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HISTORY OF EUROPE. 
which he accepted our subsidy?’ or 
to sacrifice the faith he owed to this 
country, to thé inrerest and the en- 
treaties of his,;subje€ts. © Which- 
ever of these determinations he 
adopted, he could not be exculpated 
from duplicity, as he must neces- 
sarily deceive one of the parties. 
Could we proceed in security wich 
such allies? Were the French them- 
selves less worthy of being ‘rusted? 
_ The condition of these, however 
deplorable in the representation of 
those who argued for the war, was 
now much more formidable than 
when it began: they had suppressed 
all domestic insurrections, they had 
made peace with Prussia, and were 
negotiating with the other mem. 
bers of the coalition, which in fa& 
was, ifnot actually dissolved, on the 
point of dissojution ; they had con- 
quered Belgium and Holland, and 
expelled all their enemies from the 
low countries: they were masters of 
the spaciaus and opulent provinces 
on the left side of the Rhine, and 
were preparing to cross it in great 
force: their deliverance from: in- 
surrections at home, and the pacific 
treaties they had concluded abroad, 
had strengthened their armies against 
the remaining members of the con- 
federacy, to the amount of near three 
hundred thousand men. Were such 
a people to be declared unfit to be 
treated with? Much had been hoped 
from the depreciation of their paper- 
money; but was it not strange that 
we would sot take lessons from our 
own woeful experience ? How had 
America combated and overcome us 
with paper, one hundred per cent. 
below par? The French were pro. 
ceeding directly in the same track. 
Provisions were cheaper in France 
than in England, and the republican 
armies had remitted nothing of 
[197 
their attachment to the principles of 
the revolution, nor of their enthusi- 
asm in its cause. We still con- 
tinued to trust to the commotions 
reported to be breaking out among 
them, and to the number of dis- 
contented people daily looking for 
Opportunities to rise against govern- 
ment: but might not the French on 
their side allege the multitudes in 
this country that disapproved of the 
war? Theexcessive bounties given, 
and the difficulties found to procure 
men for the navy and army ? the re- 
sistance in some places to the in- 
janétions of our legislature ? might 
they not adduce these particulars as 
proofs how much we were exhausted 
and inadequate to the farther pro. 
secution of the war? Neither was 
our situation in the East or the 
West Indies on a footing of perma- 
nency : in the East, the princes of 
those countries were watching the 
opportunity to distress us, and from 
theirnatural superiority in numbers, 
in opulence, and in native resources 
always at hand, would probably 
soon or late reduce'us to such 
straits, as might compel us to re- 
vert to our primitive situation of 
merchants and traders. Inthe West 
the same system of emancipation 
from thraldom, heid out by the 
French tothe negroes, had already 
effected a revolution among them. 
In the island of Hispaniola they had 
in a great measure thrown off the 
yoke of servitude, and their nume 
bers were such, amounting to some 
hundred thousands, that a reduction 
of them was hardly practicable, 
We should not, therefore, in pru- 
dence build much on our acqui- 
sitions there, Our situation nearer 
home was extremely serious. Ire. 
land, our sister nation, felt deeply, 
and expressed loudly, every species 
[93] of 
