its progrefs and completion. I cannot, therefore, hesitate to confider this measure as the work of a great ftatefman, whofe fuperior intelligence prevailed over those difficulties, which alarmed his friends, were regarded as the fource of future triumph to his enemies, and were rightly comprehended by none but himfelf. In former periods, minifters had nothing to do, in any exigency, but to difcover how others had acted in fimilar fituations, and to govern themfelves by their example: but we live in a period when experience is of little ufe; when events daily happen, new in their nature and operations; and when a minifter, inftead of acting from the precedents of former æras, muft himfelf make them for thofe which are to come.

Having concluded our hiftory of the important tranfactions of the British parliament, we cannot pafs on to the more extended objects before us, without mentioning that, during this period, fome very important meatures had been adopted by the legislature of Ireland.

The earl of Weftmoreland, in his fpeech to both Houses of Parliament, on opening the feffions, on the 10th of January, after lamenting the fpirit of difcontent which had manifefted itfelf in different parts of the kingdom; after ftating the aggreffive conduct and ambitious views of France, and obferving on the topics ufual on the occafion; he proceeded in the following manner:

"His majefty has the fulleft confidence,

fidence, that you will, on all occafions, fhew your firm determination to enforce due obedience to the laws, and to maintain the authority of government, in which you may depend on his majefty's cordial co-operation and fupport: and I have it in particular command from his majefty to recommend it to you, to apply yourselves to the confideration of fuch meafures as may be the most likely to ftrengthen and cement a general union of fentiment among all claffes and defcriptions of his majefty's Catholic fubjects, in fupport of the established conftitution. With this view, his majefty trufts, that the fituation of his majefty's Catholic fubjects will engage your ferious attention; and, in confideration of this fubject, he relies on the wisdom and liberality of his parliament."

On the fecond of January, certain delegates from the body of Roman Catholics in Ireland had prefented in due form an addrefs to his majesty at St. James's, praying, among other things, to poffefs the right of voting for members of parliament and, in the March following, Mr. Secretary Hobart brought a bill into the Irish Houfe of Commons, to answer the objects of that addrefs. It met with confiderable oppofition in all its parts; but was at length carried with the diminution of fome of them: and the Roman Catholics, though they did not obtain every object of their withes, appear to be grateful for thofe privileges, which they have now received from the legislative power of their country.

At this period, Ireland was by no means in a fate of tranquillity. Bodies of armed men, chiefly Ro

man Catholics, fome of whom were probably influenced by French money, as well as French principles, and affuming the title of defenders, had done confiderable mifchief, as well as committed very horrid enormities in feveral parts of the kingdom. As, in many inftances, thefe bands of defperate men had been too powerful for the civil magiftrate, it became neceffary, in order to enforce obedience to the laws, to maintain the authority of government, and to preferve the general tranquillity, to increase the military force of the country. An act was accordingly paffed for eitablifhing a militia, to confift of fixteen thousand men. An additional force of five thousand regular troops was alfo raised: fo that the whole military ftrength will, in confequence of these measures, amount to 33,000 men, an unprecedented, but neceffary, army cftablishment in that kingdom.

A reform in the parliamentary reprefentation was become a favourite fubject with many refpectable perfous in Ireland, as it had been in Great Britain; and was made an equal pretext with wicked and feditious people, in both kingdoms, to produce and foment difcontents. and diiturbance. It was thought neceflary, therefore, to bring into parliament a bill, called the convention bill, and which afterwards paffed into a law.