lenity and humanity? I am astonished to hear the noble Lords on the other side urge so warmly motives of humanity, in order to induce your Lordships to agree with the present proposition. Are there any people under Heaven who have acted more inhumanly than those very people for whom they now plead? Have they not already destroyed even the very appearance of Government? Have they not ruined, banished, and proscribed every man, who has dared even to differ from them in sentiment? Have they not trampled on every right of personal liberty and private property? Have they not even gone so far as to stifle all free discussion in print, and overthrown that great palladium the liberty of the Press, in the person of Rivington, whose only crime was that he published the thoughts of men who ventured to disapprove of the measures they were pursuing? I do affirm to your Lordships, that I have particular information to support me in these general assertions, from gentlemen of undoubted veracity, who have related a variety of particulars that would astonish you, if they were made known. But, my Lords, besides the great question depending between both countries, I would only ask, what will be the certain effect of this motion? It will only be to give the Colonies time to prepare for more vigorous and effective resistance; and if what has been thrown out this day relative to the real disposition of foreign Powers has any foundation in it, it will answer every end of giving time both to our natural enemies and rebellious subjects, to make such preparations as will for ever after put it out of our power to reduce the latter to a proper state of obedience.

The Bishop of Peterborough. I am not so insensible of my own insignificance, and, I trust, shall not be so forgetful of my duty and my place as ever to become a busy meddler in political matters; but your Lordships will not think it unbecoming my station to say a few words in support of a motion which, notwithstanding what the noble Lord who spoke last, and the noble Earl who spoke sometime before him, have objected to it, appears still to me founded upon principles of humanity, justice, and sound policy. The substance of those objections which have the most colour of argument, is, that it is unbecoming the dignity of Great Britain to treat with subjects that are in rebellion to her authority, while they have their arms in their hands; and that a republican spirit of independence being the real ground of the dispute, to negotiate would be only to delay, and give the Colonies time to strengthen themselves, and thereby become still more formidable than they are.

As to saying the Americans are not to be treated with while they have arms in their hands, it is, in effect, the very same thing as saying they shall not be treated with at all; for it cannot be supposed for a moment that a whole people engaged in what appears to them the very best of causes, who have already committed themselves so far as to incur the censures of rebellion, should, while they have the means of defence left, forego their only hope, and submit themselves unconditionally to the will of those whom they think have injured and oppressed them, without having the least assurance which they can rely upon, given them, either of redress or security. The plain and only inference to be drawn from this argument is, that slaughter and devastation must now necessarily be the only means employed to re-establish mutual confidence and a cordial reconciliation. As to the idea of the noble Earl, that these troubles originated from a republican spirit of independence, and therefore to treat would only be to delay, it seems to me a begging of the question; and to show it is so, I beg leave to recall your Lordships’ recollection to what was said in the debate on the Boston Port Bill. Your Lordships were then informed that the discontents in America were confined to the lower order of the people, and were only the idle clamours of an inconsiderable faction, whose chief support was the encouragement they had from persons here at home. In the next session, when the disturbances grew more alarming, they were said to be owing to the defective constitution and turbulent spirit of a single disaffected Province; that constitution was altered, and the evil increased; now it is spread over the whole continent, and it is attempted to persuade your Lordships that it has all along proceeded from one general principle of universal independence.

For my part, my Lords, believing in my conscience, as I do, that we need look no farther for the origin of these troubles than the fatal imposition of the Stamp Act, I can by no means admit the notion that absolute independence is even now the object of America. When I first heard the position at the opening of the session, it was altogether novel to me, in any other light than as one of the many hydra-heads that naturally spring from the blood of civil dissension; that some there may have been who have, from the beginning, had it in view, I will not question; but if their party ever becomes general, it will be the consequence and not the cause of our disputes. Ill, however, does it seem to become the wisdom and gravity of your Lordships’ counsels to adopt such a persuasion on mere presumptive evidence; and it stands on no other.

For whether America does or does not really aim at absolute independence, is by no means only a speculative idea; it is fraught with consequences of the utmost importance; it is big with all the horrors of war and desolation abroad, with all the evils of dissension here at home. Ill therefore does it accord with your Lordships’ wonted caution to decide on so material a point upon bare probability, deduced from doubtful premises, by surmise, inference, and conjecture, while positive proof was to be had; for had, it certainly might have been, and I hope still may be had. if an assurance was given to the Colonies (on laying down their arms, and making restitution for the violence done to private property) of security against the exercise of taxation. It is principally on this, by them deemed a constitutional point, and not on visionary ideas of an independence, which nothing but a perseverance in error on both sides can ever realize, that America is united, and hazarding all the consequences of resistance. The noble Duke’s motion is calculated to prevent the dire conflict between resentment and despair. It proposes no terms which might embarrass Administration, not even such as must be granted whenever an end is put to this war; for there are very few now so sanguine in their expectations as to think that America, if entirely subdued, could be held in peaceable subjection under the exercise of taxation. Should it, however, appear that nothing short of independence will satisfy America, as I fear too many of your Lordships have already concluded, it will at least have this good effect, it will let us all into the real ground of the quarrel, concerning which we so widely differ at present; it will unite the sentiments of all parties; it will give stability to Administration, enable them to unfold their plan of operation, and leave no other subject of debate than whether it is best to conquer or abandon.

His Lordship then added, that it was not his intention to enter into the discussion of a point that had already been too much agitated, and which he wished had never been agitated at all, namely, the supremacy of Parliament; but as he hoped to trouble the House no more on the subject of America, he begged leave to submit to their consideration a short reflection or two. In whatever light, said he, I have viewed this subject, I have never yet been able so far to confound my ideas as to suppose that power and right are synonymous terms; and to me it appears to avail little that it should be said the power of Parliament extends over the property, when it has ceased to influence the opinion, of the subject. Parliament may indeed call men and things by what name it pleases; it may say that what was formerly considered as an aid, a free gift of the people, shall henceforward be looked upon as an act of legal obligation. It may say this or that is rebellion, and it unquestionably becomes so thus far, that he who counteracts its decisions must suffer the penalties, and may die as a rebel; yet, after all, there is no earthly. Government whatever but in a great measure is founded upon, and is co-extensive with, opinion; and when once the whole mass of a people think themselves oppressed, be the case real or imaginary, it is the wisest, because it is the only safe way, for those who govern to change their system, and thereby prevent those struggles which, in the end, if not fatal to liberty, are dangerous to themselves. In every exertion of power, civil or natural, it is right to consider what is, and what is not practicable; it was the glory as well as the policy of imperial Rome, at the summit of her greatness; it has, in more modern times, been the peculiar boast of Great Britain, and may be her practice to the end of time: “Per populos dare jura volentes.”

Earl Gower confessed that he had been one of the members in the Cabinet who had advised, and concurred in framing, the Circular Letter written by Lord Hillsborough in 1769, and then read the copy of a letter written by a