had no right to complain of consequences dence in their future wisdom. There was easily foreseen, and of effects easily anti- no man, for instance, who did not sympa. cipated. France, as might have been thize in the sufferings of the people of expected, did interfere in the arrange- Switzerland, and rejoice in the gallant ment of the German indemnities, and example of spirit and love of independ Russia has been induced to join in the ence which they exhibited. They must same object. I do not mean to go into be peculiarly so to Englishmen, who knew any minute illustration on this subject. I not how soon they might be called upon content myself with a general observation, to exercise the same virtues. It was, which is, that this interference is in some however, to be hoped, that our governpoints of view not unfavourable to the ment did not instigate that unfortunate interests of this country, as they may be country to resistance; and if our intercollaterally affected. I have only to con- ference was such as public notoriety proclude with expressing my ardent hope, claimed it, certainly no remonstrance was that peace is the first object of the go-ever so unwise. He thought it of importvernment, as I am convinced it is the strongest wish of the people. ance to know by whom and to whom that interference was made. It was evident, that the feelings of all ranks of people in this country were in unison with those of the Swiss: but a wise administration should not suffer itself to be led or influenced by such feelings on every occasion; and if our remonstrance was precipitate, it did injury instead of good. The blow was then already struck. We had no alliance on the continent to back our Mr. Canning said, he concurred in the approbation given to the address by the hon. member who preceded him, but with a variation upon some points of opinion. The first object was, to know what line of conduct he might be deemed to support in the vote he was about to give. Whatever some bold men might think proper to assert, in maintaining that war was the remedy for the evils that sur-interference-Austria was quite unprerounded us, all must concur, or at least a great majority, in approving the system of preparation which ministers were adopting. The hon. gentleman who spoke last seemed to doubt the expediency and necessity of our increasing our naval and military establishments. But whether the House was ultimately to sanction them, he considered as matter for future discussion; and gentlemen were pledged by the present address, to support them no farther than the circumstances of the country might require. He, for one, gave the ministers credit for the peace they had concluded; but by doing so, they had not done every thing; all was not done, if every thing was conciliation on our part; all was not done, if we gave our rival to understand that we were ready to submit to insult, and were not disposed to take advantage of any ebullition manifested in the country in favour of standing up for the rights of other nations. The speech from the throne had not alluded to any of those notorious transactions on the continent which occupied so great a portion of the public attention, and only exhorted us to repose confidence in the wisdom of his majesty's councils. If, however, the interference of those councils in some foreign proceedings were really such as had been represented, they, in his judgment, afforded no great grounds of confi pared or unequal to the attempt, and we could not expect to call armies with the same facility that men might call a coach from a stand. Our interference, therefore, was ill-advised and unnecessary if it was made, and could not be attended with any moral or political good whatever. The Swiss were already conquered, and the business was done. Did the ministers accompany their remonstrance with a declaration, that if it should be ineffectual, a war would be the alternative? Upon this subject we had no official communication. In some cases there was nothing more proper than secrecy, but he was not disposed to approve of it as applied to the people governed. There should on all such occasions be a communion of sentiments between the king and his people. When the preliminaries of the late treaty with France were under discussion, we were congratulated by persons in high situations, on the circumstance that our intercourse with the continent would in future be relaxed, if not suspended; but that, at the same time, it was our determination no longer to submit to insult or encroachment. Such was then the impression, and now we had a right to know upon what system we were going; whether we were to interfere in the internal affairs of the continent, or whether we stand alone, mindful only of our own concerns, dis severed from those of the other powers; | or pay, like our ancestors, a due regard to the general interests of Europe. Some thought that we ought to stand or fall by ourselves; others (Mr. Wilberforce) that we were "too honest" for any kind of interference. For his part, he could not much admire that superabundance of honesty which some gentlemen were content to state in their places, and others, perhaps for different purposes, in popular harangues to assemblies and their constituents. The addresses and speeches to which he alluded, though they could not be regularly quoted in that House, must have made a strong impression on the public mind; and the country ought not to be suffered to run riot in the expectation of peace, while a system was pursuing, which must have a tendency to lead us into war. With respect to the reliance to be placed on the general measures of administration, he professed himself a friend to recruiting an exhausted army and a dismantled navy in the face of an imposing adversary; although, unquestionably, some late proceedings left us to retrieve and repair, instead of keeping what we had. The incorporation of Piedmont with France was accompanied by the disbanding of our army; and the allotments of Germany was, perhaps, the effect of the dismantling of our navy. All our foreign acquisitions were, in fact, given up at the time that we should have kept the proportion with our adversary, of ship for ship, and man for man. Any contest that we could have now, was acknowledged to be not so much for power as for honour; but the worst method of upholding the latter, must be to let down the national spirit. He, for himself, had no disposition to go to war at present; but, from some speeches that he had heard delivered by persons in authority, he was to infer, that a decay of the national spirit was the cause of making peace. This, however, was a position which he was ready to deny: on the contrary, he maintained, that there never was a period when the people were more ready or more able to continue the war with vigour. An hon. gentleman (Mr. Fox) seemed desirous of tracing all the difficulties of our situation to the late administration. He, on the other hand, contended, that the state in which they left the country, on retiring from office, was the reverse of being calamitous. He was ready to go through all the [VOL. XXXVI.] circumstances, point by point, and could scarcely restrain his indignation when it was asserted, that nothing but a desperate effort of patriotism could have induced any other set of gentlemen to succeed them. It was indeed true, that the country was then left involved in an extensive war, and that a war with the neutral powers was then in its commencement; yet, notwithstanding all this, there perhaps was never a situation which afforded more temptation to the wishes or ambition of those who were proposed to succeed them. An armament had already been proposed to meet the exigencies of the neutral war, and to bring it to a successful termination, and that armament effectually and gloriously put an end to it. The same admi nistration had prepared and sent forth the Egyptian expedition, the success of which so materially contributed to the peace. He was very far from wishing to disparage the present ministry; yet it was but justice to say, that they succeeded to office with this great advantage in their favour, that, as the expeditions were crowned with success, they were in a condition to claim the merit of it; whereas, had they failed, they would not have been liable to any responsibility. As to the finances, he must remark, that all the supplies of the year had been previously provided for, the internal tranquillity was secured, and the remnant of party in a great measure disbanded. He said thus much, in justice to a set of men, to whom there was reason to ascribe the salvation of the country. Nothing could, therefore, be more desirable than the succession obtained by the present ministers. It remained then to consider, what reliance was to be placed on administration for their political conduct since their accession to power. There were only two points which struck himthe neutral war and the peace that they had concluded; but they were left by their predecessors the means of putting an end to the one, and its success naturally led, in its consequences, to the accomplishment of the other. With a view to this question, he would look how this country stood in relation to Russia. We had dispatched thither a very able minister; but immediately afterwards we found it a party to the plan of the German indemnities. In a short period, subsequently, Russia showed a disposition to interfere in preventing the annexation of Piedmont to France, and Piedmont was probably lost to the king of Sardinia in [3 Q] consequence of our refusal to join in the Russian interference. Thus far as to our grounds of reliance on ministers for their conduct in the neutral war. He next came to review their merit in concluding the late treaty. It was to be observed, that the House, by approving of that treaty, was not bound to it in all its parts. It had indeed been discussed, but never debated in its terms. The approbation given to it was not on the ground that the terms were advantageous, but on the idea held out that the peace would be durable. If, indeed, he had reason to conclude it would be lasting, he felt no disposition to quarrel with the terms. These were examined, but not canvassed; and the country hailed the event with acclamation, in the hopes that it would be permanent. The disposition of France was then taken upon trust; but how was it now manifested in the present state of Europe? And let it be remembered, that the people might have acted otherwise, if they had known what was to happen. He was willing to agree to any thing which would add strength to the strength of the country; not so, however, to that which would strengthen rivalship, which would at length be turned against us when matured and invigorated-a rivalship-" qui auctum et reconditum promeret." France only waited for a favourable opportunity of showing that her emulation was not that of commerce, but extermination; and if it had not burst forth before, it was only because the means were wanting. He wished not to speak against a system of preparation, but must condemn any thing that tended first to lull the people, and afterwards suddenly call upon them for vigorous exertion. He wished at once to excite a steady conduct, a persevering courage, and a disposition to take, not a little and contracted, but a great and comprehensive view of every interesting subject. He was an advocate for our having a ready, productive activity, not only capable of meeting particular emergencies, such as those of Switzerland and Malta, but to meet every danger to which we may be exposed-a vigilant, waking activity, diffusing itself over every part of Europe. Lord Hawkesbury observed, that the honourable members who had discussed the question now before the House, had all agreed to assent to the address, but apon grounds that were different, some of them opposite, to each other. He could not agree with the hon. gentleman oppo site (Mr. Fox) in some points that he had stated, nor with his right hon. friend who spoke last in others. He agreed in many of the sentiments which had been delivered by Mr. Fox; but he did not agree with him, that the events which had happened since the signing of the preliminary treaty, might not, in the opinion of many persons, create a material difference in the relative situation of the two countries; for certainly France did not then stand in the situation in which it stood now. In stat ing this, he did not mean to enter at present on the question, whether it was wise in his majesty's ministers to conclude the peace on the terms in which it was concluded, nor to enter into any comparison between the events as they stood then, with the events that have happened since the peace. He had said, at the conclusion of the peace, that it was right then to close the account of the war, and that, with all the conditions upon which it was made, it would be wise to look always on the farther encroachments of France with jealousy and watchfulness; and he had said also, that much might depend upon the chance there was of success in endeavouring to stop it. He wished not to apply this to the present case; but the distinction which that observation was intended to convey, was material. His right hon. friend had asked, what the system was on which ministers had acted, and whether they had relinquished the system on which they had concluded the treaty ? To this he answered, that they acted now precisely on the same system as they acted when the definitive treaty was concluded, and that the principle which was then avowed, was the principle which would govern them; it was a principle which was perfectly clear, intelligible, and practicable. That principle was stated by the hon. gentleman opposite with perfect fairness-it was, that as far as respects the interests of this country, the peace was made on terms that were honourable, in as much as it preserved the integrity of the British dominions; and it was added, at the time of the discussion of that treaty, that, as far as it respected the state of the continent, many things were left under circumstances that were unsatisfactory, and ministers had expressed regret upon that occasion. The principle on which his majesty's ministers justified themselves then was this: that to continue the war for continental objects, without the prospect of continental support, would be follow a rule of policy different from that which would be a wise one to a great and important state. Inferior or subordinate states, like inferior and subordinate individuals, had to look chiefly to mainte absurd; and that consequently it was better to take the chance of peace than the chance of war-that if we were to have the alternative, it was desirable for us to try peace, when, in continental objects, our expectations had ceased.-nance and support, often little more than This was the principle on which ministers then acted; it was the principle on which they now acted, and on which they would always be ready to act and to justify themselves. His right hon. friend had alluded to some general topics, and referred to the opinions of other persons as to the system which ministers ought to pursue, and who did not agree with ministers. But he had mistaken some sentiments which were uttered by him (lord Hawkesbury). It was stated, as if something was said on the discussion of the definitive treaty, that it was the policy of this country to abstract itself from the continent. That was not the principle then avowed; but he remembered having said something very different himself on that occasion. He had said, it was not the system of this country to abstract itself from continental concerns, and attend exclusively to its own resources and internal affairs; he should have thought, if some respectable persons had not expressed a contrary opinion, that the case was too clear for any doubt to be entertained upon it. He owned, that to a country so large, and territories so extensive, commerce so great, and interests so complicated, it was impossible to apply, with good sense, the principle of abstracting itself, and to attend to mere internal policy of its own, distinct from all concern with the affairs of other states, upon all occasions. Those who should ever attempt to guide the affairs of this country upon a contracted system, would soon find it a policy which they must abandon, or sacrifice the real interests of this country. He might object to this system on a more large and extensive principle than any that he had hitherto mentioned; but it was not his intention to be diffuse in what he had to submit to the House: he knew that he might allude to what had been the practice of his majesty's ministers; that was a subject on which he felt more delicacy than otherwise he would have difficulty in the detail. He thought, however, that the affairs of states, like the affairs of individuals, took their course from the circumstances and importance in which they stood. States that were in size and consequence of a subordinate kind, had to preservation of existence. But individuals of rank and station, of high condition in life, had the support and assistance of others to attend to; the concerns of others, and interests of others to consider, and, in some cases, to provide for. So in states. Great and powerful states had to look to many things besides their own immediate and internal interest; both policy and justice required that they should attend to other objects; for the interest of a great and powerful state was often combined with those who were inferior to it, as well as in endeavouring to set some limits to another power; and therefore it was to him a matter of surprise, that any person of an enlarged understanding should suppose that it could, under any circumstances, be the interest of this country to pursue an abstract system, unconnected with any part of the affairs of the continent. This, he presumed, would be an answer to that part of the speech of his right hon. friend, which tended to imply, that the policy of his majesty's ministers was that of an abstract insulated nature. But still there might be circumstances that ought to govern them. It was fresh in the recollection of all who heard him, that this policy of attending to expediency had governed this and other states in the concerns of kingdoms-one of a recent date; it was the case of a nation, not much less than that of France itself in point of territory at the time-more populous than several of the then independent states of Europe; and yet that vast nation had been blotted out of the map of Europe, as an independent state. It must be obvious that he alluded to Poland. Upon that occasion, there was in that House and in this country, but one feeling; and yet it had been held, not only by ministers, but also by a considerable body of those who opposed them, that this nation ought not to go to war on that ground. He did not believe that any considerable body of men blamed ministers for their conduct on that occasion. Why? Because whatever pretence it might furnish afterwards for continuing a contest that might be inevitable, it was unadvisable at that time, however desirable; because it was impossible for us joiced, and he believed that every reflecting man in the country would have rejoiced, if, by a wise, temperate, and firm conduct in the other powers of Europe, a barrier could have been put to farther encroachment; but, at present, from points, some of which had been foreseen at the time of making peace-he meant particularly some questions as to the indemnities, which must give to France advantages in all continental discussions of this kind-many evils arose which were unavoidable. It was not necessary for him, at this time, to consider the question of indemnities; though there was much injustice, yet perhaps something of the kind was inevitable. It was a system of in to have interfered, with any chance of success without continental support. Another transaction was to be found in the history of Europe, which was more immediately connected with the direct interest of this country on the subject of continental policy: it was that of the conduct of William 3rd, under all the good qualities of that prince and his admired general policy, and when the political system of this country was established on the wisest footing; he meant the great point by which the ambition of Louis 14th appeared on the death of the king of Spain on the war of succession. It was then declared by William to be the policy of this country, under all the circumstances, not to interfere alone in that question, so as to indemnity, so called, and nothing more. volve us in a war, without continental support; and this was the opinion of a prince, who, from his education and habits, was certainly prone to an interference in continental affairs. In a word, it was his opinion, that without continental support this country ought not to interfere in continental concerns on the ground of expediency; but this was a totally distinct thing from any abstract insulated policy. It was a policy founded on the reason of the thing, arising out of circumstances over which we had no control. With regard to the circumstances of the present moment, and what would have been wise for his majesty's ministers to do, that was, as he had said already, a question of more delicacy than difficulty for him to speak upon. He should, however, speak in general terms upon that topic. He would say, that the conduct of his majesty's ministers was governed by a consideration of all the circumstances of the case, by a due consideration of the value of the objects, of the then peace, and of the state of the continent at the time. Putting the first point for a moment out of the question, many observations might be made on the state of the continent. It might be well worth consideration, whether, if they thought that the objects themselves were such as would deserve the renewal of hostilities, and we were determined to take that course, it was probable, at this moment, we should have any effectual support? This was a point which must be governed by a variety of considerations; and he had no difficulty in saying, that although, after a war such as that which had been closed with the magnified state of France, peace was, under all circumstances, desirable, yet he should have re But so it happened, that the moment the |