happen, and yet talked with confidence of victory, and obstinately persisted in the contest, no epithet of reproach and condemnation is too strong to be applied to him. Sir, I thought it my duty to move that the members of the house should be called together before the recess, that their opinions may be taken upon the present alarming posture of affairs. My motion has no other object; and no imputation can be more false than imputing to me a desire of dispiriting the country, or encouraging our enemies. I do not despond; and I would rather shed the last drop of my blood, than see my country dishonoured, or lose its independence. It would be unpardonable in any minister to dare to prorogue parliament at a conjuncture like the present, when every day may produce events interesting to the existence of the state. I hope that he will not think of proroguing parliament: I am astonished that he even objects to a call of the house. I have but a very few more words to address to you. I have proved that the six motives for carrying on the war with France have every one of them failed; and though the onus probandi lay upon the minister, he has not deigned to assign any new ones. Does it not then follow, that the war should be discontinued, or at least that a full attendance should be procured, that the propriety of discontinuing it may be canvassed? How great is the responsibility that ministers thus incur! If this system is continued, ruin must ensue. If I were to say that the French, having now a large body of troops at their disposal, might fit out an armament at Brest against our colonies, and send it to the West Indies, the right hon. gentleman would assure me that such a plan is impracticable, and that our possessions in every quarter of the globe are in a state of security. But after the fate of his predictions, would I, or would any one, give credit to them? Although he should, from his knowledge of human nature, declare it to be impossible, may we not, reflecting on the past, suppose that the Emperor of Russia may be influenced by the French, and declare war against his former allies? If he were to affirm that our commerce would continue to flourish, and our finances to be prosperous, would it be no answer to say, you have formerly been deceived? It is strange, indeed, to observe the manner in which these gentlemen apply experience to themselves and to others: they say that you should put trust in no one till you are thoroughly acquainted with him,

and that, if he has once acted improperly, he should never be trusted more. But they still claim confidence in themselves from all the world, although they have been repeatedly convicted of ignorance, incapacity, and presumption. I thought it my duty, sir, to bring forward this motion, and now I leave it to its fate.

Ayes 27; noes 124.

DECEMBER 1.

NEGOTIATION WITH FRANCE.

MR. SHERIDAN rose, and the clerk (at his request) having read that part of his Majesty's speech which refers to the late negotiations, spoke as follows:-Every one, sir, who heard this speech delivered from the throne, and every one who has read the papers which were laid before the house, must expect that we should take the subject into our solemn consideration, and state our opinion upon it to his Majesty in an humble address. This, sir, is a step which reason dictates, and it is strictly conformable to parliamentary usage. Whenever any communication of this nature has been made to the house, the invariable practice has been to canvas the conduct of ministers in the affair to which it refers, and to state the result of that inquiry to our sovereign. Ministers, however, seem to be of a different opinion; and, for some reason or other, seem averse to all investigation of their conduct; I, therefore, thinking it of the utmost importance to the public that it should be fully investigated, shall proceed to state the result of my most serious and mature consideration. That result, I trust, will meet the sentiments of the house, and the motion, which is founded on it, be agreed to. Instead of entering into the subject at large, as I once intended; instead of pointing out with minuteness where ministers have been guilty of insincerity, where of prevarication, where of weakness, where of hypocrisy-I shall content myself with endeavouring to prove, from the past conduct of our allies and their present views, that we ought to disentangle ourselves from all continental connections as soon as possible; and, by entering into a separate negotiation, conclude a separate peace; in doing this I shall lay down two propositions, and establish upon these, two separate conclusions-the first is, that from the commencement

of the confederacy, there has existed, in the different states who composed it, a mercenary spirit, a sole view to private aggrandizement, the grossest and the most shameful insincerity. By these its object has been defeated; these now exist in their full force; and there is no prospect of its object being attained. It will hence follow, that it is our interest and our duty to withdraw from it, to avoid the obstacles which it throws in the way of peace, and no longer pledge ourselves to continue to make war till those states which are called our allies shall be completely exhausted. The next proposition I shall lay down and support is this, that there appears the strongest ground to suspect, that in all the negotiations for peace which ministers have carried on, although they may not have thwarted their plenipotentiaries, although there may have been conditions to which they would have acceded, still that they have never sincerely wished for peace, and never sincerely lamented the want of it. The inference arising from this is plain; since the same ministers remain in office, the interference of parliament is necessary; that alone can alter their intentions, counteract the mischiefs which their views are calculated to produce, or afford the least chance of salvation to the country.

I take upon me then to say, sir, that there is no one power with whom we have been in alliance, which has not deceived, defrauded, and deserted us. It is melancholy that, while I am speaking, additional arguments and new proofs should spring up to strengthen my position. Not only has an embargo been laid upon all British vessels by our late magnanimous ally, but it would seem that their captains have all been thrown into prison. I hope things will not turn out so ill as there is at present reason to apprehend; but, allowing that there have been great exaggerations, there cannot be a doubt that the boasted friendship of Russia is at an end, and that by our vaunted ally we are forsaken, betrayed, insulted, and outraged. For having said that the Emperor Paul was insincere, and not to be relied upon, a person was not long since fined and imprisoned; yet this same Emperor Paul has done a most unjustifiable act, which proves him undeserving of confidence. This embargo is not all; there is every reason to fear that almost every port in the Elbe is shut against us; that the King of Prussia and the Duke of Brunswick have interfered, and that, except by way of Meck

lenberg, we can neither draw supplies of grain from the continent, nor send thither our manufactures. If these things are true, it is surely time for the house to consider whether this bar to negotiation should be allowed to continue, whether ministers should be allowed to keep possession of this pretext for carrying on the war. The right hon. gentleman lately allowed that our allies had treated us ill; he talked of the dereliction of some, and the perfidy of others; to some he ascribed unaccountable fickleness, and to others shameless atrocity. "But," said he, "who could have thought it? We were not endowed with a faculty of certainly foreseeing future events, and without that no one could have suspected what has happened." Sir, this is not the language of an enlightened statesman, or of an upright man. Did it require more than human prudence to foresee that Prussia, after the first ebullition of her resentment against the French revolution, would soon perceive that it was not her interest to waste her blood and her treasure for the aggrandizement of Austria; and that the best way to extinguish jacobinism, and to check the spirit of innovation, was to attend to internal regulations, to promote industry, to secure plenty, and to alleviate the public burthens? Did it require any great sagacity to foresee that Spain, unable to withstand the shock of republican arms, would, to save herself from ruin, consent to any terms of accommodation? Could it not be suspected that the emperor would prefer his own interest to that of Great Britain, and that he would not pay a very scrupulous regard to any engagements which ought to have prevented him from giving this preference? Has it only been discovered of late years, that the petty states of Germany must all act in concert, either with the Emperor or the King of Prussia? Was it a thing very improbable that, when magnanimous Paul saw all his allies fighting to promote their own interest, and when he discovered that he himself could gain nothing in the contest, his magnanimity should abate, his ardour for martial glory should cool, and that he should abandon the cause of morality, religion, and social order? But, sir, they should surely have been better able to appreciate the operation of this mercenary spirit, since it first animated their own bosoms, and they infused it into the confederacy. On what principles and pretences did they enter into the war? We are severely censured for ascribing various motives to them, and

different ones to-day from what we mentioned a few days before. But the fault is theirs; they change their language with every change of circumstances, and make their inducements for performing past actions to depend upon what happens years after they were performed. I cannot forget that it was once said, "we had gone to war because France would not allow us to remain at peace." This assertion is again repeated in Lord Grenville's letter; and it is there positively asserted, that our only reason for going to war was the unprovoked aggression of France. No sooner was this language held at home, than another ground of warfare was stated to the rest of Europe. The enormities of the French were painted in glowing colours; the dangerous nature of their designs was laid open; the overthrow of all regular governments was represented as inevitable if they should succeed; their private proceedings were represented as a sufficient reason for attempting to subdue them; neutrality was denounced as impolicy, as pusillanimity, as treason against the human race. We declared to Tuscany, we declared to Sardinia, we declared to Switzerland, that they need not wait for aggression, that all had already received sufficient provocation, who had any regard for domestic happiness, for social comforts, or the consolations of religion. Was there not here the grossest hypocrisy and the most shameful double-dealing? Must not our allies have been disgusted or corrupted by our bad example? After all these protestations of respect for the rights of humanity-after all these sentiments of abhorrence for the regicide republic, ministers were the first who neglected the professed object of the war, and who consulted individual gain. While they were calling upon all to join in a contest such as never appeared before-while they were maintaining that, to bring the awful and unprecedented struggle to a happy termination, they thought they must have an indemnity for their trouble— they fitted out an expedition, and stole the West India islands. This was the way in which we were to destroy usurpation, and to set an awful example of the punishment which awaits disloyalty and irreligion. In two right hon. gentlemen opposite to me, I think I see the true reasons for carrying on the war personified, and their union is equally compatible. The one (Mr. Pitt) says, "I will admit that the principle of the war is to suppress jacobinism and destroy its leaders, if I am not required