To the general reputation of their arms, and that habitual superiority which they derive from it, they owe their power in America, rather than to any real strength or circumstances of advantage.  Their numbers are yet not great; their trade, though daily improved, is not very extensive; their country is barren; their fortresses, though numerous, are weak, and rather shelters from wild beasts, or savage nations, than places built for defence against bombs or cannons.  Cape Breton has been found not to be impregnable; nor, if we consider the state of the places possessed by the two nations in America, is there any reason upon which the French should have presumed to molest us, but that they thought our spirit so broken, that we durst not resist them; and in this opinion our long forbearance easily confirmed them.

We forgot, or rather avoided to think, that what we delayed to do, must be done at last, and done with more difficulty, as it was delayed longer; that while we were complaining, and they were eluding, or answering our complaints, fort was rising upon fort, and one invasion made a precedent for another.

This confidence of the French is exalted by some real advantages.  If they possess, in those countries, less than we, they have more to gain, and less to hazard; if they are less numerous, they are better united.

The French compose one body with one head.  They have all the same interest, and agree to pursue it by the same means.  They are subject to a governour, commissioned by an absolute monarch, and participating the authority of his master.  Designs are, therefore, formed without debate, and executed without impediment.  They have yet more martial than mercantile ambition, and seldom suffer their military schemes to be entangled with collateral projects of gain:  they have no wish but for conquest, of which they justly consider riches as the consequence.

Some advantages they will always have, as invaders.  They make war at the hazard of their enemies:  the contest being carried on in our territories, we must lose more by a victory, than they will suffer by a defeat.  They will subsist, while they stay, upon our plantations; and, perhaps, destroy them, when they can stay no longer.  If we pursue them, and carry the war into their dominions, our difficulties will increase every step as we advance, for we shall leave plenty behind us, and find nothing in Canada, but lakes and forests, barren and trackless; our enemies will shut themselves up in their forts, against which it is difficult to bring cannon through so rough a country, and which, if they are provided with good magazines, will soon starve those who besiege them.