I have the honor to be,

Gentlemen,

Your most obedient and faithful humble servant,

EDMUND BURKE.

BEACONSFIELD, April 3, 1777.

P.S.  You may communicate this letter in any manner you think proper to my constituents.

TWO LETTERS

TO

GENTLEMEN IN THE CITY OF BRISTOL.

ON THE

BILLS DEPENDING IN PARLIAMENT RELATIVE TO THE TRADE OF IRELAND.

1778.

LETTERS.

TO SAMUEL SPAN, ESQ., MASTER OF THE SOCIETY OF MERCHANTS ADVENTURERS OF BRISTOL.

Sir,—­I am honored with your letter of the 13th, in answer to mine, which accompanied the resolutions of the House relative to the trade of Ireland.

You will be so good as to present my best respects to the Society, and to assure them that it was altogether unnecessary to remind me of the interest of the constituents.  I have never regarded anything else since I had a seat in Parliament.  Having frequently and maturely considered that interest, and stated it to myself in almost every point of view, I am persuaded, that, under the present circumstances, I cannot more effectually pursue it than by giving all the support in my power to the propositions which I lately transmitted to the Hall.

The fault I find in the scheme is, that it falls extremely short of that liberality in the commercial system which I trust will one day be adopted.  If I had not considered the present resolutions merely as preparatory to better things, and as a means of showing, experimentally, that justice to others is not always folly to ourselves, I should have contented myself with receiving them in a cold and silent acquiescence.  Separately considered, they are matters of no very great importance.  But they aim, however imperfectly, at a right principle.  I submit to the restraint to appease prejudice; I accept the enlargement, so far as it goes, as the result of reason and of sound policy.

We cannot be insensible of the calamities which have been brought upon this nation by an obstinate adherence to narrow and restrictive plans of government.  I confess, I cannot prevail on myself to take them up precisely at a time when the most decisive experience has taught the rest of the world to lay them down.  The propositions in question did not originate from me, or from my particular friends.  But when things are so right in themselves, I hold it my duty not to inquire from what hands they come.  I opposed the American measures upon the very same principle on which I support those that relate to Ireland.  I was convinced that the evils which have arisen from the adoption of the former would be infinitely aggravated by the rejection of the latter.