her a sound, an active, a vigorous member of the empire.  I hope, by wise management, she will again become so.  But one of our capital present misfortunes is her discontent and disobedience.  To which of the author’s favorites this discontent is owing, we all know but too sufficiently.  It would be a dismal event, if this foundation of his security, and indeed of all our public strength, should, in reality, become our weakness; and if all the powers of this empire, which ought to fall with a compacted weight upon the head of our enemies, should be dissipated and distracted by a jealous vigilance, or by hostile attempts upon one another.  Ten Canadas cannot restore that security for the peace, and for everything valuable to this country, which we have lost along with the affection and the obedience of our colonies.  He is the wise minister, he is the true friend to Britain, who shall be able to restore it.

To return to the security for the peace.  The author tells us, that the original great purposes of the war were more than accomplished by the treaty.  Surely he has experience and reading enough to know, that, in the course of a war, events may happen, that render its original very far from being its principal purpose.  This original may dwindle by circumstances, so as to become not a purpose of the second or even the third magnitude.  I trust this is so obvious that it will not be necessary to put cases for its illustration.  In that war, as soon as Spain entered into the quarrel, the security of North America was no longer the sole nor the foremost object.  The Family Compact had been I know not how long before in agitation.  But then it was that we saw produced into daylight and action the most odious and most formidable of all the conspiracies against the liberties of Europe that ever has been framed.  The war with Spain was the first fruits of that league; and a security against that league ought to have been the fundamental point of a pacification with the powers who compose it.  We had materials in our hands to have constructed that security in such a manner as never to be shaken.  But how did the virtuous and able men of our author labor for this great end?  They took no one step towards it.  On the contrary they countenanced, and, indeed, as far as it depended on them, recognized it in all its parts; for our plenipotentiary treated with those who acted for the two crowns, as if they had been different ministers of the same monarch.  The Spanish minister received his instructions, not from Madrid, but from Versailles.

This was not hid from our ministers at home; and the discovery ought to have alarmed them, if the good of their country had been the object of their anxiety.  They could not but have seen that the whole Spanish monarchy was melted down into the cabinet of Versailles.  But they thought this circumstance an advantage; as it enabled them to go through with their work the more expeditiously.  Expedition was everything to them; because France might happen during a protracted negotiation to discover the great imposition of our victories.