STATE PAPERS. 



35S 



invigorate the whole system of our 

 external operations. 



Impressed with this sentiment, 

 X should be untrue to his Royal 

 Highness's interests and honour, as 

 well as to the prosperity of the 

 empire, if I concurred in any 

 arrangement of an administration 

 which did not include a fair and 

 full consideration of this most im- 

 portant point. 



After such a dispassionate con- 

 sideration, my opinion is, that a 

 cabinet might be formed, on an 

 intermediary principle respecting 

 the Roman Catholic claims, equally 

 -exemptfrom the dangers of instant, 

 unqualified concession, and from 

 those of inconsiderate, peremptory 

 exclusion : the entire resources of 

 the empire might be applied to the 

 great objects of the war with ge- 

 neral consent, upon a full under- 

 standing of the real exigency of 

 the present crisis ; and concord and 

 union at home might secure ulti- 

 mate and permanent successabroad. 

 (Signed) Wellesley. 



Gloucester Lodge, May 18, 1812. 



My dear Liverpool, — 1 have com- 

 manicated to such of my friends 

 as I had an immediate opportunity 

 of consulting, the minute, taken 

 in your presence, of the proposition 

 which you conveyed to me yester- 

 day. 



In a casein which I felt that my 

 deciiiion either way might be liable 

 to misapprehension, I was desirous 

 rather to collect the opinions of 

 persons whosejudgment I esteem, 

 than to act on the impulse of my 

 own first feelings. 



The result of their opinions is, 

 that, by entering into the adminis- 

 tration upon the terms proposed to 

 mc, i should incur such a loss of 



Vol. LIV. 



personal and public character as 

 would disappoint the object which 

 his Royal Highness tiie Prince Re- 

 gent has at heart ; and must render 

 my accession to his government a 

 new source of weakness, rather 

 than an addition of strength. 



To become a part of your admi- 

 nistration with the previous know- 

 ledge of your unaltered opinions as 

 to the policy of resisting all consi- 

 deration of the state of the laws 

 affecting his Majesty's Roman Ca- 

 tholic subjects, would, it is felt, be, 

 to lend myself to the defeating of 

 my own declared opinions on that 

 most important question : opinions 

 which are as far as those of anj-" 

 man from being favourable to pre- 

 cipitate and unqualified concession; 

 but which rest on the conviction 

 that it is the duty of the advisers of 

 the crown, with a view to the 

 peace, tranquillity, and strength of 

 the empire, to take that whole 

 questioninto their early and serious 

 consideration ; and earnestly to en- 

 deavour to bring it to a final and 

 satisfactory settlement. 



With this result of the opinions 

 of those whom I have consulted, 

 my own entirely concurs; and such 

 being the ground of my decision, 

 it is wholly unnecessary to advert 

 to any topics of inferior importance. 



After the expressions, however, 

 with which you were charged on 

 the part of all your colleagues, i 

 should not be warranted in omitting 

 to declare, that no objection of a 

 personal sort should have prevented 

 me from uniting witli any, or all 

 of them, in the public service, if 

 I could have done so with honour ; 

 and if, in my judgment, a cabinet, 

 so constituted in all its parts, could 

 have afforded to the country, under 

 its present great and various difli- 



2 A culties, 



