it, I would not immediately go to war for it; because the first war on other accounts will give it to us; or the island will give itself to us, when, able to do so.  While no duty, therefore, calls on us to take part in the present war of Europe, and a golden harvest offers itself in reward for doing nothing, peace and neutrality seem to be our duty and interest.  We may gratify ourselves, indeed, with a neutrality as partial to Spain as would be justifiable without giving cause of war to her adversary; we might and ought to avail ourselves of the happy occasion of procuring and cementing a cordial reconciliation with her, by giving assurance of every friendly office which neutrality admits, and especially, against all apprehension of our intermeddling in the quarrel with her colonies.  And I expect daily and confidently to hear of a spark kindled in France, which will employ her at home, and relieve Spain from all further apprehensions of danger.

That England is playing false with Spain cannot be doubted.  Her government is looking one way and rowing another.  It is curious to look back a little on past events.  During the ascendancy of Bonaparte, the word among the herd of Kings was, ‘Sauve qui peut.’  Each shifted for himself, and left his brethren to squander and do the same as they could.  After the battle of Waterloo, and the military possession of France, they rallied and combined in common cause, to maintain each other against any similar and future danger.  And in this alliance, Louis, now avowedly, and George, secretly but solidly, were of the contracting parties; and there can be no doubt that the allies are bound by treaty to aid England with their armies, should insurrection take place among her people.  The coquetry she is now playing off between her people and her allies is perfectly understood by the latter, and accordingly gives no apprehensions to France, to whom it is all explained.  The diplomatic correspondence she is now displaying, these double papers fabricated merely for exhibition, in which she makes herself talk of morals and principle, as if her qualms of conscience would not permit her to go all lengths with her Holy Allies, are all to gull her own people.  It is a theatrical farce, in which the five powers are the actors, England the Tartuffe, and her people the dupes.  Playing thus so dextrously into each other’s hands, and their own persons seeming secured, they are now looking to their privileged orders.  These faithful auxiliaries, or accomplices, must be saved.  This war is evidently that of the general body of the aristocracy, in which England is also acting her part.  ’Save but the Nobles, and there shall be no war,’ says she, masking her measures at the same time under the form of friendship and mediation, and hypocritically, while a party, offering herself as a judge, to betray those whom she is not permitted openly to oppose.  A fraudulent neutrality, if neutrality at all, is all Spain will get from her.  And Spain, probably, perceives this, and willingly winks at it rather than have her weight thrown openly into the other scale.