That our East India company may desire the ratification of this bill, I cannot deny, because they might, perhaps, receive from it some temporary advantage by the short inconveniencies which those whom they consider as the enemies of their commerce would feel from it.  They may desire it, because the experiment, if it fails, as it must, cannot injure them; and if it succeeds, may produce great advantages to them:  they may wish it, because they will feel the immediate benefit, and the detriment will fall upon others.

I shall not inquire whether our merchants are inclined to look with malevolence on all those who cultivate the same branches of commerce with themselves, though they have neither the violation of natural rights, nor the infringement of national treaties, to complain of.  I should be unwilling to suspect a British merchant, whose acquaintance with the constitution of his own country ought to show him the value of liberty, who ought to be above narrow schemes, by the knowledge which his profession enables him to gain, of a desire to encroach upon the rights of others, or to engross the general benefits of nature; and shall only observe, that several other nations can plead a claim to the East India trade, a claim of equal validity with our own; that the Danes have their settlement there, and that the Portuguese discovered the way to those regions of wealth, from which some, perhaps, are inclined to exclude them.

But nothing is more vain than to attempt to exclude them by refusing to ensure their ships, because the opinion that they can be insured by no other nation is entirely without foundation.  There are at this time offices of insurance along the whole coasts of the midland sea, among the Dutch, and even among the French.  Nothing can debar any nation from the trade of insurance but the want of money; and that money is not wanted by foreigners for this purpose, appears from the great sums which they have deposited in our funds.

That this trade is now carried on chiefly by this nation, though not solely, is incontestable; but what can be inferred from that, but that we ought not to obstruct our own gain; that we ought not to make a law to deprive ourselves of that advantage of which either favourable accidents or our own sagacity have put us in possession.

For this reason it appears that it would not contribute to the wealth of the publick to debar us from insuring the ships even of those with whom we are at war, for it is always to be remembered that they will receive no detriment from such prohibitions, nor will feel any other consequence from them than a necessity of transferring to some other nation the profit which we receive from it.

What the profit is which arises to the nation from the trade of insurance it is not possible exactly to determine, but that the trade is really advantageous may be reasonably conceived, because after many years’ experience it is diligently followed, and a law was never necessary to prohibit the pursuit of a business by which nothing was to be gained.  But could the gain of the insurer be a doubtful point, there is a certain advantage to the nation by the money paid for commission, brokerage, stamps, and the credit of the premium deposited here.