Let us next proceed to a consideration of those countless millions which compose the wealth of Great Britain. I doubt whether her riches will render her more formidable and respectable than her numbers, I mean considered as detached from the Colonies. After deducting about an hundred and forty-two millions, a debt for the payment of which the sources of all her wealth are mortgaged, together with the interest of between four and five millions annually, in what consists her boasted riches? It exists only in idea, in name, in paper, in publick faith, in Parliamentary security. The land, the trade, and the industry of her subjects, are pledged for this security. What then must be the consequence of this enormous debt, which has long hung like a millstone about her neck; when the American trade, the source of her wealth—which gave her her national rank—as a nursery, furnished her navy with seamen, made her sovereign of the ocean, and would soon have raised her to be mistress of the world, is dried up ? What the consequence of losing that trade upon which the credit of the nation was supported, and the profitable industry of the manufacturer and the merchant very much depended ? What the consequence of being denied that supply of timber, iron, plank, masts, pitch, tar, and hemp, by which her navy was built and kept in repair? It will, it must sink her from among the nations, ruin her credit, and make her a bankrupt. Add to this the enormous sum of millions it has cost her for securing her troops with experienced Generals in their Boroughs, the forcing one intrenchment, the work of a single night, and reducing two defenceless Towns to ashes, in a manner that so stains the lustre of the British name, as will not be washed out by the inundation of time; and those incredible sums for pensioners, placemen, and court sycophants, which must be paid, if the nation is ruined. A calculation then, with a diminution resulting from a concurrence of the above combined causes, gives us the full absolute strength and wealth of Great Britain. It gives us the whole that she could lift to action, against an enemy in her own neighbourhood, was she to bend all her power and spend all her force upon him.

Her situation is the next thing, in the order proposed, that demands our attention. This, in point of locality, and from the relation she stands into the European powers, will still further lessen her already diminished strength, touching the American dispute. This, if carefully attended to, will enable us to form some judgment of that power by which she must subdue the Colonies. It gives us her relative strength, which is certainly much below her absolute power. While she is subduing the Colonies, she must defend herself. It is irrational to suppose that, by draining off her men and money for foreign service, she will leave home so destitute as to fall a prey to the first invader. An island as she is, and envied as she has been, instead of having those fortified frontiers to defend her from the incursions of her inveterate enemies, she is obliged to secure her maritime borders by her floating bulwarks, her powerful fleets and squadrons. It is true, that Great Britain is said to be at peace with her rival powers; but nominal peace, by the modern policy of nations, is a species of inactive war. The large and numerous armies and fleets that are kept encamped and supported in pay by one nation, induce a necessity of standing armies and a naval power to watch their motions and prevent their operations in another. France and Spain, always emulating the British glories, have in constant readiness for action large forces, both by land and sea. Their late increased warlike preparations wear an hostile aspect, and threaten some important blow. The latter has even dared to insult with impunity the mistress of the seas; the former has often, attempted, and is still waiting an opportunity to humble the pride of the English power. Ireland is also, in general, opposed, from the intolerable grievances and oppressions they suffer. Notwithstanding the heavy expenses of Government, they are burdened with the payment of list of pensioners and placemen upon the Irish establishment, which, in 1765, from a motion by the House of Commons, in that Kingdom, to address His Majesty upon the subject, the sum appears to have amounted, in the then two last years, to above a hundred and fifty-eight thousand Pounds; the greater part of which is paid to persons with whom they have no sort of concern. It is said there are upwards of two millions in the Kingdom so extremely poor that they are unable to pay the two shilling tax for their single hearth, and are so distressed by their tax–gatherers, that they are obliged very frequently to sell the pot in which their potatoes are boiled. I am astonished, says oue, under such depressing circumstances, to observe such a love of liberty still animating that loyal and generous nation, and nothing can raise higher my idea of the integrity and publick spirit of the people who have preserved the sacred fire of freedom from being extinguished, though the altar on which it burned has been thrown down. What heart does not melt at the deplorable situation of this people? What community, what Kingdom does not deprecate its fate? It speaks in peals of thunder to America.

But to return. In addition to all this, there is a large train of discontented subjects in the very bowels of Great Britain, headed by the greatest and best men in the nation; these will be a thorn in her foot that will give her trouble and impede her progress. In this situation, will the wisest and best of Princes leave Ireland to rise in arms? Will he abandon himself to the just indignation of his British subjects? Will he leave the nation a prey to France or Spain? or relinquish the possession of his other Dominions? If not, it must necessarily divert much of his strength from the American Colonies, many of his ships to defend his own borders; otherwise, other Princes will make him feel the weight of their swords, and constrain him to yield to the force of their arms.

There is another point of view in which this division of the subject naturally presents itself. America is three thousand transmarine miles from this belligerent power. Shafts shot across the Atlantick must lose their force in air. Great Britain must beat the air and plough the ocean, before she can take the field. The seas will continue to roll, the wind to blow, and the cold frost to visit our northern shores, which arrest the streams in their course, and lash them fast to the river’s side. She must spend much of her strength in getting at an object so remote. And after carrying on an expensive war with wind and weather, does she mount the stage upon equal terms? Can she, like Hannibal, recruit her wasted Army and procure resources in an enemy’s country, where children are upon guard, and women tarry by the stuff? Or will the skeletons of Government, the renegadoes at her standard, form one fighting phalanx, and yield her real aid. Besides all this, there is the difficulty of levying troops for service so remote, and of such doubtful success; of procuring seasonable supplies for such long and uncertain campaigns; of commanding transports and performing voyages so lengthy, in which sickness is contracted in the passage, and the consequent loss of life; the want of fresh provisions; the delays ever attendant on movements so distant from the cabinet—movements which have engaged the attention of the world. I am sensible much has been said of the thousands of Hessians and Hanoverians that are taken into British pay for present emergencies. These will not fight without pay. There must be some great object to induce them to leave their native country, to which they never may return, and to take part in a foreign quarrel. But where is the wealth to come from that shall enable Great Britain to engage in her service a sufficient number of foreigners to subdue the Colonies, and to maintain that conquest, after the richest and most luxuriant sources of her wealth are dried up and gone forever? Where are the armies, the pay for those multiplied demands that will result from her situation, at home and abroad, with her own subjects and other States ?

I shall be short upon the last branch of the subject. Bravery, humanity, and a love of liberty, were formerly supposed to enter into the composition of an Englishman’s temper. Are there no habits of friendship between the descendants of a common parent, who have fought and bled side by side, that will check the ardour of offensive warriors, who are contending for domination against the defenders of their rights? Will pot a recollection of mutual instances of kindness lead to recollection, and excite pity from scenes of barbarity? Will no spectacles kindle the relentings of nature in favour of a brave, virtuous, and oppressed people, struggling for their liberties? Will there be no defection from the sentiments of humanity? Allowing the Americans are deluded, will they have no