® 
340 
ing Piedmont and Parma to their dominions, 
itis added, ¢ without allotting any provision 
to the King of Sardinia, whom they had de- 
spoiled, though bound by a solemn engage- 
mient to the Emperor of Russia, to attend to 
his interest, and provide for his establish- 
ments*.’ Is this aggression and violence 
against us? It is aggression eG Russia. 
Are we to monopolise all insult and aggres- 
sion? What says the Emperor of Russia? 
Nothing that we hear of. Are we then to 
fight for the fulfilment of engagements with 
Russia, and treaties with Austria? ‘To make 
unprecedented sacrifices and unheard-of ef- 
forts, for the two great emperors of Europe, 
while they look on at ease? Is it to be guar- 
dian of good faith, moderation and justice, 
that thus dauntless and alone we throw down 
the gauntlet before this giant power?—to 
prevent innocent states from being insulted 
and despoiled, and shield the world from his 
colossal arm ; to protect the universal globe, 
from the German Ocean to the Indian Sea ; 
to emancipate the Dutch, liberate Switzer- 
land, defend Egvpt, Palestine and Syria, the 
Ottoman Empire, Persia and Indostan ? 
‘© Magnanimons idea! But is there rea- 
son to Imagine we shall obtain one single ob- 
ject; reconquer from Bonaparte one of his 
European acquisitions ; drive Egypt from his 
head, or India from his thoughts: yet unless 
upon these knight-errantlike principles, unless 
to attack these windmills, is there d cause 
why we should be harassed with the cala- 
mities of war?” 
Dismissing the chivalrous or quixotie 
grounds of war; and taking it for granted 
that Switzerland, because it cannot be 
aided efficiently, was to be abandoned to 
its unavoidable fate, does it follow, that 
Holland, which France had agreed to 
evacuate, and had not evacuated ; that 
Holland, whence the invasion of Great 
Britain is so practicable and so dange- 
rous ; that Holland, a nursery of sailors, 
a proprietress of colonies, a fountain of 
loans and subsidies ; that Holland, the 
usurpation of which places all Westpha- 
lia at the mercy of the French, and en- 
ables them any day to institute or pro- 
claim a new republic of the Weser, of 
HISTORY, POLITICS, AND STATISTICS. 
the Elbe, and to extend their line of coast. 
to Bremen and Lubeck, does it follow, 
we say, that Holland was not worth a 
war, or that Great Britain was bound to 
resign either Malta or the Cape, before 
the evacuation of*Holland ? 
Holland being, however; the only to- 
lerable pretence, and the only rational 
object of war, ought to have occupied 
the fore-ground in the correspondence ; 
and the offer of Hanover ought long ago 
to have been made to Prussia, for a new 
campaign of 1787. With no other aid 
can Holland be redelivered. 
The somewhat intricate question of 
Malta is well elucidated, and the right 
of the French to expect the evacuation is 
recognized. 
The concluding paragraphs deserve to 
be impressed on every memory. This is 
one of them: 
«* Little, however, is it to be expected that 
the counsels of temperance should be heard 
amidst the din of arms and tumult of passion. 
Had England been in the habit of attending 
to a warning voice, much blood and treasure 
had been saved to the nation. Inthe Ame- 
rican war, 4 voice eried—* Give up America.’ 
Had it been at first attended to, how much 
would have been saved? America was ob- 
liged to be given up. But the * sun of Eng- 
land, instead of setting for ever,’ as pro- 
nounced by great authority, set not at all ; 
but like the sun beyond the Arctic circle, 
whecled up again to its meridian height, and 
shone with brighter lustref. In the last war, 
many voices eried—* Make peace, seize your 
opportunity; the longer you delay, the worse 
peace you will make.’ [will leave the fact 
to justify the advice and the prediction— 
What will be the case in this instance? Af- 
ter millions upon millions expended, and 
blood upon blood shed in vain, the French, 
if they choose to persist, will in all probabi- 
lity sooner or later be in possession of Egypt 5. 
and if our drained treasury and exhausted 
veins recover, if we do not perish under the 
conflict, things will go on as well, or better 
than they did before, and India be as safe.” 
Art. XXXVII. The Reason Why: in Answer to a Pamphlet, entithd, Why do we ga 
to War? 
THE author of “ Why do we go to 
War,” has arranged, under eight theads, 
the various motives of hostility which 
presented themselves in the course of the 
Official Correspondence. He maintains 
s¢ * Vide Declaration.” 
Svo. pp. 66. 
that none of them were such as to jus- 
tify the declaration of war, because the 
weightier motives wanted maturity, and 
the maturer motives wanted weight. 
This writer, with unprovoked inurbas 
ep Mr. Gentz, in his excellent work on the State of Europe, asserts, that ‘the loss of 
the colonies was the first ara of the lasting and independent greatness of Great Britain” 
Lie A ee ete 
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