The same consideration will relieve you from the apprehension you express with relation to sugars, and the difference of the duties paid here and in Ireland.  Those duties affect the interior consumer only, and for obvious reasons, relative to the interest of revenue itself, they must be proportioned to his ability of payment; but in all cases in which sugar can be an object of commerce, and therefore (in this view) of rivalship, you are sensible that you are at least on a par with Ireland.  As to your apprehensions concerning the more advantageous situation of Ireland for some branches of commerce, (for it is so but for some,) I trust you will not find them more serious.  Milford Haven, which is at your door, may serve to show you that the mere advantage of ports, is not the thing which shifts the seat of commerce from one part of the world to the other.  If I thought you inclined to take up this matter on local considerations, I should state to you, that I do not know any part of the kingdom so well situated for an advantageous commerce with Ireland as Bristol, and that none would be so likely to profit of its prosperity as our city.  But your profit and theirs must concur.  Beggary and bankruptcy are not the circumstances which invite to an intercourse with that or with any country; and I believe it will be found invariably true, that the superfluities of a rich nation furnish a better object of trade than the necessities of a poor one.  It is the interest of the commercial world that wealth should be found everywhere.

The true ground of fear, in my opinion, is this:  that Ireland, from the vicious system of its internal polity, will be a long time before it can derive any benefit from the liberty now granted, or from any thing else.  But, as I do not vote advantages in hopes that they may not be enjoyed, I will not lay any stress upon this consideration.  I rather wish that the Parliament of Ireland may, in its own wisdom, remove these impediments, and put their country in a condition to avail itself of its natural advantages.  If they do not, the fault is with them, and not with us.

I have written this long letter in order to give all possible satisfaction to my constituents with regard to the part I have taken in this affair.  It gave me inexpressible concern to find that my conduct had been a cause of uneasiness to any of them.  Next to my honor and conscience, I have nothing so near and dear to me as their approbation.  However, I had much rather run the risk of displeasing than of injuring them,—­if I am driven to make such an option.  You obligingly lament that you are not to have me for your advocate; but if I had been capable of acting as an advocate in opposition to a plan so perfectly consonant to my known principles, and to the opinions I had publicly declared on an hundred occasions, I should only disgrace myself, without supporting, with the smallest degree of credit or effect, the cause you wished me to undertake.